GILF Hunter

Noon, with the sun high in the sky.

In the common room of Ian’s mercenary group after lunchtime, the mercenaries were all gathered together.

The invasion was over, and it was complete free time with no schedule at all. It was the best time to lounge around and resolve mental fatigue.

Usually, when such a long break occurred, they would go out, but after exerting so much physical strength, they didn’t even have the energy for that.

Rin, buried in the sofa, muttered.

’Phew... out of all the invasions so far, this was the hardest...’

Everyone nodded silently as if in agreement.

’I thought the sewer incident was harder?’

Mika was the only one to voice a different opinion.

She seemed to be referring to the time they were running through the sewers while being chased by slimes.

’Well, of course it was harder for you back then, Mika. Unlike now, you had to run around yourself.’

’Mages, honestly...’

’I’m telling you, I really almost died running then!’

Mika argued earnestly, but it was a topic hard for mercenaries who weren’t mages to empathize with.

’What do you think, Airi? Right?’

’Eh... Me? I... I’m not sure.’

In times like this, Airi, as a fellow mage, should have lent her support.

...Wait, she’s not a pure mage either!

Mika was belatedly appalled. When you thought about it, Airi was also the type to climb trees and run through forests—physically closer to Rin’s type.

Besides, she hadn’t even experienced the battle in the sewers.

In the end, by majority vote, Mika’s opinion was dismissed as a mage’s exaggeration.

Anyway. Rin muttered while recalling the recent battle during the invasion.

’Going up on the wall is much harder than I thought.’

She knew it wouldn’t be easy, but it was far more exhausting than she had imagined.

The surging enemies were endless, and looking down at the monsters filling the base of the wall made it feel like her motivation was constantly being chipped away. That alone caused significant mental fatigue.

When she was a low-rank mercenary, she had been quite envious of those who got to go up on the wall.

First of all, only mercenaries whose skills were recognized could go up. And since they faced the monsters directly, their income was incomparably higher than those who worked inside the city for a stipend.

But having actually done it, it wasn’t a job for everyone. She thought it might actually be better to just do the tasks assigned to her with a peaceful mind.

’By the way, where did Tanya go?’

’She said she had to visit candy shops with her friends.’

’How diligent...’

Realizing the reason Tanya hadn’t been seen for a while, Rin said admiringly. To think she’d be visiting famous shops when she must be just as tired. The lines must be long at this hour, too.

However, Mika, who had heard the detailed circumstances, added an explanation to correct her.

’She said the spirits went on strike because she made them work too much during the invasion... and she has to buy them sweets to appease them.’

’...Being a spiritist is unexpectedly tough, huh?’

Hearing the names of the shops the fairies demanded, every single one was a famous establishment in the city.

It seemed the spirits knew the city far better than the mercenaries did.

In a corner of the common room, Airi, who had been sitting quietly on the sofa, whispered to Lia sitting next to her.

’By any chance... are we not doing any other work?’

’For a while... Anyway, even if we go out, there’s nothing but recovery work, right?’

Well, she was referring to the recovery work.

Hearing Lia’s answer and pondering it alone, Airi quickly realized why.

’I see. We get a basic salary and don’t have to pay for lodging. So there’s no need to do it.’

Before joining the mercenary group, when she was on her own, Airi always participated in recovery work after an invasion ended, so she wasn’t used to this.

Since inn fees and living expenses went out every day, it was a loss to rest, and especially since the requests during this time gave good guild contribution points. Going out to work every day was essential.

She wasn’t used to resting so leisurely just because the invasion was over.

Mika, glancing at Airi talking in a small voice with Lia, spoke up as if she had just remembered something.

’Come to think of it, Airi caught an incredible amount of monsters this time. Won’t there be a huge reward?’

’Eh... For me? No way...’

Airi shook her head in flustered denial.

’I heard that if your contribution is really high, you get rewards and medals...’

’Th-there’s absolutely no way...’

At the mention of medals, Airi turned pale and shook her head frantically.

Everyone was being serious, but Airi thought it was impossible.

While she was on the wall, she had no room to look around due to mana exhaustion, so she hadn’t accurately grasped just how much work the magic she used had done.

The sounds were quite flashy and she thought she must have caught a good number of monsters, but Airi herself believed it wouldn’t be to that extent. She had spent much more time collapsed than participating in the battle, and there must have been many other mages besides her.

Just then, the sound of the door on the lower floor opening was heard.

It was Ian, returning from the guild.

’Are you finished? You’re back earlier than last time.’

’There wasn’t much for us to do this time.’

He had gone to the guild for post-war processing, but there wasn’t anything specific Ian needed to do further.

It ended with him receiving a few whole corpses because Emilia said she absolutely wanted to research the materials of those monsters.

Ian, who told everyone ’good job’ one by one, finally asked Airi.

’Airi, you worked hard this time too. Have you thought about what you want to receive?’

’A-ah, no...’

Airi shook her head with a flustered face.

Come to think of it, she remembered him making such a promise when things were hectic.

...Actually, something did come to mind when she first heard this. But in a situation where everyone was staring at her curiously, she couldn’t bring herself to say it.

More than that, even if it were just her and Ian, she couldn’t utter such words with her own mouth.

’I-I’ll think about it.’

In the end, Airi had no choice but to push the situation away with such vague words.

Perhaps in the past, she would have asked to nullify her slave status or receive a special allowance to save for a retirement fund, but...

To be honest, she didn’t hate living here that much now.

On the contrary, the thought of leaving right now made her worry about how she would manage on her own from then on.

’Ah, right. Do you have any plans or appointments to go anywhere?’

’Ah... No?’

’Then please make some time in about two weeks.’

Ian said a somewhat shocking word to Airi.

’There’s a victory party, and I think you should come along, Airi.’

’A victory... party?’

What she thought of when she heard ’party’ was the guild staff dinners she occasionally saw when passing by large taverns. It was a large dinner where they rented out an entire floor.

Did the leader of such a large mercenary group get invited to such places too?

When she heard the word party, that was the maximum scale she could imagine from the perspective of an ordinary mercenary.

’Me, in a place like that?’

’Because you were very active this time. They said they’d like you to come.’

Airi was about to reply that it was impossible, but Ian’s words continued before she could.

’It’s probably because of the reward money.’

’Wh... reward money?’

At the mention of reward money, Airi’s words of ’impossible’ stopped.

She had heard before that invasion rewards were given by the city council, so the amount was quite substantial.

It wasn’t that she was particularly greedy for money, and her life was sufficient with the salary from the mercenary group, but...

Having experienced becoming a slave due to a lack of money, her heart was tempted whenever there was a chance to save up such a large sum.

Ian, who seemed to know why she didn’t want to go, added a few words.

’You won’t know anyone anyway, so why don’t you just stay quietly in a corner and come back?’

’I-is that so? If it’s like that...’

Certainly, in a place with so many people, there was no way anyone would bother paying attention to someone like her who didn’t know anyone.

If she had known the true nature of that party, Airi would have tried to avoid it even if she had to pretend to be sick, but since she lacked accurate information, she ended up giving her consent to attend.

＊　＊　＊

Elena opened the invitation that arrived for her at the table.

Victory Commemoration Banquet.

She heard it was a banquet always held regularly after a monster invasion ended.

Ostensibly, it was a place to invite figures who made great contributions during the defense and award them medals.

Well, like most parties, no matter the pretext, it was ultimately a place for the socialites to mingle.

They didn’t hold a party because there was a reason; they found a suitable reason to hold a party.

It was likely a party held for the purpose of establishing relationships with influential mercenary groups.

In that sense, Ian’s mercenary group, attending such a place for the first time, was a supernova that would receive everyone’s attention. They could be called the protagonists of this party.

Of course, Elena was also invited to the event.

She might not be as much of a protagonist as those two, but she was someone who always made it into the top five of the list of people one must befriend at a party.

Elena looked down at her invitation and smiled broadly.

To think such a big opportunity would come so soon.

’Fufu... they’ll have to be prepared.’

Because they would be enjoying the highest level of attention to the point where they wouldn’t have a moment to rest.

Elena picked up her pen and wrote a reply to the person who sent the invitation.

- Madam. Thank you for the invitation...

Did you like the item I sent last time?

If I may tell you exclusively, Madam, at this banquet, I will be presenting my secret masterpiece, [Tears of Sagittarius]...

Airi had another long nightmare.