The Arachne Queen's Nest
What was that smell?
Shrimp? Crab? The air throbbed with the scent of roasting shellfish.
Ever since I had driven my Flame Sword into the Arachne Queen's skull, the mana-charged fire had eaten through her entire body. I pulled the blade free and stepped back, watching her burn to the end.
"Ugh..."
A spider the size of a house, writhing as the flames consumed it, flipping itself over and twitching all eight of its legs — it was not a pleasant thing to watch. And then there was the smell. I didn't want to admit it, but it was honestly rich, savory, and mouthwatering. Still, I had no desire whatsoever to actually eat any of it. If anything, I had a feeling I would think of roasted Arachne Queen every time I ate shrimp from now on. Maybe I should swear off shellfish for a while...
"Hang on a second. I'll get you down."
Once I had confirmed that the Arachne Queen's life was well and truly snuffed out, I climbed the sticky web-coated wall to rescue Silphy, who was bound in silk and hanging upside down from the ceiling. She had been strung up so completely inverted that her short skirt had flipped all the way over, leaving her in quite a state. My eyes kept drifting to those bare white legs and her underwear, but I did my best to sound perfectly casual.
"Watch out. You're going to drop all of a sudden."
"Okaaay... I'm fine! Please cut me down!"
I sliced through the webbing binding her legs and feet with the Flame Sword, taking extra care with my mana control so she wouldn't be burned. The instant the silk gave way, Silphy spun a full circle in midair and landed lightly on the ground.
"Hey! Get me down too! Hey!"
Nigel shouted at me the moment he saw it. Half-cocooned and swinging back and forth like a pendulum, he made for a faintly entertaining picture. Even in a situation like this, the guy still didn't know his place. Maybe I'll mess with him a little.
"Aigoo, my back's killing me. I can't even move!"
"A-are you all right? Didn't you overdo it?"
I clutched my lower back and dropped onto the floor, and Silphy came scurrying over to prop me up. In truth, I was perfectly fine. If anything, my back was in better shape than it had ever been. I just wasn't in the mood to cut Nigel out of that cocoon. The things he'd said still made my blood boil every time I thought about them.
"I think I'll be fine if I rest a bit. Let's take a short break before we go."
"Ah, okay! Should I start a fire?"
"Sure. Let's take it slow."
I lay back with my arms folded behind my head and enjoyed the view of Nigel dangling from the ceiling, swaying gently to and fro.
"LET! ME! DOOOOWN! HEEEEEY!"
Nigel's desperate cries echoed through the Arachne Queen's Nest again and again.
Hero Cain spent every hour of every day seething with rage.
He had realized that the title of Hero was no convenient blank check — it was a shackle of fate, forcing him to fight the Demon King whether he wanted to or not. After he had first suffered that body-rending agony in front of the Saintess, Cain had been put through the same pain several times more. It had gone beyond merely speaking aloud his refusal to subjugate the Demon King. Even thinking it was no longer permitted. If the thought so much as flickered through his mind unbidden — The Demon King? What's that got to do with me? — a shock like a bolt of lightning would slam through him. After a few rounds of that particular torment, Cain had started to hate the Demon King too.
"That Demon King bastard... I'm gonna kill him... that piece of shit... and the bastards who made me a Hero, too..."
Inside the room provided for the Hero beside the Central Church, Cain clenched his fists and trembled. Then the door opened quietly, and a middle-aged man in a bishop's vestments stepped inside.
"The hell? I told you not to come into my room without permission."
Cain glared at the man as he spoke. The man in bishop's robes paid him no mind at all, and kept coming toward him at an unhurried pace.
"You... who the hell are you?"
Cain asked. The man was wearing a bishop's clothes, but Cain didn't know him. This was not the bishop of the Castia Diocese he was used to seeing — it was someone else entirely.
"I am Xavier, Bishop of the Church of Freya. I have come a long way for the honor of beholding the Hero's face."
"Get lost."
Cain didn't hesitate for so much as a second. Churches, Saintesses, bishops — he was sick of the lot of them. They all felt like the ones who had clamped this Hero's shackle around his neck.
"Hero Cain."
Bishop Xavier did not withdraw. He spoke Cain's name in a low voice. Something felt wrong. The room seemed to be growing darker by the moment. A seething aura of black mana began to rise from Bishop Xavier's body, coiling and spreading. He extended his right hand, and a staff of grotesque shape emerged from a rift in the air.
Sensing that this was no ordinary visit, Hero Cain drew his sword at once. The bishop — no, Xavier, the Lord of Deceit — raised the staff and leveled it straight at Cain. Dark mana gathered at its tip, and he opened his mouth.
Having successfully completed the subjugation of the Arachne Queen's Nest, we were on our way back to Kubel.
Nigel, who had been hanging upside down in a half-cocoon and thrashing for all he was worth, had eventually been cut down. I had lain by the campfire with my arms behind my head and watched the full arc of his feelings play out, and it had been genuinely fascinating. At first he had poured rage on me and thrown a tantrum to be released. Then he had tried to negotiate, promising to write us a glowing evaluation. When that didn't work, he had apologized with sudden, careful manners for what had happened earlier. And at the end, he had bawled like a child. I watched the entire performance, decided I wasn't going to leave him hanging for the rest of his life, and felt just sorry enough to let him down.
Now he was trudging ahead of us with his head hung low, muttering something in a voice too small to hear.
"Nigel. You cursing me out right now?"
"N-no, I'm not."
Whatever had become of that swaggering attitude from before, he jumped every time I so much as spoke to him. The manners-injection treatment worked like a charm. Looking at this guy, I was starting to have serious doubts about the whole adventurer ranking system. Mireia was an exception — she was famous for strength so far off the charts it barely counted. But the fact that someone like Nigel was walking around with a Silver Rank badge already said there was something wrong with the system.
Once we arrived in Kubel, we reported the completion to the guild. Nigel had to be the one to do it. All he had contributed to this request was complaining and getting wrapped in a cocoon, but there was no way around it. On paper, he was our party's leader.
Silphy and I waited in the back until the report was finished, then collected our share of the request reward from Nigel. The split was two parts for Nigel and one each for Silphy and me. Another problem born of the fact that, on paper, Nigel was the highest-ranked adventurer among us. Even divided that way, it was still far more money than a Bronze-rank request would have paid. All the same, I couldn't shake the feeling that it was wrong for this guy — who had done absolutely nothing — to walk away with the biggest cut.
"Nigel. If you've got a conscience, we split it evenly."
"Wh-what?! This is my legal share!"
"You hung upside down from a ceiling, did nothing, and cried your eyes out, and you're taking the most money? That doesn't sit right."
"No! I absolutely won't give it up!"
"Fine, have it your way. Then I'll just have to do my very best to spread the story of how you hung from the ceiling in the Arachne nest, did nothing, and blubbered and begged to be saved."
"Hmph. Who's going to believe that?"
Nigel snorted and looked at me. Now that he was out of danger, he was sliding right back into that punchable attitude from the start.
"I don't know. I happen to know two receptionists here. I'll start with them, then I'll tell every other adventurer I see. I'll go to the tavern every day and tell everyone in there too. Silphy can serve as a witness. Nobody will believe it, you say? Believe it or don't — I'll just be telling the truth."
"Y-you bastard..."
Nigel was visibly rattled.
"I'll tell people today, and I'll tell them tomorrow, and I'll tell them in the next city over. Everyone I meet is going to hear the delicious tale of how Silver-rank adventurer Nigel hung from a ceiling and bawled at a Bronze adventurer to save him. I'll even get a bard to write a song about it. You think they won't believe me? Doesn't matter. I'll just keep talking. I'll talk about it here, I'll talk about it there. I'll tell the neighborhood kids. And Silphy will back me up as a witness. She saw you blubbering and begging for your life, clear as day."
"S-stop..."
I did not stop. The important thing with this kind of work was planting the anxiety. It didn't matter how many people would actually believe the rumor if I spread it. As long as I could grow the fear in Nigel's head — What if this really gets out, and I can never show my face again? — he would have no choice but to fold. Besides, the part where he had ugly-cried and begged for his life was entirely true.
"I'll tell other races too. If I run into a demon, I'll tell the demon. Silver-rank adventurer Nigel hung upside down in the Arachne nest and bawled at a Bronze adventurer to save him. I should write a book about it later. I'll add it to my lifetime repertoire of funny stories and milk it for years."
"S-stop! Fine! I get it! I'll give it to you, okay?!"
In the end, Nigel declared his surrender. And that was how we came to split the reward in perfectly equal shares.