Otherworld Adventure 236 Escort Quest 1

"Seri...my jaw still hurts..."

"That's because you overdid it!"

"How come you're fine?"

"Because...I wasn't as intense as you..."

"Uhhh..." Lucia groaned.

'What're they talking about? Were they training?'

A voice called out to him and Cecil snapped out of his thoughts.

"Hey, kid."

"Hm?"

A large bear-type beastman riding on top of a large lizard approached him.

"Stay sharp kid, we're entering the mountains where our journey's the most dangerous! You may be the only platinum ranked party in our presence, but you guys sure don't act like it!"

"Uh, yeah...I'll keep that in mind." Cecil replied.

"..."

Cecil recognized the beastman. He was the party leader of the Morux party, the second highest ranked party partic.i.p.ating in the escort quest after their party, Wanderers.

The beastman only took one more glance at Cecil and the rest of his party who was on top of Silver. He saw the party's unchanged, laidback att.i.tude and clicked his tongue before turning around to leave on his mount.

"Tsk, just a bunch of spoilt brats!" The beastman said under his breath.

With Cecil's enhanced sense, he could easily hear what he said and he only smirked at his receding back.

"Heh, not to be condescending, but even without you guys, our party would be able to finish this quest easily~"

Cecil picked up a small group of flying monsters heading towards the caravan on his mana sense coming from the east. He used Nature's s.h.i.+ft and teleported to the area just below the group and fired off a Mana Volley into the air, accurately striking each of the monsters and killing them instantly.

"...phew, C ranked monsters are too easy..." Cecil said wryly before teleporting back to the caravan.

Upon arriving back and manipulating his clone to quickly merge into the ground, Lucia called out to him.

"You done Cel~?"

"Hmm."

"What was it this time?"

"Just a flock of White Cha.s.sows."

"He~h, only C ranked?"

"Yeah...maybe I should only move to stop those A ranked and above monsters, huh?"

"Please, do that! At least give me and Seri a chance to get some exercise!"

"Sure, sure~"

Anything else under A ranked was only exercise to their party. Cecil wondered why he was going out of his way to even take out those low-ranked monsters when he had other adventurer parties partic.i.p.ating in the quest alongside his.

If he did all the work, then wouldn't the other parties be riding on a free bus to quest completion? He can't have that now, can he?

"Actually, I'll leave the A ranked to you guys as well! I'll move out if there's an S ranked or above, okay?"

It was highly unlikely that an S ranked monster would suddenly appear, but Lucia and Serilla agreed to it nonetheless.

"Sure, let us take care of them! We want to get stronger too, right Seri?"

"Totally, after all I don't want to look like a pampered and sheltered young lady! Especially not towards my darling~"

"...just a heads up, but I still know how much of a sword fanatic you are!"

"Hihihi~ how embarra.s.sing~ as expected, my darling knows me the best~"

"Geh..." Cecil stumbled when he heard her.

A monstrous roar rang through the air which originated from the front of the caravan. Cecil's party, the Wanderers, was situated at the rear of the caravan. They were supposed to be at the front, but the Gorux party leader, Sak'arh, insisted that they would take the front.

Cecil relented to their demands since it was less work for them and decided that they would bring up the rear, while the rest of the adventurer parties would guard the middle sections.

The front and rear of the caravan were the locations that would be most susceptible to monster attacks, so the two strongest parties were the ones that took up the positions.

"Hmmm...It's only a small group of ordinary Forest Ursas...C+ ranked," Lucia reported after taking a leap into the air. "Should we go help out?"

"No, leave it to the Gorux Party." Cecil immediately replied. "Since we're tasked with bringing up the rear, that's where we'll focus on. We'll only help out if the situation looks bleak."

"M'kay~"

"Jeez, Lulu, you're so impatient~" Serilla teased.

"I can't help it! We've been taking it easy for the past couple of days so I'm a little restless!"

"Even after what we did last night?"

"Urk...th-that's different!" Lucia immediately blushed in reply. She turned to face Cecil and blushed even more.

Cecil only tilted his head in confusion, "You okay there Lulu? You look sick..."

"I-I'm fine! It's just the heat!"

"Really? It's pretty windy if you ask me..."

The skies were clear and the gentle breeze was relaxing. If they ignored the shouts and sounds of fighting originating from the front of the caravan, then it was a pretty peaceful and wonderful day.

"If you guys are training at night, don't overdo it." Cecil said as he turned his attention to the front and observed the Morux party's battle using his mana sense.

When the two girls heard his advice, they immediately blushed furiously. It was a good thing that Cecil wasn't facing them or he would have to ask more questions and maybe even check up on their health.

The two were indeed training, but not like the training that Cecil was implying. It was a more...special kind of training.

When the sounds of fighting died down, the caravan began moving again after a couple of minutes.

When Cecil and the rest pa.s.sed by the cleaned up battlefield, they took notice of all the stripped monster corpses on the sides of the road.

"Pretty professional," Serilla said, to which Cecil responded.

"It's what you'd expect from a gold-ranked party."

"Hmm~ I've never gone out and become a proper adventurer so I'm not really well-versed in all of this! But I can at least tell that they took care of the battlefield pretty well!"

"Mhm." Cecil nodded in agreement, then he turned to face Lucia and said, "Lulu, burn the remains."

"Alright~"

Lucia snapped her fingers and a purple flame ignited on all the corpses of the battlefield and burnt them to ashes. Professional was professional, but they shouldn't just leave the corpses out like this.

Bury them if you must, but even though you're on a tight schedule, you shouldn't leave them out in the open like this. Sure, some other monsters will probably take care of the remains, but if none did, then the corpses will only spread out disease or even turn into undead.

Cecil explained why he did this to Serilla and the girl took note of it down, she then turned towards Lucia and asked her.

"I can't believe you guys like this as well~"

"Well, we have been traveling as adventurers long before we came to the academy, Seri! Plus, we reached 5-star gold ranked even before we enrolled!"

"Ah! No wonder you two were able to quickly create a platinum ranked party!" Serilla exclaimed.

"Yup~ in fact, the Little Kings' only platinum ranked members were me and Cel~" Lucia thought a little before saying, "If I remember correctly, only Ainz was the gold ranked adventurer before we created the party!

"He was still 5-star silver ranked!" Cecil shouted from down below.

"Well, he was almost gold! I'm guessing that after taking up all those quests as a member of Little Kings, Ainz should almost be platinum ranked, probably..."

"He's still 4-star gold!" Cecil added once again.

Lucia only shrugged at his words and Serilla giggled in response.

"I'd like to hear more about your adventures together...I'm sure that last night's stories weren't the only ones, right?"

"Yup~ those were only our earliest adventures~"

Cecil stretched his body and yawned, "Why bother? We're going to make our own adventures now! What's the point?"

"Hihihi~ darling knows just exactly what to say~"

"?"

"Hehe~ Cel's grown to become such a smooth talker~"

"What're guys saying?"

The caravan travelled for another couple of kilometers before they were once again stopped. This time it was a large pride of Blackspine Mountain Saberlions. Individually B+ ranked, but while in a pack of 20 or more, they were elevated into an A ranked threat.

The problem here was that the pack of Blackspine Mountain Wolves in front of them easily numbered over 50.

"There are 88...plus the Alpha, which makes it 89 monsters in total...+ ranked threat," Cecil said with a yawn.

The large pride of saberlions was surrounding the entire caravan from front to rear. Cecil looked around dully before saying to the girls who had already jumped down from Silver's back.

"Happy hunting~"

"Hehe~ I can finally stretch my body a bit!" Lucia said as she unsheathed both her weapons and began limbering up her body. Serilla was doing the same, she then turned towards Lucia and asked.

"Whoever kills more gets to kiss darling later?"

"You're on Seri!"

"Oi..."

With that ridiculous wager, Lucia and Serilla immediately dashed forwards to cut down all the monsters while the other adventurer parties were preparing for a long, arduous defense.

"Lulu, only sword techniques are allowed! No skills or spells!" Serilla yelled.

"That's just how I like it!"