In life, you need to have a goal.
That was something my boss at my last job had told me, but...
“I just didn’t have the capacity for a goal in life when I was working for an exploitative company...”
My life had been one of constant pressure, dealing with the loads of tasks and responsibilities foisted upon me. I had always thought, You’re one to talk, when you’re the cause of all this!
“I was supposed to be living in leisure here alone, without having to care about anyone else, but now I’ve totally changed.”
The feast with the Divine Beastfolk was over. I averted my eyes from the disaster before me—heaps of dead-drunk bodies all around—and basked in the morning sun. My past livelihood had been an unhealthy one of idly playing music and sleeping in bed. Now, I was getting sunlight while listening to the rustling of the trees.
“I’m too healthy.”
And I felt unreasonably light. It went without saying that this was because of my god-given cheat body, but that wasn’t all. One’s body could be invincible, but one’s heart was another story, and my current pleasant mood was no doubt thanks to the different life I’d led since coming here.
“‘You need to have a goal,’ huh?”
Only now did I fully understand the meaning of those words. After talking with Reina, Tailtiu, and everyone else recently, there was something inside of me that had clearly changed: I wanted to get to know the islanders better and become friends with them.
“And then I’ll have one big feast with the whole island...”
It was terribly unrealistic, on a completely different scale from organizing a company party. But a god had given me these cheat skills and a chance to redo my life—surely it was all right to dream big.
“Ancient Dragonfolk, Fierce Ogrefolk, Great Spirits...and Mina.”
Her and Elga don’t get along, so that might be tough, I thought, growing timid. But relationships between people—though for them, it might be stretching the definition of the word—could change at the drop of a hat. The Divine Beastfolk and the Alfar were supposed to be on bad terms, but Katima hadn’t seemed to mind. It was possible that some day, the two of them would be able to share a drink together like friends.
“You sure woke up early, Arata.”
“Oh, hey, Reina. Yeah, this body quickly gets rid of anything bad for it, including alcohol.”
“Really? I’m jealous...”
Reina was lightly massaging her temples, probably because she was hungover. She could hold her drink unexpectedly well, but last night she’d had quite a lot, so I supposed it made sense that she felt bad. If anything, I had been the type of person who didn’t get what was so good about the taste of alcohol, so in my past life I had disliked drinking parties. But since coming to this island, I had come to find enjoyment in those sorts of lively feasts.
“It’ll be a lot of work to clean all this up,” Reina said.
“Oh... Yeah, definitely.”
The Divine Beastfolk were complete party animals, which meant that the area around the bonfire was a huge mess.
“How about I put it all in my Storage spell?” I said.
“You can’t be that lazy.”
“Hey, it was a joke.”
But my Storage spell seems practically endless, so it wasn’t totally a joke...
“Clean up your own messes yourself. That’s just common sense.”
I was silent.
“What is it?”
“It’s just, you seem like you’d be a good mother... Ha ha.”
The moment I said that, Reina’s face reddened slightly.
“Jeez! If you have time to make jokes like that, I’m going to wake up everyone and start cleaning!”
She briskly turned her back to me, then started to wake up Tailtiu, Luna, and the others who were sleeping on the ground.
“It might be becoming less of a joke lately...” I could feel my face grow warmer as I remembered what I had said.
This is bad. This is seriously bad, I thought. Trying to do whatever I could to distract myself, I caught Suzaku, who was trying to run away from cleanup duty.