The day of the escort mission arrived somewhat slower than expected. Though, that gave me more than enough time to recover my skills while also practicing my swordsmanship and new fighting techniques. Since coming to this world, I have never once been in a fight and so I had no way of knowing how to use a lot of my skills which mainly seemed to revolve around my defense and speed. Things like the [Enhancement] and [Accelerated Casting] skills were the ones I wanted to test out the most right now but I had no choice but to be patient.
Just as I had started to feel bored and sighed, I heard the sound of hooves approaching and soon, a huge blue and gold carriage drawn by two beautiful white horses arrived and stopped in front of me only inches away. The carriage was driven by an unordinary looking coachman who wore plain stable attire and a hat. He had long coconut brown hair that messily covered his eyes and face in a way that made it almost impossible to identify him. He called out that the carriage had reached the destination at the entrance of the mountain and then following his words, a man dressed in silver armour exited the carriage and it didn't take long for him to notice me.
"You there! You're in the way."
' Ah.. don't tell me, is he 'that type' of character?'
The armoured man quickly walked up to me, his steps heavy with each movement weighted down by the armour. He stopped right in front of me and bent down, his voice reeking of disgust.
" Didn't you hear me say to move? Are you deaf? This is why lowly commoners–"
Luckily, the man was cut off by a beautiful voice. A cute and small child bolted out of the carriage and following behind was a gorgeous woman with thick wavy black hair and Pink eyes. She had fair skin that was tinged with a tint of red as she chased after the child clumsily and once she caught him and scooped him up, she sighed and then spoke in a stern voice, not at all matching her clumsy, cute appearance that we just saw.
"Therion, that's more than enough out of you. Cease this unseemly behaviour at once!"
' Ah, so this oaf's name is Therion, I'll remember that. '
The knight tried to protest but he was met with an icy glare from the woman and she spoke again saying " What? Are you going to disobey a direct order from your master? Is your pride more important than your life?"
The knight Therion jolted back slightly and then bowed on one knee, he removed his helmet to reveal a rather handsome man with short blonde hair and Green eyes, he bowed his head and apologized, all traces of his previous stubbornness seemingly disappearing and what replaced it was respect and a strange intense sense of guilt.
' Wow, she really tamed him quite easily. I'm impressed. '
After that, we all introduced ourselves. It turned out that the woman was named Ameilia Van Girshling and she's the woman I was tasked with escorting. The king's second wife. The cute boy who had black hair and heterochromia eyes, one being pink and the other being blue like an azure jewel. His name was Mason.
While we chatted for a bit, I decided to take them somewhere they could rest for a bit. The horses got to rest and eat and while everyone ate and conversed, I came to the conclusion that the woman in front of me seemed to be truly kind and elegant. Everything she did and said seemed to be done flawlessly from her posture to the way she spoke.
' It's a shame. Someone who so effortlessly embodies the essence of a proper Queen, being outcasted by all those around her. I guess unfair power struggles exist in every world. '
Because my job was to escort and protect her highness it was decided that I would Ride in the carriage along with them and the knight instead of using a rented horse. If you're wondering why I didn't just use my teleportation skill, it's because I can only teleport to places I have been. Maybe one day in the future I will be able to teleport anywhere but regardless of if that'll ever be possible or not, the point is that I simply can't do it yet. We saved more than enough time using the skill though. I wasn't slacking off these past few days. After finally arriving at the mountain, I spent the entire day travelling and made my way to a cave nearing the top of the mountain.
That's why all I needed to do was teleport us to that location, doing so saved us a full day's worth of energy and time of course. Once we got to the cave we had expected to run into creatures but none attacked us at all.
'Wow.. I can't believe that there's no monsters in a cave like this. It's strange. Was an Escort even necessary at this point?'
[ Notice ]
[ It's not that there are no monsters.]
' Huh? So there are monsters?'
If you're wondering why I couldn't tell, let's just say that there was way too much mana leaking from all directions of the cave, pinpointing exactly where and why it was coming from was hard especially when the very cave itself had its own mana.
[There are approximately 10,000 monsters in this cave alone, not including the many others that you passed from just the entrance alone.]
Hearing Azeroth's words almost caused me to have a physical reaction from shock but I managed to keep my calm.
' Then why haven't we seen any? '
[ That's because of you, master. Your skill "@$!/0" is actively preventing monsters from approaching you. The weaker ones have already ran away and/or hid by the time you approached where they should be. Even now more than half of the creatures are hiding underground or in the water. ]
'Ah, so that's why the mana is leaking from all over, it's from the creatures not properly preventing their mana from leaking.'
[ That's correct. If you would like, I can deactivate the skill—]
' No need. Though I'm more than willing to fight, the risks of these three getting hurt isn't something I would like to take lightly. '
Breaking me out of my thoughts and ending the conversation early with Azeroth was Mason who had grabbed onto my coat with his tiny hand. I had been subconsciously patting his head and even held him as he took a short nap on my lap. I had been so absorbed with talking to azeroth and watching the surroundings that I didn't notice until he started to stir awake just now. I looked down at him and smiled.
"I'm sorry, it seems my son has taken quite a liking to you.. He usually doesn't behave this way."
I simply shook my head and let Mason take his time to wake up fully.
' It's no bother to me at all, he's an adorable child. "
Her highness chuckled lightly and smiled, clearly relieved and happy to hear praise about her son but Therion clearly was offended because he clicked his tongue and just as he was about to say something snarky, mason tugged on my hood pulling it off.
Surprisingly, what followed after was silence as the three gave pretty uncomfortable stares. Just as I was about to speak though, I felt a small hand grab one of my ears.
"Woah, so pretty, and you have really weird ears!"
After he said those words, therion coughed and the Queen, clearly flustered, apologized and grabbed her son.
" I'm so sorry! I didn't know that you were–"
I just shook my head and swayed my hand dismissively.
"It's fine. Though, I think your son may be the first one who has called me pretty to my face. It's surprisingly nice to hear. ''
Jokes aside, I'm starting to get used to the reactions. So far, anyone who has seen an elf reacts in 1 of 3 ways. Disgust, Greed, or in some cases.. Fear. This was the second time however, that someone didn't react as any of those and reacted somewhat politely. All this tells me is that making my dreams become reality will take a bit more time and effort, but nothing that I didn't half-expect.
[Notice]
[Master, please be on alert.]
Immediately after Azeroth spoke I instinctively used the skill [Defensive Shield], a skill I gained after analysing the skill Nyx had used to shield against my rampaging aura before.
The skill was being used for the first time but I was able to use it in an instant to build a sturdy translucent shield around the carriage. Since Azeroth had suddenly spoken for the first time without having been spoken to first, I was on edge. I didn't have time to even respond to the Queen when she asked what was wrong, clearly startled by my sudden actions. To her, I had just been smiling and chatting with her barely 10 seconds ago and now I had a shield around the carriage that I reinforced 3 times. Just when I sighed in relief and was about to ask Azeroth why they had suddenly warned me to be alert, The ceiling above the exit of the cave burst just as the carriage exited. Above us appeared a huge greyish-pastel purple spider. It moved so fast that if I were human and happened to blink, not only would I have missed it, but I and everyone else accompanying me would have been killed. Even with time moving significantly slower for me, the spider was so fast that even I almost missed it.
"Fufufu~ I'm free!"
The spider spoke, its massive body blocking the path behind it, preventing us from moving. The force and speed from it bursting out from somewhere deep within the cave caused massive rocks and debris to block our vision. When the smoke finally cleared, The spider launched an attack on the carriage and immediately shattered the shield, despite it being reinforced 3 times it got shattered like a cold glass that had hot water poured over it.
"What's this? More pests have come to play with me??"
Now that I could see the creature that this cocky yet playful voice belonged to, I saw something shocking. A huge steel body belonging to a spider monster, and the torso of a beautiful young woman with medium-length wavy burgundy hair and two long ponytails. She broke through my barriers with no effort whatsoever as if she had blindly stepped on an ant-hill. The girl had a crazed look in her eyes as if she were a cat eyeing its prey right before pouncing. For the first time, I felt truly unsettled.
[ Notice ]
[ Analysis complete: These two appear to be demon lord candidates. ]
' Wait… two– '
Suddenly, I felt an unbelievably heavy weight followed by two shining ruby coloured eyes.
" Sis wait… "
By the time I sensed the second monster he was already in front of me, unlike his sister, he didn't have a human torso so he looked like a huge blueish-grey spider with pale purple markings near his beady red eyes and he was significantly smaller than his sister, only slightly bigger than my head.
" This one.. Smells different. "
"!"
With a quick downward swing followed by two more swings in the shape of an x, Therion swung at the spider and barely missed it as the larger spider quickly wrapped the smaller one in webbing and pulled it away.
" That's not very nice– "
The smaller spider spoke as he brushed the webbing off of him and with no more than a glare, therion fell down and so did the queen and her son, leaving only me standing.
' They're just unconscious.. Luckily. '
" What was that.. And who are you? "
I quickly picked up the knight and placed him back inside of the carriage, noticing that even the horses had fallen asleep. I sighed, not looking away from the two monsters in front of me for a second. To my surprise neither of them even seemed to mind as they simply waited and the small spider responded with a carefree attitude.
" Ah that, it's just predator haki. "
[ Notice ]
[ The skill: Predator Haki is the lowest form of haki. Capable of causing weak creatures to become temporarily stunned or in extreme cases, lose consciousness. It affects every creature within a 30 meter range indiscriminately. ]
" Don't worry, just think of it as [ Intimidation ] but a lot stronger. I suppose that means we were right about you.. Seeing as how you're not affected by it. "
The bigger spider with a humanoid torso nodded with a short sly chuckle.
" Kekeke.. You must be quite strong. Though, we knew that already. Afterall.. You're the one who helped us out of that annoying cave! "
I couldn't help but tilt my head at her words. I definitely didn't help them, I had only just met them so I couldn't have helped. Seeing my confusion and somehow amused, the woman spoke again and rested her cheek gently against her hand as she spoke with a bored expression.
" Don't tell me you don't understand~ That aura of yours.. And the sweet sweet smell coming from you too.. You led us here. "
"Not just us–"
The smaller spider cut in with an almost proud sounding tone as if he were bragging about something.
" There were tons of other strong creatures that tried to get here but they're gone now~ hehe. "
Looking at the two spiders and seeing how they weren't being hostile, I sighed again and nodded.
' So, the weak creatures hid but the stronger ones tried gunning towards the source of mana but ended up dying..? '
[ That seems to be the sum of it. Both, the creatures that were hiding in fear as well as the ones who were attracted to your presence have been slain. ]
' I see… '
" Listen… I want you to leave these people alone. "
I spoke sternly with a serious expression on my face. However, despite how I looked, I was quite nervous since I didn't know if it would work.
[ Master, I don't know what you are thinking but if you make these two hostile towards you I can't guarantee your survival. In fact, you have less than a 3% chance to defeat them. ]
' Oh hush Azeroth.. try and have a little faith. '
In response to my words, the two spiders went silent while staring at me. The tension was so thick that I felt like it would choke me if I let my guard down at all. I kept a straight face while continuing to speak.
" You've gotten to have tons of fun hunting already and even got out of the cave thanks to me. So it's only fair that you don't cause trouble for me. If you understand then step aside. "
' Though, I didn't exactly help you out because I wanted to… '
I took their stunned silence as an answer and began to turn around and walk towards the carriage. However, the moment I turned around and took a step I got stopped by the woman who held the smaller spider in her arms. It was only now that I truly noticed how tall she was. I may not be the tallest but I'm not so short that many people can look down on me the way that she does so easily. My eyes came face to face with the smaller spider and he spoke with a cheerful voice.
" Nope~ "
He moved closer, inches away from my face but I didn't move nor did I avert my gaze. His small beady ruby coloured eyes seemed to glow a bit as he spoke.
"You're right. We got out because of you, and we got to fight a lot of monsters, but we won't leave."
' Tsk, I guess it didn't work. '
After an intense staredown and an exchange, the two spiders made a ' deal ' with me. " Fight us and win. If you do, we won't get in the way again." Which I found out would only be the case because spider monsters fight to the death. Aka "never get in the way again" meant that they'd be dead…obviously. However, I somehow managed to bluff my way out of a fight with them.. fighting one would be nearly impossible right now let alone fighting both of them at once while also trying to protect others. Luckily, ny bluff worked out and in the end, I gained two new " followers" as they called themselves.
Sigh
' I guess I'm in no position to be picky.. I'm just glad everything worked out well. '
[ Indeed, thanks to your quick thinking among other things… It seems that fate has moved in your favour. Would you like to name the two creatures? ]
' Not yet. I don't want to risk naming them and going unconscious. I have a mission to do so for the time being I'll just focus on the mission. How long until we get to our destination? '
[ Approximately 3 days on foot. However, I recommend using your skills more often master. ]
' My…skills? '
" AH- "
I suddenly remembered that I had gained a bunch of new skills and while I did read their descriptions, I haven't exactly used any of them since waking up.
However, my sudden outburst caused the two spiders to jump in surprise.
" master? Is something wrong? "
The taller female spider spoke with a slightly worried expression. Her demeanor was completely different from her usual silent and scary one.
' She looks cuter this way. '
' W- wait- now's not the time for these kinds of thoughts. '
Sigh
" Heh, did you change your mind and decide that you want to fight us? "
I shook my head and sighed. Honestly, I just met these two and I can already pretty much understand their personalities perfectly. To expect this one to make sense would be foolish on my part.
No, drop it already. I merely had a thought about something I had forgotten.
' Hmm… in the game… the character's stats were visible to the player. Since I never played games before or outside of that one.. I'm not sure if that's very common knowledge but it was a lot more convenient than this reality.. there's no status window displaying my abilities and my appraisal skill only works on other people. When I look at others and appraise their information, rather than a single window popping up with info, I see a bunch of different information appearing in the form of numbers and charts. Among other things. For example…'
Looking at the tall half humanoid spider and using my skill showed me that her stats were very high.
' First, the two bars… The first thing I typically notice are these two horizontal bars, one shines a bright violet colour and the other shines a pretty sky blue colour. Thanks to this, it wasn't hard to tell which were which, the violet one stands for the users life/health, the longer the bar, the harder they'd be to kill. And the blue bar is their mana. Similarly to the violet bar, the blue mana bar shows how much mana they have and currently both siblings have very good stats. The next thing I see are the numbers. There's so many that it kinda makes me dizzy. Apparently these numbers are a rough estimate of their power. The more ridiculous the numbers the stronger they are. However, these numbers are normal. They're in binary code. Lots of 0's and 1's. If I had to compare This one to Lanceil.. the last time I saw him his stats were considerably lower than hers and her stats seem lower than the smaller spiders. Which is surprising to me. I'd have expected the stronger one to be the one who managed to gain half of a body. I can also see their stats as well as short descriptions of them. For example, Both have a skill called ' Cannibal ' and ' Sticky Thread ' I could go into the details of these skills now but I honestly rather not. '
" Ah- Hm? "
Noticing my gaze, the tall spider looked at me and to my surprise she seemed to have trouble holding her gaze.
' If I didn't know any better I'd seriously think that she was blushing or something… '
I shook my head and continued walking. Oh, and in case you're wondering about the carriage.. It's fine. My shields may have broken but they did their job of protecting so no one or nothing got hurt. Though.. they (Therion) may have started a bit of a fuss after waking up… but luckily after using a bit of stern discipline… Everyone quickly got along and behaved.
For the rest of the journey, nothing of interest happened. We travelled and eventually made it to our destination. Mason— ahem… I mean the young prince was more than a bit upset about our departure and surprisingly the queen also seemed quite unhappy about it. That's why, after a bit of compromising, I managed to make both of them happy by promising to visit them again another day and that I'd invite them to my home. Therion tried picking another fight but it turns out that he too wanted an invitation to my home. I told him I'd allow it if he fixed that crappy attitude of his.
' seriously, i thought he'd explode with how that vain in his head and neck seems to bulge '
Kek
[ Master, aren't you going to stay? Are you really leaving now? ]
' I wanted to stay.. That's true. However, I finished my quest and got the Queen and her Son to their destination safely. Whatever happens from here technically doesn't concern me… besides, I have to go back to the guild and show them that I've completed the quest so that I can get another one. The goal here is to grow my name in the guild quickly, and I won't do that if I stay behind on every mission I do. '
As for these two….
My gaze shifted towards the two spiders and I felt like I could physically see the trouble it would cause if I suddenly brought them to the guild with me. I shook my head and massaged my temples. Though, with my pain nullification, would prevent me from feeling it even if I did actually have a headache.
' Now that I think about it.. it's hard to say if that's a good or bad thing.. I mean, not feeling pain sounds good but if I can't feel pain how would I know if something is wrong? '
[ Notice ]
[ I believe you're forgetting that you have me to alert you if something is wrong. More than that, if your body were to receive too much damage it would immediately revert back to your base form. There's not much that would be able to easily reduce you to such a state though, unless someone managed to deal a large amount of damage on you at once then you would be fine. With your regenerative abilities as well as your high poison resistances, such things should rarely concern you. ]
' Hah? Has your personality always been so humble and modest? '
I responded to Azeroth's pride filled words with a bit of snarky sarcasm and I only got a " hmph " in response followed by silence. So it goes, I decided to walk a bit to enjoy the scenery of the new world as well as 'level up' a bit by defeating small monsters like snakes and such. After a few hours of that I decided I had dilly-dallied enough and teleported to the guild. After showing my ' token' (in this case, a letter written from the queen thanking me and the guild for getting her and her son and knight to the destination safely.) my quest was completed and I received money and also I could have sworn I felt myself actually grow a bit stronger. Honestly, this world is still a bit strange to me but it really is hard to get used to.
' One minute I'm reminded that this has become my reality. No longer a fictional world inside of a video game but rather, it's real life… and the next minute I can't help but think things like "this is a video game world afterall" I wonder when I'll fully grow used to the ways of this world and if I'll ever be able to forget its origins and fully immerse myself in this new reality of mine… I hope so. '
" Ah, You three can come out now. "
As if waiting, the three hiding inside of my shadow came out in a hurry. Soon, the small room only made to house me felt crowded as Eos, and the spider siblings moved about inside of my room.
"Enough fooling around. Sit still, the room is small so it's bound to be uncomfortable if you pace around like that, especially you, since you're twice my size. "
I spoke looking at the half humanoid spider woman. After I spoke, Eos chuckled as if amused and sat down on the bed beside me, crossing her legs elegantly and staring at the two new guests. Honestly, sitting next to her made me a bit uncomfortable even now.
Afterall, yeah, she's from me, and technically and literally me… however, she's starting to develop a personality of her own and an aura of her own and despite knowing that she's my clone she looks and feels like a very beautiful, powerful woman. Not even going to mention the fact that everything she does seems to almost literally ooze some kind of seductive power, I can't tell if she's doing it on purpose but regardless, sitting right next to me had to have been on purpose. Since she's my clone she definitely knows how I feel at least to an extent.
'Gaaah, whatever. I have more important things to do than to worry about that!'
" Yu two, I've decided that if you're going to be following me then you will be my people and my people all receive names from me. Seeing as how the two of you haven't once referred to eachother by name, nor did you introduce yourselves with one at any time till now.. I'm sure that neither of you have one. If you have any complaints about me naming you then you should speak up now. "
The two siblings stared at me and the room became so silent that I could clearly hear Eos let out an amused chuckle under her breath.
' That brat! '
Suddenly I heard a thud and my attention focused back on the siblings, both of them were now sitting.. kneeling in front of me.
" If you wish to name us, we would gladly accept such an honour. "
The girl spoke with such a serious tone that it made me feel a bit embarrassed, it seemed almost like Lanceil and his overly serious and loyal manner… surprisingly her brother also spoke seriously which put me more at edge.
" To be allowed to become part of your family would be an honour so great even our lives wouldn't be enough to express our feelings. "
He said, his cheerful and teasing tone completely removed from his voice and it was now filled with serious loyalty.
'Seriously?! What's the big idea here— I haven't even named them yet… S-should I maybe just not—'
[ Notice]
[ Absolutely not. If you were to suddenly backtrack on your words after already announcing that you'd name them, they'd most definitely become very depressed and maybe even hostile. ]
Sigh
' Figures… Why did I even bother asking…. '
" Settle down and listen. From now on, you will be named Claire and your younger brother will be named Yuta, you are now Claire and Yuta Verdanthel. So long as you bear those names, you will be my family and friends. That means I will do my best to protect you as such. That also means that anything you do will affect me as we share a family name, so don't you even think of causing trouble if you know what's good for you. "
I said that because I felt like leaving these two alone would result in a lot of troublesome problems arising. However, they seemed to understand. I think. Honestly, the last thing I saw before fainting were the two siblings glowing and also, for some reason I saw eos' chest and face. It seemed that naming these two took everything out of me. Luckily I already completed my mission, got paid and requested a week off. I ended up sleeping for over 4 days.