Karen and I were standing in front of wanted notices, the guard hoping we would recognise someone. Anyone. Honestly, I had only met a few people outside of the mercenaries so I wasn't expecting much. It’d be one thing if one of the mercenaries were on these notices but… I probably wouldn’t tell that to the guard. I’d first talk with Korwen.

But despite my very low expectations, I found a familiar face. And no matter the angle II looked at this piece of paper, it was, without a doubt familiar.

This is her, isn’t t? Looks a little… older, I think, though. Anyway, I can’t say I am surprised about finding her here but…  wow.

Below the picture—a fairly well-drawn portrait, I had to admit—was a list of crimes she was wanted for. And well… it was long. Very long.

“Ah, you found that notice.”
“Nn?”

The guard who had been standing to the side until now had come up to me, chuckling as he looked at the notice.

“Don’t take that one too seriously. I don’t know why we have to put it up, either. It’s just a fairy tale, after all. The Witch isn’t real. So why would we even look for her?”
“... Nn, you’re right.”

Not real… I had completely forgotten that, for most people, she was just that. A fairy tale. A fictitious character in a story.

I glanced at the portrait-like picture again. It was the spitting image of Yumias. Her expression was a lot calmer and more mature and she looked a little older than usual, but there was little doubt in my mind that it was her. I was aware that she could change the age she appeared as, so she might have looked like this in the past.

I have to admit, whoever made this portrait did a damn good job. She looks great on it.

If I had met her when she was like this, like a mature, maybe gentle woman, I might have had a different impression of her.

While I was absorbed in admiring the portrait, the guard next to me continued speaking.

“Even if she was real, no way any person could rack up that kind of track record. Not even a dragon would be that bad!”

Sure, the track record was… fairly crazy. It went from petty crimes like pickpocketing to serious ones like murder. There were even some crimes I wasn’t familiar with.

“Nn, what is Spirit killing?”
“Huh? You don’t know? Seriously?”
“Nn.”
“Really? I thought everyone knew that.”
“... Well, I’m coming from fairly far away so…”
“Ah, you were a foreigner? That explains it then!”

It wasn’t a lie, technically. Different worlds were pretty much the definition of ‘far away,’ right?”

“Well, it refers to the act of killing a spirit.”
“Uh-huh.”
“...”
“...”
And? Maybe… a little more?

Alas, no further explanation. I probably wasn’t going to get any more elaboration on that from him.

“Then, what about this mana corruption?”

I pointed at another unfamiliar term among those crimes.

“It’s when someone corrupts mana.”
“...”
“...”
“That’s it?”

I couldn’t help but blurt out at the lack of explanation.

“I’m no magician, you’ve got to ask someone else about that.”
“... Ahhh.”

That was true… I was used to having people around me who knew about things like that.

“Sorry.”
“It’s fine, it’s fine. It’s good for kids to be curious! Hahaha!”

Glad he wasn’t angry. Still, I gently pushed away the hand that had landed on my head.

Sorry, but I barely know you. That’s a little too close for comfort.

He seemed a little surprised but just chuckled at it in the end. And next to me, Karen was staring at him. Not that he noticed. Probably better for him.

Even though she doesn’t mind when the captain or the others do it.

Made me wonder why she was displeased this time. Maybe for the same reason I pushed him away in the first place. Anyway, she was still staring at him…

“Sis, we didn’t look over there yet.”

I pulled on her sleeve, drawing her attention away.

“Huh? Ah, yes!”

We took a look at the other end of the notice-filled wall.

“Nn… Nope, never seen any of these people. Do you see anyone familiar, Sis?”
“No… Fortunately I don’t.”

Considering our limited relationships, that was indeed fortunate. Though we did end up seeing Yumias… I wouldn’t mind all that much if they threw her into a cell, though. Okay, maybe a tiny bit. I still had a lot to ask her.

“But there are a lot of people that are wanted. I wonder how many…”

There might be more than a hundred of these notices… Honestly, even if someone knew one of these criminals, I doubted people would spend the time looking through every single notice… Unless they had a ton of time on hand.

Wait, is that why he asked us to look through them? Because people wouldn’t do it otherwise?

Maybe they should start cleaning them up a little…

“Excuse me, Mr guard, I have a question.”

Karen turned to the guard.

“Yes, what is it?”
“I couldn’t help but see a lot of demonkin and humans among these wanted notices. But most people in Lafria are beastkin, so I wondered why so many of them are put up here. Did they come from the outside to Auria?”
“Huh? Oh, no, no, those aren’t only from Auria! They’re probably from Aldreigh or Krohmea. I think we had some from Bruven and the Empire, too. Maybe some from further east, too?”
“...”

I paused, looking over at the guard. Then at the wall, full of wanted notices, then back at the guard.

“These are… from all over? Not just Auria?”
“Of course not! If we had that many criminals, I’d’ve long fled this place, hahaha!”
“...”

The guard laughed.

“... Just for the record, which ones are from Auria?”
“Oh, probably those over there.”

He pointed towards the end of the nigh-endless sea of criminals. Three notices hung there.

“... Wanted for thievery. Wanted for fraud. Wanted for thievery, again.”

This… was a joke, was it?

“... I guess it’s fairly peaceful here, after all.”
“We’re making sure it stays that way!”

That’s great… I suppose.

“Boy, what idiocy are you doing here?”
“S— Sir?!”

From behind us, a man called out to the guard, who immediately stood at attention. It was the same man we had seen earlier when we were checking on Alma. Speaking of Alma, she was behind him, looking exhausted.

“Thank you for waiting, ladies. We are done with our questions. Everything is in order and Miss Alma can return now.”
“I take that as there were no issues?”
“None that were her direct fault, no.”

So, there were issues. Okay, having that phantom ship appear was probably a fairly big issue. And it was true that it wasn’t directly Alma’s fault.

“Boy, did you inquire about the matter with our guest?”
“Yes, Sir! They confirmed her identity and agreed to ta— to escort her back!”
“Good. Then, ladies, I wish you a fruitful time in Auria. As long as you are following the law, you can always request our assistance. Now then, I will excuse myself.”

He gave us a light nod before he turned around and left. Barely was he out of sight, the guard next to us nearly slumped over.

“Damn, that surprised me! The Captain sure knows how to appear out of nowhere! That’s bad for the heart!”
“So that was the guard captain?”
“Yeah, yeah! Our boss.”

Their captain, huh? The guards’ boss was also called captain… made sense, somehow. A little confusing for me, since for me, the ‘captain’ was Korwen.

“Anyway, since your friend is back, I’d like to ask what you intend to do with our guest now.”

The little elf, huh… That depended on a certain person, though.

“Huh? Guest? What are you all talking about?”

The exhausted Alma looked at us, unable to follow the topic.

“Nn, they got an elf in the back that they… picked up. It’s probably one of the elves that came with us, so they want us to bring her back.”
“That so? Doesn’t sound like much of an issue to me?”
“Well, that’s wonderful. Then you won’t mind bringing her back with you, right?”
“Eh?!”

Ha, she wasn’t expecting that, was she? But sorry, Alma, it was our chance to have a day off. I wasn’t going to let any other things come in between us and a fun time.

“I guess I can… I do owe you for accompanying me. Sure, will do it.”
“Oh?”

I was a little surprised. Didn’t expect her to agree so quickly.

“Then, you that… boy guard? Show me where she is!”
“I’m a grown man, no boy!”
“Your boss called you a boy, though!”
“That’s because he is my boss!”

Admittedly, he was a bit too old to be called a boy. Not that it really mattered to me.

“Sure, sure, just bring her to me. I’ll make sure to get her back to the camp.”
“I hope so… Please follow me.”
“Mm. Yumi, Karen, see you later!”
“Nn, until later.”

Alma and the guard both left to get the elven girl, leaving Karen and me behind.

“I guess that’s that. Err, we can leave now, can we?”

They had just left us in the middle of the hallway like it was nothing…

Sorry, Mr Guard, but just leaving your guests alone in the middle of the hallway isn’t quite so great. I guess your boss calls you ‘boy’ for a reason.

Well, if he got into problems for that, that wasn’t my fault then.

“I think it should be fine if we leave…” said Karen, sounding equally unsure.
“Nn… Let’s just go. Alma is taking care of the elven girl for us.”
“Mmm… Okay.”

After thinking about it for a second, Karen nodded and agreed to it.

“Great! We took quite a detour, but let’s get our day off started!”
“Hehe, yes, let’s.”

With newfound vigor, Karen and I left the guard station. We said our farewell to the two guards standing guard in front and then walked back in the direction of the port. It didn’t take long until we were back in the middle of the lively town.

“Now then! Any ideas where we should go, Sis?”
“No, not really, to be honest. I don’t know what we could find in this town in the first place.”
“Ugh, good point.”

In my old world, I could have just looked up what a city or town had to offer. It didn’t matter where I was and it took only a short moment, too. But here, it wasn’t quite so easy. In Larfas, we had asked around beforehand but we didn’t do it this time. Mostly because of how sudden our holiday had come at us. Although, we had randomly walked around in Larfas as well.

“How about we just stroll around for a while first? Or we can ask someone about the town,” I suggested.
“Not like there’s much else we can do.”
“Well, yeah.”

I looked over the harbour area. The fish market was still going on. Men and women calling out to potential customers, presenting their fish. Most likely a few that were trying to trick unassuming outsiders as well. Like with us.

We had already seen the fish market when we were here with Korwen and Taddick, so I wasn’t particularly curious about it anymore. However, there was something nearby that I wanted to see.

“Hey, Sis, how about we go over there?”
“Over there? Oh, the boats?”
“Nn.”

The pier was right next to the fish market, and there were still boats coming in. Even from here, I could see the fishermen steering the boats into port, unloading them or making merry after finishing their work.

“Then let’s take a look.”

Karen took my hand and we walked leisurely in the direction of the pier. We garnered a few curious gazes from others—maybe because female mercenaries were fairly rare, or maybe because we were holding hands—but most people quickly went about their way again.

“Woah, those boats are big.”

As we arrived at the pier, the boats we had only seen from afar were now right in front of us. And now that I got a good look at them, they were far bigger than I had expected. You could easily place a few wagons on one of these boats, with space to spare.

“They really are. And look, Yumi.”

Karen pointed at a boat that was just coming in. It didn’t look much different from the others, apart from their haul in the back. A giant mountain of fish, held together by a net.

“Is that all fish?”
“Nn, looks like it.”
“... Who is going to eat all of that?”
“Good question.”

If every single boat brought such an amount of fish back… Then again, a town like this consumed a lot and with fish being a staple here, they probably needed that much.

While we watched, the boat came to a halt and the fishermen threw a rope over to the pier, securing the boat in place. Three men jumped off the board and went to the back of the pier, where a wooden tower stood.

“Huh, what are they doing?”
“I wonder.”

Two of the men seemed to be doing something to the tower… they were securing something with a rope and then pulling on the rope…

“Ah, it’s a crane!”

A wooden arm rose up from the ground and up the tower. The third man had climbed up the tower in the meantime, waiting for the crane arm to come up. I didn’t know what he was doing then, though, since I couldn’t quite see it. Maybe he was securing the arm. Or, judging by the slight amount of mana I could see up there, maybe something different? Either way, it was definitely some kind of magical tool then.

“A crane? What’s that?”
“Nn? It’s a tool to lift heavy things.”
“Really?”
“Nn.”

Karen frowned a little. Apparently, she had never seen a crane before.

The men had finished setting up the crane. A small rope with a hook dangled from the end of the crane arm now. They turned it over the boat and lowered the hook. The men on the boat caught the hook and secured it on the net. And barely a moment later, the hook rose again, pulling on the net.

“Huh? Wait, won’t the tower break if they do that?”
“It’ll be fine, Sis. Just watch.”

The net stretched to the limit and slowly, very slowly the net with the fishermen’s haul rose up. The crane creaked under the weight but it held up. And moments later, the net floated in the air.

“No way. Isn’t that heavy?”
“Nn, it is. That’s why they have the crane.”

Honestly, there were probably magicians who could also lift masses like that. Heck, I wouldn’t be surprised if Karen could lift that. But most of these fishermen were normal people. That’s why they needed a tool like that.

“I thought they would carry them in crates out or something like that…”
“Well, they might do that if they have no crane. But this is way easier, right?”
“Yeah.”

The crane slowly turned around, the net with the catch now hovering over the ground. At some point, someone had brought a large cart and put it next to the crane. They lowered the catch on the wagon. Again, we could hear the wagon creak under the weight. But like the crane, it held up.

“Hehe, it’s quite a sight.”
“It is…”

We watched as the fishermen drove the cart towards the sorting hall, for, well, sorting and processing.

“Yumi.”
“Nn?”
“Did the people of your place do it like this as well?”
“Well…”

I smiled wryly, remembering the images I could vaguely remember. Large ports with mechanised cranes hauling containers all over the place. I couldn’t remember anything about fishing boats in particular, but it probably wasn’t too different.

“They did. They had large metal cranes that could haul large containers. They could transport goods from all over the place. I’m not too sure about fishing, but I don’t think it’s too different. Well, I could be wrong, though.”
“Large metal cranes? Larger than this one?”
“Nn, way way larger. Larger than any building here.”
“... I can’t even imagine that.”
“Hehe, I guess it would sound fairly crazy.”

It definitely was amazing.

“It does sound convenient, though.”

As we continued watching, the fishermen cleaned up the boat and then sat down to take a rest. We could hear them laughing and chatting, talking about their catch of the day.

“Yumi. Look, they’re waving.”
“Nn?”

Some of the fishermen had noticed us watching and they were waving in our direction.

“Yumi, should we wave back?”
“Nn, let’s.”

We raised our arms and waved back at them. The fishermen laughed heartily in response.

After waving for a bit, I turned to Karen.

“Should we go?”
“Sure.”

Still holding hands, the two of us then left the fishermen to their merrymaking.

I wonder what else we can see here, in Auria.