Several days had already passed since he became a hunter.
In that time Garam had gone in and out of gates a few times and earned money, and he was gradually shedding his porter look and taking on the trappings of a hunter.
"Hoo. Today I'll do nothing but train."
And these days he was spending most of his time in the hunter-only training room attached to the Association.
"Haah. If I had my way I'd head straight for a gate, but."
The aftereffects of True Progenitor Form had been considerable.
The True Progenitor Form he'd used back when he killed the Kobold King.
Since it had been his first time using it in combat, he hadn't thought as far as the side effects.
"No, more precisely, I should say I never expected them to be this bad."
The side effect of True Progenitor Form was that the blood channels throughout his body were left in tatters.
For a human, it was the equivalent of taking considerable damage to the mana circuit.
It wasn't as serious as Ha-yeon's case and he had the Regeneration skill, so it wasn't a major problem,
but it was a state that needed at least a few weeks of recuperation.
'I'll have to go easy on True Progenitor Form from now on.'
Drawing conclusions after a single use might be premature, but it was already power beyond what his body deserved.
Keep using it however he pleased and he might end up with damage he couldn't undo.
'Though if a time comes when I have to use it, I'll use it without hesitation.'
Which was exactly why he was training in the training room for the time being, to shore up his foundations.
"Strange how the weapon just won't settle into my hand."
Garam looked down at the large axe in his hand.
A throwing axe known as a francisca.
Throwing axe or not, at nearly seventy centimeters long it was a size that could rival a two-handed axe.
It was the weapon he'd bought along with the stabilizers he sent Ha-yeon last time.
"I can't be forming a weapon out of blood every single time I fight."
That way was far more convenient, but he couldn't do it in every gate he'd be entering from now on.
Sooner or later there would be times when he had to cooperate with other people, and he could hardly be forming a weapon out of blood then.
For now, no one else could be allowed to find out that he was a Vampir.
"And above all, I can't very well go out bare-handed when I'm moving as Holy Knights."
So he had decided to at least prepare a weapon as the bare minimum.
-Breaking news. Supply of mana stones is reportedly being delayed due to the hunter disappearances that have suddenly increased over the past few weeks.
"That's getting more serious by the day too."
Breaking news flowed out of the news broadcast he'd left playing on his phone while he rested from training.
The talk of hunters disappearing that he'd heard from Ha-yeon had, in a matter of days, become serious enough to make the news.
It might be connected to that Blood Point Stone, so Garam had been keeping a close eye on it as well.
'No information has come from Ha-yeon recently.'
She'd said she would look into it, but she was still a student.
Her information would come faster than an ordinary person's, but getting details on a case under active investigation wouldn't be easy.
So for now all I can do is what I'm able to do.
"Alley-oop. Shall we go one more time to finish?"
At Garam stretching and picking up his weapon again, Carmilla's expression curdled.
"Ehh, isn't that enough already? It's been three hours."
The reason Carmilla was whining about being tired when he was the one training was simple.
It was because of the new function (?) of Carmilla's that they had discovered during this training.
"Summon Avatar!"
FWOOSH!
When Carmilla gave a small flick of her hand in midair, red flames bloomed around her.
The flames around Carmilla gathered into one mass and then changed into a shape resembling a human.
It looked impressive, but in truth it wasn't a technique he was seeing for the first time.
That was his own ability.
Crimson Flame.
With Carmilla's newly discovered ability, she could use the normal skills he possessed as well.
Slapping a childish name like Avatar on it came free with the package.
'Her control is better than mine, too.'
What he'd learned from watching Carmilla handle Crimson Flame this time was that she was accustomed to handling it.
Or more precisely, accustomed to mana, or perhaps energy would be the word.
Just like watching Hae-rang, Carmilla handled Crimson Flame with skill and familiarity.
The Avatar in front of him right now was a level he couldn't even dream of at present.
Carmilla could even handle those flames well enough to have them fight in sync with her own movements.
'Of course, not to a degree usable in actual combat.'
At best it was D-Grade, or maybe below that.
Its damage was less than weak; it was practically nonexistent.
Which was precisely why it was suitable as a sparring partner.
'What in the world is that girl, really?'
She sang the same tune about revolution, revolution, all day long, but Carmilla was also the very one who had made him the True Progenitor.
"What are you doing? Not going to go? The rule's the same as before, first one to land a hit wins."
At the words of Carmilla, who was sprawled on top of the Avatar as though it weren't even hot, Garam quickly shook his head.
Training came before things like that right now.
Like it or not, he and Carmilla couldn't be pried apart these days.
Garam gripped the axe in his hand and threw himself at the Avatar.
WHOOSH!
The axe swung at the Avatar. But the Avatar dodged Garam's axe with nothing more than a light twist of its body.
Garam hurried to pull the axe back, but he was a beat too slow.
That subtle stiffness between swinging and recovering the weapon.
"Slow."
Because of it, Carmilla jeered and at the same moment he failed to block the fist the Avatar drove into him.
PAF!
There was no damage at all, more like down feathers settling on him, but he had clearly taken a hit.
FWOOSH.
The Avatar vanished at a gesture from Carmilla.
They'd been fighting in this same pattern for three hours already, so there was no way either he or Carmilla wouldn't be worn out.
"What in the world is the problem?"
"That's what I can't figure out. It feels like something goes subtly out of alignment partway through."
"I keep telling you, just refund that thing and switch to a hand axe."
"That's not an option. You saw it yourself. An ordinary hand axe doesn't have the power."
There was a limit to what a hand axe barely larger than his palm could do.
It might work on monsters about the size of a human,
but against non-humanoid monsters it would be no different from poking them with a toothpick.
The Kobold King alone had fought on and ignored a hand axe buried in its body.
"Still, it's true that it's less convenient than a hand axe."
Perhaps because he had used nothing but a palm-sized hand axe for over eight years.
Setting everything else aside, judging distance with it was hard.
'That Kobold King the other day, I just took one swing and lopped its neck off, so that's one thing.'
To handle the francisca skillfully, it seemed he needed more practice.
"It'd be nice to have some kind of teaching aid."
It would be good to have a practice partner he could watch and imitate,
but there was nowhere to find a partner like that on short notice.
"Hoo. Let's stop here for now. I'm getting hungry, too."
He'd run straight to the training room the moment he got up and trained without a break, so there was no way he wouldn't be hungry.
Carmilla spun wildly in midair, apparently thrilled at the word food.
Ever since she came out of the Full Moon Temple with him, she'd been helpless in the face of good food.
"I'll go wash up, so wait a moment."
***
Garam came outside shaking out his water-soaked hair, Carmilla with him.
[So where are we going today?]
She chattered away at his side without pause, swollen with anticipation.
Garam was hungry too, and just as he was about to head quickly out of the Association,
THUD
he bumped into someone walking toward him.
"Ah, sorry—"
"You bastard!"
Garam lowered his head to apologize to the person he'd bumped into,
but the man immediately screwed up his face and grabbed Garam by the collar.
"You damned bastard. You humiliate me like that and then shamelessly run off?"
At the voice, Garam raised his head to see a man with a skinhead cut and a bramble pattern drawn on it.
"Yang Jin-hak?"
It was Yang Jin-hak.
"Every time I think about the money I lost that day!"
"Let go of me first and then talk."
Perhaps because of Yang Jin-hak's sudden explosion,
he could feel the surrounding eyes turning their way.
[What's this now? Why is he picking a fight all of a sudden?]
'Ah, you were asleep at the time, so you wouldn't know.'
After roughly explaining to Carmilla what had happened with Yang Jin-hak, Garam straightened his rumpled clothes and spoke.
"Get your story straight. You were the one who picked the fight first, and that money was 'damages,' wasn't it?"
He deliberately put the accent on the word damages.
The people around them began to stir at that.
Whatever their reputation, hearing that a guild member of a name-brand guild like the Saryeon Society had paid damages was bound to come as a shock.
No, if anything it was because the Saryeon Society's reputation had already gone to hell that people reacted so strongly to the word damages.
"Wow, those Saryeon Society bastards, that punk nature never goes anywhere."
"Now they're even paying damages to a hunter?"
At the voices coming from every direction, Yang Jin-hak's face flushed red and purple.
Then, apparently remembering where he was, Yang Jin-hak smiled.
"Hey. Then instead of running our mouths out here, how about we have a light sparring match?"
"Huh."
A B-Grade hunter proposing a spar to a D-Grade hunter.
Nobody but the users could see or hear inside a training ground, so he had all but announced outright that he was going to take out his temper.
Beyond cowardly, into petty.
Normally he'd have refused outright,
but Garam's eyes had been drawn to the weapon on Yang Jin-hak's back.
A sledgehammer about the same size as his axe. It was presumably the weapon Yang Jin-hak used.
'The way it's used should be roughly similar.'
Seeing Garam hesitate for a moment, Yang Jin-hak must have thought he was won over, because he added more terms.
"I won't use mana or skills at all. And if you land even one hit on me, I'll cover those damages and give you a spirit medicine on top, double."
"Hmm."
If he wouldn't use mana, all the better.
Because of True Progenitor Form, using mana was a bit difficult for him right now.
"This is a total freebie, I'm telling you. A spar without mana or skills is no different from ordinary people going at it."
Yang Jin-hak kept chattering at Garam's side, apparently worried he might run off.
'This is a little pathetic.'
Did he want to fight a D-Grade hunter this badly?
The thought crossed Garam's mind, but he had no particular intention of running.
This was how he'd get a feel for how to use the weapon.
He'd been wondering whether he would have to ask Hae-rang for help, so this was better.
Yang Jin-hak was rotten, but he was still B-Grade.
His ability as a hunter clearly exceeded Garam's.
'And the same goes for how he handles a weapon.'
Besides, B-Grade or not, it was a training ground.
Unless Yang Jin-hak had lost his mind, he wasn't going to beat him to death in a training ground.
On top of that, all sparring weapons were made of wood.
Which meant there was little chance of getting hurt.
He would just learn a bit about how to use a weapon from Yang Jin-hak and, with luck, pocket some money too.
It was simply that the training he'd planned on had gotten a little more brutal.
[Hey! What about food!]
'I'll buy you something good in a bit, so hold on.'
Food wasn't what mattered right now.
"All right. Let's do it. But let's make it weapons allowed."
That was the only way he could watch and study.
"Heh heh. Let's go in, then."
Yang Jin-hak and Garam entered the sparring hall.
The two of them set down their own weapons and took out sparring weapons.
'The Association really is fascinating the more I see of it.'
Every kind of sparring weapon imaginable was laid out on display.
Among them was the francisca, the very weapon he had bought.
Yang Jin-hak's sledgehammer was there as well.
Yang Jin-hak took up the hammer and stood in the sparring hall.
Garam stood in the center as well.
And with no signal to begin, Yang Jin-hak threw himself at Garam.