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Chapter 366: Temporary Disbandment, and the Two Crowns.

“I’m glad you’re alright. There were no casualties on your side, right?”

“Like I’ll get taken out that easily. Well, the fortress was messed up pretty badly, though.”

The other members of the Red Cats around Nia laughed when they heard her words.

After we reached the abandoned fortress, I immediately called Nia, and the call connected quickly. When I asked for their current location, and hurriedly opened a [Gate] to go there, what greeted me was the entire group, Nia, Vice Chief Est-san, the close aides Yuri and Yuni and everyone else looking completely fine. It kinda threw me off for a while, really. Well, I’m truly glad everyone is alright though.

We’re in the middle of a forest far up in the north from the abandoned fortress the Red Cats were using. Trees densely surrounded us from all sides. It’s a perfect spot for hiding from others.

According to Nia, their hideout was suddenly attacked by several giants yesterday. Those giants were under someone’s control, and the people doing that had also been firing things like cannons at them behind the giants.

“Giants?”

“Trolls, actually. They are ugly monsters with monstrous strength and regenerative powers; however, their intelligence is on the level of a monkey. There shouldn’t have been any trolls in the area… It’s quite likely that our opponents have monster tamers in their ranks.”

Est-san answered my question.

Trolls, huh. I’ve never seen one before, but are they different from the ogre tribe? The one in our knight order gave off a feeling of being a good-natured strongman though.

“They are completely different. Trolls are much larger, and they’re monsters while the ogre tribe is from the demon race. That was rude to the ogres.”

Sakura frowned a little as she explained. No, well, sorry about that; but there is the question on whether it is alright to treat the monster in this world the same way as the monsters in our world, you know.

Sakura’s the princess of the country of the demonfolk, Demon Kingdom Xenoas, after all. I should’ve paid more attention.

“So you’re saying someone was controlling those trolls?”

“Aah, we’re sure about that. They had tattoos all over their bodies, so they could be from the Jila tribe.”

“The Jila tribe…”

“It’s a minority tribe that lives in the country to the north, the Ice Nation Zardonia. They have techniques which allow them to control monsters, and I hear some of them make a living as mercenaries thanks to that. Trolls are monsters more commonly found in colder regions to begin with, so the possibility is high in my opinion.”

Even in the Reverse World, which is more advanced scientifically than the Surface World, there’s still strange techniques around, huh. If this was the Surface World, they would probably be from the Great Sea of Trees, wouldn’t they.

“But why would that tribe attack you? Did you do something that would make them angry at you?”

“Well, we’ve been doing things like that from the start. The mastermind is probably some random noble from Strain Kingdom. The aim is probably the treasures we’ve collected, I guess? If they manage to destroy us without reporting it to the country, they would be able to keep everything for themselves, after all.”

Nia’s group are chivalrous thieves. They mainly target unscrupulous merchants or corrupted nobles, and rob them of their valuables. However, around 70% of that were given to the less fortunate people and orphanages and other such groups, so they don’t really have a lot of loot with themselves.

Although that’s something one can learn with a bit of investigation, attacks like this apparently aren’t rare; I suppose it’s natural to believe thieves would be storing all the valuable they’ve gotten.

“Still, you did well escaping safely with everyone-no.”

“Est led the retreat while I drew their attention with Rouge. I escaped after beating up a few trolls. I did have to pay a bit of compensation for that, though.”

Nia looked at the red golem standing next to her, Rouge, as she replied to Suu.

The red [Crown], Blood Rouge. The price for its power comes in the form of its master’s blood. Through that sacrifice, Rouge gains unparalleled destructive power and the ability to control fire. With that, it shouldn’t be hard to defeat a few trolls.

To be honest, I’m more impressed how they went ahead with their attack while knowing their opponent is one of the [Crown] holders.

“No, there were quite a lot of them, you know. As expected, having only Rouge fight against all of them is disadvantageous for us. Plus, it was in the middle of a forest, so there’s no way I can aggressive use my flames.”

According to them, just the trolls alone numbered six. Without being able to use its flames fully, that must’ve been pretty tough. And Nia can’t keep paying the compensation for Rouge’s power for a long time, too.

“Well, yeah. It’d be bad if I collapsed from loss of blood, so I escaped quickly. The other side’s aim was probably our treasures, so they didn’t give chase as well. Kukuku, while it’s unfortunate for them, our wealth is all inside this thing right here, so their efforts would end up giving them zero returns.”

Nia laughed in an evil matter while waving the smartphone in her hand. Of course, that smartphone has the [Storage] application. Even if I say it’s 30% of what they gained, it’s still no small sum of money.

The attackers must be feeling a deep bitterness right now. Come to think of it, the reason why they destroyed the fortress to that degree might’ve been to vent their feelings.

“Well, it’s good you guys are fine but… What are you guys going to do now? Go back to your base in the holy capital?”

“No, that place has been found by the holy capital’s knight order, so it’s been abandoned already. For the moment, we’ve split our members into small groups and sent them into hiding. The only people here are ones close to Nia.”

“While it’s not what I want, we can only hide for the moment. We’ll have our revenge for this one day.”

The Red Cats had over 100 people originally after all. It would be hard to run with all those people clumping up in one spot.

The other members have already scattered in units of a dozen or so people, and the ones left here, including Nia and the other cadres, number a little over ten. True, with this size it’d be easy to hide.

“For the moment, everyone’s gone their own ways-desu ne. I want to find a good spot to settle down-desu.”

“It’s our fate as vagabonds-ssu yo. It can’t be helped-ssu.”

Nia’s close aides, Yuri and Yuni exchanged light banter while having wry smiles on their faces.

“Then you all should just come to Brunhild. We have lots of empty land, and there’s also plenty of jobs, you know?”

Everyone went silent when Suu said that, but after a while, Nia recovered and looked at me with glittering eyes. Mu. Why’d you have to say that…

“There was that too! If we go to the other world, there’s no way they can track us down, so it’s perfect for hiding ourselves! And besides, didn’t you say the two worlds are gonna get stuck together eventually anyway? It’s not a problem even if we get there a bit faster right? Right!”

“No, well, uun…”

“What’s with you, c’mon. [Black]’s also in your country, right? So isn’t it fine for us to go too?”

“No, I was just thinking, but is it really fine for a king to invite a band of thieves into his own country…”

I know Nia’s group are chivalrous thieves, which means they don’t indiscriminately steal from anyone and everyone, but still. I need to think of my position here as well…

As I was worrying over this, Yumina pulled on my sleeve from next to me.

“Touya-san. Nia-san is the holder of the red [Crown]. Couldn’t we recruit her as a tester for the Over Gear like Norn-san?”

“Muu. Well, that should be fine… I think?”

The professor and Dr. Elka would be overjoyed if that happens. The more data they have, the better, is what they told me themselves.

“I don’t really know what that is, but I’ll help if that’s what you want. Also, I promise to never steal in your country.”

“… Really?”

“Chivalrous thieves don’t lie. We can’t continue being chivalrous thieves if we can’t earn the trust of the people, you know. We will definitely repay kindness shown to us.”

In Nia’s eyes, I can see a strong conviction. Well, the sisters Elka and Norn are there already, so at this point…

“Alright, fine. For now, since it’s tough for me to bring this many people back at once, I’ll split you guys and make multiple jumps, okay?”

“Don’t really understand what you mean, but thanks.”

Is this really going to be fine? Vice Chief Est-san is my only hope now…

To be honest, it would be easier to use the dimensional gate installed on Dracliff Island instead of [Dimensional Transfer], but that place connects to Babylon’s [Garden], so.

I should ask the professor to set up a dimensional gate on the ground sometime.

After several rounds of [Dimensional Transfer], I have brought all the Red Cats members to Brunhild.

I had transferred them to a place a small distance away from the town, to let them see this country for themselves.

First, I casted translation magic on everyone so they wouldn’t be troubled by language. For reading and writing, they’ll have to learn that themselves.

As they walked on the streets in the castle town, they were surprised by various things that showed the difference between here and their own world.

“Your Majesty, hello!”

“Yes, hello. Don’t go too far away, okay?”

“Yees!”

A group of children said hi to me and then ran off. They were holding baseball gloves and bats for children’s use.

“… You really are the king, huh.”

“Well yeah. I’m leaving basically everything to my excellent subordinates, though.”

I answered Nia’s muttering with a wry smile. We have quite a few capable people in our government when all’s said and done, really. The Takeda Four Heavenly Kings, and our knight order members too.

“The townspeople all look so happy-ssu ne.”

“There’s a lot of different things being sold, and a lot of different people too.”

“This country is situated between two large countries called Belfast and Regulus, and there’s a lot of people who pass through due to that. Many kinds of people visit this country, you know.”

While talking with Yuni and Yuri, we arrived at the inn “Silver Moon”. There was the option of letting them stay in the castle, but as expected, even if they’re chivalrous, inviting thieves into the castle is a bit, you know.

“Oh, isn’t this a nice-looking inn.”

Nia made the comment as she looked at the inn. I’m glad you like it. Well, even if she doesn’t, “Silver Moon” is the only inn in this country, so she doesn’t have a choice anyway. There’s only the second branch of “Silver Moon” here, as well as the newly-constructed third branch.

We entered the inn, upon which Mika-san, who was at the counter, called out to me.

“Oya, welcome. Did you bring guests for us?”

“Yep. Total is 12 people; is it ok for them to stay here? It’ll be long term.”

“We can manage if it’s 2 person per room. The caravan that was here departed just this morning, that’s why. Now then, please sign here.”

The Red Cats members signed on the room book Mika-san brought out.

While I was looking at that sideways, directly in front of me, a person descended from the staircase leading to the second floor and let out a “geh” sound when she saw us.

“Why are the Red Cats here… Oh, right, it can’t be anyone else except you…”

“Hypothesis, correct.”

“Master, they can hear you…”

Norn, who isn’t even trying to hide her displeased face, stood on the stairs together with her golem, the black [Crown] Noir. The humanoid maid golem Elfrau-san was also with them.

Nia caught Norn’s figure as well, and spoke up towards her.

“Oh, ain’t you [Black]? You’re as small as ever, eh. You also staying here?”

“If I’m not a guest why would I even be here? You’re as stupid as ever.”

“And your words are as toxic as ever, this pipsqueak.”

“That proves that I have a functioning brain, unlike someone else.”

Oh oh, they’re glaring at each other hard. Their relationship was this bad? Yuni said they were rivals or something the last time…

I called out to Norn to try and soften the tense atmosphere.

“Going out?”

“To the dungeons. Yesterday, news came out that a bicorn appeared in ‘Amaterasu’. Bicorn materials sell for a lot, right?”

Bicorn… Ah, those black horses with two horns. I did hear before that their horns can be sold for a high price. Apparently, daggers made with those horns would possess the darkness attribute.

Norn’s earning money by diving into the dungeons from time to time. She’s not going in every day; apparently, it’s only around once a week in terms of frequency.

“And how’s your rank?”

“Still blue. I can still get money even without raising my rank anyway.”

One can’t earn a lot of points towards getting a rank-up in the dungeons. In the first place, the act of adventurers going into the dungeons has basically nothing to do with the guild. To put it bluntly, they just went into the dungeons by themselves, hunted some monsters, and came out with materials for the guild to buy.

If an adventurer wants to increase his/her rank, he/she should focus on proper requests issued by the guild; however, since Brunhild is a pretty peaceful country, there isn’t really any tough requests like subjugation being posted by the guild here.

When a strong magic beast shows up in the dungeons, the guild would post a subjugation request for that, but in that case it would be first-come-first-served. It’s not like strong magic beasts show up all the time.

There are material-gathering requests, but those don’t give a lot of points.

Because of that, overall, for adventurers Brunhild is a place where it’s easy to earn money, but hard to raise their ranks in. Of course, it’s also a great place for those who wants to polish their combat skills.

To be honest, reaching blue rank in such a short time in such a location, without even taking the rank-up test, is actually quite impressive.

Nia and the others asked me about adventurers and dungeons, so I explained to them in concise terms.

On a side note, while I was explaining, Norn’s group left quickly. She clearly doesn’t want to be involved with us any longer than necessary.

“So basically, you defeat monsters and magic beasts in that dungeon… Underground labyrinth, and earn money by selling their materials, is it?”

“That sounds interesting, doesn’t it! Shall we also earn our incomes with that for the moment?”

“Wait just a second! I already said that to Norn, but don’t use the power of the [Crown] inside the dungeon, ok?”

It’d be terrible if the dungeon collapsed. For emergencies, I passed several pendants—the same ones as the one I gave Norn, with transfer magic enchanted for escaping—to Est-san.

After that, we ate a light meal at “Silver Moon”, then I took the Red Cats to the Adventurer’s Guild. I’m a bit uneasy, but since Est-san’s here, I think it should be fine. I’d like to believe that…

- Pixel