S.A.O Project Alicization - OC/Male Reader Insert

Project Alicization ----- Chapter Four

July 372 HE, Underworld Human Realm
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The third rest day of July was shaping up to be a beauty.

Even the children over the age of ten who had been given their Calling returned to their younger days and were allowed to go out and play until dinner. Normally Shi, Eugeo and Kirito would go fishing or have play swordfights with the other boys, but on this rest day they were out of their houses before the morning dew was gone, waiting for Alice beneath the old tree at the edge of the village.

"She's late!" Kirito grumbled, conveniently forgetting that he had forced Eugeo to wait several minutes, too. "Why do women always put their own preparations ahead of being on time? In two years she'll be like your sister and claim that she can't go into the forest because it'll get her clothes dirty."

"She can't help it; she's a girl," Eugeo said, even as he considered where they would be in two years' time.

Given her status, Alice was still considered one of the children without a Calling yet, so the village tacitly accepted her activities with the boys. But she was also the village elder's daughter, which essentially guaranteed that she would serve as the standard for the other women of the village. It would not be long before she was forbidden from cavorting with boys and forced to learn not just the sacred arts but the proper manners and bearing of a lady.

And what would happen after that? Like Eugeo's eldest sister, Celinia, would she marry into another family? And what did his partner think about this...?

"Hey, stop spacing out. Did you get enough sleep last night?" Shi wondered. Eugeo nodded vigorously.

"Y-yeah, I'm fine...Oh, here she comes."

He pointed toward the village, where the sound of light footsteps was approaching.

Just as Kirito had groused, Alice appeared through the morning fog with her pristinely combed blond hair tied up with a ribbon and spotless white apron dress swaying. Eugeo looked at his friend and stifled a smile. The boys greeted her in unison: "You're late!"

"No, you're too early. Honestly, when are you two going to grow up?" Alice retorted, handing Eugeo the basket and Kirito the canteen with her nose in the air.

Once they automatically took the items, she turned to the path leading north out of the village, crouched, and plucked a stalk of high grass. She pointed the plump, fuzzy end of it toward the distant mountain and announced, "And now...we head off in search of summer ice!"

Eugeo shared another look with Kirito and Shi, wondering how it was that they always ended up being the princess, her two servants and a knight-in-training, and started trudging after Alice.

The road that ran north to south through the village was well-worn on the southern-heading side with the passage of travelers and horses, but the northern-headed side had long fallen into disuse, littered with tree roots and rocks. Alice stepped nimbly over all these obstacles, humming as she led the three boys onward.

Eugeo thought the way she carried herself was beautiful. A few years ago, Alice could be seen practicing her sword fighting with the other scamps from time to time, and somehow she usually managed to knock Eugeo and Kirito on their backs with even the finest of sticks. Their blunt sticks hit only the air, as though they were clumsily fighting off wind spirits. If she'd kept training, Alice could have been the village's very first woman-at-arms.

"A man-at-arms..." Eugeo mumbled to himself.

It had been a distant dream, a hope that he held onto until he was given the Calling of a carver. If he'd been chosen as a guard (the dream of all the boys in the village), he wouldn't have to use a crude stick yanked off a tree. He could learn actual sword-fighting techniques and use an actual steel sword, even if it was a hand-me-down.