“Hey, boss, that’s a bit much, isn’t it? Fifty rings gets us the prize pool, but the target can’t even hold five arrows. That’s just cheating, isn’t it?”
The winner had already been decided, but when the two went to claim the prize pool, they ran into another obstacle.
Maybe because good archery could still be trained, the owner of the archery booth was clearly much more indifferent than the respect the previous strength challenge’s owner had shown after being shocked by their performance.
“It says in black and white: fifty rings gets you the prize. If you can’t do it, you don’t get the prize pool. What’s there to complain about?”
The owner kept his head down as he organized bucket after bucket of arrows and bows of various sizes and materials on the rack, shooting back at Tiran without even looking up.
“At least the standard should be reasonable, right? Is anyone really capable of cramming all five arrows into the bullseye? At least one arrow would definitely fall out!”
“Of course someone’s done it. Fifty rings.”
“Seriously? Then tell us how they did it!”
“Heh. Can’t do it? Here.”
The owner clearly had no intention of wasting words. He simply slapped two arrow shafts down on the tabletop.
No—wait. They weren’t two arrow shafts. The two pieces were exactly the same length, and both had been split vertically down the middle, leaving only half their original width. They must’ve belonged to the same arrow.
“One customer split the shaft of the arrow in front of it with their fifth arrow. Fifty rings. If you can do that, I can give you the rest of the prize pool—though, of course, there isn’t much left in it now after that customer took their share.”
“……”
Carrying a deep sense of defeat, the two left the archery booth.
“Seriously, what is going on tonight?! Why does every place have some unknown expert hiding in it?!”
They knew there was always someone better out there, but the owner’s contemptuous laugh had truly stoked Tiran’s competitive spirit. Damn it! She refused to believe they wouldn’t take first place in at least one event tonight!
By this point, the nature of the competition had changed. Although the score was still tied one-to-one, Aya and Tiran were no longer focused on deciding who was better than the other.
“Super Bowling Challenge!”
Unlike the ten bowling pins used under normal rules, challengers could add as many pins as they wanted behind the triangular formation—fifteen, twenty-one, twenty-eight, and so on. Knocking them all down added another layer of pins, and the person in first place on the leaderboard could claim the festival’s grand prize pool on the final day.
“Let’s show him what we’re made of!”
“Yeah! Of course! Smash him to pieces!”
Burning with fury and an overwhelming desire to win, Aya and Tiran threw each ball harder than the last. They even created sonic booms, making everyone worry whether those poor wooden pins could survive such abuse.
However, when the final count was taken, the total number of pins the two of them had completely knocked down only barely exceeded the leaderboard champion’s score.
“Damn it! Again!”
“Super Stone-Skipping Challenge!”
Compared with ordinary stone skipping using flat rocks, this version not only took place on a sea with rolling waves, but also used polished, rounder, raised ellipsoidal stones, making it even more difficult.
This time, Aya not only stacked a pile of strength-boosting buffs on herself, she even concealed her right arm beneath her clothes and used partial dragonification and aura-scale release. She hurled the tiny stone with the force of a super-electromagnetic cannon, smashing even the waves apart.
But there was one problem…
Her angle seemed to be a little off. The “shell” blasted straight into the seafloor…
Neither Aya nor Tiran seemed to be particularly good at skipping stones. Even with superhuman strength as a foundation, the power needed to skip an elliptical stone wasn’t something that could produce a miracle through brute force alone.
“Again!!”
“Super Chili Pepper Challenge!”
“Huh? Wait a second… chili peppers?”
This one involved… eating the most chili peppers possible within one minute…
“My tongue… I can’t feel my tongue anymore…”
By the pool, Aya kept sobbing and rinsing out her mouth. She felt as if her entire face had swollen up.
“A-again! We can’t give up!”
“Ohhhhhhh!!!”
……
Another hour later.
The bells of midnight were about to ring, and the crowds at the festival had gradually begun to thin. At last, closing time was almost here.
“Da~ da-da-da~ da~”
Mmm-hmm. Festivals were such wonderful civilizations. There was good food, fun things to do, and fireworks to watch.
The little Angel was still full of enthusiasm. She opened another bag of freshly bought roasted squid strips and shared them bite by bite with Chirp when she suddenly spotted Aya and Tiran supporting each other as they made their way over.
“Whoa! S-Senior Aya and the witch… no, Tiran—why do you two look like this?”
“Dad! Mom! Are you okay?! (;≧Д≦)y”
Their concern was justified. Aya and Tiran now looked as if they had just endured a long, hundred-year war—not in the sense of torn clothes or anything like that, but in the feeling conveyed by their eyes and expressions.
It was the kind of despair Germany felt after fighting for nearly a year at Verdun in World War I, paying a terrible price, and still losing in the end.
“N-no, we’re fine! What’s a minor defeat worth mentioning?! We’re definitely going to beat that festival-game demon king today!” Aya panted heavily.
“I’m the Second Princess of Milanía! These little injuries are nothing! Don’t stop now!”
Chirp, Little Angel: 0 x 0
“So? Are there any challenges left?!”
“I think there’s one more—the l-last one.”
Aya lowered her head and checked the list they had compiled. A string of black-ink entries for the festival games had already been crossed out in red, leaving only the final line.
“Ultimate Goldfish-Scooping Challenge!”
“Huh? Why is this the only one called ‘ultimate’?” Aya wondered.
With that question in mind, the two stood on the sea embankment, each holding the paper net the vendor had given them for scooping goldfish.
The next second, the seawater on the left suddenly began to churn. Amid the white spray, a gigantic fish, fully as long as a person, leaped into the air. Its damn bulging fish eyes seemed to be mocking them.
The Adamant Ironclad King Carp, or Goldfish for short, was a type of magical beast. Incidentally, it could evolve into the Adamant Ironclad King Carp Gyarados.
“There’s no way you could scoop this thing up with a paper net! Rnm, give us our money back!”
“Wait, aren’t carp freshwater fish? How does it live in seawater?”
Was that really the important part here?
As expected, they failed to scoop it up in the end. Instead, they got drenched in seawater and would have to take another bath afterward.
“Damn it! If we weren’t forbidden from handling it directly, that thing would’ve made excellent sashimi!”
Aya was unusually frenzied, her hair dripping wet.
“Forget that. I’m more curious about how that festival-game demon king managed to scoop up something that lively.”
Tiran sighed as if she had already lain down and admitted defeat. “This is truly a matter of inferior skill.”
“True enough. His control over his strength must’ve been incredibly precise. Let’s ask the owner about it later.”
However, when they looked at the records…
Successful challengers: 0
“……”
“……”
“That bastard didn’t participate in this event of all things?!!!!”
