chapter 46

And so, I went outside .

I’ve kind of armed myself, but even armed, I’m still a maid .

“Okay, I’ll be fighting barehanded, but you can use your kitchen knife or anything, use everything you have . ”

Never mind not holding a weapon, Suzumoto isn’t even wearing his usual kinagashi .

Remember? That kinagashi is that thing that increased his attack power due to [Ronin] corrections . That’s why he changed . Apparently if he messes up, it feels like I will die before I could be healed .

I know that this is due to our difference in ability, but this much contempt is a little irritating .

… . don’t hurt ypurself~

Yes, and so, hello . The chances of the first round of the gladiator tournament becoming a battle royale is high, so battle training based on that has begun .

My goal for now, is to get through this battle royale=first round .

……impossible! What do you guys want from a maid!

No, I certainly did knock out 3 men when escaping from where I was kidnapped, but that was thanks to Hanter and the battlefield was quite advantageous for me .

There were many blind spots and it was easy to make surprise attacks . With surprise attacks, I might be able to barely win .

Or rather, I won .

But the colosseum is a colosseum .

Since there are audience seats, of course the battle field is easily visible for the audience .

Meaning there are no blind spots .

With this, my survival is impossible .

……well, at worst, if I keep running away with [Teleport], just surviving……ah, no, wait, I’ll definitely run out of MP .

After all, [Teleport] has surprisingly bad mileage .

Which means……what do I do, seriously .

go in and teleport out of the colosseum?

“If you’re not going to come then I’m coming . ”

Now then, Suzumoto’s punch is coming towards me .

For now, dodge this with [Teleport] .

When I teleported behind him, even though he was in a pose to punch just now, he suddenly changed his posture to kick behind him!

“And you are out . ”

And he stopped just before hitting me . Th, that was scary……

not oneshot at least

And so, round two .

This time, I’ll make the first move .

I pulled out the two kitchen knives from the slit in my skirt and ran towards Suzumoto .

As expected he closed the distance in an instant, so I threw one knife in that instant and [Teleport] .

Go behind him and stab with the other with all my streng……yes, before that, Suzumoto disappeared .

And the kitchen knife I threw won’t stop .

And I ended up in the comedic situation of that knife continuing in a straight line and stabbing myself .

“Uwah, are you okay, Maito . ”

“Are you okay? [Heal] . ”

Everyone got worried and healed me, but this doesn’t actually hurt that much .

Like, I have already experienced a lifetime’s worth of pain when I was eaten by the snake .

I got [Pain Resistance] from that, so just being stabbed by a kitchen knife isn’t much . I can do things from a comedy manga .

This seems to be something everyone else is endowed with as corrections .

That’s something Suzumoto mentioned before . That one where he can pretend nothing happened without forcing it even with his flank gouged out .

And I got that as a skill, I guess?

…works?

“Then since it seems you’ve recovered, let’s go again . ”

Hm, that seemed like it was on the right track, I can probably land a hit if I add another move .

……hm, if it’s just simply increasing moves, I can do it .

with? puppets?

And so round three .

With the start signal, I [teleported] into the sky . Yes, I did what I said I would never do again . But this time I have plenty of MP and everyone is here so it’s fine .

The instant Suzumoto lost sight of me, deploy 20 maid-san puppets at once with [Puppet Manipulation]!

The maid-san puppets are moving independently . And I’ve given them this order .

“Stick to Suzumoto! As cutely as possible!”

As ordered, the fluffy maid-san puppets stuck to Suzumoto and hindered his movement .

And Suzumoto mercilessly shook them off .

But I have the violence of numbers on my side! [Teleport] to the ground the instant Suzumoto’s gaze is diverted, and stab Suzumoto!

But, just before the tip of the blade hit, the counter roundhouse kick, without stopping just before, landed a clean hit on me, feeling my ribs crack, I went down .

……this is impossible .

rip Maito

“Oi, are you okay!?”

When I woke up, I was surrounded .

Is this already the standard custom?

“Sorry, I intended to stop just before, but I reflexively . ”

“No, it’s not your fault . The opponent won’t stop in a real battle . ”

But somehow, my ribs giving out just from a roundhouse kick, aren’t I weak? In this case, Suzumoto is the strange one right?

both are strange

“Somehow, I don’t feel like I can fight anymore . ”

I had my ribs healed, but my willpower hasn’t .

In the first place, fighting is not a maid’s job . Asking me to fight is a mistake in the first place .

“Mhm~, seeing that just now, it was on the right track, it’s a shame how it was so close but……”

“Isn’t the plan misdirected in the first place, Maito-san? Maito-san’s strength is having a lot of strange skills, you have to try making more use of those . ”

Certainly, I had used a kitchen knife as my means of attack this time, but a kitchen knife’s reach is short and is not a weapon that really fits me .

then what?

……or rather, in the first place, the premise of fighting is wrong .

Mhm . I am a maid . Weak .

I am a maid boasting such weakness that if I fought a combat profession straight up, I will lose 100% of the time .

Then as expected, I think a maid should fight on a maid’s battlefield .

Okay, then, let’s reconfirm the victory conditions .

loopholes?

I don’t know the details of the rules, but a battle royale format would mean a large number of people fighting and the one that survives to the end wins .

Basically, I just need to run around and stay until the end like I thought at first .

But I cannot win just by running around .

Basically, even if I use the strategy of letting others fight and take out each other, I will have to fight one on one with the final person .

Then, what to do .

A method a maid can use, a method to win without fighting .

Hm .

……mhm, since I have the chance, let’s test out a new skill, or rather, technique a little .

Basically, that . If I can make the opponent unable to fight, it doesn’t matter if it’s not by injury or death .

that escalated quickly . why death

“Are you really okay? I don’t want to become a murderer yet though . ”

“Yes! Come, let’s do it!”

Any further combat against Suzumoto is dangerous, so I will be fighting against Hagasaki-kun who has comparatively less physical attack strength .

……mhm . Even though he is a magician . He still has enough physical attack strength to kill me . That’s strange .

… . rip

And so, Hagasaki dashed at me wordlessly right after the start signal, I dodged with [Teleport] and moved far away .

And before Hagasaki-kun can move, with all my heart……sing!

I sang a classic, a good, old number .

People call this, a lullaby .

……see, I have [Ballad] and [Babysitting] . Then I thought this might work~, and it did .

Buwah, a light purple wave spread and Hagasaki-kun suddenly……not just him, everyone slept .

……hm . Won’t this work?

… . yes…?

It would delay various things if left sleeping, so I woke them up .

Seems like everyone didn’t even notice they were falling asleep .

“That thing, how is the MP efficiency?”

“Relatively good . ”

At the very least, putting 8 people to sleep seems to cost as much MP as letting 5 puppets move independently for about 10 minutes .

Well, basically, this is much more economical than [Teleport] .

“Then, Maito, somehow win the first round with this . We will wear ear plugs, so even if we are in the same group in the first round, just fight how you can at that point and just lose . ”

“If I’m not with anyone in the first round?”

“Then you’ll meet one of us in the second round anyway . We are not weak either . We’ll get through the first round . You can just retire then . ”

Hou hou, I see .

“Then……what are you going to do about the time delay until you can use that?”

Mhm . That . About that though .

“I was thinking of [teleporting] into the sky to buy time . ”

The instant I say that, they all simultaneously started mentally doing physics calculations .

“Maito-san, even if you teleport 300m into the air, you will have less than 10 seconds til you land……are you okay?”

Kariya was the fastest in calculating .

“Ooops . ”

But 10 seconds huh . With that, it’s impossible to finish singing .

Mhm~, then, I need to reduce the fall speed, I need to see if I can do that with [Embroidery] or [Dyeing] .

If I can draw out the most of the sky-blue lily’s [Flight] effect, then I might be able to somehow reduce my fall speed and it might be able to work out .

……not fly, but just fall slower… . . realistic?

It’s about time for dinner, so I will be making preparations for dinner .

When I said that to them, they all went to hunt some huge speckled birds that were flying nearby .

No, when I said I’m making deep-fried food for today’s dinner, go hunt some birds to eat, they all went to hunt .

How could this be . I didn’t think all of them would go .

Can’t be helped, I’ll grind ginger and garlic to prepare the seasoning for the meat, make the vegetable soup, and such preparations while waiting for everyone to come back .

kfc!

While waiting, I started on the experiment for [Something to increase flight duration] .

The sky-blue lily is a plant that grows on 1F, so there’s none here, but I have some stocked up, so I’ll be trying things out with those .

only dyeing and embroidery right?

First, I will try cloth dyed with that sky-blue lily and embroidery with thread dyed with the same lily .

When I tried that, the skill [Hover] was attached .

……is this a bingo already?

When I tried using it immediately, somehow, when I try to float, I do float in the air . But, 1cm off the ground .

Sad .

But with this, won’t it work if I increase the surface area of the cloth . Or if I become lighter?

……ah, wait a moment . Wait a moment . This……I thought of a wonderful way to use this .

If I use this on something light, won’t it work quite well?

like maid

And so I tried making it, puppet-size apron dresses .

A light apron dress made with plenty of sky-blue cloth embroidered with sky-blue thread, I immediately tried dressing a maid-san puppet in that . And it floated .

It floated . It actually floated .

“Try opening the door . ”

I let it move independently and ordered it, it lightly flew over, opened the door and came back .

Mhm . This extends the possibilities of [Puppet Manipulation] .

Just that, the other maid-san puppets would be jealous of this, so I’ll end up having to make enough for all of them……mhm . It’s fine, let’s go to 1F again tomorrow and gather sky-blue lilies .

fluing maids~

And everyone came back .

“We’re back . ”

“Welcome back, masters . ”

“Like I said, stop, it’s disgusting . ”

It’s also been a while since we’ve had this exchange .

“We got birds . Here . ”

Saying that, they stacked birds on the desk in the lab, 16 of them .

……you guys, how much do you intend to eat .