After all, having been Ais's patron god for so many years now.
Loki understood this blonde girl all too well.
Ais-tan was just like that—she spoke so little she was like a gourd with its mouth sawn shut, and there were hardly any expressions on her face.
Even if she wanted something in her heart, she would absolutely never speak up to fight for it on her own.
But that hand-raising gesture just now made it plain she'd wanted to take on the task of mentoring that blind little girl.
Only Haimer had been quicker to speak, beating her to it.
Tsk.
Look! Just look!
The obedient way Ais-tan silently drew her hand back—she must be feeling terribly wronged inside!
She needs comfort!
She needs a warm hug from her patron god!
At this thought, the corners of Loki's mouth split sharply upward into an extremely ill-intentioned grin, and she sprang up as though she had a spring installed inside her.
"Ais——tan!"
Loki flung her arms wide, her two legs scrabbling across the ground at blazing speed, kicking up a gust of wind, her mouth puckered into an exaggerated chicken's-butt shape as she lunged straight at Ais.
"Don't be sad! You've got me, your patron god, here with you!"
Ais, for her part, stood quietly where she was.
In her golden pupils, Loki's ever-closer, ever-more-contorted face was clearly reflected.
There wasn't much expression on Ais's face.
Only, a second before Loki was about to crash into her, the tip of her toe tapped lightly on the bluestone slab.
And she nimbly shifted three steps over toward the spot beside Haimer.
"Eh?"
Loki lunged into empty air, her outstretched arms grasping nothing but loneliness, and those eyes she usually kept narrowed to slits went instantly round and wide.
Momentum carried her flying onward.
Her two feet flailed wildly in the air, finding no purchase whatsoever.
Then.
"Splat—"
Face-down, she smacked solidly onto the floor.
The hall was carpeted with a thick, deep-red wool rug, so this fall wasn't enough to disfigure her face or draw blood.
But that muffled thud still rang out crisp and clear.
Loki lay there like a frog flattened by a truck, limbs splayed out, plastered firmly to the carpet, not moving for the longest time.
Finn stood a few paces away, watching his patron god make such a disgraceful spectacle of herself, and the corner of his mouth twitched downward.
As the captain, he couldn't even be bothered to say a single word about it; he silently turned around and acted as though he'd seen nothing.
"...Ugh."
It was a good several seconds before Loki finally came back to her senses.
Her fingers twitched twice against the carpet, then she dully lifted one arm and reached back-handed toward Haimer's direction.
"Haimer… help… me… up…"
Looking at this goddess sprawled on the ground like a puddle of mud, Haimer stood to one side, the corner of his eye twitching, and shook his head helplessly.
He too stepped over, reached out his right hand, and seized Loki by the back of her collar.
With a flex of his wrist, he hauled Loki up off the ground.
"Can't you do something about this bad habit of yours, you?"
Haimer was speechless inside; once Loki had steadied herself he let go, and without bothering with her any further, turned to look at the others.
"All right, let's not dawdle around in the hall."
"Let's all head over to your training ground together."
With that, Haimer let his gaze fall on Ais beside him.
"Ais, you come along too."
Hearing herself singled out.
Ais was slightly startled, her golden lashes fluttering once.
She lowered her head, glanced at the hand gripping her sword, then raised it again to look at Haimer, a trace of puzzlement in her eyes.
After all.
When the students had been divided up earlier, she hadn't been assigned one.
What was she supposed to do at the training arena?
Looking at Ais's dazed, adorable look, Haimer explained with a touch of helplessness:
"I want to see how that Sword of Despair of yours—now that the upgrade's finished—performs in actual combat."
"I may not be some proper shopkeeping merchant, but at the very least I ought to do a bit of after-sales follow-up on a weapon."
Hearing this, Ais understood.
She nodded earnestly.
Seeing this scene.
Loki, who had only just climbed up off the ground, bristled.
After all.
As Haimer's bosom buddy from back in the Heavens.
She knew Haimer's character all too well.
"Uwah! I've got a bad feeling about this!"
Loki gritted her teeth.
But everyone had already started walking toward the back courtyard, and no one paid her any mind at all.
"Wait for me!"
Loki had no choice but to hurriedly chase after them, grumbling and cursing.
"Haimer! Don't you dare scheme after my Ais-tan behind my back!"
…
And so it was settled.
Outside the Twilight Manor.
An extremely spacious open-air field, its ground paved with heavy, hardened stone slabs, ringed by weapon racks of every kind as well as benches for people to rest on.
At the moment, this enormous field had been quite naturally divided into several mutually independent zones.
The liveliest, without a doubt, was that corner over on the right side.
"Brat! Lift your leg higher! Didn't you eat breakfast this morning?!"
Bert had both hands lazily stuffed in his trouser pockets, his body slightly hunched.
He wore metal boots on his feet and just stood there casually in place, not even taking up a defensive stance, merely raising his right leg offhandedly.
"Bam!"
There, in midair.
Aihara Enju, drawing on the force of her sprint, brought a ferocious downward whip-kick smashing heavily onto the spot just above the ankle of Bert's raised right leg.
"So hard!"
Even though her feet were clad in first-class metal boots that Haimer had forged by his own hand from deep-floor materials.
Before the gap in their strength.
And with Bert's metal boots—"Frosvelt"—being likewise a special armament reinforced by Haimer.
Aihara Enju couldn't help sucking in a cold breath.
Quickly using the rebound to roll backward, she retreated a distance of two steps.
The moment she landed, she couldn't help clutching her right shin and hopping in place on one foot several times, baring her teeth from the pain.
"That's all the strength you've got?"
Seeing this, Bert mercilessly switched on taunt mode, splitting his mouth open to reveal two rows of grim, white wolf-fangs.
"Lv.2? Those legs of yours are so soft I bet you couldn't even kick a Goblin to pieces! Again!"
Those words lit the powder keg outright.
Aihara Enju was fiercely competitive by nature to begin with—how could she stand to hear something like that?
"Don't look down on me!"
She suddenly gritted her teeth and stomped her right foot hard against the ground.
The hard stone slab instantly burst into a ring of spiderweb-like cracks.
Under this terrifying burst of force, she shot up into the air like a launched cannonball.
"Crimson Lotus Fighting Dance!"
Aihara Enju's petite frame turned into an orange-red whirlwind, spinning rapidly through the air.
Her right leg, wrapped in a fierce, cutting gale, came chopping down from above, aimed savagely at Bert's head.
Boom!
The air was torn apart, letting out an ear-piercing shriek.
However.
"Too slow."
Bert stood below.
Still with no intention of taking his hands out of his pockets.
Only, in the very instant Aihara Enju's leg was about to smash into the bridge of his nose, his right leg suddenly snapped sharply upward!
"Bam!"
After the loud crash.
The gap in their strength was, in the end, simply too great.
The two were several levels apart.
Aihara Enju was sent flying outright.
"Waah!"
Losing her balance in midair, Aihara Enju scrambled to adjust her posture, turning several somersaults.
When she landed, her feet scraped two long white streaks across the stone slabs; she stumbled back five or six steps, her calves trembling, before she barely managed to steady her stance.
Bert, meanwhile, gave a huge yawn, looking utterly bored.
"Your moves are full of openings."
"All you know is to slam down with brute force, and your aim is all guesswork."
Bert looked at Aihara Enju, panting in the distance.
"If this is all you can do, I suggest you head home and drink your milk—this straight-line, no-frills approach of yours can only deal with monsters that don't know how to absorb force."
Not far off.
Haimer stood at the edge of the field, watching Bert's merciless dressing-down, and nodded in satisfaction.
His mouth might be foul, but Bert really was teaching attentively, targeting Aihara Enju's weaknesses.
By contrast, over on the other side.
The whole vibe was completely different.
[On-screen UI overlay: Capacity 999,998,230 / CP Raku 80 — Reward: 0 left / H Voice UR ★Meat★★ [Great Severance] Tiona Hiryute]
"Ahahaha! So cute! Really, so cute!"
Tiona hadn't taken up a fighting stance at all.
Cradling Hiruko Kohina like a doll, she rubbed her wheat-colored cheek wildly against the top of Kohina's head.
Hiruko Kohina, squeezed in her embrace, her two legs dangling in midair, wore an expression of utter impatience on her exquisite, doll-like little face.
"Let go of me."
Hiruko Kohina struggled hard a couple of times, only to find that this Amazon woman's monstrous strength really was tremendous.
"No can do, no can do."
Tiona paid no heed at all to Hiruko Kohina's struggling, her face still rubbing away nonstop.
"Lord Haimer did promise to let me be the one to coach you, you know."
With that.
Tiona lowered her head and looked at the two pitch-black short blades at Hiruko Kohina's waist.
"Come to think of it, your weapons are so finely made! Why are they so short?"
"Obviously… so I can kill people quickly."
"Shink!"
With that said.
Hiruko Kohina lost all patience and whipped her wrists around at top speed.
In an instant she drew the two black kodachi hanging at her waist, turning them into two pitch-black afterimages that slashed straight across Tiona's slender neck.
Going for the kill outright.
However.
Tiona's reaction was, likewise, absurdly fast.
The moment she noticed Hiruko Kohina drawing her weapons.
Her arms abruptly went slack.
Her body folded backward with the motion, dodging face-up.
The blade edges grazed just past the tip of her nose by a hair.
"Oh, not bad~"
Tiona gave a slight smile.
Seeing her slash dodged, the moment Hiruko Kohina's feet touched the ground, her ankles instantly surged with force.
Without the slightest pause, she went on lunging forward like a preying mantis.
Crossing her two blades before her chest, she launched a fierce back-handed cross-shaped combo slash straight at Tiona's face.
"Yo-ho! Pretty vicious, aren't you!"
Faced with Hiruko Kohina's combo, Tiona instead laughed even louder; her body, as if fitted with a spring, bounced at the waist and went flying backward.
With several consecutive back handsprings, she easily evaded Hiruko Kohina's slashes.
So that Hiruko Kohina's kodachi cut nothing but air.
"Your speed's quite good."
Tiona landed firmly.
"But there's a big problem with the way you generate power, you know."
"If you're chasing quick kills."
"Against thin-skinned monsters it'll do well enough, but if you run into an enemy stronger than yourself, a chopping style like yours won't be able to pose any threat."
As she spoke, Tiona turned and offhandedly pulled a heavy greatsword—a good half a person tall—from the weapon rack beside her.
"And you can't swing a blade relying on your arm muscles alone."
Gripping the hilt one-handed, Tiona struck a pose.
"You have to learn to drive from the waist through the wrist, channeling the strength of your whole body into the blade."
"Like this!"
With that.
Tiona flicked her wrist, and the heavy sword carved a full, rounded half-circle through the air.
As the massive blade tore through the air, it kicked up a violent gale right in front of Hiruko Kohina.
That oncoming sense of pressure forced Hiruko Kohina to slam to a halt; staring fixedly at that heavy sword, she fell silent at once, a glint of seriousness flashing through her eyes.
The seasoned adventurers were each using the experience they'd won through countless life-and-death struggles to fill the gaps in these newcomers' practical combat experience.
Of course, over on Hanasaka Warabi's side, there seemed to be a little episode that was equal parts funny and exasperating.
"Huh? Are you really not a Pallum?"
Pfft!
The girls of the [Haimer Familia], who had been earnestly listening to their respective mentors' instruction, heard the commotion and instantly couldn't hold back their snickering.
Everyone turned their heads in unison.
The source of the sound, beyond any doubt, was directed at Hanasaka Warabi over on the other side.
As the most petite figure on the team, the thing Hanasaka Warabi hated most was when people made an issue of her height.
And yet, the one standing before her right now was one of the [Loki Familia]'s three giants, the strength-renowned "Heavyweight" Gareth.
"Y-you—what nonsense are you spouting, you big-bearded oaf!"
Hanasaka Warabi puffed her cheeks out high in anger, like a ripe steamed bun.
"I! Am! A! Human!"
Through gritted teeth, she roared at him one word at a time.
"Oh?"
"Now that's a truly strange thing."
Gareth, completely failing to notice Hanasaka Warabi's mood, stroked his thick, bushy beard, his face full of bafflement.
Especially when he took a careful look at Hanasaka Warabi's pitiful stature of under a meter and a half.
Then, he turned to glance at his own captain Finn, who stood not far off at about the same height with an awkward look all over his face.
"But your build… you're even a touch shorter than Finn here, and he's a Pallum."
"Waaah!! You stinking old man! You're asking for a beating, aren't you!"
At these words, Hanasaka Warabi instantly stamped her feet in fury, both hands slapping down on the katana at her waist.
She really was about to lose it.
In the Familia, only Tsukuyo, Enju, and Kohina were genuinely children.
Apart from them, Kirukiru, Satori, Mary, Kisara—and even the Holy Emperor—had each developed figures enviable enough to make you grind your teeth.
Even Onigawara Rin had a well-proportioned, shapely figure.
Only she, alone, seemed to be hopelessly locked into this grade-schooler's height.
"Roar——"
Sensing its master's fury.
Kyoubou, too, reared up its colossal frame, nearly eight meters tall.
A huge shadow fell over them at once; it opened its maw wide and let out a roar at Gareth!
A reeking gust hit his face.
But Gareth didn't so much as blink; he met Kyoubou's descending, enormous bear paw head-on and seized it with his bare hands!
"Bam!"
"Oho!"
"This beast's foundation is surprisingly tough and sturdy!"
Feeling Kyoubou's monstrous strength, a thick gleam of interest welled up in Gareth's eyes at once.
After all, he'd long heard that this black bear of the [Haimer Familia] had once, on the middle floors of the Dungeon, withstood the fierce assault of a whole pack of Hellhounds with its body alone—its physical defense was second to none.
And there'd been a recent rumor that this monster-bear had even sublimated its level up to LV.2!
Now that he'd tested it firsthand, it truly lived up to its reputation!
"Lass!"
Gareth's exaggerated muscles all over his body seemed to twitch with excitement in that moment, and he grinned.
"A clash of pure strength—no fancy techniques needed!"
"Have your bear come ramming at this old man with everything it's got! I'll stand right here today—if I retreat so much as half a step, I lose!"
"Fine! You're the one who said it yourself, old man!"
Hearing him be so cocky, Hanasaka Warabi didn't hold back either, and gave Kyoubou's big head a hearty pat.
"Kyoubou, let's go together! Crush him!"
With that.
Hanasaka Warabi drew her katana and, with Kyoubou flanking her left and right, charged in at the same time.
Gareth's eyes went wide at the sight.
"Huh?! You little lass, that's no honorable conduct!"
At the same time.
Over on Tione's side.
Amou Kirukiru, Onigawara Rin, and Nomura Satori were likewise brimming with enthusiasm; the three of them were positioned with great care, in a triangular pincer formation.
"By the way, you're that illustrious Raging Serpent of the [Loki Familia], aren't you?"
Onigawara Rin, gripping her sword hilt, fixed her gaze intently on Tione.
They'd long ago heard Tsubaki mention in idle chat that the [Loki Familia] had a pair of Amazon twins.
Tsubaki had even made a point of stressing that the elder of the Amazon twins, the moment she got jealous over Captain Finn, would flare up in temper instantly.
Given the way she'd just suddenly shielded that Pallum captain like a mother hen guarding her chick.
It was obvious she could be none other than the rumored "Raging Serpent."
[UI: Details | Character]
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