Hi, author here!
This is the first of a two-parter chapter intended to tie up loose ends, and after that I will move on to the Lizardman Arc.
No cliffhanger, so don't worry. ;)
[X][X][X]
"Finally back in E-Rantel"
Ryu said that when the large front gate of the fortress city became visible through the viewing gap of the wagon he was riding. This was not Garret's wagon because Garret's next destination was E-Pespel, a city further west. Therefore, after spending the night at Garret's lodging, Ryu and Lily immediately began their journey back to E-Rantel on foot. They had gotten lucky to chance upon a wagon heading to E-Rantel, and the driver agreed to let them in for a small price of ten coppers.
Garret said that E-Pespel is about halfway towards Re-Estize Capital. I wonder if Peter and the others are already in the capital now.
"Where would you like me to drop you off?"
The driver asked as the wagon approached the back end of the queue of wagons and carriages entering the city.
"We will go on foot from here. Here's your payment and thanks for the generosity"
Ryu gave the driver a silver coin.
"Keep the change"
"Thank you very much"
The two of them dropped off from the wagon and began walking towards the gate. The sun was high in the sky, telling them that it was about lunch time. They ate their previously bought rations for lunch while walking towards the gate. Later, no problem happened during entry because the guards on duty saw their Platinum Rank plates and let them walk in immediately.
Due to the way the city was laid out, it still took them a while until they finally reached the Adventurer's Guild building. When they entered, the atmosphere was nothing special. Every adventurers were minding their own business.
Ryu went to the receptionist to turn his quest in.
"I'm back from the cave investigation quest"
"Alright, please tell me about your findings there"
The lady prepared a quill and paper to record Ryu's report.
"There was a sinister magic caster who casted an illusion spell, making people see each other as enemies. We found the missing people but unfortunately all of them are already dead"
The lady wrote it down quickly as Ryu spoke.
"Did you find the bodies of the missing people?"
"Yes. They were buried in a dead end of the cave"
"What is the status of the magic caster?"
"He is dead. Also, we found this book inside his robe. It is strangely empty, but it might have something hidden since it is the only thing he had"
Ryu presented the empty book to the lady.
"Was the magic caster alone?"
"The illusion casted on us broke when he died, and nothing happened afterwards. It is likely that he was alone"
"Anything else to add?"
Ryu then explained the details about the cave, such as the way to reach it, the fork inside, and the large sinkhole at the end. Also, he explained the location of the buried bodies and the dead body of the magic caster.
"Understood. We will follow up on this matter as soon as possible. Once the investigation is complete we will reward you appropriately. Please check back in three days"
"What about the empty book?"
"We would like to bring it to Magician's Guild for identification, but you can keep it with you if you like"
"Take it. I don't think I will need it"
Ryu gave the empty book to the lady, and with that the procedure was concluded. As usual, Ryu sat down on a nearby vacant seat and Lily sat down next to him.
"What are we gonna do next, Ryu-san?"
"Give me a min..."
Ryu pondered about his next steps. He was quite tired so he thought that taking days off from adventuring might not be a bad idea. He had recently counted his coins, and the result was 4 gold, 20 silver, and 15 copper coins. Enough to live for months without lifting a finger.
"I'm thinking of taking some days off again"
"Anything you say, Ryu-san"
Ryu thought about Lily again. She always agreed to anything he said, which was understandable because in all technicality she was, to put it frankly, Ryu's slave. At least that was his guess from the information he had gathered from their dialogue back then. She seemed to still have a certain degree of free will, but in the end she still had to obey Ryu no matter what.
"Let's go back to the inn"
The two of them then walked to Silver Star Inn and immediately went to their room once they arrived. After closing the door, Ryu instantly changed his clothes into his white T-shirt and black knee length shorts sleepwear and dived onto his bed. Lily just sat down on her bed quietly.
"Lily, are you tired?"
"Not at all, Ryu-san!"
"Is that an honest answer?"
"Of course, Ryu-san!"
"Then I have a task for you"
"I will do anything for you! Tell me the task!"
"Go out, take a walk around the city, and have fun for yourself"
"W-What?"
"I'm taking my days off, so you should too"
"But I-"
"Lily, didn't I make myself clear already?"
"Y-Yes!"
Ryu took his coin pouch from his photon inventory, making it look like he conjured it from thin air with a flicker of light. He took ten silver coins from the pouch and gave them to Lily.
"Use them as you like, either to buy food or souvenirs, or whatever else"
"Ryu-san..."
"Enjoy your day off, Lily. I expect you to return before dark"
After saying that, Ryu turned his body away and put on a blanket over his body.
"Thank you, Ryu-san!"
Even though he couldn't see it, he could guess from the voice that Lily was happy. After he heard the door closed when Lily left the room, Ryu slowly got up from his bed and went to the window overlooking the street in front. Soon enough, he noticed Lily coming out from the inn's front door and walking away to the right. He then went back to his bed and sat down on it.
I hope she will have her fun being free for herself for once.
However, a weird feeling started creeping up in Ryu's mind.
The last time I left her alone, she got kidnapped...
But this is E-Rantel, not a bandit fort. So it should be safe, right?
Then again, someone like those two could kidnap Nfirea and cause such commotion within the city...
But it is not night right now, so nothing bad will happen, right?
Right...?
...Sigh...
[X][X][X]
Lily felt strange.
Her master had just given her a day off to walk around the city freely for today. He even had given her an amount of money to spend as she liked. All these were strange for her, because she believed that she existed to server her master, and she would do just that without complaint even if her master treated her like garbage. Her greatest joy was to be useful to her master in any way possible.
And now she was conflicted.
She felt happy, but she had no idea why. Was it because she had been given a day off for herself? Or because she had taken Ryu's last words as a command? No matter how hard she thought about it, she could not find any answer.
Anyway, Ryu-sama has given me free time and I should make use of it!
Having herself determined, Lily went towards the market district of the city. On her way, she somewhat noticed that a number of people glanced at her as she walked past them. She had never paid attention to this before because her attention had always been towards Ryu, but now she was alone and those glances were pretty jarring.
Lily felt nervous with all the glances. It didn't happen that often, but still often enough to annoy her mind. Was something stuck on her face? Was it because of her Platinum Rank plate? Maybe her armor was unusual, or her outfit as a whole? Come to think of it, other than the sinister girl from that night, she had never seen any other girl who had the skin of her legs exposed.
Even if that was the case, this is the gift from my creator! I won't change it with anything else!
Lily tried to ignore them all and kept walking towards the market district. It was the place where merchants of many kinds open up shop to many kinds of potential customers. Common citizens, adventurers, the merchants themselves, and sometimes servants of local nobles crowded the place everyday, and today was no exception.
Lily walked around, sometimes taking a look at the shop stalls. None of them drew her attention so far, but soon she noticed a rather large crowd ahead. Being curious, she approached the crowd. However, she couldn't see anything because she was short compared to other people.
"Ooooh!"
The crowd suddenly cheered, and then they applauded. Soon, the people dispersed a bit, making way for someone to walk past. Lily noticed that the ones walking through were two Silver Rank adventurers. One of them was pretty beaten up and the other held him to prevent him from collapsing.
"Nice try!"
"Better luck next time!"
The crowd cheered the two guys up as they left. Knowing nothing about what was happening, Lily encouraged herself to ask the man next to her.
"Hi, what's happening there? I couldn't see anything"
"This is not something a little girl should watch. You better go away"
"Excuse me!? I'm an adventurer!"
The man seemed not to buy it at first, but then he noticed Lily's adventurer plate.
"Platinum?"
The man then shouted towards whatever was surrounded by the crowd.
"Hey! We might have a challenger here!"
"What?"
Lily was bewildered as the crowd once again dispersed to make way. This time, she could see that behind the crowd there was a set of short stakes on the ground, and they were connected with a rope, making it looked like a small makeshift arena. Inside the arena there was a man equipped with light armor and rather heavy looking gauntlet. The man was about as tall as Ryu, but more muscular. Lily noticed a Platinum Rank plate on his armor.
"Oh, a fellow Platinum! Welcome! Do you want to take on the challenge?"
"I just came here! I don't know anything about this!"
"This is only a simple one on one fight challenge! Wanna try?"
The crowd cheered Lily to take on the challenge. At this point Lily understood that the man was opening up a kind of street performance in the form of open challenge, but she still couldn't decide whether she should try or not. Normally she would ask Ryu, but now she was alone so she had to decide for herself.
Lily then nodded and walked to the makeshift ring. The crowd cheered even louder.
Once Lily entered the ring, the man took his gauntlets off and tossed them to the side. Another man, seeming to be his companion, caught the gauntlets mid air and put them in an open crate. This other man was more normal looking than the muscular man and also slightly shorter, but he also had a Platinum Rank plate.
"The rule is simple. Hand to hand, no weapons and magic. Martial Arts still allowed. Armor still allowed. You lose if you get knocked out or you give up"
The other man approached Lily carrying a small bowl
"Please place your bet here. If you win you will get back ten times the amount. If you lose the money is lost"
Lily took five silver coins from her small pouch and put them into the bowl.
"Five silver coins. Are you sure?"
Lily just nodded.
The large man then spoke to Lily.
"Listen. I consider you a full-fledged Platinum Rank adventurer, so I won't hesitate hitting you even if you are a girl"
"I'm glad to hear that!"
Both Lily and the muscular man readied themselves with their battle stance. Lily had never fought without her swords before, so her stance was made up on the fly. The smaller man stood between them, probably going to act as a referee.
"The time limit is three minutes. Ready, set... Fight!"
As soon as the referee gave the signal, the man charged forward quickly and threw a straight punch at Lily. She evaded by moving to the right and using the shield attached to her left gauntlet to parry the punch. She immediately threw a straight punch with her right hand to the man's stomach, but the man parried with his left arm. She then immediately spinned her body around using the force of the man's parry and did a sweeping kick to the man's legs.
It was a hit. The man lost his balance and fell down on his back. But he immediately did a handspring to stand up back on his feet. The crowd cheered loudly, and the man's face showed excitement.
"That was the first time someone could make me fall down. You are good!"
Lily just smiled. This man was pretty good but still nowhere as fast as that sinister girl back then, or even the foxman. Even without her swords she should be able to win easily.
The man then tightened his battle stance, and he was enveloped by red aura.
Is that what they call Martial Art?
[Ability Boost]
The man immediately charged forward at greater speed than before, but still not fast enough to catch Lily off guard. He threw a continuous flurry of punches, but none of them managed to score a hit on Lily because they all were either dodged or parried. Soon enough, Lily found an opening and gave the man a straight punch to the stomach.
[Fortress]
However, the hit was blocked by some kind of invisible energy, and the man didn't even flinch. Lily was surprised, and the man made use of it.
[Smash]
A fist covered in red aura flew straight to Lily's chest and scored a clean hit. Lily was thrown back almost to the edge of the arena, but she landed on her feet. She didn't seem hurt at all. There was not even a dent on her armor. The crowd cheered for the man.
Lily was about to jump back into the fight, but the man put off his stance.
"I lost"
"What?"
The crowd was surprised, including the referee himself and also Lily. They obviously wanted to know why the man declared himself lost just after scoring a big hit.
"Girl, I'm guessing that you have never seen Martial Arts before, have you?"
Lily actually had seen it used several times by Mat's party back then, though she hadn't known that they were Martial Arts.
"Uhh, yeah I guess"
"You dodged and parried all my best punches without breaking a sweat. That one and only hit was thanks to my Fortress making you drop your guard. It was the strongest punch I could unleash, but you didn't even seem to feel it. At that moment I knew that I would lose anyway if the fight went on"
The man approached Lily and gave her a pat on the shoulders. He then raised Lily's right arm, and the crowd cheered loudly with applause.
"Unfortunately I don't have 50 silver coins, so take this"
The man flipped a gold coin to Lily. She caught it and got a little surprised. A single gold coin had the same value of 100 silver coins, so it was twice the amount she should have received.
"I-I can't take this much of your money!"
"Just take it. By the way, how does joining my team sounds to you? I can teach you Martial Arts"
"I have to refuse. I already have a mas- partner"
"Is your partner the leader? Maybe we can discuss about merging our team?"
"It-It's not for me to decide! Sorry!"
Lily ran off from the place as soon as she said that. While the man seemed to be decent, something felt off with his invitation. Therefore she decided to leave them immediately.
There was still a lot of time before dark, so Lily decided to walk around some more. She bought some meat skewers to snack on, and also watched some other street performances she noticed. All in all, she had quite a lot of fun in her free time.
Later, she noticed that the sun was already pretty low at the west, so she decided to walk back to the inn. But suddenly, she heard a shout from behind.
"Help! Please help!"
She looked behind and she saw a young man, seemingly a common citizen, ran out from an alley. There was no other people around, so the man immediately noticed Lily.
"There's a wounded man over there! Please help!"
Hearing that, Lily was conflicted again. She was expected by Ryu to return before dark, but if she helped this person she might be late. But this person seemed desperate and there was nobody else.
What should I do?
"Please! Would you help!?"
Lily was still conflicted, but then a question appearing in her mind helped her to decide.
Will Ryu-sama be happy to hear that I have ignored a person's call for help?
No.
Lily immediately went to the man.
"Where is he?"
"Over there! Follow me!"
Lily followed the young man into the small alley. Thanks to the buildings around, the alley was quite dark, and the fact that there was no other people made this alley a very good hunting ground for street muggers. The wounded man might be a victim of such case.
Suddenly, Lily felt a sharp pain over her right leg.
"Ouch!"
She dropped to her left knee and looked at her right leg. There was a blowdart planted into her thigh. She immediately pulled it off, but soon she felt dizzy.
Dammit! As expected, the dart was laced with poison!
The dart had come from a smaller alley branching from this alley. Lily had stopped herself several meters ahead from the branch, so if the shooter wanted to shoot her again they must come out from the alley.
"There are attackers! Run away!"
Lily shouted to warn the young man she had been following, but he just stood still, and his face didn't show any worry. Lily then realized that she had been trapped. The young man was one of the attackers all along.
"She's still awake? The poison should have knocked her out cold by now"
Lily heard a voice coming out from the alley.
"The dart didn't go in deep enough. It seems that your skill has dulled"
A different voice came out from above. Lily looked up and saw someone crouching on the roof of a nearby single story building.
"Either that, or she has stab damage reduction enchantment on her"
The attackers came out one by one from their hiding. In total, including the man who had been acting, there were five men. All of them were holding a dagger, except one who was holding a small pipe instead. He probably was the shooter.
"Shoot her again, then. After that we can loot the belongings, and then have fun with her"
The shooter man put another dart into his pipe and put one end of the pipe into his mouth. He then aimed at Lily's leg, and blew the dart. Everyone expected the dart to stab and poison her further so they would be able to have their way with her.
But that didn't happen.
Lily quickly moved her leg a bit, causing the dart to strike her greaves instead of her exposed thigh, and therefore it was deflected. She then quickly jumped to the nearest man and gave him a straight punch to the stomach. He got knocked out cold from the strike.
Without giving the next nearest man time to react, Lily moved to him and gave an upward kick between his legs, striking his family jewels hard with her right greaves. The man also got knocked out cold from that one strike.
The remaining three men were surprised, and they made some distance from Lily.
"H-How did you do that while poisoned?"
Lily herself actually had no idea. All she felt was that the poison effect had been dissipating gradually, and the same applied to the wound left by the dart. Right now she no longer felt any bad effect from the poison, and the wound on her thigh had completely healed as if it had never been there, though some bloodstain still remained.
If that was the effect of the enchantment from Ainz-dono, I will have to thank him later.
With great speed, Lily once again charged at the nearest man and punched him straight at the stomach. She then quickly moved to the remaining men and gave them the same treatment. She had done that so quickly they all fell down faceplanted at the same time.
Without paying any more heed to the men, Lily walked out from the alley, intending to go back to the inn. She just happened to see a group of guards right outside the alley, so she called them.
"I just knocked out five muggers there. They tried to rob me so I retaliated"
The guards then moved in to arrest the five muggers. One of them thanked Lily for the service, and then Lily just walked away because it was about to get dark and she had to go home.
Lily arrived at the inn just as the sky was becoming completely dark. She immediately went into their room, and when she entered Ryu was there still lying on his bed.
"I'm home!"
"Welcome back, Lily. Did you have fun?"
"Yes! Thank you!"
Lily noticed something strange, though. Ryu was already back in his battle outfit, and he seemed to be running out of breath.
"Ryu-san, are you alright?"
"Yes, why you ask?"
"You're running out of breath"
"Oh, I also took a walk around by myself"
"Hmm... Anyway, here's the money you gave me"
Lily gave Ryu all the money she had, which was 1 gold, 2 silvers, and 5 coppers.
"You can keep them with you"
"Really?"
"Yeah, you earned it anyway"
"Thank you, Ryu-sa... wait a minute! Why didn't you ask about the gold coin?"
Ryu's face showed that he was dumbfounded. He didn't say anything.
"Also, how did you know that I earned it?"
Ryu seemed to panic and didn't know what to say.
"And why the guards back then seemed to already know that something was happening in the alley?"
Ryu was still speechless.
"You have been following me, haven't you?"
"Alright, you got me"
Lily was silent for a bit, and then she laughed.
"You doting daddy!"
"Hey, I'm not your father"
"But you just acted like one!"
Lily kept laughing. Deep inside she was happy that she had a master who really cared about her. She was now fully determined to loyally serve him until the end of her life.
