Two sub-dragons, should I go with them?

Yes, right now if you can. We've come a long way from Desibatore and the others, and it's difficult to even gather enough strength quickly enough to fight one of them.

How far is it from here?

The second closest city, Krakenia, is about a day's ride away by horse, and the closest city, Ikarinia, is about three hours away, but the task force is in Krakenia in case it falls, so we'll head there first.

That's close enough.
I'm not in Desibatore, I'm in Akkaden, which is about two days away by horse.
If it is far from Desibatore, then it is probably inland, on the other side of Desibatore from this city.
Since the strength of adventurers generally decreases the further away they are from the realm of demons, the lack of strength seems to be quite serious.
In other words, it is not surprising that there are few adventurers who can be counted as a force against the dragons.

And there are two of them.
If left unchecked, they will probably die, or perhaps the nearest city has already died.
You have no choice but to go.

All right, do you have a map or something?

"No map, but there's almost a straight road between the cities, so you shouldn't get lost, just go through this gate ......

According to the description, as I feared, Krakenia is just on the other side of the Decibatore from here.
The lack of magic swords is tough, but adventurers have dealt with dragons without magic swords before, albeit in large numbers.
If you have a blade staff made of metal lizard metal, which is physically one of the strongest except for magic swords, and magic mobility and defense, you should be able to get by.

Okay, I'll go then, I'll go now.

Besides, I'm tired of reading.
I know I need to do some research now that I've found a sub-dragon that apparently won't appear if I defeat it.
I think I've figured out the language system pretty well now, so let's let the scholars do the rest, shall we?



Then I flew around for an hour or so, being careful not to lose my way.
I had arrived in Krakenia.
The city itself is pretty ordinary.
But there are a lot of people.
It's not an unusual crowd like at a festival, but more like a lot of people squeezed into a city that is supposed to be empty.
As far as I could see from the air, it was not uncommon to see people camping out in the open.
I wondered if they were refugees.

The first place I was told to go was to the Sublong task force of the guild in this city.
This was the first time I'd ever seen a dragon-control headquarters (until now, I'd killed dragons as soon as I encountered them before they were built), but it was different from the huge "○○control headquarters" I'd seen on TV.
In this world where there is not that much information to gather, this may be just right.
All of them are unfamiliar to me, but one of them seems to be the one to talk to me.

"So you're Kaede. I've heard rumors about you.

"Well, yes.

What kind of rumors?

What kind of rumors? I've heard that you can fly at the speed of a sublong, and that you can withstand a sublong's attack, is that true?

I'm not sure if it's true or not. In the event that you've got a lot of money, you'll be able to get a lot more than that.

If you can fly at low altitude without thinking about the damage around you, you can make it faster than the dragons we've seen so far. If you exceed the speed of sound near the surface, the shock wave will be terrible, so you don't want to do it in a city or where there are people.


"Oh, I see. Then we can use one of the strategies I've been preparing.

"Prepared?

Yeah, in case Kaede comes and her abilities are as rumored. To be honest, I thought the probability of using it was low, but I've prepared a number of special strategies. After all, with the strength we have, we have little chance of winning in a proper fight.

That's how bad it is. ......

So, what's the plan?

You don't mean to say that you're going to let me go in alone and take them both out, and then run away when they get dangerous, do you?
I mean, that's already not a strategy.

"Basically, we're going to stand by, and Benov over there will give us detailed instructions, but we're going to stand by and try not to provoke the dragons.

The "other side" is probably Ikarinia.
But I don't understand the meaning of the operation.

"Stand by?　Do I need to do that?

"No, here's the problem. According to the reports we're getting now, we've managed to lead the dragons into the forest, but we don't know when they'll attack again, in fact, we haven't heard from them yet, and it's not surprising that they're already attacking us. It's a great way to make sure you're getting the most out of your money. I'm sure you'll be happy to hear that. ......

I'm not sure what to make of this.

I'm not sure what to make of it. I'll give you six days to do something. By then, reinforcements should be arriving from Desibatore.

I don't want to do a decoy mission.
I don't want to do a bait-and-switch. Well, while the swords may reduce our firepower, the magic gives us much greater mobility.
Even if there are two of them, you can distract them and run into the forest and then shake them off.

Come to think of it, I wonder how adventurers without speed like me would have left the dragons they led into the forest behind.
I don't think it would be easy to lose them.
...... Let's not think about it.

I understand.

"Yes, please. And give this letter to Benov.



The distance was about three hours, but Icarinia was less than ten minutes away at my speed.
This might be the limit for communication, but if we let the Sublime Dragon run amok, Krakenia would not be safe.
Unlike Decibatore, the inhabitants here are not all fast runners, so Ikarinia is practically the last line of defense.
I'm supposed to protect it from two dragons by myself.
What the hell do they think I am?

I gave the letter to Mr. Benov, and he promptly set up a defense system around me.
It sounds good to say that I'm the axis, but it looks like they've almost abandoned their preparations for self-defense, and they're just trying to 'let me know as soon as the dragons come this way'.
It seems that someone is always reporting my whereabouts so that I can be contacted at any time, and the letter probably said that I would take care of most of the problems.
I guess I can't blame them for not finding any adventurers of the same level as the ones in the previous Decibatore.


It's rather a miracle that I was able to guide him.
I myself was bored because I had to stay where I could be reached during that time.

It is stressful to have nothing to do but wait.
So at first, I went to the church, which was like a field hospital, and cast healing spells.
However, all the patients had recovered by the end of the first day, and I had nothing to do.
On the second day, I did some cooking and dismantled some demons in the item box to remember how to use the sword that I hadn't used recently.
I thought that nothing would happen, but on the third day, things started to happen.
At first, I thought I heard a shout from afar, but someone else heard it and shouted the same thing, and it was transmitted to me like a message game.

"Saryong approaching!

The information was minimal, probably to convey the information as quickly and accurately as possible.
But I know what to do.
I immediately cast a spell and take to the air.
The direction seems to be the same as the one where the dragon was before.

I'm off!

How do I cover the adventurers?

I'll be enough to get away!

If you want to use me as a disposable, but if I'm even weaker than the lowest of the Decibatore, it's more dangerous for me to stay.
I'm not going to be able to afford to worry about that when I'm dealing with two sub dragons, so I'm going to ask you to stay back.
While flying, I catch one of the dragons.
It seems that this sub-dragon is the same size as the Ignis Wyvern.

The distance between us is not too great, so we can't afford to take too long.
As soon as I spotted the wyvern, I accelerated to full speed and slashed at it with my blade staff.
But as I thought...
I'm not sure what to make of this.
The wound on the dragon is about three centimeters deep, but this is what you get when you slash it while flying at subsonic speeds.
It is still incomparable to the magic sword.
The wound also heals quickly.

However, I seem to have achieved my original goal of distracting the dragon.
The dragon, recognizing me as an enemy, turns toward me and suddenly spits out a breath.
My position was not prepared for the breath, but the acceleration spell, whose output had been greatly increased by repeated battles with dragons and sub-dragons, easily evaded it.

He also accelerated up to the other one and slashed it in the same way.
This time, I put my hand on the blade as I had done with the magic sword, but it didn't seem to make any difference.
However, the metal lizard metal, which never spills its blade even after being abused so much, is a fantasy metal.

Now that I've accomplished my goal of catching both of them, I accelerate to subsonic speed again and head deeper into the forest.
This forest is not the realm of demons, but it's pretty huge, so if I can lead them deep into it, it'll be easier to do something.
The dragons are chasing after me, and they're shooting their breaths at me.
I move up, down, left, right, and right to avoid them, but even though there are two dragons this time, I feel that the frequency of their breaths is too high.
While I'm busy flying and avoiding them, I take a moment to appraise them, but their MP is probably almost double that of the dragons I've seen so far.
It would be quite difficult to take on two of them with a sword that is significantly less powerful.
However, our goal this time was to buy time, not to defeat them.

I've drawn them deep enough into the forest.
I decided that it would not be a problem to shake them off, and in order to avoid damage to the surrounding area, I opened up the acceleration magic that had been stabilized at subsonic speed.
Assuming that the breath would be prevented by the magic armor, I spared myself the trouble of evading and accelerated.
You can see the shockwave raging on the surface, but you continue to accelerate.

Judging from the speed of the dragons so far, they should not be able to keep up with me at this speed.
Still, I continued to accelerate until I reached the center of the forest, just in case, and then I finally looked back.
--The dragon was still following me.
Was I wrong about the speed of the dragons, or were these guys just extra fast?

If I continue to train to the other side of the forest, damage is inevitable.
I gave up trying to escape, slowed down, and turned toward the dragon.
I was told to buy some time. ......

I'm sure you'll be happy to know that I'm not the only one who has a problem with that.