The day after my first meeting with the protagonist's party, I take a mission with Julian in the morning and thinking of going to take another mission after that one ends.
It's the afternoon so I don't have to look after the kid. I just brought him to meet some other kids in the city so he can start to play with them while I will be busy.
And in the afternoon, Cornelia was there. She's helping the guild because of a punishment. But for her, this is not really a punishment at all.
"We can sort the documents by the date and urgency. Those that are really important will be stored somewhere else and sorted according to the dates for easy access. Those that are less important will still be stored but will be separated," Cornelia says.
The guild staffs that are not busy are moving according to her command. But seriously, no one ever thought of that?
This world is really crazy if everyone believes that talents are everything. Just because you don't have any talent in sorting items doesn't mean you don't need to do it.
"The guild will miss her a lot once the punishment is over," I say to Sabine.
"True. Most of the staffs here are for interacting with adventurers and not for miscellaneous jobs after all. Many of us don't even know how to write a report properly. I guess it's good that she got punished. Now we know what kind of staff we need," Sabine says.
Cornelia then sees us talking and she stops working to approach us.
"Miro, you're here to take a mission? Where's Julian?" Cornelia asks.
"I saw kids his age playing around so I brought him there. Whether he can play with them or will end up getting bullied is up to him," I say.
"Don't bring him somewhere he will be bullied! By the way, there's a news announcement in class this morning. It seems that in a week time there's a competition between classes to see who is the strongest among each grade. It's already nearing that event," Cornelia says.
"Oh, thanks for telling me. I'll come and watch hoping that there will be good people I can recruit for our clan."
Competition to find who is the strongest among the students in each grade. This is a boring event in the future but in the earlier part of the story it's quite interesting.
It's boring in the future because by the time the protagonist is in the third or final year of the academy, there won't be any change in the ranking. The top still in the top. And the others didn't even bother trying to get to the top.
But in the first or sometimes second year, there are always ambitious students who want to be the strongest. So the protagonist was always challenged in the first two years.
It's just that in the last two years, everyone believed that it's stupid to challenge Roland. Though unless Cornelia wants to, she can try to reach the top rank for her grade.
Talent-wise, Roland is better than her. But I'm giving her guidance that no academy in this world can give. If she puts a lot of effort, defeating Roland shouldn't be difficult for her.
But there's one thing I have to do. Now that it's close to that event, the powerful monster roaming in the nearby forest should have appeared. I need to hunt it down to increase my fame so it will be easy for me to create a clan in the future.
Then the door to the guild opens and Roland enters the building with his party members. They don't want to meet me it seems. And once we make eye contact, Pearl is saying something to Roland.
I know what she's whispering. Because I was in a good mood before but not anymore. She must be telling Roland that I was good before but now I'm not after I see them.
Right. It's their fault. I don't like them at all.
"Haa… let's finish my business here right away. Sabine, pick me any mission of any rank for monster subjugation in the forest," I say.
"Hmm? There are other adventurers already hunting monsters in the forest. But no one likes taking goblin subjugation so you can take it. Are you sure though? It seems like you're overqualified for this mission," Sabine says.
"It doesn't matter. Now that I know where in the story we're currently in, I know something that will happen and want to get it done quickly. If the future hasn't changed too much, there should be a Wolf King nearby. A monster wolf that is strong and can summon other wolves with a howl. I want to kill it and bring the spoil here to increase my fame," I say.
"Oh, I see. Then, here you go. You will take the goblin subjugation mission. Good luck," Sabine says.
As for Cornelia, once Roland and the others entered the building, she returned to her punishment of sorting documents. I think she will be done in just a few days instead of a week according to the agreement.
Without caring about Roland and his party, I leave the guild and walk to the forest. Still no apology. How arrogant are they? Do they still believe that they're not in the wrong?
It doesn't matter. My problem is more important.
Leaving the city, I look around for where wolves are found while also defeating goblins leisurely for the mission. But I couldn't find the Wolf King no matter where I look.
It's a rare encounter even in the game. But this is real life so the Wolf King should exist even without this timing. I guess finding it is really hard.
I return back to the city with just the loot from the goblins. I shook my head in front of Sabine telling her that I couldn't find the one I was looking for before returning back to the inn.
…And my room is being occupied by teenage girls. It's not just Cornelia. Her friends are there as well.
"What the fuck?"
Three teenage girls are playing with Julian in my room. They're Cornelia and her friends. And because of that, they're in the game and I know them. Though this is the first time I see their appearance.
"Hello. You must be Miroslav. Cornelia's benefactor. You're a great man," one of them says.
"We're here to play with Cornelia and her brother. Sorry if we're bothering you," the other one says.
Cornelia is just smiling shyly. I guess she didn't expect this. But she gets along with her friends so this should be quite predictable.
They're all commoners just like Cornelia but because of their talents they are assigned into the same class. Melly and Anne.
In the game, the distance between Cornelia and these two grew distant because Cornelia focused on improving herself after she realized her brother was sold as a slave. But this timeline is totally different as they're still close. Though are they close enough to enter someone's place like this?
"They didn't say anything to me before. They just saw me picking up Julian and entered this inn," Cornelia whispers to me.
Do I need to go to another place? I don't want to bother with that. I prefer to stay here until I found my own place. I guess I should buy a building quickly.
"We were shocked when Nelly didn't return to the dorm last night. We saw her this morning but class started already. Then we learned what happened yesterday and asked Nelly to tell us everything so we decided to pay a visit. Though we couldn't just approach her brother because we didn't want him to cry when we approach him so we waited until Nelly appears. Then, here we are!" the girl called Melly says with her arms wide open as if it's some kind of achievement. So this is her personality before Cornelia ignored them.
She's calling Cornelia as Nelly. I guess that's her nickname.
"Okay, but this is still a man's room. Not your friend's room. You shouldn't just enter a man's room randomly," I say.
"A man who doesn't mind wasting his money to buy the freedom of our friend's brother. I think we can trust such man," Anne says.
I guess Cornelia did tell them something about me. It's nice to be trusted but I don't like how they can be so carefree in front of a stranger they just meet today.
"Can you imagine the commotion that happened this morning? The academy announced that Roland and his friends got punished for something. I believed that Pearl has amazing talent and she's good at judging people. But this morning alone, many people started wondering whether they should trust on their talent or not. Cornelia told us we should trust the skills and the efforts we put because of our talent not our talent itself. She didn't use to say something like that so we asked her about this and it turned out that you're teaching her many things. You're so wise despite being the same age as us," Melly says.
Oh, potential clan members. If they listened to such advice from Cornelia, teaching them might worth something.
"Thank you. But it's true that talent is not everything. It's getting dark. You should return to the dorm," I say.
"Okay. Cornelia, you don't have to return to the dorm again. You have a brother so you should stay with him. Julian, we'll play again next time," Anne says.
And so the two leave my room. Leaving Cornelia to stay here.
"…Before they come unannounced again, I should really buy a house," I say.
"…Thank you and I'm sorry," Cornelia says.
"Don't worry about it. They seem like good girls. If they're interested in joining our clan in the future, that would be great. You can stay here now. I'll ask the owner if there's a free room for me to stay from now on."
I guess I don't have to sleep with Julian again. And Julian seems happy to be able to stay with Cornelia longer. He has started to trust Cornelia more. That's good.