Arifureta: From Commonplace to World's Strongest Vol. 4

by Ryo Shirakome

  “Sh-Shea. I understand your resentment very well, but you need to calm down. You cannot go around shouting things like that in public. Look, you’re attracting more attention than they are now. And wait, did you just insult me there at the end? I cannot believe you would call me a pervert in the middle of the street... Haaah... Haaah... I can feel people staring coldly at me... Haaah... Haaah... Mmm...”

  Now the flirting couple had been joined by a bunny girl who’d screamed how she wanted to fuck a guy at the top of her lungs, and a beautiful older woman who was panting heavily after being called a pervert. A lot of the people who’d stopped out of mere curiosity hurriedly left.

  “Daddy, Shea-oneechan and Tio-oneechan are...”

  “Myu, don’t look at them. Pretend you don’t know them.”

  “Shea... Maybe I should tie Hajime up and leave him with you for a night...”

  Shea’s shouting had brought Hajime and Yue back to the real world, and they quickly began pretending Shea and Tio had nothing to do with them. At the same time, Hajime decided to pointedly ignore Yue’s last statement. He didn’t want to have to suspect she was luring him into a trap every time they were alone. Though, he didn’t want to actually get caught in said trap, either. Well, Yue wouldn’t really do something like that... right? She’d tried something similar before, but surely it would be fine to trust her now. At least, that was what Hajime kept telling himself.

  The party had caused such a scene in the middle of the street that the guards had come out to see what all the commotion was about. Sighing, Hajime grabbed Shea and Tio by the collar and dragged them somewhere less crowded.

  Hajime was used to receiving jealous glares every time he walked into a populated area, but for the first time he felt like people were looking at him in pity more than anything else.

  After extricating themselves from the crowd, Hajime and the others finally arrived at Horaud’s adventurer’s guild.

  Hajime pushed open the guild’s doors with Myu still sitting on his shoulders. Unlike the other guild branches that he’d visited, this one’s front doors were made of metal. There was a massive groaning noise as the double doors creaked open.

  Last time Hajime had been in Horaud he’d had no need to visit the guild, so this would be his first time inside. The inside of Horaud’s guild was exactly how he’d imagined a guild hall should look like.

  The walls were peeling and holes in the floor had been hastily covered up with wooden planks. Dust and grime gathered unchecked in the less-used corners of the room. The building’s layout itself was no different from the other guild branches he’d visited. There was a huge counter dead ahead, and a restaurant to the left. However, it seemed this one also served alcohol. A few grizzled old men were already well into their cups, despite the fact that it was barely past noon.

  Some of the adventurers sitting on the second floor walked over to the railing to see who the newcomers were. As far as Hajime could tell, all of the adventurers on the second floor were pretty strong, relatively speaking. It seemed there might have been some kind of unspoken rule that only the higher-ranked adventurers used the upper floor.

  The adventurers all had a different air around them compared to the ones Hajime had seen in other cities as well. There was an edge to them that had been missing from the laid-back adventurers Hajime had met in Brooke.

  I guess they’re all so tough-looking because they’re used to fighting monsters in the labyrinth. You’d have to be decently strong to want to come here.

  Though, even if one took all that into account, the atmosphere in the guild room was strangely strained. Something serious enough to put these hardened adventurers on edge must have happened.

  Everyone’s eyes focused on Hajime and his group.

  Myu let out a terrified squeal and tried to hide behind Hajime’s head.

  Jealous glares settled on Hajime, as was usual whenever he walked into a crowded area accompanied by Yue, Shea, and Tio.

  He took Myu off his shoulders and cradled her in his arms. She buried her face into his chest and shut out everyone’s stares.

  A few of the adventurers got up from their seat and headed over to the group. It was obvious from their expressions that they wanted to teach this cheeky little kid who’d just barged in here a lesson. They had no real reason to be so hostile toward him, they were just jealous. That, and the strained atmosphere in the guild had gotten them itching for a fight.

  They hadn’t even considered the possibility that he might be in trouble and had come to the guild to request help... not that something like that would ever happen. The only thing on their mind right now was beating Hajime up to vent their own frustrations.

  Normally he wouldn’t have paid them any mind, but since he’d become an overprotective father, he was going to make them pay for scaring his daughter. He gently patted Myu’s head and shot the adventurers advancing upon him a withering glare.

  Then, without warning... he unleashed a wave of Intimidation so powerful that it blew the adventurers back. The pressure was so strong that they could physically feel it.

  They cowered before Hajime, their earlier confidence nowhere to be seen. The less experienced adventurers fainted on the spot, while most of the others returned meekly to their seats.

  They shivered in fear, cold sweat pouring down their backs. It took everything they had to keep from fainting like the other adventurers had.

  Then, as suddenly as it had appeared, the oppressive presence vanished. The adventurers gasped for air, only just realizing they’d been holding their breath the entire time. More than a few of them had wet themselves, and some looked like they were about to hurl. Hajime flashed them all a feral grin.

  “Hey, all of you bastards that glared at us.”

  “Ah!” They all jumped when they heard his voice. Everyone was staring at Hajime like he was some kind of monster, which in a sense, he was. He ignored their fear and laid down a request... No, a command.

  “Smile.”

  “Huh?”

  He was met with confused stares.

  “Didn’t you hear me? I said smile. Like this. You’ve gotta show that you’re not scary. Wave your hands and stuff too. It’s because you all look so intimidating that you scared her. What’re you gonna do if you traumatize her for life, huh?”

  Then don’t bring a little girl with you to an adventurer’s guild in the first place! The adventurers all thought unanimously, but none of them had the courage to actually say it. Cowed by his Intimidation, the adventurers all forced themselves to smile. A few feebly waved their hands at him too.

  It was a truly surreal sight, all these hard-faced adventurers smiling stiffly, trying to pretend they were friendly. Hajime nodded in satisfaction, then whispered something into Myu’s ear.

  She timidly looked up at him with tears in her eyes. Then, at Hajime’s urging, she slowly turned around. She was greeted by the sight of hardened adventurers trying their best to look friendly.

  “Hiii!” As expected, their forced smiles did little to assuage her fears, and she buried her face into Hajime’s chest once more. And so, Hajime narrowed his eyebrows angrily.

  “You call that a smile!?” Hajime roared, a dangerous glint in his eyes.

  Don’t be ridiculous! The poor adventurers turned to Yue for salvation, tears forming in the corners of their eyes.

  Yue breathed a deep sigh, walked up to Myu, and whispered something into her ear as well. Once again, Myu hesitantly turned to face the crowd of adventurers. They once again tried their best to look friendly.

  She stared at them for quite a bit longer this time. Finally, her face broke out in a smile and she waved back at them. The adventurers forced smiles suddenly turned into natural ones when they saw how cute she was. Hajime nodded in satisfaction and put Myu back on his shoulders. His business with the adventurers concluded, he walked up to the counter.

  Silverware clattered to the floor as he walked past, but he paid no heed to the people around him.
<
br />   For once, the person manning the reception counter was a cute girl. She was about the same age as Hajime. This was the first time the adventurer’s guild stereotype actually fit. Unfortunately, the effect was ruined because she was frozen stiff. Having Hajime that close to her made her unbelievably nervous.

  “Is the branch chief here? I’m here to deliver a letter from the Fuhren branch’s chief... I was requested to give it to him in person.” He handed over his status plate to the receptionist. She accepted it with trembling fingers. Though she was nervous, she still did her job admirably.

  “Y-Yes. Let me just confirm your identity. U-Umm, does this mean you’re here... on a direct request from Fuhren’s branch chief?” The reason she was so surprised was because it was rare for a mere adventurer to undertake requests from someone as high-ranking as a branch chief. However, when she saw the ranking on Hajime’s status plate, she understood why he’d been chosen.

  “Y-You’re gold ranked!?” At most, maybe 10% of all adventurers were gold. And the names of all gold-ranked adventurers were kept on a roster that every guild worker had memorized, including this receptionist, and yet she’d never heard of Hajime before.

  When they heard her exclamation, all of the other adventurers stared at Hajime in shock as well. After a few seconds of silence, the entire room burst into conversation.

  The receptionist paled as she realized she’d accidentally blurted out Hajime’s personal information for everyone to hear. She bowed as low as she could.

  “M-My deepest apologies, sir! I didn’t mean to say it so loudly!”

  “Ah, I don’t really mind. Could you just call the branch chief over for me?”

  “O-Of course! Right away!”

  Hajime smiled to himself. If I hadn’t said anything, I bet she’d spend another hour apologizing. After all the commotion he’d caused in Ur and Fuhren, it was pointless to try and pretend he was just a normal adventurer anymore.

  He attracted enough stares as it was by bringing along a kid and a harem of beautiful girls with him everywhere. Adding gold-ranked adventurer to the list of oddities didn’t really change much at that point.

  However, Myu still wasn’t used to getting so much attention. She squirmed uncomfortably as she looked at everyone. The way she moved was reminiscent of how Tio writhed in pleasure whenever Hajime insulted her. Hajime slapped her for teaching Myu such unwholesome things, which caused even more of a stir with the crowd.

  Finally, after a few minutes, Hajime heard someone thundering down the corridor.

  A black-clad figure burst out from the hallway situated on the side of the counter. He looked around wildly, his eyes passing through the crowd. He was obviously in a great hurry.

  Hajime’s eyes went wide in shock. This was someone he recognized, and the last person he’d expected to see here.

  “Endou?” The black-clad figure was none other than Hajime’s classmate, Kousuke Endou.

  Endou wheeled around in surprise. He cast another panicked glance around the room, but didn’t spot the person he was searching for. Growing impatient, he loudly shouted,

  “Nagumo!? Is that really you!? It is, right!? Where are you!? Nagumo! You’re alive, aren’t you!? Get out here, Hajime Nagumo!” Many of the adventurers clapped their hands over their ears. His voice was really loud. Endou’s extreme impatience implied that he wasn’t just in a hurry to see an old classmate he’d thought dead. There was something urgent he needed from Hajime.

  Yue and the others stared expectantly at Hajime. He awkwardly scratched his cheek. If he was being perfectly honest, he’d rather not have talked to Endou right now. Nevertheless, he dutifully stepped forward and called out to him.

  “Uh, Endou? I can hear you, so can you stop yelling so loudly?”

  “Nagumo!? Where are you!?” Endou turned toward Hajime, reacting to his voice. The depth of the desperation in his voice shocked Hajime.

  His eyes met Hajime’s for an instant, but then he looked away again and started looking around the room once more.

  “Dammit! I can hear you, but I can’t see you! Are you a ghost!? Did you really die after all!? Is that why I can’t see you!?”

  “I’m right in front of you, moron. Just calm down, man. Weren’t you supposed to be the world’s most unnoticeable person?”

  “There it is again! That’s your voice! And just who are you calling the king of invisibility!? I’ll have you know that the automatic doors at stores open for me one-third of the time!”

  “Wait, so even they don’t notice you two-thirds of the time...? You’re really something.” After that exchange Endou finally realized the white-haired boy with the eyepatch was indeed Hajime. He scrutinized Hajime’s face. Hajime turned away awkwardly. He wasn’t used to guys staring so intently at him.

  “A-Are you... Are you really Nagumo?”

  “Yep. In the flesh. I know I look pretty different now, but it’s me, Hajime Nagumo.”

  He looked so different from the boy Endou remembered that he still couldn’t completely believe it. He looked Hajime up and down again. Eventually, he was forced to accept it really was Hajime. He had the same general facial structure, and only Hajime would know about how invisible Endou was.

  “You’re... really alive.”

  “Obviously. I’m standing in front of you, aren’t I?”

  “Everything about you has, changed though... like your appearance, and the way you talk...”

  “I had to crawl my way out of hell. There’s no way I’d stay the same after that.”

  “R-Really? Well, I guess that makes sense... Still, I can’t believe you’re really alive... Thank god.” He may have turned into a drastically different person, but Endou was still relieved that his classmate yet lived.

  Though he’d been jealous of the attention Kaori gave Hajime, much like the other guys, and had turned a blind eye to Hiyama’s bullying, he’d never once seriously wanted Hajime dead. Endou had been as shaken as the rest when he’d witnessed Hajime fall. It was only natural that he’d be happy to know his classmate hadn’t actually died.

  “Wait, so... you’re really an adventurer too? Gold-ranked at that...”

  “Pretty much.”

  Endou’s expression did a complete 180. From one of relief, to one of panic.

  It was then that Hajime noticed Endou was surprisingly ragged. What on earth happened to him?

  “So not only were you able to make it back from the depths of the labyrinth alive, you’ve become strong enough to reach the highest rank in the adventurer’s guild? No way...”

  “More or less, yeah.” Upon hearing that, Endou broke down and clung desperately to Hajime’s shoulders. His face was a mixture of desperation and regret.

  “Then I’m begging you, come back to the labyrinth with me! If we don’t hurry, everyone’ll die! We need all the help we can get! Kentarou and Jugo could die any minute now! I’m begging you Nagumo, you’ve gotta help us!”

  “W-Wait a second. What the heck are you talking about!? What’s going on? What do you mean they could die any minute now? You guys have Amanogawa, don’t you? Shouldn’t you be fine no matter what happens? Captain Meld and the others are there too, right? Even if you face a Behemoth now, you guys should be fine...” Hajime had never seen the normally composed Endou so distraught. Endou’s face fell and he sunk to his knees at the mention of Captain Meld. He managed to squeeze out a few words through his despair.

  “...died.”

  “Huh? I can’t hear you. What’d you say?”

  “I said he died! Captain Meld, Alan-san, and all the other knights! They’re all dead! They died so I could escape! It’s my fault! It’s all my fault! And now they’re all gone!”

  “I see.” Hajime replied solemnly.

  As Hajime hadn’t possessed a combat class, he hadn’t been that close to Captain Meld. That being said, he’d always thought of the captain as a nice man. And the day he’d fallen, Meld had been the only one who’d believed in him despite the fact that he was
labeled incompetent by everyone.

  Had he been the callous person he’d turned into right after escaping the abyss, he might not have cared at all about Captain Meld’s death, but at present he felt a twinge of sadness. Enough that he prayed Captain Meld would find happiness in the afterlife.

  “So what exactly happened?”

  “Well...” Endou numbly began recounting the events that had led to his escape. However, before he could start in earnest, a voice stopped him.

  “Shall we continue this conversation inside one of our private rooms? It seems that boy over there has something for me as well.” A grizzled old man well into his sixties stepped out of the hallway. There was a large scar running down his left eye.

  Judging from the fact that the receptionist was with him, Hajime guessed that he must be this guild’s branch chief. He recalled the strained atmosphere that had filled the room when he’d first entered and looked back down at Endou. He was practically sobbing now. Yeah, maybe it’s best we don’t talk about this here.

  Endou had probably broken down once here already, and spilled that something bad had happened to the hero party and their escorts. That was probably why everyone was on edge.