The Place of Beginning

「It feels nostalgic……」

I stared at the small town that was visible from the highway and muttered slightly inside my mouth.

I moved from place to place after the fight against the assassin guild before returning back to the territory of Baron Horace where that orphanage was located. It had been two years. Although I called it a return, it wasn’t like I considered this Horace territory as my hometown. I think that my birthplace was somewhere in this territory, but I didn’t remember the town and the house where my family lived when I was little.

Many things happened in this place. It wasn’t a place that I had good memory about……. Even so I returned here because I wanted to fulfill a “promise” that I made before.

The small town where that orphanage was located. There wasn’t anybody there who remembered me as I walked through it. I almost never gone outside from the orphanage, and so there wasn’t really anybody who knew me, even so I could only say “for some reason” if I was asked why I wanted to walk through this town.

Based from what I heard at a stall that was selling baked flour (it was filling but not delicious), after that hag was gone a Cruzian priest came to look after the orphanage. After that it seemed that the environment of the orphanage and the orphans got a lot better.

But even that priest had retired several months ago. The citizens here now took turn to take care of the orphans until the baron sent the next person to manage the place.

「You see, miss. We the residences of this neighborhood are all allies of the orphans.」

「Hee……」

The stall owner was talking just how hard they were working for the sake of the pitiful orphans as though they were saints, but I knew how all of you were pretending to not see the abused orphans before that.

「Come again!」

「………」

It wasn’t like I was concerned for the orphans.

I just got a bit interested with how the orphanage was doing after I was gone.

.

My memory was vague so I got lost for a bit but, I arrived at the orphanage that I didn’t miss at all without problem.

Although Claydale Kingdom had warm climate, the night at winter like now was really cold. I remembered how cold the dirt floor was to sleep on with only a thin blanket and not enough food at all.

When I peeked into the orphanage from the street, I found the orphans who dressed a bit better and looked a bit better were washing clothes and cleaning the yard with listless faces. But then──

『──oi, take out the food──』

『──……s-stop──』

「…………」

The voices of boy and girl could be heard faintly from the alley that led to the back gate of the orphanage.

When I tried peeking there, I saw a young man who looked like he just have his coming of age recently. He was wearing a slightly dirty clothes and a knife on his waist. It seemed he was pestering a girl from the orphanage.

「If I give this away then the little kids won’t……」

「Haa? The brats didn’t eat even when I was still here right-」

……Aa, I see. I remembered their action and faces.

The girl was three or four year older than me. She was in charge of cooking in the place of the old hag. And then the young man was an older orphan who liked to steal the food of the little kids and pushed off his work to others.

No……age wise he couldn’t be called an “orphan” anymore I guess.

Originally kids who almost had their coming of age would go out helping craftsman or the like as job training, but that old hag only thought of working hard the orphans or “selling” them, so there wasn’t anything like that here.

Even so there would be quite a lot of things that the orphans could do in the town if they had gotten used to do the chores in the orphanage, but it looked like that man who always pushed off his work to others could only become a thug after he became adult and got kicked out of the orphanage.

「……What the hell are you looking at, huuuh」

The man picked a fight with me while I was watching and recalling the past.

I was erasing my presence somewhat within the natural limitation, but it looked like my presence leaked out slightly from remembering my emotion at that time. The man saw me and noticing that I was a young woman, he walked toward me with a threatening swagger.

「You brat, are you an adventurer? Look real neat aren’t you huh. If you’re adventurer with money, then how about leaving some for an unfortunate orphan.」

「You don’t look like an orphan.」

「Even me is a former orphan you know. That’s why it’s fine for this unfortunate me to take the orphanage money.」

Orphanage was fundamentally managed using fund from the territory. If an orphanage was in poor condition, it must be because there were those like this man or the old hag who sponged off it…….

While the man was making incomprehensible sophism and telling me to leave behind money, the girl behind him screamed.

「Don’t involve a stranger-, I’ll give you my portion, that’s why please-!」

A faint self-deprecating smile formed on my lips under the shawl hiding them when I heard her words.

This place wasn’t my hometown anymore.

「Haah? Do you think that’s gonna be enough-, you──」

*Gogyugo-!!*

「Gyoh!?」

I instantly stepped forward and hit the man’s jaw with my palm that was strengthened with magic.

The inner part of my right glove was inserted with a thin magic steel plate so that a blade could be put inside in the worst case. Perhaps that was why I felt the feedback of his jawbone crumpling from my hand. The man made a strange voice while falling backward.

If it was just this much then he could heal in half a month if he asked for Cure to be cast to him from the hospital. If he didn’t have the money for that then he simply wouldn’t be able to eat solid food for his whole life.

During these several years, even I now was able to discern that I shouldn’t kill a former orphan in front of an orphan.

「Sorry for the bother.」

「W-wait-」

I grabbed the collar of the man who fainted while foaming from the mouth. When I started dragging him away as though to throw away the trash, the girl hurriedly called at me to stop.

「Miss adventurer, I’m sorry to drag you into this-. Also……」

The girl stared fixedly at my face, and then she talked weakly without any confidence.

「Could it be……you also, lived here before?」

「……It’s just your imagination.」

I said that briefly and started dragging away the man. The girl didn’t call out to me again, but I could sense her quietly bowing at my back.

……But, it was amazing that she noticed from looking at my current appearance.

.

One years already passed since I crushed the assassin guild branch of north frontier district. I too had turned ten years old.

As expected the wall to rank 4 was thick. Now I could use illusion without chanting, and some of my skills outside combat had also increased to level 4, but most of my combat skills were still rank 3.

I had also showed myself at master’s place just once to report. I couldn’t stay there for long because I was being targeted by underworld organizations, but I studied the spells for light sorcery and the light magic’s level increased. Thanks to that my magic power control became level 4, but that was it.

In the first place human who could reach level 4 was rare. If I had to make an example based on that woman’s “knowledge”, if there was a large tournament where all countries in the world participated in it, then athletes that could obtain the right to appear in it were rank 4 while those who got first place in each field were rank 5.

Trying to accomplish that while you were still a teenage would require a training that put your life at risk and also unique ability.

Even so my body had been sculpted really well in this one year. I was feeling the effect. The number of assassins and thieves who had attacked me until now had been more than fifty I think. I managed to turn the table on all of them.

I was also proactively crushing those who preyed on children like the thief guild in that marquis territory.

Real battle was training. And then it was definitely starting to bear fruit.

「…………」

But the greatest change that happened with me was my “appearance” I guess……. The change that happened to me made me unconsciously sighed.

Perhaps because my mana increased again, or perhaps because of the nutrition management that I did under master’s teaching, my outer appearance was growing together with the increase of my mana and stamina, from looking like thirteen years old previously into fourteen years old now. Being able to look like a man by putting on a mantel to hide the so called secondary sex characteristic in that woman’s “knowledge” had stopped working for me.

My current equipment was also something that I ordered from Gelf to match my current body build.

It was a sleeveless black leather dress that reached until my knee, made from the membrane of a rank 4 monster Wyvern. The exclusive knife holder to be attached under the skirt on my thigh had also been remade to match my leg’s growth.

There was a slit at the inner part of the skirt, so I could also unsheathe the knife instantly.

It was something very excellent with blade and flame resistances. Without this I would receive even more damage in my battle against rank 4 sorcerer, but Gelf wouldn’t take any payment except for the material cost.

My body shape had also changed. Flesh and fat filled some parts that didn’t exist until now. It was a pain to adjust my balance and posture to account for those parts, but my status also increased together with my body’s growth, so my ability was increasing on the whole.

「……I got a strange “nickname” because of that though.」

What was strange with my own body was how the thickness of my arms and legs didn’t really change even though my physical strength attribute had grew to rival adult male.

When I considered this phenomenon by matching it with what master taught me, I was just guessing here but, just like how animal became monster from absorbing too much magic particle and formed magic stone inside their body, human who had formed magic stone also got their body optimized to use magic power more rather than muscle strength. It felt like my body structure was becoming similar with elf race like master.

Human’s body grew faster because of magic power in order to deal with their enlarging magic stone. But even if that was the case, the human’s aging would slow down and their life span would get a bit longer. Those might also be caused by that.

But……if my thinking was right, the status of someone like Feld who trained even their muscles like crazy might be something absurd.

──*Bum-*

Even though the townspeople were looking at me with puzzlement, I discarded the former orphan with broken jaw to a garbage dump. Then I immediately departed to the large town where this territory’s lord was living in order to fulfill my “promise” with Galbas.

Even the distance that took nearly two days before didn’t even take half a day to traverse with my current capability.

I left the city at evening. Then I ate and took a nap at the forest near the camping ground where I built my first base, wiped my body with a wet cloth, cleaned my body with Clean, then I moved again and reached the neighboring city the next day before noon.

Previously I entered from a hole in the wall into the slum district, but this time I came while the gate was opened so I entered the town from the front.

.

「An adventurer who registered in this town huh……. I never see your face before.」

「Because I mainly worked at the capital and Dandall.」

「That’s amazing for someone your age.」

Adventurer could freely go in and out of the town where they registered. Even so it had been two and a half years since I came here so the soldier questioned me some, but he let me passed without trouble after checking my tag.

「You haven’t come here for a long time so be careful of the north ruin. There’s a rumor of a dangerous monster appearing, so ask for more detail at the adventurer guild.」

「……Yes, thank you mister soldier.」

An adventurer should have known how dangerous was this place that had a dungeon and a lot of monsters in the area, so why did he tell me something like that……? Well, either way I planned to head to the adventurer guild, so I’d ask there at that time.

Under the sky that was still bright, I entered the area for low-income earner that was close to the slum. At the same time I blended my presence to the surrounding and made myself vanished.

My Stealth skill had leveled up until level 4. Just like how when I first met Viro I could only distinguish his figure as a “magic particle shape”, if the current me seriously disappeared into darkness, a mere level 1 Search skill wouldn’t even feel that there was anything out of place.

I stopped by at the territory of Marquis Kendras wasn’t for crushing the thief guild there but to buy a certain something. I fixed my hold on that baggage and headed toward my destination, but if it was that person then surely he would be happy if I brought him a “souvenir” even though it was still this bright outside.

「Galbas, you there?」

When I called out like that from the entrance, Galbas turned his face from where he was sitting on a long chair away from the forge’s fire. He was just drinking alcohol together with one other man since noon.

「……You huh.」

「Don’t tell me, you’re “ash covered”-?」

「Long time no see you two.」

It was the person beside Galbas who called me like that. Inside there was Galbas who gave me the black knife and the old man from general store who introduced me to this smith.

「It has been really long……wait, you ‘re a woman……?」

「Are your eyes just empty hole-! She’s a woman from the start, you blind old man-!」

「How can I know the gender difference of some human kid, you goddamn moron!」

「What, are you picking a fight, you obstinate geezer-!」

「I’m not gonna be merciful even with obstinate geezer like you-!」

*Dan-!*

「I have a request.」

「「…………」」

I placed a special grade strong alcohol that cost me one gold coin for one bottle with a thud. I bought it from a settlement of rock dwarves who gathered as miners in the marquis territory. The two eccentric drunk old men who suddenly started quarreling stopped moving.

「Ou……bringing alcohol like this when visiting, you really get it even though you’re just a brat.」

「What’s more it’s a special grade alcohol……it has been a long time since I saw one.」

「I’m fine with taking work from you but, I’m not gonna do it if it’s a boring work y’know?」

「First I’m paying my tab.」

*Cling…….*

First I took out the “promised” golden coin from my Storage and put it on the table.

「Ou, you’re unexpectedly fast. But, a brat shouldn’t overdo it……」

*Gashan-.*

Next I dumped all the money in my possession on the table. Seeing that not only Galbas, even the old man from general store looked dumbfounded.

All the money that I had saved until now. Fifty large gold coins, twelve gold coins, twenty three silver coins, and some bronze coins.

「This is everything I have. I want you to make me a “blade” to be used exclusively for pendulum.」