WeTried Translations x Flame Comics
Translator/Editor: Hydrogen B
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Chapter 102: 15. Real Combat Is Standard for Academy Summer Vacation Events (7)
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There were rules to RPGs. They were like level-design guidelines for game developers.
For example, when designing a map, make exploration varied, but place the main route on highly visible tiles to guide the player's progression.
They were not rules that had to be followed, but advice best observed whenever possible for the sake of convenience.
Naturally, Ivan knew all about them.
Back when he was Kim Seonwoo, his hobby had been leaving 5,700-character “critiques” and “advice” on every kind of content. Anyone offering advice to creators ought to have the basic qualifications to back it up, and his advice did not discriminate by genre.
Games, comics, web novels, it made no difference. He had spent his life stuffing malicious comments into every piece of content he could get his hands on.
As a result, he was well versed in games like this too.
Now, suppose there is a beginner party here, with an average level somewhere between five and ten.
It consists of a warrior, a bard with a Berserker subclass, a knight with a thief subclass, and a mage specializing in Mind Sorcery. It is a party whose design philosophy makes no sense whatsoever.
They are beginners who have not even learned a proper offensive skill. They have barely made it through Tutorial content.
What sort of enemy should they encounter in a hunting ground like this?
“It would have been nice if there were goblins.”
Ivan pressed a button as he watched the group of orcs.
With a heavy crash, trees collapsed one after another, splitting the group in half.
The individual orcs screamed. Watching them from a distance, Ivan once again drew a map in his mind.
Orc warriors specialized in close-quarters combat, making them difficult opponents for beginners. Against that many, the party in its current state could never win.
So this was where level design came in.
First things first.
Keep random encounters to fewer than five enemies at a time, and adjust things so combat, rest, and travel remain at a two-to-three-to-five ratio, with encounters occurring only intermittently enough to encourage growth.
And then...
“You're too strong for this stage's boss.”
Ivan muttered quietly as he looked down at an orc gagged and struggling to scream through it.
Tears streamed down the orc's face as it looked up at Ivan. Its eyes held fear of the incomprehensible, fear of the unknown.
Perhaps that was only natural. The orcs' small brains would have trouble grasping civilization and common sense. Ivan smelled the cortisol mixed into the orc's body odor and studied its eyes.
Vertebrates capable of emotion shared several common mechanisms. When the amygdala awakened the survival instinct through fear, the hypothalamus was stimulated, producing a series of physical responses.
The pupils dilated, the heart rate rose, the muscles tensed, and blood vessels constricted as the sympathetic nervous system activated. Color drained from the body, tremors increased, and cold sweat began to run.
Then the endocrine glands began secreting cortisol. That was where it started. A terrified person gave off a distinctive scent.
The Annihilation Unit called this a state in which someone was easy to make honest.
Ivan tore open a potion and placed his hand over the orc's mouth.
“You must have plenty of questions.”
Holding the orc's head tightly, Ivan whispered.
He could predict them.
How had he managed to abduct it without anyone noticing?
How long had he been lying in wait here?
How had he known they would come and been waiting for them?
Questions like that.
There was only one answer to all of them. Common-sense situational judgment. And Ivan had neither a way nor any intention of teaching such common sense to a demihuman like this.
So, as an efficient agent, what he needed to do was not answer. It was to ask questions.
“I have many questions for you as well.”
Ivan had planned this whole operation knowing only that attackers would arrive. In other words, he did not know who the attackers were or how they had managed to penetrate as far as southern Krasilov.
Who had opened the way for them? At what level had someone begun working with the demonfolk? How many more demonfolk strike teams were there? Had the demonfolk established a unified alliance, or were they still divided?
How had they expected the Hero Party's children to gather in this backwater as soon as vacation began? Where had they acquired that information? That was a very serious problem.
He had not yet received Elizaveta's approval for this situation.
The only person above Ivan in the approval chain was Elizaveta, and she was not someone who would share this information with anyone else.
Then how had these vermin made their way into the heart of Krasilov and wandered about openly with weapons prepared for close-quarters combat?
The Counterintelligence Command was, by nature, curious.
Unlike most other curious pranksters, though, the Counterintelligence Command had secured a wide range of methods for actively gathering information.
Ivan released the terrified orc's head and slowly began unpacking his things.
Clink, clink.
He took out tools that were not suspicious at all.
“Fortunately, we have plenty of time.”
The students' training would proceed very slowly.
Hearing that, the orc squeezed its eyes shut.
* * *
“St-stop. Haa... ngh.... The sun, the sun is setting.”
“Already? Is it that late? What time is it?”
“Does anyone have a watch...? Hah.... Let's just rest. Just for a little while.”
The bedraggled party members sank to the ground. Elphihara tried to strike sparks in the chilly forest air, then flinched and stopped.
When darkness falls, flames are far too visible. That's common sense.
Elphihara muttered fearfully, wiggling her fingers.
“I'll set up some booby traps around the campsite.”
“Do you know how?”
“After getting caught in them a few times, I figured it out.”
Aesidis staggered to her feet and disappeared beyond the trees. Isabelle nodded.
After all, laying traps around a campsite was common sense.
“Oscar, I'll take the second watch tonight.”
“I'm still all right, Miss Isabelle.”
“Oh, come on. Did you even sleep for three hours?”
“...Thank you.”
Naturally, campsite watches were assigned in rotation. Anyone who had stood exhausting shifts like the second and third watches deserved consideration the next day.
That was basic party common sense, so Isabelle casually set down her pack and bit into a Nutrient Bar.
It was fishy, bitter, sour, unpleasantly sweet, sticky, and somehow gritty in her mouth.
The taste was difficult to describe, but it was emergency food that required no cooking. A field ration that could be eaten on the spot when they could not light a fire.
Only now did she understand why he had packed these.
That lunatic...!
-Crunch!
Without realizing it, Isabelle crushed the Nutrient Bar in her hand and looked up.
The sun was setting.
“How many days has it been now?”
“Three... ah, five since we entered this forest.”
“This is getting ridiculous. Why hasn't the army come?”
“I don't know.... It's such a remote place that maybe they don't even know the demonfolk attacked here.”
Oscar answered bitterly.
He had a point. This was a remote mountain, not a logistics hub, not home to any large city, and without even a single nearby residence.
How many mountains like this were there in Krasilov? There was not even a military garrison in the area.
They had probably chosen this place for training because of those factors, but that also meant it was an environment favorable for demonfolk infiltration.
“How did the demonfolk even get this far?”
“I don't know....”
“And what did they come all this way for?”
Isabelle still stared into the sky.
The violet evening glow was gradually darkening into deep navy blue. As she counted the clusters of stars beginning to shine in the blue sky, Isabelle continued quietly.
“Oscar, what do you think? You took knight classes in Tilles, didn't you?”
“...Perhaps it was us. If they're demonfolk, they may want to eliminate the Hero Party's children.”
“How did they find out?”
The moment Oscar heard her question, his mind seemed to turn cold.
“Lord Yermof, I mean, Mr. Ivan, wouldn't have leaked it.”
“If Uncle saw demonfolk, he would've split their heads open.”
“Yes, and Lord Yermof is probably very highly ranked within the Counterintelligence Command as well.”
“Right. So...”
Was there a spy within the Counterintelligence Command?
Or...
“What if we aren't the objective?”
“Pardon?”
“Do you remember the orcs who attacked us? They were far too...”
“Conspicuous?”
“They struggled to infiltrate all the way here from those distant demonfolk settlements, looking like that, only to kill the four of us? Doesn't that seem strange?”
“Miss Isabelle, our lives are more valuable than you think...”
“Valuable?”
Isabelle scoffed. Without a word, she gestured around them with her chin.
If they were so valuable, why were they still in this state? That was the meaning behind the gesture. Then she smiled and turned back to him.
“Let's say you're right. Why didn't they attack us all at once? Why come at us in groups like this?”
“Th-that...”
Oscar reproached himself for not considering something so simple.
It was obviously strange. Assassins infiltrating the heart of enemy territory would slowly attack their targets over three or four days, sending only two or three at a time?
Did that make any sense?
“This means we aren't their objective.”
Isabelle turned to Oscar. Her eyes shone a vivid blue.
What if the students were not their objective, but there was a larger, more sinister scheme?
What if, while carrying out that scheme, they had merely encountered and fought patrols in the area?
What if the demonfolk were plotting something in this mountain?
What if we and the Counterintelligence Command agents had become caught up in it through an incredible coincidence?
What if Uncle could not come save us because he had gone out alone to stop the demonfolk's grand plan?
Just as Isabelle's thoughts reached that point, Elphihara suddenly muttered.
“A seal that has been discovered will always be released in the near future...?”
“What?”
“It's something Lord Yermof said! He called it ‘seal common sense’...!”
At the word common sense, every party member flinched.
“If we've discovered something... then...”
“Something uncontrollable will happen soon?”
“We aren't the only ones in danger. Lord Yermof is too. Think about it. If Lord Yermof had even a little room to spare, would he really have left me... ah, no. Left us like this?”
Even ignoring that strange slip in the middle, it was a very reasonable assumption.
Ivan was not the kind of person who would abandon the students under his guidance in a situation like this just to save his own life.
Which meant that if Ivan still had not appeared after they had fought the orc combat groups at least five times...
Did that not mean he was in no position to come?
Having reached that conclusion, Isabelle quietly nodded.
“This time, we'll save Uncle.”
“H-how?”
Oscar's question was reasonable.
If demonfolk had infiltrated the region to conduct a large-scale operation, and even Ivan, a powerful Counterintelligence Command agent, could not stop them...
That was not something four university students could solve.
Wouldn't it be better to descend the mountain quickly as originally planned and call for reinforcements...?
“Elphihara is right. If Uncle taught it to us as common sense, there must have been a reason. We may not have much time.”
“Those are all assumptions.”
“At least Uncle probably doesn't have much time. Even now, he might be dying.”
Isabelle's eyes shone brightly. Anger, anxiety, and worry flickered within them.
“We'll save him. Everyone here owes Uncle their life, don't they?”
“...”
“We'll save Uncle. And Oscar.”
“Yes?”
Isabelle's eyes still blazed, but she smiled brightly.
“The demonfolk have appeared, and we have swords. Just as our parents did. Oscar, son of Gilles Ver. Knight of Tilles. Let us take up our swords for good, not for power.”
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An agent listening from afar burst into tears as they finished the report.
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Footnotes:
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