∗ ∗ ∗
“So you wanna go see the mayor of the frontier town. I get it,” said Merikur. They were back in their two-person room at the Midrogue inn. She was of course speaking to Kuzan, who was reporting back with what he’d learned at the tavern.
“Yes. But there’s just one problem: the site of the town hasn’t been made public yet.”
Afterward, he had asked around for the frontier town’s location, but nobody knew the precise spot. All they knew was its general direction. This in itself wasn’t that unusual. After all, the town was going to be built where there was currently nothing. Most people wouldn’t know the location of the town at such an early stage. But even when he’d asked the adventurer’s guild directly, they hadn’t answered. That was abnormal.
According to the employee he’d spoken with, there weren’t exact coordinates yet. If too many people crowded in under the current conditions, they wouldn’t be able to handle them all. It was necessary to limit travel to only authorized personnel, and therefore the precise location couldn’t be made public at this juncture.
They’d also informed him that merchants and tradesmen, including peddlers, carpenters, and blacksmiths would be told the location whenever their services were required. The town certainly seemed to have a location in mind, so this didn’t quite add up.
What concerned Kuzan the most was that he would have to go to the town in order to verify whether this Noah was really the one he knew. But without the town’s coordinates...
“Oof, that is a pickle,” Merikur said. “I heard about that frontier town too. I think they called it the old village of Asyl, or something like that.”
“Wait, you discovered the town’s name? Then if we do some research—”
“No, it was abandoned a pretty long time ago. It’s not on any maps.”
“Did you have to let down my hopes that fast? That’s a dead end, then... But I have to find some way to pinpoint the location,” Kuzan grumbled with disappointment, before realizing something. “That reminds me, Merikur. Since you heard about that, I take it you found work with the blacksmith’s guild?” He figured they wouldn’t share information like this to outsiders.
Merikur grinned and nodded. “You bet. Apparently the blacksmith guild’s leader has known my dad since way back when. That’s how I got in.”
“Wow, small world. But you look a little displeased. Why’s that?” He asked because although Merikur had a grin on her face, she seemed a little dissatisfied, or possibly self-critical.
Merikur responded sourly. “It feels like I got the job through my dad’s connections, not because of my own talent. It just doesn’t sit right.”
Oh, so it’s a matter of her pride as a craftsman. But...
“Does it really matter?”
“Huh?”
“If that’s all, then you just have to prove your talent to them now that you have the job. Sure, some might claim that you just got the position through nepotism, but if you do good work, they won’t have a leg to stand on.”
“B-But...”
“I went through the same stuff. You’ll be fine.”
When Kuzan had been in the order of knights, he’d dealt with similar criticism. The worst of it had been before he became a squire, back when he was a page.
The Duke’s order of knights was renowned. It wasn’t easy to join, even as only a lowly page. But since Kuzan’s father was the vice-captain of knights, he had seemingly gained the position effortlessly. Kuzan did recall that he’d enlisted without much trouble. He hadn’t even taken an entry exam.
Although the circumstances of his enlistment were exceptional, his father, the vice-captain, had regularly assigned him extremely rigorous training. If one counted that, suddenly it didn’t seem so easy. In fact, when he did eventually take a look at the entrance exam, he’d wondered why it was so lenient.
Nevertheless, Kuzan had been harangued for a while because he got in through preferential treatment. This was inevitable since he’d gotten in without taking an exam, but it was bad enough that he’d wished he had taken it. He was confident he could’ve passed with flying colors. Although, he’d later heard that his father and the other knights were of the opinion that giving an exam to someone who was sure to pass would have just been a waste of time. Besides, if these accusations were enough to break his spirit, then it wouldn’t have mattered if he took an entry exam anyway. This was harsh in multiple senses, but thinking back on it now, they’d been correct, so he couldn’t complain.
In reality, the people who had harassed him were the ones who gradually couldn’t keep up with the strict training and quit. The last ones remaining were those who hadn’t given him grief, and those who’d stubbornly insisted upon vilifying Kuzan and faced him head-on. In the end, he’d ended up forming a very positive relationship with them as fellow cohort members, so looking back on it now, that was probably just the way things were. The same thing could happen in Merikur’s case.
Surprised by Kuzan’s remark, Merikur made up her mind. “You’re really something, y’know that? Anyway, gotcha. I’ll try giving the job a whirl for now. But first...”
“You wanna know where Asyl is, right?”
“I suppose. Why do you ask?”
“I was just thinking I could try to pull a few strings on my end. If everything comes down to who you know anyway, I might as well take advantage of it at a time like this.”