“Ok… Sigh. Let’s quickly find a wild boar or something then, did you cast firebolt this week already?”
“I haven’t! Will you let me test it out?”
“Yes, it will be safer to protect myself and the forest from the firebolt than protecting you from the beast at melee range. I’ll keep the creature occupied and you cast it as accurately as possible, no need to worry about me.”
“All right!” I said with a smile.
When did I start to smile this much?
This was a huge opportunity, not only I would get more combat experience, I would even test my spell against a real target!
I didn’t expect this at all, I thought Luna would just let me finish off a wounded animal or something, but this was far better.
Combat and spell experience aside, this is awesome! It’s like being able to fire a rocket launcher at a cow, but less morally questionable because the beast is aggressive. I hope PETA is watching.
It was impossible to brush away my edgy thoughts, I had really hit the jackpot this time.
…
After a little less than half an hour of skulking around, we finally found a target.
I was prepared for it to take way longer than that, I had no experience in hunting, but I knew it was difficult. Luna, however, seemed to have experience tracking down targets, and in no time, she found tracks to follow.
Our target was a kind of wild boar with slightly orange fur and reddish tusks. It was also at least double the size of a normal boar.
I was expecting a normal animal, since the only big predators I had seen so far looked just like their counterparts on earth, but it seemed this was a special one.
Also, judging by Luna’s reaction, not all boars in this world were like this.
“Cona, listen up.” She whispered next to my ear, making me tremble a bit.
I don’t know which is more embarrassing, for her to think I’m scared of the boar, or aroused by her whispering.
“That boar is special, but that’s good for us.” Her mouth curved up slightly while she looked at the exotic beast.
“How come?”
“That fur color means he’s resistant to fire, so he probably won’t blow up completely with your firebolt.”
“That’s… Good?”
Wouldn’t that mean it would be harder to kill it? I guess she could always finish it off, but I really wanted to land the killing blow…
“Yes, we’ll be able to salvage it for meat and leather. Animals like these are rare around these parts, and they have higher intellect so it’s harder to track them down without being noticed. To sum it up, they’re worth a lot.”
With what she just said one would have thought she was just being greedy, but the drool dripping from her mischievous smile revealed what her real interest in the creature was.
“Wait, if he’s really that good, how come he didn’t notice me?” I was trying to be stealthy, but I had absolutely no training whatsoever in that department, that’s why my earlier operation failed so miserably.
“I cast a spell on you, don’t worry. That boar may have sharp senses but at the end of the day it’s just that, senses. It can’t find you through other means so with a basic [Serpo] spell we can easily bypass his natural detection”
Wait, spell? When did she cast a spell on me? I’m sure I didn’t hear anything, and I didn’t see her opening her book either. Actually, now that I think about it, I also didn’t hear her casting the spells she used in our combat with the bandits, is she cheating?
Noticing my confused expression, she said:
“Don’t worry, I whispered the spell, I’ll tell you about it later.”
Whispered the spell huh? This woman is full of surprises, it was absolutely worth it coming here.
“What do I do now?” I asked while trying to hide my excitement.
“Take this firebolt scroll and when I give you the signal just do as we practiced at home. I’ll try to steer the boar in a way that you can aim for his head. Like I said, no need to worry about me.”
Luna was a completely different person when she got serious like this, it like she flips a switch somewhere and changes up her entire personality.
I guess it’s to be expected though, serious situations can only lead to death if handled carelessly. I wonder just how many life-or-death confrontations she has been to.
I was nervous of course, and somehow, I got a slight bad feeling about this whole situation, but this was a far more controlled battle then the one with the bandits, so there was not so much to worry about.
“Stay here and prepare to cast the spell.” She said in an eerily uncharacteristic tone, while the boar cluelessly looked at his surroundings and occasionally let out small flames from his nostrils.
“Ok.”
Luna started to move slowly while looking straight at the boar and drawing her dagger, he quickly noticed her and seemed afraid but somehow, he didn’t run away instantly.
Now closer, they started circling each other and the boar seemed hesitant to run away, his movements seemed almost unnatural, as if he was fighting with himself.
Soon, however, his inner battle ended, and he started to charge straight towards Luna.
As soon as it got into her range, she parried one of his tusks with her dagger and twisted her body while grabbing the other one, her movements seemed even more precise than the ones in the battle against the bandits.
Digging her feet in the ground, she waited the boar’s momentum to dissipate, and then forced him to turn his head towards me.
Luna’s resolute eyes met mine and she seemed about to shout something.
It’s now! Any moment now and she’ll give the signal to cast it!
I already had my hand touched against the rough special paper of the scroll and was just about to start moving my hands like I practiced so many times, but in a fraction of a second her serious expression turned into one of shock and she screamed something a little weird to be considered a signal.
“CONA, IN YOUR LEFT!”
Eh? Wasn’t she supposed to yell ‘Go!’ or something like that?
By reflex, I turned to my left and my eyes widened as I saw a huge tiger running in my direction with incredible speed.
His eyes met mine, and seeing that he was discovered, he let out a terrifying roar.
I knew that tiger, of course. How could I forget him? It was him that almost killed me and Toba back when we were trying to get to civilization. And it was him that kept Toba so scared he refused to leave the tower.
Time passed very slowly from this point onwards, and a lot happened in just a couple of seconds.
As the tiger charged and got closer and closer, I could already see the boar lying dead on the ground from the corner of my eye, he had a wound in his left eye and blood was flowing out profusely.
Obviously, Luna was coming to save me. The problem was, she wouldn’t arrive in time, since at this point the tiger had already jumped high in the air to get me.
There was not much to do, I didn’t have my sword ready, and I couldn’t even compete with a regular bandit, let alone an apex predator.
But I had one last resort. I took advantage of the fact that my left hand was still touching the magic circle and brought my right hand towards my face making a fist.
My muscle memory kicked in, and aided by the absurd amount of adrenaline that suddenly flooded my body, I yelled as I pointed my finger forward at the end of my memorized set of movements.
[IGNIS!]
Luna got terrified by this, and it was not difficult to figure out why.
Firebolt was a beginner spell according to her, but even so, it had incredible destructive power. To put it simply, at the distance the tiger was at, if I hit him directly, I would die so hard there wouldn’t be much left to burry.
Thankfully, however, it wasn’t my first near death experience.
The firebolt exploded from my finger and the flash of fire occupied the beast’s pupils as he began to come down from the air to claw me to pieces.
To everyone’s surprise but me, the little fireball didn’t hit him, instead it passed right below him and hit the ground close to his tail.
The explosion was fierce, I had never cast this spell this close for obvious reasons, so I didn’t know what to expect.
The hot air reached and burned my face as the fire expanded from the point of impact, and the shockwave hit me like Mike Tyson’s left hook.
The last things I saw were the tiger flying over my head with half of his body charred, glaring at me, and Luna quickly taking a small ruby out of the pouch in her belt.
So, it didn’t die, huh?
***
Hungry… Cona and Luna still not come back.
Tired of training sword, tired of training speak… Want sleep but too hungry.
Should eat more after got sick, Cona said.
He right, always, but stomach weird after bad fruit, don’t want to eat after.
Now hungry but no food…
“Toba! We’re back.”
Hear sound but not see Luna yet, invisible wall not let sight go through.
Toba doesn’t understand… But Luna here now.
“Cona sleeping?”
“… Yeah, he’s a little tired so I’ll lay him to rest, ok?”
Luna look sad, not know why, but now all together again.
***
“Hmm… Where am I?”
Goddamn… I feel like I’ve been hit by a truck. Something smells nice though.
“Woke up just in time, eh? Food is almost ready.” Luna said as she looked down at me, her pink hair dropping down her face.
Not a bad sight to see after just waking up, her charm never fails to captivate me.
I was inside the tower again, probably carried by Luna after what happened. I was lying down in one of the makeshift beds we had set out in a corner, and my head was resting on Luna’s lap.
Now that I think about it, this place is getting really cramped up. Luna is extremely skilled in a lot of stuff but apparently carpentry wasn’t one of them. We really should build some more rooms around this tower if we want to continue living here.
I hadn’t noticed it until now because I was born under unusual circumstances, so this was already luxury for me, but we should improve our condition a bit.
“You must be tired, I used a healing spell, but they take a little getting used to…” Luna was wearing a smile that hid a lot of bitterness underneath as she looked away from me like she was ashamed.
Suddenly, I remembered it all, I was attacked by that tiger and just about managed to cast firebolt in time, but it seems it wasn’t far enough for me to come out unharmed from it.
“Why the sad face, you saved me like you said you would.” I said while still resting my head on her lap.
Although I had no reason to feel angry at her, I could imagine what she was feeling. Luna probably had her back against the wall there, it all happened way too fast.
I’m sure if she had detected the tiger a little sooner, she would be able to prepare a spell or get into melee range in time, but the way things were, there was not much she could do. Especially since she had her hands occupied with the boar.
The least I could do was try to ease her feelings of guilt.
“No… This time you saved yourself Cona. If you hadn’t fired that spell with such precision…”
“Wasn’t it great? Even I didn’t know I could do that, but it’s thanks to all our training together.”
I couldn’t let her dwell too much on that, so I tried my best to change the subject.
At this point though… Shouldn’t she be crying?
Her face hadn’t changed even a bit, based on past experiences she should be bawling her eyes out any moment now… But it didn’t happen.
It seemed things were serious this time, I had to change my strategy.
“Cona… You-“
“Luna, can I ask you something?” I said in a more serious voice as I got up so I could talk facing her.
“Wha-“
“If you hadn’t found us, what do you think would have happened?”
At this point I had dropped the child act completely, but since I had just been through a lot in terms of experience, and since she considered me some sort of genius or prodigy, I should be fine.
“If I hadn’t found you…”
“Sure, we could get by with the dead birds from the barrier and water from the rain, but what next?”
“Would we just sit by as the years passed? Without learning how to read or write, and without ever leaving?”
Luna was deep in thought; my words were reaching her.
“Naturally, I wouldn’t have stayed there even a year. And when we tried to leave… Well, you could imagine what would happen to us in the forest.”
She was now looking at me with an understanding face, time for the final blow.
“The only reason we even have a chance to survive is because Luna oneesan took care of us, and the only reason I managed to survive against that tiger was because you trained me and let me experience real combat against the bandits.”
“Cona…” She reached out her arms and pulled me towards her as she hugged me tight like she always did. Somehow though, this hugged seemed a little different, it felt important.
“I don’t know what I did to get so lucky as to find you two. You’re certainly special Cona, any other kid would be crying while scared for his life, but I can see it in your face that you want to go right back to training.” Her voice was extremely soft and gentle as she spoke to me while caressing my hair.
“Even those kids back at the mountain weren’t so resolute…”
Kids in mountains? Is this woman part of a barbarian tribe? If she’s Mongolian, I want to learn archery…
“Well, I don’t know about them, but I would be crazy to not want to learn everything I can from someone as strong as Luna!”
I did mean it, although I haven’t met anyone else besides her and Toba, just based on those bandits I could tell that she wasn’t ordinary by any means. It would be extremely foolish to not make use of her knowledge and experience.
“But Cona…” She said in a confused tone.
“Yes?”
“What is oneesan?”
SHIT.
Cona Stats:
KDR 0/0/2
Toba Stats:
Diarrhea
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