The Darkness Was Comfortable for Me

—–

“That said, we should try going up there at least once.” (Nanami)

The stairs are pretty steep and narrow, so I held hands with Ai-chan as I walked one step at a time. 

Ai-chan is a far superior life form than me, so the reliability was transmitted to me from holding hands. Its appearance is like that of a healing character, but this child is a bonafide Monstrosity. 

That’s why I have to take responsibility for bringing it outside, and I have to protect this child too. 

(Even so…I have done a whole ton of simulations for when I get a pet, but to think that it would be fulfilled in this way…) (Nanami)

My parents were not fond of animals, so I couldn’t have a pet at home. No, my parents said ‘you can have one’, but with how the dog was thrown away once, I couldn’t bring myself to trust my parents anymore. 

I was inflating my dream more and more thinking about how I will keep as many pets as I want once I graduated high school and got out of that house. My dream…my life plan was destroyed when I was chosen to be transferred to an isekai though.

Is what I thought, but you can keep living things as pets too. With Communication, the difficulty of taming them has decreased, so there’s probably no need to think too deeply about it. 

And I will be able to reunite with Hi-chan.

By the way, it is not like ‘everything is laid bare’ with Communication.

It is only ‘what you want to tell and strong emotions’ that will be transmitted to the other party, so it is not like everything you are thinking is exposed.

 However, your emotions are transmitted a little bit. Stuff like: I am hungry, happy, having fun, displeased, or angered. 

It seems like Ai-chan likes it when I pet its body. The feelings of happiness get transmitted to me, and it makes me happy too.

I don’t know the way of life of an Evil Eyeball, but despite not giving out that feeling of being a social creature, it seems to be attached to me. 

It might be seeing me as a mate.

I don’t know if Ai-chan is male or female though.

Then, does it feel anger when I suddenly get attacked? No, there’s no emotion like that at all. 

It thinks ‘prey prey’ just like that giant eagle… Well, it is not as far as that, but it is close. 

For this child, other creatures are simply food, so that’s natural though.

I was thinking that while walking up the stairs. 

It is already incredibly high up. If I had a fear of heights, this is a sight that would make my legs buckle and I would be rendered unable to move. I think this easily goes over several hundreds of meters. 

Moreover, there’s still quite a good distance before reaching the top.

“A-Ai-chan, are you okay? Aren’t you scared?” (Nanami)

—It is high and pretty.

—Wow.

Ai-chan was blinking and enjoying the view.

This child really is very intelligent. 

To think it would have the spirit to enjoy the view.

4 hours of going up. 

We finally reached all the way to the top. 

“This really is…one…im-…impressive sight…” (Nanami)

A breathtaking view.

It reminds me of the Grand Canyon view I saw on the TV.

There’s even the chance that this is being used as a tourist spot for its superb view.

I went all the way to the top of the stairs, but the stage-like thing jutting out that was blocking the way, so I could not proceed any further. 

The stage is 20 meters in width and around 3 meters in height. 

I thought that maybe there would be a small exit somewhere, but there’s nothing like that.

“This is troubling. So there’s no choice but to have Ai-chan carry me, huh. Ai-chan, do you think you can carry me above this slab?” (Nanami)

—Easy. 

—Get on.

The floating Ai-chan is the size of a balance ball.

 I lay face down on top of Ai-chan, and its two ear-like tentacles held my body properly in place. 

Just like that, we took off from the stairs and to the top of the cliff…

(Hiiiih! This is scary! It is scary, but it feels good!) (Nanami)

It is a new sensation. It is so high it can induce screams, but because Ai-chan is properly keeping me in place, there’s a sense of safety to it, and we finally got to the top of the cliff. 

The lid that was jutting out like a stage seems like it was being kept up like a drawbridge. At the end of the 2 sturdy chains was a stone fortress-like place. 

“Is there anyone there?” (Nanami)

—Probably no one.

Looks like this was prepared solely for the sake of this drawbridge, so it is not like there’s a city or a castle here. 

I don’t know for what reason a thing like this was prepared, but I didn’t want to meet people just yet, so this is good. I investigated the building for a bit, but there’s simply one small room that seems like a waiting room, and there was no presence of people. Judging from the way the dust is accumulating, it doesn’t seem to be used often. 

I bring out the world map and confirm my current location. 

“Ringpill Continent: Prosjen Hill, Bridge to Hell.” (Nanami)

The population density of the surroundings is 1 out of 10 steps. 

The danger is 2 out of 6 steps. 

The closest place with people is Jesson, and it is a distance of 8km in a straight line. 

“Bridge to Hell, huh…” (Nanami)

In other words, this is the ‘entrance’. Meaning that I exited from the entrance.

If there had been people, it definitely would have turned into a mess.

“8km to the closest village, huh. You could say it is close, but the direction is…” (Nanami)

I have to head further north from here in order to reach the Jes village.

My objective is far far southeast. 

But 8km is close. That there’s a fortress here must mean that there’s a road too. If it goes well, it won’t take even 1 hour. 

“That said, I am already tired, so let’s rest for today. Let’s use this fortress.” (Nanami)

There’s no people, and I doubt we will be attacked here. We should be able to take a peaceful rest here. There’s also simple beds, and if I bring out a simple mat, I will be able to rest my body. 

It is already evening. 

Tomorrow I will go down again and gather Spirit Stones.

At the very least, I would like to stock up on Spirit Stones even if I have to use all the Points that I got from when Ai-chan became my comrade. 

I myself will have to do my best in obtaining food on the spot, but there should be no problems there. In the case that I really can’t handle it anymore, it can be resolved by using Crystals after all.

◇◆◆◆◇

It has been 10 days since then. 

Me and Ai-chan haven’t returned to the fortress once, and we were hunting the hell out of every living thing around the vicinity of the staircase while making it our camping spot. 

It seems a bit of the Spirit Energy flows into me when Ai-chan hunts, so there’s also because the monstrosification was slowly advancing, and I could feel that it was getting steadily easier to act which was fun. I might have stayed for too long. 

I bought a small magic bag with 3 points in order to put the Spirit Stones in, used a barrier stone once because it got dangerous, bought a bow and arrow with 2 points as a weapon, and there was also stuff like food, bedding, and underwear. My pockets ended up getting lighter. 

Magic bag is a bag with the ability Shadow Bag that Hi-chan uses enchanted to it, and I bought it because my stock of Spirit Stones was getting way too heavy.

100 should fit in that and it isn’t heavy at all.

I have managed to see the power of Ai-chan, and I also managed to practice with the bow that I bought because I wanted to save the bullets of my gun as much as possible. 

Even if I were to reunite with Hi-chan, the only thing I would be able to do would be either healing or long distance attacks. 

I saw in the videos, but even at the time when they fought the Demon Lord, they didn’t have anyone with long distance attacks, and had a pretty rough battle. 

By the way, I have only trained around a few hours with a bow in the 20 day training before coming here, and was only taught the basics, so I know the bare minimum.

If I collect the arrows back, I can use them over and over. It is a different story if the arrowhead gets smashed, but it won’t become useless from piercing a bird.

“Ah, Celica-chan, are you watching? Thanks to you, camping isn’t a pain, so it looks like I will be able to live on this side. My preparations are done, so I will be heading to Hi-chan now.” (Nanami)

I speak towards empty space. 

I have quite a lot of viewers. Everyone must be interested in survival. It may also be because Ai-chan is cute though.

I am sure Ai-chan has become the idol of regular households, with a whole ton of goods being made, and some crazy popularity. 

I also get the benefits from Ai-chan’s popularity rising, so Ai-chan really is so versatile.

Ai-chan and I went up the stairs, got on Ai-chan just like before, avoided the drawbridge, and came to the front of the fortress.

I managed to stock up on an uncountable amount of Spirit Stones which will serve as meals for Ai-chan. I have more than 100, so we will be able to manage even if it is to eat or to sell. 

The Chaotic Spirit Stone that came out from the big lizard could be sold for pretty high.

—Something’s coming.

“Eh?” (Nanami)

I could feel a tense atmosphere from Ai-chan.

By ‘something’, it must be referring to a living being. 

—Same as Nanami.

—Person?

“E-Eh?!” (Nanami)

The state of the fortress had not changed, so I lowered my guard. 

Because of the cliff, there’s no place to hide in. If people are coming, it would be this fortress…no, there’s the chance they are coming with the objective being the stairs going down. 

Ai-chan can fly, so it can fly to the other side of the cliff to hide. We should be able to manage with that. No, maybe it could serve as a way to test whether it is bad if Ai-chan were to be seen?

If it goes awry, we could defeat them all? No, if it is super high leveled explorers like the ones I saw in the video of Hi-chan, we would easily get defeated instead. 

We really should deal with this peacefully. 

“Ai-chan, turn invisible. We will decide anything else depending on the situation. Our basic course of action is no battle…but we don’t know who we are dealing with, so at least be on guard.” (Nanami)

There’s the option of retreating below the stage again, but in the case the stairs are their objective, it is plenty obvious that it would turn extremely awkward.

Or maybe I should go down once? If Ai-chan carries me, it would not even take 1 hour to get to the bottom of the stairs. But it is still the same in the part that they could find us if luck is not on our side… Then, it would be better to use a Barrier stone from the beginning…

While I was thinking that, those people showed up from up the hill.