Scary [1]

TH 8

TL: Eevee

2. What is this. Scary. (1)

They say the three greatest necessities of man are food, clothing and shelter.

And if I were to choose, I would choose food.

If you do not have a house you can sleep rough, if you do not have clothes then you can roughly cover up, but if people do not have food, they die.

– From a certain hero's memoires

I blankly stared at the training scene playing out in front of me.

"Die!"

"This time for sure!"

"You, suit defeat."

Would the twilight of the gods, Ragnarok, have looked something like this.

-These, damn brats!

"Ice Buster"

-Kuaaaaaaagh!

No, if you look at the fire giant that was said to have been at its forefront getting the crap beaten out of him, it's more than possible to think that way.

If we look back a couple of months ago when this all started.

"From today onwards, we will begin a simple fitness training program."

Although they were only three little squirts, even if you threw them out to work as a mercenary they'd be more than usable.

Although they lack experience to be an A rank, they'd be a B, B- at the very least.

Because if they weren't then they wouldn't be standing here right now.

And teaching those kinds of kids is very exhausting.

The realm of genius, that realm is one where if you teach them something they'll get at least one thing out of it.

Put another way, geniuses are the type that can learn ten, even twenty things.

And the moment I play out all my cards against those types, I become a useless instructor, and an instructor with no fear or respect is easy prey from that moment onwards.

Actually, the previous cohort started rebelling the moment they started getting used to the method keeping them in line.

So I moved onto the next step, but I need to assume there's no way of knowing when that will stop being effective as well.

Although in all honesty I don't think it ever will.

Because of this, for the times when I need an effective method that uses none of my cards.

"The training is simple. Just run for five kilometres."

A simple run. But. When the last conditions are added on it becomes different.

"It matters not what methods or means you use. You just have to not kill anyone. However. The person who arrives last, does not get to eat."

No.1000's blank eyes ignited.

Oddly enough that child always put her life on the line when it came to food.

To be honest her appearance in the desert as she chewed a scorpion's tail which was known to have poison was a wee bit too much even for me.

When she saw a desert fox that normal kids that age, no, even older people would normally think is cute, her bright smiling face that said she had found something to eat even appears in my dreams sometimes.

To that kid, no, that bitch, not feeding her is the worst punishment.

But it seems like No.1 and No.17 haven't realised the severity of the situation.

#1 Their story: The future hero's hunger

The sky is white.

I'm hungry…

Anything's fine I just want to eat something…

"It's tasty!"

"It is."

The instructor is a devil.

Not being allowed to eat aside, but why do I have to stay at the dining table with them!

Right beside me, No.1000 is happily wolfing down her food and No.17 is nibbling away with a satisfied look on her face, and I realised what was holding me back.

To be honest, as a potential successor to a duchy I had my pride.

Just for food!

I still had my pride to focus on something as petty as that!

It was on the third day when I realised I needed to throw that pride to the dogs.

But still as a man, I couldn't let girls starve for something as simple as food but on the third day, I was at my limits.

The direct descendant of a duke.

Looking at it differently, it meant that as a direct descendant of a duke, starvation was unthinkable.

Sometimes in protest of my father's plans, his advisors went on a hunger strike, and now that I think about it they were very admirable people.

How did they last a week, a month.

Ads by Pubfuture

Thinking about that when I did my best to run for lunch, a dagger flew in front of my face.

"Hey, wait!"

I hurriedly pulled out my sword and parried the dagger. I nearly died zoning out. If I die here then only my damn brothers will be happy about that.

Maybe No.1000 felt she couldn't relax with the gap that opened up, but after throwing the dagger she started to run like her life depended on it.

And closely behind her, No.17 ran with a slightly faster speed.

"Oi, at least give me one meal at least!"

I'm hungry!

As I put strength into my legs while yelling that in my mind, all of a sudden I could see the sky.

As I shakily stood, I looked at the ground to see that it was covered in ice.

While the heat is passing by, it's not even autumn yet.

But ice!

"These little…"

Grind. I grit my teeth and started running as fast as I could.

Sure, circumstances being what they are, but still. Their comrade is this hungry!

The instructor did say to not care about means nor methods, but she really tried to kill me!

I swung my sword, used magic and ran like hell.

I narrowly caught up, I was attacked, I fell behind, then I realised.

'I can't use my full strength because I'm hungry!'

They say a healthy body is a healthy mind.

To put it literally, in a hungry body, a hungry mind sets in and you can't bring out your full strength.

I should have noticed this. The opposition are in perfect condition.

Compared to them I'm simply a golem running low on mana.

When a golem runs out of mana, they become a simple rock statue.

But it took me too long to notice!

A day, two passed and oh my gods it's already been a week since I ate anything!

The skies looked truly white and the rocks looked like fruit.

Now, when I truly am down to my last resort.

Dinner time, a light run before mealtime.

But as I no longer had any strength left I collapsed on the starting line.

Aah, even though I felt like I was going to die the instructor still didn't give me anything to eat.

On the contrary, he's watching me closely to see if I'm sneaking anything to eat.

To think I'd die of starvation like this!

Not even my brothers that threw me into this mess would have predicted this!

"…Hey, are you alright?"

Ah, she's here. It's No.17. I never really expected anything from No.1000 to begin with.