“…That surely was one of the most tiring jobs I did in a while,” Wanderer Warren said, pushing himself back into a standing position, and stretching out his limbs, before walking back to his counter, where there already was a small queue waiting for him. “You should be careful next time you go out into the desert.”
“…We will,” Alnea said, restraining all his needless thoughts, suppressing them back into the depths of his Heart. “How much do I have to pay for their treatment?”
“Let’s see… Five emergency checkups, recleaning the wounds, clearing out the infections, aligning the bones… Forget it. Counting everything is just too much of a drag. Let me just round off everything to eleven thousand Blood Coins.”
“Eleven thousand…” Alnea mumbled, as he handed his Blood Card over to Wanderer Warren. “Can you tell me how much their treatment cost individually?”
“Oh? I thought they were your teammates,” Wanderer Warren said, placing his Blood Card on the box in front of him, and fiddling with its control.
“They are.”
“Then why do you want to know the individual cost of their treatment?”
“…For fairness.”
“…So, you are of that kind,” Wanderer Warren said, shaking his head, just as the box flashed in a red light, deducting eleven thousand Blood Coins from his Blood Card. “Fine. They are all your teammates anyway… Four thousand for the pink robed one. Two and a half thousand for the green robed one. One and a half thousand for the rest.”
“…I see,” Alnea said, putting his Blood Card away, and bowing slightly to the Wanderer. “Thank you for indulging me, Wanderer Warren. And thank you for healing my teammates.”
“No need to be so polite with me,” Wanderer Warren said, with a wry smile on his face. “That is just my job.”
“Even if that is the case, it cannot change the fact that you healed my teammates…”
“…I almost forgot how stubborn people like you can be… Forget it. Do what you want. Oh, and remember to come back to me whenever you are injured, or need my help.”
“…I—We will,” Alnea said, nodding solemnly at the Wanderer, before walking away from the counter, making way for the people behind him. He did not go too far though. His teammates… Thankfully, the girls did not make him wait for long, with Karl soon following behind them.
“Is it over?” Cecilia said, as she walked up to his side, and looked at their teammates on the makeshift stretcher. “How much did Wanderer Warren charge for their treatment?”
“Eleven thousand… How about you? How many Blood Coins did you get?”
“…Enough to meet my needs for a while.”
“…Are you still angry about what I said earlier?”
“…What do you think?”
“…There is a reason why I did not say it clearly back then,” Alnea said, before turning towards Yuri and Vestia. “Did the woman say anything to you when she handed you your Blood Cards?”
“…She asked us to be careful.”
“But she did not tell you what to be careful of, right?”
“…Maybe she was just trying to scare us,” Cecilia said a little hesitantly, only for Vestia to shake her head in response.
“She did not look like someone who jokes too often.”
“…Whatever it is, I am sure that it can wait until we return to the privacy of our mansion,” Yuri said, pointing to the people around them, and their teammates lying on the ground. “Should we head back now?”
“…About that,” Alnea said, pressing his hand over his stomach, while trying not to let his embarrassment show on his face. “Since we are here already, we might as well go to the canteen and have our dinner.”
“What about them?”
“…I have a solution,” Alnea said, before walking back to the counter for healers, where Wanderer Warren was healing a gash on a yellow robed Wanderer’s chest. “Excuse me, Wanderer Warren. Could you please do me a favour?”
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“…When I said that you can come to me if you need help, I did not think that you would come back so soon,” Wanderer Warren said, still concentrating on healing the yellow robed man’s wound. “What is it? Let me remind you, I will not heal anyone for free. And I will not help you deal with your troubles either. It is against the rules.”
“…I just wanted to ask if we could leave our unconscious teammates in your care, while we go have our dinner. Though now I also want to ask if you know anything about the trouble that I—we might face in the near future.”
“…It’s just watching over them, right? Rest assured; I will take good care of them. You can go have your dinner with no worries.”
“…Thank you, Wanderer Warren,” Alnea said, deciding not to press the Wanderer, and returned back to his teammates. “Now, can we go have our dinner?”
“…I guess it’s fine.”
“…I am indeed starving a little.”
“As long as it is with Alnea,” Vestia said, winking at him with a smile… Was she taking revenge for not helping her out earlier? Thankfully, other than glaring at him a little, Cecilia did not respond to Vestia’s provocations, while Yuri just smiled, and ignored the latter. It looked like it was not just him who was starving.
Having made up their mind, all four of them made their way to the canteen, and wolfed down all sorts of dishes, until their stomachs began complaining. At least that was why Alnea stopped eating. And from how Cecilia had furrowed her brows, she had probably stopped for a similar reason. Karl, on the other hand, was silent as ever. Just as Vestia and Yuri were elegant as ever.
Still, from the satisfied smiles on their faces, it was evident that they too had had their fill. Just from the virtue of having higher Spirit Power, even if they had not eaten as much as Alnea and Cecilia, they should not be too far behind… It was surprising how much food just one Blood Coin could get in the Lost City. In contrast, healing just a couple of serious wounds could cost upwards of thousands of Blood Coins…
Returning from the cafeteria, Alnea thanked Wanderer Warren once again for helping him look after his teammates, before asking Vestia to lead the way to their new mansion. True to her words, the mansion was indeed just a quarter of an hour away from the Blood Hall. And that was when they were carrying the makeshift stretcher with them. Not to mention how tired they already were. None of them were in the mood to admire their efforts though. Especially after they had just had such a hearty meal…
From the outside, the mansion looked three storeys tall, and was half as large on either side as the mansion that they had left in the morning. It even had a couple of balconies on the third floor. Only the doors of the mansion of the mansion were of the same size. The hall that the doors opened into though… It may have been only two storeys tall, just like how the hall of their first mansion had been, but it was at least twice as large as the old living room. And there were stairs that led up to the third floor as well. Not to mention all the rooms that were already there on the first and second floors…
Apparently, the mansion was big enough to house as many as fourteen people at the same time. But the larger size of the mansion did not stop the city from decorating it luxuriously. The soft carpets that rendered the even softer cushion as useless, the beautiful murals… Compared to their old mansion, their new mansion was just pure extravagance. No wonder it cost around a thousand and five hundred Blood Coins to reserve it for just one month.
Not that Alnea was complaining. He knew how mansions were priced. From how the mansion in front of him did not have any extra decorations, and had the same architecture as the rest of the buildings around it, he could guess that Vestia must not have opted for any modifications. The high price of the mansion was probably solely because of how large the house was, and how close it was to the Blood Hall. And the extra security measures it had in place, of course. Besides, since the mansion had already been reserved for a month, what was the use of complaining?
Placing the stretcher down in the living hall, Alnea stretched out his limbs, trying to relieve their soreness, with the girls doing the same, albeit slightly differently. The Martial Styles that they were proficient in were different. Naturally, the way they relaxed their body and muscles was also different. Only Karl seemed to have given up, and just laid down on the ground, gasping for breath.
Though his weak appearance was not able to fool Alnea. Not anymore. Especially not after he had seen the grey robed man take down two Peak Stage False Wanderers, barely suffering a few scratches in the process. Although he had Yuri and Vestia’s help, still, the man was far from being as weak as he was appearing at the moment. At the very least, he was strong enough to rank in the top five thousand ranks of the Arena. But that was beyond the point.
“What are we going to do with them?” Alnea said, pointing to the men lying on the ground. “Do we carry them all back to their rooms, or just leave them here?”
“…What’s the point?” Cecilia said, tilting her head, as if to express her confusion. “We have to bring them to the Blood Hall every day… Might as well just leave them here. It will also help us better take care of them.”
“…She does have a point,” Vestia added. “More importantly, there are only three rooms on the ground floor. And there are five of them. Even if we reserve all three of the rooms on the ground floor for them, we will have to carry two of them up the stairs once again…”
“…Lia is right. We should leave them here for the time being, and let them select their room when they wake up.”
“I am taking the room on the ground floor!”
“…I certainly do not wish to climb some stairs once again.”
“…Since there are three rooms on the ground floor, how about we each take one of them?”
“…I was hoping I could share a room next to Alnea…”
“Don’t even think about it, Vixen!”
…Alnea ignored the girls, and turned towards the only other man still awake in the room.
“Looks like we will have to choose a room on the second floor, Karl.”
“…Can we not just sleep here?”
“Stop being lazy. It’s just a few stairs.”
“…Right now, each stair is like a mountain to me…”
“…You can stay if you want to see whether their argument will turn violent.”
“…Wait for me, Captain!”