How to Survive at the Academy

Chapter 14: Joint Combat Practice (1)

The first and second-year students’ joint combat class may seem like a normal event but it actually had a fair amount of importance in the story. That’s because this event was when Taylee would first hold a sword.

Taylee had only previously learned hand-to-hand combat in accordance with the Combat Department’s curriculum. But in this event, he cut down Lazy Lucy’s lightning attack with a sword.

Taylee had been born with a talent for swordsmanship. And for him who hadn’t realized he had such a talent and had only been training in bare-handed martial arts, this event was a turning point in his life.

He was paired with Lucy Mayreel, whose own talent hadn’t fully bloomed yet. Taylee succeeded in cutting down Lucy’s lightning attack, catching her off guard. Lucy retaliated with an overwhelming intermediate lightning spell, ultimately defeating Taylee.

However, in doing so, Lucy broke one of the rules which only allowed the use of beginner elemental magic. This earned Lucy a disqualification and earned Taylee the win.

Through the duel, Taylee confirmed his talent as a swordsman and his name began to circulate among the entire first-year students.

Despite having received that dreadful ending blow and only winning due to a technicality, it was still true that he did beat Lucy Mayreel.

And since there hadn’t been any big changes yet, things would probably go according to the original story, right?

A long-awaited weekend.

It was an opportunity to take care of all the things I couldn’t get done during the school week.

I discovered there was a lot more room for food than I had thought. Hunting became more efficient after I became more proficient to a certain extent. But the most crucial thing was I learned how to set up hunting traps.

[Newly Crafted Product]

Snare Trap

A trap installed by tying a rope obtained from the construction site of the Olren Hall to an elastic tree trunk.

Effective at catching small animals.

Production Difficulty Level: ●●○○○

《 Production completed. Production skills have increased. 》

Despite it being hurriedly made through following the instructions I found in a survival guide I borrowed from the library, it turned out better than I expected. My production skills had gone up and my woodworking skill had almost reached level 10.

Above all else, traps were time efficient. Even when I was attending my classes throughout the day, the traps were there, doing their job.

After every school day, all I had to do was go around the places I left traps at and collect the wild animals dangling from the trees.

At first, all I could get were small creatures like tree squirrels and rabbits, but I would hit the jackpot sometimes and get something like a raccoon. Of course, more often than not, the rope would rip, or the jerky I left as bait would be gone.

But considering how little labor was required once every trap was set, it was still an advantageous method.

And with establishing this dual method of procuring food through direct hunting and using traps, I was able to obtain more than enough meat. It had come to a point where hunting wasn’t the problem, rather, it was the hard labor involved in cleaning the animals. But even then, it was a problem to be happy about.

I was also able to raise my standards of living quite a bit.

My level of production used to be limited to the materials I could gather from the forest. But ever since school started, I had been able to pick up discarded items from classrooms and the various ongoing construction sites across campus. Through that, I obtained different types of materials that couldn’t be found in the forest.

There were several buildings currently being built under the support of ‘The Golden Daughter, Lortel.’ Thanks to her, there were quite a few construction sites on the outskirts of the academy. Snooping around earned me various construction materials. I was able to obtain leftover lumber, shabby and rusty nails, and ropes of ambiguous length. But my best find was a hand ax.

Crack! Crack!

The sound of smashing firewood resonated through the forest.

I was using the base of a tree I had cut as my workbench to cut firewood. It may be worn out, but this discarded ax that the construction workers no longer used was my best find this month.

Thank you to the manual laborers who left this lying around! I feel like crying…!

“Phew… this is quite hard…”

I cut the logs into large pieces with Wind Blade, and then I cut them vertically with the hand ax.

My Wind Blade was just at a beginner level and wasn’t powerful enough to cut down a whole tree.

Because of this, I had actually been using small stems to maintain my campfire. But because their sizes were all different, and some even had moisture left in them, their efficiency and effectiveness weren’t great.

But now, if I were to use actual proper firewood, then my efficiency in managing the fire would increase tremendously.

It was a pain to constantly take care of the campfire. And it was so crucial too, as I needed the heat at night to make sure no nearby wild animals would come close. It always needed constant maintenance.

But the fire never lasted long due to the poor kindlings I had been using. There were even cases when it would waft in acrid smoke into the shelter after it had burned out.

It was hard enough to find time to sleep during the day, and yet I would still lose sleep at night.

“Phew… Look at all this sweat…”

My casual clothes were already soaked in sweat.

I would usually wash my casual clothes twice a day during weekends.

Gathering herbs and edible plants, hunting, preparing my daily necessities, or even just inspecting the camp… every single moment of my life had become a series of aerobic exercises. There was never a day I was not sweating.

I went back to the stream to wash myself off. Even though I was a few meters away, seeing my camp warmed my heart. I felt a sense of pride from seeing its appearance improve bit by bit.

“……”

However, I had been getting a certain uninvited guest a lot recently.

I let out a sigh at seeing Lucy sleeping sluggishly on a flat rock by the stream.

Ever since that first day, Lucy would often come by my camp and take a nap whenever she wanted.

There was no sense of regularity to her visits. It seemed she just came by whenever she felt like it.

“Hello.”

Even though we were not fully acquainted, we ended up greeting each other whenever she ran into me before she would go to sleep. Then she would be gone the next moment.

I wanted to avoid getting close to an important character like Lucy Mayreel at first, but I eventually stopped thinking about it after a few days.

I mean, Lucy Mayreel’s visits were akin to natural disasters.

I was in the middle of doing all my piled-up work this weekend, I didn’t really have the capacity to waste any energy trying to get rid of a stray cat.

And it wasn’t like she was causing any harm. She would just lay down and sleep. Often, she would eat a couple of jerkies, and then she would leave when she wanted to.

I just thought of her as a background piece. She widened her radius of actions around the camp too. She would sometimes sleep on top of trees or on the rocks by the stream, under the sun. She seemed to really like the stream a lot.

Recently, I laid down dried leather from martens and squirrel furs as flooring in my shelter, and she made a fuss about liking how fluffy it was.

Somehow, it really did feel like I was raising a cat…?

Zzz… Zzz…

I walked past Lucy to wash my face in the stream.

The face reflected on the surface of the water looked completely wiped out from cutting all that firewood. I soaked my hands in the cool water to wet my face.

Then I realized I hadn’t checked my stats recently.

……

“What???!!!”

“Eughakk?!”

My scream woke Lucy up, and she ended up rolling off the rock.

* * *

[Name: Ed Rothstaylor]

Gender: Male

Age: 17

School Year: 2nd

Species: Human

Achievements: None

Vitality: 5

Intelligence: 5

Dexterity: 9

Willpower: 7

Luck: 6

Combat Skills Details ≫

Magic Skills Details ≫

Life Skills Details ≫

Alchemy Skills Details ≫

“Hi, Ed! You look happy today! Did something good happen?”

Of course, there was!

I had been steadily increasing my proficiency in both woodworking and magic, which had raised my Dexterity stat and Intelligence stat respectively.

But that wasn’t what was important.

My Vitality stat had gone up a whole two points.

What did this mean?

It meant that my training had finally opened this damn body up which wasn’t born with any physical ability.

Although it would’ve been weirder had it not gone up at all, given how much physical work I had been doing all this month.

However, this body wasn’t born with any proper muscle strength, agility, or endurance. And no matter how much I trained, there had been no change in my Vitality so it was actually starting to break my heart.

So I couldn’t believe that it actually rose a whole two points!

A wall that had been persistently blocking me had just broken down. I had now entered the next stage. From here on out, I would hope to be able to grow even further.

How could I not be happy!

But of course, there was no way I could show my happiness on the outside.

“What? Not really…”

* * *

After the lecture, we students began to leave Professor Hela’s Introductory Elemental Class one by one.

Even though I had been replying as coldly as possible to Yennekara, she still kept on talking to me with a smile on her face, just like usual.

“Hey, Ed! Uhm, you know about tomorrow’s practical combat class? It’s with the first years. And the groups have already been decided. Isn’t it so nerve-wracking when you think about seeing them? I’m still not used to being an upperclassman, for some reason. Haha!”

So tomorrow was already the practical class. I had no choice but to participate because it was mandatory.

Just as the name implied, the joint combat class was a simulated one-on-one combat training. Of course, students wouldn’t actually use real weapons or powerful magic.

Students from the Combat Department were going to use fake weapons, while students from the Magic Department were only allowed to use beginner elemental magic. And those from the Alchemy Department were not allowed to use overly powerful drugs or spiritual skills.

We wouldn’t really be doing any sort of collaboration even though we were put in groups. It was a list of matches, more than anything.

We were to conduct one-on-one practical battles according to the randomly created match schedule with the mixed years. Of course, these battles were to take place with everyone watching.

The complete randomness of the placements allowed for various match combinations.

A first-year vs first-year battle would be a good opportunity for inexperienced underclassmen to show off their skills while still getting advice from the upper years.

A first-year vs second-year battle, on the other hand, would be a good opportunity for the first years to experience a more masterful battle through direct combat.

Lastly, a second-year vs second-year battle would be a good opportunity for the first years to see the level of combat and magic skills they should be aiming for.

The point was to watch all the battles.

From what I could remember, all the important characters in the story would participate in this class. The class size was so large because everyone was supposed to participate regardless of their department.

The Benevolent Princess Penia, The Golden Daughter Lortel, The Spear from Nature Ziggs, The Elementalist Yennekara, Hard Worker Emilla, Lazy Lucy, Gloomy Clevius, Romantic Adele…

There were an endless amount of characters.

But the most important person was… The Failed Swordmaster Taylee.

I already roughly knew the match list, which meant I knew who would win and who would lose. And even though frustrating, the first years would win almost every battle.

The purpose of the joint class was for the first years to learn from the second years, but the first years were full of important characters that completely slaughtered the upperclassmen. Seeing Professor Glast applauding with a satisfied look on his face sure was a spectacle.

But what could they do? If they were unhappy, then they should’ve been the main characters, haha!

Although there was one second-year who won against a main character from the first year.

Yennekara Palerover completely overwhelmed The Golden Daughter Lortel.

To be fair, she herself was the final boss of Act 1, and this practical class was the first time she would appear in the story.

“Ed, do you want to take a look?”

Yennekara handed me the list of matches with a big smile on her face.

‘No, it’s fine. I’ll check it later,’ was what I was going to say to keep my distance. But then I became curious about who my opponent would be.

Since I shouldn’t even exist in the story at this point, I was worried there would be a big change in the match list due to me intervening.

Most of the first years participating in this class were important characters in the story. I had been keeping my distance from such main characters, but this is the one time it couldn’t be helped if I were to become their opponent.

It wasn’t like there was anything I could do given the nature of the class.

So I should just stay calm and deal with whoever my opponent was.

“Let’s see…”

“Oh, right here! Here you are! Come look!”

Yennekar cheerfully handed me the list of matches, as if happy she had finally heard a proper response from me for once.

Thankfully, there were no big changes. Most of them were still the matches I remember.

All except for one.

‘Match 13 – Ed Rothstaylor vs Penia Elias Kroel’

That name sounded familiar.

“……”

No… Oh… My… God…

“……”

It shouldn’t have been her…

* * *

The royal residence was abuzz with the news.

It seemed that newly stocked high-end clothes in the business district were in fashion.

Products distributed by the Elte Company were selling like hotcakes.

Princess Penia was not very pleased by this.

“That fox-like merchant’s scheme… I can see it clearly but…”

Princess Penia used her Insightful Eyes to gauge others, and they told her of the Golden Daughter Lortel’s slyness inside of her. This was something unpleasant to the princess.

She was one of the three Class A students recognized by Professor Glast from the class assignment exam. Lortel Kehelland was the only child of the best merchant on the continent and was a girl as sly as her father.

She appeared to always be polite and upright, but she was actually hiding her true calculating nature of weighing everything on a scale of profit.

The princess sat on her magnificent bed and sighed.

Even this sacred place of learning was nothing more than a means to make money for Lortel. She wasn’t using her magic talent, nor her outstanding brain capable of photographic memory, to study.

The princess could feel it with her sixth sense. The Elte Company was gradually trying to take control of Silvenia’s distribution channels, which was not completely irrelevant to the princess.

“I really don’t like her… But I can’t just deal with this only using my personal feelings…”

The princess buried herself in all sorts of magic books, documents, and bags scattered on her bed.

“Again and again… I keep thinking about the kingdom and politics… Even though it’s been a while since I’ve been here…”

But no matter how magnificent her royal residence may be, it would never match up to the actual thing.

If she were at the castle, she wouldn’t be able to lie down on her bed like this, nor would she be allowed to lay her reference books and documents all over her bed.

Doing such inappropriate acts helped her feel like she was rebelling, but it also made her feel a sense of self-deprecation. And yet, it also made her feel a strange sense of satisfaction, as was only human.

The princess stretched her body once again while smiling bitterly.

“Keughk! Phew… Alright… The most important thing is to develop myself through learning.”

With that in mind, she checked the notice distributed to the first years. She had to carefully check everything related to that class.

But after seeing the assigned groups for the joint combat practice, she buried herself in her bed once again.

“This is just like the last time… this strange ill-fated relationship…”

After agonizing for three days and three nights on whether to try and urge Ed Rothstaylor to leave the school, the princess ended up putting it on hold. Instead, she asked the head of her royal knights, Claire, and the dean of the Magic Department, Dean McDowell, to keep an eye on him. This was because he was an unusual person that the princess couldn’t look through with her Insightful Eyes.

She pushed back dealing with him as the semester started, and with her getting caught up in all sorts of things. But he was someone she couldn’t just ignore.

A man with a lot of unknowns. But he didn’t seem to have any excellent talent with magic. The princess would probably win without much trouble.

“There’s no reason to be worrying so much.”

She decided to go to sleep as she was on her soft bed. She didn’t even take off her school uniform properly, nor did she organize her books scattered about. The first thing she wanted to do was relieve her fatigue. Of course, this was something unimaginable as part of the royal family.

There were so many things she needed to pay attention to.

Even though all Emperor Kroel wanted was for her to let everything go and just enjoy the joys of learning. He wanted her to ignore the kingdom and its politics and just enjoy her life as a student.

But that simple task was too difficult for a young royal such as herself.

This was the fate of a monarch, after all.

____