2 Training in the Forest

A/N: I thought I'd write it here for all the people who are confused. This story will NOT be a harem however the MC is in his typical harem-seeking phase and will talk like him getting one is natural because he is an isekai protagonist and they always get a harem.

Also

{...} = Spell

[...] = Skill

"..." = Talking

'...' = Thinking

'*...*' = Telepathic Communication

<...> = Voice of the World

.~.~.~.

"{Wind Blade}!" I yelled as an orb of green light appeared a few centimeters away from my fingertips before accelerating towards my enemy taking on the shape of a slashing attack.

The dire wolf in front of me jumped toward me in a vain attempt to bite at my neck but thankfully my {Wind Blade} spell was faster. I heard a sickening noise and a wet plop as the direwolve's midsection was cut open and it fell to the floor with a loud yelp.

I drew my sword and put the wolf out of its misery by slicing its throat. I sighed to myself. Even though it was trying to kill me, I was a dog person in my previous life so killing a savage doggo made me a little uncomfortable.

"Are you getting weirdly sentimental about something again?" Nolla asked from behind me.

"Alaster?" Evelyn asked with a curious gaze.

I looked back at the two of them before smirking to myself. "No. No need to worry about it. I'm fine." I replied standing upright. "Let's get going. Where there's one wolf there is a whole pack." I said as I turned in the direction of the other two dire wolves that we ran into fled after seeing one of their own fail to kill us.

The town's chief had come to Nolla halfway through today's magic lecture and asked us to take care of a few direwolves that had been spotted nearby. This was the reason why a predominantly human town allowed an elf to settle here despite the fact that elves were generally looked at with suspicion during this era. It was because Nolla was pretty strong and good enough with magic that she could be sent on requests like this to keep the village safe and to keep our village's one warrior, my father, from having to leave the town defenseless in case of a bandit raid or trouble with merchants while he dealt with wolves or goblins.

In this era of history, what I can only assume to be thousands of years before canon, there were many races that were vying for supremacy. The High Humans and their lesser human brethren, the High Elves and normal Elves, the Beastmen, and the Vampires were all in constant competition with one another. Heck, the dwarves were getting rich off of selling high-quality metals to all the different sides during this time too.

I looked down at my sword. While it was technically my father's backup shortsword, it was still of Dwarven make and was of a higher quality than anything a normal human could make at this point in time. Furthermore, I was still only eight years old, so even this short sword felt more like a great sword in my hands.

I pulled out an old rag from my knapsack and rubbed away the wolf's blood before following after Nolla who said nothing as she walked further into the thicket.

"{Trace}" She chanted silently as she held up her wooden staff into the air. A small orb of green light surrounded it for a moment before dissolving into thousands of green particles which then shaped themselves into a long line pointing deeper into the underbrush.

"I still can't believe that it's easier to create a fireball or wind blade than a simple tracking spell," I muttered.

"That's not how magic works, Alaster. Magic is just another version of an Art. Practice makes perfect." Nolla replied as we followed the trail towards our destination.

"If that's the case then it's easier to use elemental magic because we play with it so much right?" Evelyn chimed in.

Nolla sighed before turning back to give me a glare. "I suppose that's right but still... who would have thought to play games with elemental magic as a form of practice? If we were in Soma then you'd be dead already." She replied before looking forward again.

"Hehe~ Sorry 'bout that," I replied sheepishly.

"No your not," Nolla replied without skipping a beat.

"No, I'm not," I confirmed.

What Nolla said was true. In elven society, magic was treated as almost sacred and should have been used with the utmost respect. The idea of playing the elemental household magic to increase our control was something that I came up with (stole from an anime in my past life) and taught to Evelyn. It had rapidly increased our training proficiency while still allowing us to play all the time. We particularly liked using water magic to create snowballs to fight with during the summer to cool off.

Of course, Nolla was a much more free-spirited elf than most so when she found out she didn't stop us but would grumble about it from time to time.

We crept along for a few minutes as we followed the trail and eventually found ourselves near a fissure in the ground. There were numerous wolf footprints in the mud near the entrance and there was some hair and blood scattered about the small clearing.

We hid in the underbrush and watched the fissure for a small amount of time, only to see seven wolves crawl themselves out of there. They all began to circle the clearing suspiciously for a while and a few even walked right past us.

"Did you do something Nolla?" I whispered to her.

"I cast an illusion spell on them to make it so they are smelling our sent all around them but they can't see or hear us." She replied, not whispering at all.

"When did you do that?" I asked, a bit shocked at how she silently cast such a complex spell.

"When the first one poked its head out of the fissure. I'm sure it leads to a whole cave system, so we should probably be cautious since there might be more in there... Right. Evelyn, it's your turn. Try to kill all of the wolves in one shot. No fire magic, since we are in a forest." Nolla replied before giving Evelyn her task.

"Right!" Evelyn replied with the order with a serious look on her face. She was so cute.

Evelyn stood up and raised her hand. "Flow of water, destroy my enemies. {Aqua Shot}" Evelyn chanted as seven torrents of water appeared out of nowhere in the air in front of her before twisting into drill-like shapes spinning violently and firing off towards all seven enemies simultaneously.

It had seemed like whatever spell Nolla used didn't allow for the casting of magic while it was active because the moment that she fired, all the wolves looked towards us and attempted to dodge. Six of the Seven were impaled through either their heads or their abdomen but one of them was able to dodge completely and charged at us.

Evelyn didn't panic and instead took out a small knife from her waist and threw it at the wolf who was now only a meter away. The knife suddenly turned glowed green and accelerated, piercing through the whole wolf's body and striking the dirt behind it. Obviously, the wolf, now with a massive hole going all the way through its body, fell to the ground dead.

Evelyn then turned to us. "I'm still not great with control, Nolla-sensei".

I stood there a bit stunned by the whole thing. While I could use the same spell as she could, I definitely couldn't do it seven times at once. My eye twitched a bit in jealousy at her raw talent which was several times my own.

"No need to worry about it. I'm more concerned with the fact you still need to chant before you cast water magic." Nolla replied.

"Sorry, Nolla-sensei. I'm not as good with water magic as Alaster yet." Evelyn said and lowered her head. I could tell she was embarrassed by the fact that her ears were bright red. Chanting a magic spell was something that was necessary when the caster needed better control over their magicules and was a sign of inexperience with using a spell.

Nolla looked at me a smirked knowingly. "Oh, I'd say you were doing just fine." She replied still giving me an annoying smirk.

'This woman is pushing my buttons.' I thought while I felt a tick-mark forming on my head.

"It's ok, you did well anyway Evelyn," I said to her as I walked past the pervert and patted Evelyn's head for a bit.

After a few moments of catching our breath, we made our way to the fissure. It was pretty dark inside so Nolla cast a {Candle Light} spell that floated alongside us and illuminated the tight passageway. We explored for a bit but didn't find any more wolves. We assumed that the pack was just pretty small and we had dealt with all of their members but Nolla made sure to place down a few trap spells in the deepest part of the cave in case any more came back from hunting. It was a small-scale explosion spell that would hopefully cause the whole cave system to collapse.

After finishing the extermination, Nolla left me to deal with butchering the wolves and getting all the usable meat and pelts from them while she took Evelyn home. I wanted to complain a bit but Nolla said that I was the only one of the three who knew how to and that it would be good practice.

"Besides, I don't want to see this cutie here covered in blood and guts! Do you!?!" Nolla asked while rubbing her cheek against Evelyn's cheek in a very excited manner.

"So I'm gonna have to carry it all back by myself then?" I asked with a dark face.

"Don't sweat the small stuff," Nolla said as she pushed Evelyn along who looked helplessly lost at our conversation.

I sighed to myself as I began to slit the throats of the dead wolves nearby and drain their blood into a wooden bowl I brought with us for this very purpose. Wolve meat wasn't exactly the best feed, but any meat was better than nothing. I hadn't realized how inconvenient living in a semi-medieval society really was. The only 'spices' I had access to was salt which could be extracted from rocksalt with magic and pepper since one of the villagers grew the plants to sell to merchants when they passed by.

...

I was there for about three hours and it was well into the afternoon when I finally finished the butchering. To be honest, I was feeling a bit nervous since I had the feeling I was being watched for the last few minutes. I had initially assumed it may have been the direwolves returning home who were stalking me but the presence didn't seem predatory or hostile but more curious than anything.

I quickly packed up all of the useable remains and turned to the pile of unusable parts I had gathered in the center of the clearing.

"{Fireball}" I chanted, causing the pile to become engulfed in flames and begin burning into ash and charcoal. I waited a few seconds for all the materials to be sufficiently burned before using a small amount of earth magic to bury the remains. Gotta save the environment somehow right.

'*Thank you*' I heard a voice sound from inside my own head.

I instantly became alert and my hand rested on my sword as I looked around suspiciously. "Who's there?" I called out, only to hear no response.

For a tense couple of seconds, the only sound was the wind, however, after a while, I heard a twig snap under the foot of someone behind me and quickly turned to face them.

"Whats gotten you so jumpy?" Nolla asked as she emerged from the clearing.

I lowered my guard and sighed to myself. It was probably nothing and my imagination playing tricks on me. "Nothing, just thought I heard someone talking," I replied with a little embarrassment.

"I think leaving you alone might have been a mistake. Didn't know you'd get so jumpy. Come on. Your father's returned and he wanted to meet with you. Nolla said as she turned back the way she came. I quickly followed after her to not be left alone again.

(3rd POV)

As the small human and the elf lady left the clearing, a small girl could be seen poking her head out from behind one of the trees. She had short green hair and sky blue eyes. Her fair skin seemed to be semi-translucent as she appeared to almost be glowing. Two vines sprouted from her teal-colored dress and surrounded her.

"How strange. The mistress said humans were destructive and that I'd have to clean up their mess but that human did it himself. Was the mistress wrong? I'll have to ask when I go back." The little girl said to herself as a small gust of wind surrounded her and she disappeared from the scene.