The three who entered the office—Mirene, Surnin, and Ekril—noticed the familiar figures sitting on the sofa.
"Rei!? Huh? Why are you here? Vihera too..."
Naturally, the first to cry out in surprise was Mirene.
She had found Unbris, reported it to the Guild, and been summoned to the Guild Master's office, only to find Rei and Vihera already there for some inexplicable reason.
Her surprise was only natural.
"You found an Unbris?"
Rei called out, seemingly unbothered by Mirene's shock.
His voice must have snapped her back to reality. Wearing a smug expression, she opened her mouth.
"Heh, you haven't forgotten our promise, have you? The one where if I found Unbris, you'd let me spend a whole day with Set-chan."
"Ah... yeah. Well, that's fine, but..."
If Set disliked Mirene, that would be one thing, but that simply wasn't the case. If anything, Set was quite attached to her.
Plenty of people had interacted with Set over time, but among them all, Mirene undoubtedly ranked in the upper tier of his favorability.
Not long after Rei and Set first arrived in Gilm, a raid on an Orc settlement had taken place. The moment Mirene saw Set during that incident, she had devoted herself to him single-mindedly ever since.
She petted him, doted on him, and fed him treats. With someone showering that much affection on him, there was no way Set would dislike her.
So if Mirene wanted to spend a whole day with Set, Rei wouldn't refuse—unless there was some special reason, like an urgent request.
In this case, however, that wasn't the issue.
Well, for Mirene, spending a day with Set probably is a matter of grave importance.
When it came to being a Set lover, she had a rival in Yohanna of the Former Mobile Unit. In that sense, Mirene's aim to pull ahead of her rival wasn't bad at all.
Mirene was looking at him with eyes full of expectation. Rei quietly averted his gaze.
Vihera, in his line of sight, quietly averted hers as well, and Marina did the same.
Abandoned by the two of them, Rei struggled for a moment over how to phrase things before speaking.
"Mirene... why do you think we're here?"
"Huh? That's... why?"
"No, there's no way I'd know if you ask me," Surnin replied.
Mirene looked to Surnin, the sharpest member of the party, but naturally, he didn't know why Rei was here either.
The fact that Rei and Guild Master Marina were on close terms wasn't widely known. That was precisely why Surnin couldn't understand why Rei and his group were present.
Even so, considering the current circumstances in Gilm, it wasn't impossible to guess.
"Um, did something happen regarding the Unbris situation?"
"Correct. Though the situation has become a little complicated."
At Marina's words, spoken with a sigh, the gazes of all three members of Scorching Wind turned to her.
Reading the demand for an explanation in their eyes, Marina looked toward Rei and spoke.
"Rei and his group found an Unbris too. And they didn't just find it—they managed to defeat it."
"Eh!?"
Gasps of astonishment slipped from Mirene and her companions. The three of them stared intently at Rei.
Defeating an Unbris was hard to believe, but because it was Rei, they couldn't help but think, maybe?
They knew full well just how extraordinary an existence he was.
"Really?"
The one who asked timidly was, naturally, Mirene. Though the fear in her heart stemmed from the worry that finding Unbris might mean her day with Set would be canceled.
However, Rei mercilessly nodded back at her. Seeing him nod so readily, despair washed over Mirene's face, but...
"Don't worry. It's a fact that you found an Unbris, so I won't call off the bet. Honestly, I'd say you saved me."
"...Eh? That's okay?"
She probably never expected Rei to permit a day with Set so easily. Mirene looked at him with an expression of sheer surprise.
Receiving that gaze, Rei nodded, indicating it was no problem.
In truth, the significance of the intel Mirene's group had brought was immense. Rei and his party thought they had defeated Unbris, yet another one had still been out there.
There was the possibility that Rei had failed to defeat it—or more precisely, he thought he had defeated it, but it had actually survived through some form of mimicry—but another possibility also existed. In other words...
So there isn't just one Unbris, huh?
Rei muttered bitterly to himself, but even so, this was far better than knowing nothing, letting time pass, and then being informed later that Unbris had reappeared.
Vihera and Marina felt the same way, as did Surnin upon hearing that Rei had defeated one.
"Defeated Unbris... meaning, the one we saw was a different individual than the one defeated?"
Marina nodded at Surnin, who asked for confirmation.
"Yes. It's highly likely that the Unbris Rei defeated and the one you found are separate individuals. Given the time you discovered it, probably."
Naturally, Mirene and her party didn't carry a watch. The approximately three hours since they found Unbris was merely based on their subjective sense of time.
Still, as a rising C-Rank party, they wouldn't have an error on the scale of hours—minor discrepancies perhaps, but nothing beyond that.
However, Surnin, a veteran Young Mage, had a sharp sense of time precisely because he was a veteran.
"...How troublesome."
Surnin murmured, and Mirene and Ekril, having grasped the situation, nodded in agreement.
Mirene normally lived by what could only be called the "Set First Principle," but as the party leader of Scorching Wind, she knew when to tighten up.
"Yes. Rei said he felt a lingering sense of wrongness after defeating Unbris, so I knew this wouldn't just end there... but this really is troublesome."
Surnin was, for a brief moment, captivated by Marina's sorrowful eyes despite his age. He quickly gave a small shake of his head, recognizing that this was no time for that.
"So, what will you do? Well, given that Unbris is nothing but a threat to Gilm, I understand that defeating it is really the only option."
Surnin asked Marina.
Given her position as Guild Master, the answer she should give was already decided.
"We have no choice but to defeat it. I know it's complicated."
Unbris's ability to turn demi-human type monsters into Leader Species was extremely troublesome. If such creatures weren't just one but multiple, the danger level increased even further.
As the Guild Master of Gilm, and above all, as someone who lived in Gilm, she absolutely couldn't leave Unbris alone.
"But how are we going to defeat it? Even for Rei to defeat it, it took from when the Guild Master predicted Unbris's existence until today, right?"
Mirene's words carried doubt, but no hint of resignation.
As someone living in Gilm, she absolutely couldn't let Unbris be. This was non-negotiable for her too.
...Though, the largest part of that unwavering conviction stemmed from the fact that, if things stayed as they were, she wouldn't be able to spend her day with Set.
Having just received permission from Rei to spend a day with him, she absolutely couldn't back down—not when that blissful time was at stake.
If Unbris keeps acting up, I won't have any time to spend a relaxing day with Set-chan!
In terms of searching for Unbris, Set, who could fly through the sky, was an extremely important combat asset. Given that, resolving the Unbris situation was absolutely necessary in order for Mirene to spend what would be the best day of her life.
Ultimately, resolving the Unbris situation for Set's sake was very much in character for her.
"As for how to search... well, unfortunately, for now we have no choice but to search using human wave tactics like we have been. If only it had some distinctive scent or magic, we could search for that, but..."
"Isn't there some kind of Magic Item for searching? The Alchemists in Gilm have fairly high-level skills, right?"
"I've already put in the request. However, a Magic Item to search for Unbris from a situation with zero clues isn't something that can be made so easily. If only there were at least some kind of residue... Rei?"
Marina stopped mid-sentence and directed her gaze toward Rei.
That's right—Rei had defeated Unbris once. If so, it wouldn't be strange for something that could be called Unbris's residue to remain.
Many corpses of demi-human type monsters that had been turned into Leader Species by Unbris—like Goblins and Cobolts—had been brought in before. In fact, it wasn't uncommon for dozens to be brought in per day.
This indicated just how active Unbris was, yet nothing that could be called Unbris's residue had been obtained from those corpses.
Well, given more time, they might have been able to find a lead to Unbris. But because time had already passed since Unbris's involvement had ended, they couldn't find anything that could be called pure Unbris residue.
But Rei had directly defeated Unbris's main body. If so, wasn't it possible that unaltered Unbris residue remained?
Under Marina's gaze, Rei tilted his head, not understanding what was being asked of him.
Realizing that Rei hadn't grasped her intent, Marina spoke to confirm.
"Rei, how did you defeat Unbris?"
"How, you say... Unbris was attached to a Werewolf, so I slashed through it along with the body using Death Scythe, and pierced it with the Twilight Spear."
"...Could you take out Death Scythe for a moment?"
"Is the Twilight Spear not good enough?"
"Yes. For now, just Death Scythe will do."
At Marina's request, Rei nodded without any hesitation.
If anyone else had asked to see Death Scythe, he might have hesitated a little. But this was a request from none other than Marina. He had no will to refuse.
Death Scythe, taken out from the Misty Ring, appeared in the office.
The members of Scorching Wind, starting with Mirene, had seen Rei's symbolic weapon many times before. But seeing it brought out again inside the room like this, they were still overwhelmed by its size.
How did his small body move a Death Scythe larger than he was?
Without paying any mind to the Scorching Wind members, Marina stood from her chair and approached Rei, who held Death Scythe.
Staring intently at the massive blade, she spoke.
"Hey, Rei. I'd like to borrow Death Scythe for a bit, would that be alright?"
"...That depends on how long. Even for searching for Unbris, without Death Scythe, my combat power drops drastically."
Having obtained the Twilight Spear, Rei's combat style had shifted to Twin Spear Style. Even so, the core of his combat remained Death Scythe—both as a catalyst for using skills and as a catalyst for magic. Without it, it was safe to say his combat power was halved.
Especially when it came to dealing with Unbris going forward, Death Scythe was essential.
"Let's see... I won't know until I ask an Alchemist, but if things go well, it might only take a few minutes."
"If it attacked Unbris, would the Twilight Spear not work?"
Vihera, who had been listening to the conversation between Rei and Marina, asked.
"I wonder. Considering its capabilities as a Magic Item, the Twilight Spear is a fairly high-level item, but Death Scythe is incomparably greater. If any Unbris residue remains, I'd have to say it would be on Death Scythe."
"How about we make it 'after consulting an Alchemist'? We have things we need to do too, so I can't agree right away."
And so, it was decided that Rei would go meet an Alchemist.