Even though it was labeled as a double room, once they entered, it was clear this was just a single room remodeled to fit two.
The room’s size couldn’t be hidden, and the bed was crammed in there, making it uncomfortably cramped for moving around.
There were two beds, but they weren’t pushed together, instead facing opposite walls, so at least sleeping wouldn’t be too much of a hassle.
On the upside, there was indeed a shower stall, just as Yona wanted.
‘This feels oddly familiar…’
Alex thought while looking around the room.
This sense of déjà vu brought back memories of a time when Rubina was there, and now she wasn’t—so really, it was the same situation with one small difference.
“What are you doing, just standing around without unpacking?”
Yona turned to Alex as she rummaged through her backpack, pulling out clothes to sort into laundry, stuff to keep, things to throw away, and dishes she hadn’t washed yet.
When they were out on an expedition, they couldn’t do this, so if they stayed at an inn, it was usually done all at once. While some people did it themselves, most just gave a couple of coins to the inn’s attendants to handle it, so gathering everything in advance was convenient.
“Oh, right. Yeah, we should do that.”
Prompted by Yona, Alex slowly set down his backpack and began unpacking.
After calling the attendants over and handing them two coins along with the laundry and dishes, they finally finished tidying up.
It wouldn’t be until tomorrow evening that the laundry would come back, so they were stuck staying at this inn until then.
“Oh man, this is so soft and nice.”
After sleeping on a hard ground for days with nothing but a sleeping bag, Alex’s body was screaming in agony, but laying on a mattress stuffed with straw was a relief.
Yona stretched out on the bed.
If he listened closely to the noise outside the window, he could hear people milling about, their voices bubbling with excitement.
Even though the festival was still two days away, it seemed like everyone was already getting into the festive spirit and enjoying themselves.
Lying on the mattress, Yona suddenly shot up.
Alex, sitting awkwardly, was startled by Yona’s sudden movement and looked at her with wide eyes.
“Hey, let’s go eat. I’m hungry.”
“Uh, yeah. Let’s do that.”
Alex forced an awkward smile.
“Come on, let’s hurry up.”
Yona reached out, grabbing Alex’s hand.
Following her lead, Alex stood up, and they casually held hands as they went down the stairs to the first floor, finding a table to sit at.
“Looks like they have an Adventurer’s Guild here too.”
Yona whispered to Alex while looking around.
Before Yona could finish her thought, Alex already noticed the surroundings—there were quite a few adventurers, dressed and talking like adventurers do.
Among them, Yona and Alex looked relatively neat, whereas the others appeared rather shabby with their poorly maintained gear, clearly not high-ranking adventurers.
Alex was pretty tidy, so it was obvious that they were a bunch of adventurers who couldn’t even keep their gear in good shape. They definitely didn’t seem like high-ranking adventurers.
“I really saw it! Up there is Lizardden, right? The pond coming down from there was all blackened!”
“Are you talking about that big pond?”
“Yeah! I saw it for real! You know, the pond the Lizardmen treat like a holy site!”
“Why is it black?”
“I don’t know, you idiot.”
“You probably saw it wrong. Maybe there’s ink stuck in your eyes, and that’s why it looked black?”
At that, the people around erupted in laughter.
The man, who was seriously insisting on his claim, turned red with anger, looking both frustrated and helpless.
“Humans aren’t even allowed in there, so how could you possibly go in? Get real.”
“That’s exactly what I’m saying! It’s a place humans can’t enter, yet I was inside! And the water was black!”
“This guy hasn’t sobered up yet. You just fainted up there and were rescued, and you feel embarrassed so you’re saying this, right? Just drink, will you?”
“I’m losing it! I’m telling you!”
“Then is it inside or outside? Just drink, for crying out loud.”
No one else cared about that statement.
The sacred site of the Lizardmen, Lizardden, led out to a deep pond.
That pond was always filled with lush green water, never overflowing regardless of drought or heavy rain, always maintaining its water level.
No one believed that it had turned black.
But Yona couldn’t just laugh it off.
Neither could Alex.
They had already experienced countless incidents that nobody cared about or believed in.
One of those incidents was that a demon resided in Yona’s left arm.
Thinking that this might be a sign of troublesome things to come, Yona swallowed hard.
*
Adventurers were fundamentally driven by money, and money was prioritized above all else.
For example, even if Vigrind warned about an impending disaster, they wouldn’t realize its seriousness unless it appeared right in front of them. Instead, an adventurer would simply ask, “So how much are you paying?”
“Could the cathedral provide some funding?”
Vigrind sighed, still holding an empty applicant form.
Across from her, Bishop Poby sunk into the sofa with a heavy sigh.
It was clearly an exaggerated sigh meant for Vigrind’s ears.
“It’s not that easy, Saint. As you know, this Evian Diocese is an absurdly small parish. The Kingdom of Lukasia, where the diocese belongs, is always on high alert due to its proximity to the Katus Empire, while the Marean Republic is always sidelined. Asking for funding to hire adventurers from such a small parish is truly challenging.”
“It’s a real challenge to ask for funding to hire adventurers in such a small parish,” he said, sounding insufferably smug.
If Yona had been there, she would have probably snapped back that maybe he should cut back on his meal expenses right off the bat.
Despite it clearly being an excuse, Vigrind couldn’t come up with a counterargument to his words.
Being sheltered her whole life and having hardly stepped outside Evian, Poby’s claims sounded believable to her.
The fog that had appeared in the Catacomb was causing serious damage to the Adventurer’s Guild.
So, the Adventurer’s Guild provided some funding, and thanks to that, a few adventurers managed to step up.
However, all those adventurers were deemed unqualified after Ludvik’s interviews.
Ludvik argued that bringing these people along would only result in more corpse cleanup, and Vigrind didn’t contest his words.
She could merely sigh about the Church’s scandalous refusal to provide funding while claiming that any damage to the equipment in the Catacomb was absolutely intolerable.
‘At this rate, I’ll have no face to meet the Hero…’
At this pace, it seemed that only Ludvik, Vigrind, and the Church’s Priest and Holy Knight Brigade would be entering the Catacomb.
Whatever was inside, it surely would not be ordinary monsters.
While she speculated that it likely wouldn’t be a demon, that was just a guess; nobody really knew what lurked within.
‘The Hero is strong, but he’s not invincible. If I want to be of any help…’
As a Saint, as a companion standing closest to the Hero.
Overwhelmed by the thought that she needed to show at least some useful side of herself, Vigrind couldn’t help but feel resentment toward Poby, who kept making excuses to reject the assistance.
“Oh my, Saint! Here you are! I’ve been looking everywhere for you!”
Without even knocking, Ludvik burst through the door.
Poby shot him a glare filled with annoyance, but it was fleeting, as that expression melted away to be replaced by joy.
“U-uh, the Hero just barged in, um…”
The Priest, who had been told to guard the door, appeared flustered, standing awkwardly in the doorway.
However, upon meeting Poby’s gaze, he quickly straightened up, bowed his head, and turned to close the door behind him.
“I had some news I wanted to share with the Saint first, but this works out well, since the Bishop is here too.”
Ludvik plopped down on the sofa without even asking for the Bishop’s permission.
At the same time, he subtly blocked Vigrind from Poby’s view.
“What news do you have, Hero? With you rushing in like this, it must be good news, right?”
Poby quietly watched as Ludvik crossed his legs, pretending to be cool.
And he also stayed silent as the not-so-dry mud fell off those boots and dirtied the red carpet.
“Well, it’s good news, isn’t it? Apparently, the cathedral that should be giving full support to me, the hero Ludvik, and Saint Vigrind, hasn’t provided a single coin, but Lord Carteyn has lent his knights instead.”
“What— is that really true?”
Poby almost shouted, “What on earth are you talking about?!”
His lack of support for the hero and saint was quite intentional. Of course, he hadn’t been upfront with Lord Carteyn about it, but considering their ongoing discussions, the lord probably didn’t want the hero and saint to succeed either.
Yet, the news that Lord Carteyn had lent knights was like a bolt from the blue.
At the very least, it was clear that Poby alone would be blamed for cutting support to the hero and saint.
“It’s true. If we can’t solve it in Evian, we’ll have no choice but to request support from the Kingdom of Lukasia. If I show up at the border with Katus asking for troops… surely it would create a huge security problem for the Duchy of Kapatia, wouldn’t it?”
“So, you’re saying that’s what you told the lord, and he gave you knights?”
“That’s exactly right.”
Ludvik casually draped his legs over the table, muddying it even more, but Poby didn’t have the luxury to care about that anymore.
“Such a patriotic soul! I simply mentioned that the Purification Knight Corps and the Kingdom of Lukasia might weaken to keep Katus in check, and he immediately lent us knights. Wow, what a patriot!”
“Uh, yeah…”
Poby couldn’t understand Ludvik at all.
To be precise, he didn’t grasp how this foreigner understood the political situation on the Northern Continent.
How could he know that Katus Empire and Duchy of Kapatia were at odds, and that Lukasia and the Purification Knight Corps were on the front lines?
Poby just couldn’t wrap his head around it.
“It’s all thanks to our saint’s advice that it turned out this way. The saint is so brilliant; it feels like she’s reading the entire situation!”
Ludvik shrugged.
Poby’s gaze shifted towards Vigrind, and Vigrind was at a loss for words.
It was she who had given Ludvik a basic explanation of the relationships between the countries on the continent.
But it was only that. Just that degree of explanation.
And yet, finding support based on that knowledge left Vigrind utterly bewildered.
But it was such an awkward position to deny having helped that she kept her mouth tightly shut.
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