Ch#159
Selina continued brightly.
"I've been looking into the empire's mercenary groups lately."
Tie focused intently on Selina.
"Turns out, the neighbors in Trebaga have a whopping twenty-three members."
"Twenty-three peop...?"
"Tie, do you know how Talochioum Empire defines a large-scale mercenary group?"
Tie shook her head.
Selina straightened her shoulders and went on.
"They say you need at least five mid-sized mana stone sieges per quarter, and more than twenty members excluding the leader, to register as a large-scale mercenary group."
Tie hesitantly raised one hand.
"But what's so good about being a large-scale mercenary group?"
"Oh my god, Tie."
Selina answered as if sharing a secret.
"The name sounds cooler!"
"The name?"
"Yes! Just like how Tani Pang and Royal Tani Pang are divided by rank, mercenary groups are split into regular ones and large-scale ones."
"Large-scale mercenary group......"
"So Trebaga would want to merge with Agavert, right? Agavert's just a regular group, but they're large-scale."
Tie, struck with realization, gulped.
Thinking about it, everything Selina said was right.
Of course, Agavert had Lucarion, Ppuppue, and Marbas besides the members.
But they were Tie's summons, not officially registered members.
Raoul, who had been watching, hesitantly chimed in.
"Still, numbers aren't everything compared to skill......"
"Yeah! We need to recruit members."
At that moment, Tie cut Raoul off.
Tie, with her arm bandaged, began circling the sofa.
"Let's gather twenty quickly! We need to become a large-scale mercenary group too!"
Basto pressed his forehead. Veil let out a "Ha" and stared at Tie.
But Tie ran to Basto with an innocent face.
"Uncle Basto! Where do you get members from?"
The child's green eyes were sparkling again before they knew it.
"Should Tie put up a sign saying 'Recruiting members' on the street? Right?"
Basto let out a short sigh and stood.
But surprisingly, he answered kindly.
"There are quite a few ways."
Basto knew by now.
Tie was the type to see things through no matter what if she set her mind to it.
No point in telling her to rest; she wouldn't listen.
She'd just mope around where everyone could see.
"Promise to take just one week off from the tutorial hall, and I'll find new members for you."
Shock spread across Tie's face.
"Tuto... tutorial hall... for a whole week...!"
But resolve settled in the agonizing child's eyes.
"Okay!"
Basto finally chuckled at such a Tie.
He stroked her fluffy head and thought.
'Yeah. Expanding the mercenary group was already planned anyway.'
Basto recalled a few mercenary introduction offices in his mind.
* * *
The next day.
Large posters went up at mercenary introduction offices across the empire.
"Hey, did you see that?! The Necromancer King is recruiting members!"
Mercenaries browsing the offices chattered excitedly.
"Saw the conditions? They make you swear secrecy about the Necromancer King's identity."
"Swear? Isn't that some tough magic?"
"What're you worried about? The Necromancer King's a mage, so she'll cast it herself. Hey, you gonna apply? They said you can borrow a communication orb here to contact them."
"What? Agavert already has communication orbs?!"
"A group with a base in the capital—how wouldn't they? I'm gonna apply this time."
For a full day, mercenaries wanting to join Agavert poured into the offices nonstop.
Meanwhile, at the base, Raoul and Enzo handled the nonstop ringing communication orbs.
"Yes. Please tell me your name, age, and main weapon first."
Raoul took the applicants' calls, and Enzo neatly wrote them down on paper.
Once the call ended, Enzo slowly read the info aloud.
"<Piconto Mercenary Group>'s Russ Samuel. Age thirty-two."
"Hmm, one moment?"
Selina beside him opened a thick binder.
Marbas had used his mana to create special magnifying glasses.
With them, they could quickly find any name in the hundreds of pages.
[Here it is!]
This binder of mercenary info came from Tie contacting Pearl City's governor Marianne Weibril.
Marianne reached out to her mother, Marquis Weibril, who promptly sent people to Tie's base with all the info they had.
"Russ Samuel was in a Northern Continent knight order before joining Piconto? Dishonorably discharged."
Enzo took the file at Selina's words.
"Really. Let me see the reason......"
Enzo burst out laughing.
"Embezzlement. And leaking internal knight order info on top?"
Raoul, Enzo, Selina, and Marbas exchanged glances.
The four said in unison.
"Rejected."
No sooner had they crumpled the paper than the communication orb rang again.
* * *
"Aaaah!"
"Help! Everyone run!"
In the pitch-black outskirts.
A fierce battle between monsters and a mercenary group raged.
"R-R-Retreat! Regroup at the village entrance, ugh-!"
Flying monsters attacked the fleeing mercenaries.
The mercenaries crawled desperately under bushes and behind trees to survive.
"Should've... listened to the leader. How could we siege a mid-sized one?!"
The wounded mercenaries shed tears.
"We promised to return alive......"
Faces of family and lovers left back home flashed before their eyes.
Then.
Wingbeats of monsters rapidly approached from afar.
As they squeezed their eyes shut, sensing death—
"What a mess here, total mess."
Light flashed in the forest, and something appeared between the trees.
"Brother Veil, what's a mess? Everyone's fighting hard—don't use bad words."
"Can't call a mess anything but a mess?"
"Eee, Tie hates nagging!"
A few mercenaries who had squeezed their eyes shut peeked out from behind trees. Their mouths fell open.
In the midst of monsters rampaging through the forest stood four in black cloaks, chatting loudly.
Pink embroidery of unknown meaning beneath the cloaks.
Unmistakably Agavert.
"Kkamangi will catch the sparrow monsters!"
The mercenaries gulped at the sight of the brightly shouting child among them.
"Necromancer King...?"
A gust swept through the forest at once.
Branches bent sharply to one side, and hazy wraiths began swarming in.
"Kieeeek-!"
The wraiths pierced the hearts of ground-crawling monsters like they'd been waiting.
As monsters fell, skeletons rose from the earth and dragged them down.
Nordics, watching leisurely, said.
"Must be lots of wounded around here. Veil, help me out."
"Old man, seriously! I'm busy too! Gotta collect the cores!"
"You can do that slowly later."
As Nordics entered the forest with emergency meds, Veil grumbled and followed.
The mercenaries watched silently as Agavert swiftly cleaned up the battlefield.
But that wasn't all.
An hour later, they looked up at the figure before them with even more shocked faces.
Tie, floating midair shrouded in black smoke, said.
"So, if you join Agavert...!"
While dangling Oblivion's Sanctity in one hand.
* * *
A few weeks later.
"Blood ties through merger?"
Trebaga's base.
Aleric said as he entered Tese tan's messy office.
Tese tan, leaning back in his chair, opened his eyes.
The Ring of Covenant was already tightly fitted on his wrist.
