I Got a Gallery in the Wild - Chapter 189

There were many reasons why Ludwig was testing Grylls’s skill even though his own body wasn’t fully restored.

First. His body wasn’t fully restored, but a light spar was well within his capability.

Whether it was due to the honey he steadily ate yesterday or the fish porridge, he felt significantly better.

Where his body had felt drained as if struck by a severe cold until now, he currently felt only a slight sense of lethargy.

Second. To adapt to his new leg.

Having lived his whole life with all four limbs intact, a mithril prosthetic had suddenly taken the place of his leg.

It was because he felt the need to adapt to his new prosthetic leg in order to survive in the Forest of the Four Seasons moving forward.

Finally, third. He was curious about the strength of a person who had survived in the Forest of the Four Seasons.

What kind of place was the Forest of the Four Seasons? It was a region dubbed the worst demonic realm in history, one that people refrained from even approaching.

Hadn’t Ludwig himself personally experienced why this place was called a demonic realm just moments ago?

Grylls had survived in such a demonic realm for nearly a month.

Ludwig was able to realize this quickly through the tally marks Grylls had carved into the wall.

’Simply being able to use mana isn’t enough.’

Assuming one could use mana, could Ludwig himself have survived in the Forest of the Four Seasons?

Honestly speaking, it was hard to guarantee. All sorts of bizarre animals popped out of nowhere.

Had Grylls used the abilities seen yesterday in the right place at the right time?

Or had he simply overwhelmed everything with raw weight class?

Or was there another reason altogether?

Out of pure curiosity, Ludwig had decided to spar with Grylls.

Jjeong!

Ludwig’s Mythricon sword clashed against the shield.

Even though he didn’t use any mana, an ear-piercing metallic screech reverberated through the air.

Just as Grylls was about to counterattack immediately, he hesitated.

The weapon he currently held in his hand was the Sword of the Heavenly Demon.

It was a sword that could cause a total disaster if he wasn’t careful.

Hwiik!

At that thought, Grylls tossed the sword aside as if asking Ludwig to wait a moment.

Ludwig realized his intent as well and stepped back for a moment.

Unlike the way he had closed the distance in the blink of an eye, his steps were limping.

’Is he really unable to use mana?’

Grylls picked up the Sword of the Heavenly Demon while reading Ludwig’s expression, intending to put it somewhere safe.

From that single strike just now, he could roughly gauge how powerful a figure Ludwig was.

Was it said that experienced martial artists have mana infused into their very bodies, making them far stronger than ordinary people even under normal circumstances?

He began to think that what Orange Badge said—that Ludwig could beat Grylls even without mana—wasn’t a lie, but half-true.

’Either way, it’s not like I’m using mana either, right?’

It was a contest of pure skill. Even if he used mana, it would only be for physical enhancement.

After placing the Sword of the Heavenly Demon in a safe spot, Grylls brought over the Mythricon sword.

This one was sharp as well, but at least it was far safer than the Sword of the Heavenly Demon.

’I should craft some wooden training swords later.’

Preparations were complete. Grylls cleared away miscellaneous tools to create an open clearing.

Did they realize the atmosphere between the two was unusual?

"Come here."

"Kyuu."

"..."

The animal friends backed off to a distance and started watching.

In the middle of it, Kirin tried to step in majestically, but Lackey led him away.

And so, Grylls and Ludwig stood facing each other.

With a thoroughly tense expression, Grylls awaited Ludwig’s attack.

’Is he aiming to counter after taking an attack?’

Ludwig thought as he observed Grylls raising his shield.

It was one of the simplest combat styles for a sword-and-shield warrior.

A tactic of relying on the shield’s defense to seek a counterattack.

A very useful method. One that could make opponents feel painfully acutely what it was like to fall for something even while knowing it was coming.

’Though it has the drawback of that counterattack being unstable.’

Unless it was an axe, the counterattack would be unstable due to the specific center of gravity of a sword.

Keeping that point in mind, Ludwig limped forward.

He had already calculated that Grylls wouldn’t attack even if he approached leisurely like this.

Soon, when Ludwig reached right in front of Grylls’s face—

Si-ing!

Ludwig forcefully swung the grayish Mythricon sword.

The moment Grylls saw that movement, he raised his shield to block.

’...?’

However, contrary to expectations, the sword did not collide with the shield.

There was no impact whatsoever, nor any metallic clash.

Grylls had only a brief moment of doubt before realizing as Ludwig vanished beyond his shield.

’A feint!’

Another drawback of sword-and-shield warriors: extremely vulnerable to psychological feints.

Because they often operated under the premise of "let’s block first", their defenses in other areas could easily get breached wide open.

From Grylls’s perspective, opponents like the chieftain gorilla had tried to smash through his shield, but facing someone using feints was a first, making him quite flustered.

’The right!’Read this novel at nov⁠elping.com for the best experience.

Jjeong!

Yet flustered as he was, his response was quite excellent.

Since he immediately rotated his shield toward the direction Ludwig had vanished to block the strike.

Having trained his dynamic vision daily with Bbareumbo, he was able to react immediately.

’Not bad.’

His dynamic vision and reaction speed were passing marks.

Ludwig had attacked with deliberate intent, yet Grylls had blocked it right away despite being flustered.

However, there was another reason why sword-and-shield warriors were undervalued as their realm of mastery reached higher levels.

’If you fail to block, you lose.’

Because the defensive capability of a shield gradually lost meaning.

In a realm where experts who could slice through iron like tofu were everywhere, blocking with a shield?

It was no different from advertising, Please slice me up!

Of course, there were those who used shields masterfully, but those were exceptional cases.

Ludwig grew curious if Grylls would become one of those exceptional cases.

’In my current state, I cannot pierce the defensive power of that shield. So...’

Ludwig resolved to thoroughly exploit the shield’s weakness through a different approach.

Specifically, targeting Grylls’s rigid combat style.

"Haaah!"

Before that could happen, Grylls initiated an attack first.

Having blocked once with his shield, he seemed to think it was his turn now.

Chwaak! Chwak!

Grylls swung his sword with all his strength. To repeat: he swung it.

As seen before, too much tension was put into his body, making his stance resemble someone swinging a wooden club.

But the ridiculous thing was that it was fast. Fast enough to be comparable to a decent knight, even.

Swinging purely through raw physical weight class, it brought a hollow chuckle out of Ludwig.

Jjeong!

"Hm?"

However, there was something even more shocking. When Ludwig seized an opening to launch a counterattack—

As if Grylls had predicted it, he parried the sword away with his shield.

It was a classic parry. A technique possible only by predicting the opponent’s strike.

’What kind of insane strength...?’

Shield parrying instead of sword parrying wasn’t particularly difficult. However, what drew Ludwig’s focus was the raw power behind Grylls’s parry.

Even though he had put a fair amount of force into his strike, his arm didn’t just bounce back—it throbbed with a numb sting as if it were about to dislocate.

It was literally ignorance-level raw strength. As felt earlier, his baseline physical stat class was absurdly on a different level.

"Huuup!"

Aside from that, the spar was not over.

Because Grylls, having successfully parried, slashed his sword diagonally.

Ludwig’s upper body was wide open due to the parry. At this rate, he would be sliced by the blade.

Seueuk-

Yet Ludwig did not panic, lightly dodging by simply stepping back two paces.

Extreme spacing distance measurement. An element every martial artist had to master, yet notoriously difficult to apply in actual combat.

But Ludwig stepped back with supreme ease. A glimpse into the depth of his experience.

Si-ing!

Since the attack missed, the offensive turn shifted back to Ludwig.

Regaining his balance, Ludwig brought down his arms that had bounced upward in a swift downward strike.

Jjeong!

Grylls defended against that downward strike through gritted teeth.

He had no choice but to bend his upper body slightly, which normally would have ruined his balance.

But Grylls had aimed for this. His eyes caught sight of Ludwig’s legs.

The tactic he frequently favored was crippling his opponent’s mobility.

Ludwig’s mobility was already impaired, but that was fine.

’Someone like him will definitely pull a trick.’

The moment that thought hit him, he swung his sword horizontally.

The trajectory of the blade was directed precisely at Ludwig’s ankle.

At this rate, Ludwig would end up fitting yet another prosthetic leg, but...

Kwaak!

As if he had anticipated it, Ludwig lightly stomped down onto the blade.

The decisive strike missed. Even his sword was pinned underfoot.

"Not bad."

"..."

"Normally, targeting the legs isn’t a choice people easily make."

Ludwig’s voice came from above Grylls’s head.

At the same time, a chilling sensation was felt near his neck.

Ludwig’s Mythricon sword was resting near Grylls’s neck.

"...I lost."

"Mm."Visit novelping . com for the full chapter.

Though they didn’t speak the same language, Ludwig picked up on what Grylls was saying.

Sheathing his posture, he withdrew his sword and stepped back. Grylls also straightened his waist and recomposed himself.

’He saw right through all my moves.’

As expected of a human, and a veteran knight at that, rather than a wild beast.

Lackey had the major weakness of poor eyesight, making him easy to deal with, but Ludwig was different.

’If that’s him with impaired mobility, just how strong was he originally?’

Grylls stared at Ludwig, who was rapidly writing notes in a notepad.

People in the Gallery kept hyping up how strong he was, making me curious, and this spar really drove it home.

’Even a guy like him seems to struggle to survive without mana. Since he can’t use techniques.’

It was right when Grylls was realizing the importance of mana anew.

’In the wild, technique or whatever doesn’t matter—pure weight class is key. There’s a reason elephants are the kings of the savanna.’

Amusingly, Ludwig was harboring an entirely different thought.

The reason Grylls had been able to survive in the Forest of the Four Seasons despite encountering crises: That was none other than his ’weight class’.

Technique and skills were a total mess, but he had formidable physical capabilities and a dogshit insanely powerful aura.

Even if techniques were added onto this, would it really change much? Honestly, Ludwig thought not.

’I should definitely raise him as a sword-and-shield warrior. Weight class over technique.’

It wasn’t that his talent was bad. His combat sense itself was exceptional.

It was not teaching a human techniques to beat a gorilla.

It was teaching human martial arts to a gorilla to make it even stronger.

Isn’t treating a decent human being like a wild animal going too far, you ask?

As Ludwig saw it, Grylls wasn’t much different from that white gorilla over there.

Throwing away his greatest strength—weight class—to invest in technique would be deeply foolish.

’His adaptability is also quite good. His eyes watching the opponent’s movements aren’t bad either. If he were outside, he would have been fun to train.’

Grylls did not possess heaven-sent talent like the Hero, Asella.

Instead, heaven had granted him a talent that made him rewarding to cultivate.

Asella had the talent where teaching her one thing meant she mastered ten, or even a hundred, all on her own.

On the other hand, Grylls was different. If you taught him one thing, he would apply that single thing in numerous ways.

Above all, weight class. Regardless of martial arts aptitude, there was a high probability his talent regarding weight class was superb.

While there were people who struggled to break past 60 kg no matter how much they ate, there were others who gained over 100 kg from eating just a little.

He’d have to observe further to be sure, but Grylls was likely the latter.

’First, I should teach him how to slash with a sword. If he has no talent for the sword, I’ll tell him to use an axe.’

Honestly, I almost hope he lacks talent for the sword, Ludwig thought.

Because nothing was more suitable for exploiting that monster-like weight class than an axe.

However, throwing away what he had learned so far felt like a waste, and above all, the Sword of the Heavenly Demon was too good to ignore.

Ludwig knew all too well how extraordinary the Sword of the Heavenly Demon was. It was a weapon that could be deemed a masterwork among masterworks.

"Here."

"Thank you."

Ludwig handed his evaluation sheet over to Grylls. It was quite a lengthy message.

As soon as Grylls received the evaluation sheet, he posted it straight to the Gallery.

In his heart, he wanted to ask the Orange Badge, but he couldn’t hold down a busy person.

"Hey."

"Hm?"

It was while Grylls was using the Gallery.

Lackey, who had been watching quietly, approached Ludwig.

Ludwig looked at the gorilla approaching him with a puzzled expression.

"You. Fight. With me."

"What?"

"Shook-shook. Fight. Once."

Lackey used gestures and body language to challenge Ludwig.

It seemed watching Grylls and Ludwig spar made his body itch for action.

Ludwig stared blankly at Lackey and thought:

’...No matter how many times I see it, I can’t get used to this.’

Having white fur was weird enough, but he was even wearing glasses.

And around his neck was a Mana Suppressor that looked like something a prisoner would wear.

He had heard a rough explanation from Grylls, but in many ways, he just couldn’t adjust.

’Are there only mutants here?’

That thought crossed his mind briefly, and then—

"Very well. I shall prepare immediately."

"Thank you. Sparring match."

When Ludwig granted permission, Lackey performed a Central Plains-style greeting—that is, cupping his fist in his palm.

It was a gesture of paying respect to a martial artist, a remarkably unusual action.

Watching this entire exchange, Grylls was utterly speechless.

"Hey. Why don’t you ever greet me like that?"

"You beast. You worse than beast."

"This bastard?"

"..."

Ludwig looked at the two who could communicate with each other—or rather, one human and one beast—and thought:

’I worry about when on earth I will be able to adapt.’

As expected, this forest really is a village of three-eyed people.