ISEKAI EXORCIST - Ch.133 'Chance Encounter' (Patreon)

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133 – Chance Encounter

We rolled through the Great Marketplace at a leisurely pace, all of us, even Ludwig and Renji who had both been living here for a while, looking around at the many shops and temporary stalls. There were a few other carts and carriages on the main thoroughfare, while people went back-and-forth across the road, making progress through the district slow.

            The amount of people here was on a scale I had not seen before in this world, not even in Helmstatter. In many places they were pressed together so tightly that it was impossible to see the ground and the stalls they were perusing.

Scents of hundreds of different origins assaulted my nostrils. There were the smells of perfumes and soaps, the charred-and-sweet allure of grilled meats, the complex aromas of large bags of spices and herbs, as well as the musky stench of thousands of people jostling past one-another while the sun bore down on them from above.

We moved onwards and saw a part of the market that specialised in trinkets, jewellery, and other such finery, but the quality was mixed and Renji warned against buying anything from there, as many used toxic or malleable metals and overcharged for their wares. It was, in a way, not so different from tourist traps that sold cheap plastic wares with no regard for quality.

Next came the stalls with vegetables and fruits, though some had clearly been out in the open for too long, as flies and wasps swarmed around the baskets with half-rotten produce in them. There were quite a lot of different fruits here, with persimmons, papayas, oranges, mangos, pineapples, pears, grapefruits, peaches, plums, apples, grapes, berries, and several others I’d never seen before. Renji pointed out a round fruit that had a blackish-brown shell like an avocado and said it was quite delicious if you could get over the smell. The vegetables were also a wide variety of things like potatoes of a dozen varieties, as well as carrots, cucumbers, peas, beetroots, cabbages, salads, and once again many more that I couldn’t name nor was sure even had existed back on earth.

“Do you think anyone has figured out how to make sesame dressing here?” I asked my friend, while eyeing the cabbage.

“I know a guy,” he said with a grin.

“You lot really care about food, huh?” Ludwig remarked.

“It’s the nourishment of the soul,” Renji replied poetically.

“I miss soup,” Emily suddenly commented.

“I want bone marrow!” exclaimed Elye.

“Bone marrow would be quite delectable,” Armen agreed.

“Are we making a shopping list?” Renji asked with a laugh.

Saoirse poked her head out of the window in the door. “I would like lamb.”

“Fret not, children,” Ludwig said patronisingly, “I know the perfect place to sate your appetites.”

“What are you having?” I asked him.

“Steak, obviously.”

“What kind?”

“Don’t matter so long as it ain’t synthetic,” he replied.

After what felt like two hours, we finally made it through the Great Marketplace and into the Guild district that bordered it. The crowds here were no less dense, though there were many more Otherworlders mixed into the bunch. I had expected to see many with Advanced Roles, but there were quite a lot who seemed only mildly-experienced, based on their attires and attitudes. The lure of better pay had no doubt brought them here, but I was sure that the quests they’d undertake would be several times more difficult than those of similar rank in Arley.

            As we rolled down the road towards the Adventurers’ Guild, we passed by the Bounty Hunters’ and Mercenary Guild’s buildings, the latter of which looked like a small fortress, with the former like a fancy manor. It seemed the Guilds stuck to their established themes no matter where they were. We also passed by a building that was square and utilitarian, with four floors and a walled-off courtyard in the back for training. In front of it were two dozen guards of the city, no doubt the so-called Peacekeepers, as well as two three-man groups of Witch Hunters.

            “That’s the Assassins’ Guild,” Ludwig said. “News have already reached Evergreen about their betrayal, so they are no doubt rounding up all its members.”

            “I still can’t believe they’d join the side of evil,” Renji muttered in disbelief.

            “Their name doesn’t exactly instil a sense of goodness and justice though,” I remarked.

            “The Assassins have often taken the side of Seditionists in the past,” Armen commented. “They face much discrimination for their work, which makes them susceptible to being converted I believe.”

            Ludwig nodded along with his words, while Renji seemed surprised by the revelation.

            We passed other smaller Guild buildings with quite niche purposes, like the Alchemists’, Brawlers’, and Hunters’ Guilds. Renji told me that the Brawlers’ Guild mainly served as a place to practice and learn from more experienced Otherworlders of the same Role, but that they were too small to have branches outside of Evergreen. The Vanguards had their own Guild with the same purpose, but it apparently had branches in Helmstatter and Lundia as well.

            Then we reached the Adventurers’ Guild, which was right next to a large compound that was thronging with Natives, which Ludwig said was the Explorers’ Guild who often competed with the Adventurers for quests and had earnt the favour of the Crown, meaning they got first pick on the easiest ones, like Gathering, Delivery, and Discovery Quests.

            I disembarked the carriage and went into the Adventurers Guild with Emily, Renji, and Elye. Ludwig followed a few paces behind us, while Armen and Saoirse stayed by the carriage.

            “Wow, there’s a lot of people here,” Emily said with a gasp.

            She was right, there were easily two hundred people within the Guild Hall. Many were lining up for the three quest counters, and there was even a queue for new Adventurers, though a good portion of them were Natives, judging by their auras. The whole place was easily twice the size of the Guild in Lundia, with six large Quest Boards and three ‘Looking For Party Members’ boards.

Half the crowd were gathered near the bar and drinking and talking loudly. Some parties were celebrating apparent victories or maybe quests that’d gone well, while others seemed to be making sombre toasts, perhaps to honour their fallen members. There were also a handful of parties that looked to be on the verge of breaking up, as they loudly bickered and pointed fingers at each other.

“It’s quite overwhelming, right?” Renji said to Emily and I’s benefit.

I noticed that Elye was covering her ears, while looking around in apparent glee. Emily had retracted into herself a little.

There were quite a lot of eyes on us as well, and it seemed to be a mix of a few things: the fact that Elye was an Elfin who didn’t hide her ears and horns; Renji being a minor celebrity apparently; Emily’s attire denoting her as a Spellcaster; and my getup screaming Exorcist. And, of course, we were also new faces, which was no doubt enticing to many of the parties searching for replacements or additional members.

“I see some of my friends over there,” Renji said, before excusing himself.

Elye quickly grabbed my right arm, as though to stop me from leaving.

“Yuuta! It is loud!”

“Do you want to wait outside?” I asked her, half-yelling to be heard over the crowds.

“No. I will stay with you!”

“I’ll stay with you as well,” Emily said, though her eyes and aura showed she’d rather have followed Renji.

Elye reached out and grabbed Emily, letting go of me.

“Let’s go look at the boards,” I suggested.

Though I couldn’t hear if they agreed, they both stuck to me as we manoeuvred through the crowd. I briefly had the thought to use a weak invocation of Repel to make it easier for us to move through, but decided against it, since it was probably considered bad manners.

“Did you see where Ludwig went?” I yelled to them.

“He went up the stairs,” Emily replied, yelling to be heard and then immediately blushing when she realised how loud her voice was.

After we managed to make our way to the boards, I quickly located the ones for Initiate and Seeker, though Emily was still a Novitiate. Surprisingly, there were quite a few Exorcism Quests. Even more startling, I had walked up next to a man a few years older than me whose aura marked him as an Exorcist.

“I cannot read these,” Elye complained.

“They are mostly Extermination or Bounty Quests,” Emily told the Elfin. “They sound very dangerous.”

I pulled my eyes off the man next to us. “Maybe Renji can accompany you to help raise your rank. A few of them allow for lower-ranked Adventurers if they are accompanied with someone of Seeker rank or higher.”

I quickly looked through the quests, before I found a Bounty Quest that seemed to suit her capabilities. “What about this one? It’s a flying creature, so your Air Affinity should be a good counter.”

“A Scalebird?” she asked, reading the title.

I pulled it off the board. “Let’s see if Renji won’t accompany you on this, otherwise I can go with you and bring Armen. I’m sure Elye would like to help as well.”

“I like Scalebirds,” she said. “Their nests are round and pretty, and their meat is delicious.”

“It says it has a wingspan of four metres,” Emily remarked, the colour draining from her face.

“Look at it this way,” I told her, while watching the Exorcist next to us out of the corner of my eye. “It won’t be able to fly if you disturb the air around it, and when it’s on the ground, it’ll be easy to kill, right?”

She gritted her teeth, then nodded seriously. “Okay, I’ll try it.”

“I’m going to look at some of the Exorcism Quests,” I told them, “but see if you can’t find Renji.”

“Are you going to be okay alone?” Emily asked.

“Yuuta is never alone, he is an Andasangare!” Elye replied.

I nodded, my eyes going to where Meigetsu orbited nearby. She definitely isn’t wrong there.

As the two of them left the Quest Boards and began searching for Renji in the crowd, I turned towards the Otherworlder next to me.

“Hi, I’m Ryūta. You’re an Exorcist, right?”