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Being wary of Cain doing something, the four of us left for the city together.

On the way, we also headed to where Finia and Den were attacked, but the road was already cleaned up and several guards were patrolling there. Finia tried to hide her face while looking nervous, but Den looked quite calm. Looks like she still lacked this type of boldness.

“Finia, you’re wearing a hood, so no need to be so nervous, you know?”

The way she was desperately pulling down her hood was like a child pulling down her hat, and looked cute.

But doing that attracted more attention so I wanted her to stop.

Hearing my warning, she let go of her hood, but this time she started dusting her mantle off. Looks like she really couldn’t calm down.

“Den, where was the bottle in question fallen?”
“It looks like it has already been collected.”

Hearing my question, Den looked over the blocked street and answered.

As expected, they recovered it as important evidence, I guess? If so, then sneaking into the guard post to reclaim it could be a way…

“Hmm, I guess I’ll go break into the guard post’s safe.”
“Lady Nicole, you sounded like a total criminal there.”
“Just who do you think I am?”

Being originally an assassin, I was unmistakably a criminal. Sneaking in a guard post and stealing a piece of evidence barely made a difference at this point.

But well, that could bring trouble to Lyell and Maria in this life, so I had to proceed carefully.

In any case, if that important bottle wasn’t here, there was no need to overstay any longer.

“Let’s go. If we keep standing for too long, we’ll get suspected instead.”
“O-Okay.”

Finia replied with a restless voice. Letina also refrained from speaking and just nodded a little.

We continued on the main street for some time after that, and entered one of the inns that faced the street.

There were inns on the side streets too, but frankly, the safety of those were pretty unreliable.

We decided to rent one on the main street, even at a higher price.

“Good morning. Is Michelle or Cloud around?”

I asked as socially as I could to the auntie doing register work at the counter.

Since I periodically visited this place, we were already acquaintances.

“Oh, Nicole, welcome. Michelle and Cloud said some emergency work came up and rushed out in the morning.”
“Urgent work?”
“Something about carrying luggage, but they lacked people. They said they’d be back in two or three days.”
“Is that so…?”

We’ve known each other for a long time. But they never rushed away during commissions like this. I felt a little anxious, but since the receptionist saw it actually happen, they weren’t taken captive or anything, so I could relax.

Luggage carrying was probably related to my request for them to investigate the mass consumption of the masks.

“Oh right, Michelle left you a note.”

The auntie took out a sealed letter from under the counter and passed it to me. It was sealed with a wax that had a complex pattern on it. This was one of the ornaments of the Third Eye. Since Michelle had no family crest, she used this method instead.

There were no signs of it having been open of course. Thus, I quickly unsealed it and checked the contents.

“Let’s see…”

There apparently was a trader that delivered a large number of masks, and that trader needed urgent hands to deliver a sudden big order, so the two immediately headed to participate.

Following that, she also wrote that due to helping with stocking up and guarding, they would be out of town for two-three days, and also an apology for not telling in person. Incidentally, at the end there was an illustration of Michelle and Cloud doing an apology gesture. She was pretty good at drawing.

Cain wasn’t aware of them, and their current work was also just helping with the delivery of goods, so there shouldn’t be any battles involved.

“I see. It’s bad that we can’t meet, but there doesn’t seem to be any danger this way, so I guess it’ll put me at ease? Auntie, what do you think of this Theodora Clothing store?”
“Hmm, it’s a major clothing company. They have no influence, but it has a little too high a threshold for us to approach it.”
“Are they dealing with expensive clothes?”
“Yes, even noble men visit it, so we could even run into them if our timing is bad and get into trouble. That makes it a little difficult.”
“I see… I wonder if Michelle will be fine.”

Michelle was a beauty despite everything. Since her chest attracted the most attention, she didn’t stand out as much as Finia and I. Or rather, I guess she stood out even more to a particular type of people, but that made me a bit worried whether some perverted noble’s eyes would fall on her.

“Well, Cloud is there so it should be alright. He is a good man both in looks and heart.”
“Cloud? Well, I guess…”

He’s been running into a lot of indecent topics as of late, but he was still keeping some acceptable moderation at least.

If not, I’d have kicked him out of our group. In that aspect, I valued him highly. In any case, I judged that there was no danger to the delivery of goods, so we decided to return back to the dorm.

We’ve been in this auntie’s care for some time, so I should consider a way to repay her in some way.

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