by Aneko Yusagi
“Dafu.” That was an odd call for it to make.
“What’s that thing? That’s not a Raph species from the village,” I said.
“You can tell them apart?!” Raphtalia exclaimed.
“Yeah, pretty much—by touch and by their voices. This one has got thicker eyebrows than the others too,” I explained.
“When did you learn that trick?” she asked, a strange look on her face. Not like I’m hurting anyone! They’re cute, so sue me! They were like a litter of kittens born from the same parents—they all looked alike. But after living together long enough, you started to be able to tell them apart.
“Even Ruft can do it,” I told her.
“I think I need to have a serious discussion with both you and Ruft at some point soon,” Raphtalia said.
“You do?” I asked.
“Dafu!” said the newcomer.
“This one isn’t registered to my monster seal . . . Just where did it show up from?” I wondered.
“It isn’t a monster the Sword or Bow Hero are looking after that they turned into a Raph species . . . right?” Raphtalia suggested.
“Don’t ask me,” I replied. It wasn’t as though the Raph species was a virus. As we stood there, perplexed, the new Raph species popped off a spell toward me. That triggered the monster seal and completed its registration, regardless of my intent. I wanted to comment on that, I really did, but first I checked its status.
Pretty high, all across the board. The highest among the Raph species I had. It was almost as high as Raph-chan—level 95! Just what was this little cutie?!
“In any case . . . I don’t know what this Raph species is, so let’s take it under our wing and give it a temporary name,” I suggested.
“Take it under our wing?” Raphtalia raised an eyebrow.
“Dafu!” The mysterious Raph species was waving its hand at Raphtalia.
“For now, how about we go with Raph-chan II?” I said.
“I’ve been meaning to bring this up for a while now . . . When you encounter a person similar to someone you already know, you have a tendency to just add ‘II’ to the first person’s name, don’t you?” she questioned me. Ulp, I was reminded again just how perceptive Raphtalia could be.
“Dafu!” said the newcomer.
During the subsequent breakfast, I showed Raph-chan II to Ren and Itsuki and asked them about her. As we had suspected, it wasn’t either of their monster. It also wasn’t one of the filolials that Motoyasu was taking care of.
With no idea where she came from, or how she ended up under my care, a mysterious Raph species joined the party.
“So are we going to have a meeting in Faubrey today?” Ren asked.
“Most likely,” I said.
We finished breakfast, met up with the queen, and set out. Motoyasu had reached a point just outside the capital of Faubrey, so we had decided to all gather at that point together. Then we would join him on his carriage journey from there and discuss what we were going to do next. Due to how widely known she was, we’d also decided to take the old Hengen Muso lady along with us. Including her, the party comprised me, Raphtalia, Raph-chan, Filo, Fohl, Ren, Itsuki, Rishia, Motoyasu, his three colored filolials, Gaelion, Wyndia, and Sadeena. Then there was the queen, Trash, and Eclair acting as an escort. S’yne was also quietly tagging along.
Far too many of them, all things told. Apparently it was to look after me in my emotionally unstable state. Ruft and Shildina had remained behind to watch over the village.
“Raph,” Raph-chan gave a call, summoning a ball of light . . . and Raph-chan II appeared.
“Dafu!” she said triumphantly. I was at a loss for words. So Raph-chan had also learned C’mon Raph?
I didn’t have the heart to send her back anyway, so based on the condition of her not causing any trouble, I agreed to let her come along.
“They’ve sent a message that they are ready to receive us, so it shouldn’t be a problem,” the queen informed us.
We had also heard the details about the Kirin battle. It had been one of the seven star heroes and his party who had been in Faubrey and confronted the beast.
“The report informed us that all of the seven star heroes have finally been gathered together. Achieving this gathering has apparently been quite the task,” she went on.
“I see. So the heroes have gathered. I very much suspect one of them of the deed. We’ll find out which one was in Faubrey and capture them at once,” I declared.
The wagon continued to rumble and jolt onward. Along the way, the path had changed to stone cobbles, but who had the time to care about that?
“Ren, what do you think heroes from other worlds, people like us, might be thinking?” I chose Ren to ask because Itsuki was totally spaced out for the wagon ride, and Motoyasu was only interested in Filo and his three own filolials, so he was never going to listen to me.
“There are multiple possibilities,” Ren pondered.
“Sure. Go on,” I prompted.
“One pattern would be not to care about the waves at all, completely disregarding their duty,” Ren started.
“That one I can understand right away,” I quipped. It wasn’t a bad move to think about yourself first. I wouldn’t be surprised if there were one or two who simply chose to drop out of this shitty world and live in seclusion. I’d even wanted it to get wiped out myself, although that was a while back now.
Thinking about Raphtalia and Atla helped make me more optimistic.
“Or maybe the seven star hero who defeated the Kirin said that he’d handle everything and so the others decided not to join in?” Ren continued.
“Leaving other people to handle the problem would rub me the wrong way. There are already warrants out for them under the orders of the four holy heroes. If they don’t gather together at least once, they’ll be treated as criminals,” I replied. I couldn’t imagine anyone who was enjoying being summoned to another world skipping out on an event like this.
“I guess there could also be the type getting lost in simply raising their level, becoming a monster out in the wilderness,” Ren posited.
“Ah. Maybe that was the most suspicious type of all. There was that guy in Siltvelt pretending to be the Claw Hero,” I recalled. The type of player who didn’t take part in events but loved to just raise their level, living away from civilization the whole time. That could be a big problem for this world too, to be honest. Looking at Ren and the others, I could kind of understand why there had been that imposter pretending to be a hero in Siltvelt. That move wouldn’t work on us again.
“In any case, whoever it was who interfered during the Phoenix battle must be punished. Even if they are a hero. That’s one crime I’m never going to forgive,” I stated.
“I’m with you,” Ren agreed. “There was evil intent behind that attack, no doubt. It isn’t worthy of mercy.”
“That’s right! They have to be punished!” Fohl, who had been listening quietly, chose that moment to speak up and give a vigorous nod.
“Under the authority of the four holy heroes, I shall see them punished! Even if they are one of the seven star heroes!” I affirmed. That might be contrary to the image of an ideal hero held by Raphtalia and the others, but this was one point on which I simply couldn’t back down. Even if I lost myself in anger, I could never forgive the act that had killed Atla. There could be no reasoning, no peace reached with the one who would do such a thing.
I was aware that I was taking things very personally and acting simply to fulfill my own desire for revenge. Yet I still couldn’t forgive the coward who had killed so many of us as we fought for the sake of this world. The one who had killed Atla.
“Master! It’s pretty incredible out here!” Filo shouted from outside.
“What’s up?” I took a look. The town itself looked like a pretty affluent place . . . and I could see cars that looked pretty steampunk-like, running on some kind of steam-engine technology. Cars from a level of technology featured in a series
of mystery novels featuring a famous detective, perhaps?
Then I saw a weapon shop. It appeared to be selling . . . guns?
Faubrey looked like a pretty modern place.
“Looks like they also sell guns here,” I commented.
“Are you interested in guns, Hero Iwatani?” The queen looked at the weapon shop and then back at me.
“I was just thinking about how different this place is from Melromarc. All these advancements, they look pretty powerful,” I responded.
“Faubrey is a powerful nation, and we would certainly want to avoid conflict with them. That said . . .” She trailed off.
“Right. Weapons rely on the status of the user here, don’t they?” I said.
“Correct. You surely learned during the Cal Mira islands battle how things work differently in this world from your own, Hero Iwatani,” the queen said. I recalled being unable to rely on Itsuki’s attacks and having Raphtalia using the ballista on the ship. “The majority of the summoned heroes propose making use of them, but it never really works out.” Trying to get ahead by making use of modern knowledge from home? It sounded like lots of heroes had similar ideas.
“They have all sorts of operational problems, too, and cost a lot to keep running.”
“The costs when compared to a bow mean that only a few cities such as Faubrey handle them.”
“That’s what I’ve heard too.”
“They also run the risk of blowing up if they get hit by fire magic. If you want to make ranged attacks, magic, a bow, or a thrown weapon is a far better bet.”
“In games, they can be strong once mastered. But not the strongest.” Itsuki also got involved in the conversation. Now that he mentioned it, I’d also played games in which guns were difficult to handle—games in which guns were clearly inferior to swords and other weapons. While this world was unquestionably real, this was also a sobering reminder that it was a place that mimicked a fantasy world.
Seeing as the user’s status was reflected, maybe they would be strong if Itsuki tried them now—if he was able to, I mean. Itsuki’s weapon was a bow . . . so maybe he couldn’t use guns. He could use crossbows. Seemed worth getting him to try it.
“Should I take a quite detour and copy some weapons?” Itsuki asked.
“Yeah. If it goes well, this may make you stronger,” I told him.
“I’ll do my best to meet your expectations, Naofumi,” he replied.
“We’d better go, Itsuki,” Rishia said. Itsuki gave a nod, perhaps detecting my intent, and headed with Rishia into a weapon shop.
Right now, we wanted all the fighting strength we could find.
Itsuki quickly finished his copying and came back. He’d been able to copy the guns. Whether he could use them in battle or not was another matter, and they would likely need upgrading.
The wagon rolled on, gradually moving closer to a castle larger than the one in Melromarc. It had white dove-like monsters flying through the air around it, giving off a really intense “fantasy” vibe.
If I’d come here right after being summoned, I probably would have broken down into tears. It was far more extravagant than Melromarc and looked like a pretty nice place to live.
As I reflected on it now, the Middle Ages setting for this world was really just a façade. I’d heard that most of the big cities during the Middle Ages in my world had truly terrible hygiene, with excrement and urine discarded from the windows and onto the street.
I’d even heard that high heels had been created to avoid that slop. Was that a thing?
In any case, this world certainly didn’t feel as unhygienic as that. Many places seemed to have water and sewer services—although probably not villages out in the sticks. Still, I wondered if it could have been information learned from people coming from other worlds.
The capital of Zeltoble had seemed pretty unsafe, but this place just looked like a normal city.
“Now that I think of it . . . there seems to be less discrepancy in the handling of demi-humans and humans here than in Melromarc,” I commented. Thanks to our own efforts, Melromarc was currently trying to put an end to demi-human discrimination. That said, it wasn’t going smoothly. Most of the demi-humans found in the castle town were adventurers or merchants with no real intention of actually settling down there.
The town in my own territory had quite a few demi-humans, of course, but here in Faubrey it was like there was no discrimination at all. In Melromarc, I almost never witnessed scenes of human and demi-human children playing together, apart from in my village or the nearby town. That made this place feel quite refreshing.
“You’re right. We could learn a lot from them,” the queen muttered, seeing the same sights as me. Melromarc was improving its treatment of demi-humans, but now the demi-human side was starting to cause problems. It was wrong to back either of them, of course.
We passed a large church. A church of the Four Heroes, with a characteristic emblem evoking the four weapons. There was the same emblem on the church in my territory.
The queen pointed in a different direction and said, “That’s the Church of the Seven Star Heroes.” I looked in the direction she indicated and saw another large church there. It also looked familiar. The queen proceeded to explain about both churches.
“The altars in there have holy items that prove the existence of the heroes,” she said.
“The ones taken from the Church of the Three Heroes?” I asked.
“Yes. The ones the Church of the Three Heroes secretly swapped out,” she explained.
“Wow, okay.” After we were done with our business here, maybe I’d go and take a look.
“Look. You can see it even from a distance,” she indicated.
“Huh?” The queen was pointing at the large stained glass window located above the emblem on the church. Both examples of circular stained glass had a design divided by lines from the center, with each section of divided glass individually sparkling.
The stained glass on the Church of the Four Heroes was divided into four, with all four pieces of glass sparkling. Meanwhile, the Church of the Seven Star Heroes showed seven sparkling pieces of glass. However . . . there was something strange about the stained glass on the Seven Star church.
Like there was a piece unnaturally missing.
It looked like a certain pill-munching yellow character or like a pizza with a slice missing. Everything other than the missing piece was shining.
“Until recently only six of them were shining. When the Gauntlets Hero was selected, apparently the seventh started to shine,” the queen explained.
I saw some monks praying in front of the church. Then I glanced at the other heroes inside the wagon, and they looked pretty embarrassed. If the people outside found out we had heroes in here, we’d likely get mobbed by the faithful. Best to keep that one quiet.
“It’s still all pretty suspicious to me,” I said. “The imposter in Siltvelt came into the castle as though he owned the place.”
“The Seven Star church took that incident very seriously and has been investigating the seven star heroes as a result. They intend to question the heroes during this meeting,” the queen told me.
“When we were in the village, someone did come to confirm that I’d become the Gauntlets Hero,” Fohl said, looking at the gauntlets.
“We’ve let Faubrey know that all of the four holy heroes will be coming. After meeting with the king of Faubrey, you’ll return here to the church to officially register as the heroes,” the queen explained.
“I see,” Ren said.
“Anything else? Trash is the Staff Hero, right?” I turned to look at him sitting quietly in a corner of the wagon. We couldn’t leave him behind for something so important and so had brought him along.
He was still a worthless old goat though.
“Correct.” The queen gave Trash a poke. Trash returned it with a silent nod, just looking at Fohl and me. There was nothing regal about this guy, not a thing. “He did have an inc
redible battle with the Claw Hero, back in the day.”
“I don’t need to hear about that,” I quickly stopped her. However incredible he had been in the past, now he was just an old husk.
“Thanks to you, Hero Iwatani, I did have a fruitful discussion about legends with members of the coalition army from Siltvelt,” the queen continued, changing tack slightly.
“Go on,” I prompted.
“You know that Siltvelt worships the Shield Hero, of course,” she said.
“I have some idea,” I replied, understating things a little. I’d had guys groveling on their knees in front of me. The Shield Hero definitely got preferential treatment over there.
“I asked them about all sorts of legends and realized something big that doesn’t match up,” the queen explained.
“What?” I asked. I’d known for a while now that the queen had a thing about investigating legends. Melty had mentioned it too. The legend of the filolials was apparently something she had dug up herself. From the Lost Woods, if I recalled correctly.
“It seems that from among the four holy heroes, the Shield and Bow have been most active over there. Based on their level of activity, there’s also a bias in the legends about the seven star heroes. They mainly talk about the Hammer, Claws, and Whip.” A bias. The Shield and Bow did complement each other well, that was true.
“Putting that together with what we learned in Kizuna’s world, it sounds like the effects of the fusing of worlds,” I pondered. There was a wave that had combined the Shield world with the Bow world, and then the Shield and Bow world had been fused with the Sword and Spear world to create the current one. It was only natural that a bias in the legends would arise.
“Indeed. It could very well be said that we are living within a time of legends,” the queen posited.
“The end of that time, too, if things don’t go well,” I reminded her. If the next wave caused another fusing, the world would apparently be torn apart. We’d heard all about that in Kizuna’s world, over and over.
“It looks like we’ve reached the castle.” The queen pointed, and indeed, the castle was right in front of us. There was no more time for long discussions now. “Let’s get ourselves inside, shall we?” With a nod to herself, the queen then addressed the guard on the castle gate.
