“Haa… Haa…”
In a dark inn room.
A woman with her thin nightgown half undone lies on the bed, panting with heated breath.
Cheeks flushed with heat. Skin moistened with sweat.
Between her breasts, heaving up and down with each labored breath, sweat droplets gathered like dew and flowed down, soaking the sheets.
“Hnngh…”
A tired groan escaping between clenched teeth. Her sweet-scented breath spread as white mist.
‘This isn’t easy…’
I lay on the bed, trying to calm my rapid breathing and ease the sense of exhaustion.
There was no strength left in my entire body.
I had used up all my stamina practicing the trait, <Iron Arm>, which I had finally figured out how to activate in the previous battle.
It didn’t go very well.
I tried practicing the method of lowering the output of Iron Arm to increase the number of activations, like Brunhilde in the original story…
‘Why is this so difficult?’
It was really damn difficult.
It was like trying to zigzag on a motorcycle on an icy road.
The moment I relaxed my concentration, my stamina drained away and my vision spun, making me think it would be hard to use in actual combat except for finishing blows for the time being.
Well, I still need to keep practicing though.
To become a silver token adventurer beyond copper token, I’ll need to be able to handle this power freely.
For that reason, I practiced controlling the output of Iron Arm until just before going to bed, then washed up and went to sleep around midnight.
The next day.
“H-Hilde. Are you, are you awake…? Um, if it’s not a bother, maybe we could have breakfast together…”
Friede, who was staying in the next room, came early in the morning and knocked on my door. Asking to have a meal together like yesterday.
“Ah… Just a moment. Let me change clothes.”
I put on my quilted armor with just my helmet on top, then went down to the first floor of the inn with her and ordered a simple meal.
Freshly baked bread with warm corn soup. It was a fairly decent meal for a free menu given to long-term guests.
“Um, so, you said we’re leaving tomorrow, right…? Then, um, what are you going to do today, Hilde?”
Friede, who was munching on bread dipped in soup, gently rubbed the table with her index finger while asking about my schedule for today.
“Today’s schedule… First, I’ll stop by the request office to find the last party member, and after that, I’ll need to reserve a carriage. I think that’ll be it after that.”
“Ah, I-I see…? Um, then, you know… lunchtime! You’ll be back around lunchtime, right…?”
“Probably. Why, want to come along?”
I thought it might be fine to go to the request office together.
Since Friede was also a member of my party, it wouldn’t hurt for her to see the other party members we’d be working with in advance.
“Ah, n-no. Um, I have some… things to prepare! So, um… I’ll wait here.”
However, Friede declined my offer. She glanced at the ceiling for a moment, as if remembering her own room.
“Is that so? Then it can’t be helped.”
I nodded, lightly shrugging my shoulders.
What could I do if she said she had things to prepare?
* * *
After finishing breakfast, I went back to my room, properly put on my armor, and headed to the adventurers’ request office.
“I came after seeing the undead subjugation notice, are you the party leader called Hilde or something?”
“I heard you were recruiting copper token adventurers.”
“Excuse me, are you Ms. Hilde?”
Honestly, I thought there might be only one or two applicants at most, but surprisingly, quite a few adventurers had applied to join the party.
Of course, having many applicants wasn’t necessarily a good thing.
As the ancient sages said, if five people gather, there’s bound to be one piece of trash.
Moreover, most adventurers were messed-up lives that barely qualified as human.
In other words, the trash ratio wasn’t 20%, but at least over 30%.
This time was no exception.
While there were adventurers who applied seriously, perhaps because they had reached copper token level, there were also several applicants who clearly seemed to have other motives.
“I’m Leo. As you can see, I’m a swordsman.”
A blonde swordsman pretending to be polite but glancing at my chest area.
“My name? It’s Rick. More importantly, are all the party members women?”
A tanned rogue archer who looked like someone you shouldn’t associate with, barely holding back from saying ‘woohoo’.
“Hmm… You said your name was Hilde? Misfortune has settled heavily on your shoulders. Haven’t things been going wrong or getting messed up in everything you do lately? That’s all because you haven’t been offering sacrifices to your ancestors.”
Even a pseudo-priest doing something like Barbie or whatever.
After filtering out all those guys and carefully selecting with the party composition in mind, I finally managed to find one new party member.
Back in my iron token days, I wouldn’t have had the luxury of choosing party members and would have just taken whatever party I could get…
‘But not anymore.’
The previous request taught me a lesson. A lesson that it was madness.
If I just picked anyone randomly and ended up with another bald unarmed combat warrior, it would be an unimaginable disaster.
Anyway, the party member I chose was…
“I’m Gerda. Pleased to meet you.”
A female ranger named Gerda.
A sturdy woman wearing leather armor with a hooded snow bear fur cloak on top.
She had a bow made of animal horn slung on her back, and a couple of short daggers and a one-handed sword at her waist.
Rangers were those with aptitude for both warrior and archer roles. In other words, it was a profession meaning archers capable of close combat.
You could say they were all-rounders capable of exploration, scouting, ranged damage dealing, and even standing as vanguard in emergencies.
While they were inferior to warriors in close combat and their archery skills were usually below dedicated archers, even considering this, it was a profession that was helpful in many ways to have in a party.
Since their basic skills were somewhat mediocre, they often learned how to detect and disarm dungeon traps as a supplementary skill, or handled things like poison to increase their attack power.
…Isn’t that a thief, you ask?
No way. You might get beaten to death by rangers if you say such a thing.
While their specialties are similar, rangers and thieves are clearly different professions.
Think about it. Thieves are sub-human trash engaged in the transportation business of moving other people’s belongings into their own pockets.
What kind of madman would accept such people as party members?
The place for thieves was not in adventurer parties but next to the gallows rope. Or among the fertilizer spread in wheat fields.
“I look forward to working with you.”
Anyway, I was finally able to gather all the party members. Somehow, it ended up being all women.
This was, well, unavoidable, because with three out of four positions already filled by women, I had no choice but to fill the remaining one with a woman too.
There’s no way there would be a decent man willing to join a party with three women.
There were many who were more interested in ulterior motives than prayer beads, and it was obvious that accepting such guys would only lead to unnecessary conflicts.
No, really. Those bastards were all just staring at my chest and thighs, you know?
It was really creepy.
Usually, with Kikel around, some decent guys would apply, but with three women gathered, there were only guys trying to make a move on us.
* * *
Anyway, after finding a party member like that, I told Gerda we’d meet again tomorrow morning and left the request office.
I went to the carriage rental place to reserve a four-seater carriage, and by the time I returned to the inn, it was a little past lunchtime.
Without a clock, I couldn’t tell the exact time, but it was probably around 2 PM.
Since there were more applicants than expected, I ended up being late for the lunch appointment… hmm.
…Well, it shouldn’t be a problem.
Friede looked like someone very used to eating alone, judging by her appearance.
If she was hungry, she would have eaten alone, or we could eat together now.
Knock knock.
I went up to the third floor of the inn and lightly knocked on the door next to my room.
“…Who is it?”
A low, sunken voice came from beyond the door. A voice filled with hostility and wariness. It felt like a dog greeting an unfamiliar visitor.
So she uses that kind of voice with strangers.
It was quite unexpected. She had only shown me a stammering, rambling appearance.
You know, it’s like seeing those keyboard warriors who become parent-killers on the internet, but when they actually face someone in person, they become so intimidated they can’t even utter a word properly.
If it were a grown man acting like that, it would have been pathetically hopeless, but since it was a girl a head shorter than me doing it, it was kind of cute.
“It’s me. Hilde. Can I come in?”
“Eek? Ah, um, just, just a moment…!”
Friede cried out in surprise. Along with a clattering sound, I could hear the bustle of someone running around.
Did she make a mess of the room or something…?
It sounded like she was moving and hiding something, but since I don’t have x-ray vision, I couldn’t tell exactly what she was doing.
A moment later.
“C-Come in…”
The wooden door of the room opened slightly, and a messy bird’s nest-like hair popped out through the gap.
Perhaps from hastily cleaning up the room, her breathing was strangely rough and her cheeks were slightly flushed.
Really. It’s not like she was hiding erotic books like a pubescent boy, so why all this fuss?
I let out a faint chuckle and entered Friede’s room.
As with all inn rooms, her room had a structure not particularly different from mine.
A small bed and a simple bathroom, a wooden table and dresser by the window, and a clothes rack attached to the wall were all that filled the modest space.
A hooded black fur cloak was hanging on the clothes rack, and underneath it, luggage like a backpack and sleeping bag were neatly placed.
The greatsword she had been carrying was leaning diagonally against the dresser.
“Um, wel-welcome…”
Friede, who had invited me into the room, plopped down on the bed and smiled awkwardly.
“Yeah, I said we’d eat together, but I ended up being a bit later than expected. Did you eat already?”
“Ah, no! Not yet!”
Friede shook her head.
Even though it was well past lunchtime, it seemed she had been waiting to eat with me.
“You should have eaten first. You must have been hungry.”
“Well… we said we’d eat together…!”
“You didn’t have to wait… Well, let’s go down and eat now. It’s a bit late, but if we ask, they should still serve us a meal.”
“Okay!”
I smiled awkwardly and suggested we eat, and Friede, with a happy face, jumped up from the bed, and we went down to the first floor to have lunch.
While at it, we chatted about the new party member and such.
“Ms. Gerda, is it…? Um, it seems she’s a woman too?”
Friede asked, slightly lowering her head. Perhaps because we were eating, her voice was a bit lower.
“That’s right. Isn’t that more comfortable for you too, Friede? Three women and one man would inevitably be a bit uncomfortable.”
“Uh, well… that’s…”
Friede mumbled something in a voice as quiet as an ant crawling.
“Hm?”
Her voice was so small that I couldn’t make out what she said.
“Ah, it’s nothing. Yes, a bit, uncomfortable? It would be uncomfortable. Probably.”
See?
If it were two men and two women, it might be different, but when the gender ratio becomes extremely skewed, it’s bound to be uncomfortable, right?
* * *
Anyway, we finished our meal like that.
After Friede bowed slightly saying she had eaten well and slipped into her room, I too returned to my room and rested for a while, leaning against the bed.
Then I got up again and started packing the luggage needed for tomorrow’s request.
Preserved food and consumables, oil and cloth for maintaining the sword, spare clothes and such.
Since we didn’t know how long the request would take, it seemed I should pack at least some clothes to change into.
‘Um… so… just in case, one set of top and pants… Ah, I should pack some underwear too.’
Although it’s unavoidable during dungeon subjugation, wearing sweat-soaked underwear for days on end was indescribably uncomfortable.
Not just sweat, but if blood from me or monsters soaked in, it would be beyond uncomfortable and downright unpleasant.
So I should pack underwear well too.
‘Let’s see…’
Two chest wraps. Three bottoms…
“Huh…?”
Why three?
I paused while putting the neatly folded cloth underwear into my backpack and tilted my head.
As far as I remembered, I should have had four pairs of underwear left… but there were only three in the drawer.
What’s going on…?
It couldn’t have been a thief.
What kind of crazy thief would steal just one piece of underwear?
A normal thief would have taken everything valuable, and an underwear specialist thief would have cleaned out everything.
‘What is this? Did I misremember…?’
Actually, did I have three pairs of underwear, not four?
It had been quite a while since I bought underwear, so my memory was hazy, but I had to think that way.
Even after looking around the room, there was no sign of a thief having entered anywhere.
It was utterly incomprehensible.