A strong breeze blew across the land as I stood steady tightly gripping my sword.

A ball of light was whirling through the air in front of me.

I watched it carefully, only following its movements with my eyes.

「…….fu!」

A sharp slash.

The sword left a trail of black light in the air.

A sharp metallic sound rang out.

(Onii-chan is amazing, you took it out in one blow!)

I listened to Lilia"s praise as I went to pick up the dark ball that had lost its shine.

「This makes ten…」
(How many of these do we need desuno?)
「As many as we can find. These are materials to make the trains that will run on the rails. Of course only one train is not enough. I want enough to have a route to each town, and I want it to have round trips so I need two for each…then in case one breaks I want one more as backup…so at least 3 each.」
(I see desuno. Then we have to hunt more and more desuno.)
「That"s right.」
(Lilia will do her best desuno. Let"s go let"s go desuno!)
「Yeah」

I nodded and relied on the magic circle radar to search for the b.a.l.l.s of light.

When they stopped inside of the gra.s.s they didn"t shine, but with the arrows there they weren"t hard to find.

The next I found I defeated in two hits, then the next in one, then the next.

And so I went on defeating them in one hit…and if I missed the first then I hit with the second.

Sometimes if I missed the first I received a counterattack, but Lilia"s black armor made sure that I was unhurt.

(This is going really well desuno!)

(What"s wrong?)

Lilia asked when I didn"t respond.

I released her from True Eternal Slave.

The sword lost its black light and returned to a normal appearance.

Lilia was released from the sword and went back to her normal self wearing her green dress.

「Onii-chan?」
「Back away from me a bit.」
「B-but」
「Take these and back away.」

I handed Lilia the items we"d gathered.

I wasn"t angry or desperate.

I tried to convey that to her and she seemed to understand and backed away.

「What are you doing desuno?」
「There"s something I want to test.」
「Something you want to test desuno?」
「Yeah, it feels like I"m on the cusp of something…」
「Ok……desuno…」

Lilia looked confused.

I looked for the next target.

It flew up from the gra.s.s and started to flit about.

Sweat rolled down my back.

A thought popped into my head…what would happen if I got hit?

I chased that thought out of my mind and focused.

I took my sword and——swung!
I felt it hit. The ball of light lost its glow and fell to the ground.

「Huuu……….」

I wiped my sweat with the back of my hand and picked up the ball.

It might be my imagination, but once I took Lilia out, it felt like my focus increased.

Maybe the thought that it"d be very bad if I missed and that increased my concentration.

I threw the ball over to Lilia.

I searched for another.

Just like before I found one, focused, and defeated it in one hit.

This went on for ten of them.

After taking Lilia out, I defeated 10 of them in a row with one hit.

It felt like it was getting easier and easier.

It felt like getting used to riding a bicycle.

At first it was like using training wheels and protectors, I failed a lot and got hit, but soon I removed both training wheels and protectors.

After I grasped the trick to it, I became able to do it continuously.

After removing Lilia, I hadn"t taken a single hit.

It gave me the feeling that I myself had leveled up.

I was able to hunt them even without Lilia.

「Onii-chan is amazing! You didn"t even need Lilia desuno!」

I don"t know if me or Lilia was more pleased with this.

I had gone into this with the feeling of wanting to show the sight of me becoming stronger to my slave.

Since that"s not very cool of me…I"ll just keep it to myself.

But I wanted to reward the cause of this level up…Lilia.

A reason to reward her appeared.
I"ll give it to her straight.

「Lilia.」
「Yes desuno?」

I took out an origami medal from my pocket and handed it to her.

It was an item that I always had ready now to give to them as rewards.

「This is……the legendary medal desuno!?」

Lilia was overreacting.

Oh…that"s right, she"d never gotten one.

「You are giving that to Lilia desuno?」
「Yeah」
「I"m so happy desuno…….」

—Magic has been charged by 50,000—

It seems she"s quite happy with it.

「But………why desuno? Lilia wasn"t that useful today desuno.」

Since I"d removed her from the sword for the second half, it was no wonder she thought that.

「…Your Master needs a reason to give something to his slave?」
「Absolutely not.」

Lilia instantly answered.

That response was exactly like an Eternal Slave.

That kind of thing was so worthy of being praised and loved.

「Ok then, let"s go back.」
「Ok desuno!」

Lilia carried the orbs as we headed back to Ribek.