Hunting (2)
Hunting (2)
This world also had bears.
But they weren't the bears people from Earth usually imagined.
Oh, of course Earth's bears were dangerous too. Bears tore people apart. A swipe of their claws across your belly, and your guts would spill straight onto the ground. The bear would then eat them with relish.
For similar reasons, there were large land animals like elephants and rhinoceroses. Lions and tigers too.
They were actually called that. "Bear," "lion," "elephant"... The in-game monster encyclopedia used the same names...
Well, I doubted whether the beasts I knew and the beasts of this game could really be treated as the same thing.
For one thing, their fur color was different. Even on Earth, bears had brown, black, or white fur, but this world's bears were far more colorful.
Red, blue, green, or brown.
And the forms of their claws. Thinking of ordinary animal claws would be a mistake. Unlike normal claws made of hard keratin, these bears' claws looked like solidified ice, or were perpetually wreathed in blazing fire, or whipped up wind strong enough to send a person flying, or drove into the ground to cause earthquakes... In any case, they could do things that no ordinary bear could ever do. Honestly, they launched attacks that absolutely could not be dismissed as mere beasts.
The animals called lions, tigers, elephants, and rhinoceroses were the same. The only ordinary animal an Earthling would recognize in this world was the horse, more or less. In fact, even the horse had a setting attached that humans had bred it for convenience, so wild horses had manes that were literally fire...
... Anyway, that was how it was.
And amazingly, humanity survived in a world ruled by such insane beasts and became the lords of creation.
Well, the first emperor supposedly became the chieftain among Gryphons with his bare hands, so it didn't seem that strange.
Therefore, civilian firearms were never something to take lightly. Shotguns and rifles alike were all weapons meant for hunting those monsters. Some people even made a living selling the byproducts obtained from those monster hunts.
Like loading a large-caliber shotgun with Slug Rounds to smash a bear's skull, or using a rifle with a far larger bore than a standard military rifle... Mages would have also focused on practical combat magic purely for survival.
"... Instructor!"
And no matter how much of a noble you were, you couldn't be completely ignorant of that fact. Nobles still ate meat, and they still had taxidermy trophies mounted on their walls.
"Even so, aiming a hunting gun at us! This is an insult! How could you use a gun meant for slaughtering beasts...!"
Surprisingly, it seemed the developers had taken this perception from real life. Something about Europeans being shocked when they saw American soldiers using shotguns in World War I. Conversely, American soldiers supposedly felt offended seeing German soldiers use submachine guns, saying they were "guns only mobsters use," or whatever.
Well, whether anyone was offended or not, it meant nothing. In a cramped trench, when you encountered the enemy, shotguns and submachine guns were extremely useful. In a moment so urgent you had no time to aim, there was no reason not to use a firearm that could silence an opponent by roughly pointing and pulling the trigger, or by gripping it tightly with both hands and just letting it rip.
And that was probably the reason behind pitting commoners and nobles against each other like this.
Because Jennifer, noble or commoner be damned, had been fighting warlords who shot people dead.
"Do people not seem like beasts to you?"
As one noble student raised a hand to protest while looking at the approaching group of commoners, Jennifer gazed quietly at that student and asked calmly.
"Man or beast, when shot, they bleed and die. Just because you're human doesn't mean every single pellet of buckshot veers away. I'll say it again: on the battlefield, there is no honor, no glory. There is only a single mud-caked beast, thrashing about in a waterlogged trench, trying to survive."
Having spoken, Jennifer drew up one corner of her lips.
"Or perhaps we should ask our imperial princess instead. Sylvia?"
Oh, why me? Again?
I'd been keeping quiet, not saying a word—
—Hm, thinking back, it seemed I'd been the only one staying quiet and not saying a word. The students from the noble class, even Leo, Charlotte, and Alice, had all shown some degree of displeasure on their faces, but I alone had been composed.
To be fair, Claire had been composed too, but she probably remembered the general depths of human nature to some extent.
"What do you think? Will you protest the enemy using shotguns? Will you request they use 'honorable weapons'?"
Her asking me that, right after I had told her there was no glory on the battlefield, was probably because she was certain I wouldn't say such a thing.
I had a track record of eliminating a count through assassination, not a duel, after all. I'd planted a bomb on his carriage, and that wasn't exactly "noble" behavior either. For a noble, the proper and fair thing to do was to boldly declare a duel and neutralize or kill the opponent.
I didn't know whether Jennifer was aware of that or not. But at least, I had the sense she held some strange trust in me.
Jennifer, it seemed, viewed me as a "soldier."
... Had she heard that I was slated to be deployed to the front lines?
"Can you obtain shotguns or submachine guns?"
Murmurs rippled around me at my words.
Pistols and rifles, essential weapons on the battlefield, already had a fixed image. So no one would criticize someone for fighting with such weapons. They might gossip behind your back that you were no better than a commoner with no lineage, but not to the point of boldly declaring to your face, "You are a coward."
"Of course. The most important thing on a battlefield is 'preparing' your weapon beforehand. I'll grant you the opportunity to choose your weapon before the fight. Whether a rifle, a pistol, or a hunting gun, choose as you please."
"Thank you."
My answer must have pleased her, because Jennifer nodded, a smile tugging at her lips.
... She was a beautiful person, as befitting someone from one of these games, but.
Frankly, the way she talked didn't make her seem entirely sane.
Then again, having witnessed such a battlefield, maybe that was to be expected.
*
The sparring itself was closer to a class-versus-class match, but that didn't mean the entire noble class was on the same team. With fifteen students, operating as a single squad wouldn't have been bad, but some noble students found "wielding a shotgun on the battlefield" distasteful.
Their perception might change as they advanced through the academy years, but at least in the eyes of students who had just entered the academy, that apparently seemed like "cowardly" behavior.
"......."
And the expressions on the faces of the people gathered around me weren't very good either.
"If you don't want to use one, you absolutely don't have to."
Seeing that even Alice, who treated me without particular prejudice, and Charlotte, who treated people fairly, wore poor expressions, I spoke those words.
"If you use a weapon you're not used to, you might actually make a mistake. No matter how easy a weapon is to use, it won't feel familiar in your hand the first time you hold it."
As I said that, I loaded buckshot into a shotgun.
M1889. This shotgun that Jennifer had brought was, it seemed, the standard-issue weapon adopted by the soldiers of House Winterfield in the north. With a perforated heat shield on top, a visible lug for mounting a bayonet, and no external hammer, it looked just like the shotguns used by American soldiers in World War I, commonly known as "Trench Guns" in reality.
No, considering the developer of this game, they probably just took that gun's name, changed it, and put it in.
The tube magazine held five shells, plus one in the chamber. Six shots total.
My primary weapons were rifles and revolvers, but that didn't mean I didn't know how to use a shotgun. I had practiced with this quite a bit, too. Though I thought I'd spent more time practicing reloading than shooting. Honestly, among modern weapons, the reloading method was one of the coolest aspects of this gun.
"... First,"
I finished loading the shotgun and was packing the Ergensen rifle's Speedloader, shaped like a cigarette case, when Alice finally spoke up.
"I'd like you to teach me how to use it."
At Alice's words, the gazes of everyone nearby converged on her.
"You're saying if I just know how to fire it, I can at least use it? There really is nothing better than a gun like this for dealing with enemies who pop up at close range."
"......."
I gazed silently at Alice as she spoke, then picked up a break-action Double-Barreled Shotgun that lay beside me.
I filled both barrels with buckshot and handed it directly to Alice.
"It's loaded with two shells. Point the muzzle end at your opponent, then simply pull the trigger."
It had two triggers, but they were arranged to make firing both barrels sequentially easy. You could fire both shells in rapid succession just by pulling the triggers, which would be excellent for immediate shooting.
"After firing both shells, you can immediately drop the firearm and draw your sword."
Because if you fired both buckshot shells, it would mean the enemy had already gotten close.
Besides, Alice could also wield sword energy. Once she closed to a distance where her sword energy could reach, it was a fight she could manage somehow.
... If things really went wrong, we could just turn back time, restart from the beginning, and adjust the tactics step by step.
"Does anyone else need one?"
"......."
A brief silence fell over the group at my question, then,
"Ah, I give up."
I heard Leo mutter that.
"Claire, I'd appreciate it if you didn't tell Father."
"Would I go out of my way to say something like that?"
Claire answered Leo's words breezily. Leo frowned at her in response.
... It seemed like you'd said plenty before, though?
"Your Highness—"
"Call me by name. I don't know about the classroom, but here, using titles could lead to mistakes."
Because there were two princesses on our team. There were even people with overlapping family names.
"... Sylvia. I'd like you to teach me how to use one, too."
On Earth, nobles were said to go duck hunting and such, but that didn't seem to be the case in this world.
Did they all just swing swords around in training halls or something?
I handed Leo a gun just like the one I'd given Alice.
"You already heard the explanation just now, so I won't repeat it. Don't struggle trying to reload during a fight. If you're in a situation where you can draw your sword, it might be better to use that. You gentlemen are not soldiers trained in the use of firearms."
Leo nodded at my words, seeming somewhat tense.
The commoners... so called, but these were kids with the skill level to enter this academy. Their marksmanship would never be poor. They might even be better than me, someone who hadn't had that many opportunities for live-fire shooting.
Though, if that were the case, we could just reset until they didn't hit anything.
"Me too!"
Claire said in her still-breezy voice, so I silently handed her a shotgun as well.
There were submachine guns too, but those would be inconvenient unless you used one as your primary weapon. They were also bulkier than a sawed-off Double-Barreled Shotgun.
If the shotguns didn't work out, I could hand them those later.
"......."
And then, each of us holding a firearm, we all turned to look at Charlotte.
"......."
Charlotte, oddly stubborn in her pride, seemed burdened by our gazes and averted her eyes, until,
"Oh, fine!"
When we kept staring without averting our eyes, she grumbled and held out a hand.
How cute.
She really had been a popular character because of that kind of gap.
Maybe I should take a few pointers from that.