Chapter 3

Chapter 3

Someone vanished.

At the outrageous event that had just unfolded before their eyes, more than a hundred people stood there with their mouths hanging open.

“What......? What just happened?”

Did it make any sense at all for a person to disappear behind a wall?

While not a single person could properly finish a sentence, Persica stepped forward.

“That person...... it really was her, was it not?”

“It is. Persica Ortanis....... So it was true that a daughter of the Trinity was taking the test.”

Whispers rose from every direction, but the girl, Persica, ignored them cleanly.

House Ortanis was one of the great families known by everyone in the Golden Land, so naturally there were many who recognized her face as well.

She was already used to this much attention.

“......”

Unconcerned, Persica silently ran her hand along the wall in question, then raised her sword and struck it several times.

Clang! Clang!

Nothing like what had just happened occurred.

It was simply a solid wall.

“......Who was she?”

That nameless girl.

She called to mind the face of the one person who had not been chosen by any weapon, a girl who might well have been the most hopeless dullard in the world.

‘That was not her decision.’

Even at the very moment she brought the sword down toward the wall, the girl had still looked completely bewildered.

A face that clearly had no idea why she was doing any of this.

That had definitely been someone else’s will. The look of a person merely following what she had been told.

And there was only one being capable of giving her information like that......“That sword.”

The sword planted alone in the center of the altar.

Out of the hundreds of weapons there, it had been the only one that reacted to no one, and it had even rejected her, which made it all the more infuriating.

And yet for that girl alone, for some reason, it had allowed itself to be drawn.

That was it.

The fairy of that sword had told her.

“Grit......”I should have been the one to draw it.

No, more importantly, why had it not reacted to me in the first place?

Was that nameless lowborn thing somehow more talented than I was?

“I refuse to accept that.”

Her face twisted into a fierce scowl as she headed for the exit of the altar.

If it were up to her, she would have liked to test that wall-passing trick a little more, but regrettably, there was no time.

The exit would soon close, and if that happened, she would fail on the spot.

‘I can make up for it in the next test.’

The second test was centered on combat.

Since it did not end until you defeated the enemy, there was no room for tricks.

That girl might take the test first, but because the next stage was decided entirely by actual skill, Persica had no intention of losing in the records.

“H-hey! Wait for us!”

“Come on, everyone! Let us get moving!”

Following her as she wordlessly left through the exit, the others hurriedly scrambled out of the altar as well.

***

Despite its high difficulty, the structure of the first test was actually quite simple.

The area was large, but the route itself did nothing more than loop around in a circle, which meant the goal was right next to the starting point.

In other words, in theory, all you had to do was get past a single wall.

[It was a kind of exploit, really.]

In the setting, the Altar of Waiting was an ancient structure from a distant age, so its walls were full of deep cracks, and there happened to be spots where the physics engine collided strangely.

What I had used was a bug in one of those collision points...... or rather, a glitch.

‘A bug that, surprisingly enough, only I knew about.’

The reason for that was kind of absurd.

This wall-clipping bug could only be triggered using the protagonist character’s attack motion.

Since no one had ever bothered fooling around in the tutorial with that hopeless trash-tier character, the trick had naturally remained undiscovered all this time.

At least, until a lunatic trash-game connoisseur like me appeared.

“Wooooow......”

The girl still looked as though it had not quite sunk in.

That was only natural. She had just cleared a test whose best record was one full day...... in a single second.

Unless that record was the kind that got deleted, no one would ever break it.

“Do all fairies know things like this?”

[Who knows? Judging by the fact that no one else is following us, I do not think so.]

At my words that I alone knew it, her face flushed red.

Wow, wow.

Rising onto her toes, she bounced in place, then gripped my hilt tightly and raised me high. Her face was blooming with delight, and her eyes sparkled brightly.

“I knew it, the sword I chose is special!”

[You accepted this faster than I expected.]

“I do not know what it is, but good is good, right?”

She smiled brightly.

“The Golden Rule is broken, so I guess things like this can happen too.”

Was it because everyone here took the damage to the Golden Rule as common sense, so they simply accepted most strange things as they came?

From my perspective, it was an extremely convenient piece of worldbuilding, since it saved me the trouble of explaining anything.

[That is enough. Check the reward first.]

“Oh right! The reward, the reward~”

We immediately opened the wooden chest in the center of the goal area.

The reward itself was nothing special. It only gave you a piece of armor useful in the early game.

The effects were exactly at tutorial level. It provided a small amount of defense and slightly increased resistance to the cold element.

‘If you did not wear this, the status effect was ridiculous too.’

Since the tutorial field was a snow mountain, simply walking around without it would inflict 「Frostbite」 and steadily drain your health.

It seemed they had wanted to teach both defense and elemental resistance at the same time, but thanks to that, if you did not equip this, your character would die after taking only a few hits.

“Cough, cough......”

[Are you okay?]

“Ah...... it is just a cold, a cold. I am fine.”

The girl waved her hand with a smile, but I knew better.

That was not a cold.

‘It was an incurable disease.’

Like me, she was living on borrowed time with an incurable illness.

Her backstory had never been fully depicted, but judging by the circumstances, the reason she had taken this dangerous test was probably a gamble born of desperation.

Because the power one gained from clearing the Selection Grounds could cure an incurable disease.

“Ah, it is warm~ But is it really okay if only I wear this? What about everyone else?”

[Who knows? I do not know if it will protect the people behind us too...... but they will not die without it. It will just be very cold.]

“I see~”

She wore the expression of someone who trusted every word I said completely.

I did not remember her being described as naïve, but were fairies really held in that much trust?

“Cough, cough......”

That dry cough, and the faint sound of her uneven breathing.

As I looked at her, I sank into thought for a moment.

To get outside, I needed to be carried in my owner’s hand, which meant I had to finish the Selection Grounds with her somehow.

But at the same time, a troubling thought crossed my mind.

Anyone who had played the game knew the fate awaiting a Tutorial Fairy in the end.

If we cleared every test like this, then I would......There was no time to dwell on it.

The moment the girl equipped the armor, the second stage began.

Rumble-From the center of the hall, an armored mannequin rose up through the floor.

Its proper designation was Knight Puppet. To clear the second stage, all you had to do was fight that thing and win.

Despite its shabby appearance, it was not something to be taken lightly.

Its damage was low, but its patterns were bizarre and full of off-beat timing, so if you let your guard down for even a moment, you would die before you knew what had happened.

[The second test is about fighting that puppet and beating it. Do you know how to use a sword?]

“Mmm~ A little?”

[Then follow exactly what I teach you.]

Now the real test began.

‘The second stage was the part that explained the basics of combat.’

And of course, the one responsible for the explanation was the fairy, meaning me.

I remembered the general flow of the sequence, but the problem was that I had no idea how, exactly, I was supposed to explain it.

‘It probably is not something I just tell her with words......’

There had not even been a script for this test.

The game merely told you the dodge and attack buttons, and that was it, but reality obviously could not work like that.

So I focused on the concept of transmission.

‘It has to be connected to what fairies are meant to do.’

The fairy’s true role in the Selection Grounds was to pass its power on to the player.

Only after receiving all of the fairy’s power did the player gain the qualification to enter the Dungeon, which was why this trial was called the Selection Grounds, the place that chose heroes.

So I considered another possibility.

What if the process of handing over power also included handing over knowledge?

[......Hm?]

The moment that thought occurred to me, a strange realization flashed across my mind.

I could sense an alien energy drifting around me, and I somehow felt that I could move it with my ‘Thought-Force.’

Instinctively, I understood that it was ‘Mana,’ and I knew how to use it.

At the same time, a bizarre certainty told me that through it, I could transmit my own knowledge as it was.

[......Let us try it.]

“Hm? What did you say?”

[Nothing. Just get ready to fight first.]

“Okay.”

Maybe it was some instinct fairies possessed.

I had no evidence, but I felt strangely certain that this was the answer.

I recalled the tutorial sequence I had played countless times.

‘I imagine it.’

What I pictured was myself holding a sword.

I recreated the character’s motions I had seen over and over again, and strongly focused on showing that image to my owner.

“This is......”

The girl’s eyes widened slightly.

At that moment, I was imagining myself standing beside her, gripping the sword and taking my stance.

And then, as though spellbound, the girl moved and took the exact same stance.

[Good. Keep following me.]

I felt none of the nervousness of a first attempt.

Mana and Thought-Force were both unfamiliar concepts, yet using them felt as natural as repeating something I had done countless times before.

[Do you know the second test’s best record?]

“Uh...... I think it was a little over three hours?”

Three hours.

The reason it took that long despite being a one-on-one fight was probably because the test also served to teach you about weak points.

Unless you struck the neck precisely and cut it off, the thing revived endlessly, so naturally it took time.

But I was different.

I had long since memorized all of its patterns, so if I wanted to, I could kill it as quickly as I pleased.

‘Assuming she can keep up with me, of course.’

I glanced over, and fortunately, she did not seem frightened.

Her bright eyes were fixed directly on the Knight Puppet.

‘I focus hard on what I want.’

Her movements and attack patterns were already engraved into my mind.

The scenes I had repeated and refined through hundreds, thousands of attempts were as vivid as reality itself.

‘I draw it out.’

The sequence of gripping the sword and swinging it. Every arc of movement was etched sharply into my mind.

The imagined action became real motion, and the gap of ignorance was narrowed through sensation.

How to step. How to extend. The abstract was dragged into reality.

Grrrraaaah─The knight moved.

Before the shield it had shoved forward could connect, we stopped short, and when the sword came down, we avoided it lightly by stepping one pace aside.

The patterns of sword and shield. The distance and range of every attack.

I already knew them all, so dodging was no more difficult than walking.

‘One step to the left. Half a step back. Lower the waist slightly.’

One step. Then another.

We narrowly evaded each attack in time with the pattern, and then at the final strike, we raised the sword and batted it away with force.

Naturally, that would not be enough to knock back a real blade.

Everything I was doing existed only in the movements I had imagined in my head.

And yet.

Clang!

Sparks flew, and the knight’s sword was knocked aside.

I glanced to the side.

The girl, following my every motion exactly, had deflected the knight’s blade.

[......Now!]

I drove the sword straight into the opening that had appeared in that instant.

Following that motion, the girl’s body moved like a shadow.

One heart, one body.

As though we had truly become one being, our sword pierced the Knight Puppet’s throat in a single blow.

Crunch!

The knight’s severed head rolled across the floor.

Its headless body crashed down with a thud, and then the knight crumbled into dust and vanished.

<Time Required: 0 hours 3 minutes 26 seconds>

Even so, I could hardly believe it.

I had never expected her to keep up after seeing it only once.

“It felt like...... you were teaching me.”

She looked down at me in her hand as she spoke.

“I was sure I could do it. It was like the exact movement meant for me just appeared in my head. Is that not amazing?”

[......]

Of course it was.

What I had shown her was her own basic attack pattern.

That impression of hers meant the transfer of knowledge through Thought-Force had succeeded.

She had understood the knowledge I transmitted on the spot and reproduced it perfectly.

“All this knowledge I never knew just started appearing in my head, and I was like, oh, so that is how it works~”

As she smiled brightly and flashed a V sign, I suddenly remembered the trait that defined her.

People had mocked her as the worst character because she could not even change weapons, but her real defining feature had always been the monstrous talent that overwhelmed every other character.

A once-in-history genius with no equal in all of Ethrana Exodus.

I felt that I had just seen a fragment of that talent.

[Hah.]

I possess all the knowledge in this world.

You can learn it and make it your own in an instant.

Whether here or in reality.

We make a pretty good pair.

Fwaaah!

“Ah.”

At that moment, the sword shone, and my form changed slightly.

I had just passed part of my power on to her in the form of knowledge.

That completed the bond between us, and I finally gained a form of my own as a fairy.

“Wow! What is this? Is this your real appearance?”

[Since it is the only appearance I have, I suppose so.]

A materialized fairy could be seen not only by its owner, but by everyone else as well.

At that moment, I looked like a boy around her age, one who resembled her.

“Hmmm....... I kind of look like you, do I not? Someone might think we were siblings.”

[A fairy’s appearance is based on its owner.]

Even back when I was playing the game, fairies always resembled their owners.

Their gender varied each time, but maybe because I still thought of myself as male, I ended up as a boy.

“Really? I guess that is why you are handsome~”

With that shamelessly self-admiring remark, the girl suddenly threw her arms around me.

I was bigger than she was, so in the end, it looked more like she had run into my embrace.

[You say that about yourself out loud?]

“But it is true, is it not? I am very pretty.”

She knew she was pretty, and she had no intention of denying it.

Well, that was how she had always been.

Always bright, always brimming with confidence, a living embodiment of positivity.

The person who had never lost her light in any script I had seen, the one who shone like a star.

[......I cannot breathe.]

“Ahaha! You are adorable~”

My breathing was getting rather cut off, but I did not struggle.

Because seeing her this happy with my own eyes did not feel bad at all.

***

The first test.

In the middle of a snowfield swept by a freezing northern wind, countless people trudged through the blizzard.

Feet sinking deep into the snow.

Bodies shaking with cold.

The brutal freeze clawed at their skin hard enough to make it feel as though death were only moments away, and to make things worse, countless traps lay waiting along the path to claim their lives.

“......It is cold.”

How much time had passed? About ten minutes by now?

Even there, amid the groans and screams, Persica continued onward at the front of the group with proud, steady steps.

It was hard, but bearable.

Just a little longer.

She might have lost the first test in a ridiculous way, but she could easily make up for it in the next one-

<Time Required: 3 minutes 26 seconds>

“......What?”

The second test had ended.

A test whose best record had supposedly been three hours...... had ended in just three minutes.

“That cannot...... be......”

And then, at last, she dropped to the snowy ground on the spot.