“You’re all being too harsh.”

The Guildmaster completely ignored my words and opened the door to an inn.

“This is where you’ll be staying.”

He said he would have an early lunch with me and return to the capital.

The inn was adequately clean and nice. It was fascinating that I could see the ocean through the window despite being quite far from it.

As I settled into this peaceful daily life, everything that happened in the capital felt like a dream.

Even the fear I felt towards the three thugs just yesterday had completely vanished.

The chances of them coming here were close to zero, given they had to kill monsters in the capital. Even if they couldn’t let go of their attachment to me.

I found myself humming, happy to have completely shed everything that had been troubling me.

Here, I could earn money solely through interpretation without having to participate in battles.

Isn’t this a honey-sweet life?

At that moment, I suddenly remembered something I hadn’t finished in the capital.

“By the way Honey, why did you arrange for me to meet Lady Olivia? Our guild membership was exposed because of that.”

He had been so against it when I told Olivia about the hot potato ability, but now he even went as far as to present me as a guild member.

“I did it so she would know.”

“What?”

“Duncan asked if he could tell her about the guild, so I said yes. Our hideout was already exposed to Lady Olivia in that forest anyway.”

The Guildmaster lowered his voice even though there was no one around to hear.

“Above all, I was concerned about Sir Lambert’s situation. I thought if I arranged a meeting between you and Lady Olivia, that issue could be resolved cleanly.”

Could it be… did he predict that Olivia would handle Lambert’s situation neatly?

Just how many moves ahead did he plan?

“Is my Honey a genius?”

The Guildmaster replied in a rather serious voice.

“Your Honey is indeed a genius.”

Good grief, this man who never learned humility.

“Haha….. Thanks to your genius, it seems everything will work out well. I wonder if Lady Olivia is playing her part well?”

“Let’s trust her. Unlike you, she seemed quite shrewd, so I think she’ll do fine with anything.”

***

Lambert returned to the Center today, as usual, after finishing his battle with monsters.

Though he wasn’t injured at all, he headed to the recovery room. It was to receive guidance from Olivia.

When he arrived at the recovery room, he was greeted by Olivia, who had returned earlier, thanks to Baron’s telekinesis.

“Sir Lambert, are you here for guidance?”

“Yeah.”

Lambert sat down across from Olivia after his brief response. Olivia, who had been providing guidance for several days now, took his hand with practiced familiarity.

As soon as their hands touched, a refreshing energy began to seep in.

Olivia’s energy was completely different from Yerena’s warm energy. It was colder and purer.

‘…The matching rate isn’t bad, but I can’t get used to it.’

Lambert couldn’t be as forceful with Olivia as he had been with Yerena.

For one, she looked too much like Diana to treat her roughly, and she was fierce enough to slap both Benjamin and Baron in succession.

It’s absolutely not because he was afraid of being hit by Olivia.

How much could it hurt being hit by those small hands anyway?

Rather, he didn’t want to earn her hatred.

At least Yerena would always guide him with a smile the next day no matter what he did…

“This reminds me of a few days ago.”

Olivia, who rarely made small talk, suddenly spoke up.

Lambert expressed his confusion at this sudden change.

“What do you mean?”

“I’m sorry for pretending not to know until now.”

“I asked what you meant.”

“The day you lost consciousness in the Pandora Forest, I was wandering there too. I had taken a wrong turn on my way to the Center.”

“You, could it be……”

Lambert’s red eyes trembled as he stared directly at Olivia.

Olivia, who had been staring at their joined hands, raised her gaze, and their eyes met.

“Yes, I was the one who held your hand in that forest.”

“…!”

“I think your wounds were stopped then because guidance happened naturally.”

“That’s impossible. That hand was definitely……”

“Why is it impossible? I’m confessing the truth.”

Olivia answered calmly, as if she had anticipated such a question.

“Then why did you hide this fact until now?”

“You’ve been concerned about me because I resemble Lady Diana. It’s been that way since our first meeting.”

“I won’t deny that.”

“In that situation, if it was revealed that I was also your lifesaver, how much more would you come to like me?”

“……”

“I don’t like the attention I’m getting now. Because it’s only due to Lady Diana.”

“If you didn’t want more attention, you should have kept quiet until the end. Suddenly, revealing the truth doesn’t make sense.”

Olivia thought to herself that while she had assumed he was only serious about physical matters, he was actually quite clever.

But she showed no signs of being flustered and delivered her prepared response.

“It was because I felt sorry.”

“What?”

“I felt bad watching you search that forest like a madman.”

“……”

“Do whatever you want – whether you pay more attention to me or continue searching the forest without believing my words. I’ve told you the truth.”

Having said what she needed to say, Olivia let go of his hand.

“The guidance is finished too. Since you don’t have any internal or external injuries, you shouldn’t need much more.”

Olivia quickly stood up, not giving Lambert a chance to stop her.

Lambert’s face was frozen in shock, filled with confusion.

Olivia quickly left the recovery room before he could regain his composure.

“Whew. This should resolve things.”

When she entered her room in the Center, she heard a tapping sound on the window.

Outside the window was a familiar parrot.

“Mountain Path!”

Mountain Path, seemingly sent by the Guildmaster, had a small pouch tied to its leg.

Olivia opened the window to let Mountain Path in.

“Have you been well?”

Mountain Path, perched on the windowsill, scratched at the spot as if responding.

“The Guildmaster is quick with calculations. I like it.”

Olivia untied the pouch from Mountain Path’s leg.

Inside the pouch were two checks agreed upon by the guild and a note.

「New customer∼ Hello ^0^

I’ll be waiting for the results! (^//////^)」

“…What’s with this outdated message?”

Olivia tore up the note, as if it wasn’t even worth reading again.

‘Now that I’ve completed the job, I should visit the guild tonight to see Lady Anya.’

Though Lambert seemed to doubt her story for now, she was confident he would gradually come to believe it.

There was no reason for him not to believe the story she had fabricated. The narrative was perfect, the excuse was perfect.

Now that Lambert’s situation was resolved, she became curious about why cute Anya wanted to hide the fact that she had saved Lambert.

Well… it could be because she needed to hide her identity as a guild member, but something felt off about it.

She had a feeling that Anya and the Guildmaster were hiding something from her.

Would she be able to find out why she felt this way when they meet tonight?

Olivia waited for the late night to come.

In the deep night, when everyone at the Center was asleep, Olivia, wearing a hood, quietly left the Center.

She walked unhindered to downtown and slipped into Hot Potato located in the outskirts.

And shortly after, a figure emerged from the dark alley.

It was Lambert, who had recently been coming to Hot Potato.

“This place again.”

After his first visit to Hot Potato, Lambert had his subordinates investigate the place.

As a result, he discovered that an information guild existed in the basement of the potato wholesale store.

It didn’t seem to be run by just anyone, as nobles occasionally used it.

An information guild was far removed from Lambert, whose life revolved around missing Diana and eliminating monsters.

But this place kept bothering him.

Even Olivia, who had just arrived in the capital, was secretly using it.

‘I should try using it too.’

In short, it was a frontal approach. He wanted to see the suspicious place with his own eyes.

He also had a clear justification.

Lambert planned to request information about ‘Yerena’s disappeared whereabouts.’