Nobina and Her Strange Journey Through Another World

The two of them headed to the front, where Sarah had Nobina sit down on a chair behind the desk. As for Sarah, she took her position behind one of the receptionist desks before turning to Nobina.

“Now then,” said Sarah. “My job as the Main Receptionist of the guild is pretty straightforward. I stand here to make sure that there’s always someone ready to assist guild members. For the most part, it’s just turning in quests or getting new ones. The process for both of those is pretty simple. As long as adventurers make sure the requirements are met, I just have both of those processed without issue. I note down what quests are taken and completed in our quest keeping log and that’s the end of it.”

Nobina gave a nod. It was a simple job, yet it wasn’t something she really explored when she wrote her stories. No one really thought about the simple roles like Sarahs, but it was critical to ensure the guild could function. Without someone handling the quests, nothing could basically happen.

“Occasionally, we some people need other services, but I’ll always be here to assist you in learning how to handle them. Do you have any questions?”

She shook her head. It was pretty straightforward, so she was interested to see how the interactions went. With that, Sarah nodded and began working at the desk.

Working was a light way to put it though. Ten minutes had passed, and nothing had really happened. During this time, Sarah began talking about herself, and Nobina listened intently to her talk.

She began talking about how she originally lived in another town that was half the size of Agora. Things were pretty quiet there, even compared to Agora.

“Lavasta is as small as a town you can get. Also as boring as you can get,” she laughed. “A town with only one road to it and one that operated as a farming town. Nothing really interesting there besides a few monsters here and there. That’s why I eventually moved to Agora.”

“Oh ok. Did you intent to be a guild officer initially or did it just happen?”

Sarah shook her head.

“See, I learned of my Charisma skill from the guild and was offered a job on the spot. I was lucky that there was someone who could check that day. Else, I’d be hunting for jobs and perhaps working something more traditional.”

“Do you have an ability?”

She gave a smirk, showing a proud expression.

“I got two. Neither might be rare, but it’s something.”

Nobina was surprised and interested in learning what they were.

The first one was called Far Speech. It was an active ability that allowed her voice to be heard at far distances. It was a skill that required practice, so she often spent the weekends going into the forest to train it.

“Isn’t that a bit dangerous?” asked Nobina. “What if you draw monsters to you?”

“We are in a pretty safe place and guild officers usually undergo basic monster slaying training. Plus, I only can use it twice a day right now. Of course, not all of us are required to know basic combat training, but many of us take the course. It could mean the difference between life and death, especially if you go into the field.”

She gave a nod. It made sense to have some sort of basic training for the sake of protection.

Sarah then went into her second skill, which was surprisingly not an active skill. It was a passive skill called Composure, which allowed her to maintain composure in situations that normally would cause her to lose it. It did have its limits, though, and if she lost her composure despite the skill being active, the drawback was serious.

“Yeah… I don’t like thinking about what happens when it fails,” she sighed.

Nobina waited for her to explain it more, but she quickly moved on to another topic. It was clearly a sensitive one, so Nobina didn’t press her.

With that, the topic changed to more casual topics like Sarah’s favorite foods, places to go, and her general likes and dislikes. Nobina knew she was leading the conversation, but she didn’t mind.

As they talked, occasionally an adventurer would approach and draw her attention. It was then that Nobina got a good sense of how to operate the receptionist desks. From what she noticed, Sarah always made sure to give a smile and be as welcoming as possible. Whether it was a male or female adventurer, a young or old one, or even a scary veteran, her smile seemed to be constant. She wondered if this was how she developed her Charisma Path. Interacting with people like this on a daily basis would certainly work to improve one’s Charisma. At the very least, it was something that seemed relevant to the path.

As the day went on, eventually it seemed the day was coming to an end. Nobina had forgotten that this was all on the same day and soon, Sarah asked her what she wanted for dinner.

“I’m not too familiar with this place, so I’d take recommendations.”

“Oh!” she exclaimed. “We should go to the nearby inn. Do you have a room for the town yet?”

She shook her head.

“I kind of don’t have money either, so…”

Sarah put her hand on Nobina’s shoulders, giving a big grin.

“I got you covered. I might not be rich, but I can certainly cover a few weeks of a room.”

Nobina, feeling embarrassed, was having trouble responding to such generosity.

“No need to thank me either. We are friends after all.”

Seeing no reason to deny it, Nobina merely sighed and accepted it.

“Yeah… We’re friends.”

It seemed to click in Sarah as she cheered despite people still being in the guild. Nobina noticed all the eyes turn to Sarah, but they quickly went back to their own business.

“We’ll have some drinks and enjoy the rest of the day. Oh, it’s going to be so good.”

Nobina thought about what she said. She wasn’t really a drinker, but she didn’t want to deny her. And Sarah was also offering to pay for her room till she had the funds. With no strong reason to deny her, she nodded.

“Great. Let’s finish the day off and…”

As Sarah was speaking, a new party entered. Three individuals looking worse for wear appeared, with one supporting the other. Sarah’s face turned to that of concern as she waited for one of them to approach. Eventually, a swordsman who couldn’t have been older than fifteen appeared. Nobina was surprised to see someone that young working as an adventurer, but she remembered that this was another world. In this world, people could have started working at a young age to become great adventurers. If everything took time and effort to master a Path, it made sense to start as soon as possible.

The adventurer, a kid with messy red hair, dropped a bag and the quest flyer in front of Sarah. She opened up the bag and counter eight left ears and two right ears.

“Sorry,” said the kid. “Our fire mage burned the head of…”

The kid stopped immediately as a strong smell appeared. Both Sarah and the kid turned to Nobina, who was pulling a bowl out of her bag. A strong smell of what appeared to be Miso Soup appeared around Nobina.

“Uh… Sorry,” said Nobina.

She placed the soup down on the nearby table, along with the soup spoon. She was really tempted to drink it due to how hungry she was, but the situation seemed a bit too serious for a food break.

“Anyways,” said Sarah, turning her focus back to the kid. “The quest requirements make it clear it has to be ten left ears. We can’t offer the full reward.”

The kid seemed shocked by his response, suddenly responding angrily to Sarah.

“What? What do you mean? I told you our fire mage made it so we couldn’t collect all ten ears. We had to fight ten goblins all at once! Come on. Can you give us a break?”

Sarah shook her head.

“The rules are clear. You need to provide ten left ears, else we cannot confirm that ten goblins were killed. People cheating the system is far too easy if we make any exception.”

He seemed to want to blow up in anger, but he then decided to use that energy for some harsh words instead.

“Your heartless, you know that? We almost died out there doing good for people and yet someone like you who does nothing but sit around and relax thinks they can say we don’t deserve payment? Because we could be lying? Does this look like we are lying!”

He pointed to his party, who was looking away at this point. The other adventurers’ eyes were on them, but no one was saying anything. Nobina, seeing this, wondered what Sarah would do.

With the most composed face possible, she began speaking to them frankly.

“Tell me. Why did you take on ten goblins at once? Did you think you could take them without issue?”

“Well…” The boy didn’t want to say, likely knowing how stupid that sounded.

“Did you at least try to separate them? Perhaps that failed and this was a nightmare situation, right?”

The boy didn’t say anything, with Sarah now laying into him.

“You should know that the number one rule adventurers have is to make sure to complete a mission while not risking their lives unnecessarily. We don’t want people throwing their lives away, nor do we want people taking on tasks they can’t complete.”

“But we could have…” His words were quickly spoken over by Sarah, who seemed to be annoyed.

“Excuses,” she spit. “If you would have done this safer, your party would be safe. Are you the party leader or is it one of them?”

“… I am,” he said meekly.

Sarah looked in the eye, seeing guilt now overwhelm him. At that point, her expression softened.

“Listen,” she said. “I’m saying this for your sake. Please treat this seriously and don’t blame others for mistakes you’ve made as a leader and as a party. Be thankful you came out of this alive and learn from it. Got it?”

He gave a slight nod, with silent tears falling from his eyes.

“I’ll offer partial payment. Do you accept?”

“Yeah,” he said.

With that, he took the money and returned to his party. Before he got back to them, Sarah spoke out.

“Kid,” she said. “If you need medical help, I’ll have it discounted. Please let me know.”

“Thanks for the offer,” he bowed. “I’m really grateful for it.”

The kid came over, and Sarah handed him a letter. With that, the three departed, leaving Nobina and Sarah to talk. The rest of the adventurers seemed to have a happy look on their faces as Sarah sighed.

“Man… Kids these days.”

Nobina had an expression of awe as she looked at Sarah.

“Wow… That was… amazingly handled.”

“Thanks,” said Sarah. “I’ve been doing this for a while and seen it all. Those kids are new, so I knew I had to lay it into them for them to understand. Adventuring is a dangerous job. We accept people working at their age as long as they are smart about it, but they are kids at the end of the day. We don’t want anyone dying out here.”

She gave a nod. Nobina respected how much Sarah cared for the job. It really showed that she deserved the role of Main Receptionist.

“Now then… What’s the soup?” asked Sarah, her mouth seemingly salivating.

“It’s called Miso Soup,” said Nobina, picking it up. “It’s a soup made of what’s called a dashi stock and often has ingredients like vegetables and tofu.”

The words seemed to go in one ear and out the other as Sarah merely nodded.

“Mind if I try a bit?” Sarah asked, eyeing the soup.

Nobina handed it over, and Sarah took a sip. Her eyes lit up as she handed it back.

“Wow… That’s amazing,” she said. “Do you have more?”

She shook her head, prompting Sarah to drop hers.

“You can have half. I’m still hungry so I’ll probably use this to hold me over till we leave for dinner.”

“How did you get that soup anyway?” asked Sarah, now curious about its origin.

“Uh… This is a special bag that random objects appear in it. I don’t know what determines what goes in it, but this time it was Miso Soup,” said Nobina.

Sarah was confused but easily accepted Nobina’s explanation.

“Well, hopefully you get more nice food,” she laughed.

With that, Nobina drank half of it and gave the rest to Sarah. As Sarah enjoyed the soup, Nobina wondered what the future held in store regarding this bag. The timing of the soup was so weird, and she had no idea why Miso Soup was specifically selected? Did some sort of god love Miso Soup? Perhaps this was selected because they wanted a food of Japanese origin. So many questions formed every time the bag produced an item, and the Gaze was still relatively unknown. It was doing nothing but watching as far as she could tell.

As Sarah finished the soup, Nobina put the soup bowl back into her bag with the porcelain spoon. Perhaps if she needed to make soup later, these two things would be useful. For now, Sarah returned to managing the desk. The day was close to over, but for Nobina it felt like it had been the longest day of her life. So much had happened, and the day wasn’t even over yet. All she could ask was that the day ended on a calm note.