The place was filled with a peculiar air. The smell of leather goods and metal tools stood out the most, with undertones of medicinal plants. It wasn’t really a bad smell, though. That was important, since plenty of clients were sure to come through here—the adventurer’s guild.
“Woof, woof woof woof, woof (Milord, is it all right for monsters like us to be here?)” the kobold soldier Mataza asked. Beside him, Liber nodded her head up and down, seconding the question. The kobolds behind them also gave me similar looks.
Honestly, since we’d come as a pretty big family, I wondered if we’d be causing trouble. But according to Greg, we were visiting at a relatively quiet hour for the adventurer’s guild, so we should’ve been fine. I could see a few adventurers around, but that was it. I would’ve preferred to just come alone as a representative for the whole group, but since we were getting status cards issued as proof of identity, everybody needed to be present so the magic tool could register each individual’s data.
Primal mana existed in all living creatures. There was a magic tool that scanned this and accessed the Divine Intellect, and...honestly, I don’t really know the rest of how it works. Anyway, everyone has primal mana, but not everyone can use magic. Though people incapable of using magic are said to not have any mana, they obviously possess primal mana. They simply don’t have enough surplus mana to cast magic.
Well, enough of that. I answered Mataza while putting up a weak voice barrier so that nobody could overhear us. <Barrier> skills varied, but this was one that I’d borrowed from Aht and trained. It was currently at level 3, and I could use it moderately well. I’d been told that since it was a handy skill, I should prioritize learning it. I’d used it lots of times while fighting monsters and had gotten better at it over time.
“It should be fine. You saw on the way here how lots of beastmen live here. They have different vocal cords, so a lot of species have trouble enunciating normal folk speech. And you all just look like small dog beastmen at a glance. Mataza and Liber look closer to midsize, but that’s about it.”
That was a simple fact. Though because of it, Astralism had a propensity to ostracize demihumans. To them, anyone who couldn’t speak the language the gods had given us wasn’t on the same level as humans. But beastmen of this description were capable of speech—they just used a language that was better suited to their vocal cords. Besides, humans couldn’t speak every kind of beastmen speech either. I’d lately become able to speak some kobold language, but the speech of frog beastmen would just be impossible. There were other species which could hear and also produce extremely high-pitched sounds. Humans couldn’t even hear their speech, obviously.
What I’m trying to say is, every species had its own capabilities, but Astralism didn’t get that. Well, complaining about it wouldn’t get me anywhere. I’d just never be able to understand them.
In any case, nobody would find it strange for the kobolds to only speak in woofs. That wouldn’t cause any problems.
“Woof. Woof woof woof. (If you say so. But Milord, the human over there is looking this way,” Mataza told me.
I turned around. “You’re right, he is staring at us...”
Behind us, someone had his eyes fixated in our direction. He was sitting down at one of the many tables the guild had set up as meeting spaces for adventurer parties.
What puzzled me was that he didn’t have any weapons or armor on him at all. He was muscular and definitely looked the part of an adventurer, but since he didn’t have any gear...was he a client? Maybe he was waiting for his request to get accepted. I wasn’t sure why he was staring at us. Maybe he thought we were an eyesore. I just didn’t know.
As I was deep in thought, the man suddenly stood up and approached us.
“W-Woof! (Master, he’s coming this way!)” Liber scurried behind me in surprise. The other kobolds, led by Mataza, followed suit. Cath alone climbed up on my shoulders and gave a low, threatening hiss. For her to act this way, he had to be tough.
As far as I could tell, he certainly looked strong. But I didn’t feel the need to put up my guard, because I wasn’t really sensing hostility from him. I still had no clue what he wanted from me, but that became clear when he stood imposingly in front of me and opened his mouth.
“You’re Noah, right?”
“Huh? Yes, that’s correct. Who are you? How do you know my name?”
“Uh-huh, now I’m curious about your background too. You sure don’t talk like a commoner.”
That gave me some idea of who I was talking to. “Are you Mr. Fresco?”
“Yeah, good guess. I’m Fresco Main, the leader of this adventurer’s guild.”
“I thought as much. If you’re the guild leader, what are you doing here?”
The spot where he’d been sitting was usually reserved for adventurers to idle around drinking alcohol or eating a light meal. It didn’t seem like the place for a higher-up like him to hang around. Of course, this space was probably used for serious meetings too, but it still felt like a mismatch.
Fresco answered me with a laugh. “Well, Mr. Greg told me about you. Said you’d be coming around this time today, so I was waiting. You probably already know that adventurers are usually a rough bunch. No telling when some inexplicable fight will break out. ‘Course, most everybody’s out at this hour, so I figured we should be good. But I’m the person responsible for this place, y’know?”
I was a little surprised by how polite and courteous he was being. Just as he’d said, adventurers had a reputation for being a rough bunch. Everything they did was messy and imprecise. It was different for those who were more competent or higher-ranking, but otherwise, you generally couldn’t expect them to care about the fine details. The adventurer’s guild was an organization that managed these kinds of people, so it was slapdash about a lot of things. The guild leader himself coming to greet a random guest with a completely unknown background like myself was basically unheard of.
To be fair, I may have been a special case, since I had an introduction from House Trahn.
“Well, I appreciate your kindness. To be frank, I didn’t expect to receive any kind of welcome. Um, if I may get straight to the point, we’re here for our identification. Our status cards, I mean.” I thought it would be better to spit it right out and get this business over with quickly.
But Fresco set a hand on my shoulder—the one that Cath wasn’t on. “Come on, man, let’s not stand around and talk here. Come with me to the parlor. The dog beastmen are with you, yeah? Bring ’em along.”
I couldn’t really say no to that. I sensed that it might be a bit of a hassle, but it’d have been hard to decline. So I nodded, and told my group, “You heard him. Let’s go.”
But obviously, I had some reservations about this. I had a funny feeling that we were in for more than just a typical registration.