Enter, Pursued by a Memory
Enter, Pursued by a Memory
Just walking past the bastards hurriedly jumping up from their seats for shift change and bolting outside, as I made my way deeper into the hall, eyes started fixing on me. Simultaneously, the clamorous hall gradually quieted down.
The ones with any sense showed wariness, while the slightly dimmer ones unfailingly clicked their tongues, looking back and forth between Asilie and me. It wasn't that there were absolutely no female adventurers or mercenaries among them, but the likely cause was that none possessed looks outstanding enough to rival an elf.
Maybe that was why the expressions of the women who'd been treated like some kind of queens just moments ago soured rapidly. Hmph, 'those types' existed everywhere, I see.
"Are you Bardena Bekhen?"
There wasn't a single reason to be cowed by the stares around me, but the wariness I had maintained in case someone tried to pick a fight seemed pointless. However, when I approached the morosely eating Bardena—who was consuming plain meat like it was straw—and spoke to him, the three who had been stubbornly eating beside him instantly shot me dagger-like glares, an unexpected reaction that threw me off.
What the hell? Is that a hint they want their eyes gouged out?
No one actually jumped up, but the surroundings grew quiet as if anticipating something about to pop off. Within that silence, Bardena continued his meal without even looking at me and asked back,
"And you are?"
His whole demeanor was like some relaxed mob boss out of a mafia movie... I couldn't tell if this bastard was pulling rank or just fully committed to his own concept.
"An adventurer who came from the capital on a request from the Raviel Adventurer Guild. I asked the administrator Siel, and she said you manage adventurer affairs?"
At my reply, Bardena's gaze, which had been buried in his stew bowl, slowly turned toward me. Unlike the other guys, it was a gaze as dry and bland as his own eating manner. The bastard, having pointlessly put on such a weighty air, continued his god-awful mukbang and opened his mouth again.
"Bardena Bekhen. red-rank adventurer of the Raviel private guild, 'Folded Gold Coin.'"
Good god, what a disgustingly quirky way to introduce oneself, this fellow. Was he seriously trying to act heavy? For a moment, I felt an impulse to ask why the guild was named Folded Gold Coin, but the reactions of the surrounding bastards didn't sit well with me either, so I decided to wrap this up quickly.
If I kept watching this bastard eat, I felt like I might just smack the back of his head without realizing it.
"red-rank adventurer Eldmia Ega. Enough with the trivial talk. I'd appreciate it if you could tell me how you plan to deal with the monster attacks."
The silence stretched on just the same, but the reaction was different. The bastards who'd been glaring daggers moments ago wore peculiar expressions, and Bardena stared at me with a blank look for a second before bursting into a snicker.
"The name Eldmia Ega must be common in the capital, I see."
"Why? You met someone with the same name?"
"Haven't met him, but I've heard the rumors. He's been crazy famous lately with the nickname 'Guillotine.' You'd know, coming from the capital too."
And this time, it was my turn to go blank at the bastard's unexpected question.
Seriously, in this shitty, clunky-ass world, rumors and information flow like absolute crap. You've got idiots falling for scammers, and then they can't even recognize the person in question standing right in front of them as the same guy. Does this make any sense?
What a day for deep thoughts. After dry-washing my face for a moment and resolving my dilemma, I decided to make it absolutely clear to them.
"That's me."
"What?"
"That's me, I said."
Honestly, Bardena hadn't done a single thing wrong, but since I'd already gotten slapped by a guy who'd suffered damage from a scammer before coming here, my expression soured automatically. I had never once imagined a situation where I'd get fucked over *after* making my name known, so all I could do was feel the bitter taste in my mouth.
Fuck, the road ahead was long, way too long. Would it keep being like this until something like cell phones got distributed in this other world?
Unlike me, mired in such miserable feelings, the surroundings turned into a sea of laughter. That bastard Bardena, maybe his face just always looked like that, but unlike the others who were slapping their knees laughing, he started showing a weird snickering with shaking shoulders, and the bastards around him outright shouted,
"Hyahaha! You hear that? Says he's the Guillotine! The famous Guillotine came all the way to this shabby place!"
"Ran out of money even after beheading a traitor? Nah! The nation must've stiffed you on pay because of the war, clearly! How unfortunate!"
"They say you roll with the Gaendal party—where'd they go, coming alone? Ah, are they coming later? I jumped the gun here! Uhyahaha!"
These motherfuckers were fanning the flames on a burning house.
◈
"Goddamn adventurer brats are hopeless like this. Don't know how to keep time."
"Heh heh heh. Exactly, so why split up your crew and bring those kids along to mix with the wrong sort and suffer?"
Abnam, having finished the shift change with the latecomers, quickened his pace and smacked the back of Mekel's head as the guy laughed while picking at his grumbling.
"If you bastards had gotten promoted to red-rank on time, this wouldn't be happening, you sons of bitches!"
All fifteen of Abnam's subordinates were blue-rank, and this job was strictly a red-rank request. If it had been Englem, they could've wrapped it up with a chat, no problem, and brought everyone along, but this was Raviel. The fact that he could even bring three subordinates, including Mekel, under his own name was only because their blue-rank records were on the better side.
If only just two more were red-rank. Seeing Abnam click his tongue like that, Mekel retorted incredulously.
"Ah, shit. You were the one who told us not to get promoted before, seriously."
It was a perfectly valid counter-argument, since the one who hadn't said a word when they neglected promotion tests—using the excuse that staying blue-rank helped lure adventurers into dropping their guard in a fight—was the boss, Abnam himself.
Suddenly smacked in the face by facts in a cowardly manner, Abnam hemmed and hawed before needlessly smacking the back of Mekel's head once more.
"If you're salty, be the boss!"
"Eit, ptui ptui. That's dirty and cheap, for real!"
The other subordinates watched the scene and gave fierce grins. The fact that Abnam, who'd been rigid with tension just moments ago, had recovered some composure was entirely thanks to Mekel, so they just chimed in appropriately to keep the mood up.
"Man, maybe because I tensed up earlier, I'm filthy hungry. Eldmia's probably finished eating by now, right?"
"Been a while since he went in, wouldn't he? Can't imagine he's got that much to talk about with the administrator."
"Ri-right? They aren't even acquaintances."
Unaware that the administrator Siel and Eldmia were old acquaintances, Abnam quickened his steps toward the hall, buoyed by Mekel's chiming. The complacent belief that introductions would happen tomorrow morning anyway, not on a blizzardy evening like this, also played a part in speeding him up.
As a result, Abnam and his subordinates reached the hall in no time, but they were puzzled by the warmth and loud laughter that greeted them.
"What the, did something happen? The mood's good for once?"
Usually, it was a barren place where the Folded Gold Coin adventurers and other adventurers fought for dominance nearly every other day—a rare sight indeed. Peeling off the thick cloaks that had protected them from the blizzard until now and taking a look around, Abnam saw mercenaries and adventurers alike all laughing merrily, which made him let out a dumbfounded laugh himself.
"Bastards, what good thing happened..."
Muttering while scanning for any clue, Abnam froze like stone. Mekel and the others, also looking around, belatedly noticed Abnam's reaction and turned their gazes where he was staring, instantly freezing up just the same.
It wasn't hard to recognize who the adventurers were pointing at while bursting with laughter and sneers.
Because the only adventurer accompanied by an elf was Eldmia.
"Our Sir Guillotine's tight-lipped, huh? Or got no lips 'cause he's a guillotine? For someone like that, he sure was yapping about being the Guillotine just a moment ago!"
"Ma, ma, ma...!"
What the hell were these crazy motherfuckers doing!?
Abnam choked back the shout that almost burst out vocally, his eyeballs darting rapidly. Cold sweat started pouring like rain again from a body that had been chilled just moments ago. It was pretty much a given that he'd catch a cold and body aches by tomorrow at this rate, but the situation he was in right now was way more critical than that shit, so he didn't give it a single thought.
Deciding what he had to do, Abnam moved his feet. What he needed to see now wasn't the back of Eldmia's head but his expression. Fortunately, Eldmia hadn't budged an inch, so Abnam achieved his objective quickly.
And the moment he confirmed Eldmia's face—alone and pissed off while everyone else laughed—he ran without a shred of hesitation.
"Fuckfuckfuckfuck!"
In a frantic dash completely opposite to his earlier mincing steps to check Eldmia's face, he bolted like a madman toward the hall's main entrance, his subordinates, having grasped the situation, swiftly following behind. Along the way, others looked at Abnam like he was insane, but Abnam didn't give a shit one bit.
That's just how crazy bastards are. They don't know they're crazy.
"Hey! Guillotine! They say there's a line you shout every time you fight, don't they? You gonna stay quiet after taking insults like this? Go on, give us a nice shout here too!"
Abnam had made it a principle after learning his lesson in Ogwen to never associate with madmen, but at that insane cry—no different from pouring oil on a campfire—he couldn't help but react, letting out a scream.
"You crazy fucking bastards!! Stop it!!"
At his tearful, choked cry, the people inside the hall who had been laughing merrily looked at Abnam in surprise. But rather than minding those stares, he just ran like hell to get even one step further from the hall. He'd never heard of Eldmia using magic, but he couldn't even guess what the hell would happen if a human who'd single-handedly turned a noble's mansion into scorched earth decided to go on a rampage.
And he absolutely did not want to find out by sacrificing his own body.
"I."
Into the hall where an unexpected silence had thus begun to flow, a line reached Abnam's ears—a line that should've made him wake up pissing himself if he even heard it in a dream.
"Am called Eldmia Ega."
"Uwaaaah!!"
Running with literally every ounce of strength he'd possessed even as a nursing babe, Abnam threw himself toward the exit right in front of his nose without a shred of hesitation. Not caring for a proper landing, he tumbled down the stairs at the entrance the moment he fell and collided with his subordinates, turning it into a mess, but what Abnam felt was intense relief.
Simultaneously, the sound of something getting smashed to pieces magnificently erupted from the hall, along with screams beginning to ring out.