"Well, I don't have anyone to sell this to yet, and there's plenty of room in my Inventory, so I guess I can just worry about it later," Spirit-sama said.
Right then, a turtle arrived. One might call it a "giant turtle," but it only stood about waist-high. To actually eat a person, it would probably have to do a significant amount of crunching.
It lumbered toward the girl with sluggish movements. Its pointed beak looked sharp enough to gnaw right through bone if it caught her.
"Oh, a Tutorial. 'Defeat the Young Turtle,' huh? Right, right. Now that I think about it, she was about to be eaten, wasn't she? Take that! And that! Become my Experience Points!"
Spirit-sama didn't hesitate. He marched right up to the turtle and began pummelling it with a rhythmic patter of punches.
The turtle lazily retracted its head into its shell. Spirit-sama just kept on thumping away.
"This is useless. I'm not doing any damage... Ah, wait. It looks like I'm gaining Experience Points for my Unarmed Combat Proficiency. Guess I'll keep at it."
For the next three hours, Spirit-sama continued to punch the turtle.
Tria watched from above, floating as a halo. The rhythmic thuds of Spirit-sama's fists against the shell echoed through the clearing.
At first, the turtle kept its head tucked away, but eventually, it seemed to give up. It poked its neck back out and simply endured the assault.
"I guess Unarmed Combat experience really does go up faster when you're actually hitting an enemy... Oh, crap. It’s midnight already. I have work tomorrow, so I need to Logout soon. What should I do about this? Doesn't look like it's going down yet."
As Spirit-sama muttered to himself, Tria felt a flicker of anxiety. If Spirit-sama left, she would be all alone again. What would happen if the villagers came back?
"Right. I can set the policy for Auto Mode while I'm logged out. Okay, Tria. Keep training and just keep punching this guy's shell until you can take him down easily. If it attacks, run away."
With those instructions, Spirit-sama's presence began to fade. Trading places with him, Tria's consciousness returned to her body.
...Training. In other words, while performing the movements from before, she simply had to keep striking the turtle's shell.
Her body and soul already belonged to Spirit-sama. She would do exactly as she was told.
Crouching Punch, Standing Punch, Jumping Punch. Crouching Punch, Standing Punch, Jumping Punch.
Just as before, she felt almost no fatigue. The young turtle remained tucked inside its shell, motionless. She would follow Spirit-sama's orders. If it attacked, she would run. That was all.
The night deepened. The moon peeked through the clouds, illuminating the ruins of the shrine. Surrounded by splintered wood, Tria alone continued her silent repetitions.
Morning came. Spirit-sama had not yet returned. Tria continued her Strength Training. She felt no sleepiness, no hunger.
Crouching Punch, Standing Punch, Jumping Punch. Crouching Punch, Standing Punch, Jumping Punch.
Now that she wasn't being puppeteered by Spirit-sama, she continued the movements of her own volition.
Over and over, the same motions. Tria felt as though she was finally growing a little tired—or so she thought.
In reality, her body felt no physical exhaustion. She was simply moving for Spirit-sama's sake. Since Tria had offered her everything to him, she would do exactly as he commanded.
It was past noon when a change finally occurred.
The punches that had been making a hollow patter against the shell began to land with a heavy, powerful thud.
Something had changed. Something within her body. It was unmistakable. Tria felt a surge of joy, sensing she finally understood what Spirit-sama wanted to achieve.
And then—
Crack!!
The sound of something hard splintering rang out. For a moment, she worried she had broken her own hand, but she was wrong.
A crack had formed in the young turtle's shell.
"Ah!"
Tria gasped. She had finally managed to deal damage to the young turtle, which had been entirely impervious until now.
Tria wasn't the only one surprised. The young turtle was equally shocked to have its shell cracked.
Startled, the turtle tried to flee. It poked its limbs and head out and began to crawl away sluggishly. Trying to flee? Tria hesitated. What was she supposed to do now? Spirit-sama had told her to run if it attacked, but he hadn't said anything about what to do if it ran away.
...Meaning? Yes. She would simply keep punching. Tria followed the slow-moving turtle and continued to strike its shell. She focused only on the shell, because that was what she had been told to do.
For how long? He had said until she could defeat it with ease.
Crack. Snap. The fissures in the shell grew wider.
Was this really working? The young turtle was still trying to get away. It was harder to hit while it was moving, but she persisted. Punch. Punch.
Crouching Punch, Standing Punch, Jumping Punch. Crouching Punch, Standing Punch, Jumping Punch.
She focused her strikes on three specific points. Three cracks formed, then spread.
Creak—CRUNCH!!!
Finally, the shell shattered. The young turtle had made a fatal error. It should have counterattacked before it came to this, or fled much sooner.
Precisely because it had no natural predators in this area, its sense of danger had been dull. It was the turtle's misfortune that no one had ever dared to pick a fight with it before—an act that was effectively declaring war on the Great Tortoise itself. The fact that Tria hadn't targeted its relatively soft limbs or head had also lulled it into a false sense of security.
The young turtle, its shell now destroyed, had no idea what came next. Beneath that hard exterior lay soft internal organs.
With the shell gone, those organs were exposed—literally laid bare. To take even a single blow there was a death sentence.
"Ah."
Tria’s fist finally plunged through the wreckage of the shell, crushing the organs beneath.
Confused and overwhelmed, unable to even let out a cry, the young turtle lost consciousness. It was only a matter of time now.
Strength left its limbs, its belly slumped against the ground, and it went still. Its head remained outside the shell, lolling limply.
"...Tria... won?"
Standing before the unmoving turtle, Tria couldn't close her mouth. She had been victorious. She had defeated the creature that was supposed to have eaten her.
She looked at her hands. She touched them. They looked like the same hands as before. But then she remembered—Tria's limbs had been crushed, and these were the limbs newly bestowed upon her by Spirit-sama. There was no way they were ordinary. Despite looking like a young girl's hands, they were powerful enough to shatter a turtle's shell.
"Ah! Tria defeated the turtle... What should Tria do?"
She had been ordered to punch the turtle. But the turtle was dead. Should she go look for another one?
After a moment's thought, Tria decided that wandering off on her own might be a mistake.
Crouch, stand, jump. Crouch, stand, jump.
Tria decided she would simply continue her training until Spirit-sama returned.
"Spirit-sama, please come back soon. Tria is working hard all by herself."
Crouch, stand, jump. Crouch, stand, jump.
Tria repeated the motions over and over, as if performing a ritual to summon her god, waiting for the moment Spirit-sama would return to her.