“You more than tripled the number of repelled intruders, and not one of them a repeat. Splendid!”
“Oh, you’re being too kind. I only barely made the minimum.”
I was still stuck recuperating in the cabin’s bed when Karumi arrived to accept my written report.
“You can look forward to a bonus and a raise, as well as another spot bonus for unexpected risk to life and limb. We’ll have those all sent to you right away.”
“Yeah, can’t wait. Hey, maybe you could tell me a little more about dark knights?”
“Let’s see, is that information restricted? Well, no, I suppose this qualifies as a need-to-know situation. The guardians of humans aren’t always called knights, by the way; the term used varies depending on where they’re from. But at any rate, when one of them decides to stop protecting their people, they usually lose their powers.”
Usually?
“However, if the protector’s covenant is overwritten by another oath, they instead become a dark knight, and the sworn guardian of their new people. Typical dark knights tend to be inferior to normal knights, in exchange for casting off their restraints, however...”
“It seems like the class change actually powered her up instead.”
“You should have heard my father laugh. The recipient of the oath was a labyrinth manager, and it was sworn inside their labyrinth, but still, such a simple, obviously romantic oath ought never to have reached all the way to him. Certainly, he would have conferred his blessings and protection as soon as it came to his attention that a labyrinth personnel member had become a dark knight, but this was an unusual case. The wish was so fervent, so powerful, that he bestowed greater power upon her than is typically done in these cases. Miracles sprout up around you, Kousaka.”
Well, now it all made sense. But why did Karumi sound a little annoyed?
“Not at all. I was just doing my job.”
I’d told her much the same before. I was just making sure that I would be able to rest easy at the end of the day, knowing I’d done all I could.
“I see. Well, I shall take my leave. Father will be wanting a detailed report.”
Karumi sighed and left through the door which returned to the office, just like always. As I saw her off, I vowed to get a recording the next time Karumi appeared wearing a dress. I mean, she was the one benefiting from all my hard work, so it was only fair that I got something out of it, right?
A UI window had started flickering while I was speaking to Karumi, and I looked over to see I had an incoming call. The oddly persistent person who’d stayed on the line waiting for me this whole time turned out to be Suzu.
“Pick up the phone faster if you’re there, stupid! I heard you passed out while defending your labyrinth!”
Suzu was hopping up and down so much, I thought she was going to burst right out of the window. Did I just see a strawberry pattern? Probably better not to say anything. Suzu seemed worried about me, so I set to explaining.
“Haahh. Can’t believe I got so worked up over nothing. You poisoned yourself by drinking too many potions? How dumb a dummy are you?”
Here I did my best to offer a full explanation, and all I got in return was verbal abuse. She seemed pretty angry, though, so I kept my peace. She’d just get even more annoyed if I tried to defend myself. I’d been in bed ever since the whole Theodoran thing had wrapped up. I’d fainted after the fight, and they’d had to carry me back to the cabin. The girls had called Karumi, and she’d rushed over to diagnose me. She’d immediately pronounced I had a severe case of potion poisoning. Apparently one of the effects of overdosing on magic potions was a huge, temporary status debuff, which explained why I’d been unable to move for a while and had eventually passed out. Even though I’d recovered from the worst of it, I was still feeling pretty sluggish.
“I swear to god, Aoi, most people don’t give themselves potion poisoning! I’ve never even heard of that happening to someone before. Hello! Earth to Aoi! What is wrong with you?! How many damn potions did you chug down?”
She was still going at it. You know, even if I wanted to tell her—she was already on to complaining about something else anyway—I wasn’t even sure how many I’d drunk. I’d been basically pouring stamina potions down my throat during the lightning-fast remodel, and then there’d been the battle with Theodoran where I’d taken a few vitality potions. Apparently those had been the straw that broke the camel’s back. Well, I’d learned my lesson. I didn’t even want to think about how many potions I’d used in the last week.
“Aoi, I locked the front and back doors to the labyrinth’s first stratum.”
The door opened, and Mary entered the cabin. Her black hair and crimson eyes had turned back to their original blonde and blue. They changed whenever she picked up a sword, though. If I’d been a little younger, I would’ve thought maybe it was some kind of super cool special power that sapped your life force every time you tapped into it. Like, the kind that necessitated wearing an eyepatch. That’d be awfully inconvenient when it was both your eyes, though...
In its current state, the labyrinth was a dangerous trap for any kids from the village who wandered in by accident, and there was even a risk of monsters nesting in it, so I’d asked Mary to lock it up for the time being.
“Aoi, what shall I do from now on? I feel as though I can do anything!”
Mary looked ready to take on the world, but sadly I had to burst her bubble.
“You locked up the labyrinth, right? That means there’s nowhere left to protect, except the cabin and the area around it. We won’t be reopening the labyrinth for some time.”
I’d worked my ass off on that labyrinth, so of course I wanted to expand it, but I had no budget. Every last DL I had to my name had been spent on building the first stratum and then on remodeling it in the last few days. I was thinking it’d be nice to build another stratum to serve as sort of an apartment complex, so we could host more residents. Getting a bunch of tenants paying rent sounded like a lovely way to make some passive income.
“All right, then I’ll protect you, Ann, and this cabin. Um, what shall I protect you from?”
You know, it’d be pretty awesome if she could protect me from the hardships of the world, or the bureaucracy of labyrinth management, but that didn’t really seem up her alley.
“Yeah, dude, what are you gonna do, make her a mall cop? Anyhoo, I got places to be. Catch you on the flip side.”
Stay classy, Suzu.
“Aoi, what is a mall cop?”
“Uh, yeah, dunno what she meant by that. Better ask her next time she calls.”
Mary looked at me in confusion. Damn it, it was hard to keep up a poker face when I could barely move. I’ll get you for this, Suzu.