Chapter 492

Rudeus treated Broly as a hypothetical capture target in his heart, but on the surface he showed no sign of hostility whatsoever.

On the contrary, he was extremely polite; after Broly and the girls finished speaking, he stepped forward and bowed: "Nice to meet you, I am Rudeus Greyrat. I have long heard of Broly-san; please take care of me!"

"I've heard of you. Roxy often praises you as a smart, magically talented child. If you have need of it, I will teach you."

Broly looked toward Rudeus, nodded, and replied seriously with just that one sentence — which instead left Rudeus somewhat at a loss.

Generally speaking, "please teach me" is just a polite formula; who would actually agree to it and even say "come teach me if you have need"?

Doesn't that mean the other party implicitly acknowledges he is stronger than oneself, who needs the teaching? Rudeus grumbled inwardly without end.

"Eh, then many thanks."

Rudeus replied like that, but in his heart he felt Broly was an even more smug bastard, and decided to give the other party a good look later.

But before that, Rudeus believed he needed to properly probe the opponent's true depths; if the other party really was as powerful as Eris and Sylphy said, wouldn't challenging him head-on just be asking for humiliation?

Having found new Crystal of Love Ore, Broly's mood was very good, and for the commission to forge Crystal of Love Accessories he still chose Wood Workshop, because that workshop's accessory craftsman had excellent skill.

However, considering Eris and Sylphy's age situation, their Crystal of Love Accessories and Roxy's accessories had some differences in function.

The amplification focus leaned more toward magic power recovery, plus some buff magic and interesting assist minor magic, while the portion for purely amplifying magic power was reduced.

For Eris and Sylphy as children, what mattered more was carefree, happy growth, with play and study advancing together.

As for functions like increasing combat strength, honestly, that thing has little use.

After all, this playthrough has reached its end; one is 7 years old, the other 5.

Could there really be some battle requiring them to participate?

During the accessory commission forging period, Broly returned to daily life.

Only his daily life now included a strange boy named Rudeus.

The other party often secretly sized him up in private; Broly could occasionally feel a faint hostility from the boy.

But this hostility was not true killing intent or malice, making Broly recall a boy — that same half-blood young master Jia Feng who once also wanted to pursue Roxy.

The impression Rudeus gave him was exactly that kind of feeling from Jia Feng.

One surmised the boy held affection for Eris or Sylphy, or perhaps both, and treated him as a rival role to compete against.

And upon realizing this, Broly wasn't angry, because he did not fear competition; as long as the other party used no underhanded means and competed for the girls fair and square, even if he lost it would only prove that, regarding giving girls happiness, he was inferior to the other party.

Broly's perception is very sharp; every time I secretly size him up, I am always discovered by the other party.

Every time I am discovered, I subconsciously put on an apologetic smile, using the smile to disguise myself.

But the other party every time looks at me seriously, as if able to see through the true heart beneath my smiling face.

And when I am guilty and flustered, Broly always promptly withdraws his gaze and continues his interaction behavior with Eris and Sylphy.

Listening to the girls' silver-bell-like laughter from not far away, Rudeus could also see the boy among them casting occasional sidelong glances.

That feeling was simply the other party declaring sovereignty over the two girls, telling this challenger — me — that I was overestimating myself.

After experiencing similar things many times, Rudeus was quite certain: Broly had already discovered his own heart's designs on the girls, and simultaneously had not hidden the fact that he had discovered those intentions.

But the other party made no excessive moves, merely looking at him with a gaze of 【you are the later challenger】.

It is also strange to say: from the initial panic and nervousness, using an apologetic smile to cover up, to now no longer feeling panic or nervousness, but instead meeting his gaze with a serious look.

I swear, from my past life to this one I have never met a strange guy like Broly, yet I unexpectedly formed a weird impression of him — a Showa-era manly man.

I know this is strange, but it is indeed so; facing such a boy, I have a feeling that if I keep dodging and evading, it will only prove I am nothing.

Driven by this thought, on the day of practical combat training I stepped forward, interrupted cousin Eris's praise of Broly, and voluntarily said: "Broly-san, I also want to verify my practical combat ability; could you please teach me as well?"

"Hah, Rude, your swordsmanship is this bad — you can't even beat me — how do you have the nerve to ask Broly to teach you?"

Eris had her words interrupted by the boy and immediately looked at Rudeus with some dissatisfaction, clamoring.

"What I want taught is not only swordsmanship, but also magic. Normally I can't really use intermediate or higher magic on you two; now I need a stronger person to teach my magic practical combat ability — what's wrong with that?"

Eris's voice was extremely loud, shaking my ears until they hurt a little, forcing me to cover the ear near her side, then refute her viewpoint with reason and evidence.

I am weak only in swordsmanship, not in magic. Regarding magic practical combat, although I haven't tried it, I have many whimsical ideas in my head, played various fighting games in my past life, even did solo rehearsals in private, and have considerable confidence.

"Is that okay, Broly-san?"

I stared intently at the other party, with a feeling like acting in a hot-blooded high school drama, even though this is a world of sword and magic.

"Of course."

Broly did not refuse; although he did not know what Rudeus was thinking, no matter what the boy thought, he would win.

"Magic only?"

Standing opposite Rudeus, Broly asked directly.

"No restriction on that. I am more skilled at using magic, so I will lean more toward using magic; as for what Broly-san wants to use, that is your freedom."

Rudeus answered.

"I won't bully you either. Since you use magic, I'll use magic to teach you then."

"Ah, I know that — it's the North God Style technique. Even though you say that now, as soon as I get close to you, you'll knock me down without hesitation, right?"

"If you want to think that, I can't stop you."

Broly shrugged; Rudeus didn't believe his words, so he had no way either.

"Rudeus, although I don't think you can beat Broly, still do your best not to lose too miserably."

Ghislaine stood in the middle, raised her hand, and said to the two: "Now, you two take your positions; practical combat match, begin!"

The moment Ghislaine announced the match start, I immediately used Wind to pull distance from Broly; I've seen Broly and Eris's match, know the other party's speed is very fast, and once he sprints close, even without a wooden sword, a hand knife alone could probably easily knock me down.

However, what I didn't expect was that Broly actually didn't move, just stood in place with arms crossed watching me.

Damn, this pose is really posturing, but also really kind of cool; if I could, I'd actually want to imitate doing that too, but I know my strength should be inferior to the other party's, so I must go all out and let him know my power.

"Intermediate Magic, Great Fireball!"

I didn't cast without chanting, because chanting spells increases magic power, and since the opponent wasn't moving, I didn't give up this advantage. A scorching fireball, two rings larger than a standard fireball released by silent casting, was condensed by me.

I didn't remind the opponent to prepare; I just waved my hand and launched the fireball. The fireball's speed wasn't fast, and I even prepared for Broly to dodge, secretly mobilizing magic power on the ground around the boy to lay down a swamp spell restricting his movement.

But Broly really didn't dodge; just as the fireball reached before him, a layer of water rippled around him.

With a boom, the fireball exploded, and a large amount of evaporated water vapor spread out. I didn't worry about the opponent's safety; my intuition told me he was definitely fine.

So I quickly proceeded to the next step of my strategy.

The ground beneath his feet trembled slightly. Although his vision was obscured and limited by water vapor, Broly still jumped up.

The next moment, a blunt earthen pillar thrust over, directly striking the spot where Broly had originally stood.

And a thin layer of water film on him definitely couldn't block it. Just as Broly landed and stood on the earthen pillar, a slight whistling wind sounded behind him.

Looking back, the mist was sliced open, and two invisible wind blades shot toward him.

"Bang~"

Two water elementals rose from the ground, one on each side blocking the wind blades. Although they were still pierced by the wind blades, they provided a buffer, so the wind blades reaching Broly had no lethal effect at all.

Through the mist sliced open by the wind blades, Broly saw Rudeus using wind as a skill to accelerate his journey.

"Go."

Broly commanded the two water elementals, each as tall as a person with their liquid bodies healed anew, to go attack the opponent.

"Frost Strike!"

I had seen Broly's water elementals before. These familiars condensed from magic power are very troublesome; swordsmanship, wind blades, earth spikes—these attacks are useless. Only by clashing with fire magic to consume the magic power within the water elementals' bodies can they be dealt with.

But I didn't choose fire magic, because that would consume too much magic power. I chose ice magic, by weighing down the water elementals' bodies to restrict these guys' movement capabilities.

Broly either dispels the summoned water elementals or continues maintaining them, increasing his own magic power consumption. This is the delaying tactic I thought of after the quick sneak attack strategy proved ineffective.

A person's magic power is limited. In the process of learning here, I discovered my magic power is very vast. Now what I'm betting on is that Broly's magic power isn't as much as mine. While I carefully calculate my magic power consumption, I make the opponent consume as much more magic power than himself as possible.

Just as I was thinking this, I suddenly discovered Broly had vanished. When I found him again, he was already standing behind me, with his hand on my shoulder, saying to me: "You lost."

"Broly-san, how did you do that?"

When I asked him how he did it, he explained to me the optical refraction principle of using a water film to refract light, thereby achieving invisibility. This made me, a reincarnator from the modern world of my previous life, feel quite ashamed.

"But how did you get out of my swamp spell?"

But I still didn't understand something. Even if invisible, the swamp spell should still be effective, unless he can fly. But flying with wind magic couldn't maintain the water film. This is unreasonable.

"This one is simpler..."

Broly raised his foot to show me the water under his feet. While I used wind to accelerate and shift position, he controlled the flow of water under his feet, achieving the result of easily gliding on my swamp spell.

Broly didn't use any ability other than magic to defeat me, which made me lose convinced in heart and mouth.

Of course, only convinced regarding the application of magic in actual combat.

As for capturing girls, I, who have much galgame experience from my previous life, still have confidence in surpassing him in winning girls' favor...

Not a chance!

Reality doesn't have game capture options. Everything has to be done by myself. I, a theory master with little practical ability, how can I compete with a practical expert who can send seemingly very precious jewelry gifts?

If the opponent were just simply rich, it would be fine. But the opponent is sincere, making Ru's older sister and Sylphy happy every day. What should I do?

Trying every method and giving my all, but still seeing no possibility of surpassing Broly's status in girls' hearts. This made me somewhat discouraged.

However, it's ultimately not too sad. It's just that the beautiful dream of capturing the pretty girls around me has been shattered.

But maybe in this world, there's another beautiful other half waiting for me in the future.

I am actually quite pure love-oriented. Although I also watched N-starting labeled color films in my previous life, if there are some pure love films with good plots, I would give blessings to the male and female leads with a normal mindset.

Rudeus sat under a tree whose leaves were starting to turn yellow, watching the big boy in the distance holding hands with two girls, playing around swinging a big windmill.

Without realizing it, he no longer had the thought of competing with Broly, just thinking about whether he could meet a girl in the future who fills his eyes and heart.

Not many, just one is enough.

Of course, if there could be two, it would be even better.

"Hey, Rudy, aren't you coming to play?"

Over there the big windmill stopped, and the green-haired girl called out to him, who was alone on this side.

"No, I'm not interested in this."

Rudeus refused. He didn't want to be a third wheel.

Childhood sweethearts, childhood sweethearts entering the hall of marriage—after all, it's still best to be pure.

He didn't want to be the surplus person in creating beautiful childhood memories for each other.

Thinking this way, Rudeus felt great, thinking that when Broly marries the two girls in the future, he should give him a toast.

"Mm..."

I don't know why, looking at Broly's attire today, I suddenly felt a sense of familiarity, but couldn't remember where I had seen him.

"Broly-san, have we met before?"

While the boy summoned two water elementals to play waterball dodgeball with the two girls, Rudeus leaned over and asked.

"Met before?"

Broly felt strange about Rudeus's question.

"Probably not."

He carefully recalled and found no memory of ever meeting the boy, so he shook his head in reply.

"That's true."

I scratched my head, feeling this must be my illusion. It's been nearly four years since I reincarnated into this world, and my previous self never left the house. How could I have met Broly?

"By the way, Broly-san, I've wanted to ask this before. Are you a mixed-blood of the Beast Race and Halfling?"

Looking at the tail at Broly's waist, I randomly picked a topic to ease the sudden awkwardness of my question and asked again.

"No, I'm not a mixed-blood of the Beast Race and Halflings, I'm a Saiyan."

Broly answered offhandedly.

"I see, a Saiyan... hmm?"

After I reacted, my eyes widened.

Saiyans, do you really think I haven't read Dragon Ball!

A race name that makes one want to retort, but maybe this world really does have a race called Saiyans, haha~

However, Saiyan + Broly, this reminded me of some memories from my previous life; although I prefer yellow games and anime, I've also watched some theatrical anime movies, for example "Dragon Ball Z: Burn Up!!".

So I said jokingly: "Then Broly-san, do you happen to know a guy named Kakarot?"

"Who's that?"

【Just as I thought.】

Rudeus originally thought so, until he asked Broly if he could fly, if he could use Energy Bullets, and if his father's name was Paragus.

Watching Broly float up, condense an Energy Bullet in his hand, and ask in puzzlement why he would know his father's name, Rudeus plopped down onto the ground.

He opened his mouth, but couldn't make a sound. Fear?

Without a doubt, yes, but more than that was bewilderment.

I wasn't reincarnated into an isekai of swords and magic, but into the world of Dragon Ball?

Just that I arrived on some alien planet not belonging to Earth.

But why Dragon Ball, I don't even like battle anime.

Damn it, just why?!

Rudeus felt like he wanted to cry but had no tears; if someday he died from planet destruction, he wouldn't find it strange at all.

(Chapter End)