The Dark Warrior

"Eh? Momon-san, will it be fine for us to attend too?"

"Yes. I wish for your opinion as one of the party involved."

Receiving consent from the Sword of Darkness, Ainz and the others returned to

the room they were in moments ago.

Things felt rushed.

Ainz smile sheepishly again, sitting in his original seat. Narberal was besides

him, the youth left a one seat gap between him and Ainz. The sword of darkness

team sat in their original seats like Ainz.

Among this group, the first to speak up was the youth:

"The receptionist already mentioned this, but allow me to reintroduce myself. I

am Enfrea Bareal, working as a pharmacist in this city. As for the content of the

job, I planned to journey to the nearby forest. As everyone knows, the forest is

very dangerous, and that's why I wish for you to be my escort and help with

gathering herbs if possible.

"Bodyguard. I see."

Ainz nodded calmly, thinking about the difficulties of this job.

Ainz knew he was strong and together with Narberal he would be able to wipe

out any attacking monsters. Since Ainz and Narberal were both magic chanters,

they didn’t have any shield-like abilities or skil s to protect others, so he wasn’t

confident in being an escort.

"The remunerations wil be higher——"

"——Please wait a moment. Being an escort would be better suited for you

guys, Peter-san. Would you like to be under my employ instead?"

"Eh?"

"For escort and herb gathering tasks, having the Ranger Lukeluther-san and

Druid Dine-san assistance would be more efficient."

"Oh! Momon-san has great foresight. Druids can fully utilise their powers in the

forest and will be more powerful than rangers like Lukeluther."

Dine's deep voice was full of arrogance, while Lukeluther looked displeased.

"What a thing to say, Dine."

"Taking the abilities of a Druid into consideration, it’s an undeniable fact! And don't forget I have also dabbled in the arts of medicine!"

"Hmmm—— Peter, I'm fine with it. I wil show you how strong I am compared to

Druid-san."

"This means everyone is in. We wil hunt any monsters we encounter and turn

them over to the city for extra money. How about splitting Bareal-san equally

between the 6 of us, Peter-san?"

"If Momon-san thinks it's okay, we have no objections."

"Bareal-san, sorry for the wait. Wil it be convenient for everyone present to take on your job?"

"I see, I'm okay with it. I wil be relying on you all. Ah, please just call me Bareal."

Ainz's group started introducing themselves. Narberal gave him a dirty look, but

stil finished her introduction.

"As for the plan, we wil head for Carne vil age to set up a base and afterwards

head into the forest, that's our usual practice. The number of days we wil spend

gathering herbs will depend on our harvest. But it wil be at most three days, the

average in the past was two."

“How do we get there?"

"There’s a horse carriage, but it wil be fil ed with containers for the gathered herbs, so there won't be any space for you to sit in."

"Can we resupply our food stock in Carne vil age?"

"Water wil be fine, but food wil be a bit hard. Carne isn’t a large vil age.”

The members of the Sword of Darkness started to discuss the necessary

preparations and asked Bareal various questions. Seeing this, Ainz enquired:

“May I ask a few questions?”

Seeing the youth nod with a smile, Ainz stated his first query:

“Why me? I only came to this city by stagecoach recently, so I don’t know

anyone here and I’m not famous. But you asked for me despite that and since

you mentioned ‘the usual practice’ just now, that means you hired other

adventurers before correct? What happened to them?”

Ainz’s gaze under the helmet became sharp.

He didn’t know why the youth asked for him. If his cover was blown, he would

need a new disguise and method of approach.

Observing carefully───since half of the young man’s face was covered by his

bangs, he couldn’t see his eyes clearly───he stil couldn’t see through the

youth’s real motive.

Was he just thinking too deeply───just as Ainz was feeling doubtful, Enfrea

answered:

“Ah, the adventurers I used to hire seem to have left Re-Lantier for other cities.

That’s why I am looking for new adventurers. Also… I heard about the incident

at the tavern from the customers visiting my place.

“Tavern incident?”

“Yes, I heard that someone easily threw an adventurer one grade higher than

him.”

“I see…”

He wanted to display his strength and raise his fame back then. Did the youth

take the bait? As Ainz was feeling relieved, the young man pointed at the copper

medal on Ainz’s chest and added jokingly:

“And copper medal adventurers are cheaper, right? We might be able to work

together for a longer term.”

“Haha, indeed.”

Hiring a fresh recruit, Ainz understood that feeling. He felt his wariness easing,

but there was stil something that worried him. If that was really the case───

While Ainz was thinking, the others asked several questions and Enfrea

answered them one at a time. After making sure no one else had any questions,

Enfrea said:

“Let’s hit the road after the preparations are done!”

Part 5