Chapter 216

Chapter 216 Strongest Sage, Had Inaccurate Rumors Spread

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An hour later .

Us three went to meet my father, Castor, in Baron Relaia"s pavilion .

"Mathi, long time no see!"

"It"s been so long, Mathi! You coming back as a Baron sure was a surprise . Would it be better if I add honorifics to call you?"

"Eh no need for that . This n.o.ble stuff is just temporary anyway . "

I exchanged such conversation with my father Castor whom I hadn"t seen in a while .

The two of them seem to be doing well .

"Not only you became a n.o.ble, you even got yourselves three girls . . . "

My brother Reich said so as he looked at the girls .

It"s as if he"s alluding these three to be my lovers or something .

"There"s no getting or the likes . . . These three are my party members . "

"Really?"

"Yeah . We formed a party at the Second Academy and this was the result . "

" . . . I see . "

Ruli looked disappointed when I said party members . . . I must be imagining things .

"That aside, how"s it going at Hildesheimr recently? Biffgel seemed to be same as always at least . . . "

"It"s been pretty peaceful with nothing truly eventful occurring . The only worrying element was Biffgel, but since I"ve been formally accepted as the heir now, there"s really nothing to worry about . "

I see .

This means there is no chance at all for Biffgel to become the territory lord .

It must have been the best of news for the populace there .

"And back at you Mathi, you have been doing great, right . Rumors about you even spread in the backwaters we"re in . "

" . . . What kind of rumors?"

"Like how you defeated a demon by yourself, and how you turned Second Royal Academy"s curriculum upside down . . . And the latest rumor said you killed a huge darkness dragon that showed up at the capital . "

. . . Looks like the commotions at the capital have reached even my brother .

Well I figure changing the curriculum of a royal academy would become rumors .

There"s one wrong rumor in it though .

『That darkness dragon that showed up at the capital refers to me right? But I haven"t been killed . . . 』

『These rumors seem quite inaccurate . . . 』

This darkness dragon is probably referring to Iris .

Which means, forget killed, she"s right in front of my brother now . . .

I cut to the chase while thinking that .

"So, the reason I come here today . . . Have you heard about the details?"

"Yeah . The four of you gonna infiltrate the empire and beat the dollmaster right? . . . You got any lead on this dollmaster"s location?"

"We"ll be working on it, but I don"t think finding them will be too hard once we get in . No matter what, you"d stand out controlling that amount of dolls . "

Even if the dolls can move automatically, they still need to be given orders when they get dispatched .

Once we"re inside the empire, finding the location where that takes place won"t be hard .

We wouldn"t have needed to infiltrate were the dollmaster went along with the dolls though .

" . . . Regardless of how strong you are, you will still be sneaking into the empire . Be sure to pay attention to your surroundings . "

"Yeah . Our opponents include demons after all . "

I"ve got a feeling that the dollmaster isn"t a demon though .

Judging from the dolls" scale and movement, the group that collects life forces for these dolls doesn"t seem to care much about the attack on Relaia Barondom .

The demons probably ordered some sacrificial p.a.w.n humans to a.s.ses the usefulness of life forces or something along the lines .

. . . We"d have it easy if the demons show themselves up around the group though . Then we simply need to defeat them .

"Even if you"re gonna be fine Mathias, how about these three? I"ve heard that this year"s Second Academy students are pretty strong, but you need a different kind of skillet to perform infiltrations, you know?"

Reich"s worry is justified .

After all, these girls look like ordinary girls if we"re only talking about their outward appearances .

In reality, these three are stronger than Castor, and Iris herself is immeasurably st.u.r.dier than any human .

"We"ll be fine! We"ve fought demons before, and we have some experiences doing infiltrations!"

"About a week ago, we sneaked into a town with 20 demons hiding inside and exterminated every last one of them!"

"We only lent a bit of hand though, Mathi-kun took care most of the demons himself . "

Hearing the girls, Reich and Castor looked surprised .

" . . . I thought they"d be strong when I heard they"re Mathia"s party members . . . but not to this point . . . "

"Don"t tell me, are all Second Academy"s students this strong nowadays? I can see why they"re calling Second Academy students this year monstrous . "

"No, these three in my party are especially strong compared to other Second Academy"s students . Ordinary Second Academy"s students need to work together in a group of dozens or so to beat one lesser demon . "

If those students were as strong as Ruli and Alma, they would have defeated the demon back then before we got there .

That said, these students have only started their training in chantless magic, I won"t be surprised if they"re even stronger than current Ruli and Alma by the time they"re graduating .

. . . By then, Ruli and Alma will be even stronger though .

"Dozens, defeating a demon . . . That"s quite fearsome already . . . "

"A few years ago, the kingdom knights managed to defeat a demon, but they only barely accomplished that after bringing around 500 adventurers and elite knights together . The opponent was apparently the weakest ranking demon, yet our side lost around 100 lives . I didn"t take part in it due to a certain circ.u.mstances on my side though . "

500 knights managed to defeat a demon huh . . . That"s actually amazing .

Their weapons would be those low performance magic swords created with chant magic, and their magic itself would be the weak and hard to use chant magic .

Under such conditions, I don"t think even an army of 10,000 could defeat a demon .

"How exactly did they pull it off?"

"All members shot magic on it, the rest was an all-out war . I don"t quite understand just how they managed to do it even now . . . Apparently, an awfully strong adventurer from a foreign country who had gone out of his way to join the subjugation unit landed the finishing strike on the demon . "

"An adventurer from a foreign country?"

An awfully strong adventurer .

. . . And the guy went out of his way to join a subjugation mission in another country .

. . . I probably know the guy .

"Yeah . The name was . . . Girusomething fellow . Thanks to him going home without even joining the celebration party, there was a bit of uproar . "

It"s Giruas . . .

He didn"t join the party probably because he simply had no interest in it .

Once there"s no more battle to be had, he"s done, that"s probably it .

"But I think Mathi is even stronger than that Girusomething chap . "

"That"s for sure . I mean, Mathi beat all these demons by himself after all . "

Reich agreed with Castor .

It"s certainly true that I am stronger than Giruas .

We even had a match to prove that .

My father Castor suddenly paused .

Afterward, he speaks again after pondering a bit .

" . . . Mathias, you"re strong . Hence, I won"t stop you sneaking into the empire . . . but make sure you come back alive, every one of you . Don"t ever let your guard down . "

"I promise . "

Thus our reunion ended .

Next we just need to infiltrate the empire and defeat the dollmaster, then the demons behind the dollmaster .

. . . Since these demons appear to have connections with the empire itself, this sure is going to be quite a big job . . . Here"s hoping there will be a surprising development .

If there were only one weakling demon after this much uproars, I"m gonna be disappointed .