Miyu and Flora took cover the moment he threw the cans of hairspray, as he told them about his plan ahead of time.
Kio however, didn't have time to take cover, since he had to be close enough to the zombie to accurately shoot the hairspray. He dived into the shadows, causing him to be left with 1 charge remaining.
With flames leaking out of every single orifice, the zombie was charred from the inside out.
Kio counted his remaining bullets and was a little depressed when he could only see 8 left. He started out with 15 in total, and he already used almost half of them in such a short period of time.
The smell of burning flesh quickly spread throughout the area, causing Kio and the girls to back up a few dozen meters until they couldn't smell it anymore.
Kio took this chance to look at his status. He noticed that they leveled up, which proves that the zombie is dead.
Name: Kio Nakai
Age: 22
Level: 19
Class: Assassin
Skills: [Inspect Lvl 2], [Universal Language Translation Lvl --], [Minimap Lvl --], [Stealth Walk Lvl 1], [Haste Lvl 5], [Steal Lvl 1], [Shadow Step Lvl 5], [Threat Detection Lvl 4], [Projectile Mastery Lvl 3],
Skill Points: 5
[Ou'Ki's Blessing]
***
"Huh? What's this [Ouki's Blessing]?"
"Kio, I have that too in my status!"
"Weird… Let me check what it does."
[Ou'Ki's Blessing] - A small blessing from the Spirit of the Tree of Life, Ou'Ki. A spiritual barrier is automatically generated around the user that can block 1 fatal attack. Requires 24 hours to restore the barrier after activation.
"Looks like it provides me with a defensive barrier. Maybe we got it after we cleared the trial inside the Tree of Life earlier. Does yours give you a spiritual barrier too?"
"Yep!"
"I see. Well, no point delving too deep into how we got it. As long as it's beneficial, we should just gratefully accept it."
Kio noticed Miyu and Flora's level were both at 19, which meant that they probably shared experience. Since Flora was summoned by Miyu, she was added to their party automatically. However, Kio still wanted to inspect her to see what will show up.
Name: Flora
Level: 19
Summoned Being: Dryad
***
"..."
Needless to say, Kio was a bit disappointed by what he saw. Pretty much everything was already known to him before he inspected her.
After taking a short break, Kio stood up as he wanted to check out the dead body.
"I'm going to see if there's anything valuable we can take from Eldun's corpse."
"Can I come too?"
"No, it's ok. You can enjoy your rest, since you did get knocked out earlier."
"Muu…"
Miyu was a little disappointed that she couldn't go with him, but she knew he was right. She was still slightly dizzy from earlier, and using her [Overgrowth] skill twice had made it worse.
Although Flora was also curious about checking out the dead body, she knew her job was to protect her Master, so she stayed behind and asked many questions about Miyu's life. More specifically, Flora was very interested in the relationship between Miyu and Kio, asking how far they had progressed, if they had sex yet, and other intimate things.
Miyu flushed with embarrassment when Flora's questions became more and more sensitive, causing her to wonder how Flora even acquired that kind of knowledge.
Kio's assumption was almost correct earlier. Flora not only gained some of Miyu's personality, she also acquired parts of her knowledge during the summoning.
As the girls were engaged in their private conversation, Kio reached the place where Eldun's corpse laid. The stench of the burnt corpse was unbearable, causing Kio to almost vomit.
Kio held his breath and did a quick search of the body. The only notable thing he found was an Item Box, but Kio knew it would have everything he wanted inside, so he quickly walked away.
As he looked inside the Item Box, he found many potions, arrows, herbs, and other miscellaneous items that he already had. There was nothing too special, so he just left the things in there and placed it into his inventory for now.
When he made it back to the girls, he noticed Miyu was blushing as the girls were engrossed in their conversation.
"Miyu, what's up? You two look like you're having a lot of fun chatting."
"Ah! N-nothing."
Miyu stuttered a bit as she was surprised that Kio was already so close to them. She didn't even hear his footsteps, causing her to wonder how much of their conversation did he hear.
"Um, Kio. Do you still have any snacks to eat?"
"Hm? Yea, I still have a few bags of chips, chocolate, and candy. That reminds me. Flora, take some of these as your reward for doing a good job earlier."
"Thanks! I didn't expect both my Master and my Master's husband to be so kind to me."
"Yea! Isn't my husband the best? Hehe."
Miyu took this chance to cling onto Kio's arm.
"Mhmm. I wish he was my husband too."
"..."
This sentence had caused both Kio and Miyu to become speechless. Kio definitely didn't want that to happen as he was confident that his preferences in women were normal. If Luna's race was ignored, then nobody would be able to find fault in his tastes.
Miyu on the other hand, was unwilling to share Kio with more women. She knew that she was already fortunate to stay with him, since he already had two other girls in his life. She wouldn't have any complaints as long as he loves her, but she didn't want him to further divide his attention to more girls.
"Flora, how about we help you find someone else to be your husband instead? I'm sure you'll also find somebody great."
"But…"
*Cough*
"Ahem. Girls, can you listen to me first? Miyu, you don't have to be so worried. I will always love you for the rest of my life. As for you, Flora. Unfortunately I'm going to have to decline your offer. I don't have any interest in little girls, as it was a crime back in our world. The norms of that world have pretty much been ingrained into me, so it's not likely to change anytime soon."
Miyu was relieved to hear him gently reject Flora's suggestion. However, Flora had a different opinion about it.
"Does that mean when I grow up, this wouldn't be a problem anymore?"
"...? What do you mean?"
"Well, as I get stronger, my body will quickly age and mature too! Once I get a sexy body, I'm sure you'll fall for me, hehe."
"..."
Kio and Miyu were both utterly shocked by how optimistic Flora was. They didn't want to put a damper in her dream, so they just decided to ignore it.
Neither of them wanted to strain their pleasant relationship either. However, Kio was slightly looking forward to seeing how Flora will grow up in the future, although this interest is just plain curiosity at the moment. Only time will tell if his intentions will change in the future.
After they all finished eating some snacks, Kio once again walked up to Eldun's body and asked Flora to pick it up with some branches. He didn't want to leave the body to rot in the open since Eldun had treated them nicely when they first arrived. Besides, Eldun was also a former party member and close friend of Dan.
Kio brought Eldun's body to Fae's house and asked Flora to place it on the ground. Repeating the same thing for Felix, he then buried them beside the tree and inserted two pieces of wood as a grave marker.
After everything was taken care of, he went back into the house to double check if there was anything valuable inside since they didn't have much time to look earlier.
Unfortunately, after an hour of searching, Kio couldn't find anything useful, so he went to look for the girls to leave. He already made sure the place was safe before separating from them.
When he found them, he noticed that they were staring weirdly at the potted plants and herbs that were sitting on the windowsill.
"Girls? Is there something wrong?"
"Hmm… I'm not too sure, but there's something about those plants that is making me interested in it."
"Maybe it's due to your class skill? I remember one of them causes you to have an affinity with all sorts of plants."
"Yea, but I can't tell what it is. I tried inspecting it, but I couldn't see anything too special about it."
"Let me take a look."
Item: Red Herb (?)
Description: A herb with small healing properties. Successful extraction will produce a small healing potion.
***
"Weird... We already took a lot of red herbs from the other houses, but none of them has this '(?)' around its name when I inspected them before."
"Ah! That isn't a red herb!"
Flora shouted as she vaguely realized something.