Chapter 122: Anomalies (1)
The scorching sunlight poured down upon us.
Amon has been lying beside me since earlier, tongue hanging out, panting like a thirsty puppy.
The heat must be pretty unbearable.
Even though he had changed out of his school uniform and into clothes optimized for desert activities, he was showing that he was not handling the heat well.
“Ugh.”
The sandy dust that followed caused the group to grimace.
“Tsk, tsk. Tsk, tsk.”
Amon’s mouth was filled with sand and he spat it out.
He grits his teeth a few times to make sure the grains are chewed, then glances at me.
I tilt my head to meet his gaze.
“…I never thought you’d look comfortable with a bandage over your eye.”
“Watch your language, Amon.”
Yuri immediately snapped at him.
“Haha, don’t get me wrong, it’s okay, it’s definitely comfortable.”
Our group heads out into the desert to hunt the otherworlders as soon as the sun rises, and while we don’t get much sleep due to the ‘scavenging’, I don’t feel too tired thanks to Raina bracelet.
According to Ismir, the only way to hunt aliens is to walk through the desert.
Gates appeared randomly, and the alien species that emerged from them had no discernible pattern of behavior.
Scratching the patch over her left eye, she explained, “You won’t find them easily. If I could, I’d be making a fortune.”
As it turns out, the otherworlders are not so easy to come by.
…As far as I could tell, they had to be.
“…Here they come again, and there are quite a few of them this time.”
I opened my mouth as soon as my senses picked up their movements.
“Again…?!”
The sound of my voice startled Lucia.
I pointed my finger in the direction they were coming from, and it wasn’t long before they could see it with their own eyes.
A cloud of sandy dust was rising to our left.
“Hey, it’s real, it’s puppies.”
Ismir, who had raised her hand to block out the sunlight, said, the corners of her mouth turning up.
Soon, someone’s left arm pokes out of my robe.
My left arm was already pointing at the otherworlders, so at least it wasn’t mine.
Zizik!
A blast of lightning erupts from a hand, much smaller and more slender than mine.
A straight, golden flash of light stirs up the sand and rains down indiscriminately on the charging aliens.
Crackle!!! Crackle!!!
The otherworldly beings that had been running were knocked to the ground.
‘Even though they’re low level, they’re still otherworldly beings, and you’re sending them away with a single blow.’
Aizel’s magic was quite powerful.
“Wow…! Aizel is amazing…!”
Lucia, who was watching, jumped up and down on the sand.
I turn my head and see Yuri looking at me.
More precisely, she’s glaring at Aizel, who’s inside my robes and can be seen through them.
“Why don’t you join me in battle? I thought we were here for a ‘joint’ battle.”
“…We weren’t going to fight together anyway.”
After answering Yuri’s words bitterly, Aizel grabs my arm and pulls me down to hide under my robe.
The sun was hot, and Aizel was shielding herself from the sunlight by crawling into my robe.
This was possible because Aizel, who was not particularly tall, was so small that when she was in my arms, the robe fit her perfectly.
When Yuri asked her if she shouldn’t be wearing a robe, she remained silent and finally whispered to me, “Is it okay to stay here…?” in a small whisper.
I replied that it was fine.
There was nothing wrong with her except that it was a little hot from her body heat.
I thought she might have trouble walking, but she was keeping pace with me.
I whispered to her that she might be feeling a little stifled, and I could feel Aizel’s head twitch inside her robe.
It didn’t matter, but I wondered if she had a reason to come into my arms.
If I was big, Amon was bigger.
I realized that Amon’s size would allow him to fit Lucia along with Aizel, inside his robe.
After thinking about this, I came to the conclusion that it’s because Aizel and Amon aren’t very close.
As a regressor, Aizel didn’t have much of a social circle.
“Heh…But…Didn’t you say it’s hard to meet people of otherworlders, Instructor Ismir…”
Amon, who was sweating profusely, asked Ismir, who was approaching the otherworldly species.
“Did I?”
“…Isn’t it strange, this is the third time already.”
This is the third time we’ve encountered aliens.
We were encountering them strangely often.
Well, I hadn’t even gotten a chance to draw my sword before they were swept away by Aizel.
“What’s the big deal? Sometimes you get lucky, right? Lucia, let’s go!”
“Yes, instructor!”
Ismir and Lucia giggled and ran toward the wreckage of the alien species.
For two characters who are known for their ignorance, this seemed like a perfect match.
As a side note, the cadets’ kills on this trip to the desert will be given as extra pay to their temporary instructors, the warriors.
After all, the cadets aren’t here to make money, and the warriors have an incentive beyond their basic paychecks to teach them better… In many ways, it was an organized structure.
“We’ve captured an otherworldly species, shouldn’t we be able to go back now, haha…”
Amon sighed heavily.
He sounded so uncharacteristically weak.
He was dripping with sweat since the desert heat and scorching sun would prove to be a grueling ordeal for many cadets.
“From the sounds of it, it’s going to be hard to get back, unless we catch a ‘humanoid’.”
Yuri, on the other hand, hadn’t broken a sweat. As in the sauna the other day, she was unusually resistant to heat.
Lucia and Ismir would be used to the desert while Aizel hid in the shadow of my robe.
Amon was the one that had it the worst.
I pulled a water bottle from a subspace pocket in my backpack and held it out to Amon.
“We should get a humanoid, too. Wouldn’t it be nice to show off what kind of family Caligus is?”
“Uh… that would be nice. Thank you. …By the way, how many water bottles did you bring?”
“It can’t hurt to be prepared, haha.”
I didn’t count how many I had brought.
If I had to guess, I’d say it’s enough to keep me from going thirsty if I were stranded in the desert.
Amon takes the water bottle and gulps it down.
“Do you want a glass, too?”
“I’m still fine.”
“And Miss Aizel?”
Amon asks, lifting my robe to reveal Aizel.
“Well…”
Aizel winced as she opened her mouth to speak, not expecting him to suddenly lift my robe.
Even though she was out of the sunlight, my robes were still hot and her face looked like it was burning up.
‘If it’s stuffy, she’ll come out on her own…?’
Aizel was currently wearing a fairly revealing outfit.
I don’t remember her desert outfit from the game being anything like this… Well, it’s not strange to change clothes.
It must have been hot.
As pretty as the outfit was, the scar across Aizel’s immaculate abdomen made me swallow hard.
She looked up and glanced at me, but I grabbed her arm and pulled her down, hiding her once more.
Then she shakes her head.
Her behavior reminds me of a small, cute animal, and I smile faintly.
[My disciple is really a babysitter…]
He almost laughed when Sierra’s gruff voice broke through the silence.
I never had kids, but I was used to taking care of them.
‘It’s like old times.’
It brought back memories that I hadn’t dredged up in a while because I didn’t know if I could go back.
A set of behaviors is a kind of care to maintain the morale of the party.
Without them, morale plummets, which affects combat power. Amon, in particular, seems to need extra care because he is Amon.
It’s better to fight in the best condition possible.
‘I’m worried about the ‘anomaly’ of multiple alien species’ appearances, but…’
My eyes scanned the horizon.
Beyond the dunes, ancient ruins loomed small in the distance.
I was getting closer to a site I knew had a deep connection to the alien species, and that was enough for me.
***
“Uh…”
I quickly lowered his arm to hide myself.
I felt very embarrassed to see his head sticking up at me.
My head was already spinning in the robes, filled with Zetto’s scent.
I shook my head in response to Zetto’s kind question.
I was worried that if I answered out loud, my voice would give away my embarrassment.
Part of my reason for running into his arms was to get out of the scorching sun, as he had explained, but the main reason was that I didn’t want to lose him.
I didn’t want to lose him.
The desert was dangerous for Zetto.
In the previous installment, Zetto had encountered an “unprecedented” group of humanoid aliens in the desert.
They ambushed us and for some reason, they were desperately targeting Zetto.
…Luckily, he was unharmed, but there’s no telling if he’ll get away with it this time.
First of all, the frequency with which the aliens appeared was much different than before.
This uncomfortable situation of encountering more of them, more often, was making me uneasy.
As I walked away, matching Zetto’s stride, I inadvertently wrapped my arms around his waist.
Suddenly, Zetto stops walking and I wonder if he was embarrassed.
I then spoke very softly, just enough for him to hear, but not for anyone else.
“In order to walk more comfortably…”
My answer was full of excuses, but he didn’t say anything and started walking again.
Perhaps he would have smiled at me, but it was a shame I couldn’t see his face from here.
Hugging him tightly around the waist, I renewed my resolve.
I will protect Zetto.
That’s what I became strong for.
‘I don’t know why these otherworldly beings are after him, and I don’t understand why…’
I wasn’t about to lose Zetto to them and if we could just get out of the desert, everything would be right again.
The scent of Zetto’s cologne wafting from his body made my head spin.