Orphans. And from Loro as well.
Had we not saved Loro, the goblins and ogres would catch up to the refugees fleeing westward through Surga Pass and slaughtered them all.
At least that was what happened in the actual history I remembered of Dunia.
This girl and the boy with her would not be here if we did not succeed on the tenth floor.
What a fine twist of fate.
I reached for the pouch holding the rest of my silver coins and handed it to the girl.
"Lady, I said we don't need your help."
The girl stated as she pushed the pouch back to me.
"You will bring yourself and the other children to the Beregardo Orphanage in the Rayulan Avenue in the central wall district. The money is to help accommodate your first few months there."
The Beregardo Orphanage had stood for more than 500 years.
It would exist in Seraphold even though I was not.
The girl pushed the pouch harder.
"Orphanage? We don't want to go to an orphanage!"
"The Beregardo Orphanage raises the children in their care to serve the Zeref Household. You can strive to become either clerks, servants, or even knights. All high-paying jobs under the Zeref employment, including great pensions.
"Though you can actually choose to leave once you're old enough, the orphanage will educate you so you could find your place within the Zeref family. Wouldn't that be better than living on the street for the rest of your life?"
The girl was silenced by my words.
Her eyes were studying the pouch of silver I gave her.
She then asked me.
"Why are you doing this? I said we don't need help."
I shook my head.
"I'm not trying to help you. I am simply a supporter of the Zeref and I wish to provide the family with capable loyal servants. I can do that by sending you to the Beregardo Orphanage."
Indeed. By raising and educating our people since their childhood, the Zeref had never been betrayed by those who pledged their allegiance to us.
We never had to worry about spies, either.
All the staffs weren't raised on the orphanage were easily the suspects whenever suspicion arises. They always turned out to be the culprit. Never the ones from the orphanage.
The girl, Deria if I was not mistaken, insisted on handing my pouch back.
She succeeded to return it to my grasp.
"Thank you for your advice, lady. If you're telling the truth, then we won't need your silver. We can provide the amount ourselves."
She said as she pulled little Hamsin away with her.
The two soon vanished among the crowd in the square.
Had I been the daughter of the Zeref family, I would had ordered the patrol guards to seize them and brought them to the orphanage.
But simply telling the children of the place would have to do as who I currently was.
"She's a tough kid. I hope she'll take her friends to that orphanage of yours."
Jonah said.
"If she is as smart as I think she is, she will."
I stood from the bench and walked toward the inn called Lightland Hut by the square. Jonah joined me as he saw where I was headed.
Inside, we found ourselves facing a large common room packed with people sitting at the inn's rounded tables.
I surveyed the inn's patrons and could not find the rest of my comrades among them.
"Let's find a table and wait for the others."
I told Jonah.
Fortunately, a table of five near the entrance was freed upon our arrival.
Jonah and I quickly placed ourselves there before it was taken again.
Soon, a tall servant girl wielding a tray on her shoulder approached us to take our orders.
Using a little of Jonah's money that we had exchanged with Jeanine, we ordered some light meal for our dinner, and even booked rooms to stay the night.
I would like to get a room for each of us. But there were only three vacant rooms left at the inn.
It was not ideal, but I booked them anyway. We could settle the room arrangement once the others arrived.
Only once Jonah and I were already dining our meals that Shanny and Trudy arrived at the Lightland Hut.
We decided to wait for Darius before we share our findings. Otherwise we would have to repeat our report.
As such, Shanny and Trudy ordered their meals and we lounged as the night grew darker.
The middle-aged mercenary arrived only after Shanny and Trudy long finished their meals and more than half the common room empty.
Darius certainly took quite an adventure around the city for returning this late.
We immediately began our discussion as soon as Darius sat, since he claimed he had eaten on the way.
Shanny and Trudy went first. They laid a small sack filled with heavy rounded things on the table.
"There were many fine weapons and armors sold in the shops we went to. But I bet Gerrits can make better, so we ignored them."
Shanny said.
"We remembered Serafina saying we could never have too many elemental stones, so we focused on finding those after we heard some shops sells them."
Trudy said.
She loosened the string tying the sack and revealed a number of basic elemental stones inside.
One fire. Two wind. And three water. Quite a haul.
We might be able to start restocking the enchanted weapons once we returned.
"Trudy and I had to walk all over since they're not sold in the same place. They said the mercenary guild store is selling them as well, but we skipped the establishment since we knew Darius went there."
Shanny said.
Darius then laid on the table a sack of his own. His was smaller than the women's.
"There were elemental stones in the store. But I bought these instead since they're precious as well and I think will only be useful in the lobby. I almost spent all my money for them."
He revealed three Replay Stones from his sack.
We could also never have too much Replay Stones considering we intended to improve the newcomers' training on the lobby first floor.
They needed to see how hard the trial could become so they would know how much they needed to train to face such trial.
Now that the tenth floor was cleared, we would need two Replay Stones for each newcomer to show them all the Quintal Trials that had been done so far.
Since the others had revealed their exploits, it was now our turn.
I placed the basic fire elemental stone Deria gave us on the table.
"We ended up acquiring this elemental stone in our outing. But Jonah and I also obtained something else."
I proceeded to tell them about the maps I asked Jeanine to find and provide by tomorrow.
I kept from them about my request of the Sherefiah basin investigation. That one was only to satisfy my curiosity. I also doubted the mystery required our immediate attention.
Jonah thankfully kept quiet about it. He likely had read my intention.
"Norn's map really did help us navigate through Loro on the tenth floor."
Shanny said with a nod.
"It'll be great to have a collection of all the maps in Dunia. We would never get lost in the trial."
Trudy added.
"Of course, we first needed to make certain where in Dunia does the trial take place. Only then the maps will be useful."
Darius pointed out.
Now that we had shared the items we obtained, it was time to share our other findings.
"What news have you heard of the empire?"
I asked my comrades.
"We heard about the invasion on Loro and the other border cities."
Shanny answered.
"What they said happened in Loro was just like how we remembered of the tenth floor. There're even accounts of us."
Trudy said.
I raised my eyebrows in interest. This I had not heard before.
"Somebody noticed us? But nobody could see nor hear us back then."
"I'm not sure how, but there were hearsays among the Loro refugees. Saying something about unknown heroes whose faces they could not see. That these heroes helped defending Loro until the imperial army reinforcement arrived. And yes, they did use the term 'heroes.'"
Trudy explained.
Seeing how Darius nodded along her words, he apparently had heard the same thing during his outing as well.
I decided to keep Jeanine's suspicion about the Seven Great Houses, since it might not mean anything, but impart the other news I heard from her.
"So what we did on the fifth floor affected the number of ogres that appeared on the tenth floor."
Shanny stated after I told them about the hordes of ogres mysteriously returning east after heading toward Loro.
"The tower's trials seem to be getting more connected and complicated the higher we climb."
Trudy commented with a frown.
Now that we were speaking of oddities, I directed the topic to something else.
"You must have heard of the ancient ruins, haven't you?"
I asked.
Shanny immediately nodded. She had been waiting to speak of this.
"The mercenaries and merchants call them 'dungeons.' They appeared overnight a few weeks ago, right after the invasions. Apparently those places got troves of treasure in them."
"They said there's one in Seraphold. In fact, the elemental stones we bought originally came from there."
Trudy added.
Darius cleared his throat and spoke up. He avoided my gaze as he was speaking.
"After hearing about it in the mercenary guild, I went to scout the dungeon and entered it."