"Yunyun, these are your friends from your hometown, Kazuma and the self-proclaimed goddess Aqua. The friends I told you about who stay at the inn and take quests together."
"Don't call me a self-proclaimed goddess!"
Yunyun and Megumin kept looking back and forth between Kazuma and me.
"Huh? You're from the same hometown as Kazuma??"
"You don't look like you're from the same race or tribe at all?"
"Ah~ we're from the same hometown, but our races are a bit different, so that's why."
Megumin spoke with a suspicious expression.
"Even so, the difference is huge. Tae-jin is tall, has gold eyes, an incredibly handsome face, great proportions, and Kazuma is that..."
Hearing that, Kazuma made a face like he'd bitten crap.
"Yeah! I'm uglier than Tae-jin! But that's because Tae-jin is abnormally handsome, I'm average in my hometown!!"
"Hee~"
"Hee~"
"Hee~"
Megumin, Yunyun, and even Aqua looked at Kazuma with faces that said they didn't believe him.
"Don't doubt me!!!"
"Hahaha alright, alright~ The sun's going down, if we keep this up we'll be late for the guild. Let's wash up and meet at the guild to talk more."
We washed up and gathered at the guild. Then we found a slightly bigger table and sat down.
"Then, Aqua and Megumin, order food. We'll go report our quest completion."
"Go ahead, we'll order something tasty."
Kazuma, Yunyun, and I went to the guild receptionist Luna to report our quest completion.
"Wow! That's amazing. Just the two of you took down a One-Hit Bear and a Kobold nest without a single injury in just one day!"
At Luna's surprised voice, the adventurers and staff eating in the guild all looked at us and whispered.
"Is that the handsome samurai?"
"He took down a One-Hit Bear?"
"Ah~ so handsome! I want to marry him."
"Are people like that the ones who become heroes?"
"Does he have a girlfriend?"
It's not like I'm an attention seeker, but this isn't bad. I guess some people think I'm a samurai because I carry Enma around. Yunyun also got embarrassed from suddenly getting so much attention and her face turned red.
"Then the One-Hit Bear subjugation is 2,000,000 eris, Kobold nest subjugation is 1,200,000 eris, and the ore you brought is 1,600,000 eris, for a total of 4,800,000 eris. Good work. Please confirm."
"Confirmed. Thank you."
4,800,000 eris is 48 million won in Korean money. I earned more than Korea's average annual salary in one day.
Looking back, Kazuma's mouth was wide open in shock at the huge amount of eris I received.
I ignored Kazuma's gaze and handed Yunyun half of the money I got from Lunaβ2,400,000 eris.
"I don't know if I should take this much money. You worked harder than me today, Tae-jin."
"No, I would've had a much harder time without Yunyun, and I couldn't have finished all the quests in one day. And we're party members now. Profit should be split properly."
"Hehe~ party members."
Yunyun seems happier about the word 'party member' than the money. Poor Yunyun.
Now Kazuma reported his quest completion.
"Kazuma, you completed the Giant Toad quest and caught one more, so that's 115,000 eris. Good work. Please confirm."
Gasp... Tae-jin got 4.8 million, I got 115,000...
"Ahaha, you're leveling up, so you'll be able to earn more money soon."
"Come to think of it, my level jumped to 4 right away. You really do get stronger just by defeating monsters."
"Growth is fastest when you're a beginner adventurer."
That's not true for everyone. Thanks to Pleasure Life, I'm still level 3. I found that out today when I reported the quest.
The reason Kazuma levels up faster than me is because his potential is low. The lower your potential, the less experience needed to level up, so you level fast, but your stats rise less. For reference, it normally takes 5 years to go from level 1 to level 20.
I can't bring myself to tell Kazuma this because he'd be crushed.
We went back to the table where Aqua was.
Aqua was eating the food that came out and spoke.
"Tae-jin! Amazing! Everyone's talking about you."
"Hahaha, it's embarrassing getting this much attention all of a sudden."
"No, it's been like that for a while. An incredibly handsome guy works hard, is strong too, so everyone says they're looking at a future hero?"
Just then, Kazuma spoke with a serious expression.
"Aqua, that's not important. Tae-jin's leaving for the royal capital soon. We only earned 115,000 today. If we split that among three people, it's only 38,000 eris each. We can't catch frogs every day, and if Tae-jin goes to the royal capital like this, even if we drink moderately, inn fees will be tight and we might have to live in the stables!"
"..."
Now Kazuma's finally seeing reality.
Suddenly Aqua looked at me, and stood up like she'd decided something.
"Good! I've decided! I'm going to the royal capital with Tae-jin too!"
"Th-this! Traitor!!"
"But what can I do! Kazuma's useless!"
I looked at Aqua and sighed as I spoke.
"Sorry, but Aqua, you're Kazuma's bonus. You can't come with me. And Kazuma, you leveled up now, so you can take skills..."
"Waaaaaah~~~ I wanna go to the royal capital with Tae-jin too, too, too!"
Aqua cut off my words, cried, and clung to me shaking me, throwing a tantrum. Honestly, I could ignore the original and take her, but I don't want to take on that bad luck bomb either.
Just then, a beautiful female knight with blonde hair and blue eyes spoke to Kazuma.
"I saw the recruitment notice. Are you still recruiting party members?"
Aqua stopped crying and everyone looked at the female knight.
Kazuma was either intimidated or smitten by the female knight's beautiful appearance and dignified voice, and answered in a trembling voice.
"Y-yes, we're recruiting!"
"Good, that's a relief. I've been waiting for someone like you."
Something felt off about her words.
"My name is Darkness. I make my living as a Crusader. Please, please, could you, c-c-could you add me to your party?"
If you didn't know better, you'd think Is Darkness nervous?, but having seen the original, I knew it was excitement, not nervousness.
"Um, well..."
Kazuma, with his good instincts, started to feel something was off.
"You two covered in slime are his party members, right? What on earth happened for you to end up like that...!"
Megumin said while eating toad fries.
"Got eaten by a Giant Toad and got covered in slime..."
"What!? More than I imagined... For two young girls to suffer that, as a knight I cannot just watch."
Darkness's face got redder and redder like she was more and more excited, and her breathing got rough as she went haa haa.
That's when Megumin and Aqua said.
"There's no reason to refuse a Crusader, right?"
"Right, is Kazuma in any position to be picky?"
"Be quiet! Traitor!"
Kazuma grabbed Aqua's cheeks and stretched them. It felt like that grudge from earlier would last a long time.
"Uheheeng~~~! That hurts~~~"
Darkness, still in an extremely excited state, shoved her face at Kazuma, who was doing that.
"Haa haa~ Is your party always like that? Slurp... C-can I do that too?"
"Eek!"
Kazuma was surprised and stepped back. Then Darkness also realized she'd made a mistake unconsciously and apologized.
"Ahem... Sorry. I was rude to someone I just met."
Kazuma, now getting a sense of what kind of person Darkness was, started spouting harsh words quickly to avoid taking her into the party.
"U-um, I don't recommend our party. One person, I don't really know how they help, and another can only cast magic once a day, and I'm the weakest class. It's a crappy party, so I recommend somewhere else."
"Huh? You're saying you don't know how I help?"
"It's true I can only use it once a day, but that stings a bit!"
The image of Kazuma in the party was getting extremely worse.
"Even better! To be honest, it's a bit embarrassing to say, but I'm confident in my strength and durability, but I'm clumsy... that is, I can't land attacks. So I'll just charge ahead, so please use me as a shield!"
"Give me time to think."
"Got it. I hope we can be together."
Darkness left like that. Kazuma seemed to have given up persuading her today.
"Kazuma, what was that you said earlier, about not knowing how I help???"
"Take it back. That one shot is the strongest magic!"
Aqua and Megumin grabbed Kazuma from both sides and shook him while dogpiling him verbally.
Kazuma gave me a look that said "Help me!", but I turned my head pretending I didn't know anything.
After eating at the guild restaurant, we came out to go back to the inn, and Yunyun suddenly called me.
"Um, thank you for today. Eating with so many people was fun, and forming a party and doing quests together was all thanks to you, Tae-jin. This is a small token, but it's friendship money."
Yunyun handed me a thick pouch, and when I opened it, it was full of eris.
"I don't need it!"