Chapter 687

Chapter 687

TENKEN 687 What it Mean to be an Adventurer

「She wants to be an adventurer...? How can someone with that level of ability become an adventurer? Moreover, isn't she still too young for it?」

「I-I will become one! Besides, everyone is a beginner at first!」

Katley heard Sibylla's muttering and retorted. It seems that she felt ridiculed by her saying that there was no way someone like her could be an adventurer.

However, I don't think that Sibylla's murmur had anything about ridiculing her. I think she was simply expressing her doubts about whether there were any restrictions based on ability or age.

「Will the guild approve though?」

「? They will. Adventurers are the very definition of freedom. Everyone is free to become one or quit at any time」

Well, some guild masters, like Klimut, would try to keep the kids from registering as authorized adventurers and train them as apprentices though.

It sure brings back the memories of our test with Donadrond. But that was a very special case.

「Hee―? But, for example, the kid there, if she becomes an adventurer, will she be useful? How can she protect people or kill magic beasts if the most she can do is collecting herbs?」

「Ugh...」

Katley groaned. But I guess she can't say anything back because it was a fact. Though she did not mean to defend Katley, Fran spoke back in her place.

「But what's wrong with that?」

「We don't need such a useless adventurer, do we?」

Sibylla speaks harshly but doesn't seem to have any ill intentions. But Fran retorts further.

「?? I don't get it. It's not whether we need an adventurer or not. It's whether or not someone wants to be an adventurer. It's not about other people」

「Are you okay with that? With all that strength, you don't think anything of it when you see weak adventurers? Don't you think they're a hindrance?」

「Not really. After all, people are people. Didn't you just say that we don't need useless adventurers?」

「Yeah」

「But I don't understand what you mean by that. Being an adventurer isn't really about helping people」

「Hah? What's their job then?」

「To go on an adventure. That's why we're called adventurers」

Fran seemed a little irritated, it seemed that she didn't like Sibylla's remarks.

The way Sibylla says "adventurers are supposed to help people," "If an adventurer is not useful, they're not needed," must be what makes Fran feel like that.

Sibylla herself may not be aware of it, but she is talking about adventurers as if she's superior to them. I guess you could say that she unconsciously looks down on adventurers.

Fran doesn't like it. To most people, an adventurer is a lowly, bottom-tier job, but to Fran, it's a career she's always dreamed of.

「Being an adventure as a job... Is such a job even necessary?」

「Like I said before. Whether we're useful to the kind of you or not is irrelevant. Adventurers are free. We just do what we want to do」

She's using "omae" to call her just now!! It seems that she is getting even more irritated. Little by little, her words began to show how irritated she is.

(TLN: Omae, お前, considered as a disrespectful/rude pronoun to call someone)

「So you're saying, you won't fight to protect the people?」

「Adventurers are free. Those who want to fight for others will fight. Otherwise, they won't」

「Even though they had the power to do so?」

「Nn. Adventurers might take it on as a job. But being an adventurer is not about helping people」

Well, even though she says this, if there is someone in danger in front of her, she will probably go in and help them somehow.

But I guess that's just Fran's idea of the ideal adventurer. A hard worker, an individualist, a person who is free to make decisions based on preference rather than on whether something is right or wrong. A free and unbounded people.

Because of her race and the time she spent as a slave, Fran does not like to be bound or ordered around by others. Freedom is, in a sense, the most important thing for Fran, and it is the very thing she cannot allow to be violated.

And the image of the adventurer that Fran describes is the embodiment of that freedom.

On the other hand, despite her unreliable demeanor, Sibylla seems to take it for granted that we should stand in front of the weak and help them... Or rather, she must think that it's the duty of the strong. I think this is quite a rare way of thinking in this world.

But that is why she cannot readily understand Fran's points. And likewise, Fran cannot readily understand Sibylla's point either. Their principles are too different from each other.

As the two continued their arguments, I remembered that we had talked about this same thing in the past somewhere.

On our way from the Kingdom of Kranzel to the Kingdom of Belios. We met a girl named Dianne, a self-proclaimed knight who served as Khanna's squire and escort.

The two reacted as if they had never seen an adventurer before, and spoke with a surprisingly distorted impression of adventurers.

「So you're saying that you adventurers wield power only for your personal interests?」

「Yes」

Fran nodded casually at Sibylla's words.

Well, to put it bluntly, that's what happens most of the time. Not all adventurers are good person after all.

However, some of these interests are useful to others. Some of them, like Amanda, are working hard for her interest――or rather, her goal to help children in need.

But to begin with, I think it's rather difficult to think of adventurers as a whole.

Adventurers, like Fran and Amanda, are all people with their own ideas and ambitions. Ten people, ten colors. There are as many goals, desires, and opinions as there are adventurers, and it's hard to describe them with just one word.

(TLN: Ten peoples, ten colors, 十人十色, everyone has their own interests and ideas)

Even the words "an adventurer's job is to go on an adventure" that Fran said are just Fran's ideal of an adventurer.

「Putting one's own desires over helping those in need... Is that what adventurers are all about?」

「Yes」

Fran's presence changed at Sibylla's words. A slight hint of hostility begins to mix with her anger.

This isn't good. If Fran and Sibylla were to fight here, the damage to the surrounding area would be enormous. A hint of killing intent has already begun swirling between them.

But it was the flushed, trembling Katley who broke the ice. It wasn't that she wasn't feeling fear. But her anger seemed to outweigh her fear.

「Why are you...! Arbitrarily asking such questions! Arbitrarily pushing your ideal! Can you not arbitrarily crush my dream!? Who are you!? Where did you even come from!?」

「Eh? No, I...」

「You can't answer that?」

「Aah― well... It's not like we were hiding our identity or anything...」

「You can't even tell your identity? How suspicious. Who in the world are you!?」

「S-suspicious? W-well you see...」

「Isn't that right!? You went into a dungeon but doesn't even know the adventurers' code! Such a weird person is nothing short of suspicious!」

「...A-ah, well...」

It's a breach of the adventurers' code to ask someone's identity out of the blue, but Sibylla doesn't seem to know that. She flinched at Katley's angry look.

Look who's just like the big sister now, so she can be like this too, huh.

「Besides, Fran-oneesama has saved many people! In the Beastman Country, she once fought for three days and three nights alone against a pack of more than 100,000 magic beasts to help her fellow Black Cat people to escape!」

Huh? Isn't that story getting a little exaggerated?

「When there was a dungeon stampede near Alessa, she single-handedly took on the dungeon boss to save the other fledgling adventurers, and successfully saved the lives of many adventurers!」

Our fight against the demon somehow has become such a moving tale!?

Katley then continued her splendidly exaggerated story about Fran's deed.

It seems that the story gets even more exaggerated from each pass. As a result, the image of Fran that was imprinted on Katley's mind was that she's a strong, kind-hearted, solo black cat adventurer.

「And there's still more to come from Fran-oneesama!」