Ep.9 - One Night Is Enough for Them
Ep.9 - One Night Is Enough for Them
"Waaah~!"
The dwarves clapped and cheered. It wasn't that they understood our conversation; they simply seemed to clap along with the sense that something had been settled.
"But what about the Dragon?"
Berial, the lord of L'Myune, who had been clapping awkwardly along with them, tilted her head and asked.
"Ah, right."
"Good heavens! I had completely forgotten...!"
Only then did we remember the matter far more urgent than a treaty to decide the order of sex. Weren't we about to face a battle against the Dragon right now?
"Everyone, rise!"
Kaede stood up, her tail lashing side to side, and boldly gripped her God-given greatsword. As if flaunting her Dragon-slaying prowess, she thrust out her chest, struck a dauntless pose, and shouted grandly.
"We have already defeated the Dragon several times, so I am God-damn certain we can defeat it even more easily this time! For Neva-gong has returned stronger than before!"
What Kaede said truly made sense. Even before Neva was enhanced, she had succeeded in subjugating the Dragon, so now that she was strengthened, it was obvious she would defeat it even more easily.
The other noonas also nodded in agreement. Since Neva, who handled the party's frontline, had grown stronger, the Dragon's attacks would be blocked even more easily, which meant everyone's survival rate would rise as well.
And sure enough.
Just as predicted...
"Hwoo..."
Dragging their weary bodies, they returned to Delin one by one. They were drenched in blood, but none of it was their own. All that blood belonged solely to the Dragon.
"As expected, with the frontline holding firm, we can defeat it so easily! Well done, everyone!"
Kaede came bounding over, utterly elated, her tail wagging mercilessly. Her ears, too. As if desperate to show off her Dragon-slaying heroism, those two vital beastman parts were worked to the point of exhaustion.
Then she threw her arms around the other women's shoulders as if they were close comrades, slapping their backs and reveling in the joy of victory. If you only looked at Kaede, you would think they were an adventurer party that had traveled together for decades, but...
"Get your hand off me. Unless you want to die."
"I'm not in the mood, so knock it off."
As expected.
Riko and Chichi rejected Kaede with utter disgust. The ones who actually tolerated her were Helen and Neva. They praised Kaede with moderate compliments, as if soothing a God-damn frightened puppy.
"You were magnificent. Kaede-ssi's greatsword truly left no openings. You would have made a name for yourself even as a knight."
"You were as elegant and fierce as a butterfly. Enough to make one watch in a trance."
Ppik-!
With a wonderfully honest reaction, Kaede's mood instantly brightened. Unable to hide her pride, she basked in her own glory, the corners of her lips sharply upturned.
"Khem! This is nothing! I am already an S-rank adventurer, so what more fame could I seek? Still, from now on, I shall also earn the nickname Kaede the Dragon Hunter! At last, I can hold my head high before my ancestors who dared to challenge the Dragon and failed!"
She immediately dashed forward and stood in the center of the clustered dwarves.
"W-wait! What are you suddenly doing!?"
And then, out of nowhere, she hoisted Delin's small body onto her own shoulder and bellowed thunderously.
"I, Kaede of the Gale, renowned across heaven and earth, have raced like the wind with my new comrades and returned after vanquishing the Dragon! The disaster that made L'Myune wail has now vanished, so everyone, raise your glasses!"
-Waaah!
The dwarves clapped as hard as their petite, girl-like bodies allowed, blessing the victory. Of course, none among them had ever heard Kaede's name, but they were grateful she had vanquished the Dragon, so they treated her as a benefactor and lifted her up.
"Long live the Dragon Slayer-nims!"
"Long live-!"
The dwarves raised their hands high above their heads and cheered. The faces that had been weeping like children now bore bright, sunny smiles once more. Naturally, rebuilding their ruined city would require many procedures, but how could they not cheer when the archenemy that had plagued their ancestors for generations had been defeated?
At any rate, Kaede paraded around the dwarves with Delin riding piggyback, announcing the news of victory. Although it was a distasteful, attention-seeking spectacle, the other party members didn't stop Kaede. After all, the victory did need to be announced.
"Today, tragedy visited us, yet with the aid of these splendid Dragon Slayer-nims, we have vanquished even our long-standing nemesis! Children of L'Myune! Let us all gather here and hold a festival! So long as we have our hands and our hammers, we can mend anything, so this day we felled the wicked Dragon shall be nothing but a new festival day!"
Berial, the lord of L'Myune, cried out. She even shed tears of emotion as she danced, and the other dwarves cheered loudly, expressing the joy of victory through dance.
Although it looked like toddlers showing off cute tricks, Delin's heart eased inwardly as he watched them dance.
The sight of children crying is all the more mournful. Having faced the dwarves' weeping directly, Delin smiled himself when he saw them regain their laughter.
"That's wonderful. Reeeally... But now please let me down! It's too high...!"
The smile didn't last long, since Kaede's tall shoulder was considerably high, but anyway.
The somewhat strange Dragon Slayer party earned a new achievement that heightened their fame.
In the distant future, a statue of a beastman wandering knight and a beautiful man was erected in that dwarven village,
and the children of L'Myune were said to always play at vanquishing the Dragon while waiting for the sunset.
Of course, that was no God-damn tale worth telling.
The women of the Dragon Slayer party, Delin, and even the little witch,
rather than dwelling on the great achievement of having defeated the Dragon with strange ease and the weightlessness of that feat,
were all focused on one other matter.
----------------------------------
"So I said, I'm first!"
"What nonsense! No matter how much consideration Chichi-dang's body deserves, this must be decided through a fair procedure!"
"What the hell is that supposed to mean!?"
A festival overflowing with fine beer.
A construction site being hammered back together in real-time, coexisting within L'Myune.
"Haa..."
The only voices reaching me as I sipped my beer were those of the noonas, still arguing because they couldn't settle the order...
"Everyone, don't fight too much. I have prepared a draw here, so what need is there to quarrel?"
"You should just step aside, right? Do you think you wouldn't act like this if you were in my shoes? Huh!?"
Especially, the voice of Chichi, absolutely furious and huffing.
Chichi raged with such momentum that she seemed ready to snap even the staff she held. Naturally, since the other dwarves had no clue what we were fighting about, they seemed to take it as 'the Dragon Slayer-nims' intense afterparty,' laughing as they passed by.
It was rather fortunate, really. The fact that we were raising our voices over such a topic was a perverted, sleazy secret you could never show your face with anywhere...
"I won't accept any agreement other than me going first. You dang people, I don't know when or where else you pervertedly... ugh! did that with Delin! But I haven't been able to do it even once since the first day we did it!"
"I'm sorry, but I have never embraced Seobang-nim either! Aside from when I was in heat before..."
"So you're saying you got God-pregnant that one time? Make some sense...! What are you, an orc!? You nut once and instantly get pregnant? Quit lying and shut the hell up!"
"Kkiing... It's the truth..."
Kaede, for whom a fair amount of time had actually passed since she last touched me, was claiming she had pent-up sexual desire while swishing her tail gently, but Chichi absolutely refused to believe her. She seemed to think it was an unrealistic, stupid story.
"Anyway, unless I go first, I will never agree. You better know that, hmph!"
Chichi even crossed her arms and sharply turned her head away. An utterly stubborn expression.
Seeing that, Riko clicked her tongue and muttered something, while Neva and Eva also feigned distraction, finding it too hard to listen to,
but Helen actively reflected Chichi's opinion and addressed everyone.
"Chichi-nim's opinion is sufficiently valid. Being anxious in a situation where she alone cannot get pregnant is, in a sense, only natural, so wouldn't it be best to grant Chichi-nim priority?"
Everyone just looked away, not agreeing with Helen's words,
but Chichi did not yield to the situation. She glared with wide eyes, walked up to me, and raised her voice.
"Delin, you say it! Tell them you'll do it with noona first!"
"Ah... th-that's..."
It was pitiful to see her angry with tears welling up, but I was also in a position to carefully mediate while watching the others' reactions, so...
"Shall we... do that...? What does everyone else think...?"
"You heard him!? That's what we'll do. For the next two hours, absolutely! Do not enter that room over there!"
"Can you even go for two hours?"
"Shut up!!!"
Chichi, her fingers trembling with rage, pointed at the temporary lodging prepared for us. Inside were a few beds provided by the dwarves, along with some moderately high-class decorations. Though the city was in shambles, they had given us what looked like a high-quality inn that had suffered less destruction.
At any rate, our plan was to stay there for only one night.
Because if we spent more than one night, we wouldn't make it to the Demon Continent in time.
"Wait."
And, for another reason...
"First, let's Save, right?"
Thanks to my ability,
even a single night...
in many, many senses, was more than enough...
"...Save."
[Save point set!]