This time, I improved the way I grind monsters a bit. From a hundred meters away, I left pieces of meat on the ground and started waiting for the "bite." And the orbs didn't disappoint me. Soon they began to gather into small groups of ten to fifteen individuals.
Waiting until one of those groups clustered together and started fighting each other, trying to snatch the prey, I asked Rafthalia to step back a little and began to recite the spell.
"By the power of the Grimoire, I command: decipher the laws of the universe: Erst Lightning Bolt!"
I didn't even bother to charge the spell with extra mana — the standard amount was enough to tear all the monsters to pieces.
***
The new grinding method proved effective, and by evening Rafthalia and I had reached level nine.
The next day was no different from the previous one, except that we struggled harder to gain one more level.
And already on the third day, we were terrorizing the poor orbs.
After three hours of such hunting-fishing, Rafthalia and I leveled up again, or rather, finished off what was left from the previous day.
The tanuki kept following me like a little tail, and judging by her expression, she was already bored out of her mind. No wonder — watching some guy running across the meadow and throwing lightning bolts left and right... I would probably get tired of watching that too... unless it was a woman, preferably with a good figure and in a seductive outfit...
Slurp
Okay, wiped the drool. Now I need to decide whether to actually go to the forest or not... The amount of experience needed to level up grows with each level, and it was naive to think I could level up just on orbs. To get the next level, I would need to kill about three thousand of them! That's a hell of a lot, folks!
And that's basically not even the real problem — hard but doable. But what comes next? Ten thousand? Twenty thousand? If I were alone, or better yet, listening to music in headphones, it would be bearable. Simple and monotonous work, nothing new.
The most stressful part is making sure Rafthalia doesn't get hurt. That's nerve-wracking and keeps me constantly on guard. Those creatures have already almost bitten her twice when I wasn't paying attention.
A vicious circle.
Without reaching any decision, I decided to talk to the root of the problem and explained the situation to her.
"Don't worry about me, Master. I am your slave, but I have been of no use to you so far! Of course, I will go wherever you say!" she said humbly.
"Rafthalia, you're already a grown girl. Can I talk to you like an adult?" I decided to approach it differently.
"…Well, yes," she answered hesitantly.
I told her that as long as she is my slave, she receives bonuses from my Grimoire, and that's the only reason she remains my slave. I explained that when she grows up and can confidently wield a sword, she will have the chance to become the Shield Hero's companion… I repeated three times that this is only if she truly wishes it, and no one will force her.
And do you know what this... this... I don't even know what to call her... did?
She genuinely smiled, putting her hands behind her back and said with childlike frankness:
"Pluton-sama, I've known this for a long time. I overheard your conversation with the Shield Hero-sama at the inn," then she tilted her head, fixed a strand of her red hair, and continued as if explaining obvious truths to me:
"And fighting alongside the one I've heard stories about since I was a baby has always been my dream! Of course, I want that!"
For a moment I just stood there stunned. Couldn't she have said that before? Although it wouldn't have changed anything.
"Wait, wait… Did I hear that right? Pluton-sama? Not 'Master'? Did you really say that?"
"…Well, you react to it so amusingly…" the girl replied. Though what girl? She was almost a young woman now, looking about fifteen or sixteen.
"You… just…" I said expressively and, hugging the still-smiling girl, brushed off an imaginary manly tear. Men only have imaginary tears!
"No more 'Master,' okay?"
"…Well, if you keep feeding me so well… I might consider it… Master," she said thoughtfully, looking up at the sky and tapping her lower lip with a finger.
"I think I spoiled you," I sighed.
"Yeah. And while you suffer about it, could you give me a sword? Since I'm going to be Akira-sama's companion, I need to learn to fight myself. You said: 'Tanuki are born warriors, and it's in my blood,' right?"
"Definitely spoiled," I rubbed my nose.
No, I did notice that she had become livelier lately and now resembled a normal girl her age. She stopped being afraid to ask questions when something interested her. Yesterday, during grinding, she told me about her foster parents and her village. About how she ended up in slavery and how she was returned twice because of panic attacks at night…
We have actually talked a lot the past two days. I told her about my world and about myself.
But I did it on the side since my main focus was still on leveling up.
I took two swords from my inventory that I had bought in advance from Elhart specifically for this pest and held out the hilts for Rafthalia to choose which one felt more comfortable. One sword had a three-centimeter-wide blade, somewhat like a classic Chinese jian, the other looked more like a Roman sword.
After trying both, she chose the Roman style. She swung it a couple of times quite confidently. Maybe there's more truth in my words about tanuki blood than I suspected… Of course, she didn't become a sword master right away, but the moment she held the sword, her posture changed, the position of her feet, and her movements became more predatory and graceful.
Had I not seen this transformation with my own eyes, I wouldn't have believed it in my life.
When she got used to the sword a little, she looked at me questioningly. I just nodded towards the monsters.
Approaching the nearest orb without a hint of fear, she swung her sword. I immediately got experience notifications.
For about half an hour I acted as an observer. Seeing that she was handling it confidently, I called her over.
"Stop waving that metal around," I said with a bit of envy in my voice. "Let's go back to camp."
"What? Why? We just got here," the girl was surprised.
"You need armor, and all the money is with Akira."
"Well, nothing here in the meadow can really threaten me. Especially with you nearby."
"Return the sword, or we're going to buy you armor. Your choice."
Maybe I really spoiled her?
"…Okay~" the tanuki said. "Let's go to the camp."
At the camp, Akira was training as usual. This time, three orbs surrounded her, which she was successfully blocking with her shield. On the post hung my second and last shirt, which I had to sacrifice for this. But the progress was obvious. She couldn't handle even two monsters before, but now confidently held off four.
Actually, I planned this training just to keep Akira busy. When busy, time passes differently, and sad thoughts visit less often.
"You're early. Did something happen?" Akira asked as we approached, still parrying orb attacks.
"Rafthalia?"
"Right away, Master," the tanuki joked, and with two swings, dispatched all three monsters near the Shield Hero.
"Already?" Akira asked, surprised, looking at the sword in Rafthalia's hands.
"I think she's ready," I nodded. "Give me the money, we'll go to Elhart for armor."
"No, I'll go with Rafthalia myself," the girl said, wiping her sweaty forehead with a happy smile. "And we need to talk, you know, about our girl stuff."
"Alright," I didn't argue. Taking the second unused sword from my inventory, I handed it to Akira. "Give this to Elhart. He promised to return the money."
While the girls went to town, I did nothing for the first time in days.
Just lay on the grass and stared at the sky.
Unlike Akira, who can calmly nap during the day — after all, if monsters come near her, they can't do anything to her with that kind of protection — I slept about four hours a day on average. Damn night watches!
And yes, I learned that spell "Mirage," which I had high hopes for. It even turned out to be effective. Just not very effective against the orbs… When I first used it, I poured all the mana I had into it. Even with that, it didn't cover the whole camp — only the tent and some space nearby. And from the outside, the camp was indeed hard to notice, even when looking straight at it.
In the end, we went to sleep peacefully. I let the girls have the tent, and I lay in a sleeping bag beside the tent, inside the mirage. My faith in the spell was so strong that for the first time since arriving in the countryside, I decided to take off my armor and sleep in my spare clothes.
An hour later, the grove was shaken by a thunderous scream… Yes, exactly that!
All because the Demonic Orange Orb came to visit me at night and found no better place to bite me than my ankle bells. That hurt. A lot!
After I killed it and stopped rolling on the ground from pain, I looked around. The mirage was still working.
But apparently, the demonic orbs forgot to care about it… Because there were still two more running around the camp.
Early in the morning, I specifically went to the edge of the forest and checked — the spell worked perfectly on other monsters. Under the cover of the "Mirage," none of the Bigurs or that oversized rabbit noticed me, even when I was right up close to them. So why didn't it work on the orbs? I thought... and came to the conclusion that it was probably because they simply have no eyes... or other organs except a mouth... I had to just accept that night watches were unavoidable — the demonic orbs had taken their revenge after all...
Well, at least I vented my anger on the Bigurs. And since I had the chance, I ventured deeper into the forest to scout, opening even more grimoires:
Grimoire of the Blue Bigur 0/5 E
Equipment Bonus: Magic Attack +2 (unlearned)
Equipment Bonus: Basic Alchemy Recipes
Mastery: 0
Grimoire of the Green Bigur 0/5 E
Equipment Bonus: Magic Attack +2 (unlearned)
Equipment Bonus: Alchemy: Apprentice
Mastery: 0
Grimoire of the Red Bigur 0/5 E
Equipment Bonus: Magic Attack +2 (unlearned)
Equipment Bonus: Enhanced Alchemy Production
Mastery: 0
Grimoire of the Ovoid [Egg-shaped] 0/5 E
Equipment Bonus: Magic Attack +2 (unlearned)
Equipment Bonus: Cooking: Apprentice
Mastery: 0
Grimoire of the Leafy 0/5 E
Equipment Bonus: Magic Attack +2 (unlearned)
Equipment Bonus: Herb Gathering 1
Mastery: 0
There are lots of grimoires, and I also gathered duplicate ingredients so Akira could start unlocking shields.
So I deserved a little rest. But ironically, I didn't feel like sleeping at all.
Having promised myself not to get up until I mastered the current grimoire, I just lay there for a while, pondering my next plans now that I'd finished leveling Rafthalia. It looked like nothing would really change. Same leveling, but now alone.
After ten minutes, I got the hang of the grimoire.
Rested enough, time to get to work.
Getting to my feet, I wondered why Rafthalia was my slave, but somehow I was the one who felt like the slave...
Although, well, I basically signed up for all this myself, so no complaining.
Equipping the Healing Grimoire (basic), I started studying new spells while it was settling in. So far, I only knew "Lightning Bolt" and "Mirage," which was really bad — and those at a low level of understanding.
I chose to study the spell "Regeneration." I don't know if the skill "Speed Reading" helps here, but if it does, it's not nearly as much as I hoped. While I spent six to seven hours learning "Lightning Bolt," "Mirage" took me about five hours. And I suspect that means nothing, since different spells have different study times.
A couple of times, I had to kill orbs that wandered into our camp.
Mostly, I lay in my sleeping bag reading grimoires. So familiar — it felt like I never really left home. Back home, I often spent free time the same way. Only reading books on my phone instead of grimoires.
I felt a bit nostalgic for Earth. Screw Earth though, what I really missed was music! I can't even remember a day when I didn't listen to music! I'll have to find out how things are with that here. Maybe there are some concerts or something?
***
The girls returned only late in the evening. A bit tired but extremely happy.
I noticed them from afar, chatting and laughing.
When they got to the campfire, I got a good look at them.
Rafthalia was in new armor. Long leather boots up to mid-thigh, reinforced in front with bone plates; a tunic made of chainmail fabric resembling a dress; a leather chestpiece tied across the chest; leather bracers; and a single shoulder pauldron on her right shoulder.
"How do you like it, Master Pluto?" the tanuki twirled around showing herself from all sides.
"Nice, but I'm going to kill Elhart... I asked for proper protection with chainmail pants. But no, damn it, a skirt again!"
"Well, actually, Elhart has nothing to do with it. He just didn't like the set you ordered," Akira explained as she reached the cooking pot and served food for herself and Rafthalia.
"You don't like it?" Rafthalia looked a bit downcast.
"Me? I like it... but I like girls with legs even more. And yours are defenseless."
"You grumble like an old man," the tanuki pouted and stuck out her tongue at me. "All girls wear this armor and nothing!"
"Pfft, what?! I'm no old man!" I said, then remembered she was basically ten years old. So by her standards, I really am an old man.
"Here, Elhart sent these for you," Akira handed me fingerless gloves.
I took them and examined. They weren't much different from the ones he gave me last time to try on. Except the leather was much thicker but still quite soft. And instead of spikes on the knuckles, there were steel plates from knuckles to fingertips.
I put them on and checked the fit — perfect, as expected from Elhart.
"May I?" I gestured towards Akira's shield.
"Yeah, one sec," she said, not rising from the grass where she sat to eat, and raised the shield towards me.
I lightly punched it with my fist. Nothing. Hit a little harder. Still nothing.
"Apparently, they don't count as weapons, like boots," I said aloud.
"I ordered the same ones for myself. By the way, Uncle told us where we can earn a little extra."
"Really? Are we short on money?" I was surprised — I had just given Akira thirty silver yesterday that I earned on orbs.
"Well, kind of. We still owe Uncle another hundred silver..."
"I still have thirty silver left for my expenses."
"Including those thirty, that's a hundred and thirty silver."
Meanwhile, Rafthalia was stuffing porridge into both cheeks and pretending not to care.
"Okay, and what did he suggest?"
"He advised us to go to the village of Ryut. It'll be easier there. Even if our reputation has reached them, their situation is tougher than in the capital, and they won't refuse help. Even from us."
"I see. When do we leave?"
"I don't know. Rafthalia and I just started raising my level..."
"Let's go in three days then."
Village Ryut — some familiar name. Something was supposed to happen there in the novel?..
Damn, I don't remember.