Chapter 109
In Gren's mind, this was his chance to make things right. If the FMC could get rid of the cancer plaguing the slums then Gren could begin to rebuild it. The low quality homes could slowly be replaced with high quality homes built by the system. With him being the owner of the properties, Gren would be able to offer them the lowest prices possible.
"So, which guild are we going after next? You're the leader on this mission." Gren hadn't thought of who to go after next and Annie could tell. "If I were in charge I would head south with our group and deal with the Head Crushers. They're the only group with the numbers to threaten us and it would be better to confront them before our group becomes tired. There's"
The Head Crushers were mostly demihumans which was rare for a mercenary guild but they started off as bad as the rest. The guild master had a taste for beautiful women but he was a poor and ugly orc so n.o.body wanted to be with him. It was an almost sad story if you ignored him robbing people in the past to hire a disgraced alchemist to create potions for him to distribute. Regular citizens couldn't afford to go to a healer and his healing potions used addictive ingredients that got people hooked on them. He ended up getting people hooked on his addictive potions and then spent the money in brothels or to buy s.e.x slaves so his guild never grew to compete with the larger ones even though he had been operating for the last twenty five years.
"Alright. The Head Crushers it is." Gren wasn't so worried about them because their profile didn't show anything serious lately beyond the addictive potions. "So, which way do we go to get there?" Gren knew it was to the south but the road they were on went from east to west.
Annie was annoyed by Gren's lack of preparation but decided to help him out anyways. She also wanted to clear the slums so going against him now would be pointless. "Follow me. Next time try to read the doc.u.ments that Jessica prepared for us before heading out to the mission." Gren did skim through the doc.u.ments but they referenced the names of shops and Gren didn't know the place well enough to know where those shops were.
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Gren was surprised to see that the guild manufacturing illegal potions used an inn as its headquarters. The name wasn't even close to being related to crus.h.i.+ng heads and was instead a very boring name: Old Town Inn. There were no symbols that showed that it was related to the Head Crushers like how the homes owned by the Happy Homes Guild had their logos on them. "Are you sure that this is the right place?" Gren felt it was odd that an orc ran an inn; pure-blooded orcs weren't exactly hospitable according to the stories he had heard. There were even groups of them still in the wild taming goblins to fight for them and they hadn't accepted the treaties with kingdoms like the goblin tribes run by hobgoblins did.
"Yeah, this is the place. The guild wasn't earning enough money with his potions to keep them going so his favorite s.e.x slave convinced him to create a different business. It's entirely run by his s.e.x slaves so don't try flirting with anybody in there." Annie needed to add one more jab in so that she'd be satisfied. "You know, none of this would be new to you if just read the doc.u.ments." Gren thought that perhaps skimming through them wasn't enough if he missed something so important.
It'd be bad if he continued to keep making a fool of himself so Gren did something that was unexpected for him; he thought about the best course of action for their group to take. "You know more about the mission than I do. I think it'd be better if you took control from here so that we don't make any mistakes."
Annie was a bit surprised at Gren's words but quickly got started on giving commands to the others. Gren was told to stay outside and that he'd be given more to do later if negotiations fell through. In reality, Annie was probably just keeping him away from the inn to prevent him from meeting the women that work there. Gren wouldn't do anything to them but it's not like he had the best of reputations when it came to women.
The group going in consisted of only women, including Jasmine. Annie had the idea of using the guild master's obsession to get him to agree to a temporary treaty; he wouldn't interfere with them in
During the wait, Gren looked around at the people that were gathering to watch their group. The only people that didn't seem frightened by their presence were the children that had not yet learned to fear their fellow man. Gren could spot some people with injuries in the crowd and wondered if any of them were his fault. "Let Jasmine know that I'll be just over there when she comes back." Even if the injuries weren't Gren's fault, offering to heal the people for free might improve the FMC's image.
As Gren approached the crowd, they backed away and made s.p.a.ce for him to pa.s.s by. His destination was the crowd itself so their act of courtesy towards him wasn't appreciated. He couldn't heal anybody if they didn't let him get near them. There was one child, however, that failed to move. They seemed to be looking... searching for someone or something and was in a bit of a panic. "Are you alright?" Gren got down on one knee and talked to the child at their level. "You seem lost. Do you need help?"
"My brother's gone." The child was on the verge of tears but was holding them back. It would be difficult for the child to find their own brother with eyes that didn't work. "He said that he was going to be wearing a brown hat today. Do you see him?"
"No, I don't think I see him around here." There were two people with brown hats but one was a woman and the other was an old man. Neither of which looked like they'd be this child's brother. "Did you move from where you were with him last?"
"I think so. Some people kept b.u.mping into me." That might have been the crowd that was gathered by Gren's group. Either way, it wasn't good for the child to be alone. "I'm not sure where I am now."
"You're near the Old Town Inn." The child didn't seem to know where that was located so Gren ran into a dead end. "Give me a moment. I'll make something real quick that should help him find you." There were a few things that Gren wanted to make and one of them would come in handy now. Most megaphones used a circuit board so the stingy system wouldn't let Gren build them; however, it did have old radios, microphones, and speakers which could be modified into something like those megaphones while being somewhat portable. To power it, Gren used a square battery pack that could be easily removed. The child couldn't see the device appear from nowhere so he wasn't shocked like the onlookers were.
"Alright. Just give me a moment to test it out and I'll let you use it next, okay?" Gren flipped the switch on the main body of the radio and set it down before holding up the megaphone part of it. "Testing. Testing." The audio was a bit loud so Gren turned down the volume slightly before handing the megaphone to the child. "Just hold this part and call out for your brother."
"Armand! Where are you!? I'm in front of the Old Town Inn!" Gren was glad that he turned down the volume since the kid's yelling was much louder than his testing. It still hurt his ears but it could have been worse.
It took a while for the child's brother to get there so they talked while waiting. He revealed that his name is Emile and that the two of them were staying in someone's stable after their parents died. Although Emile spoke of Armand like he was some superhero, Gren could figure out that Armand was overworking himself. Constantly working just to provide the two of them sc.r.a.ps of food was unsustainable.
When Armand arrived, he was limping and looked beaten up. His boots were missing, his clothes were torn, and the brown hat was nowhere to be seen. "Emile! There you are, I've been looking for you."
"Thank you for helping me, mister." Emile gave a small bow in Gren's general direction before turning towards his brother. "Armand, this guy let me use this thing that made my voice really loud." Emile was excited but Armand became wary when he noticed Gren in his conspicuous armor; he had been too focused on his little brother to pay attention to his surroundings so he hadn't seen him earlier.
"Greetings. I'm Gren. Do you mind talking with me for a bit?" Something clearly happened to him and Gren was planning on doing something about it. "Shenzi! Grab a couple of people and go buy some food for these two!"
"We don't need your charity. We can buy our own food." Armand was being stubborn but it was good that he didn't trust others. "Come on, Emile, let's go home."
"Don't consider it charity; think of it as an investment. Emile has been telling me about you and I'd like to offer you a job." Gren's words made Armand stop. "You sound like a hard worker and my guild is looking for young people to join. Anybody under sixteen can join our Juniors program and get paid to train under us."
"That sounds too good to be true. What's the catch?" There was no catch but Armand wouldn't believe it if Gren just said that.
Gren needed to figure out how to convince Armand that this was something that benefited the guild in some way. "You need to be part of the guild for up to one year. The only way to get out of the contract early is to get the approval of your instructors. Everything will be provided for you and your family during this time and you can keep the armor and weapons we provide you with after your time is up. I hope that, even if you don't join the guild after your year is up, you at least get used to using our products."
"I'd need to think about it. Which guild are you a part of?" Gren forgot that the golden armor didn't have any logo on it.
"The Flours Mercenary Company. We've been doing pretty well so we're expanding right now." Gren spotted Shenzi and two of the independent mercenaries they hired for this mission carrying some sacks towards him and the two boys. "The food's here already. I still need to talk to you alone about something so why don't we let Emile eat with the others over there?"
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Gren healed Armand's injuries and gave him a new outfit before talking with him. When asked about what happened to him, Armand told Gren about some of the boys his age joining a local guild. It seemed odd to talk about the boys at first but it turned out that they were the ones that beat him and took his pocket change and shoes. The stable they were in was shared but he had a hiding spot where he kept most of his money so he really didn't need Gren's charity.
When Gren noticed his wife and sister leaving the inn, he decided to wrap things up with Armand. "I'll have some of our mercenaries bring you home. If you make up your mind and want to join us then just stop by the guild. We're located in the center of the southern market streets. If you're ever hungry then feel free to come over for some food." Gren realized that there were more hungry kids out there so he came up with a plan. "Let the other orphaned kids know that they can get a free meal from us. We can't give more than one meal per day since that'd be too much work for the people cooking food but it's better than nothing."
"Who's your new friend?" Annie came up to Gren and put her arm on his shoulder but he was taller than her so she had to reach up to hold on to him.
"This is Armand. That's his brother, Emile, over there. I was just inviting him to take part in the FMC Juniors program. He hasn't made up his mind yet so I was going to have a few people go with him since he was attacked earlier." Annie hadn't yet said anything about what was going on with the Head Crushers so Gren was curious. "How did it go inside of the inn. Did they agree?"
"Yeah, the owner has agreed to stay out of our way but we needed to promise him something to make sure that he keeps up to his side. In a couple of months you'll need to help heal one of his wives when they give birth. The previous healer that he hired didn't do a good job and one of his wives died giving birth so I think we can be sure that he won't attack us." Gren didn't mind healing someone since he always did it for free anyways but he still wasn't sure if that would be enough to stop the Head Crushers from working with other guilds. "We'll be splitting off into three different groups to take out the remaining guilds in Old Town. You, Jasmine, and myself will be leading the teams. I'll be taking Ahk, Luna, Midna, and Gallia so think about who you want to bring with you while reviewing the doc.u.ments about the organization known as Returning Heaven. Jasmine will take the rest with her to deal with her target so don't take them all."
Picking out mercenaries was always the tough part for Gren. He wasn't good at thinking about who would be necessary since he wasn't much of a tactician or strategist. That being said, going in blind would make things worse so the first thing he had to do was read those doc.u.ments more thoroughly. "We're going to be meeting up at the eastern market fountain when we're done with our part. Try your hardest to finish before it gets dark but don't get yourself or the mercenaries killed. I'll go talk to Jasmine about her part in this mission real quick."
"Understood. I don't think I'll have any problems but I'll take whatever precautions I can." Annie walked off to go talk to Jasmine, leaving Gren with Armand. "Before anything else, I need to get you and your brother home safely."