Two as One Princesses

yielded and took a paper, a pen, and an inkwell from the shelf in the corner of the room.
I feel magic power from the ink in the pen, so I’m sure that it’s necessary for magic contracts.

「I’ll leave the details to your judgment.」

Being handed the complete set, Ciel and I discussed what we should write.
Since it’s absolutely tiresome to think of some implicit contract, we simply wrote a brief summary of the conversation earlier and the course of events starting from when the boy approached us, with 「The Guildmaster of Norvelle acknowledges the validity of the details mentioned above.」 written at the end.
Originally, I wanted it to be a contract with the Hunter Guild but the contract fundamentally can only be exchanged between two individuals, so it can’t be helped.

That’s why the contract Duke Rispelgia made is something purely between him and that pig man.
I have no idea what sort of contract that was, but at the very least, it’s not something that turns Ciel into a slave.
In the first place, it seems like a contract different from a magic contract is used in the case of enslavement.
In other words, Ciel’s status is not that of an escaped slave; and as for whether she’s a member of the House of Rispeliga, it’ll depend on what the contract says.
Her status is completely in the air.
If this was my former world, it’s practically no different from being abandoned without a birth certificate or literally anything to identify her.

Back on topic.

After showing the guildmaster the document detailing nothing but the truth, he stares firmly at the contract before handing it back to Ciel.

「Could you add a sentence saying “Promotion to B-rank may be accelerated depending on the circumstances”?
There shouldn’t be any issues with getting there faster, don’t you think?」
「Understood.」

Ciel added it as told and handed the document to the guildmaster; and after he signed, Ciel signed it as well.
Lastly, both of them added a drop of their blood to complete the contract.
I suppose that last sentence is saying 「There’s still a possibility of being promoted earlier, so keep up your working pace.」 or so.
The fact that it had 「Depending on the circumstances」 immediately makes it unworthy of trust, so the holing up plan isn’t going to change.

「That reminds me, I haven’t returned your card yet.」
「What happened to the requests I asked for?」

As the guildmaster gave the card back, Ciel asked so.
The guildmaster had a broad smile and answered: 「They’re properly processed.」
How can I say this, he’s pretty quick to bounce back.
These requests don’t particularly take much of our time and could probably be completed as we return from the sea, so I don’t really mind.

Being sent off by the guildmaster’s last-minute look of triumph, we decided to return to our inn for today.

◇

「So we already completed the required amount of requests for B-rank, huh.
That was a surprise.」
『Come to think of it, since we’ve done nothing but finish requests outside of travelling, it does make complete sense.
Ciel, do you know how many requests we have completed up until now?』
「That might have been part of the reason, but we also usually work on several requests at once.
So if I include the simple ones, maybe about 300 or less?」
『I think so too.
Then, do you know how many requests a typical C-rank hunter completes in a month?』
「If I remember correctly, you can earn enough to live with four requests… I see.
I get it now.」

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It looks like Ciel’s also convinced now.

Considering that they work in parties, lower-ranked hunters; particularly those of E-rank and below; will have a really rough time if they don’t complete requests every day.
As for why they work in parties, it’s naturally to stay alive.
Hunters who work solo like us—while it’s a bit weird to describe it that way—are actually a rare few.

And higher up on the level of D and C-rank, hunters will then earn more than enough to live even if they reduce their completion frequency.

However, the higher the rank, the greater the request’s difficulty and the risk of getting injured or losing one’s life.

For that reason, a typical high rank hunter only accepts a few requests per month.
After completing one, they’ll have a few days of sufficient rest.
Then they’ll leave for another request again.
It’s said that if you can’t do that, you’ll die in some random place before you can even become a high-ranked hunter.

On the other hand, Ciel completes her requests without minding this pace at all.
Why? It’s because absolutely nothing on the level of C-rank is of danger to her.
Even in the case of a B-rank request, there shouldn’t be any risk of losing her life.
Compared to the times when we were still at the mansion, being in a forest brimming with monsters is less taxing both mentally and emotionally.
We don’t have to be endlessly stressed with the constant danger to our lives after all.

That’s why I’m not surprised to hear that we’ve already gotten enough completed requests—contribution points?—for a B-rank promotion.

It’s also possible that they included our independent resolution of the monster stampede in the assessment independently of that too.

「This is the first time I’ve heard that we’ve already finished enough requests for a promotion.
That’s because they wanted to push the unprocessed requests on us, right?」
『That was probably the case.
They know that we’ll just do unprocessed requests on our own, so from the guild’s perspective, we might have been seen as really convenient hunters.』
「Ain, don’t you have anything to say against that?」
『Well, it’s important to use whatever you can, after all.
In our case, since we’ve already declared that we’ll leave this country when we reach B-rank, it wouldn’t be strange if they’re thinking of having us complete as many as possible while we’re still in here.
It’s not like I have absolutely nothing to say against this, but in my opinion, it can’t be helped.』
「I see.
Then in that case, I suppose it’s fine.」
『If I ever get angry, it would probably be when this news is intentionally kept a secret from us even though we could have already gotten a B-rank promotion.』

Nodding while seemingly convinced, 「After we see the ocean, where should we hole up?」 Ciel then changed the topic.
It seems like Ciel also has something she wants to do and is glad that she’ll have a lot of free time.
As Ciel has found something she actively wants to do, I started to seriously consider the idea of holing up on a mountain.

Heya~! And we’re out of the guild after several chapters, lol! The guildmaster seems like the responsible guy that get’s the short end of the stick, honestly.

Today, we got a bit more worldbuilding~! It’s nice to know more about the rank system to be honest, but yeah, a ten year period for assessment? That’s too long for our princesses… On another note, the guildmaster probably felt super awkward the entire time.
Like “Yeah… So about that… You’re actually competent enough, but….” And he’s also pressured to keep them from lowering their work pace, when they don’t even need to work anymore.
If I had to guess (cuz I can’t quite remember anymore), the once a month thing is just the minimum number of requests needed to keep your guild membership from being revoked/expired.
Probably just so you don’t get marked as MIA or dead in some random ditch.
So yeah, imagine being the one that has to say “Yeah, you’ve scored more than the required points, but can you… like… keep scoring more points? Please?”.
Yeah, no, please just spare me of that.

And so it seems like our princesses are planning to just, well, have some alone time after this.
It was nice to see Ciel actually deciding to get the magic contract on her own, yay~! Also, Ciel was definitely a bit pissed.
I think.
Lol.