The World Is Mine For The Taking

"That’s it?" I asked while looking at her carefully.

Her shoulders lowered slightly.

"Your mana reserves seem far too small," I continued. "I guess you haven’t been doing anything to increase them."

"Increase them?" she repeated, looking confused by what I meant.

"If you want to increase your mana reserves, you have to strain them," I explained while keeping my eyes on her. "You need to use up your mana until you reach your limit, then recover and do it again. By repeatedly pushing yourself to that point, your capacity will gradually expand, allowing you to store more mana and giving you a much larger reserve to work with in the future."

I wasn’t telling her anything complicated.

It was basic training for anyone who wanted to become stronger.

If you constantly stopped before reaching your limit, then your body would have very little reason to adapt.

The same principle applied to mana.

You needed to push yourself until you had nothing left, recover, and then push yourself again.

It wasn’t exactly pleasant, but becoming stronger rarely involved doing something comfortable.

"If this is all you’re capable of," I continued, "then you’re not suited for war."

The moment I said that, she lowered her head.

She looked genuinely discouraged by my words, and I could tell that the statement had hit her harder than I had intended.

Maybe I had gone a little too far with that assessment.

Still, I wasn’t going to lie to her simply because she looked upset.

This was supposed to be training, and training was supposed to expose weaknesses.

If I didn’t point out her problems now, those same problems could get her killed later.

A battlefield wasn’t going to care about her feelings.

An enemy wasn’t going to stop attacking just because she was nervous.

If she ran out of mana after one attack, then someone stronger could simply take advantage of that weakness and kill her.

That was the reality she needed to understand.

Still, judging from her reaction, I probably could have phrased it a little better.

Then again, maybe being blunt was exactly what she needed.

"Aren’t you taking this a little too far?" Kashiwagi suddenly asked from nearby.

I turned my attention toward him.

Kashiwagi Yuuto.

He was basically the idol of the class, as well as the person everyone naturally seemed to look toward as their leader.

He had been extremely famous back on Earth, which was something I could understand when considering his personality and the way he carried himself.

Even now, he had the kind of presence that naturally attracted attention.

People trusted him. People listened to him.

He was the kind of person who seemed to believe that protecting his friends was his responsibility, even when doing so meant putting himself in danger.

Honestly, I had expected someone like him to eventually object to what I was doing.

He had always been that kind of person.

The type who would probably throw himself directly into danger if it meant protecting his friends, even if the smarter option would have been to stay back and think things through first.

"You think I’m taking it too far?" I asked him while turning my full attention toward him.

He looked straight at me without backing down, although I could still see some hesitation in his expression.

"You seem less interested in actually training us and more like you’re trying to torture us until we give up," he said.

The courtyard became noticeably quieter after that statement.

"You think I was doing all of this because I wanted to get rid of you by training you like this?" I finally asked after a moment, looking directly at him. "Frankly, I find that a little bit disingenuous and rude, especially considering the fact that I am actually taking the time to train you right now."

"Then why the hell are you teaching us like this?" he asked, his voice carrying a mixture of frustration and confusion.

"I don’t know what you’re expecting from me, but you’re planning to join a war," I replied. "I’m talking about actual warfare, where people are going to die, where you could get killed, and where you may eventually have to kill someone yourself. Do you seriously think some half-assed techniques like the ones the other two demonstrated would be enough to save their asses once they’re actually standing on a battlefield?"

I lowered the wooden sword slightly while continuing to look at him.

"I’m trying to be as realistic as possible when I teach you because I don’t have the luxury of pretending that you’re preparing for some friendly tournament. Do you really think this is going to be fun and games once you step onto an actual battlefield? You might be a hero, but I’ve been dealing with this world considerably longer than all of you, and I have responsibilities that extend far beyond your personal safety."

I took a breath before continuing.

"If some hero who doesn’t even understand the basic concept of war suddenly goes charging into battle without knowing what they’re doing, then that could fuck everything up. It wouldn’t just put you in danger either, because your mistakes could compromise the safety of the people I’m responsible for protecting."

After I finished explaining myself, he went quiet.

He didn’t immediately have something to throw back at me.

I could understand why.

He probably hadn’t considered things from that perspective before.

As far as he was concerned, becoming a hero probably meant fighting the enemy, defeating the enemy, and eventually winning the war.

That kind of thinking might have worked in a story where everyone conveniently waited their turn to attack, but reality didn’t work that way.

A battlefield wasn’t going to care about how important someone thought they were.

"If you genuinely want to go back home to your own world, then I’m willing to help you with that," I said. "If you decide that you actually want to participate in this war yourself, then I’m willing to help you with that too. I have no problem helping you become stronger if that’s what you’ve decided."

I raised the wooden sword again and pointed it toward him.

"But I won’t forgive you if you do something stupid and compromise everything I’ve planned for this war. I’m not going to let your recklessness put everyone else in danger simply because you happen to be a hero."

I paused for a moment before making my position completely clear.

"You people are not my priority."