Chapter 61 - Evaluation Meeting of the Golden

The party returned home, two of their members in a gloomy mood. Then the next day, Eunice did not respond to Tsutomu when he tried talking to her, so he instead focused on Barbara’s training while they were exploring the thirty-ninth layer.

Barbara was showing great signs of improvement, perhaps thanks to the practical experience gained from dealing with ten Skeletons at once yesterday. The number of Skeletons she could reliably take on had increased by one, and she was becoming more stable even without buffing effects. As long as she did not get hit by critical attacks, she would not have any difficulty with the Skeletons; she herself knew that, resulting in her maneuvers getting better, too.

[At this rate, we might be fine throwing in some Skeleton Archers in a day or two after this.]

Since their eventual training targets were the Orcs, which naturally had archers among their groups, the party needed to get used to long-ranged attacks as well. While watching the Skeletons being blown away by Barbara’s blows with her buckler, Tsutomu thought about the next methods with which to train her.

Eunice, on the other hand, was constantly grumbling to herself in annoyance; she had been trying to do the same things as Tsutomu had shown, but since there was no way one could do everything right off the bat, she kept on failing and failing. Tsutomu had advised her to focus on healing and supporting the Tank at first, but ended up leaving her to her own devices after being asked by her to leave her alone for three days.

Barbara took on the ten Skeletons while enduring the pain in her joints, while Diniel frequently sighed as her body’s senses were altered repeatedly by her <<Haste>> effect running out and being applied again.

[Diniel’s the type of few words, I see. She might even pass as a Japanese person on that front.]

From Tsutomu’s experience, the act of simply walking away without a word was the most common reaction from Japanese players when encountering Healers with bad personalities. There were also those who would kindly teach them the ropes and others who would hurl profanity at them, of course, but most of the time, people would simply leave the party and find another elsewhere to avoid the hassle of a conflict.

In this case, however, there was no way to immediately break up the party, so Diniel could only keep silent while putting up with her displeasure. The situation was, needless to say, not good — not the kind of good silence where everyone involved acted naturally in sync with one another. This was the kind of silence where everyone had complaints and suggestions for improvement, but could not bring themselves to say them out loud.

Tsutomu kept on watching the three while he twirled his white staff around in his hands… and then saw Diniel starting to act up.

She began to dodge Eunice’s <<Haste>> shots, deliberately letting them pass her by as she kept on shooting the Skeletons down. After the first several times, Eunice realized the meaning behind Diniel’s behavior; now she was insistent on landing the <<Haste>> shots on Diniel.

In fact, she was so focused on getting <<Haste>> to hit that she had forgotten to support Barbara; now the latter’s <<Protect>> had expired, and she was not getting enough healing. Tsutomu, reminded of so many stray parties in Live Dungeon that had gotten wiped because of these very same behaviors, held his head regretfully.

[If this goes on for two more days, I think even Barbara might lose her temper.]

Seeing Barbara being subject to the Skeleton’s attacks without any buffing effects made Tsutomu want to intervene, but he knew that intervening now would only satisfy him and do nothing to help Eunice’s improvement. He kept on watching the trio fight, suppressing the itch to take action all the while.

Eventually, Eunice finally realized that Barbara was in a critical situation, rushing to cast her <<Protect>> and <<Heal>>. Eunice’s panic might have transmitted to the skills she used, however, as apparent from how her <<Protect>> and <<Heal>> were in half-vapor forms, failing to reach Barbara before fading away.

Diniel, losing her patience upon seeing that happen, let loose her arrows in quick succession. One after another, they pierced the Skeletons’ skulls with great accuracy, eventually temporarily incapacitating all ten of them.

“<<Heal>>.”

With the Skeletons gone for now, Eunice seemed to have regained her composure; her <<Heal>> shot this time was a spherical shape, and she successfully hit Barbara with it. Tsutomu, after confirming that a few more shots landed without issue, shouted out,

“All right! Now we retreat! Everyone, gather around!”

The three turned around at the sound of Tsutomu’s shout. Diniel, looking bored, immediately put away the arrow in her hand and rushed over to Tsutomu. Barbara also ran over, looking somewhat nervous, while Eunice clicked her tongue out of annoyance at the reconstructing Skeletons before grouping up with everyone else.

After leaving the Team Graveyard and returning to the Guild, they sat down on the chairs in the Guild’s dining hall, as asked to by Tsutomu. He proceeded to take out a pen and a piece of paper from his Magic Bag and put them on the table.

“Our Tank and Healer have gotten the basics down since yesterday, which enabled us to carry out training in a real combat environment. So from today on, after the training sessions are over, the three of you must be present in an evaluation meeting.”

“E-evaluation meetings?”

Barbara, after taking off her helmet and wiping her face with a towel to release some heat, looked awkwardly at the two others sitting in front of her. Seeming to still hold an inferiority complex due to her Job and the fact that she had not been in the main party until very recently, she still could not act all that naturally toward the two.

“Now then, let’s start with Barbara. Is there anything about the party you’re not satisfied with?”

“I-I’m first!?”

“Yes.”

Tsutomu smiled at Barbara then raised his hand to the Guild Staff Member who was taking orders, and ordered drinks for all four of the party. And then, seeing that Barbara had yet to say anything, he turned to look at her as if to urge her on. Afraid of Tsutomu’s silent gaze, she eventually brought herself to speak up,

“I’d like more healing, I guess.”

“You want Eunice to heal you more frequently… noted. Anything else?”

“…No, I don’t think so.”

“All right.”

After quickly writing down Barbara’s opinion on the paper, Tsutomu then turned to Eunice. In response, Eunice glared at Diniel and pointed at her.

“She’s been dodging my <<Haste>> shots, I can tell! She’s been doing that just now, too! What’s wrong with her!?”

“Diniel has been dodging <<Haste>>… noted. Anything else.”

“…Nothing. But, well, I’m sorry, Barbara. I’ll do better.”

“Oh, no, don’t worry about it.”

Bowed to by Eunice, Barbara hurriedly waved her hands as if to tell the former that she meant no disrespect. Tsutomu took a sip of the cold water that had been served to him and then turned to Diniel. She cast her gaze down, her expression suggesting that she wanted to hurry and be done with this.

“The <<Haste>> shots were in my way, so I don’t really need them.”

“Diniel doesn’t need <<Haste>>… noted. Anything else?”

“What!? You stop messing around!”

Eunice, yellow tail flicked up in response to Diniel’s blunt remark, retorted with quite a rough tone; the latter winced at Eunice’s volume and held her long, sharp ears with her hands.

“Don’t force yourself — there’s no use in doing something you can’t.”

“Ngh… S-sure, I can’t do it now, but I’ll get it down in three days, you’ll see!”

“I don’t think it’ll be that easy, though.”

“If that guy can do it, then there’s no way in hell I can’t!”

“N-now, just calm down for a bit, you two!”

Eunice was about to grab Diniel when Barbara leaned forward over the table and pushed the two apart with her arms. Tsutomu kept on noting things down while thinking to himself how surprised he would be if they were to actually get things in place within the next three days.

“Anyway, we’ve gotten everyone to voice their opinions, at least. Now I’ll be explaining all of your battle performances from what I observed. First, Barbara.”

“Y-yes.”

“You were very good at countering the Skeletons today. It seems that you were able to grasp the essential concepts from yesterday’s combat practice. Please do keep up the good work.”

“Yes,” Barbara nodded firmly in response to Tsutomu’s explanation.

Looking at them, Eunice groaned as if she was looking at something silly. Tsutomu proceeded to turn to Eunice and said to her,

“So, Eunice… you said you’ll get things down in three days. I won’t say anything until then, so do your best with whatever you’re trying now.”

“…You don’t even need to tell me that.”

“But if you don’t show any improvement in three days, I’ll have you strictly following my instructions going forward.”

Eunice reluctantly nodded to Tsutomu’s statement, then began drinking from her cup of cold water, holding it up with both hands. Tsutomu still had much he wanted to say to her, especially since they both had the same Job, but he decided to refrain from doing so for now. Seeing that she had learned all the basics in a short period of time, there was plenty of time to spare. As such, he decided to give Eunice three days for her to do whatever she wanted with.

“And Diniel… I don’t have anything in particular for you. You didn’t seem to be taking things seriously in the first place, so I can’t really evaluate your performance.”

“Okay.”

“Oh, but I do have a feeling that you’ve been keeping things to yourself too much. If there’s anything you want done, maybe you should try speaking it out more.”

“Okay.”

Diniel did not seem to pay much attention to what Tsutomu had to say, only giving curt answers as she held up her cup and twirled it around. Tsutomu, thinking back to how she had started dodging <<Haste>> shots earlier, thought to himself how she had always come off as unpredictable and eccentric,. The meeting ended for now, however, and after a short break, the party headed back to the Team Graveyard of the thirty-ninth layer.

――▽▽――

Two days had passed since the evaluation meeting, but Eunice had not been shown to change much; with one day left on her bold claim, she was now constantly worried over what she could do.

To make it easier to keep track of her skills’ durations, she had tried shortening the effect of <<Protect>>, which lasted longer <<Haste>>, and made it so that she could count the two skills’ times in relation with each other. However, whenever she’d had to pay attention to Diniel’s movements to get <<Haste>> to land on her, she ended up losing or confusing the seconds’ counts.

Moreover, Eunice knew all too well that the timing at which Barbara would use <<Combat Cry>>, as instructed by Tsutomu, was when the Skeletons finished reconstructing themselves. Despite knowing that, she would need a wide field of vision and good awareness to make sure to support both Barbara and Diniel while healing as needed while also noting the locations and times at which the Skeletons would come back. As she was now, Eunice still possessed insufficient abilities to grasp the whole battle’s situation.

Now, she was at her wit’s end, failing to understand why she could not do what Tsutomu could despite the latter being a White Mage with a level of lower than fifty — essentially a beginner to the scene. Using her frustration to fuel her drive on the third day, after she was done exploring the Dungeon with Barbara and Diniel, she asked Leon and some other Clan Members to give her some combat training. During the session, she tried imitating another one of Tsutomu’s moves. Thinking she should be fine if she were to succeed in at least placing <<Haste>> pick-ups, she ended up being quite shocked to know how difficult it actually was.

Tsutomu, through learning and predicting Leon’s movement behaviors, had been reliably placing <<Haste>> on the ground in the directions of Leon’s steps. Eunice, however, could not manage to get Leon to step on the right spots, even when she abandoned her other obligations to focus on him.

<<Haste>> placements had a slight delay between the spell activation and the pick-up actually spawning. Despite anticipating that and placing the pick-ups in advance, Leon would already have passed the spawn points by the time they were ready. After about five hours of practice, Eunice was not able to get Leon to step on her <<Haste>> pick-ups even once.

To fully excel at her role, she must do the following: Use the skills Tsutomu had taught her to maintain the buffing effects of her three party members, while also keeping an eye on the Tank and healing them as necessary. Reliably place <<Haste>> pick-ups so that Leon could get them, while also knowing the monsters’ positions and managing their aggro on her. And at times, making herself function as a Tank, attracting the attention of many monsters and keeping herself alive. Eunice still could not do even the first thing on the list. Moreover, this time, unlike when she had learned to use skill shots and placements, she did not feel that she had improved at all. She could not even picture a future where she managed to learn all those skills and tactical prowesses.

Eunice kept on practicing with Leon and the team until late into the night, but all she managed to understand was the overwhelming difference between Tsutomu and herself. By the time she was back to the Clan House, it was already pitch black out; she cleaned herself, changed into her pajamas, and went back to her room.

She had to admit that she was inferior to ‘that guy.’ That Garm, Camille, and Amy were not fully responsible for his team’s victories over the Fire Dragon. That her assessment of him had been wrong.

Feeling as if she was getting all that implicitly beaten in, she shook the staff in her hand in frustration, then proceeded to throw it at the wall with all her might.

The staff fell to the floor with a hollow rattle. Eunice heaved a deep sigh and went to pick it back up.

[…I’ll admit, he’s better than me. For now.]

Eunice then wiped her red, swollen eyes with her sleeve, jumped into her cutely-decorated double bed, and almost immediately fell asleep.

The next morning, Eunice woke up with a refreshed look on her face. She quickly got ready and ate breakfast in the Clan House’s Dining Hall, then waited at the entrance for Tsutomu’s arrival.

She had been trying to imitate Tsutomu’s moves for herself, an effort which had gone largely unsuccessful. Now she felt that, if she kept stubbornly going at it like this, she would not ever be able to do it. She had resolved to bow to him, to ask him to teach her, and as such decided to do so first thing in the morning.

But time ticked on, and even when it passed nine o’clock, Tsutomu did not show up. Up to now, he had always arrived much earlier, looking over some documents in the reception room by the time it was half-past eight. Eunice had her arms crossed and was thumping one foot in frustration when Barbara and Diniel spotted her on their way out.

“Oh, there you are, Eunice. I’ve been looking for you.”

“…Did something happen?”

“No, nothing — it’s just that we’ll be doing some training today as well, you see… do you have other plans?”

“I don’t. Of course I’ll go with you… but that guy isn’t here, and I’ve been waiting since early morning! Why even train today, of all days, anyway? I swear, he’s the worst…”

Seeing Eunice wagging her tail as if to show her annoyance, Barbara put her fingers on her temples, reluctant to explain what should have been obvious to the former. Diniel, standing next to them, heaved a sigh and said,

“Tsutomu did tell us yesterday that he won’t be here today, though. Didn’t you hear him?”

“Huh…”

Having been so desperate to learn all the skills yesterday, Eunice had completely missed Tsutomu’s announcement. Diniel sighed again, exasperated. Eunice now realized that it had been a complete waste to have waited at the entrance so early in the morning. Her face flushed with shame, poked the ground hard with her staff as if she was throwing a tantrum.

“Why’s he taking the day off now, of all times? Isn’t he here on Golden Tune’s request!? He can’t just take time off like that! What’s his explanation for that, anyway!?”

“Well, it’s not like I know, either…”

“…Oh yeah, I think he said something about being called over by the Guild Master, and that he’ll be away for two days. Can’t blame him, I guess. He did get permission from Leon yesterday, after all.”

Barbara tried to pacify the red-faced Eunice as the latter screamed at the top of her lungs, while Diniel simply covered her own ears. Ten minutes later, after the scene died down, the three headed to the Guild to begin today’s training.