The Return of the Genius Ranker’s Myth Warehouse - Chapter 120

—————
This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
—————

Chapter 120
Chapter 120
After Mir rushed ahead as a scout.
“Everyone, heighten your guard! We’re approaching the monster spawning grounds!”
“Understood, Captain! You all hear that?”
“Yes, sir!”
“Among the monsters that emerge near the Cliff, the Gale Hawk is the most threatening! Everyone, prepare your bows!”
The Steel Claw Mercenary Band began their serious battle preparations.
Unlike many Imperial Army soldiers and Hunters who specialized in a single weapon, the mercenaries of the Steel Claw Mercenary Band carried a diverse arsenal.
Working as mercenaries meant encountering all manner of situations.
They needed shields to defend against ranged attacks, and bows like now when facing flying monsters.
So they drew their bows once more.
While their individual skill wasn’t exceptional, if the entire mercenary band fired together, they could certainly bring down a Gale Hawk.
With that thought, we arrived near the Cliff.
“Hmm….”
“What? Why is it so quiet?”
“Isn’t this the Gale Hawk spawning ground?”
“It should be….”
No monsters appeared.
Not a single Gale Hawk, not even a whisper of any monster.
“Did a Wyvern pack hunt and leave?”
“Possibly.”
“Still, everyone maintain your vigilance! Monsters can appear anywhere, anytime!”
The mercenaries didn’t let their guard down.
This situation happened occasionally.
When a stronger superior monster appeared, lower-tier monsters would hide.
In such cases, the situation became even more dangerous.
It meant a stronger superior monster might be lurking nearby.
However.
“…We’ve passed the entire Cliff.”
“How did we traverse the whole Cliff without encountering a single monster?”
“Are we just lucky?”
“The Wyverns hunted and left, remember?”
“But we didn’t see any Wyvern traces either.”
Even after traversing the entire Cliff.
The Simmons Trading Company hadn’t encountered a single monster.
But they couldn’t afford to lower their guard.
“Entering the Forest will be far more dangerous! Such luck won’t strike twice, so everyone be even more cautious!”
“Yes, sir!”
Near the Cliff, if a Gale Hawk appeared, we could immediately detect and respond to its presence.
Once we enter the Forest, everything changes.
At any moment, monsters could ambush us from between the trees and undergrowth.
Even a small insectoid monster attacking the horses pulling the carriages poses a threat.
Plant-type monsters wrapping around the carriage wheels are equally problematic.
If a large bestial monster appears, the situation becomes far more dire.
The entire Steel Claw Mercenary Band knew this, so they entered a state of extreme vigilance.
“…What is this?”
“Did the monsters collectively go on strike or something?”
“Does this situation even make sense?”
“This shouldn’t be happening….”
“Not a single insect sound in the Forest. Did an Ogre come through and sweep everything away?”
“But we don’t see any traces of that.”
“What on earth is going on?”
“It’s so peaceful that it actually worries me….”
“Tell me about it.”
Still, no monsters appeared in the Forest.
What kind of situation was this?
We could dismiss the Cliff passage as good luck, but not a single monster appearing in the Forest couldn’t be written off as coincidence.
This unnatural peace felt ominous.
Then.
“Wahahahaha!”
A hearty laugh echoed from ahead.
It was the laughter of Jackal, the captain of the Steel Claw Mercenary Band.
“Captain?”
“Why are you laughing?”
“Isn’t this really suspicious? Either an incredibly powerful monster appeared and all the monsters fled, or this makes no sense!”
“It’s not a monster, but something incredibly strong did appear!”
“Not a monster? What do you mean by that?”
Jackal grinned widely and answered the mercenaries’ question.
“Isn’t there someone who went ahead to scout the path before us?”
“Yes? Ah, you mean Mirain? Since he hasn’t returned, isn’t he just continuing his reconnaissance because there are no monsters?”
“No, that’s not it.”
“Then what do you mean….”
“This entire situation right now. That man created all of it.”
“Sir?”
Only one person here.
Only Jackal truly understood the current situation perfectly.
“That man is performing his ‘reconnaissance’ flawlessly.”
* * *
My hunt continued.
There was nothing to do hanging around the carriage anyway.
I swept ahead of the carriage’s path, clearing out all the nearby monsters.
Of course, that didn’t mean I could block every monster approaching the carriage.
Even after clearing monsters near the route, a few would still appear after I’d passed through.
Fortunately, monsters of that caliber…
“There’s a goblin over there.”
Thwack!
“Kiek!”
“Got it.”
“…Didn’t you say this mission would be quite challenging? Is it really this easy?”
The Steel Claw Mercenary Band escorting the carriage handled them effortlessly.
Thanks to that, the Steel Claw Mercenary Band had far less work to do.
By the time we passed through the monster-infested area and reached the safe zone, I finished my reconnaissance and headed back toward the carriage.
“Our youngest is here!”
“I’m not the youngest.”
“Then you’re our hero!”
“Khahaha, that’s true!”
“You’re the best scout we’ve ever seen! Aren’t you?”
“More like a vanguard than a scout, isn’t it?”
“What does that matter? Come on, go rub our shoulders!”
“M-me?”
“Who else? We veterans aren’t going to do it, are we?”
I was treated like a hero.
The youngest of the Steel Claw Mercenary Band, the first one I’d knocked down when I joined as an escort mercenary, came running over and wouldn’t stop massaging my shoulders.
“Mirain, try this. I boiled it with plenty of meat in it, so it’s way better than the rations here, I promise?”
“Thank you.”
“Hey, give me some too!”
“Shut up! You didn’t do any work—go eat the rations!”
“No, it’s not that I don’t want to work…”
“Then eat this and go clear out all the monsters ahead instead of Mirain, will you?”
“I’m sorry!”
They even provided food.
Thanks to that, I could hunt when needed and rest comfortably when it was time to rest.
Even in urgent situations, we needed time to eat, the horses needed rest, and the wheels needed maintenance as we traveled rough terrain.
During one of those brief stops…
A man approached me.
“What’s that stickler trying to say now?”
Stickler.
That’s what the mercenaries called him mockingly.
In reality, he was Robert, the chief merchant of the Simmons Trading Company leading this caravan.
He came straight to where I and the escort mercenaries were resting.
“You there! Are you even doing your job properly?”
And immediately began to berate us.
“Do you have any idea how much money we spent hiring you all! This is negligence of duty! Outright negligence! If you’re going to be this blatant about it, I should just cut your pay, shouldn’t I?”
“What are you talking about? Can’t you see the ones keeping watch on top of the carriages and over there at the end?”
“That’s obvious! But you lot are just loafing around!”
“Sir, we’re human too. We need rest! We’re rotating breaks so it doesn’t affect our vigilance.”
“Do you think I’m paying you to rest? If you want your full wages, go stand guard instead!”
“This is ridiculous. You give yourself time to rest, but we’re not supposed to rest? We have to stand night watch too, don’t we?”
“That’s obvious!”
“Honestly, there’s no reasoning with you. If monsters appear, we’ll take responsibility, so don’t worry.”
It seemed he really disliked seeing us rest.
And the reason for that was me.
“Damn it, if there were no monsters in this area, I could have hired fewer mercenaries. What a waste!”
Through my ‘scouting’, I had cleared every monster along the route before they could even approach the carriages.
The mercenaries believed and acknowledged that this was all thanks to Jackal.
But this merchant did not.
Even when Jackal explained that the reason no monsters appeared was because I had cleared them all beforehand.
“One adventurer cleared all the monsters on the road? Don’t talk nonsense!”
“But that’s what—”
“And if that were true, why would I need to hire you all? I’d only need that adventurer!”
He would simply respond like this.
In such circumstances, Jackal came to me and sighed.
“I’m sorry. You’ve been working hard and we’re traveling safely because of it, yet you have to hear such things.”
“It’s nothing.”
“It’s unavoidable in mercenary work. If monsters don’t appear, they complain about wasted money. If too many appear, they complain that you’re not doing your job properly.”
He said this and moved on, but as time passed, the merchant’s interference grew worse.
He scolded us, saying we were wasting resources and should send about half the men back.
He complained that the Steel Claw Mercenary Band’s wages were too expensive and since we weren’t doing anything, he should reduce our pay.
It wasn’t just grumbling—it seemed like he really would reduce our numbers or cut our wages.
So.
“What do you mean we’re loafing? We’re maintaining vigilance without even getting proper rest!”
“When there are no monsters, you should be grateful, not complain! Cut our pay?”
“Send half of us back? Then why sign a contract in the first place!”
Naturally, the mercenaries’ discontent rose.
At this rate, it felt like the bomb of dissatisfaction would explode from either the merchant or the mercenaries.
In such an atmosphere.
After completing another round of scouting, I returned to the carriage and approached Jackal to speak.
“I have a good idea.”
“A good idea?”
At those words, Jackal’s expression hardened as he grasped something.
“Surely you don’t intend to lure monsters here? That won’t do. No matter what, we’re mercenaries. We can’t lure monsters and put our client in danger like that. It’s unthinkable.”
It seemed he believed I planned to lure monsters to show the merchant the reality of the situation.
It was similar in concept, but my thinking differed.
“There’s no need to lure them at all.”
“Then?”
“I’m simply pausing the ‘scouting’ for a while.”
I had no intention of luring monsters and staging a farce that would endanger the caravan.
But what if it wasn’t luring?
What if I simply wasn’t preventing what would naturally happen ahead of time?
“Shouldn’t we instill a sense of awareness not just in the merchants, but in the mercenaries as well?”
The problem wasn’t limited to the merchants alone.
Though the mercenaries were supposedly vigilant, after hearing that I was handling the monsters, their tension had noticeably diminished.
At this rate, they might not respond properly when a real crisis struck.
“…But what if the carriages are destroyed or people are hurt?”
“Isn’t it our job as escort mercenaries to prevent that from happening?”
If this continued, the merchants’ complaints would grow, and the mercenaries’ complacency would deepen.
They would have no choice but to keep requesting ‘scouting’ from me.
Jackal, having judged this unacceptable,
“Let me hear your plan.”
Jackal nodded in agreement.
After that, I halted scouting for a time under the pretense that the horses were exhausted.
And shortly after.
“M-Monsters!”
Though their vigilance had slackened, one of the mercenaries who had been steadily monitoring the surroundings cried out urgently.
“Trolls! Trolls! And there are quite a lot of them!”
Trolls.
One of the famous humanoid monsters alongside orcs and ogres.
They were massive, incredibly strong, and possessed regenerative abilities so remarkable that even if their limbs were severed or holes torn through their torsos, they would recover in an instant.
Dozens of such trolls now appeared beside the carriages.
The problem was.
“On the other side too! G-Goblins!”
“Ignore the goblins and focus on the trolls!”
“No, there are so many! It looks like there are hundreds of them!”
“What?”
To the left of the carriages were dozens of orcs.
To the right appeared hundreds of goblins.
At that sight,
“W-What…!”
Robert, the chief merchant of the Simmons Trading Company, cried out in terror, calling upon the escort mercenaries.

—————
This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
—————