Book 5: Volume 4 Chapter 12, The Commotion in Front of the Branch

Translator: Kazumi

Editor: Silavin

 

Kousuke noticed the crowd from a distance.

 

He was on his way back to the Capital after a day of gathering materials, and the Crown branch came into view as it always did. It was built outside the gate, the way all Crown branches in the Central Continent were.

 

There was a gathering in front that truly stood out.

 

Even Kousuke, whose eyesight fell far short of Kouhi’s, saw it without difficulty.

 

“What’s that?” He tilted his head as he said.

 

“A commotion.” Kouhi studied the scene ahead. “They appear to be divided into two groups. In conflict between them.”

 

“Two groups?” Kousuke’s brow furrowed. Crown members did not need to take a dispute outside. There was actually room inside for such things. After all, standing in the street only made things harder for everyone. Unless, of course, the point was to be visible. To make it difficult for the staff to act.

 

When he had passed through the branch that morning to check on requests, there had been nothing like this. Something had changed during his absence.

 

As they drew nearer, Kouhi’s account became more detailed.

 

“It looks like Crown members are holding back a group that’s complaining about the teleportation gate. About Crown members using it without paying.”

 

“About the gate?”

 

“They seem to believe Crown members receive free access.”

 

Kousuke sighed. The accusation did not hold up to any scrutiny.

 

The gate fees were managed by Razequa Amamiya. The Crown paid for them. For adventurers, the cost was drawn gradually from quest earnings rather than charged upfront, which meant they were not exempt so much as paying using a different mechanism.

 

Merchants used a different system as well. Before Razequa Amamiya had taken over administration, when the Crown had managed everything itself, an argument like that might have found some footing. But not now.

 

“Are they uninformed, or just looking for a reason to be angry?”

 

“Both seem possible.”

 

Kouhi said it plainly, and Kousuke could not disagree. The rules around the Smith Kingdom’s teleportation gate had been consistent for years. It had been in place for five years or so. There was no obvious reason for this to be happening now.

 

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The fuller picture came together once they were closer.

 

It had begun simply enough: adventurers outside the Crown voicing complaints, staff members patiently explaining. But the explanation had not landed, and while the staff continued to try, other adventurers had joined the original group, and the weight of numbers had shifted the tone.

 

The staff’s patience had no ceiling and the adventurers’ willingness to listen apparently did.

 

At some point, Crown members had stepped in, and the original argument between adventurers and staff had dissolved entirely into something between the adventurers themselves.

 

In the Capital, there was no formal division between Crown and non-Crown adventurers. But the trading counter at the branch, the ability to bring in materials without friction, translated into a modest difference in earnings over time.

 

It was nothing dramatic.

 

In practical terms, it amounted to something like an extra dish at a meal. But the gap, however small, had a way of growing in the imagination when looked at from the outside long enough.

 

It seemed the accumulated weight of ‘those Crown people…’ had finally tipped over.

 

Kousuke found this hard to feel sympathetic toward. If the treatment bothered them, Crown was not selective. Anyone could join. The complaint was actually the answer in itself.

 

Inside the branch, the mood was tense in a muted way. A number of Crown adventurers were still inside, not yet pulled into what was happening out front, but the atmosphere made clear that could change. The staff member Kousuke spoke to wore the particular expression of someone who had been trying to manage something too large for their authority to touch.

 

“Are there no executives here right now?”

 

There were things that could be done in a situation like this; but only someone with the standing to act on them.

 

The staff member shook his head. He gave no specifics about where they had gone, which Kousuke noted with quiet approval. In a world where information traveled easily through careless words, that kind of discretion was important.

 

The reason came to Kousuke a moment later.

 

“Ah. Right. Today’s the regular meeting.”

 

He said it softly, more to himself than anyone. But Kouhi was beside him, and the staff member was close enough to catch it.

 

The staff member’s expression shifted, just slightly.

 

A regular meeting was a gathering of executives at branch manager rank and above, held at headquarters once a month. It was an arrangement made possible by the teleportation gate. In a world where distance was still measured in days of travel by carriage or ship, larger organizations rarely brought their leadership together at all but the teleportation gates made this all possible to do each month.

 

An ordinary adventurer would not have any reason to know such a meeting existed, let alone its schedule.

 

The staff member looked at Kousuke with something new in his expression. He did not ask anything. He did not need to. The conversation reached its natural end, and they parted.

 

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Kousuke and the others moved to a quieter corner of the building.

 

“Are you going back to the Tower?”

 

Kouhi had already read the intention from the way he was moving.

 

“Yeah.” He paused. “Something about that commotion is sitting wrong with me. I feel like it needs to be dealt with now.”

 

“I see.”

 

That was all Kouhi needed. She didn’t ask for reasoning. For her, even setting aside any consideration of what Kousuke was, the instinct behind those words was reason enough to act.

 

“Nana. Come with us.”

 

Nana, who had been following quietly at his side, moved closer without a word. She had already understood what was happening.

 

Kousuke checked his surroundings carefully, then used the power of Yurino Shrine to take them directly to Amamiya Tower.

 

No one noticed. They were simply gone.