Sigh

"EEK!!"

A sudden scream from the front. I was near the back.

Judging by the scream, probably a girl. Most of the kids were taller than me, so I couldn't really see much.

"Stop whining. It's just a pig," Alustur said. He picked me up on his shoulder to let me get a better view. "What do you think?"

"Definitely a pig."

A pig about twice the size of a typical boar. It was a bit smaller than a cowpig though.

Roughly twenty of us, and almost all of them were trying to hit the cornered pig. Behind it was a steep hill, and in front… twenty brats. It could have easily overpowered the brats and maybe even killed a few. Yet, for some reason it was squeaking and oinking and shivering like its life had ended.

I suppose that was because Alustur was here.

It'd been about two months since the incident and during this whole time, the dude had, for whatever reason, tried to teach me the basics. In his words, "I'm not teaching you because I want you to be strong. I'm teaching you, so that you don't accidentally end up dead."

Had a nice ring to it.

Yet, he hardly ever let me try anything dangerous. He never took me to the field excursions and he never let me practice with the other kids who were bigger than me. Even today, on my very first excursion, he was carrying me half of the fucking time!

This guy was babying me more than Mom babied me! And I was a literal baby back then!

"Eyes on the prize Sol," he said. "Never let your thoughts wander in a battlefield. Every breath, every moment matters."

"Right."

We weren't necessarily on the battlefield. At least from my perspective. But for him, I guess he was right.

Some of the kids tried to attack the boar with a knife but the boar constantly rushed at them and the kids ran for their lives. This was getting nowhere.

But soon enough some of the other kids snuck behind the boar and stuck a knife in its guts. "OINK!" It shrieked and before they knew it, two kids were on the ground covered in blood. The pig's blood.

"Well, duty calls," Alustur said, casually unsheathing his sword and disappearing.

I slowly dropped on the ground, on my feet.

 We now had lots of meat for dinner.

Nice!

***

We were out in the wilderness. Out in the far west of the academy. A little far from the nearest settlement.

This place was full of trees and rocky hills and lots of grass.

What were we doing here?

Field trip!

Ordinarily I wasn't supposed to be part of this group. Heck, I wasn't even in this class. But since Alustur had been teaching me a lot lately, and he took a new group to these field trips every two weeks, I'd been pestering him to take me as well.

I'd gotten way too damn comfortable with my academy life and I needed some reminders that this world was fucking insane and dangerous. Any wrong move and you could be dead meat. No, literally. Dead meat.

"You've seen blood before, why are you staring like that?" Alustur said.

But I wasn't necessarily staring at him. I was staring at the dead pig. Poor thing was just trying to live but we hunted it, and now we were going to skin it and eat it too.

Life truly was survival of the fittest. And whether you liked it or not, might was always right. It was a bit too true for this world.

"Just wondering what would have happened if it were stronger than us, or rather you."

"We'd all be like it instead."

Alustur taught the kids how to skin the pig and drain its blood. Their work was spotty at best. They had some practice indoors just a week prior but I suppose nothing really scared the shit out of you more than seeing someone brutally murder something before your very eyes and then ask you to gut its dead body for fun times.

We finished preparing the meat. Or rather Alustur did. He carried the meat as well. About ten kilograms or so. The rest we just left there. Apparently, wild boars around these parts had horrible tasting meat in certain parts of their bodies. Certain other parts were mana dense and could give you mana poisoning like eating a manafish scale whole. Part of why, I requested Alustur to get me a bit of its mana dense part. He cut half of its liver out and just gave it to me.

Woah… this is a lot of blood. Glad I'd bought a bag.

"Don't these things have parasites," I said.

"That's why we cook them thoroughly." Alustur shrugged. "Besides, it'll be fine as long as you drowse the meat in some potions. And don't even think about eating that liver. That's only used as a catalyst."

People really took potions for granted despite those things being expensive.

Apparently, my elixir thing wasn't remotely as cheap as I thought it was. I learned it the hard way just four months ago.

But even potions were like that. They were 1 silver a piece each (on paper) but in reality, they cost from anywhere between 5 to 20 gold depending on their efficiency. And I wasn't even talking about elixirs. These were just typical healing potions that aided recovery. Yes, aided.

"We're not setting up a camp here?" I asked.

We were walking farther and farther away from the kill sight. Not towards the settlement in the distance, but just away from the blood and guts.

"No. it'll just attract more fiends. Great for a hunting party."

"But not for us."

"Yes."

That being said, we set up camp in a faraway place and Alustur started the cooking process in a big cauldron. Apparently, we were going to have pottage for dinner.

Better than stale bread.

***

 It felt like camping, honestly.

Just safer, considering we had Alustur here. I was still weary of him and I'm sure he knew that. Yet, for some reason I did feel safe. No, I knew the reason. Dude was one of the strongest men I knew.

He and Rexy (who was sleeping peacefully in my hair) never got along. No, that wasn't quite right. Rexy just didn't like that guy and would openly show hostility which she never showed to anything other than just cats. And yes, she did not like cats.

"You should eat more meat," Alustur said.

"I'm trying to."

"Try harder."

That's not helping. I rolled my eyes but did try to eat more skewers. I'd had my fair share of pork pottage with bread. But after a while, I did crave a bit of roasted meat, so I told Alustur and he readily agreed.

Meanwhile, the vast majority of the kids were sleeping under the stars. No tents necessary. We were just sleeping outside with nothing but mats. I was a little concerned about the bugs, but Alustur assured me, even bugs were going to stay away as long as he was here. That worried me a bit more but oh well.

"You're a really strong man, Alustur," I said.

"I am."

"But can you protect us from… well, you know, stronger men than you?"

He stared at me. The fire burned next to us, reflected in his eyes. Yet for some reason, his eyes were cold.

"I cannot." He shook his head. "But I will gladly die to protect you. You have given me a second chance. And I swore-"

"No, that's not necessary. I don't think I forgave you; but you probably don't need my forgiveness anyway. You don't owe me anything. In fact, you were just doing your job. As much as it irks me, killing powerless kids in this world… is normal…" Saying it out loud made my chest ache. Murder… was normal.

I was in a different world. A world with its own set of rules and scummy-ness. As much as I hated the world and all this bullshit, I couldn't really blame the people for being 'normal'.

 "There's nothing normal about murdering children," he said. "I value your ideals Sol… Don't discard them just because you think you owe the world something. You don't owe anything to do this world or its rules; you were born without your consent, it's the world that owes you. You're… you're you. And you get to decide what's right or wrong. Isn't that why you fought so hard that day?"

The hell are you even… "Guess so."

It was a little awkward but watching the fire crackle was kind of soothing.

And I thought this dude wasn't talkative. Which was kind of true because he didn't talk much in general. Yet, he was really trying hard these last couple of weeks. Maybe he'd changed. And maybe he was going to change more.

Yet… I still couldn't find it in me, to trust him again.

Yet… I couldn't loathe him either.

Sigh.