Volume 5 Chapter 6.1

Editor: Weasalopes

「Thanks to that incident, the academy is in quite the commotion.」

Three days after Rainy took down the Dark God Templar members, in Wulls Workshop, Makoto spilled the beans about the current situation of the academy to Haruna, who was working on the account book in the japanese room.

「Ah, just as expected, huh？」

「Thankfully, there aren’t any instances of instructors disappearing as of now, but the secretariat office looks to be in quite the uproar, yeah…」

「Well, they did arrest the secretariat after all.」

After doing something this large-scale, the school cafeteria business had ended without Hiroshi and the others lifting much of a finger. Panicking at all the information that had been leaked regarding Dark God Templar, instead of laying low, the cafeteria crew tried to make a move that ended up backfiring on them.

Rainy had in fact essentially resolved everything, but for those who didn’t know the behind the scenes, it looked like self-destruction. Well, from the beginning, anyone outside the academy was ready to move at the slightest opportunity, so it wasn’t like this was all thanks to Rainy.

In digression, the judiciary got hit the hardest when it was revealed they had been induced into thinking a certain way, but Layotte, Rainy, and all parties involved were in too much of a commotion and that sort of information had yet to reach Haruna and the others.

「Well now it seems like the school cafeteria will continue to be incapable of operating for the time being, so I guess we just act as the host until things improve over there.」

「Actually, even when Azuma Diner opened for business, it wasn’t like the school cafeteria was really operating in the first place, right？」

「Well, I guess we could say nothing’s really changed, then？」

Makoto made a sharp interjection, and Haruna slightly averted her gaze as she said her honest thoughts. As of now, Azuma Diner had become a thriving shop offering over a thousand meals per day. While the cuisine always caught up just barely, the seats were just never enough for everyone at once, so the diner had to temporarily make any open space into further customer seats.

「Well, the nuisances are gone, and it’s not bad for a location, so I think soon enough there will be other locations opening up.」

「That would be nice, but hey, remember Forre. Rack up too much money and you’ll get glares from everyone around you.」

「Yeah, I know. For now we’re just acting as a receptacle for employment, and it’s not even all that much profit, so I think it’ll be fine, Makoto-san.」

Haruna responded to Makoto’s question as she displayed the account book. In actuality, unlike the potions and items they had been procuring from their materials, Azuma Diner was replenishing stock at a fair, reasonable price from farms and ranches, as well as paying a little extra to their personnel (more than the market price), so it wasn’t like they were making such an enormous sum of money.

「But wow, Dark God Templar, huh……」

「Well, I did think they’d be around, but up till now they were just halfass and clumsy, so y’know…」

「Yeah. Honestly, when I heard about that, I didn’t understand why they hadn’t been eliminated immediately.」

「For real…And from what they said, it doesn’t sound as if Barold is involved here.」

「If Barold was the one behind this, I sort of feel like he’d take his time a bit more to make everything proceed smoothly, don’t you think？」

Makoto nodded at Haruna’s opinion. Apparently the head chef of the cafeteria’s methods had become more blatant with the current one, but he still behaved the first two years after his installation compared to this last half year. Around that time, while the amount was certainly less, the taste had not been quite as severe as it was now. While still not tasty, you could at least eat it without forcing it down, or so they said. And while it had gradually worsened, even that you could force down up until the sudden change last year when the flavor sharply dropped.

The cooking got even worse around November of last year, at about the same time that all the few remaining cheap restaurants, and small ones that couldn’t even replace the school cafeteria at that, were expelled. Including the newly opened stores that they hindered, the five stores had all collapsed in a row during those three months.

As a result, the guildmaster from the trade guild had completely grasped the actions of the cafeteria ever since the previous head chef and his suspicious nature, but unfortunately, by that point it was already too late and he failed in punishing them. Not only was the location strange, but the scale small, so hardly any of the parties related to the academy taking on the effects of bankruptcy was also because the guildmaster had not managed to get much support.

Had Barold been directly involved here, he probably wouldn’t have done something as risky as knocking down five establishments one after the other. He would have most certainly taken his time to drive out all the surrounding shops, including even the high class ones, and then once that was over he would have loudly exposed what he did and accredit the academy for taking the initiative on crushing the other shops for the favorable treatment of the school. Either that, or he would have used this as a foothold to slowly eat into the other districts and the palace in order to corrupt the country in ten or a hundred years. At least the Barold they faced in Farlane was competent enough to do something like that. While he was still a small fry, Haruna and the others did evaluate him to a certain extent.

Either way, there was no mistaking how hasty and sloppy this method was.

「In which case, I wonder what’s going on with Barold？」

「I don’t know, but I think he’s probably not in Rufeus. Otherwise, I doubt he would let something as sloppy as this occur.」

「You’re probably right. The real issue is why he isn’t here……」

「I can’t even guess what’s going on with his side of things, but if I recall, November or somewhere around there was right after we defeated Barold in Farlane, so it might be related to that.」

「Yeah, it’s possible.」

Makoto agreed with Haruna’s opinion, which in actuality was not too far off. While the impetus was indeed with the Barold in Farlane that Hiroshi and the others had defeated, that was more of a pretext, and in actuality was because the dark lords had sensed their plan was pretty much on its way to collapse, moving to a different region in light of this revelation. Barold himself who had been implementing the plan was at a loss with the new head chef with all his greed and stupidity, so he also meekly followed the revelation and hurriedly moved to the neighboring country.

In the end, his incompetent allies had dragged him down. Then again, not only did he abandon the project halfway through, but he was also the one who had invited in these incompetent allies, so in all honesty, who really was the incompetent one here?

「Come to think of it, we didn’t see Barold in Forre either, did we？」

「Come to think of it, you’re right. I wonder why？」

「I dunno, but I do get the feeling that people like Barold would find it difficult to get by in such a country.」

「Well yeah, Barold does seem like the kind of person to not get along well at parties after all…」

Forre’s mentality of “We don’t have time to probe anyone’s intentions!” and its system of resolving every dispute with parties was no doubt something truly difficult for Barold to get into. Having to deal with lots of drunken interactions, maudlin drinkers, merry drinkers, drinkers who forced you to drink more, and despite dealing with all that and the rumors surrounding such things, by the next day everyone had just forgotten everything and put it all to rest, so there was no merit to secret manoeuvers.

And despite all this, when it came to people like Hiroshi and the others, no matter how drunk the dwarves were they always made sure to remember to give them favorable treatment, which made the situation even nastier. Coupled with the positive atmosphere of the banquets, one might say that country was Barold’s Achilles’ Heel.