ch221-ch240 · 240-ch240

Chapter 240: Soushi's Resolve

"So far, twenty hopefuls for the rank-up request—and with Anego-san included, twenty-one participants from headquarters. On top of that, we're in negotiations with the Triple-Rank party Hondo-san belongs to to have them serve as escorts."

The next day, first thing in the morning: confirming the schedule for October's 'everyone to Floor 30' operation.

The twenty, apparently, are the number of Level 30-and-above people who attended Mia-san's farewell party yesterday.

Anego-san announced the operation at the drinking party and recruited participants on the spot.

I pray it's not one of those exploitative setups where you can't join the operation unless you attended the party.

Every qualified person present declared their participation, and the farewell party apparently went absolutely wild.

Incidentally, Mia-san has been unreachable since last night.

Worrying, but it happens often enough, so she's fine—apparently......

"Hondo-san—the whip-using woman at the Chiba branch right now, right? We met her at the Floor 14 campsite the other day."

—says Aikawa.

"Ahh, THOSE people. The whip one is Hondo-san? Huh."

So the fluffy-skirt lady apparently goes by the name Hondo-san.

Like me, Soushi apparently didn't know her name either.

"You knew, then? With Triple-Rank escorts along, our fighting strength would be more than sufficient. From Chiba, that's Haruki-san, Natsukawa-san, and Aikawa-san—three of you—plus me and Mia-san. Also, Sato-san wishes to submit his own Triple-Rank promotion request. It will be a large-scale rank-up request, and Sakura wore me down—'the branch should send people too'—so I gave in. His participation is confirmed whether or not he gets promoted. A few more parties may join as escorts as well."

Even for a rank-up request, if it's nominally just friends helping friends, no filing with the branch is required.

But it's going to be a large-scale march, so in case anything happens, we informed the branch and made it an official request.

The branch manager's approval came through—and Hayashi-san, once she learned of the request, is apparently overjoyed.

Sato-san wants to piggyback on the rank-up, it seems.

Sato-san is also a former adventurer—his main was the scout line, if I recall right.

Scout line or not, this is a man who can waltz up to Floor 19 solo without a hitch, so his skill is the real thing.

More reliable escorts is a good thing, I think.

"Shiraishi-san is on standby, then?"

I ask, since it caught my interest.

"That's right. This time, we overnight twice on the way up—Floors 15 and 25—and twice on the way down, at Floors 25 and 15, making four nights and five days. Leaving Shiraishi-san away from the branch for five whole days would be a problem, so should anyone suffer serious injury, we will be relying on you, Haruki-san."

Meaning I pretend to carry them and ship them to Floor 1 through 【Gate】?

The snag is I couldn't come back—but in that case, I'll support from afar again.

The schedule: October 6th, Thursday through Monday—five days.

Monday's a public holiday, but Thursday and Friday mean skipping school.

"Five days? Watanabe-san came back in three last time, didn't she?"

Soushi's question.

True, it could probably be a day shorter.

If we set out early on day one, couldn't we make Floor 25?

"This time there are more than ten non-combat jobs, so we played it safe with this schedule. Last time, too, the second day's return to camp came only after dark...... You will all be missing school—I ask for your understanding."

"Oh, I didn't mean it like that. If anything, getting out of school is a WIN......"

Soushi!

But he's taking an elbow from the 【Monk】 Aikawa, so I'll forgive him.

Aikawa looks about due for a 【Monk】 upper-rank job.

If it specializes in fists—【Fist Striker】? Kicks—【Kick Striker】? Elbows would be...... 【Elbow Striker】?

Does that one even exist?

"Production-job holders who actually fight, like Mia-san, are the rare ones, right? Everyone leveled all the way to 30, good for them."

Aikawa has a point, I'll grant.

"Production jobs" covers a lot of ground, after all.

Mia-san's job comes with decent Strength built in, and her special skill negates weight on top of that.

Hauling five days of food up to Floor 30 and back is hard enough as it is—demanding speed on top of that would be cruel.

"Five years, after all. I think they did wonderfully, never once giving up. The rest comes down to Anego-san and company's efforts."

"You too, Kasumi-san, right?"

"Haruki-san...... Yes."

The time for that effort to be rewarded has come.

We'll give it everything we have as well.

"And so—our plan is to break through Floor 40 before the day itself."

"At our current pace, Level 40 by October seems well within reach. But Floor 40...... an upper-rank sub-job...... Certainly nothing would beat having one, but......"

Huh? Less opposition than I expected.

Well, we've been talking Floor 40 for a while now, and a surprise is waiting for her, after all.

"If we pick up the pace, Soushi and the others can hit Level 40 by October too, I think."

"HUH?! Surely not THAT...... Reckless leveling is unacceptable."

So THAT one's a no?

"It's fine as long as it's not reckless, right? It's just the nice easy job of dismantling the golems Haru-kun brings over, so we're good."

You, little......

I'M the one who ends up doing the reckless part!

"Once you three have your upper-rank jobs on Floor 30, you're joining Floor 40 too, you know?"

"Ehhh? Isn't that dangerous?"

What's an ADVENTURER saying that for.

"With the level gap, that's too abrupt. They should be acclimated gradually, starting from Floor 31."

Hmm. No good, then.

"That slows the pace, though. Guess it's all on me after all...... Huh? Soushi?"

He's off in the clouds.

"Ah—sorry. Wasn't listening. I was thinking about what job to take on Floor 30...... wondering about magic jobs, you know."

Magic jobs, huh.

Soushi's aptitude is 【Water Mage】, after all.

At least one upper-rank job branches from it, and that becomes his upper-rank aptitude job.

"Wouldn't your stats bottom out as a main? You'd lose melee entirely—and you can finally use weapon enhancement through your Cooking skill, you know?"

"Exactly. Being stuck out of the front line is honestly pretty stressful, you know?"

As a dancer, Aikawa does have to wait in the back for buff refreshes sometimes.

"I feel useless, y'know. The front line has Kasumi-san and Haruki, right? And thinking about Aikawa's 【Partial Beast Transformation】, she could go to the front too. Floor 40 is seriously dangerous, isn't it? So what we need isn't ME getting individually stronger—it's the PARTY getting stronger. That's what I've been thinking."

"And so, a magic job? Do you have a concrete candidate?"

"Yes—【Enchanter】. Right now, Aikawa's dancing makes fights so much easier. If we layered one more, higher-rank buff on top of that, wouldn't things get even easier......? And the leveling that currently rests entirely on Haruki would be helped along by long-duration magic buffs too."

The magic-line buffer job originally planned for Floor 40, huh......

And he's taking it at Floor 30 instead?

Magic jobs tend to get avoided as mains because everything except Magic bottoms out, after all.

Hearing that, Kasumi-san has slipped into hmmm-mode.

"Thinking of everyone, huh. That's so Soushi. I think it's a great idea. If I'm dancing, I'll be back line too—I'll protect you, Soushi. So low stats are no problem at all!"

So Soushi, huh......

He does always hang one step back and carry everyone, true.

It's the same at school.

He balances everything and gets along with everybody.

Setting me aside, he keeps Aikawa and the otaku kids from being left alone—pulls them into the group......

Thanks to which, I'm a member of the weirdo group too.

If being an adventurer was his dream, you'd think he'd want to fight with a sword and look cool doing it.

Get famous, that sort of thing......

Though getting famous is off the table because of me, isn't it.

Also—you two over there, quit the lovey-dovey.

The golems the SDF has pinned down are going to start thrashing, you know?

"You're allowed to do more of what YOU want to do, you know?"

"No—this IS the job I want. I want to be useful to you."

"Soushi......"

What is this development—now even Souma-san is going to go feral.