The Adventurer’s Guild was even noisier than usual, thrown into disarray by the sudden reports of a mid-tier Demons.
Multiple hunting parties were forming, rumors running wild.
Amid the frantic comings and goings, a duo—newly promoted to Lv. 3—celebrated over drinks.
And and Neem, childhood friends from the same village.
Their modest toast was interrupted by the grim news. And, drowning his nerves, kept drinking until he was thoroughly buzzed, clapping a hand over his mouth.
“Hey, And… You’ve had too much to drink.”
“S-sorry… Gonna go throw up real quick…”
“Want me to come with you?”
“N-nah, just wait here…”
Neem smiled faintly at And’s stubbornness—unchanged since the old days—and watched his retreating back before popping a snack from the table into her mouth.
Just then, a young man approached her solo seat.
“Hey there, miss. You alone?”
“No, I’m here with a friend,” she replied, her tone firm.
Used to advances from adventurers, Neem left no opening.
Undeterred by her cold shoulder, the man took the seat beside her.
“H-hey! I said—”
“Just wanna ask you something real quick… That okay?”
She tried to shoo him away, but her gaze froze when she got a proper look at his face.
Jet-black hair (rare in these parts), refined features, and an air of maturity. His gentle smile made Neem’s words die in her throat, her cheeks flushing with embarrassment.
“Just a minute or two…”
“Uh… um…”
Fresh from a rural village, Neem had never met a man this handsome outside her daydreams. “…J-just a little, then,” she mumbled in a tiny voice.
“Thanks, you’re a lifesaver. So, I just got to town, and… What’s going on? Place is pretty loud.”
“O-oh, that…?”
Neem haltingly explained about the Mid-Rank Demon that had appeared in a Level 3 dungeon—its traits, the rumors she’d overheard.
Encouraged by his attentive nods, she added unsolicited details:
“That dungeon’s called [Battlefield’s Cage]… Lately, people’ve been going missing there one after another. Everyone says it’s the demon’s fault!”
“A Level 3 dungeon, an armored Mid-Rank Demon… disappearances… Huh. Sounds messy.”
“If you’re curious, check the quest board for missing-person requests.”
Neem pointed to a bulletin board where search requests were posted.
The man nodded, then pressed on:
“One more thing—ever hear of ‘Helheim’?”
“Helheim…? Yeah, that’s the infamous group from the Empire, right?”
“Probably them. Their goals, what they’ve done… anything you know.”
“Hmm… Goals…? There’s talk about some ‘demonkin’s grand ambition.’ They’ve been kidnapping, robbing, massacring near the Empire. Not here yet, but word is they’ll be wanted continent-wide soon…”
“…I see. Thanks—you’ve been a huge help.”
His honeyed smile made Neem hunch her shoulders, flustered.
Then—
“Heeey, Neem!”
“A-And?!”
And called out, looking noticeably more refreshed than before. He tilted his head at her jumpy demeanor.
Neem whirled toward the stranger and let out a small voice—
“Huh?”
He was gone. Vanished into the guild’s clamor.
In a back alley of Ghat,
a dilapidated house groaned as its door creaked open. It opened with a sound as if it would break at any moment.
“Huh?”
The men inside—nursing cheap drinks—looked up at the intruder.
Damp, stale air mixed with something sweet.
“—Information.”
The voice beneath the gray cloak was female. She locked onto one man and sat at his table.
“Heh.”
The men starved for female attention reacted to her voice. While glaring resentfully at the chosen man, they began to listen to the voice she emitted.
The man who was addressed placed his cup full of alcohol back on the table.
“…How much money? If you don’t have any, I’ll take your evening instead.”
The man crudely looked down at her voluptuous figure, which was evident even through her coat.
But—
“——?”
The woman who should have been right in front of him had vanished.
“—Information.”
“!?”
And the next time the man heard the woman’s voice, it came from behind him.
When everyone in the run-down house turned around at once, there she was, sitting at another table as if nothing had happened.
The scarred one-eyed man sitting across from the woman was startled and lifted his hips slightly, but quickly narrowed his eyes and moved to negotiation.
“…And what information do you offer in exchange? If none, money will do.”
One must not misread her identity here. She is not just someone who came to gather information. She is definitely in the trade of what you’d call an information broker.
As proof, the woman clearly nodded at the proposed exchange.
“Information in exchange for information. Money is the substitute. You’d be better off not keeping trash around who doesn’t even understand that—it lowers the quality.”
“……I’ll, I’ll keep that in mind.”
The one-eyed man shuddered as he realized the woman had seen through him as the master of this run-down house. The reason she first approached the amateur man who was only after money was solely to measure the quality of this establishment.
All that was faintly visible from her coat was a single strand of pale-colored hair. Her appearance was indistinct, as if protected by some power.
“I desire information about Helheim. The fresher, the better.”
“…Unfortunately, there’s little that’s highly reliable. It’s probably the same everywhere, but most of it barely rises above the level of rumors. …However, there might be a connection with the commotion happening right now… that’s all.”
The woman didn’t interrupt. It was as if she was encouraging him to continue.
The man tried to reach for his cup on the table to moisten his dry throat—and saw an illusion of the cup evading his hand.
The cup that had surely been there had changed its position in an instant.
The man became certain. This woman was no ordinary information broker.
He knew about “the information broker who manipulates time.” But he probably never thought such a person actually existed. The man raised the corners of his mouth with delight.
“I don’t need information in exchange… the solid proof of your existence is much bigger news.”
“……”
The silent woman snorted as if bored.
“Hmm hmm hmm~”
Garm, who had climbed up the outer wall surrounding the town while humming, twitched her wolf ears and closed her eyes.
What she was doing was sensory manipulation. It is a privilege of the beastfolk, who retain strong hunting instincts, to be able to temporarily shut down all senses except hearing.
With her touch sensors lost, Garm floated in waves of sound, forgetting the sensation of her feet touching the ground.
What she could hear were the sounds of town life and the footsteps of noisy explorers.
“This won’t do~”
She deliberately shut out the sounds of daily life and concentrated on the screams and spirited voices of the explorers.
“Hmm… Oh?”
Dungeon events. Abnormalities. The sound of these things hammered into her brain.
It’s the kind of information that the Corpse King and Nifl would have brought back.
“Tch.”
[Garm. Rally.]
“Eek! Boss?!”
Corpse King’s whisper pierced her ears.
He must have known that Garm was trying to get information in this way. That was the reason he called Garm to come.
“Heheh.”
That nostalgic feeling—of being utterly seen—sent her sprinting.
■
READ THE ORIGINAL TRANSLATION AT LOCALIZERMEERKAT.PAGES.DEV
“Phew… Missing people in the dungeon. That Level 3 Demon… Wait, it was Level 3? Coincidence? No way.”
Leaning in an alley, I studied the papers in my hand.
Honestly, I’m not interested in demon-this and demon-that. But there are rumors suggesting that the demon race might be involved in the objectives of those impersonating Helheim.
“How did it go?”
“Probably about the same amount of information.”
“Same here!”
Hearing the voices of Nifl and Garm, who remained unseen, I lower my gaze to the several papers in my hand.
“What’s that?”
“I snagged request notices about people who went missing in the dungeon where that mid-level demon appeared. Four people in the past month, they say. Including the very first missing person from a month ago, a total of seven people have disappeared in that dungeon.”
“That’s a lot. The dungeon in question is Level 3. I heard it was upgraded because of the recent appearance of the mid-level demon… but before that, it was relatively safe.”
“But, but! That armored mid-level demon is probably the one Garm defeated, right? In that case…”
“Yes, there’s evidence of human intervention.”
Both Garm and I nod at Nifl’s words.
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