CH 150

I hear a knock on the door while I make a throwing knife.

I turn to look, and see Chris. She’s wearing traveling clothes, but lighter ones that she apparently wears when she sleeps. I guess they don’t carry clothes specifically made to be worn to bed like pajamas when they’re traveling.

“H-hum, do you have a moment?”

She looks serious. I get the feeling that something’s bothering her, so I can’t say no.

I put everything on the desk in my Item Box, and ask her to sit down on the chair. Then I sit on the bed.

She hangs her head at first, but then she looks up, and speaks after having seemingly made up her mind about something.

“I have been thinking about a lot of things, after hearing what you said. I talked about it with Rurika and Sera, and they told me I should do what I want.

I actually wanted them to give me a push on the back, because I’m not brave or anything, but…”

No good uh? Is the feeling I get from her lonesome smile.

“But still, you told us your secret, so I want to talk about mine… No, wait. Will you listen to what I have to say?”

I wait for her to continue, because there’s a pause. I guess that’s just how much this is troubling Chris.

“I’m actually not human. My race is, well, elf.”

She whispers something, and her ears change shape. They turn from rounded to slightly pointy. I feel like the air around her changes too.

So? I learned that the moment I used Magic Energy Detection. She has more than double the normal amount of magic energy.

Her hair and eyes also change from golden to a vivid silver color.

“…You don’t look surprised.”

“Ah… Sorry, but I already knew.”

“S-since when!?”

She suddenly jumps towards me. Calm down, your face is too close.

Chris then notices what she’s doing too, and sits back down while her face turns bright red.

“I learned it today. I can use all sorts of skills, and there’s one called Appraisal.”

“Appraisal?”

“Yes. For example, do you know what this is?”

“Mithril ore?”

Exactly, I’m showing her mithril ore.

“Do you know the characteristics of this ore?”

“I don’t. I know from reference books that it’s light and tough, but nothing more. And Rurika says she wants a mithril weapon too.”

“I see. But by using the Appraisal skill, I can see it has other special traits. Mithril ore, or I guess I should say mithril in general, is highly conductive when it comes to magic energy.”

“Magic energy?”

“Yes. I think it’s easier to show it rather than explain it, but I can only do that when I finish making a weapon. But as for magic energy, can you put these on?”

I hand Chris the magic energy seeing glasses. Yes, she also looks nice with glasses.

“This is an item I made to practice controlling magic energy. Here it goes.”

I make magic energy flow, and Chris looks at it intently. She doesn’t blink once.

“W-was that just now…?”

“That light you saw is magic energy. I know, give me your hand.”

“H-hum…”

She gets flustered when I grab her hand, and starts flapping her hands as her face turns red again.

“Don’t make magic energy flow. Maybe you don’t know you’re doing it, but focus and try to feel it.”

I make magic energy flow from my right hand to hers, and it slowly goes around her body.

Chris lets out a little sound, and immediately closes her lips tightly. I feel like her face is even more red, to the point where it’s actually a little worrying…

I let go of her hand a minute later. Is she all right? She’s breathing heavily.

“Was that magic energy?”

“Yes. But I feel like we’ve gotten a bit off track.”

I don’t know how we got here from talking about the Appraisal skill. I really am bad at explaining things.

I take out medicinal herbs, and this time give her a short explanation of what kind of ability Appraisal is.

“I can learn all sorts of things by using Appraisal like this. By doing more or less the same thing, I can ‘appraise’ you and see that your race is listed as elf. I couldn’t do that before, so I only learned about it today.”

“Could it be that you are so good at picking medicinal herbs because…”

“Because of Appraisal, yes.”

“…S-so what can you see with Appraisal?”

“Name, job, race, level, and condition. For example, Chris Elfir. Spirit sorcerer. Elf. Level 22.

Ah, don’t worry. I can’t see your three sizes or physical characteristics or anything like that.”

She’s glaring at me. Is she hiding her chest with her arms because of what I said? I’m sure she is. I misspoke. I just wanted her to know I couldn’t see that sort of thing.

I should probably not think or say anything more about it.

“That’s how I know you’re an elf. And I learned it today.”

“I-I see…”

“Wait. Does that mean Eris is your big sister?”

“Yes. She is.”

“But you changed yourself to look human. Does that mean she does the same?”

“I don’t think she can use magic to change her appearance. At least she couldn’t back then. And this magic is quite difficult to maintain.”

“I see… I hope we find her. But are you sure it’s all right if you don’t go out looking right away? We were talking about exploring the dungeon, but…”

“Don’t worry about that. Rurika and I have been talking about this for a long time. We need to be stronger.”

“Did anything dangerous happen?”

“Traveling is always dangerous. A lot can happen.”

Two girls traveling alone, especially such cute girls… There are a lot of bad people out there. I’ve met my share. Today even.

Of course, there are a lot of good people out there too. Even ones that look frightening.

“It’s late, so let’s end it here for today. Coming to a guy’s room late at night can be a problem too, right?”

“I-I trust you, Sora.”

That’s kind of a troubling response. It feels like it’s basically a roundabout way of saying that nothing’s going to happen with me anyway.

Ah, not that I’m some low-life that would ‘attack’ her or anything.

“W-well then, good night.”

“Yes, good night. It’s not good to stay up late talking when you’re tired from traveling so much. Sleep well.”

I accompany her to her room. Not that I have to go far.

I stay in front of her room until her door closes, and go back to my room.

Chris actually lied about something. She said she’s an elf, but it shows me she’s a high elf.

I’ve never read or heard of high elves here before. It’s a race and title that appears in fantasy settings in my world, but you’d think there would be records of them if they existed here. And yet, there are none.

Does Chris simply not know? Did she just tell me she’s an elf because in her eyes they’re all just elves? For some reason, I couldn’t bring myself to ask.