The Time-Stop Breeding Uncle Want’s to Retire

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“Nice to meet you. I’m your senior, Brick.”

The next day, as promised, when I went to the training ground, Andrew and a large man were there.

The man who introduced himself as Brick was very large and had a very rugged appearance.

Well, I wasn’t in a position to say anything about his appearance.

At least that guy looked like a human.

Anyway, from my perspective, he was my only mentor and senior, so I greeted him right away.

“Hello! I’m Hans, the new recruit who just joined!”

“Your voice is full of spirit. I like it.”

“Understood.”

Andrew patted my back and asked, and Brick even saluted as he answered.

I was immediately put to work with Brick.

There were surprisingly many things that the refugee camp guards did.

First, going out to receive supplies, sometimes hunting beasts or scouting abandoned villages for reconnaissance, and guard duty divided into day and night to protect the village.

And finally, even patrol duty to patrol the refugee camp.

I knew, but it was more dangerous and difficult than I thought.

Well, that’s why the guards received more privileges.

“Since you’re a newbie for now, you won’t be assigned to reconnaissance.”

“Is reconnaissance done in rotation?”

“Yeah, because no one likes going outside.”

“I see.”

The palisade surrounding the refugee camp was no different from a lifeline for us.

But going outside that palisade meant literally being prepared for death.

So they had no choice but to hate it.

But I had no choice but to do it even if I didn’t like it.

Whether I liked it or not, to find a way to return to the original world, I had to wander outside in the end.

Then, naturally, I had no choice but to fight monsters.

Of course, avoiding them with time stop was also a method, but I might not be able to use time stop.

In the end, I had no choice but to fight someday, so I had to prepare in advance from now on.

“This is the most important place.”

“It looks like an old warehouse.”

“It’s a food warehouse where we store food.”

“Oh…”

I was able to obtain surprisingly a lot of information from Brick.

And also that the situation in the refugee camp wasn’t very good.

The number of people currently accommodated in the refugee camp was roughly 300.

And among them, there were 50 security guards.

Normally, it would have been an excessive military force, but in a situation like now, he said they had no choice but to maintain soldiers even if it was unreasonable.

But a problem occurred here.

Recently, all the personnel who had gone out for hunting or reconnaissance had returned empty-handed.

Thanks to that, the already lacking food became even more scarce.

“Fortunately, we’re growing turnips, potatoes, beans, etc. to get by, but even that will reach its limit soon.”

“I see.”

“But we’re still better off. At least it’s not bad enough to put in sawdust.”

“…”

Bread made by grinding turnips and mixing them with flour wasn’t very tasty, but it was definitely much better than grinding and adding sawdust.

At least turnips were food that people ate.

Anyway, today’s work was finally over.

I returned the gear I received as supplies to the security forces and went home.

To be precise, I was going to go back.

If it weren’t for the kid.

Even though the sun had almost set, the red-haired kid was sitting near the training ground, dozing off.

I released a hollow laugh.

What the hell was he doing here?

“If you sleep here, you’ll catch a cold. Get up quickly.”

“Hmm… Uncle?”

“Yeah, it’s uncle. So get up now.”

I never thought he would wait until this time.

If I had known, I would have given him a heads-up in advance.

He seemed extremely sleepy, the kid staggered and eventually fell into my arms.

“Sleepy… I want to sleep more…”

“Geez, you’re such a handful.”

“…”

I had no choice but to pick up the kid.

I couldn’t just leave him here.

And at the same time, I realized.

I didn’t know where this kid’s house was.

In the first place, even if I knew, where would I use that information?

It wasn’t like I was going to visit the kid’s house looking like this.

If I visited, wouldn’t the kid’s parents be wary of me?

I quickly tried to shake the kid awake, but the more I did, the more the kid just burrowed into my arms.

Well, it was already cold weather, and he had been waiting outside for a long time.

I had no choice, I had to take him home today.

I put the kid on my back and walked forward.

The Time Stop Breeding Uncle’s house was a tent located in the corner of the refugee camp.

It was already on the outskirts, and the condition of the tent wasn’t very good either, so it was a perfect place to freeze to death if you didn’t light a fire.

Of course, firewood didn’t just sprout from the sky, but the Time Stop Breeding Uncle solved that using time stop.

Then did he go out and gather wood himself?

How could that be?

Of course, he stole firewood from other houses and used it.

What the hell, it’s like an onion.

Even if you peel and peel, there’s no end.

Really.

“Hmm…”

“Just wait a bit. I’ll start a bonfire.”

I immediately brought firewood.

Not the firewood that the Time Stop Breeding Uncle had stolen.

I went out and gathered the firewood myself.

Gather the firewood and set it on fire, that’s it.

As I lit the bonfire, the kid’s expression became much more relaxed.

I chuckled as I saw that.

I don’t know about other things, but he’s unnecessarily honest in everything.

This should be enough.

After making sure the kid had fallen into a deep sleep, I soon got up from my spot.

Once again, the surroundings began to turn gray.

Now that the work was done, it was time to train.

* * *

Time passed like an arrow.

In the meantime, there were some achievements.

First, the cooldown time of time stop had shortened slightly.

However, I didn’t directly time the cooldown.

One day, I suddenly realized it instinctively.

Come to think of it, it was said that gifts greatly develop according to the user’s capabilities.

Could it be related to that?

However, the cooldown time didn’t decrease significantly.

If it was originally about 2 times, now it was about 1.9 times?

But this was good news.

It meant that just by using it a lot, the cooldown time of time stop would decrease.

Moreover, not only the ability but also my body had changed.

“It seems you’re training hard.”

“Thank you.”

“It’s not an empty compliment. Your stamina has gotten quite good.”

“I’m always working hard.”

Andrew was a better teacher than I thought.

I learned the swordsmanship and martial arts he taught with my body and reviewed them using time stop.

Naturally, it became a tremendous workout.

Thanks to that, the fat started to burn tremendously.

Of course, it meant that it had improved a lot compared to before.

Even now, the fact that I was a pig hadn’t changed, but should I say I had become less of a pig?

Anyway, as a result of training without fail every day and working hard, I gained some trust within the security forces.

Of course, I was still called ugly Hans, but it was okay.

If I continued like this, I could become stronger.

That was what I thought.

But life never flowed the direction you wanted it to.

It was on that day when I was training hard as usual.

The urgent sound of an alarm bell rang from the direction of the village entrance.

For a very brief moment, my body froze.

“…Monsters have invaded?!”

“Newbie! Quickly grab your weapons!”

“Y-yes!!!”

I had forgotten for a moment because it had been peaceful lately.

This world was a world where it wouldn’t be strange for monsters to suddenly invade one day.

No, rather, it being peaceful for this long was strange.

I quickly grabbed armor and weapons from the security forces and ran to the palisade with Brick.

At the entrance, I saw security guards likewise holding weapons and confronting monsters.

Stay calm, stay calm.

I took a deep breath.

And I confirmed what kind of monsters the security guards were confronting.

They were wolves with black fur. They were twice the size of ordinary wolves.

And they had sharp horns on their heads that looked like blades.

Blade Wolves, mid-level monsters from the game.

In-game level ranged from 20 to 40 at most.

Fortunately, they didn’t have regenerative abilities.

“It’s dangerous, there are so many Blade Wolves.”

“Don’t worry. I’ll take care of them all.”

“Take care of them all? What do you…”

I silently placed my hand on the hilt. At the same time, the surroundings began to turn gray with me at the center.

Fortunately, I hadn’t used time stop today, so the cooldown wasn’t activated.

If it was on cooldown… ugh, I don’t even want to imagine it.

At first, I thought about dealing with them without using the time stop ability, but honestly, I wasn’t confident yet. So, I decided to use time stop and kill them without any uncertain variables.

“Ugh. They’re fucking tough.”

Unfortunately, I didn’t have a swordsmanship technique that could cut them all down at once.

Do you know what that meant?

One at a time. I had to kill them slowly, and definitively. Even if it took quite some time.

“Damn, do I have to do this one by one?”

At first, I thought the time stop ability was really cool. But when I actually tried it, it was kind of different from what I imagined.

I grunted and barely cut the neck of the last remaining wolf.

“I really… feel like I’m going to die…!!”

I was out of breath. I felt like I was going to collapse at any moment. Was it because I was too tired?

I was barely standing and my bones felt like they were melting. At that moment, time stop had been released.

“Huh? Wait…”

And people saw.

The wolves were all dead.

And at the center of their corpses, my figure stood alone.

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