Chapter 205
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「Orphe, thanks for bringing Eris here. I’m sure she would have gotten into serious trouble somewhere if she was alone.」
「Hehe, you can praise me more, you know?」
「Amazing, amazing! Thank you so much!」
Orphe puts her hands on her hips and puffs out her chest proudly at my praise.
Oh no! If I praise her too much, she’s going to get too full of herself!
「By the way, I’m curious why you decided to bring her to me. You’re a member of Seventh Blue, this super amazing clan, so there must have been plenty of reliable people you could have gone to, right?」
「Ah, about that, before we get to that—」
「What is it?」
「I’ve been thinking about this for a while. I’m technically your disciple too, right? I was thinking of calling you ‘Master,’ but…」
「Sure, you can call me that. Didn’t we have this conversation before?」
「Something feels off about it. I mean, Eris calls you ‘Master,’ right? It’s like, you know, it would overlap?」
What is she talking about…
This muscle-head girl is concerned about overlapping titles in the middle of a serious conversation.
「It’s fine if they overlap, isn’t it? Like, at school, students all call their teachers ‘teacher’ without any problem.」
Eris gives Orphe a long stare that clearly says 「Master is perfectly fine.」
Apparently unsatisfied with my explanation, Orphe tilts her head with a dissatisfied expression.
「Isn’t there some other good way to address you?」
「You’re asking ME about this?!」
「Come on, don’t you have any good ideas?」
Feeling like I’m dealing with an NPC who only repeats the same dialogue, I realize the conversation won’t progress unless I make a suggestion.
「Well, ‘teacher’ is already taken, so how about ‘Master’ in English?」
I ask 「how about it?」 even though I know I’m not really suited for such a title and it doesn’t fit me at all. However—
「That’s not quite right.」
She flatly rejects it.
「Oof.」
Strangely enough, it’s irritating when someone (especially a muscle-head) shoots you down like that.
「Argh! Then pick one of these!!
‘Head,’ ‘Boss,’ ‘Top,’ ‘Expert,’ ‘Shifu,’ ‘Chief’!」
I rack my brain and present several options.
Orphe thinks 「hmm」 for a moment, then—
「I’ll go with ‘Shifu.’ This way it won’t overlap with Eris, and having my own special way to address you feels kind of special, doesn’t it?」
There’s nothing special about a title, I think.
But I keep that thought to myself.
「Alright then, call me Shifu.」
As I let out a sigh—
「Now, about that question from earlier,」
She must mean my question about whether she had other people she could have relied on.
「You’re right, if I went back to the clan, there would be plenty of reliable people like the Clan Master and seniors, and there are countless battle-hardened veterans.」
It’s a famous clan that even someone as out of touch as me knows about.
Of course there would be.
「But even if all of them joined forces, none of them could replace you.」
Those eyes. She pierces me with a challenging gaze.
「It was a battle fought with all our might. We couldn’t have won if anyone had been missing.
Yes, the fight with the dragon was truly a death match. We managed to grasp victory by giving it absolutely everything we had.
But what awaited us was despair.
That day, I experienced despair for the first time in my life.
The opponent who appeared before us was the king of the Living Dead. When I saw him, I gave up, thinking ‘Ah, this is the end of humanity.’」
Orphe’s body trembles. It seems to be a warrior’s trembling, caused by both fear and fighting spirit.
「I can still remember that grotesque monster when I close my eyes.
No one in Seventh Blue could have repelled something like that. Even if we had gathered the entire clan’s strength to face it, defeating it would have been impossible.
That’s why, since you accomplished that feat, I thought you could do anything. I thought you could help us overcome any difficulty we might face.」
Being unused to praise and receiving so much of it lately makes my back feel oddly ticklish.
Still, I’ll gratefully accept those feelings.
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「We can’t push Eris too hard, so let her stay overnight in the cabin,」 she says.
「What about you, Orphe?」 I ask.
「Me? I shouldn’t overstay my welcome, so I’ll be heading out soon,」 she says as she stands up.
As we’re having this exchange—
「It’s already dark outside. It would be quite difficult for you to descend the mountain alone. Just stay here for the night.」
The speaker is Sena.
「Well then, I’ll take you up on that offer.」
Orphe says this with a smirk and plops back down in her seat.
Since neither Eris nor Orphe had eaten dinner yet, they immediately nod when we invite them to join us for the meal.
With a grunt, I start thinking about additional ingredients and menu items for them, and begin preparing the meal.
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The cabin, while called a 「cabin,」 isn’t particularly small, being spacious enough to comfortably accommodate five people without feeling cramped. For bedding, we use the spare futons I had in my magic bag. When we turn off the magical lighting device, Eris is the first to fall asleep. After a while, multiple breathing patterns of sleep can be heard.
Wait a minute! Everyone except me is female!!
This is bad! This is really bad!
I’m too nervous to sleep!
How am I supposed to sleep in a place full of women!
I should go back to my room!
No way! I don’t even have a room in the first place!
Then maybe I should build an extension to the cabin?
Maybe I’ll go to my room to draw up some plans!
No way! I don’t even have a room in the first place!
I’m stuck in a loop of thoughts.
Letting out a sigh, I leave the cabin as quietly as possible to clear my head.
The night in the mountains is almost complete darkness until your eyes adjust.
Still, I continue walking aimlessly until gradually my eyes begin to adjust.
「Ichiro.」
I hadn’t sensed any presence at all.
「I followed you because you left the cabin.」
The one who called out to me is Sena.
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