Combat Skills

Three days passed without incident.

They advanced along a well-maintained stone road. Ria walked in front on foot, while Lulu swayed on the donkey's back behind her.

It was a peaceful journey. Though they had decided on a destination, there was no particular rush. They savored the true pleasure of traveling while enjoying the surrounding scenery.

"Since you called this a warrior's training journey, I thought you'd be in more of a hurry."

"Hm? Since we have the opportunity, let's take our time. Even if I call it training, we can't stay on edge the whole time."

Ria was in high spirits. Just walking along was enough to put her in high spirits.

The reason was the swords at her waist.

Neither wooden swords nor replica blades, they were a genuine matched pair of katanas, long and short. In Japan, weapons like these alone would be illegal.

Walking openly with them during the day. Just this made her happy. After all, up until now she had been using a wooden sword as her main weapon.

Traveling with Japanese katanas at one's side was a man's romance. Of course, Lulu, being neither male nor a warrior, couldn't understand this.

By the way, the wooden sword for bludgeoning was also in the magic bag. Katanas were too good for the likes of goblins. Maintenance was a lot of work too.

And so, after finishing their meal of travel rations and spending a peaceful morning into afternoon, a shadow suddenly crossed overhead.

"Oh, a dragoon."

"Pursuers, do you think?"

Dragoons were soldiers who rode wyverns. While wyverns were technically classified as sub-dragons, they were actually completely different creatures that just somewhat resembled dragons. The difference between dragons and sub-dragons was apparently about the same as the difference between humans and mice.

The dragoon circled in front of the two, then returned the way it came. In a straight line toward the royal capital.

"We've been spotted."

"Yeah, looks like it."

"Think they'll come to bring us back?"

"If they do, I'll turn the tables on them."

"I'd prefer a peaceful resolution."

"Then I'll turn the tables on them peacefully."

Ria smiled brightly, but she wasn't joking.

First of all, she was confident she could wound most opponents moderately and make them give up.

But events would exceed Ria's expectations.

After that, the group's pace remained unchanged. Only Lulu occasionally glanced back.

Sensing no disturbance from the luggage on its back, the donkey plodded on silently.

Before dusk, the sound of hoofbeats reached Ria's ears, enhanced by her Keen Senses gift.

"They're here. Three of them."

"You can tell? I should have good hearing too…"

Half-elf though she was, an elf was still an elf. Her eyes and ears should have been superior to a human's, but Ria surpassed even that. Such was the Dragon's Bloodline.

"What should we do? Hide and let them pass?"

"No, that might work this once, but we've passed many travelers already, and if they search with magic they'll find us eventually. Better to give them a painful lesson here."

She folded her arms and stood in the middle of the road. Fortunately, no other travelers seemed likely to come by for a while.

Before long, three mounted knights came into view. But…

"Ugh, Rias."

"Ugh, Carlos."

For different reasons, both women's faces twisted.

She never expected the vice knight commander himself to come after them in pursuit. And the other knight was Lulu's bane.

As for the remaining one, he was of no consequence.

"Carlos the Elf-Lover, huh…"

"That man is always staring at my ears."

He was the most skilled among the young knights, with impeccable family background and personality, but his obsession with elves was well known. He was turning twenty this year, if memory served.

Incidentally, Lulu was turning twenty-four this year. Being a half-elf, she looked much younger than that.

Lulu also dismounted from the donkey to await the pursuers' arrival.

Rias, in the lead, dismounted at a slight distance. The other two followed suit.

"Princess…"

Rias opened with an exasperated expression, showing no will to fight.

"Please return as soon as possible. His Majesty is worried about you."

"They say to let a beloved child journey, you know. Can't you convince him for me, Rias?"

"I'm not familiar with that saying. Besides, when you disappear leaving only a note, we have no choice but to search for you."

"I'm heading to the Labyrinth City for now, so please tell him not to worry."

Rias let out a sigh.

"With all due respect, Princess, do you understand the current situation at court?"

"I do. That's precisely why I left the capital—so I wouldn't be used."

At those words, a look of admiration crossed Rias's face.

"That's unexpected. I was certain you had no interest in such matters."

"Well, getting involved against my will would be unfortunate."

Ria shrugged. The atmosphere was peaceful.

"Even so, I must ask you to return for now. I don't mind accompanying you to the Labyrinth City myself."

"With Grandpa Rufus gone, having the kingdom's strongest knight disappear too would be problematic."

"We have a difference of opinion on that point."

The air grew heavy.

"Even if I have to make you suffer a bit, I'll bring you back."

"Right, I appreciate the directness."

Rias drew his sword. Not the wooden sword usually used for training, but a blade gleaming with the luster of mithril.

If cut by it, she would of course bleed. Wearing only leather armor, the blade would easily reach Ria's body.

But honestly, Ria could see nothing but victory ahead.

She couldn't find a single element of defeat.

First, his choice of weapon was poor. With a mithril magic sword, there was no room to hold back. While Ria's Iron Body skill could stop an ordinary blade at her skin, Rias didn't know that.

In other words, he would have to aim for the ends of her limbs, avoiding vital points. A wooden sword would have been better for that.

No matter how much he talked about making her suffer, he couldn't afford to seriously injure the princess. He was already at a major disadvantage.

Ria, on the other hand, could go so far as to kill Rias in an extreme case. Of course she had no intention of killing him, but attacking his vitals was an option she had.

"I'll tell you this, Rias. In all our training sessions until now, I've never once been able to demonstrate my true abilities."

It wasn't about holding back or the nature of training. She simply hadn't been able to use her techniques at all.

"I wasn't being serious either, including when I lost the other day."

Rias was actually quite competitive, but that wasn't the point.

"If I win, return to the capital obediently. I'll leave convincing Father to you."

"Very well. In the first place, if I lose to you, there's no one who could stop you anyway."

With Rufus gone, those words were correct. Though Rufus had no intention of stopping her to begin with.

"Then, shall we begin?"

With those words, Ria pulled a spear from the magic bag.

A spear. A jumonji spear.

"Eh?"

"Eh?"

"Eh?"

"Eh?"

Even Lulu, an outsider to close combat, found this unexpected.

When you thought of Ria, you thought of katanas. When you thought of katanas, you thought of Ria. That image was firmly established in the royal palace.

Without a word, she stepped forward and thrust the spear.

Rias's shield blocked it. The spear was pulled back and thrust at his feet.

"Kuh—"

He stabbed his sword into the ground to block it. The spear immediately swung toward Rias's face. Again, his shield blocked it.

With almost nothing but thrusting attacks, Rias was completely on the defensive.

Because until now, he had never once seen Ria use a spear.

But Ria had the Spearmanship skill at Level 6. While her Swordsmanship was slightly higher, the fact that spears were fundamentally stronger than swords was common knowledge in her previous life, and Ria had trained with the spear as seriously as with the katana.

In this world too, the main weapon of infantry in war was the spear. Even Rias used long-hafted weapons when fighting mounted.

But the reason he mainly used swords for ground training was their ease of handling and portability.

In this battle too, if he had known from the start that anything went, the fight wouldn't have been so one-sided.

That, in Ria's view, was Rias's naivety. You could call it a difference in mental preparation.

This world lacked the concept of constant readiness for battle. Even martial artists in modern Japan, where carrying weapons was forbidden, possessed the resolve to immediately shift into combat—and Rias simply didn't have that.

Ria had it. Even in the royal palace, when she had neither her katana nor even a dagger, she possessed both the resolve and the technique to kill if attacked.

Between Ria and Rias, in nearly every stat Ria's abilities surpassed his, except for level.

Rias desperately used magic to enhance his body and strengthen his armor and shield's defense, but these were immediately dispelled by Ria's superior magic power. When comparing their stats, the largest gap was actually in magic power.

If there was anything Rias surpassed Ria in, it was only his experience in war. But this was not a battlefield. And when it came purely to experience in killing, Ria—who slaughtered monsters whenever she had free time—was not particularly inferior.

In the end, Rias was forced to employ the strategy of sacrificing flesh to cut bone.

He held his shield perpendicular to the thrusting spear, letting it pierce through on purpose.

"Guh—!"

The spear pierced the back of his left hand, the tip reaching flesh. Even so, he rotated his elbow from there, catching the spear with his shield.

Ria released the spear easily. Though she lost her weapon, the shield pierced by the spear was now difficult to maneuver. Rias too had lost one means of defense.

However, while Rias was wounded on his left hand, Ria was unscathed.

Rias's advantage here was that he already had his weapon in hand. Ria, on the other hand, needed one extra motion to draw her katana and take a stance.

Given this, it was only natural that Rias would swing his sword one-handed at Ria.

But Rias didn't know.

Ria had the Swordsmanship skill at Level 7. But she had another skill at the same level.

Iai.

The moment Ria's right hand touched the katana at her waist, the blade had already been drawn and swung.

Rias's right arm, severed at the elbow, flew through the air, sword and all.

With a return stroke, Ria slipped past Rias's side. She cut through the metal armor, slashing his side.

"Guh—"

With a groan like air escaping, Rias fell to his knees.

Ria kept her distance, carefully confirming her opponent had lost combat capability, and only then lowered her katana.

"Lulu, treat him."

"Y-yes!"

Lulu hadn't seen what happened—only the result—but she understood he needed treatment.

Together with the attendant knight, she removed Rias's armor, first performing basic treatment on his side wound before reattaching the severed right arm.

Fortunately, the side wound hadn't reached his internal organs, and with the arm cut so cleanly, it would reattach without issue.

"Princess… were you… always holding back?"

From his prone position, Rias asked in a small voice.

The gap between himself and Ria was overwhelming. It was nothing like what he felt in their usual training. Rather, even now he believed his swordsmanship was superior.

"That's not quite it. I was always serious. But, how should I put it—the techniques you use in training and the techniques you use in mortal combat are different, aren't they?"

"Is that how it is…"

Rias wasn't convinced, but in any case, Ria was stronger than him. The gap in ability was just enough for her to precisely strip him of his combat capability.

"I'll report to His Majesty appropriately. Either way, as I said before, we have no means of bringing the Princess back now."

"Sorry. Thank you."

Ria bowed her head honestly.

"However, there is a condition."

Rias turned his face toward the man known throughout the knight order as the Elf-Lover.

"Carlos, accompany the Princess. Don't think of it as guarding her. When traveling, there will always be times when a man's help is needed."

"Eh, is that really okay!?"

Carlos asked happily. Lulu wore a complicated expression.

"Princess, is this acceptable?"

"I don't mind, but…"

Her gaze went to Lulu. Being an Elf-Lover was a kind of affliction. How would Lulu, a half-elf, feel about this? That was the question.

"Well, it can't be helped. I'll need someone to protect me while the Princess is fighting."

At those words, Carlos spontaneously dropped to one knee.

"On my honor as a knight, I shall protect you!"

Everyone present smiled wryly. Naturally, a knight should protect the princess of the royal line, but it couldn't be helped when the one to be protected was so much stronger.

And thus, the traveling party increased to three.