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Chapter 94
Although Liana said that she wasn’t able to even touch fish, she decided that this wasn’t a situation in which she could make such excuses, so she eventually walked back towards the ocean again.
I had never been to a tropical resort in any of my lives. So, I never imagined that I would end up witnessing such beautiful scenery on an uninhabited island like this.
Of course, this scenery was really breathtaking, but I didn’t have any time to enjoy it at the moment.
“Get out of the way! It’s falling!”
“Uwah!”
-Wruuuush!
After the tree began to fall into one direction, it made a thunderous sound as it hit the ground.
Harriet just felled a tree; however, she seemed to be the most confused about that.
“Gyaaaa! Bugs! There are buuuuugs!”
Or more like she was busy being terrified of the bugs that fell from said tree. She was probably the one most uncomfortable with this situation, in many ways. But we needed her the most as well, as she was the only one that had many different types of magic spells available to her.
“I think…this should be enough trees. Now…let’s cut them smaller together.”
At Adelia’s words, Harriet nodded helplessly.
She managed to fell 5 trees. Now those trees had to be trimmed down and then turned into either pillars or flooring. Cliffman was cutting down some bushes to create a road in the jungle, and Ellen was cutting the trees with an axe.
Palm leaves and vines were still in the process of being procured, and Bertus was directing the workers and helping out when needed.
“What’s going on over there?”
Bertus seemed to be curious about Class B’s progress.
“Looks like they’re doing the same thing as us.”
Class B, located on a distant place along the coast, could be seen bustling about making something as well.
“Just what is that special condition…”
If we were able to meet a specific condition, we could end this mission early, and we’d receive additional points. If we didn’t want to stay here for a long time, it would be better if we explored the island a bit more.
Even Bertus didn’t want to stay in this place for too long. That was why he’d much rather find a way to fulfill that condition.
“Reinhardt. Well…”
After trying to tell me something, Bertus just sighed.
“No. Forget it. We don’t even know what it is, so it would be foolish to just blindly fumble around. Let’s not do anything dangerous for now. Let’s think more about this after we complete our camp.”
No matter how much I went into the jungle without any hesitation just a few minutes ago, it seemed like he didn’t want to burden me with that.
After talking for a bit, Bertus and I began to roll away the trees.
-Someone catch this!
Then an urgent voice could be heard from the beach.
* * *
“Wow….”
“What’s that…?”
“Why is it so big?”
“Eww! It’s so gross!”
Liana caught something, but she wasn’t able to touch it herself, so when they saw me bringing that thing to the camp, everyone just stopped working, standing there in a daze. Harriet and Liana were evidently grossed out by it.
It wasn’t a fish.
We caught something that looked similar to a crayfish. It was five times bigger than a common lobster.
“This thing is absolutely delicious!”
Ellen nodded violently when she heard me say that. She seemed to be thinking about devouring it already.
It went without saying that the bigger the crustacean was, the better it tasted.
“…I think we should first check if this is edible or not.”
Bertus expressed some concerns and tried to calm me down, who had his eyes completely focused on that delicacy that unexpectedly appeared before me.
“Won’t it be fine if we just cook it well?”
“Uhmm…. Still, we don’t know if it’s poisonous or not.”
In fact, Bertus’ concern about what would happen if we were to eat something unknown like that was completely rational in this environment.
“I mean, the teachers are probably watching us from somewhere, they’d probably give us a warning, if we were to try to eat something weird.”
If the kids were to try to eat something like a poisonous mushroom because they were just that hungry, they would be stopped immediately. This wasn’t an actual life-or-death situation, but only a mission. Going by that reasoning, Bertus seemed to agree with me.
“But how do we prepare this?”
Its taste aside, Liana seemed terrified at how disgusting it looked. She was probably someone with Kabourophobia.
“Why are you making this so complicated? We’ll just cook it, simple as that.”
The nobles, especially the girls, grimaced as they imagined grilling something over an open fire in this place.
“But one of these won’t be enough.”
We caught a huge lobster, but this wasn’t enough to feed 11 people. At Bertus’ words, Liana, who had been drinking some water from her canteen, seemed to feel like they were directed at her.
“…I’ll go back.”
It seemed like she was going to a battlefield, having to catch something she couldn’t even touch. By the way, everyone was sweating buckets as all of them had to do their assigned jobs in this extreme heat. So, everyone was guzzling water from their canteens, not knowing that it was quite the waste.
“You’ll regret it, if you don’t conserve your water.”
“Isn’t it okay since you gathered those coconuts?”
Kono Lint’s nonchalant remarks earned a glare from me.
“Hey, d’ya think it’s easy climbing trees? You wanna do it?”
“H-Huh? N-No, that’s not….”
He said it so easily, because it wasn’t him who picked those coconuts….
No.
Wait a sec.
Number 8, Kono Lint.
His ability was teleportation.
“…Come to think of it, you really should be the one to pick them.”
If he used his ability, he’d get naked as a side effect.
So if no one was watching, there wouldn’t be a problem with him using it, right?
“From now on, you’ll be in charge of gathering coconuts.”
“H-Huuuuuh?”
As everyone in class knew the side effects of Kono Lint’s ability, everyone started laughing.
* * *
After making Kono Lint the designated coconut shuttle, I entered the jungle alone.
I didn’t know how it would go, but honestly, I wasn’t that interested whether we won or lost in this group mission. The condition of completing my quest was to survive; it didn’t mention anything about winning.
As long as we could hold out until Friday, I would receive my achievement points, so Class A didn’t have to win for that.
Also, I kind of wanted Charlotte to win.
So I didn’t really assert myself to complete these conditions. I didn’t even think that it was possible to begin with.
I wasn’t confident in my archery skills, so I was currently carrying around a machete and three javelins.
Although I wasn’t sure I’d actually be able to do some hunting, I still took them with me.
However, my current goal wasn’t to hunt for food, but to secure a new freshwater source.
The island was quite large and also had some mountains. Therefore, if I were to search carefully, I’d be able to find a water flow. Then, instead of having to bother constantly picking coconuts, we could just fetch water from there.
I was trying to find it because I actually knew that it existed somewhere around here. Of course, I didn’t exactly know where it was.
“Phew…”
I had to somehow get through this thick forest, so my stamina consumption was extremely high. In fact, it was highly difficult to even make ten consecutive steps. Of course, my path wasn’t completely covered in vines, so I could navigate myself quite well.
After walking for some time, I finally came to a halt.
I might end up exhausted and unable to move, so I decided to go back first, after I cleared a significant portion of the path.
-Kwiiiiiik!
And then the cry of some animal rang out from somewhere.
Seeing that it was screaming, it didn’t seem like this was normal. I looked towards the direction the cry came from and saw someone running through the jungle chasing something.
-Fling!
-Kwiiiik!
The scream of the beast was getting louder as someone was chasing after it with a bow, shooting arrows at it, and actually hitting.
It was a girl with long braided hair fluttering behind her, who was running through the forest like a squirrel.
It was B-9, Delphine Izadra who had an archery talent.
-Fllling! Fling!
-Kweeeek!
Apparently the chased beast had fallen, as the girl holding a bow also stopped her charge.
Not only was she able to rush through the jungle as if she was flying, she was also able to shoot down a beast that was running with all its might.
She was Ludwig’s best friend as well as one of the main heroines of this novel.
“……How can I take this back?”
She caught something, but it seemed like she didn’t know how she’d take it back.
“Hey, should I help you?”
“Ah… Huh? Who’s there?”
Delphine was startled when she suddenly heard an unfamiliar voice. When she saw it was me, her expression softened slightly.
“A-Ah… Reinhardt… That was you just now, right?”
I frequently came to Class B’s dorm, so even if we didn’t talk directly, she had at least seen my face before.
“What? Did you catch that big thing?”
It was a pig-like thing, almost the size of a large dog. It had been hit by four arrows, and one of them was lodged in its head.
“If it’s too hard for you to carry alone, I could help you.”
“Oh…. Yes, please! Thank you.”
She caught it, but wasn’t sure how to carry it back, so she felt quite fortunate meeting me here.
* * *
She and I took a short break while dragging the dead pig behind us.
“Ah… It’s quite heavy…”
“Yeah…”
How could it be so difficult to move a dead beast?
“Your archery is no joke, you know?”
To be exact, it was amazing how she was able to run around and shoot arrows at the same time. Delphine smiled at my words.
“I’m used to it.”
“Really?”
“Yep, I’m from Talprad. Almost everyone there learns how to hunt from a young age.”
“Ah… Is that so?”
Of course, this was something I was already aware of.
Delphine Izadra came from a long line of hunters, calling the mountainous country, Talprad, located in the northern part of the Empire, their home. Talprad was quite known for every citizen to know how to use a bow, and even among them, Delphine was considered a prodigy.
That was why she was able to enter Temple’s Royal Class with only her archery talent.
She had been out hunting ever since she was a child, moving through rough terrain, so she took to this situation like a fish to water.
Although she only had her archery right now, she’d later become able to use an unusual power called Spirit Magic.
In fact, there was this setting that the hunters of Talprad actually inherited the blood of elves, who had been annihilated a long time ago. Delphine inherited their powers the strongest, so she had tremendous talent for archery, as well as an affinity with spirits, which would develop later on.
Of course, it would still take a long time for her to awaken that talent.
Seeing as she was best friends with Ludwig, she was quite the kind and affable person. It didn’t seem like she was scared of me or anything. I mean, she did see me frequenting Class B’s dorm quite often, after all.
“What are you guys up to? Is everything going well?”
“Well, we’re doing this and that, but I have no idea how it’ll turn out.”
“Really? There are so many outstanding students in Class A, so I’m sure everything will turn out well.”
Originally, Class A and B were supposed to be bitter enemies. However, because I tanked all the aggro since the start of the school year, the students from Class A didn’t hate Class B all that much, even though they still looked down on them a bit. The students of Class B didn’t hate Class A because they were just that good-natured.
So, the relationship between the two classes wasn’t as bad as in the original, or actually it wasn’t bad at all, so that was why we were able to casually ask questions like that during this cooperative mission.
As Delphine said, Class A was definitely full of bright people. However, they were just as whiny as they were talented, so I was rather uncertain about the outcome.
“After tonight, I bet there’ll be more than one or two kids that will feel like they’re about to die.”
“Really? Well… You’re right. I’m used to camping, but I’m still worried about the others.”
Delphine had hunted a lot in the past, so she was used to sleeping in the open. However, she was worried about the others, who weren’t as experienced. That was why she jumped into the forest right away to secure some food.
After taking some breaks in between, we were finally able to drag the pig to the beach where Class B’s camp was located.
“Phew… Good job. Thank you, Reinhardt.”
Delphine smiled brightly as she stepped on the beach. If she had been alone, she wouldn’t have been able to bring the pig along.
“Wha… Wh-What is this?”
All the Class B kids, who had been struggling to create a camp, were shocked to see that a pig had been caught.
“Wow… How did you do this?…Huh? Reinhardt? What brings you here?”
And just as Bertus was leading Class A, Charlotte was leading Class B. She smiled seeing the pig we dragged here, but she was just as surprised seeing me here.
* * *
With her wavy, pretty, blonde hair tied up in a ponytail, she walked around with the sleeves of her shirt and the legs of her pants rolled up.
Seeing that her palms were also quite dirty, it seemed like she was also actively participating.
“Ah, we met inside the jungle, and he helped me move that thing. If I had been alone, I wouldn’t have been able to drag it all the way here.”
At Delphine’s words, the expressions on the Class B students’ faces, Charlotte’s included, became strange.
He did what now?
That was what everyone’s expression was saying.
Charlotte just sighed heavily and smiled.
“Reinhardt… Although this is a cooperative mission, it’s still a competition. How could you just go and help the other team?”
She rebuked her opponent for helping her. I laughed at Charlotte’s words.
“No way. How could I work without receiving anything in return?”
Charlotte burst into laughter when I asked them if I could take one of the pig’s legs as a reward.
“What do you mean, reward? So you did have ulterior motives after all, huh? Well, Delphine caught it, so the decision is hers to make.”
Delphine froze up, hearing Charlotte’s words.
“Well… Sure, we already have enough anyway.”
Delphine pointed towards the beach and chuckled.
-Woah!
-Guuuuuys! I caught another ooooone!
“Because a certain idiot is about to gather enough food for the whole week in just a single day.”
I could see Ludwig holding a big fish stuck on a javelin, shouting excitedly.
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