– Adventurer"s Life Day 41 (Sat) – Morning – Comnes Town – East Plains

For the sake of the emergency request, we"ve been wandering around the eastern gra.s.slands in search for the elite sh.e.l.led rabbit.

Just a little while ago, all the skeletons were split up into groups of 3, one of which consisted of Centurion and the skeletons he has authority over.

Centurions team is leading a little ahead of us in case we stumble upon some sh.e.l.led rabbits territory.

When defeated, the bones will be used to summon more skeletons and create their equipment.

Proceeding on like that for a while, we got about 35 fully armed skeletons in total before a shout was heard nearby…

At the same time, I"ve been contacted by Centurion through telepathy.

"To the RIGHT from behind are large groups of ADVENTURERS and Sh.e.l.lED RABBITS currently under BATTLE… It is believed the ELITE may be among them. Should we PROCEED?"

"Surround the rabbits from the opposite side from the adventurers and attack them from there. Is it possible from your position?"

"AFFIRMATIVE."

"Alright, I leave it to you. However, don"t stick out too much until we get there."

"UNDERSTOOD."

With that, I gave orders to the remaining skeletons to head towards the location.

"Follow along and stay in formation!"

"Yes!"

Ah, Benedetta responded to that… That kinda surprised me.

(… Even if it were an ‘Elite", I didn"t think a sh.e.l.led rabbit would be that big of a deal…)

I had this thought right from the very beginning, but when approaching closer, the situation was very different from how I imagined.

"What is this!?"

"… There sure is a lot of them."

From what should"ve been a conspicuously large rabbit it, had been completely surrounded by a ma.s.sive horde of 80 or so other sh.e.l.led rabbits.

There are already about 10 adventurers fighting against them right now, but to be frank, they don"t seem to be able to last for long.

"There"s the ‘Elite"! Prepare yourselves!"

Adventurers who were also led here form the shout were also surprised by the sheer number of enemies.

Of course, they tried to approach the source of it all, but with the number of sh.e.l.led rabbits in the way, there was no way to at the moment…

"Oi you small fry, get out of the way! I"m taking it down!"

The blonde shaved hair guy from earlier rushes by with his party in front of us, and with a large swing of his halberd, he sent the surrounding sh.e.l.led rabbits flying.

(… Ohhh.)

It"s the first time I"ve seen someone use a halberd… Because of its length and the weight of the axe by the end, so long as the distance is correctly measured, it makes the surrounding rabbits look like stuffed animals from the way they"ve been thrashed about.

"Hey, It"s only words, don"t mind it so much."

"I wasn"t minding it.

… No Benedetta, you"re definitely still minding it.

The blonde shaved head dude"s party members all are moving quite well, and there doesn"t seem to be a gap in their positions even after being surrounded by all those rabbits.

At this rate, they"ll be able to reach to the ‘Elite" from the centre of the horde… Hm? Speaking of which, where is that ‘Elite" anyways?

From the thicket to the side of their party, jumped out the ‘Elite" sh.e.l.led rabbit!

One of the party members got hit from behind and fell down. He tried getting back up… but struggled doing so for some reason.

"He"s been poisoned!"

"What was that!?"

… There isn"t a need for me to say this, but I"m pretty sure sh.e.l.led rabbits don"t normally have poison. Is it a special upgrade from being an ‘Elite"?

The ‘Elite" escaped back into the crowd of sh.e.l.led rabbits.

"That a.s.shole! Don"t get in the way!"

Blonde shaven dude took a stance with his halberd and chased after the ‘Elite", but was too impatient to notice… several other sh.e.l.led rabbits came at him from both sides.

He manage to dodge one through reaction, but he still got staggered by the others… Immediately, the ‘Elite" took a sharp turn back and rammed straight into him…

"Ah, he"s flying… He actually got sent flying…"

"W… Is it really fine to just stare and stand like this!?"

"The SITUATION is confirmed to be NOT serious."

After several spins in the air, that guy with the blonde shave had his face drilled into the ground before his momentum stopped… Really now, even Benedetta felt sorry watching that… I think.

Like the first guy, he tried to get back up… but, I don"t know if it"s because of the poison ir that he"s just seriously injured, but he collapsed back down.

The remaining two members were already trying to frantically escape, but were already surrounded by sh.e.l.led rabbits… before we knew it, they disappeared…

(… Eh?… Isn"t this like, really bad?)

Because of the collapse of the blonde haired guy"s party, a gap had been created where the other parties had now been flanked and casualties started to show all around.

Even worse, that ‘Elite" blended back in with the group and had been picking off adventurers one after another…

(I really shouldn"t be staring like this…)

At that, I ordered the skeletons to rush in… we charged behind the rabbits as they were busy attacking the adventurers.

Following along behind the skeletons, I threw some stones at the sh.e.l.led rabbits attacking the adventurers.

Because of the alchemist skill now level 8, the power behind each throw hand been considerably strengthened. Even sh.e.l.led rabbits that had quite a bit of distance from me were easily one shotted.

No sooner, the ‘Elite" appeared, and attacked one of the skeletons, but the poison"s not going to work on it and it had been held still as the other skeletons begin to pummel it with their bone clubs… Meanwhile, the other adventurers nearby had been managing to stand their ground and began eliminating them one after another.

(… Well with this, it should be alright now…)

"We are now in CONTACT with the ELITE."

A notification from Centurion had been received.

Taking sight onto one of the skeletons from the vicinity, the ‘Elite" had been acc.u.mulating damage while still being beaten up by the gang of skeletons, until it finally collapsed and stopped moving…

– Adventurer"s Life Day 41 (Sat) – Before Noon – Comnes Town – Eastern Plains

"Feido is a pretty st.u.r.dy guy, so it shouldn"t be long before he wakes up…"

The two of the poisoned from earlier had just recovered. They still seemed to be unconscious though.

Seems like the blonde guy"s name is Feido… Hopefully I"ll be able to remember this, so I can finally stop calling him blonde something something.

The poison of theirs wasn"t anything particularly lethal, it just causes paralysis. Though, they won"t be able to stand properly for a while.

… Well, I suppose this is fine I guess.

Centurions party came back with the ‘Elite" carca.s.s on their shoulders, so I had myself separated from Feido"s party and prepared dismantling it… Along the way, I noticed that guy"s halberd lying hidden within the tall gra.s.s…

It"s a halberd… and a metal one at that…

"What happened here! Feido"s halberd got broken just then!"

"We"ve been looking all over for it! That thing was h.e.l.la expensive!"

Using Alchemist"s skill, Modelling, I took a piece off the tip of the halberd and chucked it into Centurion"s bag.

It looked really good, so I couldn"t help myself… I"ll morph it a bit, just in case.

With that out of the way, the other skeletons are still in the process of dismantling the rabbits we defeated… Honestly, even including all the rabbits and elite we hunted, the reward for this emergency requests would still be rather low.

Well, at least I can brush up on my manual controlling skill when doing all this.

Once everyone else was done dismantling their rabbits, we all head back to town.

– Adventurer"s Life Day 41 (Sat) – Noon – Comnes Town – Adventurers Guild – Meeting Room

Once we all arrived back to the meeting room, trainer Dorris entered the room.

"The emergency request has been completed. Thank you for the hard work."

Well, at least there weren"t any additional work.

Now then, the reward from the request was discussed next and as decided, rabbits that have been hunted will go to the responsible parties… 

… and, from what trainer Dorris said we"ve been given a total of 40 of the rabbits including the Elite…

These weren"t really valuable monsters to begin with, and even with the ‘Elite", it"s not a reward worth more than even half of what we usually earn in a day.

Not to mention, looking at all the injured adventurers around me, I can"t say I don"t feel guilty about receiving more than half the total reward split…

"… It"s okay about the reward from us. Please let the other adventurers have this split among them."

"Eh!?"

"Isn"t it fine so long as the emergency request is complete? Well then, we"ll be taking our leave now."

Leaving things like that, while everyone continued to stay dumbfounded, me and Benedetta took our leave from the guild.

"Sorry about that. I was careless in selfishly thinking I"m the only one affected by this."

I didn"t even consult to Benedetta about it and just went ahead and did what I want… And because of that, now neither me and Benedetta got paid anything from it…

However, Benedetta"s response to it was completely opposite to what I was expecting.

"Eh that? That"s fine, I wasn"t concerned about it anyways. But more than that, we should hurry while we still have time!"

"… Where to?"

"Where else but the Gravel Fields? The day still hadn"t ended yet."

"Wait, seriously?"

However, looking over, she had a face looking like she was completely ready to head there.

Listening to her rant while walking along the way, apparently it seemed like she couldn"t hold her frustration after having to listen in with the other adventurers.

Benedetta sang out the usual ‘Hymn" once arriving by the Gravel Fields, and spent her time there skilfully defeating monsters with her bow and sword.

Well since that"s the case, who"s dismantling all the carca.s.ses?

I am! Through the skeletons of course.

It already seems like Benedetta is better than the ordinary skeletons in combat…

She"s capable of moving into advantageous positions quickly, and avoid damaging the more valuable parts…

Even the way on how she times her attack with the skeletons is well done.

"It seems like the skeletons have already reached their limit! Now then, let"s head back!"

She exclaimed so while having some blood splattered onto her cheek. I"m getting gooseb.u.mps when she smiles at me like that…

By the way, we"ve had so much materials collected that the skeletons had to be holding them themselves outside of their racks. And this is the case for all 36 skeletons, which is much much more than usual.

"Information ACQUIRED. It is best NOT to anger Ms Benedetta."

"Shhh-!"

… We"ve been quite busy today, so I"m really tired right now… Let"s quickly stop by the guild.

And as for this guy… let"s just hope he keeps his mouth shut and not say anything unnecessary…

– Adventurer"s Life Day 41 (Sat) – Noon – Comnes Town – Adventurers Guild – Lobby

Arriving to the guild"s exchange centre and collecting the rewards from the lobby, we heard some voices coming over from the seating area behind us.

"Eh!? Those guys, they still went out hunting!?"

"They"ve just went to the emergency request just a while ago!?"

""Legion"… To think they were such a group to begin with…"

Looking over this way, Feido and his gang seemed to already have been drinking, but they immediately decided to get up and leave with sullen faces…

"… That wasn"t really my intention…"

Glancing over to Benedetta grinning from my side, I"m not sure what to even feel about this…

And like that, the day had pa.s.sed.

—- Summoning Memo —-

Centurion: Hatchet + 7/6, Kite shield (Metal) + 7/6, Greek armor and helmet + 6/6

A: Mace + 7/6, Heavy round shield (bone) + 6/6, Blood stained leather armor + 0/6.

B: Mace + 7/6, Round shield with iron frame (wood) + 7/6, Greek armor and helmet + 7/6

C + 24: Club (bone) + 7/6, Heavy round shield (bone) + 7/6, Greek armor and helmet + 7/6

28 – 36: Club (bone) + 8/8, Heavy round shield (bone) + 8/8, Greek armor and helmet + 8/8

・ One stone golem

*: + X / Y describes the level of "sculptor" / "alchemist" at the time of "engraved" / "plating" for convenience.