“A named request? I’m fine with that.”
I nodded and sat down in the chair opposite the receptionist.
In fact, it was rare, even bizarre, for an iron token adventurer to receive a named request.
Why, you ask?
Well, when someone specifically chooses someone for a job, they usually pick a famous person with a great reputation. Not an iron token who hasn’t even earned a copper token.
“So, what’s the job?”
However, such questions could wait until after hearing the request details.
First, I needed to listen to the story.
* * *
According to the receptionist girl’s explanation, there are two types of named requests.
There’s the literal meaning of a named request where a renowned adventurer is designated for a job, and there’s an indirect named request where the guild selects and recommends suitable personnel according to the client’s requirements.
In my case, it was the latter.
It wasn’t that the adventurer named Hilde was specifically chosen, but rather that I was the only adventurer who met the client’s requirements.
It was all thanks to the new mid-level dungeon.
Since most of the copper token and above adventurers had gone there, among the remaining personnel, there was no one more suitable than me.
Of course, it’s not that there are no copper or silver tokens at all… but they said those are standby forces that shouldn’t be mobilized for such ordinary requests.
“It’s the lord’s instruction. ‘To prepare for emergencies, maintain a certain number of forces on standby.’ Because of such a principle, those who remain can’t move. They shouldn’t move either.”
…I didn’t know such a principle existed.
The internal affairs of the adventurers’ guild were just minor settings that had no reason to be mentioned in the original work.
Anyway, since copper token adventurers couldn’t be mobilized, they had to form a party with only iron token adventurers…
“But that’s just our circumstances, there’s no way the client would accept that, right?”
As expected, the client strongly protested, they said.
No matter how short-staffed they were, how could three iron tokens be acceptable?
“It was a troublesome situation. If it had been a small village chief or an ordinary city resident, we could have somehow persuaded them, but this time the client was a trainee magician from the Magic Tower, even if they were an apprentice.”
It was an extremely awkward situation for the guild as well, they said.
If it were a wandering magician without affiliation, it might have been different, but getting on bad terms with a magician affiliated with the Magic Tower would lead to very annoying and troublesome consequences.
Those Magic Tower guys, they’re called a Magic Tower but in reality, they’re just like a cartel.
A cartel monopolizing the production and distribution of magical items like potions and scrolls.
They held the rights to sell items essential for adventurers, and the moment you upset them, they would retaliate with price bombs. They were the worst of the worst.
When an apprentice magician from such a Magic Tower expresses a complaint, would you respond by saying it can’t be helped because of principles and tell them to give up if they don’t like it?
You disrespected our apprentice? That means you disrespected the Magic Tower? Want to taste double potion prices?
It was obvious they would come out with something like that.
…But they couldn’t disobey the lord’s direct orders either, so the request office staff could only sweat profusely, unable to do anything.
At that moment, our receptionist girl stepped forward and managed to soothe and persuade the client, the apprentice magician.
By strongly recommending me, Hilde, the strongest iron token adventurer who easily cuts the throats of other iron token adventurers.
She praised me as an excellent swordswoman with iron token employment costs but skills definitely above copper token level, with a mission success rate of 90%.
It wasn’t a lie.
She just omitted the explanation that the party member mortality rate was 40%.
“Uh… is that okay?”
It feels like selling a defective product by hiding its flaws and emphasizing only its strengths, almost like a scam. Even though it’s about me.
“As long as Hilde doesn’t cause any problems.”
There’s no need to worry about that.
Unlike some novice adventurer, a magician affiliated with the Magic Tower won’t suddenly turn into a looter.
I’m not some murder-hungry killer who would cut down perfectly fine party members for no reason.
I only respond in self-defense to those who attack me.
…Though sometimes it did turn into excessive self-defense.
* * *
After explaining the situation, the receptionist continued to explain the detailed request content.
“The client is an apprentice magician named Amy. She needs to explore a low-level dungeon and needs adventurers to escort her.”
Low-level dungeon exploration. It was a surprisingly ordinary and simple request.
“Low-level dungeon exploration? Is that all? For such a job, it doesn’t seem like she needed to insist on a copper token…”
It’s not even necessary for me to step up, three iron token adventurers would be more than enough.
“Ah, well. She said there’s a high probability that a grimoire is stored on the lowest floor. In that case, the dungeon’s monsters tend to be somewhat stronger than other low-level dungeons due to the influence of the grimoire’s magical power.”
A dungeon with a stored grimoire.
That made sense. In the original work, dungeons where grimoires dropped tended to be a bit more difficult than other dungeons.
“The request itself seems fine… but how is the party composition? Surely it’s not just me and the client, right?”
If that was the answer, I would have no choice but to refuse.
For wild monster subjugation it might be okay, but for dungeon exploration, we needed to form at least a 4-person party.
“Of course not. Do you think I would do that? I’ve already found a priest and a warrior. I’ve carefully selected people with no problems in their career, so you can rest assured.”
One priest and one warrior. It wasn’t a bad composition.
We might be a bit vulnerable to ambushes without an archer, but in exchange, we could heal immediately even if we got a little hurt.
“What are their names?”
“The priest is Mr. Bolton. The warrior is, well… Kikel Greg? Yes, Mr. Kikel Greg.”
“Ki-what?”
How can a person’s name be Kikel Greg.
It was truly a bizarre name.
Whoever they were, their parents must have had a terrible flu when naming their child.
Otherwise, there’s no way a person’s name could be like that.
“Kikel Greg. It’s a unique name, isn’t it? But his career is solid.”
The receptionist girl chuckled and shrugged lightly.
Well, what does the name matter? As long as their skills and personality are decent, that’s enough.
For someone like me who keeps encountering looters day after day, I would be more than satisfied as long as they were at least human level.
…There was a time when I thought like that.
* * *
The next morning, I equipped myself with dungeon exploration gear and headed to the request office, where I met the priest and warrior who had arrived early and were waiting.
“Ah, are you perhaps Miss Hilde? Nice to meet you. I’m Bolton.”
The priest of the Goddess Church, Bolton, was a man with brown hair and a neatly trimmed short beard.
He seemed to be in his early twenties. An iron adventurer token and a rosary of the Goddess Church hung conspicuously near the neck of his plain black priest’s robe.
While his skills and personality would need to be observed over time, at least his first impression seemed to pass.
On the other hand, the warrior…
“Kachak!”
Even his laugh sounded ominous from the start.
His appearance was even more so.
“Glad to meet, human woman! Me, Kikel Greg! Arden swamp, warrior!”
“…Uh…”
Faced with Kikel Greg introducing himself with an incomprehensible expression, I could only nod blankly, at a loss for words.
A height of at least 180cm.
Zigzag-bent leg joints.
Arms full of scales with sharp claws.
And to top it off, a horned face resembling a lizard.
A heteromorphic race, a Lizardman, whom I thought I wouldn’t encounter in the north, was looking down at me.
My goodness.
No wonder his name didn’t sound human, he really wasn’t human. It was truly an unexpected identity.
“Woman, no greet? Greeting important. People people kill well. So must live with manners!”
As I was staring blankly at his lizard face, feeling dumbfounded, he stuck out his tongue, hissed, and lectured me about etiquette.
Although it was terribly difficult to understand with the strange metallic sound mixed in at the end of each sentence.
“Ah, I see. I apologize. It’s my first time seeing a Lizardman.”
People should live with mutual respect. It was an irrefutable truth, so I apologized obediently and nodded lightly.
“Iron token rank swordswoman, Hilde. Nice to meet you, Mr. Bolton, Mr. Kikel Greg.”
“The pleasure is mine.”
“Kikel Greg!”
The Lizardman demanded a correction, saying his name wasn’t Kikel but Kikel.
Wait, was that a demand for correction?
With his lizard face, it was hard to read his expression, and his strange way of speaking made it difficult to understand the intention behind his words.
“Ah, yes. Ki-Kikel Greg.”
“Kachak! Human pronunciation difficult? Understand! Me same, human speech difficult!”
At least, it seemed certain that that kachak sound was his laugh.
“Kachak! Kachak!”
…Probably.
* * *
The apprentice magician who had commissioned the request didn’t seem to have arrived at the request office yet, so the three of us sat around a table in the request office, waiting for her and engaging in brief small talk.
Although I say small talk, it wasn’t about prying into personal matters, but mostly questions about each other’s equipment and fighting styles.
For example―
“Mr. Bolton, are you perhaps aspiring to be a paladin?”
I asked, pointing at the long spear Bolton was holding like a staff.
A priest with a spear was not only an unusual combination but honestly a baseless combination I had never seen before.
But a paladin with a spear is a different story. That’s a classic combination overflowing with tradition.
“Haha, no. This is just for self-defense.”
Of course, this old man Bolton wasn’t aspiring to be a paladin.
It was actually obvious. If he were aspiring to be a paladin, he would have been wearing armor. Not just a priest’s robe like now.
The long spear he was holding was just armament in case he ran out of holy miracles to use or in case of a sudden enemy ambush, he said.
“Don’t people usually carry maces or something?”
I asked back.
When it comes to a priest’s auxiliary weapon, isn’t it usually a mace? Or no weapon at all.
“Haha. Isn’t a mace too cruel?”
Bolton answered with an awkward laugh.
“When I tried to discipline a pickpocket boy with it, both his eyeballs were completely dislodged, which wasn’t a pleasant sight. So I switched to a spear.”
“What?”
What kind of crazy talk is this all of a sudden?
I stared at him with a look of disbelief.
This isn’t something you should say while laughing.
You smashed a child’s head with a mace? Just because he was a pickpocket?
This guy’s insane.
If you wanted to punish a pickpocket, you should have just cut off his two wrists and been done with it, how could you just smash his head?
“Uh… wasn’t that a bit excessive punishment?”
Even for me, who’s often told my methods are too harsh, this was beyond words.
“It might seem that way to you, Miss Hilde. But more important than secular law is upholding the principles of the church. It’s a principle to smash the head of those who covet a priest’s belongings.”
Bolton said this with a smile overflowing with benevolence.
What a terribly brutal principle.
I heard that the zealots of the Goddess Church were often far scarier than the Magic Tower cartel. It seems that statement was the unexaggerated truth.