“I dunno what’s goin’ on, but you wanna fight me? Tch, what a pain.”
The goblin pulled an axe out of nowhere.
“Spatial magic!? A goblin can use that!?”
None of this made sense. Goblins were the lowest of the low—there was no way they could use magic.
“Ayaka, wait a moment!”
I grabbed her shoulder.
“Huh? B-but, it’s a monster…”
“Just do it!”
When I spoke firmly, Ayaka lowered her sword. That said, Ayaka could still move faster than the opponent even from that position.
“Huh? You ain’t gonna fight? What are you guys?”
The goblin kept his axe lowered, looking puzzled.
“Are you a goblin?”
If it could talk, then talking came first. The situation was too confusing.
“Do I look like an angel to you?”
The goblin laughed.
“You don’t. Why is there a goblin in this world? Why can you talk?”
“Huh? You guys, who the hell are you? What are you talking about?”
The goblin was starting to get confused too.
“We returned from another world after ten years. There were no goblins here ten years ago. I’ve encountered goblins in the other world, but they couldn’t talk.”
“Huh? Another world? Ten years ago? Are you guys crazy?”
To think a goblin would say something like this to me…
“I’m telling the truth. What are you? What’s going on?”
“Hmm… you seem pretty desperate, and you don’t look like you’re lying…”
The goblin lowered his axe.
“It’s not a lie. You might not understand this, but our outfits are strange, right?”
“Huh? Now that you mention it, you’re wearing kinda different clothes from what humans usually wear. And I can sense mana from you guys.”
Mana?
No, more importantly, humans…
“There are humans? Not everyone turned into goblins?”
I had considered the possibility that some virus had turned humans into goblins.
“Is this for real? I seriously don’t get it…”
“What do you mean? Tell me.”
“Hmm… when you ask someone for something, you gotta offer something appropriate in return, yeah?”
The goblin grinned as he said that, and Ayaka released her killing intent.
“Ayaka.”
“F-fine…”
Ayaka stepped back several paces.
“Goblin, what do you mean by ‘appropriate price’? I don’t have money.”
I’d been a student when we disappeared, so I didn’t have any Japanese money. The gold coins from the other world were in the storehouse, and everything had happened too suddenly for us to bring much with us.
“Money? Ha! Humans really do love their gold. I don’t need that. We demons want mana, obviously.”
Mana?
“You mentioned earlier that we have mana?”
“Mana is mana.”
That answer deserved a zero.
“You said earlier that we have mana?”
“Yeah. You’ve got it. It’s rare for a human to have so much. Ah, no, maybe not so rare lately. You humans have been making a comeback.”
I couldn’t understand anything this guy was saying.
“Is mana something invisible?”
“Yeah… you’ve got quite a lot. That girl over there’s impressive too, but not as much as you.”
Normal humans didn’t have it. Ayaka had it too, but apparently not as much as I did…
“Is it the magic power used to cast spells?”
“Ah, I think that’s a good way to understand it.”
From the way he said it, was it slightly different?
Hmm…
“So you’re saying you’ll tell me if I give you this mana… magic power?”
“That’s what I’m saying.”
Hmm…
“How do I give it to you?”
“Yuu-kun!”
Ayaka tried to stop me.
“What?”
“You’re going to believe what he says?”
“I don’t know. But something is clearly wrong here. Whether it’s true or not, I want information. I’ll judge after that.”
I needed a starting point first.
“Hmph. You seem to get it, brother. You wanted to know how to transfer it, right? You can use magic, so just channel that magic power into me.”
The goblin laughed. He looked as though he might be trying to trick me, but for now, I had no choice but to trust him. Even if he tried something, Ayaka was behind me and could deal with it…
“Hold out your hand.”
“Hehe. It’s my first time receiving mana from a human. I wonder what it’ll taste like?”
The goblin held out his hand, so I took it. Then I flowed my magic power toward the goblin.
“Ooh! Ooh! Nice! The best! Amazing… no, no, no. Let go, that’s too much.”
I let go when the goblin said that.
“Is this enough?”
There didn’t seem to be any change on my end.
“Hehehe. That was good. But you gave me too much—more than the information is worth. I’ll return some.”
The goblin held out his hand again.
“No, I didn’t transfer that much magic power.”
“Ooh? You’ve got more mana than I thought? Then that girl must have plenty too… Maybe that story about going to another world isn’t entirely a lie. You’re clearly not ordinary humans.”
The goblin seemed impressed.
“I don’t really get it.”
“Figures. Anyway, I’ll return the mana. We demons value contracts. We can’t take more than what’s fair.”
Is that some kind of rule?
“Then give me information worth the price. We don’t understand anything, and our heads are still spinning.”
And yet here I was, shaking hands with a goblin.
“Hmm…”
The goblin lowered his hand and scratched his head, thinking.
“What is it?”
“Well… fine. Information, was it? Let’s talk about that. But first, let me confirm—you went to another world ten years ago and came back?”
I was the one who had said it, but hearing it from someone else made it sound unbelievable. And the one saying it was a goblin, no less.
“Yeah. We came back last night. We were walking toward town.”
“I see. So you spent the night in that settlement back there.”
“Yeah. There was no one there, though.”
“Of course not. That’s my settlement. I live there alone.”
Why is a goblin… no, never mind that for now.
“Tell me. Why are there talking goblins in this world? And where are the humans?”
“Don’t rush me. I got my payment, so I’ll explain properly. Ten years ago, bizarre monsters suddenly appeared in this world.”
Bizarre monsters…
“You?”
“Hehehe. Well, yeah. We demons came from the demon world.”
The demon world…?
“What’s the demon world? What are you talking about?”
“That’s our line. Don’t mess with us.”
“I don’t wanna hear that from people who claim they went to another world and came back.”
Well, he’s got a point there. A perfectly valid retort.
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