I took a carriage to Tetramine.
On the way, I asked Eve and Celeste, “Is it okay for you two to take the time and come with me?”
Eve gazed at me with rare sincerity. “We cannot let you go alone, low level.”
I hesitated. “Why not? I don’t get it.”
“Because of Aurum.”
“Aurum? What does she have to do with this?”
“She has the little one.”
“You mean Miike?”
Eve nodded. “You don’t have to take her anymore, so it’s okay for you to stay long now, low level.”
“That is true.”
Until now, when I went away to work, I’d worked under the impression that I had to be home soon. Because back then, I was the only person who could take her to her dungeon and back. If I needed to carry out requests, I’d always come back as soon as possible. I couldn’t, say, sightsee or enjoy a short vacation after solving a problem; I’d come straight back.
But that wasn’t a problem now. I didn’t know what kind of city Tetramine was, but I could hang out for a while after if I wanted this time.
Eve chopped my forehead. It stung.
“Ow!”
Her chops were multi-hit attacks. They were so fast that it looked like she only chopped once, but in fact, each attack was multiple. Like the blades of a fan, the faster she went, the slower it looked. That showed how serious she was about any given attack.
That one was slow, and it hurt.
“Without you, I lose my carrots,” she said flatly.
“Of course,” I chuckled. Eve and Aurum had similar reasons to keep me at home. This bunny loved the carrots that came from my S-rank drops, and if I stayed out for too long, she wouldn’t be able to get her fix. “And that’s why you came?”
“Mhm.”
“But there aren’t any carrot drops there.”
“If I need carrots, I’ll just hit you.”
“I get it. I’ll fix this as soon as possible so we can go home.”
“Mhm.” Eve nodded in satisfaction.
I turned to our other companion. “And you, Celeste?”
“I looked into it, and apparently, Tetramine doesn’t get many magic storms.”
“Is that so?”
“Yup. I figured I could help you out.”
“Well, thank you.”
“My pleasure.” She smiled and blushed a little.
It was reassuring to have Celeste around. Frankly, “thanks” didn’t seem worthy of how much she would help.
“I’ll find a way to thank you. Is there anything you want?”
“We’re friends.”
“All the more reason that I’ll feel bad if I only take and don’t give.”
“Okay, then I’ll think about it. If I find something I want, I’ll let you know.”
“Yes, please.”
Her face broke out into a big smile.
Thus, we headed to Tetramine, rocked by the carriage all the way.
☆
“Neeeigh!” the horses whinnied as the carriage stopped.
I opened the roof and asked the driver, “Are we there already?”
“Not quite.” He shook his head and looked forward.
I followed suit.
Many people and carriages had gathered, like a merchant caravan. At the far end, about thirty minutes away by carriage, I could see a city in the distance. Most people were facing that way, but they weren’t moving.
Celeste looked out and asked me, “What’s the matter?”
“Dunno. Let’s go ask.”
“Okay.”
“Eve?”
“No work without carrots,” she refused, drawing a surprisingly reasonable line.
But fine, we’re just going to ask a question anyway.
Celeste and I headed toward the group of people without her.
“What’s going on here?”
“Man, we’re in big trouble... Oh! Ryota, is that you?”
“Yeah,” I confirmed.
The man I’d addressed seemed to know me. I didn’t know his name, but I recognized his uniform; it was the uniform of Swallow’s Returned Favor. I’d asked him specifically because I recognized it.
“Is something holding things up?” I asked him.
“Oh, how unexpected this is. We can’t even enter the city!”
Seeing the look on his face─an odd mixture of hopelessness and a wry grin─I cocked my head in confusion.
☆
Celeste and I traveled to the entrance of the city Tetramine alongside people from the Swallow’s Returned Favor and other drop-buying shops.
When we got there, I quickly figured out what was wrong.
This was no place where people could live. Monsters roamed the streets, like a cross-section of hell.
“How did this happen?”
“I think the city ran out of operating funds.” Celeste had prefaced that with I think, but she sounded almost certain. “They stopped disposing of trash.”
“Now that you mention it, that’s a lot of Frankensteins,” I noted. Frankensteins were outsiders that spawned from this world’s garbage. “Yeah... You did work as a garbage disposal person before we met, huh?”
“Yup. Even we don’t work for free; if the money stops flowing, this is what happens.”
“I get it.”
On the way here, I’d expected this place would be like a dilapidated shopping district with every shop shuttered. This was entirely different from what I’d imagined.
So this is what happens when cities in this world are deserted.
I glanced behind me. There weren’t any fighters among the people who’d come to do business. That was why they couldn’t go in.
Celeste noticed my gaze and spoke up, “They must not have known that it was such a tragedy.”
“No doubt about that. But I guess you can buy up all the land here without even coming here first, huh?” After all, all you need to do is slide some documents over a desk. “Well, first things first. I’ll clean this mess up.”
“I’ll help.”
“Back me up, then. Cover anything I miss.”
“Got it. You’re not going to use your guns?”
“That’s right.” I nodded and stepped forth, unarmed and casual, before charging into the swarm of outsiders. “Repetition.”
I used Repetition, my ultimate farming spell that insta-killed anything I’d killed before. If I used this magic, I could essentially skip to the results screen of any monster fight that I’d gone through before.
I pressed on, never stopping to check on things, just firing off one Repetition after another.
Monsters disappeared one by one. I culled the numbers of the ones I’d defeated before, particularly the Frankensteins. As for the ones I hadn’t fought before...
“Eruption!” Celeste used her greater magic to clean them up.
There might be some strong ones amongst the ones I ignored, but she was much stronger than when we’d first met. I could leave them in her hands.
Like detergent on a grease stain, we cleaned up the outsiders who’d taken over Tetramine while people cheered us on.