Chapter 176: After the Battle

Sun rays penetrated through the thin curtains in my room which effectively shines through my face, allowing me to wake up from my slumber and stand up.

"F*ck, my body is still stiff and painful as ever..." I grumbled as I stood up from my bed.

Today is the very first day I can properly move without struggling much. It took me two days before I can finally get myself recover. Even when I have taken the reverter, some things remained especially the scratch marks on my hands and some pain in my head and neck. Some parts of my body also felt painful but enough for me to endure.

After the incident involving the cause of the Crazed Phenomenon Disorder, I finally got the deserved rest I wanted to get but unfortunately, I don't think I have the leisure to enjoy that. I lost most of the memories I have when I am fighting against the creature last time. The only time I remembered only ends during the time Masamune and Muramasa are about to slice off the Beast Core of the creature. After that, nothing, I don't remember a single thing however I try to recall.

I heard that the problem was solved and the investigation of the sickness was performed again to make sure the illness is solved once and for all. And due to that, the previous victims were also found but they are petrified. I don't know any updates regarding the people who got petrified but I hope they are still alive.

Checking the weather, I sighed seeing it a little bit sunny but the clouds on the horizon are warning of the impending heavy downpour.

"It's not good weather huh."

Once I finished taking a bath, I feel a little bit refreshed though it hurts my body a little bit. The scratches on my skin also contribute to the pain but the part that hurts the most is in my neck though I am unsure what caused this pain. The next thing I did is summon my familiars out since I can't call them out while I am inside the Mini-Phantasmal World of the fake Hirakata Park.

"Master~" Yuri dash towards me but I simply dodged her.

"You need to be mindful of your actions once in a while Yuri, you know that a succubus is quite a trouble to males since you can easily mess up to them," Yuto shook his head.

"But Master is uncontactable during that time! It was like we are locked in the Familiar Dimension forever!~"

"It's alright Yuri, here, some mana that you wanted to get."

"Yay!~ Thank you, Master!"

Inari-sama gracefully walked out of the portal with the other fox. The white tiger also came out but it immediately lay its head to the floor after going out and went to sleep.

"Thank goodness you are fine, Master. Did something happen when we can't contact you?" Inari-sama asked.

"Yes. It was a certain mission that got me transported in a closed world. I tried calling anyone of you out but there is no response so I guess that summoning familiars are currently sealed while I was staying in that place. But the only thing that I got confused about is the little tiger that I rescued and settled in my familiar space."

"Huh? What about this little tiger here?" Yuto looked puzzled when he looked at the tiger who seemed indifferent to what is happening around him.

"During one of the critical times inside that place, we were saved by this little tiger. It was kind of sudden so I never expected it to appear. Did it managed to escape from the restriction?"

"I don't quite follow you, Master. We are guarding this little tiger all the time without letting it out of our sight so it is impossible to have this little tiger protect you."

That's not right. I am quite sure during the time we are sieged by the lump of flesh from the illusions is that little tiger over there. If that is not the tiger then what was it?

...

After taking my breakfast, I went to Anya's room. Since Maple is still recuperating, Rena is the one who is taking care of her in the meantime. Entering the room, Rena just finished dressing Anya.

"Oh, Kazuma, you came again. I just received good news for you," Rena said as she put Anya on the bed and cover her with a blanket.

"Good news? What good news is this?"

"Remember the medicine that can help fix Anya's condition? It is finally announced that they will be ready to auction it tomorrow."

"The medicine is finally released for auction? That is indeed good news!"

"It will be further become a piece of really good news if you managed to win it since it will be in the auction. With so many people competing to get the medicine for themselves, getting it will not be easy."

Urgh, I got overwhelmed with the news that I remembered that it was an auction. The highest bidder will win and take any item they won home. Since the medicine that Anya needed is currently one of the items that some magicians are looking forward to getting, then that means this will be hard to acquire especially if a tycoon currently has his or her eyes on it. They will not care if it is about the money, as long as the item is in their hands, they will waste money to obtain it.

"We know that you don't have enough money to buy that thing so we have decided to hire a tycoon that can easily spend money to obtain it in exchange for a mission that he wanted to resolve."

"You hired a tycoon?"

"He has some sort of problem but we have no idea what it was but he said that only magicians can solve this. Although he was a human, he has knowledge about the magician world and inner workings about it due to his work as a businessman that allows magicians to conduct transactions easily and convert real money to demon shards or monster shards or vice versa. He also considers the Magician Society as one of his regular customers and he is extremely loyal, which means he will help."

"Let me guess, I am one of the magicians hired to solve his problem right?"

"Yes. He has heard of your exploits and the success rates of your missions so he wanted to also include you in the mission. And since you require the payment, we initiated to do this instead. You will be hired by him alongside two other magicians to undertake this mission. You can decline this mission if you don't want to do it."

"I accept. If this is for the sake of Anya's fast recovery, I will do anything."

"No, no. Don't quickly accept it. You should ask the one who will give you a mission first and inquire him about the mission. We already added him to the chat group. You can private message him later and you can decide whether to accept the mission or not. Don't be hasty."

...

Another mission.

To be honest, I am indeed not sure if I have to accept it or not. Of course, I am obligated to accept it, but there is a part of me that hesitates to accept it, After all, plenty of the missions I have undertaken are either too much life-threatening or just hard enough for me to deal with. Almost all the missions I have undertaken end up being comatose or collapsed.

"You wanted to get stronger right?" Blue's voice echoed inside my mind.

"Blue?"

"You wanted to be stronger than you wanted to avoid getting collapsed or comatose after severe usage of something right? Then, how about you undergo my trials then?"

"Is this one of your schemes to use a facility same as the Training space where you needed some resource again? No, I don't have enough shards to use for that whatever you are proposing."

"Idiot. This is free. I won't charge you up for using it. So wanna try? This is free of charge thing and just like the Training Space, time does not flow here, and you will still get what you learned in that space into the real world. What do you say?"

"Are you sure this is free? Not a scam? I will beat you up if you say it is a scam."

"Can't you trust me when it comes to my facilities for you to use? And I am being nice to you," Blue seemed to be upset.

"Of course I trust you since you saved my bacon many times before but I just have uncertainty when it comes to something like this. It seems like you are about to pull something nasty for me to try."

"Don't worry, this will be worthy for you since you have shown your growth since the first day I met you. You can now access the Magician Trials. A place where you will be put to your limits."