Volume 10 Chapter 1 Part 2 (2/2)
Marino introduced s.h.i.+n to the boys, ignoring the boyfriend suspicion.
s.h.i.+n had already visited the orphanage several times, but had not met the two boys before.
”I know you can see it with a.n.a.lyze, but I'll introduce you just in case. The boy with black hair is Ryohei, the one with brown hair is Teppei.”
”Nice to meet you”
”Nice to meetcha!”
Ryohei greeted s.h.i.+n a bit timidly, while Teppei sounded more energetic.
According to Marino, sometimes they hunt low level monsters in the forest, accompanied by an advanced player. Because of their natural ”vigor”, they are a bit infamous as the orphanage's troublesome duo.
”Where's Emil?”
”Inside! Luca is crying again, you know.”
Marino asked about the player that managed the orphanage and said she would go greet them as she went inside the orphanage.
”Hey, hey, mister! Have you ever been to the frontlines of conquered areas? Big sis Emil says it's dangerous and won't let us go!”
”If you want to go, you have to raise your levels some more. Or you're going to die even if you get grazed by a punch, kids.”
”Teppei, you can't go. You'd run off and get killed right away.”
After s.h.i.+n's answer, Ryohei added a snarky comment, while shrugging his shoulders.
”Whaaat!?”
”If you can't beat me even once, you have no chance!”
Apparently Ryohei was higher than Teppei in the orphanage's hierarchy.
As the kids forgot about him and started play fighting, s.h.i.+n looked around, thinking about what he could do.
”Hm?”
He then found a small shadow at the edge of his line of sight. Looking towards it. s.h.i.+n noticed the face of a very young girl subtly peeking from behind a tree.
The moment her eyes met s.h.i.+n's, the little girl quickly retreated behind the tree. But, poor thing, she couldn't hide her animal ears and the Type Cat-like tail. Both seemed to be monitoring s.h.i.+n's presence.
s.h.i.+n held his chin with one hand, acting deep in thought. And slowly moved closer to the tree. He would stop when the girl peeked, then move again when she hid.
(She's not afraid of me, is she.)
The girl should have noticed s.h.i.+n's approach, but did not try to run away. He thought that she was wary of him because they had never met before, but that did not seem to be the case.
Her slightly s.p.a.cing out expression kept poking out and hiding again. Soon enough, s.h.i.+n reached the tree behind which the girl was hiding.
”Good morning.”
”.good morning.”
s.h.i.+n tried a greeting, which was returned by a whisper. It wasn't clear if the girl really wanted to hide or not, as only her face came out of the shade when she looked at s.h.i.+n.
She was leaning forward, so her shoulder-length hair hung in the air.
”Er, I think this is the first time we meet. My name is s.h.i.+n, I came to help Marino. What about you?”
”.Luca.”
”Luca, I see. Well, nice to meet you.”
”Um.”
Luca nodded slightly and stepped out of the shade. Her height was about 110 cemels. Her animal ears, the same color as her hair, sometimes flicked and moved.
Because of the game's systems, the avatar's height was based on real life height. s.h.i.+n thought that she was a bit too small, as in a bit too young, to play a game like that.
”Ah! Luca! Teach was looking for you!”
s.h.i.+n looked back and found Teppei and Ryohei, along with Marino and another person, a woman wearing sister-like clothing.
After hearing Teppei's voice, Luca flinched and hid behind s.h.i.+n. Her hands, gripping her sleeves, were trembling.
”Teppei, you're too loud. You'll scare Luca away.”
”Ah, I'm s-sorry.”
Teppei apologized right away: he had no intention of scaring Luca.
”So you were here, Luca. I was looking for you.”
”..I'm sorry.”
Luca replied while looking at Marino, who had caught up to them.
”Come on, let's go back to the orphanage first. Ryohei, Teppei, you two especially!! You haven't prepared to leave with Garozzo, right!? Quit standing around and go get ready!! Move it, brats!”
”Yes ma'am!!”
After getting yelled at, the boys sprinted back to the orphanage, as ordered by Emil, the orphanage's supervisor. A very beautiful woman, she had waist-length light blue hair and emerald-like eyes.
Her nun-like attire made her look like a devout believer at first glance. Her personality and speech, however, were quite far apart from the common idea of a nun.
Emil's speech was coa.r.s.e and she was rather quick with her hands. On the other hand she was very reliable and caring towards the people around her.
Looking at her taking care of the orphanage kids, s.h.i.+n thought she looked more like a tough mother than a nun.
He never said it to Emil herself, of course; it would only make Emil's basic equipment, a nail bat, cry for blood. It was not a weapon feared not for the damage it caused, but for its horrifying look.
”Marino, you and Luca take care of the usual work.”
”OK, leave it to me.”
”Luca, you better do what Marino says, got it?”
”Ok, got it.”
The ”work” was handling requests given by NPCs. It was a precious source of income for the orphanage, since many of its players could not go out in the field and hunt monsters.
Marino had already done them many times, so it was unlikely that she needed help.
Luca also firmly nodded to Emil's words.
”Guess I should go over there?”
s.h.i.+n looked towards the square where Teppei and Ryohei were play fighting before. A group of boys with sponge blades were waiting.
”Yeah, you've got our s.p.u.n.ky brats to take care of. They have energy to spare after all. Let'em go wild enough to make them stop thinking of sneaking outside. I'll be the coach.”
s.h.i.+n visited the orphanage irregularly, so Emil decided what task to give him each time. Naturally, most of the time it was taking care of the kids.
The only rule was for s.h.i.+n to not go hunting or to use skills to gather items or Geyl.
-If you have to go hunting for the sake of the orphanage, take a rest instead.
-Rather than that, make sure the kids can go back to the real world as soon as possible.
That was the opinion of Emil and all other orphanage collaborators.
They had accepted that s.h.i.+n would sometimes give them a hand, for a change of pace.
”OK, today your opponent is me. Don't hold anything back!”
It was not the first mock battle for s.h.i.+n and the boys: they charged at him without hesitation.
Ryohei and Teppei, who were supposed to prepare to leave, mingled among the other boys at first, but s.h.i.+n quickly flicked them back towards Emil, who grabbed them by the neck and took them away.
”Well, that's about it.”
About 2 hours after the battle between s.h.i.+n and the s.p.u.n.ky army started, the little valiant warriors clearly showed signs of exhaustion, some lying down on the ground.
This exhaustion had no visible gauge, like HP or MP. Players with high HP or VIT would not get tired as easily, so it was said to be a hidden stat.
Exhaustion caused several demerits; attack power and movement speed decreased, while received damage increased. It could be healed via recovery magic, so it wasn't a big problem, but the only user present at the moment -Emil- did not do anything, so the square looked like a battlefield of fallen soldiers.
”c.r.a.p, you're too strong!”
”Adults can't fight seriously againstkids!”
The unperturbed s.h.i.+n was met with praise and complaints from the kids, but they were all too tired to complete their sentences.
”Got it, brats? Out there it's packed with dangerous monsters that would send even battle maniacs like him flying. Don't you ever dare go out on your own!!”
”Got it!”
”We'd die for sure”
The kids' answers were really exhausted too, to the point that one would wonder how much they had really understood of what Emil said.
”OK then, s.h.i.+n, your next job is.hm?”
”Is something wrong?”
Emil stopped halfway through her sentence and looked towards the door leading to the garden; Luca was peeking from behind it. Next to her, Marino was laughing, a bit awkwardly.
”She did that this morning toois Luca always like that?”
”Nope, not really? She's always scared s.h.i.+tless of people she sees for the first time, especially guys like you. She came here only a while ago though, so there's still plenty we don't know about her.”
Emil then added ”Never seen her like that” and motioned at Marino and Luca to come closer.
”See, Luca, let's go?”
Thanks to Emil's gesture and Marino's encouragement, Luca finally came out of her hiding spot behind the door. While walking, though, she skillfully hid behind Marino and stared at s.h.i.+n at the same time.
”Er, we meet again.”
”Um.”
s.h.i.+n spoke to Luca, a bit awkwardly, and for some reason she stopped hiding behind Marino and grabbed s.h.i.+n's trousers.
”Aher, what is this?”
”Hmm, seems she took a liking to you. Pretty rare.”
s.h.i.+n was even more confused because of Luca's behavior, while Emil commented with a grin.
”What's the matter with s.h.i.+n, Luca?”
”.looks like my brother.”
”Is that so.”
Marino's answer to Luca's words was somewhat dry.
s.h.i.+n wondered why, when he received a voice chat message from Emil.
”(Luca's brother is already dead.)”
Luca, originally, was only logged in because her brother needed a certain number of players to create a guild.
Learning that she was only 5 years old, s.h.i.+n understood the circ.u.mstances. Even elementary school students played VR games now, but he couldn't imagine that a girl of pre-school age would want to play a game where PKs existed.
In the small time until she logged out, however, the world had changed.
Her brother and his comrades had departed, leaving Luca in a field for beginners, to never come back, as Emil explained.
(”How old was her brother, by the way?”)
(”He had just entered junior high, it seems”)
(”I don't know if I should be happy or not.”)
You look like my junior high school brother -having similar height or facial features would be one thing, but if their mentalities were similar it would be pretty shocking for s.h.i.+n.
”We might as well have s.h.i.+n take care of Luca today.”
”That's a nice idea. Here!”
Emil apparently came up with the idea on the spot, but Marino caught on immediately and put s.h.i.+n and Luca's hands together.
Luca's hands were soft and very small, even more so when compared to s.h.i.+n's.
Rather than holding hands, it looked like s.h.i.+n's hands were wrapped around Luca's. s.h.i.+n realized again how young she was.
”OK! Today you can count on me!”
”.ok.”
Luca's hands gripped s.h.i.+n's tightly.
s.h.i.+n, Marino, and Emil smiled at her reaction.