Arifureta Vol 6 Chapter 4 (1/2)

Chapter 4 : Branch Head’s Request

The head of secretary; Datt, pushed his gla.s.ses up with his middle finger, and talked to Hajime with a composed tone.

“I’ve roughly heard the story. It looks like it isn’t a lie that there are many witnesses. Although I think you’re overdoing it… … well, let’s just say it’s within a permissible range because they didn’t die. For now, before they wake up and give their side of the story, I a.s.sume you’ll be staying in Fhuren. So, I want to verify your ident.i.ties and your contact address… … you won’t object if it’s just that, right?”

What’s implied was, ‘I won’t concede more than this, you know?’, so Hajime replied to the head of secretary Datt while shrugging his shoulders.

“Aa, I don’t care. If that pig still tries to complain, then it’s me who wants to be called. I’ll try a more polite method of persuasion at that time.”

Hajime didn’t refuse him, then he presented his status plate to the still amazed Datt.

“Our contact address, well we still haven’t decided where to stay… … You can just ask that guide. We are going to stay at the inn she recommends after all.”

Because Hajime turned his gaze towards her, Rishee twitched then dropped her shoulders with a resigned look because she’d still be their guide.

“Fumu, that’s okay… … “Blue” huh. Even though the guy that lies there is “black”… … how about the status plates of the ones over there?”

Even a little, Datt was surprised when he saw Hajime’s status plate displaying the lowest rank of an adventurer; blue. However, because he heard it was the two women that defeated Leganid, he thought the girls were the stronger ones and asked Yue and s.h.i.+a to submit their status plates.

“Well, Yue and s.h.i.+a… … these girls lost their status plates and we still didn’t ask for a reissue. Look, isn’t that expensive?”

Hajime casually said that lie. Although there’d be no problem to let them see the pair’s abnormal strength, if possible he wanted to avoid the details being known.

“But, even if I can’t clarify their ident.i.ties, it’ll be preserved in the record, so if you frequently cause trouble inside the guild, you’ll be blacklisted regardless of who’s the culprit and victim. If possible, can you pay the guild for a replacement?”

From Datt’s tone, it seemed it was necessary to verify their ident.i.ties by all means. But, if they got the status plates, then the two’s peculiar magic would surely be displayed in the skill column before they could conceal it. That, along with the magic from the Age of the G.o.ds that’d surely be displayed. It would definitely cause a ruckus. Although it’s possible for Hajime and his party to just mow down everyone who tries to harm them during the ruckus, they wouldn’t be able to stay here any longer. Hajime thought about a lot of troubles that would somehow come. Having read his thoughts, Yue talked to Hajime.

“… … Hajime, letter.”

” ? Aa. That letter huh…”

Because of Yue’s words, Hajime remembered that he had received a letter from Catherine of the Brook branch when they were about to leave Brook town. She said to show it to the one who managed the guild when they got into trouble in the guild, because it could help them. A mysterious letter.

If the letter was useless, according to the circ.u.mstances, Hajime considered to immediately leaving the city. Then he fished out the letter from his chest pocket and handed it to Datt. Because he only heard half of what Catherine had said, he didn’t know the contents. That’s why Hajime immediately regretted not checking the contents first.

“Although I don’t know if it’ll act as a subst.i.tute for our identification, I was told to hand this over to the one who manages the guild by an acquaintanced member of the guild staff when we got into trouble.”

” ? An acquaintance in guild staff? … … Let me see.”

From the quality of Hajime and his party’s clothes, they didn’t seem to have any problems with money, that’s why Datt felt doubtful about his att.i.tude that refused to replace the status plate, but they pa.s.sed him a letter instead. When he opened it, he earnestly read it and floated a fish-like expression.

Following that, he turned to look at the face of Hajime and his party and the letter many times while he repeatedly reading the letter’s contents. From his figure that read the letter with wide opened eyes, he was trying to determine if the letter was genuine. Before long, Datt folded the letter again and carefully put it again inside the letter’s envelope, then he turned his gaze towards Hajime and his party.

“If the letter is real it’ll certainly serve as your identification… …I cannot decide by myself if the sender is real. I’ll confirm it with the branch head, so will you wait in another room? It won’t take much time. I’ll be back in ten, no, fifteen minutes.”

Because Datt’s response exceeded his expectations, “Seriously, who on Earth is Catherine?”, Hajime and his party were slightly taken aback

“Well, I don’t mind if it’s that much. I understand. We’ll wait.”

“Let the staff guide you. Well then, later.”

Datt called the staff at the side and left a message to guide them to another room, then he immediately disappeared into the guild, taking the letter with him. The designated staff asked Hajime and his party to relocate. Hajime and his party began to walk accordingly while being perplexed, but with a voice filled with antic.i.p.ation rang out.

“Umm~, what should I do?”

It was Rishee’s. ‘If you still have to talk with the guild, can you excuse me?’, was what her eyes said. She obviously wanted to quickly separate from a seed of troubles, like Hajime and his party.

Hajime, with an expression as if it was natural, nodded and frankly replied.

“Wait for us… … don’t run away, kay? Aren’t you a pro?”

“… … Yes.”

Rishee dropped her shoulders and moved towards a seat inside the cafe. Her back said that although it was unpleasant work, she already accepted it, and the atmosphere of an upstanding member of society’s pathos drifted in the air.

After Hajime and his party were guided into the reception room, exactly after ten minutes, a knock came from the door. Hajime only answered with a word, then the door was opened. What appeared were a sharp eyed male in the latter half of his thirties, with blonde hair that was made into a swept back hairstyle, and Datt, from before.

“Nice to meet you, I am Ilwa Chang, the head of the Adventurer’s Guild — Fhuren branch. Hajime-kun, Yue-kun, and s.h.i.+a-kun… … is it okay to call you that?”

After a simple introduction, the branch head; Ilwa confirmed the names of Hajime and his party and requested a handshake. Hajime returned the handshake while replying to him.

“Aa, we don’t mind. Our names, is it from the letter?”

“Just as you said. It was written in sensei’s letter. She seems to favor… … paid you a lot of attention. Your future is promising, but because you have a predisposition for trouble, if possible she wants us to take care of you, is the letter’s content.”

“Predisposition for trouble… … Huh. Trouble certainly continued to happen in Brook. Well, that’s okay. So, essentially will that serve as our identification? Or are there other questions?”

“Aa, Sensei already wrote everything here so there’s no need to question you further. She certainly has the eyes to discern people’s characters. She even purposely wrote this letter, so I’ll let this letter be your identification.”

Apparently, Catherine’s letter was really useful and let them meet the one who managed the guild. He seems to have close ties with Catherine, to have even called her “sensei”. s.h.i.+a, who sat next to Hajime, had been especially helped by Catherine, so she was interested in the story and timidly talk to Ilwa.

“That’s~, who is Catherine-san actually?”

“Nn? Didn’t you hear from the person herself? She was the Guild Master’s head of secretary in the guild’s headquarters located in the Imperial Capital. Afterwards, she became the one in charge of training everyone related to guild management. Currently, of the 5 branch heads sent to each town, 60% are her pupils. I am also one of them, so I can’t go against her. Because of her beauty and pleasant character, at the time, she was a madonna-like existence to us, in certain ways she was also an adored big-sister-like existence. Afterwards, she married and transferred to the guild branch of Brook town. She said she wanted to raise her children in the country. Her marriage announcement was like a bolt from the blue. It became stormy after that. If you ask where, the guild in the Imperial Capital that is.”

“Haa~ she really is an amazing person~”

“… … Catherine’s amazing.”

“Although I had thought she wasn’t an ordinary person… … I never thought she was such a central figure. Rather, even though she was so popular… … Currently… … No, it’s better if I stop here.”

Hajime and his party came to admire her when they learned of Catherine’s true colors. It seemed they had always imagined her as an important person. Moreover, Hajime was somewhat looking at the distance, remembering the cruelty of time.

“Well, that’s that, if there are no more questions, is it okay for us to go?”

Originally, they came here only to verify their ident.i.ty, so Hajime tried to confirm with Ilwa if it was over because staying any longer would be meaningless. However, Ilwa’s eyes shone and said, “Can you wait for a little longer?”, as he tried to stop Hajime and his party. It somehow gave them a bad premonition.

Ilwa urged Datt that stood next to him and an application form was presented in front of Hajime and his party.

“Actually, I’ve expectations for your help, I want you to accept one request.”

“I refuse.”

The moment Ilwa requested something of them, Hajime tried to decline as he stood up from his seat. Although Yue and s.h.i.+a also followed after him, they stopped their feet when Ilwa spoke his next lines.

“Fumu, isn’t it fine to at least hear the story for now? If you listen, I think I’ll turn a blind eye to this affair…”

“… …”

What was implied was, “If you won’t hear me out, I’ll make you go through the troublesome procedures for this affair, you know?”, something like that. Using the testimonies from the surrounding people, even though Hajime and his party weren’t guilty of what was done to Poom and Leganid, what they have done was excessive self-defense. So according to the regular procedures, the guild would judge them fairly by hearing both concerned parties and this procedure would take quite some time. As a result, even if Hajime and his party weren’t in the wrong, on the other hand, they would spend time like fools until the necessary procedures were finished and the decision came. Also, if they escaped from these procedures, they’d likely be black-listed. In the future, that’d be troublesome because they wouldn’t be able to use the town’s guild facilities.

Hajime stared at Ilwa for a while, then he didn’t say “I’ll accept the request”, but “I’ll hear the story”, because he thought it’d be okay to at least hear him out to avoid the trouble, then he sat on the seat.

“It looks like you’ll listen to it. Thank you.”

“… … as expected of a big city’s guild branch head. You’ve a good character.”

“Not as good as you though. Well then, the contents of the request is written here, to search for a missing person. A party of adventurers that accepted a request to investigate the northern mountain range area have not returned, so the family of one of the adventurers put up a missing person search request, something along those lines.”

Ilwa’s story if summarized, went something like this.

Recently, there were sightings of groups of demonic beasts in the northern mountain range area, which is why the guild made the investigation request. The northern mountain range area is a mountain that, once crossed, would lead you to an uncivilized area. Although not as strong as the demonic beasts inside the Great Dungeons, there are strong demonic beasts that only high-ranked adventurers could handle. It just that, besides the original members of the party that accepted the request, there was another member that tried to forcefully accompany them. By some happenstance, he eventually became a temporary member of the party.

This person was the third son of Count Kudeta; Will Kudeta. Count Kudeta always secretly made someone follow his son that had a tendency to rush out as an adventurer, just like a runaway. But because of this investigation request, the contact with his employer was lost, as it was unusual he was perplexed and put up a search request.

“Although the count had already tried to use his family’s power to form a search party, too many problems kept popping up, which is why he put up the search request to the guild. Well, it was just put up yesterday. Because the missing party was considerably skilled, if they couldn’t handle this, it’d just result in another disaster if accepted by regular Adventurers. That’s why the big-guns should be the one to accept it. But unfortunately, such adventurers are all out on missions. Therefore, for you to come here with such timing, I want you to accept this request.”

“From your statement, we don’t have the required strength, so wouldn’t that be useless? Unfortunately, I am a “Blue”-rank, you know?”