The Mysterious Child: An Adventure Tale Beginning with Numerology

What do you think is the most important thing for a story?

If you asked ten people that question, you'd probably get ten different answers.

Story, world-building, setting, characters, catharsis... Well, to put it simply, what's sought after is individual preference. That's why readers can decide for themselves whether it's interesting or not.

I'm an omnivore when it comes to stories, so just the existence of a narrative piques my interest. Even if it's called a terrible work, or even if it's a cringeworthy piece written by an elementary school student, I could probably love it just for existing as a story.

I love stories.

I also like the common patterns that appear in stories.

I like them, but...

"This is too much though, right?"

"Yeah, it's too much..."

"Mm. Too much."

"It's too much, nano!"

Our adventurer party [Rozewill], having just departed from the town of Shaboom, immediately encountered a classic story pattern right after leaving town.

The number one classic trouble in otherworld travel stories is, of course, bandits.

Bandits.

Outlaws who forcibly rob merchants and travelers of their valuables. Famous bandit groups sometimes have bounties on their heads, and in some cases, there are rewards just for capturing bandits. If the damage becomes significant, the Adventurers' Guild may issue extermination requests.

By the way, most of the goods plundered by bandits are transferred to those who defeat them, so there are rumors of rough adventurers who target bandits for this reason. For them, bandits are like walking wallets. Honestly, I find that way of thinking questionable... but well, I suppose that's just like free-spirited adventurers. Let's call it individuality.

Anyway, we encountered these bandits... but we're still just minutes away from the gate.

At such a short distance, the gatekeepers can naturally see us.

"Guhehe! Resist if you dare~ (monotone)"

"H-Help! Strong adventurers, please~ (monotone)"

The bald bandit and the woman being attacked keep glancing our way.

Hmm.

There are two things I want to say.

First, we are indeed adventurers, but if you ask if we look strong, we don't look strong at all. The oldest-looking among us is me, a thin 13-year-old boy, followed by two girls (or rather, young children?) who look about 10, and then just a slime, the epitome of weak monsters.

If you think this group looks strong, you should go to an eye doctor without hesitation. Or maybe a psychiatrist.

"Hehehe~ Are you sure~? I'm gonna attack~ (monotone)"

"Ah~ Stop it~! Help me, adventurers~ (monotone)"

And secondly.

These bandits and victims performing worse than amateur actors are clearly in cahoots.

I mean, attempting robbery so close to town is just stupid if it's not a staged act. If the victim seriously reported this, it would be an instant arrest. Even the gate guards are looking this way with exasperated expressions.

Well, their intentions are obvious. If we're fooled and try to help, they both probably plan to stop our movements with hidden weapons.

And what these "bandits" are hiding, I can see everything clearly with my skill.

"Eyes of Fiction" sensei, you're super convenient.

This [Numerology 0: Eyes of Fiction] is a skill that allows me to see things that aren't visible to the normal eye.

The range of visible objects covers almost everything I know to exist. In other words, whether it's beyond walls or inside clothes, I can choose to see anything within my natural vision range. By the way, my vision is 20/10.

Of course, I can immediately see through any hidden equipment.

["Spear of Sleep": "Hero-class" equipment with sleep effect]

["Dagger of Paralysis": "Hero-class" equipment with paralysis effect]

They're probably planning to immobilize us with status effects when we let our guard down and then steal our valuables.

Well, we've become famous in this town. It's common knowledge that we have item boxes despite being an adventurer party of only minors. Plus, my weapon is made of mithril, so just selling that would be a fortune.

It's troublesome, but we can't ignore this.

"Sigh... Ah~, that lady over there needs help, doesn't she~? Hey you, bandit, how dare you lay hands on an innocent woman~ (monotone)"

"Hahaha! You fell for it! Fall into slumber!"

"Ahahaha! What a foolish boy! Be paralyzed!"

Even such a stupid development, I'll forgive it as the price of fame...

"As if, idiots!"

"Oof!"

"Gah!"

I punched them for now. A gut punch.

I held back a lot, but since my status values are about double those of A-rank adventurers across the board, I can knock out low-level bandits with one punch.

It counts as self-defense since we were attacked, but one wrong move and it could be considered excessive force.

"Hey, should we use a potion on them just in case?"

"Yeah. It's a waste, but it'd be troublesome if they died..."

When I nodded, Saaya took out potions from her item box and splashed them on the faces of the unconscious bandits.

Killing bandits isn't a crime, but we'd definitely be detained for procedures and whatnot. It would be too embarrassing to return to town just minutes after setting out so triumphantly.

The soldiers who arrived with exasperated looks took away the bandits covered in liquid. The soldiers know we're adventurers, so they just said "Good work" and nothing more.

After the bandit event ended, Saaya muttered softly to herself.

"Hey, could it be that this was [Rozewill]'s first battle...?"

"Huh!? Alright, listen up, you guys. We didn't meet anyone here. Got it?"

"One, two, blank, right?"

"Mm. Understood."

"Master was so cool, nano~!"

"Punisuke! Forget about what just happened!"

"Eh~ But it was so cool, nano~..."

Punisuke looked dejected.

It's cute, but please understand...!

"By the way, Ruruk, you got a convenient skill, didn't you? You can see anything, right?"

"Well, yeah. Basically, I can see anything I know exists."

"You can see through things too? Does that mean... clothes too?"

"Well, if I wanted to, yeah."

But I won't.

...Probably.

"Ruruk, you pervert! But if you ask, I'll show you without you having to look through... Ah, but it's embarrassing, so only at night, okay?"

"Mm. I'll show."

"Me too, nano! See-through~!"

Well, slimes are transparent by default.

No, that's not the point.

"It's not just seeing through things, but I can choose to see things that exist. It seems I can recognize not only through clothes, but also infrared, X-rays, ultraviolet, and even ultrasound."

"What's that? Is it useful?"

"No. It's rather disgusting, so it's nothing but a disadvantage."

Try recognizing ultraviolet rays under this clear blue sky. It's so disturbing you'll throw up.

Anyway, thanks to this skill, situation awareness has become incredibly easy.

Especially important is,

"I can now recognize mana particles. This makes magic countermeasures perfect."

"Mm. A bit disappointing."

Elen looked dissatisfied.

We've been relying entirely on Elen for anti-magic measures until now. I know she was happy about that, but... well, beggars can't be choosers.

Magic countermeasures are essential against higher-ranked demons. We painfully learned that in our recent battle.

Ah, that's right.

"Saaya, turn around for a bit."

"Eh, what? Are you going to hug me?"

"Well, something like that."

While making light conversation, I took off the cloak I was wearing and draped it over Saaya from behind.

"[Alchemy], [Color Change]"

I adjusted the cloak's size to fit Saaya with [Alchemy] and changed its color from black to red with [Color Change].

There, that should do it.

"Eh, what, what!? Are you giving me this invincible cloak?"

"Yeah. For now, there's no better equipment to protect Saaya."

It's a unicorn cloak that hardly lets any magic through.

Moreover, since Saaya is also a mystical arts user, she'll eventually be able to add multiple barrier functions. It's no exaggeration to call it an invincible cloak against magic.

Physical defense? Heh, if it doesn't hit, it doesn't matter.

Saaya was twirling around happily.

"Thank you~! I'm so happy, it feels like Ruruk is protecting me! But is it okay for you?"

"Yeah. I'll be fine."

My endurance stat has increased, and my numerology skill has evolved.

Thanks to that, I'm much less worried about defense.

More importantly,

"Let's quickly set up some demon countermeasures and head out to the next town."

"Oh! Wait, what are demon countermeasures?"

"To put it simply... this. [Landmine: Report]"

I activated the technique.

The mystical arts skill [Landmine] is my unique skill that can place condition-triggered traps by combining [Threshold Compilation] and [Alchemy]. As the name suggests, it's an attack technique that activates when stepped on.

But this time, I decided to further arrange this skill. Thanks to the [Eyes of Fiction] inherited from Roze, further settings became possible.

When setting [Landmine], condition settings could only be done with real numbers before. It could only react to single physical actions like stepping or moving.

But thanks to this numerology skill, I can now add imaginary numbers to the threshold settings.

In other words, it's now possible to freely customize the condition settings.

This [Landmine: Report] is set up so that when someone meeting the conditions steps within the installation range, the activation is directly communicated to me through the ley lines.

The condition is being a demon.

And the effective range is the entire town of Shaboom.

"Wow! The ley lines are going crazy!"

Manipulating spiritual particles and connecting to the ley lines, I set up [Landmine: Report].

To Saaya's eyes, the whole town would have appeared to light up for a moment.

"Hey, what happened?"

"If a demon steps foot in this town, I'll know about it."

"A-Amazing..."

Now we'll know even if demons come to this town when we're absent.

"But even if we know, we can't come back right away, right?"

"Yeah. That's why I'm doing one more thing... [Wedge]"

I've been thinking about this for a long time.

The technique for teleportation is a substitution method that changes location by rewriting one's own coordinate information.

But even Roze could barely rewrite coordinate information within visual range. Why is that? Because coordinate information is constantly changing.

To begin with, there's no such thing as objective coordinate information.

Coordinates are only set when there's a 'starting point'. That's why [Relative Transfer] uses yourself as the starting point, marks relay points, creates an endpoint on the opposite side, and rewrites the viewpoint to the endpoint. This allows for safe teleportation.

But teleportation to arbitrary locations can't do this. Even if you try to move to a place you can't see, you can't set coordinate information unless you recognize how far you are from that place. If you move, all coordinate information moves too. There's no center to the world.

So how do you fix these changing values... The answer was simple. It's the same as the application of [Landmine: Report].

If we can incorporate imaginary numbers into [Landmine], it means we can set activation conditions freely. Then we just need to add coordinate information to those condition settings.

In other words, we add coordinate information [X: 0] [Y: 0] [Z: 0], and transmit that to me via ley lines. By becoming the endpoint myself, I can derive the difference from the starting point coordinates, and then use that to recalculate the endpoint coordinates with myself as the starting point.

In other words, if I drive a [Wedge] into any place I like, and then rewrite my coordinate information based on that position information, voila, I can teleport to the [Wedge] location from anywhere.

"Um, so...?"

"It means even if demons come, we can rush back immediately."

"Wow... That's really amazing. Isn't that cheating?"

Indeed, arbitrary [Spatial Transfer] would be classified as forbidden magic of the extreme level.

Well, it's not so much that I'm amazing, but rather that the numerology skill I got from Roze is amazing.

"Anyway, Saaya"

"Yes?"

"If you ever want to return to this town, just tell me. I can bring you back anytime."

"Ruruk, I love you!"

Saaya jumps at me.

"Mm, unfaithful!"

"Hey, don't get in the way, Elenora!"

Elen raised a fuss and pulled Saaya back by the collar with her staff.

And so another fight between the young girls broke out, but anyway, I'm glad things worked out well.

We've got new skills, and hopefully, this will make traveling easier from now on.

"Well, shall we depart for real this time?"

"Grr! Elenora, you closet pervert!"

"Mm! Lustful woman!"

The weather's nice too, let's aim for the Bargia Dragon Duchy.

Huh? You're asking if I'm not going to stop the fighting children?

"...Punisuke is cool and feels nice."

"I love pats, nano~ More please, nano~"

Ah, my familiar is cute as always today.