Shin waited for the Onee-san to calm herself down. She was sitting powerless to the ground as a result of her recent traumatic experience.

Shin tried searching for a handkerchief from his pockets but as expected, there wasn’t any.

Knowing that he doesn’t have one, he touched the Onee-san’s face and rubbed her falling tears off by his own fingers.

Startled by Shin’s actions, she immediately stood up like she wanted to run away but her still shaking legs gave up and landed in her butt.

“O-ow.. H-hurts..”

“O-onee-chan! Are you okay?” the little girl who watched her sister? who fell down panicked and rushed into her side

“There’s no need to rush. More importantly, I’m not going to hurt you. If I wanted to, I would’ve done it minutes ago. Here take my hand.”

He then offered his towards the Onee-san.

She hesitated for a moment then slowly stood up with the help of Shin.

“T-thank you m-mister for saving us.” Said the Onee-san with a slight frightened look.

“Don’t bully Yuffa onee-san!” Interjected the little girl.

That action of a 7 year old girl protecting her sister assumed by shin was quite cute for him. His hand involuntarily reaches for the top of the little girls’ blonde hair and slowly caresses it.

For a moment the little girl looked unhappy but eventually enjoyed the feeling of Shin’s hand on top of her head.

“..Ehehe …”

The Onee-san called Yuffa by the little girl looks at the scene before her in a shocked expression.

“Hmm? What’s wrong?”

Shin noticed her reaction and asked.

“N-nothing. It’s just that this girl is usually hostile to other people especially around men. Seeing her like this is new to me”

“Is that so?” he paused for a moment and looked at the girl’s smiling face. “Maybe they haven’t tried this? Most kids like it.”

“You sure are knowledgeable about this thing. Do you have child?” asked Yuffa curiously.

“A child? I’m still 17 you know. And this isn’t something to be proud of but I haven’t even held a girl’s hand.”

‘E-eh? You haven’t?? Considering how you look, aren’t you popular?”

“What? You’re saying I’m handsome?”

 “K-kind of”

Hearing Yuffa’s honest response, he heartily laughed and wrapped his arms around Yuffa’s shoulders which made her twitch a bit.

“Let’s be friends!”

Yuffa looked baffled by Shin’s exaggerated reaction.

Not aware of his actions, he is disrespecting an older person.

He is not aware either of the beauty Yuffa possesses. She had this aura like a 20+ years old office lady back in Japan. She is a few inches taller than Shin. Her sky blue hair had given emphasis to her fair white skin. Her complexion was a little pale but even though her lips were dry, a trace of pink is still visible. Below her right eye is a black dot. It was small yet it raised her charms by threefold. What also gave her another factor that men will find attractive was her large breast probably between C & D cup. She and the little girl only wore clothes that were probably made from a worn-out rag messily sewn which made them look untidy.

“U-uh sure?” Yuffa agreed vaguely.

“Oh right. You haven’t introduced yourself. You are?” He then separated from her.

Yuffa realizes her mistake. She then pulled the little girl gently beside her and together they bowed apologetically.

“I-im very sorry for the late introduction. I-im Yuffa Strauss and this is Tanya Facururi. Thank you for saving us”

Shin felt weird having an older girl to apologize to him sincerely. But he couldn’t care more.

“Nice to meet you Onii-chan!” Said Tanya.

Shin nodded and introduced himself again.

“Nice to meet you Strauss-san and you too Tanya-chan. I’m Taiyoun Shin.”

“You can call me Yuffa if you like.”

..

Wait..

“You have different last names? A while ago Tanya-chan called you Onee-chan instead of Okaa-san. What is your relationship with her?”

“Oh. We’re not blood-related. She was our neighbor back in our place but I took care of this child ever since her family died years ago.”

What a heavy topic right on the bat. Thought shin in his mind.

“Do you mind if I ask what happened?”

“It’s okay I guess? Her parents were both adventurer which is practically the job mostly everyone have in common—“

“Wait.. an adventurer? You mean the adventurer that goes on a mission or a quest and get rewarded for it at the same time raise levels? Not that tourist-like adventurer?”

Not comprehending what Shin was making sure of so Yuffa only nodded vaguely and answered.

“Uh.. yes? Is something the matter?”

“Eh? Oh. Nothing nothing. Just wanted to make sure. Anyways, and then what happened to them?”

“? Okay. Um one day they accepted a fairly easy grade C quest to obtain an item from a group of goblins somewhere in the thick forest located on the mountainside in our place. It was an easy task but as they got deeper and deeper into the forest…. they encountered a B+ class Goblin boss”

“A monster boss, huh?” asked Shin rhetorically.

Knowing what the topic was, Tanya closed her eyes and covered her ears.

Shin looked at Tanya and then to Yuffa in turn with a face like saying is it okay? Yuffa nodded slowly in response.

“Yes. Goblins are low level monster but their sheer numbers could easily defeat mid-level players. Their number even doubled if the boss is present. Her parents killed numbers of them but they just keeps on coming that it wore them down…. And probably you know the rest.”

“Yeah. So when was this happened?”

“6 years ago when she was still a baby. She was too young to remember the faces of her parents so accepting the fact wasn’t as hard as I imagined the time I told her about this.

“You ended up being Onee-san or more like her mother to her” said Shin jokingly.

Yuffa looks at Tanya and smiled gently.

“Perhaps so”

Shin too lets out an involuntary smile.

He then remembered what his initial plans is, he asked Yuffa.

“Yuffa-san, do you know where is nearest city here?”

“Are you a traveler Shin-san?”

Yeah from Japan. Like he can tell her that.

“You could say so. So do you know where it is?”

“Yeah. Just follow the road from here. This is connected to Saint Eli city directly.”

“Oh. How convenient. Thank you. So, let’s go?”

Shin started to walk where Yuffa pointed to, but noticed that Yuffa and Tanya weren’t moving.

“What’s wrong?” asked shin.

“Ehh.. uhh.. We don’t have a reason to go there, we don’t have house either. And in case you haven’t noticed, we are slaves.”

“You both slaves?”

Yuffa nodded shyly. “We are. In fact just recently”

Shin finally realizes. He had been oblivious about the way Yuffa and Tanya were wearing. He isn’t someone to judge people base on their appearance except those with obvious looking like those three idiots he just killed a while ago.

He only noticed just now they were wearing only a piece of cloth that exposes their shoulders and thighs.

“Where do you plan to stay?” Shin asked in a worried manner.

“Honestly.. I don’t know. Maybe Tanya and I will sleep in the abandoned carriage near here. “

*Brrrrrrrrr…..* Tanya’s stomache growled.

“Yuffa onee-chan…. I’m hungryyy..”

“Eh? .. d-don’t worry Tanya. We will look for edible fruits around here somewhere. Okay?”

Yuffa comforts Tanya like a mother. But she still cannot hide her worry over. It’s all written on her face.

Seeing Tanya holding her stomach, he then called out to them.

“How about you come with me in the city?”

“Eh? we can’t possibly be of any burden anymore to you Shin-san. You already saved us that we are thankful for it. Besides, the fee for entering the holy city is 4silvers. I don’t know about you but we don’t even have a single cooper.”

4 silvers? I’m not sure it’s cheap or expensive. Let’s see .

 Shin swipes the empty air to summon his status. The section he was looking for was his inventory. He look it up and found a fairly amount in it. The exact number he found was 889,016gold(s), 89silver(s), 17copper(s).

Hoho~

This number was his exact gold earnings from his last game. Peter included it huh? Said Shin thought happily.

I don’t know if I am rich or not but having only to pay 12 silvers for the three of is very cheap. Maybe I can even buy a place of my own with only this amount of money.

He then decided.

“It’s fine. It’s only 4 silvers for each of us anyway.”

“No. I appreciate it very much but we can’t afford to burden you any longer. Thank you for the offer Shin-san”

*Brrrrrr…….” Tanya’s stomach growls again.

Yuffa then picked up Tanya and bowed to Shin attempting to leave.

“Sigh.. Wait!” Shin called them before they go.

“What is it Shin-san?”

“Leaving you guys to yourselves burdens me even more.”

“Eh? What do you mean?”

“I just can’t leave you out here. It’s very dangerous for you to wander around. I’ve just rescued you and I don’t want to see you two die somewhere I don’t know.”

“but… “ Yuffa looks at Tanya who started yawning probably tired from the whole day and the event not too long from now.

She wasn’t sure what to do.

One problem of being an adult is, they think too much. Quoted Shin in his mind. Him leaving these two girls on their own doesn’t sit well with Shin.

“At least for Tanya’s sake.. please?”

He never persuaded to someone before except for his parents to buy him something. This time is different. He may not have a shred of conscience to those he killed but even though he just met these two girls, he really feels he just can’t leave them.

He is thinking how to persuade Yuffa without having her to feel guilt.

“How about this, I will hire you as my servants not as a slave. It made me sound like a bad person which I already am. Anyways, I still don’t know the place around and how this worl- place works so I need some company to guide me. I will pay you accordingly. How about it?”

Shin was about to say “world” but Yuffa might ask him what did he mean by that. He can’t reveal that he wasn’t from this world. They might think he was crazy.

Yuffa was still hesitating whether to accept or decline his offers but Tanya broke her out of her uncertainties with a rather enthusiastic voice.

“Yuffa onee-chan! Work! Work! We can finally work! We can finally earn money to buy food and not fruits and leaves only!”

The contents of Tanya’s words made Yuffa smiled shyly to Shin. She noticed Shin almost laughed that it caused her even more embarrassed.

Seeing her acting like that made Shin feel that she wasn’t a proper adult. She looked young and radiant even at the age of 25.

Finally she agreed while asking Shin,

“Are you a son of a noble that I didn’t know about?”

He only smiled at her and said,

“Who knows?”

Yuffa had a confused face.

“So, let’s go?”

As Shin started to walk, Tanya started running towards him like she just had an energy boost or something and hugged him from behind.

“Brrrrrr….” It growled again that It brought Shin into laughter.

“Tanya-chan, if we arrive at the city, what do you want to eat?”

“Meat skewers!” She answered almost immediately.

“Yoshh! We’ll buy a hundreds of them just for you Tanya-chan”

“Yayyy!”

“T-tanya! Don’t act spoiled towards Shin-sama!”

Behind their backs, Yuffa was panicking. At some point she started calling him Shin-sama.

Before the veil of the night completely covered the thick forest, Shin,Yuffa and Tanya safely made it out to Saint Eli City.