Chapter 40 – Information Gathering
After lying still in bed for a while because of the fatigue of the long journey, I came downstairs to have dinner before falling asleep.
Like most inns, this place also serves as both a restaurant and a lodging business, and as we passed by, looking at the food on the table, the chef seemed to have a pretty good skill.
As soon as we sat down, a female waitress who had been busy walking around the store came to us with a menu.
“What would you like to eat?”
I glanced over at the menu she held out and ordered without much hesitation.
“A hamburger and a beer and a bunch of sausages too.”
“Your order has been received.”
Due to the influence of the Vulkan Mountains, Hamburg’s weather is close to the polar regions, so beer, which warms the body moderately, was treated as a drink.
It seems to have been a settled culture because of the dwarves who frequented this place, but thanks to that, there were many people enjoying beer and sausage together no matter where they went in the city.
However, eating only that can make your stomach less full, so you order a hamburger in addition.
Hamburger is one of Hamburg’s famous dishes, and it doesn’t look or taste much different from the hamburger I ate in my previous life. However, there are a few differences in that the patty uses lamb and the size of the bread is enormous.
Maybe it’s because it’s cold, so it needs a lot of calories.
I sipped my first beer and looked around.
Due to the nature of the inn, it is unavoidable that there are more foreign guests than locals.
The inn’s guests were very diverse, including aristocrats and wealthy merchants who had visited the nearby hot springs, high-ranking adventurers, and mercenaries.
If I had gone to a cheaper place, I would have bumped into the local janitors, but most of the customers seemed polite, probably because this is a place with a level of its own.
“Uh ha ha! Bring a drink here! A drink!”
… Of course, there are exceptions everywhere.
I looked at the mercenaries making a fuss while being drunk and took out a magic tool from my bosom.
It was an artifact named ‘Thief’s Ear’, and the effect was very simple.
Wearing this, you could overhear conversations at any table you wanted, regardless of surrounding noise.
I was going to hide in the margrave’s mansion late at night, but I wanted to know a little bit about the human world before that.
After entering the land of demons, I had no chance to hear news from inside the kingdom.
I put an artifact that looked like a wireless earphone into my ear and looked around to see which table to eavesdrop on.
Then, the first ones I picked were merchants whose faces were dripping with oil.
As merchants were the most sensitive to rumors, he might have valuable information.
I put my hand over my ear and focused on their conversation.
“Recently, the atmosphere has been turbulent, so shouldn’t we stop moving from Hamburg now?”
“You’re stupid, don’t you know that a crisis is an opportunity? No matter how strong the demons are, the superiors will not give up on Hamburg. The moment you give up here, the only thing that really becomes dangerous is the capital.”
“It’s true, but I feel very uncomfortable. The recent trend of the demons is unusual. I can’t even hear the performance of the hero’s party.”
“Winter is coming soon, so don’t worry. At least until spring comes, the demons will stay still, so don’t be too excited and move carefully.”
The subject of the conversation between the two merchants was probably the recent fall of the Hamburg fortress.
I don’t know anything else, but since a fortress that has never been breached for nearly 100 years has been occupied by the enemy, it must be a sense of uneasiness.
One was thinking of escaping, and the other was thinking of making money using this.
It was quite an interesting conversation, but contrary to my expectations, the information was not useful to me, so I decided to move the eavesdropper to another table.
‘I wonder if the aristocrat would be better this time.’
“Father, there are two days until the party hosted by Baron Se Si-bong, so how about enjoying a hot spring bath in the meantime?”
「It’s not bad. Did you know of any good places?」
“The sulfur springs recently discovered near an iron ore mine are said to be so good. They hear rumors from far away and come to visit on purpose.”
“Then let’s go there tomorrow. I need to sweat a bit for the first time in a while.”
This was an ordinary father-son conversation.
For an aristocratic family, it was nice to see that they were overflowing with family love, but again, this was not useful information.
Next, I turned my attention to the adventurers and somehow stopped at the mercenaries who caught my eye.
They were the guys who were making a lot of noise earlier and buying glare from the people around them.
Contrary to how they looked, the mercenary corps, which consisted of about 5 people, were talking loudly while laughing and chatting, probably because they had a lot of money.
“Captain, did you hear that? The owner of the Emerald Tower in the capital.”
“That famous eccentric old woman?”
“According to rumors, it seems that this time he has ascended to the 7th tier. I heard that the capital was in an uproar?”
“Where did you hear about that?”
“It’s me, I picked it up because there’s someone I know here. Anyway, because of that, the Emerald Tower is now crowded with people every day. It seems that all the wizards on the continent flocked to the capital to take a look at the hepta spell.”
When I heard the story, I jumped up without realizing it.
Then, he approached the goatee-bearded mercenary who had been chatting with the captain a while ago.
“Could you listen closely to what I just said?”
Then, the bear-like mercenary who seemed to be the captain stood up from his seat.
“Ahh? What are you? What are you doing, how dare you eavesdrop on our conversation?”
I tried to use violence reflexively, but I held back.
It was because it was obvious that if you made a useless fuss, the guards would come.
I forced a smile and spoke to the mercenary in front of me.
“What do you want? If you give me a detailed answer to the question I just asked, I’ll give you a corresponding reward.”
Then, the mercenary who looked like a bear laughed and laughed.
Haha! This is so absurd! To hear such a thing out of the blue from a guy I’m seeing for the first time, even our Black Bear Mercenary Corps seemed terribly belittled!”
Then merchants and adventurers nearby heard the name and started whispering.
“The black bear mercenary group is a medium-sized mercenary group that is made up of only B-rank or higher adventurers!”
“It is said that he received a huge amount of gold coins for his achievements on the front line in the recent war between the families!”
“That guy looks like a veteran, isn’t it wrong?”
It seems that they are quite famous than I thought.
Well, if you’re a goofball, you wouldn’t have thought of staying at an inn that costs 10 silver per night.
A ferocious, bear-like man, called the captain by the mercenaries, looked down at me and said.
“If you apologize now, I’ll let you go. But if you ignore my words, you’ll get sick.”
“Would you like to hear the story somehow?”
Then, the mercenary called the captain stroked his bandit-like beard as if he had heard an interesting story.
“There are two ways. Deal with me with this.”
What he held in his right hand was a large battle ax that could knock down a beautiful tree in one shot.
“Or beat me with this.”
Saying that, I took out from his bosom with the other hand something I was familiar with.
“There is no need to see blood, so I will choose the latter.”
Haha! The liver has come out of the boat!”
The mercenary captain smiled broadly and told his men.
“Hey! Get ready!”
Then the mercenary captain’s subordinates began to move and lay the board.
“Common people get out of here!”
“Tonight, this inn turns into a battlefield!”
As the scale of the incident gradually increased, the number of onlookers naturally increased.
The staff at the inn moved alcohol and food with a calm expression, probably because this happens.
Either that or not, the mercenary commander who sat across from me across the long table boasted with a forceful look on his face.
“I’m sorry, but I am a man who has never lost to anyone in the name of fighting.”
When I heard that, I shrugged his shoulders.
“Then I’m sorry. Today, the first defeat will be engraved on that undefeated legend.”
“…Jackanapes.”
The mercenary captain growling menacingly at me.
However, I was able to maintain a poker face because it was nothing compared to the demon lords I had dealt with so far.
The Goatbeard from earlier, who claimed to be the referee, came out and looked at the mercenary commander in turn, then explained the rules of the match.
“The match will be played in a best-of-three format. The condition that the loser obeys the winner’s demands. Do you both agree?”
I nodded.
“To agree.”
It was the same with the mercenary commander.
“I agree.”
Then the brinebeard declared in a solemn voice.
“Here the duel is concluded.”
Eventually, we shouted in unison, holding each other’s souls and pride in our hands.
“”Duel!””
