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I went to a place with a signboard on which “Adventurer Counter” was written. The lady at the reception had long, pointy ears and a beautiful face.
I wonder, is she an elf?

“Erm…”
“Yes, this is the counter for adventurers. How can I help you?”
“I’d like to register as an adventurer…”
“Alright, a new registration! Do you need an explanation about adventurers?”
“Yes, please.”

Rir has told me the most important parts, but I’d still like to know about it in detail.

For that reason, the receptionist spent several minutes giving me an explanation.
That rank system sounds like a bother, don’t it? Though I guess it’s nice that there’s no fee.

“…That is all, do you have any questions?”
“No, I don’t.”
“Then, shall we register you?”
“Please do.”

She verified that I had no criminal record, and then asked about my age and name. When she asked for my last name, I replied that it was “Hino”. After a short while, she handed me an adventurer card.
This apparently also serves as an ID, which saves me some trouble.

“With this, the registration is complete! Would you like to take a job right now? Limited to this time, you can take it here.”
“Then, would you mind me doing so?”
“Not at all! First things first, these are the requests that our guild would recommend for beginner adventurers to take.”

There were three requests; gathering medicinal herbs, exterminating three or more slimes, and defeating three or more cottonlings¹.

I ain’t got no clue what these… cottonlings are. Same for medicinal herbs. Slimes, however, I’ll probably recognize when I see ’em. Guess it’s those things made of jelly.

It looked like they were F-Rank magic beasts… The reward for one of them was 20 bells, and they also bought their magic cores for 20 bells each. In essence, just by accepting that request and completing it, I would earn 120 bells.

“I would like to take the one about exterminating slimes, then.”
“Understood! Slimes are often found in about a ten-minute walking distance north of this city.”
“Alright, thank you very much.”

When I thanked her, the receptionist seemed to be a bit happy.
Don’t people usually do that here?

I left the guild without arousing the attention of anyone in particular, then left the city and went into the direction I had been told.

There were two slimes²! They were typical slimes. They had neither mouth nor eyes and were so close to my image of a slime, that I ended up laughing.

But what do I do? Even if I’m shootin’ off magic, I probably shouldn’t use somethin’ large scale on just those two.

Looks like can adjust the size of the Ball, so guess it might work if I make it as small as possible? Still, shootin’ Fireballs might be a bit risky. Since it’s fire, right…? Wait, on second thought, I also learned Water Ball, didn’t I?

For that reason, I attacked the two slimes with Water Balls. When it hit them, gray magic cores were ejected together with a “pukyu” sound effect, and then the slimes evaporated and disappeared. When I looked at my status screen, my exp had increased by 50. In other words, one of those gave you five exp.

I picked up the magic cores, put them in my magic bag, and then continued looking for slimes. I immediately found more. This time, there were three of them. Of course, I easily defeated them with Water Balls.

This quest… to be honest, it feels too easy. Though it’s about takin’ the lives of others… One of those is worth 400 yen, so I’ve already earned 2000 yen in total. Still, it’s only been around 30 minutes since acceptin’ that request… How much is this per hour? Can’t even compare that to a part time job at a restaurant.

Thinkin’ of part time jobs, Ayumu was so stupidly good lookin’… and even though he was type of good-lookin’ guy who was sometimes mistaken for a girl, he only did stuff like dishwashin’ and cleanin’ for part-time jobs. He shoulda done stuff like workin’ as a receptionist or clerk instead.

In the last summer holidays, he had a job at some spaghetti place… He spouted stuff like “I’ll look for a part time job to save up some pocket money for the school trip, and to buy a birthday present for Mika”. He even dragged me into it.

Ain’t there any more slimes? Usin’ magic is pretty fun, like doin’ sports. Becomin’ an adventurer really was a good idea. Well, the higher your rank gets, the more risk of dyin’ there is…

After I had searched for a short time, I could hear the tell-tale splashing sound of a slime moving. So, there were move of them. I was about to head in the direction I had heard it from, but… hang on, that’s weird. None of the slimes until now made any sounds that I could hear from the distance. In that case…

I carefully advanced towards the sound, step by step. Finally, I found a large, white, soft thing… or rather, a several meter tall slime in front of me.

The hell is that thing, it’s huge… I’m 179.8cm³ tall. In comparison… I guess that white slime is… about two meters tall, ain’t it? Scary… To be frank, it’s terrifyin’.

What do I do? It’s possible that slime is absurdly high ranked… But if I manage to beat it, I’m sure to get tons of money. Should I take the gamble…? Right, I’ll get some more distance and then try to shoot Fireballs at it.

I moved several meters away while holding my breath. I could still see it. On the spot, I imagined the largest possible Fireball at Lv5. Five of those. I shot off all of them, which were between one and two sizes larger than the fireball I had produced the first time, in one go.

They all hit the white slime without any issues. Finally, it stopped moving and I felt a gentle warmth from the center of my body.
I was able to beat it… This made my level go up by a ton, right?

Five magic cores at once emerged from the white slime. Moreover, they were the same type as when I defeated that boss goblin. For the time being, I stored all of them away and went back towards the guild.

TL notes:
Looks like Shuu solved his financial troubles for the time being. It’d be interesting to know what a normal pace to defeat monsters would be. In chapter 27, it’s mentioned that even kids can defeat F-Rank magic beasts, and Alim at level 1 was able to beat an E-Rank rabbit to death without any weapons or magic, so F-Ranks can’t be very strong.

Also, I wonder what F-Rank magic cores are used for. They didn’t show up in any evolution, derivation, or skill synthesis we’ve seen so far. Magic cores are downward compatible, as we will learn in the future, but I’m not sure if the other way is also possible. Maybe they are used for very weak enchantments?

1. The original is ワタッコ which seems to be a combination of ワタ/綿 (“cotton plant”) and ッコ/っ子 (“someone with a liking or characteristic”). We will encounter them in a future chapter, and I chose the name based on that.
2. And after goblins in chapter 207, we finally encounter the other staple fantasy monster!
3. That’s weirdly specific.