Archery Training (3)
The moment the intruder vanished, Han Sora's arrows came flying out one after another in a beautiful arc.
Blessed with the suggestion of Artemis's Soul, her arrows punched through the monsters with the same clean, decisive trajectories as they had a week ago at Neverland.
'Grruk! Gehaaak!!'
Sniping three nimble Goblin Spearmen in succession, Han Sora was making free use of the suggestion I'd planted in her, striding forward as she shot.
Originally, the plan was to let her take down five or six, then have her try sniping without the buff while the feeling was still fresh. But watching her draw the bowstring with such an exhilarated expression on her face, I couldn't bring myself to stop her midway.
"Wow, hit again! Amazing!"
However much help she was getting from someone else, the joy of finally doing what she couldn't do before wasn't something she could hide. And unlike Neverland, there was no desperate situation pressing down on her, no need to rush through the fun. For now, I figured it was fine to let her enjoy it.
-Thwock!
"D-did you see that one?! How many meters did that fly?! Feels like it went almost a hundred!"
"Yeah, great. But you should start trying it with the buff off soon."
"…R-right! Th-that was the plan all along!"
She'd been so drunk on her own accuracy that she'd completely forgotten. Well, nominally speaking, I'd come to the Academy on a weekend to help her train, so I supposed I had to do the job I came for. To keep a steady point of contact with Han Sora, she needed to feel that my presence was useful to her.
Suggestion Release
"The buff's off now. Try shooting one more, same feeling as before."
"Okay! Honestly, I feel like I could hit anything right now, even if a whole horde came rushing at me!"
With Han Sora's confident reply, holographic monsters began popping out one by one under the exact same settings as before.
…Needless to say, there was no way Han Sora without the suggestion could hit a properly moving target. Aside from the ones that got close enough to nearly touch her, she maintained a hit rate of roughly thirty percent.
"……."
"Cheer up, Han Sora. This is just the beginning. You've only just started — don't expect to be good already."
"Y-yeah! Sorry, sorry. I'll try again!"
"I'll put the buff back on, so this time, make sure you commit your stance and the force in each arm to memory with every single arrow. I'll slow down the monster spawn rate a little compared to earlier too, so take your time and line up each shot carefully…"
From then on, it was hour after hour of the same cycle — suggestion on, practice, suggestion off, practice. Under the buff, not a single arrow missed; the moment it came off, more than half her shots sailed wide, as if she'd never hit anything in her life.
By the time we'd run through about five full cycles of buffed and unbuffed practice, Han Sora suddenly let out a near-shriek, on the verge of tears.
-Shweeeak!
"Aaargh, why! I shot it exactly the same as before~!"
She was clearly getting frustrated. Well, I couldn't blame her — that one had missed by a hair, too.
The arrow sailed past the goblin with barely a head's width of clearance. Dozens of the shots she'd fired so far had ended the same way — coming close to the monster only to veer off at the last moment. Even Han Sora couldn't help getting irritated at that.
If she'd simply missed everything from the start, she could have shrugged and accepted that her skill just ended there. But right now she was hitting and missing in equal measure, and that was the worst kind of torment.
'Seo Woojin's little visit a couple of hours ago probably isn't helping either.'
With Han Sora's stress levels maxed out — partly thanks to Woojin's departure — it seemed better to call the morning training here.
Pushing further in this state wouldn't produce any real training effect anyway, and it would do nothing but hand Han Sora another embarrassing memory.
"Nnngh, hit it, just hit it…!!"
-Shweeeeeeak!
"Aaaagh!! Why won't a single one land! This is so frustrating…"
"…I think we should stop here, Sora."
-Beep.
"…Huh? Wh-what?"
Han Sora turned toward me in flustered confusion at the sudden disappearance of the holographic monster she'd been aiming at — then, remembering the spectacle she'd just made of herself, her face flushed a deep crimson.
"Ah, ahaha. S-sorry, I got a little carried away…"
"A little? You were more worked up than you were fighting the terrorists at Neverland."
"S-sorry…"
"Nothing to apologize for, but let's leave the training here. Any more from this point and you'll just wear yourself out and pile on more stress."
"Y-yeah, you're probably right…. Thanks for helping, Seonho…"
"Here, handkerchief. Wipe the sweat off your forehead."
"Mm, thanks…"
Han Sora, drenched in sweat from two more hours of practice, brought the handkerchief to her forehead, and while she did, I pressed the 'End Training' button on the console to retrieve the arrows she'd fired.
-Vmmmmmmm…
The instant I pressed it, the entire floor of the range slid backward, sweeping up the arrows scattered across the training grounds.
They'd turned a training range over two hundred meters long into a moving walkway purely for student convenience — a stark reminder of Cheonmu Academy's economic power.
"Here, Han Sora. Your arrows."
"Thanks~. Here's your handkerchief back."
"You sure you don't want to give it a sniff?"
"Eew, I know you're not going to."
Oh, I absolutely would. You're underestimating me far too much.
Of course, rather than creepily sniffing it alone at home, I'd probably just use it to smell it openly and watch her reaction. What I like isn't the scent of a woman's sweat — it's the expression on a heroine's face as she blushes while I take in that scent right in front of her.
That said, playing around at that level of intimacy with Han Sora would still be a bit much for now, so I'd have to leave it as a pleasure to look forward to.
"Moving my body around made me hungry~."
"Same here. I've been on my feet since this morning, so I could eat."
"I heard the Academy cafeteria's open on weekends too. Want to go check it out?"
"Sure. We came to look around the Academy anyway."
"You helped with my training today, Seonho, so lunch is on me~!"
"Treating me to cafeteria food and acting like it's a big favor."
"Hey~! Even cafeteria food is serious money for a student, okay?!"
And so Han Sora and I made our way to the student cafeteria, trading banter that was still closer to 'friends' than anything else.
For the record, I helped with her afternoon training as well. If I was going to raise her affection, I figured I might as well raise a lot of it in one go.
-Slosh, slosh.
"Hnnngh…"
Late that evening, at Han Sora's house.
Having finished a somewhat belated dinner thanks to the afternoon training, Han Sora sank into the bathtub and let out a sigh of pure relief.
Her arms and shoulders ached dully from hours of nothing but drawing a bow since morning, but today, somehow, felt more rewarding than usual.
Thanks to Lee Seonho's buff-assisted training, everything felt like it was clicking into place a little more easily than normal. She even felt like she understood, at least a bit better, how to aim with proper form.
The attacks she used to fire — obsessed with raw power, almost always in a flat, straight trajectory — could be tried in all sorts of different ways today.
"It's like I'm right on the edge of touching something~"
When he buffed her, her body settled into the most stable stance all on its own — but holding that stance with the buff removed was surprisingly hard.
Han Sora had taught herself archery, and her body had long since hardened around its bad habits, treating the incorrect form as the most familiar one.
Habits carved out over years couldn't possibly be corrected in a single day, so the frustration creeping in along the way was only natural.
'If I'd known this would happen, I should have learned properly from the start.'
Not that regretting it would change anything.
Among awakened abilities that relied on weapons, archery was an especially expensive field. Unlike swordsmanship or spearmanship, which only required a single decent weapon, archery demanded a professional-grade bow and at least a dozen arrows.
Arrows capable of landing effective hits on monsters were inevitably even more expensive, and for Han Sora, born to an ordinary family, simply continuing her archery already strained the household budget.
She couldn't afford private lessons from another archery hunter, and on top of that, Han Sora's awakened ability was an unusual one with no accuracy compensation whatsoever.
The fact that she'd somehow taught herself all the way into Cheonmu Academy despite all of that was honestly the only stroke of luck she could point to.
"But this afternoon did go a little better, at least…"
If she kept correcting her form bit by bit like this and grew accustomed to the feeling of a proper release, she'd surely become someone who could pull her own weight.
Seonho had said he'd help again tomorrow. And once the Academy's formal classes began, her flawed form would get properly corrected too.
At least her raw power was guaranteed — she'd confirmed that much taking down the Owlbear during the entrance exam. All that remained now was to raise her accuracy and keep growing.
'Running into Lee Seonho at the entrance exam really was lucky, in more ways than one.'
Who would have thought the boy she met that day would become a connection lasting all the way until now, with him helping her like this?
Right now only a handful of people, herself included, knew what he could do — but once the Academy term truly got underway, plenty more would come to recognize Lee Seonho's worth.
His ability carried that much potential. And beyond that, the fact that the person wielding it was Lee Seonho himself made it all the more meaningful.
Even setting his awakened ability aside, he was manly and dependable. He was kind-hearted to a fault, always thinking of others before himself; despite being in the Support Department, he kept up his physical training without fail; and from what she'd seen at the amusement park, he seemed plenty popular with the girls…
"Mmmm…"
…Honestly, it was a bit of a waste.
She knew Eunju liked Seonho — she made no effort whatsoever to hide it. And that a man attractive enough to be loved that intensely was exactly what he was.
And somehow, Isabel seemed to have feelings for him too. Probably because he was the only man who could ease her androphobia, her heart naturally gravitated toward him.
Had those two not existed, Han Sora might have let herself be a little more honest with her own emotions. She'd only known him for about two weeks, true, but objectively speaking, he was a charming enough man.
Whether that was worth throwing away her first friendships at the Academy over, though… she hesitated to say.
'He'd make a great boyfriend, sure… but I'm not seriously in it the way Eunju is.'
Far better to simply pray for her friend's happiness with the person she liked more. It wasn't as if their friendship hung in some awkward middle ground.
If she was being completely honest… it did feel a little intimidating, too?
She'd grown up being told she was pretty, but in Han Sora's eyes, Cha Eunju was every bit as beautiful as she was.
Rather than barge into things half-heartedly, lose the competition without even recouping her losses, and get chased out entirely, it was better to just keep the relationship she had now.
'Mmm, but he did say he and Cha Eunju aren't actually dating yet, so maybe…'
"Hey! Sora! Are you planning to soak in that tub all day?!"
"I-I was just about to get out~!"
Snapped back to her senses by her mother's voice, Han Sora shook off the 'bad thoughts' floating up in her head and rose from the bathtub.