Some time had passed since the subjugation of the Goblin King. The Sword Saint Astrea had been exceptionally promoted to an Fine Steel Rank Adventurer. Although the bounty was being delayed again and again, with claims that it needed further auditing and blah blah blah.
But in reality, everyone knew what was going on.
They simply didn't want the newly reborn Empire to gain immense fame because of the Sword Saint's subjugation of the Demon King, which would make this Empire—currently restoring its former glory—even more powerful. In particular, the nobles of the Re-Estize Kingdom were the biggest interference in this matter.
This country, just like the previous Empire, had been completely eroded to its core by the nobility.
Unless a wise tyrant like the Blood Emperor appeared to change heaven and earth through violence, the Re-Estize Kingdom was destined for the fate of national destruction.
However, the Kingdom did have a Princess with quite capable methods, known as the Golden Princess. It was just that this Princess's situation didn't seem very good.
Even though the Golden Princess possessed vision and resourcefulness no less than the Blood Emperor's, being born as a woman in the feudal society of the Kingdom was itself a great disadvantage. Without the right to inherit the throne, the Golden Princess could not replicate the Blood Emperor's methods to change the Kingdom.
Furthermore, the Golden Princess was still a young girl.
Her age was also an issue.
The reason for paying attention to these things—
—was simply because they were withholding her bounty. Although Tsukasa didn't care about this small amount of money, it wasn't a reason for them to delay and refuse to pay, and this money wasn't useless to her either.
She had no intention of reopening the Night Sky Pavilion in this world. After all, in the previous world, the reason the Night Sky Pavilion could grow large was because of a stable supply channel. This world didn't have a convenient place like the Labyrinth. Therefore, the difficulty of reopening the Night Sky Pavilion was very high. It wasn't that there was no way, but rather that it wasn't worth it.
She didn't plan to waste her energy on such things, so she really did need this bounty.
Because she was indeed short of money at the moment.
Originally, she had thought about using technology from the previous world to find a partner. The first person she thought of was Arsye, because she heard that Arsye's family was originally noble but had been demoted to commoners due to the Blood Emperor's policies and had incurred many debts.
While nobles were indeed a group of filthy capitalists, it had to be admitted that their ability to become nobles and suck the country's blood meant they truly had some skill. So if they were willing to cooperate, she wouldn't mind giving Arsye's family a hand.
But when she learned the true situation of Arsye's family, she rejected the idea.
Because Arsye's parents had already gone mad.
From being high and mighty—
—nobles demoted to commoners, their former glory gone, their family property vanished, and burdened with debt, they were unwilling to accept this reality.
Thus, they hypnotized themselves into living in the past.
Like Vampires, they used the money Arsye earned with her life to continue their extravagant and wasteful consumption.
They had completely lost their humanity.
Regarding this matter,
she could indeed do something.
But unfortunately,
since their last parting, the Four Sages had consciously distanced themselves from her, and she was not the kind of good person who would enthusiastically take the initiative to lend a hand.
However, she wasn't completely indifferent either.
She used her status to negotiate with that Guild Master, asking him to help look after the Four Sages.
Out of respect for her,
the Four Sages' work became much easier.
Furthermore, the Guild Master also paid them a portion of the reward in his own name. After all, he was right here and would always have to deal with the Sword Saint. Those big figures far away in other countries could withhold the bounty, but he couldn't truly show no gesture at all.
It was unreasonable and very easy to offend people.
So his choice was to use his own money to ease the relationship between them. He gave each of the Four Sages a five-hundred-gold bounty, and then let the Sword Saint go to his warehouse to pick three treasures. With such means, he successfully won the friendship of the Four Sages and the Sword Saint.
For this Guild Master to reach this position,
he truly had skill.
Also, the Adventurer who reported the false information had already been secretly dealt with—after being interrogated, of course. He confessed everything he knew.
He had been captured by the Goblin King while on a mission outside. The Goblin King ordered him to help open the city gates to facilitate the invasion of the Goblin army.
Moreover, the Shaman had placed a curse on him,
leaving him no chance to escape.
As for why he uploaded false information,
it was because he wanted revenge, and another reason was that he hoped someone would discover the truth and help him eliminate the Goblin King and the others.
The reason the Four Sages were ambushed wasn't that the Goblins were specifically targeting them.
Rather, they were set up by this Adventurer.
The Adventurer first uploaded false information to get the Guild to send people to exterminate the Goblins, then ran to tell the Goblin King that Adventurers had discovered the cave and would likely send people to investigate. That was why the Four Sages were ambushed by the Goblin King at that time.
Originally, in that Adventurer's plan,
the Four Sages were doomed to die.
And after their deaths, it would inevitably alarm the higher-ups of the Adventurers Guild, who would then send even more powerful Adventurers to explore the cave.
By then, even if the matter of the false information was exposed, it wouldn't have much impact. After all, for a monster of the Goblin King's level, it was normal for a Mythril-ranked Adventurer to fail to notice it.
But he hadn't expected the Four Sages to be so lucky that the Sword Saint would actually accompany them to the cave and kill the Goblin King.
Thus, his scheme was exposed.
Whether he did it intentionally or truly didn't know about the Goblin King's existence, because his information had already involved a major figure like the Sword Saint, his destined end was a miserable death.
Besides, he indeed did it intentionally.
The Guild Master naturally couldn't keep him around.
Tsukasa was performing a summary of this event.
For example,
the attributes of humans in this world are—
—below a certain point. The strength shown by the Four Sages was roughly around 1,000 to 2,000 attribute points.
And judging by the Goblin King's performance, the attributes of a Demon King level were around 5,000 points.
Equivalent to the attributes of a Hero.
However, these Demon Kings seemingly had no special abilities, so their strength was below that of a Hero.
This world wasn't as strong as she had initially thought. Although the world energy of this world was indeed very strong, it seemed that just because the world energy was strong didn't mean the creatures living in this world would be stronger.
Besides, thinking carefully,
the previous world was one that had almost been destroyed once; its original upper limit should have been very high.
However,
this didn't mean this world wasn't dangerous.
For example, the legendary Dragon Kings.
The strength of a Dragon King was even above that of a Goblin King.
And above the Dragon Kings,
there were things like Ancient Dragon Kings.
The ancestors of the Astrea family had once fought an Ancient Dragon King to a standstill.
If the strength of Astrea's ancestors was close to the Reinhard she knew... the strength of this Ancient Dragon King would likely be extremely troublesome.
To be honest, she felt a bit apprehensive.
Who knows if this world, like the last one, has various hidden hands behind the scenes? At that time, she might finally manage to take down an Ancient Dragon King, only for some unknown Ancient God to pop out and insta-kill her. It wasn't an impossible scenario.
In the previous world.
That was exactly how she was forced into a 'GG'.
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