“You like her, don’t you?”
Marcus nearly jumped, frightened and surprised that Alice’s voice distracted him from running his fingers on Stella’s hair. Naturally, he pulled away, awkwardly trying to clear his throat and make sure that he wasn’t doing something too compromising.
“Ahem. You’re still awake? I thought you were tired.”
“Tired, yes, but not tired enough not to notice you being such a softie to her.” Alice was lying on her side, grinning as she watched Marcus with Stella on his lap. He frowned at her, and Marcus half wanted to shove Stella gently off his lap to appear less compromising, though, of course, such a thought was heresy to him, so his body didn’t obey that idea one bit.
Instead, he doubled down and tried to play the offense. After all, he didn’t want to appear too defensive to Stella’s good friend, so he would be on the attack.
“What, got a problem about it?”
“Oh, I have many issues with that, good sir. See, why is it that Lady Stella gets to have a soft place to rest her head on, but I don’t?”
“Heh…in that case, maybe you shouldn’t have come here with us.”
“Ooh, so you’ll get more alone time with her in that case?”
Marcus turned red. “Alright, out with it. What’s your big deal?”
“Nothing. Just…observing, that’s all.” Alice’s face softened. “Look at her. She’s so comfortable over there. You do know what that means, no?”
Marcus looked down at Stella, sighing. “She trusts me too much.”
“You sound almost disappointed about that.”
“Even if I saved her many times, and we’ve been through a lot together, and even if she knows me quite a bit now…I think…she’s too trusting and too naive.”
“Pfft, I don’t think that’s the case here though.”
“What is it?”
“Don’t you see it? She’s so smitten by you! That’s why she’s always so close to you, and she prioritizes your well-being, and that’s why, right now, she’s peacefully sleeping on your lap.”
Marcus’s face was fully red. He wished he didn’t remove his mask at this point. “I know…that…”
“As I’ve thought. You’re quite well aware, deep down. In fact, you’re probably hoping that’s true.”
“...You’re even more nosy than that maid.”
“You’re talking about Phoebe? Hmm…I suppose, yes, I am much more nosy than her.”
“You are not to speak about this to Stella.”
Alice suddenly sat up, defensively waving her hand. “O-of course not! Don’t look at me like that! To look at a lady with murder in your eyes just to silence her, you can’t just solve a social faux pas with violence!”
“You’re being too loud,” Marcus hissed. “I don’t want her to wake up.”
“Sorry, sorry. I swear,” Alice huffed and huffed. Marcus didn’t expect that kind of reaction, but he supposed he truly was intimidating if he placed his soul into it.
Alice calmed herself down, exhaling tiredly. “I swear, you men are scary when you’re too protective of someone you like.”
A permanent scowl was on Marcus’s face. “Look, I just don’t want you telling her that I ‘like her’ or something. That’s between the two of us.”
“I understand. I absolutely will not stand between the romance of two other individuals. I have tact, I’ll tell you that, hmph!”
“Good to know.”
As Alice crossed her arms and huffed, she continued. “Look, I didn’t even expect you two to be this close, so I’m simply having fun right now that I noticed and confirmed things. Quite frankly, I should have seen this coming. Yeah, maybe I shouldn’t have followed you two here, even if this mission involves the order.”
“Seen this coming?”
Alice nodded. “Yeah. Whenever she talks about you, her face lights up, like she’s dreaming about you and all that. Then her cheeks would always turn into this light pink color.”
“...Gah, I don’t need to know all that. Now I’m embarrassed for her. You’re a bad friend.”
Alice stopped, staring at her blankly. Then she facepalmed with a groan.
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“Grr…I’m so pissed; I’m annoyed! You two should get a room or something. No, I need to get out of here. Argggh…”
Alice turned around, lying on her side, facing away from them. Marcus was bewildered.
“What’s happening to you? Did I piss you off or something?”
“No, you two did nothing wrong, but I’m pissed anyway. This world is so unfair!”
“Unfair in what way?”
“Shut up, shut up, shut up, shut up…”
As Alice childishly muttered all that under her breath, Marcus shook his head with both pity and annoyance. Annoyance because she was being a bit too loud, and he didn’t want Stella disturbed, and pity because Alice did look like she wanted to simply pull her hair out for some reason. In any case, he decided to just make zero comments about it.
What a strange lady.
After letting both Stella and Alice sleep—with Marcus keeping watch—Marcus had the privilege to take a twenty-minute nap for himself. Stella insisted that he take at least an hour, but since Marcus didn’t really do much fighting, he told her otherwise. He was, at this point, more interested in getting deeper in the dungeon to find the most powerful foes.
That is, he wanted to get to the XP pi?atas fast.
When he woke up with a yawn, he quickly sat up and began preparing himself. It seemed that a few monsters did manage to get through Siris’s magical traps, so when he woke up, he saw Stella slicing a massive grauwolf near the stairs. Alice, on the other hand, seemed to be dragging the corpse of a freshly slain Ash Snake.
The monster was also massive, easily long enough to slither through three houses on the surface, with massive fangs and jaws that could devour two or three people at once. But she dropped it on the ground with a relaxed swipe of her forehead to clear out sweat.
“You’re awake!” Alice cheerfully said. “How’s the nap?”
“Was good,” was Marcus’s blunt response, walking past her. “Go take that thing’s core. Could be gold rank.”
“Aye, aye, you don’t need to say it.”
When Marcus reached Stella, she seemed to be observing the floor below near the stairs. He leaned close to her. “How are we doing?”
“Not bad,” Stella answered. “They tried breaking through, but this chokepoint was good enough to hold them off.”
“I see,” Marcus smiled. “You killed quite a lot of monsters, huh?”
Stella just nodded.
“Got any levels from it?”
“No.”
“Ah. A shame.”
It seemed that at Stella’s level, it was really, really getting hard to get more XP, Marcus thought. Again, he was familiar with this, as he struggled a lot too to get to level 100 himself. In fact, he was really starting to consider that maybe reaching that level was not going to be possible, not in his lifetime anyway.
After all, this dungeon is one of the most powerful ones.
He frowned.
If clearing it barely strengthens someone at level 60 and beyond, then that means the mortal realm doesn’t have a lot to offer.
If even the King of Sordale himself was only at around level 70 after ruling that kingdom since its founding centuries ago, then Marcus understood just how truly difficult it was to ascend to the peak of strength. Quite frankly, most individuals would never even pass through level 20. Only the cream of the crop reached near level 50, like Alice over there, or Lady Louise, alongside Fritz, who was quite strong himself.
And then, there were those that bordered legendary heroes like Stella or anyone close to levels 60 and 70. Or, they would be powerful scourges that were a headache to most nations, a headache that would be hard to uproot, like the archbishops of the Death God Cult—who probably reached their levels with very nasty means like forbidden rituals, sacrifices, and whatnot.
Just the thought of it made Marcus shudder. The lengths that people in this world had to go through just to get strong were mind-numbing. Meanwhile, all he did was spend two decades fighting demons…
Okay, stop with that. I also did not have it easy.
Quite frankly, reaching level 100 was more of a consolation prize for what he went through. He even got the unique dual-class perk from it, though; now that he thought about it, this definitely was overkill.
He looked at Stella with a conflicted mind.
Should I just…support her here and let her get the kills and XP? Or should I be a greedy bugger and hog the big XP kills?
He wanted to fudge up his numbers upward with good kills down there, but for every kill Marcus took, that would be another XP that wouldn’t go to Stella. It was a bit of a dilemma, because unlike Marcus, Stella was a more capable mage, and her growth with the [Saint] class was essentially cheating.
Every XP point that went to Marcus was an XP point that would buff Stella's strenth time over. On the other hand, Marcus also wanted to get good with magecraft, and he needed to up his levels as a [Mage] to do that.
“You look troubled,” Stella gently pointed out, looking up at him. “Is there a problem?”
“A-ah, no, nothing,” Marcus awkwardly said, scratching the back of his head. “Anyway, I think you only need a few kills, and you’ll level up soon. Hopefully, you’ll exit this place at level 63.”
“Level 63, huh?” Stella placed a hand on her chin. “I hope so, but aren’t you and Alice also trying to grind for XP?”
“I already reached silver rank.” Marcus immediately gave her a thumbs up. “I’m good for a support role for now.”
“Hmph. Why, though?” Stella crossed her arms. “How will you cast a bigger fireball with that mindset? Marcus, you’re supposed to try leveling up faster if you want to get better results in magic.”
“I have other methods; I’m sure they will come one day,” Marcus said. “I think I’d like to help you reach diamond rank now that you’ve helped me reach silver rank for my [Mage] class.”
“That’s…” She blushed. “You’re just too generous. Please, I cannot possibly accept this!”
“Sure you can. You need to get strong. That way, you can protect all of us.”
Marcus pulled out one of his rapiers and jumped down the stairs. “Call in Alice if she’s ready. I’m going to help you two carve a way through these bastards so they’re easier to kill. Oh, and…you can have the big boss of the dungeon for yourself. I’d like to give that to you as a gift, Stella.”
Stella took a deep breath as she watched Marcus advance down to the next floor. She placed a hand on her chest, mumbling weakly to herself.
“...You spoil me too rotten, Marcus.”
