Chapter 270: Prologue

Mercenary Kingdom Arc

It has been around 2 weeks since I parted with Haru huh?

The previously quiet My World has turned bustling due to the addition of the Homunculus sisters and the Dark-Elves.

Currently, I was headed north from the Great Forest ruins.

I thought of meeting Marquis Yutings to receive the reward he mentioned but I had no idea how far his offer of ‘whatever you wish for’ extended to and, in the worst case, he might even offer ‘I will advice His Majesty to bestow the rank of Duke to you’ which would be troubling. I was bestowed peerage by Earl Paul over the course of events but I do not intend to remain in this country indefinitely. A higher peerage will only serve as a fetter.

There was a reason why I was headed north.

Yesterday, I asked the Dark-Elves to allow me to tour their bow training.

After 50 weak arrows struck the center of the target made of wood, it burst into splinters. Despite being mere stone arrows. It was not as though they stuffed gunpowder in the stone arrowheads either. It was attributed to the archery of the Dark-Elves.

“Our race is called Dark-Elf because all members of the race have the possibility of acquiring the job ‘Elf Archer’ from birth. Elf Archers are able to channel magical power into their arrows and shoot arrows with equal or superior power when compared with magic.”

Rarael said it as-a-matter-of-fact, without any boasting.

Enchanting magic into arrows … so instead of magic sword, it would be magic arrows?

Incidentally, Rarael’s job was not Elf Archer but Great Bow-user and it seem to extend her arrow range by using great bows. Great Bow-users are apparently capable of acquiring numerous skills that extend their firing range.

“However, if stone arrows are capable of releasing such power, won’t iron arrows be able to release even greater power?”

“No, Ichinojo-sama. Including iron, almost all metals have a low affinity with Elf Archery. If comparing iron arrows, even wood arrows would give greater power.”

“Eh? Is that so?”

If it includes almost all metals then silver and gold would probably not work either.

In that case, they might as well use diamond arrows … but I don’t know the method to create those.

“The only exception is Mithril arrows. Arrows made with Mithril arrowheads are said to be unblockable even by shields made of the same Mithril.”

Rarael said as she took out a single arrow from her quiver.

I could tell it was not a regular arrow with a single look. The arrowhead was shining silver. It shined brighter than regular silver and upon using Metal Appraisal, I verified that it was Mithril.

Rarael loaded that arrow in her great bow.

Then, Rarael released the arrow.

The arrow flew in a straight line and pierced the surface where there was nothing around it — and immediately afterward.

There was an explosion.

It was around the power of my Boost Petite Fire? The ground was gouged out deeply, forming a crater with the Mithril arrow left intact.

“This is the quintessence of an Elf Archer. Dark-Elves capable of using this arrow are referred to as fierce fighters capable of being a match for a thousand.”

I see. I was wondering why they mobilized over ten thousand troops against just 50 Dark-Elves and gone out of their way to resort to underhanded methods of burning the forest but now I was convinced.

Taking the ‘a match for a thousand’ literally might be a stretch but it did seem capable of faring against a hundred enemies. A 50-man Dark-Elf population … could be considered a match for 5 thousand troops.

“Chieftain, even if it is to explain to Ichinojo-sama, don’t gouge out the ground. Filling it in will be a hassle.”

“Even if you wanted to show off your good side to Ichinojo-sama, didn’t we decided that the Mithril arrow should only be used during an emergency?”

“Rarael-sama is sly to take the chance to talk to Ichinojo-sama!”

There was a rush of criticism from the training Dark-Elves.

“Refrain from whispering among yourselves during training!”

Rarael rebuked them sternly but it failed to stop the jeers.

After that, for some reason, there was an archery contest for the right to have a conversation with me. What about my right to decide … sigh, I didn’t have an opportunity to interject.

There were thirty participants and 10 young Dark-Elves requested to withdraw from the competition. Rarael was also forced to not participate and the competition continued for an hour.

Even though I had already fulfilled my goal of watching the Dark-Elves’ training.

In the end, the winner was a young girl among the Dark-Elves with a silver hair side-up hairstyle. Visually she looked a lot younger than me — she looked about 16 years old but Dark-Elves was a long-living race so the age she looked was probably not her actual age.

” … I am in your care, Ichinojo-sama!”

She greeted me with a smile.

Erm, her name was —

“Rurina … right?”

I asked in a frank tone. It was somewhat frustrating to speak in such a tone to a woman I do not talk regularly to but Rarael had warned me to not use honorifics in order to make the difference in position clear.

Well, using this tone was easier as well so I had completely accepted it lately.

“You remembered even though this is the first time we are talking alone! I’m so happy!”

“Well, we’ve been acquainted for quite a few days. To clarify, we weren’t alone with just the two of us.”

Although I knew it was aimed at Rurina, the gazes from the other Dark-Elves were painful. Leaving all that aside, I’ve already seen all I had to see for the Dark-Elf Archery so I didn’t actually need any more explanations.

Eh?

I noticed after looking at Rurina’s job.

【Manager: Lv13】

That was the first time I’ve seen that job.

“Rurina’s job is Manager?”

“Yes, that is correct! I’m a Manager! Eh? That’s some amazing insight. How could you tell?”

How should I explain my Jobless skill … well, I’ve already brought them to this world so it was already too late to try to hide.

“It’s a special skill. Leaving that aside, what is the Manager job?”

“Manager is fundamentally a job meant to manage various information. You’ve never seen one in the Adventurers Guild?”

“Nope, I’ve never seen any.”

“Ah, well, we would fundamentally be doing back-end work even in the Adventurers Guild. The most famous task for the Manager in an Adventurers Guild would be to create the parties. Also, we will learn skills such as calculations and recording. In terms of books, I can memorize it in its entirety in just 5 minutes.”

Ooh, so there were such convenient jobs as well. Those were skills that university entrance examinees would covet.

“How does one become a Manager? Is it an Advanced Job after all?”

“Nope, nothing like that. Anybody can be a Manager if they pass the exam that is held in the Adventurers Guild once a year. However, in exchange, there is a mountain load of information to memorize so the passing rate is said to not reach 10%.”

No way, you must take an exam to acquire a job that is convenient for exams.

During my time in Japan, I researched various qualifications and passing rates in order to get employed so I could understand the difficulty very well.

A passing rate that is lower than 10% was even lower than that of the legal examinations but greater than the passing rate for a weather forecaster. In other words, it was an extremely strict examination.

It would probably be impossible for me.

“What kind of problems would come out in the examinations?”

“The Manager examination spans a wide range of genres. For example, ‘Using 30 gold coins and the price list for vegetables, potatoes, meats, and grains, what is the most efficient food combination for a long distance voyage in a large ship?’ would be the first question, ‘Derive the number of personnel required for the voyage when the food purchased above is loaded onto the galley shown below.’ would be the second question. After that, it would be something like ‘A fictional navigation chart has been prepared, using the food purchased and personnel, calculate the furthest return voyage possible.’.”

The questions were more difficult than expected. I could understand the question but the method to solve it was gibberish to me.

If I wanted to solve it, wouldn’t I need to have knowledge in everything from nutrition, prices, ship performances, and navigational chart reading? Ah, vegetables and raw meat would rot easily so that would have to be taken into account as well.

Are there actually people capable of solving such questions?

Come to think of it, there’s Rurina.

“By the way, from what I heard from Pionia-san, Ichinojo-sama’s precious Carol-sama seem to be able to pass the Manager examinations easily as well.”

… That was true. It would be an easy task for Carol.

Incidentally, Miri would definitely pass as well.

The tiny ones around me are way too outstanding.