On the evening of the day Rei and Ilse established a cooperative relationship with Prairie Wolves and his men, Ajas waited in his room for his two companions to return.
The sun outside had already begun to set, and the workday was drawing to a close.
With nothing to do, Ajas found himself increasingly prey to anxiety. What would he do if Rei stormed the inn before Lebejev and Haston got back?
Under normal circumstances, taking such an action would only bring criticism down on Rei. The circumstantial evidence all but confirmed that Ajas was the enemy of Ilse's family, but there was no definitive physical proof. Rei had dropped everything and rushed back to Gilm the moment he heard about it, but even that could be explained away by claiming he was feeling unwell. Naturally, pulling a stunt like that would hurt his standing with the Guild—but with Ilse in the picture, Ajas never expected to keep working as an adventurer anyway.
That held true whether he relocated to another village, town, or city... or even another country. The Guilds maintained contact with one another, and through that communication, they could issue a wanted poster and place a bounty on his head. Given how many dangerous bridges Ajas had crossed, he was well aware of how these things worked.
"Tch. Being an adventurer was such a sweet deal," he muttered irritably from his bed.
And it truly had been—though not in the way an honest adventurer would mean. For Ajas, who operated essentially as a bandit, the profession had been an invaluable source of information.
Whenever he learned that a subjugation request for bandits had been posted, he would leak the details to those same bandits for a fee. Or he would report their hideout location to the Guild and earn high contribution points from the subjugation request. The risk of arousing the Guild's suspicion meant he couldn't do it too often, but he had also taken escort jobs for peddlers, claimed they were attacked by bandits or monsters, and then killed his own escort targets himself. On top of that, when a merchant convoy put out a call for escorts, he would pass along information about which adventurers were participating and how many there were to his bandit contacts.
The title of adventurer had brought all manner of perks—not just to Ajas, but to Lebejev and Haston as well. Giving it up felt like a waste, even now.
But reluctance alone wasn't reason enough to cling to it. His current situation made that painfully clear.
"Seriously, I'd love to hit a tavern right about now, but I guess that's not..."
An option.
Ajas never finished the sentence. The door swung open without warning, and Lebejev and Haston stood in the doorway.
The sudden entry without so much as a knock sent Ajas's hand reflexively reaching for the longsword nearby. But the moment he recognized his two companions, he let out a breath of relief.
That said, the brazenness of walking in without knocking still irritated him, and he opened his mouth to complain.
"You two, just barging in like—what's wrong?"
Ajas had been ready to chew them out, but the grim expressions on both their faces stopped him cold. A bad feeling hit him out of nowhere.
Had Lebejev and Haston also had their identities exposed to other adventurers—not just him? The thought that it could happen on the very same day seemed almost too much to believe.
Could it have been Ilse? Was she pressing me because she'd timed it to coincide with something involving those two?
The thought flashed through his mind, but fortunately—or perhaps unfortunately—Haston spoke up and dispelled it.
"Ajas, this inn is being watched."
"What!? Wait, you already said someone was looking into me before, right? Isn't it just the same people snooping around again?"
Ajas was caught off guard by Haston's bluntness, but he recalled that someone had been probing into him previously and said as much. Even so, considering what had happened today, he suspected the likelihood of that was slim. On the very day he'd been identified as Ilse's family's enemy, the inn was being watched. Given that no one had staked out the place when he first noticed he was being investigated, it would be unreasonable to call this a coincidence.
"No... the one watching wasn't giving off that scent."
"If Haston says so, that's definitive," Ajas muttered, his face twisted with exasperation.
Haston had a powerful fixation on scents—particularly those of women—but his nose could detect danger far beyond the bounds of his personal interests. Since danger itself didn't actually carry a smell, the ability bordered on a kind of Special Ability, and it had saved Ajas and his group more times than they could count. There was no questioning Haston's word here.
"Exactly how dangerous are we talking?"
"...The worst. At this rate, something catastrophic is waiting for us," Haston replied after a brief pause.
Ajas's expression hardened. In all their years of committing crimes together, he had never once heard words like that come from Haston's mouth.
The reason Ajas's group had managed to evade definitive proof despite arousing suspicion from adventurers, the Guild, the Guards, and even Knights was partly because they always operated with caution—but within that, Haston's danger-sniffing ability had been an enormous asset.
"What's the plan?" Lebejev asked, not doubting Haston's assessment for a second.
Their group had never officially designated a leader, but Ajas was usually the one who called the shots.
"We've got no choice but to bail. What about the trade—where does it stand?"
"I won't know the specifics until I contact them, but given the situation, there's no way they've got the full number of women we asked for ready."
"...Figured." Ajas scratched his head at Lebejev's words.
He had only just pressed them to expedite the trade while already under suspicion. Hardly any time had passed since then; even if they demanded the trade happen tonight, there was no way the other side could be prepared.
"Our one saving grace is that they understand we're in a dangerous spot. At least they won't try to jack up the price."
"Well, if they played hardball and we got caught here, it'd put them in danger too. So it's in their best interest to play straight."
In truth, if the other side tried to inflate the price, Ajas and his group would have no choice but to pay whatever they asked. The funds allocated by their superiors for this operation were substantial—and for good reason. The women Ajas was delivering were that valuable to the higher-ups. To put it crudely, they were a resource. And since they were being used for such illicit purposes, gathering them openly was out of the question. That was precisely why Ajas and various others had been ordered to procure women through their own channels.
With that kind of backing, even an extortionate demand from the organization wouldn't be unpayable. However, since whatever money remained after the job would become part of their own compensation, Ajas and his men wanted to spend as little as possible.
Of course, that had been the calculation before everything went sideways. Now that they were in this situation, stinginess was no longer an option. Being cheap here meant being cheap with their lives on the line.
Ajas and his group were ruthless, but they weren't stupid. If money could settle the trade, the smart move was to finish it and get out of Gilm.
"Then I'll make contact with the organization. The trade happens tonight. And the moment it's done, we leave Gilm—no detours. That work for you?" Lebejev's tone sought confirmation rather than input, and both Ajas and Haston nodded without hesitation.
"Then I'll get food and water from the inn's dining hall. Three days' worth should be enough for now, right?"
"...Yeah. But buy as much as you can manage. The shops outside are still open, so if a staff member goes out to buy, the kitchen should be able to work something out."
It was evening, which meant the dining hall would be packed with diners. Buying food from them would naturally cut into the ingredients meant for the evening's meals. But the sun hadn't fully set yet—shops would still be selling ingredients if someone went now.
Ordering three days' worth of meals for three people wouldn't strain the kitchen's supplies. But when Ajas and his group fled, they would need to load the women they'd gathered in Gilm onto carriages—and that meant feeding the women as well. There was no point in buying them from the organization only to let them starve, and their superiors had been explicit: deliver them in good health.
Though if they're just skin and bones, nobody's going to want to touch them anyway.
Between what the higher-ups would say on arrival and the basic need to keep the product presentable, cutting rations wasn't an option. The Slave Collars ensured the women wouldn't try to escape or make a scene, so there was no need to weaken them through starvation—a small mercy.
At any rate, meals for several dozen people over three days would require the bulk of the dining hall's ingredients. That negotiation would fall to Haston.
I could go myself, but I'd better not show my face right now.
The dining hall drew crowds. There was a real chance someone there would recognize him—or worse, someone might have come looking for him. Strictly speaking, Ajas hadn't been caught committing any crime yet. He was a criminal, to be sure, but nothing had been brought to light—yet. Given that, keeping a low profile was the wiser course.
"Understood. Then I'm heading out," Lebejev said. Haston followed, leaving the room to handle his own task.
Alone now, Ajas turned his thoughts to what came next.
Demanding the trade on such short notice meant the number of women on hand would fall short of the original plan—a painful loss, but unavoidable given the circumstances.
"Still, if everything goes smoothly, we can be out of Gilm by the end of today. Which means we'll just have to make up the shortfall in some other town or village."
The original plan had been to gather the remaining women in Abuelo or Sablusta, but Ajas no longer had the time or freedom to operate there. Doing so would almost certainly lead to discovery by Rei, Ilse, or whoever was now watching the inn.
The fact that it's not Rei or Ilse watching... is that lucky or unlucky for me?
Rei's absence meant that even if they made a move, no one would come down on them immediately. That was good. But the presence of an unknown new force meant the number of parties hunting them had grown. A double-edged sword—that was Ajas's honest assessment.
But there was nothing he could do about it now. All he could do was pray his plan would be in time. That meant Lebejev pulling together the food, and Haston smoothing things over with the organization. The more dangerous task by far was not procuring supplies but negotiating with the underworld organization. Even so, Ajas trusted both of them. They would get their jobs done.
"Damn it. Of all days for this to happen. If someone was going to find me out, they could've at least waited until after I'd finished what I came here to do."
Cursing his rotten luck, Ajas could only pray that he would somehow make it out of Gilm in one piece.