Chapter 61
"Kururu! I need support!"
"Yes!"
In an ancient cave a short distance from the city of Valman, Rex shouted with a tense expression. Kururu cast a spell on him that enhanced his physical abilities, and a faint bluish light began to glow around his body.
"Take this! My fist! This flurry of blows surpasses even a Martial Artist's!"
After confirming that his physical abilities had clearly improved, Rex loudly declared this to the Blue Devil waiting in front of him, watching them. Then, moving faster than the eye could follow, he tried to leap at it.
"Nope. Do it again."
But Kagami immediately chopped Rex across the back as he sprang forward, forcing him face-down onto the ground with little regard for his protests.
The Blue Devil flinched and took a step back. It couldn't make sense of the sight of a human who'd tried to attack it being smacked face-first into the ground by an ordinary-looking person who'd appeared from the side.
"W-what... are you doing, Master?"
Rex slowly pushed himself up with a groan and glared resentfully at Kagami. Behind him, Kururu was fretting, apparently unsure what was going on.
"Think about why I told you to fight barehanded. There's no point if you use magic to boost your physical abilities, is there? You only gain experience by fighting at a disadvantage to your opponent."
"But, Master, the Blue Devil is Level 93, and I'm Level 91 now. I can still gain experience without fighting at a disadvantage."
"You gain experience for fighting someone stronger, separate from the experience you get from the level difference. Besides, it's better to get used to fighting at a disadvantage now. I'm watching, so I'll help if things get dangerous. Relax and fight. You want to get stronger quickly, don't you?"
At that, Rex reluctantly signaled to Kururu, who dispelled the spell enhancing his physical abilities. Once he confirmed it had worn off, Rex—now dressed in shabby traveler's clothes after removing his usual flashy gear—leaped at the Blue Devil.
The Blue Devil thrust its trident at Rex, but he dodged it by the narrowest margin, the prongs almost brushing his cheek, and landed a punch on its torso.
"Did I get it!?"
Rex turned to look at the Blue Devil, which had been knocked back by his clean hit. At that moment, a spell it cast set his face ablaze.
"Aaaagh! Hot! Hot!"
Rex flailed and writhed so violently that his usual composed demeanor was completely ruined. Kururu hurriedly conjured a ball of water and splashed it over his face, then immediately treated him with healing magic.
"It's stronger than you, so of course you can't take it down in one hit... Don't let your guard down. Be patient and take it down with repeated hit-and-run attacks."
Kagami watched Rex's hair, now singed and frizzled, as he sipped the tea Alice had brought him and murmured this.
Kagami and the others had returned to the ancient cave to complete a newly reissued set of quests from Valman to defeat the monsters in the surrounding area. Kagami had accepted twelve quests that morning, including one to defeat a Blue Devil. Now, as dusk began to fall, he had already taken down monsters one after another and completed every quest except the Blue Devil hunt.
They'd left the Blue Devil quest—the one that offered experience for fighting a higher-level opponent—to Rex and Kururu so the two of them could grow stronger. Kagami was instructing them as they trained.
They had to do it this way for appearances, too. Otherwise, David—who had come along on the pretext of keeping an eye on them while they completed the quests—might become suspicious. But for Rex and Kururu, the arrangement was actually convenient.
"Um... Is it enough for me to just keep healing him like this?"
By continuously casting healing magic on Rex, Kururu was effectively giving him the same automatic recovery effect as Kagami's. This meant that the experience gained from their level difference was divided between Rex and Kururu. But Kururu wouldn't gain the effort-based experience from fighting an opponent stronger than her, while Rex would.
Healing only kept him alive while maintaining his disadvantage in terms of ability. Even though it was assistance, it still counted toward his experience. He got hurt and beaten down, then stayed alive thanks to healing. Back when Kagami was low-level, he had hired priests in town to help him level up this way.
"Well, you'll only get experience from the level difference, but you don't seem to be struggling to grow like Rex is yet, Kururu. You can get stronger little by little like this."
"But... this is no different from when the soldiers in the royal capital helped me get stronger!"
"Well, yeah, I suppose you're right."
Kagami scratched his head, looking somewhat awkward, and answered. He hesitated over whether he ought to put his thoughts into words, then took a sip of tea. Seeing this, David stepped forward.
"Kururu-sama, I believe Kagami-sama is worried about you."
"Worried about me?"
"Unlike Rex-sama, Kururu-sama is a woman. And the Sage's role isn't to fight on the front lines. Like Priests and Mages, Sages are vulnerable to enemy attacks. From what Kagami-sama has said, fighting a stronger opponent is always dangerous, and becoming stronger inevitably involves suffering that can't be avoided."
"But Kagami-san has made it this far as a Villager, a role even more vulnerable to attacks than mine."
Kururu frowned, unconvinced. Kagami looked awkward and muttered, "Well, but, you're a girl... I don't want to make you go through pain or anything scary if I can help it... I mean..." She must have heard some of what he said, because Kururu blushed slightly, pleased that Kagami was concerned for her.
"M-Master, just because she's a girl, you treat her... so differently from me."
"You're a boy."
Rex, his face swollen in several places from trading blows with the Blue Devil, staggered over and patted Kagami on the shoulder. Kagami answered with a beaming smile that said, "Keep at it!"
Truthfully, one reason Kagami didn't want to push Kururu too hard was that she was a woman. But more than that, he thought she wouldn't be able to endure the suffering.
Rex might have had a few impure motives, but he had the resolve, conviction, and ambition to endure it. The proof was right there: even as he grumbled, he was still facing the enemy without hesitation. Kagami wasn't going easy on him because he believed in Rex.
And Kururu probably didn't have that kind of inner drive.
Besides, if she was only Level 45, she didn't have to force herself through a battle like this. As a Sage, there were still easier ways for her to get stronger at this point, so Kagami thought she should use one of those.
"When I started this journey, I was only Level 42. And now... I've only gone up three levels! Just three!"
"Well... if you haven't fought that many battles, that's to be expected. And you only started your journey two months ago, right? I know you want to get stronger quickly, but calm down. It's Rex's turn today, but I've already thought of a way for you to get stronger, too."
"...You promise?"
"Yeah. I promise."
"You'll keep looking after me until I'm Level 200, right?"
"Huh? Oh... y-yeah. I p-promise."
Kagami said this and looked away as hard as he could. Kururu drew closer, fixing him with a suspicious stare, and asked, "Why are you looking away?" But even then, Kagami wouldn't meet her eyes.
Nearby, Rex was getting more and more battered as Kururu's healing stopped. Alice hurried over to bring a potion to his lips. Kururu finally noticed the commotion, and her face went pale at the sight of Rex's condition. "I-I'm sorry!" she cried, then rushed to heal him.
"Ho ho. Your battle instruction is most impressive, but you don't seem to know the first thing about winning a woman's heart."
"Oh, shut it. More importantly, is it really necessary for you to watch us this closely? And you've been handling the preparations for the casino opening like I asked, right? It's the day after tomorrow!"
"Everything is in hand. I've completed it all. In fact, I could say I only came along today because I had free time. Of course, keeping watch is also part of my job, so that is necessary as well."
David laughed with refined amusement, and Kagami sighed, thinking what a crafty fellow he was.
The casino was set to open the day after tomorrow. Ever since David arrived, preparations for the opening had proceeded smoothly by leaps and bounds. He had handled everything so efficiently that Kagami wondered if they might have been in trouble without him.
He'd gathered the supplies and equipment for the casino and checked that everything worked. He'd learned the rules and made sure the staff understood them. He'd arranged the prizes and set the rates, and even planned out the staff's schedules and working hours. He'd taken care of everything.
At this point, all they had to do was leave the bar and tavern operations to Takako and the church to Tina. David had taken over most of the things Kagami should have been handling himself.
"Honestly, I'm grateful. When you first showed up talking about keeping an eye on us, I thought you were trouble. But without you, we'd have been in serious trouble."
"Ho ho, I can't take all the credit. Was it Takako-sama? They were remarkably efficient, and even took the initiative to help carry supplies instead of leaving everything to the staff. The staff trust them deeply... They are truly the very embodiment of a man among men."
"Huh? Takako-chan's a woman."
"What?"
"Hm? I said Takako-chan's a woman. She was wearing a pink martial arts uniform, remember?"
"I beg your pardon, but that is hardly something one could call a woman."
"If Takako-chan were here, you'd definitely be dead, so accept reality already."