“People say the best way for a god to get closer to their follower is to help them update their status.
I think that’s completely true.”
The young goddess looked at Renn, sitting in front of her with his shirt off.
Hestia rubbed her hands together, and her eyes had trouble leaving those muscle lines that were slowly becoming more defined.
This was her own boy!
Then came the update process itself.
She’d done it twice already, so she was pretty practiced at it by now.
She pricked her finger with a silver needle and squeezed out a drop of divine blood, letting it fall onto the falna on Renn’s back.
It bloomed with a gentle light.
…
Renn
Level: Lv1
Strength: H103 → G223
Endurance: I83 → G201
Dexterity: H112 → G230
Agility: I93 → G218
Magic: I0 → I0
…
When Hestia printed the finished status onto the parchment, she went through the numbers carefully.
The mood in the room got a little quiet.
Because the goddess had just realized that the follower she’d recruited was, in terms of talent, somewhat ridiculous in a way she hadn’t expected.
Was this normal?
She had never actually dealt with a regular adventurer’s growth rate before, but she’d at least heard rumors about it.
For example:
Loki, who she’d run into at the Hostess of Fertility that evening, had a member in her Familia named Ais Wallenstein.
The Sword Princess.
It had taken her one year to break through from Lv1 to Lv2, which shattered every record in Orario and the world, making her the fastest breakthrough in history.
To this day no adventurer had beaten that record.
The reason it stuck in Hestia’s memory so well was that Loki had rubbed it in her face the moment she arrived in Orario, and she could still picture that smug expression.
“So…”
“At this rate, Renn will reach Lv2 in half a month at the most!”
A bold suspicion started forming in her head, and it was the kind of idea that even a god found hard to believe.
An adventurer she’d picked up off the street was actually a monster of talent?
“Lady Hestia…”
“Ahem.”
Renn’s voice finally snapped her out of it.
She cleared her throat and put her usual expression back on.
Except.
There was no pressing down the corners of her mouth.
“Renn.”
“How should I put this…
I want you to have more confidence in the talent you have.
You’re absolutely the most outstanding kid I’ve ever met!”
“…”
The most outstanding.
The reason for that was probably just that the Hestia Familia currently had no other members besides himself.
Renn took the parchment with his status printed on it and read it over carefully.
Hmm…
He’d never actually met another adventurer in this world, so looking at the numbers alone, the improvement didn’t feel like much.
After all…
Going by the letter grades in front of the numbers, the highest had to be A, though it was also possible there was an S grade like in online games.
Or higher?
Compared like that, Renn suddenly felt that two days of exploring the Dungeon had gotten him results that were, at best, passable.
Because in dating sims, forget affection values, you could max out the sensitivity of every single body part just by pulling an all-nighter.
He put the parchment away and thanked her seriously.
“Thank you for the encouragement, Lady Hestia.”
“Don’t thank me for something like that!”
Helping Renn recover his confidence in his own talent felt like an urgent matter to Hestia.
Of course.
That didn’t mean she was going to go around showing off his talent.
She only had to wait until he hit Lv2.
Then the other adventurers of Orario would give him the answer themselves.
“Get some rest.”
“As for Dungeon exploration, I think that’s up to you, but as your goddess, I’d rather you balanced work and rest.”
“Don’t overwork yourself.
Get to bed early!”
Once she’d said that, Hestia had no intention of lingering in the dormitory, since that would only keep Renn from resting.
But the main reason was something else.
It was the new feature the Hero Raising Plan had unlocked, and she was dying to know what this exploration log could actually do.
She headed off with a spring in her step.
The goddess went back to freeloading at her best friend’s place, ignored Hephaestus’s greeting, and bolted straight to her room.
“Heh heh!”
When the translucent panel appeared, the first thing she saw was the display showing Renn’s potential.
…
[Character: Renn]
Strength Potential: B
Endurance Potential: B
Dexterity Potential: B+
Agility Potential: B
Magic Potential: D
Comprehensive Rating: Through combat training and the effort he has put into exploring the Dungeon, this rough stone has begun to take shape.
But he is still a long way from being the seed of a hero.
…
“I’m amazing!”
The panel was very straightforward about it.
All Renn had to do was keep developing at a steady pace and his stats would reach B.
What did that mean?
It meant that no matter which Familia in Orario he joined, his potential was high enough for him to be raised as an elite member!
And that potential still had room to climb.
If there was a problem, it was that Renn had an aptitude for magic but still hadn’t learned any, so that potential grade was stuck at D.
Even so, it was more than enough to delight Hestia.
She lay down on the soft bed with a pillow squeezed between her legs and started daydreaming.
“The limit for stats…
should be an S rating.
I don’t think any other adventurer has ever gotten that far.”
“So…”
“A failure of a goddess like me really does get to have a follower as wonderful as Renn.
Eheheheh~ Heheheh!”
“…”
Hephaestus was standing outside Hestia’s door.
She heard the twisted laughter coming from inside and raised her hand to knock, but the motion stopped partway.
She could say this for certain.
Hestia had finally lost it!
*
Was the life of an adventurer really like Renn had imagined it, becoming a hero, meeting a pair of princess sisters, running into a white-haired beast girl?
The answer was no.
If he had to describe it, though, it was extremely fulfilling.
He’d just swapped the company he worked for in his past life for the Dungeon in Orario.
The money he earned was his own.
And on top of that, he kept getting stronger.
Those two things alone were enough that every morning Renn woke up feeling like his enthusiasm for exploring would never run out.
“Well then.”
“Time to start today’s Dungeon exploration!”
Renn finished getting ready and left the dormitory, though before heading to the Dungeon he had to handle breakfast.
Jagamarukun.
The taste was actually pretty good, and more importantly there was a lot of it.
But when he walked up to the stall, he spotted a familiar girl standing in front of it.
They’d already met twice.
Hmm…
And yesterday she’d been his supporter.
It felt rude to run into someone and not say anything, so Renn raised a hand.
“Good morning, Miss Lili.”
“…”
When the supporter looked up and saw Renn’s familiar face, she grabbed her packed jagamarukun in a hurry.
And then, she turned and left without looking back.