Chapter 9

“Erica, what are you doing here? I can smell bread.”

It was Karon.

His huge, muscular body looked exactly the same even after all these years. He certainly looked like a mercenary who mainly used a greatsword.

“This bread! I wasn’t eating it. Shurin said she has so many mercenaries to treat these days that she often skips meals, so I brought it for her, just to make sure she—”

“Hm? When did I say that? I eat my meals just fine.”

“…….”

Hahaha. Why are you doing this to me?

Erica opened her eyes wide and forced the corners of her mouth upward into a smile.

Shurin, who had absolutely no sense of the situation, looked at Karon.

“Karon, did you come here because you’re injured?”

“My left shoulder hurts. Could you take a look?”

“I doubt you fell from a high-rise building like someone else did. Come here.”

“Who fell from a high-rise building? Do we have an idiot like that in our guild? Shouldn’t we kick them out?”

Karon walked over and put his greatsword down on the floor.

It was so large that it made a heavy thud when he set it down. The fact that he was carrying it meant he had come straight to the guild after finishing his request.

He sat in a chair and took off his shirt.

Shurin stood beside him, grabbed his arm, and lifted it while examining his shoulder.

“Does it hurt when I do this?”

“Ugh.”

Karon answered with a groan and frowned.

“Am I going to lose the use of my shoulder now? How miserable.”

“Stop being dramatic. You just sprained it.”

“Phew.”

“…….”

Despite his intimidating size, Karon was surprisingly dramatic when he was hurt.

Erica rested her chin on the table.

She was about to click her tongue and tease the drama queen when Karon beat her to it.

“Oh, right, Erica.”

As if he had just remembered something, he looked at her.

“Did you check the request board today?”

“No.”

Erica happened to yawn widely. Then she stretched lazily.

“I just got back from an A-rank request, so I’m planning to rest this week.”

“Really? I see.”

Karon casually rolled his stiff shoulder with a crack.

“There was a wyvern request in the Ruzis region. Would you not be interested in that either?”

“……?”

Erica’s eyes went wide.

“A Ruzis wyvern?”

“Yeah. A monster extermination request for wyverns in the Ruzis Canyon. It was posted.”

“That’s amazing!”

“Right?”

“I can’t say no to Ruzis!”

A request to exterminate the wyverns of Ruzis Canyon!

People who had never experienced it would never understand how thrilling and exciting it was.

It was insanely fun.

Erica could confidently say it was the most exciting request currently available.

The wyverns had to multiply to the point where even the Ruzis Knights could no longer handle them before the lord would ask the mercenary guild for help. Because of that, an S-rank request like this appeared only about once a year, if that.

The problem was that there were hardly any high-level mercenaries in the entire guild capable of accepting it.

Erica was one of those few.

“The blood in my veins is boiling. I feel a great sense of duty to save the suffering people of Ruzis.”

“Aren’t you just excited because you haven’t been to Ruzis in a while?”

Even though she had only returned from a long-distance request the day before yesterday, and her spine was still aching from falling off a high-rise building, none of that mattered.

There’s no way I’m turning down an insanely fun mission.

I have to grab that request before someone else takes it!

By the time Erica realized what she was doing, she was already running down the stairs.

Crash, bang, bang!

The two people left behind looked toward the staircase where Erica had disappeared and sighed.

Shurin, in particular, had a complicated expression.

“Not that anyone else would even be able to take that request. I don’t understand why she was in such a hurry.”

“S-rank requests are rare. It’s not often that one comes along that Erica actually likes, so of course she has to get there as quickly as possible.”

Karon spoke calmly, but Shurin still looked worried.

“She’ll go alone, right?”

“Of course she’ll go alone. Nobody goes there with her. No, they can’t go with her.”

“Erica has seemed a little lonely lately.”

“You’ve got it completely wrong.”

“Karon! Think about it. Erica seems to get along well with the guild members, but does she have any friends who can actually take high-level requests with her?”

“What can we do? There isn’t anyone around Erica’s age who is strong enough.”

It was one thing to put up with the guild members who only got in her way and look after them once in a while. Erica was unusually patient with them.

“If I were Erica, I’d have been taking solo requests all the time by now.”

Karon added that coldly.

The fact that Erica liked friends and enjoyed group missions was a completely separate matter.

No matter how many difficult situations she had experienced or how much she had grown into a veteran mercenary, she was still an awkward presence in this line of work.

At the tavern, she laughed and joked loudly with the other guild members. But once they started a group mission, her position became complicated.

Her skill was overwhelmingly high compared to her young age.

Especially in the mercenary world, where there was a strong culture of looking down on women, her abilities were not always welcomed.

Having to look after teammates who were far below her level sometimes made things uncomfortable for everyone.

In a mercenary world that had its own hierarchy, it was complicated.

Nothing particularly bad had happened so far, but Shurin had watched Erica closely for years, so she couldn’t help worrying.

Shouldn’t even the guild master be looking after that girl?

Guild Master Petchenik seemed to have completely lost his mind. He had been off on a solo adventure for a long time.

He had left alone, saying he was going to explore ancient ruins, and there had been absolutely no news from him since.

Maybe he had fallen into a desert or swamp and died. Or maybe he had found some ancient artifact and become completely absorbed in it.

Whatever the reason, he didn’t seem to have any intention of coming back.

And Karon doesn’t seem to play with her either.

Karon was quite skilled, but his fighting style didn’t match Erica’s.

They were simply too incompatible.

In fact, they had reached an unspoken agreement to avoid taking the same requests whenever possible.

Shurin let out a deep sigh.

She doesn’t show it, but… she must be lonely.

Several years had passed since Shurin became the guild’s full-time healer.

She had watched over the guild members for a very long time.

Erica was a particularly special child among them.

She complained over small injuries, but when she suffered serious wounds, she treated them herself and hid them.

She always looked happy on the outside, but there was no way she wasn’t lonely inside.

It would be nice if she could make a friend her own age.

Someone who was around her level would be even better, especially if they worked well together.

That wish was simply an extension of Shurin’s concern for her.

Ruzis was located on the border between the southern and western regions.

It was quite far from Daengterus.

Erica didn’t particularly want to travel such a long distance alone, but she had no choice.

There weren’t many people willing to join her on an S-rank request unless it was Master.

It’s far. So far.

She was already an expert at enduring long journeys.

She crossed rough mountains and then crossed rivers.

She would sleep briefly in nameless villages before immediately setting off again.

She repeated this many times.

Even so, she had only made it halfway.

At one point, she climbed onto the roof of a guesthouse and let out a roar.

Finally, when she reached the entrance to that barren land, she shouted in excitement.

“Yaaay!”

Ruzis!

Erica remembered the first time she had come to Ruzis.

How many years ago was it?

“……Can people actually live here?”

The land was bone-dry.

Smoke rose from various places.

Huge cliffs stretched high into the sky, with terrifying canyons running through them.

The dry land was too barren for farming, and flying monsters lived in the steep canyons.

When she first saw it, she wondered who would ever choose to settle in a place like this.

But surprisingly, once she entered the residential area, she found quite a large number of people living there.

Ruzis was unexpectedly large and had a long history.

The lords who had ruled Ruzis for generations had all been excellent people.

That was incredibly fortunate.

Unlike the western nobles, who were practically a breeding ground for corrupt aristocrats, the lords of Ruzis cared about and protected their people.

Their private military forces were also stronger than the Imperial average. Their knights, in particular, were quite capable and had earned a decent reputation in the surrounding regions.

Erica had liked Ruzis for a long time because of this.

This is what you call a human victory.

A harsh land.

But good people.

It was a community that had stubbornly survived and maintained its existence for generations.

Even beneath the cracked earth, Erica could feel a life force pulsing like a heartbeat.

There was another reason Erica liked Ruzis, too…