Chapter 34: Boar Hunt 1

It is the beginning of October now. Allen has turned seven years old.

Allen’s family has gathered in the mudroom.

“I’m off, then.” Rodan said to Theresia.

“I’ll see you later, Mom.” Allen told Theresia.

“Be careful, Rodan, Allen.”

Rodan and Theresia kissed before going out. After that, Theresia hugged Allen. The hug was quite strong. It seems like a lifelong goodbye.

Rodan grasps his spear and hands me the bag of food and other supplies for the hunt. The bag is a little larger than usual, as it also includes food for me.

At the beginning of September, the village mayor had told Rodan that the Lord had instructed him to hunt more Boars. Rodan was thinking of responding by increasing the frequency of hunting, when Allen suggested a solution.

Both Rodan and Gerda were open to the proposal. They felt that it would lessen the deaths.

Today is the day we will execute my proposal.

Gerda and we meet up. Lily and Kurena, held by Mithilda (Gerda’s wife), are beside me.

“I want to go too!” Kurena said to Allen while she was holding his arm.

“I’m only going to watch.”

It seems like Kurena wanted to go only because Allen was going.

Allen convinces her to stay and play knights with others. She patted him on the head and said, “See you later then”. He also told her to play knights at his house without him today. It’s because Mash can’t go to Kurena’s house alone.

Then they went to the gate at the end of the residential area.

This time, Allen is only going to observe and not participate in the hunt as it was his first time in a hunt.

Allen’s proposal was accepted by both Rodan and Gerda. However, they said no to the hunt. Allen spent an hour desperately trying to convince them. He said that his idea would not be dangerous.

But Rodan wouldn’t back down, he said that it was absolutely impossible for a child of seven to participate in a hunt.

I even asked him if I could come to watch. He almost said no to that, too. In the end, we agreed that I could observe from a distance. Gerda kept looking at me, wondering why I wanted to go to hunt.

I asked them when I can start participating in the hunt. They also talked about whether next year would be okay. They said that I must be at least ten years old, but I think seven and ten are the same. I was 35 in my previous life. It is said that the children of serfs are usually around ten years old when they start helping out at home.

Perhaps because of this, Rodan was shocked when I told him I was going to help out at home when I was just three years old.

I was a serf with no compulsory education and I also started working at an early age. Commoner children start helping at home at about the same age. I’ve heard that Rodan had started helping his family in the fields since he was 10 years old.

In addition, adulthood in this world starts at the age of 15.

(Can’t I join for another three years? I want the experience of the Great Boar. I think I have to do something for it.)

For Allen, experience (EXP) is everything, and now that it’s October, he’s planning to resume hunting Albaheron, but he also wants to get some Boar hunting experience. He has been thinking about how he could do it.

(Hmm, the card adjustment is looking good too.)

I’m only going to observe today, but since I’m also preparing for the battle against Albaheron, I made some adjustments to my cards to make them more hunting-oriented.

I look at the status over and over again, which has increased from 0.6x to 0.7x at age 7.

[Name] Allen

[Age]: 7

[Talent] Summoner

[Level] 2

[Strength] 45 (65) + 75

[Mana] 42 (60) +35

[Attack Power] 16 (24) +75

[Endurance] 16 (24) +18

[Agility] 35 (51) +28

[Intelligence] 49 (70) +10

[Luck] 35 (51) +35

Skills

 Summon <3>, Create<3>, Synthesis <3>, Strengthening <3>, Grimoire Expansion<2>, Delete, Swordsmanship <3>, Throwing <3>

[Experience] 600 / 2,000

Skill Level

[Summon] 3

[Create] 3

[Synthesis] 3

[Strengthening] 3

Skill experience

[Create] 51,418/100,000

[Synthesis] 51,410/100,000

[Strengthening] 51,400/100,000

Summons that can be acquired

[Insect] FGH

[Beast] FGH

[Bird] FG

[Grass] F

Holder

[Insect] 3 F-ranks, 3 G-ranks

[Beast] 15 F-ranks

[Birds] 2 F-ranks

[Grass] 7 F-ranks

The level of Create is now at 3, and I have been consuming mana and gaining skill experience every day since then. Create, Synthesis, and Strengthening are all halfway to level 4. It is likely that I will reach summoning level 4 next year.

The effect of Strengthening level 3 is that the two statuses that become blessings increase by 50. The summoner’s status is getting stronger and stronger.

We passed through the plaza of the meeting place and approached the gate. A crowd of people has gathered. They were my companions for today’s Boar hunt. They were all holding spears.

”Oh my god!” 

Allen hears a voice. Everyone is looking at him. They all seem to be confused by seeing him in the hunt but no one raises an objection to Rodan or Gerda.

Rodan gave permission for the hunt, and Gerda also didn’t object to it.

And Allen, too, has shown more strength than any other people above his age over the past year. Many of the serfs have been watching him pump water and buy firewood. In a world where there are levels and people’s power can multiply several times or a dozens of times, Allen’s presence seems to be accepted easily.

“Let’s go when we’re all here. We’ve got two recruits today.” Rodan said to everybody.

“Okayy!”

Everybody responded to Rodan, the leader of the Boar hunters who had returned after a year’s absence. And many of their eyes were burning with excitement and motivation.

Two new recruits arrived, both of them were commoners. I was told that they were two of the five who had joined last year. They have spears in their hands and are waiting at the meeting place.

There are several ways to increase the number of Boars that we have hunted so far:

 -By increasing the frequency of hunts

 -By increasing the number of hunters

The more often you hunt, the more Boars you can hunt. And if you have two groups of 20 people hunting now, you will be able to hunt twice as many Boars.

Now all we need is to increase the number of participants in Boar hunting.

 (First, we need to show that these two can hunt with no problem. Then we can start adding people.)

We’ll start with two people. The plan is to increase the number of participants gradually over time.

As I was thinking about it, I saw that everyone was there.

“You’re all here, let’s go!” This time Gerda shouted.

“Yes, Let’s go!”

 Gerda shouted, and with everyone’s enthusiastic reply, we headed for the gate.

It’s been seven years since I was born as a serf. Seven years of being born a serf and now I’m finally leaving the village.

This time, Allen had also obtained permission from the village mayor to leave. If Rodan and Gerda asked on his behalf, the village mayor could not refuse.

“Ooh!”

I couldn’t help but exclaim.

A few meters ahead of us, we passed through a wooden gate and found ourselves outside the village. The area beyond the gate was not very well maintained, but it was clearly recognizable as a road. I wondered if the knights who came here last year had also come from here.

There was no growth on the path, but otherwise trees grew sparsely and the horizon was not visible. Outside, there were trees but not as many as in the woods or forests. The trees nearby have been cut down, I think that the woodcutters are cutting them for firewood. I couldn’t help but admire the expanse of the world.

“Come on, Allen. This way.”

Rodan calls out to Allen, who has frozen in place.

It looks like they are not going to use this path by which the knights came. They went through the gate and went around to the woods. A dense forest can be seen in the distance.

(We’ll have to walk for about three hours to get to the first hunting ground.)

As we were walking, a young man came up to Rodan.

“I’ll do my best today!” said the young man.

(I feel like I have seen that face before.)

He seemed to be one of the new commoner participants.

“Yeah, well, you won’t have to work so hard this time.”

Rodan said, telling him not to exert himself too much.

(Oh, that’s the young man who came to visit Rodan last year. He joined again this year, huh.)

Rodan asked the village mayor to recruit two newcomers, either from the serfs or from the commoners. The mayor agreed, and here they are, the two men who joined today.

Twenty-three men set out for the hunting ground where the Great Boar was.