The answer was that it would not be.

  The next day, the party of three found themselves in a skirmish with even more goblins. This time, they were fighting four of them, and unlike before, one of them was armed with a ranged weapon.

  “Keisuke, look out…!” He heard Mahiro shout a warning behind him.

  From Keisuke’s left, an arrow aimed at his leg flew by, barely grazing his thigh in the process.

  “Thank you…!” He breathed, repositioning himself towards the goblin in front of him. He was currently doing his best to hold it off, but with arrows flying past him it became especially difficult. He had to keep his eye on multiple foes at once.

  The goblin came rushing in, swinging its wooden club at Keisuke wildly. Given the straightforward attack, Keisuke was able to avoid it easily enough. Through fighting the goblins, Keisuke noticed that they weren’t very formidable. At least, they weren’t particularly talented in swordplay or archery, so he could handle one or even two by himself if he was careful.

  The problem arose when they were in a group. Lucy herself had cautioned them about fighting a group of goblins. They weren’t strong individually, but they were conniving and a number of them could easily overwhelm a party that didn’t know any better.

  Which was precisely why they made sure that the requests they took up only dealt with a handful of them at most.

  Despite him having a simple time fighting a goblin, Keisuke was still having a difficult time ending the fight. His attacks were half-baked.

  Am I hesitating? He asked himself after his attack was dodged. That was probably it. They’d been fighting goblins for a few days now and Keisuke had even killed a few, but he still struggled. When it came down to it, taking the life of a creature was not so easy. Especially if you had to cut through it to do so.

  But it’s something I have to get over, Keisuke told himself. Right here, right now. I have to overcome it. I have to be fine with killing whatever is in my way.

  The goblins weren’t good fighters, so when Keisuke pressed the attack, it was all the goblin could do to just back away. It tried defending itself with sloppy swings, but Keisuke was relentless.

  Just like Koto-sensei showed you. Attack. Take advantage of openings. Don’t get careless. Attack. Attack. Attack.

  When the goblin raised its club to protect itself, Keisuke immediately swung low and ran his sword along the creature’s gut. Red snakes began to spill out of the open wound, and Keisuke nearly dropped his sword at the sight.

  No..! He reaffirmed his grip on the hilt. His palms were sticky with sweat. I have to finish it off…

  The goblin was toppled over, its hands pressed over the great wound in its belly, desperately trying to shove its guts back. But it was losing too much blood, and the end was inevitable.

  I won’t let it suffer…

  Keisuke raised his sword, and then plunged it toward the goblin’s neck. However, the goblin had raised its hand, and instead of piercing through its neck, the sword went through its hand instead.

  “Huh…?!” Keisuke was flummoxed. Even now, the goblin was still trying to live.

  Just die, man! Keisuke thought. He was struggling to remove the sword from the goblin’s hand.

  “Gerghh!” The goblin was screaming at the same time.

  Just die…! Please! Just die!

  Through some effort, Keisuke managed to remove the sword, and then with a deep breath, he plunged it into the goblin’s neck. Properly, that time. Blood splattered all over Keisuke’s face, and it stopped moving.

  But the fight was not over. “Keisuke, help!” Mahiro called out.

  Mahiro and Fumiko were still battling two of the goblins. Mahiro was successfully holding off both of them with the help of Fumiko’s magic. He was glowing blue. Fumiko had cast the spell Bless on him; a spell that enhanced one's physical attributes. It made you lighter, stronger, and even cleared your mind. It was an amazing spell.

  Keisuke hurriedly closed the distance between him and the others. He came up from behind the goblins Mahiro was fighting.

  Mahiro is amazing. Seriously. He was successfully fighting two goblins, and Keisuke had seen him handle even more before. He was an amazing tank.

  “Fumiko, use Sacred Flame on this one!” Keisuke shouted.

  “R-right…!”

  Sacred Flame was Fumiko’s offensive spell. It set its target on fire, however, it didn’t necessarily kill said target unless they were already near death. It did a great deal of damage, but they’d come up with the strategy to use it as a distraction.

  Fumiko cast the spell and set the goblin on Mahiro’s left on fire. It screamed out in pain and dropped its weapon. The goblin began flailing around wildly, attempting to extinguish the flame. But they’d learned that the fire wasn’t easily extinguishable. One goblin had dove into a pond and only then was able to do it. Other times the fire only ever went out on its own.

  But Keisuke wasn’t waiting for that. He seized the opportunity and stuck his sword into the goblin’s back whilst it was busy struggling.

  The second goblin must’ve gotten startled by its comrade suddenly combusting and being stabbed right beside it that it dropped its guard for a moment. That moment was all Mahiro needed to shove his longsword into the goblin’s neck.

  The goblin fell to the ground, clutching at its neck. It spat out blood and the sound of it gurgling was jarring. It eventually stopped moving, staring up at them with bloodshot eyes.

  Keisuke was feeling exhausted. “A-are you okay?” Fumiko asked him.

  He nodded. “Yeah.” He straightened himself. “I’m fine. Thanks for the assist."

  Fumiko took a deep breath of relief.

  “Looks like we’re done here.” Mahiro looked at the corpses around. “We can go back to Fortuna.”

  Just as Mahiro was getting ready to loot the goblins, they heard loud shrieks coming from somewhere deeper within the forest.

  “Seriously…?” Keisuke’s eyes turned to the source.

  More goblins. It sounded like they were heading their way. Probably comrades of the ones they just killed.

  “We can’t fight all of them!” Mahiro yelled out. “Let’s just get out of here!”

  The three of them rushed through the forest and made their return to Fortuna.

  *

  “I think our biggest problem is that we lack numbers,” said Mahiro.

  The three of them were seated on haystacks in the stable. After turning in their profit for the day and buying sandwiches at the food stall, they returned to the stables to call it another night.

  “Numbers?” Fumiko tilted her head sideways.

  “Basically, more party members. I think our biggest weakness right now is that it’s just us three.”

  A week had passed since they began adventuring as a trio and Keisuke had begun to notice that as well. Almost everyone else they’d encountered was in a party of at least five or six. There were some exceptions, but they were rare. There were even scouts who went about Altear by themselves. Keisuke found the very thought of that terrifying. How could someone do all of this alone?

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  Basically, parties were essential. Keisuke suddenly remembered Lucy emphasising that point. “A party makes travelling Altear easier,” she’d said.

  Mahiro continued, “With just us three, there’s only so much we can do, I think. We get overwhelmed pretty easily and we can only do so much.”

  Keisuke was inclined to agree. “Yeah…”

  They’d fought plenty of goblins in the past week, but oftentimes they’d been overwhelmed. The most they knew they could handle were four goblins at a time, anything more than that was too risky and dangerous. In fact, things had almost ended badly once when they tried to fight five and Mahiro got struck by an arrow. They’d barely made it out in time to heal his wound.

  Their numbers—or lack thereof—was a severe disadvantage.

  “Almost everyone else like us travels with two or three more people than us,” said Mahiro.

  “I see…” Fumiko shuffled on the bay of hay she was sitting on. “Where do we find people to join us?”

  Mahiro sighed. “I don’t know. I could ask around the guild to see if anyone is willing to join, but like I said, almost everyone is already in a party of their own.”

  They needed more people with them if they wanted to progress quicker, but it wouldn’t be easy at all. Keisuke wondered where people even recruited party members, to begin with.

  Maybe you had to take initiative like Hidenori did when they first arrived? He didn’t know.

  “I’ll see what I can find,” Mahiro said. “But until then we should carry on as normal. Tomorrow we’ll hunt more goblins.”

  Fumiko and Keisuke both nodded.

  They all went to sleep after that, but some time in the night, Keisuke woke up with a thirst. Mahiro was sound asleep beside him and so was Fumiko in her stall.

  Keisuke got up silently, careful not to wake them or the horses, and left the stables. Normally, they would fill two buckets with water from the nearby well and drink from it or use it to cook. But when Keisuke checked, they were both empty. They must’ve forgotten to refill them.

  He decided that he might as well fill them now. Luckily, the well they used wasn’t that far from them. It was about a fifteen minute walk. And Keisuke decided he could use some fresh air.

  It was dark out. There were a number of old lamps that lit up the streets of the city, spread out in rows along the houses and other stone buildings. While it couldn’t be called bright, it wasn’t pitch black.

  Keisuke found himself thinking about their earlier conversation as he made his way through the city, using the lamplights for vision.

  Once again, they were relying on Mahiro. At some point, Keisuke had put all of his trust in Mahiro. Even then, he thought “If Mahiro said he’d do it, then he’d do it.” And was fine leaving it at that.

  But was that really okay? Honestly, Keisuke didn’t like how passive he was when it came to these things. He wanted to be like Ryoma and those guys who were dependable. Who could say something cool like, “Hey, guys, follow me! I’ll lead us all.” But he knew that wasn’t him. He was one of those guys that simply went with the flow or followed the crowd. A background character. That’s right, Keisuke was a background character. And, honestly, he was fine with that.

  He'd lean on Mahiro until he couldn’t, he decided. Everything was fine that way.

  Was it really fine?

  Maybe it is. …Or isn’t it? Mahiro is a good leader. There’s nothing wrong with following. Besides, he’s the one that took charge, wasn’t it? Fumiko and I didn’t make him the leader.

  If he wants to do it, then let him do it, Keisuke thought. I’ll keep following him if that’s the case.

  Keisuke was nearing the well when he heard voices nearby. Instinctively, he lowered his pace so that he wouldn’t make a noise. He didn’t know why he did that. Maybe he didn’t want to alert them.

  Wait, am I an idiot or something? Why would I care about alerting them?

  The voices were coming from behind a wall in front of him. He had to cross over to get to the well, but he was sure that they’d probably see him.

  It’s late now, isn’t it? What could people be doing up at this hour? But in that same breath, he was also up, so maybe he shouldn’t speak. But I have an excuse, he justified.

  Before Keisuke knew it, he was slowly making his way to the wall to get a peek of who was speaking. Even he realised how weird that was.

  I’m finding my own actions suspicious. Should I just walk past fast? No, it’s probably too late now, they’d think I was eavesdropping.

  Keisuke reached the wall and hugged his back against it and looked. Just like he thought, there were two people standing beside an open door to a house. The light from inside spilled out just enough for him to see their faces.

  It was a boy and a girl. The boy had on what looked like a warrior’s outfit and the girl had on a white dress-looking outfit with a thin sword at her waist. She had long black hair tied into a high ponytail.

  It was the Mysterious Beauty. Keisuke recognised her instantly. She was the girl that sat across from him in the wagon when they’d first arrived.

  “Is there something on my face?” he remembered her saying, and shuddered.

  What is this…a tryst? Keisuke wondered. A boy and a girl alone at night? It has to be that, right? Wait…does that mean I stumbled into a lover’s meet-up? Oh, man. Keisuke was immediately regretting his decision to not carry on walking.

  “Listen, Akame,” the boy started speaking.

  That’s right, Keisuke remembered. Her name is Akame.

  “I’m listening."

  “I wanted to talk to you about the party.”

  “What about it?”

  “…You know, that’s kind of it right there. Why does everything you say sound so hostile? It’s a bit intimidating at times…”

  “If that’s how you feel, then I can’t help that, can I? Get to the point of why you brought me out here. It’s cold and I’m tired.”

  Keisuke heard the boy sigh. He must’ve been growing agitated. Even Keisuke was mildly annoyed just listening to her tone of voice.

  “Look. You know I’m the leader of the party, right? And I have to look after everyone and make sure they’re all right.”

  Akame remained silent, so the boy carried on speaking. “And, well, things aren’t really smooth right now, are they? You know, cause like…”

  “Meaning?”

  “Well…” The boy took a deep breath, “the others don’t get along with you. You barely speak and nobody knows what you’re thinking. Sometimes you say things and they come across as mean or inconsiderate. The girls even think you’re belittling them at times…”

  There was a slight pause. “And?” Akame finally replied.

  “…And? Well…it’s just like I said. The others don’t get along with you. What do you mean, and?”

  “I mean, and what do you want me to do about it? It’s not my problem, is it?”

  “…It’s definitely your problem. Shouldn’t you try to get along with your party members…? Or at least, I don’t know, not make such an uncomfortable environment?”

  “What they think of me doesn't matter to me. Besides, I’m not here to make friends. To me, we’re just people with aligned goals. Can I go back to bed now?”

  “That attitude of yours is exactly why—” The boy’s voice rose, but he quickly controlled himself. “How you act is exactly why you left me no choice. I want you to leave the party.”

  A heavy silence sank over the air. Before he knew it, Keisuke was holding his breath.

  …This wasn’t a lover’s tryst, after all. He’d felt bad for listening in now. This was something he shouldn’t be hearing. Keisuke looked around to try and see whether he could slip by unnoticed.

  But what if they hear me now? They’d know I was listening…

  He was stuck in two minds when Akame spoke again.

  “Was this everyone’s idea?”

  “Yes, but…also no. They didn’t tell me that directly. Everyone is too nice to say it. I decided this on my own, for the sake of the atmosphere of the party. We’ll find someone else. Sorry.”

  “I see,” Akame said. There wasn’t much in terms of reaction from her part. It didn’t even seem like her breathing had changed. “Pay me my share of our earnings tomorrow morning, and then I’ll be on my way. If that’s all, I’ll go to bed now.”

  “Uh…yeah, of course. I’ll give you your money tomorrow. But…is that it? Do you have nothing else to say?”

  Akame stopped walking. “There’s nothing left to say, is there? You’ve made up your mind and I’m not planning on making you change it. Nor will I apologise and promise to change my ways, because I won’t. So there’s nothing left for us to do here.”

  “That’s true…I guess.”

  “Exactly. Now if you’ll excuse me.”

  “…What a bitch.” Keisuke heard the boy mutter before returning inside the building. The door behind them closed, and Keisuke was left standing alone in the dark of the night, having heard all of that.

  He ultimately decided to return to the stable house without getting any water after all.

  It seemed like every party had their own problems to deal with. Keisuke had just overheard someone get kicked from their party and he wondered if other people were also having it difficult. For those who suddenly found themselves in this situation, it surely could not have been easy. Unless they were anomalies like Ryoma.

  I wonder if that girl…Akame, was it? If she's going to be all right, Keisuke found himself thinking. I couldn't imagine being alone out there. I wouldn't be able to survive at all.

  …I wonder if… A thought crossed Keisuke's mind, but he quickly shook his head to dispel the idea. Yeah, no, there's no way. I know Mahiro said we needed more people, but there's no way I could ask her to join us. I don't even know who she is, and if the prior conversation is anything to go by, she's a difficult person to deal with. I don't know if i could get along with someone like that. We're barely getting by as it is, I wouldn't want to make it difficult for us to work.

  Yeah, no. Definitely not a good idea.

  Keisuke decided he would forget what he’d heard and once he returned to the stables, he went back to sleep. A part of him had hoped that Akame would be okay, though.