Chapter 66: The Goblin King of Commerce

The journey back to the capital was, for Silas, a slow, agonizing march through the five stages of grief. He’d skipped Denial and Anger and was currently oscillating wildly between Bargaining and Depression, with a brief layover in Acceptance that this was, in fact, his new, terrible life.

He was covered in a fine layer of glitter-ash. His legendary silver hair, which was supposed to flow majestically in the wind, was singed at the tips and smelled like a burnt marshmallow. Walking beside him, Yui skipped along without a care in the world, occasionally trying to hold his hand or point out a cute-looking cloud. She seemed completely oblivious to the fact that she had just committed an act of ecological terrorism that would make most demon lords blush.

Leading the procession was Kenji Tanaka. He wasn’t walking; he was marching with the unshakeable purpose of a man who had just discovered a gold mine. In one hand, he held a large, blackened tree branch. In the other, his abacus, which clicked and clacked at a furious pace.

“The preliminary numbers are staggering,” he announced to no one in particular. “By my calculations, the wholesale value of the artisanal, pre-charred lumber from the ‘incident zone’ is enough to fund our operations for the next six fiscal quarters. And that’s before we even begin to monetize the land itself! We can market it as pre-cleared, ‘dragon-forged’ real estate. The slogan writes itself: ‘Buy land with a story!’”

Silas just stared ahead, his blue eyes vacant. A story? His story was supposed to be a dark, epic fantasy. It had been hijacked and turned into a slapstick comedy about environmental disasters and aggressive business acquisitions.

"The woods are gone, a blackened scar," his sword recited mournfully from his hip. "Beneath a cold and lonely star. My master’s soul is full of dread. He probably wishes he were dead."

“Can you not?” Silas hissed at the sword.

“I am but a vessel for the world’s sorrow, master,” the sword replied, somehow managing to sound smug.

When they finally trudged back into the Adventurer’s Guild, their entrance caused an even greater stir than their arrival. The silence was heavier this time, laced with a palpable sense of fear. Everyone stared at the ash-covered hero, the cheerful pink-haired girl, and the goblin who was trying to sell a burnt stick to the bouncer.

Silas marched to the front desk, slapped the charred remains of the quest-paper onto the counter, and stared the bored receptionist dead in the eye. “Quest complete,” he grunted.

The receptionist, whose name was apparently Helga, looked at the burnt paper. She looked at their disheveled state. She slowly raised an eyebrow. “You dealt with the giant slug infestation in the Whispering Woods?”

“Yes,” Silas said.

“All of it?”

“Yes.”

“There’s a lot of smoke coming from that direction,” Helga noted, tapping her chin with her letter opener. “A lot. The sky is kind of orange now. You wouldn’t happen to know anything about that, would you, ‘Precious Friends Adventure Squad’?” The way she said their party name was a physical blow.

Before Silas could formulate a lie, Yui leaned over the counter, beaming. “I helped! The slugs were mean to my precious person’s sword, so I taught them a lesson with sparkles!”

Helga’s gaze drifted from Yui’s innocent face to Silas’s twitching eye. Her expression didn’t change.

“So you’re saying,” Kenji interjected, stepping forward and placing both hands on the counter in a power pose, “that my clients have fulfilled the contractual obligations of the quest agreement? They have, quote, ‘eliminated the giant slug infestation.’ The method of elimination was not specified in the original contract, therefore we are entitled to the full reward as stated.”

Helga stared at him for a long, hard moment. Then, she let out a sigh that seemed to carry the weight of a thousand failed adventurers. She reached under the counter, pulled out a small pouch of coins, and slid it across to them. “Fine. Here’s your reward.”

Silas reached for it, a tiny flicker of victory in his heart.

“However,” Helga continued, sliding a much, much larger and more official-looking document across the counter. “This is a bill from the Royal Forestry Commission for damages rendered to state-owned property. It also includes fines for unlicensed use of large-scale destructive magic, disturbing the peace, and making the sky a weird color. The total comes to approximately fifty times the amount of your reward.”

Silas froze, his hand hovering over the pouch of coins. He was going to be in debt. His grand adventure was going to start with him being in crippling debt.

“Unacceptable,” Kenji said immediately, snatching the bill. His eyes scanned the document at a superhuman speed. “These charges are outrageous. I see no mention of the value-added service we provided. We didn’t just eliminate the pests; we performed a comprehensive land-clearing operation at no upfront cost to the kingdom. We should be billing them. I demand to speak with your manager.”

Helga actually smirked. “Be my guest.”

The Guild Master’s office was surprisingly lavish. The man himself was a mountain of muscle with a glorious beard and a weary look in his eyes. He listened patiently as Kenji laid out his case, complete with charts he’d somehow prepared on the walk back, arguing that the smoking crater was a net positive for the kingdom’s economy.

The Guild Master listened, stroked his beard, and then looked at Silas. “Son,” he said, his voice a deep baritone. “You and your friends have, in a single afternoon, caused more property damage than the last three demon lord invasions combined. Normally, I’d throw you in a dungeon. But… you did get rid of the slugs. Nobody liked those slugs.”

He sighed. “Tell you what. You’re a special case. I’ll waive the fines. But you are now on permanent probation. And from now on, you are only allowed to take quests that take place in barren wastelands, underground, or other locations that you cannot, under any circumstances, set on fire.”

It was a victory, of sorts. A humiliating, soul-crushing victory.

They left the Guild with their meager earnings and a newfound reputation. They weren’t heroes. They were a demolition crew. As they walked, Kenji was already planning their next move.

“Probation is merely a temporary market restriction,” he mused. “This forces us to diversify. We need a base of operations. A headquarters.”

He led them to the poorest, most dilapidated part of the city. He stopped in front of a leaning, rotting shack that looked like it would collapse if a strong wind blew. “Behold!” he announced with a grand gesture. “The corporate headquarters for Precious Friends Adventure Squad, LLC! A fixer-upper with incredible growth potential and, most importantly, negligible property tax.”

The “headquarters” was one room. It had a dirt floor, a leaky roof, and a smell that suggested something had died in the walls several years ago.

“It’s cozy!” Yui declared, immediately starting to decorate by hanging a wilted daisy from a cobweb.

Silas didn’t say anything. He just walked to the corner that seemed least likely to collapse and sat down, putting his head in his hands.

“Excellent,” Kenji said, rubbing his little green hands together. “Now, for our inaugural corporate dinner and strategy session. Miss Yui, you handle provisions. Mr. Silas, you continue your… strategic meditation. I will draft our quarterly financial report.”

What followed was the worst meal of Silas’s life. Yui, with the culinary instincts of a dragon, tried to cook the rations they’d bought. Her idea of “cooking” involved breathing a tiny, controlled puff of pink fire at a piece of bread, which instantly turned it into a lump of charcoal. The resulting smoke nearly suffocated them and brought three angry neighbors to their door, yelling about the strange pink smog.

As Silas sat there, chewing on a piece of what was either burnt bread or a small rock, listening to Yui apologize profusely to the neighbors while Kenji tried to sell them fire insurance, he felt a familiar, terrible sound start up again.

TWANG-twang-a-lang-a-lang!

The ukulele. It was back. A cheerful, jaunty tune for a hero at the absolute bottom of his rope. This was his party. This was his headquarters. This was his adventure.

He let his head fall back against the rotting wall with a dull thud. It was going to be a very, very long journey.