A lot of people are leaving the town. But not adventurers, soldiers.
They split into two groups, one that heads north through the road that leads to the capital, and one that heads towards the forest where Zuirya is.
There are about two hundred.
When I tell Argo, he says that close to half of the town’s guards have left.
Does that mean there were four hundred soldiers and guards here? I don’t actually know if that’s too many or too few.
“It shows how serious they are, but it’s clearly a stupid plan. No. Are they just fully committed to involving adventurers?”
If the army can deal with the goblins before the adventurers leave, that’s the end of that. And even if the town is attacked and the guards can’t deal with it, adventurers are still here, so surely they’ll fight to protect themselves. Says Guilford.
While the army is moving out, someone from the guild visits our rented house too.
Argo, Guilford, and I decide we’re the ones who will hear them out, and the guild employee looks awkward after glancing at me.
Oh? Is this supposed to be for Argo’s party, and I ended up tagging along?
The guild employee says the guild wants Argo’s party to take part in the goblin hunt because they’re A rank adventurers.
“What is the scope of the group of goblins? Who else is joining? What is the scope of the group of hunters? Will we be working with the army? What is the time limit? What if we don’t find our targets? Do we even know exactly what they are?”
Argo rapid fires questions, and the guild employee leaves after being unable to answer them.
Even adventurers that are good at investigations would hesitate to explore this. And if this person speculated and was wrong, credibility would go down.
“Peaceful times are one thing, but it’s in a time of crisis that these organizations show their worth. Or I guess, their superiors do.”
What Argo says makes me think back to Elesya and the Holy Kingdom.
When I was starting out as an adventurer, a superior species of wolf appeared in the forest near the capital of Elesya.
When a pack of wolves was spotted and a guild employee made the call that there might be a superior species, the guildmaster of the adventurer guild was informed, instructions were given, and adventurers responded.
There was a stampede in the Holy Kingdom’s capital of Messa, but the holy knights and adventurers worked together to protect the city.
But it’s different here.
There’s no clear chain of command here, and guild employees are asking people while gauging their reactions.
Is the relationship between the guild and adventurers that bad?
“What are you going to do, Argo?”
“Hn, it’s not like I have any attachment to this town. But we got Herc to make us weapons and everything… We’ll wait and see for now. Also, Herc and the others are preparing to move, but I’m sure they’re still hesitant.”
“Hesitant?”
“Yes. They’re sick of the guild and the rulers of this town, but I think they care about the people here.”
Guilford and the others nod.
Herc and the others have laid their roots and have been working here for a long time. It makes sense to have become friendly with the townspeople after so long.
Are they wavering? I’m sure adventurers that only care about themselves wouldn’t think about that, but Herc and the others seem more caring. I only met them recently, but I get that feeling. And I get that same feeling from all the people that mined with me.
I can’t say for sure everyone’s like that. Sure enough, many adventurers have already left.
In any case, we are going to see what Herc and the others do, and stay here for the time being.
Argo’s party has a lot of bad things to say about this country, but they’re caring and have a strong sense of duty. Not that I’d say that to them.
◇ ◇ ◇
After a week, the soldiers come back.
First the ones who went to Zuirya, and the next day, the ones who went in the direction of the capital.
But I see the reactions from the group that went towards the capital are a lot fewer.
Many of the adventurers are returning with pale faces and tattered equipment.
They went north and investigated areas away from the main road. Three days after leaving, they set up camp and people to keep watch, and were attacked.
These were soldiers with field battle experience, but they couldn’t contain the goblins.
The biggest reason is that they suddenly appeared in the camp and took out their commander. This caused confusion, and soldiers died while they regrouped.
Still, they slayed a lot of goblins and managed to push them back.
They decided to come back instead of pursuing them because they lost their commander, but found that the goblin corpses disappeared when morning came.
This caused fear among the soldiers, who collected their fallen comrades and returned without further investigation.
Thanks for the treat.
Thanks for this weeks updates, & hope everybody has a good weekend. 😎👍