Book 5: Volume 4 Chapter 3, Cooperation

Translator: Kazumi

Editor: Silavin

 

The man had returned safely to the capital with his information. He had barely allowed himself to exhale before his next order arrived.

 

He had hoped for rest. It seemed the organization could not afford to give him any.

 

Understanding this, he answered without hesitation.

 

“Yes.”

 

The order itself was simple: deliver a letter to a contact within a certain organization. But simplicity, he had learned long ago, rarely meant it was easy. The organization still maintained a considerable foothold in the capital, yet if the letter were intercepted by a rival dark guild, by a careless stranger, by chance alone, everything would unravel.

 

Above all else, this had to remain secret.

 

Even so, no matter how carefully a person moved through a city, they could never escape every eye. The streets always had witnesses.

 

So the man made a quiet decision: he would make contact outside the capital.

 

He had heard through another member that the person he was looking for would be heading to a nearby hunting ground today, working as an adventurer. All the man needed to do was go there.

 

He was chosen for the task for one simple reason: he could reach the location without any help. The fact that someone whose strengths lay outside of combat had been assigned this role said more about the organization’s current state than anything else.

 

He was fortunate. In a field that vast, finding a single person so quickly was more than he could have reasonably expected.

 

Knowing the other person would be on guard, he approached slowly, unhurried, and stopped just outside what he judged to be their attack range.

 

“Hey. How are you doing?”

 

“…Yeah, alright.”

 

“I was passing through and thought I’d stop by. Am I interrupting?”

 

“No. I was under attack. Just catching my breath.”

 

Several monsters lay scattered across the ground nearby as they spoke. These monsters were all low-rank, and from the look of it, each had fallen in a single hit.

 

“I see.” The man nodded. “Sorry to interrupt you. I’m grateful for the favor of the God Toitte.”

 

The other person went still.

 

The last words the man had spoken were a code shared among the Succubus. Toitte was a God held in particular reverence by their kind. The God of compassion and foresight.

 

“…Ah. A whim of the Gods.”

 

The reply came after a brief pause, and it, too, was a code.

 

The man reached into his pocket, drew out an envelope, and set it carefully on the ground nearby. He placed a small stone on top so the wind wouldn’t take it, then turned without another word.

 

All that remained was to confirm the letter had been received.

 

Neither of them moved toward the other. Much had been understood without needing to be said. The man waited at a distance until the other party had moved far enough away before walking over to retrieve the envelope from the ground. He watched long enough to confirm it had been opened, that the contents were being read.

 

Then he continued on to the nearby village.

 

…

 

Several exchanges like this one followed over the coming days, each measured and quiet, each careful in its own way. Through them, a meeting between the two parties was finally arranged.

 

Time was pressing, but caution still had to come first. If this particular meeting were discovered, it would lose its purpose entirely.

 

Even when their adversaries eventually learned of the alliance, and they eventually would, the manner of that discovery mattered. Being perceived as two separate groups operating independently was a very different thing from being seen as one. They wanted to preserve that distinction for as long as possible.

 

Much of the groundwork had already been laid through correspondence. The face-to-face meeting existed for one purpose only: to confirm that what each side had agreed to was understood the same way by both.

 

It lasted less than an hour.

 

When it was over, the cooperative relationship between the two parties had been established.

 

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Kousuke found himself seated in the Management Floor conference room across from a rather unusual gathering.

 

Towa was present, as expected, he naturally attended as the Razequa Amamiya Kingdom’s representative. Beside him sat Wahid, the head of the Crown. His attendance in person was already unusual. That he had come alone made it more so.

 

The third attendee, however, was what truly made the room feel different: Gizelle, the leader of the Succubus. And stranger still, it was Gizelle who had arranged the meeting in the first place. In all the time Kousuke had known her, he could hardly recall a time for that.

 

On the Tower’s side, Kouhi stood quietly at his side, and Peach had been designated from the outset.

 

Kousuke decided not to waste time with pleasantries.

 

“So? What is the matter?”

 

The three exchanged a brief glance. Then Gizelle began speaking, which was itself unusual, given that a representative of the Succubus was supposed to operate firmly behind the scenes. Kousuke had half-expected it, given who had gathered, so he let it pass without comment.

 

“There are roughly two things. One is a matter we’d like your permission on, Kousuke-sama. The other is that we’d like to borrow Peach for a while.”

 

Kousuke understood the first part easily enough. The second made him pause. He tilted his head slightly.

 

Peach had gone on Succubus assignments at Gizelle’s request before. It was only occasionally and not often. It had generally been framed as keeping Peach’s skills sharp, and Kousuke had never been asked to formally weigh in on it.

 

Gizelle, perhaps reading his expression, moved to explain without being prompted.

 

The situation, as she laid it out, stemmed from a power struggle among the underground organizations within the Smith Kingdom. A new dark guild had emerged and expanded with unsettling speed, making it increasingly difficult for the organizations loyal to the Royal Family to function. In structure, they occupied much the same role in the Smith Kingdom that the Succubus and their affiliates occupied in Razequa Amamiya.

 

Turnover among such groups was nothing new. Old powers gave way to new ones, that was simply how things worked.

 

What made this different was that the new guild refused to acknowledge anyone else’s existence.

 

If left unchecked, even the Succubus’s operations connected to the Tower could begin to suffer.

 

This concerned the Razequa Amamiya Kingdom, which maintained close ties with the Smith Kingdom. It concerned Crown, which had a branch there. And so both had sent their leaders to this table.

 

Kousuke listened and nodded.

 

“I see. So, what about the permission?”

 

“We’ve been approached by a representative directly under the Smith Kingdom for a joint operation. We’d like your permission to proceed.”

 

Gizelle kept the finer details to herself, and Kousuke did not press her for them. In that moment, what mattered more was that Towa and Wahid were already informed, and that all three of them had concluded there was no disadvantage to the Tower. The specifics could be worked through afterward.

 

“I see. So Peach is part of that too.”

 

“She is. A confrontation is unavoidable at this point. Whether or not Peach is there makes a lot of difference to our safety.”

 

“I see.”

 

Peach was the most capable member of the Clan, and her presence shifted the odds in ways that were difficult to overstate. Gizelle needed this to succeed and for that, she needed Peach.

 

Kousuke followed the logic of it. But somewhere in the middle of listening, something else surfaced. It was a quiet thought that hadn’t been there a moment before. He decided to put it forward.

 

“I have no problem lending Peach.”

 

The tension in the room visibly eased. The three across from him exchanged small, relieved expressions. That was until his next words.

 

“But, for this matter… would it be alright if I personally intervened?”

 

The relief on their faces shifted into something far more complicated.

 

And so, what had begun as a request to borrow Peach quietly grew into something much larger. It had not turned into a situation that would draw Kousuke himself into the turmoil unfolding within the Smith Kingdom.

 

The Living God was going to personally move.