Chapter 145

145 . The Reference Letter

Fran examined the permit she got from Dias by flipping it over and shining a light on it .

「Is something wrong?」

「Nn . Might have hidden mechanism . 」

「Hahaha, wow, you're mean . I'm right here, you know?」

「...」

Dias had made his claim with a smile on his face, but that hadn't been nearly enough for him to earn Fran's trust, she continued to gaze at the letter suspiciously regardless .

「Just trust me on this okay? I won't play any more pranks on you . The only pranks I ever play are ones that end up benefiting the adventurers that get pranked, you know?」

「Meaning?」

「Think of my pranks as a form of parental love . I use them to make sure everyone doesn't get too relaxed on a day to day basis . I don't just play them to have fun . 」

「...」

Fran stared down Dias, whose expression remained serious despite his obvious bullshitting . I didn't even need the Principle of Falsehood to know he was straight up lying to our faces .

「Well... Okay, I guess it is half for my own entertainment . 」

「Nn . 」

「A-Ah, right, that reminds me . Just letting you into the eastern dungeon isn't all I've come up with . I've also got a few other ideas that'll benefit you . 」

The Guildmaster ended up just flat out changing the topic, not that I really mind given that I was interested in what he'd brought up .

『Other ideas, you say?』

「Yeah . To be more exact, I've thought up three different courses of action . The first is to issue a proclamation regarding the protection of younger adventurers, something we, as the guild, ourselves would also benefit from . I'm fairly certain that this is something you've already noticed, but Ulmutt's got a relatively large proportion of younger adventurers . 」

「Nn . 」

「Our dungeons [1] fall in somewhere in the lower D ranked area, but we've a system that allows F and G ranked adventurers to explore the upper floors regardless so long as they party up with people ranked in at E or higher . This system really helps newbies that want to gain experience, as well as G rankers, as they aren't allowed to enter any of the country's other dungeons . 」

「That's why, G ranked kids, lots?」

「Exactly . The problem lies with the fact that many of the people out there like to take advantage of them . They manipulate them and use them as bait . I've been thinking of enforcing a penalty for actions like that for quite some time now . 」

So Fran just happened to end up as the spark that'd set his plan into action? Makes sense .

「Second?」

「My second idea would be to go around telling everyone how much Erza likes you . Ulmutt's adventurers typically prefer to be on his good side rather than not . 」

Right . All the adventurers seemed to quiet down the moment he showed up . Yup, makes sense . There's no way anyone would be willing to go head to head withthatafter all .

「Last?」

「That would be to quickly raise your rank . 」

「??」

「You know, Fran, the guild really values all the contributions you've made to it . We'll bump you up to C rank the moment you complete enough requests to qualify yourself for it . 」

「Surprised . 」

Yeah, me too . Was it because they took what we did back in Barbra into consideration?

「The royalty you escorted named you an incredibly valuable asset . The reports they sent contained nothing but praise . 」

Oh, he must be talking about when we escorted Prince Flut and Princess Satia .

Fran's expression remained unchanged, but I felt Dias' words ignite a fiery passion within her .

「Will do best . 」

「Please do . We'll do for you as we have for every other adventurer that's reached C rank here at the Ulmutt branch and make a series announcements in order to spread your name far and wide . That way, almost everyone in the city will know you're a C rank, and consequently, there'll be far fewer people that'll want to try picking a fight with you . 」

Fewer? So there still will be some? Can't be helped, I guess . Oh well, that works too . Less is always more when it comes to this kinda thing .

「I'll give you a few requests you can complete during your time in the eastern dungeon . You should be able to finish them and easily rank yourself up while going through with your training . 」

Dias handed us twenty something requests as he continued to speak .

「You'll need to complete another 23 D ranked requests if you want to qualify for C rank . Take all these, and start doing what you can . 」

「Got it . 」

『Thanks . 』

And so, we ended up being allowed into the dungeon . I'd been expecting us to have to be examined or something, but I guess this is fine too . It's a shame that Klimut's reference letter ended up going to waste, but oh well .

Actually, I guess there's no harm in giving it to him anyways, right?

「Here . 」

「That looks like... Alessa's Guild's crest . Would that be a letter from Klimut?」

「Nn . Reference letter . 」

Dias' face paled in unease the moment Fran nodded to affirm his suspicions . Wait, what? You okay, old dude?

「By the way, Fran . 」

「Nn?」

「Umm... You're not going to tell Klimut about how I tried to play a bit of a prank on you, right?」

For some odd reason, his tone voice of voice had immediately turned into a flattering one .

「Why?」

「I guess it'd be better for me to say since I'm the one asking for a favour here . Klimut is one of my seniors and someone I look up to as an adventurer . He gave me a hand when I was just starting out, so I owe him quite a bit . I wouldn't be able to bring myself to face him if you told him what I did . Er, actually, that's not it at all . To be honest, I'm just flat out terrified of him . 」

I'd used the Principle of Falsehood to verify his words, and apparently, he wasn't lying . He was actually afraid of Klimut .

Well, I'm glad that reference letter of ours ended up actually seeing some use . In fact, it more or less ended up functioning as a sort of trump card, huh?

「Will tell Amanda and Klimut next time something weird done . 」

「I'm sorry . I'll never do anything weird to you ever again . 」

You know, it's really pretty rare to see a Guildmaster prostrate himself on all fours . Man, I wish I had a camera right now . Oh well, either way, it looked like Dias is going to stop with his pranks now, so all's good . [2]

「Nn . Got it . 」

「Hahaha...」

Seeing Fran take a haughty stance while holding Klimut's letter with Dias prostrating before her almost made me want to say "Case Closed!"

_______________________________________________________________

[1] Raw does not say if plural or singular . The manner in which the writing is presented is pointing towards the first, but context from the previous chapter is pointing towards the second .

[2] Dogeza . Universal Japanese apology/begging tool . Basically getting on all fours with your knees touching the ground and prostrating . Normally only used for overdramatic apologies and whatnot .