The conversation between Ajas and Ilse proceeded so calmly that it struck Rei as almost strange, given what he knew.
Ilse was undoubtedly suppressing the vengeance burning inside her while speaking with her parents' killer, but as the conversation went on, she seemed to be developing what could only be called a method for controlling her desire for revenge.
Of course, controlling it did not mean it disappeared.
But she was growing skilled at keeping it from showing in her expression, attitude, and mannerisms.
"Hmm. So your rank is still low, Ilse? Then watching Rei work probably won't be much use to you."
"That's true. But precisely because my rank and skill are still low, I was told it would be worthwhile to observe how Rei-san—someone at the very pinnacle among adventurers—handles his requests while I still can..."
"Hm? Do you have acquaintances in the Guild's upper management, Ilse?"
Ajas kept the question casual, but internally, he raised his guard a notch.
Since Ilse was still a low-ranking adventurer, she was exactly the kind of woman Ajas wanted to abduct—if the opportunity presented itself.
Her connection to Rei was a troublesome complication, but from where Ajas stood, it looked as though Rei had simply been saddled with a low-rank adventurer.
Naturally, if he tried to snatch Ilse right in front of Rei, Rei would step in to stop him.
But Ajas believed that if he took Ilse somewhere out of Rei's sight, Rei wouldn't bother searching for her... or so he had assumed.
If Ilse had contacts in the Guild, however, that changed everything. If she vanished, the Guild might actually mobilize.
(I'd better drop this idea.)
Ajas made that call without hesitation.
Ilse was undeniably beautiful. Naturally, she would be popular among men.
But weighing the risk against the reward, Ajas decided it wasn't worth it.
If Rei had been her only connection, he might still have tried something.
The speed and caution of his decisions in matters like this was likely the reason his crimes had never come to light.
Once he abandoned the idea of taking her, Ajas's enthusiasm for the conversation with Ilse gradually faded.
Whether it was a woman's intuition or an avenger's instinct that picked up on the shift—
Whatever the reason, Ilse understood that Ajas's interest in her was rapidly vanishing.
And that—the act of Ajas, her target, losing interest in her—was something she apparently could not forgive.
The vengeance she had been suppressing until now began to surface.
"By the way, Ajas-san. My parents were actually peddlers."
"Hm? Where did that come from? Huh, peddlers, huh. It's not that unusual for a family to be in that line of work. So, are they helping with the Gilm expansion too?"
"...No. They were killed five years ago while traveling for peddling."
"Ah... bandits, then."
It wasn't particularly unusual for peddlers to be attacked by bandits.
The payoff from targeting them wasn't especially high, but peddlers didn't travel in large groups like merchant caravans, making them naturally inferior in terms of combat power.
A bandit group of several dozen would see little point in attacking such small targets, but for a small bandit group, peddlers offered plenty of reward.
Ajas suggested that she must have been attacked by such a bandit group, but Ilse shook her head.
Rei, who had been watching the exchange, hesitated over whether to stop Ilse.
But she was doing this fully aware of who she was speaking to, and more importantly, for Rei to intervene here would be blatantly unnatural.
Doing so would implicitly suggest some hidden relationship between them.
If he did that, Ajas would undoubtedly grow suspicious of Ilse.
What action he might take after that, Rei couldn't say—but if intervening would only arouse suspicion, he judged it better to let Ilse do as she pleased. He held back.
"No, it wasn't bandits."
"Hm? Not bandits? But attacking peddlers..."
"Right. I'd say bandits are the most common. But... if someone could keep the fact that they're a bandit hidden... wouldn't that be incredibly convenient? And if that person's identity was that of an adventurer, all the more so."
Residents of villages, towns, and cities generally never left the place where they lived.
Adventurers were different. Traveling to other locations for work was perfectly normal.
If such an adventurer was secretly a bandit, that would be a tremendous advantage for the bandit—and a serious detriment to adventurers everywhere.
Being able to access bandit subjugation requests was one thing, but if someone could travel alongside a target under the guise of an escort—like Ilse's parents—they wouldn't even need to hunt for prey.
Naturally, failing to protect the person they were escorting would lower their Guild evaluation.
But as a bandit with knowledge of the underworld's information networks, raising that evaluation back up wouldn't be difficult.
Furthermore, Ajas had carried out his activities while coordinating smoothly with three companions, so his crimes had never been exposed. ...Until now, that is.
He must have recognized what Ilse was describing. Ajas's expression stiffened, if only for an instant.
Even so—perhaps judging that his true identity hadn't actually been revealed—he opened his mouth to steer the conversation away.
"Bandits, huh... Come to think of it, there aren't any bandits near this Treant Forest. Well, it's near Gilm, so that's to be expected."
Not forcibly cutting the conversation short in this situation was a smart move.
If he had abruptly shut it down, it would have been tantamount to asking them to suspect him.
...Of course, Ilse had recognized Ajas as her target from the very beginning.
She nodded at the deflected topic, then spoke again.
"That's right. There don't seem to be any bandits in this area. But... there do seem to be bandits wearing the skin of adventurers."
"What are you getting at? It's sounded like you've been calling me a bandit this whole time."
At this point, he must have judged that clumsy evasiveness would only work against him.
Ajas fixed an openly displeased expression on his face as he confronted Ilse.
Fortunately for him, none of the other adventurers who had accepted the same request were present.
And... unfortunately, Rei was.
An alias-holding, high-rank adventurer.
A stroke of misfortune that wiped out his good luck entirely.
If Rei hadn't been there, he could have eliminated Ilse on the spot.
After that, he could have acted nonchalantly alongside the other adventurers, declined tomorrow's work, and slipped away to lay low... That option would have been available to him.
But with Rei present, it was out of the question.
(Just how much do they suspect me...? If I could figure that out, it'd be fine. But since I can't, am I the one Ilse is talking about...? Hm? Ilse? Bandit? Peddlers...)
The realization finally crossed his mind—the image of a family from his past.
No wonder Ilse had seemed somehow familiar. She had been among the peddlers he had attacked.
Ilse had been young enough to still be called a girl at the time, so the realization came late, but there was no mistaking it—the woman standing before him now bore the traces of that girl.
How many people had he killed over the years? Even Ajas himself couldn't say for certain. But with this much evidence laid out before him, he couldn't help but recognize who she was.
Faced with that realization, maintaining his composure became difficult.
He understood. The person before him was someone whose family he had killed.
And understanding that, he couldn't fail to understand why she was here.
No—not just Ilse. The fact that Rei was here too meant they had been targeting him from the start.
"No, I don't think you're a bandit, Ajas-san. It's just small talk. ...Or is there something that comes to mind?"
Her words were soft, but Ilse's gaze no longer bothered to hide the killing intent in her eyes.
Her attitude made it clear: she was the survivor of the family he had slaughtered.
If it had been only Ilse before him, Ajas could have killed her and fled on the spot.
But with Rei at his side, that was impossible.
(What do I do? What should I do?)
It was obvious he had been completely marked.
For now, he had to get out of this situation by any means and flee Gilm as fast as possible.
(Damn it. Is the one investigating me connected to this?)
He had to bluff his way through this.
Ajas was calculating his escape—when, as if perfectly timed, Set's cry rang out from the sky... and seconds later, angry shouts from the other adventurers reached them.
"Goblins! Goblins have entered the forest!"
"Tch!? I'm coming!"
Released from the combined gazes of Rei and Ilse, Ajas seized the opening without hesitation, shouted, and took off.
Seeing his retreating back, Ilse instinctively reached for the sheath of her short dagger... but stopped herself immediately.
Attacking Ajas here and now, with no evidence whatsoever, would only get her captured and put on trial.
...Yes. Without evidence, no matter how much she had been hunting Ajas as her enemy, there was nothing she could do right now.
"So. The question is what Ajas does next."
The voice that calmed her came from behind—Rei's.
He had been ready to intervene if Ajas tried anything—specifically, if he had attacked Ilse—but it turned out there was no need.
"Most likely... he'll flee Gilm. He probably thought he could handle it if it were just me, but with Rei-san here, that man is out of options."
Ilse took a slow, deep breath, fighting to keep her excitement and anger from surfacing as she murmured.
Whatever Ilse's current state, Rei agreed with her assessment.
He couldn't see any scenario where Ajas fought him head-on and won even slightly.
If that was the case, Ajas's options were limited.
He could hire someone capable of fighting Rei on equal footing. He could try to frame Rei as a criminal and let the Guards or the Knight Order handle him. Or, as Ilse had said, he could flee Gilm before Rei got his hands on him.
(The surest option would be framing me as a criminal.)
Rei knew his own personality well enough.
He showed no mercy to those who made enemies of him, whether nobles or great merchants, so he certainly had more than a few people holding grudges.
If someone could gather those people effectively, they might have been able to frame Rei as a criminal.
But Ajas no longer had time. Given that, framing Rei was impossible.
(That leaves hiring a guard or running... but I doubt he could hire someone capable of fighting me on equal footing on such short notice.)
In truth, Gilm wasn't entirely devoid of people who could fight at a level approaching Rei's.
But whether such a person could be hired immediately—again, the answer was no.
Moreover, hiring someone like that would require an enormous reward.
Whether Ajas could produce that kind of money... Rei's read was no.
(Then again, maybe he can? If he started five years ago... no, if he attacked Ilse's family five years ago, he might have been doing the same thing even before then. If so, it wouldn't be strange for him to have amassed a considerable sum.)
He filed that possibility away... but in the end, what he concluded Ajas would most likely do was—
"Run."
"Yes. But I don't think Ajas came to Gilm simply to work legitimately. If so, it wouldn't be strange for him to have been plotting something..."
"That's something we need to investigate as quickly as possible."
Rei murmured those words, but it was clear that the actual investigation wouldn't be handled by him. It would go through Marina to Daskar, and through Daskar to Egg.