漫画大王

Chapter 107

“It’s a bit odd, hearing that from the person who had the most fun.”

“Is it?”

Ludwig laughed in response to my rebuke. Whether one could truly call the dormitory “home” was debatable, but I supposed it was something akin to that, nonetheless. It wasn’t just Ludwig—upon seeing the Temple, everyone else seemed to feel the reality of returning to daily life sink in.

We weren’t the only ones who had returned.

“Junior!”

It seemed Adriana had also returned after her own group mission. The second-years were bustling into the Royal Class dormitory as well.

The warm welcome was rather heartwarming.

“Ah. Hey, senior.”

“Did you just get back, junior?”

“Oh, yes. That’s right.”

“Oh, it’s you, Reinhart...” said Rudina.

Next to Adriana stood student A-1 from the second year, the overachieving youngster who had skipped grades, Rudina.

“I can’t believe the first thing I see as soon as I return to the Temple is you... This must mean I’m out of luck next week,” bemoaned Rudina as she crossed her arms and shook her head, cursing her own luck.

“It looks like all you’ve gained from your group mission is how to trash-talk.”

“What did you say? Trash-talking? Do you want to see me get mad?”

“Enough, enough.”

As Rudina glared at me with fiery eyes, Adriana intervened to calm the situation down.

“Please understand our situation, junior. We lost this group mission, so Rudina is a bit upset.”

“What? No! That’s not it! Besides, we practically won!”

“It looks like you really are upset because you lost.”

“No, I’m not!”

It seemed that, for this mission, the second-years from Class A had lost to their Class B rivals. I couldn’t help but laugh as I looked at Rudina.

“Since you look pretty upset about losing, I will be generous, only because I’m in a good mood thanks to our win,” I teased her with a smirk, and Rudina’s face turned bright red with anger.

“Adriana! Reprimand him!”

“Okay.”

Slap!

“Ouch! Why did you hit me?!”

“It looks like you got better at getting on people’s nerves, junior.”

Adriana, possibly afraid that Rudina might lose her temper completely and cause a scene, took Rudina’s hand and led her into the dormitory.

“Anyway, congratulations on winning, junior! See you tomorrow morning?”

“Yes.”

“Adriana! Go reprimand him more!”

“I’m hungry. Let’s go inside and have dinner.”

“Okay...”

The two of them walked away, hand in hand, looking more like sisters than classmates in every aspect—not just in terms of height, but their whole demeanor as well.

***

After dinner in the Temple for the first time in a while...

“... I know I’m not one to speak, having just gotten back myself, but aren’t you returning to routine too quickly?”

Right after dinner, Ellen had immediately gone off to the training ground and began swinging her practice sword around. Of course, I too had intended to start training right away.

“If you’re going to train, then catch.”

Ellen threw one of the available practice swords at me, and by this time, my reflexes were good enough to catch it.

“It looks like I’m going to get beaten horribly again,” I said with a sigh.

Ellen possessed a tremendous number of talents, so much so that listing them all would be challenging. However, those talents were backed up by countless hours of discipline, by wielding a sword daily.

Kids like Erhi de Raffaeli, who had outstanding talent but did not put in any effort, could not even beat someone like me.

However, Ellen constantly honed her outstanding talents, every second of every day.

She was a genius who also worked hard.

In fact, the sight of Ellen fighting the orc had been unbelievable, even while I was watching it. She’d faced off against the hulking, muscular beast, dodging and deflecting every attack without allowing it to land a single blow.

Witnessing her pull out the spear that had been embedded in that orc’s body and immediately driving it into its eye had been enough to make me doubt my own eyes.

I knew that I would never be able to beat her.

“Here I go.”

“Okay.”

But the very fact that I could spar with someone like her every day for free was already a huge asset.

Clang!

“...”

Of course, being defeated in a single exchange was par for the course.

***

We returned to our usual routine, which consisted of morning training and then swordsmanship training on the training grounds after classes. Thanks to the severe abuse that we sustained on the deserted island, what was usually considered tough training felt almost like heaven in comparison.

The ability to shower whenever I wanted, eat whenever I wanted, and the ever-present availability of drinking water felt like an incredible luxury, making me realize just how amazing these basic amenities were.

Moreover, the training grounds were air-conditioned. Realizing how privileged I was to have such a training environment filled me with a fresh sense of gratitude.

‘Wait, isn’t this that cliché moment...?’

It was like having a moment of realization that your one-room apartment was actually a five-star hotel after experiencing poverty first hand—a sort of mental victory. Funnily enough, the way my supernatural power worked was somewhat like achieving a mental victory, so it seemed like a fitting approach.

Anyway, now that I had gone through the experience of surviving on a deserted island, it was a good thing that my motivation for training had grown even stronger.

Then, on Wednesday...

Vertus called me over unexpectedly, and handed me a sizable pouch.

“... Huh? What’s this?”

“What else? It’s money.”

Inside the red pouch, which seemed to be made of silk, were glittering gold coins.

‘Oh, right.’

“Is this the proceeds from the sale of the jaguar skin?”

‘But isn’t that hide still being processed?’

“Yeah. It’s easier for me to find a buyer than you, right? Consider it sold to me, in advance. I’ll let Mr. Effenhauser know where to send it.”

It seemed Vertus had thought it would be difficult for me to find a buyer for such an expensive skin, and had preemptively found one himself. He appeared to have received an advance payment too.

Honestly, being taken care of to this extent was quite touching. Or perhaps this was his way of compensating me for taking charge and handling various things during the mission.

“Wait... isn’t this quite a lot?”

I remembered hearing that it would be worth about ten gold coins, but judging by the weight of the purse, the number of coins inside far exceeded that.

“To be precise, the buyer is our maternal grandfather, so he paid generously. He said that it’s only right to pay well for the spoils from the first victorious group mission of the Royal Class.”

Vertus’s maternal family was part of the Salerion Ducal House.

Therefore, Vertus’s maternal grandfather would be none other than the Duke of Salerion.

Considering my near-death experience at the hands of knights from the Duke of Salerion, Vertus’s words were somewhat chilling.

For his maternal grandson—or the future emperor—to emerge victorious in his first group mission in the Royal Class meant that the jaguar skin could be seen as proof of his victory over Charlotte. The significance of such a trophy was in the eye of the beholder, and Vertus had sold it to the person willing to pay the most for it.

Though it was somewhat cruel that that person happened to be the leader of the group that once wanted me dead.

“Well, thanks a lot.”

To think I’d end up involved with the Duke of Salerion after escaping from the Demon King’s Castle was beyond my wildest imaginations.

***

I received thirty gold coins for the jaguar skin, equivalent to about thirty million won in value. It felt surreal that something we’d left behind in the jungle had turned into such a significant sum of money. It would have been money lost had Ellen not carried it back, and had Delphine not properly skinned it.

Riana could have had her share of it as well, but since she said she wasn’t interested, I didn’t bother to count her in.

After school, I brought Ellen to the Class B dormitory with me and called Delphine over. Then, I handed them ten gold coins each as their share.

“We made thirty gold coins total, so it’s a third each. Let’s each take ten.”

“Okay.”

“Wow... it sold for that much?”

“It wasn’t me; Vertus sold it on our behalf.”

Delphine seemed incredulous as I pushed the ten gold coins toward her. She hesitated to reach for the money I offered.

“I mean, all I did was skin it clumsily, with my subpar skills... Am I really allowed to take this...?”

She seemed slightly guilty about taking such a large sum of money for what she considered to be a minor contribution.

“If we go by that logic, I’m getting all this money for whacking a shocked beast on the head. What’s the difference between you and me? Just take it.”

If we were discussing who struggled the most, it was Ellen, who had carried it all the way back to camp. Technically, she had worked the hardest.

“I... I guess you’re right...? Thanks, anyway. I should treat the other guys to something nice.”

Delphine seemed to be contemplating what to buy for her classmates with this significant amount of money. Except for Charlotte, most of the kids in Class B were from middle-class backgrounds.

Ellen put the ten gold coins in one of her uniform’s pockets and looked straight at me.

“Let’s go eat something tasty.”

“... You mean something expensive, not just tasty, right? Something we normally can’t afford because it’s too pricey.”

“Yeah.”

... And this kid was thinking about splurging in a different way.

In the end, Ellen and I dined at a high-end restaurant within the Temple, a place frequented only by the descendants of the wealthiest families, and enjoyed a full-course meal.

It was delicious.

The taste was immaculate, but...

“Seriously? In the end, it’s just a restaurant, yet they’re charging one gold coin for a single serving? How does that make any sense?”

I was pretty annoyed by the outrageous amount the bill had come up to.

“It tasted good, though.”

“I get that it was tasty, but it’s not worth the money we paid, right?”

“... Is that so?”

Ellen seemed to think it was okay, since it tasted good.

“The portions could have been bigger,” she continued.

“... A dimensional rift must have opened up in your stomach.”

I was convinced, without any evidence, that there was an already open gate inside this girl’s stomach.

Anyway, since she was still hungry, Ellen ended up buying three hotdogs from a street vendor.

***

I returned to a regular routine of studying and intense training, and nothing much happened other than that. The only notable change was the gradual increase in my physical abilities.

And also...

[Strength 6.2 (D)]

[Agility 6.7 (D)]

[Dexterity 7.7 (D+)]

[Mana 11.3 (B-)]

[Stamina 10.8 (C+)]

[Demon Control D (Unique Ability of Archdemons) (Not usable in the current state.)]

[Self-Deception D]

[Swordsmanship F]

[Overall Ability Evaluation: Low-level Demon King]

[Combat Level Assessment: D+]

Did you see that?

Finally, my Pseudo-Swordsmanship had evolved into Swordsmanship, with a rank of F.

I did it. I’d reached it!

Self-Deception had also ascended to D rank, and therefore, my combat ability had jumped to the D+ rank. It was a whole step up from F+!

“Wow...”

While this progression might have felt insignificant to someone else, to me, it was the fruit of my arduous effort.

“...?”

Ellen looked puzzled when I suddenly sat down on the floor of the training ground, overwhelmed by emotion. She could not understand my behavior. The evolution of my Pseudo-Swordsmanship to true Swordsmanship was at least 90% down to Ellen.

“Thank you! It’s all thanks to you!”

“... Are you okay?”

As I teared up, expressing my utmost gratitude to her, Ellen, suspecting that something might be wrong with me, placed a hand on my forehead to check for a fever. She frowned in confusion at my emotional state.

“I, I could do it. I... I knew I could!” I continued while sniffling.

Every time I checked the status window, it felt disgusting to see that I was just a person with Pseudo-Swordsmanship, so being able to escape from it was an overwhelming joy.

... Of course, it was slightly miserable that, after all these antics, my overall level was still only ranked D+, but that couldn’t be helped.

‘Life is a marathon...’

It meant I had plenty more time to put in the work.

Just realizing the simple fact that I’d have to do this for several years, when not even a single semester had passed yet, suddenly made me feel as though all the energy had drained out of my body.

“... Ah, I want to give up.”

As I oscillated between joy and despair, banging my head in frustration, Ellen simply tuned out my drama and began practicing her swordsmanship alone.

When I thought about it, the fact that others had been defeated by me, someone who had a miserable combat rank of D+, made those guys much more legendary than me.

***

Anyway, time passed, filled with continuous training, without any notable incidents. The occasional slight increase in my stats was my only pleasure.

In the mornings, I trained with Adriana, and after the day’s classes, I did physical training until dinner, followed by swordsmanship training on the training ground after dinner.

But there was a problem...

The morning routine was becoming increasingly daunting.

“Just give it a try, will you? Junior?”

The church noona’s indoctrination was reaching its peak.

The biggest issue was that I owed her too much to get angry at her. I could easily ignore the people spouting “words of wisdom” that I met on the street, but rejecting the same request from someone I was close to without offending them was something I just didn’t know how to do.

“Just once. And if you don’t like it, you don’t have to come back. So, just this once...”

‘Noona, you’re killing me!’

“Argh, fine! I’ll go!” In the end, I succumbed to her persistent proselytizing. “But just this once.”

“Yes, junior! I’m sure you’ll like it too!”

Seeing Adriana beaming with happiness after securing my surrender was, admittedly, a pleasant sight.