Chapter 4

As the cherry blossoms danced in the wind, Misaki opened the old diary and read the words of promise written there.

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Al, who decided to take on the investigation request, spent some time talking with Luella and Kain about their days at intermediate school. Al, who had not made many friends at school and often immersed himself in spell practice during breaks, might have been talking to the two of them for the first time. According to Luella, her friends all said that Al was a weirdo who always muttered to himself.

"That's not mumbling, I was practicing spells."

Al muttered reluctantly. Seeing this, Luella laughed lightly.

"Who would know that? Everyone said you were just bad at talking. So, seeing you talk with your father was quite refreshing."

"Wow, really? I was always so busy trying to memorize spells."

Al sighed regretfully. Next to him, Kain couldn't hold back his laughter.

"How many have you memorized? Not just the magic arrow spell, but can you use illusion spells too? Assuming you know the basic light spell and magic detection spell... four?"

Luella asked excitedly, counting on her fingers. Al, a bit flustered by her approach, counted on his fingers as well.

"Um, I think eight in total."

"Wow, that's impressive. Even the mages hired by your father don't know that many. What can you use? Like a flying spell?"

"No way, those high-level spell books are way out of my budget. I couldn't even afford regular spells. But I wanted to memorize as many as possible during my studies, so I asked my teachers to lend me their books. In the end, two of the other four are from the first tier, and the remaining two are from the third tier, but they're not popular. I can't really tell you what they are, but they're not that great."

Al hurriedly denied. Generally, by the time a student graduates from intermediate school, they usually know the light spell, magic detection spell, and magic arrow spell, and maybe one or two more. Being able to use five more spells was indeed impressive, but it also meant that Al had spent most of his time memorizing spells instead of having a normal student life. In that sense, Luella's friends weren't entirely wrong to call him a weirdo.

As the three were talking, a tall woman with brown skin approached. She was about 180 cm tall, with short, chestnut hair. Her sky-blue eyes were sharp, and she wore leather armor reinforced with metal. A sword over a meter long and a large knife were at her waist, a backpack and a shortbow with a quiver on her back, and a small shield was strapped to her left arm. She looked to be in her late twenties and seemed quite skilled. Luella and Kain, who seemed to know her, saw her and returned to the carriage, promising to meet again in the border city of Lester.

"Are you Alfred? Wow, I imagined you'd be more refined since you went to intermediate school with Lord Nalish, but you look pretty good. I'm Barbara. As you can see, I'm a warrior and also good at scouting. For the investigation, Lord Nalish said Luella's safety is the top priority, so only I can go. Nice to meet you."

She walked up to Al and extended her hand. He shook it lightly.

"Nice to meet you. Call me Al. I mainly do scouting, but I can use a bit of magic. I'll do my best not to be a burden."

He himself, as a student, had little time to spend with regular adventurers, so he was a bit excited about the possibility of gaining good experience this time.

"Wow, really? I heard you killed the leader of the thieves. Are you used to killing?"

"Killing... I have completed a request to eliminate thieves."

Al remembered the leader of the thieves, who had fallen with blood gushing from his neck. Barbara might have been intentionally provocative. He shook his head slightly and replied. She looked at him thoughtfully, then shrugged and smiled.

"Hehe, not bad. Okay, I'm sorry for testing you. I'll call you Al. To be able to take down an opponent with a single spell at your young age is impressive. I think it's more than just a little. Sorry for keeping you waiting, but it looks like it's going to rain, so let's get going. I hope we can catch up to them before it gets dark."

The two decided to move to the place where Al and Nalish had fought the thieves to check the footprints and determine the number of people and the direction they had fled. The thieves seemed to have had no time to camouflage themselves, leaving traces everywhere.

She seemed curious about the way he fought and asked him in detail how he had noticed the thieves and how he had used magic to cut their throats. She said she was a warrior but seemed to know a bit about magic, and what Al had done seemed impossible to her.

"Can you really aim the magic arrow spell at a vital point? I've never seen or heard of such a thing."

She was puzzled. The magic arrow spell, when mastered, can increase in range and the number of arrows that can be fired simultaneously, but it was not thought to be capable of such precision.

"It's hard to believe, but it's actually possible. The spell book for the magic arrow spell says to aim at the target, extend your palm, and visualize a line connecting to the target. The part about where to aim is vague. When learning this spell, you're told to strongly imagine a line connecting to the center of the target. Everyone takes this at face value and doesn't question it."

Al smiled mischievously, as if he were a mischievous child.

"The first thing I noticed was thanks to the light spell. When I was a child, my grandfather often showed me the light spell because I begged to see magic. I noticed that his light spell was brighter than others. Did you know that?"

Al looked at Barbara, who tilted her head. The light spell is just a light spell, she seemed to be thinking. But Al continued. According to his explanation, the difference in the brightness of the light spell depends on how the symbol image of the sun's light in the spell book is interpreted. His grandfather was from the northern part of a different kingdom, where there is a lot of snow. The impression of the sun's light is completely different there.

"The sun's light is warm and gentle."

His grandfather, born in the north, explained. To him, the sun's light was an indispensable and irreplaceable thing that nurtures and raises life. The impression was different from those who grew up in the south. This difference in impression changes the strength of the light in the light spell. He realized that the inspiration for the spell and the interpretation of the symbol image could change many things, and by consciously changing it, he could change the brightness. That's what he explained.

He seemed to be very fond of magic, and his talk didn't stop. The content was too detailed for Barbara to fully understand, but what he was doing sounded quite revolutionary.

"Wow... Is that really how it works? I see... But if you can do that, it should be more of a topic."

"That's the thing. I've explained this to acquaintances, but no one can do it. The reason is unclear. I think it's because they have a fixed idea when learning magic from the spell book, but there's no way to test it. I've asked my former elementary school teacher to try it with students who are about to learn magic, but it hasn't worked yet."

"Hmm, it would be convenient if it worked... Oh, it looks like they took a break here."

The two stopped and examined the traces. Some had sat on the ground, and there were bloodstains in some places.

"They seem to have split into two groups. Eight and five, maybe."

Al muttered, and Barbara nodded.

"I think so too. They must have escaped this far, treated their wounds, and discussed what to do next. It looks like four or five went northwest and the rest went northeast. They seem to have been in a hurry, so they might have split up. It's a tricky split, but we have to follow the larger group."

The two looked alternately at the northwest and northeast, nodding in agreement.

Thank you for reading.

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2023.1.10 The name was wrong. Border City Rain → Border City Lester

2023.4.14 Added line breaks and restructured the text. I made significant changes to Al's continuous speech, but I didn't change the intent or content.