Chapter 59

*Thump!*

*Thump!*

The sound of something large and thick banging on the door reverberated in my ears as I sat on the bed, fiddling with my guitar.

Someone might find the knock rude, but when I remember who’s beyond that door… those thoughts vanish entirely.

This is probably the most polite and gentle knock he can manage.

“Come in.”

I set the guitar aside and slowly rose from the bed, approaching the table where my teacup sat.

A head, one that could be crushed like tofu by a monstrous fist, followed soon after, as the colossal arm gripped the doorknob and swung the door inward.

A massive, hulking back stooped slightly to clear the small doorway before straightening. The fabric of the uniform strained and whispered in protest against the immense movement of his spine.

He wore white cotton gloves, a poor attempt to conceal the fact that his arm was prosthetic, but the occasional glint of reflected light peeking between glove and collar stole my attention regardless.

“Loyal,” Rex greeted, with the precise salute he always offered.

“You’re wearing a uniform?” I blurted, the question my immediate reaction in place of a proper greeting. Rex remained frozen in his salute as he answered.

“Well, yes. This isn’t a battlefield, after all.”

Rex’s expression seemed strangely awkward. Two thoughts flashed through my mind in rapid succession.

The first was a perfectly logical observation: Shouldn’t you wear *more* clothing on a battlefield?

The second was an utterly disrespectful thought: ‘An orc…in uniform?’

…Is this some kind of hipster thing?

The intricate dwarven engineering of his prosthetic arm, already clashing jarringly with his raw, untamed muscles, had given Rex a considerable hipster quotient. Adding a gaudy, medieval-esque military uniform only pushed him past some kind of critical mass.

An orc.

A race that usually went shirtless, huge weapons strapped to their backs, constantly chanting about honor and *more* honor.

A race that wouldn’t bat an eye at being splattered with blood and gore, and if they wore clothes at all, they were just pieces of leather protecting the essentials; the epitome of raw, wild exposure.

And now, this orc was standing before me, covered in a massive uniform laden with medals and pointless decorations, saluting. With a mechanical arm, no less.

“…Loyal,” I mumbled, suppressing the tidal wave of impolite questions churning within me, and returned a clumsy salute to release him from his stance.

“Please, have a seat.”

I guided Rex to the oak chair I had prepared for him in advance. It was twice the size of a human’s, allowing Rex to settle in comfortably and lift his teacup.

…Now that I see it, I should have prepared a teacup more suitable for an orc’s size. Even though it was a large cup, half the size of my face, it looked no bigger than an espresso cup in Rex’s hand.

“How is your back wound?”

“It has improved to the point where I could go straight into battle. Thanks to the skilled priests,”

Rex flexed the brawny muscles of his arm hidden beneath his uniform, as if there were no aftereffects whatsoever.

…I know it’s impossible, but looking at such massive arm muscles up close, I can’t shake the thought that this orc could crush my head like tofu at any moment.

“How is the new artifact? Do you like it?”

“…It is versatile to an almost excessive degree. At first, I found it quite difficult to handle, but fortunately, once I got the hang of it, I adapted quickly.”

Rex patted his chest beneath his uniform as he explained.

I’m still clumsy with handling red crystals, but for Rex, a born warrior, it seems to be nothing.

“That’s good to hear, I’m glad you like it.”

“There is one strange thing, though. I feel a slight, but intense, hunger. My food intake has increased to about three times my usual amount. At first, I thought my body temporarily needed a lot of food to recover from the injury, but even after my body fully recovered, my food intake hasn’t decreased.”

“Powerful artifacts are bound to have repercussions commensurate with their effects. But… there is nothing to worry about. Just eat well, and there will be no problem.”

One of the many advantages of the artifact Rex obtained is that the cost is ridiculously low compared to its power.

There are so many artifacts with absurd prices, such as paying with one’s lifespan, or losing one’s hearing. Increased food intake is more than bearable.

“…Forgive me for saying so, but I don’t think it’s that simple. There are times on the battlefield when supplies don’t arrive on time. Enduring for a long time with little food is one of the important virtues of a warrior.”

Rex refuted my optimistic attitude with a serious expression.

“Well… I suppose that’s true.”

Rex was certainly not wrong. This world is not a game where you can take out bread that will never rot from an infinitely large inventory and eat it at any time.

…He’s not wrong, but was it really necessary to say it so seriously?

That orc, he’s too serious, I tell you.

“Ahem, well. Let’s move on to the main point, shall we? I am aware that due to my own inexperience, I must always travel with Alter and Lir, am I not?”

“You are.”

“There are three mages to protect. Even for Rex, wouldn’t guarding all three be rather difficult? It would be preferable to have at least one more vanguard, one worthy of Valerand’s caliber.”

With only Rex, the party’s balance is off. With three mages, and only one vanguard, the chances of being unable to cope with sudden ambushes or unforeseen variables are simply too high.

They needed more vanguards to compensate for the mages’ meager agility and survival skills.

To form an ideal party, they should even include a ranger or assassin with exceptional scouting abilities…

“What about Trian? Lir seems to be very shy, and using a familiar face would be less of a burden for her, wouldn’t it?”

“His guiding skills are good, but his combat prowess is lacking.”

He felt sorry for Trian, but coldly speaking, his abilities weren’t quite up to par to hold his own in Valerand.

He seemed to struggle even with piercing the hides of the spider monsters in the Akiliptus Forest.

Of course, his excellent guiding skills and observation, based on his vast elven experience, had to be acknowledged, but if the arrows he fired couldn’t harm the enemies, they would be of little use on this battlefield.

“Furthermore, the manpower we need this time isn’t scouts. As Rex knows, we have three mages. We desperately need infantry to protect these mages.”

“Speaking of infantry, I know someone with talent.”

“Is he skilled enough to be effective in Valerand?”

“His current skills are, of course, outstanding, and his potential is overflowing.”

“Then please, bring him. We need people who can protect us in moments of crisis.”

* * *

The week passed at a speed incomparable to normal.

Lir and I took over one of the many empty rooms in the castle and continued to train every day to survive the dangerous battlefield.

In my case, I focused on cultivating my sixth sense to manipulate the crimson crystal with freedom, while Lir poured herself into casting spells with unprecedented speed and agility.

“V-Very pleased to meet you! Commander of the Continental Union’s First Training Facility…”

Once Alter’s training concluded, Lir and I received basic military training from a specially invited instructor… no, the training facility commander.

Up until now, we somehow managed to mask our clumsy movements with only Lir’s and my talents on the battlefield. But the battles ahead wouldn’t be places where one could survive on magical talent alone.

“C-Considering trench warfare is expected to be the primary mode of combat! We’ll be running an intensive course on trench warfare within a week, and we’ll conduct training with the goal of completing it perfectly with a soldier’s spirit, though perhaps…”

The commander seemed quite burdened by the fact that he had to conduct basic military training for a general.

“What mages need to do in trench warfare is…”

Unlike Alter’s magic lessons, the commander’s training wasn’t properly sinking into my mind.

Thanks to the bizarrely high stat of 20 in mana, learning magic wasn’t all that difficult, but military training was a completely different realm from magic, I suppose.

I wasn’t particularly expecting anything anyway.

Ever since waking up in this body, apart from the realm of magic, I had never once felt that my intelligence had become particularly heightened.

“W-We originally should proceed with physical training afterwards, but due to time constraints, we will skip it!”

…Thanks to the commander’s considerate curriculum and his admirable soldier’s spirit to complete his mission no matter what, Lir and I were able to learn to some extent the basic movements and the positions that a mage should maintain in combat situations.

We had only *learned* it, but not fully internalized it… but it would be a hundred times better than being thrown onto the battlefield without knowing anything.

“Sir!”

On the morning of the day we were departing after finishing our hurried preparations, Rex greeted me at the main gate of the castle with a booming salute.

Behind him stood a male warrior with a large sword, as big as his own body, strapped to his waist.

“Sir! Private First Class, Ad, reporting for duty as General Bean’s escort as of this moment!”

It was such a cheerful greeting that it made me doubt whether this was really the proper attitude of a private first class towards a general.

…A private first class?

“How long have you been enlisted?”

“I just finished basic training yesterday!”

The moment I heard Aed’s words, I couldn’t help but look at Rex with a face demanding explanation.

“Aed comes with a proven reputation as an adventurer. A wanderer who single-handedly defended isolated villages from Variants, a man brimming with justice. He’s probably even more skilled than me, technically.”

“I was surprised when the offer came. To be the bodyguard of the genius mage who’s been making waves across the continent, isn’t that a chance to become a hero? There’s no reason to pass that up. So, I joined the military right away, just like Rex suggested!”

“…He does talk a bit much, but his skills are undeniable.”

“I breezed through the two-month basic training course in just three days, and the drill sergeant told me it was the third-best record ever! The General will soon have no choice but to acknowledge my abilities!”

Maybe it’s because he hasn’t even been in the army for a week, but Aed’s tone wasn’t that of a soldier.

“My goal is to become a hero! Please take good care of me, General!”

…To blurt out such a cringe-worthy opening line as ‘My future ambition is to be a hero’ right from the first greeting, with such gusto.

My eyes and ears refused to believe it.

“…Well. Yes, dismissed.”

Aed seemed awkward returning to attention after his salute, hesitating before slapping his hand against his thigh.

…Would it be too much to say to a guy who hasn’t even been in the army for a week, ‘This one needs to go back to basic drills, right from the start?’

“Well then, I look forward to working with you!”

Watching him, the thought popped into my head that he was a character designed for a video game that would be loved by the 80’s Japanese game directors.

Yeah, Aed wasn’t a person, he was like a character.

To utter such corny words so casually during our first meeting, it was hard to believe he was a living, breathing human like me.

The sword strapped to his back was a massive greatsword, the size of a human torso, and his hair spiked out like a chestnut burr, the very embodiment of a generic 80’s ‘Hero.’

Looking at this guy quietly made me realize, once again, what kind of world I’d been dragged into.

Medieval fantasy.

A narrow, consistent world devoid of diversity or originality.

As if one’s profession were decided at birth, most orcs become barbarians, elves become rangers, dwarves become blacksmiths.

I despise this world.