Part 1

6 days later… (In-game)

Godou followed Ferrex into the training hall. Inside were rows upon rows of scarecrows.

He shuddered as he remembered the aching of his arms and shoulders as a result of hitting scarecrows non-stop for the equivalent of 3 weeks inside a similar room under the church.

Having to stand during that time period hadn’t made his legs feel any better either. Although he had now completely recovered his health and stamina, Godou felt that the memories of the training would haunt him for a while yet.

It seemed that the scarecrows they were hitting were connected to the magic research side of the church and that by hitting the scarecrows they had been generating power for the church. The barbaric training that Godou and Ferrex had gone through also turned out to be a test run for a new training regime for Kallamore’s soldiers.

(I get that Kallamore is supposed to be a dangerous place because of all the constant monster attacks but, seriously, was this something that a church should be doing?

Heck, even that rebound spell turned out to be an application of dark magic. Dark magic! Being used in a secret room underneath a holy church!)

There were so many illogical things Godou wanted to complain to about.

Conversely, that test run had been deemed a failure for being too extreme.

After 5 minutes of hitting the scarecrow Godou had felt bored…

After 10 minutes he had faltered in one of his strikes and was awarded with a sudden jolt of pain for it…

Godou was also unable to log out. A message appeared whenever he tried saying:

You cannot log out until you have cleared the Basic Training.

By the end of the first hour, fatigue and mental exhaustion had started to catch up on him due to his lack of exercise in the first 3 weeks and he ended up receiving more damage from the scarecrow’s rebound spell…

However, this did not prevent him from being able to hit the scarecrow. For some reason, most likely because of the divine gem in the room, he able to continue to move after his stamina had hit its limit and his health also had sudden large bursts of increased regeneration whenever he was close to death.

Strength has increased by 1 point[tr]Stamina has increased by 1 point[/ts]

After more few agonisingly long hours, various messages started appearing in front of him, making it slightly easier for him to endure…

But by the end of 10 hours of non-stop “training”, Godou had come to hate the scarecrow standing in front of him…

After 72 hours, he couldn’t remember anything…

When he came to, Godou found himself lying on one of the beds in the infirmary. Ferrex had been lying on another bed nearby, conscious, but seemingly unable to muster the motivation to move.

Lexus had come in by that point to tell them that they their training with the church was complete. Apparently, both Godou and Ferrex and collapsed the moment they had been released from the underground room.

Lexus had also given them a piece of paper, saying:

“To go to the local training hall and show this to the instructor there to retrieve your reward for passing the basic training. You’re free to do as you like for the next few days but I want to talk to you to about something when you’re both able to leave the town.”

Afterwards, Godou had logged off for a while, desperate to escape virtual reality by entering the real world.

Logging back on, Godou had found Ferrex loitering around the church and had invited to accompany him around the town.

“Do you know where the Training Hall is?”

Since he was at loss at what to do first, Godou decided to follow Lexus’s instructions first.

“I think so. Do you want me to show you around town as well? I heard that you didn’t have time to explore the city before being trained by the church.”

“Sure”

Nodding, Ferrex then offered his own proposal to which Godou immediately agreed to. After all, he had been taught to accept the goodwill of others.

Thus after a brief tour of the small city/large town, Godou found himself in his current situation.

After noticing them standing idly next to the entrance, a burly man came up shouting:

“If you’re not here to hit the scarecrows then leave! I won’t accept any lollygagging in my hall– Oh wait, from the looks of things you two have already finished the basic training.”

“Yeah the church of Freya trained us. They told us to come here to collect our reward.”

Wincing slightly at the loudness of the instructor(?)’s voice, Godou retrieved the note he had gotten from Lexus and handed it over to the instructor.

“Okay, wait here”

After briefly glancing at the note, the instructor disappeared into a back room but came back shortly, carrying what looked like two long swords. He handed them a sword each and congratulated them, noticeably more friendly than when he first spoke to them.

After thanking him, the duo exited the training hall.

Dismissing the uneasily feeling he was getting from holding an actual weapon in a town full of people, Godou equipped his new sword.

Then curious of the bonuses it gave him Godou opened his stats window which read:

Character Name:GodouAlignment:NoneLevel:2Class:ClasslessTitle:NoneFame:142Health:957Mana:232Strength:50+10Agility:50Wisdom:50Intellect:50Leadership:5Luck:34Stamina:50Perserverance:104Sustenance:96Fighting Spirit:39Attack:11Defence0Magical Resistance:Dark Magic3%

Compared to before he underwent the all the training the church had given him, Godou found that his stats were considerably higher.

Conversely, Godou seemed to have unlocked some completely new stats at some point in time.

Perseverance

Reduces the physical damage enemies can inflict on you and increases your total health by a small amount. Stat increases automatically when you take damage from melee attacks. You can distribute level up bonuses to this stat.Sustenance

You are likely to use less stamina in action. You are prohibited from distributing stat level up points to this stat.Fighting Spirit

You can call on superhuman strength temporally, or bring weaker monsters to their knees with the force from your eyes along. You are prohibited from distributing level up bonus points to this stat and it rises spontaneously depending on the avatar’s actions, especially if you fight monsters for a long time or often confront monsters stronger than your current level.

(Then again, I also had a memory blackout because of the basic training so I might have gotten them then.)

Brushing aside the unpleasant memories that were resurfacing in his mind, Godou posed the question:

“So now that we’ve gotten our reward, what do we do now?”

“You’ve got a point there, there’s really nothing to do since you can’t go outside yet.”

“What would you normally do then?”

“I would probably go back to the church and stare at the clouds or something… Ah I got it! Why don’t we go to a pub then, know any places?”

“Speaking of which, I haven’t seen Mark in a while either. Yeah, I know a place. In fact the owner of it is the one who recommended me to Lexus.”

“Okay, lead the way then.”

Having decided that, Godou wandered about the town, with Ferrex following, trying to track down his first spawn point.

At last he found it and looking around, Godou also spotted a large sign reading [Mark’s Pub]

“OH if it isn’t Godou. I haven’t seen you in a while!”

Upon entering the pub, Godou was treated to a large shout from Mark.

“It’s nice to see you too Mark.”

“Hehehe it seems you’ve gotten stronger. Lexus must be doing his job and toughening you up. So has he begged you to become a paladin yet?”

“No, I’m not an official trainee of the yet.”

“Well I guess he can’t give out any offers before you join the order. So who’s your friend? Come to think of it you look familiar.”

While saying that, Mark passed them free drinks.

“I am Ferrex Dakef. ”

“Ah I remember now, you're that kid who arrived from last year during that battle between the orders of Freya and Beezelb–”

“...Last year? Hmmm... yeah, after that Freya took me in and I’ve been with them ever since.”

“Hmm I was wondering what happened to you. And from the looks of it you’re not an official member of the church yet either. What is Lexus thinking? If it were me I would’ve immediately tried to reel you two in.”

“Speaking of which, Lexus seems to be quite a complex person. He seemed so hard working of the surface but I never expected him to have such an extreme side to him”

“Yeah, I’ve been living with the church for years but I never knew he would have something like that underground room prepared.”

“Oh so you guys are the reason why Lexus made that strange request. I was wondering why he wanted me to configure a spell timing system and metals arms on scarecrows.”

“So you’re the culprit behind those devilish contraptions!”

“Hehehe it’s been awhile since I’ve been able tinker around with my blacksmithing skills”

“Wait, I thought you said you where an adventurer before you were a pub keeper.”

“There’s nothing wrong with being an adventuring blacksmith. Though after being injured during– …8 years ago, I haven’t been able to move around as much as I’d want to.”

Ferrex made an astonished exclamation while Godou, who had come to accept the eccentricity of the barman, frowned at the inconsistencies he found in Mark’s statement.

“If you were a blacksmith, then why didn’t you open up a blacksmithing shop instead of a pub?”

“That’s too mainstream! Besides there’s also the fact that weapon and armour making is a competitive area. After my injury it takes me too long to make things so I decided to give up on it. I tried moving to pubs but it turned out to be even more competitive than blacksmithing! Gaah why am I cursed to make such decisions!”

Deciding to ignore Mark’s outburst, Godou steered the conversation to more trivial topics, starting to feel dizzy. Eventually, the regulars in the pub recognised him as the lucky newbie and dragged him off into another gambling marathon which lasted hours.

Part 2

The next day...

Godou made his way to the church to find Lexus and Ferrex waiting for him.

(Damn that idiot Doni.)

He hadn’t paid attention to it before but the drink Mark had given him contained alcohol. Puzzled at why the age censorship filter didn’t block the taste of alcohol, Godou had checked his censorship settings and found that the alcohol restrictions were permanently set to match Italy’s, that is 15 years and over.

That explained why Godou had been feeling lightheaded at the pub. Although Godou’s physical body had a strong resistance against alcohol, his viritual body seemed to be a different matter.

When he reached them, Lexus started speaking.

“Okay, the thing is there’s a minor mission that this church just received. However, were a bit shorthanded on staff so none of our stationed paladins and priests can be mobilised without Tellap town weakening considerably. ”

Godou nodded. During the time he had spent in the church, he had noticed that he kept running across the same people. He had wondered that there were some other people too important for an unofficial trainee like him to meet but that didn’t seem to be the case.

“As a result of all that you too are the only people we can entrust this task to. However, before I can give it to you, you two will have to pass another minor task, otherwise our official trainees are going to complain that we’re being biased–”

“Hang on! You’re not going to make us do something outrageous like the scarecrows again are you?”

Ferrex asked the cautionary question that Godou had also been pondering on.

“No, this time we’ll be doing things normally. The order of Freya has recently had many complaints about how the wolves around Northern Tellap are becoming nuisance. One particularly large pack has been causing trouble. Your task, should you choose to accept it, is to annihilate this pack and bring back their pelts as proof.”

Ding!

[tds]The initial test

Before Lexus can entrust to you the mission, he needs to have evidence that you are worthy of being able to carry out the task. Therefore, you are required to annihilate the wolf pack causing trouble in the northern section of the woods around Tellap.

Difficulty: E

Restrictions:

Unofficial trainee of the Order of Freya

Completed the basic training

Completed the basic education

Close relationship with Lexus

Rewards:

Recognition from the members of the church of Freya stationed in Tellap Town

+20 fame

+10 honour points

+10 contribution points to the Order of Freya

Penalties:

Failure results in a loss of respect within the church

Quest fails if all party members are killed

“Okay”

“I accept”

You have accepted the quest

“Before you start, I suggest you get some practice on the weaker monsters around the town. Now, I wish I could also give a class as well but I’m not allowed to do this unless you are officially part of the church.”

After saying that, Lexus pointed them to the direction where the wolf pack was last seen. Godou and Ferrex made a party and headed off in that direction.

***

Later at the training field...

Godou looked around the field. It seemed to be populated by rabbits with the occasional fox here and there. He noticed that the town walls around this area also seemed abnormally high compared to the other sections.

“Why are there walls on this side of the town so much higher than the others?”

“To keep the rabbits out… well actually I think the walls were being modified to be like that during the last Kallamore-Haven war but the war ended before more than this side was built and people lost interest in it after that.”

Ferrex answered Godou’s question in a half-joking manner before saying.

“Speaking of which there’s a lot of rabbits around here. Since it’s your first time fighting monsters why don’t we start with them? Plus, I haven’t fought anything since the church took me in so I’m a bit rusty as well.”

Godou looked at a rabbit that had hopped just 5 metres in front of him. From what he could recall, rabbits were passive mobs that only attacked players in self-defence. Staring at it, Godou felt guilty at the thought of attacking such a small animal. After all, he had considered himself to be a pacifist, who much like the rabbit, only fought seriously when he had reasons to do so.

(These rabbits probably just want to live a peaceful life frolicking in fields and eating grass or something but end up having that lifestyle ruined when some newbie player who starts hunting them. Then again, this is just a game so I’m probably thinking too deeply into it.)

Suppressing his guilty thoughts, Godou approached the rabbit and crouched in front of hit. He drew his sword, raising it to strike the rabbit. The said rabbit turned its head to look at him, its large brown eyes looking at him innocently in his shadow.

(Damn it! Don’t look at me like that.)

Godou hesitated, his resolve wavering, and then swung the sword down at the rabbit.

Now, aside from the few times that Godou had used actively the Ama no Murakumo no Tsurugi as a sword (which was rather rare since he was keen on sticking to weapon regulations), Godou had no real experience in handling bladed weapons in reality and the only other time he had used a sword was during the basic training.

As such, Godou’s sword strike was not the sharp fast strike of trained swordmasters such as his knights Erica and Liliana, but rather, the sloppy unmotivated hit of an amateur. However, it was an attack that had been forcefully drilled into him through relentless hours spent hitting scarecrows.

Thus, Godou had not been expecting it when the rabbit nimbly dodged the sword and sent a vicious kick at his face. [tab]

Reflexively, Godou managed to avoid the kick by falling backwards. However, in doing so, he had lost his grip on his sword and fell flat on his back. Capitalising on this moment of weakness, the rabbit landed on him and started jumping on him.

You have lost 14 HPYou have lost 12 HPYou have lost 17 HP

(Don’t get cocky you damn rabbit!)

Godou batted the rabbit while it was in mid-air, knocking it a few metres away due to his abnormal strength stat.

Panting, Godou rolled over and quickly got to his feet, tensing for the attack he knew the rabbit would make. In doing so he realised the mistake he had made. When he had knocked the rabbit away, it had flown and crashed into another rabbit.

As a result, instead of the attack from a single rabbit, Godou now had to face the combined assault of two rabbits leaping up at him. Barehanded.

Thinking quickly, Godou grabbed the ears of the first rabbit and used it like a baseball bat (well, more like a cricket bat) to knock away the second rabbit while they were both still in mid-air.

The shock of being used in such a manner seemed to have been too much for the first rabbit because it promptly died, dissolving into grey flame and leaving a few coins behind.

Now, the second rabbit should be… oh no…

Looking over to where the he had sent the second rabbit, Godou saw that it had also somehow fallen on top of two other rabbit causing all of them to rush at him as well.

“Hey, a little help here would be appreciated!”

Godou called out to Ferrex who had been cracking up on the ground at Godou’s war against rabbits.

“Hahaha… sorry, that was just the most entertaining hunting method I’ve seen so far. I don’t know if I should consider you lucky or unlucky now.”

Apologising, Ferrex also drew his sword and blocked off two of the rabbits heading towards Godou.

The other rabbit charged through unhindered. Godou readied himself, holding up his sword, which he had just retrieved, like a baseball bat. He watched the rabbit’s movement carefully, his concentration heightening to abnormal levels.

Compared to the balls thrown by the national pitchers Godou had faced when he still played baseball, the rabbit seemed incomparably slow. Thus, Godou was able to accurately able to time and right moment to strike and tragically separate the rabbits head from the rest of its body.

Afterwards, both parts of the rabbit dissolved into grey flame.

That seemed too easy.

Compared life and death battles involving high speed arrows, swords, claws and even laser beams, the rabbits seemed extremely weak.

Reflecting back Godou found it a pleasant change, being able to fight opponents weaker than himself.

Then Ferrex came back, having dealt with the other two rabbits, asking:

“Well I think it’s safe to move on to foxes now. How are you going in terms of health?”

“I have about 95% left”

“Well, I better heal you up anyway. Healing Hand!”

A light shone from Ferrex’s left hand and hit Godou. Instantly, Godou felt the minor pain from his injuries subside.

“How are you able to cast spells? I thought you needed at have a staff.”

“Oh that’s because this ring I’m wearing does the same function as a staff. Also, a staff is just a weapon that amplifies magic not having a staff doesn’t mean you can’t use magic. The spells you cast would just be a lot weaker.”

Ferrex showed Godou a black ring on his left hand. Although it looked plain, it undoubtedly was a rare item.

“Come to think of it, I don’t know your class and level either”

“I am level... 102… I am a Sa– I’m a priest. ”

“Wow your level’s so much higher than mine.”

There was a slight hesitation in Ferrex’s response but Godou decided to let it go.

“Please keep in mind that my job is not primarily to kill any monsters apart from undead. And also I most of my training before I met you was not based on increasing my physical stats. Anyway enough about me, I noticed you didn’t use any skills in that fight earlier. Shouldn’t you have learnt a skill from that book Lexus showed you? Or was it a non-combat skill?”

“I completely forgot about that. I’ve never used it before so I don’t know what it does. How do I use it do I just call out the name?”

“Yeah, most people do that but what really actives the skill is your thoughts.”

“Thoughts?”

“I mean, considering the fact that there are some people out there who can't speak for whatever reason, there has to be another method of activating the skill. It’s a different matter with spells though, you have to say the whole incantation as well as the spell name unless you’ve reached a certain level of proficiency with the spell.”

Ferrex’s explanation was unusually long winded this time.

“Okay let me try. Mana Weapon Creation! Damn a bit wordy”

Nothing happened. Godou felt disappointed.

(Wait, this is a skill that lets me make weapons the how does the game know what weapon to make. Do I have to visualise the weapon first?)

Looking the sword in his hand, Godou tried his best to memorise what he could of it and tried the activating the skill.

“Mana Weapon Creation”

BUZZ

A ball of light flashed in Godou’s other hand and took the shape of the sword he was imagining.

Mana Weapon has been successfully created

Although parts of the mana sword appeared indistinct, Godou was glad that it hadn’t turned out as something unrecognisable. The mana sword glowed and gave off a humming sound.

Godou stared at it, mesmerised and then stopped the skill as he realised how quickly it was depleting his mana.

“That’s a pretty draining skill. I guess I’ll have to test how strong the weapons I can make are first though. Speaking of which, you also learn a skill from Lexus. What was your skill?”

“Mine’s a non-combat skill called Mana Structure Comprehension. It gives me a chance to copy spells that I have been hit with myself. Thanks to that I was learn the blasted Rebound spell from the scarecrows.”

Godou considered testing out the skill on another rabbit but decided against it. Testing new skills against vastly weaker opponents was not something that could be considered training. It would be best if he followed Ferrex’s suggestion and moved on to a fox or a wolf now.

Ferrex had sat down by now and was mediating to regain his lost mana. Seeing this, Godou decided to do the same thing.

When they had completely recovered, the duo wordlessly stood up and looked for a fox.

Upon finding one, Ferrex requested:

“Let me play around with this one first, I want to try something.”

Godou glanced at Ferrex questioningly. A priest should be a class primarily based on supporting their team through healing and buffing. Whether in reality or games the basic team formation was to have the support in the back and have the fighters protecting them.

Except, it seemed as if Ferrex had no intention of staying behind Godou. Was he just confident because of his high level or was it something else?

Ferrex charged at the fox intimidating it. It tensed about to leap at him.

“Slow!”

A bolt of light flew from Ferrex’s left hand and struck the fox as it leapt at him. The speed of the fox’s leap slowed down to about 30% of its original speed by the curse.

Sidestepping the fox that had now been reduced to a turtle, Ferrex called out:

“Divine power that leads us to triumph, Blessing!”

Another bolt of light flew at hit the fox. This time it was a blessing that increased the fox’s strength and agility for a short period of time.

The fox leapt at Ferrex again, faster than previously but still slower than its original speed.

“Divine radiance that grants protection, Barrier!”

The fox crashed into a solid wall of light. It quickly recovered and leapt at Ferrex again.

This time Ferrex did not defend in time and got bitten by the fox. Godou stepped forward about to help him until…

“Vengeful spirits that vow for revenge, Rebound!”

Godou realised what Ferrex was doing. Godou was not the only one who had new skills they wanted to test. Ferrex must have learnt quite a few new spells from reading all those books in the church.

After Ferrex had tested out a series of other different spells, he healed the fox saying:

“Ok that’s my bit done do you want me to leave it like that?”

He was referring to the fox which was still under the effects of the slowing curse.

“No, could you dispel your curse? Actually could you buff the fox as well?”

Godou had been observing the movements of the fox during the fight. Now that he had seen its attack pattern Godou was confident that he would be able to take it on. If he were a certain distance from the fox then it would leap at him. If he attacked it in a certain manner then it would perform a certain action. All this became obvious thanks the slowing curse.

“Okay, your call. Dispel! Divine power that leads us to triumph, Blessing!”

The fox charged at Ferrex, enraged at being toyed around with so much. Godou quickly intercepted it with a tackle from the side as it leapt in the air.

Recovering at about the same time as the fox, Godou rolled to his feet and slashed at it, forcing it to leap backwards.

“Mana weap– ”

The fox attacked him again before he could activate his skill. Using all his strength, he dived to the side, the fox’s fangs barely grazing his side. A savage grin unconsciously split across Godou’s face.

Landing uncomfortably on the ground, he quickly scrambled to his feet and bashed the fox away with his sword as it tried to leap at him again.

“Mana weapon Creat– ”

Once again it interrupted him before he could finish. Calling out the skill name wasn’t the difficult part of executing the skill. It was the matter simultaneously yelling out the name and focusing to visualise the sword which prevented Godou from using the skill.

Feeling frustrated Godou stopped trying to say the full name of the skill and yelled out the first thing related to the skill that came to mind.

“Trace On! Create!”

BUZZ

It worked! Feeling exhilarated about finally being able to use the skill, Godou sidestepped the fox as it charged at him again and swung the mana sword at it.

SHATTER

The mana sword cut the fox slightly before shattering into pieces. Godou stared at it dumbfounded for the briefest fraction of a second before the pieces violently exploded.

You lost 245 HealthMana Weapon Creation Level Up!

- Size of weapons created has increased

- Durability of weapons created has increased

The fox died from the explosion whilst Godou had been knocked off his feet.

Contrary to expectation, this explosion was completely silent.

“That’s an interesting skill you learnt. Seems a bit risky though. Healing Hand!”

“I was not expecting it to explode like that”

Staying on the ground, Godou started to mediate to regain his used up mana. He wondered how he was supposed to use a skill like that. No, it might be better to think about how someone else would use it. Although he did not intend to copy others, Godou felt that he could at least get some inspiration by think about it.

Savatore Doni would probably do something ridiculous like… no let’s not think about that idiot.

Liliana might use the skill to make an infinite source of arrows or something similar. Exploding arrows would definitely be dangerous… However, Godou did not know anything about archery...

Erica would… hmm that could work.

Checking that his mana was completely full, Godou got to his feet and started looking for another fox.

“I think I’ve figured out a way to use it”

“Really? This should be interesting.”

After spotting one, Godou walked up to it and stopped about 20m away from it. Closing his eyes, Godou looked back in his memories trying to visualise the weapon which Erica had sometimes used.

“Create!”

BUZZ

He looked at the weapon in his hands. A 2 metre long spear with about 1 quarter of its length making up the thin spearhead. Perfect!

It was a weapon designed to break to after being thrown to hinder the enemy. In other words, Godou had just recreated a javelin once used by the Roman military, a pilum.

Holding it up, Godou took a step forward and threw it at the fox with all the force he could muster.

It flew quickly through the air and impaled the startled fox. It exploded shortly after. The fox having survived the attack, snarled and charged at Godou.

“Wow you took out 92% of the fox’s health with that”

Ferrex used his powers as a priest to report the extent of the damage on the fox before killing it with his sword.

During this time Godou had only activated the skill for about 7 seconds. As such he still had about one third of his mana remaining.

“How much stronger are wolves?”

“About the same as the buffed fox. I think you should level up a bit before we face them. Well, you currently have the stats of a level 30 warrior/mage due to the training but I think a little more Health wouldn't hurt.”

Not feeling patient enough to wait for his mana to regenerate, Godou looked around more foxes to kill. Ferrex gave him some support from behind mostly staying at the back this time since Godou was the one who needed to level up quickly, he even applied a blessing on him that increased his growth rate temporarily.

Whenever he had enough mana Godou made mana javelins and threw them. He also started to experiment with the other weapons he could create.

During this process he got up to level 10 and had distributed all the level up stat bonuses equally between Strength, Agility, Wisdom and Intelligence. During this time, he had received the following message.

You have learn Throwing Weapon Mastery Beginner 1Throwing Weapon Mastery Beginner 1

+ 5% damage of thrown projectiles

+ 1% speed of thrown projectiles

Part 3

Afterwards, they went back to town somehow managed to persuade a hunter to track down the wolf pack for them.

After approximately 20 minutes of searching for clues in the mountain forest, they found a small cave. At that point the hunter said:

“All the foot prints led into that cave so I’m willing to bet that it’s the wolf den. If it is, then it seems to be a rather large pack, about 40 wolves in there. Well, I’m not too keen to stick around here since there might be wolves patrolling around so I’m going back. Happy hunting.”

And headed back to town, leaving Godou and Ferrex by themselves.

“That Lexus, his making us do something outrageous again. When he said a wolf pack I thought it’d only be 13 or 14 of them”

Ferrex placed his complaint. Godou was about to agree with him when he heard a sound behind them. Startled they turned around.

They had encountered a pair of wolves.

There was a moment of silence as the two sides looked at each other. Godou noted that these wolves seemed a lot larger and more threatening than the foxes he fought before.

Then, simultaneously, the wolves leapt at them.

“So we’re up against about 40 of these.

While dodging the jaws of the wolf he was facing and casually placing the slowing curse on it, Ferrex made the remark.

“How bout we spilt it so that we both take on 20 each? Create!”

Godou made his reply as he dropped to one knee and created a mana spear, placing it so that the butt of the spear was supported in the ground and the tip was directed at the wolf.

Unable to change its direction, the wolf ran straight into the spearhead. The spear broke and promptly exploded, blasting the wolf away. It came to a stop with a sickening crunch as it smashed into a tree.

“That hardly seems fair since I’m a healer and the only useable offense skill I have is the rebound spell.”

Godou, who had been expecting the explosion to happen, had braced his lower body so he had not been too badly affected by it. The wolf got to its feet, dazed and badly injured, but still capable of fighting. It raised its head, about to howl and call for help.

“You’re physical capabilities are pretty much the same as mine! Wait do you have other offensive skills?”

Seeing its intentions, Godou quickly drew his sword and threw it at the wolf. It flew at the wolf’s throat point first and skewered it to the tree before it could make a sound.

“I blame that on Lexus and yeah but certain restrictions must be met before I can use them... I think.”

The wolf whimpered and then died. Godou turned to see Ferrex about to deal the finishing blow to the wolf he was facing.

“Oh I hate troublesome abilities like that. Is there any chance of satisfying these conditions?”

It seemed that after being slowed to a snail’s pace by Ferrex’s curse, the other wolf had had absolutely no chance of winning.

“Nope. It doesn’t seem like we can collapse the cave on them either. Maybe we can block off the entrance so they only come at us one at a time.”

As Ferrex appeared perfectly capable of soloing the wolf himself, Godou went to retrieve his sword.

“I don’t think that would work. Those wolves would hear us moving the blockade in place. Besides they’d probably come through some other side entrance we don’t know about and attack us from there as well.”

“Your ability to adapt to change is truly frightening. A few hours ago you were playing around with foxes and rabbits, now you’re ready to take on a wolf pack.”

“Please don’t say it as if I’m some sort of monster.”

Feeling disgruntled at that statement for some reason, then Godou said:

“It looks like we can only do a frontal charge. Conserve your mana and only use it for healing. We’ll just have to improvise something.

“But that’s practically suicide! Wait, no it isn’t. With our perseverance we will surely be fine! No matter what fighting 40 wolves cannot be worse than hitting a scarecrow every few seconds for 3 weeks straight!”

Having decided that, Godou and Ferrex healed up and cautiously entered the wolf den. Luckily, all the remaining wolves in the den were sleeping when they had entered. As a result, they were able to reduce the number of wolves by 8 before the rest of them woke up.

After that the duo underwent a desperate battle in which they were forced to face 33 wolves in an enclosed space.

3 hours later they appeared before Lexus with their clothes ripped to rags and swords bent and covered in notches to notify him that they had completed the quest.

Quest Complete!

Having successfully purged a nuisance wolf pack, the church now acknowledges you.

+20 fame

+10 honour points

+10 contribution points to the Order of Freya

“Now that you have proven yourself, I can now safely tell you your real mission. A church in the nearby town of Naidiriv is low on members and needs more people to defend the village. We have answered their calls by sending a few of our other members ahead of you but we have no had contact with them for weeks. We need you guys to go and join the defence force there as mercenaries. So do you accept?”

Reinforcements

The church of Freya has received a call for help from Naidiriv. Other members have been dispatched ahead of you but contact with them has been lost for about 4 weeks. You are to act as reinforcements in that town and if possible find out what happened to the missing members.

Difficulty: C

Restrictions:

Acknowledged by the Order of Freya

Rewards

+500 Contribution points to the Order of Freya

+100 Fame

Penalties:

Will result in a loss of familiarity with the Order of Freya if the quest fails.

““I accept””

You have accepted the questYour party has accepted the quest

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It took longer to write this than I expected

Props go to Lin4t for the Bigpond reference.