Yeah, They Were Always Like This (3)
"You're Rayden...! Puhahahat! Ah, right. You asked us to call you Rayna now, didn't you? Ahaha!"
The elf, who had always worn a stiff, unchanging expression, was now clutching his belly and laughing so hard I wished he would spare a thought for the mental state of the person forced to watch this.
"What exactly do you take me for?"
"Puhaha! Even if I ended up as that stuffy bastard, you turned into a total stranger of a young lady! Kekeke! Oh god, my stomach!"
I knew Selba had always been quick to laugh. Still, seeing that loud personality bursting out of Elian's elegant elf body while he held his sides in hysterics felt even more ridiculous.
"I'm the one who can't understand you two. The Earth Mother may have caused an accident in my case, but why in the world did you two end up swapped? And you...!"
"Your voice sounds much nicer now. Hearing Rayden get angry is actually pleasant. A party really does need a woman after all."
"I completely agree."
"But you're the one who never let any women join the party."
"That was... unavoidable if I wanted to speedrun."
"What does that even mean?"
"It exists. That kind of thing."
The hero kept messing around with Selba without a care in the world. The task of cleaning up the demon corpses near the cathedral—monsters that the nuns could handle on their own—was left to the head priestesses. Following the Pope's suggestion that we had a lot to talk about after so long apart, we gathered in the saintess's room where I had first opened my eyes.
Since the nuns and the children had all gathered in the dining hall to check on the damage and treat one another, there wasn't a single soul nearby. I took full advantage of that privacy to shout at the top of my lungs.
"You idiots!"
How on earth are we supposed to fix this?
"There is no answer. No answer... I can't see one at all..."
At this rate, could we really defeat the Demon King again? I wanted to bet everything on the impossibility of it.
"Haha! When have we ever had proper answers? Yet we still wandered around and managed to kill the Demon King once. So what? If we did it once, we can do it again, can't we? Hahaha! Don't overthink it!"
"Elian. When you laugh like that, you look completely insane."
An elf cackling loud enough to shake the heavens. He would surely go down in elven history as the maddest one to ever live.
"What?! What did I do?"
"Ah— So that's why dealing with Selba was always such a headache."
He never seemed to have a single worry. The dwarf who used to shout and laugh every day without a care had become an elf, while the one who used to scold him constantly had become a dwarf. Neither sight was particularly pleasant. It was honestly better when they were just laughing all the time.
"...Sigh."
The old friends I hadn't seen in nearly two days were the worst possible versions of themselves. Selba had apparently wished, I want to know why that guy lives so stuffily, while Elian had asked, Why does that guy live without thinking at all? To offer up such perfect material to the Earth Mother... It was as if they had walked straight into her prank on their own two feet.
"Fine. You two are whatever you are. Yujin! What did you do with your sword?!"
No matter how you looked at it, the hero was still a swordsman by title. Seeing him without a blade at all made my head throb.
Now we'll have to go out of our way to find him a new one...
It looked like the number of places we needed to visit had just increased.
"I decided to retire the sword. Instead, I got this."
The hero pulled out two strange wooden pieces that had been hanging at his waist, fitted them together, and twisted them into one instrument.
"What is that? A flute?"
"No. A recorder."
The exact name didn't matter, but—
"Fine, the name is whatever. What do you even use it for? Is it a wand? Did you decide to become a mage instead?"
"No. This is what children in the place I used to live use when they first learn music. It's the only instrument I can actually play."
It was dizzying. Like hyperventilating from exhaustion after running at full speed, the world spun.
"...I'm going to lose my mind. What kind of wish did you even make?"
"That's a secret."
The hero, who could no longer stand on the front lines as a swordsman, wouldn't even tell us what he had wished for.
"Is it something strange you can't talk about?"
"No. Ray...na. You also have memories of being a man, so you should understand. It's just... a bit embarrassing to say out loud. Especially with your current appearance right in front of me."
The hero flashed a sly smile for a brief moment.
"...Aha?"
"You get it now, right?"
—This guy. Back then he'd formed a party with nothing but men, so I'd almost thought he had that kind of preference.
"Yeah. I understand perfectly."
Looks like I'll have to help him out.
After all, women tend to open up more easily to other women. Even if I was already a lost cause, I wanted my old friend to meet a good woman, have a child, and then boast to that child, I'm your father's old friend. Your parents were able to get together thanks to me!
Maybe it was because none of us had children yet, but I found myself thinking about kids more and more these days.
Is it because of Ailin?
Setting the hero's perverted wish aside, what mattered now was how much fighting strength we actually had. We needed to know everyone's capabilities before we could search for holy relics or treasures to raise our power and face the Demon King.
"El— No, Selba. Can you use the special traits of an elf?"
"Does it look like I can?! Haha! According to that guy, I need to perform some ritual in the forest, but when would I have ever gone to a place like that! Hahaha!"
A former dwarf who had become an elf unable to use elven traits.
"...Yeah. I figured as much."
I hadn't expected much.
"What about you, Elian? You were apparently the farthest away."
Just thinking about the locations the Earth Mother had shown us—Selba, now an elf, then the hero Yujin, and the farthest of all had been Elian, now a dwarf. When I asked how each of them had arrived, Elian carefully set down the hammer he'd been carrying on his back before answering.
"When I came to my senses, I was in some mine holding nothing but this hammer. I spent a long time looking around in confusion, wondering where I was. Then a light swallowed me up and I found myself in the forest near here."
It must have been bewildering. Having lived in the forest for such a long time as an elf, how confused he must have been.
"Hey. Shorty. Was there a lot of dull silver-colored ore in that mine?"
While Elian and I were talking, Selba suddenly cut in with a serious expression. Normally Elian would have exploded at being called shorty, but seeing Selba's unusually grave face, he stiffened as well.
"Yes."
"Weren't there things that shone especially brightly between the stones?"
Was there anything that could shine between stones? Was he talking about ore? But of course there would be ore in a mine.
"Uh... I think there was something like that?"
"Did that light look pink to you? Or did it look blue?"
Elian's—no, Selba's Adam's apple bobbed like a student about to take an exam. Perhaps catching the rare sight of a nervous Selba, I unconsciously swallowed hard.
"Blue. It was the exact same blue as the Veloche Sea."
The Veloche Sea was what people called deep navy—the pitch-black blue of a sea overtaken by monsters. At Elian's answer, Selba's face turned deathly pale.
"Damn it... That guy can't refine it. It has to look pink or red to refine it with blue flame... If it looks blue, you can't even heat it with blue flame. The colors don't register... The minerals you can refine with red flame have far too many limitations..."
Selba let out a rare, heavy sigh.
"If you can't refine..."
A dwarf who couldn't refine metal. What kind of nonsense was this?
"Exactly. I can't make equipment at all. So don't even dream of covering for your lacking abilities with gear."
A former elf who had become a dwarf without any dwarven craftsmanship.
"...Sigh. Still, we'll have to teach you step by step. By the way, Rayden, how did you end up becoming a woman?"
Selba, who had flinched, shook his head and changed the subject.
"Don't tell me..."
Selba had no idea how terrifying his current expression was. I quickly shouted to erase the dangerous misunderstanding he was surely imagining.
"D-don't misunderstand! I simply said I wanted to use divine power!! ...And I told you to call me Rayna now, didn't I? If you call me by the wrong name in front of others, I'm confident I can show you exactly how destructive divine power can be!"
It was fine when it was just us, but the moment I had told Ailin my name, the saintess had to be called Rayna. Habits were frightening. If I didn't break the habit, I might get dragged into unnecessary trouble someday.
"Well... sure. But Rayna. What does wishing for divine power have to do with you becoming a woman?"
"How should I know? That damned Earth Mother said that if I was going to use divine power anyway, I might as well use it properly, so she told me to become a saintess. ...Sigh."
At least gaining divine power had solved the drawback of being unable to use magic to some extent.
"Puhaha! Ha, seriously... What a shame. Hey Rayden... I mean, Rayna. Can't you do something about the way you talk?"
"Why?"
"You look like a beautiful young lady but talk like an old man. It's extremely uncomfortable."
"You're one to talk..."
Did he think it was comfortable listening to an elf shout loud enough to shake mountains?
"Well. I'll try to work on it."
Selba, who had been nodding, suddenly clapped his fist into his palm as if a good idea had struck him.
"...But wouldn't it be pretty entertaining to watch that guy get chased out by the elves? Kwahaha! Actually, that might be better?"
"If you're confident, go ahead and try it. I'll make sure you go down in history as a half-baked dwarf who can't even refine metal."
These guys. Fighting again the moment they reunite.
"Hey. How long has it been since you two saw each other? Stop fighting already!"
Every time I tried to stop their fights, I found myself standing with my arms crossed. The hero had once said it was a way to create psychological distance. That habit had carried over even after my body changed. As I stood between them with my arms crossed, all three of them turned to look at me.
"What are you staring at?"
"You. Please stop crossing your arms from now on. They're even bigger now. Damn it..."
"I agree completely."
The hero didn't say anything, but he slowly nodded, making it clear he shared the same thought.
"Then in terms of combat strength, I'm the highest, followed by Selba, Elian, and then the hero?"
"Probably. Ah... You can just call me by my name from now on too. I'm... not really the hero anymore anyway."
"Well... alright."
It wasn't difficult.
"Yujin. How do you plan to move from now on? Do you have any thoughts?"
"None. When I came to my senses, I was already in this area."
"You all know the Demon King has revived, right?"
"Yeah."
I already told you, didn't I?!
"No. I was simply confirming it once more."
I jumped at the sudden voice ringing in my head and answered the Earth Mother.
"Huh?"
"Ah. The Earth Mother keeps talking to me."
"Tsk. If you keep talking like an old man, I'll start calling you Rayden again, just so you know."
"..."
Hehe. How cute!