Using his latest use of the current [Hon'yaku-sha], Ethan quickly formulated what he wanted to say to her and, although there was some hesitation, he knew that at least a general explanation was due to her.
"The city we are in is known as Orario. About the distance of this place from your country.. I don't know exactly how far it is, but it's certainly a lot further than we can imagine..."
What he said was the truth. Ethan didn't really know how far away the world 1999 could be from the world 1042 were they currently were, but thinking about how the worlds might have received an order, there were few orders that came to his mind. The various worlds could be ordered by distance, or by the number of creation, or by something much more complicated than that, but he knew even if the world was rhetorically near, he had no instrument capable of bringing him to another world and, as to confirm more accurately the fact, a panel appeared before him
[The required action is completely out of my functions for the moment]
The system response startled Ethan. He thought space travel would require a spaceship, or something similar to what the humans of his previous world had been able to achieve, but the system was telling him it didn't possess anything of the sort for the moment..
'For the moment...'
Although it seemed difficult to imagine, Ethan wanted to fulfil her desire to go back to her country. He didn't know what they were going to find there, or how they were going to deal with things when that moment came, but Ethan still promised to take her back to her home world, so that she could see the truth for herself...
While Ethan was showing the text he had translated to Maple, Riveria responded with a calm tone to the question he asked them by involving her first.
"I'm pretty sure, the person who gave the symbol to Maple-san is certainly far from being an ordinary person. As I have seen, the string of mana residing above her fur is the mana of a higher entity.... even if not close to the level of a God, the density and power emanating from that symbol is frightening..."
During the period of time when Ethan and Maple wrote the first words they could understand from the latter, Riveria and Lefiya had carefully observed Maple and from time to time, the mana seemed to actively move on her body, as if to consolidate the bond with the latter
Her words interrupted Ethan's thoughts previously focused on the future, as now they looked back at the present.
Thinking about it for a second, Lefiya slowly raised her hand before adding
"The real question is, should we trust someone whose identity is so m-mysterious..?"
They didn't know whether to trust this being could be the right thing to do, but to this question, Ethan took Maple in his arms before caressing her ears.
"They could have treated Maple better, but if this entity had no choice but to hastily entrust to her this symbol, having only explained in a rudimentary way what was needed to be activated, I think there was something limiting this being, even though I'm not sure what...I'm sure asking Maple for more information will be a first step to finding out more.."
Although he was already quickly getting used to calling her affectionately as Yowaka, Ethan realized by the time he pronounced Maple's name, that the latter 'though weak, possessed all other qualities able to distinguish her from many, so describing her only as 'weak' now seemed to him really.... stupid. For some reason, he felt he could sympathize with her story even more.
Although nothing was certain, she couldn't be able to see her relatives for years, and this information would be enough to make any child who lived with the love of someone cry in desperation. Her instead, even after receiving the news, was surely shaken and lost in her thoughts, but he was sure in his heart, that Maple wasn't only very shaken.
She was also determined to return so that she could embrace her loved ones. He arrived at this conclusion from her questions, as it was clear she had more or less understood the gravity of the situation she was in and that the 'distance' separating Orario from home was unimaginable, even if she didn't know the latter was even more unimaginable than she thought.
But even though he wanted to focus on this hidden aspect behind her questions, he decided to leave this conversation for a second moment, since there were more important things to think about.
Returning to what he knew about the symbol, Ethan was aware just a few words weren't nearly enough to really understand what Maple knew or what was unknown to her, and besides that, Ethan wanted to get to know her better, and he also wanted to talk with her more, even if it would mean using his SP to buy many books like the ones he was already buying for communication.
'There must be another way that's not so uncomfortable.'
On second thought, Ethan had various solutions in mind. He knew if he tossed the Dungeon for something, he'd sooner or later find what he was looking for and perhaps with a little luck, he might even unlock the area related to the languages spoken in Inari, or in the entire world 1999, and this would make it very easy for him as he would teach the others the language as he learned further.
But this method took time and a lot of patience. This was because he had no guarantee the Dungeon actually had something related to languages, so the conditions for unlocking more parts of the world 1999 shop were unknown, so Ethan couldn't be certain they had anything to do with the Dungeon itself.
Simply put, the whole method was a big bet, betting on his hunches, and although he would have normally tried for the attempt with higher earnings, Ethan didn't want to risk staying in this situation for an unknown time. In fact, the second option that came to his mind, was to be taught by Maple the language, and teach the language currently spoken on Orario, or leave it to someone more experienced than him to teach her.
Normally, Ethan would decide to follow his instinct as he had always done until now, trusting that his judgment of the situation was correct. And even though that might be true, the way he handled the situation with Maple, having failed to find a way for communication even though it wasn't really that hard to circumvent the issue, led Ethan to falter before deciding on his final plan of action.
It was at this moment that Ethan had actually realized people wiser than himself were able to evade situations seemingly difficult or impossible to change for him, and the fact he couldn't see another alternative, brought him to wonder if Riveria might have some solution he hadn't thought of, or if there was something else she could do to lessen the time it would take for them to truly start having a conversation...
While these doubts assailed his mind, Riveria added
"What Ethan said is certainly true. Before we can decide whether the being in question is to be considered an ally, or something different, we must obtain as much information as possible. Although I sincerely hope they will be an ally."
Riveria wouldn't have trusted the latter easily just because this being seemed to be very strong, but she still hoped to not have to face something that would put at stake the lives of the whole city.
Sighing, Ethan stopped to think about the various alternatives he had to deal with the matter worrying him before deciding to talk about it at a later time with Riveria.
He decided not to introduce the matter in that moment because today was finally the first day of training, and also he had to figure out how to train Maple...
'That being didn't have time to explain how Maple should train, or the latter decided to omit the explanation as she had few words to express many things...'
Hoping this was what happened, Ethan also prepared his mind as he knew from now on, he will have to spend a lot of SP. Whatever road he chose in fact, would lead him to spend a massive amount of SP for books able to translate his words and Maple's. And besides that, Ethan also had in mind to buy the [Blacksmithing] manual...
'I think I'll have to cut some time to earn SP as well...'
There was no other way, and on this point he was firmly convinced. SP were of vital importance, whatever path he would choose, whatever would happen, whatever unforeseen events ahead of him, could not change this fact.
Although his schedule now seemed so full it could explode at any moment, Ethan didn't pay much attention to it. Instead of complaining in himself about what was ahead of him, he decided to start training and devote himself purely to it, and then move on to other important issues...
"I would like to continue thinking about this, but for the moment I have to do my training...We can't come up with a solution for the moment anyway.."
It was like Ethan was saying. They had no way to confirm whether or not their theories were true until Maple was unable to communicate more, and this led Riveria to doubt.
"As we already know, Ethan is the only one who can translate, but that doesn't mean Maple in the meantime can't write down everything she knows about her supposed training.."
In Riveria's mind, the process was very simple. They had to respect limits on the words to write, but that didn't mean Maple couldn't pass all the information she had, so that they would be able to act properly based on that information. Although in the case Maple knew very little. Riveria couldn't trust the being out of a lack of information, this wasn't a possibility at this time as the fact she wasn't surprised when they told her she had a symbol on her fur was a confirmation they would soon receive more information about it.
While Riveria thought so, Ethan confirmed in his mind he hadn't been wrong to trust his instinct without choosing any 'paths' for now.
'I think I'll start to depend on Riveria a little more than before, I'll have to sooner or later thank her for everything she does for me..'
This was all he thought before he glanced at the door, knowing he would find himself going through that same door many more times in the future.
---
(I have a discord server. https://discord.gg/cpVr5X8. You may ask me: "Why should I enter the server?". Well, I'm replying to every interesting question you readers are asking in my chapters, so, you should absolutely enter if you want to read my answers. Ah, and you can find some image reference of items in the story such as Light..! (Soon even Qienta).. so it's recommended to join, I frequently post polls as well, regarding things that(most likely) will be present in the story. One last thing, I post chapter updates in my discord right after I posted on webnovel, so I guess you can join to be able to know when I post chapters faster.)
(Poll going on in the discord: Who do you prefer? Qienta or Light? | Cat-girl or Renard(Fox) | Are you liking the interactions between Maple and Ethan?)
(Do you enjoy reading my novel? If the answer is yes, then thanks. I'll leave my Patreon here. https://w ww.pat reon.com/watashiwavdesu)
(Alternate Titles: "Being wise doesn't always mean knowing the best way to handle it, Ethan", "Solutions not working enough, my dog now speaks in Chinese and I don't understand a bat of what it's saying", "Maple's mature for her age, but maybe Ethan's overreacting to thinking she's so mature, this thought could debunk after they will be able to converse more freely lol")