kscans

Chapter 118 - Episode 118

"Hot, hot, it’s so hot!!"

"No way, this is impossible! I can’t do this!"

"Wait, seriously? Is this really okay?"

Hayate’s classmates were currently training to withstand the magic unleashed by Sakino Mei.

"It feels a little hot, but there’s no damage."

"Mei-san’s attacks won’t harm us. Please believe that."

Hayate and Rena stood in the middle of the blazing flames with cool expressions.

"You guys are amazing, as expected. But I’m a little shocked that Naoto doesn’t believe in me."

"I believe in you, Mei! But this is a completely different matter!!"

Over eighty percent of the information humans receive is through sight. It was normal for people to be unable to endure being in a place that was clearly on fire and felt hot.

"It’s amazing that you can be in here too, Rena."

"If Hayate says he can do it, then I just believe him."

Her faith was so blind that she didn’t even feel the heat from the flames.

"You’re lucky, Hayate-kun. I wish Naoto trusted me that much."

Even as the one who cast the magic, she still felt the heat. Yet Mei also stood in the center of the flames with Hayate and the others, waiting for their classmates to enter.

"Aren’t you amazing too, Mei-san?"

"I’ve trained to get used to fire."

"Trained?"

"...Well, there are various family matters."

"Oh, like cooking? I was scared of the stove’s fire at first too, so I trained with my mother to get used to it. It’s something like that, right?"

"Yeah. Something like that."

"Hmm."

Neither Hayate nor Mei knew that the other was a ninja.

In this place, only Rena knew that they were the strongest modern ninjas, each having received the scroll of mastership from the leaders of the Iga and Koga villages respectively. She didn’t know how it was in modern times, but she had heard that in the past, the relationship between Iga and Koga was not good. Therefore, she was acting to hide the fact that they were both ninjas so that Hayate and Mei would not fight.

"Back when FWO was a game, did you feel the heat from fire and things?"

"Yeah. It was pretty realistic."

"But I just convinced myself it was just a game, and the heat and stuff were suppressed. It’s gotten a lot hotter in reality, hasn’t it?"

"I understand your reason, Rena-chan, that you believe in Hayate-kun. So why are you okay, Hayate-kun? Is it because you believe in the settings from when it was a game?"

"I also trained to get used to the heat. I was made to walk on a burning path."

"What? Is that..."

"Hayate! Come over here for a second."

Rena took Hayate’s hand and pulled him away from Mei.

They passed through the wall of fire surrounding the training area and came out on the opposite side from where Naoto and the others were.

"Rena. What’s wrong?"

"Are you an idiot!? Normal people don’t train by walking on burning paths!"

"I know that much."

"Then why would you tell Mei-san?"

"She wouldn’t believe me. She’d think I was joking."

Normally, that would be the case, but it was a different story when the other person was a ninja. If they had undergone similar training, they might realize each other’s true nature.

"Are you okay with people finding out you’re a ninja, Hayate?"

"There’s no specific rule against it. Most people don’t believe me anyway."

"What if Mei-san believes you?"

"I don’t think it would be a problem. If she wants to become a ninja, I can write her a referral for a thirty percent discount on the ninja training course at the village."

Rena held her head in her hands at his utter lack of a sense of crisis.

"Rena, are you okay?"

"I’m worried about you."

"S, sorry."

"By the way, the famous Iga and Koga ninja villages, are they not on such bad terms with each other these days?"

"Ah. I guess our relationship with Koga isn’t great."

"Then it’s a problem."

"There are long-standing feuds, competition over jobs, and things like that... Speaking of which, I heard Koga also has a ninja who received the scroll of mastership for the first time in about fifty years. Rumor is they’re our age. They might be surprisingly close by."

"Ugh, ah. Y, yeah, maybe."

Both Hayate and Mei normally suppressed their divine power perfectly. A genin or a newly promoted chunin might let some of their divine power leak and show a shimmer, but they didn’t make such mistakes. As a result, they had not yet realized that the other was a ninja.

Rena wasn’t aware of the full extent of the situation, but she judged that for now, they were luckily unaware of each other’s circumstances. "Hayate, for now, I’ll keep doing my best."

"Hm? Well, I don’t really get it, but I’ll support you."

Rena steeled her resolve to continue fighting alone so that her friend Mei and her lover Hayate would not end up in conflict.