Ch 52 -- Arrival at Carerina
In the distance the road seemed to come to an end.
"That's the city of Carerina," the members of 'Phoenix' explained to me. The walls were imposing and it seemed like a fine city. It was good to have arrived anyway. I'm supposed to get a reward for capturing the bandits and I can't wait until we deliver them to the Knights in the city.
I didn't get any fried food yesterday evening, it was all eaten by the merchants and the members of 'Phoenix'. Everybody stared at me when I was cooking, and the members of 'Phoenix' have an incredible appetite, probably because they're all gigantic brutes. Cooking for them used up all my meat reserves, there's none left, not a scrap.
And, of course, there's a certain character called Fer who will complain if there's no meat to eat...
Once we get to Carerina I'll hurry to the Adventurer's Guild and get the monsters in my Item Box dismantled quickly.
Oh, Sui asked me for some sweet things, saying "I want to eat some cake-" so I secretly bought some cake from the Net Super just for her. Of course Fer found out and said "If Sui's getting some I want some too" so I had to buy some more cake for Fer. You can't deceive his sense of smell.
* * * * *
"Welcome to Carerina," said Lambert-san as he drove his carriage in through the gate.
The city was quite big as I had guessed from the outside. Lambert-san boasted it was the fifth-largest city in the Kingdom of Leonhart. Lambert-san's family had been merchants in Carerina for generations and he was proud of his home city where he had been born and raised.
It took me two hours to enter the city but I was assisted by Lambert-san who was well-known to the guards as an important merchant in Carerina. He explained to the soldiers at the gate that Fer was a contracted beast which helped a lot.
"Shall we go to the Knights guardroom?" asked Lambert-san. The testimony of Lambert-san and the members of 'Phoenix' about the bandit gang's attack would be needed when we handed our captives over so it was decided we'd go to the Knights guardroom near the gate first.
We handed over the bandit gang to the Knights and spent an hour or so telling them what had happened. A man in his early 40s wearing full plate armour, introduced to us as the head of the Knights, spoke to us afterwards.
"I've heard your stories and it's clear what happened. The bandit gang was called 'Black Dog' and they've been causing a lot of trouble recently around here. Their dead leader was named Zahar and he was a wanted man with a bounty of 30 gold coins on his head even before he became the gang's chief. Along with the reward for the rest of the gang, that makes 45 gold coins." He passed a hempen bag full of gold coins over to me.
This is a world where a man's life, even a bandit's, can be exchanged for money. The bandits were suffering the consequences of their own actions but it still felt a bit dirty to profit from their capture.
After this Lambert-san went off back to his shop. The members of 'Phoenix' headed off to the Adventurers Guild to report the conclusion of their commission and I decided to go with them. I needed to obtain some meat as soon as possible.
"Well then Lambert-san, I'll visit your shop later."
"Yes, I'll be waiting for you." he said politely.
Lambert-san's store sells leather goods such as bags, wallets, belts and knife sheaths, and I was interested in maybe buying something there. You see, the bag I carried Sui around in was getting shabbier and dirtier and falling apart at the seams. It was free to begin with, of course but it was second-hand goods so I was thinking of buying a strong new leather bag for her. I could have a look anyways but Sui would have to give her approval, of course.