We reached the port town of Reglia on the Gardir border at around noon and finished the job.
After that, we’d rented out an inn we knew and decided to relax. Our quest had been to evacuate beastfolk children from Gardir. At first, we’d planned on carrying out Nestor’s idea of taking them to Kutt, the neighboring kingdom, but after seeing all ten of the kids at Dahlia’s inn, I’d changed the plan on the spot. I couldn’t shake the fear that once we left, some slave trader from Gardir would find them again even though the slavery of beastfolk was prohibited in Kutt.
The children all looked so small and fragile. Saara had been furious when she saw just how much worse their condition was than we’d been told, and she’d insisted we find a safer way to protect them.
That’s why I decided to have them sail from Reglia to Lycia and live at a guild facility there. Since the trip involved a carriage and a ship, I figured even children whose strength had withered away from slavery would be able to last the journey.
Of course, traveling together with the children meant I didn’t have time to earn any income.
I didn’t regret it, though. We’d secured a future for those kids, which was enough for me. Saara was so overwhelmed with emotion when we handed them over to the guild staff at the port that she cried.
I’d been surprised when a Gardir general brought up Setsuna’s name, but I also felt a sense of accomplishment that I’d kept my promise to protect him. If taking that commission to keep him safe had ended up drawing unwanted attention on Setsuna, I never would have forgiven myself.
That aside, I also just wished to see Setsuna mature into a young man without any kind of interference. If that future happened to be within Moonlight, my own team, then I couldn’t ask for anything better.
“Shall we get started, Agito?” Doug called out as he entered the dining hall.
I’d known Doug for a long time. He’d been with me since I first formed the team, and I’d asked him to serve as my sub-leader. When my eldest son Chris reached white rank, Doug had stepped down and said he wanted to make way for the next generation, but he still took part in every major decision. He was someone I could always rely on.
“Not yet. We’re still missing a few people. Let’s wait a little longer.”
Each team was free to decide how it handled making the decisions. In team Moonlight, we did it by holding meetings.
Our meeting rules were simple: all members had to attend, anyone purple or higher had the right to speak, and anyone red or higher could vote. The team leader retained the power to veto any decisions. If I rejected a proposal, it didn’t go through.
“That’s true. Maks and the others aren’t here yet,” Chris said.
Doug scowled as he flopped onto a chair, then muttered something about “those guys.”
I was going to head back to Lycia after this, where the guild’s main headquarters were located, to attend a conference held only for black-rank adventurers.
I had a little time to spare; otherwise, I would have sailed with the beastfolk children. Instead, I’d decided to return by land and pick up a few quests along the way to make up for the earnings we’d missed out on recently.
Today’s meeting was mainly to decide how many commissions we’d take on. The monsters lately seemed stronger than usual, and I wanted to reduce our workload to improve safety.
We hadn’t reached the scheduled meeting time yet, though, so I didn’t start. Doug wasn’t serious with his grumbling; he did that all the time. And I heard Chris laugh as they began chatting.
I decided to use the time productively and read through the letters I’d received from the Adventurers Guild that afternoon. I opened the envelopes and skimmed through their contents one by one. Most were requests from other teams to form an alliance with Moonlight—an arrangement where teams took on commissions together or lent each other members when they were shorthanded.
Because of that, either the teams needed to be evenly matched in strength or had to offer something the other team lacked. That was the bare minimum requirement for an alliance.
Yet none of the letters I was skimming seemed to meet that standard. If anything, it was obvious they just wanted to reap the benefits of working alongside a black-ranked team.
I sighed as I kept reading. None of these letters struck me as promising. Before I knew it, I was down to the last one.
The envelope was written in the handwriting of the Lypaed guildmaster. It was marked as an alliance request from a team called Dawn Wind.
Inside was a short letter introducing the team, written by Drum, and another letter from Dawn Wind itself.
See, this is how it should be done.
When a lesser-ranked team approached a higher one, the proper etiquette was to send the request via the guildmaster. Unfortunately, more and more teams had been ignoring this etiquette lately and sending letters on a whim.
The fact they understood even that much basic courtesy already set them apart from the others.
I broke the seal and began reading, feeling hopeful. As soon as I saw the sender’s name, a wave of nostalgia washed over me, and goosebumps broke out over my skin. I must’ve looked shocked, because Chris spoke up.
“Something the matter?”
The other members were staring at me, too. I just ignored them, though, and read the letter all the way to the end.
“It’s an alliance request.”
“From a black-rank team?”
“Nope. According to this introduction letter, the team was only formed about three days ago.”
Chris looked stunned.
Beet, my third son, chimed in while sipping his drink. His tone sounded entirely unimpressed. “Three days? Well, they’re way out of their league.”
“What’s got ya so shocked, Pops?” Elio, my second son, asked, sounding more curious than critical.
“I bet he’s just as surprised by how brazen they are,” Beet said, sounding bored.
“No. I’m going to accept this alliance request.”
My sons and everyone else in the room froze in disbelief.
“Father?” Chris said.
“Dad?” Beet said.
“Pops?” Elio said.
My three sons all called me something different. I’d raised them all the same, so I never understood why they addressed me so differently.
“Wait, wait, wait. We’ve never allied with anyone, and now all of a sudden you want to? And with a team that’s three days old? You can’t be serious,” Elio said, sounding skeptical.
“You losing it, Dad?” Beet said, just sounding plain rude.
“Is it a big team? Like, are they famous adventurers who formed a team together?” Chris asked, glancing at the letters.
“No. There are only two members.”
“…”
“Seriously, what’s the deal, Pops? This team just started three days ago with two people. How could they not be dead weight?”
“I agree with Beet,” Elio said.
“I can’t see any advantage to allying with them,” Chris said.
I raised a hand in silence and decided to tell them the truth. “The leader of this team reached red rank, level two, in less than a year.”
The room fell completely silent.
“You’re kidding me. That’s the same rank as me!” Elio said.
“Purple, maybe. But red? If I had to guess…,” Beet said, staring at me like he already knew whose name was on the letter. “Setsuna?”
“Yep.”
“That’s the young man you met in Gardir, right? The one who shot up to green in record time?” Elio asked.
“Yeah.”
“He was promoted to purple recently because of all the help he gave the clinic, wasn’t he?” Chris said.
“That’s right.”
“So what did he do this time to reach red?”
“I don’t know, but I have a theory,” I said.
“What is it?”
“I can’t say.” I had a good idea why, but it wasn’t something we should discuss here.
And since the guild headquarters hadn’t contacted me about it, the reason for Setsuna’s promotion was almost certainly confidential. I couldn’t speak lightly about it.
“You’re killing us here, Pops.” Elio gave me an exasperated look, but Doug interrupted to get things back on track.
“Does it matter why he was promoted? The point is, even if he’s red rank it’s hardly appropriate for Moonlight to ally with a team led by someone so new. So why do you want this alliance?”
“Just simple curiosity. Hearing their stories alone would be worth it to me, as if I’d been through an extraordinary experience myself.”
“Nah, that’s too vague. What exactly are you hoping to hear?” Elio asked.
“Well, how he got to Lypaed, for one,” I said. I held up the envelope so Doug could see the guildmaster’s handwriting.
“You mean he didn’t sail there?” Beet asked.
I shook my head.
“No. In the second month of Salkis, Setsuna was in Kutt. I sent him a letter there, and I know he got it, but in the third month, the medicine I requested arrived from Lypaed.”
Everyone fell silent.
“That doesn’t add up. It takes four months to get from Kutt to Lypaed if you hurry. There must be some kind of mistake,” Elio said.
“That’s why it’s so strange. He’s done something impossible.”
Beet gave Elio a look that seemed to say, “How can you not see that?”
“What do you think happened, Father?”
“Well, my guess is that he found the cave that’s said to connect Lypaed and Kutt and traveled through it.”
Elio sucked in a sharp breath.
“No way… That’s impossible! You probably don’t feel it as strongly, Pops, but any sorcerer wouldn’t go anywhere near those monsters with their terrifying amount of mana!” Elio, a Firemaster, insisted. The color drained from his face.
I hardly needed my son to remind me of that. Everyone knew the Baudal mountain range near Kutt and the Toria Plains were steeped in enormous magical power and that colossal monsters had made it their territory.
“Then how do you think he crossed from Kutt to Lypaed?”
“…”
No one had an answer.
I watched Elio fall silent and felt a powerful urge to speak with Setsuna myself. “Honestly, I would’ve preferred Setsuna to join Moonlight, but it can’t be helped if he’s formed his own team.”
I shifted my gaze away from Elio and looked around at everyone.
“So you all know, I intend on forming an alliance with his team, Dawn Wind.”
“Let’s wait until all the members have gathered before we discuss that,” Chris said.
Doug and the others nodded in agreement.
I tucked the letter away, wondering how best to persuade the members of our team who didn’t seem excited about the idea.