Legend

Night time, same day after they had dealt with the queen bee incident. It was late at night, but there was still a stuffy heat peculiar to summer when Rei left the inn.

Normally, it would be dangerous to head out into the city after dark due to all the drunk people who would be rampaging about. However, for Rei, those people weren’t a problem and, above all, he wasn’t feeling sleepy at all.

If Elena had been awake, the two of them might have just spent time talking with each other. It was true that he liked Elena and he somewhat knew that Elena liked him as well as he had been allowed to kiss her on the lips several times.

However, fortunately or unfortunately, it seemed that Elena was mentally exhausted from the day’s events and when Rei went to her room and knocked, there hadn’t been a reply.

With nothing else to do, Rei decided to spend a night out in Exil.

It was close to 9pm. Even though it was summer, the surroundings were already dark. Some places used magic items to light up their surroundings.

The areas the the lights covered consisted mainly of the entertainment district where the bars and brothels were.

In the meantime, the street stalls caught Rei’s eyes.

「Heh, it’s rare to find food stalls still out at night.」

Rei was reminded of the festivals and night markets in modern Japan when he saw the street stall. Takoyaki, okonomiyaki, yakisoba, cotton candy, squid pancakes and so on.

There were also more unusual food stalls like ones that served doner kebabs, but in Rei’s case, there were only basic food stalls in the area he lived.

Some of the more foods that could be served included oden and grilled fish that had been caught from nearby rivers, such as sweetfish, char and yamame trout.

「Welcome. Kid, do you want something to eat?」

The stall owner must have noticed Rei looking over at the stall. A brash looking man in his 40’s called out to Rei.

Rei wasn’t sure how to respond for a moment. The food from the inn had filled him up, the kitchen had been like a war zone because of the amount of food Rei ate, so he didn’t have space for much more.

Fortunately, it seemed that the stall mainly sold light food such as sandwiches and soups, probably to put some food into the stomach after drinking alcohol.

(It is true that drunk people often want to eat ramen. ……Hm? Considering that, I could probably make some money by selling udon here. No, there are probably already stalls like in Gilm which exist for the purpose of serving drunk people.)

Although the thought of udon from the Satisfied Stomach passed through his mind, it was unlikely that people would eat udon noodles here……rather, it was impossible that anyone would eat udon in Exil as no one here even knew about udon. Rei though about that as he ordered a sandwich.

Probably because it was night time, there was no place to sit down and eat at the food stall. Because of that, Rei had no choice but to lean against a wall of a nearby building as he brought a ham and cheese sandwich to his mouth.

The sandwich seemed to contain mustard or something like it. The spicy taste, the mellow cheese and the salty ham blended together in his mouth, the taste making Rei unintentionally take several more bites.

As he ate his sandwich, the watched people walk down the street, illuminated by magic items giving off light.

There was an adventurer wearing leather armour and a thief who wore cloth, focusing on easy of movement over armour. There was a man who seemed to have drank too much as stumbled with an unsteady gait, using his spear as a walking stick.

Aside from adventurers, there were also merchants and residents of Exil. They drank, sang and argued with each other, as if trying to blow away the feeling of the hot weather.

As Rei looked down the street, a hand suddenly reached out from his side. Rei almost grabbed the hand before eventually letting pass after sensing that the owner of the hand had no murderous intentions.

The hand reached in and pulled out a few sandwiches from the bag in Rei’s hand before bringing them to the mouth of its owner.

Although it was summer, she didn’t have any sunburns on her lustrous white arms. Her arms were wrapped in an extremely thin layer of fabric, thin enough that it could be seen through.

Even without looking at her face, Rei could guess who the arm belonged to. After all, she had left such a strong impression that it was impossible to forget her.

That said, he wasn’t entirely sure as the woman wasn’t wearing her signature weapons on her hands.

「Vihera, was it? What are you doing here?」

「Ufufu. I was walking along and enjoying a drink when I saw a familiar kid. Hello, hello.」

Vihera grinned with her aggressively beautiful face as she brought a sandwich to her mouth.

She was just eating a sandwich. Yet, Rei felt it to be strangely sophisticated.

However, that feeling quickly dissipated at the sight of her licking her fingers after eating the sandwich.

「Enjoying a drink……huh. It seems like you have a bloody smell following after you.」

Rei turned to look at Vihera after a light sniff. There was definitely a scent of blood coming from the woman in front of him, mixed into the scent of alcohol and some perfume Vihera might have used.

「Oh? How did you know? You seem to have a good nose. ……Are you a beastman?」

「No, I am 100% human.」

To be exact, he was an artificial human, but he didn’t mention that in his reply.

「Really? You seem to have a very keen sense of smell.」

「Who knows. So, since you have the smell of blood on you, have you been fighting someone?」

Rei asked Vihera, who had a happy smile on her face. However, his hand was ready to take out the Death Scythe from the Misty Ring at any time.

He had only met with her for a few minutes before. Still, that was enough for Rei to understand that the beautiful woman before him had a lust for blood……or rather, she was a battle maniac.

However, Vihera just shrugged her shoulders with a smile. That action caused her large twin hills to shake, drawing the attention of several drunk people walking along the main street. That said, she didn’t seem to care, as if she had become used to the rude stares directed at her from men.

Vihera was one of the three most beautiful women he had seen in his life. If someone like that were to wear translucent clothes, dancers clothes, and expose their skin……adding on that it was night time and there were drunks on the street……

「Hey, girl. Why don’t you play with me instead of that boy? I have plenty of money? ……Hic.」

It was inevitable that someone would call out to her.

It was a man in his late twenties or early thirties with a solid build, just under 2m in height. His eyes were glued to her body and his cheeks were flushed with intoxication as he licked his lips.

As he had come out just to drink, he only had his long sword at his waist. However, it could also be said that the man’s physique in itself was a vicious weapon.

「I don’t like people who are weak and dull like you. Sorry.」

Vihera responded to him bluntly.

Not only did she not want to be disturbed as she talked with Rei, who was someone she had set her sights on, she could also tell the man’s strength at a glance.

The man might have been well built and quite strong. However, although he was drunk, the way he moved his body was clear enough to show that he didn’t have much skill. In other words, he was just a typical power fighter. Vihera also judged the man’s strength to be below her own.

Seeing that, she had quickly lost interest, causing her to reply as such.

However, there was no way the man would remain silent after hearing such words. He was confident in his own strength and although Vihera was beautiful, she didn’t look like someone who could fight. Because of that, the blood rushed to his drunken head.

Unfortunately, Vihera didn’t have her hand and feet weapons equipped at this point in time. If she had, the man might have realised who she was, given the mismatch between her weapons and her clothes.

Because of that, he reached out the woman who was ignoring him as she smiled at the kid beside her……the next moment, he found that the woman was no longer in front of him as his hand stretched out towards Rei for some reason.

Avoiding the man’s arm, Vihera had skilfully moved to the other side of Rei, as if sliding along the ground.

If the man hadn’t been drunk, he would have realised Vihera’s skill from her movements and withdrawn. However, he wasn’t able to tell in his drunken state. Beacause of that, Rei, who appeared to have a close relationship with the beautiful woman from his perspective, became his target as his extended hand turned into a fist.

「Seriously, don’t drag me into this.」

With a sigh, Rei grabbed the outstretched fist with his right hand and jerked it to throw the man off balance before sweeping his legs.

The man had been quite sure of his own strength. Rei and Vihera might not have known it, but the man was a somewhat well known D rank adventurer.

That said, his level of strength couldn’t be compared to Rei’s and his drunkenness meant that he was swept away and landed on his backside like a sack of rice hitting the ground.

「Uooh!」

Rei pushed his foot against the fallen man with a certain amount of force to stop him from moving.

「G-Get off me! D-Damn it! W-What did you do!」

The man tried to get Rei’s leg off him as his face turned red. However, he couldn’t exert much strength from his position and just ended up getting flustered.

Rei looked at the man and gave a small sigh as he turned to the person next to him.

Vihera had intentionally dragged Rei into it despite being able to beat someone at the level of the man with her own strength.

Even so, Rei didn’t voice his complaints as he knew that even if Vihera had dealt with the man herself, he would probably still have been dragged into the matter in the end.

He knew this from the fact that he had been dragged into various matters before due to his appearance of a 15 year old.

「Ah, that’s great. You’re the one I’ve set my eyes on.」

After hearing the words ‘I’ve got my eyes set on’ that Vihera said to Rei, several gazes which had been watching the situation unfold focused on Rei.

The gazes were filled with jealously. Or curiosity. The former were from men while the latter were from women who had heard Vihera’s straightforward words.

After putting a bit more pressure on the man with his leg to knock him out, Rei finally spoke.

「I’m pretty sure you meant a different meaning from what you just said.」

「Well, what do you think? Maybe it’s really true?」

The two were conversing as such when they heard some noise come from the onlookers around them and looked to find the cause.

「Really, it’s just another drunken commotion again. Why do they all become so rowdy in summer.」

「Well, there’s no use saying it now. There, the guy who’s knocked out over there. You go pick him up. Yes, yes, move along everyone. There’s no more issue here.」

Two people who seemed to be guards approached Rei and Vihera with a sigh as they called to the onlookers to move along before the two of them picked up the fallen man.

「Are we okay?」

Rei called out the the guards without thinking as they went to carry the man away, completely ignoring him and Vihera.

He had thought they would at least be questioned if not taken away. However, the guards were only carrying away the unconscious man.

「Oh, don’t worry about it. We heard the situation from the sandwich stall owner over there. We can also usually tell the situation just by looking.」

The guard smiled as he tried to shrug his shoulders, but was unable to do so due to body of the man getting in the way.

Of course, if this had happened during the day, they might have questioned Rei. But, right now, it was night time and similar cases, if not a dozen more, would happen every night.

Because of that, it was more accurate to say that with the number of cases like this, they didn’t have the time to question Rei.

The guards left with the man and the onlookers dispersed after seeing the commotion had ended.

……Some men had been enticed by Vihera sensual appearance, but after seeing what had happened, they lost all desire to cause a fuss and left.

As they all left, Vihera whispered into Rei’s ear.

「Hey, do you want to try something nice with this sister?」