"I'm really sorry about that, Tanaka."
"No, no, everything was fine in the end, so don't worry about it."
"But we were..."
"No, no..."
(Maybe I should ask him to lend me Ester and Sophie for a night as an apology.)
(Once I get the payment from this job, I'm definitely going to find a brothel.)
"Tanaka, I think you should have the entire reward from this request."
"You don't have to go that far. There were various expenses you payed for, after all."
"Don't worry about it. We can afford that kind of thing."
"In that case, I'll gratefully accept. Sadly, I could use the money right now."
I was sitting on one bed, and across from me, Allen, Ester, and Sophie were sitting on the other.
(I'd rather have two people on each side, though.)
Ester: "You, what was that magic?"
She was looking at me indignantly.
Tanaka: "...wasn't it basically a fireball?"
Ester: "I've never heard of that!"
I'd answered honestly, and she suddenly yelled at me. Loudly.
"Ah, sorry about that."
"Your recovery magic too, there's no way that's rank E!"
(Wow, she can be really loud.)
"Yeah, I'm sorry about that."
"Hey, you, are you making fun of me here?!"
"Ester, he has his own circumstances. Getting recklessly involved in someone else's personal life is a bad idea. You have a thing or two like that yourself, don't you?"
"But, but..."
"Sorry, Tanaka. She's strong-willed, but she's a good girl at heart, so don't think too badly of her."
"No, no, I'm sorry about misleading you."
Ester looked like she was going to jump at me. With a bitter smile, Allen grabbed her arm at what seemed like the last moment.
"Allen!"
"Well, calm down a little bit, Ester. We were saved by Tanaka too. You understand that, right?"
"But he, he tricked me!"
"Ester, he's an adventurer, the same as us. And we just met him yesterday."
"That's...ummm..."
Ester was grumbling.
Unusually, Sophie said something.
"I have one question. Where did you study magic?"
"Ah, yeah, that's right..."
(I hadn't thought about that. I'll just have to make up something...)
Her slightly scrunched-up face as she asked was cute, but now that I knew her relationship to Allen, her stock value had fallen in my view.
"I prayed to god, and became able to do that."
(Yeah, that's kind of true.)
"...god, you said? Specifically, what's the name of this god?"
(Did that god mention something like a name? Not that I remember...)
"No, I don't really know..."
"You were praying to a god you don't know the name of?"
"Ehh, well, various things happened."
"...I see..."
I was starting to feel like Allen had the best personality out of the group. Despite being a playboy.
I was still jealous.
"Well then, it's gotten late, so we should get some sleep."
"That's true."
◇◆◇
The next day, we headed back to the town, having finished the job.
The village chief's son was in the carriage with us, to report the damage to the town and the appearance of a high orc to some government official. He was in his mid-20s, and apparently he would become the village chief himself before too long.
"Gatan goton." Once again, the bumpy ride was making my butt hurt.
"Yeah, adventurers really are amazing. The best fighters in our village together could only handle one or two orcs, but you burnt a whole group of them in an instant."
He was really excited as he talked to us.
The death of 10-some people in the fight did nothing to dampen his enthusiasm. We'd been riding for an hour, but he showed no signs of stopping. Getting stared at by a young guy with stars in his eyes like that made me uncomfortable.
"No, well, I just barely managed. I thought I was going to die there."
I remembered that huge orc's fist almost reaching my face.
"Thank you so much. We should have investigated better and told the guild about the size of the group and the possibility of a high orc being there."
"Ah, you're welcome."
"My daughter was actually there, so...really...thank you very much..."
"Ah..."
(I see, that's why he's so enthusiastic.)
The trip back was uneventful. We stopped at the same place again for lunch, and ate together with the driver.
We arrived back at the town when the sun was starting to set.
After returning the carriage, our group of 5 people went to the adventurer's guild.