52 Her Duel Request

Surprisingly, Clara was still working and was completely shocked that I completed the quest in less than a few hours.

Good thing she recovered quickly and processed it for me professionally, congratulating me on completing my first quest and I was two silver coins richer.

By now, she should have realised I was the real deal.

I took a look at the request board again, the Guild being much more empty than before since it's already so late at night.

I managed to find a request that involved picking up herbs in an area nearby where we had set up camp so I took that one and registered it with Clara again. Apparently the herbs are used in some minor alchemical recipes so there's still a demand for them.

This time she processed the quest without any words of doubt, even wishing me good luck and asking me to be careful before handing my card back to me.

Thanking her once more, I flew back to the camp and sat myself down in my spot where I could see the entire camp before settling myself down to sleep, leaving the security to my summons.

The night passed with only a single attack from some wolves passing by but my summons managed to handle it without any problems. Even going so far as dismantling them and leaving the materials out for me to collect when I woke up the next morning.

While I was storing the materials, Hisei crawled out from her tent while rubbing her eyes sleepily.

"Good morning Hisei, did you sleep well?"

She looked at me with confusion at first before her eyes widened slightly, probably remembering that yesterday was not a dream.

"Good morning… Mistress… I… I did," She greeted back before noticing the dead wolves. "Were we attacked last night?"

"Yeah, just a few Hell Wolves, nothing to worry about."

"I… I see… I wasn't aware we were attacked…"

I giggled, "I guess you must have been really tired after the goblins last night. Not to worry, we should reach the town in the afternoon today. Also, I already got some breakfast stew cooking. Could you check the pot and prepare the portions for the others?"

She turned to look at the cooking pot that I left simmering over the fire and nodded, leaving me to store the rest of the materials.

Soon enough, the other ladies also started climbing out of their tents, only remembering what happened yesterday when they saw me.

I already expected some of them to still be recovering from the trauma so I had Hisei distribute the stew to them.

Hisei then came to me with a bowl as well, I thanked her for it until I realised she does not have one of her own.

"Hisei? Where's yours?"

"I read that slaves only eat the leftovers that their owners give them."

I sighed, "Well, that's only for the really bad owners or if the slaves are being punished. It is counterproductive to starve a slave otherwise since it decreases their ability to work. So go and take a bowl for yourself, don't be shy."

"Th… Thank you… Mistress…"

I suppose Hisei got most of her knowledge from reading books but has little experience outside… Though I'm not one to talk since I'm in the same position myself. That thing about lowering productivity is just my own views though.

Seeing that the Inugami girl got her own food secured, I went over to the others to greet them.

"Good morning ladies."

"Good morning, Lady Aster, thank you for the stew, even though we should be the ones making it," Linette greeted.

"No need to worry, everyone must have been exhausted and it's no big deal for me."

She smiled a little before turning serious again, "I apologise Miss Aster, but is it alright for me to see your Guild card?"

"Ah, of course."

I fished it out and handed it to her, prompting a few of the other girls to lean over to look as well.

"Eh? Lady Aster is… An F rank?"

"Yes, I only just joined the guild yesterday but I have been training my whole life."

"Ah… That makes sense… I suppose that's why you took the quest to deal with the Goblins alone too…" She noted, handing the card back to me.

"If you don't mind me asking… What happened to your convoy?"

Linette flinched visibly at my question so I quickly added, "If you don't want to say it, it's fine."

"No, no… It's alright… I… Lady Aster already knows I'm the heir to the Tiara Merchant Company right?"

I nodded slowly, wondering what this was about.

"As the heir, I have been trying to learn the ropes so I accompanied this caravan for this trip. The… Former leader of this caravan was one of our merchants… He had been trying to woo me for a while now despite me telling him I wasn't interested. So he colluded with the guards to arrange this… Accident for me…"

I looked at the other ladies and they shuddered, remembering what almost happened to them.

"Wouldn't he and the guards also lose his head for letting the heir meet such an accident?" I asked.

She shook her head, "He was already planning to run off to Shendhala Oligarchy to join another merchant company there so there was no loss to him. The guards also followed him as well… That's why they didn't even try to protect the goods."

Ugh… The mentality that if they can't have it, no one else can huh? How lame…

Linette sighed and continued, "When we were passing through that area, the bastard and his goons tied us up and left us after luring the goblins to us. That's where you found us, Lady Aster."

"I see… That merchant truly is trash."

"If only I was aware of his intentions… I would not have put everyone through this…"

The other women started to reassure her that it wasn't her fault, giving me an idea that these women were probably her retainers or something.

She smiled at them before turning back to me, "Thank you again for saving us, Lady Aster. The stew was delicious too."

I nodded at her thanks before standing up, "Well, shall we get ready to go?"

The camp was quickly taken down and we got ready to move again, though I told them we would need to make a quick stop along the road to pick up the herbs I took for my other quest.

The trip there was quiet enough with Hisei remaining by my side throughout the walk. I did notice that she was looking at me with rather weird eyes though but whenever I turned to her she would look away awkwardly.

We eventually reached the part of the road where the herbs could be found in the field beside the road.

It's less than half a day's trip from the town and the area is pretty safe, thus this was classified as an F rank quest.

The quest was also quite unpopular with beginners since the herbs were hard to identify if one isn't knowledgeable about them, so it's easy to pick the wrong herbs.

Which is also why not a lot of people are doing this quest and we had the entire field to ourselves.

It was the perfect opportunity for us to take a break too so I let the others rest while I went ahead to pick the herbs. Hisei also joined me despite me telling her that she didn't need to, but I appreciated her help.

"Are these the ones… Mistress?" Hisei asked, showing me the herbs she had picked.

I glanced at them and used [Screen] to check them, a boon that I've been using to cheat in finding the correct herbs despite myself not knowing enough about them.

"Oh? You have a talent for this, Hisei. Well done!"

"No… I just learned how to find them from Mistress…"

"Still, it's quite impressive of you, good job!" I praised, reaching out to pat her head.

Unexpectedly, she flinched upon seeing my raised hand before hastily apologising, "Sorry… Mistress…"

I shook my head and took back my hand, "It's alright, why don't you--"

I stopped myself when I heard a growl coming from nearby.

Standing up, I immediately unsheathed my dagger just as a Hell Wolf Alpha burst from the undergrowth to rush towards me.

Huh… I'm guessing it must have ran away from one of my summons who was patrolling the area. But to think the Alpha would run away from its pack…

"Go to the others," I instructed Hisei.

"Let… Let me fight too! That's a Hell Wolf Alpha, Mistress! They are much stronger than a normal Hell Wolf!"

"No, I can handle it. Stay back."

Without waiting for her answer, I sheathed my dagger and rushed forward. For an opponent like this, there was no need for me to be armed.

The wolf leapt forward with its jaws opened wide and claws striking towards me.

I heard the shouts of alarm coming from behind but I ignored them in favour of concentrating on the monster wolf in front of me.

Just as it reached striking distance of me, I lowered myself and punched upwards, striking the wolf under its chin and sending it airborne.

I leapt after it and delivered a kick to its neck, breaking it with a loud crack and killing it instantly.

The corpse of the wolf crashed back onto the ground just before I landed.

After facing wyverns and infant dragons, such monsters are of no consequence to me anymore!

I turned back to see the others staring at me with wide eyes.

Eh? Were they shocked to see the Hell Wolf Alpha? I suppose normal people would probably just run away from monsters like these and seeing one defeated in front of them might have been quite shocking.

Hisei came up to me with a resolute expression on her face.

"Mi… Mistress Aster… Please… Duel me."

…

Ha?