by Aneko Yusagi
Was it the boss monster of the island?
It seemed like a reasonable assumption. The Karma Dog Familias that we’d met up until now were probably its underlings.
“Raphtalia, Filo, let’s go! First Aura!”
I cast the support magic on them and the battle began in earnest.
The huge dog lunged at me, its fangs bared.
“Hya!”
It opened its mouth wider to bite me, but I threw out my arm and grabbed it by the teeth, pushing the beast back.
There was a loud, clanging sound, but I’d managed to stop the monster in its tracks.
Slowly, the fangs sunk into my skin, and peels of pain shot up my arm.
This beast was clearly much stronger than the other dogs had been. If it could get through my defenses then it must have been pretty damn powerful.
Granted, I hadn’t finished powering up. Still, I thought that my stats had really improved—and they had—but it still wasn’t enough.
“Hya!”
“Whoop!”
Raphtalia’s sword and Filo’s claws bit into the underbelly of the beast. But it wasn’t enough to stop the monster. I couldn’t control its claws, and it turned them on the girls.
“You won’t get me that easily!”
“Ha!”
I hadn’t been able to stop the monster, but I’d apparently slowed it down enough. They dodged its attack easily.
“WAOOOOOOOOO!”
The dog howled. As the beast’s voice died down, two Karma Dog Famlilas suddenly appeared from the mysterious sphere!
Damn. This wasn’t looking good.
“Raphtalia, Filo! Can you keep this up?!”
“Yeah!”
“Not a problem!”
“Great! Let’s use a combination skill. Filo, watch me!”
“Okay!”
I’d seen Motoyasu and the others use combination skills before. It was when you combined magic and a skill to form a stronger attack.
They normally had better secondary effects than other skills.
“Filo, are you watching? I’m going to use air strike shield, so you need to use some wind attack magic at the same time!”
“Okay!”
Filo closed her eyes and started to concentrate.
“I’m the source of all power. Hear my words and heed them! Wrap them in a fierce tornado!”
“Zweite Tornado!”
As she cast the spell, a list of compatible skills appeared before me.
“Tornado Shield!”
A Karma Dog Familia was rushing to attack us, but before it could a massive shield formed of wind appeared in the air before the beast.
The dog slammed into the shield and was forced to stop. When it did, a huge tornado, one bigger than Filo’s magic could normally produce, shot from the center of the shield and carried the two Karma Dog Familias up into the air.
Hey now, that was a pretty useful combination! If we could coordinate our attacks like this, we were even stronger than I had thought.
As for Raphtalia, her magic was normally illusion-based, so it wouldn't work so well as an attack medium.
We wouldn’t be able to do the same thing, but we might be able to trick the monsters. It would depend on how the combination skill worked.
“Raphtalia!”
“I’m on it!”
“I am the source of all power. Hear my words and heed them! Confuse the enemy!”
“First Mirage!”
“Mirage Shield!”
I used second shield and was able to use another skill while the first was still deployed.
The tornado disappeared, and the two dogs plummeted to the ground. Before they hit though, another shield appeared beneath them, and they slammed into that shield instead.
This shield was flexible though. The minute they connected with it, it expanded in a quick puff, completely enclosing them.
“Kyan!”
The shield disappeared, and the two dogs fell to the ground again, but this time they were upside down, and they landed on their backs. They tottered around, unable to regain their bearings.
And then . . . .
“Gah!”
The two of them barked and growled and started to fight one another!
Both of them had probably become confused as to who the enemy was, so they just attacked whatever creature was nearest to them.
It looked like the Mirage Shield had an interesting effect on the enemy.
“Great! Now’s our chance! Finish them!”
“I’m on it!”
We tightened our grip on our weapons and turned to face the Karma Dog.
“Whew.”
We defeated the monster. It kept calling for reinforcements, which caused the fight to drag on a little.
Luckily we were always able to get the reinforcements to fight among themselves. Raphtalia and Filo had become really powerful in the last few days as well, so eventually we were able to win the battle without too much trouble.
When the main beast was gone, we took out the remaining reinforcements. Once I was sure that the coast was clear, I absorbed the Karma Dog into the shield and received its drop item.
I used to be a pretty avid gamer, and those gamer instincts were still alive and kicking inside me. I figured that the Karma Dog had been a boss monster, and boss monsters were sure to leave behind really good drop items.
For gamers, few things were more coveted than the drop items from bosses. There was a chance it would leave behind a unique, rare, or powerful weapon.
So I was excited to check out the Karma Dog’s drop.
Oreikul Ore? I assumed it was something you could use to power up. I felt like I’d seen it somewhere before.
Huh?
“Karma Dog Claw?”
Judging by the name, maybe it was some sort of weapon? I quickly opened the menu to check it out.
There was a heavy clang, and two black claws jutted out of my shield.
“What’s that?”
“I already explained it, remember? It’s something the legendary shield can do.”
“I understand that, but I’ve never seen the shield grow claws like that. I was just surprised.”
I couldn't fault her for that.
I examined the claws closer. They were about the size of my palm, so I don’t think they would fit onto Filo’s feet. Again, I opened a menu to read about the item.
Karma Dog Claw: quality: excellent: additional effects: agility up, magic down, attack up, defense down.
The stat increases were nothing to turn your nose up at.
But unfortunately they didn’t seem to have a blood clean coating on them. So if we used them, we’d have to make sure they stayed sharpened.
Besides, I was concerned about the stat decreases too.
“Claws?”
Filo cocked her head to the side. She was intrigued.
“That’s what it looks like, but . . . .”
They wouldn’t fit on Filo’s feet.
“I want to try them out!”
“I think you’ll have to be in human form.”
Filo had made a point of staying in filolial form when we were fighting monsters. Fitoria had made a point of telling her that battles went smoothly when you matched the size of your enemy.
“Okay! Them I’m going to try fighting as a human!”
She turned into her human form and slipped the claws over her hands.
“Well, if that’s what you want to do, then I don’t have a problem with it. Let’s see if we can find a monster to try them out on.”
So we walked around in the woods for a short while until we found a monster to fight.
“Tornado Claw!”
The second we spotted a monster Filo shouted the attack and started spinning in tight circles in the direction of the Karma Dog Familia.
“Gah?!”
The second she made contact, the beast went flying through the air. A moment later, it fell to the ground, shredded into ribbons.
/> “Wow Master! These things are SHARP!”
But the shredded beast didn’t just lie there. Large scars appeared on the body, a black curse of some kind.
The corpse started to smell, and Filo scrunched her nose up.
“If I kill the monster with these, then I can’t eat it.”
“You’re right.”
They must have been dark-elemental weapons. Either that or they had been cursed.
“Filo? Can you take those claws off? Do they feel normal?”
“Huh? What do you mean?”
She slipped the claws off of her hands like any other weapon. Apparently they weren’t cursed.
And the status decreases didn’t seem to bother Filo much at all.
They seemed safe enough to use, at least until we were able to meet with the old guy at the weapon shop again.
“Should we have Filo act as the main attacker from now on?”
“Sure, why not?”
We finished our little meeting about the claws and spent another two hours in the area. The mysterious sphere in the center of the stone ruins continued to warp and release Karma Dogs.
It seemed like the monsters were being emitted from the sphere on a set interval. They were reappearing approximately every 30 minutes or so.
But now that Filo had such a powerful weapon equipped, the fights were even easier than they had been. We were defeating the dogs without much effort.
We were also getting plenty of experience points, so I’d say we were having a pretty successful day leveling.
By the way, as we continued to defeat the Karma Dogs I noticed that they were leaving behind claws of all different sizes. With some simple crafting, I was able to make a pair large enough for Filo to wear when she was in filolial form.
Now she could use the Karma Dog Gloves in whatever form she was in.
The sun was slanting down in the sky when we made it back to the main island.
I had reached level 63. Raphtalia was at level 65, and Filo was at 67.
How much further could we level up in the islands?
Not that you could ever be over-leveled . . . .
“Hey! How are you all doing?”
I was mulling over our leveling progress when L’Arc and Therese came walking over.
“We’re doing well. Leveling really fast. What about you two?”
“Same. I feel like we’re really sinking our teeth into the monsters out there.”
“Great to hear.”
“You know what I heard? I heard that the four heroes are in the islands right now! Everyone is gossiping about it.”
“ . . . .”
I didn’t feel like I needed to rehash all this with him. I didn’t want to reiterate that he was standing in front of one of those heroes.
And besides, L’Arc had already made up his mind that I was pretending to be a hero. He wasn’t going to listen to me no matter what I said.
“Oh really?”
I just wanted him to change the subject, so I tried to make it clear that I wasn’t really listening.
“What sort of gossip?”
Raphtalia jumped in and took over the conversation. I wasn’t too excited about talking it over with him, so I decided to leave it up to her.
“Well I heard that the Sword Hero was leveling by himself, and that the Spear Hero was walking around the marketplace trying to pick up girls in the street.”
Well at least he was talking about the same people that I knew.
“What about the Bow Hero?”
Raphtalia chimed, but L’Arc and Therese suddenly looked uncomfortable. They averted their eyes when they answered.
“Everyone is pissed off, because apparently he’s claimed ownership of some hunting grounds.”
I figured as much. I shouldn’t have expected him to listen to us. Everything was turning out pretty much as I imagined it would.
Regardless, none of the gossip was particularly positive. I wondered what a normal adventurer would think when they heard it.
We were talking it over, when—speak of the devil—the other heroes came walking up.
“Alright! Let’s head back to the room, shall we?”
“I guess.”
“Yes! Let’s rest up and get ready for tomorrow!”
All three of them were walking together in the direction of the inn.
“I wonder where the heroes are?”
“Right? If they’re as crazy as everyone says they are, I’d like to meet them at least once.”
Didn’t he realize that they were walking right under his nose at that very moment? There was no saving these two—they were as dull as rocks.
Still, they were friendly enough to hang around with, and peaceful too. I could ignore their faults on account of their strengths. I had sort of started to like them.
They really were dull as rocks though.
“Is that so? And what sort of gossip have you heard about the Shield Hero?”
“I hear he’s a real lush.”
“Like he’s fancy?”
“No, like he drinks a lot, Therese. Get with the program, will ya?”
“One of us needs to get with the program. But which one?”
“Oh please . . . .”
A drinker, am I? Was this all because of those little fruits I ate?
“Besides, the Shield Hero isn’t known for the deeds in the islands. They’ve been talking about him everywhere else!”
“What have they been saying?”
“I think we talking about it on the boat ride over here, didn’t we? That he’s a liar, a thief, a conman, a rapist, a demon . . . . I heard he kills anyone that gets in his way.”
Is that what I looked like to the rest of the world?
Well, I guess I couldn’t say they were wrong.
Still, at least half of that stuff was lies the church had spread about me. The rest were probably from Bitch and Trash.
Raphtalia slapped her hand to her head and sighed.
“It’s a shame we can’t make the rumors stop.”
“Raphtalia, sticking up for me are you? I haven’t given up on my more notorious pursuits yet!”
“What are you bragging about?!”
“Haha!”
“This is not a joke. This is your reputation we’re talking about here.”
People had been talking about me that way from the minute I stepped foot in this world. I was getting used to it.
Still, little by little the rumors were being addressed. Eventually they would die down.
Only a week or so had passed since our battle with the high priest. I couldn’t expect the whole country to have a change of heart overnight.
“Ha! Kiddo, are you still pretending to be the Shield Hero? You’d better cut that out.”
“Oh, right. Sure thing.”
These two sure were an optimistic bunch, weren’t they?
“So what are you kiddos going to do next?”
“I’ll tell you this—we’re not leveling through the night this time. We’ll head back to the inn and try to rest up. I was thinking I might get to work on Therese’s item if I have the time.”
“Really?”
“Good thinking, kiddo. So do you want to meet on the docks tomorrow morning?”
“Sounds good. See you then.”
“Right on. Later.”
Raphtalia and Filo waved to them as we parted ways.
“Alright, let’s get some rest. You two head out on the town and enjoy yourselves.”
“What about you?”
“I’m just going to rest in the room. I still have that curse to deal with, after all.”
“Oh? Well then I guess I’ll come with you.”
“Imma go swimming!”
“Good idea. Have fun. Raphtalia, are you sure? This is the last vacation we’ll have for a while.”
“I’m a little worn out from all the battling we did today.”
That made sense. We had been fighting for two days straight. It was impor
tant to get rest.
Filo went swimming in the ocean and didn’t come back until pretty late. When she got back she was ebullient. The ocean, she said, was super pretty.
“So I guess this is the day we level up with L’Arc.”
I had to think about what island we should head for—I didn’t want to overlap with one of the other heroes.
I didn’t know if it was a real strategy or not, but it sounded like they were moving through the islands in order. Apparently the shadows and envoys from Melromarc were following them and suggesting when it was time to move on.
That was better for them anyway—they would probably level up faster fighting a variety of monsters.
We walked to the docks and found L’Arc and Therese waiting for us there.
“Hey, kiddo! How are you all feeling today?”
“What does it matter, the day hasn’t even started? Oh, Therese—I had a little free time last night, so I went ahead and made the item you requested.”
I took out the item and tossed it to Therese.
There had been a mysterious, rough jewel in the pouch they had given me. It was called a starfire, and I couldn’t suppress my curiosity.
I polished up the raw material and imbued it with magic, but it took me a little while to think of what sort of ore I should mount it to.
Eventually I settled on the ore I’d gotten yesterday, the Oreikul ore. I brought it to the island blacksmith and had him work it into a band.
So even though I had just sort of fumbled some materials together, it ended up being a pretty impressive piece.
Oreikul Starfire Bracelet: magic power up (max)
quality: very good
“This . . . .”
Therese looked down at the item and appeared to be at a loss for words.
“Wow! The stone is overflowing with joy. I never expected so much.”
Tears welled up in her eyes.
I didn’t see what the big deal was—it was certainly nothing to cry over.
Maybe Therese was a little overemotional.
“H . . . hey!”
“It’s amazing . . . I . . . I really never thought . . . .”
“Therese! Get a hold of yourself!”
“L’Arc, can’t you tell? The jewel is overflowing with joy. Overflowing! This is like the door to a whole new world.”
