Chapter 7
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Translator: penny
Chapter: 7
Chapter Title: Swordsmanship Instructor - Complete
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In the Tower, if you ask any adventurer about the three most important elements, you'll get similar answers no matter who you ask.
Level, items, and class.
In the Tower, a class is a concept directly tied to your growth direction and skill efficiency.
It has the greatest influence on building the image adventurers associate with themselves.
Paying close attention to the job change process might be natural for any adventurer.
"Earthbound Spirit? Why have you come back to the training ground?"
But.
This time, it crossed the line by a long shot.
Ignore her if she speaks to you?
Don't receive her teachings?
"Master."
"Why suddenly call me that? Just call me like you usually do."
Tiana was the only one left in the training ground.
The adventurers who had been mindlessly swinging at scarecrows, babbling about experience and proficiency, were probably off sleeping at the inn by now.
"Master."
"W-What's wrong? Your expression..."
The class you could obtain from Tiana's teachings was the lowest rank: Swordsman.
A plain class with no modifiers, nothing special about it.
There were no rare classes on the 1st floor, as they called them.
RARE-rank job changers were a dime a dozen by the 10th floor, but not a single one here.
There were no hidden pieces in the tutorial.
This was a place to learn the basics.
Sching!
"What are you trying to do right now?"
"Won't you draw yours?"
"Surely you're not saying you want to spar twice a day?"
Become a Swordsman by accident?
What nonsense.
Did they think you could become a Swordsman from a word or two of her advice, or a bit of help?
"The guy who hated spars is coming back on his own and drawing his sword. That's something you don't see every day."
"Since when do Swordsmen talk their way through things?"
"You're right. Swordsmen ask with the sword and answer with the sword."
Sching!
How many slashes, clashes, and falls it took for me to become her disciple.
They didn't know.
They never would.
Is rare impressive?
Is common lowly?
I wanted to ask them.
Ask the idiots who made those damn guides over and over.
Do you really think the Swordsman class that Tiana bestows is truly common?
Clang!
The irrevocability of classes.
Once chosen, a job can't be undone.
That was why Moonlight Guild warned new adventurers.
The Tower wasn't a game.
There were no 'Yes' or 'No' prompts floating in front of you.
Just like quests were accepted by taking the request form,
simply acknowledging the instructor as your master could accept the job change.
Clang! Cha-clang!
The criteria for acceptance weren't so vague that it happened indiscriminately.
Just look at Sua, who received Tiana's teachings but became a Mage instead of a Swordsman.
A simple 'sure' to a formal question of becoming a Swordsman wouldn't do it.
The Tower's residents weren't game NPCs; humans conveyed and accepted intentions through questions and answers.
They feared becoming Swordsmen from a single reply or nod.
As if the Swordsman class was filth to avoid, they warned against any interaction with the swordsmanship instructor.
Lest they accidentally accept the path to becoming a Swordsman by mistake.
Kang! Kaaang!
Ridiculous.
A name without modifiers doesn't mean it's worthless.
The supposedly most common COMMON rank doesn't mean it's simplistic.
How many adventurers treated Tiana like she was invisible today?
How many avoided her teachings?
How many found the instructor annoying, worried about getting the lowest-rank class, and steered clear?
"I'm sorry."
I should have realized.
Unlike Raymond, who spotted me late amid the rush of customers,
she had welcomed me from the moment I stepped into the training ground.
Unlike Koon, whose voice gave out repeating warnings to adventurers entering the forest,
her throat was still clear.
Unlike Ellie, soaked in sweat from assigning quests to countless adventurers,
her skin was still pristine.
For the 1st floor residents, it was a busy peak season, but for Tiana, it was just an annoyingly noisy off-season.
She couldn't hit the money jackpot like the innkeeper, fulfill her wishes like the guard, or even experience a single day's bustle like the receptionist.
The swordsmanship instructor simply watched adventurers enter the training ground and leave again, standing in place.
That was Tiana's day.
"I'm sorry."
I'd left such a master alone, avoiding her because spars were tiring.
"Didn't you say it yourself? Swordsmen don't talk with words!"
"..."
"Whether apology or regret, put it in your sword! That's my teaching!"
Right now, I was scattering my emotions pointlessly.
A Swordsman should pour them into the blade, so I let my feelings flow into my two hands gripping the sword.
Memories from when I became a Swordsman.
So, we would speak of those memories with our swords.
The first opportunity came after I'd visited the training ground every day for a week.
"Aren't you still learning swordsmanship now?"
"Walking the path of a Swordsman is entirely different from superficially learning techniques."
By then, I had some inkling that Tiana's offer was the start of a job change.
A fellow adventurer who would later be called the Sword Saint had already accepted her proposal and gained the COMMON-rank class Swordsman.
Unlike me, who only got the offer after a week, the Sword Saint had caught her eye on the first day.
"So, what's your answer?"
"I'm sorry."
When the first chance came, I refused.
"It feels too early to decide my path."
"My offer is quite valuable, you know."
"S-Sorry."
"No need to apologize. It's not something I can force."
I knew.
That I could receive Tiana's offer despite my lacking talent was thanks to her recognition and pity after watching my week of effort.
That's why I refused.
A day, a week.
I felt more keenly than anyone that closing that gap was impossible.
I thought Swordsman wasn't my path.
I changed my mind.
"Please."
"Well..."
The day before I was set to head to the 2nd floor with the other adventurers.
That's when I realized I was wrong.
"You refused when I offered the chance, so what change of heart brings you back right before leaving...?"
There were several minor influences on this decision.
Hunting slimes in the forest with my adventurer peers, I could easily feel how I lagged in physical ability and combat sense.
It wasn't a lack of sword talent specifically; I just had no talent for combat itself.
Even if not a sword, finding aptitude in other weapons seemed unlikely.
Basic swordsmanship I'd learned might be the better path, I thought.
To not fall behind others from the 2nd floor, better to at least have a class.
But the biggest reason was Tiana's encouragement.
"Didn't you say no one could match my effort?"
I'm not naive enough to take that at face value.
People's true nature can't be known even after a month of watching, nor grasped after a year.
I know how narrow-minded it is to judge me persistent based on a few weeks of sparring.
It was just empty praise to cheer up a listless disciple.
But that one bit of praise was enough to make me try a new path.
"Learning everything from a master then walking another path feels rude."
"So you do have a conscience."
"So, shameless as it is, I'd like to take back my refusal."
As she said, an instructor's offer was precious.
I couldn't pick and cancel at whim.
"Hoo... I wonder if I can teach you everything left in one day."
Tiana gave me the rare second chance.
"Do you truly wish to walk the path of the Swordsman?"
"Of course."
[Acquired Class - Swordsman 《COMMON》.]
And so I became a Swordsman.
With only one day left, it was woefully insufficient to teach everything.
If not for the instructor's skill, I wouldn't have even properly learned the Swordsman class's exclusive skills.
Thus, the time to leave the 1st floor arrived.
By my measure, decades had passed; by Tiana's, a single day.
I was still on the 1st floor.
That day, too, I visited the swordsmanship training ground.
"Why are you still on the 1st floor? The other adventurers have already left, haven't they?"
"..."
"Didn't you say you were all going to the 2nd floor today?"
Sching!
"Let me learn just a bit more before I go."
Looking back, even then I had shown up unannounced and drawn my sword.
Even then, she had accepted my rudeness without a word.
"How did you improve so much in just one day...?"
"Thanks to you teaching me so much, Instructor."
"The guy who could barely handle his own body yesterday! Did you eat some hidden elixir?"
"Where would I find that on the 1st floor?"
The sword rolled across the ground.
I couldn't tell if my strength had given out or if I'd poured out all the emotions I needed to contain.
I had no stamina left for that.
"Feeling better now?"
"..."
"Unlike this morning, your sword was thick and bitter this time."
Not just the sword lay on the ground.
I collapsed too.
Tiana squatted beside me.
"Don't be so sad."
"Doesn't it bother you, Master?"
"It'd be a lie to say it doesn't."
Tiana had read the guides the adventurers followed.
She knew why those who came to the training ground pretended not to hear her and refused her teachings.
"How can I blame those dissatisfied and leaving? I should blame myself for having nothing more to offer."
"..."
"If there's a better path than what I teach, it's natural to take it."
No.
The path of the Swordsman that Tiana led me on had no shortcomings.
The meaninglessness of rank games was proven by countless rankers.
Even the Sword Saint, pinnacle of Swordsmen, had job-changed through Tiana to the lowest-rank Swordsman.
Excuses from those masking their own inadequacies as class limits.
"I'm grateful you're grieving on my behalf, but I'm not that sad today, so no need to worry."
"..."
"Having one disciple return to the fold brings more joy than making a hundred."
Tiana smiled as she spoke.
"Disciple, I don't know why you gave up climbing the Tower."
"..."
"The day you decided not to leave the 1st floor, I don't know how you mastered swordsmanship in a single day."
"Master, actually, I'm..."
"Don't say it."
Her finger pressed to my lips.
"Let the history built into your sword speak through the blade."
Once again, I missed the chance to tell the truth.
That my sword hadn't ripened only on the 1st floor.
That my swordsmanship was forged from countless climbs up the Tower.
That though everyone remembered me as the Earthbound Spirit lingering on the 1st floor, I was a dropout who had challenged and quit endlessly.
"Heh, my victory anyway. You're still a decade too early to surpass this body."
"Didn't I win this morning?"
"The final bout is what matters, you rascal."
"Heh, ha..."
See? She was holding it in after all.
Petty woman.
"Yes. Then, let me learn a bit more before I go."
"Do as you like."
I gladly
decided to become her eternal disciple.
— Swordsmanship Instructor - Complete