Some hours before noon they reached a village. It was the just like Quon's village, situated in the middle of the forest. But, they could tell without seeing that monsters almost never attacked the village. That is because, he couldn't sense anything near them. In fact, it was as if the village was isolated.
When they stopped at the entrance to the village, they saw some children smiling while running along and playing. With that, they can at least say that, the village is normal. Even some elderly people were walking normally.
Seeing three new faces, an old man walked towards the trio and asked, "Who might the guests be..?"
Smiling, Adam said, "Sorry Grandpa. We are travellers. These two are my companions. We'd like to ask if you are willing to let us stay for the night...."
The old man was happy that this youngster wasn't arrogant, but polite to an elderly man like him. He coughed and said,
"Please wait. I'd like to ask our village chief. If you don't mind, please take a seat in my home." Saying so, the old man welcomed the trio. They naturally accepted the kindness. Even though Ruby and Adriel was both princesses, they weren't arrogant. They do not need a luxurious home just to stay a few nights.
After seating them, the old man walked towards a certain direction. After waiting for a little while, the old man brought another old man. He looked quite old as his skin was wrinkled. He had dark brown hair and beard. This old man, was probably the village chief. He was walking a little faster. He was flustered when suddenly a few guests came. More than anything, if the guests are nobles, this village really can't afford to offend them.
As he reached the house, he saw trio of people. One was a young man with silver hair and purple eyes wearing casual clothes. Even ignoring his casual clothes, the old man can deduce that he was not a normal young man. The second was a girl with pink hair and green eyes. She was wearing expensive clothes. The third was the strangest one. It was a girl. But she was wearing a knight armour.
From the overall findings, he can guess that these three atleast have some relationship with the nobles. So as not to offend them, he wasn't going to neglect them.
"Welcome, dear guests to our humble village. Although we may not have luxurious home for you to rest, we hope you will be satisfied with how much we can do."
Adam stood to show his respect for the elderly, and the girls followed his lead.
"There is no need to be so polite, elder. We are here, only to stay for the night. We would like to request you of this if it's not too much. Also, you don't have to worry about the dinner. We will prepare it on our own."
The old man was happy. If he were to be honest, they didn't had any chances of satisfying a guest with their hard bread and meat. So he just accepted their choice and said, "As you wish Sir. We will arrange a place for you all to stay. As for your decision of preparing your own dinner, I have to apologize. Although we wanted to treat you, we don't have anything that can satisfy you all. Forgive us..."
The old man lowered his head, a little ashamed. But Adam smiled and said, "It's fine. In fact, the reason for that was my companions. They said they want to eat my cooking. That's why we decided do it ourselves."
The old man nodded. "Then, I will guide you to a free house available in this village. Since its already almost night, why don't you prepare for making dinner..? If you need anything, just ask. We will do it to the best of our abilities."
Saying so, the old man led Adam and the girls to a house which looked quite old. But not minding this, the duo of girls entered the house. Adam bid the old man farewell and entered as well.
Inside the house, he saw that it had only one room. There was a back veranda. But it was used as kitchen.
"..... Although I don't mind staying in such a house, I wanted it at least to have a bath.... How are we supposed to sleep with these all dirt and sweat..?"
Ruby's words were exactly the same thoughts of Adriel. The two looked at Adam. He could only sigh. Then he said, "I will do something about that. But, you will have to wait till nighttime. I can't do anything without time."
Although he could use time spells, he didn't want to increase his mental age unnecessarily. This hearing his words, the girls smiled and said, "Yes~!"
"Since that's the case, I will give you two some tasks. As you are already my student, Ruby will do it no matter what. As for Adriel, you can do as you like. What do you say..?"
The girls nodded. He continued, "Alright! As Ruby is already proficient in sword, what you need is experience. That means in everything. Saving, killing, protecting, and even sacrificing. For now, I want you to go and hunt a specific beast. It's called Snug Snail. It is a perfect target for you to train. As it is your first time fighting something stronger, I will give you some insights after explaining. Your task is to kill it and bring it's shell. And not one but five of them."
Ruby was a little shaken. She indeed knew that, she have to kill if she didn't want to die. But, killing was always something hard to do. Besides, this task wasn't easy. She have to defeat five of them. But she didn't rejected his order. She waited for him to continue.
"As of now, you are strong with your hand and sword. What you next need to train is your attack power. Snug Snail is a monster with incredible defensive capabilities. Even something stronger than itself cannot kill it with a single attack. But, it's very weak to something with speed. Thus, I want you to train your attack power but with restrained speed. Also, you are not allowed to leave deep into the forest. If you see a rock with the size of a cart, you can the snug snails near it."
She nodded after thinking for a while. But her eyes opened wide when she heard him say, "If you perform well and is within my expectations, I will reward you with something no one else can give you!"
Although he was thinking about gifting her a magic sword that's only for her, Ruby's face became deep red as inside her head, she was seeing a strange dream of Adam's and her future married life. In that dream, ten children were surrounding them with all smiles. She then heard, 'sweetheart~~'.
"Ruby..? Ruby..?"
Blinking in surprise, Ruby couldn't look straight at Adam anymore as she ran away after saying, 'I will definitely complete this task!' with an excited voice.
Not understanding why she was blushing as well as ran away excitedly, Adam turned towards Adriel who was staring at him with a smirk. He felt his face twitching on seeing this, but he ignored it and said,
"As for you...."
"Yes! Yes! I will go hunt too..!!!"
"Ah, you will be staying inside this house, not doing anything particular."
"Huh..?"
Adriel made a stupid face and asked.
"Why!? Aren't I stronger than her..?!"
He nodded. "That's exactly why. In fact you are too addicted to fighting. I won't say, it's wrong to fight, but you should hold back a little. If not, I would have to give you no time to fight during our future journey."
Feeling defeated, Adriel kneeled on the ground and looked at Adam with teary eyes and asked pitifully, "Please....?"
He had to admit. He was very weak to girls who was close to him showing pitiful gazes. Sighing he said, "Then, why don't you go and hunt for today's meat..? But you too shouldn't go too far from the village, do you understand..?"
She nodded excitedly and hugged him. Then after saying "You are the best!!" she left the house. Ignoring the loneliness, he went to the back side to do something about bathing issue.