Chapter Text
Her father, King Aultcray, continued, trying and failing to hide a wince. "...Malty, please describe what happened last night." He had an expectant, but apprehensive look.
Malty thought back, and carefully described their rental of rooms for the night, Spear ranting at Naofumi during dinner, giving him a lock of her hair to unlock a shield, and him unlocking another shield with his own hair, then returning to her room and going to sleep, and being woken up by guards knocking on his door and changing out of her nightclothes (oh, her nightclothes, that's what Naofumi was blushing about last night!) before heading to this very court, slightly behind the rest of the formation.
Her father's expression morphed into something that could be described as irritated shame as she continued. Malty thought it wasn't that bad. She had gotten them separate rooms.
He asked a few more direct questions. No, she didn't feel sick after eating. No, she didn't have gaps in her memory. No, she wasn't dressed any differently in the morning. Yes, she could disobey a direct order from Naofumi. ("I order you to destroy your filolial eggs." "Go fuck a cactus.")
As she finished, her father was quiet a long moment, before he spoke again. "...It seems we have been... misinformed... of certain events." Then, louder, with a look of chagrin and... disgust? "All charges against the Shield Hero are hereby dropped."
The Spear Hero had the decency to apologize for his accusations.
One woman in his party really gave Malty a sour look, though. Brunette with a single large braid. Her face was familiar; Malty was presumably supposed to be acquainted. Lisa? Lizzy? Lusty?
...Her parents had probably not named her Lusty.
Well, with that fiasco over with, they were back at the castle, and Malty had caught two important details from the proceedings.
1. Mother was not there, neither in person nor with shadow representative. Meaning she was still at the conference, at least a few days away.
2. Naofumi had let the bird out of the cage regarding the filolial eggs. While Father would let it slide, Mother would not, and any of her lurking shadows would certainly report it, even if they couldn't or wouldn’t stop her directly.
So, they now had a time limit to get the filolial eggs hatched into chicks and grown into valuable party members. Not precisely sure how long, but imminent.
And you know what? So be it. She had some more things in the castle, and she had plans.
=====
Old filolial bits of varying quality, feathers to beaks to bones to harnesses, had gotten them a medium growth rate increase, medium maturation increase, and a very small growth correction.
The last of those seemed to be a bonus on level up making up for missed bonuses from growth rate adjustments in prior levels, so they should be good to level for now without losing anything permanently.
And her... precious material. The opaque case, hiding something beautiful and painful. The remnant from that day. She wasn't ready yet, but... well, better to keep the option open, so she would bring it with.
All the better to buy a couple more days of shadows searching for them in the field rather than catching them at the castle.
Naofumi spoke up suddenly as she was thinking.
"Are we going to talk about what just happened?"
"Yeah, with the growth correction bonus, we should-"
"Not that," he said sharply. "I mean getting dragged into the castle and put on trial for false charges of sexual assault!"
"Oh, right." She hadn't put much thought into it since, but that was really weird. "Someone must've falsely accused you."
He looked exasperated. "Yeah, but who? Why?" After a moment, "And why of you? Who could absolutely crumple any case in an instant?"
Malty did take some time to think of it. "Who, I bet the church."
"Church?"
"The Church of the Three Heroes."
"Three Heroes?"
This would require a long, detailed explanation of political and socioeconomic details spanning at least decades, potentially centuries.
Malty wasn't up for that. "Essentials: local church likes the 3 not-Shield heroes because of longstanding rivalries and enmities and semi-recent wars and racism, and in turn dislikes the Shield Hero."
"I... feel like that is a very abridged version, but I suppose it explains at least one 'why'."
"Yeah, an excuse to lock you up, or discredit you if they can't get away with that." Though the discrediting might not have worked as well as the church and Pope Balmtree thought. Siltvelt may still welcome a convicted rapist Shield hero with open arms, and potentially legs. As she understood, they had some really messed up values and leadership due to their biological circumstances.
Whatever, not her problems, Church or Siltvelt or demihuman.
"And then, why you?"
She thought a bit longer, but was totally at a loss. "...I got nothing."
"Maybe they just thought you would go along with it as a member of the church?"
"I am not really a church-goer so much." Sure, Father had dragged her there from time to time, especially recently, but she had long since mastered the art of looking like she was paying attention when she absolutely wasn't.
"...Is your father?"
"More or less, yeah."
Naofumi's expression got much darker at that, but he didn't elaborate. "Well, at least you aren't; we need to avoid the church as much as we can while we prepare for the wave, regardless."
Something in that sentence raised a red flag in her mind. Wave.
Church.
Wave.
Church.
Hourglass.
"I don't like that expression, Malty."
=====
Everyone in the church was a passive-aggressive asshole to both of them when they visited, but they successfully got Naofumi's shield to the Dragon Hourglass inside to ensure he registered to fight against Melromarc's waves.
Y'know, so he could do his job.
"Anything else I need to know sooner rather than later?" Naofumi asked with the same unamused expression he had been wearing since she had explained why they had to go to the church that hates him (and apparently now her, too).
"Umm... Well, when the filolials get to level 40, we will have to bring them back here to get their class upgrades, or they'll stop leveling."
Naofumi sighed. "And ours, I suppose."
"Oh, no, heroes don't need to, and I have already done that," she explained.
"Oh, so we could upgrade their classes before 40?"
"No, a person needs to get to level 40 to-"
"Wait," Naofumi interrupted. "You're level 9, right?"
"Yes?"
"And you have a class upgrade?"
"...Yes?"
"...which requires level 40?"
Malty caught on. "...Oh, right. I was higher level, but my level was reset," she explained in brief. "I was allowed to keep my class upgrade."
"...What? How? And why?"
This was going to be a long conversation. Malty wasn't up for this, either.
=====
After a... careful explanation of a series of events that was mostly kept secret and was at worst 30% her fault, and much assurance that she wouldn't be bringing Naofumi into mortal peril by joining him, they were off to kill more monsters.
Usapils this time. Time for more variety of bonuses than different colors of angry rubber provided, and better experience per kill.
Unfortunately, the long eared rodents were generally smarter than balloons. So Naofumi was back to keeping the eggs safe, and she was stabbing at the fluffy vermin. She swore this was so much easier the first time she was this level.
New usapil-themed shields, new bonuses, not filolial related, and so significantly less interesting to her. She saw that he was disassembling them into bits, and processing them separately. Presumably extra stats for each variant.
Hmm. That was how they got so many filolial bonuses; the shed and remaining parts were already quite disassembled. Potentially, there may be a shield for a whole filolial, but Malty wasn't going to suggest trying that unless they found a dead filolial for other reasons.
Also, he had gotten some shields themed off of whatever they found on the ground, including rocks, sticks, leaves, grass, rusted old gear (rust shield, not particularly useful), rope...
And a glowing green shield that floated in the air, when called by Naofumi. "Air Strike Shield" or something like that, apparently a hero skill.
As they leveled, they were expanding where they could safely journey. As they were now, many places filolials frequented were off limits to a group as small and low level as they were, so they had to find other things to focus on.
They traveled forth to a not-too-distant town... Lute? Riyute? Known for its light metal mine, and therefore a place to, if nothing else, find new shields to unlock for Naofumi as they leveled.
She expected more guards than she was seeing for an important mining town. Whatever, not her responsibility to schedule and command movements.
They got cheap food and a room for the night (note to self, purchase cookware). She didn't notice Naofumi blushing all night, but did notice him requesting they get two rooms again in the future, when possible.
So I'm thrifty. What of it?
After interacting with boring people a bit, they went to the ill-lit, cold mine, with some warning of a wave monster leftover.
One wave monster? Eh, no big deal. She was up a few levels, and so was Naofumi.
=====
Two-headed dog. Huh.
Ugly, red eyed, black furred, slobbering critter.
Naofumi was very leery about fighting it, but it must've smelled them, because it didn't leave them a choice.
A real fight, not some puny critter. Time to find out how much she has to relearn.
Naofumi was able to get its attention and keep it off her (their standard strategy once again; she was now carrying the three precious filolial eggs), but against its thick hide/high defense, her rapier just wasn't cutting it. Or piercing it.
She was getting some of its attention, though, as a head bit toward her, her jump back only narrowly saving her alongside Naofumi bashing its head sideways with his shield.
Combat is status, tactics, and physics. Her current tactics did no damage, and invited counter that would ruin her whole day. Now at a safe range, it was time to bring out something stronger.
She weaved magic and began chanting, aiming carefully at the monster and not Naofumi. "As source of thy power, I, the First Princess and Filolial Regent Malty Melromarc, order thee. Decipher the laws of nature and focus heat to incinerate my foe! Zweite Firebolt!"
A narrow, but concentrated stream of fire shot out, making the dark, cold cavern momentarily neither dark nor cold, before striking the dog off the side, which let out two dissonant yelps of pain.
Way out of practice on that. At least it didn't hit Naofumi.
Between its level and her slightly off aim, it didn't die, and now was trying with more enthusiasm than ever to get around Naofumi to her.
Chanting again, "As source of thy power...", it broke through Naofumi, knocking him over through physics and charging her with two sets of razor-sharp fangs on faint display in the torch light.
"...t-to incinerate my foe! Z-zweite FirebAAAAAH!"
She panicked, and the firebolt went wide, illuminating stalactites on the ceiling. Dammit, Malty, you're a class-upped adventurer! Keep your head in the fight!
The monster now rushed her unhindered. "Erste Shield!" CLONK. Whimper. Whine.
Hindered.
Physics killed less often, but could still teach a painful lesson to the face.
Getting her nerves back, she began chanting again. It maneuvered around the shield, one head coming in for a bite as Naofumi ran to her.
Thinking quickly, she abandoned the chant, then stabbed into the open mouth, finally piercing the defense.
As its other head drew in, it was yanked back by a coil of rope, from Naofumi's rope shield as he got up behind it and held it back with his arms.
Drop efficiency and power, gain vital speed!
"Zweite Firebolt!"
Her quick-chanted spell struck dead center at close range, and the beast howled in pain as it burst into flame and flailed madly.
Naofumi held it back from one last bite, and she pulled her rapier out of one face and shoved it into the other mouth, and through its head.
It finally stopped moving and crumpled to the ground, the glow of its still burning remains supplementing the torch light.
"Seven Stars, I'm out of practice..."
As her heart rate slowly started falling, Naofumi let out a sigh of relief and turned to her.
"So," he began, "uh, what was that?"
"A two-head-"
"No, I mean the chanting and the fire."
"Listen, I was really young when I came up with that 'Filolial Regent' title, and now I need to keep using it to keep my spells strong," she admitted with a blush. "It adds at least 20% more power when included, so it stays in the magic chant, and together with my bracers-"
"Spells? Magic chant?"
Oooooooh. Another one of those things she was supposed to mention earlier.
=====
Naofumi was swiftly reaching his wits' end with Malty, and was now demanding some explanation.
He was summoned to this world against his will to fight deadly battles against monsters, and what was he granted?
A weapon that couldn't attack, a bewilderingly uninformative companion whose priorities were clearly not monster hunting and world saving (and whom he was convinced called him by his first name because she didn't remember his last), and a bunch of eggs.
And alongside the deadly invading monsters, he has since learned that three of the most significant political powers in the country would be working against part or all of his party in different ways for different reasons, to the point where he couldn't get other party members he would be able to trust anyway.
So, ride or die for the mighty filolial flock it was. Those eggs had better hatch soon; right now the only offensive attribute they had was cholesterol content.
Also, magic was part of this world. As in, besides the inherent magic of the legendary weapons, and status magic, and animate balloons, and two headed dogs, and...
In retrospect, magic spells cast by archaic chanting were not surprising.
The disheveled, rummage sale-armored redhead princess (and no one would ever guess that from looking at her) whom he traveled with being a capable sorceress, though, was a good kind of surprising, for once.
As part of the general interrogation on magic spellcasting, he got a promise of getting a magical affinity evaluation after the filolials were ready for the upcoming wave, and some help to start learning some spells himself, by book or by crystal ball as available. Maybe something damaging to supplement his defenses, or healing for his party.
But, racing against some deadline Malty seemed certain was impending, the two of them were still going to have to rush leveling themselves and the eggs to hatching.
Which, a couple days of Malty carefully watching the incubators between monster slaying sessions later, came to pass.