1

Unusually for this season, on the morning of their departure, there wasn’t a cloud in the sky.

Minori and the others had been escorted as far as the Ancient Court of Eternal Ice by the senior members of their guild, but at that point, they piled into the cart and began their journey due west.

With Eight Canals High Coast on their left, Minori’s group crossed the river.

The waterway had been called the Tama River in their old world, and even in Theldesia, it was fairly wide. This was a familiar area for Minori and the others. It was about two hours from Akiba on horseback, and there were lots of wild monsters in it, so they’d used it as one of their training grounds.

However, once they’d crossed the river and gone a little farther, they were in completely unknown territory.

At this distance, it was hard to make day trips out from Akiba, and it marked the border of the lands with which their group had no experience. Even so, they felt more excited than nervous.

Before long, the zone name changed to Zooland Meadow.

The terrain in this area was a mixture of wilderness and meadows with grass that grew as high as Minori’s waist. The grass streamed in the wind, rippling like waves. Here and there, the ruins of small buildings protruded from the meadow. Most of them were completely uninhabited, providing shelter for vines and animals.

“I see something that looks like cows.”

“Huh? Where, where, where? Where are they?”

Isuzu’s and Serara’s voices came from behind the covered rear seat.

Minori, who was sitting in the driver’s seat, checked to make sure that Touya was holding the reins, then turned back. Isuzu was pointing at a herd of large quadrupeds, out on the meadow.

“I think those are Green Elk,” Minori told them.

She’d learned about monster characteristics and distribution from Shiroe, and it was already coming in handy.

“Are they dangerous?”

“It’s fine. They’re far away, and I hear they’re docile.”

In Elder Tales, monsters were enemies that needed to be destroyed, but not all types were equally aggressive. If their group approached them, the distance at which they’d show hostility varied. Some monsters would attack Adventurers the moment they saw them, while others would ignore them even if they got close, as long as they didn’t launch an attack. Green Elks were the second type.

Minori’s group’s cart was traveling down a road of red clay. Asphalt showed through from time to time, but as a rule, the cart rolled down the rutted red road at about twice the speed at which the group could have walked.

The wind was still cold, but it wasn’t the biting chill of winter. It was cool, brisk spring air that held a hint of freshness. And although the land was desolate, Minori thought it was beautiful.

The road traced very leisurely curves over the meadow. In general, this road was supposed to run southwest, parallel to the coast, but the ocean was several kilometers away, and she couldn’t see it. The rolling grassland hid it, too.

Minori was remembering Shiroe’s lecture.

On Earth, he’d told her, this road was known as National Route 1, and it had once been called the Tokaido, “the eastern sea road.” Of course Minori had known the term national route, but she’d never given much thought as to what it actually meant. She’d thought, vaguely, that it was a road with lots of lanes that got lots of traffic.

According to Shiroe, national routes were arterial roads managed by the nation of Japan. These major roads formed a web across the whole of Japan, and the country took care of them, while the roads that linked them—the ones that were midsized and smaller—were managed by local governments. This efficient division of labor had been devised in the Meiji era and had been in use ever since.

National Route 1, which linked Nihonbashi in Tokyo with Osaka, was the very first road in the national highway project. When she heard this, Minori had sensed something like history about it.

There was a corresponding road in the world of Theldesia, too, although it paled in comparison to the well-maintained, four-lane national highway. This was the red clay road Minori and the others were traveling down.

“Say, Minori. The weather’s great, so can we go a little faster?”

In response to Isuzu’s bright voice, Minori flipped through her notebook.

Think we can do it?

It’ll work, it’ll work!

Let’s do our best!

In the presence of yours truly, the road will manage it!

Awright!

Urged on by her friends’ voices, Minori felt stirred up, too. “Let’s do it!” she said. —And promptly made a mistake.

Late in the afternoon, when they’d hurried farther down the red clay road without stopping at the village of Karube, all of a sudden, the rigging that hitched the horses to the cart came undone.

As Minori and Touya watched, startled, the horses gave a single loud neigh, then took to their heels, disappearing over the horizon.

Minori and the others were left stranded in the cart on the road, looking at one another blankly. After a short while, they burst out laughing.

Lyman’s Twin Horse Whistle had hit its time limit.

No one had noticed that the time restriction—six hours per day—was about to run out. They laughed about that, too, but more than anything, they hadn’t expected the horses to make a break for it like that just because the time limit was up.

“Oh, honestly! The silly things ate cabbage from my hand, remember?”

“From mine, too…”

“Geez, they’ve got no human feeling. Traitors!”

“That’s because they’re horses.”

“Would you call them trait-horses, then?”

“‘Horses,’ he says. ‘Horses.’ ‘Horses,’ agh, I can’t take it anymore. Ah-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha!”

Isuzu and Serara rolled around inside the cart, laughing. Touya and Rundelhaus, and of course Minori, laughed, too. Even though Isuzu and the others were talking like this, the horses had gazed at them with such cute, round eyes that even Minori had given them vegetables. Those twins had definitely swindled them out of snacks.

Between the coaxing and the way they’d taken off without a backward glance once their working hours were over, the horses were just too clever, and they couldn’t bring themselves to hate them.

They’re much more worldly-wise than my twin and I, Minori chuckled, feeling impressed. A grassland at dusk, and a cart with no horses. They’d made a huge blunder and were firmly stuck, but Minori and the others had laughed so hard that none of them felt very bad.

“No help for that. Here, Minori.”

Minori was still giggling. Touya took her hand, and the whole group got out of the cart.

Her feet were unsteady after riding in the cart for so long, but Touya supported her. Minori’s little brother was almost too perfect.

On the night when she’d become conscious of her love for Shiroe, while she was writhing in the darkness, Touya had stayed close the entire time. She wouldn’t tell him this, but she was very proud of him.

“The horses ran away, but this is exhilarating in its own way, isn’t it!”

With a big stretch, Rundelhaus looked around. “And? Where are we, roughly?” he said.

According to Minori’s map, they seemed to be about halfway between the inn at Karube and the Wistria settlement.

However, whichever one they went to, with a horseless cart, they’d be lucky if they got there by the middle of the night. Of course, they’d be able to use Lyman’s Twin Horse Whistle again once the recast time was up, but that would take another eighteen hours. It would probably be about ten o’clock the next morning.

The five of them decided that, in that case, they should just steel themselves and camp for the night.

They worked together to move the cart to the side of the road so that their stalled group wouldn’t block the way and cause trouble for any merchants or Adventurers.

Then they began to set up camp.

Their camp was a total disaster, and that was putting it mildly.

Because Minori’s group had been clumsy, their preparations had taken much longer than they’d expected. Serara had put on New Wife’s Apron and enthusiastically made stew, but by the time it was finished, it was already completely dark.

Minori was a modern middle schooler, and to her, four o’clock—the time when the horses had run off—was nothing more than late afternoon. They’d wandered around the area looking for a suitable campsite for a little over an hour after that, and the sun had started to set before they began cooking.

They got the fire ready and pitched the tent, making mistakes as they went, and by the time they’d gotten everything into a semblance of order, it was probably around eight in the evening.

The tent Touya had eagerly set up was off balance and listed to the right, and when the five of them saw it, they laughed. Everyone’s hands were dirty with earth and grass stains, but even that was just another excuse for them to point and laugh at one another.

The stew Serara had made was watery, and even if they were being tactful, no one could have called it good. Rundelhaus fished out a string of carrot slices that were still joined at one side, and Serara was terribly ashamed and apologized over and over, but it wasn’t enough to dampen the party’s spirits.

When Minori heard the word “nature,” at best, she thought of what she’d see in a nature park. The mountain hiking course she’d walked on a school trip to Oze was as far as her imagination went. That was all the experience she had, and so she was surprised to discover that “nature” had far fewer flat areas than she’d expected.

The surface of the grassland where they were sitting was dotted with pieces of shattered concrete, and tree roots twisted under the soil. When Touya carelessly plopped down cross-legged, he sprang up with an “Ow!”

Inside the tent, things were sure to be at an angle, so even when they laid out their beds, they might not be able to sleep soundly.

Even so, the five of them smiled and ate warm stew under the starlight.

Between breaking up and passing around red bean buns from their luggage, remembering the heartless horses, stirring the bonfire so that clouds of sparks went up, and inspecting the axles of the car using Magic Lights, the five of them stayed up quite late under a night sky filled with countless stars.

As far as the beginning of a journey went, it was nothing laudable; it was awkward and clumsy. Still, it was their first long expedition.

The thought that they were the only ones for several kilometers in any direction thrilled even Minori. She felt exhilarated, happy, and anxious all at once, as if she were on the verge of flying off somewhere.

She wanted even just a little more power, so that she could catch up to her beloved Shiroe.

She was happy that she’d been able to leave on her journey to obtain it with friends.

On this spring night, all the trouble they’d encountered that day and all the mistakes they’d made spun together until they almost seemed to be blessing Minori and the others. Now, even things that would have made them hate themselves and want to go home if they’d been alone struck the group as entertaining jokes that added color to the journey.

Saying “I’m practicing!” Isuzu began to play a cute little tune. She repeated it over and over, and Minori and the others hummed along far into the night.

Only when the sky began to lighten did they regret not having gone to bed sooner.

2

Three days after their departure, Touya and the others were in the town of Southern.

As they’d planned, they’d arrived in the village just after the sun began its journey down the sky. Waving greetings at the villagers from their cart again and again, Touya’s group made for an inn that had a sign with a horse on it.

The local residents called the road Touya’s group had followed “the Highway to the West.”

To the locals, highways were the main arteries of Yamato, boasting an unprecedented amount of traffic. The villages along these highways were larger than the surrounding fishing and farming villages; they became centers of physical distribution for their areas, and from time to time, they held markets. As a result, traders came and went frequently, and it was ordinary for such towns to have inns.

Touya and the others had heard all this in advance, but after starting their journey, they had learned:

There was a reason for everything.

When they’d looked at the map, they’d thought, Why would anyone make a road that winds around like this? Wouldn’t it be more efficient to just make it go to the destination in a straight line? However, once they’d actually traveled on that road, they saw deep forests and depressions or hills that hindered the creation of a straight path. With modern construction machinery, things might have been different, but in this medieval world, it couldn’t be done.

There were reasons behind the locations of each village, too. Many elements twined together organically—the location of nearby water sources, its relationship to the highway, whether there was flat land that could be cultivated and the distance to forests and other resource-rich areas—and the villages were built in places that made you think, Yes, building here was the right choice.

Villages that were particularly convenient and whose populations had grown were likely to expand until they were proper towns. Southern had developed for all sorts of reasons—resources, geography, importance to trade, and the safety of the vicinity—and for the area, it was a comparatively large People of the Earth stronghold.

The first floor of the inn had been billed as a tavern, but it felt more like an assembly hall than a tavern or restaurant. The hearty, rustic building was enormous, and its first floor was a high-ceilinged space that was bigger than a classroom. Its floor was pieced together from brick-like blocks, and for about half of the hall, floorboards had been laid over the bricks.

The inn’s reception desk and cashier were located in one spot, and the place used a unique ordering method in which a seated, cheerful-looking elderly individual shouted out any orders for food or drink. The old man had a huge dog at his feet, and even as he dozed by the stove, he relayed customer requests to his granddaughters, who ran the tavern.

At a big table, People of the Earth with bronzed skin who looked like sailors were enjoying an early round of drinks. The menu consisted mostly of marine products… That and liquor.

Half an hour after entering the inn, Touya’s group was performing with the biggest table at their backs.

Apparently, in a People of the Earth village with very little entertainment, the thought of turning them down never occurred to their hosts, especially when they weren’t asking for much by way of compensation.

Serara played a toylike, foot-pumped porta-organ while Touya drummed on the back of a wooden crate. Isuzu and Minori played their lutes in turn alongside impromptu vocal work, sung by whoever happened to be free at the time.

Their show was more like a student exhibition than a gig, but the crowd of villagers who’d gathered in the hall looked like they genuinely enjoyed it.

The innkeeper’s granddaughters (and there were a lot of them!) carried liquor as if they’d gone mad, their faces bright red. Apparently, they racked up record sales.

The old man, who had pure white eyebrows like a goat’s, told the group, “Just for you kids, room and board are free,” and that made them even livelier. Toast after toast was called, and Isuzu in particular was mobbed by People of the Earth and showered with praise.

Touya was having too much fun: The crate had been a clothing case, and he accidentally struck it hard and broke it. Minori got mad at him for that, but even she was happy.

They’d heard that Rundelhaus was a former People of the Earth noble, and true to Touya’s mental image of a noble, he was running this banquet as if he was really enjoying it.

After all, Rundelhaus had launched the whole affair by speaking to the innkeeper: “We are a group of traveling Adventurers, and our musician says she would like to stage a single night’s performance at this inn. We won’t make a nuisance of ourselves. Could you see your way to providing us with a venue?”

After that, he’d gone up on stage first and introduced Isuzu, Touya, and the rest. When the performance began, he retreated to a corner, bright blond hair gleaming, and waved the entire time. From the look in his eyes, you’d have thought he was watching the most entertaining thing in the world.

It brought Touya to think, in the end, that Rundelhaus was a pretty amazing guy.

When Touya had to sit out from his soccer group, he hadn’t been able to cheer them on with a truly happy face like that. This time around, the thought had put a lump in his throat and had made him perform a bit forcefully. Isuzu might not notice such subtleties, but that was all right. It was fine to share this sort of respect exclusively between men.

They stayed up very late that night.

The five of them had sung all the songs they could think of, and they’d given the best performance they could.

Of course they’d squeezed in meals and breaks, but every time they’d rested, a group of People of the Earth that hadn’t been in the assembly hall earlier had come in, looking dejected, and asked whether the day’s performance had ended, and whether they’d missed it. They’d added one more song for these people, and then another, and every time they did, the show got longer and longer. By the time the old innkeeper stood up and yelled, “That’s it for today. Everyone’s tired, and there’s work to do tomorrow! Go home, g’wan!” it was already five hours past sundown.

“The girls are going to sleep now, you hear?! Rudy, you need to wrap up warm.”

“Touya, Rundelhaus, sleep well.”

“Good night, Touya and Rundelhaus.”

On that note, the three girls, who’d already changed clothes, disappeared into the room they’d been given.

Although there was no bath, the inn employees had kindly heated water for them, and the girls had used it to give themselves sponge baths and wash their hair. Touya and Rudy had just sluiced the dust off, leaving everything else for the next morning.

When they parted ways in the corridor and entered their rooms, the rooms were—as befitted an inn where traders stayed—even more trim and tidy than they’d expected. Thick, quilted coverlets decorated the plank beds, and compared to their rock-littered camps, it was heaven.

“Magic Light.”

In the midst of the light Rundelhaus summoned, the two briefly checked their luggage, which they had brought in from the cart, and then took seats on their beds.

Their throats were hoarse, bellies full, and arms leaden. All of it was due to the huge ruckus, but in their inn room, Touya and Rundelhaus savored the echoes of that happiness.

This wasn’t like the journey Touya had imagined when he thought about going to hunt Wyverns; he thought it was much better.

When the five of them worked together and journeyed across the wilderness all on their own, it was like an adventure program all by itself, but on the other hand, camping in the wilderness was much harder than he’d thought it would be. Touya didn’t want to admit it, but he was a modern kid who was used to city living, not a wild boy.

Besides, the idea of stopping at villages and performing music had been a big hit and a whole lot of fun. It had been like a festival, and being in the brightest spot in the center of it had been a heady experience.

On the bed, he stretched and groaned, but the excitement was still there, like the sound of the surf, and he doubted he’d be able to sleep.

“……Heh-heh.”

“……is…right. Uh-huh…… Yes…… Knew it!”

In the quiet room, he could hear fragments of the bright voices next door.

He couldn’t tell what they were saying, but from the tone and quality of the voices, he knew they belonged to Serara and Isuzu. Minori also seemed to be part of the conversation. He could hear soft, giggly laughter from all three of them.

“They’re quite energetic, aren’t they?” Rundelhaus quipped.

“Yeah, way too much energy.”

Rundelhaus had sounded as if he were biting back a smile, and Touya sat up, agreeing with him.

“I wonder what they’re discussing.”

“Curious, Rudy…?”

“Perish the thought. I’m not so vulgar that I would interest myself in ladies’ secrets. I merely wondered at the fact that they hadn’t yet run out of things to talk about.”

“Well, yeah, they’re girls.”

Biting back a grin, Touya responded with an answer that wasn’t an answer at all.

He thought back to when he’d been in school. When girls’ conversation grew enthusiastic, it got out of control. They could stay excited for half a day, or even a whole day, over the pattern on a pair of socks. Touya and the other boys could never understand it.

He thought Minori had a relatively calm personality for a girl, but even then, once she got going, there was nothing anyone could do. He’d once been given a description of the pudding from some shop in front of the station that went on for half a day, and he really didn’t think he could match that level of excitement.

However, from what he’d seen, even Rundelhaus seemed happy. He spoke as if the girls’ chatter puzzled him, but he was polishing his Magician’s Gauntlets with a smile on his face.

“You look pretty cheerful yourself, big bro Rudy.”

“Hm. This is, erm, because one must maintain one’s weapons.”

“Uh-huh. Guess I’ll do that, too, then.”

Touya began inspecting the leather belts of the armor he’d packed.

Right before they’d set out on their journey, the group had had a Hermit artisan look at their gear. There was no way it would have gotten damaged or broken in a few days, so any maintenance was about 20 percent caution and 80 percent for show.

It was already close to the middle of the night, no less. They were physically tired, and it wasn’t as if they had to tend to their armor now, so why were they awake?

The answer was a bit embarrassing: They didn’t really want to sleep.

It had been a magical evening.

Touya and Rundelhaus kept talking, unwilling to part with the night, as if it held jewels they hadn’t yet discovered.

They spoke about the cart, the horses, their journey. About the food, and the camping, and the battles.

Before stopping at this village, they’d come across a Wild Boar and had managed to vanquish it easily. Minori had been very cautious, but they’d heard that strong monsters didn’t appear in the vicinity of the highway anyway, and combat in this zone didn’t seem to be a problem.

Then they talked about their companions again.

Rundelhaus, looking dejected, suddenly muttered with a sigh, “Touya, listen. Why is Mademoiselle Isuzu so pure and innocent?”

“…Is she?”

To Touya, Isuzu didn’t seem all that innocent or childlike. She wasn’t calm or intellectual, but she did act her age. She was a good friend who understood the feelings of the people around her. He could understand why Minori had become close friends with her.

“She hugs me at the drop of a hat, you know, and she tries to comb my hair.”

“Oh.”

That was true.

But it was something she did to Rundelhaus, never to Touya.

“I feel as if she may be making light of me somehow… Don’t laugh, Touya. I’m being serious.”

Trying to choke back the laughter that had welled up inside him, Touya fell over onto the bed, holding his stomach and twisting around. Wiping away the tears that had appeared at the corners of his eyes, he searched for a response. It was a tough problem. Any answer he gave would be funny.

“Uh, listen.”

“Yes?”

“It means you’re special.”

“Special?”

As Touya spoke, he was fighting back the urge to laugh. An image of Isuzu striking a powerful stance, lips compressed into a dissatisfied line, saying, “Rudy’s my henchman, so he’s special!” popped into his mind, and as a result, his abdominal muscles gave an awful spasm.

“That’s what Isuzu-sis does when she has fun being with somebody and she’s feeling happy about it.”

“Is it?”

“Yuh-huh.”

Rundelhaus folded his arms, muttering to himself. He seemed to be trying to internally come to grips with something.

“Still, I don’t think it means ‘especially pulchritudinous,’ or ‘especially godly,’ or ‘especially magnificent and mighty.’ What does she think of me? The way you Adventurers express your emotions is a bit strange.”

Well, uh, Rudy, your “pulchritudinous” is a bit strange, too.

…But Touya didn’t say it. The bewildered Rundelhaus was Touya’s precious older friend. Right now, he was also a member of his party and a fellow Adventurer.

“You go places with Isuzu quite a lot, too, Rudy.”

“As if I could let a lady walk alone. Mademoiselle Isuzu is a lovely woman. She might get pulled into something untoward.”

Touya’s tightly compressed lips crinkled into a wavy line, but he felt like patting himself on the back for having kept things at that level. He really liked this young blond guy.

The performance they’d just put on rose in his ears again. He felt itchy and impatient, and he wanted to break into a run.

“It doesn’t matter what it is. We’re friends either way.”

“Well, yes, perhaps, but…”

When Touya spoke, he did his best to look serious.

Rundelhaus tilted his head as if he wasn’t really convinced, but he did listen.

Then the conversation turned to their future plans.

They intended to follow the red clay highway to the Deserted Castle of Ariba. Although the Highway to the West didn’t run beside the ocean, it crossed the plains on the Pacific side of Yamato in a general way, linking Akiba with Minami. To get to their destination, the Redstone Mountains, they’d have to leave the highway at the Deserted Castle of Ariba, then take a smaller road, or they might be forced to travel through trackless mountains.

Touya didn’t hate combat.

Of course, it frightened him and grossed him out, and it hurt, but it seemed as though that only made his ties to his companions stronger, and it felt as if he’d accomplished something. Now that they were Adventurers in this other world, monsters were a reality. If they wanted to live here, it was best to have combat abilities.

“Starting tomorrow, we’ll be solidly in the Sakawa region, then.”

“Yeah. Can’t wait!”

“We should sleep soon. While traveling, Touya, one should avoid fatigue like the plague.”

The two of them lay down on their own beds.

Then they fell asleep, wholly satisfied.

3

On Earth, the Sakawa region was the plain that included Odawara.

Until now, Minori hadn’t been particularly good at geography, but in this world, she understood it with an ease that mystified her. When she thought, This is where we’re going to go, she grew interested, and things stayed in her mind.

According to Shiroe’s knowledge and the information she’d looked up in Akiba beforehand, this area was water-rich and focused on agriculture. It was dotted with small People of the Earth settlements, and the main crops were rice and wheat.

The enemies were mainly nature-types, and there were lots of Wild Dogs, Wild Boars, and plant monsters. However, even these lived in the forests and mountainous areas. The plains and farming villages weren’t absolutely safe, but the levels of the monsters they were relatively likely to run into were low, and so was the encounter rate.

Still, when they entered the Sakawa region, Minori’s group felt a faint tension, and they grew warier.

It was a slight difference—the scent of the wind, the rustle of the treetops—but it definitely reached them, telling them that something was off. In fact, in the half day since their departure, they’d seen monsters running away in the distance twice, and although they’d only been skirmishes, they had fought battles.

They hadn’t taken damage, of course, but it was a warning that something was different.

“I mean, there was a Dire Rat.”

“Yeah, that startled me…”

Even as they talked, the cart gradually made its way up an increasingly steep road to higher ground.

When, climbing slowly, they reached the top of the gentle slope, Minori’s group saw a pure white landscape. In that first moment, it looked like snow, but the faintly sweet fragrance that reached their noses told them it was flowers.

“Cherry trees?! Are those cherry trees?”

“No, Isuzu. Those are plums.”

Isuzu had leaned out, and Serara, who was supporting her, told her what they really were.

It appeared a region of plum trees was rising out of the chilly, early spring landscape.

“They smell so good!”

The scent of the blossoms was weak, but out in the fields, it had a definite presence.

On the hill’s descending slope, they saw that stone walls had been used to build terraces, showing that human hands had been at work here. The plum trees were planted here and there in the terraced fields. Possibly because someone had taken the amount of sunlight into consideration, this side of the hill was a forest of plum trees.

Minori and the others followed the road as it wound around the hill, heading west. It took them away from the direction they wanted to go, but there was a wide river ahead of them, and they’d have to choose a place to ford it.

The sea of white plum blossoms went on and on. Isuzu and Rudy were thoroughly impressed, and Serara provided commentary for the two of them and Touya. Apparently, just after the establishment of the Round Table Council last year, she and Nyanta had bought plums, pickled some of them, and made jam from the rest.

It was a bucolic sight.

The wind was still cold, but the light was bright and clear; the cart traveled in a warm pool of sun. As they approached the big river, the wind began to feel moist and the temperature fell, and even when they entered the shadows of the forest, the peaceful atmosphere was unbroken.

From deep in the woods, they heard People of the Earth shouting in unison, like teamsters.

They might have been doing farmwork. The five Adventurers listened to the voices, smiling a little.

It was when they were detouring through the woods along the river, looking for a place to cross, that the air changed. The dense growth shut out the light, and from inside it, they heard sharp screams and violent sounds. Instantly reclaiming the tension she’d felt since that morning, Minori picked up her nearby staff and held it at the ready in front of her chest.

“Minori, I’m going on ahead! Something’s there!”

“Touya! Oh, honestly!”

“What? What is it?!”

With a cry that was more like an oxygen-starved gasp than a scream, a sturdy man in brown and gray cold-weather clothes came tumbling out of the woods. He was a Person of the Earth. While they were looking at the man, people who were probably his companions came running out of the darkness behind him.

Touya leapt down from the driver’s seat, racing forward at several times the speed with which the other group was approaching them.

“Enemy attack! Get ready!” Minori shouted, then swung her staff and cast Purification Barrier on her little brother. The bestial breathing that was closing in on them from the forest belonged to an ogre.

Ogres were classified as evil demihumans.

They were considered to be similar to the goblins Minori and the others had fought in the village of Choushi.

Ogres were taller than goblins, and their builds were comparatively powerful. They were stoop-shouldered, but if they stood up straight, they were about as tall as Touya, and they were stronger than goblins as well. However, they were bad at working together and acting in groups, and they weren’t particularly good at using weapons.

High-level goblins had full sets of weapons and gear, tamed Dire Wolves and other animals, and were very occasionally able to use magic.

Even at high levels, ogres wore almost no armor. They got bigger and bigger, and their strength and endurance rose. They used a strange kind of magic known as “black magic.” Ogres that had been given names, like Ooe, appeared in quests, so named ones could be said to be one of the famous types.

Both ogres and goblins were seen across a wide range of levels, from low- to midlevel. It was said that when Elder Tales had been a game, they had been distributed across regions in order to bring out each area’s distinctive characteristics.

There were many goblins in the field zones of eastern Japan, from Kanto to Tohoku. Ogres were also found west of the Chubu region. Parenthetically, Shikoku was home to lizardmen, while orcs lived in Kyushu. Each area had had its own forces and distinctive quests.

These were all things Shiroe had taught her.

According to what Shiroe had said, the levels of most of the monsters along the highway were low. Of course, he’d told her that the world’s transformation had probably affected things and that they should be careful, but even so, something about this felt wrong.

They’d encountered a level-21 ogre in broad daylight. True, at this point, it wasn’t a tough enemy for their group, but wasn’t it the sort of monster they should have met in the woods or mountains, far from the road?

“Wolfie!”

Beside Minori, who was growing warier due to the feeling that something wasn’t right, Serara had gotten down from the cart and was summoning her servant. The Gray Wolf that appeared was cute and still roly-poly, not yet full-grown. Cloaked in shining magic, he circled around to the front of the group of People of the Earth. He’d gone to guard them.

“It’s a start, at least,” Serara said, eyes focused and intent.

She’d sensed the same wrongness, and instead of vainly trying to follow Touya, she’d made a general-purpose move. This made it possible for her to go forward.

“What’s the situation, Mademoiselle Minori?”

“Ogres came out of the forest. They’re chasing People of the Earth. Rescue and protect them!”

As Minori shouted and broke into a run, she passed the leading Person of the Earth, who stumbled from fatigue and fell. Touya had already gone farther ahead and was locked in combat with the ogres. There were three enemies, levels 22, 22, and 21.

Strangely enough, their levels were nearly the same as those of the skeletons they’d fought in Forest Ragranda. However, in the six months since that summer training camp, Minori and the others had grown much stronger. Putting her level 54 magic behind it, she cast Mirror’s Mystic Spell. A magic mirror appeared in front of her, and the projectiles of light it unleashed pierced the monsters, which had bright red skin and vicious faces. At the same time, they healed Touya’s scratches and scrapes.

After the missiles had run the ogres through, Touya landed an additional attack with Izuna Cutter. Using the momentum, he spun halfway around, shifting directly into Floating Boat Crossing, then into Fire-Wheel Sword. Samurai’s accuracy and damage were lower than those of an Attack class, but this trick compensated for it. Even as he scattered his attacks, he cut the monsters’ lines of sight, continuing to take positions that protected Minori, his guard.

“Minori, the woodcutters are all right!” From behind them, Serara shouted a report.

At the same time, Frost Spear drew a clean trajectory and blew off one of the ogres’ arms.

If this was how things were, they’d be okay. They were overpowering three monsters with only half of their party’s firepower.

They’d all grown enough, both in terms of levels and fighting style. More than enough.

“Don’t get careless! Fifteen more!”

A clear, carrying voice they didn’t recognize rang out from the forest, and then the trees ejected a clump of monsters. They were unfamiliar ones, shaped like black mist.

Due to the strict training she’d received from Shiroe and Naotsugu, Minori responded by drawing one leg back, taking an alert stance, and then checking their statuses.

Nightshade Servants. Level 40.

These were much tougher enemies than the ogres, and there were fifteen of them. Quickly, Minori ran some calculations. If she recalled correctly, Nightshades were spirit monsters. Spirit monsters’ lineage gave them high endurance regarding attribute damage. Dark spirits had the ability to withstand toxins and mental attacks, and they were also highly resistant to instant death.

Servant indicated the role and rank of a monster in the same category. It was a sign that, among Nightshades, these monsters had relatively low combat power. Even so, level 40 was just ten levels below Minori’s group, and in this post-Catastrophe world, that meant these weren’t opponents they could afford to be reckless with.

They could probably win. However, the People of the Earth might take damage. There were too many of them to protect properly. That was what they were up against.

Without hesitating, Touya roared out Samurai’s Challenge.

He was letting Minori take command:

“Rundelhaus, concentrate your firepower and finish off the ogres! Isuzu, focus on defense!”

“Leave it to me! Orb of Lava!”

“Sturdy Pastoral!”

They’d probably been on standby. Rundelhaus’s fireball flew in immediately, punching through two of the ogres and finishing them off. Timing his move to that, Touya retreated a distance of about ten paces in one jump. Their ranks had extended too far. He’d retreated in order to condense them, and he’d made the right decision.

On the other hand, Touya and Minori were on the front line, and the People of the Earth group was still behind them. Serara and Isuzu were guarding them directly, so they didn’t think anything too bad would happen, but there were limits on how far they could retreat.

Even as they did this, the Nightshade Servants moved their mist-shrouded forms to attack Touya. But he’d refined his swordsmanship; while they weren’t the sort of moves he would have used in kendo, he’d learned from Akatsuki and Soujirou, as well as Naotsugu, and he was learning the key points of diverting enemy attacks.

Minori shot glances in all four directions. The woman who’d warned them was probably in the woods. Depending on the situation, they’d have to save her, too.

However, as if ignoring Minori’s wary thoughts, a bespectacled woman emerged from the forest at a run, crashing through the undergrowth, her pure white coat flaring behind her. She sent a soundless torrent of energy from the tip of her staff, turning two of the Nightshade Servants iridescent. Then she raised her staff again.

“Servant Summoning: Princess Lace!”

Servant Summonings were a basic Summoner attack method: Monsters called “servants” were called in and put to work. Since there were no time limits, a Summoner’s fighting power was a combination of the Summoner’s own power and that of their servants, equal to the other eleven classes at the same level. On its own, Servant Summoning wasn’t a very powerful spell.

However, that was if they were on the same level.

Cloaked in shining level-90 magic, the woman and her servant ran across the battlefield, routing the enemy.

Summoners’ spells could never be called first-class, but the female Adventurer played her cards magnificently, using her servant, Princess Lace, to blast death-dealing energy waves, destroying the Nightshade Servants in rapid succession.

Facing Minori’s group and the stunned People of the Earth, she adjusted her glasses with a humorous gesture and raised her voice.

“Allow me to introduce myself. I’m Roe2, a Summoner. I’m on my way to Minami, and…I suppose you’d call me a traveling Vampanella.”

Standing before Minori and the others was a Summoner in a pure white coat and round glasses.

4

The People of the Earth who’d fled from the forest were woodcutters, and they explained that the ogres had attacked them while they were working. Minori’s group split up to retrieve their tools: the axes and racks slung on their backs they had flung away in their escape.

The People of the Earth could have gone to pick them up, of course, but it was possible that there were still hostile beings in the woods.

Minori and the others weren’t obligated to help them. Even though no one had actually suggested it, they naturally accepted the job of guarding the People of the Earth. Minori decided it was too late for them to back out now, since, if people they’d saved once ended up being attacked in the woods a second time, it would leave a bad taste in their mouths.

While they were doing this, even though she’d made such a flashy entrance, the woman who’d called herself Roe2 sat slumped in the back of the Adventurers’ covered cart.

She was a high-level Summoner, but according to her, she “wasn’t good with sunlight.” As a result, she said, she’d been traveling through forests or mountains all this time.

When they’d collected the tools and were ready to set off again, a staggering fact came to light. Thanks to Minori’s Damage Interception spell, the red beams of light the Nightshade Servants had fired had veered away from Touya, but the stray shots had struck the group’s horses. The twin animals had been badly injured, but even so, they’d taken off running and disappeared beyond the horizon. Even their item, Lyman’s Twin Horse Whistle, was cracked. Because of the recast time, they weren’t able to check right away, but even if that hadn’t been the case, the damage was bad enough that they were hesitant to use it again before getting it repaired.

As a result, Touya and Isuzu ended up taking the cart to the local village.

Even if their levels were still in the fifties, they had Adventurer strength. As long as speed wasn’t an issue, walking while pulling the cart was easy.

The People of the Earth—the woodcutters and their boss, Haze—were walking in any case. Since they were traveling together, this was actually more convenient.

Serara and her servant wolf led the way. The wolf pup, a ball of light gray, was a bundle of curiosity; it kept busily shoving its snout into the bushes on either side, sniffing the scents, then returning to Serara and yapping in a cute little voice as if to report its findings.

Touya was pulling the cart. Haze and three of his assistants walked warily beside the boy.

Isuzu was the one in charge of pushing the cart from behind. Technically, Rundelhaus was next to her, doing the same thing—“It would be unseemly to force all the manual labor onto a lady,” he’d said—but class differences were cruel, and even when they were the same level, Bards (a Weapon Attack class) were stronger than Sorcerers (a Magic Attack class.)

“Don’t worry about it. You can just ride in the cart.”

“No, I cannot.”

“Then I guess we’ll go for a walk together.”

“Why are you in such high spirits, Mademoiselle Isuzu?”

“Because it’s a walk?”

Minori, who was listening to the exchange taking place behind the cart, was riding inside.

Since Roe2 was exhausted, she’d decided that she needed to treat her.

“No, don’t trouble yourself. I’m not good with recovery spells.”

“Not…good with them?”

“Because I’m a Vampanella, you see.”

Roe2, who was wearing an extremely lethargic expression, poked her index fingers into the corners of her mouth and pulled outward, showing her teeth. Sharp canines peeked out.

On seeing this, Minori remembered the Vampanella subclass.

It was something she’d heard about from Shiroe while he was making small talk. It was one of a vast number of subclasses that had been added during a previous fair of some sort, and apparently it had been a rather badly balanced one. Its performance wasn’t at all suited to party play: In exchange for heightened abilities at night and the ability to absorb HP during close combat, abilities were greatly reduced during the day, and recovery spells not only failed to recover HP; they actually did additional damage.

Yet Roe2 had said she was a Summoner. She was about as tall as Minori, but she had a womanly figure, and her chest, which was encased in a thin knitted garment, was rather prominent. She was also quite beautiful.

In this other world, everyone was beautiful or cute. This was a relic from Elder Tales’ game days, and while Adventurers kept the appearances they’d had on Earth, they’d been made more attractive.

However, strangely, even now that things were like this, there were clear “beauties” and “lovely girls.” It was simply the power to attract people, something like an aura, and it came through in gestures and atmosphere.

Her guildmate Akatsuki had that quality, for example. She radiated a delicate charm that went beyond her fair appearance. In terms of Minori’s acquaintances, others included Henrietta and Marielle, Misa Takayama, and Nazuna of the West Wind Brigade, who’d recently begun to teach Minori.

To elaborate even further, Princess Raynesia was far and away the best of them. Even though Minori had only exchanged greetings with her a few times, she thought she’d never known anyone who was so memorable.

These beauties (or lovely girls) had a definite presence, and even if all they did was smile, even though Minori was a girl as well, it was enough to set her heart beating faster.

Roe2 seemed to be that sort of person, too.

Her disheveled, casual hair didn’t look as if she really took care of it, but it was glossy and somehow stylish. Even though she wasn’t doing anything in particular, the lazy-looking expression behind her glasses had a pensive charm to it.

Her white coat and angular bag were the rough Adventurer sort, and in combination with the rather masculine way she spoke, they gave her a boyish air. However, even then, it was likely that no one could have mistaken Roe2 for a man. She looked like a charming woman through and through.

It gave Minori a rather sizable inferiority complex.

After all, awakening to love had made her more melancholy overall.

Because it had made her realize that she was ordinary.

Of course she was trying as hard as she could, and she wanted to wear cute clothes as much as possible… Particularly when she went anywhere with Shiroe. She was talking it over with Isuzu and trying to choose clothes that were subtly mature: not childish, but nothing that would fail her by making her seem as if she was trying too hard.

(According to Isuzu, this was “Minori’s Trim, Upper-Class Young Lady Strategy.”)

Even so, when she walked beside Shiroe, she sometimes felt ashamed and ridiculous. It was as if she was an embarrassing little kid who knew nothing, someone who wasn’t suitable for him.

When that happened, she lost sight of the words she’d been about to say, and even just walking with him made her feel bad. Apparently she was more of a coward than she’d thought. The moment Shiroe turned around and waited for her to catch up, the feeling—which resembled dejection—was blown clean away, and she felt as if she’d burst with happiness.

Minori had been startled to discover herself to be so calculating.

Yet she had been the one to tell Touya, “I haven’t done a thing.” That was the night she’d resolved to do everything she could to be allowed to stay with Shiroe.

However, the fact that there was so little she could do confounded her. Shiroe was an adult, but even in this world, where school didn’t exist, Minori was still only a middle schooler.

She felt she was a wretched, puny, insignificant human being, and it made her chest ache.

Even so, although the pain hurt, she didn’t want to let it go.

“You seem pretty down.”

Roe2 spoke, and Minori responded: “Yes… Wait. Is that the Sacred Robe of the Stars?”

“Hm? Oh. That’s right. I’m impressed you knew.”

“Yes. My, umm… My teacher, Shiroe, he wears one.”

“Huh? Ah, I see. Is he a Magic class, too, then?”

“Yes. He’s an Enchanter.”

“Well, this robe is pretty high-performance. It’s resistant to wear and tear, too, which makes it handy for everyday use. Besides, it’s comfortable. Even after a long journey, it’s still nice and clean, no?”

She was right. The robe didn’t seem to have any tears or dirt on it.

She’d been traveling over mountains and fields, but she was a level-90 Adventurer. Even moving alone, if she chose her route well, it would probably be possible to travel without causing too much wear. That said, being a Vampanella really did sound inconvenient. Having your movements restricted during the day was a pretty big handicap.

“Where did you come from? Where are you going?”

“‘Whence do we come, and where do we go?’ That’s a very philosophical question.”

“No, um, that isn’t what I…”

Roe2 grinned, as if to say, I know that. She’d been teasing. Minori had been about to protest, but that expression killed her momentum.

Apparently this woman had a much better sense of humor than her appearance suggested.

“I started my journey in Ouu. I think it’s been about three months now. It’s brutal. Even I didn’t think it would be this rough.”

“From…Ouu?”

Minori searched her memories. If she remembered right, that was in what would have been Japan’s Tohoku region. Shiroe had gone to that area near the end of last year. A raid quest called the Coronation of the Goblin King was still underway there, and an emergency in Ouu had been the indirect cause of the desperate struggle that Minori and the others had encountered in Choushi. When she thought of it that way, it felt like a familiar area.

“Before that, I was somewhere farther away, though. I jumped there by Castling.”

“Oh. Yes, you are a Summoner, aren’t you. That’s a special spell that lets you switch places with a servant, isn’t it?”

Castling was a spell unique to Summoners that let them trade places with a creature they’d summoned or a being with which they’d made a contract. Apparently Roe2 had switched places with a servant in Ouu.

In Elder Tales, summoned servants hadn’t been able to go very far from their magicians. However, in this other world, they’d discovered that, depending on the method, they could go quite far, even to other servers. This knowledge was so common that Honesty, one of the guilds on the Round Table Council, was using it to investigate the Fairy Rings.

“Yes, my servant, or my older brother… Yes, my brother. Let’s call him that. I switched places with my brother.”

Roe2 blushed, speaking as if trying to cover up the fact that she was a bit uncomfortable, then went on rapidly.

“Since then, I’ve spent my days walking through the mountains to avoid sunlight. For now, I’m headed to Ikoma. If I go there, I can quit being a Vampanella.”

“So it’s a departure quest, then?”

When she heard that, everything made sense to Minori.

Ordinarily, it was possible to overwrite your subclass by acquiring another subclass. When you did, you lost the subclass you’d used up until that point. Minori herself had changed to Apprentice by overwriting Tailor.

However, there were some subclasses that couldn’t be overwritten. It was a feature seen in subclasses acquired on highly difficult quests and at limited-time-only events. If you wanted to change those subclasses, you had to complete a “departure quest” and reset your subclass entirely.

Vampanella was a subclass with a lot of disadvantages. Furthermore, Shiroe had told her it was a rather embarrassing subclass and that, at this point, it was rare to find someone who had it.

The fact that Roe2 was having such a hard time on her journey was probably due in large part to the effects of being a Vampanella. If it was possible to leave the subclass, she’d certainly want to. Apparently that departure quest was in Ikoma.

“Excellent guess. I’d love to ask the responsible party why I even have this subclass. My older brother–type… Maybe? Well, anyway, the person in charge. I mean, really, this is just for show. True, it was handy on the moon, but I wish he’d given a little thought to what would happen after I came down to Earth.”

Something about Roe2’s musings raised a question for Minori, and she was about to ask about it.

However, just then, they felt a bouncing sort of vibration, the cart stopped, and their conversation broke off.

“Heeeey, Adventurer in there, and our little Adventurer benefactors. This is the edge of our town, Koyurugi. We do have an inn, so please relax and take it easy. We’ll come by to thank you properly in a bit!”

When Minori poked her head out from under the canopy, she saw that the river had forked, forming a delta. On the delta, which was created by the protection of the currents and fertile soil brought in by the river, there was a town surrounded by a patchwork of beautiful fields.

In the light of the slowly sinking sun, with smoke rising from its cook fires, the town seemed to be welcoming them.

5

It was easy for them to get a room.

February was still early for trading. Traders who’d been affected by the feverish atmosphere in Akiba were the exception, and they often worked hard at their jobs even in winter, but the trade in farm produce wouldn’t really begin until spring.

Isuzu and the others left their belongings in their inn room, which stood independently, like a cottage. Then, taking only their valuables and equipment, they returned to the dining hall. The room was intended for traders, and while it was a separate room, with the five of them in there, there wouldn’t be much space for anything except beds. That wouldn’t be a problem when they slept, but the sun wasn’t completely down yet.

The woodcutters had said they’d be paying them a visit, and there was dinner to think about, too.

That being the case, the five of them went back to the dining hall, where the innkeeper waited.

The hall was made of wood and had a low ceiling.

The framework seemed to have been made with pillars and beams that used fallen trees and other natural materials in their original state, and the whitewashed walls were striking. Instead of oil, the lamps used Light-Storing Stones. These were magic items created in Akiba; they sat in the sunlight all day, then released that light slowly over four or five hours, and they were much cheaper than Firefly Lamps, which used mana to shine.

In the dining hall, there were several low sofas tinted green with plant dyes, set around equally low tables. Ornamental plants decorated the areas around pillars, and the hall seemed more like a living room than a dining area.

Roe2, who’d traveled to the village with them, sat on one of those sofas with her legs stretched out casually in front of her.

They didn’t know any of the other guests, and it would have been awkward to go to a different table, so Isuzu’s group approached the woman’s sofa. Roe2 smiled faintly, beckoning to them, and Touya relaxed on a seat across from her with no hesitation. Isuzu and Rundelhaus sat at the edges of the table, and Minori and Serara ended up next to the woman.

She was drinking a reddish-purple juice. When Serara asked, she told them, “I hear it’s plum juice.”

“Did you take lodgings here, too, Roe2?”

“Yes. I wanted a bath; it’s been a long time. From what they tell me, this inn has one.”

“We heard!”

Isuzu’s voice was so cheerful that even she noticed it.

A good percentage of Adventurer equipment repaired and cleaned itself. The function automatically got rid of mud stains and dust from grass and trees, until the items looked brand-new. Even if they got sweaty, with their current bodies, the sweat dried before they knew it, and in that sense, as long as Adventurers paid attention to damage, baths weren’t as necessary for them as they had been in the old world.

However, mentally, things were different: Even if they weren’t sticky, they felt like they were, and they wanted to bathe. As a teenage girl in high school, Isuzu felt this twice as strongly as the average person. She thought Serara and Minori probably felt the same way.

Food they hadn’t ordered was carried over to their table.

According to the man who served it to them, they were being treated by the woodcutters they’d rescued. Apparently the town mayor had sent a message of thanks as well. For some reason, the menu consisted of deluxe rice bowls with fried egg, with sausages and tomatoes poking out over the rim of the bowls. There was white rice at the very bottom, and two fried eggs on the very top.

Maybe it was the inn’s specialty: The same thing was being served at every table.

With a big smile on his face, Rundelhaus began looking around the table restlessly. Taking the initiative, Serara took several seasonings from the pouch at her waist and set them on the tabletop.

“Soy sauce for me!”

“Oh, Touya, honestly.”

—The twins apparently belonged to the soy sauce camp.

Without saying a word, Isuzu handed the similar bottle that sat next to it to Rundelhaus.

“My thanks, Mademoiselle Isuzu.”

“Once you’re done, pass it back.”

Isuzu and Rundelhaus were members of the Worcestershire sauce camp. At Isuzu’s house, her mother used soy sauce, while her father and Isuzu preferred regular sauce. If she’d been in Akiba, and if it had been just her and Rundelhaus, she could have splurged and used teriyaki sauce, but she wouldn’t ask for such a luxury now. On the contrary, lately, everything she ate tasted so good that it was almost a problem. Compared to her days in Hamelin just after the Catastrophe, the things she ate now were heavenly.

The dish currently sitting in front of her was a (rather eccentric) rice bowl with fried egg, but this wasn’t bad news. Isuzu thought that the most delicious things in this world were B-grade gourmet items. This was because they were guaranteed to belong to the food culture that the Adventurers had brought in.

An Adventurer somewhere had probably dreamed up this fried-egg rice bowl, too. When sumptuous-looking full course meals were brought out, if they were incredibly lucky, there was a possibility that they might be good, but if not, such food was generally tasteless.

Compared to menu-created items that were all show, handmade cooking that couldn’t be made at the touch of a button tended not to look very fancy. In other words, if the food that was brought out looked like B-grade gourmet fare, it was almost certain to have flavor, and to have originated with the Adventurers.

In that sense, while it didn’t quite measure up to a teriyaki Crescent Burger, this fried-egg rice bowl looked promising.

Rundelhaus was almost certainly thinking the same thing. He’d closed his eyes and was waiting for the formal “Thanks for the food” to be said, but she felt as if she could see a transparent tail wagging from side to side, sweeping the floor.

“Yes, yes, there we go.”

Serara was using a spoon to take mayonnaise out of a lidded bottle, and there was a languid smile on her face. As an ordinary high school girl, the feeling of looking forward to meals while on a long journey was something Isuzu could highly relate to.

Yet Roe2 seemed puzzled, so Minori offered:

“This is soy sauce, and this is salt. This is semisweet Worcestershire sauce, and the red one is ketchup. Which would you like, Roe2?”

“Hm. Hmmm…”

Looking mystified, Roe2 picked them up, then put them all on, in order.

Personally, Isuzu thought that using both soy sauce and Worcestershire sauce was an awful idea, but to each her own. Humans were liable to start wars when delicate subjects were brought up, and fried eggs were high on that list. It was the same way at Isuzu’s house. Isuzu wanted to tell her father that ponzu sauce was simply not okay.

“Thanks for the food!”

And so the group ate dinner. Spoons had been provided, but both Isuzu and Rundelhaus had brought their own chopsticks. Rundelhaus had gotten quite skilled with his.

About half the seats in the dining hall were filled.

Most of the people around them were artisans and merchants, and they seemed to be exchanging information about the area. Isuzu had learned this only after beginning this journey, but in towns and villages that were on the small side, inns and taverns were more than just commercial buildings. They were a sort of public facility. Naturally, it was possible to eat and drink there, but apparently people also visited them to collect information on the town, to talk to other people, and sometimes to create rules.

In this dining hall at dusk, Isuzu and the others had a pleasant meal.

Meals eaten while camping had a charm all their own, and (provided Serara didn’t mess up) they were delicious, but it was nice to be able to settle down and look at each other while they ate.

Isuzu tweaked a grain of rice off Rundelhaus’s cheek, then poured chilled tea into everyone’s cups from a pitcher.

“All right, I’ve got it now! This gloppy black stuff is Worcestershire sauce, and the runny black stuff is soy sauce, yes?”

Murmuring that to herself, Roe2 added more of both.

Isuzu and Minori exchanged looks. They were both thinking the same thing. Both sauce camps were still in competition with each other.

“Well, well. It’s perfectly clear to me now. Learning should always be thus.”

“Mayonnaise is yummy, too.”

Serara was looking to recruit allies, and possibly because she’d pressed her, Roe2 gingerly added mayonnaise on top of everything else. Isuzu grew worried, but still she said nothing. The politics surrounding fried eggs were complicated and rigid. Simply expressing her opinion might be taken as interference in domestic affairs.

“…I hear they turned back partway there.”

“A caravan would have difficulty, then?”

“Even so, individual merchants might be able to manage…”

Travelers were in close conversation with influential villagers and artisans, their foreheads practically touching. This probably wasn’t just idle gossip; it might be an important exchange of information that would determine future policy for the town.

Hearing the sigh-filled conversation, Isuzu looked up. Now that she was paying attention, the merchants’ faces seemed gloomy.

“Do you think something happened?”

At Isuzu’s puzzled question, her friends all looked around the dining hall.

The comfortable hall held merchants who seemed to have been staying there for quite some time, and there were a lot of artisans with grim expressions.

“If you head west from here, there’s a mountainous area known as Boxroot. It has a pretty lake, and it’s governed by an aristocrat who grew prosperous on tariffs, but they say monster activity in the Boxroot Mountains has increased.”

“Is that right…”

After eating a mouthful of rice mixed with egg yolk from her spoon, Roe2 interpreted the conversations in the dining hall for them. She said she’d heard about the situation while Isuzu and the others were in their room.

“In general, the monsters’ levels range from twenty to thirty. That’s similar to the ones we fought this afternoon. I expect there was some sort of power struggle in the mountains. High-elevation monsters that are mildly strong are coming down into the foothills. Their activity ranges are probably shifting in a chain reaction.”

“Did you see it, Roe2?”

“Yes. After all, I’ve been traveling in the shadows of the forest the whole time.”

After answering Minori’s question as if it was nothing important, Roe2 set down her bowl, saying, “Thank you for the meal.” She’d been casual about it, but she’d been the first of the group to finish. Privately, Isuzu updated her opinion of the woman: For somebody gorgeous, she eats fast. It made her feel friendlier toward her.

“We’ll be fine, but it must be very hard on the merchants.”

At Minori’s words, Isuzu thought for a little while. “Provided we’re merely traveling along ordinary highways, the monster levels are all about ten. Most of the terrain is like that. I hear the red clay highway in particular has an ancient-tech spell meant to ward off wild beasts.”

Rundelhaus, meanwhile, spoke as if he was organizing a fresh idea that had just occurred to him: “If merchants are trading based on that assumption, of course things would get ugly if level-twenty monsters started appearing on the highway.”

The merchants who were staying in the dining hall long-term had probably had trouble crossing the mountain pass and were stranded.

“We’re in trouble, too, you know. Our horses are injured.” Serara’s interjection brought the reality home to Isuzu as well.

It was true: That was a big problem. She really doubted that a People of the Earth town like this one would have a shop that sold Adventurer equipment. The possibility of finding an Adventurer item artisan here was very nearly zero.

“Horses, hm? Oh, yes, they did run off, didn’t they? You could just summon horses, couldn’t you?” Maybe because her belly was full, Roe2 seemed to be in a good mood.

It certainly would have been possible for a Summoner, but not for Isuzu and the others.

“Can you do that sort of thing, big sister Roe2?”

Touya was probably thinking the same thing. He had asked the question in his usual, cheerful voice. However, the response wasn’t what Isuzu had expected.

“Big—b-big sis?! Boy… Would you call me ‘big sister’?”

Isuzu had a vague premonition that the atmosphere was about to head south in a big way, but before she could stop them, her friends had answered: “Big sister?” “You mean ‘big sister Roe’?” “Would ‘Lady’ be more suitable than ‘Mademoiselle’? No, that’s not right, is it. Sister Roe2.”

The bespectacled woman clenched her fists, basking in the lingering echoes of emotion. She nodded wordlessly, breathing deeply over and over, as if savoring the feeling.

“Big sister. That’s nice. Big sister… When I hear that phrase, it makes me feel as if someone’s counting on me.”

No, we aren’t, Isuzu almost said.

Her friend Minori had even struck a pose, the palm of her hand held out to interrupt Roe2, as if the Kannagi meant to say something.

However, with Roe2 the way she was now, neither of them could cut in. Her expression was proud, radiant, and filled with goodwill.

“Being counted on is rather exhilarating. Big sisters are good things, aren’t they? I’d like to be treated as a big sister—I’d like to be admired as a big sister! All right, I’ll accompany you on your journey. You may depend on me in battle. I’ll provide horses as well, of course. I’ll summon the most splendid horses the world has ever seen, so many that you could stack them! As my reward, you will let me act as your big sister. Will that do?!”

Roe2, with her dashing expression and figure, had made a declaration that seemed pretty uncool to Isuzu. She’d asserted herself all in a rush, and Isuzu’s group found themselves steamrolled.

6

“Ooh, look how big it is.”

“Wow. That’s amazing.”

In the night’s darkness, the Bug Lights that had popped into existence with charming little sounds illuminated dense clouds of steam and a bath surrounded by rocks. They’d been told there was a bath, but that it wasn’t attached to the rooms at the inn. Instead, it was in a depression a few minutes’ walk down the gravel path around back… And so they’d gone to see.

The surrounding trees provided a perfect screen, while hot springwater and cold river water cascaded into the rock bath like waterfalls. It was closer to a true hot spring than a bath, and it was apparently made from a mixture of hot water drawn from the earth and cold water from the Ricouart River.

The structure that looked like a shed was probably the changing room. After marveling at the rock bath for a little while, Serara went into the small building with Minori and Isuzu.

Like the rock bath, the changing room was deserted.

Ordinary People of the Earth went to bed early. Felinoids had good night vision, and it was possible to use Light-Storing Stones like the ones in the inn dining hall. Even regular households probably had lanterns, at least. However, it took fuel and preparation to use them, and it wasn’t easy to light up a large space. Taking one along to the bath would have been a pain.

According to the universal way of life among the People of the Earth, if the alternative was to go to the trouble of getting a light ready and work at night, then it was better to finish what they needed to do while the sun was up and turn in early.

When Serara and the other two had headed for the bath, the innkeeper had told them, “It’ll be so empty you’ll think you reserved it.” This was only natural for him to say, but it had also been true.

Serara knew she was timid enough to feel unnerved by the bath being described as “reserved,” but since Adventurers had Magic Lights, they could enjoy the rock bath to their hearts’ content without any problems, even at this hour.

Isuzu, who’d stripped energetically and tied her hair back, wrapped herself in a towel. At the changing room exit, she turned to look back.

Serara was flustered, but no matter what she did, she ended up moving slowly.

It depressed her, but even if the only people around were friends of the same gender, it took courage for plump girls to undress.

Since it wasn’t as if anyone was paying attention to her, this was sheer, embarrassing self-consciousness.

Hurrying as fast as she could, Serara pulled her hair together at the back of her head with her bath clip, then timidly made for the rock bath, holding her bath towel so that it hid her front. This was another world, after all, and defense was important.

Minori was waiting for her there.

“It isn’t all that hot. There are stone flags over there. Would you like to rinse off?” Her younger friend gave her an untroubled smile, and Serara relaxed just a little.

Smiling and nodding, she headed over that way.

Compared to their old world counterparts, the “natural, additive-free shampoo and conditioner” and “experimental creamy soap” that they’d brought from Akiba weren’t very high-class articles, and their performance was sure to be bad as well. Still, the People of the Earth treated them as ultraluxury items, and they were good enough for practical purposes. The three of them used the products with loofahs and towels, and they washed their hair as well.

After the Catastrophe, it was times like these that made Serara think, I’ve changed, too.

Before, Serara thought, she’d been awkward, slow, and clumsy enough that even she could tell. Even she’d thought, It’s only a bath, but on school trips, she’d been the only one on her team to stay in for a long time and cause trouble for the other team members.

She didn’t know whether she’d changed because she was a Housekeeper, or whether it was living in this world that had done it.

In the old world, she hadn’t hated doing thorough tasks like cleaning and laundry, and she’d often volunteered for them. However, her skill with them certainly hadn’t been better than average.

In this world, since she’d become a Housekeeper and had done chores the entire time, she seemed to have grown more dexterous at a variety of things.

Serara thought it would be nice if it was because she’d mastered things, and not just some sort of game-related subclass bonus.

She still wasn’t all that skilled, but even so, she was much better than before. She thought that being attentive and efficient at housework was a wonderful thing, and that it made one seem a bit like a young wife.

She and Minori washed each other’s backs, then rinsed their hair at the same pace.

“I’m finished, Serara.”

“I’m done, too, Minori!”

Their eyes met, and the two of them snickered. Then they jumped Isuzu, who was looking dazed, and began washing her hair.

Unbound, Isuzu’s hair was wavy, and it fell all the way to her waist.

Isuzu said she wasn’t anything like a girl, and that she was skinny as a rail, and freckled, and just your average high school kid, but Serara had noticed that she took very good care of her long hair. This was patently obvious from the way she washed it slowly and carefully every time she took a bath, even though she badmouthed it as she worked. Serara and Minori had been waiting for the opportunity to touch their friend’s hair.

“We’ll make your hair soft and fluffy, Isuzu.”

“I brought two different types of comb.”

“Don’t bother; it’s a pain. I can do it myself.”

“No, no, this is a Housekeeper’s job, too.”

“Apprentices don’t run from any task.”

“Does it itch anywhere?”

“Geez, Serara…”

“If you talk, you’ll get soap in your mouth, Isuzu.”

“Minori, you, too? Argh.”

“Serara’s practicing for the future.”

“Huh?”

“It’s practice for being a newlywed.”

“Whaaat?!”

At Minori’s overly solemn tones, the three of them laughed as if they couldn’t hold it back—Is that true? Really? Why?!—and their voices echoed in the rock bath. Even so, Serara’s hands didn’t pause. She knew that washing long hair really was a lot of work, and besides, washing Isuzu’s hair was a special event that she and Minori had discussed beforehand.

It was wonderful that they’d gotten their chance now, on the road.

In the glow of the Magic Lights, which were spinning cheerfully in midair, Serara relaxed in the big rock bath, sinking up to her shoulders. The heat of the hot spring slowly soaked into her body, and it felt heavenly. The two beside her were also smiling and sighing.

The bath was big, about five meters square. This was spacious compared to the lion-footed bathtubs found in high-class People of the Earth inns, and it was deep enough that, if they stretched their legs out in the water, the tips of their chins touched its surface. In a few places, it was even deeper.

Two streams of water flowed into the rock bath, one hot and one cold. Searching for the perfect temperature, Serara and the others sat down companionably.

“Mmmm, what a great bath!”

Isuzu smiled as she spoke.

Minori was smiling, too, and Serara was happy.

The sky held the Magic Lights and a moon that was about half full. The three of them looked up, then giggled for no reason.

Adventurer bodies were astonishing things: Even though they’d been traveling and had spent some of the time camping, they didn’t get muscle aches, and they weren’t particularly fatigued. Even so, they’d been tense and on edge, and they were glad to have found an inn where the three of them could soak in a hot spring like this.

As a matter of fact, when she’d heard they’d be doing a lot of camping on the journey, she’d been a little frightened.

Minori had said that in the old world, this region was a big tourist area. She’d heard that the fish were delicious, and the dried seafood was famous.

Serara thought, absently, that she’d love to come here with Nyanta someday.

“It’s warm, isn’t it?”

“Yep. Nice and warm.”

“Mm-hm.”

The three of them relaxed limply, talking about that sort of thing.

Even Isuzu, who was always full of energy, was smiling like a cat during its afternoon nap. When she saw this, Serara felt entertained. To hide her smile, she ducked until her mouth was underwater and blew bubbles, and even that was exhilarating.

In baths this comfortable, maybe all humans turned into felines. Serara felt like taking a nap; she thought she might even have been developing cat ears.

If she did grow cat ears and whiskers, she’d be a felinoid, a kitty cat. Or, no, felinoids were all cat, so maybe she’d call herself a mew-mew. That would put her one step closer to her ambition. She wriggled her toes in the warm water. Pleasant fantasies were always a little ticklish.

“You look a bit dreamy, Serara.”

“That’s because I’m a kitty cat.”

She was warm all the way to the center of her brain, so she couldn’t think anything very complicated. If she sounded silly, there was no help for it… Or that was the excuse Serara made to herself as she responded, anyway.

“And? Do you want to bathe with Nyanta, Serara?”

Isuzu shattered her drowsy mood with one shot.

It might have been payback for earlier. She pressed Serara, wearing a bright smile with a trace of spite mixed into it.

“No, it isn’t like that.”

“But Nyanta is handsome, right?”

“Nyanta is dandy, and dashing, and stylish.”

Serara had given the very best retort she could muster, but Isuzu hugged Minori’s shoulders to her, beaming. Minori was looking from Isuzu to Serara in bewilderment, but Isuzu kept loudly broadcasting the attitude that Minori was on her team.

“If that’s what we’re talking about, then what about you and Rundelhaus, Isuzu?”

“Huh? Rudy’s just a walking buddy.”

To Minori’s response, Isuzu looked blank, while Serara was exasperated.

Considered normally, Isuzu and Rundelhaus had to look much more like a couple than Serara and Nyanta did, but for some reason, Isuzu didn’t seem to have noticed it.

Even though they look so good together…

She’d thought they were going on early-morning dates. She hadn’t been able to think otherwise. For Serara, who went on kitchen dates (or wanted to think she did), Isuzu’s denseness was a complete mystery. However, she thought this might be because she herself yearned too much for Nyanta. Even as the thought crossed her mind, she asked herself whether “yearning too much” might not be a questionable expression for a maidenly young woman to use, and she was steamed by a heat that had nothing to do with the bath.

In order to hide this, the only thing she could do was stick the lower half of her face underwater and blow bubbles.

“Serara will make a good wife.”

…Especially once Minori launched an additional attack in a cheerful voice.

“And what about you, Minori? Will you be Shiroe’s secretary?”

“Ah… That isn’t what I meant.”

“But you’re crazy about him, aren’t you? I’m cheering for you, you know.”

The brunt of the attack had shifted away from her, and Serara felt relieved.

Isuzu was happily messing with Minori, but Minori seemed like an amazing girl to Serara, too. She’d changed her subclass to Apprentice, and now, on the days when she didn’t go out hunting, she was working part-time at Shopping District 8.

She was a super middle schooler.

While she spent time with her as a friend, she’d noticed lots of cute things about her, and lots of klutzy things as well. However, she wanted to learn from her firm sense of responsibility and her cleverness, and particularly from the speed with which she worked. She thought so every time they cleaned up or pitched camp, but Minori always finished her work first. It wasn’t that each individual move she made was fast. She was quick at linking one job to another, and at preparing for tasks. To Serara, it seemed like a natural, mental difference, a difference in intelligence. In short, Minori was impressive.

She was a little bit younger, but in this other world where there was no school, it didn’t seem to matter much. To Serara, Minori felt like a friend her own age.

“If he has you as his secretary, Minori, absolutely everything will go well.”

“That isn’t it. I just want to be a little bit useful, that’s all.”

“Suuure you do.”

“Suuure you do.”

“Isuzu, Minori’s saying something.”

“Serara, Minori’s pretty cute, isn’t she?”

She blindly followed Isuzu, and the two of them jostled Minori between them.

She giggled. She was in an odd mood. When she was in Susukino, she’d never even imagined being able to laugh like this. It felt as if it had been years since then.

This time, as Serara clung to Minori, feeling giddy, she sent a leading question to Isuzu:

“Well, what are you going to be, Isuzu?”

“Huh?”

Isuzu had been teasing both of them, and the question seemed to have startled her. However, that expression only lasted a moment, and when she spoke again, she looked solemn.

“I’m ordinary. If we get back to the old world, I’ll be an office worker or something. If we stay like this, I’ll hunt and go on quests and run errands for the Round Table Council, and every week, I’ll sing at Bloom Hall.”

“Are you going to be a singer, Isuzu?”

“Huh?! No, no.”

Half laughing, Isuzu waved her hands in denial, making light splashing noises.

“No, no way. A singer? Nothing like that. That’s for girls who stand out more. I’m just normal. Strumming away at a restaurant once in a while suits me best. I provide background music for the times when everyone’s having fun. Me and Rudy.”

Her expression was nonchalant, and there was no darkness or excessive humility in it, so Serara thought that really was what she felt. Come to think of it, that was only natural: Not everyone aspired to be a musician. Isuzu loved music, but she probably wasn’t interested in that sort of thing.

“The future, hm?”

The voice was quite close, and it startled them enough to make them jump.

They hadn’t expected there to be any other bathers.

Roe2 nodded generously to the flustered group. Her steam-fogged glasses glittered.

“You’re young, aren’t you?”

Her voice was gentle, and for some reason, Serara nodded meekly. Roe2 was a mysterious woman: Some of her reactions were childlike, but from time to time, she showed the easy kindness of someone much older, someone who knew absolutely everything.

“Roe2, you’re—”

“Naturally, as your big sister, I’m older than you, so I have a physical advantage.”

Roe2’s statement startled Serara.

Isuzu wasn’t just startled. Her mouth was hanging open.

The fact that they’d thought of her as a dependable older sister up until this very moment was blown clean out of their minds.

“Uh, ah, um…”

“My chest is big, too.”

Isuzu was tense and flustered, Minori seemed terribly depressed for some reason, and Serara tried desperately to encourage them. Naturally, she couldn’t put it into words well, so she did it all inside her head, but as far as Serara was concerned, she was one big cheer squad. Isuzu was slim with a nice figure, and she thought Minori looked right for her age.

“My chest is big, too.”

Regardless, Roe2 said it twice, so comforting them was a job and a half.

The two of them protested, and were appeased in turn. Then for some reason the conversation turned to love, and then to Earth and the towns where they’d lived.

“Where did you live, Roe2?”

“I suppose you could call it an underpopulated city. It was an empty place.”

“Did you live alone? Lucky…”

“I am an adult, so yes. Besides, with transmissions as developed as they are, physical distances don’t matter much.”

I see, Serara thought. That’s true.

There had been an online game, and it had turned into another world, and Serara had met Nyanta.

Maybe distances didn’t matter where meetings were concerned.

Time simply flew by, but they didn’t run out of things to talk about.

Serara realized that she’d never once gotten bored when she was with Minori or Isuzu, and Roe2 had jumped right into their circle.

They had just as much fun as when Pippi visited the Settergren siblings. Of course, pleasant times always come at a price, and the four of them got very overheated.