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I was given the torn up certificate. Looking at it, I wondered if it would be alright for me to fix it. And also, what kind of face would the girl have if I fixed it? If I did that, it would probably gather too much attention, so I opted not to.

From what I imagined, this girl was probably the client, but from her words and actions, it was clear that she had no intention of paying the reward. She’d gone and done something really unnecessary. But I found that rather amusing actually. It was nothing that couldn’t be fixed using money.

Though the sum wouldn’t be cute at all.

“What should we do about this?”

For the meantime, I decided to talk to the receptionist, as she was the only one who might be able to do something. The moment the frozen receptionist heard my voice, she snapped back to reality.

“Well… I’ve certainly witnessed that you’ve completed the request, Miss Fi. In this case, we have an intentional abandonment of the request, so Miss Monia will have to pay a penalty to you, Miss Fi, and the Collegium. The total is half of the commission fee. Miss Fi, you will receive 80%, while the Collegium will receive 20% of that sum. In addition, we will also return the commission fee you had to pay and the Ancient Dragon scale.”

In other words, I’d receive 5 large gold coins. Simply put, just taking a short walk had earned me 40 million yen. But a question remained. The item in question was an Ancient Dragon scale, so even if it was returned to me, I could just sell it later on. However, what would happen if the item had an expiration date?

“What if the item was a medicinal herb or something with a use-by effect? Even if it’s returned, you can’t find an immediate use for them, and they’ll just go to waste.” I asked.
“In those cases, the Collegium will purchase that item if we can. However, you would have to agree on a penalty fee. Normally, such cases happen quite rarely…”

This was understandable given that usually the Collegium would have the request rewards. However, this case was a special one because the item had been so expensive. If I had risked my life to obtain it, I might have been tempted to complain. But since all I had done was take a walk, I felt it was fair.

As I was thinking, the girl, Monia, suddenly cut into the conversation.

“Is this what I get from staying quiet and listening? There’s no way I’m going to pay half of the completion fee¹!”
“So?” I asked.

I wasn’t trying to be arrogant, but I had expected as much of a response, and I believed it was right to let the Collegium handle this. I felt a little bad for the receptionist, who looked troubled, but this was her job. Just when I thought things were playing out as expected, Monia dropped another bomb.

“Besides! It was the Collegium that proposed this! Why must I take responsibility for this!”
“Hey! Bring that one to the back.”

Suddenly, a man’s voice echoed from the back of the Collegium. Immediately after, Monia was dragged away, ranting and raving. As I watched the scene unfold, the receptionist, looking very apologetic, turned to me. “I’m sorry, Miss Fi, but could you come with me?”

Things were moving to the next stage.

◇◇◇

“I’d like to first know what’s going on.”
“Oh… Yes…”

After being taken to the back, I found myself face-to-face with a gruff-looking older man. His status was high enough to be a B Grade adventurer, which meant he was likely the head of the Collegium. I honestly didn’t care about his position or name—I just wanted the truth.

I didn’t need him scratching his head; I needed him to spit it out clearly and exactly. Meanwhile, Monia was now on the floor, rolling around with her mouth covered and bound with rope.

“First of all, it is guaranteed that this client sent out a request for an Ancient Dragon scale and promised to pay 10 large gold coins for it. Due to the reward amount, they were supposed to bring the money after the request’s completion.”
“But it turns out she didn’t have that kind of money, correct?”
“That is correct.”

The Collegium head nodded gravely.

“This girl here is a town girl who was really in need of money and came here to become an adventurer. However, her status was low, and she didn’t have any skills, so the receptionist at the time suggested that she submit this request.”
“I see… So it was a setup to collect the commission fee.”

I had also paid one large gold coin. If I had failed the request, that payment would have gone to the Collegium and the client. It was an easy trick to come up with if someone thought about it, but usually, malicious intent like this was caught when the request was being registered. However, this time, someone on the Collegium’s side had orchestrated it. Since no one had ever completed the request, the issue had remained unnoticed until now².

I didn’t know exactly how the money was split between the client and the Collegium, but if it was a 50-50 split, each side would receive five small gold coins, which amounted to about 5 million yen. And there had been adventurers who fell for this scheme once or twice every couple months.

That alone would make everyone filthy rich in this world. Monia was well-dressed, likely because she had spent the money she received on herself. Considering her age, this scheme would have been set up two or three years ago at most. Even if she had saved all her earnings, it wouldn’t even be close to 5 large gold coins.

I was also curious about the staff’s involvement, but for now, I needed to focus on my situation.

“So, what will happen with my request? You don’t mean to tell me that I’ll only get one large gold coin for all of this, right?”
“We acknowledge that we, too, were to blame for this case, so to take responsibility, we will pay you two large gold coins. Half of the penalty.” The Collegium head said.

This would mean that Monia’s debt would be 2 large gold coins as well. I honestly wondered if she even had that much money left. It was obvious she had already spent most of the money.

“Do you think the girl lying over there will be able to pay the rest?”
“I doubt it.”
“Then what will happen to her?”
“She will become a slave.”

Ah… I was getting a really bad feeling about this³.

1. Robinxen: Why are you trying to get out of the holy you dug yourself?
2. Robinxen: So the reason she looked like a noble girl was because she was taking dividends from an impossible task?
3. Robinxen: Why?

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