Path of the Pioneers

My eyes opened very suddenly. I realized, rather quickly, that they were wet. As were my cheeks. I clenched my teeth together in silent horror, wiping the tears off of my face and eyes with the back of my hand. Red eyes could be a sign of poor sleep, couldn’t they? It didn’t necessarily mean that I had been crying. She shouldn’t realize a thing.

As long as I had been silent.

Despite the dream I had been having, I felt well rested. Unfortunately, one night of rest wasn’t quite enough time for my battered body to repair itself. Despite that, I felt far better than I should have. The pain that wracked my body before had been reduced to a light, dull ache. Besides that, I just had a slight stiffness in my legs.

I stood up from the grass, an involuntary groan slipping past my lips as I did. Adeline, who was standing a few meters away, sword in hand, turned to face me. She looked at my face for a moment, and then spoke up, “Up already? You can still sleep for a while longer, if you need.”

The sun was still just beginning to rise, so I must have woken up rather early. Regardless of that fact, however, we had a long trip ahead of us. I also wasn’t keen on seeing what my dreams had in store for me if I dared to fall asleep again.

“No, I’ll be alright. I got enough sleep.”

Adeline just nodded, fluidly sheathing her sword. Resting her hand on its pommel.

The two of us ate breakfast together, and then resumed our travels once more.

The scenery was dull, to put it lightly. Primarily fields of grass, with forests to the west, and the coastline to the east. We had been placed smack in the middle of the most boring terrain of the three. And to my knowledge, it would continue this way, more or less, for the rest of our trip.

After a few miles or so of walking, I had fallen into a sort of trance. Moving my left leg, then my right leg. The steady repetition was almost enough to let you turn off your mind entirely. This state was broken when I heard Adeline’s voice coming from in front of me.

“So, how did you slay the minotaur? If you don’t mind me asking, I mean.”

I opened my mouth to speak, and then stopped. She made it sound as if that kind of information may be secretive. Still, it was probably in my best interest to tell her.

“Well, I doused it in fire, to start.” I stopped when Adeline raised an eyebrow at that. “M-my intent was to frighten it with the fire, I wasn’t exactly trying to harm it with them..”

“Huh.. Did it work? I’ve heard of other monsters being scared of flames, but I haven’t learned much about minotaurs, personally.” By this point, Adeline had turned around entirely to face me, now walking backwards through the grass.

“It seemed to do what I intended.. At least, it wasn’t exactly willing to step through the fire to attack me. Or, maybe being buffeted by flames was a large enough distraction?”

Adeline laughed, “I don’t know if I’d be able to think of a solid attack plan if a girl started shooting fire at me, either.”

“After I was certain that it wasn’t likely to attack me, I.. Well..” This was a difficult thing to explain, after all. “Through my hand, I propelled a beam of mana. It made contact with the minotaur’s insides, and then…” I put my hands together, and then quickly moved them apart, to indicate some kind of ‘bursting.’ “With a few dozen spike formations.”

Adeline’s eyes squinted slightly, was that alarm? “Huh…” She sighed, “That sounds like a ridiculous skill. I wish I could have seen it myself. Or fought the minotaur myself..” I wasn’t sure how to react to the longing in her voice when she said that she wanted to fight the minotaur.

“I might be able to show you? Perhaps it would be best if we did it after we made camp, though. It.. Kind of takes a lot of my mana to cast.”

It was extraordinarily powerful for an E-rank spell. In return, it ate up a huge amount of mana. At the current rank, it took a flat 100, nearly half of my mana.

Adeline grinned, “I’ll take you up on that.”

After a day’s worth of traveling, Adeline very suddenly stopped walking. “This is as good a spot as any.” I had no objections, of course, to resting for the day. Still, we usually walked well into the night, yet the sun was only just setting.

Adeline turned towards me, smiling. “I’ve decided that on our trip to Grymgate, I’m going to give you some training!”

Training? Me?

She read the look on my face with ease. “Most of the monsters you’ll encounter are going to engage you in melee combat. Whether it’s with claws or clubs. If you don’t know how to deal with something like that, you may just get yourself killed.”

She said it rather flatly, but Adeline wasn’t wrong, either. I very nearly died because I couldn’t avoid the minotaur’s attack. Even the monster at the beginning of the dungeon nearly ended my life, despite my use of [Barrier].

“To that end,” Adeline unstrapped her scabbard from her belt, pointing her sheathed sword at me with a wide grin. “I’ll be sparring with you every night before we sleep!”

She hopped back, “On the count of three!”

“One!”

I raised my hands up slightly, preparing myself to cast any spells for the onslaught I was about to face.

“Two!”

I looked closely at Adeline’s stance. Her left hand was curled around her front, almost as if she were wielding an invisible shield. Her right hand held her sword aloft beside her head, its sheathed tip pointing towards me like a scorpion’s tail.

“Three!”

Adeline charged towards me, closing the distance with truly frightening speed. It felt like she was faster even than the minotaur.

A stab, it has to be, doesn’t it?

I cast [Barrier], a wall of force erecting in front of me. Just as it looked as if Adeline would go for a stab, she whipped her sword around, slamming it into my left side.

She went around the side of the barrier?

My thoughts were swirling like mad as I tumbled to the ground, rolling in the grass from the force of her blow. I had been thrown back about half the distance the minotaur sent me flying, but it felt like I was barely injured as a result. Just aching. But at the very least, it was enough to leave a bruise.

I quickly stood back up, getting Adeline back in my line of sight. Had she seen my barrier? If aura and mana are similar, then perhaps the ability to sense aura might also extend to mana?

For a time, I had to operate under the assumption that by some means, Adeline could grasp the position of my mana. The mechanisms by which she could sense it, however, were vitally important, for instance- My thinking stopped as Adeline pulled her sword back, readying for another strike against me.

It looked like it might either be a left slash or a stab. I thought I knew what to do to avoid it, but I wasn’t certain if I could actually pull it off.

But with 13 agility…

I ducked down, shifting to the left as a roaring mass zipped by over my head, far too close for comfort. She was surely open after such a powerful attack. Putting all my weight on my left foot, I pushed off, trying to drive my palm into her side. My hand was nearly there, before I felt a searing pain in my side and the grass against my face.

I heard some kind of slapping sound as I tried to catch my breath. Turning around, I saw Adeline, lifting her sheathed sword up and dropping it back down onto her hand. “You did well, but you ended up getting a little bit too greedy at the end. Don’t rely on an opening unless you can capitalize on it in an instant.”

I sat up, on my bottom rather than laying on my back. “R-right..”

She struck me down thrice more before we slept for the night.