Companion Reroll
"Haaah... This is driving me insane. Completely insane."
Jun let out a heavy sigh and tipped back the beer in his hand, guzzling it down in an attempt to soothe the frustration churning in his gut.
Even after draining more than half of a mug the size of his own head, the tightness in his chest refused to ease.
Of course it wouldn't.
Three months.
It had already been three months since Jun returned from his first expedition, and his permanent party members still numbered exactly zero. The result was an endless, soul-crushing cycle of companion rerolls.
Maybe I should've just held on to those two...
After coming back from that first expedition, Jun's original party had fallen apart completely.
Dennis, Susan, and Amber had all quit adventuring.
Dennis had no choice — the Solo King had drained his life force to the absolute limit and taken his right arm with it. Even if he'd wanted to continue, he couldn't.
Susan and Amber were different. Physically, they could have kept going as long as they wanted. What drove them out wasn't a missing limb — it was the psychological damage.
Even so, Jun hadn't tried to stop them.
Adventuring was a profession where you could die at any moment. He figured no one had the right to talk someone else into staying if they wanted out.
Three months later, he was starting to regret that decision — just a little.
Compared to every party member he'd met since, those two had been genuinely good.
"Heh heh heh. So this latest batch was a bust too?"
Tats, whom Jun had run into for the first time in a while by pure chance, grinned as he asked.
Jun nodded and flagged down a passing waitress for a refill.
"Don't even get me started."
His fifth and most recent party had been, personally, the best of the lot so far.
The second daughter of a noble house, a graduate of the Imperial Academy's knight division, had outstanding sword-and-shield technique.
The female mage who'd taken up labyrinth exploration to fund her research wielded flame magic of terrifying power.
And the elven archer, brought to the Britia Empire under the Church's multi-species harmony policy, had proven versatile across archery, spirit arts, tracking, and more.
On top of all that, every one of them had the kind of beauty and figure that matched Jun's tastes perfectly. The moment he first met them, he'd thought the miserable reroll cycle was finally over.
Then, the second they finished the expedition and returned, Jun kicked every last one of them out of the party without a second of hesitation.
"Why the hell? You said you really liked them."
"They never stopped fighting. And of course all three of them had massive egos, so if we hadn't gotten out through a Divine Statue, something bad — really bad — would have happened."
The three women's pride contests had been that severe. If Jun hadn't constantly mediated, blades would absolutely have been drawn.
For reference, the Divine Statues Jun mentioned were sculptures of the Bright God installed throughout the labyrinths — provisions the Bright God had placed for adventurers, packed with useful functions. One of those was a warp function: it could take you out of the labyrinth, but not to the next floor or the previous one.
"That bad, huh. So what were they even fighting about?"
"..."
"Yeah, no need to ask. Possessiveness over you, right? Being too damn good-looking is your crime. Just grit your teeth and endure it. It's not like you can suddenly become ugly now."
"This is going to sound incredibly obnoxious, but... I kind of wish I could be a little less attractive."
"You're right — that does sound incredibly obnoxious. But... I'll let it slide this once. After everything you've been through."
Tats clicked his tongue in sympathy and cast his mind back over the disasters his friend had endured.
"The second party was the attempted rape, right?"
"Yeah. They barged into my tent at night and tried to jump me."
"And the third was the kidnapping attempt?"
"No — the third was also an attempted rape. They slipped an aphrodisiac into my food. Didn't work, thanks to the Blessing of Health. The fourth party was the kidnapping attempt."
"You said they tried to snatch you at the after-party celebrating a successful expedition?"
"Yep. And they dragged other adventurers into it — a full-on planned operation."
Of course, kidnapping someone whose specialty was escape was never going to work.
But among the adventurers involved was a high-ranking one — not quite a Ranker, but right below that tier — so the guild had no choice but to explode into chaos.
"I heard Carol and the Guildmaster went completely nuclear."
"You should count yourself lucky you were mid-expedition at the time. Those two were terrifying."
Starting the day after Jun's kidnapping incident, Carol had used every means at her disposal to root out every shady adventurer she could find and throw them in prison. The Guildmaster, under the pretext of "helping with mental training," had personally beaten nearly every adventurer in the place half to death at least once.
It wasn't until the major clans and the strongest parties banded together and filed formal complaints that the two of them finally dialed it back.
"...Being too good-looking really is a problem."
"Agreed. Never thought I'd live to experience stuff like that."
Jun tilted his beer mug in agreement with Tats, then shot a sidelong glance at the angel who had made him this unfairly attractive in the first place.
"Hic!"
Had she felt his gaze?
The angel, who had been happily sharing snacks with the divine beast, gave a little start.
"Fort, what do you think? Hmm?"
Poke, poke.
Amused by how adorable she looked, Jun jabbed his fingers into the angel's sides.
"Ahn. Aaahn. Stop iiit. Nom nom."
Fortuna twisted and squirmed, putting on a full display of protest — without ever once stopping her snack consumption.
"Ugh, if you keep eating like that you're going to turn into a little pig. You too, Dohwa. Pretending you weren't eating now won't save you."
"Nuh-uh! Fort doesn't get fat no matter how much she eats!"
"This humble one is the same, my lord. A-and I was most certainly not pretending I hadn't been eating."
"Nope. You're both going to be pigs any second. Look at the evidence — you're both all soft and squishy."
"Nyaaah~! Don't poke me!"
"That is not fat, my lord!"
Jun poked and prodded Fortuna and Dohwa all over with both index fingers.
A wonderfully soft sensation met his fingertips.
It was an addictive feeling — but even more addictive was the way the angel and the divine beast swatted and nipped at his fingers like a pair of cats.
God, they're so cute I could die.
Watching his two wives like that, the frustration that even beer couldn't touch finally blew open and drained away clean.
For Jun, his two wives were as good as a cure-all for every ailment under the sun.
"Hey. Cut it out. It's gross to watch."
Tats said it with a look of genuine torment on his face — the expression of a man debating whether he needed to report this guy to the authorities.
This is so unfair.
When Fortuna and Dohwa transformed into Mini-Mini Mode, their appearances shifted younger as well as smaller — presumably for the sake of proportional balance.
Before the coming-of-age ceremony, Jun had still been a kid himself, so it hadn't been an issue. Now that he was past it, even the mildest affectionate contact with his two wives in Mini-Mini Mode earned him the kind of stares usually reserved for dangerous predators.
Since no one around them knew about the two wives' human forms, he had no choice but to grit his teeth and endure it. His patience, however, was rapidly approaching its limit.
Should I just show them the human forms and be done with it?
The thought flashed through his mind out of pure irritation, but Jun immediately shook his head and erased it.
Spirits had relatively free control over their appearance compared to other races, so Dohwa could manage it. Fairies, however, changed even less than humans — Fortuna simply couldn't. If both of them could do it, fine. If only one could, it was better not to do it at all.
Dohwa wouldn't want to grow up alone and leave Fortuna behind, either.
Resigned, Jun withdrew the fingers that had been poking his two wives.
The two of them immediately turned and glared at Tats as if to say, Why did you have to open your mouth? Looking thoroughly burdened by those stares, he cleared his throat and changed the subject.
"Anyway, this is bad. By the three-month mark you should have at least one permanent party member."
"I know. That's why I'm here. And look at that — appointment time."
"Oh! You've got a meeting set up?"
"Yeah. Someone who got kicked out of a party recently. Carol's actively recommending them, so I'm a little nervous, but I figured I'd at least meet them."
"...Carol — who has sky-high standards — is actively recommending someone who got kicked out of a party?"
"Huh? Yeah. Apparently they're actually really solid, but their combat style just didn't mesh with the rest of the party, so they got cut."
Tats's expression turned dubious. As Jun's explanation continued, it twisted further — the face of a man who had just eaten an entire basket of unripe persimmons.
Jun was about to ask what the problem was when—
BANG!
Someone slammed the door open hard enough to rattle it and stormed into the central plaza.
Then they bellowed at the top of their lungs:
"B-BOMB! The Bomb Demon is here!"
"““...”””
For a single instant, the central plaza — which had been filled with the laughter and chatter of adventurers — fell into dead silence.
But only for an instant.
"KYAAAAAH!!!"
"Evacuate! Everyone evacuate!"
"Hey, rookies! Stop standing there gawking and get ready to defend!"
The plaza erupted into a roaring, chaotic scramble — the kind of full alert you'd expect if someone had just shouted that a rabid dog was loose.
Jun had a bad feeling. A really, really bad feeling.