Shield Hero's viewpoint I

NAOFUMI'S POV:~

Reached near the entrance of the labyrinth. We saw that the noble of that place was getting out of the basement. We hid there and waited for him to leave. When he left, we went inside.

The basement was quite empty. There were only animals there. Then my gaze went inside the room in which Raphtalia and Rifana were.

Raphtalia!!

Both were covered in bruises. Rifana's condition was much worse than raphtalia. It seemed like she might die at any moment.

I guestured raphtalia to keep quiet and ordered Alna to cut the bars. I took out a potion, went inside the small room and gave it to Rifana. I also gave her nourishing beverage.

She looked very weak but we can't bother with that now.

I quickly checked their chests, But what I feared happened, There was a slave crest on both of their chests.

Why? why only with me?

If he came and saw that they aren't here, he would kill them using the slave killing spell.

I can teleport with them to the nearest location to the church where we could teleport and go there by foot but church hates the shield hero.

Even if we tried to find some other way to remove this, we don't have much time. They must've seen the dead bodies of Guardias by now and would've been searching for us. They'll eventually come here. If they won't see raphtalia and Rifana they'll report it to the noble.

I was running out of options. Alna tried to calm me down but there's no way I can.

I thought I could save both of them this time but by coming here I put Raphtalia's life in danger as well.

Wait, to apply the slave crest he has to mix his blood with a special ink and apply it on the chest. How will it work if I try to absorb it with the green orb of the shield?

The chances of that were very low. As soon as the ink is marked on the chest it evaporates, and anyway it must have been a long time since the slave crest was applied. But still, I wanna try.

I tore raphtalia's cloth to the chest and pressed the orb of my shield on her slave crest, but nothing happened. I pressed it even harder that her chest started hurting. Is it worthless too??

Slave User Shield: conditions met

Slave User Shield II: conditions met

Slave User Shield: ability locked:

equip bonus: slave maturation adjustment (small)

Slave User Shield II: ability locked:

equip bonus: slave status adjustment (small)

Finally!!

The slave crest disappeared. I did this to Rifana too. I was worried about her because she was in a very bad condition but thankfully it went well.

The noble had already saw us, he was just outside this room. if I teleported now, he'll report what happened today to the king. Of course he doesn't know me. But he has seen that a shield is attached to my hand and many people have seen us when we were riding the horse town to town. It won't be much difficult to deduce the one who stole the slaves was the shield hero. Afterall, who other than the four cardinal heroes can use teleportation?

It would be a very good chance for Trash to isolate us and even give us some punishment. I don't wanna go through any trouble again.

There were many reasons. But the biggest one is, I can't let him off after seeing this much, Can I?

I told Alna to wait and started going outside to fight him. Of course she's more skilled than him, but when she was killing the guardia, I observed that her movements slowed down.

She's doing her best for the last two days. Nourishing beverage reduce fatigue and also relieve stress, but it also has side effect. although for a while, It slows down the reaction time. A person becomes normal after sleeping once. Maybe she might not have been able to sleep yesterday.

Still, she pushed me behind and started going to fight him herself. I was worried, so I followed her.

That noble has a whip whose attack power is very high, if he used it, I would block it using the shield and absorb it with the green orb of the shield.

Suddenly a lot of guards started coming inside the basement. If we don't do something about them now, they will cause a lot of problems later.

According to the experience of my previous life, the guards are very weak. But since I can't use any attacks, it'll be very difficult for me to kill the guards.

I ordered Alna to fight the guards, but she didn't listened to me. She got lost in thoughts for a moment.

I thought the noble would use the whip, but he didn't. He started running towards her.

I can't do any damage to him at this level. Which is why, I changed my shield to Knockback shield, strengthen only my feet using magic with multiple casting.

He got close to her and took out his dagger. It was impossible for me to reach there by foot, so I quickly teleported there. I kicked him using all my strength as if my life depends on it.

But looks like I overdid it and he was thrown aback.