Fairy Tale Chronicles

Chapter 6.5

Quickly finishing assigning them roles, the two of them prepared for their first inter-personal battle. At the same time they were readying themselves, the back wall at the back of the cave crumbled with a tremendous sound. Beyond it was a mass of skinhead muscle, the body type of which rivalled that of an ogre or troll. In its hands were a club and a beat-up, unconscious Jade. Throwing Jade somewhere, the skinhead made a truculent grin as it saw Haruna, swinging the club around as if trying to intimidate her. Overwhelmed by its presence and sudden appearance, the two of them regained their bearings and readied themselves for battle.

「Toudou-san！」

「I’m fine, leave it to me！」

Haruna stopped Hiroshi, who was ready to charge to the front and push back this boss-level opponent. Quite honestly, this type of opponent was the easiest for Haruna to defeat.

「Right. Leaving this area open wouldn’t be good」

Seeing the amount of people coming down from the passageway, he muttered while clicking his tongue, confronting this group of bandits, shaking as per usual. With an unexpected start, the curtains rose on their first inter-personal battle.

Fending off the club that was swung down, she countered weakly on purpose. For the skinhead, who had muscle like steel, it was no more than a light bruise, but she had managed to confirm that without using a magic sword, it was possible to damage him normally. To add further, he did not seem to have regenerative capabilities like Hiroshi where the wounds would heal right before your eyes. With that information, Haruna began with two attacks against her opponent’s one attack, chiseling off his stamina.

Along with a beast-like groan, the club rumbled as it was swung around. If a normal human were hit by this, they would probably be minced in an instant. However, such a wide swing wasn’t all that difficult to monitor. Since Jade was unconscious nearby, she would have to mind where she dodged, but other than that, nothing else.

「Hah！ Tei！」

She lightly cut through the arm holding the club twice. If she were to cut too deeply, the muscle might solidify the grip. Therefore, it was fundamental to graze the surface when stabbing. And honestly, she wanted to just avoid messing up and killing him. It was highly likely that this would become a battle of attrition, so it was no good to use special moves when unnecessary.

A swing came down from the right. She lightly stepped away to evade it. She dug into his chest and flank. Slipping under the level swing, she once again cut the same area with precision. A punch from the left arm. She evaded it by cutting his arm. She cut him a third time, then escaped from his bosom. Magnificent and sweet, she danced as she led her opponent by the nose, racking up damage on him little by little.

It seemed like the skinhead did not take kindly to the unanticipated prowess of this little girl, small enough to blow away. Howling like a beast, he swung down the club with full power, moaning vexingly as that, too, was easily fended off. The rapier should have smashed the moment it hit, but no matter how many times they clashed, the club was always flung away. His attacks were stupidly powerful and each swing was sharp, not to be underestimated, but Haruna’s body was not even scratched.

If not for Haruna’s skillset, even with Hiroshi’s specially made rapier, it would have probably lasted only up to the third parry. And even with Haruna’s skillset, the average weapon would have absolutely broken long ago. That was just how powerful the skinhead was. This huge man was strong enough to where even a knight would have to have a great amount of skill to avoid having the tables turned on them.

It was just that in this case, he went up against the wrong opponent.

（I’d better have this regulated soon）

After several more rounds of “hit and away”, she decided to leave a good amount of distance between them, reconfirming the location of everything. Calmly determining the locations, she quickly decided where she would incite him to. As she had to attack whilst running around, she was being chased into a strange position. However, at least there was no worry of a stray bullet flying toward Jade. After that, all she had to do was guide him toward the jailhouse front and then focus on battle without worrying about the small things, away from the unreliable area she was in. Of course, it was bad to have the jailhouse to her rear. Her opponent’s attacks could miss, striking the ground and scattering rubble, which had enough power to cause damage in close-quarters.

Several times, she had felt the flow of mana from the entrance, characteristic of when magic was usually activated, but she listened to Hiroshi and forced herself to cool down. She also figured that at worst, Obaba and Mick would support her to some degree, and if she screwed up then that would be what would weigh Hiroshi down. At times like this, without panicking, she must firmly complete her role. That was the greatest way to contribute to the entire party.

「Hmph！」

「Not good enough！」

One who knows little often repeats it. She elegantly parried her opponent’s downward swing, leading him on to where he lost sight of her. She flowed from that to behind him, unleashing her special attack skill, Break Hit. It was a subspecies of Smash with the objective of fiercely crushing the opponent’s stance, which sent the skinhead to fall straight forward. As soon as she had retreated to the correct planned-out spot, she smashed him from the side and sent him flying.

At first glance, Break Hit may appear convenient, but unlike Smash, which was practically a guaranteed down for super large-framed opponents, half-heartedly launching the attack would do nothing more than halt their movements for an instant at best. If you were looking to guarantee a break in your opponent’s stance, on top of dealing a decent amount of damage, you would have to drive it into them with the right timing. Meeting this particular timing was unexpectedly difficult, plus you could just down the opponent with Smash or its extension skills. There wasn’t much reason to use this move.

But as it came out faster than Smash and could be used without hardly having to move, if you used it properly, it was one of those exceptionally effective skills that revealed the player’s talent, and Haruna enjoyed using it against humanoids and beasts. The biggest reason as to why she didn’t use it in the fight with the piaranocks was because she had lacking experience with bugs or crustaceans. Especially against things like spiders, with a low centre of gravity, she wasn’t sure how to strike them down because of their secure footing, so even for Haruna, an effective application of it was difficult. There was also the fact that as long as Hiroshi was there as the vanguard, there was no point in going so far as to solo things, and she had merely resorted to using attack skills.

「Shadow Saber！」

She cut through him with a dark-type magic sword that took off more stamina and MP than it did HP. It was an advanced magic sword with the special effects of Stun, Confusion, Fear, and Bind; four types of status irregularities, perfect after striking an opponent’s weak point. Needless to say, on top of everything other than Bind barely working against insect-based bosses, even Bind had shallow effects.

「Just in case, I’ll give him another strike」

Just in case, Haruna drove another strike into the fallen, fainted skinhead that resembled the previous. After he convulsed with a twitch, the skinhead stopped all movement. After she checked for some sort of life sign, she tied him up with the wire in her bag. If one were to ask why she were carrying such a thing around, it was because it was useful for all sorts of things, such as securing lumber in a trunk, using the principle of leverage to hang things up, or temporarily securing things for carpentry. Incidentally, this was something that Haruna had made with Hiroshi’s guidance, enchanting it.

「And with this, it’s good」

Confirming that he was in no condition to move, she went to assist Hiroshi when she noticed the thick scent of blood drifting through the air.

「Azuma-kun！？」

「It’s alright, it ain’t my blood！」

While shivering as per usual and brandishing the axe, he replied to Haruna in a shaky voice. When she looked, she saw the corpse of a man who looked like a bandit near the entrance, an arrow stabbed through his chest, and a large pool of blood flowing from his chest.

Other than that, Hiroshi’s feet area was pretty messy. After all, knives, arrows, and pebbles were rolling about the floor in large amounts, the tip of the sword’s blade broken and scattered, and there was a fallen corpse whose shoulders had been stabbed by a large amount of arrows. It looked like the whole body had been burned to a crisp (otherwise it would have been in fine shape). When she looked deep into the passageway that Hiroshi had been blocking, she saw one person who had been sent flying back, eyes rolled back, three people who had been hit by said person as they were sent back, utterly grounded, and one of their necks was facing the wrong way.

（……Could it be！？）

Judging from the situation, other than the corpse that had been pierced by arrows, Hiroshi had probably killed the other ones. To put it more accurately, their neck had probably been broken the moment they were launched away, or perhaps they had hit it in a bad place and ended up dying. She wasn’t exactly shocked by Hiroshi having killed someone, given the circumstances, but whatever happens once can happen again. She was concerned that history might repeat itself. The minute she sought to somehow ease his burden, Hiroshi stopped her.

「It’s fine the way it is！」

「But！」

「It’s alright！ Reinforcements arrived！」

「Correct！」

The voice of an unknown woman rang out, the same time of which two screams of agony rang out. Taking advantage of the confusion, she smashed the prideful-looking boss man and the fat slave trader, smacking the tip of their jaws with her longsword’s handle, knocking them out.

「Thanks for all the help」

「Sorry for being late」

The woman had apprehended all of the survivors. Well-proportioned in every sense of the word, with an average outward appearance, she praised their efforts. From her facial structure, hair, and the color of her eyes, she seemed to be a Japanese person. She was probably also a player. To their further shock, a disguised Rayna appeared from behind her.

「Thanks a lot. You were a big help」

「Even if I hadn’t come, in just 5 more minutes, you two would’ve overpowered them, right？」

「I am seriously sorry for being so late」

「Nah, we’re super happy that ya came. Thanks to you, Toudou-san managed to avoid killin’ anyone」

The two of them nodded meekly. They didn’t seem to want Haruna to kill people either. From Rayna’s viewpoint, after everything that had happened yesterday, it was also bad enough that Hiroshi had to kill someone. She couldn’t regret it enough.

「But how should I say this……」

With a pale face, Hiroshi had barely managed to conceal his quivering, but spat out words with complicated emotions.

「What？」

「It’s probably the same reason why I don’t hesitate when dissectin’ monsters, but the fact that I felt literally no shock when I killed a person is honestly a gigantic shock to me, ya know……」

「Ahh, so I’m not the only one……」

「You the same way, Onee-san？」

「Mhm. Well, this isn’t Japan, and all you did was resist bad people who attacked you, so no one’s gonna blame you」

Nodding lightly as she spoke reassuringly, the woman approached Hiroshi. He instinctively took his distance. Seeing his strange actions, she furrowed her brow in displeasure.

「Hey, what’s the big deal？」

「Ahh, sorry. See, I’m super ‘fraid o’females…」

The woman made an indescribable face as she sighed.

「I already heard it from Reena. You really do have it bad, eh? Thanks for the kind of answer that’ll put Ae-I mean, Elle into a state of extreme unease toward her guardian」

「Hah？ If yer bringin’ that name up right now……？」

「I’m Mikoto Mizoguchi. Seventh-class adventurer and one of Doul-oji-san’s trump cards. Nice to meetcha」

Unsure of how to react to Mikoto as she grinned at them, Hiroshi and Haruna looked slightly perturbed. Furthermore, after they got back to Wulls and Haruna had finished her bath, she got right back to selling curry bread at the stand with the remaining time as if nothing had happened. Mikoto would exclaim with an exasperated face:

「You worried about that loser all the way back! The hell ya doin’, selling curry bread like you don’t care！」

But that was another story for another time.