Leopin did not get angry.
Even with the schemes of those cruel, scheming people turned on him, he just kept running.
"I never liked marathons, but running like this is actually pretty fun."
He said it with a smile, cutting through the wind. It was a fresh sight. Behind him, the screams did not stop.
The boys were rolled along the ground, coated in dust, crying out.
"S-stop, stop! Please stop!"
"F-forgive us already, Leopin-kun! No, Lord Leopin!"
"We're gonna die like this! We're gonna die!"
He had real earplugs in, so the voices never reached him. The rope tying them together had a Weight Ignore effect, so no matter how they were dragged, none of it came through to Leopin.
The boys braced like dogs that did not want to go home from a walk, and dug in like cats that did not want to go to the vet. None of it meant anything against a run like a bolting horse.
Leopin had completely forgotten the classmates he was hauling behind him, dried out like persimmons, and kept running.
He crossed jagged wasteland like a file, jumped stream after stream, left prints in the sand, and hopped the stepping stones through a marsh. When he entered an unfamiliar forest, he felt a small resistance at his waist.
Only then did he slow down and look back.
The first time I looked behind me in hours, my heart jumped. The sight was straight out of a horror scene.
Mr. Nickbacca and the boys had turned into mud dolls. They were reaching out, like something trying to drag me into a bog.
I would not have noticed if someone's body had not gotten caught on a tree by chance. I pulled out my earplugs and crouched beside the mud-daruma of a man.
"Are you all right, Mr. Nickbacca!?"
Mr. Nickbacca spoke in a voice that was almost gone.
"Ugh... ugh... The Hell Marathon... this is... the end..."
"Huh? But we were supposed to keep going until the last person went down. I can still run, you know?"
Mr. Nickbacca flinched, frightened. As if those were forbidden words, he covered his face and burst out crying.
"Ugh, uugh...! D-don't run...! P-please, no more running...!"
I felt like a marathon runner who had just been told he had a serious illness, and that another step would shorten what he had left. If he was going to say that, I could not keep running.
I untied the rope at my waist and tried to take the mud dolls by the hand and get them up. They collapsed in a heap at once, like newborn fawns.
They had done a real number on their legs. The boys stayed on all fours and sobbed it out.
"Ugh... ugh...! It was supposed to be... it was supposed to be him like this...!"
"Hic, gulp! Why, why is it us...!"
"Waaaaah!"
In the end every one of them was crying, and I was at a loss.
"Hmm. Then I'll run ahead a bit and call for help."
The mud dolls clung to my legs at once. "Don't go!"
"You're planning to leave us and go back alone, aren't you!?"
"That's awful! We ended up like this because of you, Leopin!"
"Take responsibility! Get us home in one piece!"
"Yeah, yeah! If you don't, we'll tell the vice principal!"
The mud dolls closed ranks and blamed me. I thought about leaving them and going home, then something occurred to me.
"Right. A distress signal. If I use that, I can call for help."
I went for my pocket and only then realized I was not wearing my coat.
"Damn. I left my distress signal with the coat."
I asked the group.
"Hey, does anybody have a distress signal?"
The mud-doll students shook their heads. "No way. We're in gym clothes." Then the big mud doll raised a hand. "Then I have one!"
Mr. Nickbacca fumbled in his jersey pocket and pulled out a grimy red tube.
"Because of you, celebrity kid, I hurt my arm, and I can't raise it. Take responsibility and launch it yourself."
The way he said it snagged, but I took the distress signal without arguing.
"Yeah, all right. There are trees overhead here, so it might catch. I'll launch it outside the forest."
I left the mud dolls and headed for the edge of the woods. I held the red tube up toward a sky already going dark.
Then a line from the vice principal came back to me.
"Oh, just so you know, zamasu, it is useless to launch someone else's distress signal on your own and try to drop their rank, zamasu! To prevent fraud, the magic device checks not only the name the firework writes, but also the face of the person who launched it, zamasu! Help comes only if it is judged not to be a prank, zamasu! Also, the size of the rescue team and how fast they arrive depend on the rank of the student who launched it, zamasu! If you want help in a hurry, use a high-rank student's distress signal, zamasu!"
"If I launch it, Special Training Class and all, maybe help won't even come..."
I muttered that and started back, but the mud dolls deep in the woods were sitting in a circle, whispering. Now and then they glanced my way.
That felt wrong. I activated Skillful Body from Jack of All Trades, raised my Five Senses, and listened in.
"Mr. Nickbacca, the real plan was to drag that trash around, half kill him, then leave him in this forest, right?"
"That was the plan. The Avoidance magic does not reach the woods out here at all. And at night, monsters come out in swarms."
"I see. So that's why you picked a fight and made him take off the coat that looked like it had gear in it!"
"Exactly. Then, when we left him, we would hand him that rigged distress signal and say goodbye..."
"Killed by a monster, or he quits the academy. One or the other, right!"
"Wahaha! Either way, hell for that trash!"
"The plan changed a little, but this makes it certain he leaves the academy!"
"No way..." I thought, and class-changed to Appraiser. I appraised the red tube in my hand with the Appraise skill.
Distress Signal
Quantity: 1
Quality Level: 3 (Material Level 8 + Job Penalty 5)
A set-piece firework made by mixing gunpowder. When launched, it writes a message in the sky.
The message reads:
"Please, save me! I was an idiot to defy the vice principal! I'll quit the academy, so please save me! Sincerely, Leopin"
"So that was it...!"
It all fit.
The moment I launched this firework, help would come. After that, they would use the message as leverage and push me to withdraw on my own.
Thinking it through that far left me feeling hollow.
"...I could just leave them and go home. After all this, I don't owe them a rescue. Ugh. But I don't want them dying out here either..."
I thought for a while, then a good idea hit me.
"Didn't think this would come in handy out here...!"
Job: Ninja → Fireworker
Job Skills
Make Toy Fireworks
Create toy fireworks.
Make Launch Fireworks
Create launch fireworks.
Make Set-Piece Fireworks
Create set-piece fireworks.
With Make Set-Piece Fireworks, I tweaked the powder mix in the distress signal I was holding. Then I went back to the mud dolls and tossed the red tube to the boss.
"I rewrote the name on the distress signal to Mr. Nickbacca. Well, I'm off."
I raised a hand and hurried back toward the edge of the forest.