Okano The Unwanted Undead Adventurer: Volume 10

1. Auflage 2023
ISBN: 978-1-7183-2118-2
Verlag: J-Novel Club
Format: EPUB
Kopierschutz: 0 - No protection

E-Book, Englisch, Band 10, 250 Seiten

Reihe: The Unwanted Undead Adventurer

Tasked with picking up the grand guildmaster of Yaaran and bringing them to Maalt, Rentt and Lorraine travel to Yaaran's capital, Vistelya, only to find the grand guildmaster is out and won't be back for a few days. Now that Rentt and Lorraine have unexpected time on their hands, they decide to take care of their additional errands in the city. They head to the Church of the Eastern Sky to deliver Sister Lillian's letter to Abess Elza, then meet up with Augurey, their colorful acquaintance, to visit the palace for an audience with Princess Jia.

During their meeting, the princess unexpectedly begs Rentt for a favor. Secrets and machinations abound among the Kingdom of Yaaran's royalty, putting themselves and the kingdom at risk. The solution lies with the Land of the Venerable Holy Tree and the high elves that live there, but their help comes with conditions, ones that may involve Rentt and, of all things, his cursed mask!

Autoren/Hrsg.

Okano, Yu

Weitere Mitwirkende

Jaian

Akimoto, Noboru

Seacord, Adam

Leseproben

Chapter 1: The Royal Capital and the Church of the Eastern Sky

“It really does make Maalt look puny by comparison,” I said as I peeked out of our carriage at the scenery of Vistelya, Yaaran’s royal capital. Night was just falling upon the city.

Yaaran was a backwater kingdom, but even so, the capital was larger and more prosperous than the other regional cities. Or maybe it felt particularly glamorous because I was comparing it to a city like Maalt. I mean, sure, Maalt was trying its best despite being on the outskirts. It had its own dungeon now and a fairly large population. All in all, it was a nice place to live, but when compared to the capital...

“That goes without saying,” Lorraine remarked. “But I prefer Maalt over Vistelya. Vistelya is prosperous, but it reminds me too much of the imperial capital.”

“You said before that a lot happened to you there. Still, Yaaran isn’t as stuffy as the empire, right?”

Lorraine once mentioned that when she was in the empire, she’d found the constant politics that came with being an elite member of the scholarly community exhausting. Research and scholarship, in general, were valued much more in the empire, but in Yaaran, you didn’t hear much in the way of glamorous tales of the scholarly class. At most, the Tower and the Academy squabbled now and again. It was plenty stressful for people in the Tower and the Academy, but it wasn’t even comparable to the empire’s scholarly politics.

Lorraine nodded. “True enough. Maalt is a good example of the more relaxed atmosphere in Yaaran. Seems it’s the same in the capital.”

Yaaran’s capital felt like a giant metropolis to me, but to Lorraine, it was still on the quaint side. But if that made it easier on her, then it was probably a good thing. I silently gave thanks to Yaaran for being a backwater country.

“We’ve arrived,” our driver announced. “Please feel free to enter your lodgings. I’ll be staying in a separate location, so contact me when you’re ready to return to Maalt,” he added as we disembarked from the carriage.

It bears mentioning that the driver brought us straight to our inn, but he and the carriage would be staying elsewhere. The place we were at didn’t have space to store a carriage, and because the draft animal was special, it needed to be kept in a specialized holding pen.

All things considered, this was an expensive ride, but Wolf—or rather, Maalt’s guild—was footing the bill, so it was no skin off my back. Given that we’d use the same carriage to return to Maalt, it must have cost the guild quite a bit in additional lodging fees. Wolf had gone out of his way to treat us well.

“Come on, Rentt,” Lorraine prompted, and we entered the inn.

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“Lodgings for two, then. Please, follow me,” the receptionist said.

After the receptionist left, Lorraine murmured, “They didn’t bother to ask and just gave us a single room.”

It was just the two of us now. As for Edel, I’d left him back in Maalt. It wasn’t that I wanted to exclude him, but security was a lot tighter in Vistelya. Since we were going to the palace itself, I thought it might be a problem if an actual monster like Edel was with us. I could’ve claimed I was a monster tamer, but Vistelya was a proper city, unlike Maalt. There were plenty of actual monster tamers in the capital, and if they’d bothered to take a closer look, I might have slipped up.

If I’d known I’d be in Vistelya, I would’ve asked my father in Hathara more about monster taming, but I could always do that next time. Besides, he had some weird monsters in his menagerie, and I wasn’t really sure if his knowledge would make me seem like a normal tamer. So, all things considered, I was pretty sure I’d made the right decision in leaving Edel at home.

“We must have looked like siblings or a married couple,” I replied.

Lorraine laughed. “Married couple, perhaps, but siblings? We don’t look anything alike.”

“Fair.”

Back when I was alive, our faces didn’t look similar at all, but the differences were even more pronounced now that I wore a skull mask. In fact, I’d be more concerned if an inn worker said we looked alike. Chances were that they thought we were married.

“Were we acting like a married couple?” I asked.

Lorraine paused, then calmly answered, “I don’t think we were, but it’s hard to say. You can’t really tell unless you’re looking at it from the outside.”

“Do you want me to get separate rooms for us?” I offered.

Lorraine furrowed her brow in exasperation. “We live in the same house. Staying in the same room isn’t that much of a change, is it?”

Part of me wanted to ask if she wasn’t worried that I’d try something, but Lorraine was a powerful mage. She only needed a wand to deal with the vast majority of men in this kingdom, including me. I could probably survive a couple of blows now, but I still couldn’t beat her. And as she’d pointed out, we already lived in the same house. I agreed with her that sharing an inn room wasn’t all that different.

“Fair enough. I thought I’d ask anyway. So which bed do you want?”

Thankfully, there were two beds in the room. Lorraine chose the one closer to the window, so I ended up having to stare at the wall when I went to bed.

Anyway, it was time to rest for the day and prepare for tomorrow. First, we had to go to the guild, but... Maybe we should go buy souvenirs first? I figured I would hammer out the details with Lorraine in the morning.

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It’d been a while since I’d visited Vistelya’s guild, but just as I remembered, it couldn’t even compare to Maalt’s guild. The building itself had a more solid construction and was large enough to house the huge number of adventurers who called the capital home. Last time I was here, I wasn’t able to get a good look at the interior, but this time I spotted some elevator doors.

That made sense. The building was five stories tall, and it’d be quite the task to use the stairs every time. It would be one thing if the upper floors were rarely used, but I was pretty sure the guildmaster’s office was on the top floor, which would make a daily commute up five flights of stairs a bit of a chore.

“I’m told the Grand Guildmaster of Yaaran is fairly old,” Lorraine said. “While he was once an adventurer, surely he’s no longer active at this age.”

Lorraine was right. I’d heard that the current grand guildmaster was already in that position when Wolf was recruited into the guild. I’d also heard the story about the grand guildmaster being a former adventurer, but I was sure I’d also heard that was over fifty years ago. Even if he’d retired in his thirties, he’d be over eighty years old at this point. Adventurers were substantially tougher than normal people because of their physiques and mana supply, but still being an active adventurer in your eighties was stretching it.

“But there are exceptions to that rule, like Gharb. So it’s not impossible,” I noted.

I thought about Gharb, the medicine lady and head mage of my hometown. She was getting up there in years, but she was still going strong. If she decided to become an adventurer now, they’d start her off at Silver-class, in which case, she’d instantly surpass me. Well, she was my mentor, so that was okay.

“Now that you mention it, I guess that’s true,” Lorraine said. “My mentor is similar. I’m sure they’re enjoying themselves in the empire.”

“The person you threw your wand at?”

Lorraine furrowed her brow. “I was young back then. I wouldn’t do that now. I couldn’t do that now. I still can’t forget how angry they were...”

“Heh, I’d like to meet them.”

They’d be a great source of fun stories about Lorraine, and it’d be nice to turn the tables on her for once. After all, the people of Hathara had told her all the embarrassing stories about me when we went there.

“Really? I’d like to go see them, but you can’t just walk in and meet them. I’m sure we’ll eventually head to the empire, so we can plan for it when that time comes.”

Surprisingly, Lorraine was more receptive to the idea than I expected. I assumed she wouldn’t want me to meet her teacher, but it seemed Lorraine felt a lot of gratitude toward them. Lorraine had lived in Maalt for a long time, and even though she sometimes returned to the empire, she’d never stayed long. She might not have seen them for ten or so years now, so I could understand why she’d want to go.

“I’ll look forward to that,” I quipped. “Ah, the receptionist is open. I’ll go deal with that.”

“Then I’ll wait over there,” Lorraine said as she pointed at the bar built into the guild hall.

Technically, it was a cafeteria that offered light snacks and all manner of drinks. While not all guild halls had one, they were a common sight in most of them. The menu selection and the portion sizes were a bit too limited for a proper meal, so it was mostly a place to take a short break between jobs or to wait for party members—meaning that Lorraine was using it exactly for its intended purpose.

“All right. I’ll see you in a bit,” I said and headed toward the reception desk.

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