Chapter 16. Distribution Disputes
I took off the helmet and looked at the them.
"You guys, can you spare some time? I want to talk to you about something."
"Something? What something?"
I began to talk.
"I think it"d be good for us to talk about how we"re going to distribute the spoils now, so that we don"t get into any conflicts later on."
After that comes the sharing of information.
Necro made a shocked face after hearing what I had to say and he shook his head vigorously.
"d.a.m.n~ I"m fed up with this kind of stuff! It"s not like I"m robbing you of your money, am I? You"re quite a greedy one, huh? Of course, as leader, I"d get nine. You two get one. Share that among yourselves. Of course, this will be the case when our group succeeds in our mission."
The saint banged on the table as soon as Necro stopped speaking.
"No way! Items all belong to the healer! Plus, in terms of level, aren"t I the strongest? How dare you noobs act like this in front of an expert!"
"d.a.m.n it, there"s only a one level difference. Expert my a.s.s. All you do is heal people from the back!"
I decided that I made the right decision in bringing this up now.
"Now, now. Calm down a little. Necro, when do we leave?"
"A little later, at 11. Everything else is already on the move, so we can just take it slow. I think they"re getting ready for the departure ceremony right now?"
It"s nine right now, so…
"We have time. We can deal with the matter of distribution now and we can talk about information later."
"Information?"
The two asked me this at the same time.
"I should know about my allies before I know my enemies, don"t you think?"
Necro responded with a remark that seemed to be mixed with sarcasm.
"d.a.m.n… how professional. Pros really are different, huh? Alright. We"ll do that later. And as for distribution… I"ll take 9 with the saint. You take 1. I choose what to give you."
A scam, huh.
"It"s not that different from before."
"Not that different? You had 0.5 before, and now 1, so it"s a 100% increase in profits, no?"
"…We should be fair."
I could hear myself get tilted.
"Oh, really? We"ll go with a vote then. I say yea."
The saint raised her hand when she saw Necro raise his.
"I say yea."
This guy…
"I say nay."
"2:1. We win. We get 9, you get 1."
Unfair.
"At least do a 7:3…"
"Let"s go with whatever the majority says again. I say nay."
"Nay from here as well."
Hey…
"Unfair."
"Unfair? I"m the boss, and I"m the one who"s making your body move. Of course it"d be us getting 9. Me? The strongest black wizard in the world. Her? She looks a little out of it, but she"s still the strongest white wizard in the world."
The saint jabbed Necro"s side using her elbow.
"Ow, ouch! I thought my ribs were going to break! Are you unable to communicate without your fists or something? Anyway, where was I… Ah, yeah, she"s great. And you? A criminal."
"……"
"Now, try looking at yourself from an objective point of view. Remember what Socrates said? "Know thy position.""
…More like "know thyself".
"A noob. Poor as h.e.l.l. s.h.i.tty level. Looks like h.e.l.l. Uh, that last one was a joke, so let"s pretend you didn"t hear that?"
"No, that"s…"
"Did you do anything useful after coming here? Winning in a tournament? Just one thing? Go find a different job if you"re dissatisfied. We can just summon someone else."
This guy was the incarnation of an abusive boss.
"You"ll be rewarded by the government if you complete the mission anyway. I"m doing this with that taken into account. And do you even know how much of my own money that I"m spending for this? You, a person who hasn"t done anything, is asking for a raise? I don"t think so. If you"re a proper member of society, and a logical person, you should say something after you achieve something. Right?"
I raised a white flag under his bombardment.
"Let"s change my rates the more stuff I achieve, then. I can"t back down any further than this."
"Okay! Sounds good! Now, the first enemy we"ll face is [The Warrior], so if you take the leading role in taking him down… Uh, you might as well take everything he has. Let"s settle it with that. Otherwise, it"s all 9 to 1 like before. You good? Good? Good."
"……"
"Let"s try calculating. There are five to take down in total, right? Let"s say 100% of the warrior"s stuff goes to you. The others are 1/10 for four times…"
28%.
"…That"s lower than I thought… 28%! Uhh, it should be well over 33% with the rewards from the government."
I took a look at the saint.
Seeing how she had tightly closed her lips, it seemed like she already knew.
"Isn"t that calculation wrong though?"
Necro raised his eyebrows at my response.
"Wrong? Where?"
He tried calculating with his eyes squinted again.
"…28. I"m right?"
"If the goods that the warrior has is not the same as those of the hero, it"d be unfair to a.s.sign the same value to their things."
If the warrior possessed one million and the hero possessed ten million, I"d be experiencing a loss with this sort of calculation.
"Ah~ Right, right. You"re right~!"
Sounds like he knew already…
"What should I do, then? I didn"t think of going this far, but… That floating eye. I wonder how expensive it was?"
This would never end at this rate.
"Consider the floating eye as the part of the spoils and agree with the suggestion I came up with."
"Deal. No paper contract needed, right?"
I shook hands with Necro.
The saint looked at this exchange with a look of disappointment.
"Well, that"s that with the distribution…"
Necro made a confused face for a second.
"We still have things to go over? Ah, what was that before? Information?"
"The information on our manpower and the enemy"s manpower, the amount of money we have access to, relations between every member between our groups, and etc. I want to know as much as possible."
I had already memorized the geography of this world.
"Hmmm–"
Necro took a deep breath, as if he wasn"t really happy with my request.
"Hah… Information…"
He put his tongue against his cheeks.
He exchanged a look with the saint, then scratched his head.
"I don"t know about the others, but I can"t tell you our budget. Too sensitive a topic. The rest… wait. What coffin did I put it in again?"
Coffin?
Necro rubbed the symbol on his left hand.
The surface of his hand began to ripple.
Was that where he stored his items?
The coffin must be the Hero"s Coffin that Necro had.
"Ah! Here it is."
After looking around for a while, he managed to pull out a thin packet of doc.u.ments.
"For now, the formation and the first phase of the plan will go as written here, but you should know that the plan won"t go exactly as planned. This is real life, after all. Oh, and since that"s a secret doc.u.ment, be careful with it."
I feel like I got this way too late, seeing that this was the day we were setting off…
Well, this must be because the First Subjugation Battalion and the Second Subjugation Battalion were the "planned" forces, and the special task force had only been organized a while ago…
I memorized the contents of the doc.u.ments and asked Necro a question.
"Any info on the warrior and the others?"
The plan would go with us taking down the warrior, the thief, the fighter, the summoner, and the hero in that order.
"Ah, we"re working on that right now. I"ll give it to you once we finish."
So Necro was in charge of the task force and the saint was in charge of the information huh.
Now, the only thing left to do was to confirm their information, as well as to share mine.
This task that I was given wasn"t as simple as a "Ready- Fight!" kind of a thing.
Each and every one of the enemies were strong enough to take out an army by themselves.
According to the doc.u.ment, there was an extremely low chance of the First and the Second Subjugation Battalion actually succeeding in their mission.
"Now then, show me information about yourselves. What can you do? What do you possess? What magic can you use?"
Necro made an annoyed expression at my request.
"Is that really needed? Well, I"ll show you, but… Yeah, I"ll show you. Hah… Just, that, I"d have told you to just shut up if you were any younger, but… I suppose I have no choice, considering how you"re a pro? You need it, right? For real? It"s going to get boring?"
Instead of responding, I just watched the saint laugh in the background.
Why was she laughing now?
"You were that curious about me? I would"ve answered if you had just asked. To think you"d drag Necro into it like this. You"re too shy!"
"……."
Her mind must have nothing but a field of flower inside.
"Speaking of, you share first, saint."
"And what about you, Mr. Murderer?"
"I"ll share last."
Necro and the saint responded to that at the same time.
"d.a.m.n, so dirty!"
"To think a person would be so disgusting! Do you even know what the word "trust" means? After all that I"ve done for you too! You really can"t trust me?"
"You were the one to ask for information first, so you might as well share first. You"re a pro, aren"t you? You should know about this kind of stuff."
"Do it first! Do it first!"
Can"t hear.
"We"re going to waste too much time at this rate. What do we think about letting the lady go first?"
The saint shook violently when I tried this suggestion.
"Only at times like this people mention ladies first!"
"Let"s take a vote if you"re so dissatisfied, how about that?"
Necro and I raised our hands at the same time.
The saint muttered "d.a.m.n males" under her breath, as she raised her status screen.