Fifteen Gold Coins
The bounty for capturing a single bandit was a staggering fifteen gold coins. Even if three people split it, that was five apiece. If five took the job, three each. Even if fifteen swarmed the target, one per head. It was the kind of request any mercenary, regardless of rank, would jump at.
“…Could you step inside for a moment?”
“Yes.”
The amount was too large to simply stamp “accepted” and move on, age notwithstanding. Following the receptionist’s lead, I watched as Brenda’s likeness was etched onto parchment. The guild’s reception room—something I’d once dismissed as mere background in the game—was now crowded with guild officials drawn by the sudden high-value request. Separately, they questioned the source of funds so mismatched with my age, but…
“Would you place your hand here for a moment?”
Once I explained my connection to the merchant Esmar, the victim of the carriage attack, and identified Brenda as the ringleader, the device accepted my story without issue. It seemed to function as some kind of lie detector. After verifying that two mercenaries had recently accompanied Esmar as guards, and confirming every word I’d spoken was true, they pulled Brenda’s portrait straight from my mind. Some kind of magical parchment, apparently—press your palm to it while focusing on an image, and it transferred directly onto the page.
The vivid, blood-red hair and that mocking smile were reproduced with unsettling accuracy. In the drawing she looked pleased with herself, but from this moment on, her days would be nothing but the miserable life of a fugitive. The receptionist carried the full-body sketch out of the room. The instant it was pinned to the board with a sharp thwack…
“Out of the way! I saw it first!”
“Where, where? Let me see too.”
“So we get fifteen gold coins if we bring this bitch back alive?”
Mercenaries of every stripe crowded the board—some in light leather armor, others in heavy plate. Men and women alike, drawn by a reward far heavier than the request itself. From now on, she was a walking purse worth fifteen gold coins. Though technically tied to the request, it was a bounty in all but name.
While the mercenaries swarmed the notice, the receptionist asked politely, “Do you have a residence in the capital?”
“No. I was on my way back to Pardin village when the attack happened…”
“I see… Then you currently have no fixed residence or guardian.”
The conversation ended there, as if there was nothing more to discuss. I counted the coins left in my pouch: roughly thirty silver and twenty copper. I knew exactly how much money I’d spent in ways that didn’t match my supposed circumstances. Still, that naive, ignorant approach had seemed like the best option at the time. Because of it, everyone here now moved toward a single goal—capturing Brenda and dragging her into the middle of the guild hall. Of course, the real objective behind that was the fifteen gold coins… but that didn’t matter. Right now, my mind held room for nothing except crushing Brenda.
I forgot about acquiring items in the capital. With no income, I simply whittled away at the silver in my pouch, staying at the inn. On the third day, I finally received the news I’d been waiting for.
Even before I opened the guild doors, a familiar woman’s furious voice cut through from inside.
“Let go! I’ll kill you bastards! Aaaagh!”
I quickened my steps. The door burst open to reveal the scene within. Several mercenaries, arms crossed, turned at the sound and gave me knowing nods.
“Oh, the client’s here.”
Brenda lay bound on the floor, her entire body wrapped tightly in thick rope—fitting for a capture request. At the mention of the client, her rage-twisted face snapped toward me. The plate-armored mercenary who had subdued her kept one heavy boot planted on her back, holding the rope without a word, his expression impassive as he looked my way.
In the tense silence, the receptionist spoke. “Then, if you two would come this way?”
“You damned brat—ack!”
At the receptionist’s words, the plate-armored mercenary moved without hesitation, dragging Brenda along by the rope as if he had no interest in what was attached to the other end. Her eyes wide, she tried to shout something at me, only to be yanked away with a yelp.
Just like when I’d first submitted the request, I was led back into the reception room—this time accompanied by the bound Brenda and the taciturn mercenary in plate.
“Is this woman indeed Brenda?”
“Yes, she is.”
Even inside the room, the mercenary kept Brenda pinned with rope and the weight of his armor. At the receptionist’s polite question, I gave a short confirmation. Once the request was acknowledged as complete, the receptionist scribbled something on a document with a quill, then looked up again.
“The request is complete. How would you like her to be dealt with?”
“Dealt with…”
The words carried weight. The receptionist added, “Since it’s been confirmed she’s killed people, normally she would be executed on the spot. However, because the request specified capture, she can be sent to prison if that’s what you prefer.”
The phrasing felt deliberately vague, as if asking what I intended to do. My fingertips brushed the hilt of the throwing dagger at my waist—the worn cloth wrapped around it. A cold, ruthless impulse brushed my mind: kill her cleanly, leave no loose ends. Logically, that was the correct choice. But driving a blade into living flesh… was far harder than I’d imagined.
Send her to prison to face justice on her own, or stab her here and now to be certain? While I stood at that crossroads, a voice scraped against my ears from the floor.
“Ah, um… hey, you?”
Brenda’s tone had changed completely. The fury from moments ago was gone; now her eyes darted nervously, watching me. What filled them was the raw fear of death—even a thirteen-year-old could recognize it. The moment I understood that, my heart grew strangely calm.
“I-I won’t do it again, I swear… Yeah! I’ll do anything for you! So please…”
Her desperate plea for survival only hardened my resolve. Gripping the worn hilt of the dagger that had left scars on my back, I stood up. I still didn’t know exactly where to stab for an instant kill. But the sharp pain of steel sinking into flesh—that much I could deliver. It didn’t matter if my technique was clumsy. I was simply returning the pain the three of them had suffered.
“D-don’t…!”
Brenda’s anguished voice clawed at my ears. You didn’t stop when those two mercenaries were groaning in pain. Remembering the first mercenary I’d seen stabbed in the stomach, I drove the dagger into her smooth abdomen. It didn’t sink as deep as I’d expected.
“Aaaagh! Ghhk…”
She thrashed in agony, her scream twisting into a broken whimper before she could finish it. She curled in on herself, blood staining the floor. No one in the room made any move to stop it. Instead, they silently looked away, the plate-armored mercenary only pressing down harder on her struggling form. There were no humans here willing to side with an evil woman who had killed innocent people.
“Haa… haa…”
The metallic scent of blood filled the air. My vision narrowed. Only after her desperate screams finally ceased did I rise, the bloodied dagger still in my hand. It was broad daylight, inside a mercenary guild, yet everyone had turned a blind eye to the killing. The three-day revenge play ended with a strange mix of relief and emptiness.
The receptionist spoke again. “Right, let’s clean this up… and begin the settlement.”
Seemingly accustomed to such scenes, he brought the payment and placed it on the wide table without fuss. Only then did the plate-armored mercenary lift his boot from Brenda and move to the sofa. After counting out the fifteen gold coins, the receptionist offered them to him. The mercenary tucked them one by one into the heavy pouch at his waist. Two coins remained on the table. He pushed one toward the receptionist with a metal-gauntleted finger.
The receptionist tilted his head, puzzled. “This is…?”
The mercenary pointed once at the bloodstained reception room, then at the coin. No words were spoken, but the meaning was clear: Use this to handle it.
“Ah, thank you.”
The receptionist understood and accepted the coin. Then the mercenary picked up the second gold coin, stood, and walked over to me. The oppressive presence of the massive plate armor loomed close. He extended one hand, holding the single gold coin between thumb and forefinger as if about to drop it. I held both hands out slightly. The coin landed softly in my palm, almost as if acknowledging my pitifully thin wallet. I slipped the gold into my now much lighter pouch. The mercenary turned his palm upward and stared at me.
“…?”
I looked up at him, unable to grasp what the outstretched hand meant. What now?