"This is..."

"Oh... Wow..."

"Are you for real?"

"Damn"

Everyone was surprised as they opened the chest. Everyone but Necro, that is. Inside, aside from an average amount of small copper and silver coins that was to be expected, there was a small pile of expensive looking jewelry, a fistful of large gold coins and an expensive looking ornate dagger.

To be honest, the amount of money was less than what Necro had in her ring, but still... It was a large amount of money that would allow one of them to live comfortably for almost a year... Too bad there were 5 people present. What piqued her interest was, rather, the jewelry. Although most of it seemed to be fake, there was at least a handful of proper pieces in there. From a quick glance, none seemed to be either valuable or an artifact, but she wanted to take a closer look after the fact.

"So much alcohol..." Mary began daydreaming as soon as she saw the money.

*thump*

Which prompted Hal to shut the lid of the chest.

"HEY!" She protested, but Hal wouldn't take his hand off.

"Let's discuss what to do with this then." Bid started.

"I think we should count all that is in there and on the pouch from earlier and leave it here until we all go together.

"Pouch? Ah, you mean the coins from the bandits."

"Yeah. That stuff. Also, you should hurry and get the finger from that last one over there." She pointed towards the bandit they killed inside.

"There's another outside too." Said Necro, complementing Ace.

"Ah. True." She acknowledged, staring at Bid.

"Okay, I'll pull it out." He got out of his clothes a small pouch which he got from Necro with all the money from the bandits. And walked a couple steps closer to the chest, making Hal open it. "Now we count."

All and all, together with the give or take 900 Kit they got from looting the bodies, They got 9000 kit from the 9 Large gold coins, 2500 kit from the 5 small gold coins, 750 kit from the 4 large and 7 small silver coins, and 137 kit from the 11 large and 27 small copper coins.

Did you know this story is from Royal Road? Read the official version for free and support the author.

"So... 12387 kit total. That's quite a hefty sum. 3000 and a little for each right?" Mary said, after finishing accounting for all the coins.

"Wrong!" Protested Ace. "You forgot Necro. "It's a little under 2500 each."

"Aw... So then... With this we have what? 2 months worth of food and shelter? Not bad." Mary thought out loud.

"Aren't you forgetting about something?" Hal asked, trying to tease her.

"No, no. See. This money is for food and shelter. The reward money, the one from the wolf fur and the money from selling their stuff goes for drinking."

"Ah... Yes, I completely forgot about that." Realizing he was bested by her, he just gave up at once. "Anyways, it's gonna get late if we don't hurry. We better get going at once, Bid."

"Right. Let's go." Bid agreed with him and moved to remove the finger from the, now dead, wounded mercenary.

"Don't forget to loot the guy outside, he's probably got some money on him." Mary reminded him about the other one. While he and Hal bid them farewell.

"Take the bodies with you! Dump them near the rest! We'll pass there later." Ace yelled as they were almost at the door, making Hal hurry back and take the dead mercenary from inside with him.

After the two left, the girls were sitting on the floor, thinking about what to do next.

"Haah... It's finally over. I really wanted to take a bath."

"A bath? It's been a long time I haven't taken one of these." Ace responded to Necro's mutter.

"Huh? You guys take baths?!"

"Hm?"

"Yeah!?"

They answered the surprised Mary with a little confusion.

"What do you do to clean yourself then?" Necro asked.

"Back in the army, we used to get a bucket of water and clean ourselves with a wet rag. Unless there was a river nearby we could wash into, that is."

"So... The same we do as adventurers then?" Ace asked, halfheartedly.

"I guess so... Although we have seen far fewer rivers around this area than back in the day."

"We've been avoiding them, you know. But to get to the town we'll need to cross one. There should be a bridge in this road though."

"Sorry for interrupting you but... I don't remember there being any bridge on the way to Helf."

"Ah. See, they built it recently, the town name also changed to Cluj. But we still call it Helf."

"Ah, I see... Sorry." It was a known fact that she had little knowledge about her mother's former territory. And also that the local governments were rather strong. It was not a surprise that she didn't know such a thing or that the stuff she knew was outdated.

'Father must have received a letter I didn't get my hands on.' She thought.

While politically considered part of Wallachia by the people, in actuality, all this land belonged to Ungri. This area, called Transylvania, was far too difficult for Ungri to actually lay claim, so most of the public safety and cleaning was taken care of by her Father. But it did belong to her mother's cousin, Corvinus, who was actually born in Helf, now Cluj. While said to be a Town, it was actually pretty large, among the 10 largest cities around Wallachia and Transylvania combined.

"So... What are we doing now?" Ace asked.

"Maybe carry the bloody straw mattress outside before it starts to reek." Ace and Mary stared at her like she killed someone. But soon Mary stood up and started dragging it out.

"You girls not helping?" With her words, both stood up and helped her drag the whole thing outside.

"Now what?" Mary asked, panting.

"I guess we go check on the bodies, right?" Responded Necro, very nonchalantly.

"You serious?!" Mary said, sitting on the ground.

"Yeah... But you can rest, me and Ace can deal with them."

"Hah... Thanks then." Mary said, looking up towards them.

"It's fine." Ace talked before Necro could say anything. "You can take the armor off, we'll do something about cleaning up when we get back. Just pay attention around to see if there are any animals or monsters."

"Sure thing!" Mary responded happily. "You two also take care! If you don't come back before it gets dark I'll go look for you."

"We'll make sure to come back soon." Necro said, pulling Ace by the hand towards the forest.