The sound of rustling echoes through the woods. A monkey with black fur and long fangs flees through the trees.

“Don’t let it get away! Nel, Chaos!”

Having received Havoc’s orders, I finally start casting. However, with my confusion, Cornelia is faster than me. She shoots, and her arrow pierces the monkey’s hand with accuracy. The monkey screams as its hand slips and it falls from the tree.

I can’t see the monkey since it’s hiding in the trees, but a little while after the sound of the crash, I grimace as I hear a high-pitched shriek.

“Nice work,” Liam says, returning with a blood-stained sword. He immediately started running after the monkey when it started running away after its ally was killed, so I guess he finished it off. Now, we’ve defeated all the enemies in the area.

“So there are monsters in this region as well,” Emilia says.

“That’s because there are no full-time adventurers in the area,” Cornelia says. “The residents of the village are the only ones who can kill the monsters. But they also have normal lives, so they can’t spend all their time fighting monsters, and it’s dangerous. Fur and such isn’t profitable enough that people can make a living through that alone. But if they aren’t dealt with, they’ll damage the crops.”

“I guess stuff like that’s the same no matter where you go,” Liam says.

The monsters we defeated were small fry. They’re so weak that at my level, I could defeat them singlehandedly even if they had me surrounded. Even so, from the locals’ perspective, they’re pests that threaten people’s livelihoods and are dangerous to fight.

“So it really helps that everyone’s lending a hand in keeping their numbers down,” Cornelia says.

“We’re getting delicious food in return, so of course I will!” Liam says.

“As they say, those who don’t work won’t eat,” Emilia adds.

The reason we’re fighting monsters in the forest is to repay the kindness we received from the villagers. Ever since we arrived in Cornelia’s hometown, we’ve been staying in a vacant house in the village instead of her family’s house. When the villagers heard that we were guests that Cornelia brought, they gave us a warm welcome. Havoc suggested that we hunt the monsters in the area to return the favor, and everyone else agreed.

But I’ve been useless. Most of the monsters were defeated by Havoc and the others, and the most I could offer was support. And all the spells I’ve been using are spells like Chain Bind that prevent the enemies from moving instead of spells that attack the enemy directly.

In the game, when a party member defeats a monster, the experience points are distributed to all party members. So even if you don’t play an active role in the party, you can gain experience without attacking or taking a single step in extreme cases.

Even in this world, that rule still applies. If the others defeat a monster, I’ll also receive experience points. Even if I haven’t attacked the monster even once. In the game, people who receive rewards like experience points without contributing in combat are hated and called parasites, but that’s basically what I am now. No, if anything, I’m worse, since it’s a job where their lives are on the line.

But no matter the situation, I can’t defeat enemies. Havoc and the others are the ones actually getting their hands dirty. I’m just forcing other people to do the dirty work.

Back in Clermont, my plan was to use those same spells to stop any Weichsel soldiers I encountered. But that was in the middle of a war. A soldier who can’t move is just a sitting duck. If I encountered a Weichsel soldier, any Commune soldiers who were nearby probably would have finished off a Weichsel soldier who was rendered defenseless.

I’m realizing just how careless I was. Back then, there was so much going on in my head that I couldn’t see the whole picture. If even one thing had gone wrong, I probably wouldn’t be here right now.

I should stop, thinking about this is just going to give me nothing but negative thoughts. I need to take my mind off of this.

“Where did my s****y old man wander off to?” Cornelia curses in clear displeasure as we’re on our way back to the village.Apparently, her father, who is the groom of the wedding, left the village to travel. I don’t see why he would need to travel right before the wedding, but it seems like they planned it to occur in time for Cornelia to return. It was uncertain when Cornelia would arrive, so all I can say is that our timing was bad.

“Your dad is the chief, right? Is it really okay for him to abandon the village like this?”

“There are also the elders, and there’s nothing going on that requires the chief’s presence, so it won’t cause any problems for the village. Also, he’s been doing this for a long time, so we’re used to him leaving the village like this.”

“It kind of sounds like your dad just does whatever he wants,” Havoc says in amazement.

“I know, right?!” Cornelia agrees. “Seriously, that guy is just out of control! And just when I think he’s wandering aimlessly like usual, he somehow finds himself a woman! He even brings total strangers back to the village sometimes! I wouldn’t be surprised if I had brothers or sisters out there that I don’t know about! Do you have any idea how terrified I am every time I see a kid with the same hair color or facial features as my s****y old man?!”

By how she describes him, he’s a stereotypical bad dad with a cheating habit.

“Changing the subject, if a baby is born between a human and an elf, would it have long ears like an elf?” I say, asking a question I’ve been wondering about. Though, I’m also asking to try to shift the conversation away from her dad a bit.

“Being born from a human and an elf doesn’t necessarily mean they’ll have long ears,” Cornelia says. “Until they’re born, there’s no telling whether their physical characteristics will more closely resemble that of a human or an elf, so it’s hard to tell if someone’s a half-elf or not. Apparently, there are some who don’t even know they’re half-elves and think they’re humans. Though, their life expectancy is typically longer than humans’.”

“Then, there must be a lot of half-elves.”

“That’s right. There also are some who moved to this village. Though, most of the old people here are pure elves. In the past, humans and elves were discouraged from intermingling. But the children have done no wrong simply by being born. A guy who has an indeterminate amount of lovers and puts his hands on a young girl who his daughter loves like a sister would be a bigger problem.”

Ah, I poked a hornet’s nest.

“You understand, right, Liam? I can’t believe that my little sister who I love so dearly is getting married to that no-good womanizer. And he’s known her since she was little.”

“Yeah, that’s just unforgivable.”

Liam, who has a little sister of his own, is completely on Cornelia’s side. Well, from what I’ve heard of her dad, there’s no room for sympathy there.

No matter how I look at it, even though those two probably won’t go out of control during the ceremony, the atmosphere will be so tense that I’ll feel it in my stomach. Now I know why it was Havoc, not Cornelia, who first invited me to the village. I look at Havoc with a slight glare, and he quietly whistles, feigning innocence. That b*****d.

“He’s the man your sister chose. You should give her your blessing,” Emilia says. Just as you’d expect of the party’s healer, she’s trying to calm their anger. She’s way more dependable than Havoc, who is quickly falling in the rankings.

“But even if he’s settled down, I’m worried he’ll fall back into his cheating habit,” Cornelia says. Although she’s somewhat accepted the marriage, apparently, she still has some concerns.

Emilia thinks for a moment and says, “Hmm, you’re right. If he makes her cry, then…”

“Then?”

“I’ll pulverize him.”

Automatically, my gaze falls to the mace she always uses. I don’t want to ask what exactly Emilia is planning to pulverize and how. When I look up at Havoc and Liam, they’re wincing. I’m sure I’m making the same expression.

Suddenly, a strong wind blows. We all look up at the sky.“Hm? That’s…”

I can see a small black dot through the trees.

“A dragon?”

“Yes. It’s much bigger than a normal dragon. They wouldn’t send a dragon all the way out here for a dragon flight. It’s probably a wild dragon,” Cornelia says.

I can’t tell if it’s a dragon or not, but something pretty huge is flying this way. I check it on the map, and there’s a huge green marker on it.

Normally, when there’s a green marker on the map, it means they’re friendly and non-hostile, like an NPC or a player. If it was a normal monster, it would show a red marker.

Then, does that mean this dragon is friendly? Of course, there are also friendly entities like Elizabeth, who was a ghost.

I can’t just declare that this dragon is actually a friendly monster. Besides the fact that it’d be tough to explain how I know that it’s friendly, there’s no guarantee that something the map recognizes as friendly isn’t going to attack.

Like the war that recently occurred in Clermont with humans fighting each other. Even though Weichsel and Commune were scattered all over and engaged in combat, Alexia and the other Weichsel soldiers were identified as friendly and displayed green on the map. Of course, Commune soldiers were also shown as green on the map, so it was difficult to tell who was an ally or not.

In other words, the criteria for who is identified as friendly on the map is very ambiguous. If the only criteria is their attitude towards me specifically, then there’s no guarantee that it won’t be hostile towards Havoc and the others, so I can’t say for certain that it’s safe.

“Isn’t that dragon coming this way?” Liam asks with his voice trembling, and everyone turns pale. Just as he says, the black dot which was blurry before is becoming much clearer, and the green marker that seems to be the dragon is getting closer.

Dragons as a species are pretty strong monsters. In the game, there are different levels of dragons, but if it’s a high-ranking dragon, it’s strong enough that at my current level, I would be killed instantly. If I upgraded to a Rank 2 class, that’d be one thing, but even if I fight with Havoc and the others who are only around the same level as me, we don’t stand a chance.

“R- run!” Havoc shouts, and we run as fast as our legs can carry us.

…But it’s too late.

On the map, the green marker is rapidly closing in on us at a speed faster than any human is capable of. With conviction, I look up at the sky. There’s no doubt about it, it’s the dragon I saw.

“It’s here, it’s here, it’s heeere! We gotta run!” Liam shouts.

“We can’t run back to the village! It’ll attack the villagers too!” Cornelia says.

“Then where do you suggest we run to?!” Emilia says.

Maybe this is the sort of animal strength you get in a crisis, because we’re running faster than we should be able to. Though, it’s not exactly reassuring. A flying dragon is overwhelmingly faster than a human.

This is bad. I hurriedly try to change directions, but I hear a creaking sound as trees are knocked over. The sight of its enormous body crashing through as if prying open a hole in the forest can only be described as stunning.

The black dragon stands on four legs as it looks down with us with its bright red eyes. Then, it spreads its wings toward the sky and lets out a majestic roar. Its booming roar is loud enough to shake the trees around us. There’s nothing we can do except fall on our backsides.

“Oh, pardon me. Do you all live around here?”

Just when we thought the dragon was going to rampage, we suddenly hear an unfamiliar voice speak to us. It’s a woman’s high-pitched voice. And not Cornelia’s or Emilia’s, either. I look around in confusion, but there are no other women present.

The threatening dragon lowers its wings and its head.

“Ah, I apologize for startling you. It is I, the dragon you see before you,” the dragon says, bowing its head in apology.