Kirk Wright, vice president of the guild in Halian, always started his day early. He had been working for the guild for many years and was involved in a great many things. Although he couldn’t inspect every little matter, he had gained an understanding of how to respond to most things.
With the sky still clear, Kirk looked through paperwork, prioritizing which he would get through first for the day. “As expected, there aren’t enough adventurers,” he said to himself.
What he saw was the drastic decrease in request completion due to the lack of adventurers. Many low to mid-level adventurers had been injured or killed over the course of yesterday’s incident. Their absence created a gap in monstrosity extermination and subsequently a reduction in materials earned from said tasks.
Monstrosity materials were an essential resource. Halian’s development owed itself to the great number of transportation stones and the access they gave to various resources.
“We’ll need to deal with this as soon as possible.”
First, the guild would support adventurers by offering them discounts for consumables at affiliate stores. Slowing down adventurers would be bad for the guild’s economy. They could afford to take some minor losses as long as the adventurers could do their jobs.
Next was the issue of reclassifying dangerous areas. Adventurers slowly fulfilling requests was bad, but losing more of them was worse. With fewer of them out in the field, scholars would have to be called in so they could discuss the current danger levels of the zones.
Last that needed handling was adventurer recruitment. The guild would have to make up for the lost adventurers somehow. Registration fees could be temporarily wavered, and they could rent equipment for new adventurers to get them started. Simply increasing numbers wasn’t the best strategy, but there was no other option. These new adventurers could also be enrolled into established clans who could show them the ropes.
“Looks like I’ll have to talk to Bates Lagait and Glow Garatt again… They’ll probably complain.”
The Wadatsumi were famous for supporting young adventurers. The two middle-aged, top members of the Wadatsumi clan had also known Kirk for a long time.
It happened over twenty years ago.
The executives of the Halian guild were corrupt and exploited rookie adventurers as they pleased. Senior adventurers would lure recruits with honeyed words and drown them in debt, forcing them to become bait for dangerous missions and treating them little better than slaves. The guild, which was supposed to supervise them, had already been bought out and turned a blind eye to what was happening. Many young lives were lost.
Bates and Glow, then rookies, talked Kirk into taking part in their investigation. Disappointed by how corrupt his superiors were, Kirk did whatever he could to gather evidence against them. They picked their allies carefully—powerful people with upstanding morals. Finally, after five years, they unveiled the crimes of the guild to the public.
It changed Halian instantly. After confiscating the ill-gotten gains of the perpetrators, the funds were used to develop the city. The random deaths that befell adventurers ceased. Kirk worked hard to reform the broken guild until he stood as its vice president.
“Fifteen years… I’m getting old.”
It didn’t feel like much time had passed, though. His hair started turning gray, Bates shaved his head at some point, and Glow’s face began to be decorated with wrinkles.
There were no adventurers left that remembered what happened. They were all either dead or retired. But people who knew about that time hailed the three as the heroes of Halian. Although they were embarrassed to be called that in public, the three couldn’t help but feel proud of what they had done.
Kirk opened his eyes as he lost himself in those memories. What he found was not the warm glow of nostalgia but a pair of brilliant, sharp eyes.
“You better not have broken something,” he said.
“Don’t know what you’re talking about.”
When he snapped out of his reverie, he was greeted by a giant man standing before him in his office. The nearly two-meter-tall man stared Kirk right in the face.
No one was supposed to be here. Not this early.
Maintaining his composure to keep from screaming, Kirk placed his chin on his folded hands. “You’re supposed to knock, you know,” he chided. He could only hope that the man wouldn’t poke him for being somewhat rattled.
“Well? Did you just come here to scare an old man, or did you actually find something?” Kirk demanded, sounding sterner than he usually did.
“Sorry. I didn’t mean to scare you. I just thought you were asleep since you had your eyes closed.”
“Whatever. How did you even get in here?”
The first floor was filled with staff who were getting the guild ready for business. Kirk doubted Zig was able to pass through without them noticing. Besides, the front door wasn’t even open yet.
“I climbed the wall.”
“I’m pretty sure I locked my windows.”
Kirk looked at his window. There were no signs of breaking and entering.
Zig smiled, seemingly satisfied that Kirk had asked. “Not your windows. But the room in the back where you keep your cleaning supplies was unlocked.”
The room was musty and dusty and needed a lot of airing out, which meant that the window was unlatched usually. Zig had entered there and sneaked into Kirk’s office.
“I’ll let the custodian know. So, are you telling me there’s been a development?” That was the only explanation as to why Zig would visit him at such an ungodly hour.
However, things were progressing quickly. Too quickly.
Locked in a state of disbelief, Kirk prepared himself for Zig’s report. Zig nodded and filled him in on what happened the night before.