"Now what should we do?" I wondered aloud. It was all well and good that we had arrived, but where were the shops and the adventurers' guild? All the houses looked the same to me and there didn't seem to be any taller buildings at all.

"I guess you could ask the locals," suggested Masa with a shrug.

"Why me?" I retorted automatically, but he merely gave me a look that said everything. "All right, I know it was my idea to come here and you don't like talking. Fine."

With that, I approached a girl carrying a basket of vegetables. She looked to be around my age or slightly older. "Excuse me, we just arrived, so could you tell us where we might find the shops?" I inquired politely.

"O-oh! You must be travellers!" The girl widened her eyes in a dramatic expression of surprise and spoke in a slightly stiff manner. "Let me show you where the shops are. And if you're in need of anything, you can proceed to the Adventurers' Guild to post a request. They charge a token fee but it's not too expensive."

Belatedly, I realised that we had no money. Or rather, we had no idea what kind of currency was used here. Even if this world was connected to Earth, what were the chances that they used Japanese Yen, Malaysian Ringgit or Singapore Dollars? A standard Isekai trope would be for them to use coins minted from precious metals or even fantasy metals like mythril and such. Anyway, we had none of that, so we might have to start by earning money first.

As the girl kindly led us to the shops and pointed out where the Adventurers' Guild was, I asked her whether there was a way to earn money. "Oh yes, of course," she replied with a smile. "You seem like seasoned travellers, so perhaps you could complete quests at the guild. And if you are not registered adventurers, why not sign up to be one? They offer many benefits like discounts at certain inns and taverns, as well as a point system that you can exchange for goods rather than using cash."

Was it just me or was she starting to sound like a salesgirl promoting a credit card at the end? I exchanged glances with Masa and he was shaking his head firmly. Right, I doubted he was the kind of easy mark that would be fooled by such offers. It looked like he needed more persuasion. I thanked the girl and proceeded to drag the reluctant Masa into the Adventurers' Guild. It was a somewhat larger house than the others and had a plaque above the doorway stating its name, so it was surely the right place.

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The interior was much dimmer than outside, but once our eyes adjusted, the interior was much larger than it appeared at first. There was a reception desk at one side, several counters to the left and a tavern-like area to the right. There was even a large notice board on the wall beside the counters displaying the requests that had been posted so far. All right, so far so good. There were a few rough-looking men sitting at the tavern but no one else queuing up at the counters. Oh well, this was a small town after all and it was the middle of the day. Normal adventurers would be out adventuring at this time.

We approached the receptionist and she directed us to one of the counters. The young man behind the counter was looking slightly bored, but perked up when we approached. "Hello there, how can I help you?" he asked in a pleasant tone.

"We would like to learn more about registering as adventurers," I told him. "There seem to be some benefits, but what do we actually need to do as adventurers?"

"Ah, an excellent question," he said, standing up and coming out from behind the counter. "Please follow me to the request board over here."

Masa and I obediently followed him as he gestured at the various requests pinned onto the board. "This is where we post requests that people have submitted to us," he explained. "They range from finding lost pets to gathering herbs and hunting certain beasts or even escort jobs. Basically, we help people out when they need something they cannot do themselves."

I was nodding away, but Masa still looked sceptical. "Naturally, adventurers do not do the requests for free. Each request comes with a reward based on its difficulty and urgency as set by the guild," continued the young man. "For example, take a look at this one which says 'Vanquish thirty goblins'. Ah, by the way, this is a regular request set out by the guild to keep the population of goblins down."

My eyes quickly scanned the words, which were somehow written in English. Come to think of it, the people we met had been speaking English too. But before I could continue in that line of thought, my eye fell on the reward money. Fifteen silver! Wait...was that a lot? I tilted my head to the side as I considered.

Masa must have been thinking the same thing, as he asked, "How much does a simple meal cost around here?"

"It depends, but the average is six or seven copper, with the higher end of the spectrum going up to ten copper, or one half silver," replied the young man, helpfully providing us with a simple conversion rate.

So if a meal cost around six to seven dollars, one silver would be twenty dollars. That would make the reward for killing thirty goblins three hundred dollars! How many goblins had I already "vanquished" so far? I had pretty much stopped counting after fifty or so. But wait, how could we prove we had defeated them when they always disappeared? There were no drops and no bodies! Was this the kind of game in which you had to accept the quest before there were drops?! Noooo! I don't want to hunt them all over again!