Not even 3 days had passed after that bandit incident when a group of more than 50 people came again into this remote village. That leader of the bandits that I drove out earlier also appeared. Looks like they are bringing their entire group to this village now. Is revenge that important for them?

“Where is that brown haired girl!?” The leader screamed while kicking the villagers away.

“Umm. I am here.” I said to the leader.

Then said bandits surrounded me from all directions, forming a circle. Opening a notification I saw that I got a 10% buff, I did not use any skills so this must be from the audience skill. So there must be around 100 people watching me. Since the number of bandits had increased, that means the number of villagers had decreased. Now where are the rest of them?

“So you are brave enough to come huh?”

“Umm, where are the rest of the villagers?”

“Just inside their puny houses. Now I have nothing against this puny village but since this village has rebelled against us, it is a must for us to discipline them.” The leader gave laughed while announcing that.

“Are you sure that bringing 30 more people will take us down?” El said with a relaxed tone. She didn’t seem to be afraid at all.

“So there are more of you? Hey, I heard this village only has one protector!” He screamed at his underlings.

“Umm, boss. S-s-she is the only protector. Other than that she only has a moderate lightning mage fairy and a green haired woman as pets. S-s-s-since all of them are pets I just said this village only has one person guarding it.” The henchman said with a stuttering voice out of fear of his boss.

“Ahh. I see. I wanted to avoid a bloodbath if I could. Hahahha. So here is the deal. If you can defeat my underling here I will not disturb this village any longer. Marissa!”

A pink haired woman came in. She brought twin swords with her.

“Umm so you are this group’s leader?”

“I am no leader. I am just a mercenary. Now I will kill you. Draw your sword.”

“Umm. I don’t want to fight. I just want to stay in this village in peace.”

“Then kill us.”

It is not helping. She can’t be persuaded. I then drew my weapon slowly from my waist. With a half- hearted stance it marked the beginning of the battle.

With lightning speed she charged at me while slashing her left sword vertically. I blocked the attack but quickly lost my balance and fell. She then stopped while drawing her second blade waiting for me to get up again. Her stance, technique and skills are in a different league from the leader of the bandits himself. She might even be stronger than me in sword skills if not levels as expected of a pure fighting class.

Now Riri needed to fight seriously. She was no longer relaxed as she watched her opponent’s swords. Stella and El were watching their battle as they also needed to keep their strength just in case. Stella had no intention of battling from the start and by changing to wolf form, she might increase the villagers’ hostility against her so it is best if she does not participate.

After a series of strokes, the two sides took some distance and waited for the perfect moment. They charged nearly at the same time while slashing their swords. Riri could parry Marissa’s dominant left hand well but her right hand was no worse than her left one. She could only rely on her multitask skill to dodge the attack. Her acrobatics that she rarely used recently also began to kick in which made Riri’s movement faster than Marissa’s. But her sword skills were lacking thus she was continuously pushed back.

But Riri had her own advantage over Marissa swords. She had the buff from the audience and light bless and single bless buff. She was also able to cast fireballs when she was in a tight pinch so the battle was at a stalemate. Riri and Marissa’s HP continued to decrease. While Riri’s HP dropped faster, she could heal with her spells while Marissa could only rely on her health regen which didn’t do much. Slowly but surely after numerous exchanges of swift blows that commoners’ eyes could hardly follow, Marissa’s HP bar continued to become yellow.

“Tch!” She spat as she pulled back from her onslaught.

“Hey, you said you are the best the guild could offer. But you seem to be losing here. Where is that skill you are so proud off, bitch!” The bandit leader who was watching from the beginning complained to Marissa. Now after seeing this scene I didn’t feel like fighting her anymore. She is clearly a sellsword who has no relation with the bandits.

“Umm. Are you a foreigner or a native?”

“It does not matter.” She shrugged. “I don’t need your pity.”

She started her slashes again with greater speed but she was reckless at the same time. No, it was not reckless. She was getting serious. Her slashes were getting more dangerous. Even if she had more gaps than before, her damage output is higher now.

“As expected of a killing art specialist. Her sword skill is no joke!” The bandit leader exclaimed in admiration now. “Not only does she have the looks but her skill is outstanding. She is worth every penny we gave her.”

All of the bandits laughed as I was getting pushed back. My healing skill and phoenix regen can’t keep up with her damage and my attack power can only scratch her. This is bad.

“If only you had a better weapon. You might have won. It is too bad but I will kill you now!” She said as my HP was nearing the red zone at 23%. “Crimson death strike!”

Her image then split into 3 with each of them performing a different slash. One of her images performed a diagonal slash while at the same time the other images performed a diagonal slash from my back while the last one performed a horizontal slash from my side.

With haste, I dodged the first strike while at the same time putting my sword at my back to block another strike. My sword was quickly deflected as my balance was thrown off. Even with my multitask skill which watched every shadow with precision, I still couldn’t dodge the last strike as my footing was lost due to the impact from second strike. She is not just fast but this strike has some serious power behind it!

You have received 700 damage!

I fell as blood gushed from my right. My sword was deflected and thrown quite far from my position. This is bad. I am going to die now. i was lucky to even have 2% HP now

“Stop now!” Stella stood in front of me with Elkami on her shoulder.

“Hey. If you only obey us. We will gladly leave you alone. But you chose to oppose us so we have to kill you.” The gang leader blurted out while laughing. “Clean them up Marissa.”

The mercenary could only stare in doubt. The intense pressure of Stella’s fighting spirit send shivers to everyone. Fighting spirit is a rough measure of someone’s strength so it is no wonder that they were all in doubt. Stella who looked like a fragile girl but possesses a ridiculously high fighting spirit send Marissa and the others into confusion.

First thought that came to their mind was that she is actually strong, but currently she holds no weapons nor equipment so her fighting spirit might not reflect her current strength. Second is she is actually weak and her fighting spirit is a bluff. Though rare, there are persons and monsters with this attribute. No matter how they thought, in their mind Stella was only bluffing. But their instincts told otherwise which confused them.

“What are you waiting for. Kill her, Marissa.” The bandit leader finally issued a command.

“..... the contract says that I only have to kill 1 person. Why should I kill these two?” She said after pondering for a while.

“They are her pets. killing the master and the pets are included in the contract.” Some unknown guy came up and explained the situation to Marissa.

“...please stop. Or we will kill all of you.” Stella threatened them.

“There are no pets that are stronger than their masters. I was wondering why you didn’t help her when she was battling with me. But right now your chance of winning is zero.” Marissa blurted out.

Just as she was about to attack, Stella turned into her wolf form and charged at her. With a straight headbutt Marissa was thrown far away and crashed into some houses in the back. With Stella’s Devil glare Marissa had zero chance of dodging that headbutt.

“Guh!” She stood up again with a darkened face. The moment Stella touched her the venom kicked in. While her HP still stood above red level after that hit she seemed uneasy.

“Everyone. Kill them!” The Tartarus leader started to shout. Everyone brandished their weapons.

What happened later was not a battle but a slaughter. El struck with her thunderbolts while Stella continuously ran around, charging, biting and clawing. With devil glare the enemy remained standing still. (Not literally. They are able to move but with 20% penalty to movement it is easy to target them.)

While Stella’s attack was like a level 80 monster but with her debuffing poisons and fear, she could challenge even a level 120 monster. For El, she is weak in close combat but her magical prowess was a match for even a level 200 wizard, not to mention her special enigma skills. In the field against wolves and rabbits to preserve Riri’s mana she was constantly lowering her power to match that of a lvl 30 wizard. As long as the wolves could be killed with a single hit there was no need to overkill them so she was only known as a mid-level spellcaster pet but she disappointed all of the bandits with her full onslaught. Thunder strike, thunder shower, thunder storm. All of these above level 100 magic were cast one after the other, not to mention her incredibly fast chanting thanks to her spellcaster skills. And so, in summary, the bandit group was slaughtered with Stella continuously distracting the mobs while El picked them off with her spells.

“L-L-Let’s escape!” The leader shouted an order while stuttering.

Just as the bandit group was about to escape a familiar group appeared behind them.

“Hey. What is all of this commotion?” Hasega asked while greeting us from afar. Besides him was his everlasting group of Fira, Dem, and Victor plus Iris.

“Umm. They are bandits.”

“Oh I see.” He smiled “Well, that means they are bad guys right? What a coincidence. We got a request of killing a band of bandits roaming in this forest. Could it possibly be you?” Hasega glared at the bandits.

“No joke. Hey Riri, I thought you were having a quiet village life here. Why are you intercepting our quest? And we thought about giving you your share of money from that cave’s loot.” Victor complained.

“Yeah you ruined our fun. I thought we were going to have some fun at last since they are said to be around lvl 100 with a connection to sellswords. Not to mention they have around 50 members. But they are already half dead now.” Fira complained.

“They came to us first! Why are you complaining to me? Ask them!” I shouted in anger of their ridiculous complaints. “By the way, are they really that tough?”

“Their forte are traps and forest ambushes. So you are lucky to meet them at their terrain disadvantage. But for your levels I think you should not have problems with them even if they have their terrain advantage.” Hasega said with confidence.

“Alright. Let’s tie them up and bring them to Trisia’s prison. It might be disappointing but we have finished our quest.” Iris commanded.

After that the group blew a golden whistle, a magnificent griffin came down from the sky. Stella and El were already prepared to attack but were stopped by Hasega.

“You have a griffin pet?” I unconsciously asked.

With the biggest grin :grin: the group could muster Hasega answered. “Well. It is not technically a pet. We have helped them and they agreed to be our means of transportation. But the contract clearly stated they will not participate in battle.”

“Good bye Riri. Too bad you can’t get one since they are acquired trough unique quest.” Fira said. “I have already phoned you, you know. But you had this ritual. So we are sorry.”

Even though she said sorry, her eyes clearly weren’t. Why do I have this kind of defeated feeling when I saw the group fly away with the prisoners in the griffin’s claws?

“Ahh. Here is the money from the cave’s loot. We are off now. Bye Riri.” Iris also flew after handing 3000 gold coins to me. “We might come again. Let’s travel again sometime.”

After they disappeared into the horizon, Stella came to me.

“Sorry. You couldn’t get a Griffin because of me.” Stella was feeling dejected, she seemed to notice my feelings.

“Don’t worry about it. If it were not for you they would not have gotten the griffin in the first place. Well, it doesn’t matter. So let’s continue protecting this village.”

“Umm. Dear protector. What should we do with the girl here?” The village elder asked.

“Huh? Which one?” As I tried to look around I found the swordswoman beauty that was being tied right now. She appeared very weak. Even when left alone she would kick the bucket in few more minutes due to Stella’s poison.

“Cure poison.” I chanted to heal her.

The next moment was filled with an awkward silence. Her HP was still red as I did not want to heal her only for her to start slashing her swords again. I wanted to ask but her face was filled with unapproachable aura.

“Umm.“

“What? I have failed. Kill me already.”

“We do not want to kill you, but if we release you, will you attack us?” Stella finally stepped in to break the awkward silence between two antisocial persons, me and Marissa.

“If someone else paid for it.” She answered.

“Umm. The bandit leader.”

“Our group has lost. So it was not necessary to follow the loser’s side. It is stated in our guild.”

“Umm. Okay. If she is not going to attack us. Let’s release her.” I answered.

The other villagers then obediently followed my command with a few complaints. It seemed these villagers harboured a lot of hatred towards that bandit guild and their acquaintances

“Thank you.” After being released she left with her red HP still not healed. No one wants to give a potion or healing herbs to someone who was their strongest enemy just a moment ago. So she left as she was. But I doubt some random monster could kill her even if she only has 15% of her HP now.

previouc chapter 28 http://www.royalroadl.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=350&t=3960&p=24952#p24952

http://www.royalroadl.com/forum/viewforum.php?f=350

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Author note:

- manage to slip some chapter in saturday and sunday. don't expect me to do this again for several months later. it is just a lucky stroke of inspiration.

- comments and questions are welcomed