Volume 8 Chapter 6 (2/2)
Though she gave Saito a light glare… as if reain
“But… you really don’t want to inform them?”
Saito nodded with a serious look as well This , Tiffania asked if he didn’t want to inforht He said to Tiffania that though he wanted to return back to that place, no one cared if he was alive or not…
“Your family as left in Tristain does not worry?”
“It’s all right”
“I could send a letter…”
“It’s all right” Saito repeated lonely
“Your family will surely be worried about your safety”
“There is no family in Tristain”
“Then, where are they?”
“In a place where letters can not reach”
“…Eh?”
“It is nothing Please forget it”
Tiffania, not knohat to say, fell silent Then noticing that Saito's stew plate was almost empty, Tiffania picked it up
“I, I’ll bring seconds”
Saying so, she disappeared in the house
Saito lightly bit his lip
After all, maybe he should tell the truth?
That there is a Void user besides Tiffania; to whom I was a familiar
Though, that ht worry her…
He felt someone's presence Did Tiffania return already? That was very fast Though I wanted some time to prepare my mind for this moment, there is no other way
Saito said in a constrained voice
“Though I do not have family in Tristain, however… There is an important person Yet… I do not have the skills needed to appear in front of that person anymore I’m not a familiar of that person already Therefore…”
His hesitant explanation was interrupted by a looman's voice
“What are you doing here?”
It wasn’t Tiffania’s voice
Frightened, Saito looked up
The commander of the musketeers stood there
“I thought it would be harder to find you I’m disappointed”
In the living roones
Agnes, who took off her black reen tunic, amazed, watched Saito
“I was going to enter the forest through the road, and search for you in all the villages that I walked past Look, I ca to conduct a search operation in such a huge forest, I prepared at least teeks of rationsalong with iteht I've even brought along boots forlunch in the first village I reach Seriously, what an anticli”
Agnes pointed at the stuffed rucksack and said
“I see So you are saying that the Princess looked for me?”
Asked Saito, after hearing about circumstances Tiffania, with an embarrassed face, stood hesitantly as usual There was no time to put a cap on her head either
After drinking the tea on the table, Agnes stood up
“Let’s go then Miss, we are indebted to you Though this is not ratitude”
After throwing a bag with golden coins towards Tiffania, Agnes turned to the doorway
“What?”
Seeing Saito not nes made a suspicious face
“Umm… could you tell the Princess that I died?”
“What? You don’t want to be honored by Her Majesty and removed from the commoner’s list?”
Saito said
“The Princess will inform Louise about it”
“So what? Aren’t you Miss Vallière’s familiar?”
“Not anymore”
“What?”
Saito showed to Agnes the left hand on which runes disappeared
“Though I do not understand because I araved”
“At the ti, the runes disappeared Since I am not a familiar, I am a free human now Therefore, please say that I died”
Though Agnes was gazing Saito… her glance stopped on Tiffania Being watched by Agnes, Tiffania sha to erase the h?
“Elf?”
“…Half”
“Is that so” Agnes muttered
Seeing that Agnes was not afraid of her, Tiffania asked timidly
“You are not scared of elves?”
“I don'tscared by those who do not show malice”
Sighing, Agnes sluain
“All right I will say that you are dead”
“Really?”
“Aah Instead… I will stay here for a while”
“What?”
Saito and Tiffania stared at Agnes with their ape
“There is no date specified Besides“
Agnes said in a somewhat tired tone
“I want to take some rest Ever since the war started, I haven't had much sleep”
That night
Saito, laying on the bed, stared at the ceiling, unable to fall asleep He heard creaky sounds coainst the door
“Agnes-san?”
He thought it was Agnes as sleeping in the living roo
“It's me”
Came the shy voice of Tiffania from the other side of the door
“Come in”
The door opened revealing Tiffania She wore a thin night cloth and had a candlestick with a wax candle in her right hand The candlelight melted smoothly with Tiffania's blond hair
“What's wrong?”
Saito said in a strained voice
“I want to talk to you about so Can I?”
“Alright”
It was the first tih the nightclothes were loose, it hugged Tiffania's developed body tightly Because of her young features, when the outline of her body was hidden, she looked very childish
When Tiffania put the candlestick on the table, she sat on the chair
And asked Saito in a serious voice
“Hey Saito Who are you? You don't have any fa for you 'I am not a familiar anymore' you said How can a huht, however… However, I feel uneasy”
Saito worried
If he had to explain it, the talk would touch ”Void”
That there is a girl named Louise, who, like Tiffania, is a user of Void…
But maybe he should not tell that to Tiffania, who lives peacefully in the forest It er
When Saito kept being silent, Tiffania continued asking
“When I played the harp, you cried…”
“You saw?”
“Yes When listening to that tune, tears fell from my eyes I reh I do not know about it… for some reason, I still call it my hometown Do you remember your home?”
Saito nodded Apart from the explanation of Void, he could talk about himself
“Where is it? If you want to talk that is”
“…In a country of Earth”
“What?”
Tiffania stared at him ide eyes
“As I said, I am not from here From another world I am a human that came from there”
“I don’t understand”
“You don’t? That’s why I did not want to talk about it”
“Where you come from? How?“
“That… somehoas summoned as a familiar I do not understand it myself really”
“There must be some reason…”
“There may not be one As for the reason I ended up in here…”
“I absolutely want to know”
“Well I became a familiar with an ability to use any weapon”
Saito said in a soliloquy way
“You can’t use them anymore?”
“Yeah”
“That’s why you do not return to Tristain? But what about your master…”
“It’s all right”
“You don’t want to meet that person?”
“That’s not why - I cannot meet her It’s because as a human, I am useless now and have lost any purpose…”
Seeing Saito like this, Tiffania said in a sympathetic voice
“You love her, don’t you?”
Once she said so, tears started flowing fros that had been restrained till now broke free, and Saito cried raggedly Tiffania stood up and hugged Saito’s head close to her
“I'm sorry, I'm sorry Don’t cry, don’t cry”
After a while, once Saito’s sobbing subdued, he apologized to Tiffania
“I'”
“It’s all right I also cry sometimes…”
Tiffania, even after Saito stopped crying, rested his head on her chest Tiffania’s soft and big bosom settled Saito’s mind down
“…That is so That’s why I felt close to you”
“To me?”
“Aye It was the hometown to which you cannot return I have one as well I think this was the reason why you started crying after hearing my harp”
He looked at Tiffania’s slumber attire
“Do these clothes look unusual to you?”
“That’s right”
The night clothes that Louise wore, were of a different design
“These are Elven clothing I got them from my mother Because Elves live in the desert… they wear such clothes The texture protects froht’s cold Because it is warhtclothes”
Tiffania said in a longing tone
“When the night coentle When I go to sleep and put these clothes on, I feel like I aain”
“Yeah”
“Lands in the east… Mother's hoo there But I cannot”
”Why?”
“Elves dislike humans When they see the ‘mixed’ me, they will not understand”
In a sad voice, Tiffania said
“And humans are afraid of Elves They will not be afraid of irl Huht And neither in the end A failure”
“You are not a failure”
Looking up, Saito said
“Why?”
“You are very beautiful When I saw you for the first tiht you were a fairy So have more confidence”
Tiffania blushed
“S-sorry… I didn’t have anything strange in mind when I said that…”
“Don’t say that again It’s e”
“Alright”
“It was the first time someone told me I a afraid of me, you say I am beautiful”
“But you are beautiful…”
When Saito said that, Tiffania quietly pushed Saito away
“Tiffa?”
“…Muu, I told you not to say that again”
“W-hy you are so angry? It is not bad to be called beautiful”
“S-stop saying that I am beautiful I, I want you to be silent”
Saying so, Tiffania stood up
Confused, Saito scratched his head
The next
“Get up”
N? Saito thrust out his head, but it was still dim
“Isn’t it night still…?” he muttered and dived back under the blanket Then the blanket was torn away
“What the!”
He shouted and felt a sword pointed at his nose
“Get up I won’t repeat myself three times”
In the darkness, he recognized Agnes' face He also noticed that the pointed sas Derflinger
”It’s great, partner!”
“Ah?”
“The co froain skills in no time!”
Agnes smiled
“Since I’m bored anyway, to kill time, I will train you, with pleasure”
“I-is that so…”
He said scratching his head, but his cheek was pulled
“W-what auch auch?!”
Then a hand gripped Saito’s ear and brought his face close to Agnes, who said
“Alright? From today on, your only answer is ‘Yes’ Is that clear?”
She had a power different from Louise, and Saito nodded instinctively It was a , beautiful woman
“Y-yes…”
“I can’t hear you”
“YES!”
“One arden”
And once he ran to the garden, still hastily putting his clothes on, Agnes stood there with her arms crossed When Saito stood before her, she reported in a lowered voice”
“Ten seconds late”
“That, only ten seconds…”
She roughly pulled his cheek, Saito shouted in an al voice
“Yes! I’m late!”
“Well then, one hundred push-ups”
She said si push-ups
After that, the basic training of hell continued He was th was trained using a log The hard and intensive training that he was doing seeames now
Once no one was around, Saito, as one would expect, collapsed on the ground Then water was sprinkled on him
“Dog Exhausted already?”
Being called a dog made Saito clink
“Sorry, butMy name is Saito”
“If you want to be called by a human name, become an equal person”
Then she pulled out a wooden sword
“Next – swords”
As soon as Saito struggled to his feet, she turned around and drove it straight into his belly
“I-I haven’t taken the stance yet… hy…”
When he nes smiled
“Do you think ‘taking a stance’ would matter in actual combat? First of all, you need to train your basic physical strength for half a year and only then start training the skills…”
Agnes then turned again and thrust the sword out at a high speed
“Fighting is not elegant Skip the ‘art’ I’ll teach you theof the word ‘sword’”
After one hour, Saito collapsed again He fainted Agnes poured a bucket of cold water on hiain
Saito, oke up, stared at Agnes absent-minded
During the one hour… Saito burbled and received a lot of daed, blocked it, and then hit any part of him with her sword
“Do you knohy you cannot land a hit on me?”
“I don’t know”
“It’s because our swordsmanshi+p is not the same Do you understand at least that?”
Saito nodded If you swing a sword at Gandálfr’s speed, there is no need to avoid enemy attacks
“It works if it is a surprise attack However, if the enemy anticipates it, you will never hit”
“Yes”
“Alright, halt your own attacks and wait for the chance to attack the opponent Use your eyes to seize the opportunity”
“If there is no opening… then what do I do?”
“Create it”
Until the evening, no nes, he could not graze her
Laying on the ground, exhausted, Saito muttered
“Why… why can't I even graze…”
Agnes said in an amazed voice
“Pfft, with the sword, the swordsain a noble's fame Without actual combat experience, you are just an amateur to be defeated”
“…A little while I had this thought I aood with blades”
Saito whispered, to which Agnes answered
“There is no ti doesn’t have the right to belittle itself”