Chapter 199
Extra: A Promise Fulfilled
Uzoh and Muzoh came to a new dungeon in search of a magic sword.
The area was under the Demon King’s rule. There were many yet untouched dungeons here and among them were dungeons that held magic swords.
“Were we a bit reckless this time, Uzoh?”
“Maybe, Muzoh.”
Their one-year deadline they’d made with Kehma was approaching.
They would find a magic sword and return. They didn’t intend to break their promise, but they still hadn’t found a magic sword.
Even though it was a bit reckless of them to do so, that’s why there was a very strong-looking monster walking down the passage in front of them.
It was a white wolf that was even taller than a human. If they recalled correctly, its was called a Fenrir…? At any rate, they could tell it was dangerous with just a glance. Because of that, as the room they’d escaped to was a safety zone, even though it had saved their lives—it was a dead end.
“Should we resolve ourselves here? Uzoh.”
“There’s no way out huh… looks like we’re trapped? Muzoh.”
“What do we do? We do have around a month’s food this time though.”
“We did learn, huh, Muzoh?”
“Maybe it’ll head off somewhere within a month? Let’s try waiting.”
“Maybe.”
Three days passed since then, but the Fenrir was still there.
They were eating the preserved foods that had the least amount of time they’d keep for… and had a lot of free time.
“Hey, I wonder if trying to attack it from within the safety zone would work…”
“That’d be great. People say that the safety zone would be invalidated though, Muzoh.”
“That’d be bad.”
Since they didn’t have anything to do in particular, the Uzoh Muzoh brothers decided to play dice. They’d learned that preparing ‘tools for killing time’ was a good idea as well. Dice didn’t take up much space, so they were great as something that adventurers had to carry around with them.
“Five chips, I roll two, Muzoh.”
“Hoh, then I’ll respond with another single chip and roll one… Roll!”
“Roll! … Dangit, snake eyes!”
“I got a four. It’s my win, Uzoh.”
The Uzoh Muzoh brothers were exchanging a small amount of copper coins back and forth. They were limited by the what they had on hand, so it wasn’t like they were seriously betting money. Instead, it was just a normal game they used real money for chips.
When they finished, they’d reset their amounts and start another name. After playing many times, they didn’t know how many times they’d won or lost. That’s how they passed the time.
“Still though, we’re stuck in a room. This is just like with that magic sword one.”
“That’s something I really don’t want to remember…”
“Least we have food this time. I don’t know if help with come this time, though.”
Bored, Uzoh started to examine the room.
Just then, a dice happened to roll out of his pocket.
Clink, clink… rolling across the floor, the six-sided die landed on a six.
“… How about we wait around another six days? If no one’s come to help and if that thing hasn’t left, we’ll try attacking it.”
“Yeah…”
It was when he tried to pick up the dice.
The floorboard’s color was different. He hadn’t noticed since he’d never taken too close of a look at it, but Uzoh noticed that it was slightly lighter in color.
When he knocked his knuckles against it, it sounded as though it were hollow.
“Muzoh, there’s something here.”
“Huh? What’s up?”
He used a dagger to rip up the floorboard. When he did that, what they saw was a sword.
They also saw that it had a magic stone in it.
“Ooh! We did it, it’s a magic sword!”
“We did it, Uzoh! … Will the exit not open if we don’t turn it back?”
“No way. This place is different from that dungeon, Muzoh.”
“Yeah… what kind of magic sword is it?”
“No clue. Let’s try putting some magical power into it?”
Muzoh picked up the magic sword and filled it with magical power.
They then collapsed.
“O-oi!? Muzoh… fuwaaah… w-what the…?”
“Aah… I’m alright, just super… tired…?”
Apparently, the sword had the effect of indiscriminately spreading around sleepiness.
When the two of them woke up, the Fenrir on the other side of the safety zone’s wall was sleeping as well.
That was dangerous. The effect attacked indiscriminately, so that means that the safety zone had collapsed… no, if that sleep wound up as being regarded as an attack, the safety zone was still unsafe.
“Hey, couldn’t we beat it since it’s asleep?”
“Cut it out. I don’t know how long it’s been asleep, but if we didn’t finish it in a single blow, it’d wake up. We’d die, Muzoh.”
“Ah, right. Uzoh.”
… And then Uzoh stepped on something.
[Guruuuu!]
The Fenrir howled.
They fled into the safety zone at a dash, holding their weapons as faced the entrance.
“Oi, Uzoh… don’t step on its tail!”
“Yeah, sorry about that…”
At any rate, the Fenrir had woken up and was glaring at them… The safety zone appeared to still be in effect. They took a breather.
“… Phew. Muzoh, what do we do?”
“… War of attrition?”
It was at that time.
“Oh, found a Fenrir… what’s it doing?”
A youth with dark red hair came walking up from behind the Fenrir. Both casually and without any hesitation. It was entirely as though he were strolling through a garden.
“Oi, it’s dangerous!”
“Nn? … Ah, adventurers?”
He warded off the Fenrir as it tried to bite him with its fangs with the sword in his hand.
Forcefully pushed away, the Fenrir face planted into the ground.
“It’s all good with you guys if I take this one yeah? It is, right?”
“Eh? Y-yeah, sure.”
A youth even smaller than him was taking on the Fenrir like he was toying with it. It looked like a joke, but the only thing the Uzoh Muzoh brothers could do in that situation was just stare.
A few minutes later, the Fenrir that had given them such a frightening feeling collapsed onto the ground covered in wounds.
“Good, it’s not dead. Successfully captured it alive… Ah, right. Seriously, that Jiji told us to do something so troublesome.”
The youth was talking with his sword. It was clad in fire, so it was unmistakably a magic sword.
However, for him to talk with the magic sword… well, maybe there were talking magic swords?
“This should be good enough for today… Will you guys be getting in my way?”
“Ah, no, don’t mind us.”
“What’re you saying, you just saved us! Ha ha ha.”
“… That so? I’m off, then.”
Saying that, the youth left in the same way he came. However, this time, he was dragging the Fenrir by the tail behind him.
“We survived somehow, Uzoh.”
“Ah, we forgot to thank him… we have to give him our thanks next time, Muzoh.”
They didn’t know just how strong that person was, but he was definitely powerful. They hadn’t heard of him, but if he was an adventurer, his name would rise up soon enough. It’d be fine if they give him their thanks if they happened to meet him again.
Either way, with the Fenrir’s threat gone, the two were able to return to the Raverio Empire’s Imperial Capital virtually unharmed.
Having returned from the dungeon, the two carried with them a magic sword.
… With this, they’d be able to face Kehma. They finally got a magic sword for him.
“We finally obtained a magic sword…”
“It’s a magic sword with a demerit to it though… it’d be difficult to use. Maybe that last time was just a coincidence? Let’s try having it appraised, Muzoh.”
“Yeah, let’s take it to a shop. If we sell it, we should be able to buy another magic sword if we include our savings.”
The appraisal’s result was that its effect caused everything in the surrounding area to be indiscriminately affected by drowsiness. And that they’d buy it for a single gold coin… That wasn’t a bad price for a normal sword, but it was considerably low for a magic sword.
“Maybe we could sell it for its sleep-inducing effect, Muzoh?”
“Yeah… people would usually just buy a [Sleep] skill scroll for that though. Unlike this magic sword, [Sleep] let’s you choose a target, too.”
“It wouldn’t even do anything for someone that doesn’t have magical power. And keeping a weapon nearby when you’re going to sleep would just increase the danger if you didn’t know how to do it right, so aristocrats wouldn’t take it either.”
“It’s unusable, huh. So there’s no helping the price… rather, it’s obvious it would be so low. Haaah.”
He sighed.
He thought that they’d be able to buy a new magic sword if they combined its sale price with their savings, but it turned out they wouldn’t be able to… They would be able to buy a bad magic sword that had demerits like their current one, though.
“Maybe we could buy a magic sword without any demerits to it if we worked a bit more and took on some debt?”
“Maybe… how about we check the Imperial Capital’s high paying commissions?”
Temporarily putting aside selling the magic sword, they went to the Imperial Capital’s Adventurer Guild.
They found a well paying commission that was just a bit troublesome and decided to accept it.
However, just as they accepted the commission, they came across a rather unexpected person.
“Huh, aren’t you Kehma-san? Why’re you in a place like this?”
“Hmm? Who is it?”
It was Kehma, the person who saved their lives. However, it appeared he didn’t remember them.
Helping other people was probably an everyday thing for Kehma. There’s no way he could possibly remember each and every person, so, conversely, that also meant that he wouldn’t expect a reward.
Once again experiencing how great of a person their benefactor was, they decided that they would absolutely repay his kindness.
Listening to him, it appeared that the dungeon had changed a lot.
It had been a year since then. Yeah, the one year time limit.”
“Ah—umm, Kehma-san. There is something that we have to apologize for.”
“We said that we’d get a hold of a magic sword and give it to you within a year, but, uhh…”
They were being awkwardly evasive about it, but Kehma seemed to have figured it out. And then—
“What, the magic sword? Don’t worry about it, I don’t mind even if I have to wait another year.”
Saying that so readily, it looked like he really didn’t expect to be rewarded for saving people.
Much like an excuse, they blurted out the thing about the magic sword they came across, despite it being a magic sword that had a demerit.
“Alright, show me it. Quick, take it out, quick!”
Saying that, Kehma was handed the magic sword by Uzoh and Muzoh to look over it. He then pulled it out of its sheathe to check its demerit.
“I’ve never seen such an amazing magic sword. I’m alright with this. No… I’m super good with this!”
—He really wanted the magic sword.
The magic sword that had a demerit. The magic sword that Uzoh and Muzoh had risked their lives to obtain.
“Kehma-san…!”
“I like it. Can I keep it?”
He looked truly happy. Right, rather then it being a magic sword, he was definitely looking at it as [The magic sword they got within the year]. Something that they got to keep their promise, making him glad.
“It’s a bit used, but here. Take it.”
“Kehma-dono, this is…”
“This is the same magic sword from when you guys were trapped in the [Avarice Trap].”
Of all things that could’ve happened, he gave them the magic sword that was at his waist as though to exchange it with them.
Moreover, this was a magic sword that had an improved sharpness. It didn’t even have any demerits.
Furthermore, he gave them another one since they were a duo.
“A-are you sure?”
“Yeah, think of it as my appreciation for keeping your promise.”
Was he a saint?
They were able to return their debt of gratitude, but wound up receiving another one. Somehow, they’d ended up receiving two magic swords by giving him a single one.
They weren’t asked to give him anything back this time—but they would definitely repay this debt of gratitude.
“Golen Village, was it? Looks like Kehma-san’s the Village Chief, Uzoh.”
“Settling down in and working for the village doesn’t sound so bad huh, Muzoh?”
They didn’t need to buy a magic sword anymore, so even with travelling expenses, they’d still have room to spare.
The Uzoh Muzoh brothers decided to finish the commission they just accepted and head over to the village.