Later on, Takaroo heads back to the blacksmith with a handful of materials and asks if they’re good enough for the special pair of scissors he wants. The blacksmith, still drowning in guilt from the mountain of illre Takaroo brought him last time, swears he’ll craft the perfect pair of scissors — the kind that could probably cut through destiny itself.
Takaroo happily accepts his enthusiasm and leaves the shop. Outside, he finds Puny waiting for him, along with Grit from the guild. Grit apparently has something important to discuss, so they all head to the guild together.
There, Grit explains that a festival is coming up, and one of its events is a gathering contest. He was hoping Takaroo would join. Takaroo admits the idea sounds interesting… but competitive gathering? Not quite his life’s ambition. So he asks why Grit bothered coming personally to recruit him.
That’s when Grit reveals the surprising part: this is actually a personal request from the Lord of Belim, Lord Belminant. The contest is held under Belminant’s patronage, and for some mysterious reason, he specifically asked the guild to make sure Takaroo participates.
Since turning down a lord tends to be bad for one’s lifespan, Takaroo reluctantly agrees.
A few days later, the contest finally begins. All participants gather outside a shop, excited to hear what item they’ll be hunting down. They’re told that this year’s target is something special: in celebration of Lord Belminant’s wife’s miraculous recovery, the contestants must bring back wool from the rare Seven-Colored Sheep.
This immediately catches Takaroo’s attention — mostly because he’s never heard of such a sheep and suspects this is going to be one of those “sounds cute, is actually terrifying” situations.
There are no restrictions on rank or skill, and the first person to obtain the wool will be crowned the winner.
Since teaming up is banned for the contest, everyone has to rely purely on their own gathering skills. If you want transportation, you either rent a horse or squeeze into a shared carriage. Pony is devastated because this means Takeru isn’t allowed to ride her, and honestly, she takes it more personally than she should.
With teamwork off the table, Craystone asks Takeru what he plans to do, since he could finish the whole thing in thirty minutes using his Gate Spell. But Takeru, being annoyingly fair, refuses to cheat… even though he technically invented the shortcut.
When the star horn sounds, Takeru tells Bee to wait with the others and immediately sprints off like he’s late for a sale. He heads straight to the library, finds out that the rainbow-colored sheep live in the Tokurana Mountains, and rushes there.
He reaches the base quickly, but the magical sheep live all the way at the summit — because of course they do. As he climbs, he finally realizes how lonely it is without Bee constantly buzzing beside him. Once he reaches a grassy area, he spots a flock of seven-colored sheep, but his Scan informs him that they are ridiculously fast and extremely hard to catch.
So now, Takeru stands there wondering: What’s the best way to nab a rainbow sheep without looking like an idiot?
Takeru then realizes something obvious: he only needs the wool, not the whole sheep. So instead of trying to catch the rainbow track-stars, he claps loudly to get their attention and politely asks if he can borrow some fur. Surprisingly, the sheep are totally cool with it. They gather around him like he’s running a magical barber shop, and he snips a little wool from each one.
A short while later, he has everything he needs — and honestly, he’s shocked by how easy it was. But hey, an early day is an early day.
When he returns to town, Bee practically tackles him with joy. After he presents the wool, Takeru is declared the winner of the gathering contest. Though calling it a “contest” might be generous considering how effortlessly he won.
Later, Takeru is summoned by the guild master, who wants to discuss granting him the mysterious FB Rank. Takeru, confused, asks what that even means. The guild master explains that FB Rank lets him accept jobs from F to B Rank without paying the usual B-rank base fee.
Takeru is thrilled — it means he can rank up while still helping customers for his usual bargain-bin prices. But the guild master warns him: if he performs too well, they’ll have to increase his pay.
And Takeru looks genuinely distressed… because apparently getting paid fairly is his mortal enemy.
The guild master tells Takeru he really needs to stop flooding the market with rare items at bargain-bin prices. Even his friends feel guilty paying him low-rank fees when he’s clearly operating on “secret final boss” level.
Takeru has always tried to blend in and avoid drawing attention ever since arriving in this world, but he never realized everyone around him already saw him as some kind of walking miracle machine.
Klay tells him not to overthink it, while Puny bluntly asks why he insists on pretending to be average when he’s literally packed with divine blessings and cheat-level powers. When she puts it like that, even Takeru has to admit the “I’m normal, really!” act is getting a bit silly — so he accepts the promotion.
The guild master gives him a shiny new armband, officially making him FB-Rank.
Just then, Arianna bursts into the room with terrible news: a giant worm has been spotted in the forest and is slithering straight toward the city. Ordinary adventurers can’t handle that thing, so the guild master turns to Takeru and his party for help.
They rush to the forest edge — only to discover the worm is way bigger than they expected. Like “this is no side-quest boss, this is DLC content” big.
Dealing with the giant worm would be a nightmare if it turned hostile — but before anyone can panic, a familiar voice suddenly echoes from the top of the monster. To everyone’s shock, Brolite is happily riding the worm like it’s her personal limousine. She’s thrilled to see Takeru, claiming she’s been searching for him everywhere… and of course, she’s completely covered in dirt again.
Before she can get within “contamination range,” Takeru fires off cleaning magic like a panicked mom wiping mud off a toddler. Once she’s sparkling clean, he finally asks why she’s here — and why she brought a massive nightmare beast with her.
Brolite proudly explains that she wanted to repay the debt she owes him. She remembered Takeru mentioning he wanted a horse for travel… so naturally, she brought Kerasus, the giant worm. Because in her mind, “horse” apparently means “any giant creature you can sit on.”
Takeru appreciates the thought but absolutely refuses. He instantly cleans the worm too (because why not), then politely-but-desperately tells Brolite he does not need a worm. After all, he has Puny, the “best horse in the world” — according to Puny herself.
Brolite is understandably confused about why Puny — a sacred beast — keeps calling herself a horse, but Takeru promises to explain later.
They return to town and head to a bar, where Takeru fills her in on everything that happened: forming a party with Klay, curing Militia, saving a village, and how Puny joined the team. Brolite finds the whole story fascinating.
And then, with bright eyes and zero hesitation, she asks Takeru if she can join his party too.
Takeru happily agrees, since he was planning to ask Brolite to join the party anyway. Brolite is thrilled, explaining that she’s been training like a maniac to make sure she wouldn’t just be luggage with legs once she joined. She proudly reveals a golden armband showing she reached A-Rank, something she worked very hard for—probably harder than Takeru ever works when he’s pretending to be “average.”
Then, out of nowhere, she asks if Takeru can do her a little favor. He casually says he’s always happy to help… only for Brolite to drop a bomb: she needs help finding her missing sister. Takeru freezes, because he definitely wasn’t expecting something that serious.
Brolite’s sister, Ludakara, recently ran away from home after being chosen to bear the next generation of tribe leaders. She was supposed to marry an elf clansman and produce an heir—yup, very traditional, very old-school, and very “no thank you,” apparently, because she bailed on the whole tribe.
This is already a lot for Takeru to take in, but Brolite continues. Ludakara didn’t like the guy she was supposed to marry, so she made one condition: she would only marry him if he presented her with a white Pegasus. So Brolite, being the overly loyal sister she is, actually went out to get one. But by the time she returned, Ludakara had already disappeared.
Brolite knows she can’t find her sister alone, but she does know that Takeru is basically a cheat-code in human form, so she asks for his help. Takeru agrees, but wonders if it’s really okay to bring Ludakara back when she clearly ran away for a reason. Brolite clarifies that she isn’t trying to drag her home—she just wants to know why her sister vanished without telling her anything.
Hearing that, Takeru promises to help as much as he can, and the rest of the party immediately agrees. Once they finish eating, the group heads toward the elf tribe. Of course, none of them have ever visited the elf village before, so they’re basically wandering blind. Fortunately, Brolite explains there’s a hidden path deep inside the forest. She can’t go into the details because it’s elf-only knowledge, but the shortcut works through a type of spatial magic.
Naturally, the mention of spatial magic makes Takeru perk up, and he begins wondering if it’s anything like the gate spell he recently invented—for “average person” reasons, of course.
Brolite’s light guides everyone deep into the forest until they reach an old tree stump. She mutters a small prayer, and suddenly a swirling vortex appears. She calmly explains that they just have to stick their hands inside, close their eyes, and poof — they’ll be transported straight to the elf tribe.
Of course, when she demonstrates it, Takeru immediately hesitates because it looks like the kind of portal that eats people for breakfast. But his friends aren’t bothered at all and walk straight through like it’s a revolving door. Eventually, Takeru forces himself to follow.
Once he pops out the other side, he realizes something horrifying: his friends are nowhere to be seen. Before he can panic, Klay shouts for him to get down because they’re under attack. A volley of arrows comes flying toward them, and at this rate, someone is definitely going to end up looking like a pincushion.
Takeru quickly casts a shield to protect everyone, still confused about why they’re suddenly being shot at. Then Brolite notices the arrowheads — they match the ones from her village. A moment later, a group of elven soldiers emerges from the trees, surrounding them. And judging by the looks on their faces, they are not happy to see Brolite. At all.
