I Wanted to Use Magic, So I Trained My Magical Power. I Wanted to Eat Meat, So I Went Hunting. And Then, Before I Knew It, I Had Become the Strongest... - Episode 9: Mom might kill me……

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Episode 9: Mom might kill me……

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The damp, rotting leaf soil after the snow melts erases footsteps.

I didn’t mean to neglect magic detection. But I might’ve let my guard down.

Just ten meters ahead, a wolf appeared.

“So it’s you.”

It was the lone wolf I’d encountered before.

Its right ear was half torn, so it was definitely that one.

It was probably drawn here by the smell of boar bl00d.

“Grrrrr.”

“Looks like we’ll settle this once and for all this time.”

That boar is mine—I hunted it. I won’t back down.

And that wolf was riled up by the scent of bl00d. It probably won’t back down either.

Looks like today we’ll be fighting over the boar.

I pulled the trigger of the crossbow I had at the ready.

The drawn string released and launched the arrow with all its might.

But the wolf didn’t lose its calm expression. It dodged the high-speed arrow.

It moved as if it had predicted my actions.

No way… was it watching my finger movements?

When I used to do judo, there was this guy who said he could tell what move was coming next by watching the opponent’s eyes.

That guy was overwhelmingly strong—he won a gold medal in the Olympics during his first year of university. And he went on to win gold in three consecutive Olympics.

Even when I died at thirty, he was still active. So he might’ve ended up winning four times in a row.

What made him that strong was his ability to predict his opponent’s actions as if he were controlling them.

I also heard once that you can predict someone’s actions by watching their muscle movements.

I thought that was impossible. And besides, in judo we wear uniforms. So the muscles you can see are limited.

I never believed you could understand anything in that situation.

“This guy… has it gotten stronger than before?”

“Grrrrrr.”

Back then, I thought I could win even if we fought. But now… I think I might lose.

It evolved over the winter, huh.

There are guys like that. You don’t see them for a bit, then they show up crazy strong.

For someone average like me, that was something I just couldn’t understand.

Someone I used to beat easily suddenly took me down in seconds.

It was so frustrating, I cried.

I took judo seriously too, you know.

And yet, I always wondered why such a huge difference appeared.

“I didn’t just lazily pass the winter either, you know.”

I trained every day. I was activating my body-strengthening magic to its fullest. I almost puked several times.

And not just that. I swung a wooden sword in my warehouse room every single day.

“Let me show you the strength of the evolved me.”

I slowly unsheathed the Divine Sword Kern.

Taking the middle guard stance, I focused only on delivering a single supreme strike.

“Gau!”

“Sha!”

The wolf and I crossed paths.

A burning pain shot through my left upper arm.

Since my body had grown, Mother Norsh had sewn me new clothes.

The freshly-made clothes tore. And bl00d seeped through.

But the wolf wasn’t unscathed either.

It was bleeding from its left front shoulder.

Just like me, the wound wasn’t serious. So we were dead even, fifty-fifty.

“Mom might kill me……”

Even if I survive this fight, Mom might kill me when she sees the state of these clothes.

I have no future but death!? Waaah……

“Thanks to you, I’ve now got a one-way ticket to hell. But you’ll be seeing hell right here and now!”

Maybe for the first time in this life, I felt something like a true intent to kill.

Then we both crept in closer. And at the three-meter mark, we moved all at once.

A clash of movement completely opposite to the prior stillness.

It was a series of fierce motions that made it impossible to even breathe.

I deflected its claws with the Divine Sword Kern. I then twisted my wrist to aim at its neck. But the wolf narrowly dodged.

While I accumulated small wounds, I couldn’t land a single decisive hit.

Even with body-strengthening magic activated, it still wasn’t enough.

“Huff, huff, huff…… fuuu—haaah—”

I caught my breath. I had about ten seconds left to keep the body-strengthening magic going.

At this rate, I’ll run out of magic power.

It’s clear I’ll collapse first. What do I do? What should I do? How do I win against this guy?

‘Don’t think. Just feel.’

My old teacher’s words surfaced.

I’d never been able to feel it in my previous life.

And now I’m supposed to do that in this world, with a five-year-old’s body?

I closed my eyes. I’d never done it before, but I emptied my mind.

The enemy isn’t the wolf. It’s me.

In complete darkness, I simply held the Divine Sword Kern loosely in my right hand.

Is this the natural stance?

In front of me stood me.

My 18-year-old self, at my peak in my previous life.

The judo version of me approached.

Judo-me reached for my collar.

At that moment, my body moved unconsciously.

I don’t remember how I moved. But even though it was the perfect timing to grab my collar, the judo version of me was on the ground.

When I slowly opened my eyes, the wolf was down.

Bl00d gushed from its neck—it was on the verge of death.

“What… was that just now…?”

Even trying to recall the feeling, I had no idea what I did.

But the wolf was lying on the ground, nearly dead.

“Sorry. I don’t even know what I did. But I somehow won.”

Bringing back both the boar and the wolf was tough.

But even tougher was Mother Norsh’s scolding.

“Those brand-new clothes are already in tatters!?”

While Grandpa Benas led the butchering process, I got a full lecture from Mom.

For about two hours, I sat in seiza while she unleashed an endless, machine-gun-like barrage of words.