Chapter Thirteen: Parting Ways
We went back to the ghost ship where we’d fought the inter-dimensional Soul Eater. Perhaps because the enemy had been defeated, the ship was lying on its side on the ground. The heroes and their parties were there too, unconscious.
The volunteer soldiers and villagers were standing around them, apparently they’d been protecting them. They shouldn’t have had to do that.
Finally, it was time for the best part of this whole disaster: Adding the materials to my shield’s repertoire. Unfortunately, the Goblin Assault Shadows and Lizard-Man Shadows were just that, shadows. Therefore there were no materials left for me to absorb. Well, there was a little clump of shadowy material, but I was only able to unlock one new shield with it.
Shadow Shield: ability locked: equip bonus: shadow resistance (small)
There were some other things, but they just unlocked status boosts, so I’ll just ignore them for now.
All that was left was the inter-dimensional Soul Eater.
“Oooh. Yummy!”
“Don’t eat it.”
Filo had grabbed it and was about to put it in her mouth when I stopped her. It was clear enough what had caused her to go crazy and violent. Any way you looked at it, it must have been because she’d eaten the dragon core.
“Come on!”
I reached out and took the material from Filo, but for some reason it instantly ran through my fingers and fell to the ground.
“How did you hold onto it?”
“I cast wind magic on my hands.”
“Really?”
So you couldn’t hold the fish in your bare hands? That was weird.
“Is everything okay?”
The volunteer soldiers saw the confused face I was making and came over to help.
“Oh, yeah. I was just asking Filo how she was able to hold onto the monster here.”
“These monsters don’t have physical bodies. To get a grip on them you need to use something that has magical properties.”
“What?”
“It’s pretty well known. Did you not know about it, Shield Hero?”
“No.”
“Oh, well, monsters without physical bodies are a pretty rare thing, so you’ve probably just never run into one.”
“Then do any of you have a weapon with magical properties I could use? I’d like to butcher this thing.”
The soldier went around the group asking if anyone had a weapon like that, and he found one person whose weapon had some cheap magical materials in it. They let me borrow it, and I butchered the fish.
Filo told me how she’d gotten the magic into her hands, and I copied her. I picked up the tail and let the shield absorb it.
Soul Eater Shield: ability locked: equip bonus: skill “Second Shield” spirit resistance (medium): Spiritual Attack Resistance (medium): SP up:
Special effect: Soul Eat, SP recovery (weak)
The shield unlocked with just the tail, and it didn’t reference any other parts—which probably meant that further butchering the Soul Eater wouldn’t do me any good. I tried letting the shield absorb other parts, but nothing changed.
But what was this Second Shield thing? Spirit resistance probably meant that I could hold off spiritual attacks.
The special effect Soul Eat sounded kind of interesting. I hope it didn’t mean that I could eat souls. That didn’t sound so good to me.
I slowly changed the shape of the shield. It was like the whole thing was made from the monster, from the Soul Eater’s head. It was a strange design.
And the Chimera Viper Shield had a higher defense rating.
If the special effect Soul Eat meant that I could eat souls, then I should be able to hold the Soul Eater. So I reached for it. But my fingers weren’t able to actually touch its flesh.
I guess I was wrong. Good. I wasn’t interested in eating any souls.
It was probably a counter attack of some kind. Maybe it “ate the enemy’s soul” in the sense that I absorbed their SP.
Okay next, what was this Second Shield skill? I tried it out.
“Second Shield.”
Air Strike Shield to Second Shield.
That’s what the icon flashing in my field of vision said.
“Air Strike Shield!”
I waited to make sure that the Air Strike Shield appeared in the air before continuing.
“Second Shield!”
Another shield appeared.
So that’s what it meant. Up until now I could only use one Air Strike Shield at a time. But now I could apparently summon two. There were probably a lot of different ways to use it, but it didn’t excite me all that much.
I looked back at the remaining inter-dimensional Soul Eaters.
“I kind of want to absorb them all and leave nothing for the others.
But they would never let me live that down.
Besides, if they didn’t get stronger it wouldn’t be good for anyone, let alone for me. If I was going to have to fight with them, they would have to be strong too. Sure, in this fight I was definitely the MVP. Still, I decided to leave materials for the others.
“Master, let me eat the leftovers!”
Filo shouted, a long trail of spittle dangling from her beak.
“Can’t fight nature.”
I cut through the spine and tossed a tail over to Filo. She gobbled it up.
“The bones are so slimy!”
“Wait. Did we run into any slimes?”
“Um…”
The rest of the conversation wasn’t interesting, so I’ll just cut it off there. Let’s just say that I ended up angry because I didn’t get to use them to unlock any shields.
“All right! Let’s head for the next village and see if we can help them rebuild.”
We had finished what we had come to do. So the volunteer soldiers and I started to help with cleaning up the bodies and making repairs in the next the village.
We obviously weren’t going to be able to help with all the jobs that needed to be done, so we focused on feeding the survivors and treating their wounds.
“Thank you so much! We’ll do all we can!”
The volunteer soldiers listened to my orders and obeyed them without issue. I guess it meant that I didn’t need to doubt their sincerity anymore.
A day had passed since our long and trying battle—finally, the knights arrived.
The leader of the knights was very upset that I had summoned the
volunteer soldiers to the wave with me.
“You bastard! You think you can steal my subordinates and use them to form a private army?!”
“It’s not the Hero’s fault! We came to him and offered to lend out services. He merely accepted our offer.”
“What? And you call yourselves soldiers for the great land of Melromarc?! You’d sell yourselves to the Shield?!”
“You fool. Are you really going to focus on scolding your subordinates when you are surrounded by all this tragedy? Do you have any idea how bad the damages would have been had they not been here?”
The villagers had gathered around to hear what was going on. They all nodded in agreement with me.
“And just so you know, those other heroes that you depend on so much, they were defeated along with their parties during the wave, and now they’re relaxing in that building over there.”
No one had asked them to do it, but the villagers had gathered together and brought the unconscious heroes back to town so they could nurse them back to health. They had the medicine they needed, but it would still be a few days before they were back on their feet. Still, they were recovering quickly, and they’d probably wake up before the day was over.
“Hurry and bring the Heroes to me! I will send them to an excellent hospital!”
“Their wounds aren’t as bad as the others around here. There are villagers in much worse shape. You should prioritize them!”
“We must prioritize the Heroes for the sake of our great country. No, for the world!”
This guy sure was impressed with himself.
Regardless, I’d assumed they would behave that way, so we’d been prioritizing the villagers’ treatment anyway.
“Yeah, yeah. Anyway, hurry up and get them out of here! The rest of us have things to do.”
“Wait, Shield.”
I waved them away, but the knights had been talking about the situation with the volunteer soldiers, and now they called out to me.
“What is it now?”
“Your presence is requested at the castle.”
“No thanks. You’re a pain.”
“You WILL come with us.”
I’d like to see them try to force me. We had more important matters to attend to. Why were they always in my way?
I ignored them and turned to leave, but the volunteer soldiers stepped forward, petitioning. They bowed to me.
“Please, Shield Hero. Please come with us.”
They had done everything I asked and obeyed all my orders. It didn’t seem right to ignore them now. Besides, I did have that new carriage that I needed to pick up from the guy at the weapon shop.
“Geez.”
I scratched at my head and slowly turned around.
“Fine. All I have to do is go with you, right? I owe these soldiers, so that’s the only reason I’ll do it”
“Thank you so much!”
They were all clearly thankful that I was going with them. I slowly nodded.
And so we all made for the castle.
We arrived the next day and entered the castle.
“We’d like for your companions to wait in the other room.”
“You’d bring us all this way and then send them off?”
These people drove me crazy.
“Mind if I just get out of here?”
It wasn’t like they were going to do anything nice for me. All this was a waste of time.
“You may not leave. We have a great deal of information we need to learn from you.”
“I told you everything on the way here.”
I’d already told them about how the heroes were defeated and we were left to face the final enemy alone. The volunteer soldiers had seen it all happen, albeit from a distance, so there was no room for them to doubt what I was saying.
The Trash might try to make something up, but if he did I would just run way.
I was strong enough to get away now, and if Raphtalia and Filo were with me then I should be able to outrun anyone who tried to pursue us.
“Silence! You are before the king!”
The door hinges squealed as the door opened, and we were lead to the thrones, where the Trash sat and looked down severely at us.
I’m sure he’d already been told everything. He was obviously irritated at how successful I had been during the wave.
“It is incredible to think it, but I hear you were able to fight back the wave, Shield. As for myself, I don’t believe a word of it.”
“Is that how you express your gratitude?”
“Insolence! I have a question for you—not that I can trust your words.”
“What?”
How awful was this guy? Did he need to indicate his distrust after every single sentence he spoke?
“Shield, I hear that you have discovered a strength that has made you more powerful than the other Heroes. I don’t believe it, but you have an obligation to tell me if it is true. Speak now. Not that I believe you.”
He was so transparent, the fool. He was wondering if I was stronger than the other heroes, but he wasn’t honest enough to ask me directly. He made me sick, the Trash.
Honestly though, I had no idea why Glass retreated after she defeated the other heroes.
She’d mistakenly thought that I was the strongest hero, and so we started fighting. But then a counter indicating a time limit appeared, and she retreated.
I could tell that the hourglass timer had something to do with what happened, but the rest of it was a mystery. What would have happened if the counter had run out?
There were too many questions remaining. Eventually we would have to find the answers. But I didn’t have time for that now.
But still. I could tell what was going on here. I turned to the Trash and smiled, jabbing my finger at the ground before me.
“If you really want to know, crawl down here and bow to me.”
The Trash King was so shocked he froze up for a moment. His face was hilarious. I wished I could have taken a picture.
“Did I stutter? Are your ears plugged up? If you really want to know, come down here and put your nose on the floor!”
“Uh… Uh… Uh…”
“What are you grunting like a monkey for? Or do you only aspire to be as wise as a monkey? The king is trash! Not that I would believe the words of a monkey anyway.”
As I parodied and mocked him, his face grew red and stiff. His eyes glared at me, full of hate. You know what? It felt great.
“You bastard!”
The Trash roared. His shout echoed through the halls.
The first enemy was the wave, and the second was the Trash. But I wasn’t going to lose to the Trash.
“Don’t you ever show your face here again!”
“You’re the one who asked me to come! You don’t have to ask me to stay away!”
And so I said my final farewell to the Trash.
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