Chapter Fifteen: Growth Sounds like Rice Krispies
"1 Gold Coin to enter and leave the village!?"
"That's too much!"
"That's way too much!"
"How do you expect us to pay that?!"
A crowd of people was gathered in the town square of Lute Village with the 'former' Lord. On a stage that had been set up by the Knights was their new Lord, Motoyasu. He was dressed in a new set of armor that looked exactly like the set Naofumi had shattered before, only without any of the bull crap enchantments.
He'd have to wait until the court magician was available again to get this new set enchanted.
"This temporary tax will go towards the town's rebuilding funds!" Myne announced authoritatively to the crowd. She stood beside the Spear Hero, holding a royal declaration in her hands.
She was being as bitchy as ever.
"Your town was hit hard by monsters during the last wave! Thus, in order to quickly gather the money needed, sacrifices must be made!"
"Sacrifice?! You want us to sacrifice a gold coin just to enter and leave!?" Someone in the crowd angrily yelled.
"We barely make twenty-five coppers a day!"
"We can't afford that!"
"We could never afford that!"
"We're doing just fine fixing this place up without your help!"
"It wasn't even monsters who did all this damage! It was your damn knights! They should be the ones paying for this damage!"
Some of the knights glanced at the young men who'd yelled. Some of the people looked like they were agreeing with their logic.
Myne continued to smile haughtily. "This is a royal decree. The King himself has given his approval." She said matter of factly. "Sir Motoyasu's word is law, and you must follow it-"
A cacophony of yells came from the crowd, drowning out Myne's next words. The villagers of Lute did not agree with her faulty reasoning.
She scowled angrily at their boos and shouts. What was their problem? They were supposed to be submissive villagers! Nothing more than peons meant to serve them till they dropped dead!
Albert and the rest of the town's guards moved between the people and the knights. Trying to calm them down before they did anything drastic.
Motoyasu stayed silent. Observing what was going on around him while Myne did all the talking.
"You're supposed to be a hero!"
"Why are you allowing her to do this?!"
"Please help us, Sir Spear Hero!"
Motoyasu clenched his fists. He could hear people in the crowd calling out for his help. He was supposed to be a hero. He was supposed to help them. Yet others in this crowd were glaring at him. Looking at him and Myne as if they were the bad guys.
Like he was worse than Naofumi.
'I'm supposed to be a hero. Myne and the others tell me that I'm a hero… so why do they all hate me? Is it true? Would this tax be something that would hurt them? Are they mad about that?' He didn't want to question Myne about it now. She had given him the idea, after all. But it didn't help that he'd found himself questioning everything on his mind more and more lately.
He was supposed to be a hero. He was supposed to help protect the people of this world. It was all supposed to only be a game... Yet he couldn't get that duel out of his mind. He couldn't forget how hard Naofumi, a horrible despicable excuse for a person, had fought to beat him despite having no attack power. He couldn't forget how Naofumi had held Raphtalia before Motoyasu had admitted defeat.
He especially couldn't forget what Raphtalia had said to Naofumi after she'd been freed.
"You've gone through a lot of pain… But from now on, you won't need to be alone with the pain."
He couldn't forget the sincerity in her eyes. The strength of the resolve in her voice. She hadn't been brainwashed or under anyone else's control. She truly believed that Naofumi was the one that was hurting. Not Myne, not the King, not anyone else Naofumi had supposedly harmed.
It was Naofumi...
Motoyasu put a hand to his head. It was impossible. How could anyone ever fall in love with that horrid rapist! Had he forced her to act that way using the slave contract as he had during the duel!?
But she hadn't had the slave crest on... But did that mean she had been free from the effects of the slave contract!?
Motoyasu scowled. He was having a mental conundrum over it all. Slave crest or not, real or not, she had meant it when she said she loved him. It went against everything logical in his mind. Myne said Naofumi was abusing her, but Raphtalia had defended him with all her heart. It made him wonder if a person could even be brainwashed to be so sincere. And because of that, he was not only starting to doubt Myne. He was starting to doubt himself.
Was he really a hero to the people here? He'd been trying so hard… yet standing here, hearing all these people yelling… some of them asking him to be merciful… some of them saying he was hurting them… some of them saying he wasn't acting like a hero…
Was he really not the hero here? Was Myne only using him to hurt others like Naofumi? Could he trust his friends in this game? Could he trust himself? Why was he staying silent then? Did that mean he really trusted himself to trust Myne's judgment here? Did that mean he was okay with imposing this tax on these people for their sake? They were just NPC's...
"Enough!" Myne tried to silence the crowd. But the crowd wasn't having it. They had already survived a wave of monsters. They were not going to let this monster take away everything else from them.
'What am I doing?! Of course, I trust her! She's one of my friends! I'd trust her with my life!' Motoyasu couldn't let any doubts in his friends shake him! He had to move forward under his friends' guidance so he could be the hero they wanted him to be!
"Get out of here!"
"We refuse to accept this!"
"Take your dumb taxes back to the King!"
He wanted to be confident in his decision... so why did it have to be so complicated?
"Master Naofumi! You need to wake up!"
"Huhhh!" Naofumi yawned loudly into his hand. "Five more minutes." He said drowsily, rolling over to go back to sleep.
"Ugh, Master Naofumi, get up, now!" Raphtalia said irritably.
"Uhhhhh…" Naofumi rolled over, trying to reenter dreamland.
With one hard tug, Raphtalia pulled the sleeping bag out from under Naofumi, putting him facefirst with the cold hard ground. It was, admittedly, not the politest wake up call he'd received.
"I said get up!"
Naofumi glared at the rising sun. 'Damn. How late did I stay up?'
It was a rhetorical question. He knew how late he'd stayed up.
After a somewhat bumpy start, he and Raphtalia had spent some time going over the Melromarc alphabet. It helped that she'd put the Melromarc characters in order. They'd started with the basics, with her having him read them over and over again, working on memorizing what each symbol represented. She tried to get him to pronounce the letters, but since his weapon auto-translated everything they said to each other, that turned out to be pointless so instead she focused on teaching him what each character meant in his language.
It was slow going, but he felt they'd made some progress last night. It'd be a long while before he was proficient enough to read anything though.
After doing that for a while, he carved in the symbols for his language underneath the symbols for Melromarc's language to help him when he studied in his free time. Then, hand in hand with Raphtalia, he'd read the Intermediate Compounding grimoire, using the translation pad as a rough means of figuring out what he was reading. He barely got through translating a small paragraph of the first listed recipe (which he discovered to be the nutritional pill he'd first created). He'd then checked his work over with Raphtalia before she'd decided to pull out her sleeping bag and go to sleep.
Finally, after that, he'd taken the second watch of the night and used that time to test out his new compounding tools. He'd found, to his delight, that they were much better than the old ones he'd been using. So much so that by the second batch of medicine he'd absorbed the old set into his shield, unlocking several shields, including the Medical Research Shield and the Beaker Shield, both of which improved his medicine making skills, and then he got back to compounding high-quality medicines from the various herbs he'd gathered.
It was almost like cheating, but it was a lot of fun. In fact, he'd had so much fun with it that he forgot to wake Raphtalia up when it was her turn to keep watch…
Much to the Half-Raccoon girl's displeasure.
"Master Naofumi!"
Naofumi looked up from the paper he was writing on. He'd finally discovered how to compound potions when he'd accidentally compounded together several different ingredients he hadn't meant to use (he attributed that to how tired he'd been before the compounding) and discovered a familiar potion.
Potion of Healing: Quality: Low
He'd quickly flasked it and had been in the middle of writing down in his language how he'd accomplished it when Raphtalia appeared yelling at him.
"What is it Raphtalia?" He asked quizzically.
"It's almost morning! Why didn't you wake me up!?"
Naofumi blinked his eyes tiredly. "What are you talking about? It's not supposed to be your watch for…" He trailed off as he looked up and realized he could see the light of dawn appearing on the horizon. It should have been her turn to keep watch several hours ago.
Oh, ^%$#. He hadn't realized he'd stayed up almost all night compounding. No wonder why he felt so tired. "Um, heh heh." He chuckled nervously to himself. "Guess I lost track of time?"
…
He knew it was a lame excuse the moment Raphtalia grabbed him by the collar of his cloak and started dragging him to his sleeping bag. "Bed, now!" She ordered.
"Alright alright, I'm going! I'm going! Geeze! You don't have to drag me like a little kid!" Naofumi complained as a pile of flailing limbs behind Raphtalia.
"Well, obviously, I do!" Raphtalia smiled as she dropped him down onto the sleeping bag. The previous day's exhaustion almost instantly caught up to him when he made contact with its surface. "Now. Are you going to climb into your sleeping bag yourself, or do you want me to tuck you in like a little kid?" Raphtalia teased him.
"Go... to… hell..." Naofumi was slowly drifting off to dreamland. Suddenly way too tired to finish the rest of his sentence.
Raphtalia happily finished tucking him into his sleeping bag. Once she was done, she kissed him on the forehead. "Sweet dreams. I'll wake you up if anything happens, Master Naofumi." She whispered.
'Yeah… sweet… dreams…' Why was he mad again? He couldn't remember as he dived into his own little dreamland.
Naofumi grimaced and groaned, still feeling tired. He felt the beginning of a headache forming. 'I need to be more careful about staying up all night. This is not like my old otaku days.' He finally got up off the ground. His sleeping bag, which Raphtalia had so rudely woken him out of, was off to the side.
'And I was dreaming of punching Motoyasu in the face too.' It had been such a good dream. He was actually doing damage in it. Why did his Shield have to be such a yandere about him attacking…?
"Good morning, Master Naofumi!"
Naofumi blearily opened his eyes and saw a Raphtalia that looked way too cheerful sitting by the fire with the morning sun blazing in the sky behind her... His eyes widened. 'Wait, morning!' He groaned, realizing he'd only been asleep for an hour, maybe two. "Why'd you wake me up so early?!" He asked grouchily. "You said you'd only do it if it was important!"
She pointed to the monster egg sitting by the fire excitedly. "And it is! Our Filolial egg is getting ready to hatch!"
…
Any more thoughts of sleep went flying out of his mind. 'Oh hell!' He quickly scrambled the rest of the way to sit next to Raphtalia. Sure enough, the egg was moving from side to side. The little being inside trying its best to escape its egg prison.
Raphtalia's tail was already wagging in anticipation, and if Naofumi had a tail he bet it would have been wagging too. 'But Firo said the end of the week! That's still five days away!' Then again, the bastard had probably been lying to him to make sure he stayed...
He found this odd. Normally, it'd be him that was up early in the morning. Technically, he had been up early that morning, after staying awake all night. Had he not done that, he figured he'd be the one waking Raphtalia up instead of vice versa.
"It won't be long now." She said cheerfully. "It's been doing this for the last few minutes."
Naofumi stayed silent, watching as the egg continued to rock from side to side. Then he gasped lightly when a crack formed on it. Then, a piece of shell fell off. 'If the Filolial is hatching this soon... That means it must be rare!'
He was about to own his very own rare breed of Filolial... or was he just coming up with grandiose delusions from how tired he was?
…
A few seconds of waiting later, the monster egg finally broke apart.
"Piiu!" From the remnants of the egg, a cute little pink-feathered fledgling looked up at Naofumi. A piece of the egg was still on its head.
Naofumi was… underwhelmed.
'It doesn't look rare...' He thought in disappointment.
"Wowwww!" Raphtalia's eyes went wide with awe. "It looks so cute!"
"Piiu!" The little fledgling Filolial jumped off the log into Naofumi's face. It didn't really hurt, it just caught him a little off guard. 'Seriously?! What a waste of 100 Silver!'
"Aren't you going to say something to her?" Raphtalia asked him curiously.
"What are you asking me for? Some stupid speech about how awesome this thing is going to be-" Naofumi grouchily asked her.
"Piiu!"
The bird ran with surprising speed along the length of his arm and jumped onto his head. Making his long shaggy hair into a nest for it to rest in.
Naofumi had a very flat look on his face. "You have got to be kidding me."
"Pii! Pii Pii Pii Pii Pii!"
"Awww, she already thinks you're her daddy!" Raphtalia said happily as the baby fledgling looked around from its new perch. She started to ruffle one of its little wings gently with her hand, causing it to Pii in happiness. "Who's a cute little Filolial. Yes, you are. You are."
"So it's imprinting on me, great," Naofumi said sarcastically. Had he really been woken up, for this?
He wanted to go back to sleep now. This was ridiculous. What kind of fever dream had he been having to think Filolials could ever be rare or epic?
"Naofumi, stop thinking harsh things about your daughter." Raphtalia chastised him.
"I'm sorry, what?" Naofumi gave her a stink eye, and she gave him an innocent grin.
"Pii!" The fledgling chirped happily as it continued rubbing its head into Raphtalia's hand.
"That's it, how about you let it imprint on you then." Naofumi picked the fledgling Filolial out of his hair and handed it to Raphtalia. It looked up at him curiously at the action. "Pii?"
"What, why me?" Raphtalia asked.
"If it wants a parent, then you can be its mommy," Naofumi added to his previous sarcastic statement.
"Do… do you really think I could be a mom?" She asked curiously.
What was up with that? She knew he was being sarcastic, didn't she? "Beats me. I didn't have the best parents in my world, so I wouldn't know. Anyway, I'm going back to bed. Wake me if something important happens."
"But, but I've never been a parent," Raphtalia said fearfully.
"Not my problem." Naofumi laid down on his bag to go back to sleep.
The fledgling had no idea what was going on. But it excitedly rushed up mommy's arms and into her hair before settling down between her Tanuki ears. "Pii!" It chirped happily.
"But Naofumi, what are we going to name it!?"
Naofumi groaned. He just wanted to go back to sleep. "It's a Filolial, right? So how about Filo."
"Filo?!" Raphtalia asked incredulously.
"What? You asked for a name, and I provided one."
"But doesn't that sound a little obvious to you?!"
"Pii! Pii!" The fledgling chirped happily on Raphtalia's head at being called Filo.
"Looks like Filo likes it to me," Naofumi flatly stated.
Raphtalia gritted her teeth. "If Filo, is going to look to us as her parents, then you're starting off as a horrible spouse, Master Naofumi."
…
…
"Master Naofumi-?"
"Huaghhhh!" Naofumi snored in response.
"What, no! You can't already be asleep! There's still-"
"Pii! Pii!"
"Sigh. What is it… Filo?" Raphtalia resignedly said the bird's name as she took Filo off her head.
"Pii! Pii!" Once Raphtalia held Filo in front of her eyes, she started piiing again and gestured with one of her small wings towards her mouth.
"What, are you hungry?" Raphtalia asked softly. So what if Naofumi was too tired to care right now? She'd be alright with this cute little-
"Pii!" A loud, almost comical growl came from Filo's small abdomen. Raphtalia stared at the happy little bird in shock.
How could something her size already be making sounds like that?!
"Maybe you are hungry…" She walked over to the wagon to grab one of the bags of beans.
Hopefully, she and Naofumi would be able to use them to feed little Filo for a while.
"Pii! Pii!"
"Haaaaa!"
Raphtalia thrust her sword into the chest of the large frog-like monster in front of her. She then jumped back as blood sprayed out of its chest wound. The frog monster leaned forward, still alive as it tried to grab Raphtalia with its long tongue.
"Air Strike Shield!"
The tongue slammed into an ethereal green Shield. While it was surprised, Raphtalia jumped from behind the shield and cleanly sliced off the end of the tongue. Then, while the frog monster was screeching in pain, she dashed in and slashed through the monster's side.
The frog monster teetered on its back two legs from that attack. Blood spurted from its chest, side, and mouth. It tottered, but at last, it croaked and fell backward to the ground. The fight was over.
"Good job, Raphtalia," Naofumi commented as he approached her and the dead monster, a familiar experience notification appearing beside his head. Now that he'd had some time to sleep, he seemed to be in a much better mood than that morning.
"Pii! Pii!" Filo chirped happily on Naofumi's head. The pink feathered bird looked a little bigger than she had earlier.
Raphtalia sheathed her sword. She didn't look tired at all. "I was hoping a level 30 monster would challenge me more." She said sadly. The frog monster and the carcasses of all the other monsters lying around had died far too easily. These small fry hardly pushed her any more, unlike the ones she'd grown used to fighting before the Wave. "How am I supposed to grow stronger if all the fights are going to be this easy?"
Naofumi dropped the red balloon he'd been doing his daily punching workout with and pulled up her stats on his HUD. "I'd rather you not jinx us with comments like that." He said dryly.
"Oh, sorry Master Naofumi," Raphtalia said abashedly.
Raphtalia: LV. 35
She wasn't at the level cap yet, but her stats were surprisingly high for her level. She was far stronger and faster than she'd been before the wave. How had her stats gotten so high… oh yeah. He'd almost forgotten about the Slave User Shields he'd gotten from Beloukas.
They were far more effective than he'd realized. Damn. He wished she'd had this power boost before the Wave. Fighting monsters would have been a piece of cake.
And maybe, that one knight wouldn't have been able to stop her from cutting off that Commander's head.
Now that would have been a sight to see.
"You're thinking rude thoughts again, aren't you?" Raphtalia asked.
"No, I'm not." Naofumi glared back. Raphtalia crossed her arms, not believing her master in the slightest. "Also, thanks to your hard work today, Filo is already at level 11," Naofumi said, changing the subject. "So she's certainly getting stronger."
"Pii! Pii!" The not so fledgling Filo cried out happily. He looked her stats over and was similarly impressed at how much they'd increased since that morning. 'The Monster User Shields I unlocked from absorbing Filo's egg, feather, and a feather from that one grown Filolial yesterday are really helping Filo to grow too. Damn. Can I strengthen all my future party members this way?'
Snap! Crackle! Pop!
Loud, painful sounds came from the baby Filolial as it increased a little more in size on his head. Despite that, it still looked quite happy. "Um, did that sound healthy to you Master Naofumi?" Raphtalia asked.
"Not really. Is she supposed to be growing this fast?" Naofumi asked.
"No, that's really… unusual," Raphtalia said.
'Maybe that's another benefit of those Monster User Shields… at this rate, Filo will outpace Raphtalia.' Not just in terms of stats. He remembered vividly how much Raphtalia had eaten during that time. 'Damn. I really hope Filo doesn't eat as much as Raphtalia did. She spent so much money on food whenever she visited a village that I thought for sure I'd go bankrupt.'
"You're thinking about something rude again." Raphtalia pouted at him.
"No, I'm not." He responded dryly. Seriously, how could she always tell what was on his mind?
"You're making the same face again. Don't lie to me." Her pout deepened.
It was cute in a way.
"I'm just thinking about Filo's unusual growth. That's all." Naofumi said dryly.
"Pii!" Before Raphtalia could question him, Filo suddenly hopped off his head onto the head of the dead frog monster. Right as he'd finished cutting off a part of it to absorb into his shield.
"Wait, Filo-" Naofumi tried to say.
The sight they saw next was so sickening, he stopped speaking. The young little fledgling opened its small mouth wide, and it got to work on devouring the frog monster one chunk at a time. The amazing part was how the pieces that disappeared seemed impossibly bigger than the size of Filo's mouth. Maybe even close to her size.
"Oh, hell no, I'm not watching this." Naofumi turned away, looking slightly sick.
"Ack! Filo! It could be poisonous!" Raphtalia said in worry.
"Pii! Pii! Pii!" Filo cried happily in between gobbling up the frog monster. Whether it was poisoned or not, she didn't seem to mind in the slightest.
"How is she eating so much?" Raphtalia looked shocked at the little bird monster's appetite.
Not even she had been that bad when she was growing... she hadn't been that bad when she was growing, hadn't she? At least, not bad enough to eat a whole monster without cooking it first.
"Oi, how am I supposed to know?! You're the one that took care of her this morning!"
The almost three-meter tall, chunky frog monster Raphtalia had taken down took less than five minutes to be gobbled into the ravenous gullet that was named Filo. The sounds that came during that time were sounds that Naofumi never wanted to hear again. It was a mercy the frog monster was already dead, though its family watched from the bushes in terror.
Naofumi focused during that time on getting his shield to absorb the frog monster fragment. Fortunately, it was enough for him to unlock a new shield. Frog Monster Shield. Its stats weren't very impressive, but its equip bonus once unlocked would give a small stat increase to his defense… and better his ability to swim?
He didn't know what was more mind-boggling. The fact that Filo was eating a monster many times her size, or that he needed a swimming skill in this world.
Granted he hadn't swum around much since arriving in this world unless bathes in the shallow ends of rivers counted. So who was he to know?
Finally, when she was done, Filo laid back on the grass. She rested her small pink wings contentedly on her stomach. She was surrounded by scraps of flesh and blood. "Pii! Bwarp!" She let out a loud burp.
"...Maybe we've leveled up Filo a little too much in one day," Raphtalia commented.
Snap! Crackle! Pop!
The sounds of Filo's growth hit their ears again. Raphtalia stared at her 'daughter'. 'Is it just me, or is Filo already three times the size she was this morning?'
To Naofumi, the sounds she made while she was growing reminded him an awful lot of the sound of Rice Krispies from back home. Man, it'd been a while since he'd had a treat like that. He should see if he could try making it in this world one day.
...
"Master Naofumi, just what kind of Filolial did you buy?" Raphtalia asked.
"How should I know? It was an egg lottery, not window shopping." Naofumi said. 'I should have known something was off the moment Raphtalia told me Filo ate half the beans this morning!' Naofumi groaned.
He'd written it off as the bird being hungry after putting in all that effort to being born so quickly. "I have no idea what the hell she is…" 'I don't know if this is even normal for Filolials or not! Damn it! We can't go back to Beloukas to check if this is normal! And we're definitely not going back to Firo!'
"Pii! Pii!" Filo got back up and ran up to Raphtalia. She pointed a wing at her beak and opened it, indicating she was still hungry.
"Um, Master Naofumi?!" Raphtalia asked nervously.
"What? You're the one who's supposed to be its mother. Not me." Naofumi said indifferently.
"But, but that's not fair! You're supposed to be Filo's Father!" Raphtalia said pouting.
"I never agreed to that. And you're the one that hunts the monsters." He added. "Me, all I can do is punch balloons." He said, holding up a red balloon munching on his indestructible hand. "And I doubt that leather tastes very good to Filolials."
…
Raphtalia crossed her arms and gave him a light glare. She didn't say anything, but he got the feeling that she did not want to be the only one between the two of them to put in the effort to raise the little Filolial. Or whatever the hell Filo was. Such an arrangement would not be fair at all. Especially when it was his choice to buy the egg in the first place.
Naofumi eventually sighed and relented. "Fine, help me gather the monsters. I'm sure I'll be able to cook something up that she can eat."
Raphtalia smiled and gave him a big hug. "Thank you!" She said happily.
It made him feel somewhat better. Somewhat.
'I mean, Raphtalia did kill a lot of monsters today. I'm sure we'll have more than enough to feed Filo.'
Hours later, the small Filo laid in a small nest of balloon scraps in the back of the wagon carriage. She sighed contentedly in her sleep. About fifteen feet away, a stunned Naofumi looked down at the large empty pot he had cooked with… again, and again, and again...
'She ate… everything Raphtalia gathered today… as well as the beans... and she was still hungry…'
Usapils, Pikyus, Porcupines, everything that had been killed now rested in the bottomless pit named Filo. Whether it had been cooked beforehand or not.
He'd honestly lost count after the tenth meal how many times he'd had to cook. He couldn't even remember if he'd had the chance to eat or not. Satisfying Filo's appetite had taken far more effort than he could have ever imagined.
Snap! Crackle! Pop!
The painful sound of Rice Krispy noises came from the back of the carriage. He cringed at them and opened up the magic grimoire next to him. Maybe it'd be better for him to take his mind off of Filo for a while. Or to take his mind off of food for a while in general.
One thing was for sure, if he'd been hungry before, Filo's rampage on their food supply had definitely killed his appetite.
...
For the next twenty minutes, Naofumi had a rough time trying to translate what was next to an illustration to see if it was a spell he could learn or not. He got the message Failed to Read over and over again. He could make sense of some of the letters after some time using the translation pad, yet it was just a bunch of jargon to him.
"Urgh." He groaned, and he rubbed a hand to his forehead to try and alleviate the approaching headache.
Learning magic from another language was harder than he'd thought. Why couldn't he have a cheat sheet as a Hero? This sucked.
"Is something wrong, Master Naofumi?" Raphtalia asked as she appeared from the forest. She had several large porcupines gripped in her hands. The needles had been stripped from their bodies. With their food supplies gone, she'd gone hunting in case Filo was still hungry.
"It's… it's nothing." Naofumi grumbled. "I'm just trying to read this section, but all I'm getting is garbage."
'It's like trying to use Google Translate on a dead language.' He thought back to the times he used the Internet tool to try and pass his English courses in college.
Long story short, he'd almost failed his English courses.
He figured it didn't help that he didn't know the rules of this language. Though it couldn't be as convoluted as English, right?
Raphtalia looked over his shoulder. "Are you sure you can't read it?" She asked quizzically. "That's the page of text I learned Light from."
…
Naofumi looked from the book to Raphtalia in disbelief. "You're kidding. I didn't read anything about that spell." 'Hell, I didn't read anything about anything!'
Raphtalia crossed her eyebrows and pointed to a line of text on the page. "See, it's right here."
Naofumi looked at the sentence, and at the translation pad. It took him a little while to be able to read out what it said. "I still don't see anything like that written there." He said. It was just some garbage letters thrown together.
Failed to Read
'Yeah yeah, I already got the message. Stop badgering it into my brain already you stupid book!'
"Hmmm... are the letters glowing for you?" Raphtalia asked.
"Are they supposed to be glowing?" He asked.
"Well, when I first read them, they glowed for me," Raphtalia said. "They weren't at first… but then it was like the letters rearranged themselves and began to glow… does that make sense?"
Naofumi looked over the magic grimoire curiously at that. Maybe it wasn't just about learning the language. Maybe he also had to learn to read magic text... or whatever the heck a mage in this world would call it.
He flipped through the pages to see if it really was as simple as finding lines of glowing text. However, he groaned to himself when none of the lines of text stuck out to him.
"It might help if you were to put in some effort and read the text yourself," Raphtalia said, failing to hide the amusement from her voice.
"How about you explain how you found it so easily!?" He complained.
"Um, beginner's luck?" Raphtalia shrugged.
Naofumi groaned. "At the rate I'm going, I'm going to throw this book into the fire if it doesn't make sense anytime soon." He grumbled. "Or absorb it into my shield."
Despite the threat of being burned or consumed, the magic grimoire still refused to give up its secrets to Naofumi.
Failed to Read
He swore it was mocking him.
"How about we take a break from reading then." She suggested, taking the grimoire and translation tablet from his hands.
Naofumi grunted unhappily but didn't resist Raphtalia's action. He instead brought out his compounding tools from his pack and got to work on compounding more medicines and potions.
At least that was something he knew how to do. And his tools definitely wouldn't mock him by saying failed to create medicine.
He swore, if they did that, he'd grind them down to powder and spread their ashes over some random lake so nobody could ever use them again.
…
"Master Naofumi, is there a reason why you've been making a lot of medicine lately?" The Tanuki girl asked.
"Well." He began to reply without looking away from his work. "If I want to pass for one of those traveling night merchants, I need something to sell people."
"I, I guess," Raphtalia said unsurely. She looked down at her lap, her tail slowly moving side to side behind her. The sound of Filo's content sleeping sounded cutely from the back of the wagon.
Despite the day they'd had, Raphtalia still couldn't take her mind off of yesterday.
"You see, when humans laid with monsters and animals, the filthy demi-humans were created. A vile abomination indeed..."
She looked down at her legs sadly. She didn't know if what that evil man said was the truth or not… she really hoped it wasn't. But would Naofumi look down at her for it if it was?
"Is there something on your mind?" Naofumi interrupted her thoughts.
"..."
Naofumi looked up from the low-quality Healing Potion he created to look at her. "Raphtalia?" He asked curiously.
Raphtalia snapped back to the present, and her cheeks flushed a little red from embarrassment. "Sorry." She quickly apologized.
"..." Naofumi went back to his next creation. "It looked like you were pretty deep in thought there."
"I…" Raphtalia sighed. "I was."
"Hmmm." He hummed in response.
'Do I tell him... should I tell him?...' She thought about it for a moment… he wasn't pressing or anything. "... I was just, um… thinking about the last couple of days since we left the Capital," Raphtalia said while looking off to the side.
...
"It really has been only a couple of days, hasn't it?" Naofumi asked. It was strange, it felt like a lot had happened. Yet, in reality, it hadn't been that much time. The timer with the hourglass on his menu said there were still 42 more days until the next wave.
"I want to think that we'll be able to get somewhere safe… but..." She trailed off. "I won't be able to help you if we get separated again."
Naofumi set his failed creation to the side of him. He looked at Raphtalia. His eyes were soft, even if it did look like his face was still getting used to smiling again after frowning for so long. "You know that I do my best to watch your HP bar when we're separated, right?" He asked.
It was close to what she'd wanted to hear. So close... but he didn't have the ability to read her mind. He probably wouldn't know unless she told him. "It's not the same…"
…
Naofumi gently slipped his hand into hers. "It's not." He agreed. "But it's my way of caring about you enough to try and protect you even when you're not with me."
Raphtalia looked at him... a warm feeling filled her chest, and she gave him a soft smile. "Thank you."
"No problem." He said. 'If a broken clock is right twice a day. I guess even a guy can get lucky and say the right thing to a girl.'
…
"Um, Master Naofumi?"
"Yeah?" He asked.
"How… comfortable are you…" Raphtalia's face was flushing red. She was still holding his hand.
Naofumi looked down and realized it. A slight flush filled his face. Even after cuddling with her a couple of nights ago. "Um." He let go of her hand. "I'm not sure…" 'For so many different reasons…' "Why do you ask?"
"Well… my instincts are telling me one thing, but my mind is telling me another. And I don't want to do anything you're not comfortable with." She admitted.
'Yeah… animal instincts... Elhart warned me, so okay. I need to find an adult demi-human soon.' He didn't want to commit to any relationship right now. And he definitely didn't want to step into a relationship with someone who didn't know how adult relationships worked. Even if Raphtalia was an adult now, it didn't mean she had the experience of an adult.
At least, he hoped she didn't. If any of her previous masters had done such horrible things to her... the thought filled him with such rage that he had to lock it away before he really got pissed off.
"Alright. For now, how about tomorrow we continue what we're doing, and once Filo is large enough, we'll head to the nearest town to try out the night merchant business." Naofumi suggested.
"Y-Yeah. That sounds fine." Raphtalia said.
"And while we're there. We can try finding an adult female demi-human as well." Naofumi added.
Raphtalia looked at him curiously. "Why would we need to find another demi-human?" She asked curiously.
"Because... your body and emotions have obviously gone through some changes, and I think it'd be best to learn from an adult of your race how to handle them," Naofumi said, doing his best to remain calm. Damn it, he was twenty years old and he was afraid to talk to a girl about the effects of puberty!
Why did he have to be an otaku?!
Raphtalia looked curious at that and thought about it. "Yeah, I think that would be a good idea." She agreed.
Naofumi inwardly sighed with relief. 'I won't have to give her the birds and the bees talk after all.' "Alright, it's settled." He started putting his compounding tools in his pack.
"I'll take the first watch tonight," Raphtalia said happily.
"Sounds good to me," Naofumi said, getting up from his log to walk to his sleeping bag. He was tired after today, and all he wanted to do now was sleep.
"And Naofumi."
He looked back over his shoulder at Raphtalia. "Yeah?"
"I, I love you." She said quietly.
...
He hadn't realized until that moment it hadn't been since before she got her slave crest back that she'd said those words to him.
"Master Naofumi no one is forcing me." She said seriously. "I want you to be able to trust me at all times to never lie to you. Even about my feelings."
Naofumi's mind returned to the present, and he finally smiled genuinely for her. "I know." He said back quietly before he laid down in his sleeping bag to fall asleep until his shift. Glad for more than one reason. "Goodnight Raphtalia."
"Goodnight."
...
Where Raphtalia sat on her log, she started to smile as well. 'He didn't say it back… he didn't mention yesterday to me... but at least he knows that I'm serious about my feelings.' She thought, moving her hand over the slave crest on her chest. The crest that would have acted up if she had been lying.
'And he didn't reject me, a demi-human, for having them.'
It was progress.
Hero Clips!
Wake Up Master Naofumi!
"Wake Up Master Naofumi!"
Raphtalia stood over Naofumi who was dead asleep in his sleeping bag. "You need to wake up! Your egg is going to hatch at any moment!"
"Huhhh!" Naofumi yawned loudly into his hand. "Five more minutes Raphtalia." He said drowsily as he rolled over in his sleep.
"Master Naofumi, get up, now!" Raphtalia said irritably. Her tail was bushed out behind her.
"Ughhhh…" Naofumi rolled over again.
With one hard tug, Raphtalia pulled the sleeping bag out from under Naofumi, putting him in contact with the cold hard ground. "Just wake up already! I'm being serious!"
Naofumi continued to doze. An anime bubble appeared from his nose. Increasing and decreasing in size as he breathed in and out.
"This isn't funny Master Naofumi!" Raphtalia yelled as she raised Naofumi by the shoulders and shook him.
"Huuaahhhh!" Naofumi snored to her face.
"MASTER NAOFUMI!" Raphtalia tried slapping him across the face. Whether because of his high defense stat, or how tired Naofumi was, he still refused to wake up. He continued to snore instead.
"AUGHHHHHHHH!" Raphtalia raised Naofumi off the ground and shook him in the air above her. Showcasing her immense strength. "YOUR FILOLIAL EGG IS ABOUT TO HATCH! WAKE UP! DAMN IT! I SAID WAKE UP NAOFUMI!" Raphtalia yelled.
"Huahhhhhhh!" Naofumi snored again whilst being shaken around.
Over near the fire, the monster egg cracked, and then it burst open. "Piiu!" Filo, the small pink feathered fledgling black hole, cried out happily. Then she looked around curiously when she saw no one around. "Piiu?"
"MASTER NAOFUMI!"
Filo looked over behind her. Mommy was now slamming daddy's back into a tree again and again. The tree shook with each hit, dropping leaves around the pair. "DAMN IT! THIS ISN'T FUNNY! WAKE UP NAOFUMI!"
"Huahhhhhhh!" Naofumi continued to snore despite his body being smashed into the tree repeatedly.
Filo watched for a moment more, and then looked down at her stomach worriedly. "Piiu?" If her parents weren't aware that she'd hatched, did that mean it'd be a while before she was fed?
Hero Clips!
Failing at Everything
Failed to Read
"Ugh, this book is impossible!" Naofumi threw the grimoire away from him.
He swore he heard laughter coming from its pages. It was as if the magic text was mocking him for his inability to read anything.
He scowled as he pulled his compounding tools from his pack and began working on a potion.
At least these wouldn't fail on him. He'd made this particular medicine a hundred times. He knew it like the back of his hand-
Failed to Create Medicine
...
Naofumi threw the compounding set at a tree. His scowl deepened however when the sturdy beakers and mortar and pestle didn't break. He couldn't even get the satisfaction of venting his frustration out on the stupid objects!
"Alright, I guess since that's the case, I'll just try gathering herbs! At least you don't need any skills to do that!" Naofumi got up and went to pick some nearby herbs.
However, when he pulled on them, they refused to come out of the ground.
Failed to Gather
What the literal &^%$?!
"Don't tell me you need a skill for gathering too?!" Naofumi screamed as he tugged with all his might.
Failed to Gather
"Why, I didn't need some stupid skill to gather these herbs before!"
Failed to Gather
Failed to Gather
Failed to Gather
"Ahhhhhhhhhhh!" Naofumi finally screamed as he ran towards the lake.
"Master Naofumi, look at what Filo and I caught-" Raphtalia appeared in the camp, holding a rare monster in her grip.
"Ahhhhhhhhhhhh!" Naofumi continued to scream as he dove headfirst into the lake to try and escape the madness.
Failed to Dive
Failed to Swim
Failed to Swim
Failed to Swim
"Um, Naofumi?" Raphtalia looked around the empty campsite curiously.
Failed to Swim
Failed to Swim
Failed to Swim
Air bubbles came up from the bottom of the lake.
The screaming of a Hero who'd had enough of this stupid world.
Till Next Time
Allen