The journey wasn’t long, and the few of them chatted casually as they walked. In less than half an hour, the outline of the town ahead came into view.
After leaving the Mageling Forest, there was a stretch of grassland, and about two or three kilometers ahead, the town’s walls stood.
The walls didn’t look very tall. Up close, they appeared to be only about four or five meters high, probably only enough to keep out ordinary monsters.
Scattered small villages and farmlands dotted the area away from the forest.
The group reached the heavy wooden city gate and showed their Adventurer Identification to the two guards.
The guards glanced at Krexia with some suspicion but eventually opened the gate and let them in.
“This is Vanor City, Miss Krexia.”
As they entered, the long-missed bustle greeted them.
The faint roars of monsters, the wind, and the rustling of leaves and grass that had filled the Mageling Forest all vanished instantly.
Separated by the city gate, it was like two different worlds outside and inside the city.
The group didn’t attract much attention as they entered.
By this point, Krexia had already used Disguise Magic to cover up her striking silver hair, replacing it with a relatively common black.
After all, silver hair and red eyes paired with elf ears would easily trigger guards and Adventurers to react strongly in a border city like this.
Thinking back, the way those four had jumped her in the forest now seemed somewhat understandable.
If she were in their shoes and suddenly saw Coutia appear before her, she probably wouldn’t have been able to resist giving her a couple of elbows either.
“Miss Krexia, since you just arrived and haven’t had a chance to get your identification yet, why not come with us to the Adventurer Association first?”
Fana said with a smile.
“We also need to submit a commission.”
“Submit a commission? I thought you said your commission was a Patrol Mission, but you turned back halfway?”
Krexia asked in confusion.
“Oh, that’s what this is for,” Fana said, pointing at the owl perched on her shoulder.
“A Patrol Mission is basically just a slacking-around kind of thing. I’ll just say the Scout Beast Spirit flew around outside for a couple of rounds and didn’t find anything unusual.”
“Sometimes doing this once in a while, the receptionist won’t say much.”
“That’s one of the little privileges magicians have at the Adventurer Association.”
Elvie frowned slightly at this.
As a church nun, she had been raised with principles like honesty and kindness from a young age and felt somewhat uncomfortable with this borderline deceptive behavior.
But since she still had to help Krexia later, she silently chose to ignore it.
After all, even the captain hadn’t said anything.
“Hey, what happened to you, Falco? Got stung by a hornet? Why’s your face so swollen?”
A short-haired man in armor by the roadside waved at Falco and greeted him.
Falco coughed a couple of times, touched his reddened cheeks, and forced a smile.
“Nothing, just tripped while walking…”
Elvie deliberately didn’t heal the two swordsmen’s faces, probably thinking it would make Krexia feel better that way…
As for whether the two swordsmen were comfortable or not, who cared?
They had brought it on themselves.
They followed the main road straight ahead and soon stopped in front of a tall building.
Glancing at the storefront, Krexia thought to herself, “Definitely much smaller than the place back home. Well, it’s a border town, so this scale is already pretty good.”
“Speaking of which, I wonder if that bastard Third Princess has harmed my family. If they’re still alive, they’d probably be quite upset knowing I’m dead.”
“What’s wrong, missing home?”
Coutia’s voice came at the right moment.
“A bit,” Krexia answered quietly in her mind.
“Want to go back and see them?”
“No.”
“Why not?”
“With this appearance, going back to see them would be worse than dying out here.”
“! You really dislike the body I gave you that much?”
“They wouldn’t recognize me.
If I went back like this and said, ‘Hey, Old Deng, don’t you recognize me? I’m your son! Yes, that’s right, although someone chopped off my head, I’m not dead, and I’ve actually turned into a cute girl, bla bla bla…’ you think they’d just let me be?”
“You have a point there.”
Coutia unusually agreed with Krexia on this topic.
Naturally, the others couldn’t sense the silent conversation going on in Krexia’s mind as they led her into the Adventurer Association’s hall.
It was morning, and the hall was somewhat empty, with nearly all the dozen or so tables around vacant.
Only a few attendants were cleaning, and the receptionist in work clothes near the commission board was yawning from boredom.
When Falco, Fana, and the others arrived, she perked up but then froze upon seeing Falco and Hodge’s faces.
“Mr. Falco? Weren’t you out on a commission… Oh my, what happened to your face?”
“Could it be that you encountered a powerful monster on the road and rushed back to report?”
Falco felt mentally drained. Several acquaintances had already teased him about his face during the journey, and Hodge was in the same boat.
Krexia stifled a laugh inside.
“Ahem, Miss Sensa, please don’t tease me, but that’s pretty much it. We did handle that powerful monster, and we’re indeed here to submit the commission.”
Of course, there was no powerful monster; it was just to save face.
Fana stepped forward and, touching a ring on her finger, produced a brown, plump pouch out of thin air and placed it on the counter.
“That’s a Storage Ring. As expected, those who can learn magic usually come from families with some background.”
Krexia thought silently as she watched.
Sensa took the pouch, untied the string, and poured its contents onto the table.
Four Magic Crystals of various colors and shapes clinked crisply against the surface.
Krexia almost felt hungry looking at them, remembering the taste of the Magic Crystals she had eaten before.
The flavor was unforgettable.
“One First-tier, two Second-tier, and one Third-tier — four Magic Cores in total. Not bad at all for such a short time.”
Sensa smiled. With that Third-tier Magic Crystal, she was half convinced of Falco’s so-called “powerful monster.”
In reality, only two of these Magic Crystals had been casually obtained from monsters on their way back. The Third-tier one was taken from Fana’s private stash.
“Including the 50 silver coins from the patrol reward, that’s a total of 7 gold 75 silver. Here you go.”
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