d*mn. You're not bringing Bartolo with you.

It wasn't a snowball.

　Thor and Asmo complained as they knocked the snow off their bodies.

　Bartolo dunked Thor and Asmo in the snow and went back to the kitchen in a good mood.

'That's because you two were going to attack me. I was just trying to protect myself too.

That doesn't make it so.

It's over-defense.

　And that earlier wasn't a snowball fight, it was just an overrun.

　It's no wonder the two of you are complaining about it. But that doesn't mean I'm going to apologize because I don't have any intention of being beaten honestly by these guys.

So what are you going to do now?

　When the complaining settles down, Asmo asks me again.

　He came to invite me to play, but he doesn't seem to have decided on anything in particular to do.

It's been a while since I've seen the village. I haven't seen much of the village lately.''

Especially when it's just a bunch of adults playing in a snowball fight.

You're very active in the morning.

　I had an image of villagers being more busy with farm work and side jobs.

At this time of year, they stay indoors and do all kinds of side jobs. If we don't get out here and do this kind of physical activity, we won't make it.

It's hard to stay in the gyms for long enough.

　That's certainly true, too. For them, who usually do a lot of physical labor, it's also depressing to stay at home all the time and work on the inside. I guess the snowball fight is the way to get rid of it.

　But why is that? It sounds like a terrible construction job. The people of the Colliat village were youthful and just wanted to play.

''Anyway, let's go to the village first.

Oh.

　We decided to head to the village of Colliat, so we left the courtyard and headed down a single road.

　The thickness of the snow on the ground seemed to have increased considerably since it had snowed last night.

　There were still about 30% of snow clouds in the sky, but the clear blue sky was more visible.

　The wind wasn't that strong, so it wasn't too hard to walk outside in this temperature, relatively speaking.

'Oh!'

　As we were walking leisurely, Thor made a strange noise and lost his balance.

'It's buried in snow, but it's by a creek, so it's a subtle slope.

　It's hard to notice because the area is all white, but it's by my favorite creek.

　The slope where Thor's feet had been placed on the slope, so it was only natural that his feet would be trapped.

　Even though it's hard to see with my eyes, I've walked it so many times that I can get a general idea of where it is by the distance and time I've walked.

'Thor, it's lame,'

'Shut up!　There's so much snow over here that it's hard to walk!

　Thor talks back to Asmo's words that were blurted out.

　There's not a lot of traffic on this one road, unlike the one near the village. It was inevitable that the snow was piling up and making it difficult to walk.

'Let's make it a little easier to walk.

　It wouldn't be good if Thor fell down again and got hurt, so I used my earth magic to make a curved board about the width of the road and moved it forward with my psychic.

　Then the snow that had been piled up on it was gouged out and made it easier to walk on.

　Once the snow overflowed from the planks, it would be pulled to the edge of the road.

　It was like a partial, magical recreation of a snowplow from a previous life.

'Wow!　The snow just keeps chipping away, man!

It's easy to walk around.

　I should be happy to see them, but I am somewhat pissed off when these guys walk leisurely. Is it because I feel as if I'm a lowlife, as if I'm clearing the road for the hoodlums?

　Let's not think too much about it.

　We walked along the single road, plowing the snow, and soon we arrived at the village of Colliat.

　The fields of wheat have of course been mowed down, and the roofs of the houses are covered with white snow.

'Oh?　Aren't we having a snowball fight right now?

　It was much quieter than last year, and it didn't seem like they were having a snowball fight.

'Hey, I'm trying. You see him over there?

　I looked at where Thor pointed and saw Roland and the other villagers gathered behind the snow wall.

''Look, we'll act in groups of four. We'll approach slowly, using the snow wall as a shield.''

'It's bad news. The Wester team is missing from the main camp!　It must be coming around from somewhere.

Then we should send out a scout. Find out where they're coming from.

　As he said this, some villagers moved away.

　Roland and the other villagers are hiding behind the ice wall and staying put.

　If you look closely, you can see that they were holding a frying pan or something in their hands as a shield.

".........isn't your tactical skills somehow improved?　Didn't we all charge in together last year, screaming and yelling?

　This year's snowball fight is very different. It's more like a military exercise than an innocent game, or it's more like a serious sport. It's more like saber-rattling.

'Because we imitated Al building ice walls and using pitfalls and stuff like that,'

Yeah, the level has gone up since that snowball fight was over. Plus, it seems like the vigilante guys have been joining in lately.

　Apparently, it's because of the confrontation between me and Elinora sister that we ended up like this.

　I used ice magic to create a wall to get close to it, play it with magic, use the snow and ice pillars around it, and other tricks.

''Well, it's good that the range of play is expanding, but this makes it hard for kids to play.

The near-adult guys are mixed in with the adults, but the kids our age are lounging around on the exercise field.

　I felt sad that the harmonious snowball fight was gone, but it wasn't.

　Looking towards the vigilante exercise area, kids our age were happily having a snowball fight.

　A little wall of snow had been built, and it seemed like the rule was to play within a designated area.

　We could hear little kids and girls having fun, and it was very peaceful.

'That would be fun for us to play with, wouldn't it?

Well, we can't just go over there.

'What?　Why?

　I'm a seven-year-old, and Thor and Asmo are nine. They are not yet old enough to reach the age of adulthood, and I would say they have the right to mix in with the peaceful snowball fight over there.

　I ask, and Thor and Asmo look away awkwardly. I have a bad feeling about this.

'....Hey, what did you do?

No, I just used a little trick to win, didn't I?

'Yeah, I just kicked the snow up and blinded them, or pretended to be my buddy and infiltrated the enemy team.

Wow, not very popular.

　The bottom line is that what these guys do is so egregious that they've been banned.

　It can't be all of the things I've just mentioned. I'm sure they must have done something even more vicious.

We're not very popular, and we're just kids. Why in the world do we have to fight them head on?　What's wrong with doing what you can do to win!

I don't have to fight on a level playing field. I prefer to fight on the stage that I'm best at. To hell with muddy frontal fights.

　It was a way of thinking about how a younger brother, always under the threat of an older sister, could survive in a strong way.

'I agree with both of your ideas, but you shouldn't do that with a normal kid.

I know that, but my back itches when I do it head-on like that.

You just can't help but want to do something stupid, can you?

　It must be hard to fight that kind of honest fight from two people who are better at everything: surprise, trickery, eye-rolling, petty tricks, betrayal, and everything else.

'You guys are twisted, too,'

'Ugh. I don't want to hear that from Al, who can use magic in a snowball fight.

'Al has been out of the children's box from the beginning, just like Lady Elinora.

That's ridiculous...

　Apparently, they had seen me and Elinora sister's stiff magic ant confrontation and were the first to be excluded from the children's slot.

"So you're saying that the only way for us to have a snowball fight with everyone else is to mix in with the adults?

All right. What do we do?　Do you want to join us over there now?

　When Thor told me that, I looked at the adults' snowball fight.

'The Roomba!　The Roomba is out!

'He's got a funny snowball!　The snow wall will break in one hit!

You stormed in here!　Somebody stop that guy!

　In the adults' area, a rumba seemed to have just broken in, and many villagers were being blown away.

　This is a scene I've seen somewhere before. Specifically, the pillow thrower that was in Kagura's inn.

　Right now, a rumba muso was happening right in front of us.

''Well let's not have a snowball fight today. I have other things to play with.

'Yes. And with Roomba around, too.

　No one would want to mingle with that scene.

'Let's make snowballs and block the door of the village chief's house before we move.

Yeah. It's an annual tradition.

　You're going to get the title of bad boy for doing that.

　But it sounds like fun, so I decided to help out.