About a quarter of an hour later, Lilith, whose cloak had been hacked to ribbons, finished stowing away the materials Ningning and Baiye had brought, and quoted them a price:
"The materials you brought today come to thirty gold coins in total."
Baiye had done the math in her head: if she'd handed today's haul to the Adventurers' Guild as usual, the payout would probably have been less than ten gold coins.
Ningning's suggestion really had earned the Hero's Party a tidy profit.
Yet, faced with this reality that ought to have been cause for delight, Captain Baiye's face showed not the faintest trace of joy —
"However, twenty-five of these thirty gold coins will be deducted as compensation for repairing this cellar."
Lilith pointed at the pockmarked, wretchedly gouged stone walls around them, courtesy of Baiye, and at the counter behind her, now hacked into a scatter of wood shavings, and added the caveat.
"...I'm sorry."
The chief culprit, Baiye, let her shoulders sag dejectedly and apologized to Lilith in a small voice.
The sky-high fury with which she'd chased the woman down moments ago had, by now, long since vanished without a trace.
The Baiye of this moment was utterly deflated, for all the world like a slug left out to bake in the sun for a full year, wrinkled up into a wretched little ball.
"It's fine. You don't need to apologize, just pay up."
Lilith answered with a smile, counting out five gold coins from her pocket and placing them in Ningning's hand.
The coins fell into Ningning's palm with a few scattered, crisp little chimes.
Baiye had already been eaten up with guilt over the disaster she'd caused; hearing those few clinks of coin on coin, her chest grew ever more tightly choked, until she could hardly breathe.
Was this enough to cover tonight's bill?
And if it wasn't, what then?
What if her teammates were disappointed?
What if they blamed her?
What if... the Hero's Party disbanded over this? Where would she go then?
The girl's face changed color again and again, growing blacker and gloomier than her own hair.
She fell silent for a moment, then turned and climbed the stairs, leaving Ningning behind and departing the wrecked cellar alone.
"...Haah. Landing myself a rotten friend like you is truly the worst of luck. Well, Lilith, did you have your fun?"
Ningning gazed at the spot where Baiye's figure had disappeared, then turned her head and glared at Lilith.
"How is that my fault? Even I didn't expect the honorable captain of a whole Hero's Party to be so fragile on the inside."
"Besides, Ningning, you didn't exactly go all out to stop me, did you?"
Half astonished, half aggrieved, Lilith laid bare Ningning's little scheme in a single stroke:
"You yourself wanted to see Baiye flustered and cornered, but you wouldn't do the teasing yourself, so you brought her here on purpose to make me play the villain."
Ningning shot her a few more glares and pressed a hand to her forehead, resigned:
"Well, obviously. If I did the teasing myself, it'd cost me affection points, get it... never mind. Just put the compensation on my tab."
At that, Lilith looked at Ningning in surprise:
"Huh? Aren't you the one who'd rather die than touch her own little treasury?"
"What do you mean, rather die? Am I that much of a cheapskate?"
"And besides, you didn't actually think your quiet little embezzlements of my personal funds were flawless, did you, Lilith?"
Ningning sneered coldly, glaring at Lilith, who'd gone all fidgety now that her under-the-table dealings had been exposed.
Having applied plenty of pressure, she gave a light wave of the hand to signal she'd let her off the hook for now:
"All right, all right. The thing I ordered from you came in, didn't it? Hurry up and hand over the money and the goods."
"Honestly. If you weren't going to hold it against me, you didn't have to scare me like that, you sadistic little thing..."
Seeing that Ningning had decided to spare her, Lilith finally let out a breath of relief, drew a glittering gemstone bracelet from her bosom, and handed it over along with a pouch holding the twenty-five gold coins:
"Here. Everything you wanted is inside, some savings, all sorts of magic circles, gear for travel, records copied from the royal palace library, and the last-minute order you put in last night for two hundred pairs of pan..."
"Ahem, zip it, you."
Ningning hurriedly coughed, forcibly stuffing that dangerous word back down Lilith's throat:
"Fine, I won't check it now, I'm in a hurry."
The White Mage turned to leave, but was suddenly called back by the underground merchant guildmaster behind her:
"Oh, right, Ningning, wait just a bit longer."
"What is it?"
"This is a gift from Her Highness the Princess. She instructed me to place it in your hands personally, without fail."
An extremely ominous premonition suddenly rose in Ningning's heart.
She turned her head stiffly, and one glance told her that what Lilith held was precisely the pink, semi-transparent dress she'd just deliberately pulled out to tease Baiye with.
"...Wasn't that dress just sliced up a good ten times by Baiye a minute ago?"
Ningning pointed at this perfectly intact dress before her, thoroughly astonished.
"This is a garment Her Highness the Princess made for you with her own hands. It's lightweight, supple, and indestructible all at once; it can even partly screen out that far-above-average 'Perception' of yours."
"...I don't want it."
"Just take it. Her Highness told me to place it in your hands personally, or she'll give me an earful."
"Hnnngh ohhhh—!"
With that, Lilith gave a light poke to Ningning's waist, and in the interval while the girl clutched her belly and trembled all over, forcibly stuffed this priceless dress into her arms, laughing:
"There, mission accomplished."
"...I am absolutely never wearing that thing."
It took Ningning a good long while to straighten up again, and she eyed the gorgeous dress in her arms with distaste as she made her declaration.
Hearing that, Lilith only laughed more merrily:
"That's not so certain."
"Her Highness gave me special instructions; she wants you to wear this the next time you see her, and to be a good girl and get yourself ready."
"...Then I just won't go see her." Ningning looked away.
"Heh heh~ When the time comes, you'd better hope you can keep the rest of you as stubborn as your mouth."
"I said I won't see her, so I won't."
Ningning stowed the dress into the bracelet-shaped spatial magic tool, and turned to go.
She bounded up the steps two at a time toward the surface, letting Lilith's voice behind her fall entirely on deaf ears:
"One more thing, Ningning, you have to hold the Hero's Party back, don't let them go charging into the Demon Lord's Castle in one breath!"
"This is Her Highness the Princess's own request!"
Ningning gave no reply to Lilith's reminder, charging up the stairs and out of the cellar in one go, forgetting even to shut the door.
Her Highness the Princess had done her a kindness, true, but Ningning had no intention of blindly following the woman's arrangements.
Especially not when subjugating the Demon Lord was tied to this freakish body of hers.
Sorry about this, Your Highness.
The Demon Lord, she, Ningning, had that one in the bag!
So right now, she needed to first secure the one reliable member of the Hero's Party, and also her top conquest target — Baiye.
But after dragging her feet this long, Baiye hadn't already run off, had she?
Fretting to no end, Ningning ran down the narrow alley toward the exit.
A moment later, the girl rounded the final corner and finally let out a breath of relief —
Baiye was leaning against the wall by the exit, head hanging dejectedly, her hair curtaining her face so her expression couldn't be seen.
So Ningning walked over with feigned ease, came to a stop in front of Baiye, bent down to peer up at her face from below, and opened with a grin:
"What's the matter?"
"...Nothing."
Baiye turned her face away, not wanting Ningning to see her in this flustered state.
"Really?"
"Really."
Ningning tilted her head and didn't press further, only smiled and gave the gemstone bracelet in her hand a little shake, its crisp chimes ringing especially clear in the quiet alley.
"So then, honorable Captain," she said, deliberately drawing out the words, "about whether we're going to feast well tonight or live on thin air... have you come to a decision?"
Baiye's shoulders trembled almost imperceptibly, her muffled voice coming from behind the fallen curtain of black hair:
"...There's only five left."
"Yep," Ningning nodded, tone light. "So?"
"So..." Baiye jerked her head up, her eyes actually rimmed with red, whether from anger or panic it was hard to say. "It's nowhere near enough! Even the cheapest ale at the tavern costs two silver a mug! Even if all five of us ate nothing but black bread and vegetable soup, it'd still cost at least one gold coin! And there's the lodging fee on top of that... it's all my fault, I ruined everything..."
The more Baiye spoke, the more frantic she got, her words tumbling out like a string of firecrackers.
The calm, self-possessed air she usually wore had vanished without a trace, leaving only a girl at her wits' end for having wrecked the team budget.
Ningning watched her quietly, then suddenly burst out laughing, "pfft."
"Wh-what are you laughing at!"
Baiye flushed with a mix of shame and indignation, her cheeks reddening another shade.
Ningning straightened up, composed as ever, and kept right on teasing:
"Laughing at our Captain Baiye, of course. A minute ago you were earth-shatteringly cool swinging that blade, and now you're nearly in tears over a few gold coins."
"Really, so~ adorable."
"Who's nearly in tears! I am not!"
Baiye retorted shrilly, though her voice carried a suspicious nasal thickness.
"Yes, yes, no crying, no crying."
Ningning nodded agreeably, then, as if by sleight of hand, produced a small velvet pouch from the bracelet and weighed it in her palm, letting it give off a heavy, pleasant jingle far richer than five mere coins.
Baiye froze, staring blankly at the pouch.
"Here." Ningning forcibly pressed it into Baiye's hands. "The twenty-five gold coins are inside."
"This... where did this money come from? Did you steal it?"
Baiye stroked the coin pouch in her hands, trembling.
Ningning couldn't help a laugh:
"Steal it, honestly."
"Did you forget? I'm the one who introduced you to that shop. Of course I've got connections."
"There won't be any trouble?"
"Of course not. I got the money back, didn't I?"
With that, Ningning stepped ahead out of the alley, deliberately leaving Baiye with nothing but a dashing view of her back:
"Just remember to pay me back someday. No rush, though."
Wanting to catch up to her, Baiye hurriedly looked up, and, as if in a trance, saw the light from the alley mouth slant in, cutting a stark boundary of light and shadow between the two of them.
Ningning stood in the light, the edges of her white robe plated in pale gold.
While she herself remained in the dark.
"What are you waiting for? Come on, let's go eat."
Ningning glanced suddenly back over her shoulder, a brilliant smile on her lips, her jade-green eyes clear, translucent, scattering a mesmerizing crystalline glow.
Yet Baiye didn't step forward right away.
She lowered her head, the loose fringe at her brow falling to cover her eyes.
Several long, long seconds passed before she softly answered, "Mm."
And so the two of them walked, one ahead of the other, into the lantern-light of the long street.
The lamps along the street lit up one after another.
The aroma of food drifted over, mingled with the boiling roar of the crowd.
Baiye lightly pinched her own burning ear tips, her voice trembling faintly with gratitude:
"Ningning... thank you."
The corners of the White Mage's lips curved once more into the faintest smile, yet she remained wholly unmoved by this weighty gratitude:
"What's there to thank? Don't be so formal; we're comrades, after all."
She could feel it; the footsteps of the person behind her had noticeably slowed a beat.
She could have seized this chance to put Baiye in her debt, but for some reason, the moment she pictured that fawn-like face, lost and helpless, Ningning suddenly felt that keeping things as they were for now wasn't so bad either.
In short.
Today, too, was a thoroughly satisfying day.
...If not for a certain absurd Hero.
A moment later, Ningning looked at the Hero, inexplicably skewered by one of the tavern's iron roasting spits, and thought, speechless.