Chapter 54 Highschool Girls

" …But man, you really won't speak to me though, huh?"

Well anyway. The big guy not answering me was fine, I think. After all, I didn't also want our conversation to turn into that of two highschool girls discussing their matters of the heart.

Maybe that's why the mess of hot tears of fear didn't respond in the first place. I now wondered what these two had been thinking. What the heck was the enemy, the overwhelmingly powerful general enemy, doing here. I guess they must have thought me an eerie person, which I absolutely was, sometimes. Right now, however, I had a reason for staying here and engaging in a conversation with them.

For now, we three might only have seemed like three best friends casually hanging out together in the woods, sharing a beautiful moment, but it was only for now. I had asked questions to the two, and others were to come. That's how you gather information, had said the old man. You inquire about matters.

For now, we were still in the middle of the road, all hanging out together. Some clouds got on top of us, finally hindering the sun from beating down on us. The result was that the weather had gotten cooler.

A dozens meter away there was good old Mr. Creaky, and further down the road, another two dozens of meters away—I shut my eyes and used Mana Perception—the battle was still going down on their side. They were much more lively. Orcs went down, but humans, too. More humans than orcs had dropped dead, but as the orcs had been far lesser in numbers at the beginning, the battle was still somewhat a match for both teams. I thought of going and helping them, but no.

Questions. I figured that this human was quite a good one. And I felt like inquiring him about questions. Some important matters. My eyes went back to staring at the man. His breathing quickened and he excitedly averted my eyes as big beads of sweat trailed down his nose. He would never meet my eyes, but only look down at his feet.

Dang, my new friend was a shy one. As I thought he was too meek, I told him that it was okay, if I had questions, the girlfriend would answer them for me. However, when I got up and started circling him around, to sit in front of the girlfriend, he moved his huge bulk around, preventing me from meeting the priestess face to face.

That really was one badass hero I fished today. You might have seen him hesitant and scared to protect the girlfriend, but hey, he still did move around and kept protecting her with his bulk. If you ask me, that in and of itself was what made him a total hero. Love, huh? I promised him I wouldn't bring my dagger down on her, but even with this, the human conflictingly groaned, whimpered, and sniffled telling me not to approach. Shaking my head, I told him I needed to, as gently as possible, then he uttered his first words.

"Y-Yes…. Uh… Ma'am...! I-I'll… Sniffle… A-Answer y-your questions…! Please!"

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"Tut-tut," I kick his knee. "'Sir'."

"I'll... a-answer y-your questions... sir!"

Few things were on my mind. These many thoughts being up here occupying all the room in my head just like the clouds which assembled in the sky, stalling over and begging for answers to come. The hero and his protegee would answer my questions.

The big man just said it again, as he saw my silent stance, stuttering to me that he would answer now, but he begged me not to harm them. Nodding at him, I told the big man I would not harm 'you' as he was my hero. Sitting back my ass on the cool ground, I got myself into a comfortable position. Leaning back, I rested my back on my arms and looked up at the sky. My first question was, are you guys adventurers?

"Y-Yes, sir!" Their whole unit, the one I 'obliterated', he said, were all adventurers. So they were adventurers, just like Hideous had said. 'Adventurer', I liked the sound of it.

Adventurers, what are they? They're the guys who accomplish quests. They make a living, for most of them, unlike nobles, it's not a hobby, and put bread on the table thanks to their dangerous job. That wasn't really my question, but I guessed what I asked was too vague, so it figured.

Reiterating the same question, he stuttered so much about guilds, to register, to teach the basis of adventuring—I shut him up. That still wasn't what I asked about.

A question I wanted to ask, for instance, was… what are they like, are they necessarily humans? "N-No, sir! No! …Th-They aren't necessarily… B-But oh… I-I mean…" For some reason, he was unable to answer. My guess was that they weren't necessarily human, but at the same time, would a monster like me, who sides with the Demon Lords, be considered a human? Technically I was an elf, the Receptacle was, but I evidently didn't look human at all. Like, when it came to mana, aura, and that kind of stuff, I clearly couldn't be identified as a human or demi-human for that matter. That's why the big guy hesitated.

How do adventurers live anyway? They only have the quests to do? I have quests of my own too, with the System, but maybe that's not enough to be an adventurer? The same goes for this one question, after stammering around the answer the same way he did for the precedent, I had to shut him up.

I had to be more specific if I wanted answers out of my chubby boy. Therefore: Did adventurers get to at least eat food and have a shelter on top of their heads? "Y-Yes, sir! Very much so, sir!" the big chubby guy answered. Now, that was a question that spoke to him. The big guy, seeing I was surprised, even flashed a thumbs-up at me, nodded like a reliable guy, and insisted, saying the food was succulent. That was my chubby boy for you.

Was being an adventurer fun? Like always fun like this much fun? Fun we had today? "I don't know about fun, sir! But to you, sir, I would hope to guess it is fun!" At first, there was a wall between us two. Now that this wall had been shattered, our back and forth questioning and answering paced up. And so, being an adventurer and monster-hunter was fun activity, eh?

How can I join your cause? "You— You…" Shaking his head repeatedly, he cast his eyes downward with a frown. I told my hero it was okay if he didn't answer that. He was a hero after all, he couldn't go about telling a monster-type creature to go to the nearest town and what to do about all the required steps to become part of the Guild.

Where did adventurers get their quests? The big guy spoke of a city—a big city—and said it was in the Guild Bureau. A city? He said yes, the Guild Bureau was in a city.

At this point, I won't hide the fact that almost all the questions I asked the man weren't answered as I would have wished. Meaning, my playing detective, if you could call it that, was a failure. As it was always the old man who shared useful information, I wanted to surprise him this time. But I guess for now I couldn't.

At any rate, it was a fun experience, and I learned some more about the human psyche and emotions. I only had three last little questions now. The first question was about the city he spoke of, as he referred to it as a 'capital' I thought it was worth seeing. The big man was used to all my questions being so obvious.

Giving me indications, I nodded and remembered. My second question was about the sun. Was there really no way at all to try and peek, in a healthy manner, at the sun without any black dot popping up? With his answer, I made a mental note to think of getting myself one pair of the legendary "sunglasses" he mentioned and also some of the rarest healing techniques that existed so that I could contemplate the sun's flaring beauty safely.

Then there was my last question. "Are you done with it yet, you little rat?"