“But why are we heading to the World Tree Forest?”
While moving, Sarah was curious and asked Mero who was walking ahead of her. He answered back looking puzzled,
“You didn’t hear?”
“Yes. I was just told that we will leave in the morning.”
“It seems like the High King forgot to tell you something important.”
Well, if it was Hasyath it wouldn’t be shocking. He always had the bad habit of skipping over the important parts of the information.
Most of the Ran warriors and even Mero had experienced it, so there were quite a lot of times when Karlovan, who was acting as the lieutenant, had a hard time.
“Escort.”
“Escort?”
Who? Escort who?
Surely, it didn’t mean that they would escort the High Elves guarding the tree.
Weren’t they the strongest ones? Joining their forces made sense, but escorting them didn’t.
Mero realized what Sarah was thinking and said,
“We aren’t escorting the High Elves. Why would they even want us to escort them?”
“Then. Who could it be?”
“I don’t know exactly, but they will join us in the middle of the journey. In fact, I wonder whether it is even appropriate for us to escort them.….”
Mero blurted out those words.
No matter how much he thought about it, it seemed unnecessary. The Ran race, on the other hand, was a skilled group of warriors.
Simply put, it was baseless.
There was no reason for them to be there. And it was also the reason why Isis, their King, left at the same time.
To a free-spirited woman like her, it was just frustrating.
‘Even though I’m the same.’
Mero also didn’t fit in well, especially in the world of the warriors. If he had the strength, he would have run away like Isis.
The problem was that he wasn’t as skilled as Isis.
“You mean to say we will meet up with someone?”
“At our pace, it will take a week.”
They were walking at the same pace as when they moved to the Rotomo Strait.
It wasn’t on the other side of the world, so it should be fine.
So how far was the World Tree?
Sarah thought hard about it but there was something she couldn’t understand, so she asked,
“Can’t we ask Mayatrey?”
“Wouldn’t we be more comfortable?”
“So why are we running like this?”
Right.
They had been running nonstop, with Hasyath in the lead.
“Why are we not taking the efficient way and doing this instead?”
“Well.”
Mero shrugged his shoulders and said,
“Because the more inefficient, the better the effect?”
“….”
Sarah just stopped talking after hearing that.
Mero smiled, and somehow, his expression looked ominous.
“You are following pretty well this time. At first, you looked like you’d die any minute. Did your intensive training work? Should we speed up a little?”
“Uh? No, wait….”
Sensing something strange, Sarah tried to stop Mero from speaking but he put his hand up and said,
“Sarah wants to run a little faster!”
“Oh? Sarah, are you okay?”
“She thinks we are moving too slowly and hopes we can speed up a bit!”
“Front! Get the message to Sir! We can speed up a little bit!”
“W-Wait!”
Sarah shouted in panic, but her voice didn’t reach any of them. Sarah glared at Mero in anger.
“You fool!!!”
Five days passed.
Because they sped up, their arrival time was shortened by two days.
Sarah was too scared to tell them to stop the entire time, and she fell headfirst onto the ground.
It was a hellish journey.
Even though she took breaks in between, following behind the Ran warriors was never easy.
Rather, she experienced the same pain she felt on their way to the Rotomo Strait.
“Ah, I will feed you.”
Sarah turned her dirt-stained face to the side and looked at Mero, who was smiling.
She wanted to spit at him.
“Spit!”
“Why?”
Of course, she wasn’t able to aim correctly, and Sarah looked like an angry cat.
“I don’t know if you are a cat or a dog.”
As he said that, Mero snapped his fingers and put the special pill down her throat.
And after a while, Sarah jumped up, looking fine. And she aimed for Mero’s head with her feet.
It was a fairly sharp kick, so it seemed like it would work, but he raised his hand and grabbed her foot.
“Eh! No. No.”
“You jerk! I thought I was going to die for a week!”
“It is all just physical training, training. You need to accept it.”
“You just want to annoy me.”
“Haha. Maybe around six points, right?”
“Eik!”
Sarah punched again, but Mero easily dodged it. Seeing that, Sarah trembled in anger.
Actually, if it was just about them going a little faster, she wouldn’t have been angry.
But Mero never stopped teasing her.
It was hard to move when the guy continued to scratch her nerves.
“I will not talk to you anymore.”
Sarah turned around and walked away.
“Are you really mad?”
Mero was a bit shocked.
He asked for them to speed up to tease her, but he didn’t think she would be pissed. The warriors wouldn’t let go of this if rumors went around saying he bullied a young child.
Mero had an awkward smile and went to appease Sarah.
“Ah! It is just a joke. Was it a bit harsh? Haha… let me off… kuak!”
When Mero approached Sarah’s back and moved his head close to her, Sarah’s eyes shone, and she hit him in the stomach with her elbow.
Mero was shocked at the surprise attack, and he grabbed his stomach as he knelt down on the ground. No matter how skilled he was, getting ambushed like that would hurt.
Furthermore, Sarah was not just a normal person but a swordsman who had reached a fairly high level as an expert.
When Mero wasn’t smiling anymore, he heard a triumphant laugh.
“Hehehe. I knew it would work.”
Sarah said as she was turning back.
“I waited until you approached me.”
“W-Wait… I’m out of breath…”
“No questions and answers. Didn’t you do this too? Father used to tell me that when I receive something…….”
……the words Count Welton said to her when she was young.
“I’ll make sure to pay it back!”
“Yah, Yah!”
Sarah’s fist hit Mero’s face hard.
“You pitiful bastard. Were you beaten by a little kid? And you bullied her first?”
“… yes.”
“If I were beaten, I would have left my position.”
Mero was making excuses for no reason and decided to stay silent.
Actually, to some extent, some of them were right.
Even if he thought about it, he allowed her to do it.
‘When did her fist move so quickly?’
If she had used aura, he wouldn’t be alive now.
But he wouldn’t have let her hit him, nor did she have any intention to do that.
Anyway, when he felt a pain in his stomach, something felt wrong.
And then a fist aimed at his face followed. As if to show that geniuses are different, Sarah’s punching skills improved in a month.
From the point of view of someone who was hit by a fist trying to relieve one’s resentment, he had to admit it.
“She improved a lot.”
“Did you get hit like this because you wanted to experience it firsthand?”
Gen looked at Mero pitifully.
Gen, who was straightforward, had always watched Mero and his stupid actions, but lately, he thought Mero was becoming more stupid.
Still, he knew the guy was nice, so he didn’t say anything further.
“Tease Sarah in moderation. You and I both know that you get along with her, but I’ve realized that you aren’t that bright. Because you are nasty, you don’t know your limit. Do it in moderation.”
“So much nagging.”
“When did this bastard start to talk back so much?”
Pak!
In the end, his forehead was flicked by Gen.
And he knew for sure that it would hurt more than Sarah’s fist.
Sarah was resting on one side with a relieved face. She had always wanted to punish Mero, and she finally put her plan into action.
Of course, she knew that he did it on purpose. No matter how hard she tried to attack him at the start, he managed to avoid her.
So she beat him more.
“So refreshing.”
Her stress has been released. Otherwise, she would have accumulated mental strain.
“Phew.”
She realized it when she hit Mero in the face—she thought that her fists felt lighter. Could it be that her movements were now sharper?
During her training, she didn’t feel it because she was continuously beaten by her opponent, but she clearly feels it now.
“Sword Master. It might happen.”
“Probably.”
“Ah!”
As Sara clenched her fists and talked to herself, she heard Harshath’s voice from behind.
Surprised, Sarah jumped up and bowed her head. And she asked with an awkward expression,
“You heard it?”
“I have good ears.”
Hasyath smiled and perched on a nearby rock.
As Sarah awkwardly stood there, he pointed to the other side.
And she walked over and sat down.
“You have been through a lot traveling with him for five days.”
“No.”
“Mero isn’t bad, so try and understand him.”
“I do.”
Sarah smiled, touching her fist, and Hasyath smiled too.
She rarely saw this man smile, so it made her look at him more. And then she remembered something and asked,
“But, when I was telling myself that, you said probably, right?”
“Yes.”
“You really think so?”
It was hard to move on after hearing something like that since she wanted to be strong.
Hasyath spoke in a normal tone.
“All you need is one step.”
“One step?”
“Right. No matter how much you swing your sword and no matter how swiftly your body moves, even when you fight while getting beat up, you won’t get any better than now.”
Of course, she could train more physically and improve her senses, but at her current level, the difference wouldn’t be much.
“You just need one thing, and that is enlightenment.”
Enlightenment.
At that, Sarah looked dumbfounded.
She achieved enlightenment by practicing the sword a couple of times, and there were times she felt drastic growth. The problem was that it continued to change over the years.
She wasn’t stagnant yet.
“Mistakes are made.”
But Hasyath dismissed her thoughts.
“Am I mistaken?”
“I will ask you one thing. Do you believe your strength has increased dramatically since a month ago?”
“That….”
Obviously, her body was lighter and her movements more natural. She was definitely stronger than a month ago.
However, it couldn’t be called a drastic development.
“Getting strong doesn’t happen easily.”
“That is why normally the experts and the Masters are different.”
Even if there was a difference in skill between experts, there were cases where the weak defeated the strong due to various factors.
However, between a Master and the top expert, the Master had the advantage, unless he was an idiot.
“That is what being a superhuman is. It is just one step, but just going over it will allow you to wield in your hand the strength that is different from before.”
Ability was secondary.
If one turns into a Master, their body evolves, so their body grows more.
“Just like your brother.”
Her brother, who was now the Demon King, was now a full Master.
He worked so hard to the point where he became unrivaled, and no one could land an effective hit on him.
So he was able to reach the Master class and become superhuman.
“However, you need to keep this in mind. You have one step left, but that one step is the one that you may never reach.”
“I will make sure to keep that in mind.”
Sarah nodded, as if she really wanted to remember it.
At that time, a sound came from the barracks, signaling that the meal was ready to be served.
Sarah had to help with the meal distribution, so she got up first.
“I will help them get it ready.”
“Yes.”
“Thank you.”
Like a polite child, Sarah bowed and ran to the barracks.
Alone, Hasyath watched her and mumbled,
“It isn’t too far for you.”
Like what he said the first time.
For some, one step to becoming a Master was endless, while for others, it was a road that they had to take the next moment.
And Sarah was the latter.
“I am looking forward to the day she meets her brother.”
A talent with the sword that surpasses even her older brother’s. How would he react?
‘He might not show any reactions.’
Hasyath stood up. And a series of carriages arrived.
