The Protagonist’s Party is Too Diligent

Still, what can I do? I can’t think of a better way than this.

I had no intention of learning swordsmanship from now on. In fact, even if I started learning from now, I wouldn’t know how far I could reach.

…No, can I even reach a level that could be called ‘skill’?

Besides specific sword styles, there were military sword techniques in the Empire. Although firearms started being used more than swords in battle, there were still plenty of monsters with incredible skill running around swinging their blades, and even true masters who were literally one against a hundred existed.

Guys like Lucas would run amok on the battlefield, effortlessly cutting down enemies, so the significance of swordsmanship hadn’t completely faded.

But still, sometimes I think it might be better to deal with close-range threats using a pistol or shotgun… However, if you shoot a gun at a swordsman deeply engaged in combat with allies all around, friendly fire could also become a risk.

That particular scene was rendered in 3DCG, but since the motion was poor, I couldn’t precisely tell how the fighting happened. It was a game where even the anti-air fire wasn’t well depicted in large-scale drop missions, so without witnessing it personally, I wouldn’t know how they actually fought.

Not that I thought the battles from the original would be impossible here—

“SILVIA!”

—That’s right. Particularly because of kids like those, I believe Lucas can perform well in battle.

I thought I had come out early in the morning, but there were those who came out much earlier than me.

“CLAIRE.”

I happily waved my hand and approached Claire, who was calling me.

“LEO.”

“Hey.”

After all, having seen each other’s faces for about three weeks, Leo seemed to have learned that I wouldn’t bite him, so his expression towards me was much softer. Though that doesn’t mean he was completely relaxed.

Fortunately, Mia Crowfield seems to be keeping my secret well. Otherwise, Leo wouldn’t be approaching me with even a bit of wariness.

In the original work, Leo was very friendly to those he had no reason to doubt. Well, considering he’s the protagonist of a harem story, he only has that kind of personality.

“You’re out early today, fulfilling your requests again, huh?”

I guess he came out around three in the morning.

The request for this week was something I wasn’t aware of. Just because it’s set in the Academy doesn’t mean the day-to-day life of the Academy can actually be fully implemented. Sometimes episodes just pass by without any separate story.

However, looking at the request form, I could at least know what the contents or rewards might be…

“……”

“How about it? I feel like I understand this area a bit better now since I’ve gone around it in the best possible route!”

Claire said, her eyes sparkling.

Just as she said, there were six beasts piled up next to Claire and Leo. They might be called beasts, but if encountered on Earth, they’d easily be considered monsters.

A gigantic eagle with feathers still smoldering, a huge vampiric bat that could probably ask you to HUG ME when spreading its wings towards a person, and a buffalo with horns absurdly huge, which would be terrifying just to stumble upon in reality… Along with three other beasts.

All of them were perfect targets for extracting Marmaros.

…Didn’t the original have simpler requests besides these? Like just running errands.

“Ah, and since I was at it, I hunted a few dangerous beasts on the road. They said they would properly reward me if I brought the evidence.”

Oh, really.

In the original, you would get rewards immediately upon defeating monsters, but that isn’t easy in reality. At least you can’t dissect a wild beast on the spot.

In reality, you’d likely have to bring back the carcass to receive your reward.

“Then can’t you just take a part of the beast and bring that back?”

“Huh? But it would look bad if we just left the carcass lying around, right?”

“……”

That’s true.

Is that called being diligent, or is it just being a pushover?

It seems the environment a person grows up in really matters a lot. Who would have thought this kid, who only used to say such annoying things in the original, would grow so commendably?

Though I suppose being overly commendable might actually be an issue.

“……”

As I silently looked at Leo, he shrugged and said,

“Well, it is true. If we don’t remove it soon, blood will start leaking from the beast’s corpse. It would be a hassle for the managers later on.”

It’s not like we intentionally left waste behind; it was literally something done to help people, so nobody would complain about the road being a bit dirtier, but it seems like they really care about that.

“By the way, why are you out here at this time, Silvia?”

I didn’t think coming out at this time was all that strange.

At least it should be much more normal than you two. It’s currently eleven in the morning, you know.

…By their standards, it would have already been about seven hours since I came out.

“Did you have breakfast?”

“Yeah. I brought bento with Leo here.”

It definitely didn’t feel like a walk in the park.

“…Ah, just to clarify, we aren’t that close, okay?”

“…Who was the one bringing it up first?”

Leo frowned at Claire’s words. It wasn’t a ‘tsundere’ scene you’d often find in games, comics, or anime, but he looked genuinely surprised, like a shocked person who misunderstood the close relationship of a brother and sister in reality.

Well, even in the original, Claire wasn’t a character you could capture… Was she? It’s a bit tricky to say since her ending was predetermined, meaning she couldn’t be captured, just because it had to end with her demise.

“You can relax; no one mentioned anything like that.”

“I’m glad to hear that you didn’t misunderstand.”

“Then, who brought it up first?”

While Leo grumbled, Claire simply ignored him.

…Well, whatever.

“I’m glad to see you two getting along well.”

“What?”

“Me?”

Claire and Leo both said that almost simultaneously.

“This guy?”

“This guy?”

Their reactions were so comic-like that I had to put in a lot of effort to hold back my laughter.

Well, still, how nice it is to see them act like this right in front of me.

They were both characters I liked a lot.

*

Not just Leo and Claire, but most protagonists in this game are quite diligent.

Even Jake, who appears to be living quite lazily on the surface, is like this. He only seems lazy externally, but in reality, he’s been working hard and studying various things. Especially since he’s currently dealing with love towards a foreign race, which is still quite rare in this world. He should know at least enough to properly counter the other characters who belittle Roti.

In that sense, maybe I’m the laziest one around?

If I have time to rest, I completely relax while rolling back time as many times as I can.

Of course, rewinding time doesn’t mean the exhaustion accumulated from that time reflects on my body. When I rewind, all the fatigue I would have felt comes rushing back.

However, it’s still good to have chances like ‘just five more minutes.’

Once I have at least an hour to rest, I take a solid break for that hour.

Then I rewind time just thirty minutes back. It’s never hard for me to do this since I genuinely want to rest.

No matter how hard it is, after about thirty minutes of rest, my body manages to feel okay. At least unless I’ve sustained really serious injuries.

So, I extend rest by rolling back the time repeatedly for those thirty-minutes’ worth of recovery.

Naturally, my body can only recover as if I rested for one hour, but at least during that time, my mind stays connected and I get some time to prepare mentally.

And during that time, if something urgent comes up, I can handle it.

“……”

It was the same now. Under the determination that I didn’t want to meet the approaching Monday, I rewound time for the fifth time.

As I lay on the bed, stretched out to the point of thinking too much about whether it was okay to be this relaxed, ideas suddenly popped up.

Most of the brief thoughts that flashed through my mind were short, but combining those brief thoughts led to a somewhat plausible conclusion.

For example, here’s what just came to my mind.

I had already received the first semester schedule of the Academy.

Thanks to that, from the second week of May, I knew what kind of events were happening at the Academy. That event would be a field practice.

Field practice would take place over a total of four days from Thursday to that Sunday.

The destination was Winterfield. Of course, it was quite far from the battlefield.

So that’s the information I have about the Academy, and from here on, it’s information I have from the original game.

Winterfield is located in the Empire’s northernmost region. There’s always a place where it snows, which is why it’s called Winterfield.

Perhaps due to that image, or perhaps because of the preconceived notions about the fantasy world that originally existed, it has been established that renowned warriors from the Empire often hail from here.

Even if the name Winterfield isn’t a must.

And among the names that come to mind right now, there are several that are crucial in terms of lore or content.

Among them, the Sword Saint is also a famous figure originating from Winterfield.

“…Huh?”

Suddenly snapped back to reality, I sat up sharply.

And putting my hand on my chin, I began to think quite seriously.

The Sword Saint hasn’t died yet in the story. Unless something changed dramatically with my appearance and Lucas went to find the Sword Saint first.

Lucas sought out the Sword Saint because at that moment he was ‘confident in his abilities.’ He sought out someone thinking he could surely fight and win against them. In reality, the dev team’s lore suggests that at this point, Lucas is stronger than the Sword Saint, but Lucas’s confidence in himself would only manifest in the timeline of the second installment of this world.

The Sword Saint had aged a bit, but was still very much alive.

If I just put my mind to it, there’s no reason I can’t meet the Sword Saint next week.

If I were to meet the Sword Saint before Leo or Claire did, wouldn’t that give me access to learn various training methods on my own? Perhaps methods that allow for meditation and rest with slightly less sleep? I could train while rewinding time… well, sure, my physical abilities would reset each time I rewound.

“…Ah.”

Oh, no.

It wasn’t that meeting him wouldn’t be feasible.

I know where the Sword Saint is, but… that location is at the base of a mountain.

The Sword Saint is set to have cut ties with the world and is living in seclusion, so in the game, I wouldn’t be able to meet him through normal means. But there are hidden quests that allow you to meet the Sword Saint.

“But it’s a mountain, isn’t it?”

I pinched the bridge of my nose with my fingers.

Just as the road looks a bit different in this game, surely the mountain wouldn’t look the same as in the game. Climbing a mountain isn’t easy to do in the first place.

Isn’t that right? Just climbing Seorak Mountain alone could easily take over ten hours if you keep going.

The mountain where the Sword Saint resides is likely much more treacherous than that.

“…Wait, no.”

I recalled the two people who had been cheerfully grinning while stacking six beast corpses this morning.

…Even if I don’t want to think about climbing, wouldn’t those two push their way up to find the Sword Saint anyways? They definitely looked incredibly passionate about swordsmanship.

And, probably, Alice or Charlotte might be next to them.

…If Alice is there, I would likely be there too.

“……”

If someone were watching my face right now, they would be shocked to see how pale it had become.

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