‘Aaaaah! my house is in ruins! I ended up with overtime! You soreheaded piece of shit, I will curse you for generations to come!’

It was late at night when Alina’s resentment echoed through Ifühl Counter’s office.

She was the only one left at the reception. The others were also supposed to have unfinished paperwork to catch up on, but they all went home early, using the disturbance caused by the Clay Golem as an excuse.

‘Well… I’m not sure what to say, but chin up, miss Alina.’

Alina grimaced as best she could as she glared at the man who’d uttered those ill-considered words.

‘I thought I told you to get lost. Why are you here?’

Needless to say, the person sitting at the desk next to Alina’s was Jade Skleid.

Had he been but an unrelated adventurer, Alina would have promptly reported him to the guild and had him escorted off the premises, but for being the leader of the Blades and therefore holding a position equivalent to the top brass of the guild, he was entitled to be in the reception office normally off-limits to all but authorised personnel. Of course, a member of the elite dungeon raiding party would normally have no business being in such a place.

‘I mean, can’t you just go home? All the others went.’

‘Go home? And leave these mountains of paperwork behind? You’re right. I used to be like that, putting off work for another day when I didn’t feel like it.’

‘Eh?’

‘But then I realised! A debt incurred today must be repaid tomorrow. The longer you postpone your work, the more it piles up. Besides, you’ll never feel like doing it, no matter how much you put it off. That’s why I’m finishing it now! And I’m going home on time tomorrow!!’

‘I had no idea you were such a serious person, miss Alina.’

‘Anyway, all the inns are booked up with people like me who’ve lost their homes. At least here I have a complete sleeping set prepared, so I might as well.’

‘You have a sleeping set at work? That’s… Hmm? Wait a minute, if you don’t have a place to stay, wouldn’t it be better if you slept at my—’

‘I’d rather spend a million night at work before I’d spend one at yours.’

‘You hate it that much?’

‘Yes! Like I said, you’re pissing me off, so get lost already!’

‘I don’t wanna. There may be guys out there who’ll take advantage of the reconstruction chaos to do bad things. You can’t expect me to leave a young woman on her own, now can you? I’ll wait here until you’ve finished your work.’

Alina shot a glance more murderous than usual at Jade, who was grinning gleefully as though the words he’d just uttered could justify his behaviour, before moving her gaze to the document on her desk.

‘I’ve told you before that that’s none of your concern. If a weird guy comes in, I’ll beat him up myself.’

‘Well, that may be so—By the way, miss Alina, I’m done with this stack.’

‘Huh?! Already?!’

Hearing Jade’s shocking report, Alina jumped to her feet, kicking her chair over with a clatter.

Jade had been hanging around Alina since a while ago, not only annoying her with his presence but also pestering her about wanting to help with her overtime work, so she gave him a stack of documents and a cursory explanation and left him to his own devices.

‘Also, there were a couple of omissions and mistakes here and there, so I fixed them.’

Alina took the documents with trembling hands and leafed through them. She was at a loss for words. In her hands was a stack of perfectly processed documents, as though they had been prepared by a veteran receptionist.

He’s fast! Even though I only taught him the bare essentials! Everything is meticulously done, and he even thought about the sorting order and put it together in a neat bundle. He’s even finished double-checking it!

Alina’s eyes widened in shock, her complexion turning paler than if she were facing a ferocious monster.

When it comes to office work, each task is plain, simple, and monotonous. The problem lies in the sheer volume of work. What’s more, guild commissions are a public affair, so even minor errors or omissions are not tolerated.

It’s safe to say that doing commission work, which involves dealing with mountains of paperwork on a daily basis, is a test of strength. Can you take a mountain of documents, process them flawlessly, check them again, and catch any mistakes? Before you can call yourself a fully-fledged receptionist, you need to be able to carry out the document checks that few people tend to bother with, perfectly and without looking down on them.

Not only did he complete this many documents in such a short amount of time without a single mistake, he was also able to maintain a high level of concentration when it’s so close to midnight! What toughness! This man, he’s good!

Grasping the stack of documents, Alina bit down on her lip and fell silent for a few seconds. Shooting a glance at Jade, she sat back down.

‘Hey. Have you done this kind of work before?’

‘No? I’m fully devoted to the adventurer’s life. Well, I sometimes read instruction books to help me learn new sword and shield stances and such, but I’ve never had any reason to do office work.’

Alina’s face hardened at Jade’s nonchalant reply.

I see how it is. He’s the type of skilful guy who, with only a little understanding, can do most things right from the start without making any mistakes.

At the other end of the spectrum was Alina, who was the clumsy type who needs to experience every pitfall and make every mistake at least once in order to learn.

The paperwork Jade had just completed took Alina over half a year to perfect. As she felt her pride as a receptionist being torn to shreds she barely managed to mutter under her breath:

‘You piss me off… People like you piss me off the most!!’

‘Eh? What are you—’

‘It’s skilful guys like you, who just barge in and instantly outdo the three years of pain and tears of working hard as a receptionist, that piss me off the most!!!’

As she shouted Alina collapsed on her paper-littered desk and started pounding it with her fists.

‘Why does the world have to be so unfair?!’

‘C—calm down, miss Alina. It’s not that I’m amazing, you’re just that good at teaching!’

‘Uuuuhhh. I can’t take it anymore. Today has taught me that people are born unequal. I don’t want to do anything anymore. I can’t do my best anymore…’

‘All right, miss Alina, leave the rest to me and go to sleep. I’ll take care of everything!’

‘My pride as a receptionist won’t allow for that!’

Alina scowled resentfully at Jade with eyes on the verge of tears. It was at that moment that they heard the sound of something hard falling to the ground.

Alina looked at the source of the sound. A half-broken red stone glowed faintly in the lamplight, a sun-shaped magic circle just barely visible inside. It was a fragment of the red orb that she crushed to intimidate Jade the other day.

‘Isn’t this the red orb you broke before?’

Jade’s eyes followed Alina’s and, remembering the fear he felt that day, his face turned a light shade of pale. Snivelling, Alina picked up the fragment.

‘That’s right. It was just the right size for a paperweight.’

‘You used a priceless relic as a paperweight?’

‘What’s wrong with that?’

‘I didn’t say there– Hmm? Doesn’t it look like there’s something written inside?’

As Alina picked up the fragment, Jade seemed to notice something in the cracked cross-section and pointed at it quizzically. Responding to his question, Alina turned the fragment over and noticed the small golden letters inscribed within.

‘You’re right, there’s something written here. But how did you manage to see these tiny letters from that distance?’

‘I told you before. I have good eyes.’

Now that he said it, thanks to his good eyes Alina’s side job as an adventurer got exposed. Alina grimaced at the unpleasant memory as she read out the tiny golden writing.

‘“Quest…commission…”?’

The moment she spoke those familiar-sounding words, the fragment began to emit a strong light.

‘Get down!’

The blinding light made Alina avert her eyes. Jade reacted quickly, knocking the orb out of her hand and forcibly pulling her behind his back.

‘Whoa, hey!’

The red orb fragment fell down to the ground, only to float back up again, glowing brightly as golden letters flew out in a spiral pattern.

‘What on earth?!’

The golden letters gathered in orderly lines in the air, forming sentences.

‘W—what the hell is this? A commission form?’

Jade’s eyebrows furrowed as he read the airborne words. Alina too, upon reading the words which, despite the flamboyant way they appeared were intrinsically familiar to her, blinked her eyes in confusion.

Adventurer’s rank: Unspecified

Location: The Tower of Chalk

Condition of fulfilment: Defeat every floor boss

Nota Bene: the commissioner is unspecified. The signature of the commissioned is not required.

As per the above, the quest commission is approved.

After a brief moment, the golden letters vanished in a puff, and the fragment lost its light. Returning to its original state, it fell to the floor, leaving nought but silence.

Alina stared at the wordless red orb for several dozen seconds before muttering in disbelief:

‘I must be tired.’

‘Miss Alina, this isn’t a dream.’

Jade carefully picked up the fragment. There wasn’t a shadow left of the golden inscription.

‘That just now. Whichever way you look at it, that was a commission form, right?’

‘Well, I suppose it was.’

Both Jade and Alina have seen more commission forms than they can count. There was no way they would mistake one. What the golden words mentioned was no different from an an ordinary dungeon quest. Excluding the fact that it came flying out of a relic.

‘A quest commission from a relic? For starters, I’ve never even heard of a dungeon called the Tower of Chalk.’

‘Right. What a queer little mystery this is. Well, I’m giving you this weird relic, so from here it’s up to you and your Silver Blades.’

‘Miss Alina, you’re clearly trying to pretend you didn’t see it, right?’

‘Of course I am. No way I’m getting involved in this troublesome-looking business.’

‘…’

‘Oh don’t look at me like you have something to say. I’m a receptionist with a lot of work to do. You can see the piles of paperwork, right? This has nothing to do with me!’

As Alina shouted, jade let out a resigned sigh and intently stared at the red relic.

‘Well, I suppose that’s true. For the time being, I should investigate this thing first.’