WeTried Translations

Translator/Editor: Irevi

Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried

Chapter 29: The Speed?

──────

No separate classes were held on the Academy’s first day.

After orientation, the students were given free time. It was the Academy’s way of giving freshmen time to adjust to their unfamiliar surroundings.

Thanks to that, the campus was noisy with the voices of new students. Seeing everyone paired off, it seemed the other classes had received their Follower lessons too.

There were exceptions, of course.

“Hehe. As expected of Ruidel Academy. I already feel exhausted on the first day.”

I think you’re the only one who feels that way.

Senia had somehow already sidled up beside Cecilia and me.

Luna was nowhere to be seen.

Had Senia quietly ditched Luna?

Cecilia cautiously asked, “Um... what about Luna Grace...?”

“Hm? Who’s that?”

Had Senia decided to erase Luna from her mind?

Senia was now showing the attitude Cecilia should have shown in the original story.

But that was that.

“So, what are you going to do, Senia?”

“Huh?”

“We’re planning to visit the training hall.”

Before challenging the Doll Dungeon, I needed to check Cecilia’s specs first.

I also had to see how combat would play out when we actually fought together.

That was why we were heading to the training hall.

She wasn’t planning to follow us there too, was she?

“Ah... right. We’re students now. That’s true.”

Senia nodded as if she understood.

“Then I’ll see you at lunch, Cecil.”

“Y-yeah. See you later.”

With a bitter smile, she waved and turned away.

Cecilia looked strangely awkward, as if she wasn’t used to seeing Senia like that.

Unfortunately, it wasn’t something I needed to worry about. Whether Senia and Luna got along or not, we had things to do.

I asked Cecilia, “Could you show me your Abyss Core?”

“W-what?!”

“...I’ll show you mine too.”

This useless setting.

How was I supposed to plan a strategy without checking the Cores and Shards?

Cecilia’s original Core had been Lapis Lazuli.

But Senia had Lapis Lazuli now.

That meant Cecilia must have brought a different Core.

‘I need to know what it is to plan properly.’

The problem was that everyone overreacted whenever I asked to see their Cores. It was always awkward.

“...Here.”

Only after I said I’d show her mine did Cecilia open her socket, her face red as a tomato.

“B-be gentle.”

I’m not doing anything.

As I carefully examined the Core she handed me, the pattern engraved on it looked oddly familiar.

I knew this Core.

‘She brought this?’

Abyss Core [Lumen].

Lumen was a Core obtained as a reward from a subquest involving the Ren House later on. Whenever its user attacked, there was a certain chance that particles of light would fall. Absorbing them restored a small amount of Health.

It seemed that in the timeline where Cecilia failed to obtain Lapis Lazuli, she equipped Lumen instead.

Its ability was ordinary, but Lumen had a hidden trait. As it grew, the Core’s functions evolved.

Once evolved, Lumen became [Lumen & Caligo], allowing its user to freely switch between an attack-focused stance and a recovery-focused stance.

Because it could freely shift between healing and attacking, it was normally considered standard to give it to Mine and use them as the main damage dealer.

And Cecilia had it.

‘Not bad.’

It honestly looked better than Lapis Lazuli.

Its growth potential was high, and it could heal too.

How I used it would depend entirely on my judgment.

The Core was one thing.

The Shard slots were another.

They were a complete mess.

╔═════════╗

◈Abyss Core - Lumen◈

╠═════════╣

▸ Equipped Shards: 16/16

■ ■ ■ ■

■ ■ ■ ■

■ ☆ ☆ ☆

☆ ☆ ☆ ☆

╠═════════╣

■ = Blue Shard 9

☆ = White Shard 7

╠═════════╣

▸ Stat Bonuses

Health 9

Mana 7

╚═════════╝

Health 9 and Mana 7.

What kind of HP hog was this?

“...It’s embarrassing.”

Yeah. You should be embarrassed. Your setup was completely fucked.

What was wrong with the Ren House that they all insisted on these ridiculous tank builds?

The funnier part was that she had somehow squeezed in seven White Shards too.

That made it neither one thing nor the other.

At least I could understand if she had gone all-in on defense like Senia because she didn’t want to get hurt.

But in reality, raising Health just meant you could get hit more. Unless she was some pervert who liked getting hit, why bother?

...Fine.

‘I’ll redo it later.’

When I handed the Core back, Cecilia spoke softly.

“...You have to show me yours too.”

Go ahead.

“What? You have three Special Shards? I’ve never seen one of them before.”

“I got it from the Beast Dungeon.”

Cecilia stared into the socket for a while, then froze when she saw Self-Love set in the center.

“Wait. Isn’t this the one my sister had?”

“I got it during the entrance exam.”

“...Why?!”

“For the same reason as you.”

She seemed bothered by the fact that the Renee she had given me contained Senia’s Shard.

But why did that bother her?

“...I don’t like it.”

Stop reading into things!

I dragged the unnecessarily dejected Cecilia toward the training hall.

The training hall was fairly large. It had enough space for at least a hundred people to train at once.

There were more than five such facilities on the Academy grounds alone, so the military academy concept wasn’t just for show.

Within a few days, the training halls would be packed with students, but it was still quiet on the first day.

That made it easy to find a spot.

Then I spotted a familiar face in one corner of the hall.

“Huh? You’re...?”

“Funeral Sword.”

Aren, who had gone from being a 183-centimeter alpha male to simply male.

Ran was sparring with him.

Aren had chosen Ran as his first Follower.

‘Good choice.’

Choosing Ran was about as standard as it got.

She was a typical early-game character with a high floor and low ceiling. Aren specialized in boss damage, while Ran excelled at clearing weaker enemies, so they worked well together.

The Beast Dungeon had plenty of minor monsters. I rarely had to deal with them thanks to Instant Kill, but normally, you had to fight every one of them.

With Ran’s Arts, they could bulldoze their way straight to the boss room.

Then, after using Ran for a while, he could discard her...

Thinking about it that way made me sound like garbage.

Anyway.

Fortunately, this Aren was following the standard route.

‘We should be able to talk easily.’

I needed to get acquainted with Aren anyway. I also had to explain my meddling during the entrance exam.

As we approached them, Ran spoke first.

“The Ren House’s Sword Princess and the Funeral Sword. Did the two of you mate?”

“W-what...!”

“...That’s not usually how you phrase it.”

“Did I misspeak again? My apologies.”

Ran had always been this kind of character.

She had lost her parents young and done nothing but train under the Fist King, so she lacked worldly knowledge.

She probably hadn’t meant to tease us.

Still, hearing it from her was something else.

Aren spoke up.

“Did you two come here to train as well?”

“We’re fellow students. You can just call me Halibal.”

“Huh? Oh. Okay.”

Either way, I managed to start talking to him naturally.

Since they were here, they had probably come to train too.

Perfect. Fighting playable characters would be the most efficient option.

“If you’re okay with it, would you like to spar with us?”

Normally, we would have had to beat up training dummies, but they didn’t even trigger combat judgments, so they were pointless.

To develop a feel for real combat, we had to fight people like this. Meeting these two here was lucky.

Both of them were training fanatics, after all.

When I made the offer, Ran’s expression visibly brightened, and Aren nodded.

“Then we can face each other one at a time. May I go first?”

“Wouldn’t it be better to try two against two at once?”

“...?”

“?”

Ran and I spoke at the same time.

Our eyes met.

“Isn’t sparring normally one-on-one?”

That was true. It was just that one-on-one didn’t mean much to me.

Cecilia whispered from beside me too.

“How do you even spar two against two?”

She had a point.

But we had to do it.

The bosses we had to face came in pairs.

I couldn’t exactly say that.

As I looked at Ran, she answered firmly.

“Sparring is one-on-one. That’s what I was taught.”

A response fitting for someone so single-minded.

Just as I was wondering how to persuade this stubborn woman, Aren stepped in.

“Everyone’s goal is to clear the Dungeons of the Evil God, right? Later on, we may have to face several monsters at once. We can spar one-on-one anytime, so I think trying two against two this time would be fine.”

Was this the protagonist’s power?

I knew I could count on him.

Aren’s way with words had been quite good in the original story too.

He never made people uncomfortable and had a way of naturally making them agree with him.

That was why he eventually earned the Raid Corps’ trust and became its leader.

“You’re right. I was stubbornly insisting on my own view.”

At the mention of the Dungeons of the Evil God, Ran seemed unable to find anything else to argue about and reluctantly nodded.

“Is this okay, then? Could I ask for an individual spar next time?”

“Of course.”

Aren gave her a gentle smile.

Seeing him in person, I understood why he had been given the alpha male setting.

At least Aren wasn’t gay.

He would probably charm all the heroines with that smile.

So we split into two teams on opposite sides of the training hall.

Cecilia, Aren, and I held wooden training swords, while Ran stood bare-fisted instead of wearing gauntlets.

I had deliberately removed Black Cloud.

It would be a problem if Instant Kill triggered during training.

Since this was a friendly match rather than an official sparring lesson, Arts were prohibited. Aiming for vital points or weaknesses was prohibited as well.

It was a shame, but there was nothing to be done.

“Shall we begin?”

The moment Aren finished speaking, he raised his fighting spirit and pointed his sword at us.

Cecilia and I responded in kind, while Ran took the opening stance of Fist King’s Five Forms like she had during the entrance exam.

‘Whew.’

I took a deep breath and lowered my body.

Until now, I had only experienced turn-based combat one-on-one.

This time, it was a group battle. How would one-against-many or many-against-many combat unfold?

I stretched my right foot back and raised my sword.

Then the familiar sensation came over me.

Time slowed, and a blue gem signaling the start of battle floated above my head.

‘So far, it’s the same...’

I looked back and forth between the two frozen figures before me.

Would I have to fight Aren and Ran separately?

Did group combat not actually exist, with only one-on-one battles possible?

...Just as I thought that, something unexpected happened.

A red gem appeared above Aren’s head.

At the same time, a red gem appeared above Ran’s head as well.

Normally, when it was my turn, no gem appeared above my opponent’s head.

But now they had appeared.

There was a difference in their appearance too.

‘The gems differ in size and clarity.’

Aren’s gem was a little smaller and dimmer than mine.

Ran’s was even smaller and even dimmer.

The clearest of them all was the blue gem above my head.

What it meant was obvious.

‘It’s the turn order.’

Once it became a group battle, the gems showed the order of turns.

In other words, combat would proceed in the order of me, then Aren, then Ran.

The deciding factor was obviously speed. Aren’s attack speed had been faster than Ran’s in the original story too.

‘...This could get troublesome.’

With two opponents, the turn order could become tangled.

In a real battle, Aren and Ran could have focused their attacks on me one after another, dealing serious damage.

There was more to keep track of now.

But wait.

‘What about Cecilia?’

When I turned my head, strangely enough, there was no gem above her head.

‘Don’t tell me I’m the only one in turn-based combat?’

But that wasn’t it.

When I narrowed my eyes and looked carefully, a very, very faint blue gem floated above Cecilia’s head too.

“Just watch. I’ll show both of you the power of the Ren House.”

Um... Cecilia.

The speed?

Footnotes:

Join our discord at https://dsc.gg/wetried