Abandoned After All?
"Hey, looks like that slave merchant's fixing for a fight?" "Can't blame him—a dryad's enough to make anyone's eyes light up. Let's just finish him off quick."
The three bandits drew rough, oversized carving knives. Their speech was flippant, but their stances were anything but amateur.
"Hh... hngh."
Hayangi's fur bristled at the bandits' killing intent.
Run, please, run.
Hayangi prayed and prayed in his heart. Three vicious bandits. He could picture it vividly—the slave merchant being butchered before his eyes.
It overlapped with the image of his parents, felled the very same way once upon a time.
Don't die. Please...
But the slave merchant showed not the slightest intention of turning his back.
He tilted his head, loosening his shoulders, and asked the dryad a question.
"Elder, things are about to get a bit messy. Will that be all right?"
"Nothing to be done about it, I suppose. Do see to it."
Thud!
The slave merchant stomped hard against the ground.
Caught off guard by the move, the bandits were a beat slow to react.
But they were professionals at murder, men who had lived their whole lives off plunder. In an instant they spread out to encircle the slave merchant, hacking away like madmen from every angle.
"Got you!"
The bandit flicked his tongue.
Shing!
A clean, smooth arc swept past the man's lower half.
Blood burst forth and a scream tore through the air. From the ground where four men had been standing, eucalyptus buds sprang up in a spray.
"What the—!!"
"The slave merchant can use a sword?!"
No wonder the bandits were flustered. A slave merchant was, first and foremost, a merchant. Common sense said he'd have no combat ability whatsoever.
And even if he did, there was no way he'd be carving down veteran bandits with such clean swordwork, cutting two men in half with a single stroke.
The slave merchant gave the bandits no chance to regroup their broken formation. In a blink he was flowing from one body to the next, thrusting and slashing in an unbroken chain.
The time hoarse screams echoed through the valley was very brief.
In moments, three corpses lay in the flower field.
"Wicker, my boy—haven't your skills improved since last we met?"
"They weren't much. Just quick on their feet—that's the only reason wanted criminals with seven murders to their name were still running free."
"Well, that's a relief."
"I can't take the whole bodies with me, but may I at least take the heads for the bounty?"
"Of course, of course. I'll see to the rest."
Haaa...
Hayangi, who had watched the whole scene in hiding, slumped back against a boulder and let out a long, shaky breath.
Had someone, somewhere, answered his prayer this time?
No—if the Goddess were kind enough to heed the prayers of a pathetic little beastkin, she would have helped him a hundred times over by now.
No, the slave merchant had overcome that crisis purely through the effort he had steadily built up, day after day. It had to be.
And yet, still.
Hayangi was grateful the man hadn't died.
Unlike his parents, who had shielded him to their final breath, this man was still alive—which meant Hayangi could still thank him. That alone was a relief.
His heart was still burning hot.
His frightened chest kept gasping for oxygen, and no matter how long he waited, his breathing refused to settle.
Then, suddenly, before Hayangi appeared the kindly face of an old man with skin like tree bark.
"Hyahk!"
To Hayangi, who shrieked in fright, the dryad held out a single flower.
"The scary part is all over now. You can come out."
Hayangi slowly accepted the flower.
"Um... that man. He..."
"Wicker's gone on home, I'd say. Seems the two of you have things to sort out."
"That's..."
To the stumbling boy, the dryad spoke gently.
"He's a good soul. You needn't fear him so."
Hayangi hesitated a moment.
"...Why did he become a slave merchant?"
"As you can see, I've always wanted to be a gardener."
The dryad swept his gaze slowly over his flower garden.
Hayangi could see the job written on the old man's nametag: Alchemist.
"But a nametag cannot be changed. Alchemist is 2-Star, you see, while gardener is only 1-Star. Even though the time I spent as an alchemist was but a fleeting moment of my life, the tag stayed. I imagine your friend has his own circumstances too."
Could it be that the slave merchant, just like him, carried burdens of his own?
...It's frightening. But I want to ask him.
So thinking, Hayangi accepted the flower the old man offered.
"Payment for four requests and three bounties. Please verify the amount."
"Verified. Thank you."
It had been a busy day of running around, and with the wanted criminals captured on top of it, the take was decent. The hole left by several days of rest was more or less filled in.
The receptionist really was wonderfully businesslike. Her deadpan expression in particular was a thing of beauty.
"Mister Wicker."
I was about to leave now that business was done, but the receptionist stopped me.
"Did I miss something?"
"No, nothing like that... This may be overstepping, but judging by your completion rate, you're more than qualified for a promotion to C-rank."
Someday you might set your sights on B-rank, too, she added quietly.
It was the first time she'd offered an opinion beyond her duties, and I found it oddly refreshing.
A faster promotion was obviously good for me too. Same requests, bigger payouts—and access to harder jobs.
Not that I didn't know already.
"My party-request count is too low. Filling the quota solo is what's slowing me down."
Going a little slower couldn't be helped.
"If party requests are the problem..."
The receptionist hesitated a moment, then made an offer.
"I could accompany you on my days off, if you like. I do have adventurer experience."
I waved my hand at once.
"I couldn't trouble a receptionist who isn't even an active adventurer with my requests. I'm fine, truly."
Not picking fights with me, handling my paperwork without fuss—that alone was more than I deserved.
Now that I knew what kind of people spat at the sight of a slave merchant, I understood just how much that quiet courtesy was worth.
There was no quest window, no objective marker, so time was the one thing I had in plenty. I could take it slow.
Besides, raising my adventurer rank wouldn't change my nametag anyway.
If I wanted to change the tag, I'd have to look elsewhere.
"...I see."
The receptionist wore a strangely disappointed look.
Just then, a guild guard approached us, bristling with suspicion.
"Is there a problem here?"
The guard glared at my nametag. The receptionist reacted instantly, waving her hands.
"N-no, not at all! It was my mistake—"
The guard gave me a doubtful once-over.
Well, I was used to this. Nine times out of ten, whenever a conversation with anyone ran long, the fault lay with the slave merchant.
Staying any longer would do me no good.
My earnings were fat today and I had the shopping district to visit, so I decided to head out of the guild. I gave the receptionist a small nod of farewell.
For the first time in a while, my bag was heavy with coin.
There were a few other things in the bag as well—one of them being the bundle of dead insects I'd received from Elder Kelian.
The bandits had been wanted criminals, so taking their heads was pure business, but he'd saved my life all the same, the old man said, and pressed them into my hand as thanks.
He'd called it a nutritious delicacy, but it wasn't an item I remembered, and the guild didn't deal in it—so I planned to ask a specialist in the shopping district what exactly it was.
"Good heavens—Ultramarine Cliff Butterfly larvae! Five of them?! Sell them to me, I beg you!"
The moment Magic Material Merchant Rick laid eyes on them, his pupils spun.
"They're rare, then?"
"Rare? They're ingredients for the Magic Tower itself! There's apparently a high-grade enchantment that cannot be cast without this material."
News to me. Well, this was thirteen years before the original story—magic and materials alike might still be under development. Maybe there were situations that demanded more primitive reagents.
"I'm reluctant to sell, honestly. They were a gift."
"I'll give you 2 gold for the lot of five."
Hm. Cheaper than I expected. That was nearly a week's worth of request fees.
Sorry, Elder Kelian, but I had zero intention of eating bugs.
"Let's say 5 gold."
"Wha—? Rare as they are, even my supply price doesn't run that high!"
"Then I'll take them back. They were payment for drinking company, after all."
"D-drinking company?! Just—just give me a moment!"
The merchant stamped his feet in a rapid little dance and threw out new offers in a hurry.
"3 gold! I'll pay 3 gold!"
"4 gold, 50 silver."
"3 gold, 50 silver!"
"Dig a little deeper."
"Ohh, come now."
At last the merchant bowed his head, reached deep into a jar, and produced four gold coins, laying them before me.
"4 gold. Any higher and the margins simply don't work. Let's call it settled at this."
So if I'd accepted his first offer, he'd have pocketed more than double. Business was brazen by nature, apparently, and conscience had long since been thrown to the dogs.
"Deal."
An unexpected bonus. I was reaching contentedly for the four coins when—clink—the merchant added forty silver on top.
"What's this?"
"Merchants must trust one another, no? Consider it my good faith, in hopes of more fine dealings to come."
Looking at his beaming face, I could see no ulterior motive.
Just then, a message appeared in my status window.
First Successful Trade!
Skill [+10% Sale Proceeds] has been unlocked.
Slave Merchant job level has risen to 2.
Hm.
So Slave Merchant counted under the merchant job category after all?
Slave Merchant wasn't among the selectable jobs in the original game, so the wiki had nothing on it—I knew neither its skill tree nor how to level it.
Besides, I'd always offloaded surplus items through the guild. This was my first time selling to a merchant directly.
The wiki for my ability reflected the current world's information, so the data existed—but my level was too low to access it.
Inferring from this situation, it seemed likely that ordinary mercantile activity could teach me the [Release Slave Contract] skill.
A crack of light was beginning to show.
"Do come again."
The magic goods merchant showed not the slightest suspicion about the extra ten percent I'd received.
Apparently that was just how the skill worked.
Taking an extra ten percent on every single transaction as a matter of course—pretty impressive, honestly.
I could even see a future where I quit adventuring and went full merchant. Might there be a way to change my nametag down that road?
I decided to mull it over at my leisure and stepped out of the shop.
"Right—first things first, let's buy that."
With spare coin in hand, I suddenly wanted to buy all sorts of things.
"All of that happened... I'm so glad you weren't hurt."
Geumjeong-i worried over Hayangi.
The three of them had trudged home to the windmill that served as their house.
"He wasn't what a slave merchant is supposed to be. He might be a better person than most ordinary humans, even..."
Hayangi's voice trailed off.
When even Hayangi said as much, Geumjeong-i's heart wavered. Only Norang-i seemed entirely unconcerned.
"...Ah."
The sun was sinking low and lazy. Night comes early in the forest, and the three stomachs growled in perfect unison.
"...He's late."
Has he abandoned us after all?
The thought drifted unbidden through Hayangi's mind.
True, the danger had passed quickly—but it was a fact that the man had been put at risk today because of him.
They hadn't trusted him, so they'd shadowed him. If he'd seen through their spying and lost his affection for them, that would only be fair.
Hayangi's eyes fell on the pebble the man had left behind that morning. Before he knew it, he'd picked it up and held it in his hand.
It was cold.
What had he said again? That if he used this, he'd feel warm, and his spirits would lift.
He was the one who'd said it, so it must be true. But with him gone, Hayangi didn't know how to use it. He should have listened more closely to the man's words instead of being so afraid.
"...Hhk."
Hayangi fought down the welling tears. No—he wanted to fight them down.
It wasn't easy.
Was it because he was hungry?
Because he was frightened?
Or because he was sorry?
He wanted to know. He wanted to see that man again.
And just then—
Click.
The door opened.