Elf Tensei Kara no Cheat Kenkoku-ki Vol 1 Chapter 17

After I tortured him, he spat out all the information he had. It appeared that the information about the 500 Empire Soldiers had fairly high credibility.

But it seemed like they needed to request 500 Empire Soldiers from The Empire, since there weren’t many soldiers left in the supply base. If the officer they sent to village didn’t return in time.

This meant we still had 10 days time to spare.

I shouldn’t waste the remaining time on pointless stuff.

“When on the battlefield, rather than shooting them with the crossbow one by one, it is more effective if we shoot on them simultaneously when everyone is in formation. That’s why, on my signal, start to practice by shooting with the crossbow.”

I,  together with other 100 elves, went to the Shooting Field that was established outside the village.

Every morning, I put aside two hours for training before work. Although, crossbow training was more than enough.

After I made the minimal requirements of being able to pull the string of the crossbow and use wind magic, about one hundred elves gathered. Their gender and their ages were quite different.

As for the crossbows using the metal taken from the supply base, I gave them each one, with 20 left over.

All the metal I had gotten before had been used up mostly on farming tools, but I had gotten the armors and swords from ten Empire soldiers the other day. I could change this to a tool that could obstruct the enemy’s advance.

“The aimed target is 50 m ahead! Everyone, form  platoons of 50 people each!”

Following my words, the 100 elves divided into two rows with 50 people each.

“All members, set your arrows. The goal is to shoot the target in 15 seconds!  Now begin!”

I looked at the state of elves while doing a countdown.

When I had just started the training, their movements had been awkward, but now they were getting used to it. Now, each one of them could nock an arrow within 10 seconds.

“Alright, everyone’s targets is clear. The next row will take the aim in 10 seconds. Front row ready!”

Under my command, 50 people in the front row held their crossbows to take aim. All of them had dignified airs around them.

“Fire!”

Just ten seconds later, the arrows were set loose.

They advanced straight towards the target.

The target was a wooden stick with a soldier helmet, implanted into the ground. There was a ◎ mark where the human stomach should be; that was their target.

I’d also wanted to melt the helmet and use it as material, but I had let it be as a motivation to make it more similar to the soldiers from the empire, so that they wouldn’t hesitate to shoot when the time came for them to kill.

It was best to let them think the practice target they shot were human beings.

it’s well founded to make them aim at the abdomen, not on the head and in the heart where it can lead to an instant death.

There is a reason why I make them aim at the stomach, Instead of the head and heart that can cause instant death.

When the poison arrow hit its target, it could make them unable to fight. That’s why it was much better to aim at the stomach, which had wide area and less movement.

The enemies that weren’t killed were convenient, since I could ask for ransom money if I captured them. The movements of other soldiers became dull to help a wounded friend. So it was much better to have one injured soldier then one dead soldier.

“Target hit confirmed! Front row, retreat to behind the back row”

50 people of the front row withdrew behind quickly, and with my command, the 50 people of the back row stepped forward.

“Ready!”

With my command, the front row set up their crossbows, and the 50 people who had just shot a crossbow some time ago pushed the tip of their crossbows to the ground and pulled the strings.

“Fire!”

Another volley was fired. the arrows struck the wooden stick.

“Target hit confirmed! Front row, retreat to behind the back row”

The front row and the back rows swapped again like before. An arrow has already been set on the crossbows of the 50 people who had stepped forward.

I made them repeat the formation about twenty times.

“All members, rest. Yes! the hitting rate exceeded 90%. Everybody has good skills”

I praised the villagers with a smile.

“Replacement of the front row and a back row has also become quite smooth. Each volley was fired every 30 seconds. I am surprised because I don’t think we’d accomplish this in such a short amount of time.”

The formation we practiced just now was to cover the weakness of crossbow when compared to a bow. It was a trick to compensate the ability to shoot continuously in short periods of time.

The time to reload was reduced by swapping the front row and back row during the attack.

Still, although it had less rapid fire, if you compared it to using a bow, the power behind each arrow had more destruction power with each volley. It was totally different compared to using an ordinary bow to scatter the arrow.

“Chief Syril, with this, we can beat those guys from the Empire”

“Look, if it was the actual battle, their stomachs would’ve really been pierced”

“Really, it’s an easy win against a soldier from the empire. Unlike the bow, this crossbow is easy to use and really good.”

Their skills were improving steadily, and their moods were good.

Indeed , the speed of their improvement was abnormal.

The secret lied in their eyes.

The Elf has excellent Dynamic vision; their eyes could track an arrow that could fly at the speed of 360 km/h. But humans couldn’t do this, and could only guess where the arrow would land from its trajectory. This slowed their improvement because they didn’t understand how the arrow flew As for Elves, because they could watch it properly, they could remember it. This mad a big difference.

Furthermore, Elves naturally had extraordinary senses of distance . They could grasp the distance between them and the other party, so there wasn’t a need to train them to hit the middle of the target.

“If we can maintain a firing rate of less then 30 seconds to strike them accurately, we can try it from a distance of 100 m next.”

When the group exact shooting range was 50 m, it was considerably hard to fight 500 people. But we could still cope with it if we could shoot from 100 m away.

“Urgh, is it even possible?”

“I don’t have that much confidence ”

“I can do it!”

They are saying pessimistic thing with laughing eyes. We can raise their confidence with a few days of training.

[TL: no, I don’t understand what the h.e.l.l is laughing eyes mean…]

“You keep giving order but, doesn’t village chief had to practice as well?”

“I don’t need practice. Because I can do it already.”

“Then, please give us a demonstration please.”

I might have said some unnecessary things seeing that Roreu is the strongest man in the village taunting me.

“Yeah I want to see how cool Syril is”

Lucie said it while making mischievous expression on her face, but her tone didn’t have any evil intention and Lucie purely only want to see me playing an active role instead of only observing.

Roreu aside, I cannot betray Lucie expectation. I give a wry smile and said…

“I see. I’ll show it to you guys how to do it. First, I will start from 100 m away”

I pull the string of the crossbow while saying so and nock an arrow.

And I start to activating three magic spell.

The first magic I use is [Wind Breaker] that can be used by other Elf as well. With wind breaker the arrow willn’t move from it track. Because there is no air resistance against the arrow, the power of the arrow does not decrease.

In the village of the elf, when an Elf reach certain age they were taught by adults on how to use [Wind Breaker] other than this spell, normal Elf can’t use other magic beside this.

What I used next was [Perception Expansion]. It was one of my forte where I united with wind mana, and receive various information from surrounding area. It is handy to use if other people can use it, but the information processing put excessive burden on the brain, because the method is complicated it will be difficult for other people to use it.

And then the last, the original spell completed using Internal Magical Power of Odo【Program】was activated.

This is the magic which calculates physical phenomenon based on the information I got from [Perception Expansion] and feeds back the result to my sense. In this way, Perfect trajectory can be calculated.

“Hit”

the arrow that I casually shot hit the target

Since I did not need to consider the change of irregular wind , so it’s quite easy to aim.

“Next, will be from the distance of 300 m”

I said so while withdrawing to the back. Because the prepared target was only 100 meters away, I need to go further back.

And 300 m is also the limit of my [Perception Expansion]

When it reach 300 m mark, the gravity pull can’t be negligible. so I shoot the arrow 42 degree into the sky from the target

“This also hit the mark too”

The arrow which I fired hits the target, while forming the shape of an arch.

More or less, that shot may become useful as a reference.

I don’t demand the villagers for that kind of precised shooting with that distance but if they use 【Wind Break】, it’s possible to fire with lethal power.

If 50 people simultaneously fire, they could still hit a fairly considerable amount of enemies.

“Lastly, from the distance of 500 m”

At this distance it already exceed the limit of [Perception Expansion]

I try to limit [Perception Expansion] and force it to extend into the front only.

I shoot 120 degree to the sky from the target. Because of increasing distance the pull from gravity is increased exponentially. For me It is a mere acrobatic feat

With lesser Air Resistance, the arrow can fly in a curved manner anywhere in the sky making it look like a disqualified weapon.

The arrow I shot felt like tearing up the sky for 5 seconds to the target as if it was sucked into it.

“This is my limit with crossbow”

While sighing I return to villagers side. I see their face were stupefied as they watch my arrow. It must be completely unexpected for them.

“As you can see, everyone can do this if they become accustomed with it so try hard”

I intentionally make a triumphant look, everyone was surprised and came to their senses then made some noise..

“Syril is too good it can’t be used as reference”

“Are you really an Elf? are you sure you aren’t the legendary High Elf?”

“I think you can shoot a commander from anywhere you want”

“I have a hunch that 200 m is possible with training but to do 500 m like Syril is impossible.”

The elves became noisy.

“Today practice only at the distance of 100 m so today practice end now. each person please collect the arrow that was used. Oh, before that, I have reward for everyone”

When I say so, the children who can’t pull Crossbow string and aged people bring wrinkled nuts with wooden basket and they distribute it while walking.

“Syril what is this?”

Lucie asked with curiosity.

“It is dried cranberry”

“Urgh… cranberry again…. it is sour, I don’t like it”

Lucie whose was forced to eat raw cranberry everyday make unpleasant face.

Other elves also have the same look too. Because the wild cranberry is awfully sour, and the sweetness only subtly, there are few who will eat it willingly.

“Mah mah, how about you try some before thinking that I’m lying, it is sweet you know”

“Cranberries are sweet?”

“What are you talking about?”

“That’s right, come one, go try some”

Elves that was getting dried cranberry from the child whom distributed it raise a surprising voice doubt, and have various reaction.

The Elves give various reaction while raising a surprise and questionable voice, some of them even returned the dried cranberry to the children who distribute it.

Meanwhile, the child who received a dried cranberry has sparkling eyes,

“Thank you!”

They said, while eating it.

” Delicious ! ”

He said with an innocent face.

Even a guy that has doubt my word before put their dried cranberry on their hand into their mouth while tilting their head.

“it’s true. it is sweet”

“delicious”

“Oh S***, it really is sweet”

The dried cranberry disappear into their mouth one after the other. even though it is only an ordinary sweets it is still valuable. They become absorbed while eating it, well it can’t be helped i guess.

the recipe is simple, I bake the cranberry with brick oven which can regulated the temperature to 100 degrees Celsius by one side in an hours. [TL:maybe like how they make a okonomiyaki where the bake it on one side and turn it over to bake the site] Then I dry it in the sun, you must continue this work by taking it out in the morning and take it in when it is evening for two weeks.

The heat make the sourness become mild, and the sweetness will condensed, so it become very easy to eat.

“Syril I want to eat this every day”

“It’s no good, To improve Lucie vitamin depreciation you still need to eat the raw one for a while”

“No way…”

“ I do not say it with malicious intent, but when it was heated the vitamin broke down so in medical perspective it is better to eat it raw.”

I want to give Lucie delicious thing to eat too. However to improve Lucie vitamin deficiency I need her to take plenty of vitamin for a while.

So if she switch to eating dried cranberries now there is barely any vitamin remain on it.

“So chief village Syril make woman and children to pick cranberry to make this?”

Roreu asked after eating his share of dried cranberry while licking his finger clean.

“True, but that is not all of it. Because the dried cranberry can last for one year so it can become a valuable source of vitamins during the winter”

Not to mention raw cranberry, there isn’t any edible wild plant in the winter that can be source of vitamin and only uncooked meat that can become vitamins source in winter. I want to store up dried cranberry if I am thinking about their health.

“Beside can this be used for something else?”

“I think when it is winter, I can brew liquor in large quant.i.ties this was one of the necessary material to brew it”

“Liquor!? can such a thing be made at this village?”

“It is possible, also we can make vinegar now as well”

“Seriously! can you make it now? I want to drink it immediately.”

“That’s impossible. The ingredients that I need only available in winter. and I only have knowledge how to make it but I have never actually make it before. Because I may fail please don’t raise too much expectation, Because it is still fall, I will only make a Dried cranberry now.”

I said so while giving a bitter smile.

Liquor and vinegar are fairly luxury item on elf village. When it was made with my own expenses if I success life will be more abundant but if it was fail I will not die from it either.

Even if I can make ale with wheat as raw material, I do not want to reduce the storage of wheat to make it. There is a lot of processes and it also take time and effort to make it.

“Well, today practice is ending. From now on I want to prioritize on hunting and fis.h.i.+ng to prepare for winter. we will survive this winter together”

To my voice, everyone answered. I have a positive feeling coming in. With our power, we can repel the Empire Soldiers before the winter would pa.s.s. Right now, there is no problem that is too difficult for us.