Chapter 87: The Bear is Unknowingly Resented

Chapter 87:
The Bear is Unknowingly Resented

 

IMBECILES! Insufferable imbeciles all around! “What’s the meaning of this!” I snarled at my direct reports in the room. “Why does the adventurers’ guild have all this…” I winced as I even spoke to the fools “…wolf meat?!”

“I think it’s because someone killed the beasts?” one of my reports said.

“What an illuminating answer from the new biggest idiot in town. Have you got your head screwed on right? A hundred wolves in a day or two? Don’t be absurd!” Surrounded by fools, I swear.

“Sir, maybe it was the adventurers who came the other day that did it?”

There actually had been a party of adventurers who came into town a few days ago. A four-person group. Two swordsmen and two mages. They were high ranking, but they had the absolute gall to turn me down. Worse yet, the leader of the party took the other three pretty ladies off somewhere.

There was a chance they were the ones to hand off the wolves to the adventurers’ guild, but I’d gotten reports that they left town a couple of days ago. Who could prepare so much wolf meat?

“If the adventurers come back,” said one of the idiots around me, “would you like us to grab them for you?”

“And which one of you is capable of grabbing a whole C-Rank party, huh? Think before you speak!”

They really were fools, the whole lot of them. If that were possible, I would’ve had them steal me a party from the start. We were in this mess because none of them could do it. But they couldn’t even get something so simple through their thick heads.

“Just…go look into how the adventurers’ guild ended up with that much wolf meat! Get out of my hair!” I roared, and they fled.

What did I do to deserve such slobbering nincompoops? “Curses,” I muttered. “This miserable backwater. I was only going to stay for one more month.”

Five years ago, I was an employee at the trade guild in a big town. When they offered me a position as a guild master, I was foolish enough to accept, and ended up stuck in this fish-reeking backwater. I kept up my work for five years despite that. And yes, I was embezzling funds right under the townspeople’s noses, but what were they going to do with it?

And then the overgrown squid showed up.

I couldn’t send out any ships, couldn’t catch any fish, and that bumbling mayor packed his bags and moved away. On top of that, the wealthier residents began to leave. How was I supposed to make any money without my cash cows?

I hired some strapped-for-cash adventurers to play as bandits and keep any more residents from skipping town. Even if some of the townspeople hired adventurers to help them get out, word of the bandits would spread, so there weren’t as many people trying anymore. The only road they could take was blocked off by the bandits and the kraken was in the ocean, so nobody could set out by ship. The only option left was the grueling mountain range, and who would be stupid enough to try that?

I let a select group of fishermen catch the fish they could off the coast and managed all of them. I’d pretend to divide those equally and crank up the price. Hungry? Then come to me and pay up! The poor wastrels of the town got to have little morsels, but only to prevent any rioting.

Even if they tried making a break for it, the bandits would attack them and steal their property. Run and lose your stuff, or stay and lose it all the same. I just needed one more month, and then I could blow this miserable hovel.

Until the adventurers’ guild started handing out free wolf meat.

If I didn’t do something, my cash flow was going to dry up completely. Not to mention that the townspeople might turn on me. I just had to locate the wolf meat supplier, first…

 

That night, my cronies brought me the info I was waiting for.

“The bear’s weird, man.”

Oh, a bear was weird? What was he yammering on about? “You take me for a fool?”

“No, I’m—listen, there’s a girl in a bear outfit.” He had to be kidding me. “I looked into her and it seems she came in alone the other day.”

“She got here without being attacked by the bandits?” Did she have a guard, then? I was sure those guys would’ve attacked a girl walking on her lonesome, but maybe traveling alone had let her slip by?

“Word is that she came over the mountains on her own.”

“Ha! A little bear girl climbing over a mountain? Are you drunk?”

“No, I heard it from the gatekeeper himself! According to him, she helped some townspeople who were trying to get over the mountain. The next day, several residents saw a bear on the coast. There were also people who saw her head over to the adventurers’ guild.”

According to his report, that girl in the bear outfit had gotten to the adventurers’ guild and just dumped tons and tons of wolf carcasses into their storage. Which…hmm. If she really were powerful enough to get over that mountain alone, she’d be able to easily defeat wolves, even if she was just a girl. And if she had so much wolf meat on her, that meant she had to have a first-class item bag too.

Did that mean she was a pretty high-ranking adventurer? If so…yes, surely she was B-Rank, or maybe C-Rank at the very least.

What an asset someone like that could be! And perhaps I could secure more wolf meat from her, too. Now, what move to take?

I rubbed my chin thoughtfully. “Tell me more about this girl.”

“She’s thirteen and wears a super cute bear costume.”

Ah, he misspoke. “Once more, but smarter.”

“She’s…about thirteen?”

“You mock me? You’re saying that some…some little kid came over the mountain on her own with a gigantic stack of dead wolves?”

“No?”

“No?”

“I mean, yes…”

A thirteen-year-old brat? What did he take me for? How could a kid like that get over the mountain? How hard was it to fact check intel?

But as time passed, I received still more reports about…bears.

According to my lookout at the adventurers’ guild, there was still tons of wolf meat around. He said he saw them butchering carcasses in the storehouse and carrying the meat out. Even if the bear girl was a fiction, the wolf meat was a fact.

I needed clarity. I needed good intel.

“Have you looked into where this, ah. This ‘bear girl’ is supposed to be?”

“Yes, she’s staying at Deigha’s inn.”

“Oh, the macho idiot.” That meant a little trouble, but it wasn’t like I could let this matter rest. “Then we’ll gather four or five adventurers and launch an assault.”

We’d attack this bear girl in the middle of the night. If she had more wolves on her, they were ours for the taking. If not, I’d hand her off to the bandits and…well, from there it wasn’t really my problem anymore, was it? They could do what they wanted with her.

All very well then, eh? But…none of the adventurers who went to the inn came back.