In the vastness of space, a lonesome ship flew through the endless sea of stars, inside it was a trio of people sat by the command center of the vessel, the one currently driving the ship was a humanoid toad standing at 6.67 feet, having a cool bluish-green color for his skin, he wore brown finger less gloves with his left hand having a brown gauntlets with red buttons on it, he had two yellow bandelers on his chest that had no ammunition on it, he wore a brown utility belt with the 'Toads' insignia on the buckle. This was Zits, the leader and the tech savvy brain of the group
The other member on the left side of Zits and currently trying to solve a Rubik's cube was a toad that presented a brown color for his skin, standing at a height of 7'4" and with a muscle constitution similar to a brick wall, making him the largest in the group, he wore spiked black arm braces with green spikes along with a black belt with the team's insignia. This was Pimple, the muscle and heart of the team
The toad on the right and holding a boom box on his shoulder had bright green skin and was the smallest out of the three, wearing his trademark sunglasses, red ninja ribbons on each of his arms and the same belt as he fellow amphibians. This was Rash, the Coolest guy of the team(so he says) and who brought personality to the group of space heroes
"Could you turn that music down? I'm trying to concentrate" Pimple said as he turned around from his chair to look at Rash, who was nodding his head along the beat of the music
"Sorry bro, but flying through space would be a boring pain without some radical songs to play along!" Rash said as he didn't bother to look at his companion's way, propping his feet up on the dash board of their spaceship
"Get your feet out of there, it's sensitive equipment" Zits said as he pushed Rash's feet out of the board before focusing back on driving the ship, as this was unfortunately not one with autopilot
"Soooo... Where are we going anyways? Going down to battle some bad guys I assume?" Rash asked Zits, who just sighed while placing a hand on his forehead
"Rash, I already told you that there are no bad guys to fight, we are just delivering a package" Zits explained to his teammate while looking at him in the eyes
"That some space pirates will definitely try and steal?" Rash said, wanting Zits to confirm his prediction to be true
"Not unless they want plain old mango" Pimple said as they weren't carrying anything valuable enough to steal, unless the tropical fruit had somehow became the new crypto currency in this galaxy
"Ugh, we shouldn't be doing this, we should be out there being heroes! Where's all the bad guys at?" Rash complained as he placed down his boom box and crossed his arms annoyingly while leaning back on his chair
"Probably in jail or hiding, we must have scared them with all of the beatings and day saving we been doing" Pimple said as he finally solved one side of the Rubik's cube he was working in
"Wish something cool would happen already..." Rash said as he rested his head on the palm of his hand, just as a giant spacial rift opened in front of them, setting of thousands of alarms in their ship's sensors
"You just had to jinx it, Rash!" Zits yelled at the cool toad, who just shrugged off with his shoulders with a sorry look on his face, Zits returned his attention to the command board and tried to maneuver away from the rift
"Is that a black hole? Zits can you turn the ship around?" Pimple asked as he held on tight to his chair, fastening its seat-belt
" I can't! The pull is too strong!" Zits yelled as he tried his hardest to stirred the ship away from the rift but it was all to no avail
"AAAAAAAHHHH!" The three battle-toads screamed as they were pulled inside the rift and blacked out after the first second of spacial spaghettification
Naofumi Itawani was an average Japanese individual, he lived with his parents and was currently attending college, at the moment he was inside a local bookshop looking for a good light novel to read, but as always he was met with self-indulging isekai. He was about to leave the section before he heard the sound of something hitting the ground, he turned around and saw that a book was now on the floor
"Huh? How did this fall?" he said as he went and picked up the fallen book and analyzed it, it was a rusty red book that was fairly big and wide, he observed the sides and saw that it seemed to have a lot of pages, he looked at the back to see if there was a synopsis but it didn't, he turned back to the front of the book were the title was written in big golden letters
"Record of the cardinal weapons? At least the title doesn't give away the whole story" he sarcastically said as he opened the book to see what it was about
"An event called the waves of calamity would hit the world and threatened to end all of existence, to combat this, the citizens of the world would use an ancient ritual to summon heroes from another earth, These heroes would wield the legendary holy weapons that could repeal the waves" He started to read, it sounded kind of like an isekai, which was a bit discouraging but it could be worth a damn. He flipped the page
"Three experienced heroes from the far reaches of the cosmos with bold personalities and looks were to lead the charge, while a modern human would be their vanguard" Naofumi says as he read the page looking at a illustration on the other page depicting three very aggressive looking anthropomorphic frogs wield a spear, bow and sword, while a human with a similar hair to Naofumi was in front of them charging ahead with a shield
"Frogs? From space? Okay, I'm interested in this now" Naofumi said as he was now hooked to see what this story was going to be like, he flipped the page again only to be meet with it being blank
"What the? Why is it blank?" Naofumi asked confused as he flipped through the pages only to find that the entire rest of the book was blank, suddenly the book began to glow a bright light
"AAAhrrrgh!" Naofumi screamed as the light consumed him whole
"The summoning worked! Our saviors have arrived" A figure said as it looked at four figures inside a summoning circle, a torrent of steam from the ritual obstructing his vision and preventing him from seeing nothing more than the general silhouette of the heroes they summoned
"Ugh... What?" The Battletoads and Naofumi asked as the four got up and looked at the voice who called out, a man standing in front of a group of people wearing dark robes, who were all shocked as they saw the Battletoads, Naofumi looked around the room before seeing the toads summoned to his left, quickly surprised before remembering the last thing he read on that book
"Abducted by cultist? That's new" Zits said as he looked at their summoners, before taking notice of the strange metal bow on his hand, looking at it with confusedly
"And that means new butts to kick!" Rash said as he pointed at the robed man with his left hand, seen a elegant white sword that was in his palm "Oh hey, I didn't remember having this cool sword" he quickly looked at its blade, seeing his reflection on it which just made him smile as he thought how handsome he was under candle lighting
"I don't think they are the bad guys here, they said something about needing saving" Pimple pointed out as he looked at the robed man, before signaling to his fellow toads with a tug of his head to look at the robed men
"Well, hello there, I'm Zits the gallant leader of the Battletoads, a band of amphibian heroes and that guy..." Zits said as he looked at Naofumi for a moment with a neutral expression before returning to the robed men "... Is someone, I'm sure"
"I want an explanation on why you guys summoned us in the middle of a mission" Zits demand of them since being filled in on the situation would do them nicely, the man in the front looked at them sweating before sighing, a more composed expression on his face
"Well, It is very complicated, but to simplify, we have just finished an ancient ritual and summoned you Heroes of the four Cardinal Weapons," the robed man answered as he looked at the toads with a bit of anxiety due to their appearance. "Our world is teetering on the brink of destruction now by a apocalyptic event. Without your help, we are going to be destroyed by the horses of monsters. Please, lend us your strength, Heroes." The man pledged for them, desperate for salvation for his birth land
"Dude, saving the world is kinda of our thing! We're happy to help out and dish out!" Rash said as he opened his arms wide, not only excited for some good classic hero work but also this out to make them more popular, as Rash had to admit that he was missing the spotlight a bit as of recently
"You can count on us to assist, sir" Pimple said, glad to help out these folk. Although the brown toad wondered what these strange silver weapons had to do with any of this world saving business
"What about some form of... Compensation? How are you going to accommodate us?" Naofumi asked, as suddenly everyone looked at him, causing the Japanese boy to feel a bit nervous as he realized that he sounded like he wanted to exploit these begging people in need
"I mean, if we are going to fight a literal apocalypse, do we get some form of assistance from the local government? Like a roof to sleep under or payment?" Naofumi explained his question in more detail as the Battletoads think of what he said, considering the boy to be justified in asking such thing
"He does have a point, depending on how long this takes, we might need such things" Zits said as he realizes that this might be a situation they were not used to dealing with
"True, working for free doesn't put food on the table" Rash said as they really needed some cash to get by, not just here but also anywhere in the universe
"All of your needs can be discussed with the king of this great country, he's most eager to meet all of you" the robed man explained to them, there was a brief moment of silence as the heroes thought about the offer
"Whoa, meeting royalty? Count me in!" Rash said excitedly as he followed behind the robed man, the other two toads and Naofumi looked at each before they shrugged off with their shoulders and followed the robed man through corridors and flights of stairs, when they reached the window, the four stopped to look at the outside view, seeing the town bellow filled with active, the quartet was in awe of the sight before the robed man called out for them to follow
When they got to the throne room they get a glimpse of the supposed king they were to meet, an elderly man wearing expensive garb of gold and purple, a crown adorned in jewelry and rings on his fingers sitting in a grand wood throne, with a smaller one by his side that was probably meant for a queen
"What is this?" the king says with his surprise very visible in his face as he starts to study each of them, taking note of the weapons each of them carried, particularly the shield hero "So these are the Legendary Heroes?"
"Yes your highness, I'm Zits, these are my fellow companions Pimple and Rash, together we three are known as the Battletoads" Zits said as the toads did their best to look at least presentable in the king's presences since first impressions were that important when meeting royalty, especially when their own looks worked against them, as the glances of shock and disgust were not lost on the blueish green toad
"We saved the universe a bazillion times" Rash pointed out as a brag to further impress the court
"And this is..." Pimple said as he motioned to naofumi, as all the eyes in the room layed upon him, the Japanese boy could only gulp in anticipation before he cleared his throat to speak
"I'm Naofumi itawani, 21 years old, an college student" Naofumi introduced himself, but the king seemed slightly annoyed at the shield bearer for whatever reason, as if his introduction was more of a bother to him
"Very well, I am Aultcray Melromarc the XXXII, King of the lands of Melromarc. And I suppose I owe all of you an explanation. My country and the rest of the world are going down the path of destruction." Aultcray began to recount what was currently happening in this world. He began explaining what the waves of calamity were. They could happen anywhere at any time, lasting for multiple hours or until the boss is killed. During that time monsters would continue to pour out of the wave and even after it stopped, any monster already here would remain until slain "The waves are said to become stronger over time. They last longer, and the wave bosses and all under them will be stronger. There are even written accounts of waves with more than one wave boss...It is best to summon you now when the waves are weak to give you time to strengthen yourselves to stay ahead of the waves growing threat"
"Strengthen ourselves? How so?" Naofumi spoke as he observed the shield in his arm more carefully to try and feel any power coming from it
"You see heroes, each weapon has its own strengthening method. It gains strength alongside you all, they are as strong as you will let it be, it is your responsibility as the bearers of the sacred weapons to help them grow into their true potencial as to one day they may be able to rip the sea in half and turn mountains into dust," the king clarified as that made the heroes look at their weapons more inquisitively at the thought of doing such feats
"And with the four of us here, I'm guessing we are supposed to work together as a team" Zits pointed out as he looked at his fellow toads, before focusing on Naofumi, unsure how to feel about a random civilian joining them on such quest
"Well the three of us already are a team, so that's no problem. And I guess you get to join us Naofumi, welcome aboard our group!" Pimple said as he offered a hand shake to the shield bearer, Naofumi applied and shook the toad's hand back
"Well heroes. The sun is beginning to set, get some rest. As tomorrow, your adventure starts" Aultcray said as a girl in a maid outfit walked up next to them
"Please come this way, we have prepared rooms for you." The maid said, as Naofumi and the Battletoads followed her. Soon enough, they found themselves in a hall with various doors that all had luxurious interior rooms, after they entered one of the rooms and the maid accompanying them had gone out the four heroes were to themselves
As Naofumi stared at the toads, each talking about this situation they were in, Naofumi couldn't help but feel out of place when standing close to them, they were supposed to be a legendary quartet but they were giant toads while he was a human, the toads definitely looked strong and seemed to have experience with the hero business while he didn't, he initially thought that maybe he was different because he was supposed to be the leader but that was shut down by Zits proclaiming himself leader and the other two not seeming to be against it. He looked sadly to the sides, wondering how he could be useful when he saw a small icon on the corner of his vision, he tried clicking on it but it did work, he tried concentrating on it and that opened up a digital window in front of him
[This is the status magic, a form of magic exclusive to heroes to help them maneuver in this world]
[NAME: NAOFUMI ITAWANI]
[LV 1 - EXPERIENCE POINTS REQUIRED FOR NEXT LEVEL: 20]
[OPTIONS]
[HELP MANUAL] [EQUIPMENT] [STATUS] [WEAPONS MENU] [CRAFTING SYSTEM] [PARTY] [STRENGTHENING METHODS]
Naofumi looked at the system in front of him, it was incredibly similar to a video game, he clicked on the [STATUS] menu and the screen transitioned into one showing his physical and magical traits like his health, attack, both physical and magical defense and plenty of other stuff too
"Woah... This helps" he quietly mumbled to himself as he digged in the information on the screen, terror coming to his being as he saw how his attack was only at 1 as he wondered how he was supposed to hurt anything with such pathetic stat
'Then again, I'm the support of those three, they are the ones responsible for causing damage' Naofumi noted as he glanced back at the toads, they clearly were warriors of some type considering their muscular physique and the fact they were barely phased from the prospect of fighting off hordes of monsters
'Should I ask them about this?' he thought for a moment before brushing aside the idea 'Mhn... Maybe later, let me read up on this menu thing and I will tell them after...'
At midnight, all the heroes were soundly at sleep, each sleeping in different beds. The window of the room slowly opened as a shadowy figure entered through it, the figure was wearing a dark purple outfit similar to that of a Japanese ninja made its way across the room
* Squeak *
the small sound of a wooden board on the ground squinting was made, the figure stops all movements and looks around to see if it had somehow alerted the heroes, thankfully for it they were all in a deep sleep, slowly the figure in the tip of it's toes walked through the room covered in the darkness of the night making his way to Naofumi's bed. The figure pulls out a short sword preparing it to stab the teen on its head
"*Yawn!* I need some water" Rash exclaimed as he got up from his bed, scratching his back as he looked around the room, seeing the shadow about to slash, as both ninja and toad stared at the other in silence
"Whoa! Who the heck are you?!" Rash broke the silence with a loud shout as he pointed at the ninja
"Rash what is now-" Pimple was about to reprehend Rash for waking everyone when he saw the ninja with its sword ready to strike the shield hero "Naofumi! watch out!"
"Aaah!" Naofumi rolled out of bed and into the floor as he quickly turned to look at the ninja, the Shinobi tried to swing its sword at him but was prevent from cutting down the boy as a tongue struck his face like a whip, the shadow turned to see the tongue retract back into Zits mouth as he and the other Battletoads looked at the ninja with frowns on their faces, Naofumi took that moment to run and join the toad's side
"Is that a ninja? Did a ninja just try to kill me in my sleep?!" Naofumi shouted in disbelief while pointing at the ninja, looking back and forth between the toads and his mysterious assassin
"Alright buddy, big mistake coming to the toad den all alone by yourself" Rash proclaimed as he slammed his two fists together, ninja as a response made a whistled a sound very reminiscent of a bird call, as in a few seconds a group of more cloaked ninjas appeared behind the shinobi, all carrying a variety of weapons "... Okay you brought buddies, that means they get the boot as well!"
"Battletoads! Team formation Gamma 2!" Zits yelled as he pointed his finger at the ninjas, with the other two toads and Naofumi looking at him with confused expressions
"Try and finish them without smash hits and full body morphs! we don't want to break a room that belongs to a king! Remember what happened in Guarthyng XII?" Zits explained as he recalled to his two amphibian companions the incident that almost ended in their decapitation when Rash broke a priceless vase by accident
"Fine, Engarde!" Rash shouts as he assumes a fencing pose as he pointed his sword at the ninjas, and runs up to one of them, as he starts to exchange slashes with the ninja that tried to decapitate Naofumi, with the toad being on the disadvantage since he didn't actually knew anything about fencing or swordfighting besides what he saw in movies and cartoons
Zits looked at the legendary bow, seeing that it had no thread to pull or arrows to shoot, he remembered that the weapons were supposedly magical, and thus decided to try this theory by envisioning a thread for him to pull, as the bow manifest a thin line of red energy, he smiled as he pulled back the line, a white energy arrow with a red outline appearing for him to shoot. He began firing arrows at the ninjas, his aim was sharp like a knife as his eye seemly became highly technological as if he had given himself aim assist, the ninjas dodging with some difficulty as they tried to rush the toad. Just as one was about to strike Zits from behind, he was blocked by Naofumi's shield, as the Japanese boy assumed his role as a support and tank to protect the amphibian archer, the ninja would strike again if it wasn't by Pimple grabbing and throwing him across the room
"Thanks for the save guys" Zits said as he went back to try and shoot the ninjas, helping Rash by sending a arrow in the head of the ninja he was fitting
"No problem, but how are we beating these guys?" Naofumi asked as he and Pimple did their best to keep the ninjas at bay, with the large brown battletoad was swiping away attackers with the legendary spear, occasionally trying to poke them or punch them away
"Zits, can we please use smash hits on them? Because I'm going to even if you say no" Rash said as he jumped back away from the ninja he was fighting to look at Zits
"Sigh... Let's just try to keep the damage to this room and this room only" Zits said, he would be content if they just wreck just this room and not the entire floor they were in
"Alright!" Rash exclaimed as he ran towards one of the ninjas, he prepared what seemed like a diagonal slash upwards with his sword, which the ninja in front of him was ready to counter, when Rash started to swing the sword down, the ninja prepared to block it, but Rash did a switcheroo, and wound up a punch with his left hand that morphed into a giant red boxing glove, the ninja was so surprised that he didn't try to block the incoming punch until the last second, the force of the impact was so strong that it sent him flying away into a wardrobe, breaking it in pieces as Zits face palmed himself. "Ding ding! It's a knockout!" Rash commemorated as his hand turns back to normal, the ninjas and Naofumi look at him in shock
"What... Did he just turned his fist into a giant boxing glove?!" Naofumi shouted as he looked at the other toads for confirmation, as they were very nonchalant about it
"Yeah, we kind of do this sort of thing, like, everyday. What's a hero without a few tricks on his sleeve?" Pimple said as he gave Naofumi a tap on the back as him and the other Battletoads assumed a more relaxed battle position, with the toads putting the legendary weapons on their backs as they cracked their knuckles
The heroes and the ninjas looked at each other in silence for a moment, as Rash let out a battle cry as he and the other toads ran towards the ninjas to engage them in combat, Naofumi followed behind since he didn't know if he could handle one ninja on his own without some assistance
"Now you see me!" Zits said as he pressed a button on his bracelet right as a ninja went to strike him with a double knife slash, as the frog suddenly fell through a white energy portal with a red outline, the ninja looked around for the amphibian only to be hit on the face by Zits fist now transformed into a hammer's head "Now you don't see anything at all!"
Pimple was side by side with Naofumi, as the brown toad was punching attackers away with his fist and swinging his spear at them while Naofumi occasionally blocked some of the knifes and shuriken thrown their way, it wasn't much but he was happy to at least help out a bit. A group of five ninjas each carrying a different type of weapon came in towards the two
"You guys should really be quick to finish this, you know?" Pimple said to the ninjas as he pulled back his body and seemed to be holding it out for something as he seemed ready to charge, Naofumi took some steps back since he was guessing Pimple was going to do a smash hit, once the ninjas got close enough, Pimple pushed his head and torso forward, as most of his upper body turned into a old steam train engine with his face on the front, as he crashed into the five with a devastating force that was sure to break some bones "Wouldn't want to miss out on the Pain Train!"
With their uncommon fighting style of utilizing shapeshifting and smash hits, the Battletoads seemed to be gaining the advantage against the group of ninjas, as the shinobis in dark purple clothing stand on one side of the room, panting from tiredness and groaning in pain while the toads seemed to be doing just swell
"Ready to give and surrender? Because a part of me, The Bad Pimple, really wants you all to say no" Pimple said with sly smirk across his face, he was usually a pacifist, but when he started to get rilled up in a fight like this, the more violent side of him started to make itself more pronounced in his body language
The group of ninjas looked at each other and nodded silently, as three of them started to chant different types of enchantion to unleash magic. the first chant to be completed caused the ninjas to be covered by a soft light green glow around their bodies, as the masked assassins got up and their posture seemed less tired, Naofumi could only assume that they had used some type of healing magic
The second one to be finished, had one of the ninja hold out a hand in front of them, as a ball of fire appeared in between the toads and the ninjas, a the flamming orb seemed to be growing and heating up at a quick rate.
The final chant caused a globe of wind to be formed in around the ninjas as some type of protection. The orb of flames seemed to have reached its critical point as it began to misformed it shape at a rapid pace, Pimple was the first to connect the dots between the ball of fire and the wind barrier the ninjas had summoned, he quickly transformed his hands into two halfs of a big and thick lead shield that he placed in front of his fellow companions, right in time as the ball of flames exploded, causing fire to spread everywhere around the room in a burst. The flames raged on for a bit before they died down, the entire room was scorched black with the exception of the area inside the wind barrier of the ninjas and the area behind Pimple's hand shields, that were currently a bright orange form how heated they were, the brown toad quickly morphed them back to normal while wincing in pain from the burns, shaking and blowing air at them to cool them down
"Pimple! You okay man?" Naofumi asked in worry as he reached out a hand for the brown toad, looking at his hands to see the burns, they didn't look severe but he probably wouldn't be able to punch as well with them in the moment
"Y-yeah, it's just a little -ouch!- burn" Pimple replied with a forced smile in his face. Zits looked at his burned companion, then at the destroyed room and finally on their attackers who seemed ready for round two
"Rash, Pimple, you got my permission to go buck wild, no reason to try and hold back since they destroyed the entire room" Zits said as he kept looking at the ninjas for any sudden movement, not caring anymore about damages since this battle was quickly getting dangerous and could end with one of them seriously hurt
"Finally!" Rash exclaimed as he ran towards the ninjas, a pair of huge goat horns growing from his head as his feet changed into roller skates for him to move faster, as he went at the ninjas like a battering ram, the group of shinobis jumped away in all directions from the approaching toad, Zits took shots at them with the legendary bow as the ninjas jumped from wall to wall around the room, the one's he did hit seemed unaffected by the bow's magical arrows
"Fine, archery was never my thing, but lasers? That's my style!" Zits said as his head turned into that of a square robot, as his eyes glowed red before blasts of energy came out from it, as he tried to fry the ninjas with the plasma energy
"You guys are crazy! Is this how you fight every day?" Naofumi asked while shouting as he stood with his back against Pimple's, trying to avoid all the weird and dangerous fighting that was going around while giving some cover to the brown toad from behind
"Pretty much" Pimple replied as he turned into a huge brown Baboon and pounded his chest while letting out a nasty snarl, as he ran towards some of the ninjas, they threw shurikens at him, but he blocked the projectiles by spinning the legendary spear in front of him to deflect it, pouncing on them
Rash engaged in combat with three of the ninjas, as they attacked him with everything from knifes to retractable blades from their wrists, as the toad with the shades did his best to keep up, having turned his other hand into a giant butter knife while holding the legendary sword in his other hand, but he was just barely avoiding getting cut to pieces, noticing that the ninjas had surrounded him from all angles and were about to all dash in to stab him, he did what a toad does best and jumped up after turning the bottom of his feet into springs as he looked down before turning into a comedically large anvil to try and cush them, the ninjas escape his attempt
"Argh! That's it! You guys are too annoying with all your dodging!" He exclaimed irritated as he morphed into a large old style cartoon bomb complete with a burning fuse that had his face on it "Let's see you dodge this!"
"Oh crap!" Both Zits and Pimple exclaimed as the brown toad grabbed Naofumi and tackle him to the ground as the large battletoad morphed into a golden Sarcophagus with the shield bearer save inside, Zits pressed a sequence of buttons in his gauntlet and teleport to as far as he could, which was the floor above the one he was currently in. The ninjas saw the other toads drastic reactions and the maniacal expression on Rash's face, but before they could make their escape, the toad turned bomb exploded. Glass windows, bookshelves, beds, walls, everything in the floor the toads were in was completely blasted by the explosion, as the sound of it was so loud that it probably woke up everyone in the castle if not the entire kingdom
Pimple morphed back to normal as he roll over to the side as Naofumi was under him, the brown toad having his entire face and front body covered in ashes from the explosion, but otherwise being alright physically with no visible wound "*Cough!* *Cough!* Ugh..."
"Did... That... Do it?" Naofumi asked as he looked at Pimple, and the Battletoad gave him a thumbs up with a lot of struggle. Zits emerged from a portal, he looked around the room to find both it and the entirety of the rest of the floor destroyed, he looked at a Rash's body laying on the floor at the epicenter of the explosion covered in burned ashes with his sunglasses still intact
"Good going Rash, you blew it, literally!" Zits yelled as the ashed covered toad got up and violently shook himself to get the ashes out of his body, as Naofumi and Pimple started to check their defeated foes
"Hey... We can *cough!* Blame it on... Them" Rash said as he pointed at the multitode of bodies belonging to the ninjas on the floor "They can't say otherwise anymore! Since they're D-E-A-D!"
"Actually... This one still has a pulse" Pimple said as he felt the faint pulse of a heart beat coming from the ninja's chest, he checked another ninja and saw that he had a pulse as well "This one too! I think all of them survived!"
"You're kidding me?! How?!" Rash asked in disbelief at such thing z he was sure that those guys wouldn't be alive and kicking after they took such a direct hit from his kamikaze explosion
"I think it might be because of the level system, we are all level 1 while these guys are level 25 or higher" Naofumi explained his hypothesis on how that was possible, the status magic didn't allow him to see the level of someone higher than him without some type of shield form that could upgrade his system's inspection ability, but he did understand that these guys couldn't possibly have become such high dangerous assassins without at least having a high level
"Level system?" The toads inquired at the shield bearer with raised eyebrows at what he said
"The weapons give us a video style screen full of information to help us out, I will explain later, let's just tie these assassins before they wake up" Naofumi brushed aside the explanation of what the status system was as he pointed at the unconscious ninjas, the toads wanted to press him further on this but Pimple and Zits understood that it was better to deal with the deadly assassins first
As they start to check the ninjas bodies and remove any weapons they had on them, which was a lot. They placed all the weapons in one side of the room and the ninjas on the other, they hear a bunch of loud footsteps coming their way, as they turn and see the king in his nightgown, followed by a bunch of knights in metal armor carrying spears
"What madness is going on here?!" The king shouted as he looked at the destroyed hallway, seeing how the place was practically blown up to its entirety "What happened here?!"
"Ah King! Hello" the heroes greeted him half awkwardly as due to being the ones responsible for such destruction, Rash hit Zits in his elbow, indicating for the blueish green toad to step up and explain what happened
"We were sleeping when these assassins came and tried to kill us, but they didn't seem to expect us to put up as good of a fight as we did, so they tried to explode everything to kill us and leave no trace! Fortunately, we survived thanks to my impeccable leadership" Zits explained as he hid the fact that Rash was the one to blow up everything, as he didn't want to get on the bad side of the king right now
"A group of shadows couldn't take them down?" The king whispered, surprised at such a thing, the heroes saw his look of surprise but attributed that to the unexpected assassination attempt
"Sorry for the entire floor, it's all these guys to blame, whatever they say when they wake up is a lie" Rash said as he pointed at the ninjas, emphasizing to not believe in them on anything they say when they woke up
"They're alive?" The king asked surprised as he looked at the unconscious ninjas, wondering why the heroes didn't finish them off, but he assumed that they would want answers for why they were attacked and targeted, and the dead can't speak to the living
"... Very well, guards! Take these assassins to the dungeon for interrogation!" The king commanded with a yell, as the knights accompanying him did a salute and went to pick up the unconscious ninjas away
"As for you four, I'm sorry for such a thing happening in your first night here" king Aultcray said as his face and expression had a certain tone of annoyance to them, but the heroes attributed that to the fact he just got woke up by a loud explosion and finding a entire section of his home destroyed, anyone would be a little mad at that
"Nah, it's okay, we had worse sleeping experiences, right guy?" Pimple said as he looked at the other Battletoads, who all kinda of agreed to not make the king feel too bad
"So where do we sleep now?" Rash asked the king, as him and the other toads as well as Naofumi looked at the monarch with much intrigue
"You just had to blow up everything didn't you?" Zits complained to Rash as he, pimple, Rash and Naofumi were all outside of the castle in the cellar where they kept the royal steeds that were all a bunch of lizards similar to velociraptors or dragons, as the four heroes layed on a larger pile of hay
"I said I was sorry! Now move to the side, I'm barely getting enough hay to get comfortable" Rash said as he pushed Zits to the side and moved around a bit in his little mound of hay, trying to sleep
"Just try and get some shut eye, guys, we have a big day tomorrow" Pimple said as he looked at his fellow toads before letting out a yawn and rolling to the side
'Just what did I get myself in?' Naofumi wondered as he looked at the ceiling while laying awkwardly between the toads, as he could only imagine how he was able to get himself into such a bizarre situation with such strange people