Chapter 8
Chapter 8: Cleaning every Nook and Cranny!
The adventurer’s guild,『Qualidia』
Once, it used to be the leading quest dealer in the front-line city of Odel Knights.
But in recent years, the number of quests received by the adventurer's guild has been greatly reduced due to the establishment of a larger guild, directly under the control of the central government. Even still, it is a well-established guild that holds a certain degree of recognition among the adventurers.
“You, hold it right there, this place is still dusty.”
Today, the guild building seemed rather hectic with the four figures sweeping the floor with brooms in their hands.
Nasha, Louise, Suzette and I, were given the task of cleaning the three-story wooden guild building which also served as a lodging facility.
Dahlia-san, the guild leader of Qualidia, furrowed her brow at the sight of us buzzing around.
“Listen here, I’m only letting you guys use the dormitory on the second floor because you said you didn’t have any money. So if you can’t even work properly, you might as well move out right now!”
“Yes, ma’am!!!”
The four replied in unison.
The hero party,『Deared』was always short on money.
While Nasha used all her money to help people, Louise spent hers on food. And Suzette offered everything to God.
Besides, the party income wasn’t much to begin with since their style was to help out around the neighborhood rather than to take on missions at the front-lines and fighting against demons and such.
―― But as Suzette already mentioned at the interview, there’s still a guaranteed minimum wage. And most of all, there was no overtime.
Work started at the sunrise and ended at the sun set.
I have far more free time than I did before. So I'm feeling quite content in here.
… Still, I didn’t quite expect that I’d be joining a hero party to do things like cooking, cleaning and washing though.
Meanwhile, Louise scratched her head, looking at the specks of dust that Dahlia had pointed out to her.
“Even if you say that, I’m not very good at this type of work you know…”
“I guess you’re still the same old muscle head. Just take a look at the place where your newbie, Eric-san, was cleaning. Isn’t that just so wonderfully done?”
As she said so, Dahlia-san pointed at the area that I was working on.
“Not a speck of dust on the floor or in the closet. Not to mention, he even repaired the desk that was a little wobbly before and rearranged the bookshelf as well. I simply can’t find a single fault with him!”
“Uu… Uwooah… Eric, how did you make everything so clean!?”
“I-I was pretty confident with my cleaning skills before but now, mine looks kind of messy…”
“That’s so amazing Eric-san! Now I want to learn your cleaning techniques too!”
Members of Deared were all surprised by my cleaning skills.
Well this was something I had to do every single day at the demon army.
Since there was no time to go back home, the office room at the military had practically turned into my living quarters. Compared to cleaning such a large office space by myself, tidying up a corner of this guild building was a piece of cake.
Dahlia muttered while releasing a sigh.
“I don’t know how you joined this party but you drew yourself a short straw on this one. The new guild across the street came down from the capital. They took in all the adventurers on the area but you still somehow ended up here, in this old, run-down small guild. Well, I guess it’s too late now.”
Dahlia-san was cooking at the back of the kitchen as I went to clean the kitchen as well since there was nothing left for me to do upstairs.
This guild certainly had a very small number of available quests— or rather, there was a distinct lack of subjugation quests in particular.
Back when I was still in the demon army, I had once snuck into an adventurer's guild with Garlock-senpai before.
The guild board was flooded with various demon subjugation quests and emergency recruitment notices for volunteer troops to defeat high tier demons within the demon army every single day.
As it turned out, the sudden influx of aggression from the hero’s side at that time occurred due to the establishment of this new guild.
In the past three years since this guild was dispatched from the capital, skirmishes between the heroes and demons have increased drastically
Causing the delicate balance of the Odel Knights to have tipped to the wrong side of the scale.
Up until then, defending the borders from hero invasions and maintaining order within the demon territory has been the main policy of the demon army but, suddenly some extremist groups began appearing. They prattled about controversial topics such as the complete extermination of heroes and the start of a new rule after uniting all the lands under the demon king’s army.
As a result, discord started to spread among the demon army, which had been established as a single monolithic structure up until then. Rifts began forming and some people even dared to act arbitrarily, ignoring military discipline.
It would cause quite the stir if someone like Gralock-senpai or someone that’s far above the ranks of a Colonel were to become such a disruptive factor. It would still be troublesome even if it was someone at the level of a battalion commander, like me.
It’s been three years since the root of the whole problem, the new adventurer’s guild was created.
And it was also exactly about three years ago, when the amount of overtime work, such as writing reports of late night subjugation's began increasing so dramatically.
How many times have I wished for that entire adventurer’s guild to just disappear from the face of the planet—.
It looks like it wasn’t only the demon army that had to deal with the aftermath of the appearance of this new guild from the capital. They were even putting a lot of pressure on these small guilds on the hero’s side…
“Well, there is still a bright side to all of this.”
Dahlia-san’s musings kept going on.
“Even though you lost the main source of your quest dealership income?”
“That’s right. Before all this happened, the quest priority was always on fighting against the demons and other subjugations requests. But thanks to the new guild hoarding all those mainstream commissions we are now receiving all the low priority requests from residents of Odel Knights and the surrounding areas. So the number of requests to ensure the safety of the residents are appearing more and more lately.”
“I see, well that’s in line with our party’s main policy. So I guess it all worked out well in the end.”
“Yes, you’re right. And that’s why I’m grateful to those girls. The guild doesn’t make much money and business has gotten more difficult, but Odel Knights isn’t just a war zone to these people. Qualidia just wants to live a peaceful life with everyone here.”
With a slightly bitter yet content smile on her face, Dahlia-san watched over them as the three kept on with their cleaning work.
“Well then… Are you guys done cleaning yet? You guys didn't eat much today either, right? Alright, come up now. It’s time to eat!”
“Oba-chaaaaaan~ I love you sooooo much!!! Food food!! Hyahooooooo!!”
“Thank you so much, Director. You already helped us with the accommodation and now the meals too…”
"I love the food that Dahlia-san makes! They’re so, so delicious!"
Dahlia-san put five bowls on the counter with a smile.
White steam rose from those delectable bowls of food atop the counter.
“There, go ahead and have your fill. By the way, we received a new request from the guild just now. I’m sure you guys will be interested in it.”
Dahlia-san brought a piece of paper to Nasha as she placed her bowl on the counter.
Nasha read through it and smiled delightfully.
“Of course, we’ll take this on. Everyone, there were some burly wolves seen in the area next to the Shaltz Forest. Children will be in danger if they reach the village. So let’s go take them down before they do!”
“Fugafu….mmmmh!” (T/N: This is supposed to be eating sfx)
“Hey Louise, please stop trying to talk with your mouth full. That’s unpleasant!”
“... Damn, this is too good. Dahlia-san, can you teach me how to cook this after the mission’s done?”
“Well that’s not a problem. You seem rather quick on the uptake. I’m sure it’ll be worth teaching a thing or two.”
Dahlia-san rolled up her sleeves as she said so.
For the first time in a long time, I filled myself with a warm delicious meal before setting out for a new mission.
Sorry I'm late. Next 2 chapters will be released soon as well. So please look forward to it!
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