by Funa
She was in a remote city, so it was but a short distance from the inn to the forests where the prey lived. It would take an adult about one hour by foot, but Mile arrived in fifteen minutes. Of course, it only took her that long because she slowed down when she saw other people—and because she avoided running at full speed so as to avoid trampling the plantlife along her way.
“So, this is the Hunters’ Woods…” she mused. She had received a map and directions from the clerk, and now there was no mistaking that she had arrived.
It was a dense forest, and there were no traces of other humans, so Mile let herself think aloud. Walking around in silence got a bit lonesome.
“The more experienced people go deeper into the woods or to a different forest entirely,” she muttered as she stepped deeper into the forest. “This is an area intended for novices, so of course there shouldn’t be any big, high-reward monsters around here…”
After a brief walk, she spotted a bird sitting on a tree branch. Though these woods were dim, she could somehow see it quite clearly.
However, though she could see it, there was no way her sword could reach a bird up in the top of a tree. Even so, it was a fairly large bird—if she could catch it, she would certainly be able to sell it for a nice sum. And if she didn’t, well, she might find herself going without food (her lodging, thankfully, had already been arranged).
Mile looked down at the ground, spotted a fist-sized rock, and picked it up. She wound up and pitched it at the bird as hard as she could.
Bwam!
A great roaring reverberated throughout the woods.
The bird vanished from sight. The upper part of the tree, where the bird had been sitting, vanished as well.
Somehow, she didn’t get the impression that the bird had fled.
Her vision still somewhat sharper than normal, Mile could clearly see bits of meat and feathers, and a few bloodstains, spattered against the remaining tree.
“Noooooooo…”
Several minutes later, she began walking once more, the pockets of her tunic stuffed with a number of small pebbles, each about the size of the tip of her pinky.
Something that size should only pierce them, she thought, deciding that she would aim for their heads. Mile was, after all, an intelligent girl.
However, perhaps because of the terrible roaring sound, there wasn’t another animal in sight. Without any other options, Mile resorted to picking herbs.
However, she had heard that they were exceptionally difficult to find, so she had to employ a bit of cunning. That’s right, she thought. It’s time for some location magic.
Mile was the sort of person who figured there was no point in doing a lot of hard work if you had access to a tool that might help you.
“Location magic! Show me the way to medicinal herbs!”
PROCEED SEVENTEEN STEPS BEFORE TURNING LEFT, THEN PROCEED SIX STEPS.
“What are you, a GPS??! Those are just directions! That isn’t magic!!”
WELL, REMEMBER—THE THING THAT EVERYONE CALLS MAGIC IS ALL OUR DOING, ANYWAY…
“Good point.”
Mile fell to her knees, a bit disappointed. Truthfully, she had been hoping for something a bit more magical—like a radar screen with red and blue dots, or a pillar of light that would radiate from the spots where the herbs were growing.
IF THAT IS WHAT YOU WISH FOR, WE CAN CREATE IT.
“Can you?!” Mile didn’t want to rely too much on the nanomachines, so she tried not to speak to them except when she was working magic. However, this time, she responded immediately.
If anyone were to see her, they’d probably have mistaken her for some kind of weirdo performing a one-woman show.
Before her eyes, the location magic shifted forms to a radar system—sans voice navigation. The signals seemed to be beamed directly to her retinas, and using these coordinates, Mile gathered the herbs. After accumulating a certain amount of one herb, she switched to a different variety, storing the first away in her loot box, figuring that it wasn’t smart to collect too many of the same thing.
A little while after she began gathering, the last echoes of the great boom she had instigated had finally faded, and the animals that had hidden away in their burrows and dens started to reappear.
Facing a jackalope that had appeared a short distance away, Mile drew one of the tiny pebbles from her pocket and flicked it with her fingers.
On Earth, there was a special finger technique whereby one could flick a metal ball or coin with one’s fingers in order to distract or startle an enemy. Mile’s version, of course, was different.
Whoosh!
The pebble struck the animal perfectly in the skull, piercing it right through, leaving the meat, pelt, and—most importantly—the horns undamaged. The jackalope’s sale value would be undiminished. Pleased with the outcome, Mile gave up on collecting herbs and switched to hunting beasts.
Jackalopes, birds, fox-like creatures—one by one, they fell prey to her pebbles. After a while, she stopped to replenish her stock of ammo, but was soon back at it with a vengeance.
With a spear or sword, the animals would have run before she could get too close, and the chance of actually hitting a creature with a bow and arrow wasn’t very high. As a result, normal hunters tended not to go for birds and other small animals. Then again, they would never have been able to spot them as easily as she was in the first place. Even without using location magic, Mile had an uncanny sense that allowed her to spot prey easily, one animal after another. And thanks to that, even when she missed and startled a creature away, she could still manage to fell it before it escaped her.
She continued her hunting until suddenly a giant boar appeared.
Bwoosh!
It was a huge catch.
Mile started on her path home, utterly giddy. But then, she realized something.
“I’m a mage, but I didn’t use magic even once…”
Apparently, she didn’t count the search magic she used while gathering herbs as “using magic.” Unlike combat magic, the things she had been executing weren’t exactly what one imagined a hunter mage doing—however, she couldn’t help but think of those things as a kind of roadmap.
Ultimately, at the end of the day, Mile had used neither her attack magic nor her sword.
***
Mile made her way back to the guildhall to exchange her spoils for money. Her bag, which carried but a portion of what she had gathered, was slung over her right shoulder. Thinking of future situations, Mile decided it was best not to hide that she could use storage magic. Instead, she would make the appeal that it was possible for her to hunt properly while still using it. Otherwise, she would never be able to carry all her prey.
But today, she was only going to be turning in her herbs and jackalopes, as per the standing order, as well as selling off the other meat and materials she had gathered. She headed straight for the reception window but was stopped along the way by a man’s voice.
“You have a moment?”
Does he mean to flirt with me? Mile wondered.
When she turned to look, the man—or rather, a boy of about fifteen—continued to speak, looking a bit flustered.
“Oh, n-no! Please don’t get the wrong idea! I just wanted to invite you to join our party! We’re five now, but we still don’t have enough attack power. We were hoping to gather one more person. This is all of us so far.”
Behind the boy, some boys and girls of around fourteen or fifteen years of age stood in pairs.
“I’ve never seen you around here before,” the boy said. “Did you come from some other town? Judging by that catch, you must be pretty skilled, but it’s easy to end up in a tight spot when you’re hunting solo.”
“We aren’t much older than you, and we already have girls with us, so you don’t have to worry about being the only one. How about it? Will you think it over?”
Mile had absolutely no interest in joining a party. If she hunted with others, they would discover
very quickly that she was an anomaly. Soon, the other members of the group would start leaning on her—or worse, selling information about her to a noble somewhere.
At the same time, it was pretty peculiar of her to continue standing around talking with her bag on her shoulder. She didn’t want to start a quarrel with this young man.
“Um, well… Can I go finish turning in my goods first?”
“Oh, sorry.” The boy took her request literally and said, “I’ll wait right here.”
Mile proceeded to the exchange station and handed over her captured prey, along with her name and registration number. With this information, a hunter’s deeds—even if they were only everyday tasks such as gathering meat or herbs—could be recorded on their achievement log, to be referenced in their promotions.
“Well now, little lady.” The old man at the exchange station sounded highly impressed.
“You’re young, but you’ve got a lot of skill. You got a lotta these guys, and their pelts’re in perfect condition. I’ll put a special mark down fer this.”
“Really?! Thank you so much! Oh—that’s right—I have a few more…”
She pulled the rest of her prey out of her storage space and piled everything up on the desk. The old man’s eyes went wide with shock.
“St-storage magic… And there’s so much here…”
“Oh, I—is this unusual?”
“No, er, nothin’ unusual…”
When Mile finally pulled the boar from her bag, the old man’s jaw dropped.
Yet as unsettled as he obviously was by this turn of events, the man was still a professional. When he picked his jaw back up off the floor, he began sorting out the goods.
The birds and jackalopes were each worth 2 silver coins a piece, the vulpine creature was worth 8 silver, thanks to its pelt, and the boar was worth a whole 8 half-gold! She had brought in five each of the birds and jackalopes, so altogether, her payment totaled to 1 gold, 8 silver. In terms of modern-day Japanese currency, that was roughly equal to 108,000 yen.
Of course, it was thanks to the boar that the sum was so large this time. However, even without it, Mile would have brought in about 28,000 yen. If she worked thirty days out of a thirty-six day month, she would bring in 840,000 yen. That was a considerable salary.
Becoming a hunter was the best decision ever!!! Mile thought.
Overjoyed, Mile left the exchange station before suddenly, she realized something.
Oh wait! I forgot to turn in my herbs…
Having stashed the herbs in her loot box rather than using storage magic, Mile had completely forgotten about them. However, as long as they were in the loot box, they wouldn’t go bad. She could just turn them in next time.
Factoring in the herbs, Mile’s monthly salary would be ten gold pieces—over one million yen.
When she returned to the boy and his party, something about them seemed a little bit odd. Some were staring blankly. Others were completely agog. It was just like the old man at the exchange station before…
“So, about earlier—” she began to say.
“Hey, you!” A man in his thirties rushed in, interrupting Mile’s words. “You can use storage magic? How much can you hold?”
Mile was utterly appalled at the man’s arrogant manner. She completely ignored him, turning instead to the boy before her. “Please allow me to ask something.”
“Hey, brat!” the man snarled.
Mile continued to ignore him. “First of all, out of all of these hunters here, why would you choose me?”
“Are you listening?!”
“To be frank,” she went on, “I am much smaller than everyone else here, aren’t I? Did you not think that might hold you back?”
“Quit messing around!” The man was indignant. The boy was flustered.
In the evenings, the guildhall was packed with hunters, so a little quarrel like this was nothing out of the ordinary. Still, everyone looked on out of idle interest to see how the newcomer would handle herself.
“You are much too loud! Please, be quiet. Can’t you see I’m trying to have a conversation?”
“Wh-what…? W-well, you were ignoring me, so…”
“Oh! Were you talking to me? I do apologize. I couldn’t believe that you would possibly be so mannerless as to butt into someone else’s conversation without even a greeting, so I merely assumed that you were speaking to someone who I couldn’t see.”
“Y-you damn brat! You think you can mess with me… W-well, fine. You’re gonna join our party. Then you can do some proper work carrying our bags!”
“Anyway,” Mile turned back to the boy. “What is it that you four normally hunt for?”
“Can you even hear me?!?!”
“You, sir, are a nuisance. If you have something to discuss with me, please wait your turn. However, if you’ve come to petition me for either a loan or a date, I must preemptively refuse. I too have the freedom to choose—”
“You little twit!!!” The indignant man drew his sword, swinging it down at Mile. The other hunters leapt to stop him, but they could never have made it in time.
Shing!
Ka-thump.
Everyone froze. Several hunters stopped in place, as though they had seized up mid-run.
The man stood still and silent, gripping the hilt of a bladeless sword. Mile held the stance of someone who had just swung a weapon. And there, clattering to the floor, was the sword’s blade—but it wasn’t a broken edge that it had. The massive blade had been cut clean off.
“Wh-wha…?”
Schwip!
With a flick, Mile returned her sword to its sheath.
A beat later, the man’s iron cross guard snapped in two.
“Ee….” He stumbled back slowly, then turned on his heel and ran.
Two other hunters, most likely members of his party, followed in a panic.
It was probable that the man hadn’t actually intended to cut Mile down; there was a strong chance that he had instead intended to stop short, just to give her a fright. However, Mile was not the sort of optimistic idiot who would assume such was the case and simply do nothing. If she hadn’t acted and he hadn’t stopped short, then she would’ve been killed.
“Now, as I was saying…” Mile attempted to return to her previous conversation, but the boy only stared at her with his mouth agape, unable to respond.
As Mile stood there, baffled, another hunter in his thirties began to speak.
“Little miss, that sword of yours…. It’s amazing… Where did you get your hands on it?”
Oh dear.
It was likely that the hunter had no ulterior motive beyond simply an interest in swords, but if people thought her sword was amazing, then they would covet it.
“Uh, I just bought it at a shop, like most people, you know? It was just a used sword from the bargain bin.”
“You’re joking me! With an edge like that?!”
What do I do? Ah, wait!
“Um, could I borrow your sword a minute?”
“Hm? Oh, well, sure…”
The man detached the sheath from his waist and handed it to Mile, who fastened it on her left side, beside her own blade.
“Now, could I kindly ask someone to toss a copper piece into the air?”
“I’ll toss it!”
A curious crowd began to gather around Mile, and one of the hunters spoke up, pulling his coin purse from his breast pocket to produce a single copper coin.
“Here we go! And…hup!”
Shing! Snap!
Mile swung the man’s blade quicker than the eye could see, then thrust her left hand into the air.
“Here you are.”
Mile stretched her palm out to the man who had lent her the sword, revealing two clean-cut halves of a copper coin.
“N-no way…” He stared at it, dumbfounded. “W-with my sword…?!” The man plucked the coin halves from Mile’s hand, staring at them in a daze, his disbelief clear.
“You see? It has n
othing to do with the sword. It just takes a knack.”
Was this girl serious? Everyone present in the hall, hunters and clerks alike, were confounded by Mile’s pronouncement.
However, as members of the guild, they were forbidden to launch an inquiry into another’s past or abilities. Invasive questions were frowned upon, so they merely watched and listened intently.
Mile returned the man’s sword, glad to finally get back to her conversation with the boy. “So. You were saying something about having insufficient attack power…”
“Y-yes! Right now, we have a sword-wielder, a spear-wielder, and a bow-wielder, as well as two mages, one of whom can use attack magic. The other’s more skilled at utility and healing magic… Anyway, things can get a little dicey in close-quarters combat, so we were thinking it would be nice to have one more decent swordsman to act as a rear guard…” This boy, presumably the leader, stumbled over his words as he attempted to explain the situation politely. Nevertheless, Mile understood his meaning.
“But, um, I’m a magic user, so…”
“Whaaaaaaaat?!”
This time the surprised shout came from the hunters behind them as well.
“B-but that sword—? And that thing you did earlier…”
“Oh, well, even as a rear-guard magician, sometimes enemies slip past the front lines and end up in front of you, right? And sometimes you get attacked from behind. So at the very least, I figured I should be able to use a sword well enough to protect myself, should that happen. I’m really a pretty half-baked swordsman.”
Bang bang bang bang bang!
Mile heard a strange sound behind her and turned to look, only to see the swordsman-like fellow she had been speaking to earlier banging his head against a wall. Had he eaten something bad? What was all that about?
Yet unlike the flabbergasted advance-guard swordsmen, the rear-guard magic users appeared somewhat relieved. If there were really a swordsman who was also able to use such a rare, high-level skill as storage magic, then there would be no point at all in having magic users of their level around. On the other hand, having an excellent mage who could also cross swords with the best swordsmen… That was thrilling.
