Road to the city

"Pardon? What's your name again?"

"I'm Sevyn."

That sounds more like a number than a name for me. Well, there are all kinds of people out there, I guess.

"Really? You look more like Marika to me."

"Do you know her, Rio?"

"No, she just looks like a Marika to me."

“Anyway, I have cookies with me!”

She’s dodging the question.

Well, it may be something sensitive, so I’ll just leave it at that.

But yeah, she probably isn't even giving us her real name, but she does offer us cookies. Ain’t no way I’m taking them.

Cookies from a stranger, what can possibly go wrong, right?

*Chomp*

…

“Lia!?”

“What?”

She just took it…

*Chomp* *Chomp* *Chomp*

“You too!?”

All of them just took the cookies. They’re like little kids.

I mean… I know she just saved our lives and all, but still… some credit of trust or something?

But maybe I’m just paranoid.

“I’ll take one too, then.”

So there are seven of us now, counting me and Pin. Kinda funny that her name is Sevyn out of all possibilities. Funny coincidence.

When we were leaving the forest we talked a little. We decided that it would be good to have someone strong to protect us. Sevyn agreed to the idea of being our companion, at least for now. However, she was against the idea of joining a harem.

Are they all just tsundere or what?

It’s not gonna keep me from calling five of them my harem anyway, so…

Back to the topic.

While we were talking, we got to know her a little bit more. She is older than all of us, even than me.

Well, that wasn’t surprising, considering that I already wasn't the oldest before she got here.

She didn’t tell her exact age, just that she is older. I haven’t asked though. It’s not appropriate to ask a woman her age.

She also happens not to be the one who killed the bear twice before it was two rings. She was just passing by.

There were some other things too, however not that important.

From my own observation, she seems like a good person. I was quite cautious at first, but I’m starting to trust her a little more by now.

But Rio… She looks like she’s been a little more careful around her than with other girls. Well, I was at first too, so I don’t blame her.

Time was passing. We are already quite close to the destination.

During the way, we encountered a few more, less dangerous (a lot less) creatures.

Sevyn took care of most of them.

Although she wasn’t fighting like with the bear. Like she was limiting herself to most basic moves or spells.

Well, they do consume some stamina, from what I observed about the girls after using some magic, so I understand that she didn’t need to go all out on weak enemies.

We tried to help her a little sometimes, but I guess we were more of getting in the way than helping.

The statement that she took ‘most of them’ is because we did defeat some little slimes by ourselves, but that’s one of the easier things to do. Even I would be able to do that with a little bit of training. Well… I wasn’t able to take care of them now… but that’s just because I”ve never trained.

Let’s just skip this topic, please.

“Hey, you remember that slime? The one that nearly swallowed Rick?”

“How could they not remember? You’ve literally been reminding this to us every five minutes!”

“Oh, haha. Silly me.”

I don’t know how she can take so much satisfaction from that…

We are nearly here.

“I can see the gate!”

Lucy said.

“Finally!”

Lia was whining for quite some time now. It was a long road, so I don’t blame her for that.

The gate Lucy saw is the entrance of the city, where the event will take place.

“So, will you finally tell us what kind of quest it is?”

Rio asked me.

I realised just now that I still didn’t tell them.

“No. I actually wanted to earlier, but you were irritating me with the slime incident.”

I actually just forgot, but they don’t need to know that.

“It’s gonna be a surprise.”

I said.

“Okay, okay.”

We headed to the place in the city, where we needed to confirm our arrival to take part in the event.

I saw a stand where we should do that.

“Hey, how can I help?”

“We are here for the volleyball tournament.”

A little shorter chapter. It's more of an intro for the next one so its not that big of a deal. Also quite late update, because I've been really busy today. I don't really know when will I have next chapter ready but I'll try to write it as fast as possible. Sorry for inconveniences.