Chapter 32 Strongest Sage, Creates Crude Bow

 

Whoa. That means Ruli enrolled in a school where 10% of its students died just to become a magic augmenter.
I could understand if she wanted to learn about augmenting along with combat, but if she enrolled here just for the augmenting lessons, there should be many other safer places.

It might have been understandable if she lived in the sticks with no sufficient info on her hand and was told to do it by her parents like me, she must be quite whimsical....

"But is it really all right? Letting someone with a crest not suited for combat into your party...."

"Of course. Magic augment is also necessary to build up your magic. There's no shop that sells proper magic swords in the Royal Capital, thus raising a strong augmenter with Glory Crest is quite important for me personally."

And also, I can collect magic stones once I enter the dungeon.
Judging from the dungeon's presence, the monsters prowling near its entrance are far weaker than the monsters around the territory's vicinity, so the magic stones won't be of good quality, nevertheless, they're usable for practices.

You need a huge amount of magic stones for augment training, therefore we can't begin without going inside the dungeon first.

"Of course I'll join! Please let me join your party!"

"Then, me too!"

....Alright. Now the most difficult part of the mission required to enter the dungeon has been cleared.
Now these two just need to get as strong as second graders... though I wonder if they're already stronger than the average second grader.

Chantless magic shouldn't be usable for the second graders yet after all, I'm also sure that these two exceed them in magic power, consumption and firing rate.
Well, there are still some worrying parts though, I'd like to train them above ground before we go inside the dungeon.
The interpersonal matches will be held next month anyway, right after that should be a good time.

"By the way Alma. You said you were better with bows, why did you switch to swords then?"

"Eh, do I have to use bow?"

"Not really, but... why?"

"Because a bow is useless once you run out of arrow, and it can't fly  straight unlike magic.... They told me to stop using one since it's only useful for hunting animals...."

"Which idiot told you that...."

It's true that bows aren't strong by itself, but you can strengthen it by using enchant and augment on the bow and arrows.

A type of weapon with a stronger firepower and firing rate than bows called 『Gun』 was developed in world I lived in the past, but since magic augment couldn't be used on them, they were only used in low level combats.
And you're saying bows are weaker than chant magic? Nonsense.

In the first place, Alma's Second Crest is a crest well suited for bows than swords.
Its firing rate isn't comparable to the Third Crest, but it's easy to put high powered magic on an arrow with it.

With the Third Crest, you can't match firing rate of normal magic with bows, so you'd end up shooting arrows with half-assed power and half-assed speed, like an inferior version of Second Crest bow-users.
By the way, the Fourth Crest is unparalleled for swords.

"Then that means I can use a bow? The part about needing arrows is difficult though...."

"Yeah. But you will need to put magic on the arrows, so you'd have to train on it if you've never done it before. Even an arrow like this can fly well if you compensate it with magic."

I picked up a branch near my feet and reshaped it into a haphazard arrow using magic.
It's crude and has no feather or arrowhead, but it can fly straight if you put magic on it and is relatively powerful.

"You said that and all, but I've never seen anyone who could do that in the present time!"

"You have the Glory Crest Ruli, you'll be able to make something better with your eyes closed with a few months of training. Well that's that, so there's no need to worry about arrows."

"Yay! ....I left my bow in my home though, gotta buy one later! ...Wonder if I have enough cash...."

"Training.... Mathi-kun, are you going to teach me augmenting!? Isn't Mathi-kun's augments something like an extraordinary family secret technique!?"

"Of course I'll teach you how. But only after we get some magic stones in the dungeon. As for the bow.... It might be better to make one myself rather than purchasing one."

Usually, you get weapons created by a proper First Crest craftsman, but the bows I saw when I was picking swords back then were all of terrible quality just like the swords.

"You're going to make one!?"

"It's only a substitute until we can obtain a proper bow. Don't expect too much of its performance.... We'll rebuild it once Ruli is able to use processing and augmenting magic.

"But I have a feeling that Mathi-kun's 'don't expect much' can't be trusted at all...."

"Like with this amazing sword too...."

"No really. I'm really not good with bows. To begin with, my crest can't be used to augment it well."

Augmenting a sword with magic is simple, but bow is another matter.

"Then it'll be a common strong bow?"

"....I wonder about that. It might be a tad better than the stuff they sold in the city."

◇

Next day.
As promised, I made a bow with a pitiful shooting performance (I made it small to make it easy to use inside a dungeon. I mixed a tiny amount of metal in it to increase the power even a bit) and gave it to Alma, but....

"It really was a lie!"

That was the first thing Alma uttered after shooting a few arrows with the bow I made.

"Is it a let down? But I don't think there's anyone selling a proper bow in this city...."

Alma isn't a daughter of a noble for show after all, she must have had a proper bow.
In that case, I should use movement-type magic and go to--.

"No! It's the opposite! What's with the power when it's this small!? It's also very precise, it's so weird, this bow's scary!"

Eeh....




































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