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Chapter 358: The Test Island, and Blood Liger.

(Author note: This chapter of Isesuma is brought to you through the eyes of our ninja girl, Sarutobi Homura.)

Since His Majesty and the others are gone, us seven who are left on the field started discussing about what to do from now on.

“Then, is everyone fine with finishing their own preparations and assembling in front of the transfer gates an hour from now?”

“Wait a second, why the hell are you taking charge?”

To the man with long brown hair, Abert’s words, the red-haired warrior-like man, Gallon was it, retorted. I’m bad against this type… Annoying.

“I’m not trying to. If you want to, please enlighten us on the direction of this party henceforth yourself.”

“No need for something like that. We just need to get to the island and get that firewheel grass or whatever as soon as possible, right? I’ll go by myself, so you guys can just wait here. I don’t need extra baggage.”

This person just said something weird.

“Are you an idiot? If you failed, we would fail with you, you know. There’s no way I’ll risk my two white gold pieces on you, blockhead.”

The tattooed nee-san with huge boobs—Rose let out words with a tone that sounds like she’s dealing with a true idiot towards Gallon. Although her words are rather bad, I think the same way as well. Why would anyone leave the possibility of obtaining a huge sum of money in the hands of some total stranger?

Ignoring Rose and Gallon who had started glaring at each other, the staff-wielding magic user, Sarges-san started walking away. Arere?

“Then, in front of the transfer gates in an hour. Excuse me.”

Leaving only those words, he left with brisk steps. Un, he’s a pretty selfish person in a different way from Gallon alright.

Following that, the dwarf, Dom-san also started walking away with the same hard face as before. After that, the cat-eared beastman Miu-san also departed.

“Well then, in an hour.”

“Keh.”

“Fun.”

Probably having reached the conclusion that staying like this isn’t going to help anyway, the final three, Abert, Gallon and Rose also left the academy grounds.

While seeing them off, I placed my hands on my waist and heaved a sigh.

“Somehow, everyone seems like they’ll be a handful.”

“Adventurers are generally people with one or two quirks, you know. Especially for ones at higher ranks, I feel like that trend becomes stronger.”

“I see, that’s reasonable. So that’s why His Majesty is at gold, huh.”

“Don’t find that reasonable. Also, Karina nee-san, don’t say whatever you want, please.”

“Uwa, His Majesty!? And, Karina-sama!?”

When I turned around, somehow His Majesty and his cousin, Karina-sama were standing behind me before I realized. His Majesty had released the illusion magic over him and was in his usual appearance.

I moved backward swiftly before dropping to one knee and lowering my head.

“What, what, what may your purpose be for this visit?”

“Well, I just wanted to send you a cheer to work hard. I think you know, but your primary mission is to observe their behaviour, got it? Don’t help them more than what’s necessary just because you want the request to succeed. Even if you become friends with some of them.”

“Understood.”

You’re saying some tough things…

“If I may, to what degree would ‘more than what’s necessary’ be at…”

“Something like you (Homura) becoming the center of the party, I suppose. Don’t do anything flashy. Just don’t stand out. Endure. You must endure.” (Note: hidden joke. As mentioned last chapter, the word “ninja”, or rather, “shinobi” in Japanese means “one who endures” literally.)

Telling me to endure… That’s harsh. I’m the worst at enduring, you know.

“And this. There’s three day’s worth of food and some simple medicine, as well as some other stuff inside this rucksack. It’s enchanted with [Storage], so it can hold quite a lot of things.”

A magic formation appeared out of thin air besides His Majesty, who then took out a small bright green-colored rucksack from within.

There’s a magical storage space inside, so it can apparently hold an amount several tens of times of the rucksack’s original capacity. Plus, it’s not heavy even though it has that much stuff. This is nice. And the design’s cute too.

“Can I have this?”

“I mean, it’s necessary for the request… Eh? The rucksack? N… Well, sure, I don’t mind…”

“Yay!”

Hehehe. I’m gonna go boast about this to Shizuku and Nagi later.

“Remember the periodic contacts. Also, hide your smartphone. If the others see it, it’ll cause some problems, after all.”

That I understand. The only ones who have a smartphone within this country are people in important positions, people who are handling special missions, and people who have personal connections with His Majesty.

By personal connections, in this case I don’t mean His Majesty’s family members, but those who are friends with him. The innkeeper lady of the inn “Silver Moon” has one, and the maid Rene-chan has one too.

Of them, I would fall into the category of people who are handling special missions. Well, in the first place that’s the kind of people shinobis are.

Those who know of the existence of the smartphones know who has them. Since the fact that they have smartphones also mean they’re under His Majesty’s protection, those who know about it won’t make any stupid moves towards those people.

There are no idiots in this world who would go against His Majesty, who is the owner of rumours such as turning the rebel in the Regulus Empire coup d’état case into a cripple, erasing the Heavenly Emperor of Heavenly Empire Yulong with a beam of light, subjecting the Slave King of Sandora Kingdom to eternal torment, and many others. If there were, well, they’re idiots.

“Well then, Brunhild knight order intelligence department, Sarutobi Homura, will return to her mission now!”

“Un, I leave it to you. Keep up your vigilance, ok?”

His Majesty gave a small nod while smiling. Alright, I’m gonna work hard!

An hour later, the seven of us assembled in front of the transfer gates. Everyone was holding some extra gear and luggage. The dwarf, Dom-san had the most luggage, while the one with the least is me. I’m only carrying a light-looking rucksack, after all.

“Don’t go around telling us to share food with you later, alright? That’s your own responsibility.”

“Don’t mind me-. At least, I definitely won’t trouble you-.” (Note: she’s dragging out the ends of her sentences here.)

“Keh, a cheeky kid.”

Ha, what a noisy man. I stuck my tongue out towards Gallon, who turned his back towards me and was heading towards the transfer gates. Behaving like he’s some cool stuff with that giant shield on his back…

“Let’s get moving as well.”

Following Gallon, who had walked ahead, Abert also started walking. Rose and Dom-san, then Sarges-san, and finally Miu-san and I walked towards the transfer gates.

There are three gates that lead to the dungeon islands. Those each connect to a different island and the dungeon on it, and this time, we’re going to the gate that leads to the island which has the “Amaterasu” dungeon.

“… Are you really ok with not buying any food?”

“Eh? Ah, it’s ok, it’s ok. There’s no problem.”

“That so.”

Miu-san spoke up while walking besides me. Her voice was rather cold, but still she was probably worrying about me.

Seemed like the guild had already made contact; when the gatekeepers checked our names and guild cards, they let us through without problems.

Since the gatekeepers are knights belonging to Brunhild as well, they know about me. We see each other often in the canteen and other places anyway.

They pretended to not know me during the procedures, but once everyone else except me went through the transfer gates, all of them sent a silent thumbs-up at me which expressed the words “Do your best!”.

I gave a thumbs-up back to them with the silent words “I’ll do my best!” and went through the arch-shaped transfer gate.

The other end of the gate was set inside a mausoleum-like building, near the coast where sea breeze was blowing. I say building, but it’s just a roof supported by round pillars; it doesn’t even have walls.

While it’s an embarrassing talk, it’s actually my first time coming to the dungeon islands. Until now I was always busy with missions and training, and, well, I can’t swim so… I don’t really want to go to the sea.

Still, it’s hot… From what I heard, it gets pretty cold when it’s night time. Is that true? If so, the temperature difference in this place is huge.

“First, let’s get to the island where the firewheel grass grows. There should be a bridge.”

“I don’t need you to tell me that.”

Gallon muttered while making a small tongue click towards Abert’s words. Abert should’ve heard that clearly, but he just shrugged slightly.

Sarges-san took out a map from his bosom and confirmed that.

“… Around 1 km from here in the north. We can get to the island in question from the bridge there.”

The entire archipelago consists of seven islands of varying sizes.

Of the seven, three had a dungeon on them, and were named “Amaterasu”, “Tsukuyomi” and “Susanoo”.

However, those were actually the names for the dungeons, and the islands themselves have their own names.

The seven islands themselves were named Sundy, Mondy, Tuesdy, Wednesdy, Thursdy, Fridy and Saturdy. Pretty weird names, but His Majesty’s the one who named them so I can’t really complain.

Of them, “Amaterasu” is located on Sundy Island, “Tsukuyomi” on Mondy, and “Susanoo” on Wednesdy.

We are currently on Sundy Island. Our destination is Tuesdy Island.

We can get to the second-largest island of the seven from here via a bridge.

After we walked for a while, a large bridge came into view. The stone bridge stretched over the ocean all the way to another island far off in the distance.

“Amazing, isn’t it.”

“Apparently this bridge is something built by the Sovereign King of Brunhild as well. It’s been enchanted with strengthening magic and won’t break easily, or such.”

“There’s apparently a special barrier put in place too. It’s blocking magic beasts from crossing this bridge. It’s really something…”

Rose, Abert and Sarges-san spoke their impressions while looking at the bridge. All seven islands are connected with these bridges, or so they say. Although it will take time, you can basically walk to any of the seven islands.

Since only the islands of Sandy, Mondy and Wednesdy have transfer gates installed on them, the person will have to walk back to any of those islands if they want to return, though.

“Don’t stand there like idiots, just cross already.”

“You’re noisy. We know that!”

Rose angrily retorted to Gallon. Can’t that person think a bit more about what to speak before letting it out…

We all began crossing the bridge. Since the view was so nice, I was unconsciously focusing more on the scenery and was at the back of the group before I realized it.

Still, man it’s hot. There’s even some heat haze if I look towards the other end of the bridge. I took out a water bottle from my bag and drank the water inside. Kuu-, it’s dang cold-. It’s nicely chilled and delicious.

Apparently, the time is stopped for things inside the sack, and the temperature of the things put inside would remain the same when they’re pulled out. Food won’t become spoilt too. Although you can’t put living things inside it, if it’s dead then it can.

As I returned the water bottle to the rucksack, something was reflected in my eyes. There’s something above the skies of Tuesdy Island which we’re heading towards. Is that… A bird? Wait, but that…

I activated my mystic eyes while making sure the other members don’t notice my actions.

The mystic eyes I have are ones with the power of “Far Sight”. Clairvoyance, basically. It can let me see things far away while also ignoring light obstacles in the way.

In my right eye, the scenery is enlarging and flying farther towards the target… Uee!?

What I saw was a dragon. It had scales which glowed with a dull light, a long tail and large wings. As its forearms had merged with its wings, it’s probably a wyvern species.

Does that island even have dragons!? Wha, what, what do I do!? Even if it’s a lesser species, a dragon is a dragon. It’s definitely not an opponent our party can manage. If I had the knight order equipment, and Shizuku and Nagi with me, then I think it might be possible though.

I’ve heard that before I joined, the seniors in the knight order fought against more than a hundred dragons once. Although I heard they only managed with their equipment and the support of His Majesty and others, I wonder if it was possible for me…

For the moment, I need to tell Chief who’s the observer about the wyvern.

While pretending to wipe my sweat using a towel, I typed on the smartphone hidden inside the towel to send a message to Chief.

Pi.

>Confirmed a wyvern. Awaiting instructions.

A reply from Chief came back quickly.

Pi.

>No problem. Continue with mission.

Gunuu. Is she telling us to do something by ourselves!?

I mean, sure, it can be argued that being able to react to sudden changes in the situation is also a hallmark of a good adventurer, but…

“Oi, you feeling unwell?”

“Eh? Ah, I’m fine, yes.”

“If so then that’s fine, but if you feel bad speak up. It’ll bring us trouble too if you collapsed or something.”

The dwarf Dom-san called out to me who had a long face. His words were harsh, but I suppose he’s concerned about me.

There’s the case with the beastman Miu-san as well; it’s possible that I’m being cared for since I’m the youngest in this group no matter how you look at it.

When I raised my head, the figure of the wyvern was no longer there. Un, it might have just been a passing-by dragon… (Note: I can make a wish to the stars and pray that’s correct, Homura, but we all know that’s not gonna happen.)

We left the bridge, and took our first steps on Tuesdy Island.

Since we’re now out of the barrier on the bridge, we need to raise our guards. Magic beasts could attack us at any time.

Sarges-san stopped and confirmed the directions using a magnetic stone.

“This way. The firewheel grass should be somewhere on that mountain there.”

The staff he had was pointed towards a reddish rocky mountain in the distance. Uwa, that’s far… We probably can’t cover that distance by today. Un?

“… Something’s coming.”

At nearly the same time I noticed the presences, Miu-san raised her voice.

Everyone else took their stances and looked around in vigilance. From the forest in front of us, the sound of leaves rustling could be heard.

The thing which jumped out in front of us with a *pyon* was a small deer. Everyone relaxed and let out a breath.

“This bastard, scaring us like that…”

“Ha, you were scared? Spineless.”

“What was that!?”

As Gallon and Rose were about to get into an argument again, the deer with cute round eyes in front of us was snatched up by a large magic beast which jumped out from the side.

We, shocked by the sudden event, could only stand still while the raw sounds of bones breaking and blood spurting out reached our ears. The head of the deer dropped down with a plop from the mouth of the beast.

While moving its bloodstained mouth, its eyes caught sight of us.

The head of a lion with long teeth, blood-red mane and limbs with tiger stripes, and golden eyes.

“Blood Liger…!”

The name of the magic beast slipped from Rose’s mouth.

Blood liger… I’m sure it’s a species of magic beast that lives in mountainous regions. After that, uhh, umm… What was it? Chief talked about this magic beast sometime before! I should’ve paid attention back then!

“Gogaaaaaaa!!”

The blood liger released a sharp roar towards us. Not good!

We snapped out of our stupor and held up our weapons.

“Take your distance! That thing—”

“Uraaa!”

Rose was saying something, but Gallon ignored that and charged in.

He aimed a downward swing towards the blood liger, but it evaded easily. In retaliation, the liger sent a strike towards Gallon.

“Heh, something like this…!”

Gallon blocked the front paw of the liger with the large shield he had. He managed to withstand a strike that would most likely have sent me flying. Oo.

“I said get away, idiot!”

“Ah!?”

At the same time Rose yelled, the blood liger released flame from its mouth.

“Guaaa!?”

Gallon was bathed in the fire attack and fell backwards. The liger tried to press its attack at once, but Dom-san sent his hatchet flying towards it.

Noticing the hatchet, the liger made a large jump backwards before turning to look this way.

“Be careful! That thing can breathe fire! It’s dangerous to get close to it!”

Right! I remember now! Like Rose said, the blood liger can breathe out fire!

“[Come forth Rock, pulverizing boulders, Rock Crush]!”

When Sarges-san chanted the magic incantation, a boulder the size of a large barrel appeared on top of the blood liger. However, the timing was slow, and the liger avoided it easily. The boulder fell to the ground and smashed into pieces.

“Slow! Can’t you do something better!?”

“It’s hard to concentrate on magic! Don’t tell me to do the impossible in this kind of situation!”

Abert thrusted his sword towards the liger. Sarges-san seemed to have become irritated at his words and shouted back in anger.

Rose swung her whip and drew the attention of the liger.

“We’re fine here, go do something about the guy rolling on the ground over there!”

Sarges-san, as told, started casting healing magic towards Gallon who was down on his knees.

“Oi, little girl! Don’t swing your whip over here! I’ll split you!”

As Dom-san was about to strike the liger with his battle axe, Rose’s whip flashed by in front of his eyes with a bad timing.

This isn’t working. There’s no teamwork at all.

I took out several bo shurikens from my clothes and threw them at the liger’s face. One of them struck one of the liger’s eyes splendidly. Although it seems like I aimed for it, it was a coincidence! (Note: you have to admit, Homura is cute in ways Touya will never be. Also, bo shuriken = stick shuriken. Just google it.)

“Gurugaaaa!”

With one of its eyes crushed, the liger changed targets and started chasing after me. Oops, not gonna let you catch me that easily-.

I grabbed onto a tree branch, and with the force of one full rotation using the branch as the axis, I jumped to another branch. While the liger was chasing after me, I was running using the trees one after another. This is exactly the Art of Monkey Flying. (Note: joke. The Japanese name would be “Sarutobi no Jutsu”. As you can probably tell, it’s the same name as the surname of Homura.)

At a place sufficiently far away from everyone else, I landed on the ground and took out my ninjato.

Its movements themselves aren’t that fast. It’s like a turtle if I compare them to Moroha- sama’s swordplay shown to us during training sessions. As long as I pay attention to the flames, I can probably take it down myself.

Ah… But it would be bad if I defeated it by myself, wouldn’t it? I was told to not stand out as well.

Etto… What should I do?

- Pixel