Strange Grief Wants to Retire ~ The Weakest Hunter Dreams of a Hero ~

36 判断 Judgement

“Oi oi, Iron-san…”

A brown haired male hunter was looking down on Sven, his staring eyes twitched.
He was a member of a party that had taken a different route to Sven during the investigation of the White Wolves Den.

Although 『Footprints』 was one of the largest clans in the Capital, the great majority of hunters were not a part of it.
This operation also had multiple hunters that weren’t part of 『Footprints』 participating.

Surrounding Sven who had safely evacuated, was a party that had escaped after hearing the signal for emergency.

Fellow treasure hunters were rivals.
Resources created by shrines were pretty much limitless, but were restricted to being obtained over fixed intervals.
For that reason, fellow hunters often clashed at shrines.
Outside of towns was no man’s land, so if you incurred someones hostility it could be enough to get you killed.

However, at the moment this was an official request by the country.
An investigation request where it is unknown what might happen required cooperation.

A signal of caution was the compromise.
Let each other do as they please.
If an unmanageable emergency occurred, let out a sound to notify the other.
Something like that.

Near the entrance to the White Wolves Den they had made camp, and close to twenty hunters were gathered together.
Everyone had returned after receiving Sven’s signal.

The air drifted with a tense atmosphere.

“So what was that? You still don’t know what the abnormality is either, but after getting a message you sent out the emergency signal?”

“That’s right.”

Some hostile eyes.
Some eyes that were observing the situation.
Even with the odd gazes coming from hunters armed to the teeth, Sven’s expression didn’t waver.
The gathered hunters became noisy from the words that had cut through clearly.
The accusatory hunters also frowned.

『Iron Cross』 was a famous party.
The hunters inside it all held the ability to heal, and they placed importance on stability in their party composition.
There were some who laughed saying they were scared of fighting, but their actual accomplishments didn’t lie.
Above all, that one of their members reached a high level without any others getting harmed was a fact worthy of respect.

But the present matter was a separate story.
Since parties of different levels and factions were investigating jointly, behaviour that disrupted the situation should be avoided.

The brown haired hunter clicked his tongue, and spoke in a loud voice to confirm with the other party members present.

“…Did anyone here find anything? For instance the boss would be something.”

At his voice, Sven frowned slightly.
Sven joined the investigation halfway through.
Although they had been officially received by the Explorers, it wasn’t amusing to the ones that had accepted the request first.

The surrounding party leaders answered briefly.

“Not particularly.”

“Neither did we.
We encountered a few phantoms, but dealt with them easily enough.”

“…I heard the Boss was slain by Severed Shadow.
It probably won’t appear again for a while.”

The White Wolves Den was a mid-size shrine.
The paths were complex and there were many dead ends, but with this many people it wouldn’t take long to fill out a map even while remaining cautious.

It was too late to fear a strong enemy when the Boss had already been subjugated.
Although the cause of the abnormality had yet to be found, it was a comfortable request.
And the request received by the hunters was simply to investigate the scene, not to determine the underlying cause.

The brown haired hunter gave a snort, and scowled at Sven.

’

Sven knew of the male hunter in front of him.
Not whether he was a good man, but that his ability was certain.
For an investigation request like this, hunters with too many problems would not be mobilised.

No, if Sven was in that mans position, and someone gave his reason for sounding the alarm, he would probably let out a complaint as well.

“…It’s like this is it? Over our judgement, you choose to believe in a man that hasn’t even been on site, while he lays back in town with his legs outstretched.
You’re saying that?”

Intimidating eyes.
He hadn’t drawn his sword, but that was probably because of the surrounding hunters.
The newcomer Henrik had trouble breathing as he looked between Sven and the brown haired hunter.

Sven gave those surrounding him one slow look around, and made a show of shrugging his shoulders.

“Yeah, that’s right.”

“…-!”

Because of the unexpected words the brown haired hunter’s eyes went wide.
His face quickly went red, and his eyebrows slanted severely.
Even though right now he was striking forward with his attitude, Sven sighed inwardly.

“It’s a pity.”

“!? What did you say!?”

“What you said before…It was out of a 『warm heart』 that we sounded the alarm.”

Looking at each person that was growing angry, Sven continued on in an indifferent voice.
From the cave the sound of howling echoed out.
The invaders had disappeared all of a sudden – were even they trying to threaten Sven? Those howls seemed to be a pre-cursor of some kind.

“If it was that lot 『Strange Grief』 then… they wouldn’t have sounded it.
If it was Cry, he would say everything was fine.
If it was Liz or Luke then they wouldn’t show any interest to begin with, and Sytry ― she would probably make you go on ahead first.
However, more or less we are『Healers』.
Not stopping the casualties we know are going to happen is against our 『way』.”

Hunters were responsible for themselves.
It was an unspoken agreement to help each other in emergencies, but there was no obligation to warn someone that would complain.
But Sven did so.
To begin with, Sven predicted this development.
That was the reason he was calm under fire.

Keeping his back to the trees, Sven continued as he trampled the growing grass underfoot.

“Soon our clan will be coming over in great numbers.
We’re going to do a reexamination after waiting, but it’ll take time.
If you want to die, then do what you want.
We’ll wait here.”

“…-“

“If the large reward dies with you, then what’s the point? I’ll make preparations with the new information.
It’s lucky isn’t it?”

The investigation request had a fixed reward rate, but additional rewards were given to those that obtained significant new information.
With the introduction of multiple new hunters, it had gained a race like aspect.

The brown haired hunter chewed his lips.

The amount of additional reward offered wasn’t something you could ignore.
But they had been investigating since before 『Iron』 arrived, and they hadn’t found any significant information.
If they continued on like this, it was unlikely they would find anything.
But even still, if they just stood by and waited while a lot of parties from 『Footprints』 showed up, then the amount of competition would increase even further.

The man was also a hunter.
He had more greed than the average person.
And he didn’t feel any great risk from the current circumstances.

The other hunters also exchanged perplexed looks.
They were probably thinking about the same thing.

Usually they would laugh down a warning like this.
But the other party was famous in the Capital, so they maintained restraint.
In actuality, the hunter before them had the appropriate demeanour to hold the name 『Tempest Strike』.

’

If 『Iron Cross』 was going to continue searching on their own it would be a different story.
But, they were choosing to wait.

As if one of the hunters couldn’t bear the atmosphere, he raised his voice.

“What comes out here are wolves…for something like a slime….there would be no way! Even more is that it wouldn’t even be a problem! After all I’m the Magi of my party.”

The possibility of a slime.
If they were asked what it was, everyone would reply with zero.
Even if it wasn’t zero, it would be a probability close to zero.
It’s not a natural prediction to make.

“-It’s something I won’t forget, a story from when our clan 『Footprints』 was first created.
Cry he…our clan master, he began talking about going outside for cherry blossom viewing.”

Sven began to talk about something unexpected.
At his serious expression his surroundings became quiet.
The brown haired hunter that was grinding his teeth until they creaked a short while ago, also raised his head.

Behind Sven as he talked, the expressions of the members of 『Iron Cross』 distorted unpleasantly.
Only the newcomer Henrik looked at his companions curiously.

“He didn’t need to hire everyone as guards, but he said since it’ll be outside, don’t forget to carry your weapons with you.”

“? …So what’s the story?”

“Now that place ― is a shrine.”

“!?”

“I’m not sure whether any of you lot remember, but there was an earthquake that slightly displaced the Earth Veins.
They were displaced precisely at the cherry blossom viewing location.
Have any of you seen the moment a shrine is created? That really was ― a sight to behold.
It was as if hell had appeared on earth.
Well, I don’t think you’ll ever get a chance to see it though.”

Nobody said anything.
If you were a hunter it was natural to seek out information on shrines.
In those days when a shrine appeared it was big news.
All the people there had some idea of what it was.

With a shocked expression, the brown haired hunter asked back in a broken sentence.

In the vicinity of the Capital, a shrine with a high degree of difficulty due to the harsh nature of the environment that most hunters could not even attempt.

“That couldn’t be…that 『Flower Garden』?”

Only appearing recently, in only three years it arrived at a Level 7 certification, it was called the worst shrine in the vicinity of the Capital.
Recently it was talked about that Ark went to capture it, but how many hunters could challenge it within the Imperial Capital?

Whlie he replied, Sven looked up at the sky.

“『Infinite Variety』 can see the 『future』.”

“…that’s…ridiculous.”

It was a ridiculous story.

The were many varieties of different Relics, but they were all said to be imitations of things that had once existed in a previous civilisation.
Nothing existed too far outside of reason.
Seeing the future was something beyond human capabilities.

But, for the most part Relics could not be reproduced by modern civilisation.
Who could completely rule out it’s existence?

At the hunters who seemed to lose their bearings, Sven gave a big smile as he spoke.

’

“It seems he has some sort of Relic like that.
It’s just a rumour though.
The person himself denies it but… that was why I decided to retreat.
There – I gave my reason.
But still, if there’s someone here that wants to make progress, do as you like.”

§　§　§

Time passed calmly in the clan masters room.
Everyone ended up heading towards the shrine, and the usually bustling clan house had a quiet air to it.

At the tall, large clan masters desk, I drank the coffee Eva had brought in while flipping through the balance sheets of the request prepared by her.

Since she was originally a merchant, the data was easy to read.
It was amazing that even a layman like me could understand it.
It listed the parties from Footprints that had received the request.
The reward lump sum from the Explorers Association and the amount deducted after administration expenses.
And also the members that were predicted to raise their level during the request.

Many other clans had careless management, but First Step had high membership fees so it went into minute details.
You could understand the tendencies of the clan members quickly by examining the data.

But I still didn’t try to understand the tendencies of the hunters in the clan… that’s how it was.

Incidentally, Eva seemed to know it all so if you asked her she would reply straight away.
The first thing I needed to do was memorise everyones name and face…

Frankly, my impressions didn’t go anywhere beyond ‘oh?’.
It wasn’t good to Eva though so I flipped through the data while acting dignified and nodding.
There were a lot of places I didn’t understand, but I didn’t make any enquiries.

Then, a certain party name came up.

“Eh? Hm? Could it be that Iron Cross also went?”

“?? Yes.
Wasn’t it because Cry-san sent them?”

At Eva’s curious words, I finally remembered using Sven and the others as errand boys.

Most likely, when they gave my report, Gark-san had asked them.

Iron Cross was an elite party.
They didn’t have explosive power, but they had incredible stability, and there was nothing to criticise about the leaders strength.
And of course, he had much more common sense than Liz.
They were one of Footprints exemplar parties.
If they were there, then there would be no problems in command.

The tension in my whole body was released, and I lent back into my chair to relax.
When I put my feet up on the desk, Eva knit her brows disapprovingly.
Now now, at the moment there was no one else here.

“I guess it was overkill…”

“…Isn’t it also good, to have some extra leeway occasionally?”

“No, we should always have extra leeway…”

“……”

Eva faced me with blank eyes.

I take extra leeway.
I always have it.
But, things never go smoothly.
I have no talent and no luck.
My timing was always bad.
No matter how I moved it never went smoothly.
Somehow I can keep the clan moving, but maybe I’m cursed.

I want to throw up.

I held the black coffee in my mouth, and the bitterness made me frown involuntarily.
I should have had cafe au lait instead of trying to show off.
It was already too late.

’

“I wonder if I should stop being a hunter…”

“You’re saying that again…”

Well it should be alright this time.
For things not to go smoothly with 『Iron』 there would be unimaginable.
Ark wasn’t available, but if it wasn’t the best it was still better.

The remaining problem was… how could I restrain Liz?

Looking back at the training range, Liz needed some stress relief.
I breathed out a sigh.

At the moment she was believing in my words ‘I have something else for you to do’, but if I didn’t come up with something there was the danger that she’d rush over to the White Wolves Den alone.
Not only Footprints, the other parties there would also be exposed to danger.
At least that much needed to be avoided.

It’s a job only I could do.
I wasn’t very motivated, but I had to do it.
I didn’t want trouble.

However, yeah… that girl was motivated.
She wasn’t able to stay in one place.

Folding my arms, I absentmindedly stared at the ceiling.

Hmm… Liz-chan was such a wild kid.

Should we go to a suitable shrine… Tino will probably be forced to come along, so lets choose a simple place.
It should also be a place far from the White Wolves Den… so there’s no trouble lets make it somewhere unpopular.

Liz also probably wouldn’t refuse my request.
Since she’s a person always in 『motion』, trying to stop her from moving was difficult, but changing her direction was easy.

Today I’m – clearheaded.

“Yep, that’s right.”

As I nodded, Eva who had stayed silent while I was staring at the ceiling asked me a question with an indescribable expression.

“…What did you see?”

“Eh? No…nothing?”

“…..Is that so?”

Rising up, I decided to start work on selecting a shrine.
I was itching to put my skills to use.

a

Translator Notes

cafe au lait means coffee with milk in french.
(the style is specifically hot milk apparently).
Sorry, that’s all I got.