"He’s close, limping, most likely on the verge of dying." Grandfather Emilien mumbled while kneeling to inspect a bloody trail on the ground.

With his hand, he waved me to follow him forward, but silently.

I climbed up the shrubland slope, my bow ready, simply nodded and followed him.

"There he is."

Having reached the top of the slope, looking down at the other side, we finally saw the bleeding creature we were after.

It let out a long, pained grunt.

Running down the said slope, we soon reached the animal.

He was on the ground breathing cathartically. On his body, the tails of two arrows were protruding and lodged deep within his flesh were two thirds of it.

It was an enormous deer-like creature. I believe people from the northern part of the kingdom called it a Moose or a Pond stagg.

Grunting, the creature tried to get away from us, but it clearly didn’t have the strength anymore.

"He’s even bigger than I thought he was." Kneeling, Grandfather said.

"Yes, me too." I followed.

The moose once again let out one of its groans.

In length, it was somewhere between two and three meters long. If I were to lie next to its head and compare my size with its skull, including its wood, I would be somehow evenly lengthened. That was how big that creature was.

"Boy, so what is it going to be for you?" My grandfather asked me while displaying a dagger to me.

Though his question was still very vague, I knew very well what he meant.

"I think we’ve disrespected this creature enough," I announced, accepting the knife from him.

Grandfather didn’t comment on my decision, and instead added, "Wait, I’ll hold him for you."

Just as he did, he went to position himself to hold down the moose head and front legs, offering me a clear opening to its neck.

I, knowing what had to be done, kneeled and with my blade slit, after having inspected and found the right spot, the creatures' throat, blood squirted profusely on us, emptying it of its last bit of life.

After a few minutes of frantic jumping because of the "reflex action", we finally let go of the creature.

Patting me on the shoulder, a smile on his face covered in moose blood, my grandfather said, "Well done, boy. I think it’s finally starting to sink in."

He was handing me his equipment. He took the enormous moose and carried it on his shoulder as if it didn’t weigh at least twice, if not more, his size.

"Time to move on, boy."

I nodded and we returned to where our camp was.

***

A few dozens of minutes later,

Grandfather and I arrived at our aforementioned camp in the middle of nowhere grassland.

"Hopla!" Grandfather sighed, putting the moose corpse on top of an autel on our campment.

I cleaned the blood off of myself with a towel and handed one to my grandfather, who used it to do the same.

Upon doing so, he immediately went to grab a bucket, in which he left the putty and the arrow he had extracted from the animal corpse. "The hunting was generous for us today.", he said with his usual cheering voice. "Wasn't it?"

This time his voice went back to its usual self compared to how serious he was earlier.

"Yes, Grandfather."

A few months after the Seven Great Calamities, Grandfather Emilien and I have been doing these kinds of activities for some time now, and it didn’t take me long to realize how different he was when hunting compared to his usual self.

While preparing himself to eviscerate the moose, a cold breeze blew by, which, despite the clear sun up above, was still reminiscing the winter that has just vanished away. Because of how primitively we were dressed, we both couldn’t but shiver because of the cold.

Once again offering me the dagger, he asked, "Do you want to try?"

"I..." I muttered hesitant, for I never done it before, at least, not on an animal this big.

"Don’t worry, I’ll show you." He reassured

"Well, why not?" I said, accepting the knife, and I proceeded on my way to skin the moose.

You should start from here and smoothly slide to the other side. But that's it, but your knife has plunged too deeply... That’s it. "

With his help, it was going more smoothly than expected.

"You’re quite good at it, boy."

"Thanks, Grandfather."

"You know, it was my father who took me hunting for the first time. I was around ten or eleven when we did so. Just like you and I, he showed me the rope, or well, to be honest, we discovered the rope together, by ourselves. "

"What do you mean, Grandfather?"

"Well, you know the unique situation our Edouard and Aubrecht were in three generations ago, don’t you?"

Three generations, that's got to be back to great-grandfather time.

"Yes, I know that for many years before my grandfather's ascension to the ducal throne, Grandfather’s father was the one in charge."

"Yes, exactly. Your great-grandfather's situation, bloodline-wise and status-wise, was quite complicated, so that father of mine was, from an early age, put in charge of the duchy in your grandfather's stead. To get back to our earlier discussion, my father was more of an official within a four-walled office than he was a man of medicine and healing like us, and even less a semblance of a hunter. So you can imagine what it looked like when he and I went hunting for the first time. He was very insistent on doing this as a father-son duo activity, so most of us ended up with either nothing or a gorily butchered trophy. " He said, with an expression of reminiscing about a glorious past expression on his face.

"It took us a few to get good at it, and over the years, though it was slow and quite late, I realized why he wanted to do these activities on our own." He looked at me in the eyes and said, "Just like you and me, he did it, so that we understand the value of a life, how it feels to handle it, for that’s what we do, and also to prepare ourselves for the possible missteps that can occur during the course of our work."

From how the conversation unraveled, I already foresaw what he was getting at.

Some of them may be challenges that we cannot afford to face unprepared.So the best we can do is to prepare ourselves.

"Understood, Grandfather."

With a grin, he said joyously, "Your grandfather must be fuming right now thinking that our Edouard family is trying to take away their only male heir."

I was quite intrigued the first time Grandfather Emilien asked me if I wanted to go on hunting with me. Even though I myself didn’t see much sense in hunting poor helpless animals, soon I realized why he invited me for it: to train me with my magic.

Not any kind of magic, but healing magic.

That’s it. I, Elliel Aubrecht, possess the gift of using the healing magic of the Edouards.

This was particularly novel, because for years after inexplicably awakening my magic before the age of ten, I had assumed I only had lightning-wielding magic, but two years ago, amidst the chaos caused by the calamities, I discovered purely by chance that I also had a gift for healing magic.

So from the moment I got to discover it, I naturally got to interact more with Grandfather Emilien, who so far has served as a mentor for me, given that despite being quite uniquely different from the one Big Brother Mael, his father, and Grandfather were wielding, it was and remained healing magic, so accross the duchy there was no one else better fitted to act as a mentor than him..

"I know Grandfather was bringing father and uncle Damien and Phillip to hunt a few years ago; did you brother Mael go hunting as well after his coronation?" I inquired.

I immediately realized from the silence he remained in that maybe I shouldn’t have asked that question.

"Well for Mael, even if I was the one left in charge of that child, I never had the opportunity to go on hunting with him. It is mostly my fault. Maybe I was afraid that this activity would be of no interest for him well even compared to any of us in the family."

"I’ve seen that too," I noticed.

At nine, when I started hanging with Ramia and Big Brother Mael for their training, I, at many reprises, treating Ramia’s injuries, I saw how good at it he was.

"You know, Boy, when it was revealed that you could use healing magic, and you announced that you had developed an interest in it, I was really delighted by it. I always wanted to do this with one of my children, to be some sort of mentor. I think I failed it for Mael, and for my sons as well, especially for Damian. While my father did take me hunting in spite of his busy schedule, I did take them hunting, but not for the same purpose as my father did for me. Back then, hunting was more of a coping mechanism for me." he confided.

"I’m not sure if you will ever make use of our healing magic in the future, but for the moment, I’m glad to have you around. And I hope I won't mess up this time."

Not knowing what else to say, I said the first thing that came to my mind.

"Thanks, me too, Grandfather Emilien."

He simply smiled it off, then out of nowhere, "Now that I think of it,... I know this is none of my business, but how is it going between the two of you?" To make sure who was who, he raised an eyebrow, "You know, you and her." Then he added, "You know, I know that she is one of the reasons why you can hardly remain still in the ducal castle. lately, ... So..."

I was quite taken aback by his question regarding "her".

We never discussed it, but I knew he was aware of how my enthusiasm for hunting was related to that individual. So him suddenly bringing it up was like pouring a bucket of icy water onto me.

"I... I don’t know. I’m sure Grandfather already knows how I feel about this,... I know that many are looking forward to us and I know very well that I was the one who ultimately brought this upon myself and herself, yet despite that, I don’t know how to face her. " I confessed.

He smiled and nodded briefly before responding, "This advice might be old-fashioned for you youngsters, but why not just--" before being interrupted by a trotting noise.

Just as we finished stripping the bowels and the skins off the moose, we noticed that coming on the horizon was a carriage driven by two coachmen.

Though there was no carriage around here, to reach this place we took our own carriage. It was just that we left it where the closest town was, which was a few dozens of kilometers away from here. It didn’t take me long to notice that it was the carriage of the Edouard, but it was certainly not the one we took to reach this place. To avoid a potential problem, we traveled using a modest coach that wouldn’t easily give up our identity. meaning that this one most likely came from the Duchy’s capital itself.

The carriage stopped a few meters away from our camp, and soon a man came out of it. It was a middle-aged noble. I’ve often seen him alongside Grandfather. Though I didn’t know his name, I knew that he was one of the family affiliated with the Edouard Family.

"Prince Elliel," referring to our unsightly appearance, "Lord Emilien," the man greeted.

"What is it, Anry, an urgence?"

"In a sense, yes, my Lord." The man came to Grandfather and murmured in his ears the nature of the matter.

"I see. That was unexpected. I guess I’ll have to go back to the Ducal Palace right now. "

"Is there a problem, Grandfather?"

"It's not really a problem, it's just that something quite unexpected happened. " he said, "Nothing to worry about." Glancing at our meaty booty, he announced with a sour expression, "But still, I have to go back to Beaumont immediately, so we won’t have time to consume this spoil of ours the hunter's way."

"I understand." I declared, not putting any resistance, for I knew from the way he voiced it that this was most likely a very serious matter.

At Grandfather's order, the two men, with the best of their ability, charged the moose meat into the carriage.

And just as we were about to board the carriage, I requested, "Grandfather, I think I’ll stay around for a bit."

"You're sure?"

Nodding, I declared, "Yes, I’ll take the other carriage to head back to Beaumont. I’ll take it by the end of the day. Considering the journey, I think I’ll be back home by tomorrow afternoon. As a result..."

Smiling, he said, "Don’t worry, I will cover you up until tomorrow. So make sure to make it back in time. "

"Yes, Grandfather."

He was about to board the carriage when once again he stopped, and declared, "About the advice I was about to give earlier, maybe doing what you believe you should do is the best course of action. I, as for you having brought this upon yourself, I, as your grandfather, should’ve stood for you in that regard when that decision was taken. But things are that we can no longer go back, so maybe the right thing to do for you is to talk things out with her, and if there is something that you would need help with, you will know to find our castle. I’m sure we can find a way out of whatever you might stumble upon."

"Yes, Thanks, Grandfather."

Nodding, he boarded the carriage with the other man named Anry and headed north to Beaumont.

***

Wandering around, I found myself going where Ramia and Mael were training themselves under the supervision of Uncle Matthew. I often found myself going to train myself with my magic on my own after Ramia and big brother Mael left for the holy capital, or at least I used to.After the event of two years ago, I stopped it, and instead dedicated myself to activities with my grandfather.

The place was nowhere close to what it used to be. The plain was completely upside down. Though nature was trying to recover, the trail of their catastrophic passage was still rooted deep in these lands.

Amidst the plain, a gigantic trail was making its way southward, straight to the Iharana Great Forest.

Two years ago, when the 7 enormous dragons that were now referred to as the 7 great calamiities breached the church’s barrier from every corner of the continent to head for the Iharana great forest, the seven of them, with Beaumont being on their path to the Iharana great forest, passed across the Duchy of Beaumont. Luckily for it, unlike most of the other duchys and archduchys whose duchys have been traversed by these calamities, the duchy was lucky enough to not be as much destroyed as others were, even though it was traversed by the seven of them.

That being said, the duchy still suffered losses; human losses, catastrophic environmental consequences, and economic and political consequences, most of which would probably take more than decades to recover from.

The moose Grandfather and I were hunting down earlier were not even native to Beaumont; they were creatures that emigrated as an aftermath of the calamities.

The consequences were catastrophic, but once again, if one were to compare what Beaumont went through to what other territories of the human continent went through, it was fair to call the Duchy of Beaumont lucky by a wide margin.

Wandering around, I found myself following the gigantic trail left by the dragons to reach what was left of what I believe was once a town, which was, by the look of it, ravaged by the calamities.

It was in the middle of that town that something caught my attention, or to be exact, people.

Standing there in the middle of the lifeless and tattered town were a boy and a girl whose features, despite their outfits, were like something out of a painting.