Author's Note: As you read this, I want you to think about something, what should I do about Malty S Melromarc a.k.a Bitch? I'm not sure about the light novel, but in the web novel, Bitch is the key to many problems that Naofumi faced after she becomes a slave. My plan was to make her into Naofumi's personal bitch, to show her what demon he had become because of her actions. But that was until my Beta Reader pointed out that Malty was the key player to many of the things that happened in the story until she was sent to the Pig King.
So I would like to know how should I handle her, should I make her Naofumi's personal bitch, or should I leave her like in the story until it was time to send her to the Pig King where instead she becomes Naofumi's plaything. If I change it so that Bitch becomes Naofumi's personal bitch, how should I handle the key points that she was part of? I hope that as you read this, you can come up with something that I am unable to at the moment.
Chapter Four…
The Journey Begins!
As they walked through the streets and alleyways, they came to a shop with a conspicuously huge sign, emblazoned with nothing but a sword.
"Here it is." Myne told the Shield Hero.
"Woah…"
Peeking in through the door, Naofumi could see that the walls were covered with weapons from floor to ceiling. Without a doubt, this was an honest-to-god weapon shop! And not only that, it looked like they also dealt in armour and useful tools for adventurers.
"Welcome!"
The shopkeeper bellowed out a greeting as they entered the store. His was an enormous black man, muscular frame was exactly what you'd expect from the owner of a weapon shop. But that was great! Naofumi would have been a little disappointed if he had ended up being some sleazy ball of grease. This really was another world, huh?
"So this is a weapon shop, huh?" asked Naofumi as he looked around the shop.
"Ah, a new customer! The fact that you came in means you must have an eye for quality!" said the shopkeeper, pleased to see someone can see good items when they saw it.
"Actually this girl here recommended you." Naofumi admitted as he pointed at Myne, who gave a quick wave to the shopkeeper.
"Well, thanks for that missy. My name's Erhard by the way." the shopkeeper said with a small bow.
"Oh, don't worry about it. Your shop is famous around these parts, that's all." Myne informed the shopkeeper.
"You flatter me! Anyway, this strangely dressed fellow is your boyfriend, I presume?" Erhard asked her.
That's right. To the people of this world, Naofumi's clothes must have seemed otherworldly. Anybody judging him by his appearance alone would think he was a total weirdo.
"You can't tell who he is just by looking?" asked Myne with a smile.
"Wait, you don't mean… he's a Hero!?" replied the shopkeeper, with a question of her own, as he stared at the Shield Hero for what seemed like an eternity, before saying, "He doesn't seem very reliable…"
'Hey.' thought Naofumi, offended at that. Sure he wasn't the strongest person out there, but he wasn't the weakest either. Although he had to admit that he probably did look pretty unreliable to those in this world. But that's why I wanted to get stronger!
"If you have something to say, say it." said Erhard. "I'm just saying if you don't load yourself up with quality equipment nobody will take you seriously."
"That's probably true…" admitted Naofumi.
"From the looks of you, I'd say… you must be the failure of the Heroes, right?" said the black man.
Urk. Naofumi could feel his cheek twitching. Why did rumours about him seem to spread so fast? Well, whatever. He couldn't let it get him down.
"I'm the Shield Hero, Iwatani Naofumi." Naofumi told Erhard, "I've come here in the hopes to get a weapon and some equipment. So that not only can I fit in this new world, but to protect myself from the dangerous situations that I'll be facing from here on out… so I'm sure we'll be seeing a lot of each other."
Naofumi figured it would be best to introduce himself properly and clear up any misunderstandings.
"Naofumi, huh? Well, if you're already planning on becoming a repeat customer, then I think we'll get along just fine. Nice to meet you!" the shopkeeper told him happily.
'Geez, this guy was energetic.' Naofumi thought to himself, before saying, "That all depends on how things go, but yeh, as long things go well I'm planning to be a repeat customer."
"Hey, mister. Don't you have any good equipment on sale?" Myne asked as she pouted a little and batted her eyes at the shopkeeper.
"What's your budget and your level?" asked Erhard.
"Hmm, let's see…" Myne said thoughtfully as she looked Naofumi over like she was appraising his value.
"I'd say… around two hundred and fifty silver coins, or thereabouts and he's level one." Myne informed the black man.
Two hundred and fifty of his nine hundred silver coins? He knew that Myne warned him that the armour was going to be expensive, but he didn't know it would be this expensive. Naofumi was hoping that Myne was figuring in the cost of recruiting allies, paying for lodgings and the rest of the things that they needed. As he feared if things ended up costing too much, they might be forced to buy second-hand equipment.
"Understood! Wait there for a moment." said Erhard.
The shopkeeper left the counter and wandered around a bit, before finally returning with a pile of weapons from various sections of the shop.
"So, kiddo. Do you have a preference for any particular weapon type?" asked Erhard.
"Not really." admitted Naofumi, never used a weapon before, "I've never actually held a real weapon before in my life."
"In that case, I'd recommend a sword made for novices." Erhard informed him. He lined up a selection of swords on the counter in front of the Shield Hero.
"All of these come with a coating of Bloodclean already applied." the black man informed the young hero.
"Bloodclean?" asked Naofumi, not knowing what it was.
"It's a special coating that makes blood and gore slide right off the blade, to preserve cutting ability." explained Erhard.
"Woah…" Naofumi was amazed that there was such a thing, but it would be very useful to have. Now that he mentioned it, Naofumi was pretty sure that he'd heard something in his world about blades wearing down after being used to cut meat a lot. So then, basically he was saying these were all swords that never go dull? Amazing…
"From least to most expensive, we've got iron, magic iron, magic steel, and mithril. You might think they're a bit pricey, but I can guarantee their performance." Erhard told the young man.
'Interesting. Did the toughness of the weapon vary by material?' Naofumi thought to himself.
"We've got even better weapons in stock, of course, but these are the ones that fit your budget and level." Erhard explained politely.
Normally in console games, the shops in the first town were full of crap items, but there seemed to be an amazing assortment of products here. This world really was like an online game, wasn't it?
Wait, no, what was he thinking? This wasn't a game, it was reality. It made perfect sense that a weapon shop in the capital of a major country would be well-stocked.
"Maybe… the iron sword?" Naofumi asked, unsure what sword to use.
He gingerly wrapped his fingers around the hilt and picked it up. There was a hefty weight to it like you'd expect from a weapon. Compared to his shield, it was surprisingly heavy. He had to wonder if he really is able to fight monsters with this…
CRACK!
"Ow!"
Suddenly, Naofumi felt a shock like he had been struck by lightning, and the sword snapped out of his hands.
"Oh?"
The shopkeeper and Myne were looking back and forth between him and the sword with looks of wonder on their faces.
"What happened?" asked Myne.
Naofumi bent over and picked up the sword again. It seemed perfectly normal. So then, what was that before? Was it just a fluke?
CRACK!
"Ouch!" He yelped in pain, "What the, what's going on here?"
What the hell? Was the shopkeeper playing a prank or something on him? Naofumi glared at Erhard, but he just shook his head and shrugged. He was clearly just as confused as Naofumi was. Maybe Myne knew what was going on? Naofumi couldn't imagine that she was responsible for this, but she was the only other one here…
"Didn't it just fly out of your hands on its own?" asked Erhard.
Naofumi tried to pick another sword up, but the same thing happened. As Naofumi stared at his palms in disbelief. As he did, a message in bold red writing appeared in his field of vision.
Legendary Weapon Rule Violation: Contact With Unauthorized Weapon
'Wait, what?' Naofumi thought confused, he had no idea what the hell was going on. So quickly pulling up the Help menu and consulted the user's manual. He hoped that something in there about… aha!
A Hero can't fight with anything other than the legendary weapon in his possession.
'Seriously!?' Naofumi thought in disbelieve, 'I can't even use anything to fight except my shield!? What kind of shitty system is this?'
"Umm… sorry, but apparently this shield is the only weapon I'm allowed to have." Naofumi raised my head and smiled bitterly.
"Really? Could I have a look at it?" asked the shopkeeper.
Since Naofumi couldn't take the shield off, he held out his entire shield arm for the shopkeeper. Naofumi felt a little silly, but there was no way around it. As he put his shield out, the black man muttered something under his breath, and a small ball of light flew toward Naofumi's shield and burst apart.
"Hmm. How does that work?" Erhard asked mainly to himself as he examined the shield, after a few seconds of doing so, he said, "At first glance, it's just a normal small shield. Are you able to take this shield off?"
"No, although I'm able to move it around my body." Naofumi informed the storekeeper.
"Hmm, interesting," Erhard said thoughtfully, before he told the young hero, "I have to say that there's something strange about it…"
"Ah, how can you tell?" asked Naofumi. He was painfully aware that it was just a small shield. Even if the status magic said so. (Though, it did have the designation "Legendary Weapon" attached.)
"See this jewel fixed in the centre here?" asked Erhard as he pointed at the jewel, "I can feel powerful energy radiating from it. I tried examining it with appraisal magic, but I wasn't able to see much. Even though there shouldn't be a type of magic I can't identify…" The shopkeeper gazed at him and thoughtfully stroked his trademark beard. "It really is interesting… ahem. Anyway, if weapons are out, let's see about getting you some protective gear."
"Yeah, okay. That sounds good." said Naofumi, even if he can't use a weapon, he still had a few ideas gaining attack power. But first he should get some armour, so it would be harder for someone to defeat him.
"Let's see… you already have a shield so there's no need to worry about that." Erhard told him, "And since there's no point in splitting your budget between weapons and armour anymore, you should be able to afford something pretty nice."
"Let's see… you already have a shield so there's no need to worry about that -" Erhard began, but before he could say more, the blacksmith was cut off by Naofumi.
"Actually, I would like to see more of your shields," explained the young Shield Hero, as he walked over to one of the shields on display, "whilst I might not be high enough in my levels, but I want to see what shield are out there and what I can get once I get stronger."
"Understandable." said the blacksmith, he had seen many people who have done the same thing, looking at his gear to see what stats they needed to get before they were able to get better gear.
Now as Naofumi picked up one of the shields and touched it, hoping that what the other Heroes told him was true. Thankfully it was true, as the moment that he touched an Iron Shield, a notice appeared in front of him.
Weapon Copy Activated!
You have unlocked the Iron Shield
You have unlocked the Red Iron Shield.
You have unlocked the Blue Iron Shield.
You have unlocked the Green Iron Shield.
There were a few other colours for the Iron Shield. He didn't understand why there were different coloured shields, but then again, he knew that there were some people who like to colour their weapons and equipment. He never understood it himself, but he believed that its each to their own, but he wouldn't be using this.
'So it did work,' Naofumi thought, 'I'll check this out later.' He knew that to some it would be like he was stealing the shield, but he didn't really think it like that. He thought it was like he was only copying the shields, he wasn't taking them from the shops so that the shopkeeper wasn't able to sell them. The reason he didn't want to show this skill off, was that the shopkeeper wouldn't think it like that and want him to pay or thought he was stealing from him. He might not even give him a discount. So Naofumi thought it was best to keep it to himself. It's not like he owed the man anything.
So pretending to check each shield, Naofumi copied various shields, such as the Magic Silver Shield, Heavy Shield, Iron Shell Shield, Magic Shield, and so on…
When he got the Iron Shell Shield, he had to wonder what was the difference between the Iron Shield and Iron Shell Shield? Magic Shield seems to be a shield that can convert magical power into the shield. Naofumi heard of this before, but is the shield an item that is considered a weapon after all? It's naturally being sold at a weapon store. Naofumi wasn't complaining since he was copying the shields. The Shield Hero found that some of these shields had colour variations… it seems people that the people of this world love to alter the colour of their equipment. Naofumi had to question the usefulness of such a system.
Just then he picked up a shield that got his interest, it was called the Iron Meteorite Shield, it was a four-foot black shield with what looked like a shooting star on it. It gave off a strange atmosphere, a hidden power. Even though the shield stats was ten in defence, Naofumi could tell there was more to this shield than meets the eye.
Iron Meteorite Shield.
Requirements:
Level 20.
Equip Bonus:
Meteor Shield.
"What can you tell me about this shield?" asked Naofumi, "Whilst I can't use it until I'm level twenty and it only has ten defence power, I can tell there's more to this shield. It has an ability called Meteor Shield."
"It's a prototype of the iron meteorite series, it along with a few other items are display products from Zeltbull." the old man informed him.
"So why do you have it?" asked Naofumi.
"Part of a deal that I and a few others have with Zeltbull," explained Erhard, "we display these items for him, giving him feedback and such from the items and we get a discount from some of his other products. To be honest, I have no idea what the ability is, I wasn't told."
Naofumi nodded at this, whilst he was at college they were taught that sometimes if you want to get things from another company for a good price, you would have to make deals with them. It would seem that this was one such deal. It would be interesting to see what this ability was once he got to the high enough level to use it.
"Well, there are a few interesting shields I might buy once I have the money and level to do so," Naofumi lied to the man, "Now if you don't mind, do you have any decent armour for someone at level one?"
"Yeah, this armour here." Erhard told him as he walked over to a display dummy, it was a chain mail, "This is a nice set of entry-level chain mail, it allows you some defence whilst allowing you to move with ease.
Naofumi walked over to the armour he had recommended and placed his hand on it. The countless chain links jangled and swayed. He wondered what it's defensive abilities were like when a screen popped up…
Chain Mail - Level 1:
Stats:
Up +5
+5
Special Ability:
Slash Resist 5%
Slots:
Two Empty Slots.
'Hmm, not too bad for a starting armour.' Naofumi thought to himself, sure he would have liked something better, but he was only level one. So he couldn't expect much in stats for such a low level. He did remember for his time in gaming that this type of defence was better than most, as normally a person would be lucky to get something over three points in defence in their starting armour.
"How much does it cost?" Myne addressed the shopkeeper.
"For you? As a hero discount, I'll knock it down to a hundred and twenty silver coins." Erhard told the young lady.
"Are you kidding me?" Naofumi asked in shock at the cost, "Sure I don't know much about the money in this world, but even I can tell that is a little too much."
"For a normal piece of armour you would be right," admitted the older man, "but this isn't a normal piece of armour. No, this armour has slots in it."
"What's so special about these slots?" asked Naofumi. Sure he expected it was the same in his world, you would find some sort of gem with powers in it and if you place it in armour, it would power up the armour. But he wanted to make sure it was the same here.
"There are magical gems that can give you extra abilities," explained the blacksmith, "like giving you the ability to lockpick if you couldn't before, or you might have element defence or attack added if you add the right gem to the armour or weapon. But the thing is, to add gems to the armour or weapon, you need slots, you just can't add them. Slots are specially made so that you can add these gems, and no normal slots can be used, magic and special martial are used so the gems could be used."
Here Naofumi nodded in understanding, so slots were just like in the games back in his world. But, unlike in his world where you don't need anything special for slots, here, you need special made slots where magic and special martial are needed. So he could understand why the cost was more than normal, as whilst magic could be free, he had no idea how much this special martial cost nor the time it takes to make the slots in the items.
"How much for buybacks?" Myne asked, whilst the Shield Hero was thinking this over.
"Hmm? Well, I guess if you brought it back in good shape, I'd be willing to pay a hundred silver coins for it." explained Erhard.
"What's going on?" asked Naofumi, as his mind got back to the present.
"Oh, Sir Shield Hero. I was just asking him how much we could make back on this armour once you outgrow it." explained Myne.
Naofumi found it strange, why would Myne call him Shield Hero, when before leaving the castle, she was willing to call the other heroes by their names. Maybe it was that damn rumour that was going around, maybe it was making her uneasy calling him by his name. He'll have to talk to her about this later on about it, with luck he can get her to call him by his name later on.
Either way, what she was doing made a lot of sense. Right now he was only level one, but as he grew stronger it stood to reason that he would be able to equip more powerful equipment as well. This chain mail was just the best thing he could equip at the moment for his level.
"Okay, I'll take it." Naofumi told the storekeeper, but then a thought came to him. Remembering the icon that popped up, he remembered about the games he played before, where other than body armour give them stats too. Maybe if he can't use weapons, he could use his martial arts to defend himself and maybe get gear to help him get offence strength. So he asked, "I was wondering, do you have some gloves and boots to go with this armour?"
"Yeah I believe I do, I'll be back in a few minutes with them." Erhard informed the Shield Hero as he went to the backroom of the shop and come back a few minutes later with boots and fingerless chain gloves.
With these items in front of them, he placed his hand on the boots first, where the icon popped up again:
Chain Boots - Level 1:
Stats:
Up +5
Agility Up +2
Speed Up 5%
After this, he placed his hand on the gloves next, and again the icon popped up:
Chain Gloves - Level 1:
Stats:
Defence Up +4
+3
Special Ability:
Critical Chance 3%
Naofumi couldn't help but to opp with joy in seeing that his attack going up. Sure it wasn't by much and there were no slots to them, but still, it was something. At least he knew that if he wanted to gain more attack up, he would have to find equipment that had attack power. "I'll take them." Naofumi told the shopkeeper.
"Wonderful! So with the Chain Mail, that'll be one hundred and sixty silver coins and I'll even throw in the innerwear for free!"
The shopkeeper's generosity rendered Naofumi speechless. With a smile, Naofumi handed over the one hundred and sixty silver coins for the items. Sure it cost him more than he had hoped for, but he didn't know the cost was in the world so it could have been cheap and b, one of his items give him extra attack points - something he really needed. Sure it wasn't much, but it was something and it was something he was willing to pay more for. When he had more time and money, he would go out and look for more equipment with attack points.
"Would you like to wear it out?" asked Erhard.
"Sure." Naofumi informed the man, not seeing why he shouldn't wear it now. In fact, seeing that he was going out to level out soon, it was best to do so now.
"Okay then, right this way." Erhard told him as Naofumi was guided to a room at the back of the shop, where he changed into the innerwear and then his armour. Naofumi put my original clothes into a bag that Erhard gave him.
"Gahaha, it's not much, but you definitely look a little sturdier now!" Erhard said with a smirk.
"Thank… you?" Naofumi thanked the man, unsure how to comment to that, he was pretty sure that was supposed to be a compliment. But he couldn't tell with him, so he took it as one either way.
"Well then, Sir Shield Hero. Shall we head out into the field?" asked Myne.
"Not right now no," Naofumi informed the red head thoughtfully, "this was just the first stop of the day, seeing how I needed to get some armour, now I need to get some potions and a few other things. I also want to get some materials, as the Shield has the ability to absorb minerals and other things into it, where it can create new shields. So I was hoping to unlock some more shields, ones that give me some attack points. So I want to head to the Alchemy Shop… I believe that's what you call it here in this kind of era, then maybe if there's a church around I'll go there next to see if I can get some holy water if I can get some."
"You would be able to get some holy water, most start from around five silver coins to one gold coin," explained Myne, "if you want the best holy water, then you would need the high-quality holy water worth one gold coin."
"And how much is one gold coin?" asked Naofumi.
"One gold coin equals one hundred silver coins." Myne informed the Shielder.
'Damn,' the young man thought to himself, with a sigh, 'if I want the best I need the high-quality holy water. But I can't afford it right now.'
"Fine, I get it another day. Not like I need it right now." Naofumi said with a sigh.
"Anyway, let me show you to the Alchemist Store." said Myne, but thought to herself, 'Thank god, that was a close one.' She didn't want them to go, as if they did, there might have been someone who would reveal who she really was and she didn't want that right now.
The first thing he bought at the Alchemist Store was a set of basic tools in potion making, which he promptly fed to his shield. After a few items, a new shield appeared: the Alchemy Shield. It was shaped like a large old looking book, with a Mortar and Pestle on the front. It unlocked the Alchemist series, which would presumably grant similar skills.
The Alchemy Shield…
Equipment Bonus:
Pharmacy Creation. (Unmastered.)
Potion Correction- Small. (Unmastered.)
Special Effect:
Keeps a list of Recipes of known potions created.
Medicine: Area of Effect - Small
Looking around the Alchemy Shield symbol, he saw that there were other shields connected to this one, a series of shields. Each of the linking shields would make the series stronger. Two such shields were Petit Medicine Shield and Petit Poison Shield, one would raise medicine's effects, whilst the other shield would give small resistance in poison
When he saw Equip Bonus and Special Abilities, he remembered that this wasn't the first time that he saw these he saw them on the Tantric Shield. This got him interested and so he checked his Help Menu to learn more about it:
Weapon Transformation and Mastery:
Weapon Transformation refers to your Legendary Weapon's ability to change form.
To activate this transformation, simply hold your hand over it, and think of the name of the weapon you wish to use.
Using weapons increases their mastery, and fully mastered weapons grant permanent bonuses.
The shield can be mastered by either using its skills or just having it equipped for a certain amount of time.
Equip Bonus:
Equip Bonus refers to the special abilities conferred by equipping different weapons.
For example, when a weapon with the Equip Bonus "Air Strike Bash" is equipped, the skill "Air Strike Bash" can be used.
Likewise, a weapon with the Equip Bonus "Attack +3" will have three points added onto its attack score.
Special Effect:
An exclusive effect that will only be used when equipped with a specific weapon.
The effect won't be usable by other weapons even if its true powers have been unsealed. Therefore, one will need to fit a specific weapon into a slot for this special ability to take effect.
Naofumi found it interesting, with the equip bonuses, when you first got the skill, you would only be able to use it with that shield for a while. But once you master it, either by using the skills or having it equipped for a certain amount of time. The young Shield Hero had to wonder which of these methods would master the shield the fastest, he also wondered if there are other ways to master the shields faster, he would have to look into this later on.
After buying another basic Alchemy Tools, they also brought a few herbs, which when fed to the shield unlocked another shield useful shield, Leaf Shield. It had a Gathering Correction Skill Lv 1, form his knowledge from the games back home, this skill should make any herbs that he picks up into better quality herbs.
Naofumi noticed that the skill had Lv 1 next to it, so he figured that it could be levelled up and increase in power somehow. Naofumi believed that if there was such a skill for Herb Gathering, there had to be one for Mineral Gathering too. If he was able to get both of these, it would make his life much easier. As he could find low-level herbs and minerals and with this ability, increase them to good or legendary status increasing how much money he would make from them and how potent they were.
After leaving getting some of their medical needs, Naofumi went to a general store in the hope of getting some wooden spikes. He believed that if he couldn't use weapons, he would try and set up another way to fight, by setting up traps or throwing enemies into the spikes. Whilst in the store, he brought two other things that created two new useful skills, nails and magnifying glass: Spiked Iron Shield and Appraisal Shield.
Spiked Iron Shield…
Requirements:
Level 5.
Equipment Bonus:
Attack: 2 (Unmastered.)
Defence: 4 (Unmastered.)
Special Effect:
Counter Attack
When Naofumi saw this, he was glad that he had more attack points to come, but the problem was that he had to wait until he was level five. Whilst it wasn't too bad, he wished he had it sooner, as he believed it would help him. Oh well, he just had to work harder to get to level five. The shield was a round medium-sized Iron shield, with two-inch spikes covering the shield.
Appraisal Shield - Lv 1…
Equipment Bonus:
5% Change of Rare Item Drop on Appraised Monsters (Unmastered.)
Plus 10% Defence against Appraised Monsters (Unmastered.)
Plus 10% magical Defence against Appraised Magical Monsters (Unmastered.)
Plus 5% Attack against Appraised Monsters (Unmastered.)
Plus 5% Magical Attack against Appraised Monsters (Unmastered.)
Special Effect:
Appraisal
This one was like the Alchemy Shield, where it was in the form of a book, it was a dark red book with a magnifying glass on the front of it. Naofumi knew that at first it wasn't that strong as a shield, but knew that once he gets the monsters appraised his attack and defence would go up a bit. Sure not but much, but at least he would get more attack power when facing the same monsters over and over again. Although Naofumi didn't think it would be that easy, in some of the games that he knew back in his world, you would have to appraise so many monsters before you would get the bonus attack and defence. He knew he would have to look into this once he faced his first monster here to see if it was true here.
Whilst the other shields that he gained had some good effects, the last two shields were better, as they had attack points to them. Something he really needed if he was going to survive in this world. Then again, knowing his luck, even with this new attack points, it wasn't going to be that easy. Either way, with his shopping down for the day though, spending about twenty silver coins, Naofumi decided that it was time to level up.
As he went to the fields with Myne, he was shocked to see that she seemed to be worried about something. When he asked about it though, Myne told him it was nothing. Whilst he let it go for now, it didn't settle the uneasy feeling he had in his gut about her. His gut was telling him that she didn't want him to become stronger, but he couldn't figure out why. Why would someone want another person staying weak? None of this made sense, so he decided to leave it for now, so that he could level up. He would figure it out, later on, for now he needs to level up.
o0OoO0o
Once Naofumi and Myne were outside of Castle Town, this was Naofumi first sight of outside the town, there were grassy plains extended far as the eye could see. There was a stone road (of sorts) leading off into the distance, but aside from that, there wasn't so much as a trace of human civilization to be found.
The last time Naofumi had seen anything like this, was when he went on a trip to Hokkaido, but even that paled in comparison to this endless blue sky, this sea of green that stretched all the way to the horizon. The only thing that kept him from running around and frolicking to his heart's content was the knowledge that if anybody saw him doing it, his stock as a hero would plummet even further than it already had.
"Just a minute, Sir Shield Hero." Myne called out to the young Shield Hero, "This area is home to many weak monsters. We should use this as an opportunity to warm up before things get tougher."
"Sounds good to me! This'll be my first time in a real fight, so let's do our best!" Naofumi told her, he also wanted to see what his strength was like against something weak. If he wasn't able to defeat them easily, he would level up before facing something tougher, as he really didn't want to die a few days of coming to this world. Then a thought occurred to him, so he asked Myne, "And please, call me Naofumi, it feels strange you calling me Naofumi."
"Yes. Please do your best." Myne informed Naofumi, "And I'll try to use your name Sir Shield Hero." Naofumi hoped that she would, as it would get awkward will fast if she couldn't.
"Wait. Are you saying you're not going to help?" Naofumi suddenly, wondering why she would do this.
"I will." Myne told him, "But before that, I thought it would be good if we figure out how strong you are on your own. The monsters around here are the weakest in the kingdom, so you should be fine around here."
"Oh… I guess that makes sense." Naofumi admitted.
As Naofumi thought about it, Myne was probably already fairly experienced, as the king said, he was giving the heroes companions who were the best that his kingdom had. So she would be a few levels ahead of him, so she would more than likely be able to deal with them with ease. Him on the other hand, he had no idea what he was even capable of. If she thought the monsters here were safe for me to start with, he would trust her judgment. If they were weak, he could see how the extra three attack points would affect his fighting ability.
They plodded through the plains for a while, until eventually, they stumbled across a conspicuously orange balloon-like… something.
"Ah, there's one now. An Orange Balloon, by the looks of it. Be careful, Sir Shield Hero… whilst it's the weakest here, they attack in groups and are extremely aggressive." Myne told the hero.
What was with that naming sense? It looked like an orange balloon, so it was called an Orange Balloon? Naofumi almost felt sorry for the thing.
"Grah!"
Naofumi could practically feel the hostility emanating from its ferocious growls and two vicious little eyes. The instant it noticed his presence, it charged right at him. As it did, five other Orange Balloons appeared and joined in the fight.
"Good luck, Sir Shield Hero!" Myne wished him luck.
"Alright!" Naofumi told her.
The first thing that Naofumi did was to summon his Appraisal Shield, so that he could appraise them and find their stats. It was a pain, the shield was a book and only had low stats, two in defence. But if he wanted to master the shield bonus skills so that he could use them whenever he wanted, he would have to use it often for now.
"Appraisal!" Naofumi called out as he threw the monsters off him, once he called the ability out, a red magnifying glass came out of the shield and hit the monsters. As it did, a screen appeared:
Orange Balloons…
Level:
2 - 4
HP:
10 - 20
Attack:
1 - 3
defence:
4 - 6
They were basic stats, but for a shield that was at level one, but still whilst the attack wouldn't be a problem for him, the defence would be. As he only had four points in attack, so it would be hard for him to defeat these guys without a weapon. Sure he got a plan, but he wanted to see how long it would take him to defeat them with his fests, that way he could plan how to train himself.
In the first few moments, he realized that while he knew that he was going to have problems in defeating them, he didn't realize it would be this hard. The damn things were faster than he expected, he wasn't able to catch one to pin them down so he could hit them. "Dammit, this is harder than I first thought!" Naofumi grunted with his hands on his knees, breathing heavily. "Whilst these things don't hurt at all, they're too fast for me to catch them!"
Naofumi thought this would be his chance to shine, showing them he was more than the Shield and what the rumours said about him. But it wasn't to be, as he tried to catch his breath while several balloons decided to gnaw on his limbs. He didn't feel anything besides a small pressure on his body, so he completely ignored them. His HP wasn't decreasing either thanks to his defences, so they were effectively harmless to him. It almost felt like a faint barrier was being emitted by his shield and protecting him.
"Here take this, it'll help with regaining your stamina." Myne told the Shield Hero as she stood under a tree nearby, as she gave him what looked like a potion.
Taking it, Naofumi drank the potion and indeed his stamina seemed to return to him, as he began to breathe normally again. In thanks, he said, "Thanks Myne I needed that."
"No problem Sir Shield Hero." Myne waved it off before she went on to say, "Listen, whilst your defence stat is high so that none of the low levelled monsters are unable to hurt you, with the way you are fighting you won't be able to do much." Here Naofumi went red in shame at this, not liking that he wasn't able to capture one of the weakest of the monsters here. But Myne seemed to just smile at this, as instead, she said, "Because of this, they make perfect practice targets. You need to learn to anticipate their attacks and defend yourself from them. Focus less on killing them and more on not getting hit." Myne instructed.
Nodding his head, Naofumi got back to work first by throwing the attached balloons off of himself. Here he did as instructed and anticipate their attacks and defend himself. It reminded Naofumi of his training back in his world when he was doing his martial arts training when he had to predict his opponent's movement, he felt foolish in forgetting something so simple, he was embarrassed at the fact. Either way, with them being so fast and that they bounced around a lot, it took about half an hour to be able to evade the attacks, at which point he was able to get his first few hits in on one of the damn Orange Balloons.
*smash*
*boing*
The spot he hit popped back up as if nothing had happened. It was surprisingly elastic! Might have been one of its special abilities, one that was preventing him from using his fest to defeat it. He had been sure it would burst immediately… especially with the extra attack points that he gained. They were after all the weakest of the monsters, they only had between four to six points in defence. It had to be some sort of ability that was preventing him from popping them like the balloons that they were.
It took him a few moments before he realized something, they were leather balloon enemies, meaning that for normal adventurers who can use weapons they would have an easier time than someone who had to use blunt force. It's like basically hitting a volleyball, it will just bounce back until he wears them out or until he hits it hard enough.
The Orange Balloon snarled and snapped its teeth at him as the other Orange Balloon attack him.
"Woah!"
*clang*
It made a solid-sounding noise, but he ignored it. Even though it and the other Orange Balloons were gnawing on different parts of his body, although they won't having any effect at all on him.
He looked at Myne without saying anything.
"You can do it!" she told him.
'Can I though?' thought Naofumi he wasn't sure that he could. Whilst he was able to evade most of the attacks and wasn't taking any damage if he was hit, wasn't dealing any either. He hadn't set up any of his traps yet, as he wanted to see if he was able to defeat them without any traps and such. He knew that he had to change his strategy.
"ORA ORA ORA ORA ORA!"
So instead of trying to hit them with his shield, he started to use his martial arts skills and pummeled the Orange Balloons with his fists and feet hoping to hit their weak points. He knew that he had to put in some strength into his hits, in the hopes to get a critical hit. Then after three minutes, there was a pop. At long last, one of the damn things finally split open and after a short while later, all six were done for.
"Haa… haa… haa…"
He heard a ping, and a message saying he had gained one EXP appeared.
'Damn it, all that damn work and all I got was six damn EXP for the six of them.' Naofumi thought darkly, he couldn't believe it, all that work and nothing to show for it…
It didn't bode well. For these guys to be the weakest of all the monsters in this world, they were way tougher than Naofumi first thought they would be. Naofumi knew that there was a limit to what he could do with his bare hands, but he knew that he couldn't use any normal weapons. If these balloon creatures were the weakest of the monsters here, then he had to find not only other ways to get attack points but also other ways to fight and defeat these monsters.
"Good job, Sir Shield Hero." Myne was clapping, but Naofumi realized it seemed a little forced.
Just then, Naofumi noticed the sound of footsteps somewhere in the distance slowly growing louder. He turned his head to see what it was and saw Renka and her followers trotting along at a brisk pace. He briefly considered calling out a greeting, but Naofumi didn't have the nerve to disturb people running with such serious expressions.
Suddenly, five Orange Balloons appeared in front of them.
*slash*
Without hesitation, Renka drew an arc with her sword, popping them one after the other.
'She took them all out with one strike!?' Naofumi thought to himself in shock, 'so that's the major difference between my attack power and hers!?'
"…"
Myne waved her hand in front of Naofumi's face to snap him out of his daze. "Don't worry about it so much. Every Hero has their own way of fighting, that's all."
"…Thanks, Myne." Naofumi thanked her, sure he wasn't sure if he really could trust her, but he was thankful for her words just then.
'That's right,' thought Naofumi, 'I had just been used as a chew toy for a few minutes without getting so much as a scratch. My defence score is actually pretty high, I just have to find another way to fight. Ways that don't need the conventional kind of weapons, maybe I could use potions like in some of the games back in my world somehow. Or I can look into magic, whilst not high, I do have a decent magical attack points, so I could try my hand in using magical attack. I'll need to look into this later.'
With his spirits rising a bit and a plan for the future, Naofumi stooped down and picked up the remains of the Orange Balloon that he defeated.
Naofumi slowly brought the balloon scraps towards his shield. The instant he touched them together, like many other times that day, a faint light glimmered and the orange, rubbery material was sucked into the shield's jewel.
Orange Balloon's Balloon Scraps Acquired
Naofumi noticed that the Weapon Book icon had lit up. As he opened it up, he saw that one of the shield icons had lit up, this one was the 'Orange Small Shield.'. It was still locked, though - apparently he needed to gather more materials before he could actually use it.
After finding this, he went into the bestiary icon to see about the Orange Balloons, hoping to find more info about them and how to defeat them. Sadly, it was as he expected there wasn't much about them. He wasn't too surprised to be honest, he expected that once the Appraisal Shield had gotten to a higher level, more info would come. Either that, or he had to wait for the appraisal icon for the monster to get to 100%. It was like he expected, before he could gain the Equipment Bonus, he would first have to get the appraisal bar for that monster to 100%. At the moment, after defeating the six balloons, it was at 12%, he had a lot of work to do before he could gain the bonus from the Appraisal Shield.
Sadly for now, he had other problems to deal with, levelling up and mastering some of his shields so that he could gain the bonuses from them.
Now it was time to see if his plan to set up traps would work, as if he was able to set up spike traps and throw the balloons into them and defeating them by doing so, he could work on other traps to defeat other monsters. Oh, he knew that he couldn't do it for all monsters, seeing how powerful most will be, but if could lower some of the higher levels so that his companions would have an easier time to defeat them.
So he began to set up the wooden spikes. But as he did so, a thought occurred to him, what if instead of feeding the Orange Balloon's Scraps into his shield, what if he could sell them. So hoping to find a way to earn more money, Naofumi asked,"Are those balloon scraps worth anything?"
"Sadly no, you would be lucky to get a single copper coin for them."
"…And how many copper coins are in a silver coin?" ask Naofumi.
"Like with the silver to gold, a hundred." Myne explained to the Shield Hero.
'Oh, well. I didn't really expect it to sell for much anyway.' Naofumi thought with a sigh.
"So what level are you by the way Myne?" asked Naofumi, wondering if he suspicions were right, that she was a high level than he was. "Also, what are you skilled in?"
"I'm a level five and I'm skilled in swordplay and I can use fire magic." explained Myne, seeing no real reason to hide her skills from the Shield Hero. It wasn't like he could do anything to her,
"So these small fries won't be any problem to you?" asked Naofumi.
"Not really no." explained Myne, when two more Orange Balloons had approached them as they were speaking. However, Myne drew her blade and struck them down with two swifts, elegant cuts. They didn't even last a second. "As you can see, they don't last long for me. But this is a good place for you to level up before you have to face any tougher monsters." Then seeing that Naofumi had finished placing the spikes about, she asked him, "What are you planning to do with those spikes?"
Sighed, he was right, these balloons were nothing for her, it also should how weak he, or rather, this shield - really was. So he needed something else if he wanted to level up, as if he wasn't able to hold weapons, he had to use the environment around him to defeat the monsters. Like setting up traps and such and use it against them to defeat them.
"Well seeing how I can't use normal weapons, I want to see if I can use the environment around me." explained Naofumi, "See if I'm able to use traps and such to defeat the monsters around here. I know that I might not be able to defeat high level monsters, but I could weaken them or at the very least destrate or slow them down, allowing you to defeat them instead."
"That's not a bad idea." admitted Myne, where for a split few seconds, she had a worried and concerned look on her face. She had plans for the Shield Hero, one that she was now rethinking about. She hoped that this Hero was like most adventures in her world, those who thought within the box and and fought monsters head on. Instead he was thinking like someone within the Hunters Guild, who hunt the powerful monsters that cause problems for villages and towns, those who thought outside the box. Those were the ones that she try and stay away from, as they thought about their actions and react differently to what they faced. No, she knew she had to watch the Shielder carefully and see how to change her plans for him.
What she didn't know was that whilst her worried and concerned look was only on her face for a few seconds, Naofumi saw it and was concerned himself. He suspected something was up, but with no proof that she was up to anything, he couldn't do much about it. As right now, he needed her more than he would have liked, all he knew was that he had to be more careful around her.
"But how are you going to bring the monsters to you?" asked Myne as she thought about it, "It's not like they'll appear here all the time, unless you are willing to wait around her. And it would be a waste of stamina finding them and making them chase after us to this point."
Naofumi had to admit that she was right, not only would it be a waste of stamina, but time too, he had to think about this. That's when he remembered the shield that he unlocked last night, the Tantric Shield. It Special Effect was, Pheromones. He just remembered from his science class that some animals use Pheromones to not only mates, but prey too. It was so that they wouldn't have to go far to hunt, as their prey would come to them. Hoping that this idea would work, he summoned the shield to use it.
As he summoned it, Myne was shocked upon seeing it, as it wasn't one of the shields that was created that day. So she had to ask, "When did you get that shield Sir Hero?"
"Last night," admitted Naofumi, "I was playing around with my shield last night when I unlocked this one. Until now, I wasn't able to test it out, but it has a Special Effect known as Pheromones. So I think you should stand behind me, in fact, I would say you should move back to the tree. As this shield could affect you too."
Myne was all too happy about moving away from him, she knew all too well what pheromones were, as some adventures came across this skill before. In fact, when she first started adventuring herself, she snake away for her guards and team. Her team meant to be searching a dungeon for an important artefact that was meant to be there, but she wanted it for herself. But she was caught by a monster with this skill, if it wasn't for her party, she would have been a monster's plaything before it killed her. She pretended that she got lost and that's why she got caught.
Not only did she know about pheromones because of getting caught by the skill from the monster, but she uses a potion based pheromones for her own needs. After getting caught by it, she realized how useful it was, she found if made into a potion and given to a person, they would be willing to do whatever she wanted. But that's as long as she made sure that she kept giving them the potion, they would be able to make them do whatever she wanted. As she got behind the tree and smiled wickedly at the foolish Shield hero at showing her this specific Shield.
As Naofumi used his sex shield's special abilitiy, ten Balloon monsters appeared, Orange, Yellon and Red Balloon monsters from different levels - from the Appraisal Shield, the red ones being the strongest of the three. In fact, when he used his shield to summon them, their behaviour seemed to be different, more aggressive. They in fact had Aggressive added to their name, and their attack and defence went up a bit, along with being faster. But it wasn't anything that Naofumi couldn't handle thanks to being the Shielder. These were a bit tougher and faster than the original Orange Balloons, but it meant that Naofumi could learn to anticipate and evade their attacks too.
As Naofumi hoped, as he threw the Balloon Master onto the wooden spike, they popped as the spike went through them. The Shield Hero had hoped that with two different versions of the Balloons appearing, he would gain more exp, but it wasn't the case. In ten minutes of defeating the Balloons, he only gained ten EXP. Naofumi was somewhat shocked, he thought that as Aggressive Balloons, they would have more EXP, but it wasn't the case here.
Naofumi did this trick until his EXP was up to thirty-five points, at which point Myne called out for him to stop. She informed him that if they were going to be allies, they had to begin to learn to fight together. As much as Naofumi would have waited to level up to level two before doing so, he didn't see any problems with the idea. He could level up as they fought together.
So the two of them they walked through the plains until the sun had nearly set, slaying every Balloon they encountered. Apparently, they came in a variety of colours, since aside from the standard Orange Balloons they ended up fighting a few Yellow Balloons even a few more Red Balloons, too. Being the normal versions of the Balloons, they were easier to deal with.
By the end of the day though, Naofumi was able to collect many balloon scraps from both the Orange, Yellow and Red Balloons, something he was hoping to sell when he had the time. Not only that, but he was able to gain another fifteen EXP by finishing off some of the Balloons that Myne weakened for him. Not only that, but he also gained 2% in his Accuracy and 5% in his Evading Skills, something he didn't know about. But at the time didn't have the time to look it up yet
"There are stronger monsters up ahead, but we should probably head back to the castle before it gets dark." said Myne seeing the sun setting.
"Aww, but I wanted to keep fighting some more…" Naofumi admitted since he wasn't taking any damage, defending against the Balloons' attacks was really easy. He felt like he could keep going all day. "I only have ten EXP to gain before I can level up."
"I understand your feelings, Sir Shield Hero," Myne told him, "but it is said that at night, more tougher monster appear here. Not only that, but I was hoping we could visit the weapon shop again before they close. If you buy me better equipment, we will easily be able to progress much further than this tomorrow."
"…I guess I can't argue when you put it like that." Naofumi somewhat agreed with her.
But Naofumi had to wonder if it was really okay to stop here when he was so close to levelling up? Naofumi had already fulfilled the material conditions for the Orange, Yellow and Red small shields, so all he had to do now was to gain a little bit more experience and he would be able to use them.
Although he had collected enough balloon scraps to fulfil the conditions to unlock the shields, he kept collecting them. They might only be worth a single copper coin each, but hey, money was money!
Because he needed Myne to be at her strongest, she got her way and they paused our adventure midway to return to town.
o0OoO0o
By the time they got back to the castle town, it was already evening. They headed straight for the weapons shop.
"Ah, if it isn't the shield kiddo. You know, the other Heroes stopped by after you left." Erhard told the Shield Hero.
'So everybody ended up outfitting themselves at this shop, huh?' Naofumi thought to himself, 'No wonder the shopkeeper looked so pleased with himself.'
"I see. Say, you wouldn't be willing to buy these, would you?" asked Naofumi, as he showed him the scraps that he had scavenged from the Balloons they hunted today, but he just waved toward the door indifferently.
"There's a shop around here that specializes in buying and selling materials from monsters." Erhard informed the young man, "I'm sure they'd be willing to take them off your hands."
"Thanks."
"No problem. So, do you need anything else?"
"Yes. I wanted to buy some equipment for my companion, here." Naofumi informed him.
Naofumi looked around the store for Myne and found her staring intently at the equipment on display.
"What's your budget this time?"
Naofumi knew he had seven hundred and twenty silver coins left, and he thought as he looked around the store, 'What's the best way to spend them?' As he thought about it, he realized the best he could do for now was to get her a new sword for now. Especially since that he didn't fully trust her, he had been having doubts about her all day, so until he knew where he stood with her, it was best not to give too much to her yet.
Not only that, but after they have done with their shopping, they needed to have enough left over to get them through the rest of the month and gain new companions and get them equipment too if they needed it, Naofumi had no idea how much that was going to cost them. "I say no more than two hundred silver coins, enough for a sword. I need the rest for the remainder of the month, the other is I need to get new companions."
"Equipment for your companion, huh?" Erhard said thoughtfully, admiring the young man's foresight, "Well, it will definitely make her stronger..."
"That's the hope and when we get more money, I can get her better armour." explained the Shield Hero, "Unless you're willing to give a discount for one price of armour."
"But, Sir Hero, I mean Lord Naofumi, can't you get me a good set of armour today?" asked Myne, hoping that using his name would get her what she wanted, as she went up and personal, trying to be lovey-dovey
"Not unless we can get a decent discount, not today." Naofumi told her as he pushed her away, suspecting what she was up to. "I want to see how much I can get from the Balloon Scraps that we gathered today before we plan to buy things first."
Erhard smiled at this, liking this young man for not having the lady pushing him around, trying to trick him into something he didn't want. There won't many people like that, seeing there was one in front of him, he said with a smile, "In that case, depending on the sword she gets and what armour she wants, I'm willing to haggle a discount."
So with that Myne went to search for a decent sword and chest armour, she was a bit upset that she couldn't get a full set of armour. After a while searching, she came back with a sword and a metal chest piece, and after some haggling, Naofumi was able to get enough discount to get the price down to two hundred and ten silver coins. Sure it was ten more silver coins than Naofumi planned to payout, but at least it wasn't as bad as it could have been if he allowed Myne a full set of armour.
After buying the sword and armour, Myne thanked him and gently kissed his hand in gratitude.
'Yeah! Affection Points: UP!' Naofumi thought happily, hoping that things were getting better, although part of him was still worried, 'With luck our journey from tomorrow should be more enjoyable!'
At any rate, new equipment in hand, Myne and Naofumi headed to the town's inn.
o0OoO0o
As the two got to the local inn, Naofumi booked them in where he found that the rates were thirty copper coins per person per night. There was an extra eight copper coins for breakfast and dinner for each day, per day, so it would be eight copper coins for that nights nights meal. So with food, it would be normally thirty-eight copper coins day at the inn, which wasn't bad as Naofumi believed it would be.
So he knew that for one person for one month at the inn, it was going to cost him eleven silver and forty copper coins. Which meant that for him and Myne, it would cost twenty-two silver and eighty copper coins for the next month. So that meant with the remaining coins that he had, after paying for the rooms for the two of them, he would have about four hundred and eighty silver coins. This meant that he could only gain one other companion for now, as it was possible that the new companion might need weapons or armour. If they didn't then he might be able to gain another one after them. There could be other ways around this to save coins, but right now he couldn't think of it. Maybe after a good nights rest he might think of something.
After paying for the room for the night, decided that seeing that it was his first night with his companion, they would stop in at the tavern next door for dinner. Where Naofumi decided he would order two of their deluxe specials, which ran six copper coins apiece.
As the two were waiting for the waitress, Naofumi pulled out the map that he had purchased on the way back into town and spread over the table and asked Myne to help him get his bearings.
"This here is the plain we were fighting in today, right?" asked Naofumi as he was making notes about this area's terrain on the map, for future reference. It might have been better to ask Renka or Motoyasu about it, but they won't there right now and Naofumi wanted to plan out the next day now, so he knew where he and Myne was planning to go tomorrow.
"Yes, that's right." acknowledged Myne as she looked at the map.
"And from our conversation earlier, would I be right in thinking this forest here is the next hunting ground after the plains?" ask Naofumi.
The map gave a broad overview of this country's terrain. Basically, there was a vast plain with the castle at its centre. From there, there were roads running toward the forest and mountains, as well as roads that intersected with rivers and villages.
However, since this map was so small, only a few villages near the castle were actually shown. It didn't give any indication of what to expect beyond the forest, either, which was problematic. Without knowing where to go and what kind of monsters would be there, it was impossible to progress.
"Yes. It's not recorded on this map, but our current goal is Raffin Village, which is on the other side of the forest." Myne informed our young hero.
"Hmm..." hummed Naofumi.
"And, just past Raffin there's a dungeon well-suited for novice adventurers." informed Myne.
"A dungeon?" Naofumi asked in concern. Sure, hunting monsters was the basis of online games, but that was aiming too high. He was concerned that his level wasn't high enough to be facing a dungeon right now.
Seeing this concern, Myne said, "You don't have to worry about the dungeon, it is an old and abandoned one, not ones that appear every so often."
"What do you mean by the ones that appear every so often?" asked the Shield Hero.
"Well, there are dungeons that seem to appear every so often, that have great treasures within them." explained Myne, "Some appear in random places at random times for a while, whilst other dungeons appear and stay and over time their treasures stop appearing - these dungeons have all kinds of monsters at different levels. The treasures are from coins to spells and other magical items."
Naofumi found this interesting, so from what he could understand, a dungeon could appear for a short while where an adventure could search the place for the treasure and defeat the monsters to level up. But then there were dungeons that appear and stick around, which have treasure that reappear over time before it stops.
"What do you know about this dungeon?" asked Naofumi.
"It's an abandoned dungeon, with much of its treasure already found, I highly doubt we'll find much of value there now." explained Myne, "However, you can often find low to medium level monsters there, so it's a good place for increasing your level."
"Are you sure it's safe for us?" Naofum asked with concern, "Whilst you might say there's low to medium level monsters there, are you sure witch my level well we be okay?"
"Don't worry! Thanks to you getting me this new sword and with your high defence, it will be an easy victory."
"Haha, thanks." Naofumi laughed, "I just hope that it'll be so easy."
"Think nothing of it." Myne told him as the waitress came to take their order.
After ordering food from the waitress, the two settled into a companionable silence, exchanging a few words about the world and people nearby. Soon enough, their food arrived and Naofumi placed his hands together with his silverware while saying "Thank you for the food".
Myne looked at him with curiosity, as she wondered who is he saying thank you to?
He dove into his meal with gusto, his eyes lit up as he chewed. Swallowing his first bite, he exclaimed "This is incredible! Is all the food in this world this delicious!?" She laughed at his excitement. If nothing else, it was contagious.
"Not everything tastes this good, but this is pretty standard here. The inns in this country have a work union that helps keep the quality fairly high." She answered, slowly eating her own meal.
After several minutes, both of them had finished their meals and it was beginning to get dark.
"I just wanted to say thank you for joining me. I don't know what I would have done all by myself. I probably would have gotten lost getting out of the castle." Naofumi laughed while scratching the back of his head in embarrassment. Myne giggled and placed her hand on his arm affectionately.
"It's no problem! I'll always be here for you, Sir Shield Hero." Her eyes were practically closed from how much she was smiling. Naofumi once again had a gut feeling that something wasn't right, that the way she was acting around him was an act.
But then again, he could be wrong, he was in a new world and so people might act differently than they do in his world. "By the way, that style of fighting that you used early, the punching and kicking, what was that all about?" Myne asked in interest, she didn't see anything like that before in her life. Most adventures she knew used either magic or weapons of some kind, never their feet or/and hands. The only times she saw someone using their fest and feet was in bar fights, or when things got out of hand and fight break out. Even then, she didn't see them using their hands and feet in the way the Shield Hero did.
"Hmm, that's what my world calls martial arts," explained the Shield Hero, "we use it to defend ourselves. With training, one can break wooden blocks, even stone breaks. There are stories that masters of martial arts can use energy called Chi, I believe it is called, to do amazing things and use to strengthen one's body to live for longer. To be honest, though, I don't know much about it."
Myne couldn't believe that the Shield Hero's world had such ability, she heard rumours that other worlds had magic and such, but she never heard of anything known as Chi nor anything about martial arts. She had to wonder though, what was the Shield Hero's ability in this skill. So she asked, "So tell me, what is your skill level in this martial art skill of yours and can you use this Chi?"
"Sadly I only started martial arts in the last few years years, so I'm still considered as a beginner. I could have been more, but to be honest, I only started to learn it to defend myself. I wasn't planning to master the ability." Naofumi informed the red head, as he ate his dinner. "As for Chi, I was years away from learning such ability, and if the stories are true, I would have to master most of the martial arts before I could learn it."
"I see," Myne said thoughtfully as she took a sip of her wine, "it could have been useful for you here if you could have learned it."
"You might be right, but there's nothing I could do now though." Naofumi said with a shrug of his shoulders.
"True," admitted Myne, seeing that he hadn't drunk any of the wine that she gave him, she asked, "aren't you going to drink any wine?" Myne asked. But the way she was asking, Naofumi sensed she was too eager for him to drink it for some reason.
Since this was a tavern, they had brought out alcohol along with the food. However, Naofumi hadn't touched it at all.
"Ah, sorry. I don't really like the stuff."
It wasn't like Naofumi couldn't handle himself. On the contrary, he had such a high tolerance that it was almost impossible for him to get drunk. He just didn't really have an interest in it, that's all. It probably stems back to the times Naofumi went out drinking with friends in college and had to sit there and watch everybody get drunk off their asses whilst he stayed stone-cold sober. It wasn't very fun.
"You know, most men in this world would never in their lifetime refuse a drink from a woman." Myne told the young hero, finding it a bit of an insult that he wouldn't have one drink with her, "Melromarc is a matriarchy, so women generally hold the power in both politics and relationships."
"I understand Myne, but I have personal reasons why I don't drink, at least not anymore." the Shielder informed his companion.
"Not even just one glass?"
"Seriously, I'd rather not." Naofumi told her firmly, "I don't mean to insult you if that's what you're thinking, but the stuff doesn't do anything for me and so I don't see the point of drinking it."
"But..."
"Sorry."
"I see..."
Myne put down the bottle of wine with a disappointed look on her face.
"Anyway, I'm glad we were able to talk about our plans for tomorrow, but I think I'm going to go ahead and turn in early." Naofumi her, the truth was he wanted to think about what to do with her. Whilst she was cute and he would love nothing to be with her for his time here, something about her made him uneasy and he was starting to think that they should part ways before she could do something to him.
"Goodnight, Shield Hero." Myne sounding a bit unhappy.
Naofumi had already finished his meal, so he left the boisterous tavern and returned to his assigned room.
o0OoO0o
Along the way, he brought a few more maps for him to look at, not who that but he had an idea or two he wanted to try out. Once Naofumi was there, he stripped off his chain mail and laid it on the chair.
"..."
Naofumi set down his pouch of silver coins on the desk in the room. This inn required payment in advance, he was glad that he didn't spend so much on Myne early, otherwise, he was unsure about how much he would be down to. That thought alone made him uneasy, as he could have been almost totally broke if he allowed himself to buy her more, and that's something he didn't want right now. He needed every last coin that he had.
As he sat at the desk, he put backpack next to the new maps, before he looked through the maps, trying to make heads and tails of them, so he could at his bearings for future reference. As he was looking through him, he thought about what happened today. A whole lot of things happened that day!
Naofumi knew what it was like to defeat monsters, now, even if it was just popping balloons. His thoughts were racing. He was still shocked that he really was in another world. Just like last night, the excited feeling in his chest wouldn't go away. Sure he didn't have as many companions as the other Heroes, he might have to let go of the one that got, but it might be better that way.
Why keep someone around when you can't trust them, in the long run, that would be more trouble than anything. He could easily find new companions soon enough. And who cares that he wasn't the strongest, as long as he did the best that he could and help those who can.
But thinking about his strength though, there was a nagging feeling he couldn't get rid of. In the few games that he knew of back home when a person was in a party when a companion killed a monster whilst you're in the party, you would get some EXP too. But then again, it could be that this world's system was like one of the other games that he played, where even if you were in a party, you wouldn't gain EXP if your party killed a monster unless you hit them or in his case today, killed them.
Another problem that he had with her was how she was treating him that day, that nagging feeling told him that wasn't the case, that she was hiding something from him. Like why would she call him Shield Hero, when she could easily call the other heroes by their names with ease. There was the fact she was trying to get her a full set of armour when she knew that they need to spread it over time until they recruited new companions, not only that, but she was trying to force him to drink the wine when he didn't want to drink it.
As he stretched his arms out, he knocked his backpack over and some of his paperwork was knocked out. One of the papers was the drawing of the red headed bitch/witch, the one that had notes to say that no matter what, he couldn't trust the whore. For the first time since he got here, he saw the face he wanted to draw for her face, it was none other than Myne's face.
With this new revolution and the way things were going that day, the growing mistrust of the red head, it made his decision to part ways even easier. He would do so the very next morning. Sooner he did so, the faster he would be able to find new companions without worrying she would interfere somehow.
*yawn*
Damn, he was tired, he said before putting the pictures away figuring that he'll figure it out later. but there were a few things he wanted to try before he went to sleep for the night. If his shield was able to absorb everything that he given it today and created a new shield from it, there was another shield he hoped to create - some sort of map shield. Which is why he bought these maps that he got, he wanted to see if it could absorb the maps and if so what would happen to them.
He tried and memorize as much of the city map as he could before he fed the parchment to his shield.
For the first time that day, his shield only absorbed the map and nothing happened; it didn't unlock a new shield-like before. Curious as to why Naofumi unconsciously grabbed the next map and almost fed it to his shield. He glanced at the second map, this one is even easier to memorize than the first. He gulped in some air and did the motion in one flow, feeding more parchment to his shield.
Cartographer's Shield Unlocked
Cartographer's Shield…
Equipment Bonus:
Cartography Proficiency (Unmastered!)
Terrain-Recognition Proficiency (Unmastered!)
Special Effect:
World Map
Naofumi equipped the shield. His shield morphed into something akin to a binder. He opened the cover to find the inside of the shield resembling something like a sci-fi screen from a manga that he had read a while back. It seemed alive, it was showing little details of the areas he had been and coupled it together with the maps he fed the shield. There was even a little dotted trail following the locations of that day.
It would seem that his first idea seemed to work, sure he didn't get any bonus defence or attack points, but now he had an ideal way to keep track of where he was going. Naofumi believed that if he added more maps to the shield and visiting places, the shield would show even more details. This gave him more of a reason to travel the kingdom and other counties, to find unknown landmarks and areas that the maps didn't know about and won't written in.
There was a pin and a screen with an update notice on it, so sceleting it, it reopened the Appraisal Shield.
Appraisal Shield - Lv 1…
Equipment Bonus:
5% Change of Rare Item Drop on Appraised Monster (Unmastered.)
Plus 10% Defence against Appraised Monster (Unmastered.)
Plus 10% magical Defence against Appraised Magical Monster (Unmastered.)
Plus 5% Attack against Appraised Monster (Unmastered.)
Plus 5% Magical Attack against Appraised Monster (Unmastered.)
Special Effect:
Appraisal
Appraised creatures will now be shown on the Cartographer's Shield…
Leaf Shield…
Equipment Bonus:
Gathering Skill 1 (Unmastered)
Special Effect:
Locations of plants that have been appraised will now be shown on the Cartographer's Shield…
Sharpening Shield…
Equipment Bonus:
Mineral Gathering Skill 1 (Unmastered)
Special Effect:
Automatic Sharpening (8 Hours) - High Consumption.
[One will need to fit a specific weapon into a slot for this special ability to take effect]
Locations of Minerals that have been appraised will now be shown on the Cartographer's Shield…
It would seem that unlocking this Cartographer's Shield, it allowed it so that any monsters, plants and minerals that he appraised with his Appraisal Shield, appear on his World Map. This would make things so much easier, it would help him with levelling up and making sure that he didn't face high level monsters until he was ready. He was really pleased with himself for unlocking this shield. He had to wonder if there was any other shields that could interact with his Cartographer's Shield, he would have to keep an eye out for them. As they would be very useful if there were shields like this.
*yawn*
Naofumi knew he had to get some sleep, but there was one more experiment that he wanted to try, seeing how the map idea worked. So grabbing wallet from his backpack, he placed it next to the shield's gem to see if anything happens. He was going to use some coins for this idea, but until he was able to get more, he didn't want to risk losing the coins that he had for an idea he didn't know would work. His wallet though, he knew that he had no need for it in this world and using it might give him a new shield, so there was nothing to lose. So he brought his wallet close to the gem, which he happily see that it promptly sucked it in. After sucking the wallet in, a message popped up and the shield transformed once again.
Treasury Shield Unlocked
Treasury Shield - Level 1:
Equipment Bonus:
Defence: 5 (Unmastered.)
Special Effect:
Coin Storage
Max Cooper Coins: 300
Max Silver Coins: 300
Max Gold Coins: 30
His new shield was a leather vambrace with three metal pleats, the shield's gem on the back of the hand. It had a wallet like sleeve, to place the coins. It looked less like a shield and more like a method of deflecting weapons with one's forearm. The Shield Hero had to admit this was a useful shield, as he could hide the fact that he was the Shield Hero. This was one shield he didn't want people to know about, so he wouldn't be telling anyone about this shield apart for those he really trusts.
As he opened up the new shield to look inside of it, nothing out of common, it looked like his wallet then a shield. Taking the name of his current bonus skill in stride, Naofumi grabbed all of his remaining copper coins that he had and dropped them inside the sleeve meant for copper. With great relief, they fit rather easily.
A screen appeared in front of him:
Copper Coins:
28/300
Naofumi smiled at this, glad to see that he could keep track of how much coins he could hold. Next he decided to place some of his silver into his new shield.
Silver Coins:
200/300
As Naofumi placed the silver into the shield, he begun to wonder to himself, 'This, legit, breaks so many laws of physics. Does this world actually follow the same laws?' Sure there was magic, but he thought that if you place so much money into something, visual effect to show that he placed so much into the shield, but there was nothing.
But other than that, he would have to level the shield up if he wanted to place more coins into it, but he had to find out how to first, especially since as soon as he zipped up his wallet a number appeared on his scream showing him exactly how much money he was holding. But before he could investigate more about it, he once again yawned. He placed his coin bag to one side of the disk, he would have placed more into the shield, but one thing stopped him: he didn't want people to know about this shield. This meant that he had to have a bag of coins on him, or people would wonder where his coins were.
Naofumi couldn't fight it, his eyes were getting heavy. A joyful racket was coming from the direction of the tavern, and Naofumi could almost swear he heard Motoyasu and Itsuki's voices amongst the noise. Maybe they were staying at this inn tonight too?
Naofumi reached out and extinguished the lamp lighting up the room. It was still a little early, but even so, he quickly drifted off to sleep… he, after all, had a long day.
To be Continued!
Author's Note: Here ends the next chapter of The Rising of Shield Demon, I hope that you enjoyed the chapter and the new shields that I have added -if you enjoyed the chapter, please leave some feedback and let me know what you thought of it. I still want your thoughts from the past chapters, so please look back on them and if possible, give me your thoughts.
Now I would like your thoughts about something I have planned, I'm thinking about making Naofumi as an Alchemist. I came up with the idea by reading the Web Novel, where he had Alchemist like skills. I also the idea popped into my head when I was thinking about ways to make Naofumi stronger in some way. Seeing that he had stronger magic attack than normal attack, I was thinking about using magic to make him stronger. Over time, giving him powers of an Alchemist came to mind. So I want to know, what do you think of this, is it a good idea or not?