Chapter 40
Otoko Aruji - Chapter 40: Reflection13 more chapters in volume 1...
Year 7438, Month 4, Day 28, Afternoon
Now then, after being thrown out of old woman Shaymi"s house I sluggishly walk along while worry about how to convince the old woman. I"ll try organizing things a
bit.
1. In order to use magic there"s no need to use an incantation.
2. In that case, it"s possible to activate the magic in instant if you"re used to it.
3. However, it requires concentration and if your concentration is interrupted before it activates the magic fails.
(Even if it only takes an instant it"s still not zero so concentration is an absolute requirement)
4. If you use magic with an incantation then the magic won"t activate until the chant is completed.
5. The amount of concentration required is decreased by using the incantation. (it becomes semi-automatic)
6. Incantations are different by magic and by person and it"s necessary to search for words that you"re compatible with.
I"ll add just a bit to that. The instant that I mentioned in 2. is different based on the magic. If the number of different types of magic that is required or the
level of magic required is low then it can quite literally be done in an instant.. even at longest around 1 second.. but, in the case that it requires a high level
of magic or a number of different elemental magics then while you can"t call it an instant, it takes around 2-3 seconds. In the case that you"re not used to it then
it can take more than a minute or depending on the situation maybe even several 10s of minutes, so compared to that it could still be considered an instant.
And next is 3. the concentration but this is quite literally concentrating your mind. It requires an extreme level of concentration to knead the mana and use the
magic you"ve decided on. Honestly speaking, it"s just right to say that you can"t do anything else at all until completion after you"ve decided on the image of the
magic you want to use and start working in your mana. If it"s a magic that you"re very used to then you can finally move your body a bit at best. That"s why if
you"re disturbed or unable to focus because of a distraction then you can"t start kneading the mana in the first place. Obviously you wouldn"t be able to use a
different magic after you"ve started using and are maintaining one magic.
The problem is after all 6. This alone is something that I don"t think you can do just at random. It was a bit too thoughtless to so casually say I was injuring
myself in front of the old woman. No matter what the reason you"d normally realize that it wouldn"t be thought well of for a child to injure them-self. I wonder what
I did something as stupid as that. Well, I guess greeting it can"t be helped. Rather than regretting something I"ve already done it"s more healthy to think about how
I can make use of it from here on out.
Next is the objective for why I want to be able to recite the incantation for healing magic. Why is an incantation necessary? There"s only one answer for this.
It"s because I can"t deny the possibility that I won"t be able to concentrate enough to use magic from the pain or shock if I were to be heavily injured.
Just that. It"s not like by reciting a chant that you don"t need to concentrate on the magic. It just reduces the amount of concentration on the
magic you need to
do. It just makes the kneading of mana into the magic being used semi-automatic through the incantation. In other words as long as you can maintain your
concentration in any situation then you don"t need an incantation. There"s no merit other than reducing the amount of concentration required after all. That"s why I
practiced so I could heal my arms and legs even if they were cut off in battle. I have enough confidence in this from how much I practiced that I could probably do
it during battle or any situation.
Although, I didn"t have the courage to injure my body or any important organs even if it was for the sake of training and I didn"t have the confidence that I could
concentrate while enduring the pain from a sudden injury to my body. I"m sure if I spent enough time on it I could probably use healing magic even on a serious
injury to my body. But, I just want to practice it because I think it would take some time and I don"t think I would be able to do it during combat. It"s a matter of
whether you can calmly use magic enough for it to have an effect while dealing with the fear of death from bleeding or shock from taking a lot of damage to your body
which has many important internal organs...
There"s no way I could be confident. However, if you were to say that then it would be equally difficult to recite an incantation in that situation. If blood were to
come up your organs or esophagus then you wouldn"t be able to accurately p.r.o.nounce it so the incantation would really be meaningless. It"s not just a matter of
properly p.r.o.nouncing the words after all just like Sharl said if you"re in a situation where you can"t speak then it can"t be used at all.
Hmm, I guess it can"t be helped for now.. Just like I thought of just now if it was an injury to my digestive tract organs, esophagus, or lungs and I spit up blood
then there"s no way to recite an incantation after all... But you know... The body has a lot of area so it"s easy to become a target and get injured but if you were
to use your arms and legs for defense then you won"t easily take an injury I guess... No wait, I should a.s.sume the worst situation possible...
However, if I think about it normally I can"t argue against what old woman Shaymi was saying at all. If a 10 year old brat were to say something to me like, "I"m
stabbing myself in the stomach so I can practice healing a serious injury to my body" and I was in old woman Shaymi"s position I"d certainly say, "What are you
doing, you idiot!". If there was someone who actually accepted it and said "Alright, you"re sure enthusiastic about your training. I"ll teach you." then I can only
think of them as madman. Is there no other option than to wait until I get big older then ask to teach me again? In the first place, I"m starting to lament training
nothing but healing lately.
For example I could have tried asking her to teach me because I want to try using attack magic while defending or running at the same time... I wonder why I said
that sort of thing. Normally I"m always thinking about what kind of reaction they"ll have to what I say but this time I didn"t think about it all. Is this a result
of my mentality being pulled along by the age of my body as well? No wait, even if that was the case if I don"t think of it as just me being an idiot then I might
repeat the same mistake again. Good things are thanks to others, bad things are my own fault. If I don"t think like this then I won"t grow.
I"m thinking about such helpless things with my shoulders drooped while returning from the center of the village where old woman Shaymi"s house is.
It becomes noon and Mill wakes up so we eat the lunch that maid Sonia made and then us siblings go to train with the sword. Even if I say go we train right outside
of our house so we arrive right away. We have some matches using wooden swords with the children of squires who didn"t go on the campaign and then move on to
production of rubber. Since I"m already used to the totality of it I can just flow right through each process of rubber production. I absentmindedly watch the
process until night and return home to eat the dinner that was made.
Somehow I don"t feel satisfied so I think I"ll go hunting tonight... If I go hunting alone at night then my feelings should be resolved a bit. And the means of
taking on that Horned Bear isn"t something like healing magic but should be leveling up. Almost as if using magic when the Horned Bear uses Roar it leaves itself
wide open. If I aim for that time then I can do plenty of damage with a spear or sword or even use magic.
After confirming that Mill is asleep I sneak out the same as usual. I hold my bayonet while making sure not to be found by anyone as I go to the edge of the village
and think about where to hunt, but for now I need to quickly level up so I should go to the spot with the highest monster count that gives a lot of experience points
to level as soon as possible.
If I were to go to the northwest from the northern area of the village then I should be able to go to the area with slimes but that"s where I was once attacked by
the Horned Bear. Other than the Horned Bear, Slimes are the next highest experience monster around here so if possible I"d like to hunt them but somehow I haven"t
been able to bring myself to go there since. Since I haven"t seen the Horned Bear at night even once until now I don"t think the Horned Bear is nocturnal but after
all that place is pretty far away.
It can"t be helped I"ll go East from the village. It"s easy for groups of Goblins to appear around the East side of the village. Other than that there"s also the
nocturnal monsters Large Bat and Giant Rat. Depending on the situation you can even find a Hobgoblin which gives a much better amount of experience than Goblins. I
can only hope for some Hobgoblins.
After walking for about an hour and a half from the village I was able to find a group of monsters. Just as I hoped for it"s a Hobgoblin. I slowly use the Identify,
which I"ve been using for scouting, on the biggest one in the group.
【Male/17/5/7428 ・ Hobgoblin ・ Bazu Tribe】
【Condition: Good】
【Age： 9 Years Old】
【Level： 4】
【HP： 70(70) MP： 2(2)】
【Strength： 12】
【Speed： 13】
【Dexterity： 5】
【Endurance： 10】
【Special Skill： Infrared Vision】
There"s 12 of them like with stats like that there. It seems they"re eating something at a campfire. They have lookouts in four spots and the remaining eight are
surrounding the campfire. What a good harvest this is. It"s a group that I"ll probably get 7,000 or 8,000 experience from killing off. I"m getting excited since it"s
the first time I"ve seen a group as large as this. Oh, I need to calm down precisely at these sort of moments.
Hobgoblins normally form groups of a few at a time and I"ve only ever defeated one up until now. If you manage to make even a bit of an injury to one of them in the
group then they"ll start to withdraw while protecting them after all. Even though I"ve seen them a number of times while gathering rubber since we"re always in
groups of five or more they don"t attack so I don"t have much experience fighting them. They look similar to Goblins but their bodies are 150% larger and more
compact and they"re almost like a slightly small human. However, they"re more than just a couple times stronger than Goblins, they are a considerably strong monster.
Furthermore, their special skill infrared vision can see around 2-30m or so. I confirmed it with the elves and dwarves in the village who have the same special skill
so there"s no mistake. Ah, just in case I"ll try Identifying it.
【Special Skill： Infrared Vision
Vision that can perceive infrared rays of up to 3m per level in distance. In order to switch vision to this mode you have to consciously try to use this ability. After
switching to the mode all things seen will have their colors changed based on the amount of infrared rays they"re emitting. Things that don"t give off little or no
infrared rays will be seen as black and the more infrared rays they give off they"ll turn red. And if there"s something which gives off even more infrared rays seen
then it can go beyond that into even white. Depending on the situation this vision can be seen even if there"s a wall in between the target. It"s not like the
infrared rays are being seen directly from the eyes so if there"s a large object nearby giving off infrared rays vision can completely turn black or white and make it
ineffective.】
Yeah, it"s the same after all. It seems there"s no need to worry.
Since there"s a campfire nearby they don"t seem like that much of a threat and their field of vision is short. It"s a considerably useful skill inside of a building
with no light but if there"s distance then it"s the same as if it they didn"t have it.
In reality I want to try taking them on one at a time with close combat for training but if I were to take them one 1v2 it would probably be unfavorable for me. And
I didn"t come today for training but to gain experience points. I"ll get rid of the lookouts as quietly as possible then either bury the entire group or freeze them
I guess... It"s not like I can"t not wipe them all out at once including the lookouts but there"s a considerable distance between the lookouts on each edge so the
amount of MP it would use is a bit inefficient. It should be fine if I take out one or two of the lookouts first.
I think about that while cautiously approaching just within the 200m viable range of magic and set my aim with Ice Javelin Missile on the lookouts. I"ve obviously taken into consideration the light given off when using magic and I"m wearing a rubber glove on my left hand when I use magic. It"s not like it doesn"t give off any light at all but still far better than not doing anything at all.
I make the lookouts outline more prominent by using Identify and wait for the moment it turns to a different direction to fire off the spear and finish off the first lookout. I then approach the next lookout and finish it off the same way. The lookout died instantly after taking an ice spear to the side of its head. There wasn"t much of a sound at all but there should have been a sound of the lookout falling. However, there"s no sign the hobgoblins have noticed that half of the lookouts have already been killed.
It seems like they"re talking about something in a loud voice while focusing on their meal. Alright, since this is the case it seems I can finish off the rest of the lookouts as well. I take a bit of a detour around the campfire and finish off the third lookout with ease.
It should be fine already. I"ll bury them all with enough dirt to swallow up the remaining lookout as well...
I wait 20 minutes after burying them and after I"ve confirmed they all suffocated to death I use "Anti-Magic Field" to erase the dirt. Using "Anti-Magic Field" across a wide area uses a considerably amount of MP. With this I only have a couple hundred MP remaining for today so after this I"ll just collect the magic stones and... it"s already a pain. Even if I ignore the corpses in this area I"m sure some other beast or monster will eat them for me and if that happens monsters might gather together so I could some more experience right? Let"s just ignore them.
No wait, it would be bad if some weird monster were to come. Even if it"s a pain it"s better if I clean up the corpses, it can"t be helped. I guess I"ll do it.
I quickly got to stabbing the pitiful Hobgoblins in the chest and removing their magic stones then gathered them near the campfire and used "Flamethrower" burn them. I use it like a flame thrower like Sharl did but raise the temperature to about 1000 degrees. I can spend as much time as needed so if I raise the temperature up enough they"ll quickly turn to ash.
I"ll return home for today and prepare for tomorrow. It"ll be fine if I talk to old woman Shaymi again tomorrow. I"m sure I"ll be able to take care of it.
Author"s Note: Shaymi"s stats.
【Hannah.Shaymi /20/9/7386 ・ Hannah.Ozgarl /14/6/7368 】
【Female/12/1/7367 ・Human ・Free Person】
【Status： Normal】
【Age： 71 Years Old】
【Level： 11】
【HP： 39(39) MP： 45(45) 】
【Strength： 6】
【Speed： 10】
【Dexterity： 16】
【Endurance： 7】
【Special Ability：Earth Magic(Lv.5)】
【Special Ability：Water Magic(Lv.5)】
【Special Ability：Fire Magic(Lv.4)】
【Special Ability: Void Magic(Lv.5)】
【Experience：182456(210000)】