A: Hey, my name is Alice. You dont see recruits staying calm in these situations often. Whats your name?

K: Kyle.

A: Well.. what did you do to get here? I mean the other 3 were either cowards or just very lazy but you do not fit in either category. You can fight like that and dont lose track of enemies in a 1v4 and stayed calm during all of that.

K: Reasons.

A: Me too, they wanted to become tooo friendly with me all the time and i defended against them. They didnt like that and now im here to die. So you fight with sword and shield? I prefer to use my bow and dagger, keeps the bad guys away. I always went hunting with my dad and made my mom go crazy because i did not behave like a daughter should and more like a son. Did not work out like that cause in the end i got dragged away because i can use weapons unlike most other daughters.

...

Now that Kyle fought besides Alice for 1 time she does not seem to be shy anymore or she just did not want to talk with someone else before who would die like the other 3. Anyways the fact that Kyle is greatly annoyed does not help him at all so he tries to ignore Alice most of the time or only answer with single words or sentences. The problem is that she just does not stop talking.

Although Alice does not know anything about Kyle he feeld as if he knows everything about her life after just 1 and a haf days. To keep his mind distracted he started to train even more seriously if they do not patrol the area with their group. The only interactions the 2 of them have with those veterans are when the cook hands out meals. Otherwise both parties are masters of ignoring each other and neither minds this state of things.

A: By the way do you happen to have any magical talent? I have a minor talent in air magic that helps me guide my shoots a bit after i release my arrows from the bow. Really practical if you want to hit something like a wolf or just hunt in the wilderness. Sadly i did not have enough time to work on something else yet if you do not count making a small breeze.

K: Magic? you mean you can control the wind?

A: Yes. Or atleast a bit and maybe more if i had a bigger talent or more training in wind magic. Dont tell me you do not know anything about magic? Where did you live, under a stone?

K: How do you know what magical talent you have?

A: Wow you talked back, you must really not know this. Well then my dear party member. There are various ways to know if you are talented in magic. The easiest is to use a magical altar but those are for nobles. Then you can try to discover it yourself but since you didnt even know magic exists i dont think that will work. I can try to send some mana pulses through your body and then you can try if you can feel or control something similar in your body?

K: Yes, could you please do that, Alice?

A: Double wow. I did not know you could be polite. Of course I am gonna help you Kyle!

This narrative has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road. If you see it on Amazon, please report it.

And so after that time every evening Alice sends some little mana pulses through Kyles body. Because she is only a magic beginner it does not do that much at first but after some days she seems to get the hang of it. After his usual training Kyle starts to focus more on his body and tries to discover anything magical in it if that makes sense. Just a week later it finally did...

Nothing!

Although it is disappointing Alice continues and tries to help him somehow partly because her own ability to control her mana improves with time. Even if it does not help Kyle at all at the moment he decides to discover if he has any talent later. The first goal he gave himself for a long time now. Joining the merchant guild was one but it was not really his own. He just went with the flow and continued to be an apprentice to his step father and the next step is joining the guild in that profession.

During the next week they did not encounter anything dangerous. There was one bear that might have been a threat to Kyle and Alice but the veterans handled it with a routine that makes it look very easy. 

Some days later though this changes. In the evening when everybody settles down and Kyle starts his usual training routine there is an obvious line of smoke in the air just a few miles away. So instead of camping out in the open they continue on and arrive near that area just before the sun complety leaves the sky. With the last rays of light they can see something in a bigger open area in the distance. It is not just a camp but the start of a little fort. Everything in the early stages but they already set up a rudimentary wall of wood around their camp and start to fortify it a but more.

And now is the first time the veterans speak with us that we can see these enemies trying to establish a base in our countries territory.

Captain: You 2 stay here and try to delay their progress a bit or even more. We will immediately return to the base and report this. Just to clarify this, if you are not here actually working on your assignment then dont think of ever returning to your homes. This country does not take deserteurs and their families well i heard.

Without giving Kyle and Alice a chance to reply the group of veterans left. Up until now they were the food supply of those 2, and nothing more or less. But now they can just walk away while giving the 2 an impossible task and no chance of retreat. A suicidal mission or death awaits it seems.

Authors Note:

Not at home atm and dont have that much access to internet here. Since my chapters were already short before and I have no idea of how long a chapter is in relations to the ones before the ones in the next weeks may not have a stable size and might be smaller in general. Well only fun story anyways so doesnt really matter i guess xD