"So yeah, it could take a year if you want."
"Huh?"
"Your training and homeschool."
"Uh, yeah. I know. But, how? I thought you said it would take 2 years, so I'd be finishing around the time I would've graduated."
"Yeah, but we can hurry it up."
"So no 2-year timeskip?" Chifuyu clearly looks dejected.
"I mean, if you wanna take 2 years then sure."
Shoyo casually drops this news on Chifuyu with an unserious tone as they were eating breakfast.
A few more days have passed and Chifuyu has finished getting settled into Shoyo's home, which is in District 5.
"Well... No matter how determined I am, can I really finish 2 years of training and homeschool in half the time? I don't even think I could finish 2 years of learning at school in 1."
"That all depends on you. There's two reasons why I'm bringing this up, one is because the second Alter World Expedition we plan to carry out will most likely happen next year."
"And you want me to take part in that big mission?"
"It'll be our hardest mission yet, no doubt. But I think you'll be able to hold your own. Pass me the salt, by the way."
"Sure."
"So, what do you say?"
'Well, I guess my dramatic farewell to Erika and Dakota was all for naught now.'
"I was already expecting these 2 years to be rough, so if I can shorten it by half the time, what's a little more sweat and blood?"
"You'll be training and studying 6 days out of the week for about a year then. It'll be intense."
"I'm stuck being a Hunter for life anyway, might as well put my all into everything."
"That's the spirit."
***
Shoyo's living quarters in District 5 is a 4-bedroom house with a giant backyard and an underground training facility. There's high-quality workout equipment that he prepared in the past couple of weeks.
Chifuyu's routine will start at 8 a.m. and consist of 5 hours of rigorous training, and an hour break followed by 6 hours of intense studying that ends at 8 p.m. Shoyo recommends Chifuyu go to bed anytime between 9:30 and 11 p.m. Therefore he's getting his bare minimum 8 hours of sleep so he can wake up at 7 a.m.
Chifuyu spends 30 minutes warming up his muscles and gets ready for his first day of Hunter training. While doing so, Shoyo explains how the state of the world has changed over time since vampires appeared.
"You already know how there was a huge battle that took place when the vampires first appeared over 200 years ago. A battle we would've undoubtedly lost without the help of the unknown person from the Alter World."
"Right, the one who sealed Ariel."
"The world has gotten relatively peaceful over time, thanks to the humans who stepped up to fight against vampires who came to be known as Hunters. Our mysterious protector taught us how to fight for a couple of years before vanishing. About a year after, the vampires tried to launch another large-scale attack, but they failed."
"I suspect most of the vampires that came to this world were those under me."
"Ariel, you're awake?"
"I got plenty of rest to make sure I would be up for your first training session."
As she said this, she arose from Chifuyu's shadow.
"Well thanks!"
"Your smile never fails to brighten my day."
"Good morning, shorty."
"Tch. All tall people should burn in hell."
Shoyo has made a point to tease Ariel over the last few days. He succeeded in getting on her nerves. She has a little complex over her height. Ariel is very short for vampire standards as well. Humans and vampires have about the same average height.
"Getting back to what I was saying, vampire attacks have decreased over time. But the 50 years following their second large attack is when vampire incidents were at their highest. Vampires would attack in broad daylight and there were several mass murder cases. There were countless casualties each week. But thanks to the increase in Hunters, their numbers slowly died down. The next 50 years after that, there was a noticeable drop in incidents. The average number of deaths by vampires declined from the tens of thousands to a few thousand a month over those next 5 decades."
"Tens of thousands a month died for decades? The mortality rate must've been unimaginable."
"This puts things into perspective huh? Over a hundred million died in the first century that vampires arrived in. Most of those lives were claimed in the first attack."
Shoyo sees Ariel looking crushed. She feels guilty as this was all caused by her.
"Everybody deserves a chance at atonement Ariel, and you're getting it right now. Besides, I'm sure we would've gotten invaded sooner or later. You just happened to be the one to initiate it."
"Sigh. Putting your stupid face aside, you're genuinely a good guy."
"Stupid face?"
"I'll continue feeling sad for all the lives I've taken, but I won't regret it. After all, I wouldn't have been able to get to this point without my actions that led me here."
Shoyo and Chifuyu smile with relief.
"As for my subordinates that have been running wild here, it's my responsibility to stop them."
"We're gonna need you. Over the last century, vampire incidents continued to gradually decline. But there have been another few big attacks, 2 of which had several thousand casualties. The first was exactly 68 years ago in District 11. The second was 20 years ago in District 25. The third was 5 years ago, which was when I became known as the strongest."
"Everyone my age knows about the Island 86 Incident from 5 years ago."
"Yeah. So besides those 3 major battles, the world has gotten relatively peaceful, especially in the last 30 years. The current average number of deaths by vampires a month is about 30 to 50. The main way they take lives or drink blood nowadays is by breaking into people's houses at night. About a thousand hunters patrol each district during the day and night, so as much as I hate to say it we can't stop every death."
"Thanks for explaining all of this to me. It's because of Hunters that we can try to enjoy our life to the fullest without worry. I'll put my all into training."
"Good to hear... Say Chifuyu, while you're still warming up, why don't you watch some live combat?"
"Live... combat?"
"Yeah. Ariel, what do you say to having a little spar?"
"Ho."
"Wait, Ariel can't fight humans because of her vow."
"Remember carefully, Chifuyu. She vowed never to harm a human with malicious intent. So she can still help out with some training."
"No, if I do hurt you I'll probably die."
"Huh?"
"Huh?"
"I don't like you after all."
"..."
"Well, this is awkward."
"Haha, I merely jest. But you do rub me the wrong way. So sure, let's do this little spar. Don't think I'll let you off easy."
"Heh, that's more like it. Don't think I'll lose to a runt like you."
"Keh..."
"Oh no, Ariel's definitely mad."
"Let's go, shall we?"
"Whenever you're ready."
Shoyo grabs his scabbard from his waist and unsheathes his blade before he tosses it to the side.
"You actually look like you wanna harm me."
"I do."
Shoyo's future is bleak.
"There's a couple conditions though, the spar will only last one minute. Of course, I can only use the back of my blade and can't use my blade's ability, and you can't use your curse."
"Ok."
"Curse?"
"Let's start when one of those leaves falls in the pond."
"Hmph, how cliche."
"I think it's cool."
Shoyo assumes his sparring stance while Ariel just stands there nonchalantly.
They're currently in the vast backyard which has a fairly sized pond with a cherry blossom tree sprouted in the middle. The two patiently wait for one of the calming pink leaves to fall into the water. Not even 20 seconds later, the pond is graced by a cherry blossom leaf.
The spar begins.
Ariel lunges towards Shoyo with quick speed. A normal human wouldn't be able to react to a vampire's speed, but Hunters have been trained to. Shoyo tosses the sword to himself and catches the hilt in his mouth. This was a preemptive move that was already in process half a second before Ariel's charge. Shoyo does a half-backflip, holding the balance of his body with his hands and uses the momentum of Ariel's lunge to send her flying upwards with both of his legs.
Ariel was sent at least 50 meters in the air. Shoyo assumes his stance once more as she comes flying down. Ariel takes a nosedive to accelerate her descent and parries Shoyo's swift strike by precisely lifting her legs up to evade the swing and uses her hands to halt her fall on his blade mid-swing. An exchange of attacks that continue to be parried follow.
A move is finally dodged and it's by Shoyo. He spins around Ariel and grabs her by the arm, tossing her straight to his house. This was just to create a little space. Ariel gracefully sticks the landing on the outside wall of his house and punctures her nails into the stone to momentarily stay there. Shoyo rushes her and scales the wall to get a hit on her. She kicks herself away though, only to still be chased. Ariel dodges his first slash, but receives a kick back to the ground. Shoyo is quick to follow and gets a jab on her. Instead of using his sword for that attack, he intentionally sucker punched Ariel to make her mad. Her nose slightly bleeds.
"Let that sink in."
"You are so annoying."
"Most ladies beg to differ."
"Eugh."
Ariel takes another lunge towards Shoyo, this time a lot faster. Her attack is dodged but she immediately pushes back in, sliding under Shoyo's horizontal slash. She grabs his leg mid-slide to return the favor triple fold. Instead of tossing him, she slams Shoyo right into the ground, face first. That's going to leave a bruise.
"Why you…"
"Heh."
Shoyo leaves his sword on the ground. Not much time remains. He intends to humiliate Ariel with a good ol' fist fight.
"Let's see what you've got."
Punches are thrown with fierceness. They both trade heavy blows, swinging incredibly fast. 10 seconds of that pass, and time's up. They both got a fair amount of blood on them from mainly going for face shots. Chifuyu spectated the entire spar with astonishment. They weren't even trying.
"Tsk, I shouldn't have accepted that one minute condition."
"I can go longer, actually I want to."
"Uh, Shoyo. I'm supposed to be getting trained here."
"Oh yeah, I forgot I started this spar for you."
These two are undoubtedly dissatisfied with a draw, but there will be more chances to beat the living shit out of each other.
"So, what'd you think of that spar? We weren't trying at all so you should've been able to follow our movements."
"Figures. But yeah, I could follow you guys no problem. The first fight I saw was a one-sighted slaughter, but this was more like a real battle."
"Hm hm."
Shoyo smiles with pride.
"It looked like you were trying awfully hard to me."
"I guess even vampires need to get their eyes checked."
"Hmph."
"Anyway, I'd say Ariel was moving as fast as your average vampire. But her skill can't be compared to them at all."
"As I am now, I doubt I'd last a second against Ariel. But by the time my training's finished, maybe I could fight for a whole minute."
Chifuyu wants to ask what Shoyo meant by curses, but he's sure he'll bring it up to him later.
"Well it'd be a good idea to test that huh?"
"You mean you actually want to…"
"Yep! Let's have a sparring session on the evening of your final day!"
"I'll try not to disappoint you."
"Ha! Nonsense."
"Well, looks like you finished warming up Chifuyu. Shall we get started on your long arduous training? It'll be a long roa-"
"Take a shower first."
"My bad."