My Status as an Assassin Obviously Exceeds the Hero's

Thank you all for waiting so long!

The novel has been released safely, the end-of-year exams (nightmare) are over, and now I can update steadily!

“So? If the ultimate goal is to defeat the demon king, what are we going to do next?”

The hero party, who had been staying in the Human race’s continent, Yamato Country, was finally getting ready to move.

“…From what I’ve heard, the previous hero party was wiped out by the Demon Clan and demonic beasts before they could reach the demon king. Only the hero and the Beastmen representative survived.”

That was roughly a hundred years ago.

The previous hero couldn’t avenge that defeat and died of old age.

The current demon king should be the same as the demon king back then, but no one really knows how long members of the Demon Clan live.

“That just means not only the demon king but his subordinates are strong too, right?”

I nodded at Shiori Hosoyama’s words.

“We don’t know exactly how strong the previous hero party was, but there’s no doubt skilled fighters were gathered from the three continents.”

“They were definitely stronger than us now.”

Asahina-kun, who had been listening quietly, muttered that.

For the past few days we’d been registered at the Adventurer Guild and taking jobs.

Then again, Yamato has no labyrinths, so the available requests are limited and few adventurers stop by, meaning there were heaps of demon-slaying requests against weak demonic beasts that non-combat civilians couldn’t handle.

We split them up and cleared them one by one, finally getting a breather.

But there didn’t seem to be any demonic beasts around here with power enough to put us in danger like that Minotaur did.

To be frank, compared to Saran-san or Mr. Zeal, these fights were underwhelming.

They were about the same level as monsters from the upper layers of the Cantinen Labyrinth.

“Still, we can’t neglect the basics,” Ueno-san said, folding his arms and frowning.

Looking around, everyone except Asahina-kun and me had their arms crossed, deep in thought.

“Our adventurer rank just rose to yellow today. Probably because there are no labyrinths, the monsters here are way too low level to be a real challenge. …So there’s only one thing to do, right?”

While basics are important, there’s plenty to learn even if we leave here.

“I’ll start missing Japanese food again.”

“Well, Tsuda will do his best there.”

“Me again?”

Tomoya Tsuda, the party’s cook, grumbled.

The two girls technically also had cooking skills, but Tsuda, who handles most of the cooking at home, had the highest skill level and the best results, so despite being a knight his role in the group was like the mother of the members.

By the way, the remaining member of the hero party is Daisuke Waki, whose recent catchphrase is “I’m glad to be alive.”

His job is tamer.

Right now he’s been taming a small monkey-like creature he met in the forest and a stray cat he found in town.

He’s generally a lighthearted guy.

It’s strange how his presence makes even serious conversations lose their seriousness.

Apparently he’s the eldest son in his family.

Demonic beasts can’t usually be tamed because they don’t understand human communication.

Every few centuries someone appears known as “the one who commands demonic beasts” who names and keeps a demon, but it’s odd that anyone would want to keep creatures that only harm humans.

“Just so you know, I can only make things I’ve actually cooked before, okay? And we have fewer seasonings here than back home, so the range of dishes I can make is limited.”

Tsuda, the party’s shield, cook, and youngest member, puckered his lips, and Nanase-kun patted his shoulder.

Rintaro Nanase’s ability to get along even with that eccentric Akira shows he’s very good at communication.

Legend has it he once had a lively conversation about anime with the almost-silent Asahina-kun.

In the party he’s more like the second son.

“Well, that just means Tomoya’s cooking’s really good. I know making Japanese food from local ingredients here is hard, but could you try making the seasoning taste more Japanese?”