WeTried Translations

Translator/Editor: ZERO_SUGAR

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◈ Ode of the Brave ◈

Chapter 20

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Once Ricart had sorted out the pecking order, some things at Beringen Academy changed, while others did not.

The biggest change was that the so-called tribute money had disappeared. In other words, the culture of exploitation practiced by higher-ranking students was gone.

What had not changed was that new students still had to go through an initiation, lower-ranking students still had to move aside first when they met someone in the corridor, and Volka was still the students' leader.

Once the exploitation disappeared, the students could finally stand on their own. Regardless of rank, everyone could work hard to earn money, attend class, and walk toward their future.

Following their own traditions and rules, the students of Beringen Academy lived that way, even if it was a place like a chicken coop.

Whenever he wanted, Ricart taught the students without holding anything back. He did not discriminate against anyone, whether their rank was high or low.

To Ricart, they were all about the same.

Volka worked the hardest. He lived busily, going back and forth between the dormitory and the city, and trained harder than before.

All he had needed was a small piece of hope.

Hope that he could live diligently.

Still, Ricart hated going on about talent. But whether he liked it or not, talent clearly existed.

And apparently, even Ricart could not do what he could not do.

“Why can't you do this? Why?!”

At the training ground behind the chicken-coop-like dormitory, Ricart glared fiercely and shouted as he brought his sword down hard through the air.

Beside him, Boribori held a practice sword awkwardly and wore a gloomy expression.

Even Ricart, who rarely lost his composure, had finally broken while teaching Boribori.

Nothing changed even after he taught all day. Everything had been wrong from head to toe in the first place. If he corrected each thing one by one, then this part would be right, but that part would be wrong. Once that part was right, this part would be wrong.

Boribori simply did not improve. This was already the third day.

At this point, should they not pay respect to Ricart's patience?

The funny thing was that the kids watching Ricart teach Boribori improved faster by learning over his shoulder.

Others were blocked by the high wall called Ricart, while Ricart had been blocked by the low wall called Boribori.

“Ah... Please, Bori. I feel like I'm going to die.”

Ricart squeezed his eyes shut and pressed his brow.

“S-sorry. I'll try harder.”

“Trying is important, but try to do well. That's why you're trying, isn't it? You said you wanted to become an adventurer.”

“...I want to do well, but I can't...”

Seeing Boribori so discouraged, Ricart quickly felt sorry again.

Right. It was not as though Boribori wanted to be bad at this. Boribori was not trying to make Ricart suffer on purpose.

“...Sorry for getting angry.”

“N-no. I'm the one who's lacking...”

Ricart looked at Boribori with an uneasy expression.

Then he had a thought.

When people called him a genius, he had never believed it. He thought he was only better than others because of his experience from his previous life, not because he had any particular talent.

But that was not true.

He really had been a genius.

Even in his previous life.

Ricky, in his previous life, could grasp the heart of anything at a glance, and his realizations came quickly. He could refine what already existed, and he was creative enough to make better techniques and master them in no time.

Ironically, Ricky had never had the chance to realize that he was talented. Without any period of practice, he had been thrown straight into life-or-death battles, spending his whole life in bloody fights.

Die or survive.

In that narrow gap between life and death, he had never had time to consider whether he had talent.

Only now, looking at Boribori, did Ricart realize that those things had been talent.

In any case, what should someone do if they lacked talent?

No matter how much he thought about it, there was no clear answer.

“Let's take it slow. There's no need to rush.”

“Okay...”

“Let's rest a little.”

“Okay. But I have to cut the grass.”

Boribori did not return to the dormitory. Instead, Boribori walked around the training ground and out behind it.

Behind the Inner Castle, the main building, lay an overgrown area.

Beringen Academy stood on a flat stretch of land atop a rocky cliff. It covered more ground than expected, but over half of it was thick with growth like a forest.

Since it was spring, plants had begun growing wildly, so they had to start cutting the grass around this time. By summer, they did it almost every day.

Lower-ranking students, or the so-called underclass with no rank at all, did this kind of work.

Unfortunately, Boribori was part of the underclass.

Since it was a place where people lived, there was plenty to do, including cleaning, washing clothes, and cutting grass.

Students were already cutting grass with sickles in the overgrown area. Students without sickles carried the cut grass away and threw it over the cliff.

Ricart rolled up his sleeves and joined them. Even though he was now ranked first, he did not shy away from unpleasant work.

The students had felt awkward about it at first, but given time, people adapted to anything.

It had already been three months since Ricart enrolled. Born in April, Ricart had turned eleven.

A mere ten-year-old had arrived, defeated all the supposedly strong students, then even beaten the seventh-ranked student in a real sword fight to become number one.

It was such an incredible debut that they wondered whether anything like it had ever happened in the Academy's history. Still, the students were simply relieved that the current number one had an easygoing and unpretentious personality.

Someone else could act as their leader, but the whole Academy's atmosphere depended on what kind of person held the top rank.

Some ruled like tyrants, while others squeezed the students dry like vicious lords.

The students could not clearly explain what had changed, but they could feel it.

Many things had changed.

While working, Ricart got his clothes completely dirty with soil and grass. The other students were the same.

Ricart roughly dusted off his clothes, cleared a spot on the messy ground, and sat down to rest. Boribori came over, fidgeted for a moment, then held something out.

“Hold out your hand.”

Ricart held out his hand, and Boribori poured something from a pocket into his palm.

It was hard bread crumbled into tiny pieces.

It was not just plain breadcrumbs. Salt and herbs gathered from nature had been ground into powder and mixed with them, making a sort of snack.

Ricart poured it all into his mouth at once and chewed.

The crumbs softened in his mouth, and their salty taste and gentle aroma tickled his nose.

It was not bad.

Boribori poured some into his own mouth and chewed as well. Then Boribori looked somewhere and frowned.

“Can't you beat them up?”

Ricart turned his head and saw the Ice Gang talking among themselves in the shade.

As Volka had said, the Ice Gang had no interest in the Academy.

Whether the other kids lived or died, held a feast, or Ricart became number one, they only kept to themselves.

But was that really a bad thing?

“Out of nowhere?”

Boribori did not normally act like a fox flaunting its power because it trusted a tiger, but Boribori seemed to dislike the Ice Gang in particular.

“It isn't out of nowhere. They're bad kids.”

“Based on what?”

Boribori leaned close and whispered into Ricart's ear.

“They're heretics. Heretics.”

“Huh?”

“I saw them by chance when I went to the city last time. They met with bad people and did this. I saw it.”

Boribori opened a hand and covered his eyes with the back of it.

Ricart had seen that gesture somewhere before.

Had Daisy's mother done it?

“Isn't that the Church of Judgment or something?”

“Yeah! That's heresy!”

People viewed religion differently. Boribori did not seem particularly devout, but apparently Boribori had an intense hatred of heretics.

“Sorry, but I'm not an inquisitor.”

“What if they take out the other kids' hearts and livers while everyone sleeps? If they borrow evil power, you won't be safe either, Ricky.”

Ricart looked at Boribori as though Boribori were pathetic.

“You believe that stuff? Where did you pick up such stupid nonsense?”

“My mom said so.”

“...There is no harm in being careful. But picking fights with them for no reason isn't right. If you really don't like them, go fight them yourself.”

“Th-that...”

“That's why you need to train properly.”

“Okay...”

Boribori answered gloomily, still chewing.

Ricart roughly ruffled Boribori's bowl-cut hair. Boribori was two years older than him.

“Let's wash up first. We should do some laundry too.”

“Okay.”

Ricart went with Boribori to the well in the courtyard. Students had already gathered around it, taking off their clothes and washing.

Female students lived in another building, but there was nothing they could do about it.

The boys, who had grown quickly and developed fairly sturdy builds, instead enjoyed the attention of the female students watching from distant windows.

Ricart and Boribori also took off their clothes and drew up the bucket.

The bucket full of water was quite heavy, and hauling it up by rope took no small amount of strength.

Daily life itself was physical training.

Climbing the cliff stairs, going back and forth to the city six hours away, all of it.

That was why there was not a single fat student at the Academy. Most had lean, muscular bodies.

Ricart was taller than others his age, around 160 centimeters. Boribori was 150 centimeters, which was below average.

As an aside, fifteen-year-old Volka was in the high 170s.

All the students were different heights and weights. They looked different, came from different regions, and had different backgrounds.

But they all had one thing in common.

Their families had abandoned them.

Only Ricart had come here by his own choice. Perhaps because he had grown up in a comparatively good environment, he carried himself a little differently from the other students.

He had not intended it, but perhaps that foundation of character was influencing the atmosphere now.

At least inside the Academy, everyone was the same kind of student.

After washing himself clean, Ricart hurried into the dormitory with the other students.

Students who had towels dried their wet hair and bodies, then lent the towels to friends. Ricart simply dried his hair and body with the clothes he was changing into, then put them on.

A violet was embroidered on one side of the chest.

The day was overcast, so they made a fire outside and hung the washed clothes nearby. Several students watched over them.

Ricart's bed had recently been moved. It was now an upper bunk near the middle, simply because it was far from both doors. When students constantly came and went, the traffic could not help being bothersome.

“I swear it's true! It was the swordsmanship professor! I was on my way to work when I saw him coming out of a pigsty, so I asked why he was coming out of there! Then, covered in a pile of shit, he said this!”

No matter where you went, there was always someone fooling around and making people laugh.

One boy, completely naked, talked excitedly with wild gestures, while the thing below swung back and forth.

Kids gathered around him, listening with smiling faces.

“Strange. I drank last night and was sure I made it home. I saw a pale butt and thought it was my wife, but...”

No one knew whether it was true, but the way he imitated the professor's solemn voice and manner was hilarious.

“Wahahahaha!”

Just as expected, the kids burst into laughter.

One even clutched their stomach and rolled around on top of a bed.

“But I don't think he was drunk.”

“Then what?”

“He went in there on purpose.”

“Blegh.”

“Is that true? I'll ask the professor!”

From a little distance away, Ricart lay backward on his bed and smiled as he watched the kids talk.

Scenes like that always reminded him of his military days.

Put people together, and they were all the same.

Then suddenly, the loudly chatting and laughing kids fell silent.

The Ice Gang had entered.

They were not a group that bullied the other kids or anything like that. It was simply the atmosphere they gave off.

Especially since power had changed hands not long ago, the other students were nervously watching them.

The problem was that Boribori was coming in from the other side after hanging up the laundry. The kids gathered in the middle had probably blocked their view of each other from afar, because Boribori and the Ice Gang came face-to-face.

Ice silently looked down at the shorter Boribori.

Then Ricart heard Ice's voice for the first time. Ice always whispered only with the others, so Ricart had never heard it before.

“Move.”

Contrary to Ice's delicate appearance, the voice was a low, masculine one.

Boribori flinched, hurriedly tried to move aside, then stopped.

Instead of moving, Boribori spoke.

“N-no. You move.”

It might have seemed like nothing from the world's perspective, but within the Academy, the most serious situation in the world had just unfolded.

Kids had a world of their own.

When Boribori refused to move aside, Ice raised his gaze and looked at Ricart, who was lying on an upper bunk some distance away, watching this way.

Neither of them glared at the other.

They simply looked at each other.

But neither looked away, and the atmosphere became strange.

Tension filled the room. With every passing second, the situation seemed to grow uncontrollably more serious.

The dormitory, noisy only moments ago, fell silent as a grave.

Then Ice looked away first and stepped aside.

For an unranked member of the underclass.

Once Ice moved aside, Boribori did not know what to do. Boribori stiffly pressed close to the opposite side and passed through.

Boribori looked dazed.

Anyone could see that Boribori's heart was pounding fast.

Even after coming to the space beside Ricart, Boribori still looked stunned, as though trying to calm that startled heart.

Ricart waited for Boribori to settle down, then spoke with all emotion removed from his voice.

“Bori.”

“H-huh?”

“You are my most precious friend. I like how pure you are. I don't care if you can't fight, and I don't care whether you help me or not. But rules are rules. From now on, you move aside.”

The words sounded kind, but they were firm.

And they carried authority.

Ricart did not judge people by rank, but he believed that order and rules were important in communal life.

The dormitory was so quiet that everyone heard Ricart's words.

The Academy students finally understood it clearly.

Power had changed hands, and Ricart was number one.

“Okay...”

Boribori answered gloomily.

Only then did Ricart smile.

“Come here. It might be a chicken coop, but isn't it nice that we can all stay close together?”

“Yeah.”

“But I saw you drawing on the ground last time, and you're good at it. It doesn't matter if you have no talent for fighting as long as you have talent for drawing. I'm jealous of that.”

“Really?”

“Yeah. If I could draw well, I'd paint Mother so I could see her often.”

“Want me to draw her for you?”

“You've never seen my mother.”

“If you tell me her features, I can draw her. Anyway, the best thing is to draw beautifully. Someone can be ugly in real life, but in a picture, they can be handsome or pretty. Everyone likes that.”

“Is that so?”

It sounded a little strange, but in a way, it made sense.

As Ricart and Boribori began chatting softly, the sounds of friends talking came from the other beds too.

At some point, rain began falling outside.

Still, what would have happened if Ice had not moved aside?

The kids wondered about that.

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