“You’re after my sword?” Fran asked.
“Yes! How could a little Black Cat girl be so strong? By wielding that sword, that’s how! Once I have it, I can get out of here… My master will forgive me…if only I have that sword!”
Fran didn’t respond. As angry as she was, she couldn’t help but feel pity.
“Now…give that sword to me!”
Poor thing didn’t realize that yelling wasn’t going to help.
Wait, hang on. Fran?
Hm? What’s up?
Hand me over to her.
What?
I wanted to test something. Having heard my explanation, Fran agreed.
“This sword is cursed. Anyone unworthy will be killed upon equipping it. Are you sure you still want it?”
“Aha ha ha! What foolish lies! You should’ve come up with a better story if you were going to lie. If you don’t want to give me your sword, just say so!”
Fran had no reason to lie to someone she could finish off with her bare hands. Unfortunately, the woman’s madness meant she didn’t realize that. Fran handed me over, almost with a look of pity.
“All right. It’s yours.”
“You should’ve done that from the start! Come on! Give it here!”
Fran tossed me to the woman, sheath and all. She greedily picked me up.
“Heh heh heh heh. Now I can be strong too…”
I felt her try to take me, and something stirred inside of me. Something I hadn’t felt in a while.
“Aah…whaaaah…”
Immediately, the woman started groaning. Her eyes widened with fear, but I could only guess at what she saw.
“Hyaaaaaa…”
Her entire body convulsed as her groans turned to screaming. Her screams of agony bore notes of shock and pain, dreadful enough to traumatize anyone who heard them.
“Aaaaaaah—!”
With me still in hand, she let out a terrifying wail that sent shivers down the spines of passersby. They were granted a scene of terrible horror. They must’ve heard Fran’s warning, and assumed the curse was expressing its true nature. Civilian and adventurer alike looked upon the woman with pale faces. How many seconds had gone by?
“I-I’m sorry! Forgive—eeyyaah!”
Those were the woman’s last words before blood exploded out of her eyes, ears, and mouth. She keeled over on the street.
Thud.
“…”
The ensuing silence was deafening.
“Hm. Not worthy.”
Fran walked over to the woman’s corpse, cleaned my hilt, and picked me up. The consequent murmuring was so loud the crowd might as well have been shouting. I couldn’t blame them. A woman had just died a horrifying death in front of them. The gods were ruthless in dealing out their punishment. A thunderbolt for the ignorant and death for those who knew the nature of my curse. What did the gods show her in the last moments of her life? What did they do? I was plagued with a nasty aftertaste, although I hadn’t directly caused her death.
Which reminds me… Where are the other mages?
I’d totally forgotten about them. I looked around and saw that Phelms had apprehended them. The men looked shameful as he tied them up with his threads.
“Well, what shall we do with them?”
“What do you think?”
“I suggest handing them over to the Adventurers’ Guild.”
“Yeah?”
“Yes. They are still an organization. The guild will not hold anything back to support a strong adventurer like yourself.”
I guess we should, if Phelms said so. I was going to drag the mages to their own guild and show them what would happen to them if they crossed us, but that would take too much time.
“Shall I take them to the guild for you?”
“Sure. Thanks.”
“Very well. If you’ll excuse me.”
Phelms took the hired mages away, with Glackmar complaining all the while.
“Oh, wait a second.” Fran stopped Phelms before he could get very far.
“Was there anything else?” he asked.
“Hm. They just need one more lesson.”
The pathetic mages were finally taken away after Fran administered a punch to the solar plexus to each of them. We felt a little bad for asking for Dias’ and Elza’s help again, but upon hearing the story, they were ecstatic.
“Now we can finally get rid of those scummy mages for good! I’ll show them what happens when you pick a fight with the Adventurers’ Guild!”
Dias jumped with joy as one of his subordinates took the rogue mages away. Fran bowed her head to Phelms.
“Thanks, Phelms.”
“Not a problem. I had a similar experience in the past.”
“A mage guild tried to trick you into joining them?”
“No, just the unpleasant things that fame can bring.”
Phelms had won the fighting tournament when he was younger, and he was just as popular as Fran was now. Mage and mercenary guilds came to recruit him, not to mention the nobility and mafia. He had more than his fair share of coercions, and some organizations even compelled him to join through physical force.
“I couldn’t just stand there and do nothing.”
“How’d you deal with it?”
“I ran, for the most part. I wandered through the country so I wouldn’t be roped into any commitments.”
That might be the best way of handling it. Tracking Phelms down would’ve been difficult.
“But Dias was the one who saved me in the end.”
“Dias?”
“Yes. We were about the same age, and we got along well. He was already a Guildmaster, so he took me on as one of his advisors. It prevented other organizations from recruiting me.”
Even a clueless noble wouldn’t dare poach a Guildmaster’s confidante. At the very least, Phelms no longer had to dodge invitations by himself.
“You are definitely going to attract more unwanted attention, and some of these people might prove dangerous. You can demolish any criminal organization that messes with you, but doing so to a noble will only cause unrest.” Phelms pursed his lips.
“Speaking from experience?” Fran asked.
“Ha ha ha. You guessed it. An aristocrat from another kingdom pursued me once, and they were quite persistent about it.”
“Just because you refused to pledge allegiance to them?”
That sounded like an overreaction.
“Well, they were very arrogant and ill-mannered. Really, there were only fifty of them, including the lord of the house…”
“Did you kill them?” Fran asked, her eyes alert with expectation.
“Oh, no. I just sent them to the hospital.”
“Aww.”
“The
