Volume 4 - CH 4.02

I guess it was her deep and slow breathing that got me thinking that she passed out, but apparently this girl is much more resilient than she looks. Nevertheless, I think it is going to be more tactful to not raise my voice too much, so I asked her a question with a quiet voice:

「So, what do you think, Sherry? About today as a whole, I mean?」

「Thanks to both master and Miss Roxanne’s advice and guidance I was able to do a lot in just this one day, and I was also not dragging you two down. So. . .  so I want to thank you for including me in your amazing Party.」

「I also think that you were as amazing as always, if not even more, master.」

Roxanne showered me with another praise. Oh stop it, you two, you are going to make me blush!

「Miss Roxanne is also amazing! Your movements are always so swift, and they way you are dodging each and every one of the monster’s attacks is truly divine! And master as well, your magic is one of the reasons why I think we were able to achieve so much in such a short time! Before today, I only heard the stories of how powerful magic is, but now, after witnessing it for myself, I can definitely confirm with utmost certainty that magic is a truly useful tool that makes all of the battles way less difficult than they could have been! Forgive me for being so bold, but I honestly think that this Party is going to achieve a great deal of wondrous accomplishments in the future, and I promise that I am going to do my absolute best to be a part of those great achievements together with master and Miss Roxanne!」

In other words, Sherry seems to be positively thrilled about our performance today. And I have to say, that optimism of hers is pretty darn contagious.

「Yeah, likewise. I am looking forward to working with you and Roxanne, so let us do our very best from now on, shall we?」

「To be honest, before I decided to come to the Labyrinth with you, I did not know what I should be expecting, but I was preparing myself mentally for even the worst of eventualities, because I heard that it is not an uncommon practice for masters who own combat-oriented slaves to use them as meat shields and free laborers in the Labyrinths while they themselves reman in the safety of their houses, doing nothing to help them, so when I learned that this Party is nothing like these awful ones from the stories, my heart has been set at ease.」

「Yes, you will never have to worry about something like that happening, Sherry. Master is not a cowardly person like that. And even if he was, we still would not have to worry about a thing, because no matter how tough the enemy is, as long as we crush them before they manage to crush us, then everything is going to turn out all right in the end!」

She thought that since she was a slave, she might be treated as little more than atool that is going to be used up for all it’s worth and then tossed aside when it would no longer be useful. As much as I want to say that there was nothing for her to worry about at all, Sherry was right to be worried about that. And also, I cannot agree with what Roxanne said just now about defeating the enemy before it defeats you. I know that she is biased when it comes to fighting because she has her godly dodging skills and she airheadedly thinks that this is something that just about anyone can learn as long as they continue to practice long and hard enough, but right now, she should have realized that this is not the case when she tried to teach that dodging of hers to me and sherry and failed both times. She herself would have simply continued to avoid the enemy’s attacks and drawing its attention so that I could defeat it with either my magic or my sword, but I am afraid that such a tactic might now be possible all the time. Somewhere down the line, we are bound to happen upon the enemy who is going to be so powerful that even Roxanne’s dodging any my uber OP gear alone might now be enough to handle it, and I cannot help it but wonder how are we going to deal with such a threat when it finally shows itself before us?

There are things that only Roxanne can do. There are things that only I can do. There are things that only Sherry can do. So if we work together, there will be no adversary that we will not be able to overcome. Heh, look at me, thinking about such heavy and serious things while in a state of post-sex clarity. But with very minute now my consciousness is getting more and more hazy, so I think that it will not be long before I will drift off to sleep *Yaaaaawn!* Aaaanyway, from now on, all that I have to worry about is leaving the vanguard position to Roxanne and Sherry, and support them from the back with my magic to the best of my ability. Today was Sherry’s first day of fighting with us for real and there were experiments with the Jobs to perform so I had no choice but to step up and defeat a number of enemies myself, but ideally I want to have the two of them capable of defeating all of the three monsters that can be in a group at once on the seventh floor without my help at all. And once we advance onto the seventh floor, where the number of maximum enemies per encounter is going to increase from three to four, I would want each of them to be able to handle two enemies at once. . . . . . . . . . .  but now that I think about it, is such an approach not reminiscent of the concerns that Sherry told us about just now? Because it might not be as cruel as ordering them to fight in the Labyrinths while I myself would be sitting on my ass in the safety of our home, but it is still a pretty selfish thing to do. So maybe I should still be helping them out in the vanguard on occasion so that they would not feel like they have been left alone? That might be a good thing to do, because it might lead into the deepening of the trust between us, and the more Sherry and Roxanne trust in me, the better. That is a no brainer, or at least I think so.

The next morning, we took Sherry to the seventh floor of the Labyrinth of Quratar with us. I only just bought Sherry and I do not have the need for getting the large amounts of money urgently, but it does not mean that we should be breaking our routine of fighting the enemies who drop items that we could sell for a good amount of Nars. As they say, money cannot buy you happiness, but they can certainly help in obtaining it and keeping it by your side. Besides, since Sherry was doing okay on the Seventh floor of the Labyrinth of Vale and was holding her own against the Escape Goats, then she should have no problems dealing with the Slow Rabbits here. And she really was fine, because she was slamming them to the sides left and right before they could even get close to her with the slow hopping.

Until recently, Roxanne and I have been coming to the seventh floor of Quratar’s Labyrinth so that we could hunt down Slow Rabbits and sell their skins for profit, but now there is no need for us to do so, and we used that additional time to proceed further wit our exploration of Vale’s Labyrinth.

After hunting the Slow Rabbits and collecting their skins for a bit, we moved to the Labyrinth of Vale, where we proceeded straight toward the Boss Room of the seventh floor. Looks like we made much more progress and at a much faster rate than I thought. . . . . .  or it is much more likely that I have consciously avoided coming back here, because I was refraining from moving to the eighth floor due to my lack of confidence and fear of having to fight up to four enemies at once.

The room where we have emerged was the small one next to the Boss Room’s waiting room. As usual, there are only two doors: the ones leading forward, and the ones leading back.