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Immortal-Emperor is a freelancer, you can support them on:

“Anyway, since there doesn’t seem to be any issues, let’s go ahead and make a guild card.”

Ahh…finally…finally free from that explanation disguised as a lecture.

While I’m exhausted and deflated, Miss Gilly takes out a blank white card.

“Please drip a drop of your blood here.”

I take out my carambit knife and make a small cut on my right thumb, letting a drop fall onto the card. The card then lights up and text appears, turning it into an engraved card.

“El-chan, I’ll heal your finger so give me your hand.”

“It’s okay Lizlina-san, it’ll heal on its own if I leave it.”

“No way! You’re a girl so you need to take care of your body properly. Here, hold out your hand.”

The reason why Lizlina-san’s tone changed is because she found out we’re the same age. She’s reverted to her normal way of talking, and the severity has left her face, leaving behind a mellow expression.

“Lizlina-san’s way of talking is different from earlier so it’s throwing me off.”

“Ehehe~, when I’m working versus normally I change how I talk to have more distinction. Anyway, lend me your hand.”

Lizlina-san takes my right hand and looks at my thumb.

“Huh? The wound is gone. Could it be you healed it yourself?”

Lizlina-san looks puzzled as she examines the thumb I cut with my carambit.

“No, that’s not the case. For me, wounds this minor heal quickly, so please don’t worry about shallow cuts.”

“El-chan’s body sure is mysterious…Anyway, such pretty hands, I’m jealous~”

Lizlina-san enviously gazes at my hand.

With her staring at it like that, I guess a lot of girls care about their complexion and skin condition huh?

“Ahem!…I’d like to give an explanation now if that’s alright?”

“Please go ahead.”

Oh shoot, I was in the middle of registering with the guild.

“This will be your guild card. The guild card serves as identification, so any crimes committed will be engraved onto the card. Also, if you lose your card, there will be a fee to replace it, but since the fee is high, please don’t lose it. Got it?”

“Yes, I understand.”

“Then, please take this.”

I receive the card from Miss Gilly.

“Now, I will explain about the Adventurers Department you belong to. In the Adventurers Department, ranks are given based on proficiency, and are also listed on the card.”

I see, pretty standard.

“The ranks from lowest to highest are: E, D, C, B, A, S, six ranks in total. All general guild registrants start from E-rank, so your starting rank is E as well.

To raise your rank, you take on quests from Reception, then accumulate Quest Points by completing subjugations of monsters or material gathering.

Once you save up a certain amount of points, you can take on a Rank-Up Quest, and if you pass it your rank goes up. However, just tagging along on someone else’s quest without doing anything like fighting monsters or only landing the final blow will not give you Quest Points even if the quest succeeds, so please be cautious.

Also, whether you can take on a Rank-Up Quest or not will be informed by us.”

I see, so you can’t advance in ranks through other people’s efforts.

“Additionally, there are restrictions on which quests you can take based on your rank. E-Rank can only take E-Rank quests. A-Rank can take quests from E to A-Rank, and so forth.

However, there are exceptions…I can’t explain those now since it pertains to reaching C-Rank. And from Rank C onwards, not only Quest Points but completing prerequisite quests become mandatory to take on a Rank-Up Quest, so please keep that in mind.”

Up to here, do you have any questions?”

Yeah, I have one that I need to ask no matter what.

“Are there penalties for failing quests?”

“I was just about to explain regarding that.”

Oh crap, I might have done something bad.

“If you fail an accepted quest, penalties will incur of course. For subjugation and material gathering quests that would be reduction of Quest Points. For escort and transport quests, on top of Quest Point reduction there may also be times you have to pay penalty fees.

And if you continuously fail quests, your rank could be demoted so please be careful.”

Hmm, so there are times you can’t proceed unless you pay penalty fees. I’ll have to be cautious.

“May I ask a question?”

“Please go ahead.”

“For escort and transport quests, if there was an issue with the client and the quest failed, even if they go ‘It’s your fault, pay the penalty fee!!’, would I still have to pay the fee?”

Since there may be guys who intentionally make others fail quests to collect penalty fees.

“You don’t need to worry about that. If there was an issue, we will basically intermediate and judge if the penalty fee needs to be paid or not. Also, to request escort or transport quests, commoners need to register with the Commercial or Production Department of the guild, royalty and others with special privileges being the exception.

Not only that, carrying out actions like demanding penalty fees on the spot or decreasing rewards on site fall under illegal acts defined by the guild, so such crooked clients should not exist. And vice versa, adventurers demanding increased rewards from clients also violates guild laws. I assume you understand that murdering a client for money is a crime and should absolutely never be done.”

Yeah, if there are rules like these in place I guess there’s no need to worry.

“And finally, the higher the rank, the higher paying quests become available, but danger also increases, so we recommend forming parties.”

Parties huh…well, I can think about stuff like that gradually.

“That concludes the basic explanation. If you have any questions, feel free to talk to the counter staff.”

“Thank you very much!”

“No no, thank you.”

With this, guild registration is complete.

Afterwards, the Guild Master instructed the staff to bring Grubert here because he wants to question him about the circumstances. While waiting for Grubert to arrive, we were chatting with each other when the door suddenly burst open.

“Captain Guel! “What are you doing, Keith! We’re in front of the Duke!!”

While Guel yells angrily, Keith looks out of breath and flustered like something happened. It seems something must have occurred.

“That can wait! Please come quickly and stop Aid!”

Guel frowns. “Did something happen?”

“I’ll explain afterwards so please come and stop Aid!”

“””Haaah?!”””

Stop Aide? …What does that mean?

Wondering what’s going on, when we arrive at the scene Aide is restrained outside being punched in the face by Grubert.

“As expected, that’s what it was!!”

Grubert’s face is battered and swollen from being punched by Aid, with several teeth knocked out. Amidst this, he weakly begins speaking to Aid.

“Yes… after dis…posing of you, as hostages…I threa…tened your family and ordered you to assassinate Duke Valdeck at Riveis’s command…I’m sorr…y…”

Grubert’s face is dripping with tears, snot and blood as he desperately pleads to Aid, but his anger does not seem to subside as he balls his fist preparing to swing.

“Aide, stop already!”

While Guel says that, Aid doesn’t seem to notice as he continues punching.

Hmm? What he just said…

I should stop this soon before things get really bad, but Grubert’s words contain something curious so I unconsciously stop moving.

“Where the hell is my family?! If you don’t wanna talk I’ll beat you to death!!”

Eh?! Family…then doesn’t that mean Aid is…

“Urgh! The…basement! Book…room, hidden door…threw them in cell…alive…please sto…p…”

Noticing us here, Grubert comes pleading for help.

“Aid, stop already! This isn’t like you!”

“Senior Aid, please stop!”

“Aid, that’s enough!”

While Guel and others try to restrain Aid’s body and get him to stop, he struggles to break free.

After hearing that story, my speculation has become conviction. I want to believe otherwise but…he should frankly tell me now.

“Umm…Aid-san, could it be your family was taken hostage by Grubert?”

Until now Aid had a furious expression while struggling, but the moment I say that he suddenly stops and his face turns sad and vexed.

“Yeah…it’s true…my family was held hostage by this *******…”

The others look surprised when he says this.

Guel releases her grab and moves away, then starts speaking to Aid.

“So the reason you were acting strange today was because your family was kidnapped?”

“Yeah, that’s right. They got abducted two days ago. And that day, the perpetrator said to me. ‘If you don’t cooperate with assassinating Duke Valdeck the day after tomorrow, your family’s lives are in my hand. And if you tell anyone about this…you know what’ll happen to your family right? …’ That’s what he said.”

So that’s what happened. So that’s why he was glaring back then.

“I managed to find out about the location of my family and the mastermind. However, there was no time to go for help, and I was at a loss about what to do… I was troubled, and then that day arrived. I finally came to the conclusion that I had no choice but to do it. So, today… I tried to betray you all.”

Captain Guel and others have incredulous faces.

“Aid…you…”

“I’m sorry…I had no choice…Please don’t forgive me.”

I feel bad for the dejected Aide and others but let’s hurry and take action to save his family. And hand over Grbert too. There are things I’m curious about.

“Let’s save the rest for later. I’ll notify the guild staff about the hidden room so they can locate it. And there’s something I want to ask Grubert so can you leave him to me?”

“Hmm, very well. By the way Elrina, what do you want to ask this ******* about?”

“It’s about this ‘Riveis’ person Grubert mentioned guhahhh?!!”

Looking in the direction of the voice, what the?! A thick stone spear is stabbed into Grubert’s chest causing him to collapse!