Chapter 6.3

Chapter 6.3

As circumstances would have it, once you advanced past a certain threshold, the conversation would blaze through at astounding speed. But despite being right in the middle of one of these troublesome conversations, Haruna, who was supposed to be working outside, brought in something even more bothersome.

『Azuma-kun, can you hear me？』

『What’s up？』

『Some trouble sprang up at Merizza’s place. I don’t think I can handle it all by myself, so could you maybe lend a hand？』

『Lemme talk it over with the old man』

Feeling something slightly different from Haruna’s tone, his face grew grim. Stopping his work on cooking the fish-paste cakes, he moved them aside before turning back to Douga. Furthermore, Merizza was a merchant they had come to know from various requests, most of which were miscellaneous affairs, but lately, things had been going quite favorably.

「Old man, got a moment？」

「What be the matter？」

「Seems like Toudou-san’s been mixed up in some sorta trouble at her destination. Seems likely that she won’t be able to handle it by herself, so is it alright if I go out a bit？」

「Ye need not pay heed to us. Ye already fed us, and it isn’t like I’m too senile to look after the place」

「Yeah? Then sorry, please stay put here. Eat some fruit or whatever ya want」

Hiroshi left him with that, bringing a bag with various tools and a hand axe, then dashed out of the room. Incidentally, since he didn’t really know what was happening for lunch, he had prepared Kansai-style hotdogs with curry-flavored cabbage inside. Needless to say, his home-made sausage and ketchup had high ratings.

『Where do we meet up？』

『Can you come to the east gate? It’s because you have to go out of the gate once』

『Roger』

Following Haruna’s guidance, he used up a large amount of discardable amplification items he had made via alchemy, dashing over all the way to the east gate. From how Haruna had sounded, he didn’t have the leisure to wander around, plus even if he were to use a canal or stagecoach, there was no guarantee of finding one perfect for his destination. In addition, this wasn’t Japan, so those sorts of rides wouldn’t have regular departure times. As the transportation gates couldn’t be used without going to the central plaza, it was a bit of a gamble. Which was why it was fundamental as an adventurer to cut unnecessary costs.

In order to move as quickly as possible, he dashed full speed along the back streets. He did so not only because it would obviously decrease the distance to his destination, but also because there were a lot of people in the main street and running at this speed might endanger them.

「Toudou-san！」

「Azuma-kun, that was pretty fast」

「Well yeah, that’s cuz I came here full speed」

He said, taking out and showing her this variety of movement speed amplification items that could be stacked. Haruna saw them, nodding satisfactorily. With Hiroshi’s stamina, even moving along the canal with 20 minutes to his destination wouldn’t be difficult to maintain top speed. To an adventurer, obstructions like slow movement could easily be solved by amplification items. To add further, he was only slow compared to other adventurers, but was more than double the average person.

「So, what’s up？」

「She says that Lumina-chan went out to gather medicinal herbs and hasn’t come back」

「When’d she leave？」

「Apparently, early this morning. She left with adventurers and the other girls, but ran into some trouble and fled, and it seems that some of them weren’t there when they got back」

「Well that sucks. How many were there？」

「We know of three. All girls」

While arranging for their departure, they exchanged all necessary information. Incidentally, it wasn’t all that rare for the children of shop owners to gather herbs or fruit from trees. The Adventurer’s Association was regularly sending out gathering requests for things like medicinal ingredients or long-lasting food ingredients, but unless they were in quite the emergency or had to travel far for certain things, they would normally take on a number of requests alongside adventurers, as the Association’s prices were high depending on the quality. Providing that it wasn’t the sort of business that required going to multiple towns, even the children of the bigger stores quite often would just go to collect things.

Furthermore, at times like these, the majority of adventurer’s fulfilling these gathering requests were experienced people, rather than upstarts. Or rather, starting completely from scratch wouldn’t get you many requests until you passed the test from the personnel. In other words, the adventurers who set off at times like these were generally people who had a decent amount of battle prowess and had their wits about them to a certain degree. This time around as well, there were adventurers with quite a bit of results in the gathering area.

This meant that they had ran into the kind of trouble that not even that level of adventurer could handle.

「Incidentally, what kind of trouble？」

「They say a rather strong monster appeared a bit closer to the mountain」

「Another fishy story, I see」

「Yeah. Plus I’ve been hearing not-very-good rumors recently」

「I heard from Anne that the number of missing children’s increasing. Might be another one o’ those again」

As they went to the place that Haruna had heard about ahead of time where adventurers would end up fist fighting with monsters, they exchanged their thoughts. Other than them, there were several adventurers under Merizza’s patronage on the search. The reward for this sort of request was usually nearly nothing, but there weren’t too many adventurers who turned it down because of the lack of monetary rewards. On the contrary, there were mostly adventurers who were willing to act even without a reward if it meant helping their patron in times of trouble.

Incidentally, Hiroshi and Haruna were also being favored by Merizza because they had gone gathering with Lumina for some good quality materials. As of late, since Merizza would sell more with wholesale compared to the rate of the Association, she would sell materials solely gathered from punitive work. There was many a time that they accepted her requests directly as part of that relationship, and she was also just a friendly partner to them.

Furthermore, the work that they took the most was tool repair/modification and chores like mending shops, so in terms of battle prowess, because of their equipment, they weren’t sought after much. This time around, they were sought out because of their above-average tactfulness. After all, this situation required as much help as possible.

「…Toudou-san」

When they had only half more of the distance to the warplace, Hiroshi had suddenly stopped, calling Haruna.

「What’s the matter？」

「That place is unnaturally distorted」

Haruna frowned as she looked where Hiroshi was pointing. Certainly, the vegetation was a bit out-of-order, but she honestly only felt it to be slightly odd. She wouldn’t think it strange for it to just be her imagination.

「You sure？」

「At least that’s how it looks to me」

Perhaps because of the difference in composition and ability points, Hiroshi had far more keenness with these things. However, it was still bad to go by themselves. They decided to call a few adventurer’s over.

「Is this the place you said feels off？」

「Yup. Looks a bit unnatural」

「…You, might be right」

The young man answered with a grim face. He was the type of adventurer called a thief or scout, good at tracking or finding/dissolving traps, but not suited for combat, training only his crucial skills.

「Seriously?」

「There are footprints. And they were left relatively recently. Also, they’re in disguise」

「But of course, that just makes it all the more strange」

Added the thief, and everyone’s expressions grew stiff.

「Might this be a bit dangerous?」

「Yeah. But if we all went together, that would be bad if they held one of those missing children hostage. Plus it could be a false lead. I’ll investigate a bit with the others over here, and I’d like you guys to check the other areas just in case」

「You’ll be alright with them?」

「Yeah. Haruna can use her support magic, and these guys are pretty good at concealing their presence, maybe from all the gathering they’ve been doing. They can even ambush on occasion. Rather than wear slow armor, it’s better to travel light to avoid being detected」

Hiroshi and Haruna wryly smiled at what he said. True, they were good at erasing their presence, constantly avoiding useless fights by only silently moving behind favorable monsters. It was almost strange why they didn’t go a step further and open locks or break traps. Also, not just them, but the majority of Fairy Tale Chronicle players knew how to make soundproof barriers for the necessary quests. They were actually well-suited for these stealth missions.

「We’ll start out making soundproof barriers, but with more people, movement would become difficult, so I guess it’s for the best that there are few. And when we find something, we contact you?」

「Yeah. You can also give us your location」

「Then how about the three of us go? Cause we can manage with both firepower and defense as it is. Plus I have a bit of a bad feeling about this. It would be seriously bad if we got confused about anything」

The other adventurers nodded seriously at Haruna as she tied up her hair. They took no time in splitting the teams and scattering off. It was as if there were some rule that mandated they move promptly as soon as their directions were decided.

「We can go『transparent』, but whaddya say?」

「Can we still see each other?」

「We can see whoever allows us to see them. However, I used cheap materials from leftovers, so ya can guess how much time it lasts」

「Then let’s try them until the effects wear off」

「Roger」

「Anything else?」

「I brought all sorts of bags, so there’s a lot to choose from regardless of the amount. I’ll give a brief explanation while we move」

Haruna and the thief nodded. It wasn’t like they were just researching about cooking and seasoning for this last month. The items were all within the outskirts of Wulls, and they had already checked what they could make, so they had provided storage in accordance. Anyhow, it would be clumsy to waste time checking usable items when there was nothing but a bad feeling in the air. The three of them formed a temporary party, communicating as quietly as possible while pursuing the footprints at lightning speed.

***

Tatsuya Kazuki and Mio Mizuhashi were out of luck. After all, as they were playing Fairy Tale Chronicle, the screen had suddenly filled with errors, and when they came to they were tied up.

「Well this isn’t good」

「Agreed」

Shackled hand and foot, they had been thrown into a jailhouse together with two other kidnapped people, talking offhandedly about their situation without letting their voices be heard. Plus their voices were worn out, not having access to water for a long time.

「Tatsu-nii, is this what I think it is?」

「Yep, it’s gotta be」

「Which means you were actually lucky for not being killed?」

「Hey, don’t put it like that…」

Tatsuya didn’t even try to hide his tired expression. He was quite down when Mio had said exactly what he was thinking out loud.

Tatsuya and Mio had also realized that they had come to Fairy Tale Chronicle or a world resembling it. They had various reasons for thinking that way, but the biggest one of all was that Tatsuya had managed to use magic as they were testing their escape.

「So. Since this is the situation and all, any idea on how to get through this?」

「Seems like we can use our skills, but not bare-handed. What about you, Tatsu-nii?」

「I was able to use magic, but it’d be pretty terrible if I couldn’t hit them directly…」

「True」

Mio only sighed at what Tatsuya had said. If they used attack magic in a place like this, there was no guarantee what would happen to the people around them

「But this really gives me mixed feelings」

「Mm?」

「The girl who was taken off earlier, probably…」

「Ohhh, yeah, probably…」

The two of them only looked down as they felt the painful lack of power in this disgusting situation. The bunch that had thrown them in here weren’t the best looking people, taking with them a girl in her late teens, not especially cute or hot but with a comparatively voluptuous body. They had probably judged that as she was neither the cutest or prettiest female in the area, her product value wouldn’t drop no matter what they did to her.

「And I wasn’t chosen because I don’t have much flesh on me, right?」

「Yeah, probably」