"After the last few students that I had, I decided that I lost my ability to judge people," Gilles continued. "The last students that I had become pawns of war. They used what I taught them to kill people in the name of stupid leaders. For their stupidity, they lost their lives. Still, it didn't change the fact that I made a mistake as well."
Gilled had many reasons to stop being a martial arts teacher. While it was a pity, it couldn't be avoided. While his style probably was going to die with him, he was satisfied with that. However, Billy wasn't.
"It is fine if you don't want to teach, but about a demonstration of the Palm Cannon?" Billy asked.
"How do you know about that skill?" Gilles frowned.
"I heard some rumors," Billy lied since he couldn't mention the power of Appraisal.
"I was certain that everyone had forgotten about that.. Nevertheless, you seem like someone who learns fast, so even just a demonstration isn't good," Gilles said.
The old man was sharp... He probably didn't know that Billy learned one of his moves thanks to Manuel, but he still could feel something weird in Billy. Regardless, it seems that Billy lost the chance of learning some amazing secret techniques... That being said, he could tell what it could do by the name alone, and he was going to try that eventually.
"... Gilles mentioned before that you had some work for him," Jean said after a long sigh. "What do you have in mind, Billy?"
"Nothing special, for now, but since he doesn't work to work in anything related to fighting, I figured out that would put you in a bad spot if you give him easily what he wants," Billy said. "My idea was to make him and his people work for me doing miscellaneous tasks."
Billy had other things in mind, but he would need to make them trust him more to reach that level. For that to happen, they will start slowly. Jean didn't get Billy's idea. It didn't seem like he had anything in mind when he decided that aside from solving problem for him. Gilles also seemed a bit confused, but since it wasn't related to fighting, then it was fine.
"If there isn't anything related to fighting, then we will accept it," Gilles said.
"All right, show up at my house tomorrow morning, and we can decide the terms of employment," Billy said.
"Terms of employment?" Gilles frowned.
"I will explain that tomorrow as well," Billy said.
It would be good if Billy could make them work digging the tunnel for him, they had around forty adults that could do that kind of job, but again... Billy couldn't reveal those to everyone. In any case, Billy had many things he wanted to do but too little time and hands to try all those things, so those guys would come in handy.
After that, they just had dinner together and had some small talk until the time they went home. As promised, Gilles and the adults of his group showed up early in the morning the next day. While they had to work soon after, Kate and Natalie also were with Billy to see how he was going to handle them. However, much to their surprise, Billy only asked some of them to gather the fruits of the trees that he had brought as soon as he had returned and taught them how to make the pure juice. The entire garden now had twenty of those, and since Billy upgraded them, he could produce around ten liters of pure juice every day. Which would recover around two thousand points of mana. Still, that was work that only a few people could do..
As for the others, they would work on the tunnels indirectly. Billy could get rid of the dirt without moving from the tunnel by compressing it into small blocks and then moving them to the side. However, that consumed some mana. In order to make things more efficient, he was going to move the dirt to his backyard and then take those guys outside of the capital. They probably would wonder from where all that dirt and sand was coming from, but even if they thought that Billy was excavating, it was fine. It wasn't like they could use magic and look for it. Billy told his friends not to teach anyone to use Earth magic and look for things underground, so only a few of those would do that.
"Which are you going to choose, old man?" Billy asked.
"... I suppose if you don't have anything else, I will work on getting rid of this dirt," Gilles said.
"Right now, this is the only thing I have for you guys to do," Billy said. "If you are interested in doing something else, you will have to wait a while longer."
Billy truly wished that he could trust those guys to help him with the tunnels, but it was a bit too soon for that. Thanks to it, Billy will have to have to attach several wagons to his cart and, in order to conserve his mana, pull out all that while pedaling. It was a bit tiring, but it was good training for his stamina as well.
For one to live while eating decent food and having the money to rent a room in an inn in the capital, one needed one silver coin every day. Still, Billy paid one extra for them daily. Thanks to that, the amount of money that he was spending every month increased once again. On the other hand, Billy began to excavate two hundred meters of the tunnel every day. It was around thirty percent faster than before. Little by little, since his magic was also improving, and that distance was also increasing. Still, even at that decent pace, it would take at least three months for him to reach the fire dungeon in the northern part of the state..
