Giant Subjugation Quest #2
Giant Subjugation Quest #2
Wendy wasn't lying.
She pulled out the roster for the subjugation squad, drew lines through the bottom section, and filled in our names.
"You're actually making spots for us, Miss Wendy?"
"Of course I am!"
Just like that, two positions that hadn't existed a moment ago materialized on the subjugation squad list.
I stared at Wendy, dumbfounded.
A receptionist handling things on her own authority—it worried me a little.
"Please wait just a moment. I'll go get it signed and be right back."
But when Wendy, who'd left her post, reappeared moments later, she had, astoundingly, already gotten a superior's sign-off on the documents right there on the spot.
There it was—a red seal stamped plainly on the signature line.
Rebecca and I stared at the papers in disbelief.
"Is this the power of a mage?"
"Luke. Then why am I wedged in there? I'm just a regular human swordswoman."
"You're my fixed party member, so I wedged you in."
At that moment, Rebecca seemed to grasp, if only a little, the natural order of the adventurer industry.
A world where a noble-class profession earned you a free pass anywhere.
Rebecca gulped and muttered.
"Should I try learning magic as a hobby? Who knows, I might actually have a talent for it."
"Pay me and I'll teach you."
"F-For real?"
"Nah. Not money. I'll teach you on the condition that you call me 'Master' for a month."
"...You son of a bitch."
I shrugged and looked back at Wendy.
"Miss Wendy. Are mages really that essential for a subjugation squad?"
"You're not asking because you genuinely don't know, are you? Mages are useful no matter what quest you're on. They simply can't be compared to those dime-a-dozen swordsmen."
"You could just put another mage in the squad besides me. Is the guild that short on mages? I figure there have to be plenty of mages better than me."
"Mr. Luke."
Wendy looked at me with a faint smile.
"Skilled mages don't do adventurer work."
"What?"
"They live off a steady paycheck from nobles. Why would they do this kind of dangerous work? If I were a mage, I'd have quit this receptionist job in a heartbeat. This shitty workplace."
"Ohhh...."
Was it okay for her to say that here?
My heart swelled with awe at Wendy's image as she casually spat out that verbal abuse. A woman whose guts were as big as her massive tits.
"Well, that is true."
"It's not like the guild has zero wandering mages. But they're all so abysmally bad that it's a bit hard to even treat them as mages. Mr. Luke, among the mages at the guild, you're on the quite excellent side."
"Me? When the only magic I can competently handle is manipulating water? I do have a Mana Sphere as well."
"Worst case, you can at least provide drinking water for the subjugation squad. It's better than nothing."
"...I see."
I nodded at Wendy's words.
Truthfully, I didn't perfectly understand what Wendy meant. I couldn't really feel that I was better than other wandering mages. Just how utterly pathetic were the skills of those other mages? I'd never met one, so there was no way to know.
"Alright then, let me explain the quest details."
Wendy clapped her hands as if to shift the mood.
Rebecca and I focused on her voice.
"One week ago from today, giants raided a village. They plundered food and livestock and fled. Fortunately, there were no casualties, but an entire village was smashed to pieces."
"How do you mean, smashed to pieces?"
"A lot of buildings collapsed because the giants went on a rampage. The village's self-defense force at that level can't hold back giants. The Adventurer's Guild sent a pursuit team to find the escaped giants, and they've fortunately figured out where their hideout is. It's Corpu Beach."
The beach?
Did that mean the giants were hiding near the sea?
Yoen-su wasn't a city all that far from the sea.
If you walked north for a few days, a wide stretch of beach appeared.
It was a pretty scenic beach, but monsters spawned frequently, so it was a place people rarely visited.
"At Corpu Beach, there's a large coastal cave below a cliff, and apparently the giants have made a hideout inside that cave and are living there. The subjugation squad needs to move out before they run away again. You just need to go and subjugate three giants."
"Do I have to personally finish them? Can't I just provide support from the back?"
"There's a bounty for anyone who directly contributes to subjugating a giant. It's a whopping 40 Silver offered per head."
"40 Silver!"
A shiver ran through me at the mention of 40 Silver. 40 Silver was money a Bronze adventurer could never make off a single clear of any quest. Hearing that, Rebecca beside me was flushed with excitement too.
"How much is the base pay?"
"It's 8 Silver per person. Difficulty is D+ rank! A giant isn't an easy opponent, but this subjugation squad has quite a lot of people. Including Mr. Luke and Miss Rebecca, it's 42 people total. On top of that, the squad has a monster-like expert..."
"Who is this monster-like expert?"
"A barbarian on the verge of a Gold promotion."
A barbarian!!
My mouth fell open at those words.
Barbarians, each and every one of them, were monster-like bastards tantamount to a one-man-army hero. That meant there was a bus driver mixed into this subjugation squad. If push came to shove, Rebecca and I could just transform into passengers and ride along for free.
'A barbarian is offering a free bus ride? This is insane!'
I absolutely could not let this subjugation quest slip away.
"So, you'll be joining the subjugation squad then? Both of you."
"That's right."
"Yeah!"
"The squad assembles in two days. Just go to the north gate plaza of Yoen-su early in the morning and wait. Make sure you hold onto these Wooden Tags as well."
Rebecca and I each received a Wooden Tag bearing the subjugation squad's emblem from Wendy.
We had now officially accepted the subjugation quest.
After thanking Wendy, who had carved out spots for us on the roster, I walked outside the guild.
Behind me, Rebecca ran after me, making a huge fuss.
"If we behead a giant, it's 40 Silver! We could make a fortune overnight!"
"Just how huge is a sum like 40 Silver...."
"With that money, I could buy myself armor for every body part and still have some left over!"
"I could buy twenty basic magic books."
Of course, even though we were chattering excitedly, I didn't actually expect I'd be the one beheading any giants. The subjugation squad was packed to the brim with prominent experts. Especially since a barbarian was said to be mixed in, the bounty would in all likelihood be claimed by him.
"If you kill a giant, the money dupes itseeelf-!"
Rebecca was already wearing a giddy grin as if she'd already bagged a giant.
She seemed lost in fantasies of striking it rich, a true newbie adventurer.
"Party leader, any advice you can give? Like a giant's weak point or something."
"I don't know that either. It's my first time joining a giant subjugation quest too. This time around, just like you, I'm in the position of going in head-first."
"Head-first?"
"It means ramming your head into bare ground with nothing to go on. In this case, the bare ground is the quest, not the actual ground."
"Aha, head-first."
Both Rebecca and I were participating for the first time in a subjugation quest. I'd let Wendy know that when we left the guild, so when assembly day came, no major trouble should arise. Of course, since it was a quest with some difficulty, the other adventurers might give us dirty looks.
"So we're both first-timers then."
Rebecca looked at me and smiled.
"I've felt bad for constantly being indebted to you, so just trust me this time. If a giant comes at us, I'll block everything with my shield."
"Why would you even think of blocking with your shield? You need to think about running away. Maybe for a normal monster it'd work, but if you try to block a giant with your shield, your arm's gonna be wrecked, you know? I'm begging you, please don't do that kind of thing."
"Then there's no point in me having bought the shield."
"Why is there no point? You've got a good shield, so you can at least protect your own body. Before you worry about me, look after yourself first."
"Ha..."
Rebecca suddenly let out a sigh for no discernible reason.
She lifted the shield with her hand and held it out toward me.
"Why would you think I went out of my way to buy a shield? If I wanted to protect my body, I could have just bought armor."
"Wasn't it to block arrows? Though I don't know if giants shoot arrows."
"I bought it to protect you. This thing."
"...Protect who? Me?"
Hearing that voice, I thought Rebecca was just trying to take credit for something. But when I turned my head and looked at her face, Rebecca was wearing a surprisingly serious expression. The characteristic smile she wore when her mischievous streak was acting up was nowhere to be seen.
"...Are you serious?"
For a moment, silence hung between the two of us.
Rebecca simply nodded at my question without a word.
I had no idea what I should say to her.
She bought a 5 Silver shield for my sake?
To play the role of a tank in front of me?
What kind of nonsense was this....
The moment I tried to say something, Rebecca stood her shield up with a confident look.
"I may not look it, but I learned shield techniques back in my homeland. Swordsmanship alone wasn't enough to catch up to my peers. I'll be able to properly perform the role of a shield-bearer too."
"...That's a relief."
"Mages are valuable assets. I have to be helpful in my own way. When you get down to it, we only got this quest because of you. So, if anything happens, I'll protect you."
Rebecca swung her shield around in the empty air. Her movements had composure, likely meaning her claim of learning shield techniques wasn't a lie. But no matter how reliable Rebecca sounded, I could only let out a hollow laugh.
Because in the end, both she and I were still just Bronze adventurers.
Bronze ranks are usually too busy looking after their own safety to worry about anyone else.
I was more worried that trying to protect a party member might actually cause an accident.
"I'm grateful, but you're going to protect me? Does that make any sense?"
"Ah, seriously—! Why won't you just believe me once?"
Because Rebecca kept tapping my body with her shield, I had no choice but to shut my mouth. That didn't change my opinion of her, of course.
Protect me, my ass, you damn newbie.
She's giving off that overeager newbie scent again.
She's unbearably earnest, just like a rookie shouting at a veteran, "Someday I'll be useful to you too, I swear!"
A friend who makes me want to just do a deulbak the more I look at her.
After that, time passed, and before I knew it, it was time for Rebecca and me to part ways.
"See you in two days, at the north plaza."
"Yeah—!"
I sent Rebecca off and returned to the inn. The quest was set to begin in two days, so I planned to use that time to make preparations. I had to pack plenty of dried rations and such to eat during the days the subjugation squad would be traveling. On top of that, I intended to use the two days to practice Fire Magic more.
*
Two days passed since then.
I was able to considerably increase my proficiency in Fire Magic over the two days. The size of the flame didn't particularly increase, but the duration I could maintain the fire had grown.
The first time I created a flame, I could sustain it for about 10 seconds.
But after two days, I could maintain a flame lit on my fingertip for about one minute. Fire was the sort of thing that, once it caught, blazed up fiercely anyway, so having increased sustain wasn't a bad thing.
When I had time, I also read through the Mage Hand magic book, but it was a spell of unexpected difficulty, so I couldn't learn it right away. I'd memorized the hand seals in my head, at least. I figured I could practice it during the quest whenever I had spare moments.
On the day the subjugation squad was to depart.
When morning brightened, I set off for the north plaza of Yoen-su. It was quite early, but countless adventurers were already waiting in the plaza. Looking at the Wooden Tags they held, they were all adventurers joining the subjugation squad.
"Luke! Over here!"
Rebecca, who had arrived at the plaza first, waved her hand toward me. I greeted her back by waving and walked over to her. She had a Tower Shield strapped to her back; she hadn't forgotten her equipment.
I approached Rebecca, waving back in greeting.
"You've been doing well these two days? Nothing much happened, right?"
"I did nothing but practice shield techniques. I nearly smashed up my stuff swinging the Tower Shield around inside my room, I'll have you know."
It was while I was sitting next to Rebecca waiting for departure.
Suddenly, Rebecca spoke to me with a puzzled look.
"Luke, the other adventurers suddenly started lining up. What's that about?"
I looked in the direction Rebecca was pointing.
As she said, people were lining up in the plaza for some reason. I stood up, went on my tiptoes, and looked at the end of the line, and in that moment, I was flabbergasted.
"It is an honor to meet you, Sister Kate!"
"Please come quest with us next time! I'm begging you on my knees! Pleeease! We can't even depart because we don't have a nun!"
Because a familiar blonde nun was standing there.
All while being bombarded with countless handshake requests from adventurers.