Chapter 31: Chapter 30: Proof of Strength

「What strength…」n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om

Asbar, who had seen the whole fight between Mira and the devil from the castle, muttered unconsciously. The others also didn’t know what to say upon witnessing that her strength was in another dimension.

「Amazing, Big Sis Mira! That’s so cool!」

Except for Takuto. Gazing in adoration at Mira who had won the battle against the devil, he ran up to her. Upon seeing the Holy Knight follow Takuto and faithfully fulfilling his orders, the members of Écarlate Carillon returned to themselves and dashed to Mira.

「I want to become as strong as Big Sis Mira too!」

About the time they reunited with Mira, Takuto said that with shining eyes.

「Ohh, I see. As long as you hold onto those feelings, you can surely become strong.」

While getting praised by this innocent child, Mira started grinning and stroking Takuto’s head. Not a single trace of the ominous magic eye remained, as her eyes had returned to their usual color.

By now her figure had nothing in common with when she fought the devil, she looked exactly like a girl her age should. At first the guild members were taken aback, but they were curious about the spectacle that unfolded before them. After all, they had just witnessed Mira’s crazy display of her strength which could even overwhelm the legendary enemy of humanity, the devil.

「I don’t know what to say, but anyway, thank you, Mira. You saved us all.」

「Yeah, who knows what would have happened if it had been alone.」

「I haven’t done anything worth the praise. After all, I am the one who dragged you all into this.」

Emera firmly believed Mira saved their lives, but Mira originally planned to come here alone. And that means she dragged everybody into a battle with the devil that happened to be here, so she rejected the gratitude by shaking her head.

「Putting that aside, Mira is hella strong. Is your strength related to your instant promotion to rank C?」

Suddenly Zef voiced the real question that everyone was thinking about, without any warning.

Even though everybody wanted to know it, Asbar and Fricca assumed there were some circumstances that made her keep it a secret, so they were very much astonished and stared at Zef.

The one under their gazes looked at Mira. He had no idea about her circumstances, but was sure she wasn’t a bad person. It was only intuition, but usually Zef’s judgement of a person was accurate. And not only Zef but also the rest of the party saw how Mira had been taking care of Takuto. Mira who stood next to Takuto was a nice big sister and her grown-up manner of speaking was really adorable.

「Hmm, sure… I guess telling you can’t hurt…」

After pondering about Zef’s words and considering the talk with the chief of the magician’s guild, Mira concluded that they would find out anyway.

And in that case, instead of inventing excuses when they start to ask for details, she could just tell them the excuse she’s been using up until now, which should save her time and would be consistent.

Because she’s the pupil of a hero, the devil was not a match for her. Really, it should convince anybody who knows about the valor of Danbulf.

「Then… the reason why Mira is so strong is…?」

As expected from her, or perhaps displaying a natural reaction, Emera as the most curious of them fixedly stared at Mira’s face, waiting for her to continue. Feeling the beauty’s gaze left Mira disturbed and confused.

「Erm, yeah… Do you all know a person named Danbulf? I’m his pupil. Thus, I’m going on errands instead of the master who can’t move around due to certain reasons.」

Together with the explanation of her strength, she hinted at the reason why she’s here, since they would probably ask that anyway. She thought that even if somebody would ask for details after hearing that she’s here instead of one of the Nine Wisemen, she could just tell it’s confidential.

Mira was preparing herself for the reaction, but that reaction was unexpectedly plain.

「A pupil of Danbulf…. That’s why she’s so strong.」

「The wiseman with an alias of the 『One Man Army』… And you’re his pupil? I see.」

Emera and Asbar, seemingly convinced, readily swallowed her answer. A battle of unbelievable scale had unfolded in front of them. And the traces of it could still be seen all around. Considering that power, it could easily be one of the Nine Wisemen, a legendary adventurer or the supreme commander of the Three Initial Countries.

They would rather doubt any other explanation for Mira’s strength, since that would not have been convincing.

After all, considering what they saw with their own eyes, they had no reason to doubt it and even if they tried, that doubt itself couldn’t explain anything. Therefore, rather than thinking about her relation to Danbulf, they just took her words as truth.

「A pupil of Danbulf…a Wiseman.」

Contrary to Emera and Asbar, who calmly accepted that explanation, Fricca repeated those words over and over.

Fricca had seen that overwhelming strength with her own eyes, so she barely doubted it. She even had some premonitions of that before the fight with the devil. But, unlike Emera and Asbar, Fricca was a magician and knew that such a thing never happened before. None of the Nine Wisemen took in any pupils at all. All the magicians at the Silver Towers were only researchers and, while they could ask the wisemen to teach them something, that was the most they could do. Not disciples, nor even students. And obviously there was nobody who got all the skills through private training with any of them, as far as she heard.

Before the Nine Wisemen disappeared, there were no rumors about pupils, and the only one who had returned, Luminaria, definitely didn’t have any pupils too.

Keeping in mind that she couldn’t explain her strength otherwise, Fricca started considering the existence of the first pupil of the wiseman in history.

「That’s cool! Of course, I know. Even I’ve heard of that name. And you are a pupil of such a famous man. Little Mira, you’re so cool!」

As the most carefree of them, Zef showed his admiration with gestures. Then, further contributing to the fuss, he added while staring at the Holy Knight who stood at the side: 「Looking at him again, that dignity is something!」

For Zef, the fact Mira defeated a devil and thus saved them all mattered more than whose pupil she was. And Mira definitely was really strong. Just that. In a good sense, he couldn’t read the atmosphere.

As for Takuto, he knew who Danbulf was, but that knowledge was only limited to the “hero of tales and picture books”. Compared to that, Mira was a hero right in front of him that defeated the devil and his eyes shone in awe when he looked at her.

Mira, anticipating questions, prepared for answers like 「Yeah」 or 「No」 but it wasn’t needed, so she happily took her rest without having to explain further.

She was expecting questions because, to begin with, the Nine Wisemen still counted as missing. And anybody could claim to be the students of someone famous with unknown status. But everybody here accepted her story without even considering that or asking for any form of proof. For Mira’s viewpoint, it was strange, but for the rest it was the only plausible explanation of her strength. After all, her strength was that aberrant.

「Strange, you all believe me so easily.」

Disappointed, Mira finally said that.

「Eh? You lied!?」

Just having calmed down with that explanation, Emera started to urge Mira again, getting too close to her.

「No, I didn’t. Also, you’re too close.」

Mira slightly shook her head and averted her eyes. Her face began to redden.

「I mean, my master is missing now. And nobody wonders about that.」

「AH, I see.」

Emera nodded in understanding.

「There are some theories about their disappearance, of course. They could have gone to the demon realm,or have killed each other in an epic discord, or even have been called to heavens by some god.

But those are just jokes popular among some people. For everyone else, the Wisemen are hiding somewhere in this world, far away from worldly affairs.

And the appearance of a pupil isn’t that strange now that three decades have passed since then.」

She wasn’t the only one thinking that. As she finished, Asbar, glancing Mira from head to tiptoes, said

「And also, miss, your fighting style exactly matches one from stories my father told me about the Wisemen.」

Following that he started to grin. For him this was the main reason to believe Mira’s story.

「My father too often told such stories!」

「And mine too. Right after he noticed that I had the potential to become a magician, he often read me stories about the Nine Wisemen.」

「Well, of course he would. Rather, I don’t think anybody born in this country hasn’t heard about them.」

Following Asbar, the other three agreed and started to recall those stories. They were very similar to Mira’s fight.

「Stories?」

As Mira tilted her head, Emera began recounting the details.

They were talking about stories themed on the Nine Wisemen, very popular among the entire Alkite kingdom, young or old. And in those sagas, Danbulf was depicted as a hero able to control a thousand of summons, but among them one story was the most popular. That story told about how he mastered both the summoning and sage skills, a practice mostly unheard of for a summoner as they don’t normally engage in close combat and let their summons fight.

Danbulf dashing headlong into combat with his summons. Every child loved that story. That common knowledge from childhood led them all to outright believe Mira’s story.

「I had no idea such stories were around…」

Emera briefly, yet passionately retold the content of the stories. Takuto got excited as well, and due to him cheering 「Cool, cool」 Emera got a little side-tracked.

「Mira, that’s only just the prologue! The saga about your teacher, Danbulf, isn’t over yet!」

Getting more and more caught up in the moment, Emera swung her fist up. Immediately after, Fricca used a hard part of her stick to smack it into Emera’s belly.

「Emera, that’s enough. Let’s return first. I don’t want to delay the report about the appearance of a devil.」

「Ahh…. you’re right. Let’s return…」

Crouching and holding her belly, Emera answered in a muffled voice. When she got up unsteadily, some tears appeared in her eyes.

「I was the one who asked, I should have stopped her in the middle of explanation.」

Mira spoke up for Emera, thinking that Emera wouldn’t have to suffer if she had stopped her earlier.

「Not at all, Mira! You shouldn’t worry since it’s Emera’s fault!」

「Oohh!?」

Fricca raised her voice so much that it almost seemed to break when she pulled Mira into her embrace. At the same time, she put her face in Mira’s breasts and started to rub against them while breathing heavily, which obviously in turn led to her falling to the ground after receiving a chop from Emera. She reaped what she sowed.

Right before Fricca collapsed, Emera snatched Mira from her and put her back down on the ground.

「I’m sorry about her.」

「She was normal just a moment ago…」

「Perhaps she lost control of herself as soon as she started to relax.」

「How troublesome.」

Saying that, they watched Fricca writhing while happily rolling around the ground and shouting 「She was sooo fluffy!」

「Such a disappointment.」

「Well, that’s one of Fricca’s charms too.」

Asbar sighed and Zef argued back, justifying everything with beauty.

「Still, you can use both Summoning and Sage skills just like Danbulf did, right? That was amazing.」

As Fricca was coming to her senses, Emera began her passionate speech. Indeed, it was Danbulf’s combat style, deviating from the combat used by any other decent summoner.

「Sage, huh… you quickly disappeared and then reappeared. It was so cool.」

「It’s nothing special.」

「I too couldn’t follow her with my eyes from time to time. Can all the Sage fighters do such insane movements?」

「No idea about others. But it’s nothing special.」

「And you ran in mid-air too, right? We have some Sage fighters in the guild, but I don’t think any one of them can do that.」

「The Sky Stride is a common Sage skill. It’s nothing special.」

Mira was a highly skilled Sage fighter too, and coupled with the splendid visuals it seemed like a supernatural spectacle. The actual battle was way more intense than in those stories. And the vivid scenes of course had been engraved into their minds.

「Sages are amazing!」

An excited Emera said, voicing everyone’s thoughts. Along with her words, the members of Écarlate Carillon changed their minds about the Sage mastery. The pupil of a wiseman, while being a summoner, could do so much with the Sage skill. And those Sage skills overwhelmed the devil. Of course they were fascinated.

「…What did…you say?」

She had planned to show off the power of her summoner skills, but in the end only the Sage was judged. Mira gazed into space as she tried to find where she had gone astray.

「Hey, isn’t that stuff pretty nice?」

While Mira was hoping to be able to recover the reputation of summoning on their way back, Zef called out to them from afar. When everybody turned to look at him, they saw the remains of the devil and his weapon by Zef’s feet.

「Nevertheless, he got done in quite bad.」

Asbar said that while tracing the scars all over the devil’s body. He lightly hit it with the back of his hand and gasped at the unbelievably robust armor. He wasn’t sure whether his full swing would be able to leave even a single scratch on it.

With the same feelings Emera put her hand on the hilt of her sword and swore to herself she would double her training starting from today. Reflected in her eyes was a scenery that seemed to belong to another world, urging her to improve until one day she would be able to fight on the same level.

Contrary to the group that was surrounding the body in admiration, Takuto hid behind Mira’s back as soon as he saw the devil. Mira gently stroked his head, repeatedly saying 「Don’t worry」.

「So, about this stuff. It’s a bit too heavy to carry for me.」

Struggling, Zef lifted the scythe with both hands and carried it to Asbar. Receiving it, Asbar’s face instantly distorted.

「Woah… It’s really quite heavy!」

With those words, he grabbed the scythe with both hands and made a large swing. Along with a high-pitched metallic sound, the blade pierced the ground.

「How is it? Think you can you handle it?」

「This one is too heavy for me. And I never used a scythe before. To begin with, this scythe belongs to the miss who defeated the devil. Well, she doesn’t seem to need any weapon at all, but it should at least yield quite a price if sold.」

「You’re right. And there are magic stones and magic crystals too. Mira got quite a haul. Can I get one tenth as payment for collecting items?」

Zef made a joke while smiling. Aside from the first few ghouls they killed, everything else had been defeated by Mira and so those items belonged to her. Zeff also knew it, and no other member would say anything about it.

But Mira was different.

「What? Usually such stuff is evenly divided. Since I’m bad at math, I leave that to you.」

Her words rendered the minds of the members of Écarlate Carillon completely blank. The gathered magic stones and the devil’s weapon, even without estimating anything, it was clear that this would yield quite a fortune.

And everybody here thought of Mira as the owner. But the owner herself told them to split it as if that was the most obvious thing to do. It was common among adventurers to split the loot after defeating monsters together, but after learning of Mira’s strength, they all didn’t have any doubts they had only been tagging along with her.

「But, it was your summon that defeated them.」

「Aren’t we a party though?」

Puzzled, Mira looked at Emera who had tried to explain the situation.

Mira wanted to do it this way from the beginning, because it was ingrained in her as common sense of a player. And, since Mira disliked disputes about drop items, she always thought that splitting them evenly between all party members would be the most ideal approach during party battles.

While looking at each other, both Mira and Emera tilted their heads. Takuto joined them with that, without knowing what they were talking about.

「Being so generous is another great side of Mira!」

With those words Fricca jumped at Mira and hugged her, prompting Mira to demand Emera to stop her with an annoyed glance.

Emera showed a bitter smile as she dropped another chop on Fricca once again.

「Mira definitely lacks all common sense.」

「I agree.」

Asbar gave a big nod to a half-amazed yet gently smiling Emera.

「After all, I’m not short on money.」

If necessary, she could just ask Solomon for more.

「Well, she is staying at the Summer Lantern inn, so it must be true.」

「Ohh, right, you mentioned something like that.」

「Yes, yes, I did. And I’m kinda envious that she doesn’t lack any money.」

Emera, with a distant look in her eyes, recalled the best inn of Requiem City of Caranach. They had visited the Summer Lantern Inn only once, as a victory celebration. They had eaten a lot of elaborated dishes and enjoyed the clearly different interior and furnishings, not comparable to that of cheaper inns. Emera started to recall the night she spent there with her friends, feeling like a princess.

Asbar and Zef also thought back on that time, but the first thing that came to their minds was Emera’s smiling face that lasted all night long. Apparently, Emera hadn’t noticed that due to her feeling as if she were a princess, her expression had slackened back then.

「Err, are you really sure about that?」

「I don’t mind. Also, if you have someone in your guild that is able to use that scythe, you can give it to them.」

She wasn’t able to equip it, but since it was still a rare weapon it would be a waste to not give it to somebody who could wield it . That was yet another unspoken rule back from when she was a player. When a piece of equipment dropped, it would go to the one who had the highest compatibility with it. Mira had always done so and had no intention to change that now.

Mira’s words once again caused everyone to be surprised. Emera was dumbfounded, Asbar smiled wryly and Zef started laughing. And Fricca, who had only just recovered from Emera’s chop, tilted her head, shooting a confused look at the different reactions.

「We haven’t appraised it yet, so we don’t know the exact amount, but even just that thing alone is worth a fortune you know?」

「Equipment is best given to those that can use it, even more so if it is someone you know. Since I don’t have any use for it, do you have anyone in your guild that might be able to use it?」

「Hmm, it’s too heavy for me, but there is a Darkness Knight in our guild and he should be able to use it, I guess.」

Asbar said, not understanding why she would give a first-class weapon used by a devil to someone who wasn’t even here.

「Ohh, a Darkness Knight. In that case it should be okay to give it to him.」

「No, wait. It would be a great addition for our guild but we can’t just accept that. This is to much.」

「Yeah. I am grateful for your proposal, Mira, but, you know, we can’t feel comfortable receiving it like this.」

No wonder Emera and Asbar hesitated. It was one thing that adventurers were very careful about money, but this case was on another level. Mira had no need for the scythe, and was not very troubled when it comes to money either.

Additionally, she couldn’t get herself to like the idea of selling it. After all, she was also worried that the scythe might end up in the hands of a bad person. And if you give such a powerful weapon to a villain, the damage would be disastrous.

It’s possible that her loot would be used for something bad. That’s why she believed passing it on to Emera’s guild would be the best. They hadn’t been together for long, but she could already tell that everyone in that party was without a doubt a good person. That they had come here because they had been worried about a child was more of a prove than anything else. And since their guild was famous, it should be easy to trace what they were doing.

「As for me, I don’t want it to end up in the hands of a bad person if I get bad luck when selling it. Thus, I’d have less to worry about if it ends up in the hands of a trustworthy person, don’t you think so too?」

Mira said so and turned her gaze from the great scythe to Emera. Receiving that look, although astonished, Emera’s expression had gradually changed to a bright one. She responded to the trust that could be felt in those words.

「I got it! I will take care of it!」

After saying this, Emera held Mira’s hand and they looked at each other with eyes containing a strong will.

「Are you serious? Missy got a point there, but we only just met her today!」

「Well, he’s right. I mean, you know, this is way too fast, right?」

「I won’t do anything that would betray Mira’s trust.」

Fricca said without hesitation. In contrast, Asbar and Zef were happy too, but still chose to say something reasonable. They were thinking about Mira’s future, but she herself was perfectly aware about it.

「If something happens, I’ll come and take it back myself.」

Mira smiled daringly, forcing the members of Écarlate Carillon to accept her proposal.