The Field Trip and the Gnolls
“Our next class is a field trip.” Meredith said this just as the lesson was wrapping up.
A field trip? Suddenly? Perhaps my skepticism was written all over my face, because she grinned and continued, “We’ve pretty much finished the theory, and since we need to move on to practical application, I thought it would be good for you to see some ‘real magic.’”
“I’ve used spell scrolls before, though.”
“Real magic. Hazel, you really shouldn’t go around saying things like that. It’s embarrassing for your teacher.”
Real magic, huh? It seems to be a sensitive subject for mages. Then again, they say mages in this world have a fixed number of spells they can cast. I suppose it’s natural for them to be competitive. If you manage to hoard enough scrolls, it’s essentially the same as having another mage on your payroll.
“We’re meeting in front of the guild. Make sure to hold your guardian’s hand tight.”
“My guardian?”
“Technically, it’s an investigation of an unexplored dungeon. I’ve set it up as a formal escort request to your guardian. You’re just tagging along. You don’t have a license, right? If you did, I’d put you down for a regular commission.”
“No, I don’t.”
An unexplored dungeon. I’d heard that while the exploration process is grueling, the pay is decent enough that competition is fierce.
“But isn’t the competition pretty intense?”
“Ah, about that.” Meredith rummaged through her robes as she spoke. What she pulled out was an Academy student ID.
“Academy students have priority investigation rights for dungeons that offer rewards like pensions, medicinal herbs, or rare materials. Preliminary reports say this one is rich in herbs.”
So they have privileges like that, too. It must be a truly prestigious institution.
“How about it, Hazel? Sounds good, right? It’s not too late, so if you change your mind now, I’ll forgive you.”
“I must respectfully decline, Master.”
“Ugh! Why do you hate it so much!”
With that, she started ruffling my hair with both hands. Ever since I turned down her offer to enroll in the Academy, Meredith has been seizing every opportunity to pitch its benefits. Is she trying to change my mind by any means necessary? And whenever she gets rejected, she always ruffles my hair like this. At this point, I’m starting to suspect she’s just making up excuses to pet me. Since she’s someone who gets shy quite easily, I suppose that’s a possibility.
We stood at the border between dawn and morning. The sun hadn’t risen yet, but the stars had vanished, and the sky was already brightening. Even though it was the height of summer, the air was cool. It would get hot once the sun came up. I felt exhausted, even though it was barely daybreak. Maybe it’s because the nights are short, leading to late nights and early mornings. It was that peculiar feeling you only get during a summer dawn.
Meredith was already there waiting for us.
When I asked, “You’re here early?” she replied, “Punctuality is the foundation of a mage.” I wondered if it was just the usual mage-superiority complex, but she followed it up with an explanation that many grand spells and rituals are time-sensitive, making it crucial. For the record, she claimed the most accurate clock in the world is installed in the Academy plaza. So, it all circles back to that in the end, doesn’t it?
Despite the early hour, the guild was quite busy. There were adventurers looking disheveled, perhaps just returning from a quest. There were others in relatively clean attire, seriously contemplating what to do next in front of the quest board. And then there were the guild staff, their eyes dark with fatigue as they handled the paperwork. They looked like their souls had left their bodies, likely because they were on the night shift.
“Does the guild stay open all night?”
“The reception desk does. Issuing rescue quests is a vital duty.”
“Rescue quests?”
“If an adventurer doesn’t return within a set time, the guild takes charge and issues a quest saying, ‘Please go find this person.’ Since the time limit doesn’t necessarily expire during the day, we have to keep the night shift.”
“The rest of the work is just handled while they’re on duty anyway,” the protagonist added. It sounds like a form of life insurance. The only difference is that the payout isn’t money, but the life they managed to hold onto.
“Still, they treat you well, don’t they? I thought they’d work you harder.”
Meredith chimed in, having finished her business at the reception desk. “You have to do your part for the money you earn. Do you have any idea how much they take out in fees?”
The protagonist stood up, picking up his backpack. Everyone seemed to be getting ready to move, so I lay down on the backpack I’d left on the floor. Then, I slipped my arms through the straps and stood up with a forward roll. How’s that for the technique of a veteran sergeant who finished his mandatory military service? I was met with a very warm gaze. Well, I expected as much.
Today’s destination was a hill located in the suburbs. They say we can take a shared carriage for most of the way since there’s a major road nearby. And the way back? Meredith explained that the harvestable rewards were medicinal herbs, and the confirmed monsters were of the Gnoll variety.
Gnolls? They don’t seem like a common race to encounter as enemies. When I asked, she said they were monsters with hyena heads that walked on two legs. Ah, is it that creature that appears frequently in Western fantasy? They have a habit of traveling in packs and are quite intelligent, so we need to be careful. Should I think of them as Beast Goblins?
“Spells?”
“Three Level 0s, three Level 1s. I’ve prepared three Basic Spells, two Magic Missiles, and one Invisibility.”
“All Basic Spells?”
“Impressive, right?” Meredith replied, making a V-sign with one hand. Why is she looking at me while talking to the protagonist? That aside, it was impressive. Magic has levels, and if you aren’t proficient in a spell, you have to cast it at one level higher. Basic Spells are Level 0, but if you aren’t proficient, they’re treated as Level 1, which can lead to wasting your Level 0 spell slots entirely. For a low-level mage, that’s a fatal situation where you lose nearly half your casting capacity.
Because of that, street mages usually only master the Light spell and focus their efforts on learning higher-level magic. Since Light is the spell you need to use the most, they consider the rest a write-off. They say you can only find people who have mastered all Basic Spells once they’ve graduated from a magic university. Yet, the person in front of me had mastered not just the Basic Spells, but Magic Missile and Invisibility as well—it’s no wonder the word ‘impressive’ came out. Moreover, she was still a student. I hadn’t noticed because I was used to it, but what a high-spec person she was.
“Folks, we’re almost there. Get ready to hop off.” A rustic voice came from the driver’s seat.
“We’re here?” Meredith, who had been nodding off, said in a sleepy voice.
“Ugh, being an adventurer is such a pain.”
“Tell me about it. What are we even doing out here this early in the morning?”
A veteran adventurer responded to Meredith’s comment. While everyone was groggily checking their gear, the carriage came to a stop. The adventure had begun. Though we still had to walk a bit further to reach the dungeon.
While climbing the gentle hill, I saw stakes driven into the ground in the distance.
“There’s something over there.”
“You can see that? *Huff*, that’s amazing, really.” Meredith said. She hadn’t even walked that far, but she was already gasping for air. She had started to lag behind while climbing the slope, and now she was looking at me with eyes that seemed to say, ‘Why aren’t you tired?’
“That must be the dungeon boundary. Should we catch our breath here before going in?”
“Agreed, I’m literally dying.” Meredith said, laying down a flat stone to sit on. Is this the limit of human endurance? Weak, pure-human mages.
“Hazel, Meredith just has particularly weak stamina. Don’t think this is the average for all mages, and make sure to work hard on your physical training.”
“Yes.”
I squatted down, pressed my backpack against my back, and lay right down. Maybe it was because the walk had been just the right amount of pleasant, but I started to drift off.
“Alright, we’ve rested enough, let’s move.” It had been about ten minutes. The protagonist spoke up. Meredith let out a groan as she brushed herself off and stood up. The respect I’d felt for her in the carriage seemed to be vanishing.
The scenery inside the dungeon was completely different from the outside. Outside was a gentle hill with grass and trees, but inside was a small mountain made of rock. So this is what a dungeon that unfolds in an open field, rather than through a door or cave, feels like.
“The ones to watch out for are the scouts, the priests, and the chieftain. There should only be one chieftain, but be careful with the others. The scouts have feather decorations on their heads. If you see one, kill it immediately before it can signal the others. The priests will have skull decorations, and if you leave them alone, the battle will turn against us, so target them first. They’re quite intelligent, so watch out for traps and the weapons they’re holding, and they have good hearing, so speak quietly. Got it?”
I nodded at the instruction to speak quietly. But if that was the case, shouldn’t she have explained that outside?
“Then shouldn’t you have explained that before we came in?” It seems there was one other mage who had the same thought.
“Alright, from now on, be quiet. Let’s advance.”
And then, the protagonist slipped away. After moving forward a bit, we saw two Gnolls wandering around. One was carrying a small shield that covered about as much as a forearm, and a cleaver. It looked like a Chinese kitchen knife, but the blade seemed to be about the length of an adult man’s forearm. It was slightly curved at the end, giving it the feel of a badao. The other one had red feathers hanging all over its head. That must be the scout. I knew it at a glance. It was holding a cleaver, but no shield. Instead, there was a tube hanging at its waist. A blowgun? It looked like it required caution.
“When I attack the scout, you move immediately.”
It was a simple plan. We held our breath and crept toward the Gnolls. The Gnolls seemed to sense something strange, lifting their snouts and sniffing the air. The protagonist pulled a dagger from his thigh holster and threw it.