Karuta in Class
The weekend’s little kids’ experience turned into something like a village festival, and when the week began, the topic was still all over the school.
The teachers had basically worked through their day off, and the guild staff apparently had a rough time appraising all the gathered materials.
Since it was everyone’s first experience, a lot of the materials got crushed and ruined, and while no parents complained—because they’d known it was part of learning—it was tough calming down the kids who cried when they found out the things they’d worked so hard to gather couldn’t be used.
“Was Ron okay?”
“He fell asleep on the way home the first day, and yesterday I left him with Mom while I went ahead for lunch, so Ron doesn’t know how it turned out.”
“For Ron, it was more about getting to do something he doesn’t normally get to do! The results didn’t really matter much.
Vio-chan, thanks for keeping him company for two whole days.”
“Oh, Vio! My dad said to thank you too. I didn’t think what I told him would turn into such a big festival, y’know?”
Right—Ron didn’t stop by the guild after either day.
Nachi thanked me too, but honestly, I never expected it to become such a big festival-like event either.
Still feeling the afterglow of the festivities, we spent Fireday and Woodday continuing our karuta making, practicing magic on the wooden tags, working on playing cards, and doing athletic exercises.
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After spending three class periods on what was basically craftwork—making karuta and cards for playing—we finally reached the fourth class today, where we could actually use the karuta we’d made.
At first, the plan was to learn the letters one by one while reading them aloud, but we’d already been doing that while making the cards. Everyone was eager to play with the karuta itself.
Even Teacher Paul couldn’t hide his excitement, so today’s class would be our first karuta game.
“Okay everyone, the karuta you all worked so hard on is finally finished! Let’s hear some applause!”
“““Ooooohhh!!”””
The boys shouted with excitement, while the girls clapped and cheered.
The teachers already knew how karuta worked since we’d explained it to them, so they’d be running the session today.
Tony, Nachi, and Run moved the desks and chairs to the edges of the classroom, and the three sisters plus Kathe laid out the rug the teachers had brought—one with a bit of thickness to it.
We five-year-olds couldn’t do much but stay out of the way.
“Okay, you three can start laying out the karuta. Make sure the pictures face up.”
“““Okaaay!”””
They quickly found their task and took it seriously.
The three of them took the karuta and spread them out face up, trying not to overlap them. The directions were purposefully all mixed up.
“All right, now let’s spend a little time memorizing where the cards are. Once you’ve picked your spot, sit there. I’ll read the cards aloud.”
We were told to take off our shoes before stepping on the rug, so everyone did and sat where they liked.
I looked slowly over the cards from my spot, trying to memorize which pictures were where.
“What’s that one with the two black circles?”
“Because it’s the ‘ku’ card, maybe? Kuroi maru—black circles?”
“No way, that’s Milina the shoemaker! Look—there’s a rabbit next to the black shoes!”
Well… it’s all drawn by kids, so you have to rely on the letters more than the pictures.
Tony tried to explain, but honestly, with two ovals and a circle, it didn’t look like shoes or Milina.
Nachi’s drawings were definitely the best—he’d studied art. Kathe and Run weren’t quite at his level, but theirs were clear enough.
Tony, on the other hand, was still confidently explaining his scribbles, so he clearly didn’t think he’d done badly.
“All right, is everyone ready? I’m going to start reading now.”
At the teacher’s words, everyone straightened up, suddenly serious.
[Eggs are the children of the kokkoko.]“Ta, ta…”
“Which one’s the egg picture?”
“Ah! Here! … Wait, it’s just a white circle—this one’s Tony’s, isn’t it?”
“What? It’s an egg! What else could it be?”
I spotted the “ta” card, but it was far away, and before I could grab it, Nachi had already taken it.
And Tony’s “egg” card—just a single white oval—was as plain as could be.
We’d only added the letters before, so this was our first time actually seeing how they’d turned out. Looks like the teachers hadn’t commented on the… simplicity.
“Well, the main goal is learning the letters anyway. Don’t rely too much on the pictures, everyone—look for the words. Okay, next one!”
As expected of a language teacher—she’s strict about that.
[Dandada is the adventurer’s weapon and armor shop.]“Yes!”
“Ah, I was aiming for that one!”
“Whoa, this drawing’s amazing! That’s Giren-san, right? It looks just like him!”
This time, Mire got the card.
It had a lizard beastman standing proudly with an axe in one hand, drawn beautifully.
Apparently, Kathe had made that one—she blushed shyly when praised, which was really cute.
There were plenty of comments about good and bad drawings, but the karuta match went smoothly overall.
Everyone fiercely guarded the cards they’d already collected, so the game was quite balanced.
You’d think the “creator” (me) would be dominating, right? But against athletic beastkin kids, even with my knowledge advantage, this five-year-old human could only barely keep up.
Once only five cards were left, things got wild—false starts everywhere, and the leaps toward the cards were no joke.
The three sisters and I ended up mostly watching by then.
No way we could jump into that brawl. Kathe never hesitated though—charging in fearlessly like a total big-sis hero.
In the end, Nachi won the very first karuta tournament.
I only managed to grab five cards—the ones close to me.
It was super frustrating, and I really want to practice… but since there’s only one set of these wildly creative karuta, we’ll just have to get used to them over time.
By the way, in magic class, the six-year-olds and up have gone back to their usual attack magic practice, but card-making continues.
So we five-year-olds and the three sisters are still focused on crafting cards.
For the teachers, it’s perfect—this lets us practice mana control, and since there aren’t any life magic lessons for five-year-olds yet, it’s safe to have the three dads—each a master of wood magic—teaching us directly.
If we get good enough with wood and wind magic, we might be ready to learn support magic next year.
Hachi and Ren have already learned Wind Cutter, and Teacher Muscle-Squirrel praised them for it.
By the fourth lesson, their aim’s gotten pretty accurate—honestly, it’s probably more advanced than just shooting at faraway targets now.
The three sisters have moved from polishing to fine cutting, and since polishing required delicate mana control, they were surprised by how easy Wind Cutter felt after that.
They’re using the cutter for separating small pieces and polishing for rounding the corners, so just this work alone has improved their mana control a lot.
Maybe next, Hachi and the others should try their dads’ polishing work too. I’ll suggest it to them.
What do you think about this chapter?
