Chapter 1: Life in a New Land

Chapter 1:
Life in a New Land

 

JEEPUPP WASN’T A WEIRD CITY or anything. They were really big on agriculture around the city’s outskirts, which were surrounded by fields. But the area near the inn that we stayed at was just as developed as any other town. Sure, nothing about the cityscape really grabbed your attention and stuck in your memory, but that was fine by me. I’d rather have a normal, boring city over some kinda weirdo metropolis built to have an impact on people, the kind with bizarre-looking streets or whatever.

Anyway, after we reported to the guild and informed them that we’d completed the request, we headed back out onto the nice, well-built roads, and soon, we arrived at the inn.

Now, as far as inns were concerned, they were basically all the same, and it really shouldn’t have made much difference where we stayed. But I hadn’t gotten used to this one yet. I glanced over at the two beds in our room, which were placed side by side. Those two beds were a big part of why I was still finding my footing. Now that we had plenty of money, we didn’t have to skimp out on lodgings anymore. That meant we could just rent a normal room like normal people, but…

Well, I was sure we had been assigned to a room that was considered normal for a pair of adventurers.

Anyway, no matter how normal all of this was, sleeping next to another person wasn’t something I could get used to overnight. At least Filia seemed to be in a good mood about it.

“At last, I don’t have to feel guilty that I’m the only one sleeping in the bed!”

“Doesn’t it feel embarrassing if we like, sleep next to one another?” I asked…or, uh, I wanted to. But she’d probably reply with “Oh, it’s embarrassing, huh?” and it would have been a whole thing. I bit my tongue and ignored the Filia in my head who was teasing me about it pretty much nonstop.

Well, whatever. I got down on the floor and sat cross-legged. “Ah, another long day! I’m exhausted.”

Filia practically floated over into the bathroom and changed into her pajamas in an instant with her Mage Hand spell. Then she stepped back out and plopped down on the bed. “We really worked hard again today.”

You could see her white midriff peeking through the gap between her pink pajamas. The incredible beauty of her waist alone would have been enough to entice men from all over the world—not that Filia seemed to notice. She could be so careless about that kind of thing.

I supposed that if you were in the middle of battle or carrying out a request, you couldn’t really pay much attention to how you looked, but she didn’t even seem to care about it when things were normal and peaceful! Seriously, how could I not notice that cute tummy?

“Yeah, you really did work hard. Want something to drink?” Being the gentle muscle man that I was, I averted my eyes and decided to make us some refreshments.

“How unusually thoughtful of you, Yuri. Okay, I believe I shall have…a milk tea, please.”

“Okay, the ‘unusually’ part was a little uncalled for. I’m a gentle muscle man, after all, and we have been together for a while now,” I replied, heading toward the kitchen as I spoke. I got out the tea leaves to make milk tea. Except…hold on. She wanted tea, sure, but I had no clue how strong she liked her tea. “Hey, Filia?”

“What is it?”

“Which do you like better? Strong and deep or light and breezy? I don’t know how casual you are about these kinda things, so…”

“If I’m going to be together with anyone, I’d prefer it to be a strong, deep sort of connection.”

“Uhh—what the heck are you talkin’ about?!” I had absolutely no idea what to do with that, so I just went ahead and guessed with the tea. After making my own drink as well. “Here ya go.”

“Thank you very much!” Filia bowed her head in thanks and took the cup from me. I sat down on the bed next to her and took a sip of my own drink.

Yep, it was revolting as always. I let out a sigh and then shifted my gaze over toward Filia, noticing that she was staring at my cup. “Uh…what is it, Filia?”

“You’ve been drinking that creepy purple stuff pretty often lately, Yuri.” She leaned closer to my cup.

I took the opportunity to move my cup closer to her face at the same time. Near to it now, she caught a light whiff of its scent, and her face contorted with disgust. “Revolting! S-such a dreadful smell, isn’t it? And what’s that odd bubbling foam on top? What in the world are you drinking?”

“Oh, this? It’s poison.”

“You’re drinking poison?!” she cried in horror.

What? What was she mad about? “Yeah, it’s just poison, ya know? Oh, don’t worry, Filia—I’m only drinking three times the lethal dose.”

“Only three times? Yuri, I don’t think that word means what you think it means. Why are you even drinking something like that in the first place?!” She sighed heavily. “Let me guess: You’re about to tell me that you’re drinking poison for…internal organ training or something. Am I right?”

Oho! I was quite impressed with my pajama-clad companion. “That’s correct. I’ll give ya one point.”

“What kind of point?”

“Muscle Points! Every point you get enlarges your muscles.” I released the muscles just in my right arm, showing off just how developed they were. Check out these bulgin’ babies! I let out a gasp of admiration. What is it about muscles that makes them so beautiful? I mean, who in the world wouldn’t start hoarding Muscle Points then and there?

“I think I’ll pass, thank you!” she huffed.

Well, I supposed there was someone out there.

Jeez, was I the crazy one here? Who wouldn’t want this?

“Seriously, Yuri, are you trying to kill yourself?” she asked, climbing out of bed and standing in the space between hers and mine. She bent down and looked me straight in the eyes, utterly serious. I could see my own face reflected in those silver eyes of hers.

As serious as she was, there was only one answer I could give: “I’m drinking it because I don’t want to die.”

There was no room for cowardice when you fought with your life on the line. An enemy could at any time try to poison you. In fact, Bezegamoth had used poison in our fight, come to think of it. So, for the sake of survival, I had to get my body used to poison by exposing myself to it daily.

Filia looked unconvinced. Her cheeks twitched. “You’re drinking poison because you don’t want to die. Yuri, do you know how completely insane that sounds?”

“Hm? No, not especially, unless…oh, is that a riddle? Oh ho ho…you’ve got some pluck, challenging an intellectual muscle man like myself! Bring it!”

(A true intellectual muscle man, you see, is quite good at riddles.)

“We’re talking the same language, right? Are we not? Because it feels like we’re not…” Filia sighed deeply and let out one of the most impressive head shakes I’ve ever seen from her. But I really had no idea what she was even getting at.

 

The next day, sunlight poured into the room through the curtains.

“Nine-thousand nine-hundred and ninety. Nine-thousand nine-hundred and ninety-one. Nine-thousand nine-hundred and ninety-two…”

Only the sound of my breathing disturbed the silence of the inn. In the middle of my light workout—just doing push-ups from a handstand position—I casually glanced at the clock. It was about the time Filia usually woke up.

“Nine-thousand nine-hundred ninety-nine, ten-thousand…whew.”

After ending my early morning muscle training regimen with a strong finish, I headed over to the bath to wash off my sweat. By the time I got out, Filia was already awake.

“Good morning, Yuri!” Filia, with her long, shiny, silver hair, looked intently at me with her large eyes. I was a little bit surprised to see her looking so bright-eyed and bushy-tailed this early; she wasn’t much of a morning person, often nodding back off to sleep right after getting up. It was a bit of a surprise for her to greet me so energetically.

“Oh, g’morning. Did something good happen or something?”

Filia blushed, looking ecstatic. She went into the kitchen and came back out with some strawberries. “I’m going to eat the strawberries we bought yesterday. Who wouldn’t be excited about that? Tee hee hee!”

Delighted, she poked and rubbed the strawberries with her fingers. Oh yeah, we had bought those yesterday, hadn’t we?

“You really do love a good strawberry, huh? Didn’t your folks show me that picture of you at their house? What was it they said, that you wanted to be a strawberry when you were little?”

“J-just forget about such foolish things! I was little, it was a cute dream…” Maybe she was feeling self-conscious about it, because Filia flushed red and turned away from me.

“I just thought it was adorable, that’s all. I mean, to think that there was a time when even you were so sweet, huh?”

“Excuse me? I’m still sweet today, thank you very much! Are you trying to make me mad?” Filia glared at me, her hands on her hips.

Oops. Maybe I’d gone a little too far with that. A true gentle muscle man makes up for such mistakes. “Sorry, sorry! You’re sweet today too.”

“He he he…”

“What’s with you all of the sudden?”

“You complimented me so suddenly, I didn’t know how to reply, so…I just laughed.”

What was that supposed to mean?

“What should I do, Yuri?” she asked.

“Turn into a strawberry?”

“You…you are making fun of me, aren’t you?” Filia’s cheeks were puffed up, but she didn’t seem angry.

“Am not. There, there, cutie pie.” I stroked her head and tousled her hair.

“You absolutely are!” Filia glared, her long silver hair now thoroughly ruffled.

I took my hands off the grumpy-looking Filia and pulled open the curtains in the room. “Anyway, get a load of this: Even if you’re so full of energy this morning, Filia, it looks like we’re stuck with a rainy day.”

In fact, the rain was just starting. Soon it fell harder and harder, and in almost no time at all, it turned into a violent downpour. And to think that just a little while ago, rays of sunshine had been pouring in through the window.

“Um. To be clear,” said Filia apologetically, looking up at me, “this isn’t my fault, okay?”

“I know.”

We decided to have some breakfast and see if we could wait it out. But even after we’d finished eating, the rain didn’t let up. I put my hand up on the window and looked outside.

“This really is dreadful weather, isn’t it?” Filia lamented. “There I was, so excited about those strawberries, and now it’s raining so hard that I don’t even see the point of going outside. How depressing…”

“But when the weather’s bad, that’s exactly when you should be going outside to train, you know?” You can’t always fight under ideal conditions, after all. Whether or not you’ve put in the daily training to handle that kind of stuff? That truth always comes out in actual combat.

“Sorry, but I just can’t,” she said.

“Why not?”

“Yuri, the truth is…I dissolve in water.”

“What, are you made of paper or something?!” I snorted. She was lying so audaciously, but with such a meek expression on her face.

“Maybe I am, what of it? I want to rest. Let’s just rest, okay? Please just let me rest.”

“Okay, so now you’re asking that I treat you like you’re made of paper? Well, all right, if that’s what you say, Filia. I guess we’ll take today off. I suppose it’s also important to explore your relationship with your partner in order to strengthen your bond.”

By increasing the amount of trust you had in one another, you could fight even stronger opponents, which meant that I could become stronger too. That’d be a plus for me. Besides, if I pushed her too hard, then Filia might catch a cold like she had once before. It would have been wrong to put too much pressure on her.

It was always difficult for me to tell what Filia really wanted, but she rarely ever outright said if she wanted to take a break. As her partner, the responsible thing to do was to at least listen to her requests once in a while.

At that, Filia hopped up and down happily. “I knew it, Yuri, you do understand what I’m saying! Muscles are simply the coolest!”

“Oh, yeah, speaking of which, how about it? Wanna touch ’em?”

“Deepest apologies, Yuri, but it appears that I said that muscles were ‘cool.’ It was a bit of an overstatement, I’m afraid. From the bottom of my heart, I’m truly sorry for making a statement that is so thoroughly incompatible with reality.”

“No way, my muscles are unmistakably cool. Check it out!”

I released all of my muscles and showed them off to Filia. There was no such thing as a person who was completely ripped from birth—no, these bulging muscles were a symbol of my training. If you listened very carefully, you could even hear my muscles speaking to me. Give it a listen: Thank you for training us, Yuri!

Were there any words more beautiful? Of course not! Which was why I said back, “No, no, I should be the one thanking you. Thank you, muscles.”

Ahh! And would you look at that? Now those muscles were smiling…somehow. I had no idea where their mouth was, though.

I gently stroked my biceps, which had grown to be even thicker than a log, treating them with tender, loving care—

“Yuri. Yuuuuuuuri?” The voice was as clear and sharp as a bell. Oh, right…Filia.

“Oh, hey. When did you get here?”

“I’ve been here the whole time. Exactly how much daydreaming are you planning to do?”

I’d gotten sucked into my own little world before I even knew it. Hadn’t I originally released my muscles to show them off to Filia? But there I was, mesmerized by my own muscles in the blink of an eye. For crying out loud, how thoughtless was I?

“Well, whatever,” said Filia. “You know what, Yuri? Let’s play a game! A game!”

“A game?”

“Don’t you know any? Gimme something new, something original! I want to play something!” Filia grabbed onto my arm and gently rocked it back and forth.

I felt a little bad about how I’d just slipped into a daydream right in front of her, so I decided to go along with her. But still, a game, huh? I’d lived alone in the woods for ages, so I didn’t know too many games for more than one person.

I nodded to myself. “Hm, okay. Yeah, there is one game that I’ve been thinking about.”

There was this game I’d come up with when I was a kid, but it was a competitive one. Needless to say, I’d never had a chance to play it back then, but now Filia was here!

“The fact that you came up with it,” said Filia, “is terribly worrisome, but I suppose I can at least listen to your explanation.”

Jeez, did Filia have to have so little confidence in me? Well, no matter. If I told her what the game was about, her confidence levels would rise for sure!

I gave her a broad grin and a thumbs-up. “Okay, the game I came up with is called ‘Power of the Fist.’”

“Denied.”

“Hey!” I hadn’t even said what it was about yet!

“The name speaks for itself; it sounds like a hobby for cavemen! I suppose it’s the kind of game where people just punch each other and the one who knocks the other down wins. Am I wrong?” Filia asked.

“Look, it’s way more complex than that. Just hear me out!”

“Okay, I’ll listen, but…” Reluctantly, Filia went silent.

For crying out loud, I was an intellectual muscle man! No way a game by me could be so simple. “Okay, listen up: first, we gotta get the cards.”

“Ah, so it’s a card game? That’s…a relief.”

What was that supposed to mean? She could be so vague sometimes. “Anyway, you shuffle a bunch of cards and place them between the two players. Then each player takes turns drawing five cards.”

“Mm-hm.”

“Next step, you check those numbers on your cards. You keep the card with the lowest in your hand and return all of the other cards to the deck.”

Filia raised her small hand. “What if you have multiple cards with the same lowest value? A two of spades and a two of hearts, for instance.”

Hmm. A good question. More importantly, it was encouraging that she was taking this seriously and listening along, even if she had questions. “In that case, you can just keep whichever card you like more. Now, finally, we get to the next phase—and this is what the ‘Power of the Fist’ is really about!”

“So, at last, the game’s about to begin,” said Filia, her silver hair hanging over her ears. “What then?”

“Then you each throw all your cards away and start punchin’!” I exclaimed. “The one who knocks the other down wins!”

Filia’s eyes widened. “What?! That’s insane!”

“Huh? How so?”

“The punching, Yuri? That last part is unhinged! I mean, even if you reversed the order of the phases, don’t you think it’s weird? The previous steps in the game become completely meaningless!”

I sighed. Filia was gonna be Filia about it, huh? I had no choice: I’d just tell her as gently as possible, like I was explaining to a whiny kid throwing a tantrum. “All right, Filia, but think about it this way, you know? Meaning, absurdity…what’s the purpose of anything, you know? Like, why are we even born into this world?”

“You’re arguing for argument’s sake, and I am not interested in the least!”

“For me, there is a reason for my existence. I was born into this world to become stronger, to train. So that’s why, in Power of the Fist—”

“I’m not doing it. In the end, it’s just people beating each other up!”

“Filia, listen: That is…the Power of the Fist.”

“Power of the Fist, my foot! I will never, ever play a game of that sort!”

Dang. She was pretty firm about it. “Come on, no need to be a stick in the mud.”

“Okay, I am not a stick in the mud. The stick has left this dimension. I am the stick, your game is the mud, and I am soaring as far away from the mud as possible because I suspect that getting punched by you would make me explode. You would explode me, Yuri, and I am much too beautiful and pretty to die yet, thank you very much.”

In the end, my attempts at persuasion were in vain, and Filia didn’t play Power of the Fist with me. Unfortunate.