11 The Reques

It is morning in Lurep Village.

Rose and Thorn are heading to a branch of Zelu's Blacksmiths to sell Dani Zelu's armor. Besides his armor, he had 230 gold coins with him. Evidently, Rose is happy about this, considering that these spoils of war will speed up her plans by a few weeks of time.

"You'll have enough money after selling that armor?" Thorn asks.

After remembering how many gold coins she has to accumulate, Rose responds somewhat downcast: "I wish it could be that cheap to contract a great ship designer. *Sigh*… We need at least 50 000 gold coins…"

"50 000 gold coins. We've received just 20 gold coins for a day of job… It will take us quite some time to reunite such quantity…" Thorn says calmly, he actually doesn't mind it.

They arrive at a beautiful eight stories high building that has the shape of the torso of an impressive white armor, and they go directly at the eighth floor because, in the eighth floor, there are the best blacksmiths of Lurep Village.

Once there, they choose a random shop and go into it. The shop isn't that big but it is full of B-class zenanium suits, armors, and weapons. In it could be found suitable equipment for any Civilized Race.

The owner of the shop is a dullahan blacksmith who is wearing blacksmith clothes, and his light jet black smoke cloud has the shape of the plus sign. Seeing that some customers have entered his shop, he says with the characteristic dullahan's vibrating voice: "Welcome to Tom Zelu's Shop, are you searching for something in particular?"

"Well, actually we just want to sell this." Thorn says giving a big sack to Tom Zelu.

This doesn't surprise him, there is a lot of occasions where something like this happens. After placing the content of the sack on a table, he inspects carefully the armor that appears before him. A while later he says impressed: "A noteworthy A-class zenanium armor in perfect conditions, this is a rare sight in Lurep Village."

"How much are you willing to pay for it?" Rose asks with a businesslike expression on her face.

"Umm… before that, I need to ask, why there is a blood stain on the armor?" The shop owner asks nonchalantly while pointing at a very small red mark that the armor has.

Without losing her cool, Rose says: "Oh, there is indeed."

Then she puts on a thoughtful expression: "What could it be…? Oh! Perhaps…"

She quickly grabs Thorn's hand and secretly uses her nail to cause him a tiny wound in one of his fingers.

"Just as I thought! You must have hurt yourself by accident when you put the armor in the sack!" Rose exclaims, and then she turns her gaze toward Tom Zelu, and says smiling innocently: "Well, mystery solved!"

Tom Zelu: (To who is this woman trying to deceive!? Really what a shameless scoundrel! Is she looking down on my brain? Is she actually looking down on my brain!? Hehehe… She doesn't need to recur to such means! Because doesn't matter where they have got this armor since I have the Zelu family backing me! So whatever its provenance is, there shouldn't be any issues if I just buy it… Unless that this armor belonged to a Zelu family member, but that is impossible, after all, how could they have the guts to rob and offend the Zelu family, and above all, the guts to sell what they robbed from the Zelu family in the Zelu family's territory! Jajajaja there is not enough courage in the world to do such a thing, not with that pathetic level of cultivation of them!)

After thinking up to this point, he says: "I'll be fair, 500 gold coins. I won't pay more than that."

"Ok, yes, it is fair enough to me." Rose doesn't bargain because she has grasped that her lame excuse has been seen through it with ease.

She takes the money and without looking back, she gets away from the shop with Thorn.

After some time of walking, Thorn can't hold his curiosity back anymore and asks: "Why was he wearing blacksmith clothes? I mean, it is just a shop and not a blacksmith factory."

"Ah, it comes with the job. Usually, the customers have the preference to buy their equipment from someone wearing blacksmith clothes rather than from someone wearing another kind of clothes." Rose responds showing off her knowledge.

Thorn says smiling: "Oh! It makes sense." But then he frowns: "Wait a moment, doesn't that means that he uses devious psychological tricks to sell his goods? Humph! What a shameless scoundrel!"

_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _

Lurep Village's Library

The name of the elderly gargoyle librarian who wears a white librarian uniform, the gargoyle which attended Rose some days ago, is Blan Ton. He is sited at a chair reading a fist-thick book with the demeanor of a sage.

"Hello."

Suddenly, a voice interrupts his concentration. He cast his gaze upward slowly. (Oh, she is that girl from a few days ago. Mmm!? Second Level Initial Awaken!?) Chuckling, he says: "Hehehe… Hello. It seems that you manage to breakthrough, congratulations!"

Of course, that girl is Rose, and Thorn is by her side. She beams proudly: "Well, actually it was very easy. Hahaha…"

"Was… it?" Thorn murmurs indolently.

At that moment, Rose puts on a solemn face: "Anyway, today I am here to buy a copy of The Mountain of Rose, by Lin the Lonely Adventurer."

"Mmm? There was a book by Lin the Lonely Adventurer with that name…? Wait here please, I'll go to look for it." Blan Ton then walks to the stairs that go at the underground of the library.

Within the underground of the library, there are copies of every single book that the library has.

After walking for some time flanked by immense bookshelves, he finally finds the book Rose is searching for. "It truly exists! It seems that I am a big shame as a librarian!" He critics himself, feeling incompetent.

It must be known that Lin the Lonely Adventurer is one of the top three best writers of this era, so his feelings are well-founded.

He grabs the book and immediately after that, his hands start to quiver. This is because the book has a blue mark of a feather on it. That mark means 'there is a request from the author regarding this book'.

"A request from Lin the Lonely Adventurer!" He exclaims, loosing completely his demeanor of a sage.

He then starts to run wildly toward a classified room of the library. With his speed, he reaches that room promptly.

The room is full of neatly arranged big boxes, and a pair of numbers are inscribed on every box, in this way: 348 598 to 489 232.

He looks at the blue mark on the book and sees on the feather a number: "6 238 724!" He then searches for the box he needs right now.

Soon, he finds the box and opens it. Inside it, there are D-class zenanium papers. After a while, he pulls the 6 238 724 paper out of the box and earnestly reads it.

Written on it is: "I am leaving my Energy Signature on this note, so please, contact me if you suspect that the mystery of The Mountain of Rose has been solved."

This leaves Blan Ton trembling in fear an excitement: "T-the Energy S-S-S-Signature of Li-Lin the Lonely Adventurer…" Right now, he is holding that piece of paper with utmost care and nervousness, after all, he hasn't held, in his one hundred fifty years of life, something more precious and valuable than this Energy Signature.

After some time, he manages to barely calm himself down.

"Oh, right! The mystery of The Mountain of Rose, I need to read this book!" He then opens the book and starts to decipher every word in the book.

After finish reading, he exclaims: "That girl must have found that legendary plant!"

His breathing becomes unsteady as he wonders: (What should I do? What should I do!?... This is just too much for my old bones to manage… Ah! I'll just follow the instructions mindlessly, after all, that style of life has allowed me to reach my actual age…)

Five minutes later.

He enters The Butterfly Room of the library, it is a huge room where butterfly type monsters are hovering about aimlessly. They are really beautiful, and most of them are blue, and there are a few green, and a single red. Of course, the butterfly type monsters of better quality are fewer.

He doesn't hesitate to call the red one with a grain of a special food. After the red butterfly type monster finishes eating, it stands on the Energy Signature of Lin the Lonely Adventurer for a few seconds. After that, it catches a small piece of paper from Blan Ton's claw. And it then disappears into thin air.

(It is done. Now, I have to make a copy of the book to give it to that redhead girl.) He thinks.

Another five minutes later.

"Here it is, by the way, just for curiosity, do you live in Lurep Village?" Blan Ton handovers the copy of - The Mountain of Rose – to Rose, and asks that.

"No. But I think I'll hang around Lurep Village for quite some time. Are you sure that you are asking that just for curiosity?" Rose responds while giving two gold coins to Blan Ton.

"Oh, well, I suppose I'm a little curious about the person who made me learn about another book of Lin the Lonely Adventurer." He responds with his usual demeanor of a sage.

"Hahaha… If that is the case, I do understand you very well! Hahaha… What can I say about myself? Right now, I'm just a novice mercenary. My team consists of just me and my sister." She says pointing at Thorn. "Other than that… Um! Lately, I have grown rather fond of the money. Hehehe…" She then keeps laughing shamelessly about it.

_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _

Mercenary's Guild

Thorn and Rose arrive through the main entrance. Thorn says amazed: "Oh wow. So thanks to that book you found me. Really what a big chain of coincidences."

"Right? Anyway, I'll need Lin the Lonely Adventurer to join us in the future, and I was thinking that this book could be a good excuse to make a connection with her." Rose explains her 'little' plan.

"Mmm? Will you need more than one person to join us? I have assumed that you just need that ship designer." Thorn asks concerned about how many more she needs.

"I don't know who will be the ship designer. And including Lin, I have in mind, four persons. So I'll need five, but of course, if we meet someone who could be very useful to us, then I'll ask that someone to join us as well." Rose responds without giving many details about the other persons that she has in mind.

Thorn then says with a sigh of relief: "*Sigh*… Five. I was afraid you'd say without a hint of shame something like 'a trillion'."

"Eh!? Do you think I am a shameless scoundrel!? Why!?" Rose asks, so shocked that she doesn't notice that she is shouting.

Thorn just shrugs.

"Here you were! I need to talk to you!"

Suddenly, someone says this loudly. That is a familiar voice to Thorn and Rose, so they turn around to look at the owner of this voice. It is Vei Dal!

"Hello, what is it?" Rose asks somewhat puzzled.

Standing before them, Vei Dal says fired up: "I was wondering if Miss. Thorn is interested in participating in the Lurep Village Mercenary vs. Adventurer Novices Tournament."