My Status as an Assassin Obviously Exceeds the Hero's

I'm late

I woke up that evening.

Crow and Yoru calmed me down when I insisted on going to look for Amelia right away.

“Darkness will only thicken from now on. True, darkness is the Assassin’s domain, but don’t forget it’s the demonic beasts’ territory too.”

“You’re still far from fully recovered. Stay in bed.”

I couldn’t understand why the two of them could stay so calm, and I was frustrated that I couldn’t go to Amelia.

“Why… why can you stay so calm?”

I hit the wall to vent my frustration.

I knew it was taking my anger out on something.

I’d gotten into this state because I’d used shadow magic without thinking ahead, and I knew both of them were unbearably worried about Amelia.

But I couldn’t help lashing out.

“…I’m not calm, master.”

“I am calm, though. ‘dark assassin,’ are you?”

Crow’s flippant answer irritated me, and as I opened my mouth to snap back, something snagged in my throat.

“‘da…re…kuse’?” — I blurted it out in hiragana from shock.

My head was scrambled; I couldn’t make the kanji conversion happen.

Crow looked at me and grinned.

I’d heard his barbs countless times since we met, but I’d never seen a smile that sent such a chill down my spine.

“…That’s the master’s title,” Yoru said.

He said the one thing I most didn’t want to hear.

Is he doing it on purpose?

My friend Kyousuke has a talent for obliviously picking precisely the places people don’t want touched, and maybe Yoru has that trait too.

“Apparently everyone on the hill where people were sheltering saw you annihilate the demonic beasts when you last used shadow magic. For a Yellow-rank adventurer, being given a title so quickly is unprecedented. And the guild’s endorsed it… Well done. They gave you quite a cool name.”

Crow patted my shoulder and left the room.

I buried my head in my hands.

“No way—an assassin getting noticed like that, what the hell.”

“True enough. Though I don’t think the master would be outclassed by other assassins,” Yoru offered as a sort of consolation, but that wasn’t my problem.

…What the hell.

That over-the-top, emo title!

And what even is a title?

I’d never heard of such a thing!!!

There’s a system for this!?

“I absolutely, definitely do not want my classmates to know. Especially Kyousuke and the hero…”

Kyousuke would probably give that blank-faced ‘good for you’ again.

Since he’d truly mean it from the bottom of his heart, it’d be even worse.

As for the hero, he’d probably make a visibly disgusted face.

If I told him the situation, he’d say, “That was unfortunate,” without a doubt.

That would piss me off too, and I could easily imagine the conversation being overheard by girls, getting repeated, and spreading through the whole class.

I sighed, still holding my head.

“…Sigh. Hey Yoru, can’t we change the title to something more tame?”

“It’s not impossible, but every corner of the town is talking about ‘the dark assassin.’ It’ll be hard to retract it now.”

Yoru, not grasping the gravity, tilted his head, not understanding why I resisted the title so fiercely.

“I see. So assassins being conspicuous is okay, huh… Also, my magic is ‘shadow,’ not ‘darkness,’” I said.

My shadow seemed to agree.

Right? You think so too, don’t you?

“From a distance it must have looked like you commanded the darkness. Shadow magic isn’t even recognized as a category. Even if it was shadows, the sky was engulfed in darkness back then, so in a way they’re not wrong.”

Yoru tilted his head, wondering if there was any title that would fit better than “the dark assassin.”

Damn it.

He’d won the argument.

Come to think of it, having shadow-attribute magic and being an assassin already reads like peak emo regardless.

If we return to the other world, shutting these two up will be my top priority.

“…I’ll stay put and sleep for today. But I’m leaving early tomorrow!”

I pulled the blanket over my head out of spite and grew sleepy again.