Ch 10

I opened the door to Kinwall’s shop, but there was no one in sight. Weapons were stacked in somewhat organized piles, filling barrels and lining the shelves. The only sound was the clanging of metal reverberating throughout the shop.

“Be there in a minute; I’m in the back.”

“Hello, it's Nyx.”

“Oh, it's you. Just wait. I’ll get to you.”

After waiting for around a minute, Kinwall walked out from the back of the store after putting down what he was doing.

“So what are you looking for?”

“Some knives and spikes that I can throw.”

I had thought about getting not only some throwing knives but also some throwing spikes. Granted, they would be harder to use, but I could carry a lot more of them, and they were overall cheaper to buy.

So, telling him what I wanted and how many, I waited for Kinwall to respond.

“So you want 4 throwing knives and 10 throwing spikes. I don’t have any to sell, so I have to make them”

“How much and how long will it take?”

Kinwall rubbed his beard in thought and said.

“14 bronze, and they will be ready in about 2 days.”

“That is surprisingly quick.”

At minimum, I would have thought that it would take at least 4 days to make, but I guess it is because he is a dwarf; he could make them in 2.

“Well, you're my only customer right now, and I have no orders coming in. Besides, how is being an adventurer working out for you?”

“I just became E rank today.”

I showed Kinwall my adventurer’s card, which was now bronze, and he looked slightly surprised when he saw it.

“That was quick; normally, people would take twice ot three times as long to get to E rank.”

“Really?”

“Ya, seen a fair amount of people rank up just as fast as you. You did a nice job, especially since you had to fight the guild master to earn your promotion. I’m sure it wasn't easy.”

“Thanks. It was tough, but honestly, it was pretty fun. I realized quite a bit about my shortcomings after fighting him.”

After I paid for my order, I said goodbye to Kinwall.

“Alright, see you in 2 days.”

Leaving his store, it was still afternoon, so I decided to go back to the library and continue where I had left off yesterday. I spent the rest of the day reading silently with Mable until closing time.

The next day, I took on my first E-rank quest. It was to hunt some horned rabbits along a road that passed through a forest.\

Each horn you bring back pays 1 bronze coin, and if you bring back any monster parts, you can sell them off for extra money.

I exited through the north gate and followed the road till I saw the edge of a forest.

This must be the location the quest told me to go.

People consider horned rabbits to be pests. From reading a monster encyclopedia in the library, I learned that horned rabbits are normally solitary monsters, unlike the ones I fought when I first traveled here. They’re generally known to attack anyone who enters their territory.

This would be a problem for merchants, travelers, and townspeople passing through the area, so the Adventurers’ Guild routinely puts out subjugation quests to deal with them.

I entered the forest and followed the road. Other adventurers were scattered throughout the forest, staying relatively close to the road as they searched for horned rabbits.

I continued down the road until I noticed an animal trail that the other adventurers had overlooked. Maybe I’d have better luck finding horned rabbits deeper in the forest rather than staying near the road. It had worked for me during the bittercress grass quest, so perhaps the same logic applied here.

The adventurers I’d seen were all newcomers, so they probably hadn’t figured that out yet.

With that in mind, I broke off from the road and followed the animal trail for a short while.

Eventually I found some imprints in the trail. They were tracks, and they looked fresh, matching the monster encyclopedia book for a horned rabbit

Not a moment later, as I thought that, a horned rabbit emerged from the foliage.

Compared to the white ones I’d fought before, the one in front of me was smaller.

It growled and prepared to lunge at me.

I smirked as I drew my sword, feeling a bit excited at the sight of it.

As it lunged at me, I slashed at it with a single swing. It went down, lying motionless on the ground.

Is that it? I poked the horned rabbit with my sword to make sure it was dead, but it didn’t react.

My smirk faded. Well, that was disappointing. I didn’t expect a single slash to be enough to kill it, but apparently, I was wrong.

Man, this is going to be a pain if they’re this weak. My enthusiasm dropped at the thought of having to hunt them all day. I wish this were more interesting.

However, my boredom didn’t last long. A high-pitched scream suddenly came from the right side of the trail.

I saw a skinny boy with blue hair and eyes, around my age, running with teary eyes while being chased by a horned rabbit.

“Somebody help me!”

Well, that is certainly something.

I immediately chased after them through the forest, marking each tree I passed with my sword so I could find my way back.

“Hey!”

I shouted at the horned rabbit, drawing its attention. It stopped chasing the boy and turned toward me instead, so I swung my sword at it once, and it went down.

After dealing with the horned rabbit, I approached the boy, who was still hiding behind a tree after being chased by it. His gear made him look like an adventurer, but why was he so far into the forest, and why had he been running from a horned rabbit? These things are easy to kill.

“Are you alright? What’s your—”

Before I could finish, he clung to me and immediately started sobbing all over my cloak. Geez, I’m really going to have to find someplace to clean off his snot and tears later. But oh well, at least I know why he was running away from just seeing him.

“Thank sob, you.”

Not knowing what to do, I waited till he calmed down for a bit and asked him what happened.

“Scary hic. It hic was chasing me.”

“What happened?”

He started to wail even more once I asked, but I managed to make out an answer out of his incoherent sobbing. Apparently his name is Rain, E rank, and this was also his first E rank quest. He got scared by a horned rabbit of all things and ran.

He's really a crybaby; I wonder how he even managed to pass the E-rank evaluation test?

“Ya sob, they’re super scary, sob.”

“Do you have a party or anything?”

“No, sniff.”

Guess I can’t leave him here.

“You can let go now.”

Rain slowly let go, his face completely red from both crying and being chased.

“Follow me then, I’ll help you.”

Picking up the dead horned rabbit, we made our way back to the trail by following the marks I had left on the trees. During the walk, Rain followed me very closely, almost like a lost puppy.

“Umm, erg… Where are we going?”

“We’re going back to the trail you ran past; there’s a Horned rabbit I killed earlier, so I want to pick it up. Then we’ll look for some more horned rabbits”

Rain let out an audible shriek when I mentioned “horned rabbits,” as if the very words brought back some terrible memories. Tears began welling up in his eyes as he clung to me again, giving me a look that made it seem like I had just betrayed him.

“Please no, they're too scary.”

“Don’t worry, you’ll be fine, probably.”

“What do you mean, probably!?”

“As I said, you’ll be fine, and I’ll even help you.”

Honestly, looking at him, he is really helpless; leaving him here by himself would be a really bad idea.

“But I don’t want to; they’re too scary!”

Rain started crying again.

Not wanting to deal with any more of his crying or get my cloak even dirtier, I did the only thing I could think of. I smacked Rain on the head, figuring it might work since it had usually worked back at the nursery on the military base where I was stationed in my past life whenever the kids got out of hand.

“That hurts”

As expected, it worked; at least he stopped crying. Rain was holding both of his hands on top of his head where I hit him, teary-eyed.

We walked back to the trail where I’d killed the horned rabbit. Thinking about how I should help Rain, I wondered if making him fight one would help him overcome his fear. As if on cue, another horned rabbit appeared.

How convenient; let's see how well Rain can fight.

It screeched and went after Rain, probably because it sensed that he was the weaker of the two of us.

Rain screamed in terror and began running in circles around me, being chased by the horned rabbit.

“Ahhh, please save me!”

“No, just fight back.”

“I don’t want to!”

However, it didn’t work. Rain still ran away, with the horned rabbit chasing after him as they went around me in circles.

After being chased for a while, Rain eventually tripped on something and fell. To my surprise, he actually drew his sword. However, to my disappointment, he swung it wildly as the horned rabbit prepared to attack him.

I'd step in and kill the horned rabbit just before it could harm him, then knock his sword out of his hand so he wouldn’t hurt himself by blindly swinging it.

“Hey, you okay?”

Rain was curled up into a ball, repeatedly muttering, “Someone save me, I don’t want to fight.”

Why does it feel like this is somehow my fault?

With a sigh, I smacked Rain on the head again. If it had stopped him from crying before, I figured it might work again. Sure enough, it managed to snap him out of his panicked state.

“Ow!”

“At least that's some progress.”

This is going to be more troublesome than I thought. For a moment, the thought of leaving him crossed my mind. But I quickly dismissed it. If I left him alone in these woods, he’d probably end up dead, and I wasn’t willing to let that happen.

After several attempts where I had to resort to some… let's just say forceful measures to get him to fight, he finally killed his first horned rabbit.

“I did it, Nyx, I really did it.”

Rain was jumping for joy and was about to start crying again, but I raised my fist into the air. He immediately stopped and looked terrified at my clenched fist.

We were by a creek, taking a break under the shade of a tree. It was mid-afternoon, and I was starting to feel hungry.

“Hey, Rain. I’m going to make lunch. Could you make a campfire?”

“Okay”

Doing what I was asked, I began skinning all the horned rabbits we had killed by the creek. In total, I killed 4 today while Rain only killed one.

After finishing the skinning, I set the rabbit fur aside and inspected the meat. I picked out the two best-looking rabbits for lunch.

I carried the meat over to the campfire Rain had finished preparing, skewered the pieces onto sticks, and began roasting them over the flames.

I headed back to the creek. Taking off my cloak, I began washing off the mess Rain had made crying all over it. Once I was done, I put it next to the fire to dry and sat by the fire.

While my cloak dried and the horned rabbits roasted over the fire, I decided to talk to Rain.

“So, I’ve been wondering why you chose to become an adventurer?”

Rain doesn't seem to fit being an adventurer, with him being a crybaby and all, plus he keeps trying to run away whenever there is a monster around. I’m honestly surprised that he’s an E-rank, which is a miracle in itself, because I could not imagine him fighting an examiner; instead, I imagine him just running away.

“I had a teacher who taught me how to use a sword. They told me stories of their adventuring days, so I’d decided to become one”

I guess that explains that question, at least. So he can know how to fight.

“And where are you from, and are you alone”

“I'd rather not say; it’s a personal one”

He said that with a pained expression on his face.

“But I’m not alone; I’m living with a relative”

So… he has his own problems to deal with, like me.

“How about you, Nyx? Why did you choose to become an adventurer?”

“You could say I want to start a new life, I guess.”

“A new life…?”

“Ya, a new life. Like you, it’s a personal reason.”

After around 20 minutes of us talking, the horned rabbits looked to be done cooking. I took mine out of the fire, checked if it was done, and bit into it.

“Hey, Rain, it’s done cooking.”

It tasted okay, though, not as tender or tasty as the white-horned rabbit I ate.

Rain took her own horned rabbit and looked a little awkward as she tried to figure out how to eat it, as though she had never done this before. After watching me for a while, she began eating it, carefully copying my movements.

Once we finished eating our roasted horned rabbits, I asked if Rain wanted to go back.

Before Rain could speak, I heard a rustling sound behind me.

Noticing the rustling, Rain immediately tried to flee in the opposite direction of the sound while I drew my sword.

I guess I have my work cut out for me.

Grumbling to myself, I waited in anticipation to see what was coming. A moment later, I saw a horned rabbit emerge from the bushes.

Once it saw me, it immediately charged toward me. I swung my sword and killed it in one swing, then I looked for where Rain had run off to.

“Hey, Rain, you can stop hiding now.”

“Uuugh.”

Instead of seeing Rain come out, I heard a groan of pain from the direction he had run.

I walked over to see what happened, only to freeze when I saw something I never expected. My brain seemed to short-circuit for a moment.

Rain had tripped and fallen onto a bush, his pants caught on the branches. What they revealed left me standing there in stunned silence.

I could even feel an expression form on my default expressionless face becaus is that panties he’s wearing.

It was up in the air for everyone to see. Is he like… a pervert?

Once Rain got up, he noticed that I was staring at him with actual emotions on my face, though it was barely noticeable.

“What's wrong, Nyx?”

Rain looked at me with a bit of confusion before looking down and realizing his pants were down.

A short, awkward silence filled the air. Then his face turned bright red, and he screamed.

“Ahhhhhhh!”

Almost immediately, he tried to cover it with his shirt unsuccessfully and ran behind a nearby tree instead. Rain started crying again as I was still standing there, stunned

“You saw, you saw, didn't you? You saw my secret.”

His cry became even louder. “Now I can’t get married!”

Can’t get married? Why is that the first thing he’s worried about? Of course he can get married. He’s a guy after all. If someone saw him wearing panties, they’d probably just think he was a weirdo.

It’s not like he’s a girl… Wait!… don’t tell me…?

“Hey, do you know Hutch’s clothing store?”

Asking that question, I managed to get Rain out of his- no, her stupor, which confirms it.

“Wait, how do you know about Hutch?”

“Same reason as you do”

It seems that I found another crossdresser in this town.

“Heh!? That would mean, wait, no, that, you're–you're a…”

She was in a daze till she finally connected the dots that I’m also a girl crossdressing as a guy.

Who knew… like what are the odds we cross paths with each other, two people crossdressing meeting each other by chance.

“A girl! You’re a girl!”

Rain was about to go back into a stupor, so I smacked her head with my fist again so she wouldn’t.

“I think we should go back”

This is certainly a weird day.

“Also, you don’t have to worry; I won't tell anyone about you crossdressing as a guy, and I wouldn’t ask why, either.”

After I finished skinning the horned rabbit and getting its horn, I picked up my cloak by the fire that had finished drying, and we started walking back to town.

After reaching the northside gate, we headed straight to the guild, where we turned in the horned rabbits we had hunted and completed the quest. It seemed that Emma wasn’t here today.

“Here.”

I gave Rain half of the money we earned from turning in the horned rabbit horns to confirm the kills, along with half of what we made from selling the fur.

In total, we got 6 bronze coins for killing the horned rabbits and 6 large copper coins for the furs.

“It’s too much; I only killed one, and I’ve been a trouble for you all day.”

“Just take it; we’re working together, aren’t we?”

Hearing that, Rain was about to start crying again, this time from happiness. I quickly raised my fist to stop her, not wanting to clean my cloak again after her last round of sobbing. At the sight of my fist, she immediately began shuddering in fear.

Seeing that I had managed to stop her from crying, I lowered my fist and asked if she wanted to work together again tomorrow.

“Yes, I would like that very much.”

“I might show up a bit late. I got something to pick up, so could you wait a bit for me?”

“That is no problem.”

“Okay, goodbye then.”

“Goodbye, Nyx.”

Watching Rain walk away, going back to her relative’s house, where she was staying, I looked up at the sun. Since there were still a few hours before the adventurers’ guild closed, I decided to head to the library.

“Hi there, Mable. I finished my first E-rank quest earlier than expected. It looks like I still have some time left for today.”

Mable was silently reading a book in this cramped library as usual. She looked up from her book, greeted me, and asked.

“Do you want to continue where you left off?”

“Yes.”

Mable grabbed the book I didn't finish yesterday and gave it to me. I silently continued reading that book with Mable till it was closing time.

After that, I went back to my inn, bought some dinner, and went to bed.