Otome Game no Heroine de Saikyou Survival-Chapter 73

Place of Beginnings

“Long time no see…”

I muttered, staring at the small town I could see from the road.

After moving from place to place, I returned to Baron Horace’s territory, where that orphanage was located, for the first time in two and a half years.

It was not that I thought of this place as my home. In fact, I thought it was this territory, but as a young child, I didn’t even remember the town where I used to live with my family.

It was not a land of good memories.

But I came back here because I wanted to fulfill one of my promises.

As I passed through the small town where the orphanage was located, no one remembered me.

I had hardly ever been outside the orphanage, so I didn’t know anyone, but I still came to this town, somehow that was all I could say.

I heard from a stall selling baked flour (filling but not tasty) that a Cruzian priest took care of the orphanage after the old woman disappeared, and the orphanage had been doing much better since then.

However, that priest retired about half a month ago, and the townspeople were taking turns taking care of the orphans until the next caretaker was sent by the lord.

…How could the people who have turned a blind eye to the abuse of the orphans be expected to take care of them?

“…”

It wasn’t that I cared about the orphans.

I was just a little curious about the orphanage after I was gone.

I got a little lost because my memory was a little hazy, but I arrived at the orphanage with no problems and no nostalgia.

Even though the Kingdom of Cleydale was a warm land, I remembered that in winter like now, it was cold at night, sleeping on the dirt floor with only a thin blanket and no food as far as I was concerned.

I peeked inside from the street and saw orphans, looking a little cleaner and a little healthier, washing and cleaning in the yard with a listless look on their faces.

Come on, let’s get something to eat…

[…No, stop…]

“…”

I heard such a voice coming faintly from the alley leading to the back gate of the orphanage.

I somehow peeked in that direction and saw a young man wearing dirty clothes and carrying a knife on his waist, who looked like he had probably just come of age, entangling with a girl in the orphanage.

“If I hand this over, the little girl’s food…”

“Huh? The little kids weren’t eating when I was there either!”

…Oh, I remembered now.

The girl was three or four years older than me, and she was the one who cooked the meals for the old woman.

And the younger man was an older orphan who had taken food from the little girl and forced her to work.

No…he was not an orphan anymore, judging from his age.

Normally, children near adulthood in an orphanage would be sent to work as craftsmen as a form of job training, but the old woman was too busy selling or working the orphans to do anything of the sort.

But the man, who was forcing others to do the work, was sent out of the orphanage when he came of age and became nothing more than a thug in the town.

“…What the hell are you looking at, hah?”

I ended up getting involved when I looked at him.

I made sure to leak as little sign as possible, but because I remembered some of the emotions I was feeling at the time, I ended up revealing my presence. This guy turned towards me and noticed that I was a young woman, so he came closer to me, shaking his shoulders from side to side.

“Hey, are you an adventurer? If you’re an adventurer, you must have some money, right? Leave some for the underprivileged orphans.”

“You don’t look like an orphan to me.”

“I’m a former orphan myself. Then why couldn’t I, a less fortunate man, take the money from the orphanage?”

The girl from earlier shouted from behind him as he asked me to leave my money behind because of his incomprehensible theory.

“Don’t bring strangers into this, I’ll give you my share!”

“You think that’s enough?”

“Giggooooo! “

“Gigigyaa!”

I stepped in a split second and punched him in the jaw with a palm strike that was enhanced by a body-strengthening technique.

Inside the glove of my right hand, there was a thin, magical steel plate to stop the blade in the worst-case scenario. Perhaps because of this, I felt the jawbone crumple in my hand, and the man fell on his back with a strange cry.

If this was the extent of the damage, you could probably cure it by getting Cure applied at a sanitarium. If you didn’t have that money, you just wouldn’t be able to eat solid food for the rest of your life.

I also had enough sense not to kill a former orphan.

But the girl interrupted me.

“Wait, wait!”

The girl stopped me as I grabbed the man by the collar, who had passed out from the pain, and dragged him out to throw him in the garbage dump.

“I’m sorry I got you into this…and…”

She looked at me sternly and let out a voice that sounded unsure.

“Maybe…weren’t you here at the orphanage before?”

“…It’s just your imagination.”

Aria replied curtly and walked away, dragging the man along with her, and she didn’t speak to him anymore.

…But how could she recognize me now?

It had been more than a year since I had crushed the Northern Frontier branch of the Assassins’ Guild, and I was ten years old now.

[Aria (Alicia)] [Race: Human Female] [Rank 3]

[Magic: 221/240] [Strength: 178/190]

[Strength: 9 (12)] [Endurance: 9 (12)] [Agility: 13 (17)] [Dexterity: 8]

[Dagger Arts Lv.3] [Taijutsu Lv.3] [Throwing Lv.3] [Archery Lv.1]

[Defense Lv.3] [Manipulation Lv.4]

[Light Magic Lv.3] [Dark Magic Lv.3] [Non-Attribute Magic Lv.3]

[Life Magic x6] [Magic Control Lv.4] [Intimidate Lv.3]

[Concealment Lv.4] [Night Vision Lv.2] [Detection Lv.4] [Poison Resistance Lv.3]

[Simple Appraisal]

[Total Combat Power: 576 (With Physical Enhancements: 691)]

As expected, the barrier of Rank 4 was very thick. I could now use magic without chanting, and some of my non-combat skills had reached Level 4, but my physical skills had yet to improve.

I visited my master’s place once to make a report. I couldn’t stay long because I was being targeted, but I learned a spell of light magic, and thanks to the increase in the Level of light magic, I became Level 4 in magic control, but that was all.

It was rare for a person to be able to reach Rank 4 in the first place.

If I were to use that woman’s knowledge as a metaphor, if a Rank 4 was someone who participated in the Olympics, then a Rank 5 would be someone who would win a Gold Medal.

If one were to try and achieve it in one’s mid-teens, it would either take them at least a lifetime of training or have unique skills.

Even so, my body had become much more physically fit over the past year, and I felt that I was getting good reflexes and feedback from all the training.

The number of assassins and bandits who had attacked me had probably exceeded 50, and I had killed every one of them.

Real combat was training. And it was definitely beginning to bear fruit.

But I guessed I had changed the most in terms of my appearance…

Because of my increased magical power, my outer age had grown to about 13 or 14 years old.

Due to the secondary sexual characteristics that the woman’s knowledge had taught me, I was almost no longer seen as a man, even when I wore a cloak.

My current outfit was also made by Gelf to fit my growing body shape.

It was a sleeveless, above-the-knee, all-black dress made of hellhound leather, and I also had a special knife holder made to attach to my thigh inside the skirt.

The left side of the skirt had a slit so that I could pull out a knife instantly.

It was quite a good thing, being both blade and fire-resistant, but Gelf would not accept more than ten gold coins.

The body shape had changed, and I had a hard time adjusting the balance of my body, with flesh and fat on parts that didn’t have it before.

However, it’s not all bad because my status had also improved due to my growth…although it had given me a strange nickname.

But what was more strange was that my arms and legs hadn’t changed much in thickness, even though my muscle strength had increased to the level of an adult.

I guessed, based on my knowledge, that the body functions were now designed to use not only muscular power but also magical power, and the musculature had changed into that of a monster.

…In that light, Feld’s status with that much muscle must be extraordinary.

Dumping the former orphan with the shattered jaw at the dump, I headed straight for the big town where the lord of the land lived.

The journey that used to take me nearly two days now took me less than a day.

Leaving the town in the evening, I ate and took a nap in the forest near the campsite that had been my first stop. After wiping my sweat with a wet cloth and cleansing myself with [Clean], I moved on further, arriving at the next town near evening the next day.

New n𝙤vel chapters are published on novelbuddy.cσ๓.

In the past, I would have entered the slum through a hole in the wall, but this time I came at a time when the gates were open, so I entered through the front.

“So you’re an adventurer registered in this town. I don’t usually see your face around here.”

“I’ve been active in the royal capital and Dandol.”

As a registered adventurer in this town, I could come and go as I pleased. Even so, it had been two and a half years since I had been here, so the soldiers did ask me who I was, but after they checked my tag they let me through without a problem.

“If you haven’t been here in a while, be careful in the northern ruins. There have been reports of more adventurers getting injured recently, so ask at the guild for more information.”

“…Okay. Thank you.”

The adventurers in this land, which was filled with ruins and monsters, needed to be quite skilled, but I wonder if there was a problem? Well, I was planning to go to the Adventurers’ Guild anyway, so I should just check then.

As soon as I entered the low-income area near the slum under the sky that was beginning to darken, I disappeared, letting my presence blend into my surroundings.

My Concealment skill had upgraded up to Level 4.

Just as when I first met Viro, I could only distinguish his appearance by the color of his magical element. If I were to blend in with the darkness, I would not be detected or leave a strange presence when scanned with Detection Level 1.

I repacked the luggage I had bought at the Marquis of Kendras and headed for my destination. It was already dark, but I was sure there would be no problem even at this time of night.

“Galbas, are you there?”

Galbas, who was drinking with another man on a couch away from the blacksmith’s fire, looked up.

“…You?”

“Are you that Ash-haired brat?”

“It’s been a long time, you two.”

The person next to him, not Galbas, shouted out. It was Galbas, who had given me the black knife, and the old man who introduced me to this blacksmith shop.

“It’s been a long time… wait, you’re a woman…”

“She’s been a woman from the beginning, old man!”

“I couldn’t tell the gender of Human children, you idiot!”

“What the hell, you mean you’re an obstinate old man?”

“Says the obstinate old man, and I won’t tolerate that!”

*Don

“I have a job for you.”

“”…””

The two drunken obstinate old men, who had suddenly started fighting, stopped moving as I noisily placed a bottle of the special fire wine I had bought at the rock dwarf settlement where the Marquis’s prospectors were gathered.

“Oh…you know how to prepare the stuff, it is a good strategy to bring your own alcohol, even if you’re just a kid.”

“I haven’t seen that special fire sake in a long time.”

“I’ll do your job, but I won’t do anything stupid, okay?”

“I’ll pay the bill first.”

Snap….

I took out a gold coin from Shadow Storage and put it on the table.

“Oh, that was surprisingly quick. But what crazy things did you do, kid…”

*Gasp.

Next I dumped all the gold I had onto the table, and not only Galbas, but the old man looked appalled.

All the money I had saved so far. 10 large gold coins, 14 gold coins, 22 silver coins and a few copper coins.

“That’s all I have. I want you to use it to make a special weapon for me, a pendulum.”