Eccentric Blacksmith

「──Thrust ──!」

The impact of the Battle Skill that was thrust out from my knife gouged the log that was one meter ahead.

Battle Skill was a monosyllabic non-elemental magic. It was like a special move for close quarter combat occupation that was activated through weapon as the medium. Magic power was consumed by its usage and with that you could unleash an attack with power that was several times the normal attack.

However, in exchange of being easily usable, there was limitation in its usage. The higher the skill’s level was, the more it would consume magic power and the harder it was to handle. And then there would be a slight lag time to the body right after you unleashed the Battle Skill. Magic particle would also pile up in the muscles which felt like heat. If you forcefully used your muscles while the heat hadn’t cooled down, you would injure your muscles. The injured muscles could recover using Heal, but the pain wouldn’t recede immediately, and it seemed that if you forcefully kept using Heal, you wouldn’t be able to lift your arm for several days.

The rank 1 Battle Skill of short sword skill was Thrust. It was used by thrusting a knife with one hand, then the impact would be fired to the front with double the power. The range would depend on the user’s technique. It could reach further than one meter, which compensated for the weaknesses of short sword which was its low power and short reach. This Battle Skill was really useful.

I didn’t have deep knowledge about Battle Skill so I thought that perhaps it would be difficult to learn it, but Viro taught me the form and showed me an example. After that I became able to use it without the scheduled one hour had even passed.

Thrust was a “magic” that only launched non elemental magic power in the shape of blade. I kept in mind that it wasn’t a sorcery but magic, and in order to reproduce the flow of magic particles that Viro showed me, I used the image of extending the blade instead of firing magic power. My experiences of learning all the daily life magic although crudely helped with this. But I believed that it would take longer for me to learn the Battle Skill if I hadn’t learned magic power control.

*Clap clap clap…….*

「Very good Aria-san. That was a wonderful display of Battle Skill. With that I welcome you as a rank 1 adventurer of the adventurer guild.」

The receptionist who also acted as my examiner sent me an applause before handing me the tag that was already finished. It seemed that originally I would have to wait for a while to get this after the examination was over, but it seemed that she had created this first because I could become an adventurer already with no problem due to my capability to use light sorcery. The receptionist smiled kindly and handed the tag to me. Then her gaze changed completely into a stern gaze that was directed to the man behind me.

「Viro-san, the total amount of fee for the training ground usage and registration are two silver coins. Please pay them fully okay?」

「Your attitude to Aria and me is too different-!」

「Don’t you think it’s only natural for someone’s attitude to change between a young and cute child and an uncle?」

「Shit-, I can’t argue against that-!」

……Was that alright? Well, I’d just consider it as them having good relationship.

「Aria, let’s move on to the next.」

「Yes.」

Viro walked with loud footsteps to display his dissatisfaction. I also followed behind him and left the adventurer guild. When I glanced back, the receptionist noticed me and waved her hand.

Come to think of it, in that woman’s “knowledge”, it seemed there was a tradition of an event where beginner adventurer would definitely got into a quarrel with bad natured adventurer, but thanks to Viro coming with me, it seemed that kind of event was getting postponed for a bit.

.

For now I walked while thinking back on the “work” that Viro was going to make me do. In his plan, he was going to make the kid he picked to do several short-term errands. From there if he judged the kid to be useful, Viro would personally trained them in combat, and then if he thought that the kid could be trusted, only then he would introduce them to his client where the kid would be given the work.

Just like how I didn’t trust Viro fully, he too still hadn’t evaluated me completely. And so he still wouldn’t tell me who was his client and what kind of work I was going to do there.

But……was it possible that his client was a noble?

As expected I didn’t think that a noble would give a work to a child and a street urchin on top of that, but even if it was really a noble, the current me had grown up slightly taller, so I didn’t think that I would immediately get found out as the child who vanished from the orphanage.

Besides, there was a slight change in my mental state that was on guard against noble. The current me wanted to become strong in order to live, but seeing Feld and Viro, I realized that being strong would also make me quite conspicuous. Perhaps there would be occasion where I got involved with noble when I became strong. At that point, my life from there on would greatly change depending on whether I chose to run away from all those occasions or tolerating them to certain degree while still hiding my true identity.

That was why, I thought that being able to come into contact with noble while having a patron like Viro to act as middleman was a good chance. Besides, even if the client was a noble, then perhaps that noble shouldn’t be that influential seeing that they were making use of street urchin to do some jobs. Besides, thinking back, if at the end I was able to obtain strength that could enable me to escape to other country by myself, then there wouldn’t be any problem even if I got found out.

And then, I got the hunch that in order to 『become strong』, doing Viro’s job would be the fastest way.

「Then, I’ll train you to be able to do the minimum so that you can carry out the job.」

「……Understood.」

For a moment, the memory of training that was definitely not for a kid that Feld gave me surfaced at the back of my mind.

But, it seemed that Viro would pay for the living expenses during that training, and not only that, he would also give me one small silver coin as daily allowance. From the perspective of normal commoner, it was a cheap amount, but for a street urchin from slum quarters, it was an excessively favorable treatment so there was no way I had any complain.

「Also……Aria. Show me your knife.」

「Hm?」

I felt uneasy handing my weapon to other person, but there was no meaning even if I tried to oppose someone with Viro’s skill level. Viro took the knife that I handed to him and he frowned a little with a conflicted expression.

「……This knife, did someone give it to you?」

「Hm? That’s right……」

Viro lightly sighed after hearing my reply. Then he returned the knife to me.

「Only use that for dismantling or as reserve weapon. No matter what you use it for, it’ll immediately get dull from clotted blood.」

「But, what am I going to do for fighting?」

「The biggest reason I came to this town is because I have business with a blacksmith here. I’ll buy something that suits you. That knife is too heavy for a brat, and its handle is too big for you.」

「……Yes.」

Originally it belonged to a large man like Feld so its handle was also big. I myself was aware of that, so I’d happily accept if he wanted to buy me a new one.

「Also……put this on too.」

「Hm?」

What Viro handed to her was a short pants. Perhaps it was something that caught his eyes and bought from a stall, the size was a bit mismatched but it wasn’t like I couldn’t wear it. But, why did I need to wear that? I tilted my head in puzzlement and looked up to Viro. Viro frowned and roughly rubbed my head.

「Your cloth flap around too much when you fight!」

Viro said those incomprehensible words and started walking again. I also followed behind him. I didn’t understand why, but perhaps it would be better if I didn’t touch this topic too much.

「Come to think of it, did you use sorcery when you fought Viro?」

Viro chanted something like a sorcery in the middle of the fight, after that he was behind me even though he should be in front of me. That might be his sorcery. When I asked him about that, Viro seemed to recall it too and looked back across his shoulder at me while walking.

「Aa, that one. I can use Darkness Sorcery you see. It’s only level 1 and I can only use one spell, but that’s a sorcery to produce “sound” at a place that you picked.」

「……Darkness sorcery.」

I seem so it was an illusion from darkness sorcery. It sounded like the effect of making a sound somewhere didn’t sound noteworthy at all, but it seemed like it would be useful in many situations in the hand of scout like Viro or me.

「Teach me darkness sorcery.」

By some chance I managed to find someone who knew about darkness sorcery that I didn’t have any knowledge about, so there was no way I’d let this chance go. When I said that, Viro stopped walking and looked down on me while showing a thinking gesture for a bit.

「Sorcery huh……. I don’t know whether you have aptitude for darkness element, so I can’t guarantee that you’ll be able to learn it you know? I also don’t know how to teach it so I can only teach you its incantation……are you fine with that?」

「That’s plenty.」

In the first place nobody had ever taught me. As long as I knew the incantation and meaning, I could just spend time and analyze it bit by bit again.

We were walking through the main street while having such talk. Then Viro headed to the direction of the residential district for the low-income earner that was near the slum quarters. If I didn’t remember wrong……that general store grandpa’s shop was located around here wasn’t it? Come to think of it, that grandpa told me about an eccentric blacksmith dwarf. Then perhaps we were heading toward that dwarf blacksmith.

.

After that we walked through the low-income earner residential district for a while before I heard the sound of metal being struck from far away. That might be our destination. Viro entered the alley with complicated structure and walked through for a while with a familiar gait. Then we arrived to a workshop made from stone that had slightly bigger size.

「Galbas, you there-!」

Viro let out a loud yell. After a bit of time passed, a loud voice that sounded like a gong rang out from inside the workshop.

「Don’t yell in front of someone’s house ye bastard!!」

I reflexively covered my ears from the voice that stung my eardrums, then a dwarf old man appeared from inside. His body was small but with even wider width than Feld, and white beard growing on his face. He was……an old man right? I too only knew about dwarf from the knowledge, but this was my first time actually meeting one so I didn’t really understand.

「What, it’s the youngster Viro huh. Do you come to bring me alcohol?」

「Stop calling me “youngster” already. I have gathered the thing that you asked me before, so I came here with it. Here, the magic stone of fire breathing lizard. It’s a quality good y’know?」

「Oo, so ye finally got it. My hearth’s heat won’t rise up with that. I’ll try using it right away!」

「Oi oi, pay me for it at least. It was hard work getting my hand on it.」

「Don’t be stingy. Show me the short sword that I made for ye before. I’ll make it look brand new again.,」

「……Can’t be helped.」

I didn’t really understand their conversation, but it seemed they were really close with each other. I was also watching with great interest about how he would fix the weapon. It was then the dwarf Galbas finally noticed my presence.

「Viro, is that yer kid? ……No, the kid got a nice face. Yer disciple then?」

「Don’t insult me so casually like that……well, she is like my disciple. I want to make her use knife so, do you have anything suitable for that?」

「I got no weapon for this kind of brat! ……Is what I want to say but, pick one that ye like from the box over there. I’ll put it into Viro’s tab.」

「……You are going to charge me even though you aren’t even paying me for the magic stone?」

Galbas ignored Viro’s muttering and threw a part of the magic stone into the hearth, then the color of the flame that was burning in the hearth changed noticeably. Intense heat surged out. Galbas gulped a mouthful of alcohol from a bottle and sprayed it into the hearth. The heat that was scorching to the skin flickered even more fiercely as though it was dancing.

Surely it wasn’t just a normal alcohol. Perhaps thanks to the fire breathing lizard’s magic stone and that alcohol, the vivid “color” of the magic particles dwelling in that flame was too enchanting for me and my voice slipped out.

「……pretty……」

「…………」

Galbas caught my muttering. He raised his face from the hearth and stared at me fixedly.

「Ye, do ye understand the “color” of this fire?」

「The color is……”red” without any impurities.」

When I answered that unconsciously, Galbas stared fixedly at my face while stroking his white beard. Then he slowly nodded.

「That hair……ye’re the “ash smeared” that eccentric old man from the general store mentioned before huh.」

「…………」

So both of them were calling each other 『eccentric』.

「Oi, ash smeared. Yer weapon, ye are using a knife?」

「Yes.」

「Alright, got it. Oi, Viro!! Don’t just look at that kind of trashes that I left there for stupid guys to buy!! Answer me this, do ye still have time until tomorrow-!?」

Viro who was choosing short sword with a serious face from a box that was placed at the corner of the smithy looked back with a surprised voice from Galbas’s voice.

「You made your customer bought trash weapons-!? Well, I have time until tomorrow I guess……what’s the matter?」

Galbas nodded at Viro’s reply and headed to the back of the smithy. After a while he returned with a thin black knife and handed it to me.

「It’s a knife that I made in the past. Ash smeared, I’ll remake it to fit yer grip.」