Chapter 42.1 – Reader/Protagonist: I’ll accept this task.
Windy Town1 is close to the Elven Forest. Since it is a place where travelers stop before exploring the Elven Forest or the Gnome Ruins, the mercenary guild set up an office there.
Anne, the receptionist, was playing with her fingernails, bored. The mercenary guild office was more boring today compared to recent events when there was a great change in the depths of the Elven Forest. Many low level spirit beasts were seen, and there was even a spirit beast stampede. A week ago, many people saw flames in the Elven Forest and the power fluctuations were on the level of a War God or Mage God. The power fluctuations have already subsided but many people are still frightened.
The elves live in seclusion in the Elven Forest, and it is not good to provoke this race of beautiful people. They have at least two Mage God or War God level warriors. That is the consensus of the people of the Chaos Continent.
From that day on, the elves seemed to be in some kind of situation. Now the task board is full of Elven Forest missions, and almost all of the mercenaries have run off to explore the Elven Forest. All sorts of news came – some people said they saw the signs of a curse, some people said they saw an empty Elven Forest, and some people even said that they saw a dragon.
When she heard the news, Anne was very amused at first then her thoughts became confused. After all, four years ago the legendary demon race appeared. Somehow, they had gotten through the Lost Land’s passageway into the Chaos Continent. Although the Temple of Light has repeatedly called for a grand alliance to fight against the evil demons, it has not been successful. That’s because when people come in contact with the demons, they realized how terrible that race is. Demons were born for fighting and destruction. Every demon is at least at the level of a Grand Swordsman. The most terrifying of them all is the Thunder Legion whose every member was at least a Sword Saint. In fact, the whole human race only has 100 Sword Saints. The demons have already conquered ⅕ of the Continent. If they hadn’t stopped of their own volition, the whole Chaos Continent would have fallen. Now that even the elves were in trouble, Anne felt the world was getting messier and her intuition told her that this was far from the end.
“Tap. Tap.”
Anne froze a bit before she reacted. There was someone knocking at the table to call her attention. There were two people on the other side of the counter: a black-haired youth and a silver-haired … elf?
Du Ze very calmly looked at the receptionist who was staring at Xiu, speechless. He was used to it. Whenever he had this close friend by his side, most people ignored him.
Du Ze knocked on the table again and Anne finally reacted. Her face became red. It wasn’t like her to fuss like this. She had spoken before to a lot of elven mercenaries, but none of them were so beautiful that they made her lose her ability to think.
Anne smiled professionally, trying to conceal her previous gaffe: “Hello, how can I help you?”2
“Mercenary registration.”
“OK, just a moment, please.” Anne took out a form from a drawer: “Please show me your warrior badge.”
Du Ze froze. He had forgotten this detail. The threshold for becoming a mercenary, though very low, requires at least some strength. A warrior badge serves as proof of a warrior’s rank. Ordinary non-fighter folk don’t have a warrior badge. Of course, the Earthman Du Ze has no such thing and Xiu left his in the Mage School.
Seeing Du Ze’s reaction, Anne could guess the situation.
“You can apply for warrior badges here but only at the basic level. If you want to upgrade, you will have to go to the relevant professional guilds.” Anne pointed to a particular door: “After paying a silver coin, you can go there for the test. If you pass then you can obtain a warrior badge.”
