章 35: Just Lend Me A Gun
編集者: EndlessFantasy Translation
In the army, respect is obtained by proving your own capabilities.
Benjamin realised how true that was after experiencing it himself.
By utilizing the interface the System had somehow placed in his vision, he intimidated the entire gunfire troop with just a shot. The attitude the army recruits had towards him took a 180 degree turn. Their eyes were no longer filled with mockery. There was only respect and admiration, with a hint of envy mixed in.
Benjamin felt somewhat guilty.
He was different from these people who trained and worked hard, as he received external help he could not be proud of the achievement. If it was not for sudden appearance of the shooting interface, he would have embarrassed himself. It was just that he had felt the urge to try and shoot once he had the gun in his hand, and he could not back down from the challenge once he had raised the gun. He could only go along with the flow.
Thus, after his outburst of ‘professionalism’, he quickly played it down and behaved as modestly as possible.
He quickly knew that his decision to go low profile was a correct one, as he was soon tortured by the training.
Even though this was the gunfire training camp, physical training is a must — no matter if you were a veteran or a new recruit. For the entirety of the morning, Benjamin never got to touch a gun after his initial shot. The instructor took back his gun and ordered Benjamin to go join the ranks, and the training started.
The training regime was that of running — running fucking laps.
"You bunch of bastards! Want to touch a gun when you’re still babies? Didn’t you hear, guns can kill! I’m doing this for your own good, you’ll thank me soon enough!" That was the middle-aged man - their inspector’s words.
Benjamin could not help but barked in his heart, ‘The most dangerous person on this field is you! A gun without the safety clutch on your waist? If it went off, you’d be losing your balls or it’ll go through your anus.’
However, it was only him — the half-assed ‘recruit’ that thought this way. Judging from the looks from other people’s face, they probably thought that the orders from the instructor was more important than a message from God, and whatever he do will always be right. They executed the task of obedience perfectly.
Well, that can’t be helped. Benjamin was not a soldier, he only came here for the training. It would be difficult to ask him to be loyal and steadfast like a real soldier. He was a mage, and if he didn’t have the ability to think independently and question everything, he might as well just go and join the church.
He was quickly called out by the instructor.
"The last one in the team, step out!"
Benjamin who had ran more than 10 rounds, was so exhausted that he nearly fainted when he walked towards the man.
"Weren’t you great just moments ago? What happened to that vigor of yours? The fastest person in the group ran almost 20 rounds now, what are you doing at the back?" The instructor reprimanded him without any pauses, "Where is your energy? Did you not eat?"
Benjamin panted as he bent over and supported himself on his knees. Once he recovered his breath, he said, "I really didn’t eat…..."
"Greet before you speak to your superiors! Say ‘Sir!’" The instructor cut him off before he could finish his sentence, "Go back! Come here again, and repeat your words!"
"..."
Benjamin dragged his heavy steps and walked back to the running formation, before walking out and returning to stand before the instructor, and shouted with all his might.
"SIR! I REALLY DIDN’T EAT!"
"..."
An awkward silence blanketed the field.
The instructor nearly lost control over his stern expression, but after much effort he managed to maintain a straight and stern face. He roared at Benjamin, "That is not an excuse! Will the enemy show mercy if he knew you didn’t eat? Go back and run! Don’t even dream of eating if you do not complete a 100 laps!"
In the end, Benjamin left the army base lying down.
Benjamin felt he had ran more in one morning than all of the running he ever did in combined. Thankfully, the maid that was sent to escort him had called a carriage to the entrance of the army base to take him back to the manor. Otherwise, he would have collapsed on his way home.
After he arrived in the Lithur Manor, he did not have any energy to even walk to the living room and have lunch with everybody else. He could only muster energy to walk back to his room before collapsing onto his bed, unmoving. He told Jeremy to bring him some bread and tended to his hunger as he lied in bed.
As he finished the bread, he sent Jeremy away again on an errand. Being entirely alone in his room, he really wanted sleep right away.
But he didn’t. He mustered his mental energy and dived into the space of his consciousness, thus beginning his magical training for the day.
This had become a daily homework that he could no longer skip.
During this period of meditation, the triangular symbol seemed to have changed. The light emitted from the symbol shifted from pale blue to dark blue, as if it had unlimited magical energy within it. The mysterious vibe from it was mesmerising. The water ball that was summoned through the symbol had also surpassed the size of that of Accius Fulner’s fat head.
Benjamin estimated that if he had compressed this water ball and threw it, it could knock out a strong, grown man if he had no heavy armor on him.
From face washing to punching people in the face, this spell was finally living up to its standard.
Not only that, Benjamin felt that his control over magic had improved as the triangular symbol became stronger. The speed of his waterball summoning was also quicker, and he could maintain control over the water ball better than he ever did before.
Now, he could manipulate the water ball skillfully to form a defence bubble around himself. Of course, the defence abilities of the bubble was still very much insufficient. Although it would not burst from just a poke, it would still crumble easily if it was sliced by a sharp object.
Benjamin was far from satisfied with this. He was going to use this to fight the Pope! If it could not withstand normal knives and swords, what more defending against magic! This bubble could be broken by a simple knight, what more a Cleaner from the church?
He still needs to train!
As for the healing effects of the Waterball Spell, Benjamin also spent some time studying about it. He deliberately casted around 20 spells, and finally he successfully summoned a few drops of the Water of Life. He then observed and scrutinized the differences between the Water of Life and the Waterball Spell.
Under his observation, he found out that the water molecules in the Water of Life was held together in a very unique structure. It was somewhat like a strange cube. This unique structure construed of water molecules produces a strange life energy, and it was this life energy that brought about the healing effects of the Water of Life spell.
Benjamin found out that it was very difficult for him to manipulate the water molecule at the molecular level. Thankfully with the help of the triangular symbol, he managed to successfully create a water ball with healing powers. However, it could only maintain its structure for approximately 10 seconds, before losing its healing traits once the time elapses.
He could only wait for the symbol to become stronger before he could form a healing water ball that can be stored for a longer time.
Although the level for attack, defence, and healing was low, at least Benjamin had started training all of these aspects simultaneously. His new skill was just around the corner too! This was the period of rapid growth for his abilities.
He wished dearly that he could stop eating and sleeping to dedicate the whole of his time to cultivate his magic.
Only if he no longer need to go to military training.
Although it would take a lot of his time, he was not opposed to the idea of military training due to the gunfire training. But judging from today’s training, he had a long way to go before he would be able to touch a gun, much less learning how to shoot. God knows how many more laps would he need to run before that happens.
However, if he thought about it in a positive light, the military training could slowly improve the state of his body.
"Oh, before I forget, how advanced are the guns in this world?" Benjamin asked the System.
The System thought for a while before it answered, "It's okay, hmm…... how should I phrase this….... Basically, you will find pistols, artilleries, rifles. The pistols can be reloaded and are of average firepower. However, they are not held in high regards."
"You basically said nothing of use," Benjamin scowled.
The System was instantly offended as it bit back with vigor, "I am not Baidu [1] , and I can't even connect to the internet here, what do you expect? Do you think I know everything?"
"... Okay then," Benjamin had no choice but to accept its reasonings. He was thinking of using any information that the System provided to him to improve a pistol and evolve it into a AK27 or something.
However, it was also impossible for anyone to store this much useful information that would be needed in the event of a teleportation. How did the main characters in the teleportation novels manage to remember so many scientific theories from their original world? Why were they able to push the development of technology in their teleported world with just a flick of a finger when he could not even make a block of soap?
How great it was to have an author that was willing to diligently scour Baidu for information! He was filled with jealousy.
Thankfully, in an effort to prove its worth, the System provided information on the gun status in this world.
According to what he heard from the System, he found out that gunfire had a lower status than he had expected.
In this world where supernatural abilities are present, magic and the divine arts are the two dominant sources of power Not only referring to those in a battle, but also that applied on enchanted swords and knives, and the blessed armours. A normal bullet will never be able to pierce a blessed armour, much less the shield of the divine arts. The divine arts could also be used to bless bullets, but it was rarely deployed as it would drain too much power. Instead, it was used to bless the ammunition of the artilleries.
Also, it is useless to enchant pistols using divine arts or magic, unless you intend to use it to knock people.
Even though many countries still had gunfire troops, they only function as long-distance backup soldiers and their status were lower than the artillery regiments.
Thus, pistols are usually used by agility-type mercenaries, or by the nobles and wealthy merchants as means of defence. Just like the gun Dick had on that day, which he most probably stole from his own house.
That was true when the pistol is in the hands of most people. . However, it is an entirely different scenario when a pistol is held by Benjamin.
Equipped with the shooting system from the online games, shooting with a 100% accuracy was no problem to Benjamin. In the future, he could also learn more on enchantments that he could utilise on his shots. All in all, the ability to shoot was very valuable for him — at least during the time where his water ball is still relatively weak. Using a gun to shoot was still the most direct and efficient tactic he could deploy in an attack.
Of course, the prerequisite for whatever that was said was for Benjamin to actually possess a gun.
He still needed to somehow find a way to get a gun.
It was prohibited to trade gunfire in the country, but they did not actually enforce this. Every noble family would horde a couple guns, and that includes the Lithurs. Benjamin considered stealing the one at home, but it would be inconvenient for him once they found out that the gun was missing, which was why he gave up on that plan.
What he needed was a gun that only he knew existed, and one that he could always carry around secretly.
After some thoughts, Benjamin finally decided to buy one at the outskirts.
Havenwright is the biggest city on the land, and the outskirts took up to 75% of its total land area. Although Havenwright was the main base for the church, the outskirts of Havenwright can be described as chaotic due to the church focusing its forces on pushing their influence outwards instead of maintaining order.
Benjamin's knowledge on the outskirts did increase vicariously via the errands he sent Jeremy to complete. Once, Jeremy told him that there was a place where gunfire was sold and purchased, after returning from a trip to the outskirts. At least, Benjamin wouldn’t be heading there without a clue.
He was not afraid that the church might find out about this. Although the church's watch was not a tight one, Benjamin could never shake them off his tail — not especially if he wanted to buy a gun.
The bishop would then know that he went to buy a gun. So what?
In the eyes of the bishop he was only one terrified noble. After the events in the castle, it was normal for him to secretly buy a gun from the black market out of fear of the witch and also as an effort to protect himself.
As long as the church had no idea about the relationship between Benjamin and magic, they would never suspect a thing.
Also, under the watchful eyes of the church, he could not imagine that he would ever be in danger. No matter how dangerous the outskirts might be, he will be protected as long as he was not isolated from the outside world.
Additionally, the pendant from the church further increased his ability to protect himself. Although there was still some risk to this, what kind of teleporter was he if he did not even dare to take some risk? Furthermore, a gun was quite important to him.
However as a precaution, he still planned to sneak into Claude's study and take the gun out of its hidden place.. He will return it after he got his own gun.
After an afternoon of cultivation while lying on his bed, Benjamin's soreness faded into a slight discomfort. After dinner, he successfully stole the gun from the study, and sneaked out of the Lithur Manor under the cloak of the night.
Facing the direction of the supposed gunfire trade post in the outskirts of Havenwright, Benjamin started his journey.
Translator’s Note:
[1] Baidu is a prominent search engine in China.
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