There seemed to be no particular limit of the number of magic one could contract. However, he thought contracting too many magic, which in the end he would never use later, sounded like a pain. In the end, he decided to narrow down the number of magic he would like to learn.

Thus, Tanaka decided to contract a magic to ignite fire, Ignition, and a magic to ensure the availability of drinking water, Water. Those were magic that were commonly used and popular even among the general people. And for Tanaka, who was planning to make a living out of hunting, he chose the two as they seemed to be pretty useful to the cause.

In the end, he decided to practice magic the next day in the forest, and headed straight to bed. Overflowing with anticipation for the unknown experience of magic, no matter how common they might be, Tanaka ventured into the pink-colored world of dreams.

◇ ◇ ◇

The next day, Tanaka left the town and dived into the forest early in the morning. After exploring the forest for a while, he found himself in a slightly open area. He judged that there would be no problem with him practicing there, so he decided to begin his magic training.

「I guess I’m going to start with Ignition. Alright, focus, focus….」

Recalling the contents of the magic book, Tanaka confirmed the steps to invoke the magic. Once he was ready, Tanaka spread his legs wide and raised one hand up.

「Ignition!」

Tanaka chanted the spell while pointing his index finger up to the sky. By the way, striking such a pose was by no means necessary.

At any rate, the magic activated wonderfully. Along with thunderous roars, light was emitted in tremendous force from his fingertip. The azure colored light soared up high to the sky.

「…..」

Tanaka silently ceased the magic and took out the magic book from the item box. After having a short review of the magic, he struck another cool pose and chanted the spell again. 「Ignition!」

Once again, azure colored flames erupted from his fingertip. Any trees touched by the flames instantly vanished. The tip of the remaining trees were charred black with faint smokes rising from them. Fortunately, it was a lush forest, so fire didn’t spread easily. However, feeling no such reassurance whatsoever, Tanaka screamed.

「This is no mere ignition! It would directly incinerate firewoods dammit! This kind of ignition is too dangerous to use!!!!」

The ensued phenomenon was way too different from both what was described in the magic book as well as what he had imagined. Tanaka furiously retorted to the world. It should have been a delightful event to the chuuniboyu Tanaka, however, the flames emitted from his fingertip were simply way too powerful. Seeing its firepower that was far beyond his imagination, as expected, he was taken aback.

「Haahaa… w, well, I did succeed in igniting fire, so the rest is only a matter of control…. Yup, let’s leave it at that for the time being.」After a while, Tanaka’s excitement subsided a bit. For the time being, he decided to put the matter on hold and tried his other magic.

「Somehow I’ve got a very bad feeling about this, but… I guess I’ll at least give it a try…」

Tanaka quickly changed gears and focused himself to invoke the next magic.

「Water!」

Almost as soon as the incantation was chanted, a small mountain-sized body of water appeared in front of him. 「…. ah.」

Tanaka felt as though the flow of time had slowed down for him. Not long after the body of water was materialized, it began to be affected by gravity and surged into the surroundings.

「… ububu! … wha! … wai! *Cough, cough*!」

Swallowed up by the water current, Tanaka was drowning in the forest for a while. Water flooded over the forest and the body of water subsided before long.

「*Cough cough*! … haahaa!」

For a while there, Tanaka lied down and waited for himself to recover while catching his breath. Once he had calmed down somewhat, his body began to tremble. And he then roared in blazing anger.

「Sure enough, I did obtain water to drink, but… that’s just too damn much! I feel like I’d drown myself to death one day! *Cough, cough*!」 He already had a bad feeling about it, but it turned out to be even worse than what he had expected. Upon going through such a disaster, Tanaka couldn’t hold his welling up anger in any longer.

「Haahaa… But still, the magic of this world sure is scary! How can those people use it without even batting an eye?」

As his mind began to calm down gradually, he examined the matter in a calmer manner.

「All in all, I’ve confirmed that I can invoke both magic. The problem is the scale. They were so dangerous that they could even be used as attack magic. To begin with, they’re supposed to be live-support magic, not attack magic….」

Tanaka took out his magic book and reviewed it again. It was stated that the effectiveness of magic was affected by the user’s Intelligence and Spirit stats. It was also stated that it was possible to increase the effectiveness by increasing the output of magical energy.「Leaving Intelligence and Spirit aside, did I make some mistakes with my magical energy distribution? Was I too focused?」

Tanaka decided to check his own stats.

Magical energy: 2.1e13/2.1e13

… It hadn’t decreased in the slightest. Tanaka tried reviewing the magic book again, but failed to find the answer to this mystery. After much deliberation, he finally came to a conclusion. 「Well, I guess my magic control is simply that crappy, huh. Looks like I’ve got no choice but to practice to the level where I can use magic properly. I’m not sure why my magical energy didn’t decrease, but… My stats value isn’t quite right to begin with, so there’s a possibility that these glitched numbers don’t really represent the real value.」

However, while he did say that he was going to train in magic, he still thought that it was very dangerous. Especially the case with Water, which wasn’t something he could joke about. Thus, Tanaka thought about heading back to the mountain ranges and practiced his magic there. He wouldn’t bother anyone by practicing there, after all. Above all, if he chanted Water toward the lowlands, he didn’t need to face the risk of getting himself drowned in it.

Tanaka decided to cease his magic training right away, and returned to the town. On the way back, he began constructing the preparation plan for his trip while moving his legs forward. The day was still in the morning, so he decided to set out that very day.

When Tanaka arrived at the entrance gate, Hachi called out to him with a meek expression on his face.

「You know what, just a moment ago, I saw a blue pillar of flame-like thing in the distance. Then, it was followed by a rumbling sound on the ground right after… I think something dangerous might have showed up in the forest. It seems that just now the feudal lord has also convened with the guild master to discuss about this matter.」

「…..」

Tanaka decided to act as though he had heard nothing about it. He briefly finished his greeting and said goodbye to Hachi. Sensing the calamity that was closing in on him, Tanaka swiftly finished his preparation to run away, such was the sad nature of a little man he was.

Year 5963 of the creation calendar, summer, Tanaka set out on a journey to train in magic. Name: Tanaka

Level: 12 Experience: 452/1200 Guild Rank: E

Vitality: 2.3e13/2.3e13 Magical energy: 2.1e13/2.1e13

Strength: 2.3e12 Dexterity: 2.2e12 Agility: 2.2e12

Intelligence: 2.1e12 Spirit: 2.1e12

Skills: Sword (2.00) Magic (0.01)

Equipment: Short sword, Cloth clothing

Money: 1554,000G