The next day, the lot of us headed for the guild together.
Yumina’s clothes were too gleaming and conspicuous for walking through town, so she’d borrowed clothes from Elze and Linze.
A white blouse with a ribbon at the throat, black overcoat, navy culottes, black knee-socks. Other people’s clothes, but they sat well — composed, suited her. Just a touch oversized.
Her long blonde hair was braided into a single plait so it wouldn’t get in her way.
I’d worried the heterochromia would draw attention, but apparently in this world, not so much. Heterochromia doesn’t necessarily mean Magic Eye, supposedly.
So just on appearances, an ordinary girl was complete. Whether you’d call someone solidly in beautiful-girl tier “ordinary” — different question.
“Hey, just thought of something — if Yumina marries Touya, does Touya become the next king?”
“Yes, that’s how it works. I’d be very glad if that happened. Of course, the nobles and the people would have to accept Touya-san for it. Well — if I get a brother, that child would inherit instead.”
Listening to Elze and Yumina’s conversation as we walked to the guild, I sent the king my heartfelt cheers. Hang in there, for my happiness. Get one more child, somehow. Maybe later I’ll look up stamina-drink recipes on my phone… wait, no! That’s already presupposing I’m marrying Yumina!
“I don’t want to be king, you know…”
“I am aware. If a son is born to my uncle’s line — or, ahem, if our child is a boy, that child can inherit, that path also exists!”
“Our child” — what? Also, no fair saying it yourself and going beet-red — it’s catching.
Before going to the guild, we stopped by Bear-Hachi’s Weapons to gear Yumina up. When I asked if she had money, she showed me a heavy bag — jangling — that the king had sent her off with as a parting gift. Bad feeling. Looked inside: fifty platinum coins. Fifty million yen as a parting gift is a touch too much…
We had Bear-Hachi’s owner, Baral-san, show her some bows. Selection wasn’t quite the capital’s, but they had a reasonable spread. Yumina drew several bowstrings to test feel, and chose a short, lightweight M-shaped composite bow.
She picked rapid-fire usability over range. True — a longbow would be tough for someone her size.
Plus a quiver and a hundred arrows. White leather chest armor, matching boots.
All right — preparation, OK.
We brought Yumina into the always-bustling guild.
The people there flicked the usual glances our way, and a contingent of the men shot me harsh looks.
I hadn’t understood why at first. Now I know.
Elze, Linze, Yae too — without rose-tinted glasses, they’re really cute. And the looks the men give me, the guy who’s with these cute girls, are like this. Sharp.
Truth be told, in spots without the girls, I’d had guys come at me with I don’t like the look of you. Politely got them to lose consciousness.
Best policy with that crowd: don’t engage.
While I had Yumina at the reception desk handling her registration, Elze and the others went over to the request board to check the postings.
Registration done, when Yumina and I joined them, they had one green request in hand.
“Anything good?”
“Hmm — what about this one?”
The handed-over request. Extermination. Let’s see —
“Five King Apes… what kind of monster was that?”
“A great-ape monster. They form packs of several and attack. Not very intelligent, so they fall for traps easily — but their power needs respect. At our level, hunting them should be no problem.”
Power-mongers, basically. Bit weird though — “King” everywhere, in packs? Doesn’t quite track. I thought that as Linze explained, and handed the request to Yumina beside me.
“How’s it look? Doable?”
“No problem. I’m fine.”
Our guild cards were green; Yumina’s was, naturally, the beginner-black. There was no need to align with our rank, but Yumina insisted on green and wouldn’t budge.
The ranks: black > purple > green > blue > red > silver > gold.
- Black — beginner.
- Purple — apprentice adventurer.
- Green — third-tier adventurer.
- Blue — second-tier adventurer.
- Red — first-tier adventurer.
- Silver — top-tier adventurer.
- Gold — hero.
Like that. Naturally, the higher you go, the harder the next promotion. As it happens, no gold-rank adventurer exists in this country. Heroes don’t grow on trees.
We took the King Ape extermination request to the desk and got it accepted. The location: south of here, across the Arène River, in the forest beyond.
I’d never been to the south, so [Gate] wasn’t an option — we hired a carriage.
Elze and Linze took the driver’s seat; Yae, Yumina, and I sat in the back. Apparently Yumina can handle a horse, too. Princess, but. Or — princess, therefore? Long-rides as part of the deal? Maybe in this world, not being able to handle a horse is the minority…
“Hmm — renting a carriage every time, maybe better to just buy one.”
“Carriages range cheap to ruinous, indeed — and they cost. Plus the upkeep of the horse is heavy work. Cannot leave it perpetually at Silver Moon, either, indeed.”
True. Pros and cons. Honestly, I can’t take care of a horse. Shouldn’t keep a living thing if you can’t care for it.
We chatted on, and three hours later we’d crossed the Arène River and arrived at the southern forest.
So — where would the King Apes be. [Search] would help, but if a monster were within fifty meters, I’d notice anyway. I could use [Long Sense], but that essentially makes a sense-only doppelganger at distance — same as searching alone, in the end. Reduces the danger, but.
The smartphone map showed a sizable forest. Searching out a particular monster from this would be a chore. Map’s search doesn’t work on creatures and monsters…
Guess it’s the slow way. As we made to step into the forest, Yumina stopped us.
“Excuse me — before we enter, may I use a summon spell?”
“Summon spell? Summoning what?”
“Yes. It should help us find the King Apes.”
Yumina stepped a little away from us and began the spell.
“Dark, come — what I seek is the proud silver wolf — Silver Wolf.”
She finished the chant, and out of her shadow, silver wolves emerged in succession. Five total. About a meter long. Tails wagging happily, they circled around her. One was a little larger, with a cross-shaped marking on its forehead.
“These ones will look as well. We can communicate even at distance, so I’ll know the moment they find them.”
Got it. Dogs — er, wolves. With that nose, finding them won’t take long.
“All right, everyone — please.”
At Yumina’s command, won! — they barked once and bounded off into the forest. So this is summon magic. I’d thought it before with the lizardman — can I use it too?
I asked Yumina as we started into the forest.
“At base, if you can form a contract with the summoned creature, you can learn it. The contract conditions for those wolves weren’t difficult, so I bonded easily. Some of them say fight me, prove your strength, or answer my question. The stronger they are, the harder to bind.”
I see. Stronger summon, tougher conditions. Stands to reason.
I was thinking about that as we scouted the area, when Yumina suddenly stopped.
”…They’ve found them. Ah, but it’s a lot. Seven of them.”
“Seven… what do we do? Request is for five.”
Elze cracked her gauntlets together.
“Best to wipe them out at once. If even one escapes, it might call reinforcements.”
Same thought as Linze. Could be more than seven, even. Better to take them while we can.
“Yumina — can you lure the King Apes our way?”
“I can, but… what’re you planning?”
“Set a trap. A pit-trap — earth magic’ll do it fast.”
I made several pit-traps with earth magic, and we hid in the trees. Soon, with a gogaaaa! roar, several great-apes appeared, chasing Yumina’s wolves.
Slightly bigger than gorillas, with long fangs. Pointed ears, eyes blood-red. Vicious-faced, they were chasing the wolves.
Just before the disguised pit, the wolves leapt high and cleared the trap. The great-apes, suspecting nothing, plunged straight ahead and dropped neatly into the pits.
“Gogaaa-OH!?”
“Now!”
Yae, Elze, and I sprang from the trees. Three of them in the trap. Buried up to chest-height in the ground, struggling to claw their way out.
An arrow drove deep into one of them’s eye. Yumina. From the dead-angle of that ape’s lost eye, Yae closed in and severed the carotid artery in its neck.
“Flame, come — coiling spiral — Fire Storm.”
The fire-tornado Linze called up assailed the other two trapped ones. In a flash they were charred black, and Elze and I finished off the weakened King Apes.
No time to breathe — the remaining four appeared from deeper in the forest. Swinging those thick massive arms, with roar and ground-tremor, they came at us.
“Slip!”
“Uga!?”
The lead one, riding its momentum, went down hard from my spell. Arrows poured into the fallen ape. Last, Yae plunged in with her full weight on the strike, sword driving into its chest, and the ape stopped.
“Boost!”
Beside her, Elze, body-strengthened, dove into another King Ape’s guard and struck repeatedly into its abdomen. Unable to bear the strikes, it collapsed; Yumina’s wolves swarmed it.
Two left.
“Lightning, come — white-lotus thunder spear — Thunder Spear!”
“Flame, come — crimson-lotus fire spear — Fire Spear!”
Yumina’s and Linze’s spells loosed. Wind and fire — two magical spears drove into the chests of the last two great-apes.
Gugogaaa! — death-roars, and the pierced two collapsed.
Whoa, impressive. Magic on par with Linze, then. Which means in the six-element magic she’s above me. I can’t fine-tune mana well, so high-tier spells, especially attack magic, I struggle to acquire. Light I’m pretty good at, though.
All seven King Apes were down. That’s combat over. Easier than I’d thought, thankfully.
Yumina’s five wolves leapt back into her shadow and vanished.
“Um — how did I do?”
What Yumina meant was, was I a hindrance to everyone? probably. Honestly, far from a hindrance — a huge help. Didn’t realize covering fire could be that effective.
“In terms of strength — no problem.”
“And the magic was fine, indeed.”
“Aye, rear-support is a real boon, indeed.”
Affirmative voices, one after another, accepting Yumina’s ability. True enough — but putting a twelve-year-old in danger… mm.
The girl watched my deliberation with anxious eyes. Those eyes are a foul, I said… She isn’t doing it on purpose, is she?
”…I’m in your care from here, Yumina.”
“Yes! Leave it to me, Touya-san!”
In a smile spilling over, Yumina threw her arms around me. Wait — please not in front of everyone, augh!
I peeled her off somehow, and we collected the King Ape fangs that served as the tally proof.
“Well — with Yumina in, that’s four girls and just me as the only guy…”
I let out a small sigh.
“What’s the problem?”
Linze tilted her head. The unawareness is also a problem.
“None of you three may have noticed, but you stand out at the guild and so on — and the looks I get because of it sting.”
”? Why is that, indeed?”
“Because being surrounded by girls earns me jealousy. Elze, Linze, Yae — you’re all noticeably cute.”
"""Eh?"""
Everyone froze. What — did I say something weird? If you saw a guy surrounded by cute girls, you’d go tch — any guy would.
“S-saying weird things, Touya, what are you — joking around. Cute, what…”
“Eh, what?”
"""…"""
Why is everyone going red?
“L-let’s, l-let’s go home!”
”…Y-yeah, Nee-chan!”
“H-home it is, indeed!”
The three of them strode off through the forest at a brisk pace. What was that…
A tug at my coat sleeve.
“Touya-san, what about me? Am I cute?”
”? I’d say cute…?”
“Eheheh.”
Yumina hugged me with a bashful smile. I said stop it!
After that, we returned to the carriage, fired off [Gate], and went back to Reflet.
Summon magic, huh. I hadn’t dipped into the dark element yet. The first one I saw was a lizardman, so the impression was kind of off-putting.
If there are animal-types like those, maybe I’ll contract one. I’ll get Yumina to teach me next time.