Didn't I Say to Make My Abilities Average in the Next Life?! Volume 7

by Funa

  All the fight suddenly gone out of her, Mile fell to sulking, leaving the choosing of the inn entirely to the other three.

  “I guess this is the place, then,” said Reina, as the Vow stood before their chosen inn.

  There were not a lot of inns in town to begin with, so it was not as though they had very many choices. Plus, comfort was not their priority this time. They would be staying for only one night, and picking the most questionable place they could find was best for the job they were currently on.

  “Yeah, this should do the trick,” Mavis agreed.

  “It looks cheap and pretty shady… Perfect,” said Pauline.

  “It really wouldn’t matter anyway,” said Mile. “Good enough!”

  The decision was unanimous.

  “Shady” had probably been a bit of an overstatement. Yes, the place was a bit dirty, but it wasn’t as though there were any criminal types coming in and out of the lobby. It was merely that the place was a bit crude compared to the Crimson Vow’s usual choices of lodging, which were inns that were tidy, seemed safe for a group of young girls, and were cozy, even if they were a little pricey. This inn was the sort of place that any normal group of travelers would lodge at for cheap, so there was really no issue here.

  “Welcome! Will you be staying the night?”

  At the counter sat a precious young boy of around seven or eight. Mile’s eyes flashed, and she was immediately drawn to him.

  In her previous life, Mile had always wanted a little brother. She wanted an older brother too, but that was a physical impossibility. Well, technically, if her parents had separated, and one of them got remarried to someone who already had kids, then perhaps she would have still had a shot, but there was no way that a couple who were as in love as those two were would ever grow apart, and she certainly was never going to say to them, “Hey, can you get divorced so that I can have a big brother?”

  Therefore, she had settled for wishing for a younger brother, but around the time she reached high school, she had given up on that dream as well.

  In fact, Mile’s true weakness was not cute little girls but cute little boys. Seeing how quickly she now perked up, the other three looked on wearily…

  “I swear, Mile!”

  When they entered their room afterward, the exasperated comments began immediately.

  “You can’t be so boy crazy! Have you no shame?!”

  “What will people think about us for being with you?!”

  “You do realize that with a boy that young, it’d be a crime…”

  Even Pauline and Mavis went in on the attack this time.

  “I-I-I-It’s not like that!!! I just love to dote on little boys…”

  “I… I can’t believe it… Mile, you really are—”

  “A pervert!”

  “A pervert…”

  “It’s not like thaaaaaaat!!!”

  “So…when are you going?” asked Reina.

  “Going where?”

  Mile did not catch Reina’s drift.

  “Honestly! Hurry up and go bring that kid up here!” the mage impatiently demanded.

  Mile looked to Mavis and Pauline to see two more hopeful faces staring her way.

  “Seriously, what is with you guuuuuuuuuys?!?!”

  Indeed, even more so than Mile, Reina, who was an only child; Pauline, who was nostalgic for the days when her brother was little; and Mavis, who was the youngest of her line, were all starved for the affections of an impressionable younger sibling.

  “And you all thought you had the right to criticize me?!”

  Of course, not even Mile had the courage to bring a boy up to their room. It was one thing for a girl, but four young ladies bringing a boy to their room was bad no matter how you looked at it…

  At dinner, the four continued to talk loudly about their plans for the following day.

  “So, tomorrow at the second morning bell, yes? We’ll head straight to Caldile and reevaluate our schedule once we arrive.”

  Reina’s voice carried easily, so the other guests and the employees of the inn were certain to hear them. By conveying their departure time and their destination so concisely, they made themselves easy prey for any spying bandits. It made ambushing them more efficient, which meant less wasted time. They were doing the brigands a great service.

  After they returned to their room, Mile snuggled into her bed, ignoring the lingering gazes coming her way from the others, who silently implored, “Are you sure you won’t go fetch him?” The rest of the party, lacking the courage to do anything about it themselves, gave up on the venture and went to bed as well.

  They had another four-day journey to prepare themselves for, after all, and this time they were carrying all their own gear, so the rest was all the more necessary. And so, the sounds of peaceful snores came quickly after that.

  ***

  “Okay, let’s head out!”

  “All right!!!”

  Apparently, the Crimson Vow had already given up on the whole “Yes, ma’am” business. When children went about pretending to talk like hunters, the adults usually went along with it. Thinking that their behavior would be interpreted in this manner, the members of the Crimson Vow opted to go with their usual reply rather than an unfamiliar, more conspicuous turn of phrase.

  “Let’s walk at a normal pace today,” Reina suggested, earning nods from the other three.

  This time, there was no telling when they might be set upon by hidden assailants, so except for Mile, who was playing the role of the young noblewoman, they were all equipped with their staves and swords. Besides some small canteens, the rest of their gear was stashed away in Mile’s storage. Now that they had revealed her ability publicly, it would be more unnatural for them not to be utilizing it. Thus, they could very easily move more quickly than normal hunters. However, that might put a hitch in any attackers’ plans. They had to proceed at the pace of any normal group of non-hunter ladies with a child in tow, just as the attackers would expect.

  Of course, there was also the possibility that rather than being ambushed, they would be tailed. The whole thing would be moot if they left their pursuers in the dust.

  “We should be seeing them soon,” Reina said, as the sun began to set.

  The only people who were attacked on leaving Zarbef were travelers, not townsfolk. This implied that the bandits were lurking within Zarbef, or at the very least, that they had informants who lived in the town. In order for them to relay information back and forth quickly, their stronghold could not be anywhere that far out—particularly not if they were actually town residents.

  The casualties that had occurred thus far had, furthermore, all happened at places one or two days’ walk from the town. If they attacked too close to town, it would be easy to hunt the bandits down, so that particular distance had certainly been taken into account, too.

  Well, speak of the devil, and he appears. Surely enough, not long after Reina spoke, five men appeared ahead of them from behind a rocky formation on the side of the highway. They all appeared to be in their thirties or forties, with decent-looking hair and garments.

  “I doubt they’ve set up shop right there. They probably go back and forth from the town.”

  “It does seem that way…”

  It was likely just as Reina and Pauline said. If they lived as far out as this, their hair and beards and clothing would all be in a bit more of a “bandit-y” state. It didn’t look like there was anywhere the men could wash up around here, after all.

  “There are three behind us, too,” Mavis announced. “Standard practice.”

  Indeed, another trio had suddenly appeared at their rear, drawing nearer with wicked grins upon their faces.

  “Stand back!” Mavis declared to the men. “If you should come any nearer, you will be considered brigands, and I, as the guard of this daughter of a noble household, shall deal with you accordingly! Should it come to that, I take no responsibility if you are injured or killed. And, if you should happ
en to survive, you will be apprehended and taken to the authorities, where you shall be handed over to the city guard as criminals by way of the Hunters’ Guild!”

  Naturally, such a threat was not enough to convince the bandits to stand down. This was nothing more than standard proceedings to create a situation where Mavis could fight them without holding back. This way, the men could not later backpedal and say that it was a “misunderstanding” or that their intentions had been misconstrued.

  “Heh heh heh,” chuckled one of the men, “better settle down there, little lady. There’s eight of us, and, from the looks of ya, only one of you’s gonna put up any kinda real fight. You can fight us all ya want, but all yer gonna do’s end up hurt.”

  “Very well,” she replied, “I will take that as confession of your banditry, your intent to do harm, and an official threat! Let the battle of justifiable self-defense begin!”

  “What?”

  The chief bandit was suddenly quite puzzled. Not only was their quarry not quaking in her boots, the young lady was now spewing off all sorts of phrases he had never even heard of, still cool and collected.

  The Crimson Vow swiftly moved into formation. Against the five bandits at the front were Mile and Pauline. Against the back three were Mavis and Reina. Pauline and Reina had their backs up against each other.

  “Oh? Dunno what you gals’re playin’ at here, but tell me, what exactly’s a little maiden like you gonna do against us empty-handed?” the leader asked with a sneer.

  “Hm?” said Mile. “Empty-handed? What are you talking about?”

  “Huh???”

  The bandits in front did a double take. Sure enough, this noble maiden, who had been empty-handed until just moments ago, now held a sword in her right hand.

  “Wh-when did she… That’s right! Storage!”

  That confirmed it: they were affiliated with someone in the Guild. There hadn’t been a chance to talk about Mile’s storage magic at the inn, and it would have clearly been unnatural to go out of their way to bring it up. It would have been incredibly hasty of the brigands to leap to the conclusion that a young noblewoman would have storage magic, a very rare thing. Usually one would think, “She must’ve been hiding that sword somewhere!” or something along those lines.

  “Heh! If little girls like you start playin’ at swords, all’s that’ll happen is yer gonna get hurt!”

  The leader’s words were directed at Mile, who stood in front of him, but behind her, Mavis, who was facing the rear group with her back turned to the man, suddenly flinched.

  “Little girls like you can practice with a blade all you want—it don’t mean nothin’! Why wouldja even bother?! If you just stayed at home playin’ princess like good little girls should, you wouldn’t be endin’ up in situations like this! Gyah ha!”

  Crack!

  “What did you say? What did you just say, you bastard…?” came a low voice.

  “She’s snapped!!!” the other three gasped.

  Yes, Mavis had well and truly snapped.

  “Heheh. Eheheh. Eheheheheheheh…”

  “Oh my god!!!”

  Mavis was laughing. The other three began to tremble. This was Mavis, who was always courteous and kind, considerate to a fault. Her will was so strong, no one could even imagine what would possibly ruffle her feathers.

  But of course, Mavis did get angry sometimes, just like anyone else. And what made her angriest was a personal insult, such as an attack on her family, her honor, or her tireless pursuit of her own dreams.

  Ka-chk.

  Reina and Pauline could not see it, but Mile, with her dynamic field of vision, noticed Mavis rotate the hilt of her sword in her hand.

  What is she doing?

  The utterly meaningless maneuver left Mile perplexed.

  And then, Mavis shouted, “Don’t worry! I’ll only strike you with the back of the sword!”

  “They’ll die!” Mile suddenly screamed out. “Mavis, you’ll kill them!!”

  A Japanese-style sword was one thing, but rotating a Western-style sword, with a cutting edge on both sides, was summarily pointless. Apparently, even in her haze of rage, Mavis still hoped to end the battle without a fatality. She had remembered a technique mentioned often in Mile’s Japanese folktales—the reverse-blade strike, which could be used to fell a foe without killing them. What she had forgotten, however, was that the katana used in these stories and the double-edged blade in her own hands were not the same thing.

  That said, even a single-blade katana, used in reverse, was still a metal rod, and being struck hard with such an instrument could result in broken bones, internal injuries, and if one was not careful, death…

  “Reina!” shouted Mile, “Please save those bandits!”

  “What the heck?!?!”

  Reina was thrown for a loop at this outrageous instruction, but in truth, she had already grasped the situation herself. She was prepared to kill without hesitation if she had to, but even she knew that a situation like this, where they had plenty of leeway, was not the time for that.

  “Ugh, guess I better…” she grumbled, quickly and quietly beginning an incantation.

  The three rear bandits, not hearing Reina’s incantation, and thinking Mavis and Mile’s conversation merely that of a pair of fanciful young ladies, paid them no mind, until…

  “Firebomb!”

  Ka-boom!

  As Reina’s spell went off, the three men were blown backwards. She had purposely aimed it away from them, so while they might end up a little singed and a little bruised, there would be no fatalities.

  Seeing that Mavis was displeased that her quarry had been driven away, Reina nodded to herself. “Protecting them by attacking them… This must be what Mile meant when she once said that, ‘The best defense is a strong offense…’”

  …No, Reina, that was not at all what the phrase meant.

  “Wh-wh-wh-wha…?”

  The men had assumed that, besides the swordswoman, these were all normal little girls, but suddenly here was a combat magic wielder—a fairly skilled one, at that. The boss found himself panicked at the realization that three of his men had just been blown away in an instant, but when he turned his fretful eyes to the young mage, he saw that she was not looking his way but walking slowly toward the three she had just attacked. Perhaps she was moving to finish them off so that she would not be attacked from behind while she was not looking.

  In any event, this gave the bandits the perfect opportunity to capture the other three while her back was turned, and take them hostage. If they could nab them all…

  There was a noble maiden who could use storage magic and a combat magic user—and both of them were young and pretty to boot. Even the well-endowed maid and the swordswoman would fetch a fair price on the black market.

  The men in the front faced the noble, the maid, and the swordswoman, who had now turned their way. Of the three of them, two appeared to be complete amateurs in combat. Those forces were up against five ruffians. Capturing the girls would be like taking candy from a baby. First, to strike down the swordswoman…

  Smack! Clatter!

  And so, the sword was struck down…the bandit leader’s sword.

  “Huh…?”

  He looked down, stunned, at his suddenly empty hands, then abruptly fled to the rear.

  “Get ’em!”

  She had closed the gap and struck down his sword before he could even react—this woman was dangerous! The leader suddenly valued his safety over the prospect of capturing Mavis unharmed. There were still three other girls, after all, and the swordswoman would probably fetch the least of the bunch anyway, so it was a small loss.

  At the leader’s command, two of the four remaining subordinates headed toward Mavis, while the other two went for Mile and Pauline, respectively. Even if Mavis was a sword wielder, she was still a young woman. Two of them should be more than enough to keep her in check. And, while she was down, all they would have to do was thrust their swords at the
noble who employed her and the maid, and the fight would be finished—all before the mage girl could turn back their way.

  Smack! Smack! Thwump! Thwump!

  Indeed, the bout was over in an instant. Mavis struck each of the two men with the flat of her blade, in what could perhaps be called a “side-strike” style, knocking them down entirely. Apparently, she had cooled down a bit since her initial burst of anger, so Mile stood back and left her to it. Mavis, in her right mind, would never kill anyone senselessly.

  However, in that same moment, the remaining two men were still gunning for “the noble and the maid.”

  Gotcha! the leader thought, when suddenly, the head of the bandit who was facing the maid suddenly caught alight.

  “Gaaaaaaaaah!!!”

  The man cried out, dropping his sword and writhing, his hands clutching his head. The other man, however, had seized the noble maiden around the waist and now had a sword held to her throat.

  All right, that’s it!

  The leader was a little bit shocked to see that, somewhat improbably, the maid was a mage as well, but it was not as though people who could use at least enough magic to light small fires were rare. Now that they had the maiden as a hostage, this was little skin off of his back, anyway.

  A satisfied grin on his face, the leader began to issue a decree of surrender to the young women.

  “All right, ya little bastards! If y’all wanna see yer precious little mistress make it outta this alive, then…”

  Just then, the captured maiden gripped the blade at her throat with the thumb and forefinger of her left hand and casually bent it away. Crack. The blade snapped off with a soft pop, a few inches from the guard.

  “Huh?!”

  The bandit hurriedly moved to draw his back-up dagger when Mile gripped the wrist of his right hand tightly.

  “Owwwwwwww! Stop it! Lemme go! You’re gonna break iiiiiiiit!!”

  After twisting the arm that was wrapped around her away from her body, she casually landed a blow to his gut, and the man crumbled to the ground, unable to breathe.

  The mage, meanwhile, had been busy beating the other three men with her staff, incapacitating them with physical power instead of magic. Then, she began walking the boss’s way.