Curse of the Kat – ch 6

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Chapter 6 – The cat is short-sighted

“Here’s your card. You are now officially an adventurer.”
Luckily, I didn’t get punished by scaring the crap out of that old guy.
He started it, after all.

“Thank you.”
And since I have proven I can take down a C rank adventurer, there was no need to test my battle skills anymore.
But…

“Please don’t do that next time.”

“Y-yes…”
Those reproachful eyes…
I’m sorry!
I won’t do it again!
… probably.
I mean, if I get assaulted I can defend myself, right?
I just have to do it in a reasonable way, right?!

Well anyway, it seems that not just that old guy, but pretty much everyone who saw that scene is now scared of me.
I don’t get it though.
I only have 28 speed points.
There’s no way that’s a high value.
Definitely not high enough to make people mistake my speed for teleportation.
So why?

Is it the slippers?
They supposedly boost my speed by 300%.
But whether I wear them or not, my speed is still 28.
So, is it an invisible boost?
As in, the status shows 28, but it’s actually 300% higher?
Huh…
That’s totally possible.
Or more like, I don’t see any other explanation.

But enough of that.
It’s time to go on a quest or I won’t have any money.
Incidentally, even though I’m clearly stronger than a C ranked adventurer, I still have to start at F rank.
That means I can only accept F and E ranked requests.
What a pain…
Well, I can do multiple quests at once, so it might not be that bad.

Quests:
Subjugate four ashen wolves in the eastern forest.
Collect-
Okay, Stop right there.
I don’t need to read any further than this.
This is a quest similar to the one those three accepted.
And it seems like it’s repeatable.
Which means I just need to slaughter those annoying furries and my money situation is solved!
It’s perfect.

Now, let’s go!

Exit the guild.
Walk toward the eastern entrance.
Endure stares.
Arrive.

“H-hello.”
It’s the guard from yesterday…
Why you again?
Do you live here?
Please tell me you already forgot about yesterday.

“Oh, it’s you. Do you have an identification card yet?”
He didn’t forget.
Of course he wouldn’t…
Now… is the adventurer’s card enough?
From what I heard, it should be.

“Here.”

“Hmm… so you became an adventurer, huh?”

“Y-yeah…”
Come on, just let me through…

“But don’t tell me you are going outside alone.”
Urk, that ‘I’m seeing an idiot’ look…

“It’s fine! I’ll be careful!”
I’m not a pushover, after all!
… why are you sighing?

“… well, It’s fine I guess… Good luck out there.”
Yes!
Finally!
He gave me my card back and let me pass!
Let the wolf slaughter begin!

 


A miscalculation.
What?
No, no, I’m not too weak to beat the wolves or anything like that.
In fact, I can kill them instantly without any problems.
But the thing is…
How do I transport them?
I didn’t bring and rucksack or anything.
I’ve already taken down twelve of them.
What do I do…?
Drag them back by their tails?
I see no other way…

Ugh…
I guess I don’t have a choice.
Six in each hand.
Let’s go back.

 

“Stop right there!”
It’s that guard again.
So he really lives here, huh?

“What in the world is that?!”

“The wolves I killed.”

“Are you serious?!”
Hey, calm down.
You don’t need to yell that loud.

“Can you… help me transport this?”
I asked nicely…
So, what is with that face?
You look completely baffled.
Did you just see someone solve a rubick’s cube in five seconds?

“… sigh, I can lend you a small cart, but it won’t be for free.”
Argh, money again.
I only have five big copper coins left…

“Will this be enough…?”

“…”
Uh, please don’t look so annoyed.
I didn’t have a way to earn money up till now!
After I get money for these, it will get better!
I swear!

“Fine then. But after you are done exchanging the wolves for money, return it right away.”

“Thank you!”
The guard went to his little station and brought out a small cart.
Can it really hold this many wolf bodies?
I guess it will have to…

I hand over the money and load the wolves.
They are almost spilling out.
I will have to go slowly.
But, seriously…
That guard is such a tough opponent.
I would rather fight a horde of wolves than go through him again…

Now, off to the guild!
More stares.
I’m used to it now.
But, I guess now I’m also dragging a pile of animal corpses behind me.
And they stink really bad.
Let’s hurry up…

I have arrived at the guild.
Now, where exactly do I park this cart?
Do I just pull it inside?
I would like to avoid getting yelled at for stinking up the place…
And I don’t wanna just leave it outside while I go there…
What if someone steals it?

“Hrm? Oh, it’s you.”
While I was a loss as to what to do, someone came out of the guild.
It’s the man who was supposed to test me, I think?

“Hello. I defeated some wolves.”
I point at the cart.
And the man frowns.

“… where did you get all those wolves?”
Huh?
Didn’t I just tell you?

“I defeated them.”

“You left the guild not even an hour ago.”

Are you saying I couldn’t have defeated twelve wolves in such a short time?
I thought you confirmed I can ‘teleport’.

“I defeated them and came back.”
He crossed his arms and looked at me suspiciously.

“You think I stole them?”
He looked at the cart and then back at me.
After a moment of silence, he finally sighed and beckoned to me.

“No, never mind… sorry about that. Come this way.”
Huh?
What was that?
Why the sudden change?
Well, I won’t complain…

He takes me to the side entrance and we enter a spacious room buzzing with people.
There are people skinning animals, cutting meat, removing scales, and so on.
Is this where you dismantle subjugated beasts?

“Please unload it all here.”
And as per his instructions, I unload the wolves on a table.
Some woman comes over and starts lining them up and checking them.

“Those are…”
She stopped at a wound one of the wolves had.
Four parallel cuts on its back.

“From this.”
I raise my hand in front of me and extend the claws.

“… what an interesting weapon.”
You think so?
I think sword is better since it has more range.

From what I have seen yesterday, one wolf should be worth two silver coins.
So I expected to get twenty-four now.
But…
Since I didn’t dismantle them, they cut the reward money to twenty-one silver coins.
That’s still fine.
I can easily hunt more.
Not a problem.

After getting my reward, I headed back to the gate and returned the cart as promised.
But… since the cart was stained with blood and covered in wolf fur, the guard made me clean it.
So cruel…
I’m not used to manual work…

By the time I finished, it was afternoon.
At that point, my stomach wouldn’t stop rumbling.
Come to think of it, I didn’t eat anything since breakfast.

I headed to a nearby restaurant and had a nice meal there.
Afterwards, I decided to wander around the city a bit more.
Since I had some money now, I decided to take it easy.
Before I knew it, the sun set.
I returned to the inn and paid for three more nights before going into my room and lying down on the bed.

Somehow, I feel like the second day went by much quicker than the first one.
Hmm…
Why do I feel like I’m forgetting something?

Oh, right.
I wanted to buy an item bag so I don’t need to use a cart for the wolves.
I guess I’ll do it tomorrow.

No, I still feel like I’m forgetting something.
What is it…?
I got enough money to live for a while…
There shouldn’t be a problem.

Then, something clicked in my head.
I sat up in an instant.
Sweat formed on my face.

N-no way.
What have I done?
How did I manage to mess up this bad…
Am I really that dumb?


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