An Exploit for the Ticket Exam
“Some of the dishes made from the ingredients you gathered are Rare delicacies you couldn’t eat on an ordinary day even if you begged, right?”
“Well… yes, I suppose that is true, but…”
“As you can see, I didn’t eat well growing up, which left me short and full of regrets. I have no intention of passing up a golden opportunity to feast on such a wide variety of food!”
Giselle stared at me with an utterly flabbergasted expression.
“Then what about your ticket?”
“Can’t I just eat first and think about that later?”
“Ha. Do you honestly believe a method will magically present itself if you sit around stuffing your face with zero preparation?”
“Why wouldn’t it?”
“Now that wounds my pride. To utter such lazy nonsense right after witnessing my shrewdness firsthand…” Giselle’s eyes turned cold. “If you are truly that confident, how about a wager?”
“What kind of wager?”
“Thirty-two dishes from those meal vouchers. At three dishes a day, it will take eleven days to sample them all. If you manage to acquire a ticket through an astounding method—one even I must acknowledge—before finishing the final plate, I will cover the entire tab for free.”
“Whoa…”
“However, if I win, you must pay me one hundred gold coins and purchase a Silver Ticket from my inventory. Regardless of who triumphs, you secure a ticket, and I defend my reputation. A fair bet, wouldn’t you say?” Giselle tilted his chin up with an arrogant smirk. “If you lack the nerve, you may surrender right now before losing face and simply buy the ticket… buy the…”
Drip, drip, drip.
His words trailed off into silence as he watched me practically drown in my own drool, thoroughly blinded by the prospect of free food.
“My lady… No matter how hearty your appetite, it is hardly becoming for a proper young lady to drool before unfamiliar gentlemen. Please, exercise some composure.”
“But you said the food would be free!”
“Ha. Such sheer audacity. It seems I need not even ask whether you accept.”
And just like that, the wager over the ticket exam began.
Five days had passed since our stay at the inn began.
Giselle, the covert merchant operative, watched the girl’s every move with keen eyes, waiting to see what ingenious scheme she would concoct to claim a ticket. Yet the longer he observed, the more a single thought consumed his mind:
Shouldn’t I report this for child abuse first?
He knew noble houses were notoriously strict with discipline. High-born aristocrats lived in an entirely different world from commoners, after all. Even so, there was a limit to human decency.
“The way this dish coats the tongue at the very end leaves such a wonderful lingering aftertaste!”
The young girl smiled in pure bliss after finishing another Rare delicacy. But when she set her fork and spoon back onto the table, a heavy, resonant thud shook the wood.
It was not merely the weighted cutlery.
The moment the meal concluded, she engaged in a terrifying regimen under the guise of agility training: spreading her fingers wide across the tabletop and repeatedly stabbing a fork between the gaps at blinding speed. A single slip of the wrist would sever a finger clean off. It was madness.
And shockingly, that was the milder part of her day.
“Given your current parameters, my lady, ordinary sprinting will no longer yield benefits. We must therefore practice evasive maneuvers while under fire.”
“Sounds great!”
“I shall announce the target zone before each strike. Should your evasion prove sluggish, you will sustain injury, even if short of a full amputation. Maintain absolute vigilance.”
Though the butler addressed her with immaculate deference, he ruthlessly swung cold steel at his own master.
Sssss.
Meanwhile, the maid tested a drop of lethal poison—a venom potent enough to make an ant thrash in agony before dying—nodded in grim satisfaction, and coated the girl’s candy in it. And the little lady, completely unaware, cheerfully accepted the treat and hugged the maid’s skirts in adoration.
This goes beyond mere child abuse. It looks like an active assassination contract! At this rate, I ought to press charges with the local lord!
What tragic, convoluted circumstances had placed her under daily threat of murder and poisoning by her own retainers? Driven by suspicion, Giselle deployed his informants to investigate.
“The icy chill of this strawberry bingsu clears my head right out! And the sweetness that follows is out of this world!”
“The ingredients diced into thick cubes give it an exquisite bite, and the curry ties everything together in pure harmony! A perfect ten out of ten!”
Oblivious to the dark clouds swirling around her, the girl chirped away like an innocent food critic, listing colorful reviews for every Rare meal placed before her.
Giselle could only watch her with an increasingly conflicted gaze.
“Is she just stalling until she has to cough up a hundred coins for a ticket?”
“Damn it, I should have bet on the merchant.”
“Hey, spill it! You two rigged this from the start to bleed us dry of our spare coin, didn’t you?!”
The long-term lodgers, who had set up a side pool wagering on the outcome of the bet, began shouting in frustration. When the girl flinched and ducked her chin at the sudden clamor, a flash of murderous intent glinted in the butler’s eyes. His gloved knuckles popped in a rhythmic, menacing crunch as he stepped forward.
“Watch your mouths,” Giselle barked before the butler could unleash violence. “Do you truly believe a merchant of my standing would stoop to match-fixing over pocket change? For an unsanctioned side wager I am not even running?”
The patrons, having witnessed his cunning firsthand, shrank back and swallowed their protests.
“Clear out of this inn immediately. If you linger, you will pay dearly for offending my sight.”
Tickets were items of astronomical value. A man who plotted to hoard dozens of them would never travel unescorted. At Giselle’s sharp command, several heavily armed mercenaries stationed at nearby tables rested their hands on their weapons, glowering down the disgruntled guests.
“Tch…!”
“Just you wait.”
“Arrogant bastard.”
The guests muttered petty curses as they slunk away. Disgusted by the cowardly bluster of dogs tucking their tails, one mercenary drew his blade an inch from its scabbard.
Shing.
The chilling scrape of honed steel sent the lodgers scrambling toward the doors in sheer panic. A few even bolted into the street without bothering to collect their remaining lodging deposits from the innkeeper.
“Hahaha! Cowards, the lot of them.”
“An embarrassment to adventurers everywhere.”
When the mercenaries swept their cold gazes across the dining hall, the remaining patrons who had been snickering quickly averted their eyes. Unlike adventurers, who took on mundane odd jobs, mercenaries earned their living through pure slaughter. Even as personal bodyguards, their combat prowess stood on an entirely different tier.
“Come over here, little lady.”
The girl glanced at her butler for permission. Only after he offered a slight nod did she scurry over on light feet.
“I do not make wagers with just anyone,” Giselle said quietly.
“Were you disappointed because I looked easy to beat?”
Giselle shook his head. If anything, the girl’s unwavering cheerfulness bothered him more than insolence ever could. Not because of her plucky spirit, but because her life had evidently been so harrowing that she failed to recognize outright hostility and abuse as abnormal. The sight filled him with profound pity—and deepened his contempt for the suspicious duo posing as her attendants.
“I have watched the fierce struggle of your daily routine over the past few days. I was not disappointed then, nor could a trivial wager ever disappoint me now.”
Disappointment was nowhere near what he felt. What gnawed at his chest was genuine worry.
“Should you ever find yourself with nowhere to turn in the future, speak my name to the underground merchants in any city. I will ensure you always have a roof over your head and food on your plate.”
“Are you scouting me right now?”
Giselle kept an impassive face, keeping the watchful butler and maid at the edge of his vision.
“I merely thought that with your strength and sheer boldness, you might grow into a merchant tycoon rarely seen in our trade.”
“Whoa… I’ve never heard anyone say that to me before.”
The girl beamed with genuine wonder. As if guarding against any further influence, the butler spoke in a cool, level tone.
“The young lady is scheduled to matriculate into the Academy. While we appreciate the sentiment, she has no calling as a merchant.”
“He says so,” she chimed in. “And that’s my plan too!”
“…I did not make the offer expecting immediate acceptance. Simply keep it in mind. In this life, things rarely unfold according to plan.”
The girl tilted her head, then broke into a roguish grin like a mischievous little boy.
“I’ll remember it!”
Giselle considered pressing further, but quickly shelved the thought. Those abusive guardians would never release their grip so easily anyway. For now, this was enough. If dark days ever fell upon her, simply knowing that an adult stood in her corner would be of immense comfort.
A few more days trickled past.
A full week had elapsed since the start of the ticket exam, and the examinees who had scattered into the wilderness began trickling back to the inn one by one.
“I’ve come to deliver the ingredients!”
“Too bad. That quota was fulfilled days ago.”
“Wh-What?!”
Naturally, the quotas for easier ingredients had long since been claimed by Giselle’s preemptive strikes.
“Please, innkeeper, just one break! If I leave now, I don’t even have the coin to pay for another room!”
“This establishment does not extend credit. Will you walk out on your own two feet, or do you prefer to be thrown out the hard way?”
“Damn it… this year is ruined. I’m leaving…”
The innkeeper was directly affiliated with the proctors. Defying his orders risked disqualification from taking the exam the following year, which was a far steeper price to pay.
“Bwahaha! Well, if it isn’t the little runt! You’re still loafing around in a place like this?”
Amidst the chorus of despair, the massive monkey beastman made a grand entrance, having pulled off a monumental feat.
Thud!
He slammed down a bloated bladder brimming with sap harvested from a thorn-vine horror. The innkeeper popped the seal, inspected the pungent aroma and color, and nodded in satisfaction.
“A flawless delivery.”
From within his robes, High Examiner Mihael produced a ticket radiating a soft, golden sheen.
“Here is your Gold Ticket.”
“Now that I’ve passed, I don’t have to walk on eggshells around you, do I? How about it, pretty boy? Care for a bout?”
“I suppose it will help digest my meal.”
After polishing off a freshly prepared Rare dish using a portion of the sap, the two men stepped out into the inn’s rear courtyard.
BOOM!!
A series of thunderous impacts and muffled bellows echoed through the walls. A short while later, the Fair Nobleman, Mihael, strolled back inside with his customary look of detached boredom and headed straight up the stairs to the second floor.
The monkey beastman, by contrast, dragged himself back into the lobby over an hour later, limping heavily on one leg.
Figures.
Talking back to a High Examiner and walking away with your life was an accomplishment in itself.
Groaning under his breath, the battered beastman caught sight of me and snorted.
“Lazy little squirt. Haven’t even set out yet?”
“There’s no need to.”
“Tch. Boring.”
Having concluded his business, the beastman hoisted his iron staff onto his shoulder without lingering and strode out the front doors.
Yet as Giselle looked at me, his eyes held a peculiar flicker of admiration. He had witnessed the audacious maneuver I pulled off while the beastman and the examiner were busy clashing in the yard.
“Was that the opening you were waiting for, young lady?”
“Spot on.”
Whenever Mihael took an order, he always carried his exclusive, personal menu back upstairs. But during his brief duel with the beastman, he had left it sitting unguarded on the counter.
In those unattended minutes, I had flipped open the leather-bound menu.
And right beneath the existing entries, I penned an entirely new request.
This was the veteran gamer’s sequence-break—a tactic that transcended mere luck.
The exploit known as the Special Menu: a trick to forcibly generate whatever quest you desired.