by Funa
The sword had been almost at its limit, and Mavis thrust it into the orc at a rather unfortunate angle, which further increased the pressure on its blade.
And so, it broke.
There was nothing to be done about it.
“I’m hopeless…”
Mavis was crestfallen. She knew better than anyone how the amateurishness of her final strike had contributed to it. Looking upon her sullen face and her broken weapon, there was nothing for the other three to say but…
“Let’s go home.”
A cold wind blew, whisking fallen leaves around the Crimson Vow as they trudged along, shoulders drooping.
It was a picturesque sight. One that, in a painting, would take first at any exhibition.
The title, naturally, would be “Hard Times.”
***
That evening, the four girls made their way to a weapons shop.
It was their first day as rookie hunters, and they’d done well enough to receive the praise and blessing of the other hunters when they exchanged their spoils at the guildhall.
Despite this victory, however, the girls looked gloomy. Puzzled, the other hunters asked them what happened. Mavis drew her sword with a self-deprecating smile.
“Oh jeez…”
Swords were by no means cheap.
No matter how much they’d earned, this would put them into the red.
The other hunters recommended this shop, which was said to stock decent, relatively cheap swords.
“The dilemma here is whether to buy an okay sword with the funds we have on hand or to buy a cheap one now and save up for a better one. What to do…?” Reina pondered. “Tell us what you think, Mavis. We want to do whatever will be best for the party, after all. That sword was on the verge of breaking as it was, and we already knew that we’d have to replace it. Really, it’s my fault for being so insistent about landing the kill. If the sword broke even a second sooner, you might have been killed. I’m so sorry…”
Having a sword break in the midst of battle was a one-way ticket to the grave. Buying an unreliable weapon just for the price tag was out of the question.
“Okay. I’ll try to make the best decision for all of us. What we need is…”
“A cheap one!” Mile interjected suddenly.
“Huh?!”
“Go on, Mavis. Just pick one with a grip that feels good, that’s about the right length. From the duds in the bargain bin.”
“M-Mile!!!”
Chapter 12:
New Gear
And so, Mavis’s new (used) sword was purchased.
That night, in their room at the inn, Mile turned to the others. “Why don’t we take a day off tomorrow?”
“What are you talking about? We’ve only done a single day’s work! If we carry on like this we’ll never save up any money!”
“C-calm down…” Pauline attempted to pacify Reina, who bristled at Mile’s suggestion.
“Well,” Mavis jumped in, trying to help. “If Mile is suggesting this, there must be a reason, right? After all, she’s always so sure of herself.”
“S-sure of myself…?”
Contrary to Mavis’s intention, Mile looked wounded, her posture crumbling as she folded her hands on the table.
“What? Is something wrong?” asked Mavis, perplexed.
“N-nothing. It’s fine… even though that’s really not…” Mile stood again, mumbling her final words. “Um, anyway. I was hoping to go out with just Mavis tomorrow…”
“Huh???”
The other three exclaimed as one.
“M-Mile, don’t tell me…”
“N-no way!”
“That’s fine with me,” Mavis said. “But what for? You want to go shopping or something?”
It was hard to know exactly what she was imagining.
The following day, somewhere in the woods…
“What are you two doing here?!”
Somehow, Mile and Mavis weren’t alone in the forest. Reina and Pauline were there, too.
“I was concerned about what the two of you might be doing all alone!”
“She dragged me along against my will…”
“In that case,” said Mile. “Why didn’t you just say something? Why did you have to follow us in secret?!”
“If I’d told you, then I’d never be able to find out what the two of you were doing!”
“Gah!!” Mile struggled to collect herself. “Whatever! We may as well do what we planned anyway, Mavis.”
“Okay. What should I do?”
“Just lend me your sword a minute.”
“Sure. Here.” Mavis unhooked the sword from her waist and handed it over.
Mile removed the sword from the sheath, then stabbed it into the sandy ground with ease, plunging the blade deep. The sword slid into the hard ground until all but the hilt was buried, showing no resistance.
“Wh…?”
Even though the ground was sandy, this wasn’t a desert. It wasn’t normal to drive a sword so deep into the ground with so little effort.
“So Mavis, how much would you like this sword to weigh?”
“A-ah, well, my sword style is focused on speed, so if it was a little lighter I could swing it a little faster. But…that would decrease its power. Also, if I always used a lighter sword, I would never hone my strength, and if I had to use something else, then I would get in trouble. I think a normal weight is best.”
“Of course! Normal is best after all!”
Mavis drew slightly away, put off both by the ease with which Mile had plunged the sword into the ground and her strange enthusiasm for this. Then again, Mavis was used to Mile’s strangeness by now. Perhaps she didn’t need to be so concerned.
She was more interested in what was going on with her sword.
“Um, Mile, my sword…?”
“Ah! Just a little longer.”
With these words, Mile sank deep into thought, her eyes going unfocused.
After a short while, she blinked once and gripped the hilt of the sword, yanking it from the ground. She used wind magic to clean the excess dirt from the blade, returned the sword to the sheath, and handed it back to Mavis.
“All done!”
“Ah, thanks…”
Mavis took the sword and hung it back at her waist, then drew the blade to inspect it.
It didn’t really look all that different, but…
“Why don’t you try it out? You wouldn’t want to test a new sword for the first time in a real battle.”
“You’re right. It’s better to give it a whirl ahead of time. I need to get a good sense of the sharpness and weight.”
“Yes. And I have something that I’d like to try out as well, so perhaps we can do some hunting togeth—”
“Hold it right there!” Reina, who’d been watching quietly this whole time, finally interjected. “Going out to handle some sword matters on your own on a day off is one thing, but hunting is another matter! We’re your party, and we’re coming, too!”
“Huh? That’s fine if you really want to, but we’re mostly just going out to test our weapons. We aren’t going to be catching all that much. Are you okay with that?”
“It doesn’t matter. A party hunts together! And that’s all I have to say on the matter,” declared Reina, standing firmly with her arms akimbo. It was a familiar pose.
“In any case, why don’t you take a few practice swings, Mavis? To make sure that the weight and balance are to your liking.”
Mavis swung her sword around for a short while, then answered, sounding satisfied. “No problems here. It’s got a good feel, sits nicely in my hand…”
Mile pointed to a nearby tree, grinning.
“Well, then. Why don’t you try chopping down that tree?”
“Wh…?”
The girls looked at the tree. It was as thick as an adult’s arms could grasp.
“How could I possibly cut through that?! If I even tried it, the sword would be damaged, and we just bought
it! This blade is much cheaper than the one I had before.”
Mavis’s previous sword was taken from her family’s personal armory and had been of a fairly decent make. The blade was strong, but Mavis, lacking the technique to match the weapon, had shortened its lifespan considerably with her amateurish attacks…
The cheap sword they obtained yesterday was certainly not capable of the sort of thing that Mile was suggesting…was it?
Despite Mavis’s objections, Mile urged her on. “It’s fine! I used earth magic to strengthen the blade for this very reason. You can swing it as hard as you like, and it won’t even chip!”
“………”
Mavis stared silently, her face sour.
Mile didn’t realize that, in trying to reassure her friend, she’d implied that Mavis’s swings were less than impressive.
“Fine. I’ll cut it. But whatever happens next is not my fault!”
“Of course. If your sword gets damaged, I’ll just fix it. It’s no problem!”
Yet a sword wasn’t something you could just reshape, Mavis thought. No matter how cheap, a sword was still a sword. It wasn’t the same as a metal plate.
Ignoring Mile’s foolish words, Mavis prepared her sword and swung it.
Ka-shunk!
With a dull ring, the blade sunk into the tree, about one-fourth of the way through.
The sword didn’t break. It didn’t even show any sign of bending.
“Uh…”
The three girls were shocked, which was quite understandable. There was no way that a normal sword—which wasn’t an axe, and shouldn’t function like one—should have been able to cut through a tree.
If every blade were capable of power like this, then lumberjacks around the world would toss their axes away and become swordsmen.
“Wh…?”
Mavis stared down at the completely normal-looking blade, lost for words.
Thanks to her training in the past half a year, her strength could rival even the strongest of men. There was no doubt that, if the sword had gone so far into the tree, she had put her full strength behind it. But even though a tree was wood, not metal, a sword in these circumstances should break, or at least bend.
In a match against another person, you didn’t use your full force in every swing. You used only a certain percentage of your power. Yet here she’d swung with full force and, because the blade did not cut all the way through, the sword had absorbed most of that power. Even so, it had not been bent, broken, or even warped. This might be expected of a magic sword or heavenly blade, but this had been simply a cheap, used…
Don’t tell me—did some amazing, high-quality blade end up in the bargain bin by mistake?
Reina and Pauline’s eyes glittered at the thought of this unbelievable steal.
Or…is this because of Mile’s strengthening magic?
“Now, could you try cutting through that for me?”
Mile, who didn’t seem surprised at all, pointed to a spot about seven or eight meters from the tree. To a great boulder, about two meters in diameter.
“M-Mile…?”
This time, as Mavis stared, slack-jawed, Reina stepped forward, snarling.
“That is absolutely, one-hundred percent impossible! What on earth do you think you’re doing with the sword we just spent all that money on?!”
Even Pauline could not keep silent. Her money had been involved too, and she nodded wildly in agreement.
But, after a few fraught moments of uncertainty, Mavis readied her blade a second time.
“Mavis!”
“D-don’t do it!!”
Reina and Pauline protested, but Mavis’s resolve was firm.
“When I cut into that tree, I felt a response. Almost as if the sword were speaking back to me. Besides—everything we have now is thanks to Mile, so… no, wait. What I mean to say is, if we can’t have faith in our friends, then what can we have faith in?”
“………”
Reina and Pauline fell silent.
“Fine,” said Reina, “Do as you like! But if that sword breaks, there will be no more days off until we’ve saved up enough to buy another one!”
Pauline gasped, but Mavis only grinned.
“You guys…!”
Even shy Pauline could not help but protest at the thought of so much money, but it was not enough to stop Mavis.
She stood before the boulder, gathered all her strength, and swung down into the rock with one fell swoop.
Snap.
…The blade broke.
“MIIIIILEE!!!”
“I-I’m sorryyyy!!!”
Mavis collapsed to the ground, while Reina leapt for Mile, and Pauline, still thinking of the party’s finances, stared with a hollow gaze.
“M-Mile, you little…”
“W-wait! Just let me explain!”
“What is there to explain?! I believed in you, and you made a fool of me!”
***
After a few minutes, Reina finally calmed down and Mavis picked herself up off the ground, while Pauline still sat, mentally recalculating their budget.
Mile stood before them and explained. “I’m sorry. I thought that my earth magic would be able to strengthen it, but apparently it wasn’t enough…”
“………”
Mile had done so much for them, and there was no way the others could be truly angry with their teammate. However, this was quite a blow to their finances.
It couldn’t be helped that Mavis’s previous sword had broken. It was nearing the end of its life, and they had already planned to set aside money to replace it. But it hurt badly to lose a brand new sword which they’d bought with the majority of their funds. Each of the girls wore dark expressions—even more so than the day before. That is, except for Mile.
Her bright voice rung out cheerfully. “Well then, I’ll go ahead and fix it!”
“Huh…?”
“H-hang on, even if you say you can fix it, you can’t just patch a sword back together with glue!” Mavis protested, looking distraught. “Even if you stick it together with earth magic, the moment it strikes something, it’ll snap again, and that could be fatal! I absolutely refuse to wield a sword like that!”
“Weapons,” added Reina, “aren’t nearly as simple as you seem to think. When a sword is broken, there’s nothing to be done but melt it down to reuse the raw metal. Have you ever heard of someone using a sword that was merely stuck back together?”
Pauline nodded as well, but Mile appeared calm and confident.
“Please. Wait until you see the results before you pass judgment!”
“Your results are already rolling away!”
Sure enough, the broken sword was tumbling down the hill and away.
***
“Sorry about the wait. Here’s your new-and-improved sword. It’s tough, unbreakable, unchippable, unbendable, low-maintenance, and will never lose its cutting edge. And, it carries the Mile Company quality assurance guarantee!”
Mile drew the sword from its sheath in a single motion.
Mavis received it wordlessly.
“Is it really fixed…?”
Reina and Pauline eyed the blade suspiciously.
“Don’t be rude! It’s fine this time! Last time, I was just holding back. When I put my whole heart into it, then surely…”
“Maybe you should put your whole heart into it from the start!”
“…Yes, ma’am.”
In order to restore their confidence in her, Mile worked hard. For the sake of the party, Mavis, and herself, she couldn’t afford to conjure up a sword that was too efficient. Therefore, the first time around, she’d aimed to give the sword only the minimum necessary improvements.
However, if the sword broke, there was a chance that Mavis could lose her life, which would put the rest of the party in danger, too. Even if they did make it out safely, having to purchase yet another sword would be a considerable drain on their savings.
And so, Mile had poured her
energy into creating a sword that was merely sturdy, but possessed no other special properties, conjuring up the image of carbon fibers, titanium, and high-tensile steel—materials that were thought to be among the strongest on Earth.
She had assumed that this would give Mavis’s blade the necessary strength, and yet the boulder had proved too much for it.
Now, Mile was indignant.
On Earth, were there not blades that could cut rock and iron? Should hers not have been able to slice through that boulder? How could she restore her own credibility?
Failing again was not an option. If she failed this time, there was no way that Mavis would ever trust her life to a sword that Mile had tampered with.
She had to do it. There was no other option.
This time, Mile told herself, don’t worry about the range of techniques that exist in this world! Instead, make an absolutely unbreakable blade, by any means necessary.
A useful sword with an unchippable blade that never rusts and never needs maintenance! The edge should be the fifth sharpest in this world. However, the weight and shape should be the same as before. It would still look exactly like a cheap, normal weapon.
Let’s gooooo!!!
Mile packed the dirt with her feet, then thrust the broken blade into the ground, driving it deep, and channeled her magic into the hilt.
This was the sword she presented to Mavis.
“All right! Now, please try cutting that boulder!”
Mavis was hesitant, but if she didn’t do it, then she would never know how much confidence she could have in this sword. And anyway, the blade had already broken once. If she didn’t test it, how could she know it wouldn’t snap again? A weapon she couldn’t trust was not one she was willing to fight with.
Mavis readied herself and swung the blade up, bringing it down onto the boulder.
Crack!
As was to be expected, the blade did not slice through the boulder. However, seeing how far the blade had sunk into the rock, Mavis, Reina, and Pauline’s eyes grew round.
“This…”
Mavis inspected the blade in disbelief, finding that it had not even chipped. As she did, Mile quietly pulled a short sword from storage and presented it to her teammate.