Short Course
After completing the procedures for the short course at the reception desk, we immediately moved to the training area .
Weapons training is taught by the guild staff or skilled adventurers who are commissioned by the Guild, and this time there seemed to be two guild staff teaching us .
âWe are free at the moment, so let us join . â
âI can teach you how to handle swords . â
Evan and Scott were not taking any more requests today, so they decided to join us as instructors for free since they had time to spare .
âYou want to learn all the weapons, right?â
âUh, itâs just me who wants to learn all of them . â
âIs that so? Well, where should we start then...â
The Guildâs practice weapons were prepared and the short course was about to begin... but we soon got stuck . This is because the teaching methods were different for the Black Cats, who were amateurs, and us, who had a set fighting style and wanted to learn about weapons as preliminary knowledge .
âHow about letting the children decide on their weapons first? As expected, they canât afford to mess around like we do . â
âItâs certainly true that rookies like them should avoid doing this and that and focus on practicing with one weapon at a time . â
âI thought soââKane-kun, you guys should consider the composition of your party first and then decide on the weapons you want to use . â
âââââYes!âââââ
The first thing to do is to decide which weapons the Black Cats should use .
The five of them were seriously thinking about it as they tried holding the practice weapons that were prepared for them .
âTakumi-san, we have decided!â
I donât know if they had weapons they wanted to use or if they were already using them, but they made their choice immediately .
Kane-kun and Keith-kun chose swords, Terry-kun chose a spear, Nina-chan chose a bow and a dagger, and Fiona-chan chose a dagger and throwing knives . It seems that they received a bit of advice from the staff, but they came together quite nicely .
But the weapon you want to use and the weapon that is right for you donât always match together, so they may have to make some changes after they actually wield the weapons .
âThen, Scott and I will teach you the sword . â
Evan-san handles a large sword as tall as he is, and Scott-san uses a regular sword, so they are going to teach us how to use swords, including Kane-kun and Keith-kun .
One of the staff membersââRick-san, is in charge of spears and will take care of Terry-kun, while the other staff member, Moran-san, is in charge of bows and throwing knives and will take care of Nina-chan and Fiona-chan .
âAs for me, letâs see~ Iâm going to mix things with a spear . â
Whether I can handle it well or not aside, I have already acquired the Swordsmanship skill, so I guess I will try to learn the skill of a different weapon .
âEvan-san, Scott-san, can Allen and Elena join us?â
Iâm not sure how long itâs going to take for Allen and Elena to learn how to use a sword, but Iâm sure they will learn how to handle one properly .
â... Well, we will be learning basics like sword stance at first, so I donât mind . â
ââYay~!ââ
âAllen, Elena, you guys listen well to what these two say, okay?â
ââYeah!ââ
Knowing that they can learn to use swords too, Allen and Elena joyfully took out their swords from their pouches .
âOi, Takumi! You are letting your kids carry such fine swords!?â
Then Evan-san shouted, surprised that the kids had their own swords .
âFine swords...? They are bladeless swords, you know?â
The swords look reasonable, but they are swords that were made for practice by an apprentice blacksmith . They are not very good, according to the master blacksmith, because they have been re-hammered many times .
âThey are proper swords, even if they have no blade! Itâs much better than the ones that adventurers with no money have! You canât just buy something like that for kids!â
âI didnât buy it... my children earn enough to buy those swords with the money they earned themselves, you know?â
ââHah?ââ
It was not just Evan-san, but Scott-san as well, who sounded dumbfounded .
If we were to strictly divide the earnings, the children might be earning more than me . The kids are the ones who kill most of the monsters and find all kinds of rare medicinal herbs, after all .
âNono, I told you that the twins are D-rankers, right? D-rank adventurers would have reasonably good weapons already, right? Itâs the same . â
âThat is... true?â
â... I guess . â
Although the two still had some doubts, they seemed convinced and the short course begain . First, they taught us how to hold the swords properly, the manner of swinging, and then a series of flowing movements .
âYou seem to have gotten the gist of it, Takumi . â
âYou think so? Iâm glad to hear that . â
By the time lunchtime came and we took a break, I had acquired the Spear Technique skill . Itâs all thanks to Rick-san .
âNow then, what should we do for lunch?â
âWhy are you asking, are you not coming to the Guildâs cafeteria?â
âOh, come to think of it, there was such a place . â
The Adventurerâs Guild has a cafeteria, or rather a tavern, attached to it . I often see adventurers drinking after work, but we almost never use it, so I forgot about it .
âAllen, Elena, are you fine with the cafeteria?â
ââYeah, Iâm hungry~ââ
Allen and Elena seemed to be starving after a lot of sword practice . Both of them were rubbing their stomachs .
âI would like to say that itâs fine to eat a lot, but we continue the practice in the afternoon, so donât overeat too much . â
ââOkay~ââ
âCome on, you guys come too . â
âNo, well...ân/o/vel/b//in dot c//om
When I was about to leave the training area, I called out to Kane-kun and the others because they were not moving . However, Kane-kun and his friends were timidly standing in place .
âThey are in a period where itâs hard to pay for lunch . â
âIs that so?â
âIndeed . When we were like them, the most we could earn on a daily basis was a small deposit for the lodging fee . You have to save up to buy weapons, so itâs not unusual for the rookies to not be able to eat three meals a day . â
Evan-san and Scott-san told me why Kane-kun and the others are not moving .
I didnât know that rookie adventurers had to live on such a tight budget .
âItâs fine so just come with us . I told you I will help you out, right? I will treat you, no need to hesitate . â
âBut... umm...â
âWe hungry~â
âQuickly come~â
Urged by the hungry Allen and Elena, Kane-kun and others finally moved .
Itâs not that they are reserved, itâs that they donât know what to do, Iâm sure of it .
âOh, I will treat you too, Evan-san, Scott-san . Eat to your heartâs content, but please donât drink, we have to learn from you in the afternoon too, after all . â
âAre you sure? Evan eats a lot . â
âDoes he eat that much even though heâs this slender? Rather, now Iâm curious to see just how much he eats, can I ask you to eat until you are full, Evan-san?â
âHohou, are you challenging me?â
âCan you eat about one large silver coin of food?â
âThatâs too much even for me . â
Evan-san gave up quickly .
Well, if you had five large copper coins, which is 50G, you could eat a set meal at a cheap place . When it comes to a large silver coin, which is 1000G, that would be roughly 20 meals by a simple calculation .
Even if he eats a lot, it seems that itâs not this much .
âHeh~ itâs quite crowded here . â
I had assumed that the cafeteria would be empty at noon, since many people go out to complete requests during the daytime, but the cafeteria was quite crowded . And I could also see a few people here and there drinking something that looked like alcohol .
âWhat do you want to eat Allen, Elena?â
ââN~ you see...â
The menu at the cafeteria was sold as follows: Choose a main dish and get soup and bread with it . And the main dish, the most important one, was almost always a steak .
However, there was a wide variety of meats, from cheap ones like Wolf and Horn Rabbit to more expensive ones like Orc and Rockbird meat .
ââThis~ââ
âBlack Sheep, huh . Thatâs meat we have never eaten before . â
ââYea!ââ
âLetâs go with this then . ââWhat would you guys like to eat?â
âErm...â
I decided on the same meal as the twins and asked Kane-kun and his friends which one they wanted, but all five of them were too shy to order .
âI will choose myself then . Alright, letâs all have the same thing . â
âââââEhh!âââââ
Black Sheep meat is cheaper than Orc meat, but itâs probably in the expensive variety for Kane-kun and others . And so, though they looked flustered, they didnât complain .
And I ordered Evan-san and Scott-san Orc and Rockbird meat instead, as the short course fee .