Chapter 70
“Nyaaaah! Huh? Sniiiff.”
Just another day in District 15.
Merchants who had opened their shops early called out to customers in loud voices, while dogs pestering their owners for lunch barked at them.
And here, despite the sun being high overhead, a girl remained only half-awake from a hazy sleep.
Just as she scratched her head and was about to lie back down, she noticed the damp pillowcase and deeply furrowed her brow.
She decided there was no way she could sleep on the fabric, soaked with liquids she couldn't distinguish as either sweat or drool.
Adella normally didn't dream much, but today, at least, she felt as though she'd had an extremely long and lingering dream.
She couldn't remember it at all, though.
“Hyaaaaaawn. I wanted to sleep just a little longer...”
She had been caught stealing, chased by guards all night, and only managed to fall asleep once morning finally came.
Her head wasn't refreshed, but she wasn't in the mood to go back to sleep, either.
She reluctantly threw off her pajamas.
“He told me to come back before dinner. Hmph, hm-hmph.”
Mr. Gestalt had called all of Abyss together for the first time in a while.
Even when she asked Alpherion, he said he knew absolutely nothing.
Her cat-beastkin instincts told her without a doubt that the scent of an interesting mission was wafting her way.
‘Should I go buy some perfume for a change?’
She tossed the coin pouch into the air from the table and hummed.
She had a sort of personal jinx: she never washed on the day she was assigned an important mission.
It wasn't as though she could show up smelling bad when meeting people, so she planned to at least bring along some perfume.
No matter how little a cat beastkin cared about what others thought, before all that, she was still a woman.
When she went downstairs, the dining hall was already bustling with mercenaries who had come for lunch.
Though some people cast furtive glances at Adella as she passed through the central hall, no one greeted her.
Since she had no desire whatsoever to befriend sweaty mercenaries, she ignored them right back.
The capital was crowded with people of all kinds of races and species, even in its narrow streets.
Jingle—
Her ears twitched whenever she heard the sound of coins here and there, but now was the time to restrain her kleptomania.
If she stole in broad daylight, she'd really end up having her hands chopped off.
After walking three blocks, the area from there onward was classified as District 7.
It was a neighborhood where wealthier people lived than in District 15, so the shops were livelier too.
Judging from the glass bottles already filling her arms, it was obvious her plan to buy just one bottle of perfume and come back had failed.
‘I'm suddenly craving a drink.’
She figured her tongue had grown accustomed to the cheap taste from drinking nothing but Abyss's low-grade draft beer every day.
At times like this, she had to periodically soothe herself with expensive food and alcohol.
“One tuna baguette sandwich, and, um, could I get a bottle of sparkling wine too?”
“...”
A sandwich and sparkling wine were a truly bizarre combination for lunch, but the shopkeeper handed Adella her order without saying a word.
Then the shopkeeper held out a hand.
“How much?”
“...”
“I said, how much?”
“...”
The shopkeeper continued to stare intently at Adella without a word.
“Jeez, what a pain.”
Adella roughly checked the price tag, paid the amount herself, and left the shop.
She assumed the shopkeeper had grown lax in customer service because new customers never stopped coming, no matter how poor the service was.
It was the first time she'd felt bad even after spending money.
She pulled out the cork on the street and poured the wine straight down her throat.
“Ugh, this is disgustingly sweet.”
She had chosen what looked like the best one in the shop, too.
‘I should've just spent this money on as much draft beer as I could drink.’
Cursing the increasingly heartless state of society, she returned to the inn.
“Susan, one glass and three bottles of beer.”
“Adella? Should I bring them up to your room?”
“No, I'll wait and take them up myself. How long will it take?”
“...”
Susan ignored Adella and walked into the kitchen.
Adella claimed a seat at the corner of a table and irritably bit into the sandwich she'd brought earlier.
“Am I normally that unnoticeable?”
It made her furious that people ignored her questions just as readily here as they had there.
Her lack of presence probably made her good at stealing, but it didn't feel very nice to be ignored.
“Adella, here. Enjoy.”
“Hmph.”
The moment she entered Room 302, she shrugged off her outer clothes and changed back into her pajamas.
She poured beer into a glass chilled solid with cold ice magic.
“Kyaaaaa! That's the stuff.”
The refreshing sensation tickling her throat sent Adella's tail shooting toward the ceiling.
On top of that, the alcohol kept flowing in, making her feel sleepy for no particular reason.
She couldn't guarantee she'd be able to wake up again in the evening if she slept now, but her eyelids gradually grew heavier.
“Won't someone come wake me when it's time...?”
She wanted to enjoy this tipsy feeling a little longer.
With that irresponsible thought, she sank back into sleep.
* * *
[Ow!]
[This is the last time I'm letting you off. Get down there right now and apologize to the branch director for being late!]
[No way! I deliberately didn't go anywhere today so I wouldn't be late, so this is unfair!]
[Hurry.]
In the end, Adella slept in her room until the summons time, and Daniel dragged her out by the hand.
It wasn't that she had literally gone nowhere, but Adella felt wronged because she'd made an effort, in her own way, to keep the appointed time.
“And you, NoName, I won’t be entrusting you with a difficult operation. You’re a novice, after all, and you haven’t been involved with our Abyss for long. You understand?”
It was Branch Director Gestalt's order to the Forest Keeper.
The Forest Keeper from Arseria, who had appeared like a comet just a few days ago.
Adella strongly agreed that they clearly wouldn't assign a difficult mission to a complete novice with no experience.
“Good, you made that decision quickly. Then you can go with Adella tonight. It’s a simple diversionary operation, so it should be easy, right?”
Apparently, Adella had never imagined that she herself would be included among those novices.
‘Ha, figures...’
It was always like this.
The branch director never once entrusted her with the honorable missions everyone else received, apparently finding her completely unreliable.
To think she had to team up with a novice who hadn't even joined a few days ago made Adella's insides burn with anger.
She tried to soothe her seething insides with alcohol, drinking the beer she had left until the branch director arrived.
“Life is so bitterrrrr... Even this shitty beer tastes so sweeeet...”
Adella opened the window and drank straight from the bottle to feel the cold air.
Her gaze turned toward the full moon hanging alone in the empty night sky.
‘It's really bright...’
She entertained the silly thought that, if it was that bright, moonlight might even reach the Empire's darkest back alleys.
Two years ago, after being expelled from the academy and wandering aimlessly, Adella had lost the meaning of life.
Branch Director Gestalt, who had reached out to her then, had always been like a bright lighthouse to her.
‘If only that full moon were actually the golden chandelier in my house...’
Along with that impossible fantasy, she leaned back and collapsed onto the bed.
She wanted to savor this comfort and haziness as much as possible, because she would sober up soon.
At times like this, she resented having a body that didn't get drunk easily.
Bang—!
“Damn, that scared me!”
But her plan was derailed by an unwelcome visitor who barged in without warning.
Adella irritably checked the entrance.
After taking in the elf's sunny blond hair like the midday sun, skin white as jade, and two sharply pointed ears, Adella calmed her startled heart again.
“It’s rude, rude, to throw open the door like that without even knocking.”
The shopkeeper earlier, Susan, and now even an elf...
Adella lamented how too many people these days had no common sense.
“By the way, Forest Keeper, what’s your name, nya?”
“NoName.”
“Oooh. That’s a name that really rolls off the tongue, nya.”
Adella kept repeating the Forest Keeper's name.
It was a nostalgic name, one that felt as though she had heard it somewhere before.
“Why?”
The Forest Keeper expressed confusion.
“What do you mean, nya?”
“My name. Isn’t it strange?”
“Not particularly. It’s actually familiar. Once you’ve lived in the capital long enough, you hear all sorts of shitty names, and Forest Keeper is one of the respectable ones.”
For example, the shopkeeper Adella had visited today had the difficult-to-pronounce name ‘Etteugab Cepen,’ while among the nobility there were people like ‘Emiger Tneicna.’
When the species itself was different, like lizardmen, even stranger names were bound to pop up.
‘Did they get teased about their name as a child?’
Adella guessed to herself.
She downed the last remaining sip.
But the curious Forest Keeper kept pestering Adella.
“Adella.”
“Why?”
“Adella.”
“Why do you keep calling me, nya? You’re making me self-conscious. If you have something to say, just say it!”
Maybe the Forest Keeper was unhappy about being teamed up with her for this mission.
Judging from the Forest Keeper's attitude, that seemed highly likely.
Perhaps the Forest Keeper would even go argue with the branch director, just like the members before them.
“Huh? Eek, why, why...? Did I do something wrong, nya?”
When she opened her eyes, the Forest Keeper was suddenly right in front of her, thrusting their face into hers.
Adella was so startled that she nearly dropped her beer bottle.
The Forest Keeper's bright eyes blinked, while moist lips, like cherries beaded with morning dew, moved softly.
The fragrant scent of grass tickled Adella's nose.
As Adella took in the elf's beautiful appearance up close, she couldn't calm her pounding heart.
“Want me to brush your hair?”
“Whaaaat...?”