~~ Unspecified Year of the War Demon Calendar ~~
In the Far East Wasteland, one young man was sitting on the desolate earth, facing Tūs.
The gigantic Elf’s gaze was not on the young man, however; it was fixed, unwavering, on a rough and rugged stone surface.
Tūs pushed against the stone, but it didn’t budge. Nevertheless, he continued to push it. He pushed, stepped back, shifted, stepped forward, and pushed again.
The unyielding stone remained motionless, while Tūs was shedding an absolutely absurd quantity of sweat.
“No.”
He suddenly said to the young man behind him — a preemptive rejection.
“I haven’t even said anything yet, though…”
The young man said in reply, but Tūs remained silent, continuing to push the stone surface with all his might.
Perplexed, the young man tilted his head.
“Um, if I may ask… what are you doing?”
“It’s called… isotric training…!”
Tūs replied, his expression showing signs of exhaustion.
“…A-and how is that supposed to help you get better at magic?”
At this mont, Tūs’s push ca to an abrupt halt.
“Whew… What magic? This is just strength training!”
“Strength…? Um, excuse , but are you actually Master Tūs, the one they speak of?”
“Damn it, who the hell ‘spoke of’ …? And how did you even find this place?”
Tūs took a brief pause before responding, facing the young man who showed no willingness to leave anyti soon.
“Well, I let the arcane energies guide , sir!”
“Shaddup. You’re noisy. Get the hell outta here.”
Tūs seed quite grumpy, perhaps due to the young man’s answer not being to his liking.
“I have a reason not to!”
The young man asserted as he stood up. Tūs, once again, paid him no mind, resuming his push.
“Master Tūs!”
The young man leaped to Tūs’s side and landed gently before shouting at the latter.
But even this did nothing to sway the gigantic Elf’s decision to ignore the young man.
A bitter expression crossed the young man’s face, but he began to focus on the Elf’s actions more than his responses.
First, the young man observed Tūs’ arms, legs, and then the silent stone surface.
Tūs did not react to the young man, but the latter’s actions were a different matter.
“Hmm! Huh… I see. A training thod using immovable objects. This is definitely intense…!”
Surprisingly, the young man started mimicking Tūs’ actions.
Tūs glared at the young man, who, in turn, ignored Tūs this ti.
Despite the ground being chiseled away from repeated pushing, Tūs never stopped.
The exhausted young man looked up at a Philosopher of the Far East with an unwavering aspiration to train himself.
And then, with the sun setting and his strength depleted, he collapsed.
Naturally, Tūs had no intentions of helping the young man.
Left out in the elents, the young man lost consciousness, spending the night. When the sun rose, he regained his senses. He ate the food he had brought and began to continue imitating Tūs’ training.
At tis, he gazed at Tūs, occasionally receiving a kick from him, but the young man kept on copying Tūs’s every move day after day.
When his stamina ran out, he collapsed on the spot, only to repeat the process whenever he woke up.
A month later, the young man was utterly tattered, exuding the scent of a beast.
It was then that Tūs finally showed so response to the young man.
“…So what’re you doin’ here?”
Tūs’ tone treated the young man as if the latter had just arrived.
Nevertheless, the young man remained undeterred. He knelt, bowed deeply, and spoke,
“Master Tūs! Please accept you as your apprentice–“
“–No.”
Naturally, Tūs had only listened to hear the purpose of the young man’s visit.
The bowed head of the young man remained pressed to the ground as he knelt before Tūs.
But by the ti he looked up again, Tūs was nowhere to be seen.
In the distance, Tūs was already engaged in a session of lightning-fast squats, an exercise that the young man had witnessed nurous tis over the past month.
The young man promptly got up, clutching his forehead, and rushed towards Tūs.
“Master Tūs!”
“Hmm! Hmm! Hmm! Hmm! Hmm! Hmm! Hmm! Hmm! Hmm!”
“Excuse ! Master Master Tūs!”
“Hmm! Hmm! Hmm! Hmm! Hmm! Hmm! Hmm! Hmm! Hmm!”
The rapid squats Tūs perford were so fast that, even at a close distance, he appeared as a blur.
The young man, looking up, felt a profound reverence for Tūs.
What Tūs was doing now was an unconventional training thod he had not shown in the past month.
The young man lanted his own inadequate strength and began to imitate Tūs’s actions, replicating them every second, every minute, every hour, every day, every month — every year.
And then five years passed…
“Master Tūs, is today’s training over?”
The question was posed by the young man, who had asked it countless tis by now.
Tūs had ignored the young man up until this point, but it seed that he had reached his limit.
With veins pulsating on his massive forehead, Tūs let out a fierce battle cry and struck the earth with all his might, creating a massive crater.
“Wow! That was amazing!”
The young man expressed innocent, child-like delight on his face.
Tūs’ anger went completely unnoticed, and he finally relented in the face of the young man’s words of admiration.
“Gah~~~~! …Okay, fine! I give up, dammit!”
“Huh?”
“The apprenticeship thing. You’re my apprentice now. Gotta follow so rules, though.”
“……Huh?”
“What, you don’t want in?”
“Uh, yes– I an, of course not! I want in! Definitely! I’m honored to be your apprentice–“
But Tūs, as usual, imposed limitations on the young man’s words.
In front of the young man, Tūs placed his enormous palm. The young man was left speechless.
Gradually, Tūs’s palm moved, and only his index finger pointed up towards the sky.
“I’ll ask you only one thing, so you better answer.”
“Y-yes, sir!”
The young man, displaying his nervousness, felt a bead of sweat trickle down his cheek.
“What’s your na?”
For the first ti in over five years of barely any conversation, the young man got to introduce himself.
He joyfully opened his mouth wide, as if to say that he had been waiting for this mont.
Tūs, anticipating damage to his eardrums, blocked his ears.
“MY NAAAAA!! IS GASPARD!!!!”
The grand introduction, which pierced through the back of Tūs’s hand, indeed shook his heart, not to ntion his eardrums.
◇◆◇◆◇◆◇◆◇◆
Ten years had passed since Tūs took Gaspard in as his apprentice.
Gaspard had grown strong during this ti. Although his physical form remained human, his curiosity about magic ran deep, and he frequently surprised Tūs.
“Master, you have a guest.”
Naturally, Tūs was already aware of this visitor’s presence, but it was his expected behavior to pretend otherwise.
Straggling into the Far East Wasteland was a figure that looked more like a girl than anything else.
She wore a tattered outfit and a wizard hat.
As soon as she spotted Tūs, the girl fainted in front of Gaspard’s eyes.
Quickly holding her up, Gaspard turned to Tūs.
“Leave her.”
“Master, she’s starving.”
“Then that’s as far as she goes.”
“Master…”
“Don’t give that look. We’re living like beasts out here. Do beasts help humans? No, they don’t.”
Tūs exhaled loudly, and Gaspard’s gaze lowered.
“But I’m human.”
“Rember the rules I said you had to follow?”
Gaspard beca Tūs’s apprentice under certain list conditions.
And since he was still here, it naturally ant that he had accepted those conditions.
Gaspard stared at Tūs with a firm expression.
“Never bring trouble to the Master.”
“That’s right. So, what is she?”
“…A human.”
“No. She’s trouble.”
Tūs pointed at the girl.
“Leave her.”
Despite Tūs’s emphatic words, Gaspard did not nod.
After spending a mont in contemplation, he said to Tūs,
“All right… I’ll take her away.”
With the girl in her arms, Gaspard left Tūs.
As Tūs watched them go, he muttered quietly,
“Tch, he’s too kind for his own good…”
Eventually, Gaspard arrived at an oasis in the wasteland.
Setting the girl down by the water’s edge, he began to cast a spell.
“Water & Remote Control.”
Thin columns of water rose from the lake, moistening the girl’s face.
“Bwah–!?”
The girl instantly let out a strange noise.
Gaspard, having forgotten to cover his ears, suffered from an intense headache due to the piercing voice.
The girl, noticing Gaspard’s twisted expression as he covered his ears, looked up.
“You there! Who are you!?”
Her attitude was far from that of a near-death person.
She proceeded to stand up and begin speaking energetically while pointing at Gaspard,
“Hmm?! Wait a mont, is this actually the Far East Wasteland? If so, I’m here to et the Philosopher of the Far East — but you don’t look like a Philosopher… as far as I see, you’re more likely to the Philosopher’s–“
“That’s right. I’m the Philosopher’s a–“
“–Assistant! Yes, you must be! You have the right look for it! Man, my intuition’s so on point, I can tell things like this in an instant! Oh, and by the way, is the Philosopher here? I ca all the way from Beilanea with so questions that need answering, you know? Wait, actually — wait a minute! That can wait! I feel hungry! Let’s have sothing to eat first! I’ll starve if I don’t put sothing in my belly right away!”
“You’ve already–“
“–Assistant! I’m the Philosopher’s guest, you know! C’mon, bring so food! Right now! On my count! Five~~! Four~~! Three~~! Two~~! One~~! What, you don’t know how to accommodate guests or sothing? That’s sad! I’m sad!”
This little girl, whose attitude suggested that she was in fact anything but, sat cross-legged and lanted about Gaspard’s response. Gaspard, overwheld by the continuous stream of words, pondered the word “trouble” that Tūs had used — because she indeed turned out to be just that.
Taking a deep breath, Gaspard tried to assist the girl in front of her.
“If you’re hungry, I’ll prepare a al for you. Do you have anything you don’t like?”
Despite his efforts to speak gently, the girl did not respond, perhaps out of anger.
Baffled, Gaspard took a good look at her face.
“……Hello?”
It turned out that the girl had rolled her eyes back and fainted.
“Master indeed has foresight. She is indeed… trouble.”
Gaspard finally said, repeating the sa word as his master, Tūs.
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