WeTried Translations

Translator/Editor: Irevi

Discord: https://dsc.gg/wetried

Chapter 30: Alicia Machine

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The first turn was important.

But what mattered here was not an individual’s initiative. It was the initiative of the entire team.

Even if I moved first, it was no different from not having the first turn if Cecilia acted late.

‘How many Black Shards do I have left?’

Black Shards already had a terrible drop rate, and after giving most of them to Elia, I only had a few left.

Even if I had plenty, though, I had no intention of giving them to Cecilia. Once the Shard Converter arrived, I needed to convert them into higher-tier Shards.

Cecilia, you’ve got five hundred rounds of agility training scheduled.

Anyway.

‘...Should I make a move first?’

My gaze shifted between Aren and Ran.

Even in a friendly spar, Abyss Core abilities activated.

If I attacked Ran, Heaven-Collapsing Fist would probably come flying at me right away.

‘Then Aren first.’

After taking a quick breath, I thrust my sword toward Aren’s arm guard.

Aren took the attack head-on and was pushed back slightly.

“Your sword... is fast. So the rumor that it’s hard to dodge was true.”

The blue gem above my head flickered.

A signal that the turn was changing.

Was it Aren’s turn now?

Oddly enough, the gem above Cecilia’s head, despite her standing far away, began flashing along with mine.

What was this? According to the order, Cecilia’s turn should have come after Ran’s.

Then a word caught in my throat.

This had never happened before, so why now?

Should I say it or not?

Usually, things worked out better when I did.

I shouted the word lodged in my throat.

“Cecilia!”

“Got it!”

Boom!

The moment I called her name, Cecilia kicked off the ground and shot forward.

In the blink of an eye, her sword closed in on Aren and came crashing down on the arm guard I had struck.

“Urgh!”

Aren let out a short groan as the overlapping slashes sent him stumbling back.

He quickly grabbed his arm and regained his stance.

Only then did the gem above my head disappear completely, while a red gem appeared over Aren’s head.

It clearly had not been Cecilia’s turn, yet she had moved at my call as though she had stolen one.

‘Could this be Bond?’

The ability of [Self-Love] that I had received from Senia.

I had not really understood when it said it caused additional attacks based on Affection Level, but was this how it activated?

‘I need to understand the mechanism.’

Did it apply to Arts? Did it link with Break? Could it mark or trigger weaknesses? Did it provoke counterattacks? How many times could it activate in a single turn? There was plenty to figure out.

Still, one thing was certain. It built up damage. Even if I treated it as nothing more than a bonus, it would be useful.

The problem was...

‘It probably looks really underhanded from the other side.’

Aren had just been hit by a sudden two-on-one attack.

Sure enough, when he was knocked back by Cecilia’s strike, Ran’s expression hardened.

“What are you doing? A joint attack against one person in a sacred spar? Isn’t that cowardly? Or was the Funeral Sword’s reputation exaggerated after all?”

Good question.

It might have been an efficient tactic against monsters, but it did look questionable when used against people.

Looking around, several students wore expressions that said, Is that really okay?

When I kept quiet, Cecilia stepped forward instead.

“Cowardly? Don’t be ridiculous. The ones we have to fight are monsters. Do you think monsters will consider your circumstances and attack you one at a time?”

“Even so...”

“She’s right, Ran.”

Just as Ran tried to argue back, Aren unexpectedly cut in.

He defended Cecilia, then pointed his sword at me.

“I understand now. This was why you insisted on a two-on-two spar. You wanted to teach us something like this, right?”

“...?”

“You have more dungeon experience than we do. You must have gone through countless dangerous situations, and surely some of them were like this.”

No, this was my first group battle too.

“Monsters in a real fight won’t care about fairness.”

So he admitted it was not fair. I felt bad for no reason.

Ran could not argue any further after hearing it from Aren, the target of the ganging-up, and let out a sigh.

But Aren did not stop there.

“Since we accepted this spar, we have no reason to complain. We just need to do our best too!”

The moment he finished speaking, Aren swung his sword at me.

So he was targeting me instead of Cecilia. Despite his words, it seemed he was not entirely comfortable with it.

I immediately raised my sword and blocked the attack.

Screeeech!

[Just Guard!]

The damage was minor.

But...

“Ran!”

Ran took over right after Aren’s turn and charged in without missing the opening.

“Hah!”

Crunch!

With a shout, a fist packed with emotion shattered my wooden sword to pieces.

No wonder I had felt uneasy from the moment I picked up a wooden sword.

When three swordsmen held wooden swords, the martial artist naturally had the greatest advantage.

“Stop!”

At that moment, Cecilia’s sword slipped between Ran and me, knocking away Ran’s fist.

I saw her shoulder as she stood in front of me.

At the same time, the blue gem above her head disappeared, and my turn returned.

Aren and Ran had already retreated, putting distance between themselves and us.

That was one exchange.

‘So that ended the first turn.’

In a one-on-one fight, turns had gone back and forth in a straightforward one-for-one exchange. Once it became a group battle, the variables increased exponentially.

Additional attacks were one thing, but Ran’s attack linked immediately after Aren’s, making it much harder to succeed with Just Guard.

Then there was Cecilia.

She appeared to move in turns, but it seemed that was only how I perceived her. She probably felt as though she was moving in real time.

The issue was that I could not control her however I wanted.

‘This is a little...’

For some reason, I pictured a game’s stupid AI character spending its entire life applying nothing but Attack Power-reduction debuffs.

At least she was talented.

Even in that brief exchange, she had moved on her own at just the right moments.

Looking at it positively, this might have been better. It meant I only had to focus on what I needed to do.

Of course, strategy and communication would be essential at important moments.

The real problem was the broken wooden sword in my hand.

Since this was friendly training, we had not been given proper weapons. At this rate, I would lose to Ran every time.

We could use proper weapons in spars held under an instructor’s supervision, but that was not something we could do today.

“Well... My sword broke.”

“If you want to continue, there are spare swords over there. Go get one. We’ll wait.”

I shook my head.

Training like this had obvious limits.

I needed to test Arts and practice working with Cecilia, but that was impossible with wooden swords.

It was too far removed from actual combat.

Besides, it had been something of a shock.

‘Things were close with Varhatan too.’

Among Academy of the End’s game-related stats, there was one thing I had never even paid attention to until now.

Weapons.

Varhatan was basically a tutorial boss, so it had worked out. If my sword shattered like this in an important situation, though, that would mean death.

‘I need to get a weapon. Preferably today.’

I had something in mind.

It had originally been a plan for later, but it would be better to visit tonight.

Swallowing that thought, I spoke to the two of them.

“I think we should stop here for today.”

“We’ve only exchanged blows once.”

“It’d be better to continue after we get permission to use weapons. Wooden swords have their limits.”

Ran seemed to understand and nodded.

Since she had fought me during the entrance exam, she would know.

There was not much to gain from me while I held a wooden sword.

“It’s a shame. I haven’t even warmed up yet.”

“Still, I learned something.”

I had learned something too.

And I had realized something once again.

‘As expected, I’m better off being the one who charges in first.’

I watched Cecilia stretch and decided I needed to enter a dungeon soon.

⁎⁎⁎

“We’re going to practice a little longer. Ran still wants to continue.”

“Sorry. It feels like things ended awkwardly because of me.”

“No. It’s a shame, but unlike during the entrance exam, I got to see your sword.”

That was because I had removed Black Cloud.

Still, if Aren was satisfied, that was good enough.

Aren held out a hand.

“Let me introduce myself again. Aren Bright. I look forward to working with you.”

“Halibal Velder.”

I shook his hand.

It was soft, but every finger joint was deeply callused.

Even if his appearance had become more rounded, Aren was still Aren.

When Aren and I held hands for longer than expected, Cecilia openly glared at us.

Did she really have to act like that when we were both men?

After saying goodbye to the two of them, Cecilia and I left the training grounds.

It was already nearing lunchtime.

We had agreed to meet Senia in the cafeteria, so we followed the still-unfamiliar academy map.

At the end of the corridor leading to the cafeteria, I spotted familiar silver bobbed hair.

“Big sis!”

It was Senia.

For some reason, though, she was not looking our way and was staring intently down the corridor.

“What is it? What are you looking at?”

“Ah... Cecil, look at that. What is that?”

Once we entered the corridor, I saw that dozens of students had gathered around a single spot, not just Senia.

They were all staring at an object placed in the middle of the hallway.

“Was this here before? I don’t think I saw it earlier.”

“You can synthesize higher-tier Shards with this?”

“Wasn’t that only possible with imperial approval?”

Beneath a statue engraved with a sun symbol stood a machine with an unfamiliar yet oddly familiar design.

Its color was strangely red, but it was definitely the Shard Converter I had ordered from Elia.

Elia was nowhere to be seen.

Even though he had borrowed Alicia’s name, he had not received her direct permission, so he seemed too nervous to step forward.

There was a sign beside the Shard Converter.

[10 lower-tier Shards = 1 higher-tier Shard]

“This is ridiculous. Ten Shards?”

“I’d rather just use them normally.”

“Isn’t it a scam? What if it’s trying to trick us?”

Most of the students were unhappy with what they saw on the sign.

Even by my standards, the ten-to-one exchange rate was pretty brutal.

No one had lower-tier Shards to spare. No, at this point, even students with lower-tier Shards were rare.

Unless they had ground through dungeons like I had or were children of nobles, filling their slots alone was difficult.

And in that situation, they had to throw in ten Shards for just one higher-tier Shard.

It was like giving up ten Attack Power to gain two Attack Power. Who would like that?

In other words, unless Shard compression was absolutely necessary, the current Shard Converter was a useless device.

Still, that brutal exchange rate was just like in the original story.

At first, it had an awful ten-to-one exchange rate, but as its usage accumulated, it upgraded. Eventually, the rate improved to three-to-one.

Of course, reaching that stage required feeding it an enormous number of Shards, something I could never manage alone.

That was why I had told Elia to place the device in the academy. The more students used it, the faster it would upgrade.

‘It arrived at just the right time. I was about to need it.’

I had already been planning to visit a dungeon tonight, and Elia had completed this at the perfect time.

I walked through the students toward the Shard Converter.

The Ren sisters looked at me doubtfully.

“You’re going to try that?”

“You don’t have to test it yourself, you know?”

You two would have to use it eventually anyway.

Everyone around us turned to look at me.

“It’s the Funeral Sword.”

“Is he really going to try it himself?”

“Does he have that many Shards to spare?”

Not that many.

Other than the sixteen of each type I had set aside just in case, I had one extra Red Shard, one Blue Shard, one Green Shard, and one White Shard.

Those were the spare Shards I could exchange right now.

For this device to show its true value, someone had to demonstrate it first.

And naturally, that role fell to me as the person who had first proposed it.

I placed ten Red Shards into the converter slots one by one.

The machine began glowing red and humming.

[Synthesis in progress.]

A moment later, a red crystal rose inside the transparent holder.

[Red Shard II]

“Oh.”

I had worried there might be a chance of failure, but fortunately, the synthesis succeeded.

I held the Shard high, drawing the students’ attention.

“It worked, didn’t it?”

“It wasn’t a trick?!”

The murmurs around me shifted from suspicion to amazement.

Watching them, I deliberately spoke in an exaggerated tone.

“This is really amazing. Ten lower-tier Shards turn into a higher-tier Shard. Let’s see, this machine’s name is...”

Then my eyes stopped on the name above the sign.

Where it should have said Shard Converter...

[Alicia Machine]

“...It’s called the Alicia Machine.”

A different name was written there.

Footnotes:

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