According to the doctor in town who treated the two of them, the severity of their injuries was approximately on par. He had no idea which of them was actually in worse shape, but he did remember thinking that their conditions looked similar. What probably happened was that in the process of healing them, their dear demon researcher figured it was sufficient to simply keep them from dying and stopped both their treatments at about the same stage. After they woke up, Rona had used her own gracecraft to heal her wounds, while Azu opted to rub some prescription medications all over himself. This was the source of the discrepancy in their current conditions.
The graces commonly employed for restorative purposes worked by expending the user’s stamina to heal wounds. For this reason, a heavy bout of healing came with an equally heavy toll in vitality, as evidenced by the profound fatigue that currently plagued Rona.
“What do you mean?”
Azu looked up from his book. Being entirely unconfident in his own stamina, he had declined Rona’s offer to heal him through gracecraft and instead chose the slow and steady option. While he physically looked like a mess, his expression showed none of the bone-deep weariness exhibited by Rona. Whatever ointment he applied also seemed to numb the pain to some degree, so he turned out to be better off than Renya initially thought.
“Your party members quit adventuring altogether, didn’t they?”
While they all returned with their lives fully intact, the same could not be said for their bodies. On top of that, after being swallowed whole by a massive chunk of meat, they had been thoroughly violated within its innards. Some took it harder than others, but none escaped unscathed; the experience left them all traumatized.
Deciding that their lives alone were reward enough, all four of Azu’s guards had declared that they were retiring from the adventuring life and heading back to their hometown with their share of the bounty. Apparently, before they became adventurers, all of them were brought up on a farm in a village somewhere, and they intended to head back to the village and help out with the family business. Hearing that, Azu had taken his share of the mission reward and given almost all of it to his four friends as thanks for everything they had done for him, mentioning with a laugh that while it didn’t come out to much after being split among four people, it should at least give them a head start if they were starting a farming business.
“Yeah. My party has disbanded.”
Azu did not sound particularly upset, but the three listeners’ expressions clouded nonetheless. Everything he had done, he had done with that party; they had gone through thick and thin together. And now, they were gone. There was no way he felt nothing about it. The fact that it didn’t show on his face was either a sign of resignation to reality — no point worrying over a situation if nothing could be done — or a thoughtful attempt to avoid troubling Renya and the two girls with his own issues.
“It might sound perfunctory, but do you want to come with us?”
Had Azu agreed, Renya would have tried his hardest to convince Shion and Rona.
“It’s a generous offer, but…” said Azu with a wry smile before shaking his head.
“Did you receive an invitation from another party?”
“Actually, there is a place where I can find some work. I don’t plan to quit adventuring, but I intend to stay there for a while.”
“Oh, yeah? Where is it?”
“The school.”
Azu explained that Kukrika was home to a school that trained adventurers, and they had offered him a temporary teaching position some time ago. He had originally declined, since he was focused on his work as an adventurer, but they kept the offer on the table so they could discuss it again when he had more time. Now that the opportunity had presented itself, he figured he would take them up on it. Reasonably competent mages with real combat experience rarely deign to serve as teachers, so the process of seeking prospective solicitees was a daily and ongoing endeavor for the school.
“A school for bringing up adventurers, huh… So, you’re going to teach them how to, like, what? Adventure?” asked Renya, his tone slightly incredulous. “Sounds like a pretty sketchy place to me.”
“Not quite. Just so you know, those unfortunate enough to be born in noble families with neither the right to be heir nor the prospect of marriage often become adventurers.”
According to Azu, as a rule, the two eldest sons stayed home. The first-born son succeeded the father as head of the family, and the second son served as both a counselor and a substitute in case the eldest son met an untimely end. The third son and onwards, however, were often seen as trouble by the first two due to their tendency to get tangled up in fights over succession if they stayed home, so they were often kicked out of the family once they reached a certain age. Some even chose to leave on their own. Among these forcibly-exiled progeny, those who were reasonably competent might, through their own hard work, find themselves a position in the government. Those who strove for more, or could only manage less, were then funneled into adventuring.
Daughters were usually married off into other families, but the exceptions often found themselves becoming adventurers. These exceptions included those whose personalities scared off all suitors, those whose features evoked the wrong kind of awe from onlookers, and those who simply refused to let their parents decide their marriage and ran away from home.