Chapter 16 : Request P1

"Requests" and "missions" are completely different things. The former are taken voluntarily, while the latter are half-mandatory assignments given directly by the guild master to high-ranking guild members.

The time was past 4:30 PM. Sakika was stuck with nothing to do during the free time after school.

He had the monthly Eight Emperors meeting at 7:30 tonight, but until then, there was nothing on his schedule. Still, killing time by sleeping or something would be a waste.

Never in his life had he experienced this kind of free time. There was always something he needed to do.

Until yesterday, he'd been assigned some kind of mission every day and had to complete it. But based on what guild master Stella had said yesterday, he'd probably only get the bare minimum of missions while attending the academy.

But wasting this time would be such a shame.

Sakika, who had been lying on his bed, sat up and stuck his hand into his open Box.

×××××××××

Sakika stood in front of a tall brick building—the headquarters of Moonlight guild.

But he wasn't wearing student clothes. He wore the white-based combat uniform of the Zero Squad captain of Moonlight guild, with a silver cloak embroidered with black swallowtail butterflies at the hem. His face was hidden by a hood, and silver hair occasionally peeked out. Black boots covered his feet up to his knees.

Anyone who saw this outfit would immediately recognize Sakika as the Grand Emperor. However, since he had erased his presence and blended into the crowd, no one was paying him any attention.

He opened the wooden door and entered the guild. The first floor, with its wooden round tables and chairs, request board covered in job postings, and reception desk, was packed with people.

The request board only had jobs up to AAA rank. To take anything higher, you had to go to the reception desk.

Sakika headed for the reception. The desk had magical devices—computers and fax machines powered by magical energy—used for processing job applications and sharing high-rank request information with branches and other guilds.

Sakika spoke to the woman at reception.

"I'd like the top five highest-ranked requests, please."

The receptionist's eyes went wide. She'd realized who he was when he spoke.

"P-please show me your guild card!"

Seeing the woman speak in a voice stiff with nerves made him feel a bit sorry. Sakika, carrying the title of world's strongest, always caused trouble whenever he took requests.

"Please don't be so nervous."

When he smiled slightly, the woman turned bright red. He hadn't meant to mock her, but maybe she'd taken his smile that way. He pulled his guild card from his Box and handed it to her.

Guild cards contained everything from names and photos to magical attributes, but once you reached SS rank or higher, you could prevent others from reading the information at will.

The ability to restrict information access was limited to SS rank and above to prevent criminal misuse. This prevented thieves from stealing guild cards, making parts unreadable, and selling them to others. Anyone SS rank or above could usually fight back, and since there were so few people at that level, any misuse would be quickly noticed.

Using this function, Sakika had hidden most of his personal information. All you could tell from his card was some of his usable attributes, his title Silver Blade Wielder, that he belonged to Moonlight guild, and that he was the Grand Emperor.

"Y-yes, confirmed! EX-rank, Silver Blade-sama!!"

The receptionist returned his card after looking it over. Her voice made everyone nearby turn around at once.

"It's the Grand Emperor..."

"First time I've seen the real thing..."

"I'm so glad I came here!"

The guild's first floor instantly became noisy. Sakika let out a small wry smile. The woman looked up from the terminal she'd been operating. The fax machine next to it spat out several sheets of paper.

"Um... w-will these work!?"

The woman handed him five request forms. Three were SSS rank, with one SS rank and one EX rank.

He skimmed through them but saw no problems. After memorizing the locations and details, he stored them in his Box.

"Thank you. I'll be going now."

"Take care!"

When he gave his thanks and spoke the words that had become routine, the receptionist sent him off with a smile.

"Thanks. Teleport"

Moonlight guild headquarters had anti-teleportation barriers. But those meant nothing to him.

His vision changed instantly.

Sakika arrived at Sajour Village, located at the western edge of the Central Nation. It was a village surrounded by vast forests, with the crystal-clear Lake Maral very close by.

<>

That was the SSS rank request here.

Sparn Dragons were burnt brown dragons covered in spikes. Those spikes were thought to be evolved scales—they had no poison but were sharp, tough, and hard enough to easily pierce humans. They ranked high among upper-class monsters.

Their attributes were earth and fire, but they had high wind resistance, so magical attacks were best done with anything except fire, earth, or wind. They also breathed fire and earth attribute breath, requiring caution even when attacking from a distance.

They were extremely violent—it was said that getting within a kilometer meant certain death.

Even SS rank adventurers struggled against just one.

But according to Sakika's memory, these dragons weren't supposed to have flocking behavior.

The Sparn Dragon pack was apparently 5-6 kilometers from the village, and they needed to be eliminated as soon as possible.

Sakika headed to the village chief's house to get information, keeping his presence hidden.

He could search for the Sparn Dragons' location using his own magical power and presence detection, but he should meet the village chief to report that he'd come to handle the extermination.

Even though it was still evening, no children were outside. He could see a few adults here and there. The parents were probably keeping their kids inside.

That's the right response...

Curious children always wanted to go places they were told not to.

That's why locking them safely inside where you could watch them was the best option right now.

He reached the finest newest wooden house in the village. Since he could sense the strongest human magical power in the village coming from here, it was reasonable to assume this was the village chief's house.

When he knocked with the gold-plated dragon-shaped knocker, a woman in her mid-fifties with graying blonde hair came out.

Her green eyes looked at him.

"Could you possibly be... Silver Blade-sama!?"

"Yes. It's my pleasure to meet you. I am Grand Emperor Silver Blade"

He bowed politely.

"I've never seen the real thing before... Nice to meet you. I'm Aria, wife of village chief Bark Smith. Welcome."

After Aria bowed and they exchanged greetings, she tried to invite Sakika inside.

Sakika hurriedly declined.

He didn't need to speak directly to the village chief—as long as word reached him that he had come, that was enough.

"I'm sorry, I'm in a hurry. Could you just tell me where the Sparn Dragons are?"

The woman looked disappointed. Seeing that made him feel truly sorry, but he told himself that eliminating the dragons had to be the priority.

"I see... The Sparn Dragons should be by the wide river about 5-6 kilometers in that direction."

"Thank you. I'll come report once I'm finished."

Snap

When Sakika snapped his fingers, transparent ice wings sprouted from the back of his cloak.

Snapping fingers was done instead of chantless casting—it used the same amount of magical power but the spell's effect was slightly reduced.

However, this activation method had an advantage.

The opponent couldn't tell what kind of magic you were using.

In situations like this, that advantage was meaningless, but in combat it was significant.

But this method of snapping fingers to activate magic was as difficult as chantless casting—activating magic without doing anything at all.

Of course, chantless casting was far more difficult than chantless recitation, and this was about equally hard.

Sakika flew away on his ice wings.

Why not teleport? When teleporting to places you'd been before, you could just picture the location and it didn't take much time. But when teleporting somewhere new, you had to specify coordinates, which took longer.

For short-distance travel, flying was faster.

….

A few minutes later, he reached his destination. He dismissed the wings and observed the dragons. Since he'd erased his presence, the Sparn Dragons didn't notice him.

"Black Phoenix Butterfly"

Sakika summoned Black Phoenix Butterfly to his left hand and attacked.

Slice...

He cut off one dragon's head and intimidated the others. The dragons became wary and all breathed their attacks at once.

He easily dodged and began cutting off Sparn Dragon heads one after another.

Blood sprayed, but Sakika avoided it.

Sparn Dragon skin—no, scales—were a bit harder than other dragons. Just cutting normally would quickly numb his hands. Sakika channeled magical power into his sword/

The sword gleamed silver-white, its blade growing sharper.

This was one source of the Silver Blade title.

After that, he picked up speed and defeated dragon after dragon, finishing the extermination in less than a minute.