“It really was here.”
Fortunately, the women’s secret base was nearby.
When I dug into the ground, I found a half-rotted wooden box. I opened it with difficulty.
“Antidote herbs, medicinal herbs, money, food…….”
Perhaps many herbs grew nearby, because there was an ample supply of antidote herbs and medicinal herbs.
They were raw herbs rather than prepared medicine, but this much would be enough to treat the wounds of everyone here.
‘That said…….’
I bit down hard on my lip.
If I made the coldest possible judgment, the most profitable choice for me would be betrayal.
Kill all three women, then take all the food, herbs, and gold coins here.
“……Ha.”
I gave a hollow laugh and shook the thought from my mind.
‘I should go along with the girls’ alignments. What a pointless thought.’
The key to running a mercenary company was managing human relationships.
It was important for the mercenary company to grow stronger immediately, and it was important to earn a great deal of money. But nothing was more important than making each mercenary someone I could trust.
‘The core of my mercenary company…… Or rather, its only two members. Iris and Dana. Both are Good-aligned.’
If the two of them had been Evil-aligned—if they were the sort of people who hated taking a loss to a dreadful degree—I would have had no choice but to think more deeply about it.
Evil-aligned members would never tolerate me playing the sucker, so to speak.
But Good-aligned members, on the contrary, would not forgive me for betraying those women.
Of course, it was unlikely that Iris, who had sworn loyalty to me, or Dana, who had a contract with me, would immediately leave my mercenary company.
But they would carry this in their hearts. I would have to live with a time bomb that could go off someday.
One year, two years, or perhaps five or ten years later, an opportunity might arise for them to unleash the anger and resentment they felt now.
‘In the first place, there isn’t much in the way of herbs, money, or food. I should consider it the price of buying goodwill.’
When trust and faith from members could be bought with money, I had to buy them in advance.
Because when I desperately needed them, no amount of money would buy them.
“Let’s begin the treatment.”
The poisoned woman was groaning, sweat pouring from her rigid body.
‘There isn’t much time…….’
If I crushed and processed the herbs here, then brewed them, I could remove the poison more efficiently.
But this woman could not wait that long. Reluctantly, I had no choice but to chew the raw herbs properly and put them in her mouth.
“Treat the infection in the severed arm as well.”
The sizable pile of medicinal herbs and antidote herbs began to vanish like snow under the sun.
‘There won’t be much left…….’
The poisoned woman’s symptoms were grave. So grave that I had to use every last antidote herb.
After treating the woman with the severed arm and giving first aid to the others’ wounds, there would not be much medicinal herb left either.
I rubbed herbs onto their bodies and fed them antidote herbs. Once I had done everything that needed doing, the tension finally left me, and I collapsed where I stood.
Only then could I feel that everything was over.
***
“Anna…… I’m so glad.”
Dana clung tightly to the sturdy woman, smiling happily.
“It was dangerous. You shouldn’t have come to rescue me.”
With a warm smile, Anna gently embraced Dana.
“How could I abandon you? I was going to do whatever it took. I made all kinds of promises with our Captain…… At first, he wasn’t going to rescue you, but I worked really hard. I did everything he told me to, so he rescued you-”
Anna looked at me suspiciously. I shook my head.
“The song. The song.”
“That’s right! The Captain said if I could sing the song…… You know, the song you praised, the one about putting mystical power into it…… He said he’d rescue you if I did it well. That he’d fight with us…….”
After looking at me, Anna bowed politely.
“Thank you for saving us.”
“What are you thanking me for? It was a deal.”
“A deal……?”
“I needed your younger sister in my mercenary company.”
“You mean Dana. She is a talented child. Please take good care of her.”
“Of course. She’s overflowing with talent. Talented enough that she’s worth risking my life for.”
Perhaps happy that her younger sister had been praised, Anna smiled faintly.
“If possible, may I join the mercenary company as well?”
“We’ll see about that. The entrance test for my mercenary company is rather demanding.”
I needed to think about whether it would be efficient to take Anna into the mercenary company or better to leave her out.
‘Honestly, she makes a very good impression…….’
While I considered it, the women who had been imprisoned with Anna came up to me.
“W-we want to come too!”
“Please take us in!”
This was a variable I had not anticipated.
“Listen. Think it over calmly. Mercenary work is the kind of work where it would not be strange to die at any time. You might have to go through a fight like the one with the Man-Eating Spiders just now dozens, even hundreds more times. You survived because you were lucky, but that luck will not remain with you forever.”
My words were gentle, but I had no intention of taking them in.
‘Increase the number of mouths by three here? And one is one-armed, while another is poisoned?’
The poison had been neutralized, so she would not die immediately, but she was still gasping for breath.
‘There are aftereffects.’
The pain would continue until she received treatment from a proper priest. It would be difficult to use her as proper fighting strength.
‘There are ways to make use of women, but…….’
In this world, once women underwent training beyond a certain level, they could become as strong as men.
They could not completely overcome the basic physical difference, but they could overcome the disadvantage with agility and skill.
‘But…….’
When there was no leeway to train mercenaries—when I had to send them to the battlefield immediately after hiring them—the wise choice was to recruit men who could strike even a little harder and endure even one more attack.
‘But one has one arm, and another is suffering from the aftereffects of poison. You want me to feed them with my money and even spend on treatment while taking them along?’
No. That would not do. I shook my head.
“I think you and I…… should go our separate ways.”
“W-why?!”
“Mercenary work is rough work. Difficult work as well. It would be better for you to return to a village…… No, to find another path.”
The uninjured woman looked at me with trembling eyes.
“Then please explain one more thing.”
“What?”
“Us. The part about being…… abandoned. What does that mean?”
I let out a deep sigh. Then I explained Culling to them.
Carefully and gradually, so it would hurt them as little as possible, I told them that they had been abandoned.
“Then…… we have nowhere to go…….”
“I’m sorry. But my goal was to rescue Anna. There’s nothing more I can do for you.”
“But we fought! We did everything we could, risking our lives. And now…….”
“Were you planning to become spider feed there, then? You survived. Isn’t that enough?”
It was sad, but there was nothing I could do for them.
“Then at least let us take the test! The entrance test!”
“It would be meaningless.”
“Please, please…….”
Iris’s gaze grew piercing at their pleas. Reluctantly, I nodded.
“Don’t expect too much.”
I did not think they could be of any help to me.
***
I gave the entrance test. The four women, including Anna, demonstrated their stamina and weapon-handling skills.
Most were exhausted, and I judged their abilities with that in mind.
“Hmm…….”
Together with Iris, I slipped away from the group for a moment to exchange opinions.
“What do you think?”
She was watching my reaction. I let out a deep sigh.
“They’re not bad, are they?”
I had not planned to say that, but they were different from what I had expected.
“First, the three besides Anna. They’re much better than I thought.”
The first: the woman with all four limbs intact. She had a respectable build. Her name was Jema.
“Her talent is utterly ordinary……, but her body is sound. Her stamina is good too.”
Her Starting Background was an odd-job worker. When I had asked what she was good at, she had answered, ‘I’m good at laundry!’
Her stance with a club could not be called very bad. She fell far short of taking the role of main damage dealer, but if I put a wooden club in her hand, she seemed capable of serving as a Meat Shield and weapon rack, at least.
She was not the finest talent, but she was serviceable.
The second: the woman suffering from the aftereffects of poison. She had a slender build. Her name was Niv.
“She uses a sling…… Well, I can’t verify it right now, but there are plenty of spiderwebs, right? We only need to make a sling…….”
In mercenary companies of this world, ranged damage dealers could never become the main damage dealers. Proper fighting had to be handled by melee mercenaries wielding swords, spears, axes, and glaives.
Still, there were times when ranged weapons were needed. When I had to take a good position, or when it was difficult to charge in first.
But unless it was a bombardment that one could unleash without caring whether it hit, accuracy mattered when an individual used one, so not just anyone could use such a weapon.
The mere fact that she could use one meant she had at least minimal value. Not right now, perhaps.
Her Starting Background as a hunter was also something I needed immediately. She only hunted small animals like rabbits by throwing stones, but that was better than nothing.
The third: the woman with the severed arm. Her frame was almost as small as Dana’s. Her name was Ember.
She was weak, but reasonably agile. She also seemed to know, more or less, how to use a dagger. Though that only meant she was at the level of a country girl.
Her Starting Background as a gatherer was not meaningless either. She could gather medicinal herbs or mushrooms, so the burden of food would lessen somewhat.
‘I can’t call this particularly good…… Still, we need at least one person who can use a dagger.’
None of the three were people my mercenary company absolutely needed right away.
If I had to pay to recruit them, I would never use mercenaries like them. If my mercenary company’s composition were reasonably complete, I would not use mercenaries like these.
The same went for Starting Backgrounds like gatherer and hunter.
If I had a proper hunter, a real hunter who hunted animals such as wolves or deer in the forest with a bow, I would have no need for a pseudo-hunter like her.
The same went for a gatherer. If I had a proper herbalist or alchemist, I would not have given her a second thought.
‘But…….’
My mercenary company’s circumstances were terribly poor.
Poor enough that I had to regard the chance to acquire mercenaries like them ‘without paying money’ as an opportunity.
“Are you thinking of taking them with us?”
“I suppose……? It’s a bit of a gamble, but I think it might be all right.”
There were problems. The moment three more mouths joined us, we would be short of food.
‘But…….’
Increasing the mercenary company’s numbers was an important matter in itself.
Even if it was not an extreme case like the Man-Eating Spiders, every additional member changed the mercenary company’s power.
“That is fortunate. Then what about Anna?”
“What do you think?”
Iris tilted her head.
“I do not know very well what sort of person a mercenary company needs. But if I imagine her joining my unit as a soldier…….”
“If you imagine that?”
“She would be the best.”
“I agree.”
I bit down hard on my lip.
“That’s the problem. Anna is far too tempting a talent.”
My worries deepened. I had no choice but to think seriously.
About whether she should join the mercenary company.