Chapter 3: 3—Speedrunning F Rank [2.0]

I went through the F Rank subjugation quests on the corresponding quest board—there was one per Rank up to B—and, not finding anything near challenging enough nor with a good enough reward, decided to skip over quests of that Rank altogether and start directly on E Rank ones. It was good that the guild allowed adventurers to take quests one Rank above theirs.

I immediately discarded all the herb collection ones—after all, I lacked the necessary botanical knowledge and discerning eye, all greens looked the same to me—and focused on the subjugation ones. Some asked for specific valuable materials from certain monsters, or even whole carcasses, while others were simple culling quests, that merely required a horn or ear as proof of the kill. Naturally, their rewards were accordingly lower.

Weighing pros and cons, my desperate need for money won over, and I decided upon a quest that asked for the full carcass of a greywolf—some kind of magical hybrid of wolf and hyena, stronger and faster than their non-magical counterparts but not that dangerous—with the compensation varying upon the state and integrity of the corpse. I didn’t want to know what they’d be used for. The quest only asked for a single one, but it was posted several times, likely so they wouldn’t all need to come from the same source. Grinning, I took three of the papers and brought the, to the receptionist’s desk.

I repeatedly confirmed that I wished to take the quests despite the Rank difference, and that I was aware of the fee I would have to pay to cancel them, ignoring all the stupid warnings from the receptionist, and after a while I was finally able to go out to the forest.

I ran through the the outer ‘band’, where the mana was only dense enough to support F Rank beasts for sustained amounts of time, and a few minutes later was in the E Rank zone, more specifically near the zone that recent reports had claimed were the current hunting grounds for greywolves, who often moved around.

I was lucky, and encountered one a bare few minutes later. I didn’t even have to follow any tracks, something I was glad about since I’d have no freaking clue where to even start from. The fight was quick. I heard some rustling of foliage to my left, and immediately entered a stance, swinging my greatsword in a broad, horizontal arc in the sound’s direction before even looking. The greywolf who had just jumped at me in ambush didn’t even have the time to realise as his head was nearly split in two, my sword separating his wide open jaws even further.

I blinked, then had to hold the barf in as I took in the unnecessarily gruesome scene, despite Raynold’s previous experience with gore and killing beasts.

’I overreacted. I thought I was in danger and went all out. Dammit, what an idiot! I was supposed to cause as little damage as possible! Still, that was… disappointingly easy. I should be able to cause less damage to the next one I find. Let’s finish these quests.’

And that that I did. With far less damage to the bodies, I killed another two greywolves in a couple of hours, and returned to the city soon after  by carrying all three corpses in a manner no human should be capable of. 

'God bless my muscly, OP body. Wait, is that blasphemy? Eh. Whatever.'

I presented the materials to the startled guild secretary who didn’t believe me until I showed her some of my prowess with the sword, involving a bald drunk and a mutilated chair (your sacrificed will be remembered,) then picked another three identical quests while they judged the bodies’ condition and prepared my monetary reward from the ones I’d just handed in.

By the time I finished the second batch, it was already dark, so I hurried back into the city, showing my temporary guild card for the fourth time today to the gate guards, who had thankfully changed shifts a couple of times and weren't the same ones that saw me rushing in with three monster bodies the first time.

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When I reached the guild and handed in the quest materials, I was informed by the ork-like receptionist that I already had enough contribution to advance to E Rank, having done six missions of that rank already, and I was given an E Rank temporary card, before ever receiving the F Rank permanent one. As I headed back to the mansion I counted up my rewards from the six missions.

‘78 silver, huh... around 750$. Doesn't feel like too much for six whole monsters, though it makes sense given the obscenely high supply. I mean, it's a whole lot for a day's work, but I've still got a long way to go. 

'Still, good thing they have large coins and bars of every material, since having to carry 78 physical coins would be a real pain. And it would only get worse when I became richer.’

As I got back home, I went to the courtyard to do my daily sword practice. It was already late evening so there wouldn’t be much time, but the me of this world hadn’t missed a single day of training since 4 years ago when my talent had been discovered, and I wasn’t about to break that streak.

My strength was already superhuman by Earth standards, since I could wield my 40+ kg compressed orichalcum sword almost as easily as a normal warrior could wield a normal two-handed sword, but my power wasn’t enough to even scrape the boots of the most powerful people of the world, or even in the kingdom. 

‘Well, maybe twenty of me could barely take on the strongest swordsman in the kingdom, the head of the Royal Knights. Not sure about the best mages, though. Magic’s just so varied and mysterious that you never know how a fight will play out.’

My physique was remarkable, but my swordsmanship was still a bit crude and incomplete, since it was self-created. This was because my father, due to his stupid envy, or pride, or whatever, had refused to even hire a swordsmanship tutor for me, which had made old Raynold stop attending all the classes with his other tutors out of spite.

'The duke is seriously an idiot. In terms of intelligence, Ray was worse, though. Not to mention both of the brothers. I guess it runs in the family.'

Fortunately, it seemed like the brainpower that the me of this world hadn’t put into intelligence had gone into intuition with the sword instead, and the style I created, although crude, was simple but effective when using heavy swords against both humans and beasts. Well...most beasts, anyway. Not much a sword could do against a mass of goop that could freely reshape itself, if that even existed.

As I finished my repetitions and form training, I grabbed a quick dinner from the kitchen, earning me a fair share of disdainful looks from the staff. I ignored them and went back up to my chambers, crashing into my bed the moment I arrived.

It had been a long day, and the sweet release of sleep came to me immediately.

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