Damn. This early? Yeah, this is a much smaller chapter. It was going to be quite a lot bigger. But I spent a long time talking with Allen, and like. That cut things short. And finishing the chapter where I did.
I also made some changes to previous chapters. Mainly taking out Rino from Motoyasu's party. An replacing her with Randomguy#1, yeah, i'll leave that for another time. Also, my math problems attacked me, and I actually gave everyone 10x the amount of starting money. So I corrected that, and replaced Kieran's money with the classic 800 silver that Naofumi got.
Today was very productive. Things are changing from what I previously planned, but they are getting better the more I learn. Anyways, enjoy the smaller chapter. And once again, thanks to Allen Blaster for discussing things with me and giving me valuable tips!
Kieran arrived at the Inn and was immediately greeted by Motoyasu, who raised his glass full of wine. The girls of his party didn't look too happy, except for Elena and the other guy, who both gave him a casual shake of the head, doing something other than that would upset Malty greatly.
"Hey! Sorry for being late, I spent the entire day working with a fellow blacksmith friend." The shield hero said, ignoring Malty and Lesty, who both gave him annoyed looks. Hearing that, and seeing some sweat still glistening in him, the both of them turned their faces.
"Ewww, and you didn't even take a bath before coming to meet Sir motoyasu?" The princess asked, pinching her nose to keep the smell away.
"Huh? I don't think he's smelling…" Motoyasu said, moving his head closer after greeting Ren, who sat at a nearby table with his party.
"Oh, that's alright. My clothes are enchanted, you won't feel anything. But if you don't want to be near me, I can go over to another table." He said, sounding apologetic, neither Elena or the other unnamed guy cared, as they weren't smelling anything. But as always, even before Motoyasu could say anything…
She spoke.
"Yeah, go away. Urgh. We're here to eat with Sir Motoyasu. Not with you." Malty said, shooing him away.
"I'm sorry man, I think she's still feeling bad about you not wanting her in your party… Let's go over to Ren's table. I want to hear about that friend you made. Excuse me for just a moment, ladies." Motoyasu said with a wink, before he got up. Half of his party understood, and went back to the other meals.
Malty was fuming, and Lesty was agreeing with her. Both whispering bad things about the shield hero.
But Malty was going to get revenge, an evil smile creeped into her lips.
Ren watched as the other two heroes pulled chairs to sit down at the table, both of them greeted the other party members, who replied cordially. Except for Mald, who grunted. Displeased.
"So, you didn't grind any levels today?" Motoyasu asked, after the whitehead made his order to the waitress.
"No, I was going to buy equipment. So I went to this shop, and the owner was an older bald guy that was super nice. We ended up talking quite a bit, and we became friends quite quickly. I went to help him make some armor for the knights, and before we knew, it was already dark.
"I see… Quite selfless of you, bro. But you need to prioritize yourself. He could've done it alone I guess. But only us can save the world from the waves!" Motoyasu said.
"Yeah… But that thing from the castle really stressed me out. I needed to blow some steam. And besides, the knights will help us in the waves, they can protect the people, help hold out a position, or even kill the lesser monsters so we can focus on the stronger ones." The blacksmith explained.
"I see the logic behind that… If they're better equipped, then we can focus on what really matters…" Ren considered, rubbing his chin.
"We should reunite before the wave to discuss strategy and stuff. Like, I hope to have some nice support skills by then. Also, maybe some sort of barrier? In my world there was a spell called Shield that was quite useful. It helped me protect others that were too far away from me."
"Did you receive your crystal ball? The king called us a couple hours ago and gave us a bunch of stuff, weapons to copy, crystal balls that gave us some spells…" Motoyasu asked, but Kieran gave him a puzzled face.
"No… Nothing of the sort. The weapons I copied were all given to me by Elhart. Also, I recommend that you go there. I saw a spear that I thought you would like." He said in response, smiling at the taller blonde who laughed.
"Well, is that so? I'll be sure to come by tomorrow then. If he's really that good, I'll keep buying from him, until you can set up your own shop." He gave him a couple pats in the back. "What kinds of shields did you unlock?"
"They mostly had decent defensive stats, and no real skill. But there was one that is level locked that had a skill called Shooting star shield. I hope I can unlock it by the time the wave hits. By the way, do any of you know when that is?" He asked the two casually, but was instead bombarded with questions.
"WAIT! D-did you just say… Shooting star?" Motoyasu asked, both he and Ren were leaning forward.
"How did you get a Siderite weapon?! That's like… Super hard to obtain!" Ren said, both heroes were really interested. Itsuki perked up at that, but didn't say anything.
"Oh! Hum…. Elhart had it on display. It was one of the first weapons I copied. I saw that it was level locked, but i…"
"We need to go there!" Both heroes said to him. Itsuki would need to follow them when they left.
"Hey, calm down! We can go there sometime. Jeez, I didn't know it was that great, there's no material with that name in my world and I didn't have much time to look at it. Now answer my question about how I will find out how much time it will be until the waves." The blacksmith said, seeing the other two sit down.
"Oh right, you need to register at the dragon hourglass in the church." Ren replied, seeing their meals arriving, and he began to eat calmly.
"Yeah, go there when you can. And ask for some sand from the hourglass. That will give you access to a really cool shield. But you'll only be able to use it at level 50. So keep it in mind." Motoyasu said, teaching him about another thing.
"Oh yes, the Portal weapon. It will become really useful. Try to unlock it as fast as you can, it will allow you to teleport." Ren added between bites of his meal.
"Teleporting? Oh yes… That will help a ton. Thanks guys." He said, smiling, and giving them each a coupon.
"Uhh… Thanks. You didn't need to. But, I appreciate it." Ren said, a bit shyly. But he placed it inside his weapon.
"Oh! I'll need you to enchant the girl's weapons sometime. I don't want to see them hurt, but Malty used a fireball spell that was amazing! When I tried using the same spell it wasn't even close to being that strong… I think magic isn't really my thing."
"Yeah… Magic feels a bit weak." Ren said, displeased.
"Maybe it was the method? Like, I've studied magic myself. And it's a huuuuuge pain. Even in my world, you couldn't gain spells like that normally, unless you were a Warlock or some sort of Cleric." He spoke casually while the other two looked at him, surprised.
"Wait, your world has Warlocks? Like, those dark dudes that serve devils and shit?" Motoyasu asked, once again, the whitehead's world surprising him.
"Yeah, there's also plenty of other races too. In my village, there is a half-elf couple that sells vegetables and fruits. A centaur lady that is part of the local guard… I knew a couple faeries too. I gave them sweets, and they showed me spots to gather edible mushrooms and stuff." He spoke, all the people at the table were confused about some of the terms, but a quick explanation of the species' appearance made them understand.
"I see… So they're basically the Demi-humans of your world. And they just live freely in your village?" Welt asked, a bit surprised.
"Yeah, they do. I'm not going to say that there are no discrimination, or slavery in some kingdoms. It happened in mine, with Oni's, brought from the east. A good friend of mine, Tessa was one of them. But the queen banished the slavery, and Tessa and her party beated up any slaver they found and freed the captives." He said in response.
"Well… Here in Melromarc it isn't like that… Slavery is legal." Bakta spoke, sighing a bit. That talking got the attention of the other table.
"Demi-humans are filthy creatures. They deserve to be enslaved!" Too fed up with being rejected, abandoned for the shield devil, Malty couldn't control herself and just screamed.
"M-malty? You don't need to scream like that!" Motoyasu asked gently, but was caught by surprise.
"Goddammit… You screamed like a Banshee." Kieran complained, putting his hands in his ears. He could feel his head tingling from her sharp tone.
"Did you just call me a bitch?!" She asked, flustered with his insolence.
"No, a Banshee. An undead creature that screams at her victims to weaken them so they can feed on their life force." He lectured her. For some reason, that actually sounded a lot worse.
"EXCUSE ME?!" She screamed again, the rest of the table, minus Ren did the same thing, covering their ears.
"Ow… N-need to pretend that didn't affect me at all…" Ren told himself in his head. He wanted to get away from this situation as soon as possible… But there was the promise of a dessert.
Itsuki was hearing everything and his eyes narrowed… No one told him that slavery was legal in this country. His sense of justice was tingling. He and his party were sitting down quite far away from where the others were reunited.
"Stop screaming princess… Urgh. Did you see why I didn't want to have her with me?" He commented with the closest person. That being Welt. The rogue was left with an awkward smile.
"Grrr… Stupid shield." She grunted, getting up and walking away. Fuming, she almost looked like a train. Pushing away everything in front of her.
Seeing her gone, Kieran noticed that Ren had finished his food. He didn't give up on his promise, and called the waitress again, and ordered some cake for the sword hero.
"Here, as promised. Oh yeah, about what we talked about earlier. I can use all the strengthening methods you three mentioned." He casually said, and the two heroes got serious at that.
Yeah, not about the slavery thing. But the dispute about who was right, and wrong.
"That doesn't sound right to me, Motoyasu's and Itsuki's methods are too complicated… Too complicated to be used if you ask me." Ren said, closing his eyes.
"Your method looks really weak! I can make even my base spear be godlike if I put enough investment into it!" The blonde argued back.
"Hey! Calm down, calm down… Both your methods have decent effects. Ren is very low effort, and you don't need to focus on it too much, and that's a good thing, because I can focus on other things. Like, I reached complete mastery of my Forge hammer shield. And I got a bunch of energy from it. I'll wait until I get a better shield, all of that, just from smithing." He told them, Ren smirked.
"See, i told you?" The dark haired spoke, crossing his arms.
"But Ren, you shouldn't underestimate Motoyasu's method. It's quite expensive to use, but if you combine it with yours, then you can get super strong. And don't get me started on Itsuki's Job level. That's my only hope to raise my attack stat if weapon's don't work!" The two heroes were silenced at that. The companions had puzzled looks, but watched intently.
"But… There's nothing like that in my game." Motoyasu argued, looking at the shield hero.
"I have no idea what that is. But look, you guys also didn't know about my enchanting method. Right? And I still managed to enchant your weapons. I have proved time and time again that I didn't lie, not even once. If you guys can believe that I'm a blacksmith from a world like this one, then why can't you believe all of you can be right?!"
The two heroes looked down, Ren's cake arrived and he began to eat it slowly. But both of them began to look at it.
Even someone dumb like Motoyasu, and a chunibyo like Ren had troubles arguing with that logic. If he hadn't proved more than once that the absurdities he said were true, then they would've dismissed their ideas.
And they reminded themselves that Kieran was actually a very helpful NPC. Maybe he knew a whole lot more that they weren't aware? So far, he was teaching them some interesting things…
Motoyasu was the first to open his help menu. He began to navigate everything… But he couldn't find anything. He had the information about his own power up method, and no mention of Kieran's.
"Kieran, how does your method work?" Motoyasu asked, and he knew that it existed. He just didn't know how to do it. And it wasn't appearing on his Hud.
"Right… You basically need to infuse elemental mana into your weapon. You need concentration, and you can only do it if you have the magic affinity for that." He explained, opening his help menu and seeing the mention about the enchanting shield. But it wasn't where the other heroes' power up methods were.
"No… I can't find it." Ren spoke, he changed swords and even tried to do what he said. But it didn't happen. "Am I missing something?"
"Probably skill in magic. You don't know how to properly draw the elemental power from inside you. I didn't learn to do this from night to day, it took me months to learn how to use magic properly." He explained, closing his eyes.
Hearing that talk, Tersia walked closer to the table. Welst walked up to them as well from where Itsuki was staying.
"Studying magic from Grimoires is the best way to know magic." The female mage said. Excited about helping the heroes, she tried calling Itsuki, but he kept trying to hide himself.
"Sir heroes, I recommend that you do that if you want to learn strong magic. I know you can use powerful skills, Sir heroes. And it's really impressive, Lord Itsuki has a lot of talent. But with Support magic, you could be even stronger! Or you can make one of us stronger enough to stand by your side!" The male mage spoke too, and Ren couldn't help but feel a bit happy at the compliments.
"Well, I can't speak the language either. What about you two?" Kieran asked the other two heroes, but they looked away.
"No… I can't…" Motoyasu confessed, Ren wished he still had cake to keep eating and have an excuse to not speak. But he ate it too fast.
"Welst, maybe we could lecture them in the language, then help with magic?" Tersia suggested, smiling.
"I don't consider myself the best of teachers… But anything for the great heroes!" The fellow magic user spoke. Then turned to the shield hero. "You could certainly join us if you want."
"I think I will. We could reunite somewhere and study together. I really want to learn some healing spells. I knew some from my world, but I can't use them here." He agreed, finding it as a good opportunity to get along with the other heroes.
While that was happening, Lesty watched everything. Making sure to pull away her thoughts aside so she could relay all this information to Malty later…
"I recommend you buy a healing grimoire. There's a really nice magic shop in the city. I'll give you directions." Tersia said to Kieran, smiling. "I have a support grimoire i can lend to Sir Ren. Could you share yours with Sir Motoyasu?"
"Sure! I have all affinities, so I may as well share everything." He gave her a thumbs up. Both mages froze.
"B-but… That's impossible!" Welst said, his eyes widened like golf balls.
"Y-yeah! Most people have only two affinities at most!" Tersia said, leaning into the table.
What kind of monster was the Shield hero?
"Uhhh… That's… Genetics." He gave them a poker face and his usual answer as to why he was like that.
"I'll need to see that for myself… Should we meet at the Witch's shop? She can check your affinities. And we can buy the necessary books." The mage of Ren's party suggested. "9 AM is good for everyone?"
"Okay by me! I'll talk to the other girls. Malty doesn't like to wake up too early. So I might leave her sleeping." Motoyasu said, relaxed.
"Alright… I'll do it." Ren's anxiety went through the roof, he crossed his arms to pretend he wasn't trembling. He was going to need more cake, he wanted to go out to grind some more now… Anything to disappear. But if he backed down, people would think he wasn't cool.
And Tersia looked so excited! He knew if he said no, Tersia would be sad…
He couldn't do it. The pressure to not pick the bad dialogue options was too much.
That was his curse, his cross to carry.
"Alright! It's settled then… But, going back to the strengthening methods... Maybe if I hear it straight from Ren…"
Ren got out of his panic attack, anything to get his mind off the stress of socializing.. And studying. He always hated group projects. Ren then explained how his strengthening method worked, he explained it slowly for the blonde. Who now paid total attention.
After hearing it, Motoyasu gave his shield another look. Being met with a "trust me" smile. He believed in him, no one noticed the shield's gemstone flashing faitly, in sync with the one in Motoyasu's spear. He opened his menu… And found the Mastery.
"No fucking way… I… I can see it!" Motoyasu spoke, navigating the menus, and seeing some mastery that had built up in his spears. He was flabbergasted, that reaction made Ren open his menu… But nothing was there.
"Motoyasu… How does your method work?" Ren asked, sweating nervously.
"Right… One second. It goes like this, please notice that…" A long and detailed explanation followed, and Ren this time was able to see. His facade fell once more as he eyed the entire thing like a boy who just found out that he had UNO pre-installed on his Xbox.
Seeing the two like that, Kieran shared Itsuki's method. The archer was hearing everything, thinking to himself that they were lying, and playing a prank on him. Kieran totally did that on purpose, just so they wouldn't admit they were lying…
Kieran left the heroes to debate and share tips, while he went to pay for his meal and Ren's dessert. Lesty watched as he and the Innkeeper talked, she saw him handing some money to him, then made a pause and asked for something. The Innkeeper smiled and gave him something small. He was going to stay there…
The pink haired woman smirked evilly, and left to tell Malty about that. She scurried so fast, that she failed to notice the whitehead swallowing a piece of candy he got as his change. He smiled happily, then bid farewell to the other heroes. Promising to meet them at the meeting location. He got a short reply, as the other two were too busy talking.
"Malty! The shield hero is going to…" She began speaking, but then saw that Malty wasn't alone, there was a sleek figure wearing all black. Lesty recognized the figure, being one of the church's shadows.
"What do you mean there's a change of plans?" Malty asked, gesturing to Lesty so she would close the door.
"The shield hero is too smart… He knows that you're plotting against him. As such, we will use more… Direct approaches." The shadow spoke in a feminine voice. Hearing that made Malty's blood boil… This was supposed to be her moment to shine!
Fuck that idiotic shield devil…
Kieran thanked the other party members, including Elena to her surprise. And with a casual flick of his hand, he enchanted her sword with lightning. He was happy that she had at least considered joining him. So she deserved a gift.
After that, he left the Inn. So he could go back to the safe house that was Elhart's house.
To his surprise, Ren and Motoyasu followed right behind him.
"Huh? Oh, you guys want to ask about the siderite weapons?" Kieran asked, laughing nervously. When he looked ahead, he even noticed Itsuki standing next to him, which gave him a small scare. "What the… From where did you come from?!"
"I heard what you said, if that blacksmith has a Siderite bow… Then I must speak to him." Itsuki replied. The four heroes were reunited. Walking through the dark streets like a group of college friends.
"Oh yeah, did you hear us talking? The other two now know each other's methods. You can have theirs too. Did you try it out?"
"Hmpf. I know you're lying. You said that my method worked, so you've admitted that you were lying, and I was right." Itsuki simply stated.
"Come on man, don't be like that. Did he lie even once?" Motoyasu tried to argue, shaking his head.
"Even I relented Itsuki. You should do the same." Ren said, closing his eyes.
"Well, leave him be. We can't force him to believe in us. He might notice it in the future when we're all stronger than him." The whitehead joked, smiling casually at the good atmosphere. Despite the things with the Banshee, overall, the night was quite good.
They walked for a bit, basically escorting the Shield hero until they reached the shop. Kieran opened the door, and found Elhart behind the counter.
"Ah, Shield kid, Sword kid. Welcome back, I can see you two brought your other friends?" The man spoke softly, smiling at them.
"Hey! Kieran talked a lot about you, thanks for taking him in! You did a lot to make his day better." Motoyasu spoke.
"Kieran mentioned he copied a Siderite shield. I came here to see if you have a Siderite bow." Itsuki spoke plainly, looking around. There were a couple bows on display, they looked pretty good.
"Yeah, those weapons are super rare. The place we tried asking said that the only place we could find weapons like that was a country called Zeltoble." Ren walked closer to the counter.
"Ah, the Siderite shield was the only one I had in stock. But I can try to put my hands on some more to make weapons for you kiddos. I had made a Siderite sword, but I sold it a couple weeks ago." He rubbed his head.
"If you could, we would really appreciate it. Those weapons can give us some really strong skills!" Motoyasu said with a large smile.
"If you make a bow, I'll copy it from you… And I guess I could accept that deal of paying for the copies…" The high schooler sighed, and took some money to pay for his copies.
Motoyasu did the same, Elhart had just made a couple extra silver without doing much. That kid was good for his business.
"Well, you can always feel free to come here if you need anything. Armor, weapons, tools… Great Elhart gotcha covered!" He spoke, laughing joyfully. He was happy helping out the saviors of the world. But he also had a store to run. But the heroes would work as advertisements as well…
When people heard that the glorious weapons the heroes used were forged from him? His business was going to boom. Hell, if the word arrived to Siltvelt that he worked alongside the shield hero, he could import stuff to them at large prices!
His retirement was guaranteed!
Kieran watched the whole ordeal while laughing at his greedy face. It made him laugh a bit. He had to say he was quite worried, but maybe things were going to be okay.
"I'll be sure to make my armor with you then, please let us copy those rare weapons when you get them!" Motoyasu said excitedly. "I need that power to protect my bro Kieran here."
"I'm going to get stronger. Your craftsmanship is also really amazing…" Ren praised his work, having a look at the workshop in the back. "Should I? No… It's too hard. And it's Kieran's thing already. I'm not going to steal it…"
"I'm leaving now, have a good night. Please tell us when you get those weapons." Itsuki said respectfully now, exiting through the door.
"I'll take my leave, we'll see you tomorrow." He told the whitehead, before exiting.
"Goodnight Shield bro! Uncle bald smith!" Motoyasu said playfully, running towards the door, before Elhart could complain about the nickname.
"Those are some fun friends you made there, kid." The smith said, after all the other heroes were gone.
"Yeah, they're very, very strange… But not bad." He replied, shaking his head. "Did you clean the room?"
"Sure did. You can go up there and sleep. If anything tries to attack you, just scream. I'll have my warhammer by the bed, alright?" He spoke, guiding the hero to the back, to his room. "There you go. Changed the sheets and cleaned it a bit. Sleep well there."
"Thank you Elhart, goodnight." He replied, seeing the man go down the corridor a bit and disappearing into his own room. As soon as he was gone, the whitehead entered.
"Ah, Shield hero. What a pleasure to finally meet you." A masculine voice spoke.
Kieran quickly turned around. And he saw an adrogynous masked figure, wearing all black. In their hands was a globe, the object shined, and a projection was shown.
The figure of a smiling pope.
You guys now see why I ended the chapter so early, right? Yeah. I had some time now at night, and decided to hop in to modify the chapter and finish it. This chapter was originally gonna include the trial, but I decided to go another route instead.
As you guys could see, the church is going to be the main villain of this first arc. And next chapter, we'll get the introduction of the mysterious shadow that is a part of the Inquisition. Expect it to take a bit longer for the next chapter to drop. Next week is going to be hectic.
Alright, I'm signing off. See ya!