Chapter 10: 10 - Guard Captain

After everything had been taken care of, the Guard Captain turned to her and said, “While I appreciate the help, Lady Adventurer, I must protest your breach of etiquette earlier.”

Vivi blinked at him. His cool gray eyes met hers, and they were less yielding than usual.

“By that I mean your magical assault on my person,” he clarified. “One cannot go around seizing and teleporting city officials. It could easily be misconstrued as an attack. Thankfully, the guardsman accompanying me is a more discerning sort, but had it been another, we might have found ourselves in an…unfortunate situation.”

Internally, Vivi felt herself flush. She had already suspected that she was breaking decorum with how casually she spoke to this man, but he was right: that, especially, had been going too far. Teleporting people without their permission was likely defined as ‘magical assault’ by whatever their legal system was.

“My apologies.” That her voice remained steady pleased her. She wouldn’t have managed it in her old body. “Your words concerned me, so I rushed to ensure the two prisoners were secure.”

“I intuited as much. Nevertheless, I request more discretion in the future.” When Vivi nodded, he did so as well, amiably moving past the bit of awkwardness. “Now, if you please? We have business remaining with Guildmaster Flint.” He extended a gloved hand.

Vivi laid her own atop it, then used the [Farsight] and [Blink] combination to arrive at her desired location—the alleyway to the right of the Guild.

“Tier nine magic, no?” Guard Captain Soren asked with apparent casualness. But even Vivi could tell it was feigned. She chose not to respond.

They walked into the Guild and met with the Guildmaster, who was trying to calm an agitated-looking guardsman. No doubt agitated because his superior had been kidnapped. Vivi internally flushed a second time at the reminder.

Various other adventurers watched them as they walked in, some subtly, and some not so much. Vivi supposed she’d blown her cover to the whole guildhall, teleporting the Guard Captain away. She had really acted rashly.

“No need for concern,” the Guard Captain told his subordinate. “The lady of the hour was simply enthusiastic to ensure our defenses. She’s kindly offered to renew and improve the cell’s enchantments as well, though we’re waiting on a supply requisition.”

The guard eyed Vivi, but bowed toward the Guard Captain, who gave his own nod in response.

“Now, I admit requesting your help was one of the reasons I came seeking you, Lady Adventurer,” the Guard Captain said. “Magical experts are one of the more reliable methods for detaining criminals, and it isn’t every day mithril-ranks need to be locked away on such short notice. To be frank, on-the-spot execution is usually where these cases start and end. Securing mithril-ranks is simply too dangerous for everyone involved. That said, two living members of Morningstar is no small boon. Perhaps we’ll finally find an opening into this organization. Interrogators and proper guards will be here shortly.”

Execution was the default approach? That was brutal, but after considering the situation, she couldn’t call it undeserved. She couldn’t use Earth logic here. Criminals in her world couldn’t teleport out of their cells or use another of a million skills, items, or spells to complicate their detainment. Killing really might be the appropriate first step when it came to dangerous rogue elements.

As for what ‘interrogators’ meant…she didn’t think too hard on it. She had already had one wake-up call that being dropped in a fantasy world didn’t mean frolicking around in fields of flowers. She hoped the so-called good guys wouldn’t resort to torture, but that happened even in her supposedly more humane world.

“In any case,” the Guard Captain said, clapping. “That fulfills one of two goals! Now, the bounty. There was a rather significant one. Forty mithril apiece.”

Vivi felt her eyebrows raise. Not that significant, seeing how an hour of work had made a little over thirty, earlier.

She reminded herself that most people couldn’t teleport around and instantly kill orichalcum-tier monsters. Even if she’d initially thought the Frostmaw Titans were merely ‘upper-middle tier’. She had put together by now that her sense of scale was off. Probably because in context, Vivisari was a figure of myth. Frostmaw Titans had been decent hunting targets in the mid-game for her, which meant beyond end-game for regular people.

She didn’t react to the announcement of the impressive sum, and the Guildmaster seemed mildly amused. He had been the one to hand off the payment for her loot haul earlier, so he knew that eighty mithril, while impressive to most adventurers, even higher tier ones, likely wasn’t much to her.

“I see. You have it now?”

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“It’s being put together. Ready by morn at the latest. You’ll be staying for the first day of the festival, I hope?”

Vivi nodded. But only the first. She had business in Meridian.

“Then the last matter is that of credit,” Guard Captain Soren said. “Such a meritorious act would provide significant advancement toward qualification for rank, but my conversation with the Guildmaster indicates you’re new to the City. Ah, I misspoke. You visited around a century ago?” The sentence which sounded strange to Vivi’s ears didn’t make the man himself pause. More than one long-lived race populated this world, and they weren’t rare. “More relevantly, you haven’t registered with the Guild.”

“I have not.”

“Then I’d like to extend an offer. Feel free to refuse, naturally, but one good turn deserves another. I’ve spoken with the Guildmaster”—the short, strongly-built man nodded when the Guard Captain gestured at him—“and he’s authorized a gold-rank registration. Of course, that your skill far eclipses gold is without question, but even this is unconventional, deserved or not. Consider it a sign of our thanks, to accelerate some of the bureaucratic necessities, should you be interested in fostering a relationship with the Adventurer’s Guild.”

Hm. She didn’t intend on climbing through the ranks of the Adventurer’s Guild—why would she?—but assuming she wanted to keep an alternate identity, a quick jump to gold would be convenient.

And she did want to keep a backup identity. Openly announcing herself as Vivisari Vexaria everywhere she went came with all sorts of troubles. Even when she eventually felt comfortable with the world and no longer wanted to hide who she was explicitly, having a fallback to avoid the scrutiny that came with being a figure of legend would be nice.

“The gesture is appreciated,” she said.

He smiled and nodded. She was struck by how good-natured the Captain of the Guard seemed. Her thoughts went, again, to Lailah. That experience had soured how quickly she would trust.

“Glad to hear, Lady Adventurer. I’ll be taking my leave then. My plate is beyond overfull. The Festival alone is enough to cause a Captain of the Guard a headache to last a month, much less all of this business. Do you need anything else of me?”

She shook her head.

“Then let me offer my thanks once more,” he said, bowing deeply at the waist.

She returned it, somewhat hesitantly, and since he didn’t seem to find that odd, she guessed she’d done the right thing.

He strode out, his guardsman falling in step behind him.

Guildmaster Dougal Flint faced her next. His expression was considering, and he crossed his arms as he mulled over what to say.

“Same goes for me, for the record, but not for the Morningstars. Shoving those two in a dark hole will be good for humanity, don’t get me wrong, but that’s not what I’m grateful for.”

Vivi tilted her head, interested.

“You’ve seen it yourself, I think. That girl, Saffra, she’s one of the good ones. Been watching her since she came in a few months ago, she had that look that said she might need help. Did fine though, never had to step in. Allen too. He’s a good one. The temple will have their own thanks to give for helping one of their own.”

Dougal Flint rubbed his chin as he considered his words, seeming frustrated.

“Look,” he said. “I became Guildmaster for a reason. Most people working as adventurers, not everything’s going perfectly for them. There are easier, more comfortable ways to make a living. I could’a settled down you know, I’m no pushover, most Guildmasters in the cities aren’t. We did our time, made our small fortunes almost dying. No. I became Guildmaster because I wanted to look over the folk who needed lookin’ over. I failed this time. Don’t know how I let those monsters walk around without noticing.”

His expression was deadly serious as he squarely met her eyes.

“You stepped in where I couldn’t. That’s how community ought to work, but it still stings a little, if I’m being pure honest. You ever need something, come ask. I’ll do what I can and then some.”

Vivi wasn’t sure how to meet such sincerity. Especially when she was still blaming herself for how poorly things had gone. She didn’t deserve to be thanked like this. She disappointed herself when her only response was a nod.

The Guildmaster didn’t seem to mind. “Alright, then. Let’s get you registered.”

Twenty minutes later, she had a card identifying herself and a badge marking her as a gold-rank adventurer. She used the name ‘Vivienne’ instead of ‘Vivi’. It seemed smart to separate herself from Vivisari, no matter how trivially.

The metal badge was engraved with a symbol of a staff, marking her as a generalist mage. There were a number of symbols to choose from, though most people requested one of the major five.

Soon enough, Vivi extricated herself from the clutches of the Guildmaster, not that he’d been trying to keep her around.

Finally free, she went through her usual routine: alleyway, [Invisibility], [Fly], [Blink].

Her conversation with the Guildmaster churned inside her head. Particularly the part about Saffra. She’d seen the girl stalking out of the guild earlier and had decided to leave her alone. Saffra probably wanted to go through life and forget the events of today had ever happened.

Vivi would encourage that. But even the Guildmaster had mentioned how the girl seemed to be ‘one of the good ones’. From what Vivi had seen, she was inclined to agree. Saffra had only joined Lailah because Allen had; she had wanted to look out for him. That had been made clear in the accounts of the events the guards had extracted. And despite that pure motive, things had nearly turned out in the worst way for her.

The girl was clearly shaken. She’d plastered on a mask of bluster, trying to come off like she’d moved past it already, but even Vivi had seen through the act.

Then the catgirl had run off at first opportunity to return to her previous quest: that missing pet poster.

She could imagine how that task of hers had manifested. A teary-eyed kid asking for help from the silver-badge adventurer as she was out and about her daily life—the teenage girl more approachable than the others. And Saffra hadn’t been able to deny her.

Maybe that was all fantasy, but it didn’t seem out of place for what she knew of the girl.

Vivi summoned the poster from her inventory and scanned it.

If there was something she could do to make the actual hero of this dreadful debacle feel better, she would do it. She would locate this missing pet and somehow orchestrate events so that Saffra tracked it down and assumed all credit. She deserved a win.

With these grand and mystical powers Vivi had been given, she had a cat to find.