The next morning,
I woke up quickly and got ready for the meet-up at the Village Head’s house.
I groomed myself appropriately, left the room and advanced towards the Dining Hall.
There, I could see that Maria-san had already finished making breakfast, so as soon as I got to the seat, she brought me freshly made breakfast.
This, I am really grateful for this.

[Maria-san, Good morning.
Thank you for the Breakfast so early in the morning.]

Maria-san said it was fine and smiled before going back to the kitchen.
Beautiful, gentle and good at cooking, I am really jealous of Gantt-san.
Now then, I suppose I should eat while it’s still warm.
Yep, It"s delicious. This warm soup really hits the spot.
It just makes me wanna do my best for today.
After a few minutes, I had completely finished the breakfast Maria-san prepared, and so I decided to head towards the village Head’s house.
Maria-san who saw me about to leave walked over from the kitchen with something.
While I was wondering what it was,

[Yuma-kun, I made a boxed lunch*, please have it when you have the time.]

Maria-san seems to have prepared a boxed lunch for me! And moreover, it was for both me and Shingu.

[Thank you very much for the boxed lunch, Maria-san]

When I said so, Maria-san shook her head.
Then Maria-san started to laugh,

[Fufufu, it’s alright I don’t mind, since Yuuma is going to go fight for the village. This is the least that I could do, so make sure to do your best]

Rather than saying that it’s for this village, it’s more so for the Gantt-san’s family.
As I thought such things in my mind, I thanked Maria-san again and then left the inn.
Now then, I guess the time to meet has almost arrived.
When I looked at the sky, I realised there was still a considerable amount of time left before the sun rose.
I guess taking a slow walk would be fine.
Thinking so, I headed towards the Village Head’s house.
After walking for a while, the Village Head’s house came into view.
Alright, I seem to have made it in time for the meeting.
When I got a little closer, I could see that there was a single child standing there with an angry face at the entrance.
Alright, the persuasion seems to have succeeded.
But, I couldn’t understand why he was angry.
I am definitely not late.
While pondering, I thought I should ask him why for the time being and so called out to him as I approached.
But then,

[Too slow, how long am I supposed to wait for you here?!]

Well,
I think I"m definitely not late for the meeting.

[Eh, this might be a misunderstanding but wasn’t this the time that I had set for us to meet up?]

When I asked Shingu that,

[Adventurers come a lot earlier than the stipulated set time. At least, my dad was definitely like that!]

Ah, I see.
Indeed, when I was in j.a.pan there was the custom that, one used to come early from 5 minutes to 15 early than the stipulated time.
I should apologize properly for that.
I lightly apologized to Shingu.
But then, he did not expect me to apologize for it, so he was quite surprised and started talking while embarra.s.sed.

[Ah, um!  It’s fine if you understand that much. If you"re an adventurer you should at least know this much!]

Shingu claimed while blushing.
But the embarra.s.sment still on his face was quite visible.
Oioi, just why are you reacting like that!
It was completely different from yesterday.
Well, I guess he was just trying to not be seen as a child….
While I was thinking such, Shingu seemed to have resumed his calmness and resumed talking seriously.
First of all was our self-introductions.

[Although this is not our first meeting, I shall introduce myself,
My name is Yuuma, and I am an A-rank Adventurer.]

Saying so, I introduced myself and held out my hand for a hand-shake.
But there was no sign of Shingu holding his hand out.
Ah, I forgot that he dislikes adventurer’s so there would be no way that he would shake my hand.
While I was thinking so, I looked up to see what was going on.

[.....Nii-chan, are you really an A-rank Adventurer?]

Ahh, that’s right.

[Ah yeah it’s true, here is my guild card.]

As I said that, I took out my guild card.
Shingu stares at my guild card.

[Cool~, Nii-chan is seriously strong right. Even though you"re stronger than dad your face is still not as good as Dad"s]

Ahh, I know that you are quite fond of your father.
However the face has nothing to do with strength, it definitely doesn’t.
After that, Shingu continued to look at me with a surprised face for a while. But then he noticed that we were still in the middle of introducing ourselves. Looking at my hand which I"d held out, he also held out his hand for a handshake. Shingu looks like quite the apologetic figure.

[I think you have already heard from Ji-chan, but my name is Shingu.]

Saying so, Shingu shook my hand.
Soon after, we were able to have a proper conversation with each other. Apparently, Shingu"s forte was the sword. Well, that could be easily a.s.sumed from the sword at this waist.
While such conversation took place.
It was finally time for us to depart.
I"m sorry for this Shingu, excuse me for this.
Let me have a look at your status.
It’s been a while, [Appraisal] Activate.

Shingu:
level: 17
Strength: 31
Endurance: 21
Agility: 33
Luck: 21
  Swordsmanship: Level 7, Sign Detection: Level 2
Son of the Sword

…...hmm? Shingu-kun, you"re pretty strong, aren"t you?
First off, the status points that he has is extremely high for someone of his level.
Especially Agility, Even Grace-san only had 34 points in agility when he was level 39, but surprisingly Shingu is already nearing Grace-san’s agility even though he is only at level 17. Well, his Endurance is quite low, but that can’t be helped since he is still a child.
And the most Cheat thing is his skill.
What the heck is this, Level 7 Swordsmanship, that’s the first time I"ve ever seen this.
Guren-san who is the guild master of Forks only has swordsmanship level 5 but this kid already exceeded him by 2 levels.
And finally,
That t.i.tle. What is with this cool looking t.i.tle.
Even I am yearning for this battle, dammit.
Okay, this can be quite a pleasant miscalculation depending on how you see it.
If Shingu has this much strength, perhaps he might actually be able to take on a few enemies.

[Oi Nii-chan, what’s wrong, you froze all of a sudden. Come on let’s quickly go to Barris Forest.]

It seems that I was taken aback by looking at his status.

[Sorry about that, I was thinking about something.]

Then, Shingu and I headed towards the gate to go to Barris Forest.
Despite the time, which could still be called quite early in the morning, several villagers were still hiding, as they were anxiously watching Shingu. Fufufu, it seems that everyone is quite worried about Shingu.

[Nii-chan, why are you laughing this time?]
[No it’s nothing. I’m just a little happy.]

Unfortunately, Shingu doesn"t seem to be able to notice everyone"s gaze.
Someday I hope that you can realize.
But, is it not strange?
Maybe that’s because Shingu is…..,

[Oi, let’s go quickly or I will leave you behind!]

Oops, if this goes on, he really might leave me behind.
Let’s think about all this later and quickly go to the nostalgic Barris Forest.

TL:  Just why couldn"t Shingu be a loli? And also have the child of the sword t.i.tle? It would have been so much better.*Drools*
ED:  ……