Two days had passed since weâd run into the Leviathan and nearly met our demises.
âDrop the anchors!â Jerome shouted.
âAye aye captain!â
âOne of you is going to need to run over to the magistrateâs office. Weâve a serious political situation on our hands, one involving royalty,â Buphett noted as the crew began getting to work.
âYes sir!â One of the sailors immediately responded and began running an errand as per his instructions.
The Algieba managed to safely reach Chrom. More specifically, it found itself currently docked in the port of a seaside city named Greyseal. Both the city and the port were about a whole size smaller than Barbraâs, but still of a respectable scale nonetheless.
All the adventurers had already gotten off the ship after receiving a hefty bonus. The total number of battles we engaged in was on the relatively low side, but they rewarded us handsomely nonetheless given the whole midgard wyrm incident. Fran in particular had been paid a whole hundred thousand golde.
With her duties completed and renumerations rewarded, she, like all the other adventurers, had gotten off the ship. She was currently standing in front of it, saying her goodbyes to her three apprentices.
âThank you very much, Ms. Fran.â
âYou taught us a whole lot.â
âWeâll do our best to make sure we keep training ourselves hard! Weâll get strong enough to impress you next time we see each other!â
Naria, Miguel and Liddick responded in their usual ways as they got ready to leave, to which Fran responded with a simple âNn.â
âGood bye!â
âLater!â
âFarewell!â
Their training had only lasted a few days, but it semeed to have been impactful nonetheless, as the three all seemed to have taken her teachings quite seriously. Fran had tried her best to play the role of an instructor as well, albeit seemingly because she wanted to kill time. I couldnât tell whether or not she really thought of them as her apprentices. She didnât seem reluctant to part with them, and I wasnât even really sure whether she ever ended up remembering their names.
âWe should probably heat out too.â
âMiguel, Naria, Liddick,â I many doubts about her stance on the matter, but Fran struck them all down before I even so much as had a chance to voice them by calling out to her three apprentices in turn.
âHuh?â Miguelâs jaw dropped.
âTeach just called us by our names!? That has to be the first time sheâs ever done that!â
âD-Does that mean sheâs acknowledged us?â Likewise, Naria and Liddick also responded with their voices filled by surprise.
âSee ya.â
âSee ya, teach!â
All three immediately responded in loud, clear voices.
Satisfied, Fran turned around and began to move without so much as even showing any sign of turning back.
âSo you actually did end up memorizing their names?â
âNn. Because apprentices.â
Franâs response made it clear that sheâd taken from the experience and matured, even if only a bit. As her guardian, I was overjoyed, both because sheâd grown up and because a part of me empathized with her disciples.Sheâdreciprocated their emotions; their efforts hadnât been in vain.
The first place Fran decided to head towards was the guild so she could pick up the requestâs standard reward. She didnât know where it was though, so she had Mordred and his buddies show her over.
âIt should be right over there,â Mordred gestured towards the guild as it came into sight.
âHuge.â
âThatâd be because Greyseal is a pretty big city.â
Greysealâs guild wasnât too far away from its port. The building was quite large, as per Franâs description. Apparently, it was relatively influential because it was frequented by adventurers that liked picking up ship-related escort tasks.
Upon entering, we found ourselves staring down a bar with a large number of adventurers hanging around it. Some seemed to gaze upon Fran in one of many unrespectful ways, but quickly averted their eyes once they saw Mordred enter right behind her.
Being a B ranker, Mordred was quite well known, even in Greyseal. There werenât any adventurers dumb enough to mess with anyone accompanying him.
Fran was both a cute child and a Black Catkin, so I expected a few people to try messing with her, but fortunately, it didnât look like we would need to bother this time around. Though no one tried to explicitly attack her, that didnât actually mean we didnât have to deal with any sort of annoyances. A bearded, lazy looking middle aged man that seemed a bit too thin to be an adventurer waded through the crowd and approached us.
My immediate thought was that we were going to have to deal with him and whatever idiocy he would pull, but I was well off the mark.
âThatâs a cute girl you found there Mordred. Is she travelling with you?â The lanky looking man grinned as he spoke in a teasing tone.
âOh, hey Leroy. Youâre a bit off the mark this time. She and I just happened to be escorting the same ship. It was her first time in Greyseal, so I lended her a hand and showed her over to the guild.â
âHuh. Well, I guess Iâd better introduce myself then. The nameâs Leroy, I work as an adventurer around these parts.â
âHeâs only a D ranker, but heâs got great memory, so he can come in handy. Iâve often asked him for help so I could work around these parts without needing a map,â Mordred nodded as he affirmed the other manâs usefulness.
The fact that even Mordred asked him for help made me understand that Leroy was a respectable adventurer in his own right even though he didnât look the part.
âNn. C ranker, Fran.â The catgirl named herself curtly.
âYouâre a C ranker at that age!? I could tell that you were pretty strong, but god damn!â Leroyâs eyes opened wide in response to Franâs introduction, a reaction that caused Mordred to put on a bit of a wry smile and look at Leroy with an almost pitying gaze. Heâd only just called Fran out the other day for being way stronger than was justified for a C ranker.
âI think you might want to change the way you introduce yourself, Fran,â he suggested.
âWhy? Not lying.â
âThatâs true, but I think you should at least make sure you mention that youâre the Black Lightning Princess.â
âWhat? Sheâs the Black Lightning Princess everyoneâs been talking about lately?â
âThat she is, friend.â
âThat would mean sheâs way stronger than me⌠Man, and her rank made me think we werenât all that different in terms of our combat ability tooâŚâ Leroy was completely taken aback by Franâs identity.
It seemed that information about Fran had already made its way to Greyseal through the merchants given Leroyâs reaction and willingness to accept Franâs identity. Mordred, once again, had voiced a really good point that proved his judgement solid. Fran would be able to stop people from looking down on her so long as she revealed a bit more about herself.
There was, howver, a certain risk related to Mordredâs suggestion. Anyone that had yet to hear about Franâs exploits would likely think her an idiot with a self proclaimed identity. I wouldnât be able to stand for someone making fun of her as a result.
For that reason, we decided to stick with the C ranker thing for the time being.
âYou serious!?â
âThatâs the Black Lightning Princess?â
âWait, the Black Lightning Princess is here!? Where!?â
âDamn!â
âY-Yo, you serious?â
It seemed that all the adventurers present had heard of her, as they immediately began kicking up a huge fuss. Some stood up in order to get a better look at Fran, while others let their curiosity get so out of control that they approached despite the heavy aura Mordred was giving off.
The reaction we got out of making Franâs identity public was even bigger than the one weâd gotten back in Barbra. Upon further observation, I realized that over 90% of the adventurers were beastkin, and that the beastkin were much more curious about Fran than Iâd initially thought. Though their interests were far outside my expectations, I did at least understand them. Black Catkin werenât supposed to be able to evolve, but Fran had done it nonetheless. But more importantly, she had defeated Goldalfa, a veritable hero that all of the countryâs citizens knew.
âDid that little girl really manage to beat Goldalfa?â
âThatâs what they say. Itâs probably true too, seeinâ as how the info came from a merchant sanctioned by the crown.â
âMustâve been because he let her win though, right?â
âHuh, youâve got a point. It might be one of those public appearence things.â
âAre you guys stupid? Weâre talking about Goldalfa here, thereâs no way heâd ever do that.â
âYeah man, thereâs no way Goldalfa would just fork over a win, especially not to a kid. Thatâd tarnish his reputation.â
âExactly. You all know heâs not the type to pull his punches.â
âAnd youâve gotta consider this. It wasnât a spar either. I could see him holding back if it was a spar, but Barbraâs tournament lets its participants fight for real, so he mustâve been going all out.â
A fair number of the adventurers seemed to think that Goldalfa had allowed Fran to beat him. I couldnât really refute their sentiments. It was quite hard to believe unless you were actually there.
People continued to stare at Fran even as she turned in her quest.
âAnd sheâs really evolved too.â
âI know, right?ă
âHow the hell did she manage that?â
âI remember the merchants saying something about killing evil beings. I donât remember the details though, âcause I thought it was bullshit at the time.â
Weâd long turned Evolution Concealment off so we could spread the idea that Black Catkin were indeed capable of evolution.
The merchants and nobles had already started to spread the method we told the Beast Lord. People would probably start believing it once we went around and showed off that Fran really had evolved.
Gazes continued to follow Fran all the way up to the moment she finally left.
âAlright, letâs find ourselves a place to spend the night and figure out how weâre supposed to get to the capital.â