After declaring that he’ll be accepting the duel, Ryouma made a rod with his short sword by cutting off and shaving a moderately sized branch of a nearby tree. The adventurers surrounding him, gave a sidelong glance as they whispered amongst themselves.
These kinds of squabbles are fairly common amongst the adventurers. Well, for it to reach to the point where it turns into a duel is pretty rare, but fist fights do happen a lot. So with that in mind the adventurers basically didn’t try to stop the fight.
Because adventurers put their lives on the line for their job, the ability to be able to judge the strength of their opponent in comparison to theirs is very important. Even if one were to end up badly hurt after picking a fight with someone stronger, the one at fault is the person who couldn’t properly gauge his opponent’s strength. This is true even if it’s not a quarrel between two adventurers and is a job. If you take a request that you can’t handle, if you fail, then you’ll lose your life.
Normal people would fail that once or twice, after which they’d understand their limits. But even then, there have been hardly any deaths when it comes to arguments between adventurers. Even if an adventurer was known for his bad deeds, he would still remember the days when he too was inexperienced and will keep himself from going overboard.
That’s why, other adventurers won’t do anything else aside from spectating. Unless the members of the Fang of Orbtem really try to kill Ryouma, or injure him in such a way that it will leave irreversible injuries, they won’t do anything.
These people are the same, believing that Ryouma is a novice that picked a fight with an opponent he cannot win against, and plan to leave them alone for it to serve as a lesson for him, going in only to help when his life is in danger.
However, not all the adventurers are just there to watch over them.
There are also people that are cheering. For example, the group of Wereanna who had just finished eating and had come back.
Since they can’t fight, they decided to at least throw Ryouma words of encouragement.
After that, Wereanna asked Ryouma,
“Ryouma, why did you accept the duel when you didn’t even say anything to the six in the cave?”
“Those guys were also annoying but these guys are wearing armor so it won’t end that badly for them. I wanted to settle it by talking, but that doesn’t seem to possible right now… and also…”
“And also?”
“Actually, there’s also that urge to let loose, you know? I believe I’ve talked about this a little while ago with you guys, but I haven’t actually fought a lot. I’ve always remained defenseless except for situations where I’ve decided that my life is in danger.
And even if I were to resist, it would be as self-defense. Without killing my opponent and dedicating myself to running away, and no matter what fighting only when it’s not possible to run away. That is my way of living. Because I had to do that, that’s why. But, right now is different.
I thought I’d try to choose how to live my own life. So I thought that I’d like to use the skills I’ve trained in my life, and resist unreasonably for once. That’s why those kind of guys are really convenient. Not only are they wearing armor, they have also been trained. If it’s like that then they won’t end up too hurt.”
“Ryouma-kun…”
“Ryouma. I can’t stop you guys, but be careful.”
“We’re ready!”