Leave a comment

「Someone, explain this to me.」

The middle-aged man that arrived asked not us, the concerned party, but the witnesses around us for what just happened. And in the middle of the sudden silence, one man said 「Let me do the explaining, guild master.」 and raised his hand.

「Oi, Chasse. If you were here this whole time, you should’ve stopped it before things ended up like this.」

The guild master stared at Chasse with disbelief. Yup, I knew he was there. While I would’ve preferred if he had helped us before things escalated to this point; in the end, our relationship is only that of acquaintances that had a short chat at a pub. We’re not close enough to be asking for his help after all, and if he did save us over such a shallow connection, we’d feel somewhat uncomfortable instead.

Chasse ignored the guild master this time, 「Cielmer, short time no see.」 and lightly waved his hand.

「Thank you for going out of your way to do this.」
「As I thought, you noticed that I was here, huh.」
「Though, I have no idea why you were here. You were drinking at the pub just a few moments ago, right?」
「Well not exactly a few moments ago, but this is this and that is that. We, the Fool’s Gathering, are generally in the guild most of the time.」

So that’s why they were there when we first came here to look at requests. They might be in a position that’s similar to Carol’s. Maybe it’s precisely because they’re a B-Rank party that they stay here in case something unexpected happens. As Chasse and I were having a leisurely chat, the guild master cut into our conversation 「Chasse, do you know this girl?」 as he seemingly lost his patience.

「We’ve chatted at the pub. She seems to be pretty popular, so I had some unexpected difficulties coming here after she left the pub. More importantly, guild master. You better brace yourself. This girl is pretty clever, you see? If you treat her just by her appearance, you’re set to have a bad time.」
「Is that supposed to be a compliment?」
「It’s a compliment, really. In my personal opinion, you’re a hunter worth giving attention to, and the hunters in the pub would probably have the same sentiments as well. Yet, despite that…」

The once affable talker Chasse then scowled at the stalker. His gaze seems to have a mix of bloodlust as well, as the already pale-faced stalker is now trembling on his feet. Seemingly realizing something, the guild master turns his eyes to the stalker and says 「Tolt… you’re a part of this too?….」 with a distant gaze.

After that, Valbar and his cohorts were sent to the sickbay, and we, Chasse, the guild master, and the stalker (Tolt) headed to the inner depths of the guild building.

◇

「Let’s start at the very beginning, shall we? And Cielmer, I know you have something to say yourself, but would you mind staying silent unless I’ve said something wrong?」
「Understood. The concerned party’s viewpoint could have some subjectivity after all. As long as Chasse doesn’t put me in an unusually disadvantaged position, I’ll stay quiet.」
「Sure. Let’s do this.」

We were brought to what seems like a reception room. It’s a more modest place than where the underground’s top dog met us at. There are two large sofas facing each other with a matching table in between them. Chasse and I sat on the one near the entrance, while the guild master and Tolt sat on the opposite side.

Chasse has a completely different tone when he’s talking to the guild master compared to when he talked to me. When he’s dealing with the guild master, he sounds somewhat hostile, I think.

「The start of it all wasn’t anything particularly special. Valbar noticed Cielmer and bumped into her. I didn’t hear the reason for this, but it was probably because of how she looked. This was a conflict between hunters, so we had no reason to intervene unless things went too far, and since Cielmer was the stronger one, Valbar and his cohorts got the tables turned on them. From Cielmer’s perspective, she was simply being bothered, but Valbar just reaped what he sowed. And so exactly when the tables were turned, guild master came along.」
「Couldn’t you have stopped them before things got violent?」
「Cielmer was stronger than I expected, you see?」

After saying this, Chasse turned his eyes to me but that isn’t my, or rather Ciel’s, fault. I claim everything, including the slashes, as legal self-defense. I have no idea if legal self-defense is recognized here though. Still, it shouldn’t be forbidden to protect oneself.

「Well, at Valbar’s level, even a girl of your age should be able to beat him depending on your Job. Nonetheless, hacking at him was a bit unreasonable if you ask me.」

Telling someone with a non-combat Job to deal with a big guy like Valbar without wounding him is more unreasonable, actually. I considered giving him a look of reproach or something, but I might just endanger my position if I start getting emotional here, so I held myself back and settled for a smile.

While the guild master knit his brows as he saw my expression, he continued the discussion.

「Then, where does Tolt come into play? From what you just said, he’s completely unrelated to this.」
「That’s because I intentionally left that information out. Rather, he’s the one that caused this problem. Guild master, you know Tolt’s Job, don’t you?」
「No, I have no idea. Though, I do know that he’s a young but promising staff member.」

As the guild master defended him, Tolt’s stiff face slightly softened. Since the Hunter Guild is against Job discrimination, it might be possible for the top to be unaware of the Jobs of their personnel. However, considering what I speculate Tolt’s Job to be, this is something that I think the top should be aware of precisely because of their position.

「If I’m not wrong, you brought Tolt to the guild, right? You endorsed him, saying that he’s sure to be useful. And it is a fact that many of the hunters Tolt has been responsible for had great records and increased in rank.」
「Right? So what’s the problem here?」
「The problem here is that, no matter how great his track record is, he actually disclosed Cielmer’s Job to the public.」
「Wha-…!?」
「When Valbar was trying to force Cielmer’s Job out of her, Tolt exposed it to Valbar before we could step in to intervene. And even though Cielmer tried to feign ignorance, he asserted with full conviction. Upon hearing this, Valbar loudly announced it to the whole guild.」

The guild master fell silent as his jaw dropped in pure shock. Still, Chasse seems to be asserting that what happened wasn’t his responsibility. I don’t particularly mind that, but perhaps he’s in a position where he has to intervene with these sorts of things.

The silent guild master finally got his act together and asked Tolt for confirmation, 「Is this true?」

「Yes.」

The contrast between Tolt’s proud nod and the perplexed guild master holding his head with both hands is pretty comical. At this moment, I somewhat feel pity for the guild master. Tolt then continued his mental attack on the guild master.

「In that situation, if she had only told her Job immediately, it would have sorted out that problem. But instead, she wouldn’t say it at all, so I said it in her place. I don’t know why things escalated all of a sudden, but there’s no need to be ashamed of whatever Job a person has, right? 」
「You, haven’t you realized what you’ve just done?」
「You said that no Job is better nor worse than the others, right guild master? It’s also properly written as one of the Hunter Guild’s principles. ‘Discrimination by Jobs is strictly unacceptable.’ But despite that, she caused trouble for everybody by hiding her Job. I only did what was right.」
「Then how did you know what her Job is?」
「What are you talking about?」
「I see, just shut up.」

Hearing anger in the guild master’s voice, Tolt shrank away and swallowed his words. The guild master scratches his head with both arms in unrestrained irritation, but since all his efforts have just been crushed by Tolt, it’s understandable. Though right now, I think the guild master’s last question was an attempt to distance himself from Tolt, so Tolt’s reply couldn’t have been a mistake.

「So in short, Tolt is an Appraiser. More specifically, he’s a Job Appraiser. Then after utilizing his job to uncover this girl’s Job, he publicly disclosed it. Be that as it may, why is Tolt here when he was supposed to be off-duty today?」

I’d prefer if the guild master didn’t brush things off with a ‘Be that as it may,’ but based on what I’ve seen from Chasse so far, he probably wouldn’t let that slide, so I’m not too concerned.

Either because of the overwhelming tension or because he was told to shut up, it seems that Tolt is having difficulty in speaking. And since Chasse doesn’t seem to know about this part of the story, I decided to do the explanation.

「After I left the pub, he constantly followed behind me. I didn’t want the inn I was staying at to be known, so I killed some time and toured the town; but since he still kept following me, I eventually went to the guild.」
「Why were you following her, Tolt? Was her Job something particularly rare? Even if that was the case, you can find as many rare Jobs as you want in the guild, you know?」

Previously I thought that he did all of this because he wanted to get rid of me, a Song Princess, but now that I’ve seen Tolt’s responses, that doesn’t seem to be the case. After all, if he really did perceive Song Princesses as evil, he would have already said so at this point. I think he sees the Song Princess as just a Job like any other, something that ‘shouldn’t be and will never be discriminated upon’ or something.

But in that case, why did he stalk us and such? Perhaps noticing that I’m currently racking my brains for an answer, Ciel talked to me.

『Perhaps it might be that he didn’t see Ain’s Job at first. That’s why he was curious.』
『But since he knows about it, he should have seen it, right?』
『So then why did he insist that he saw “Song Princess” from me?』
『While I agree that this is weird, it might be because he saw our Job at the pub but isn’t seeing it right now.』
『Ain constantly has a barrier up, but while Ain sings, small gaps tend to appear, see? I’m sure that he couldn’t see our Job when the barrier was fully active, but when the barrier weakened, he might have gotten a small glimpse.』

Ciel’s reasoning is pretty sound. No, it’s probably correct.

What a mistake I’ve made. Was it because I think of the authorized pub as a safe place? I feel ashamed and embarrassed from my own carelessness, my face is starting to burn up.

I nearly drowned in the vortex of my own thoughts, but I remembered my current situation, and desperately hid my emotions.

「I think the reason Tolt was following me was, probably, because he couldn’t see my Job at first.」
「How did you…!」
「…Ahh, I get it. Man, seriously. That’s amazing.」

Tolt was shaken, but enough about him since he already let the secret slip, while Chasse had a variety of different facial expressions as he showed his surprise.

「What’s wrong?」
「Well, I’ll be somewhat vague, but I was told that it was unraveled a bit, just by a tiny bit. I’d be grateful if you let me off for this.」
「That’s my own fault for letting my guard down in public as well, so I don’t mind that.」

Please don’t suddenly set up a conversation that needs reading between the lines. In short, he’s saying that there was somebody else other than Ciel that noticed the existence and the unraveling on my barrier. Chasse was told about it, but carelessly talking about a hunter’s abilities is a clear breach of etiquette. And that’s why he asked me to let himself off for speaking about it in this situation. After all, knowing the existence of a concealed barrier could greatly change the tide of a battle.

Though with that said, the barrier’s discovery was caused by my failure, so I can’t blame him for that.

「Incidentally, is being followed from the pub to the guild a punishable offense?」
「While it would at least ruin people’s impression of the person in question, having someone punished for that reason would be pretty difficult. In this case though, the stalking can at least serve as additional material for judgment.」

While I was casually ignored by the guild master, from what Chasse just said, it seems like it is more or less punishable. For some reason, the more we continue on, the more dirt we dig up on the guild master. And he probably felt this himself as the guild master suddenly bowed his head.

Edit: First of all, it seems like my translation ended up a bit vague in the last part. I’ll explain and change it a bit. Chasse is apologising for talking about Ain’s barrier. Since the hidden barrier is AinCiel’s secret, while it’s a breach of manners to publicly talk about it, Chasse still told Ain about it, even though he was a bit vague, to inform her that some other person told him that there were gaps in Ain’s barrier while she was singing. Ain replies that her barrier being discovered, *not her Job being announced to the public*, was half her fault for being distracted, so she won’t be blaming him. However, this only applies to Chasse. Ain is definitely not thinking of letting the publicity of their Job go. She’s even asking if the stalking can be a punishable offence. Having her barrier discovered is one thing, but her Job? And it being announced to the public? Nah, that’s not gonna fly, especially as it is a risk to Ciel’s life. Sorry for the vagueness in the last part.

Heya~! Well, well, well. The guild master has arrived, not bringing order however, but just even more chaos to the table. As Ain put it, we’re getting more and more dirt on the guild master for some reason. Good job, ruining everything Tolt.

So yes, for this chapter, the main thing being shown on display is naivety. As our good editor Fire put it: “My god… Tolt’s a dolt.” The guy’s misguided “kindness” have pretty much made everything worse. I mean, really? Telling other people’s personal information? Man, who could have thought that it would ended up this way? *Right?*…… Well, his Job is really useful though.

On the other hand, we have the guild master’s secrets. First, he was the one that endorsed our dumb but useful dolt. Next, his anti-discrimination stuff. And lastly, the forest thing. One funny thing though, the guild master tried to throw Tolt under the bus, but Tolt was too honest, lol. If Tolt have said his Job himself, the guild master would have been able to go scot-free, but no, Tolt wouldn’t self-destruct on his own. And in the first place, Chasse already knew that Tolt is related to the guild master.

Still, the most important part here is Ain being embarrassed, lol. Poor Ain.

And now, the enigmatic Guild Master has appeared. Completely dumbfounded by the situation, lol.

Now then, I hope you enjoyed this chapter. Please feel free to comment. Stay clean, stay safe, and have a nice day~!