Chapter 5: Daily Quest, Rozz Is Different! (Patreon)

Hephaestus's weapon shop.

Back at her best friend's home, continuing her life as a freeloader, Hestia couldn't wait to shut herself in her room to study the brand-new feature.

"Daily Quest"

Perfect!

Just thinking about how she could get more involved in nurturing her Familia member filled the little goddess with nervous anticipation.

Hestia lounged lazily on the single-seat sofa.

Gone was the mature facade she deliberately put on during the day — she sat with her legs crossed, utterly unladylike, toes hooked lightly around her slipper.

The arch of her foot curved in a perfect line.

Not a single blemish marred her fair skin, and her round, plump toes looked as sweet as ripe, juicy grapes.

"So..."

"...what exactly is this Daily Quest?"

"Rozz, newly turned Adventurer with no combat experience whatsoever, feels lost about the Dungeon exploration to come."

"Quest Requirement:"

"Player, please train the character Rozz in combat. Completing the training has a chance to raise the character's potential."

"?"

The Daily Quest's requirement was simple enough.

After all — the Dungeon was a dangerous place. One misstep from a rookie Adventurer, and they could end up dead at a monster's hands.

The logic made sense!

Hestia understood all of that just fine. What gave her a headache was the requirement itself — when it came to being a lazybones, she considered herself something of an authority.

But, how exactly was she supposed to train Rozz in combat?

...

She'd hit a wall.

Out of habit, Hestia's first instinct was to just give up and let things slide. But then she remembered — completing the training quest had a chance to raise... Rozz's overall Adventurer potential.

She suddenly felt like she really ought to put in some effort!

Of course, that meant putting effort into finding a friend to help!

Demeter?

No, that definitely wouldn't work — her Familia in Orario ran an agricultural operation.

Hephaestus was even more out of the question — she'd already lent Hestia a good deal of money, and Rozz's future exploration gear would need to be mooched off her too.

After much deliberation, the little goddess thought of a friend she'd known back in the heavens — she'd even spotted them working part-time at a fried-potato-ball stand not long ago.

Takemikazuchi, the God of Martial Arts.

As the deity who presided over martial arts, surely he'd have no trouble guiding Rozz and helping him grasp the basics of combat?

"Yeah... that's exactly what I should do!"

Best of all, Hestia was confident that, given her relationship with Takemikazuchi, and with Rozz being her very first Familia member, he'd never refuse her.

With that thought, the goddess sprang up off the sofa and set off at once, still in her slippers. But just as she was leaving the room to go find Takemikazuchi,

she ran straight into Hephaestus, who happened to be looking for her.

As much of a headache as Hestia gave her, Hephaestus still always made a point of coming by at mealtimes to remind her: "Food's almost ready."

"Ah..."

Hestia stopped in her tracks.

But compared to eating, finishing the Daily Quest clearly mattered more: "Just save me some, I've got an errand to run."

"Hm?"

"I'm going to see Takemikazuchi. Rozz just became an Adventurer, and since he doesn't have any combat skills, I figured I'd find him a master for some special training."

"That'll definitely help him down the line, when he starts exploring!"

...

Recruiting a Familia member and offering what help she could —

As far as Hephaestus was concerned, that alone would've made Hestia a perfectly adequate goddess. And yet here she was, going out of her way to find Rozz a martial arts teacher.

Honestly...

Why did it feel like this woman was being a little too enthusiastic?

"Hestia, do you really need to go this far..."

"Rozz is the only one in my Familia. If everything depends on him alone... I think it'll be really rough for him," the goddess answered without a moment's hesitation.

Especially since, when Hestia remembered the game called the Hero Cloud-Raising Plan, she looked up to meet her best friend's deeply puzzled gaze.

"And besides, I think..."

"Rozz is different from other Adventurers!!"

...?

Hearing that, Hephaestus felt an odd sense of déjà vu — it reminded her of something, back in the heavens, when a certain god had been courting Freya.

That guy had said almost the exact same thing.

'Freya's a good girl. She's different.'

—

Living off someone else without a shred of guilt?

Rozz wasn't quite shameless enough for that. After a simple dinner of fried potato balls, he washed up and lay down on the wooden plank bed in his dormitory room.

He thought back over everything that had happened today.

Even now, he still hadn't adjusted to the shift from "corporate slave" to "Adventurer" — to put it simply, his brain was still reeling.

If he had to name his biggest regret —

it was that before he transmigrated, he never finished watching DanMachi, so now he had no clue about the key characters or the plot.

Otherwise, with the god's-eye view from having watched it, he'd at least not be as lost as he was now.

"Damn it."

"Being an Adventurer means fighting in the Dungeon, huh. One wrong move and... I could probably end up dead, my life handed over to some monster."

Before he transmigrated,

if there was anything resembling real combat, it was probably the epic online pile-ons against internet lunatics.

But in reality, Rozz had never been in an actual fight — if he had to name something close, it'd be the handful of hardcore action games he'd played.

It was such a headache!

Transmigrating into a world of superhuman powers and becoming an Adventurer hadn't solved his real-world problems at all.

If anything, he was now stuck between a rock and a hard place on both fronts.

Give up?

That would be a slap in the face to all the help Hestia had given him, and more importantly, Rozz wanted to change how he lived in this new world.

So, he'd keep being an Adventurer.

Which meant gear, how to fight monsters, and how to explore the Dungeon were all problems he'd need to overcome.

"Well, since things have come to this,"

"I might as well sleep on it... worst case, I'll look for a rookie party that needs members, get used to things slowly. I'll find my footing eventually."

After a whole day of running around exhausted, drowsiness swept over him, and once he set his scattered thoughts aside, Rozz drifted off to sleep — until the door to his room opened again.

The air filled with the smell of fried potato balls.

Rozz slowly opened his eyes. Outside the window, the sky had only just begun to lighten, yet footsteps and voices of Adventurers already echoed in the hallway.

Remembering his situation, it seemed he had no excuse to be a lazy bum, did he?

But just as he was about to get up, he noticed the goddess standing in his room — wearing a white dress, cradling fried potato balls in her hands.

Hestia.

The smile on her face was as bright and lively as ever, with none of the distance you'd expect from someone who was, technically, a goddess.

It was like — a Petite mom trying hard to act mature?

"Good morning!"

"Rozz."

"I figured you probably don't have any combat experience since you just got to Orario, so today I'm taking you to see Takemikazuchi, the God of Martial Arts. He'll teach you some skills."

...

Honestly, Rozz suddenly felt that calling Hestia "Mom" yesterday now seemed, looking back, like a pretty deliberate choice on his part.

"Affection +2."