The Weakest Tamer Began a Journey to Pick up Trash - Volume 1 - Chapter 58.1

Side:

Captain Oght

A BUNDLE OF PAPERS slammed down onto my desk. I had a bad feeling about this. I glanced to my side, and there he was. The guy was always smiling, but boy, this was an especially chilling grin. 

“Uhh…Velivera, what is this?” I asked.

“This is all that work you’ve been saving up, Captain.”

“Ha! Ha ha! Ha ha ha…whoops, would you look at the time? I’d best be patrolling.”

“Heh. Don’t worry. I’ve changed the schedule around so you can spend your entire day in here.”

“Ha…ha…hahhh…” It was getting harder to fake-laugh.

“Oh, and here’s an idea: Why don’t I stay here with you, too, all day long?”

“Huh.” I shivered… Those eyes were serious. Yeah, I was in big trouble. Come to think of it, I hadn’t done any paperwork lately. I glanced at the bundle of documents. Fair’s fair. Good times can’t last forever, I guess.

“Allow me to take care of it,” I said.

“That was the plan, yes.”

“Right.” I reached for the documents. Aagh, reading them all is gonna be a pain. Why does paperwork have to be like this?

“Also,” he said, “there’s this.” 

“Hmm?”

Velivera handed me a single document. I read it at once…and immediately felt my brow furrow more tightly than ever before. It was a copy of a request issued by Ratomi Village’s adventurers’ guild. Specifically, it was a search warrant for villagers who had absconded with village assets. The list of names extended all the way to the third page.

“The chief there sure is a knucklehead, isn’t he?” I mused.

“Yeah. Both guilds have already spread the word about the state of Ratomi Village. There’s no reason to bother with this one.”

Merchants’ livelihoods depended on good information, so their network was naturally fast and accurate. The merchant guild took info gathering seriously enough that it promptly looked into even minor rumors spreading among merchants. As a result, the situation in Ratomi Village was already well known. The merchant guild had set its valuation of the chief and lord of Ratomi Village at the lowest possible level.

The valuation of the merchant guild was a measure of trustworthiness. When it was low, that meant that productive negotiations were essentially impossible. Nobody dealt with a village whose chief had a poor valuation.

It was astonishing that their adventurers’ guild would put out a request like this now. Did the chief not realize this would be tying his own noose? The adventurers’ guild knew about the state of the village, too, which was why they’d appended a note to the front page: “Protect the assets of the listed villagers.” Not return the assets to the village chief but protect the villagers. In other words, the adventurers’ guild wasn’t helping the chief on this one.

“What an idiot,” I said. 

Velivera nodded. “Through and through.”

Ivy’s name wasn’t on the list…but there was an odd listing for a little girl. All of the people who’d fled were in families, save that one single child. Velivera must have realized as well.

“That kid has a secret,” I said. “And not just that she’s a girl.”

“I think you’re right. I’m sure it has something to do with why she couldn’t stay in her village.”

I sighed. “She really didn’t trust me, huh?”

“That probably has less to do with you and more to do with how Ratomi Village treated her,” Velivera assured me. “I’m sure she’ll tell you someday.”

“You’re right. We might as well wait. You saw her on the way out, right?”

“Yeah. I had some information to share with her.”

“By the way, how did you convince the gatekeeper to trade shifts with you?”

Velivera raised an eyebrow. “Why do you ask?” 

“You traded shifts before, didn’t you? Last time, the guy you traded with came over to me crying and begging. ‘Please never make the vice-captain angry again, please!’ That sort of thing.”

“How rude. All I did was ask with a smile.”

“They’re more scared of you than they are of me!” I said, a little indignant.

“Captain, I hope you know you’re not leaving this room until your work is done.”

“Ack! Okay, okay, I’ll do it!”