— — — — — —
Half a month passed in the blink of an eye. During that time, Kazuma had been resting and recovering.
"My arm and leg finally grew back. I was bored out of my mind lying in bed every day."
He stood up, flexing his newly regrown limbs. Not bad at all. Stronger than before, actually.
"Mana capacity's up too. Body's tougher… though the injuries aren't fully healed yet."
A quick check told him what he already suspected: things looked fine on the surface, but the internal damage was still there. External wounds recover quickly. Internal ones take longer, especially after being hit by Damocles's destructive energy.
"What are you doing out of bed? Hey! Back down, back down. Patients need to rest!"
Tohru walked in with a tray of food and immediately panicked when she saw him standing.
"Don't make a fuss. It's just a scratch, not like I'm dying." Kazuma shook his head. Tohru had been glued to his side these past days, more worried about him than he was himself.
"What if something happens! Humans are fragile! What if you get hurt again, or get sick, or— or— just lie down already!"
Tohru had recently learned how to use a smartphone. The first thing she did was look up how to treat injuries.
And everything she found scared her to death. Every symptom online was apparently some kind of fatal illness. Humans were way too delicate.
"Stop reading those scam articles online. Humans aren't that weak. Besides, I'm not normal human to begin with."
He clenched his fist. The air popped from the pressure alone, more than enough proof of how sturdy his body was.
As they talked, Yolda stepped in from outside. "Someone… no, a group of dragons has come to see you."
"Dragons?" Kazuma raised a brow. He didn't know many dragons, and he definitely didn't have a dragon bloodline. So who on earth was looking for him?
"Let's go take a look."
He stepped outside with Tohru and Yolda. The moment they walked out, he spotted more than a dozen dragons circling above.
"Tohru, are these your friends?"
He looked at her. If anyone here knew a bunch of dragons, it would be her.
"Nope. I don't know them." Tohru shook her head. She only had a few friends, and she'd definitely remember these guys. "They're not from the Chaos Faction either."
"Alright, then who are you guys? What do you want from me?"
The dragons shifted in the sky, forming an opening. From behind them emerged… Elma.
"Eh? You want me to explain?"
She hesitated for a moment, then shrank down into her humanoid form and walked up to him.
"We're from the Harmony Faction. We'd like to invite you to join us. We work to preserve peace and… you know… all that."
"And just so you know, we're on the human side. We deliver the gods' messages to humans, and pass human words up to the gods, keeping everything balanced. That's our role."
Elma lifted her chin proudly, clearly pleased with her introduction.
"To hell with your 'Harmony.' You guys are just hypocrites. You preach balance, but all you really do is exploit humans in a more civilized way!"
"Kazuma— don't fall for it. If you join any faction, it should be the Chaos Faction. I'm the Emperor of Demise's daughter, so of course I'm part of the Chaos Faction. And since you're my partner, you're Chaos Faction too."
"Plus, we're super free. No gods telling you what to do. No rules. Just raw strength and living how you want. It's the best faction there is."
Tohru jumped in like a mother hen guarding her food, glaring daggers at Elma.
"Tohru, you're the one spouting nonsense!" Elma puffed up angrily. "Your Chaos Faction is just a bunch of muscle-brained destroyers!"
"What did you say!"
"I said what I said!"
The two glared at each other, foreheads touching, one wrong move away from throwing punches.
"Both of you, calm down. Harmony or Chaos, I'm not joining either. I already have my own faction."
Kazuma looked up at the dragons, completely unbothered, and continued, "My faction is… the Fairy Faction. Want to join?"
He even managed to say it with a straight face.
"Oi, oi, oi! You can't just make a fourth faction out of nowhere! You'll throw everything out of balance! It'll cause huge problems!" Elma ran up to him, dead serious.
"She's right. Any faction outside the big three gets wiped out immediately. It's really dangerous." Tohru rushed over as well, nodding frantically.
"Uh… excuse me."
A soft voice interrupted them.
Kanna walked out of the house, tugged lightly on Kazuma's sleeve, and gazed up at him with sparkling, excited eyes.
"Kanna wants to join the Kanna Faction. Umm... I created it just now. Can Kanna join it?"
"No!" x2
Tohru and Elma shot down her proposal instantly.
"Mmhh… Toru-sama and Elma-sama are mean."
Kanna puffed up like a tiny angry balloon and hid behind Kazuma, refusing to even look at them.
"Starting a Kanna Faction isn't that simple. The impact would be huge, so don't learn bad ideas from Kazuma," Toru scolded her in a stern tone.
"Exactly. There's a reason why only the three major factions exist. Right now the world is in its most stable balance. Even a tiny shift between the three can trigger massive consequences." Elma nodded seriously.
"You two are telling her, so why're you staring at me the whole time? Anyway, I've already made up my mind. I'm not joining any faction."
Kazuma looked at the two who were clearly talking around Kanna while glaring straight at him. He could practically hear the subtext.
"Then how about joining the Spectation?" Lucoa appeared out of nowhere and threw out the offer.
"Nope." Kazuma shot her down without hesitation.
"Oh~ Come on, our Faction—"
"Lucoa, get lost! Your puny Spectation Faction doesn't get to steal our recruit!"
"That's right, Lucoa, scram!"
Toru and Elma teamed up for once and shoved Lucoa out of the way.
After a long round of arguing, persuading, and bickering, Kazuma still refused every invitation. He stubbornly clung to his plan of founding his own Fairy Faction.
"Chaos stands for freedom. Harmony stands for balance. The Spectation stand for non-interference."
"These aren't just slogans. They're survival methods. If you want to create a Fairy Faction, what's your doctrine?"
Just as Toru and Elma started another noisy fight, a dimensional gate opened, and a tiny girl stepped out, asking the question.
"Our doctrine, huh… in my faction, you don't have to follow the Harmony Faction's balance, or the Chaos Faction's battles, or the Observer Faction's non-interference."
"You only have to follow your own path, whatever it is. That's the rule of my guild. So our doctrine is no doctrine." Kazuma smiled.
"What an ambitious and tempting faction," the girl said with interest. "Since you're determined, I won't stop you. I hope our factions can cooperate in the future."
Telne finished speaking, opened another dimensional gate, and left with the Harmony dragons.
"Who was that?" Kazuma asked, watching the loli who was about Kanna's size vanish.
"That was my grandmother. Telne, the Harmony Faction's second-in-command," Elma explained.
But the moment she finished, another gate opened. A small white hand reached out.
"How many times have I told you? Call me big sister, not grandma."
One punch later, Elma was on the ground. The gate closed again.
"Ow… ow… Grandma is so mean…"
Elma rubbed her head. She wasn't acting. Telne might look tiny, but she was infamous for her absurd strength.
Dragons like Toru and Elma would lose their combat ability after taking one hit from her.
"Kazuma, your words are going to spread through the entire dragon world soon. The appearance of a new faction means big changes. And with that will come many problems. Please be careful."
Elma gave her warning seriously before opening her own portal and departing.
"Well, I'm gonna go back to sleep."
Kazuma watched the dragons leave, then turned around and headed inside without a care in the world.
Toru followed him in, leaving only Kanna outside.
"Hmm… hmm hmm hmm."
Kanna stood still for a moment, thinking hard. Then she ran back into the house, grabbed a wooden sign, and wrote two big words on it.
"Kanna Faction!"
Hands on her hips, she looked extremely proud. The next step was recruiting members. She decided her first recruit would be little Beel.
---
While Kazuma enjoyed a peaceful nap, news of the newly born Fairy Faction spread rapidly through the dragon world.
And it stirred up one hell of a commotion.
.
.
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