Chapter 85: The illusion of choice

"I-I'm sorry... young lady Pride, could you repeat that...?"

Shanks shook his head having a hard time believing his ears.

Cranberry, sitting casually on the not-so-comfortable couch, took a sip from the prepared glass, taking her time before responding.

"My Zombie and I have already cleared most of the no man's ground adjacent to the Pride's territory, and I want the Dandelions to take care of clearing out and selling the monster corpses."

The red-haired girl smirked.

"I'm requesting an important monster corpse retrieval mission. You see, while my Zombie and I wouldn't mind if some monsters like lesser drakes would show up to feast on the griffins' carcasses, it would be a real disaster for the local population."

She said, putting down the empty glass and glancing at the blue undead.

Without any hesitation, Zombie grabbed the jug from the center of the table and refilled the glass.

The two of them seemed so comfortable as if they were owning the place, and not being inside the enclosed space filled with potential hostiles.

And considering what they did just a few minutes before, the probability of a vengeful crowd arriving was uncomfortably high.

Because of that, Shanks couldn't stop shaking and nervously checking the door as if he expected a swarm of furious adventurers to barge in to take revenge for the fallen Brave Swords at any moment now.

...the ridiculously sounding request that was just a repeat of what was in the letter, wasn't helping to ease his nerves either...

But this time, there was no easy way for Shanks to reject the offer.

After all, after witnessing the one-sided massacre, he couldn't just laugh off Cranberrie's words as crazy, overconfident, and completely blown out of proportion.

"You... young lady Pride, did you really killed all of the griffins there...?"

There was no way for the Dandelions to reject Cranberry's request if it was a real one.

Well, there was, but then they wouldn't get the end of it from the guild, and in the worst-case scenario, the Dandelions could be even forced to pay the reparation for the families of the fallen adventurers.

It wouldn't be completely justified, but the Dandelions weren't an indispensable group in the adventurers guild and would make for a fine scapegoat.

"There could be a few stragglers left, or a young chick that had run out of their nest, but nothing that would pose an actual threat."

Cranberry shrugged her shoulders and frowned.

"A-a single griffin is still very dangerous, young lady Pride, during the lull all of the monsters got much stronger than before..."

Shanks bit his lips nervously and was just a step away from biting his fingernails from stress.

"Should I take your doubts as a refusal...?"

Cranberry tilted her head and smiled with an evil glint in her eyes.

The red-haired girl was fully aware of the Dandelions situation, after all, she was the one who set it all up.

She wanted the Dandelions at her beck and call, just as it was before the system changed the world's setting.

Why would she kill some random adventurers otherwise?

The EXP that she and her servant got for all five of the Brave Swords was pathetic, far less than one could get from killing a single griffin.

"Th-that's absolutely not what I meant! Yo-young lady, please, you have to understand that us Dandelions, well, we're not that strong. Truth to be told, we're on the weaker side. Each one of us has only one or two stats exceeding the three hundred points threshold. And..."

Shanks was fidgeting as if he was sitting on a bed of needles.

He started playing with the silver wedding ring on his finger.

"I honestly believe that you would be better off with a stronger group..."

Shanks said and sighed, visibly deflating, as if the thought of what the guild will do with him and his party sucked the life out of him.

But still, he was more inclined to face the possibly unjust, though mostly deserved, consequences of indirectly causing the death of the beloved group of adventurers, than face the danger of getting killed by the empowered monsters.

"Graough...? (Master, he didn't have that ring before, right...?"

Zombie growled suddenly, curiously peeking at Shanks's hands.

It wasn't some insightful hint, he just noticed the shining accessory and got interested like a big blue magpie.

Cranberry glanced at her eternal servant and then at the trembling rat-faced adventurer.

"Could it be... did Uresha finally confessed? Are you two married now?"

Unlike her servant, Cranberry had the wits necessary to connect the dots, and she did have noticed all the not-so-subtle attempts at seduction that Uresha did during their travels before the system messed with everyone's memories.

Although it was still mostly a shot in the dark.

She hadn't considered before that the system would just rewrite the relationships of any of the player characters, but it was entirely possible that the system interfered there just as much as it did with her own story

As far as she knew, Shanks could be married to anyone.

"H-how did you...?!"

The rat-faced man flinched and hurriedly hid his hands behind his back.

"Haa..."

Cranberry breathed out in relief.

It seemed that even the system had some bounds about messing with people's lives.

Though, it was kind of annoying for her to learn that she now had to consider that all that she had learned in the past might be completely off by now.

Especially the relationships between all the main nimble families of the kingdom...

Cranberry started massaging her forehead, already getting a headache thinking about what could have changed.

"If it's about the money, it's just as I wrote in the letter, you get one-sixth of the profits for selling the raw materials from the dead monsters."

Nevertheless, she still was in the middle of the negotiations, so she raised her head and declared.

"Wasn't it one fif... ah!"

Shanks managed to bit his tongue - but not fast enough.

Cranberry was smiling brightly at him for confirming that the letter did indeed arrived and the Dandelions had simply ignored it.

"It would be one-fifth if only you guys responded to my request from the beginning. Think about it as a fee for your own stupidity."

"..."

Shanks didn't know what else to say.

She was right.

What's worse, while the Dandelions' fate was hanging above a cliff, young lady Pride set herself up so that no fault could be found on her side.

She wanted to see the Dandelions, but her reasonably polite request was rejected - rudely at that.

Things that the sword of protection, Avocado, and the vice-master of the whole guild have said to her, could be taken as disrespecting the Pride family that, although in a rough spot at the moment, was still undeniably one of the main noble families of the whole kingdom.

And finally - she warned the Brave Swords.

From the very beginning, she was absolutely clear about the duel being one to the death, and she even made sure that the sword of light, Cherry, would acknowledge the consequences of accepting the duel.

In that situation, even if the Envys were against Prides, there was no way that Cranberry would get punished.

A young woman who wasn't even taken seriously had demonstrated how overconfident the adventurers have become.

"Hey, Shanks, are you listening...?"

Cranberry snapped her fingers to get the rat-faced man's attention.

"Wh-what...? Oh! I'm terribly sorry, I just..."

Shanks flinched and stuttered nervously.

"As I've said, I understand that you are worried about the lives of your companions, even more than your own, considering that one of them is your wife, but working with us will not get any of you in danger."

Cranberry assured him with a confident smile.

"..."

The poor man was cowering and fidgetting unable to answer.

He, of course, had an answer, but it wasn't the one he knew that the girl wanted to hear.

"If it's about safety, we can adjust the request a bit."

"What do you mean, young lady Pride...?

Cranberry's next words met with a mildly positive reaction.

"My Zombie and I will temporarily join your party."

"Graough? (Huh...? We will?)"

"Wha... and how would that help?!"

The girl's word met with a shocked response from both the blue undead and the rat-faced thief.

"Well... think about it. If I, a member of the Pride family, would join a group of adventurers and let them all die, that would seriously affect our honor."

Cranberry explained.

"I... I see. But still..."

Yet Shanks still didn't look fully convinced.

"By that, I mean that one of us will accompany you whenever you will be busy carving up the corpses."

Cranberry explained further.

"How about it? There are at least twenty-something nice and cold griffins just waiting to get turned into raw materials, not to mention the frenzy wolves of various colors... and with the guaranteed protection, it's almost like free money just laying on the ground, ready to be picked up."

She was slowly chipping on Shanks's words with an enticing offer.

"I..."

Shanks said and closed his mouth.

He then took a deep breath and looked between the red-haired girl and the blue undead.

"...since the young lady of the Pride family goes so much out of her way to work with us, the Dandelions humbly accept your conditions..."

Shanks lowered his head deeply and spoke in a low, defeated voice.