「Phew……I managed to find a place to stay the night.」

Rei took off his Dragon Robe and Shoes of Sleipnir as he lay down on the bed in his room in the Blue Sea Coral Inn.

The dinner he had in the dining area had been satisfactory and while the stables weren’t as large as the Dusk Wheat’s, it was enough.

His only complaint was that his room was only 3 tatami (5m^2) in size due to it’s location in a corner of the inn and most of it was taken up by the bed. Still the inn had given him a room under their current circumstances and price with breakfast and dinner included was only one silver a night. Considering the treatment that other adventurers currently received in Emoshion right now, his treatment could only be considered exceptional.

「Well, that’s how it is. First thing to do now is to figure out what to do starting from tomorrow.」

Since he had come here to subjugate the monster called the Lemrace and collect its bounty, Rei decided that he should focus on that. However, the all important target was hidden under the sea and even if it sunk ships, it would use magic to do that. Even if Rei could kill it, he needed to be able to see it first to do anything against it.

「I can’t just boil all the sea water……I don’t think think that would be good either.」

Considering Rei’s magic power, if you asked him whether or not it was possible, it was probably possible. However, since this was a port city that lived with the sea, it was the worst thing he could do. In the worst case scenario, he might be able to kill the monster with the bounty, but he would end up with a bounty on himself instead.

Of course, even if he did end up with a bounty on himself, Rei was confident in being able to fight off any bounty hunters. However, in that situation, he wouldn’t be able to go back to Gilm, his home city. That would be bad in various ways.

「In that case, I guess all I can do tomorrow is to fly out on Set and try to bait out the Lemrace?」

Muttering, he gave a small sigh.

That was because he recalled the water spears that had been created with magic. For Rei, who was good at fire magic, an opponent that used water magic was a bad match up. Even so, as long as the monster showed itself, there would be a way to do something about it. Rei couldn’t help but feel depressed.

「That said, I don’t really have a choice. I’ve come all the way out here and this monster has been causing a lot of trouble. I also want to get the monster’s magic stone and materials. ……Now that I think about it, maybe it would have been better to bring Miroir and Egret along?」

Rei thought about that for a moment, but there was no doubt that if he had brought them along, they would still have been wandering around the city looking for accommodation.

There was no way three people would have been able to sleep in the room Rei was staying in. And above all, Rei expected that Miroir would probably hate to stay in the same room with two other men.

「First things first……I don’t have a choice but to fly out to sea to see if I can bait out the Lemrace. If we can see the monster, we can think of some way to deal with it.」

He was tired from travelling and rescuing

 

 

The next day, Rei woke up at the 6am bell and went to the dining area to eat a breakfast consisting of seafood, soup, bread, grilled fish and seafood salad, just the kind of food you would expect from a port city. While eating, he looked around at the other adventurers in the room.

「What do you plan to do today?」

「What do I plan to do? Even though I came all this way to the Mireana Kingdom to collect the bounty, I haven’t even been able to see the monster with the bounty. I’ll go to the guild and pick up some doable requests. This is a port city and the cost of living is expensive.」

「Ah, that’s not great. In that case, can I join you?」

「Yoo? Well, based on the last request you did, our strength is about same, so I don’t mind.」

「Hmm, I don’t want to give up my original goal, so let’s pick up a request that’s near the sea. If we’re lucky, we might be able to kill some monsters around the area and collect their magic stones and materials.」

「No, when you say you’re not giving up your goal, you’re not aiming for the Lemrace are you?」

「I’m not sure……it’s true that the bounty is attractive, but I don’t think I’ll actually manage to get it. Moreover, since a large number of adventurers have gathered here, the number of available requests has also gone down.」

「That’s right. Also, the original adventurers of Emoshion don’t look on us nicely.」

「That can’t be helped though. After all, the had to put out a bounty because they couldn’t deal with the monster themselves. We are outsiders who came here for the bounty, of course they wouldn’t look at us in a friendly way.」

「Ahh, I think I might give up the bounty and head for a different city. Even if I could get rich here, right now I’m just wasting time and money.」

「If you want to do that, then go ahead. The less competition for the rest of us, the better.」

While listening in to all the voices around him, he nodded in understanding as he tasted the seafood soup.

(It would be good to collect the Lemrace’s bounty, but it’s also a fact that there’s nothing that can be done if the Lemrace doesn’t show itself. In that case, I should consider myself lucky that I can fly and attract its attention somewhat safely.)

Simply seasoning the grilled fish with salt, Rei squeezed some citrus fruit juice on top of it before placing it on a piece of bread along with some seafood salad and bringing it to his mouth.

As expected of a hidden away inn, the breakfast they served was as good as what Rei had at the Dusk Wheat in Gilm.

In particular, the food had texture and a deep flavour like the steamed shrimp in the seafood salad, which seemed to make his his teeth bounce off it.

(If there’s any fried shrimp, I would like to try that. There are eggs, bread crumbs and shrimp, so oil is the only thing missing? Since this is a port city, there should be at least olive oil or sesame oil……in that case, the only thing left is sauce, tartar sauce. Are there pickles in this world?)

Thinking up to that point, Rei came back to reality.

He hadn’t come to this city to eat shrimp but to hunt a Lemrace. The shrimp in his seafood salad had been so delicious that he had distracted himself. Rei shook his head to clear up his mind.

「Hey, whats with that kid? He’s shaking his head.」

「Who knows. But what is a kid doing here anyway? I don’t think he’s come here for the Lemrace.」

「Kuh, that’s a good joke. If the Lemrace could be beaten by such a brat, I would have gotten the bounty already.」

Rei sighed as he heard the adventurers talking about him from the table next to his.

Even though it was just the consequences of his own actions, he couldn’t feel happy about it.

Recently, his title of Crimson had become more well known, but it was really just another nickname magic warrior and Griffon pair. Without Set at his side, Rei was just seen as an apprentice mage, the same as before.

(Well, it can’t be helped. First of all, I head to the guild and collect all the information I can about the Lemrace. However, it would be best if I went over after the morning rush.)

Muttering to himself, Rei finished the rest of his food and completed his breakfast with a mixed fruit juice.

After that, he went out into the city with Set to buy a large amount of raw and unique seafood to this port and stored them into the Misty Ring as they killed some time.

For Rei and Set, they took this time to relax, as in a sense, that was why they had come to Emoshion. Eventually, they noticed that the busiest time in the adventurers guild had passed and they started to head there with some regret.

「Gururu~」

Even on the way, Rei thought back to Japan as he saw the white curtains that were made from squid hung on laundry lines to dry. Set gave cries as he greedily looked at the various seafood dishes. Eventually, they arrived at the guild.

「Well then, Set.」

「Guru~」

Without needing to be told, Set silently lay down at the guild’s area for tamed monsters.

There was a carriage there that was probably being used by some people who were inside the guild and the horse pulling it went stiff when it saw Set. There were also people who had only arrived in Emoshion this morning and were scared of Set as they hadn’t heard about the incident from yesterday. However, those reactions had already become normal to Rei and he entered the guild without care.

And……

「Don’t joke with me!」

As soon as he opened the door, he heard a shout from inside.

Hearing the voice of a woman, Rei thought it might just have been another drunken dispute. However, the voice that Rei heard from near the guild’s counter was from a brown skinned woman wearing a swimsuit, that looked close to a bikini, who was yelling at some adventurers.

(Brown skin? A Dark Elf?……no, a tan? But why is she wearing a swimsuit in the city?)

The sensory overloading figure of Gilm’s Dark Elf guild master passed through his mind for a moment, but the woman at the end of his line of sight had a darker skin colour purely due to exposure to the sun. Of course, unlike Marina, there was no sense of excess sensuality from the woman in the swimsuit.

「I’m sorry, but we took up a request for it, so it couldn’t be helped.」

One of three adventurers bowed his head towards her as he apologised.

The other two adventurers seemed to disagree with his actions, but didn’t say anything against it.

(A request? Did some trouble happen?)

Rei felt some interest for a moment, but his purpose in coming here was to ask about information on the Lemrace. Because of that, he moved to a counter a little further away from the place where the woman and adventurers were arguing before calling out to a receptionist.

「Excuse me, I’d like to hear information about the Lemrace.」

As long as there was a bounty on it, the guild would always hand out a minimal level of information regarding the target. Before departing from Gilm, he had asked Lenora and Kenny about it as well, but the information then was already old news.

However, the receptionist couldn’t just give the information to Rei after seeing his appearance. The fact that low ranking adventurers dared to fight the Lemrace and die in vain wasn’t a good thing for the guild, even if they were adventurers from other branches.

「Can I see your guild card? Information on the Lemrace is restricted to adventurers D rank and above.」

「Ah, is this fine?」

「-!? ……Pardon me, C rank adventurer Rei-sama. I’ve seen your guild card. Here is the information.」

Whether she was surprised after seeing Rei’s guild card, or she had known about the referral letter from Marina, Gilm’s guild master, or that she knew about Rei’s title as Crimson, the receptionist expressed her surprise for several seconds before immediately recollecting herself and handing Rei a single sheet of paper.

Perhaps she had handed out the same information many times already, there was something practised about her motions.

……In fact, some adventurers who had heard Rei’s request for information on the Lemrace had been planning to persuade him against it based on his appearance. But when they found out that he was a C rank adventurer from the receptionist’s words, they stopped themselves as they unintentionally gave a sigh of relief.

The sheet of paper contained all the information they had acquired about the Lemrace after all this time. But from the fact that there was only a single sheet of paper, there was almost no actual information known.

(No one has even seen what it looks like. Even with regards to the name it was given, Lemrace, it was only given because because they don’t know anything else about the monster. The only known method of attack it has is water magic. It can use water magic from a long distance away and without revealing itself. With just this much information, a single sheet of paper is definitely more than enough. Even in the cases where it was fought off, it was more like it just decided to leave.)

Quickly looking over the page, Rei didn’t find any particularly new information, so he decided to resort to the idea of flying over the sea with Set to lure the Lemrace out and take it down and went to leave the guild.

「Wait a minute! If you’re an adventurer, why don’t you say something to them!?」

As he was about to leave, the woman in the swimsuit arguing with some adventurers at a counter a bit further away called out to Rei. Seeing that he was being dragged into the argument, Rei gave a sigh.

「I’m sorry, but I’m busy. I don’t know what you’re arguing about, but I don’t want you to drag me into it.」

「You don’t want to get dragged in……then you’re an outsider adventurer like these guys as well!? Then, you’re not on my side!」

「No, I don’t want to just get lumped together with all the other outsiders……」

「That’s the same for people in this city!」

Sighing again after dragged back into the dispute for a second time, Rei turned to face the woman……to be exact, Rei turned to look at the three adventurers who had been one-sidely blamed for something.

「I can hear you out, but at least we could go to the bar? You were the ones who dragged me into this, so the least you could do would be to treat me, right?」

「……Yes, I’m sorry.」

The good natured adventurer out of the three bowed apologetically at Rei as the five of them went over to the bar.

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