What Outsiders Can Do

"I think I like this better. It's not as bulky."

"When you're wrapping things in it, this is easier to eat. When I stuff too much in, I can't fit it in my mouth…"

"That's because you're being greedy."

Finn looked exasperated as she watched Azu eat.

Azu protested that that wasn't true, but one look at the bread in her hands made it plain as day.

"Here, you've got something on your face."

Elza said this and gently wiped Azu's mouth with her finger.

Same old Elza.

"Thank you… I put in a little too much."

Everyone gathered around the table and had the breakfast we'd prepared.

I'd made a fair amount of filling and baked plenty of bread, but with growing girls in the group, the filling vanished in no time.

With no other choice, I was eating the leftover bread with just oil and salt.

This was good too. No fluffy softness, but the savory aroma was irresistible.

After filling up, we changed into more practical clothes and headed out.

We could have kept staying at the inn but ultimately decided to settle the bill for now.

Freeing up even one room meant someone whose home had been damaged could stay there.

At times like this, it was better to sleep somewhere decent, even if it cost more.

If someone had to deal with cleanup while barely getting any sleep, even the toughest person would break down.

We headed to the Adventurer's Guild when we left.

Adventurers, with their jack-of-all-trades nature, became a major workforce at times like this.

As expected, the place was packed to bursting.

Quest forms were overflowing from the board onto a desk, piled in disorganized stacks.

It was clearly beyond capacity.

"Please don't push! Missing persons inquiries go to the barracks, not here!"

A receptionist was shouting at the top of her lungs.

Apparently, a lot of people had come here trying to confirm whether their loved ones were safe.

The guild couldn't spare the manpower for that, so they were directing people to the barracks.

That was probably the right division of labor.

I tried to push through the crowd but got pushed right back.

There was no way I was getting through this.

I had no choice but to ask Alexia and Elza to go check it out.

"Hey, don't touch me."

"Coming through, excuse me!"

The two of them shoved their way in.

When they came back a while later, their hair was a bit disheveled and they looked worn out.

Even past the initial crowd, it had clearly been just as chaotic.

"It was like being in a potato washing machine… Some people even tried to grope me in the confusion."

"Well, looking at how Alexia-chan's dressed, you can't really blame them for being drawn to you."

"It's not like I dress like this because I want to. Most of the quests, from what I could see, were for rescue assistance or transporting materials. They're basically desperate for manpower."

"Figures. Let's help with various things until noon."

"I grabbed some that looked urgent!"

I took the quest forms Elza handed me.

The pay was practically nothing.

But we'd made plenty of profit in Alsarm, so it was fine.

It wasn't just about receiving; the will to give back somewhere mattered.

In that sense, this was a good opportunity.

First, we headed to clear debris from a waterway.

The important waterways were being handled by soldiers, but the outlying ones were being left for later.

If a waterway got blocked, doing laundry and disinfecting wounds became difficult.

When we arrived, a section of the aged waterway wall had collapsed and blocked the flow, causing water to overflow into the surrounding area.

If left alone, it might flood into houses.

Apparently, there weren't many young men in this neighborhood, and work hadn't progressed at all.

"Restoring it is one thing, but as long as the water flows, right? It's already broken anyway, so a little more won't hurt."

Alexia said this and jammed the tip of her battle-axe into the debris with brute force.

"Step back for a sec."

Then Alexia quietly chanted a spell, and the battle-axe turned red.

"H-hey. What are you doing?"

"This!"

Alexia raised her right leg high and brought her heel down on the axe's handle.

A powerful impact, and the axe's tip exploded.

The debris collapsed at once and water rushed through.

It was a bit of a brute-force method, but the client thanked us.

Better than having their house flooded, probably.

"I loaded explosive magic into the axe. Pretty handy at times like this."

"You can do that, huh."

"It's incredible when you slam it into a monster. Makes them burst apart, so I don't use it often."

… Was she talking about the magic that took down that Chimera?

I'd only seen the aftermath, but it was obvious the power had been tremendous.

With this much force, you couldn't even harvest materials. Not very practical.

Next was a quest from a public bathhouse we'd used before.

They wanted us to carry the collapsed debris to a designated spot.

The customers who'd been buried had already been rescued, so we just needed to move things.

The manager was elderly, and apparently the soldiers had left for the next rescue operation as soon as the life-saving was done.

"… If it breaks, we just rebuild. The duke surely won't abandon us."

"I'm sure you're right."

The manager said this while gazing at the ruined building.

Despite being quite old, they still had the spirit to start over.

I thought I should learn from that.

Would I feel the same way to try again if I ended up in a similar situation?

With Azu and the others' abilities, they could handle most things.

We had a mage and a priestess, and even heavy labor was easy.

Tasks requiring brainwork were no problem either.

We rushed through the quests and finished them in no time.

By noon, the crowd at the Adventurer's Guild had settled down a bit.

We collected our quest completion rewards.

The urgent work must have been taken up by other adventurers too, as what remained were all long-term jobs like rebuilding.

Deciding we'd done enough, we went to leave word with the duke.

He was probably busy, so getting an audience would be impossible.

"If Yohane-sama came by, he was to go here."

The butler who received us said there was a designated location.

It was the place where the Earth Elemental Stone was enshrined, where we'd tilled the fields before.