Isekai Tensei: Recruited to Another World Volume 9 E-Book

Kenichi

• Herausgeber: J-Novel Club
• Kategorie: Gesellschafts- und Liebesromane
• Serie: Isekai Tensei: Recruited to Another World
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 350

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2024

Beschreibung

Three years have passed since Tenma’s last adventure, and life in the capital has become routine for him and his companions. As one of the kingdom’s most esteemed adventurers, Tenma is renowned far and wide. But trouble brews when Margrave Haust, with whom Tenma shares a tense history due to the events in Kukuri Village, requests his help to defeat a rampaging swarm of wyverns. Driven by his friendship with Leon and a desire to mend old rifts, he agrees to take on the mission. As he sets out to confront the deadly creatures, however, he quickly realizes that these creatures are merely the beginning of a much larger, more dangerous ordeal. Tenma’s next journey will not only test his strength, but also force him to confront the shadows of his past.

Leseprobe

Table of Contents

Cover

Chapter 9

Extra Story: How Amy and Eliza Met

Extra Story: The Birth of a Golem Squadron

Extra Story: Kriss’s Ambition

Afterword

Color Illustrations

About J-Novel Club

Copyright

Landmarks

Color Images

Table of Contents

Chapter Nine

Part One

“I can’t believe it’s already been three years since this kid was born...” I muttered as I watched the child with tiger ears. They were absorbed in a picture book in the mansion’s library.

“Hmm?”

“Nothing. It’s snack time, so you should go see your mom.”

“Okay!” the child answered cheerfully. They left the book open on the desk before running away.

I put the book back and then headed to the dining room for snack time.

When I got there, the child was already seated and munching away with their mother sitting in the next seat. Shiromaru and Solomon were begging for treats as usual and several other chairs were also filled.

However, someone came running into the dining room to disrupt this peaceful moment.

“Yoshitsune! Did you read a book all by yourself?!”

The intruder was Blanca, the tiger-eared child’s father. Although his face was usually so scary that he could make a grown man cry, that expression had been replaced with a broad smile. He took a few steps toward his son, but as soon as Yoshitsune saw his face, the boy let out a strange noise and quickly threw his arms around his mother.

“There, there. It’s nothing to be scared of. I know his face is scary, but that’s all,” Sana said for some reason as she patted Yoshitsune’s back.

Yoshitsune had tears in his eyes but looked like he was doing his best to suppress them. Meanwhile, Blanca looked deeply depressed by the fact that his smile had brought his own son to tears.

“This always happens. Either you need to get used to it, or just start wearing a mask all the time, Blanca!” Amur said as she pointed to him. She was sitting across from Yoshitsune, stuffing her face full of snacks.

While Amur yelled at Blanca, Yoshitsune left his mother’s arms and escaped. He ran behind me to put more distance between himself and his father.

Amur thought that was hilarious. “Pfft!”

However, Blanca stood up uneasily and approached her. Amur’s attention was focused on Yoshitsune so she didn’t notice, but then...

“Arghhh!”

Blanca firmly grabbed her finger, which had still been pointed at him, and bent it in the other direction. Her finger joint was locked in his painful grip while she frantically smacked the table and screamed.

“That’s exactly why Yoshitsune reacts like that to you,” Sana said, her tone filled with exasperation at Blanca’s behavior.

Blanca suddenly realized what he’d done and looked over at Yoshitsune, but it was already too late. The tiger cub was retreating to the corner of the room, putting even more distance between them.

“No, Yoshitsune! It’s not like that!” Blanca protested although it wasn’t clear exactly what he was trying to deny. He made a desperate attempt to clear up the misunderstanding, but Sana quickly caught him before he could get any closer to his son.

“Go outside for a while,” she said.

“O-Okay,” Blanca stammered, looking dejected as Sana kicked him out of the dining room.

Once Yoshitsune was absolutely sure his father was gone, he cautiously moved closer to his mother. Amur tried to laugh despite the pain in her finger, but her forced smile only made her look creepy.

Yoshitsune returned to his seat and focused on his snacks again at last, seemingly forgetting all about Blanca.

The boy had been born the year after I won the tournament. He didn’t resemble Amur or the others, not even Sana or Hana. And much to Amur’s relief, he didn’t resemble Blanca either. That was something she often pointed out, which led Blanca to answer her with his fists. Hana would comment on that the most after Amur. According to the two of them, Yoshitsune took after Amur’s grandfather Crow—Sana and Hana’s father. Although Crow had been the biological son of Grampy Kei (the Bandit King), he had taken after his mother instead. She had been a calm and gentle person in both appearance and temperament.

Incidentally, I was the one who had named Yoshitsune. The reason was that the baby had just been born when I went to pick up Blanca and the others from the SAR to bring them all to the capital. Neither Blanca nor Sana could agree on a name, so I had participated in the discussion about it with everyone. The suggestions kept getting more and more ridiculous. Most of them had been Amur’s ideas, of course. Eventually, Sana had said, “He looks like my father, so maybe we can name him something related to him.”

The first name that came to mind was Yoshitsune. That was because the name Crow sounded like the Japanese word “kurou,” which meant “to suffer,” and I thought this baby should have a name with the opposite meaning.

I had casually muttered the name and Sana overheard me. Before I knew it, it had become a candidate. They’d asked why I had chosen it, and I told them that Yoshitsune was associated with good fortune, and I wanted this child to always have good things happen to them. In the end, Hana, Sana, and Blanca had all agreed that Yoshitsune should become the child’s name.

The reason the three of them had agreed was because Crow hadn’t done martial arts like Grampy Kei had. From an outsider’s perspective, Grampy Kei had been seen as a total warrior due to his physique and reputation, although apparently, he had been more than capable of handling clerical work as well. But Crow had struggled to unite the family because he had constantly been compared to Kei.

But once he had established and governed the city of Nanao, his whole family came to appreciate him and no one underestimated him again. So, Hana, Sana, and Blanca thought that naming Crow’s great-grandchild something associated with him would be fitting because of the resemblance. At that point, Honorary Viscount Lobo had been quickly deemed irrelevant and was kicked out of the meeting, along with Amur since she had only been suggesting joke names at that point.

Yoshitsune had heard that story from Sana and the others many times, so maybe that’s why he was so attached to me. On the other hand, he seemed to have a bit of a complex about his real father, Blanca. Maybe he just found him scary. I had a feeling it stemmed from the martial arts tournament that was held every year in the capital, as that was something Yoshitsune had watched ever since he had been born.

The year of Yoshitsune’s birth, Blanca had come in second in the individual, pairs, and team competition. He had partnered with Amur for the pairs event and had competed with the top-ranked SAR warriors in the team event.

Under normal circumstances, he should’ve won at least one of those competitions. However, that year, I had taken first place in the individual event, Gramps and I had won the pair event, and our team Oracion—which had included Gramps and Amur—had been the favorite and won the team event. The polls had suggested that Blanca would come in second in all of those events, and that was exactly what had happened.

The following year, Blanca had placed third in the individual competition and second in the pairs event. He hadn’t participated in the team event.

I couldn’t participate in the pairs competition this year, so Blanca and Amur had been the favorites to win. They hadn’t even made it to the finals. Instead, Blanca had come in third place in the individual event again, and his team with SAR warriors had ended in third place.

The reason Yoshitsune was so scared, however, was because of the way Blanca fought.

He’d always been a hot-blooded fighter who loved combat. But being determined to impress Yoshitsune, Blanca would get even more fired up during the tournaments.

He radiated such an intense aura that it could make his opponents lose their will to fight before the match even began. His matches were brutally one-sided, leaving little room for sympathy for his opponents, in both the pair and team competitions.

Blanca was probably the most recognizable figure in the tournaments but not in a good way. It was all because of the fear he would spread. But despite his fierce performances, he lost to me in every final.

The matches had been close, but they always ended in a complete defeat for him. He’d lost to me three times in a row.

The following year, Blanca’s losses had still stung. He had entered the tournament again only to face me in the individual semifinals, where I had beaten him. He and his partner had faced off against Gramps and me again in the finals only to lose once more. His team hadn’t even made it to the team competition due to the other members not being able to participate.

This year, however, Blanca had another shot at victory since I hadn’t competed in the pairs competition. That hadn’t been because I wanted to give him a chance though—Gramps had suffered a sudden back injury right before the preliminaries. Since there had been only a few minutes left before the match began, it was too late for me to switch partners, so I’d had no choice but to withdraw. This had led to a flood of complaints to the tournament organizers and they even reached the royal family. The king and the archduke in particular had directed many snide remarks about Gramps.

Blanca had ended up losing in the semifinals to a knight who had worn stark black armor. The knight had been the talk of the town ever since the preliminaries due to his mysterious fighting style and hidden identity. They had caused quite an uproar. However, I recognized his style immediately and confirmed my suspicions with Identify.

The knight had been none other than Dean, the kingdom’s strongest knight, who went by the nickname “the Black Lion.” When I had asked him about it, he just said, “I haven’t felt this excited in a long time, so I convinced myself to join.”

Blanca and Amur had pulled themselves together and became the favorites in the pair competition. He had been disappointed I wasn’t participating but had seen it as an opportunity and became more determined to win than ever. However, his and Amur’s luck had been unfortunate when it came to their first-round opponents.

They’d faced a duo known as the Tiger Mask and the Masked Knight, who had turned out to be Hana and Kriss. Blanca and Amur had suspected something during the prelims, but they had been so excited about their chances of winning that they were caught off guard and lost. Kriss had held Amur off while Hana defeated Blanca, and the match had ended with the two of them ganging up on Amur. The duo had gone on to win the entire competition.

Blanca’s team had faced my team, Oracion, in the semifinals team competition and lost, which had been a result of bad luck and overconfidence. There might’ve been a chance for a comeback if he had realized who his opponents in the pairs event had been...

Yoshitsune probably didn’t remember those battles clearly, but Blanca’s intense aura had most likely left a deep impression on him.

The atmosphere began to return to normal when Yoshitsune resumed eating his snack, but two people hadn’t relaxed at all.

“What are you doing there?” I asked them.

I was talking to two women: Kriss, who had been drinking since noon, and Amur, who was still nursing the finger that Blanca had injured. I thought Amur might’ve had a broken bone so I made a mental note to heal her later. But for right now, she could reflect on her actions because it was her own fault.

“There just aren’t any good men out there!” Kriss whined. “I thought winning the tournament would leave me swimming in men, but I haven’t had a single decent offer!”

“Here we go again...”

The reason Kriss had entered the tournament was because she was on the hunt for a boyfriend. Many of her friends and colleagues had gotten married over the past few years, and she was getting closer to being the oldest single woman in the knights’ order. The current oldest was a woman in her forties, but she didn’t technically count as she’d lost her husband. There were four or five women older than Kriss who were still unmarried, but they at least had boyfriends.

Kriss continued to complain. “And why is it that only old men approach me? And even when someone my age shows interest, they either have a bad reputation, are just after money, or are looking for someone to take care of their aging parents! Seriously, there’s nothing but losers out there!”

Just as I was wondering how to respond, Aina suddenly appeared behind me and dropped a bombshell.

“At least no one’s after your body. Not to be rude, but you don’t exactly have anything to boast about in that department, do you? Although I suppose there are some men who may be into that sort of thing...”

I have a feeling she said that on purpose...

“As if you’re one to talk, Aina! Who do you think you are, talking to me like that?!” Kriss protested.

“How rude! I have more than you do,” Aina said.

“You do not! And you’re acting awfully high and mighty for someone who doesn’t have a boyfriend either!”

“Hah!” Aina snorted in response.

Kriss looked at her in disbelief. “No way... Don’t tell me you’re...”

“I am.” Aina held out her left hand, revealing a ring on her ring finger.

“Aina...” Kriss’s voice grew quiet in contrast to Aina’s unusual triumphant expression.

However...

Kriss was utterly appalled. “No matter how desperate I was, I’d never even think of buying myself an engagement ring,” she said. “Even I haven’t sunk that low. Aina, you need serious heeearrgh!”

Before Kriss could finish speaking, Aina smacked her in the face with the tray she was holding.

I decided to step in and reveal that Aina’s relationship was real before Kriss threw a full-out tantrum.

“That was your fault this time, Kriss. But just so you know, Aina really does have a boyfriend. I’ve met him myself, but I promised not to tell anyone his name,” I said.

“No... God really is dead... Damn it! The gods are jerks after all!”

Kriss collapsed to the floor in despair. But honestly, her choice of words wasn’t right at all. If she was talking about the goddess of love, I knew for a fact that she wasn’t dead. If anything, Kriss might’ve just made an enemy out of her with that outburst.

I ignored Kriss as she lay on the floor like a corpse. I also shrugged off Aina, who stood triumphantly over her. Instead, I decided to continue enjoying my snack.

By the way, Aina’s boyfriend was Dean. Since there was an age gap and status difference between them, they hadn’t gotten married yet.

Kriss wasn’t the only one affected by the news of Aina’s relationship, by the way. Aura had been eavesdropping from a distance and looked shaken. And for some reason, Jeanne did too.

Meanwhile, Yoshitsune finished his snack. “Thanks for the meal,” he said and then ran off toward the library.

“By the way, how long are you planning on staying this year?” I asked.

“Hmm... I’m thinking of heading back south this week,” Sana said. “This year, I want to show Yoshi a few things on the way back. We also have to celebrate my sister’s victory.”

When I had met Hana and her family, I had told her they could always stay at our place in the capital whenever they visited. So, for the past two years, they’d stay with us for about a month after the tournament. But this year, since Hana had won the pairs event, they’d only be staying about half as long.

I asked if she was planning on taking Kriss with her since they had been partners in the tournament. Hana had given up on the idea though since Kriss was still serving in the royal guard—that made it difficult for her to travel alone to another noble’s territory.

With all the success she’s had, you’d think she could find a boyfriend down south...

People from the SAR admired those who had power, and a tournament champion would be treated like a celebrity there—especially if that person had teamed up with their leader.

“Kriss really doesn’t get it, does she?” Aina said. “If she were serious about finding a boyfriend, she’d have plenty of options if she went to the SAR.”

It was almost like Aina had read my mind and she gave Kriss a sympathetic look. I’d only seen her give more considerate looks to Aura, who still hadn’t moved from her spot.

As I looked at Kriss, who was still lying on the floor, I heard a voice coming from the foyer.

“I’m home!”

“Oh, sounds like Amy’s back. The other two must be with her,” I muttered.

Just then, the dining room door burst open. It wasn’t Amy who opened it, but Luna.

“Princess Luna, that’s very unladylike,” Aina said, but Luna didn’t care that she was being scolded.

Queen Maria and the others had been lamenting about how Luna was starting to take after the king and Prince Lyle in some strange ways as of late.

Luna walked over to me, her footsteps echoing as she eyed the snacks on the table. “I’m hungry, Tenma!”

“Nope. Not until you’ve changed and washed your hands,” I said, pulling the plate of snacks out of her reach.

She grumbled but eventually headed up to her room.

Amy and Tida then came into the room. “I’m home, Master! The quest was a success,” she said.

“That’s good. There are snacks ready, so go ahead and change first. You too, Tida,” I responded.

And with that, Amy and Tida also headed off to their rooms.

This year, they had reached the age where they could officially register as adventurers and had been taking on reasonable quests. Tida was less than enthusiastic about the fact that one of the royal knights always went ahead to the guild to select safe quests from reliable clients for him, but Amy didn’t mind. He would complain about it, but since that was the condition Prince Caesar had set forth when he became an adventurer, Tida reluctantly went along with it.

In other adventurers-guild-related news, Jin and I had become Rank S adventurers. Blanca had been promoted to Rank A, and Amur to Rank B.

Jin’s promotion had been because of his consistent performance in the tournaments over the past few years in addition to his achievements as an adventurer. The Dawnswords had reached what was believed to be the deepest level of the Sagan City Dungeon, leading them to be highly regarded among our peers. Blanca and Amur had also been promoted based on their tournament performance and various adventuring activities.

As for me, my undefeated streak in the tournaments, along with accomplishments such as defeating the dragon zombie, slaying the earth dragon three years ago, and taking care of the running dragon two years ago, had contributed to my promotion. On top of that, I had discovered and cleared a new dungeon last year, which had only solidified my S-rank status.

I had been visiting Nanao when I encountered a running dragon and managed to defeat it on my own. As for the undiscovered dungeon, I had stumbled upon it while on another quest to the SAR last year. It was located on the mountainside, a short distance away from Nanao.

The dungeon had been about ten floors deep, so it had been relatively young—probably only a few decades old. The monsters inside hadn’t been particularly strong. The boss on the lowest floor had been a humanoid golem and not much of a threat. But since it’d been an uncharted dungeon, its resources—ores and the like—had never been touched, so that’d led to a sudden economic boom in the SAR, and especially in Nanao. The effects had rippled out to the capital too.

That discovery had been the key factor in my promotion. I had risen rapidly, but the guild had found it challenging to promote other adventurers without raising my rank first. With every significant achievement I racked up, my rank continued to climb.

“Snacks!”

Just as I expected, Luna was the first to return. She’d grown a bit in the past three years and was now around 155 centimeters tall. Although her appearance had matured (except for her chest), her personality hadn’t changed much. In fact, she seemed more like the king and Lyle every day. Because of that, every time Queen Maria and Princess Isabella saw me, they asked if there was any way to train or educate her so she’d become more ladylike. Of course, I always told them, “It’s impossible, so please give up.” They just wouldn’t accept that answer, though.

“Luna, you’re going to get in trouble with Mother and Grandmother again!”

Tida, now a young man, followed close behind her. He had grown quite handsome and looked like a younger version of Prince Caesar. He was close to 170 centimeters in height, which was almost as tall as I was. At this rate, it wouldn’t be long before he’d tower over me.

Recently, Tida had become quite popular at the academy and in noble circles because of his good looks, but he had remained devoted to Amy. According to Luna, he wouldn’t even look at other girls. Prince Lyle had said there’d even been talk within the royal family—unbeknownst to Tida and Luna—about adopting Amy into a noble family and arranging an engagement between them.

By the way, both Luna and Lyle had gotten scolded by Tida and Queen Maria for letting that bit of information about Tida at school slip to me.

“I brought you a souvenir, Master.”

Amy was the last to return to the room. She had brought me a basket filled with mushrooms she’d gathered from the forest during their quest. The last time she had brought some back, most of them had turned out to be poisonous. But this time, they were all edible, which showed me that she’d been studying diligently since then.

Amy was a bit under 160 centimeters tall now, and her chest was noticeably more developed compared to other girls her age. I saw Tida occasionally sneaking glances at her too.

Luna was also jealous of Amy’s growth and had been eating dairy products nonstop in an effort to catch up. Unfortunately for her, the only thing she had to show for it was a stomachache. From everything Luna had told me, Amy seemed to know how Tida felt about her, but for now, she only saw him as a close friend. And once Tida found out Luna had told me that, he scolded her for leaking that to me again.

“Thanks,” I said to Amy. “It’s still a bit early in the season, but those look good enough to eat. We can have them for dinner tonight.”

I took the basket from her, and several recipes came to mind. Meanwhile, Shiromaru and Solomon were drawn in by the scent of food and peeked into the basket. They quickly realized that they couldn’t eat the mushrooms immediately, however, so they turned their attention to Amy and Tida’s snacks instead.

As Jeanne and Aura helped me sort and prep the mushrooms, Aina came in. “Master Tenma, Lord Albert and his party have arrived.”

Since they weren’t the type of guests who required special treatment, I told her to bring them directly to the dining room. In addition to the usual trio of idiots, there was one other familiar face—someone I’d been seeing a lot of recently.

Amy immediately spotted the woman and called out to her. “Oh, Eliza!”

Eliza smiled in response. She politely nodded at me and then quickly moved over to Amy’s side.

“Sorry about that,” Albert said. “I apologize on Eliza’s behalf.”

“It’s fine. I’m used to it.” I waved off his apology, telling him it wasn’t a big deal.

After all, Gramps and I had spent so many years living in the countryside or wandering from place to place that we didn’t mind if our close friends were casual like that with us. If anything, a certain family who I’d gotten to know over the past few years had only strengthened that attitude...

As Albert and I exchanged our usual banter, Aina led Cain and Leon into the dining room. They took their seats and happily sipped on tea and munched on snacks. This was another typical scene in the mansion these days.

However, seeing the same routine play out every time was starting to get boring. It would be easier if Albert could just be like Cain and Leon and act more brazenly, but I guess he had his reasons against doing so.

And that reason was Eliza, Albert’s fiancée. She would be the Duchess of the Sanga family one day, so her actions directly impacted the family’s reputation. Albert had no choice but to constantly offer apologies, even if just for appearance’s sake. I had asked him once why he didn’t just relax in private like the other three, and he had said, “I’m afraid I’ll slip if I get too comfortable, so I’d rather just keep myself in check.”

Once Duke Sanga and Marquis Sammons had heard that, they’d offered him a light warning. They had told him that he was too tense and that he was nervous for no reason, but they hadn’t pressed him much further than that.

Gramps had said, “They probably think it’s better to make mistakes while he’s still young,” and I thought he might’ve been right.

Eliza seemed more confident in separating her public and private life, unlike Albert. In fact, she didn’t really seem to care that much. She always handled herself flawlessly, even when she unexpectedly ran into the king or Queen Maria at our place. Eliza never slipped up, even when she was caught off guard.

“It’s about time you became my little sister, Amy,” Eliza said.

“Um, well...”

Eliza was always trying to recruit Amy like this. About two years ago, Amy had been shopping in the capital when she accidentally wandered into a back alley. She was then attacked by a kidnapper. Eliza had happened to be passing by and noticed the commotion. She rushed over, and they had managed to fight off the kidnapper together.

After that incident, Eliza had grown fond of Amy and wanted to adopt her as her little sister. However, Albert and her parents scolded her as soon as they found out. Still, Eliza had figured that as long as Amy agreed, there wouldn’t be a problem, so she kept asking her to join her family.

By the way, the attempted kidnapper had been so thoroughly beaten by Amy, Eliza, Rocky, Birdie, Spidey, and Amy’s golem bodyguards that when the guards arrived, they weren’t able to tell who the bad guy had been in that situation.

“Stop it already, Eliza! You’re making Amy uncomfortable!” Albert said.

“Eh? She doesn’t seem uncomfortable to me.”

“Aha ha...”

Albert would regularly scold Eliza after her persistent attempts to recruit Amy into the family. Amy should’ve been rejecting her more clearly, but since she liked Eliza, the conversation would always turn out this way.

Eliza was also a noble and the same age as Albert, so she went to the same academy. Her full name was Elizabeth von Sylphid, and she was the eldest daughter of a count who belonged to the royalist faction.

She was a top student in magic-related studies, but her overall rank was similar to Leon’s, which she found unsatisfying. Her ranking wasn’t because she was bad at anything other than magic—instead, since Leon was so good at physical combat, that made up for his academic disadvantages at the academy.

The Sylphid family had been founded by someone who was skilled in Wind magic, and their descendants had also excelled in that type of magic to varying degrees. However, Eliza wasn’t that good at it. Instead, Lightning magic was her forte, which made her a rarity in the Sylphid family tree. Eliza and her family didn’t seem too bothered by that, but other nobles, especially ones in the reformist faction, gossiped that perhaps it was because Eliza’s mother might have had an affair.

The Sylphid family and their noble allies had investigated the source of the rumors and had discovered that the very nobles who’d been spreading that around had illegitimate children themselves. That discovery became a well-known joke among drunk patrons in pubs.

To people who were well-versed in magic like Gramps and me, Eliza’s strength in Lightning magic wasn’t strange at all. If you were knowledgeable about it, you’d know that Lightning was considered a derivative of Wind magic.

Along with her abilities, Eliza’s appearance was also very striking. She was around 170 centimeters tall and had a figure that women envied and men couldn’t help but notice. She had curves in all the right places. On top of that, she wore her blonde hair in curly corkscrew pigtails, which I’d never seen before in this world. It was a hairstyle that had been trendy twenty or thirty years ago but these days had become unusual due to its difficulty to upkeep. She also had a headstrong personality and sharp eyes, so people who didn’t know her well assumed she was snobby or haughty.

She didn’t have that kind of attitude at all, however. She had clear preferences, sure, but she was a fundamentally good person. She was popular among children due to her unique hairstyle, and, since she loved children herself, she often visited orphanages run by her family and those in the capital. Her nicknames at the orphanages were “Curly Tails” and “Twisted Sister.”

“Honestly, if you keep pushing it, Amy won’t like you anymore,” Cain said, butting in. “You should just stop!”

“What did you just say?”

Cain thought he was helping out Amy, but instead, he was just pissing off Eliza. Still, it was all in good fun, so I doubted it would turn into anything serious. Cain looked at me for help, but I wanted to avoid getting dragged into the mess, so I sneaked out of the dining room.

“Do you need something? Or have you become my stalker for real now?” I asked the person behind me.

For some reason, Leon had followed me out. At first, I thought he had run away like I had, but apparently, that wasn’t the case. I teased him about something from the past, and he hurried over to me. Whenever he acted suspiciously like this, it was usually because he had something to hide. His behavior was much easier to read than the other two.

“Um, please take this!” he said, pulling two letters out of his pocket.

“Wait! Are you two...?”

And of course, that was the moment when Kriss suddenly appeared. I figured she was trying to get away from Aina and Eliza since both of them had boyfriends. However, the timing was so perfect that I couldn’t help but wonder if she’d been secretly watching us from the shadows.

“Kriss, I know that everyone has their own preferences, and I have no intention of criticizing them as long as they don’t try to force me into anything,” I said. “And sorry, but please try someone else, Leon.”

“No, I can’t do that! I was told to make sure these get delivered to you!” Leon seemed flustered by my joke and tried to force the letters into my hands.

“Told by who? You’re not using Tenma for some kind of shady business, are you?”

Kriss seemed to suspect that Leon was working as some kind of delivery boy. She wouldn’t have reached such a conclusion normally, but given her current state, she was likely more on edge than usual due to Aina and Eliza.

“I’ll take them for now, but they’re nothing weird, right? And this isn’t a love letter?”

I accepted the envelopes and opened one up. I quickly understood why Leon looked so uneasy.

“Leon, do the king and queen know about this?” I asked. “Because things could get pretty complicated if they don’t.”

Leon had a serious expression on his face. “Don’t worry, he got the king’s approval beforehand, and he told me it was up to you.” He assured me that everything had been arranged correctly.

“So? What does the letter say?”

Kriss was curious about the contents, but she wasn’t trying to peek over my shoulder. That was probably because the king and queen had been mentioned in our conversation, but also because she noticed a certain family crest on the envelope.

The crest had a howling wolf. It was the one that represented Leon’s family, the Hausts. And since Leon was using the crest, that meant someone from House Haust had sent it—someone who had enough authority to communicate with the king and send the future head of House Haust out as a messenger. The sender’s identity was crystal clear.

“Basically, Margrave Haust wants me to help him,” I said.

“Will you take the request? The king said it’s up to you, so it’s not mandatory or anything,” Kriss pointed out.

Mandatory requests concerned national defense or the survival of towns and villages. They were issued in emergencies. In those cases, beyond a few specific exceptions, adventurers didn’t have the right to refuse. Saying no could lead to severe penalties, including the loss of one’s guild card.

On the other hand, a named request was when a client required a particular adventurer. In that case, the adventurer had the right to refuse, so it was okay to turn those down—at least on the surface.

But clients who put our named requests were usually owners of large trading companies or nobles who had significant influence over the adventurers guild. So, if you refused requests from those people, you could run into trouble later on. I’d heard stories of adventurers who had ignored such requests and had ended up being poorly treated by the guild or sold defective tools and equipment later on.

I’d heard tales of worse things that happened to people who had refused named requests. While the adventurers had been taking jobs with temporary parties, they had suddenly been attacked by their companions. The attacks had resulted in severe injuries that forced those adventurers into retirement. Those companions had been hired by those snubbed company owners or nobles, of course, and even if the victims had reported it to the guild, there wouldn’t have been any consequences. Too many strings had been pulled to set up that situation. So, in the end, the adventurers had been deemed to be at fault instead.

However, due to recent legal reforms, such tales had become rare, but they still weren’t that uncommon behind the scenes. The occurrences just weren’t public knowledge.

As for me, everyone saw me as an adventurer favored by the royal family, which meant they had to get prior approval from the royal family to request me. That was why I hadn’t received many requests from anyone besides royalty, and when I had, they had usually been from close friends like the people from Kukuri Village or Duke Sanga. Other adventurers were somewhat jealous of my ties to the royal family, but honestly, I found it easier to work with familiar faces—they rarely made unreasonable demands.

The request from Leon’s father, the margrave, was for help protecting the domain. Apparently, a number of nobles from the neighboring republic of Gilst were engaging in behavior that could be construed as military action. The margrave had sent out some of his knights to patrol the area, but unfortunately, they had run into a large group of monsters—two groups, in fact.

The first had been a horde of goblins, just like I’d encountered in the SAR. They had estimated the horde was two thousand strong. Margrave Haust was planning to deploy adventurers from his domain to take care of the goblins. He was also considering whether to send a squad of about fifty knights there or a company, the latter of which would be several squads and number around two hundred knights.

The second group of monsters, however, was the main reason Margrave Haust was asking for my help.

“A swarm of wyverns, huh...”

Thirty wyverns had settled into the mountains of the margrave’s domain, and it was believed they had gathered there for mating purposes.

The Haust knights were considered to be among the strongest knights in the kingdom, but there was no way for them to handle both a goblin horde and wyverns at once and keep an eye on the Gilst Republic while also providing backup to the adventurers who were being sent to deal with the goblin horde. They’d also need to protect the surrounding towns and villages.

Well, if the knights’ reputation was true, I didn’t think it would be impossible for them to deal with the wyverns themselves. But it would still be very challenging for them to do so, and there’d probably be significant collateral damage. There might even be enough to alter the border with the Gilst Republic. So, the margrave’s decision made sense to me.

But what stood out to me the most was that he had chosen to make a direct request to me. Not to criticize him or anything, but I was surprised—most people thought our relationship was quite strained. Now, it wasn’t inaccurate to say that we didn’t get along, but I didn’t harbor as much resentment and ill will as I had before. My perception of him had changed once I had met Leon, and since so much time had passed, I’d come to see the incident concerning the soldiers he’d deployed to Kukuri Village as having been somewhat unavoidable.

“I’ll take the request,” I said. “But since we’re dealing with so many wyverns, I think the reward should be higher, and I’ll need some additional accommodations. Also, I’ll accept the request as my party Oracion, but Aura and Jeanne might need to be evacuated to safety during the mission if it becomes necessary. Is that all right?”

Leon agreed. “No problem, that’ll help out a lot. I’ll tell my father that Jeanne and Aura will join as the party’s support staff, and I can arrange for the reward to be paid out to the party. I’ll also negotiate for him to include individual rewards based on achievements.”

We decided on all the general terms right there on the spot, and the specific details about rewards would be negotiated directly with the margrave. Normally, someone would decide to accept a request like this based on the amount offered, but in this case, there wasn’t a risk of unfair payment or default. That was because Leon was acting as the margrave’s representative and agreed to my conditions, and the terms of the request had been discussed with the royal family beforehand. Any attempt to avoid payment would be seen as an insult to the royal family. No respectable noble, especially a high-ranking one in the royalist faction, would ever dream of doing such a thing.

“I’m planning on getting ready so I can depart immediately. What about you, Leon? Will you come with us?” I asked.

“Yes, I will. I requested reinforcements from House Haust and our allies Duke Sanga and Marquis Sammons, but we shouldn’t expect too much. Plus, if our forces are too large, they could draw unwanted attention from Gilst.”

He had a point; if we gathered too many knights and nobles near the border, Gilst might see it as a threat and ready their own knights. They could use it as an excuse to invade, regardless of who started it. That would put the margrave at a disadvantage since he was already dealing with his own problems related to the goblins and wyverns.

If that happened and Gilst won, they would likely seize the opportunity to claim more territory. And even if they lost, Gilst would probably destroy as many things as they could to get back at House Haust as they retreated.

“I’ll let the margrave worry about that. My job is to deal with the wyverns as quickly as possible and then wait with the knights by the border in case of any emergencies,” I said.

It was best to leave complex matters like that to the margrave and the king. In return, I had to take responsibility for dealing with the wyverns. The request to do so was risky not only for the margrave but for me as well.

The margrave had to be careful, because this might be seen as him forgetting about what he had done in the past and him trying to use me for his own convenience now. No matter how much we tried to show that relations between us were friendly, there would inevitably be some who wouldn’t understand or would blatantly ignore that fact.

As for me, if the mission failed or if there was a lot of collateral damage, people could accuse me of sabotaging it on purpose to seek revenge against the margrave. And even if he accepted any property damage as something within the limits he’d expected, I was sure there would be those who would make a fuss.

I informed everyone about the request and told them I had accepted. When we discussed the details and risks, Gramps immediately realized the potential benefits.

“However, that also means there’s a lot to gain,” Gramps said.