As they left the outpost, Erica turned to Raine and asked, "Raine, are you sure about this one-week deadline?"

Raine replied with a hint of confidence, "It's fine if it's around 100 pieces. But is that major always like that?"

Erica nodded. "I haven't met him often, but yes, he's typically like that."

Raine couldn't help but think that the major seemed like one of those unpleasant nobles. Turning to Erica, Raine continued, "Erica, I'll handle this urgent request on my own."

Erica looked surprised. "Huh? But... I can help, you know?"

As expected, Raine knew Erica would offer her help. "No, this request is a bit special. I'd like you to focus on making bricks and ingots. You haven't made ingots before, have you?"

Erica hesitated. "Well, I did in school practice, but..."

"That's good enough. Anyway, let's head back to the branch," Raine said, steering them away from the outpost as they started their walk back.

On their way, Erica seemed to be mulling something over. "Um, Raine, are you sure about this urgent request?"

Raine turned to her, curious. "What do you mean by 'sure'?"

Erica elaborated, "I mean, this is our first urgent request... Plus, we didn't have any deliveries of magic stones last year."

Raine acknowledged the point. It was unfortunate that there were no deliveries of magic stones, essential items for the military. "This is a harassment job," Raine stated flatly.

Erica was taken aback. "What? Ha-harassment? Why?"

Raine shrugged. "I don't know the reason. Maybe they were upset with orders from above, or perhaps they took money from a civilian... In any case, this request is unusual."

Raine suspected they might have been paid off by a civilian to bring them down, noting how officials sometimes operated.

"I'm sorry... I don't quite understand," Erica said, looking a bit downcast.

Raine offered reassurance. "No, it's fine not to understand this. In the first place, unless there’s a war or a massive outbreak of monsters, there shouldn't be a shortage of magic stones. The military always keeps a stockpile since they’re essential. Still, this request was made because they think we lack the ability to deliver the stones to the branch."

Erica nodded slowly. "Is... is that so?"

"Well, this is an opportunity for the branch to profit, so don't worry about it," Raine explained. "Magic stones aren't that difficult to handle."

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Raine considered them tedious to deal with manually, but not impossible. As they walked back to the branch, they continued their conversation. Upon arriving, they went up to the second floor and took their seats.

With some time before the magic stones were to arrive, Raine turned to Erica. "We have some time before the magic stones arrive, so I can teach you how to make ingots... but you've done this in magic school, right?"

Erica nodded. "Yes, I did in practice."

Raine encouraged her, "Then give it a try."

Erica placed an iron ore on the desk and raised her hand, channeling her magic power into it. The iron ore began to glow faintly.

Raine observed her work. "See... you can do it."

There was nothing more to teach. "It just takes time," Raine added.

Erica agreed, and Raine continued, "Everyone's like that. If we had specialized equipment, it would be instant... but we don't have that here."

Raine thought about how nice it would be to have such equipment someday, but who knew when that would be.

Watching Erica as she diligently transformed iron ore into iron, Raine occasionally gave her advice. When it was time for a lunch break, Raine went out to buy some bread.

Upon returning, Raine noticed a few soldiers unloading wooden crates from a truck bed in front of the branch. Among them was Lutz, so Raine approached him.

"Hey, did you bring the magic stones?" Raine asked.

Lutz seemed to recognize Raine. "Huh? Oh, Rainevald, right?"

Raine quickly corrected him, "Just Raine is fine. You don’t need to be formal. We're about the same age, right?"

Lutz looked to be in his early twenties and agreed. "Yeah, that's about right. Where's Erica?"

"Upstairs, having lunch. Should I call her?" Raine offered.

Lutz shook his head. "Oh, no, that's okay. More importantly, I brought 100 magic stones. Here's the appraisal certificate."

He handed Raine a piece of paper, and Raine read it over. "Five B-rank, twenty-two C-rank... the rest are D-rank, huh..."

Raine thought they weren't terrible, but not great either. Lutz explained, "I rushed to gather them from the market."

Raine understood that they had gathered them in the morning using people. While Raine would have preferred they took a whole day to collect higher-quality stones, it wasn’t Raine’s place to tell the client how to do their job.

Lutz then asked, "Do you need a catalyst to improve their quality? It will cost extra, though..."

Raine shook their head. "No, that's fine. But the major said they need them within three days..."

Is he stupid? Raine thought.

"That's the client's problem, so the fee will be doubled. No, more than that," Raine declared.

Lutz sighed, "...To tell you the truth, the major wants this to fail."

Raine already knew this. "We can deliver in three days. But be prepared for the invoice. Although, I guess that doesn't concern you."

Lutz shrugged. "I'm just a messenger. But are you really okay with this? I don't know much about alchemy, but usually, this kind of request would have a deadline of at least a month."

Raine nodded. "It's urgent, right? These things happen. As long as we get paid, we don't care."

Raine was used to urgent requests, especially at the main office in the capital, where Raine had even issued them personally. Whenever someone hesitated, Raine's go-to line was, "There are 24 hours in a day, you know?" No wonder people had hated Raine back then.

Lutz seemed resigned. "Anyway, please take care of it in three days. Sorry about this."

Raine waved off the apology. "Don't worry about it. By the way, I wanted to ask, is that major from this town?"

Lutz shook his head. "No, he's apparently a noble from up north."

Raine understood—a demotion, just like Raine's own situation. "I see... Well then, I'll deliver them within three days. Thanks for your work."

With that, the soldiers placed the wooden crates in front of the branch, and Raine used spatial magic to store them.

Lutz commented, "If you can use spatial magic, you should have said so from the start. We wouldn't have had to unload them from the truck bed."

Raine replied without any real remorse, "My bad," then entered the branch and went up to the second floor.