Leave a comment

I’ve looked at the explanation of each skill, so I guess I spent around two hours, or so?

When I walked while swinging that wooden stick around, the SK2 skill called Sword Arts rose by two stages.
Just doin’ this is honestly enough?

So, I’m currently walkin’ around while swingin’ my arms at shadows¹. If anyone sees me now, they’ll totally think I’m suspicious, y’know…

I followed the wheel tracks while swinging my stick, until I reached a well-maintained road.

Great, I managed to get out of the forest, so I should be safe for the time bein’. I gotta stop strikin’ at shadows, since I might encounter people. Till now, I haven’t seen any magic beasts.

After following the road for some time, I heard the sound of something driving behind me. When I turned my head, there wasn’t anything yet, but I went to the side of the road for the time being. Around ten seconds later, I could see a large cart that was drawn by three animals that looked like horses. A man holding a whip was riding on the carriage. He was probably the coachman.

When the carriage was passing me by, I caught a glimpse of what was in its cargo hold. It was several girls. They wore ragged pieces of cloth and, I didn’t know whether those were tattoos… or brands, but at any rate, they had a black pattern on their shoulders. Moreover, it looked like they had animal ears… For some of those girls, one of their ears had been torn off.

In any case, are those slaves or somethin’…? All the girls over there look like they’re about in the first half of their teens, so… assumin’ they’re slaves, what’s been done to them…! Damn… that’s disgustin’.

That said, there’s nothin’ I can do as I am now, right…? All I can do is follow that carriage with my eyes. I’m… powerless. I’m seriously powerless. On Earth, two of my friends died and I could do nothin’ but mourn them. I was even separated from their younger siblings in a world like this.

I got that special power from a god, but that doesn’t mean I can do anythin’.
…All I can do now is keep walkin’.

Therefore, I walked for around another 10 minutes.

Come to think of it, it’s chilly. From the color of the leaves and air temperature, is it currently fall here? If that’s the case, I dunno how long it’ll take me to get a place where people are, but with just my school uniform, I’m gettin’ cold.

Those girls from before… won’t they be cold, too, dressed like that?

It happened while I was thinking about that. I could see something ahead… it was the carriage from before. It had stopped at the roadside for some reason.

What’s goin’ on?

I got worried and when I rushed to the carriage’s side, the man who’d driven it had gotten off it and was fighting with something. It looked like he had quite a hard time.

I got closer to the carriage. When I was almost right behind it, my eyes met those of a girl in the cargo hold who seemed to have dog-ears… Those eyes looked as if there was no light left in them…

That’s right… As it is now, can I save those girls? No… but… that might cause lots of problems, right? It’s clear that it will only worsen the situation. In that case… Is there somethin’ I can do?

Should I… save the man in trouble?

The man in trouble… he’s the coachman, right? Still… should I save someone who’s probably a slaver? No, on second thought, that’s just my guess and those girls might not even be slaves…

Besides, if I ignore the carriage, what’ll happen if the coachman’s defeated by whatever attacked him? Those girls in the cargo bay might also…

In that case, I gotta assist him, right?

I arrived where he was fighting. As for his opponents… They had red skin, pointy ears, and sharp eyes, were about as tall as kids, and carried knives and clubs.
…If remember correctly, those things should be called goblins². There are… six of ’em?

“Do you need assistance?” I called out to the coachman.

At that, he turned his head my way while swinging a dagger. His face didn’t look as fiendish as I had expected.

“I don’t know who you are, but help me…!”

On a closer look, the coachman had stopped the movement of several goblins with what looked like a magic circle. Usually, I wouldn’t have expected a single man to defend against six humanoid opponents. He probably used some kind of skill.

I zeroed in on the closest goblin. I neither knew if judo techniques were effective against these guys, nor how strong they were. Moreover, my opponent wasn’t wearing clothes. Still… that didn’t mean I couldn’t throw him.

I grabbed the goblin’s waist and hurled him away. It was my first fight, but… it was effective. Maybe because they had never seen judo, it looked like the other goblins were startled. I took this chance and hurled several of them away.

One among them lost consciousness, perhaps because he was hit in a bad place.
Oh, he certainly looks as if he’ll die, if he’s hit by any further attacks, I guess?

I sent a flying kick at the unconscious goblin. At that moment, my body became warm. It felt like the warmth was coming from my core.
Did my stats change? I’ll take a look at the screen later.

After a short time, the coachman and I had defeated all the goblins. Still, because it was hard to defeat them barehanded, the coachman had finished off most of them with his dagger.

“Really, you saved me.”
“I was just passin’ by…”
“Is that so? Still, you’re probably trying to get somewhere? As thanks, I can give you a lift, if we’re going in the same direction. By the way, this carriage is going to the castle town of Yggdrasil³, you see?”

He’ll give me a lift… huh? I wonder, should I take him up on his offer…? Since he called it “castle town”, it’s probably a large city…
What should I do?

Should I have someone who might be a slaver give me a ride? That said, this weird pride won’t get me anywhere… Well, I’ll take him up on it, I guess.

“Can I rely on you, then?”
“Alright, you can ride next to me.”

I did as I was told and sat next to the coachman. The carriage started moving.

TL notes:
This chapter marks the end of volume 8 (at least according to syosetu). There was a comment from the author at the end of chapter 204, that volume 9 starts with said chapter. I’ll be keeping to how it is on the site where the raws are, even if volume changes often happen at times that seem to be wrong.

Also, I can already see Shuu get into trouble with how he reacted to the girls. As he is described in the character showcase, he probably won’t stay quiet when he sees more injustice.

1. The original is シャドウをしながら (“while doing shadow”). I assume it means something like fighting with an imaginary enemy, like shadowboxing.
2. It only took 207 chapters for the standard fantasy monster to appear.
3. Of course, they’re in slavery central, after we heard so many nice things about the country in chapter 203.
   It’s written as エグドラシル (egudorashiru) in the original. Not sure if that’s the name of the city and slightly different from the country or just one of the myriad name typos. I’ll change it if it’s consistently spelled like this.