Legend

Reserving a room at the inn, Rei gave a sigh of relief as they decided to immediately head to the guild branch office.

It was already evening and they had no other urgent business that couldn’t wait until tomorrow. But in the end, there was the matter of the mantis they had fought on the way. Given it’s special characteristics, Elena judged that they couldn’t leisurely wait until the next day.

According to the information Vel had heard in the inn, the person in charge of the village that surrounded the dungeon and the person in charge of the guild branch office were the people who decided things here.

「Hey, look over there……」
「Who is that beautiful girl? I don’t recall seeing her here.」
「She’s not just a pretty girl. Her abilities are quite good.」
「As for the guys with that girl, they also have a considerable strength.」
「Anyway, with that body, I would love to play with her for a night.」

In the first place, because Elena boasted a beautiful face and a well proportioned body, she stood out clearly as she walked through the village.

As it was a village built around a dungeon, although they may not know each others names, most of the adventurers recognised everyone else by their face. What would happen if a beautiful girl like Elena, whom they had never seen before, walked past them? The answer was now in front of Rei’s eyes.

All the male adventurers that looked at Elena stopped on the spot and looked admiringly at her beauty and talked about her with their friends nearby.

……However, the people that were muttering that they would like to play with her for a night shut up and held their breaths when Ara and Kuust gave bloodthirsty glares at them.

Unlike Kuust and Ara, who were getting angry, Elena continued walking without minding the surroundings. To Elena, who had wandered the battlefield, she just ignored it as there was nothing that could be done with her appearance.

Naturally, there was also her confidence in her own strength. Anyhow, she had declared that anyone who wanted to make advances on her had to be at least stronger than herself. And if anyone were crazy enough and attacked her, she would just fight back, which had actually happened before.

Though their group stood out a lot, Elena led everyone through the village.

……Though they would have attracted more attention if Set was here as well, fortunately, he wasn’t here and was happily focusing on eating the food provided by Linde. Though he had wanted to go with them, Rei persuaded him.

「Um……yes, the guild is here.」

Vel, who had been guiding them to the guild, walked out in front and looked up at the building.

Though it wasn’t at the same size as the guild in the city of Gimuru, with was still a rather large building. However, as it was only a temporary building built for the dungeon, Rei was able to see that it was sloppily built in a variety of ways.

「Umu~. Then let’s enter.」

Kuust frowned his eyebrows at the rough design of the guild as Elena opened the door to the guild.

As they entered, they looked around the inside of the guild.

「Hmm, something like this.」

As Elena checked the state inside the guild, the guild staff and hardened adventurers all unintentionally glanced at Elena.

As for Rei, he also looked around the guild as he stood next to Elena.

Again, maybe related to its temporary nature next to the dungeon, it was very different from the guild in Gimuru. The biggest difference was that the guild didn’t have a bar. Material purchasing and party application, because a large number of adventurers would gather at the guild, the bar in Gimuru was something that was added for their use.

For example, a large amount of requests were always posted on the request boards in the guild at Gimuru. Also different were the periods of congestion in the morning and evening when people went to start and finish requests. Even then, they still had room to spare. However, because all the adventurers who were aiming for the dungeon gathered here, the guild here was awfully crowded.

At night, the monster in the dungeon became more belligerent and active, no different from when they were outside. Because of that, most adventurers would enter the dungeon at roughly the same time, causing this packed crowd.

Of course, there were also adventurers who wanted materials specifically from monsters that come out at night or those who just wanted to fight strong monsters. However, high ranking adventurers like them were few.

However, there were people who had taken guild requests to escort trade groups and as a result weren’t at the guild at any specific time.

「The counter……is over there.」

As the adventurers and guild staff who had glanced over finally gathered themselves, Elena headed towards the guild counter.

「Is here okay?」
「Ah, y-yes. Of course. What can we do for you?」
「I have a little business with the person in charge of the guild here, I would like you to tell them.」
「That, may I ask about what for?　I can’t permit just anyone to talk with him.」

As expected for someone working for the guild near the dungeon. Although the young male staff member was stunned by Elena’s presence, it didn’t take him long to calm down as he spoke and gave a reply as usual.

Impressed in her mind at his professionalism, Elena continued to speak.

「That’s right, we have two business matters. First of all is this.」

Saying that, she presented two letters in two envelopes. They had the wax seals of Margrave Rowlocks and Duke Kerebel respectively.

Duke Kerebel aside, the guild staff recognised Margrave Rowlocks’ crest as he ruled the land they lived on. Taking in a sharp breath, he looked at Elena twice and checked the letter three times.

「I understand. Please wait a minute, I will tell the head of the branch immediately.」
「Umu~, I understand.」

As Elena nodded, a guild staff member nervously ran up the stairs next to the counter at a quick pace.

Watching him go, Elena looked around the inside of the guild with interest.

Because of her missions were given to her by her father, Duke Kerebel, there weren’t that many opportunities to enter the guild. Not to mention under normal circ.u.mstances, Kuust and Ara would avoid bring her to such places, given her status as a duke’s daughter.

There was also the opportunity to sell off the magic stones and materials they had gotten during the journey and for Vel to gather information efficiently.

「Hey, who are they?　Does anyone know?」
「No. It’s the first time I’ve seen them. They stand out so much so I wouldn’t forget them if I’d seen them before, they probably came here recently.」
「Looking at their demeanor, they are probably not adventurers. They resemble some knights I know.」
「……Knights?　But what would knights come to the frontier for, moreover, so such a dangerous place like the dungeon.」
「Even if you ask me about that. You should ask the person in question if you’re interested.」

There were adventurers talking with their acquaintances and companions like that. Along with that, there were also excellent mages who were behaving strangely after seeing Rei’s vast magical power.

「-!?」
「Hey, what’s wrong?」
「……」
「What, you as well?　Our mage also went quiet as soon as those guys walked in……」

While the noise went round, the guild staff member from before came down the stair and went to Elena and the others.

「Sorry for taking so long. Our representative would like to meet you.」
「Sorry for the trouble.」

Elena nodded and followed the staff who guided her up the stairs.

Of course, Kuust, Vel, Ara and Rei followed after them.

All that was left on the first floor of the guild were adventurers guessing Elena’s ident.i.ty and the mages who finally gathered themselves after Rei left.

Using this opportunity, the mages told the existence that was Rei to the rest of their party. That spread out from friendly party to friendly party and so on.

「Representative, I’ve brought Elena-sama’s group.」

The guild staff probably already knew what kind of person Elena was. After respectfully guiding them to the room of the guild representative, he knocked on the door and called out.

The reply to the staff member was an unexpectedly young voice.

「Yes, please enter.」

Following the voice from inside, he opened the door and entered. Elena and the rest followed after him.

「Welcome. My name is Walker and I serve as the representative of the guild.」

Saying that, a man in his twenties stood up from behind his work desk and gave a bow. Even the highest estimate of his age wouldn’t be above early thirties. He had gentle features and gave of the atmosphere of having a good att.i.tude.

It was quite different from the person they had imagined. Vel and Ara smiled in surprise. Kuust just saw all commoners as the same and turned to look at the representative without any particular change in his expression.

Meanwhile, Rei also lifted his eyebrows slightly in surprise.

This was a guild that was right next to a dungeon. Of course, the were a great number of adventurers and quite a few rough people as well. For a guild representative to deal with such things, they had a.s.sumed he would be someone like Daska, Margrave Rowlocks.

(This is the representative of the guild. Well, because it’s probably not possible to deal with adventurers just by being gentle, I feel that he probably has another face……)

While Rei thought that in his mind, Elena sat down on the sofa for visitors and spoke up without any particular change in expression.

In addition, the rest of them stood behind Elena as guards.

「Though I think you would have understood if you read the letter, allow me to greet you again. I am Elena Kerebel. I was dispatched my father, Duke Kerebel, to go to the place known as the Altar of Inheritance found in this dungeon. My best regards.」
「Yes, thank you. ……Though that said, the Altar of Inheritance that you’re talking about is on the 7th floor down, the lowest layer of the dungeon. It’s very close to to the location of the boss. Even from the rumors I’ve heard about the General Princess, it would be difficult to get there……」
「I understand the circ.u.mstances. Fortunately, I have a subordinate called Vel who had the skills of a thief, as for the others, there is no problem with their strength. ……Of course, this is the first time I have gone to a dungeon, we will proceed carefully and won’t let our guard down.」

Elena, Vel, Kuust and Ara. Walker then turned to look at Rei after looking at them.

「…….I understand. Though the letter asked me to a.s.sist you as much as possible, is there anything you wish for?」
「Not for the time being. We have prepared sufficient goods and combat strength in Gimuru. There are no particular issues as long as we can smoothly enter the dungeon.」
「Smoothly, is it. ……I see.」

Walker thought of something like nodding. Before long, he took out something similar to a guild card from the desk in the office.

「Please have this. I can give you this in accordance with my rights as the guild representative. It will be necessary to enter the dungeon.」
「When entering the dungeon?」
「Yes. All the adventurers enter the dungeon at about the same time. Because of that, waiting is sometime necessary. You can use this card to go in immediately without waiting.」
「I see, thanks. I’ll be grateful to receive this. ……When I return, should I return it?」
「Yes, that would be helpful. With that, how about maps of the dungeon?」
「Though we’ve acquired maps down to the 3rd floor from Margrace Rowlocks, are there any more detailed maps?」
「No, as for what’s being sold at the moment, the 3rd floor is the newest one. Though there are parties that has gone past that, any information they provide would only be out of good intentions……」

After Elena put the card in her pocket, the matter about the dungeon was finished. After a few seconds of silence, Walker spoke up again.

「So you mentioned that there were two matters of business, one was the matter of the dungeon, what’s the other?」
「Umu~, actually, we were attacked by a strange monster when we came here from the city of Gimuru.」
「Strange?　Is it a new species of monster?」
「Maybe. Can you define something that melted away without leaving a magic stone after being defeated a monster? In addition, its strength is at least a B rank monster.」
「……That, is that true?」

That’s strange. Ara took a step forward to Walker, who seemed to be doubting the authenticity of the story in this situation.

「Are you saying that Elena-sama is lying!?」
「No. However, as the guild representative, I can’t just easily believe a story that such a monster appeared. ……However, there were some circ.u.mstances. I should say that I could believe it.」
「Hou~?　You have some thoughts? Please continue.」

Walker nodded at Elena’s words.

「Actually, several trading groups that left here in the past few weeks have gone missing. There were also merchants that left Gimuru for here.」
「Escort?」
「Of course we gave them escorts. Please wait a moment.」

He took the doc.u.ments which were placed at the corner of the desk and turned one of the pages as he said that.

「The highest rank escort was C rank. The lowest escort rank was F rank. If the monster had a considerable strength, B rank as Elena-sama mentioned, the result would have been quite severe. ……Are you certain it has the strength of a B rank monster?」
「Ahh, Rei can testify.」
「……Rei?」
「If you’re with the guild, you should have heard about the story of the Orc Village?　He’s the person who defeated the B rank monster, the Orc King, who was leading the Orcs at the time. Rei.」

Prompted by Elena, Rei came forward.

「I’m Rei. The monster we fought along the way certainly had strength at the same level as the Orc King. It was a huge mantis that had 4 scythes and had an armoured body like a beetle. We can also confirm that it could become invisible and disappear from the surroundings as well as use an ability similar to wind magic. After defeating it, it melted away and produced a foul smelling odour. By the way, the liquid that dissolved the mantis was toxic enough that it also melted away the gra.s.s that grew on the ground.」
「……I understand. This matter will be reported to the guild in the city of Gimuru. As for the mantis monster, I hope it was only a single rare species or something……」
「According to Rei’s view, he’s of the opinion that is was something made with alchemy.」
「I see, an alchemist. Thank you very much, allow me to spread the information around here.」

Thus, the important matter of the mantis was reported and they decided to return to the inn to soothe their fatigue from the journey.

And the next day, they challenged the dungeon.