Chapter 212 : Qualification Exam (4)

Yurad Forest was a vast forest located at the southernmost tip of the Frey Empire.

Therefore, the group’s plan was first to take an airship from Icata to the southern metropolis of Roenberg, and then travel by land from there to enter Yurad Forest.

The group boarded the airship bound for Roenberg, departing for the south.

As soon as the airship ascended, Rachel immediately took Reina and entered the cabin.

It was a flight time of 6 hours.

The person in charge of the party was Oliver, and since he had announced that we would move to Yurad Forest without resting as soon as we got off at Roenberg, it was good to catch up on sleep whenever there was a break like this.

“Sleep enough, Reina. Once we get off, there won’t be time to rest comfortably.”

“What about you, Unni?”

“I have something to think about.”

Rachel, who smiled and stroked her younger sister’s forehead, got up from her seat and came out to the lower deck.

Clack!

She went down the stairs and opened the door.

A strong wind blew in.

It was the secondary deck connected to the bridge and attached right at the bottom of the airship’s body.

With the intense sun floating above the ship right now, the upper deck was so hot from the scorching sunlight that it was difficult to even stand there.

So during the daytime when the sun was up, one had to come out to this lower deck to view the scenery.

Before she knew it, the airship that had left Icata was piercing through pure white clouds and cutting across the blue sky.

Rachel leaned her body against the railing and blankly gazed at the fluffy clouds, the green plains, and the river stretching out refreshingly and sparkling.

And she was lost in thought.

‘Yurad Forest, huh.’

She thought she knew why Oliver had gathered so many guards.

Because that place, teeming with dangerous monsters, was a place that could never be broken through with the level of an ordinary mercenary troop.

The problem was Reina, as expected.

Generally, guard requests asking for personal protection usually have a danger factor threatening the client, so once that danger factor is eliminated, the request becomes incredibly easy from then on.

I thought this was also that kind of simple guard request.

‘I didn’t know the objective would be finding herbs in Yurad Forest.’

If it becomes like that, the danger factor becomes unspecified masses of monsters.

Naturally, one cannot step forward and eliminate them first. You would have to dry up the seeds of every monster living in the forest, but there is no way that is possible.

Far from eliminating them, one has to prepare for monster attacks that could pour out at any moment from the darkness of the forest without relaxing the tension for even a moment.

Literally enduring.

The time frame is until Oliver finds the herbs; it was a request of practically nonsensical difficulty.

‘He got himself meat shields.’

The more meat shields, the better.

‘……It’s a qualification exam, but I’ve met the worst client. Just what is the herb he’s looking for? He doesn’t even tell us.’

Is it just bad luck, or is even this part of the qualification exam?

She didn’t know the inner thoughts of the Skull Mask who selected the request.

But one thing was certain.

For Rachel, the one thing more important than the qualification exam was her younger sister.

Her sister’s heart in wanting to follow her and join Shadow was very grateful and admirable, but she absolutely had no desire to join Shadow even at the cost of losing her.

‘If it seems like Reina will be in danger, I will give up the request immediately.’

Rachel firmed her resolve.

Of course, until then, she would do her best though.

Thick clouds increased around them.

Along with that, Rachel’s ideation spread out even wider.

Actually, there were one or two suspicious corners to this request.

When the two sisters first arrived at the meeting place, the Central Plaza fountain, the Silver Lion Mercenaries looked at them with hostile gazes.

Should I say it felt cold?

My instinct, which allowed me to endure in the Darkness Council filled with murderous intent and the smell of blood even though we were on the same side, was telling me it wasn’t very good.

‘But when the kids appeared, they were noticeably agitated.’

It was distinctly different from the hostile attitude they showed towards themselves.

Because they are famous figures who have been exposed to the Royal Dream several times?

No. The atmosphere was different from being purely surprised by the appearance of famous figures.

‘That was clearly a flustered appearance.’

It seemed necessary to watch and be on guard with caution.

I hope not, but since they might have a different objective.

Furthermore, the client, Oliver.

If we’re talking about being suspicious, he was also a formidable human.

Unless it was an announcement about the request, he didn’t speak and spent a lot of time alone.

His staring gaze was like dead fish eyes, exactly like looking at her past self, so she felt a strange sense of kinship along with unpleasantness.

‘Still, I at least had the clear goal of revenge for losing my sibling. What is that jerk?’

A human tightly packed with unknown secrets.

Seeing how much he hides, it didn’t seem like he was an ordinary herbalist.

Rachel had already finished the background check on him.

Because gathering information about the request preferentially was the basis of the job.

But somehow, records of the person named Oliver, the wandering herbalist of Icata, did not exist starting from a year ago.

As if he fell thud out of the sky, he suddenly appeared at some moment and started activities within the Empire.

A request full of question marks here and there from the start.

‘Still, it’s fortunate. Since the kids are here.’

Yuria and Karina.

And Gerard.

They were people she could trust and rely on.

‘Come to think of it, my first extracurricular activity was on this ship too.’

Rachel recalled that time.

As the first extracurricular activity week for the 890th Class began, there was a time Rachel manipulated the roster to enter Gerard’s team out of curiosity about the person named Gerard and to win the Cult’s favor.

The extracurricular activity assignment at the time was a search, and the goal was to find the son of the hunter Bedrock.

As time passed, it all became precious memories.

It was when she was resolving her anxiety about the future while ruminating on the past she spent with her Academy friends like that.

She felt a presence coming down from the cabin side.

Rattle!

They say even a tiger comes if you speak of it.

The one who opened the door and came out was none other than Gerard.

“Hm?”

She hurriedly turned her gaze away, but Gerard was already approaching where she was.

“Hello?”

“……Hi.”

Rachel acted like she half-received the greeting while touching her face with her hand on the other side.

“I felt like we couldn’t share proper greetings before departing. I’m called Gerard, a cadet from the Academy’s 888th Class.”

“……I know.”

“Aha! You know. Haha.”

“There’s no way I wouldn’t know.”

Despite Rachel’s chilly attitude, Gerard just laughed without minding it.

‘Oh no.’

Rachel bit her lip so as not to be caught.

She wanted to keep her distance from the Academy kids as much as possible.

Because she was worried her identity would be discovered.

However…….

“What is your name?”

……It didn’t look easy.

“Do I have to tell you?”

“Still, we are colleagues who will move together for some time, so it’s good to know. Or, is there perhaps a reason you cannot tell me? Hmm.”

Gerard, who muttered like that and showed a grin.

Rachel, who saw that appearance, felt her heart sink on its own.

Even if he looked like that on the outside, Gerard was an extremely meticulous human.

She, who had watched him from the Cult’s perspective while acting together all this time, knew very well.

Just how thorough and careful Gerard’s personality is.

So, afraid of buying needless suspicion, she answered hurriedly.

“I am Mitchell. My younger sister is Michelle.”

“I see.”

“Right. So…….”

She ended up unable to say the words ‘I want to be alone so please go’ because of Gerard’s following question.

“But why do you keep touching it?”

Rachel raised her eyes.

“What?”

“Your face. Below the neck. Since you kept touching it from the time we first met.”

Inwardly, she thought ‘oops’.

‘This idiot. To ruin things because I doubted Luis.’

Luis’s disguise art had improved rapidly day by day, so the Face Mask was also in a much more advanced state.

Rachel knew that fact well, but perhaps because she met her Academy friends in an unexpected place, without realizing it herself, she was constantly touching the seams of the Face Mask and checking its condition.

She hadn’t even thought that that action would instead buy suspicion.

“Th-That is. Because it’s dry.”

Rachel made an excuse while quickly taking her hand away.

At the same time, she carefully examined Gerard’s reaction.

“Is it dry this summer? Do you have dry skin?”

“…….”

“Should I give you some cream at least?”

Fortunately, it looked like Gerard didn’t harbor any particular suspicion.

“……No. It’s fine.”

It was then.

Gerard abruptly extended his hand.

“Anyway, nice to meet you, Mitchell. Please take care of me while we are together.”

“Uh. Okay.”

Rachel, who held his hand in bewilderment.

And.

‘Hm?’

She was puzzled by a familiar sense of déjà vu.

‘What is this?’

When she looked at Gerard again, he had already let go of her hand and was going up to the cabin.

Rachel looked at that back figure with strange eyes.

***

The group that arrived in Roenberg City moved straight to Yurad Forest without resting.

Yurad Forest was located across the Ludain Mountain Range.

A time that took a full day and more.

Sleeping outdoors in the mountains was not a choice but a necessity.

Chirp-

Chirp-

Night in the mountains came early.

When the surroundings became dark and an open lot suitable for camping appeared, Gorian suggested to Oliver to spend the night, and Oliver roughly nodded his head.

The center of the party was the client Oliver who gathered them, but the practical leader leading the party was Gorian, the captain of the Silver Lion Mercenaries which had the largest scale.

It was implicitly that kind of atmosphere, and everyone didn’t express any particular complaints.

The campsite took shape in no time.

Since they just had to start a fire and make places to lie down and sleep, there was nothing difficult.

However, the night in the mountains did not call only pitch-black darkness.

Thwack!

“It’s a raid!”

It was goblins.

Kekeke!

The goblins of the Ludain Mountain Range were cannibals that ambushed and ate travelers going in and out of Roenberg City like this.

Although they aren’t strong monsters, they are small in build, agile, and have good reproductive abilities, so they are a species not easy to exterminate.

However, since they also have a lot of fear, if you could instill overwhelming terror in them, they were monsters that realized their place and retreated easily.

So the goblins’ night raid was easily repelled.

Kieeek!

Kek!

The problem was what happened next.

“Ah shit. Damn interfering!”

A disturbance arose.

It was on the mercenary troop’s side.

“What. What’s happening?”

“This dog-like thing keeps interfering!”

“Yes? No. I never…….”

“What! Then are you saying my words are wrong? Huh!?”

The situation was like this.

However it happened, when a situation occurred, their top priority goal was Oliver’s protection.

So the mercenary troop attached the vice-captain Gallard, a mercenary with skills next to Gorian, to Oliver, but the problem was that Reina was also together next to him.

One of the poison needles shot by a goblin was fired at Oliver.

Gallard, who saw that, tried to block it with his shield, but Reina suddenly cutting in front was the cause that created the current situation.

“Anyway, I blocked it! I mean I just tried to save Mr. Oliver! Then isn’t it fine?”

“Ha! Hey. Then what if you hadn’t blocked it?”

“I blocked it!”

“Oh. This leg cripple, seriously!”

It was the moment when Gallard, who couldn’t hold back his anger, tried to raise his arm to strike.

Rachel, who had finished off the fleeing goblins and returned, hurriedly cut in between the two.

“What are you?”

“……If you don’t want to die, lower your arm.”

Before anyone knew it, her sword was aimed at Gallard’s heart.

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