The Kicked Out S-Rank Appraiser Creates The Strongest Guild - Chapter 07: Mine Management
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- The Kicked Out S-Rank Appraiser Creates The Strongest Guild
- Chapter 07: Mine Management
Upon returning from the dungeon, Marco was summoned to the Guild Leader’s office.
“… complete summary of what occurred within the dungeon.” Marco gave the report regarding his preliminary judgement of the situation and how Lilianne came to possess large quantities of [Earth Stones].
Once Lucius finished listening, he opened his eyes and fixed Marco with a glare. “Essentially, what you mean to say is this: you made it to the lowest floor of the dungeon. At which point, you decided to retreat without even attempting a single fight. And, when a rival guild attempted to conquer the dungeon, you stood by and did nothing. You just looked on dumbly. Is that what you’re trying to tell me?”
“Guild Leader, it is as you say. However, at that time, the unit was exhausted. Without [Earth Stones] at hand, fighting a hundred skeleton warriors in that condition was…”
“Don’t bother with excuses. How did a f**ker like you become a high-ranking member of Golden Hawk?”
“Urk… I apologise profusely.”
“Enough. Get out of my sight.”
Marco left the room, hanging his head in shame.
Lucius expelled a displeased sigh.
Damn it all. I’m surrounded by useless idiots. I’m forging connections with the nobility and on the verge of controlling this city, and yet…
Lucius’s expression was uncharacteristically troubled.
Count Elson reached out to us because we are the city’s foremost guild. If it gets out that we had a dungeon conquest snatched from right under our noses, it’ll be trouble.
“Deanna, demote Marco.”
“Of course, and who shall be the new captain?”
“Hmm. Do we have anyone talented and useful?”
“How about Jill? She is in excellent form, and her abilities will be more than enough. Even if we select her, there will surely be no complaints from anyone.”
“Jill, hmm?” Lucius stroked his jaw in thought.
I can’t put aside the fact that Laurent taught her.
“No, it’s still too early for her. Find someone else.”
Deanna blinked. “I understand. I’ll put together a list.”
“Hm. That would be good.”
From early on, Lucius took great pains to avoid giving a high position to anyone Laurent had taught.
If he had allowed that, the upper management of the guild would be virtually stacked with Laurent’s people.
If Laurent’s faction came to occupy the guild’s upper management, it wouldn’t be long before people would start whispering that maybe it was Laurent who should be Guild Leader, and not Lucius.
And even though Laurent was no longer here, Lucius still thought of nothing but how to strengthen the upper management with his own faction.
“Regardless, why do Guardians of the Magical Tree have so many [Earth Stones]? We should have control over every alchemist guild in the city capable of smelting [Earth Stones].”
“Perhaps, we have a traitor among our alchemist guilds.”
“Gather the representatives of the alchemist guilds immediately. I want the traitor flushed out.”
——
Laurent and Lilianne met up at a café.
This café was appropriate, as it was targeted at everyone, from couples to business associates. Both of them could freely drop in without worrying about ulterior motives.
“It’s been quite some time since Guardians of the Magical Tree have been able to clear a dungeon before Golden Hawk. Thank you, Laurent-san.”
“Please, I didn’t do much.”
“Last month, Jill-san obtained first place in the Subjugation rankings, but I may recover my position this month.”
“Congratulations. I heard that you defeated thirty-five skeleton warriors by yourself. It’s an amazing battle achievement.”
“That is thanks to the large supply of [Earth Stones] you provided us. To be honest, I could have taken down more, but well, I’m now in a position where I must think of my unit’s results, rather than only of my own.” Lilianne sipped her tea peacefully.
Lilianne looked even more beautiful today.
At the moment, as she basked in the fulfilment she felt for her work, Lilianne exuded a feminine elegance.
“It’s hard work, maintaining the position of an A-rank adventurer.”
“Yes, you’re quite right. Incidentally, we found a mine within the dungeon. It seems that we can mine a large amount of [Earth Stone] ores there. Can Arsenal of the Spirits handle the production of [Earth Stones] for us again?”
“Of course. We would gladly take it on. Speaking of, I did have a request…”
“Ara, what is it?” Upon hearing that Laurent himself had a request, she straightened herself abruptly, leaning forward.
“Currently, my guild has a member with the skills, [Ore Mining] and [Mine Management].”
“My, if you’re the one saying that, this person must be very talented.”
“Could you allow him to participate in the mining operations, as well?”
“This works out perfectly; I was just thinking that we didn’t have enough people working on item collection from the dungeon. If you have such a talent in mind, we’d be more than happy for the help.” Right then and there, Lilianne pulled out a piece of paper and wrote up a permission slip for entrance into the dungeon. “Here you go. Give this to your guild member, and he’ll be able to enter the dungeon whenever he pleases.”
“Thank you.”
“Not at all. Ara, it’s gotten late. I have some business to deal with soon. Please excuse me.”
“I’ll see you soon.”
——
“Alright, let’s get started with our morning briefing session!”
At the Arsenal of the Spirits workshop, Ranju began the briefing session. In one hand, he held a clipboard where he’d written down the schedule of the day.
Another one of his responsibilities was communicating announcements for the workshop, such as this.
“A few days ago, I managed to obtain large quantities of ores from the dungeon conquered by Guardians of the Magical Tree. Hence, I will be rearranging the workshop to make room for the materials in the morning. As such, I will leave the task of supporting Arri-san to the Guild Leader.”
“Got it.”
“Arri-san, your task for the day is to smelt thirty [Earth Stones].”
“Yes.”
“Well then, let’s work hard today, as well. The briefing session is adjourned.”
After Ranju dismissed the briefing session, they each set about completing their respective tasks.
Ranju prepared to leave for the dungeon with his pickaxe. Arri got the fire going for the boiler, and Laurent began taking out the ores and tools from the warehouse.
Laurent gave advice to Ranju as he was leaving. “Ranju, it’s an opportunity for you to raise your [Mine Management] skill now. I want you to work on your [Mine Management] as well, not just your [Ore Mining].”
“Alright, I’ll give it a shot.”
“For [Mine Management], you’ll have free run to select whoever you think you need. Don’t hold yourself back from making demands.”
“Yes. I’ll inspect the dungeon immediately, then.” Ranju grabbed his favourite pickaxe and left through the workshop’s backdoor.
As Laurent assisted Arri, he observed how Ranju had reorganised the warehouse.
It was the right move to leave it to Ranju.
When he’d appraised Ranju’s skill this morning, he’d found that Ranju’s [Workshop Management] skill had already become B-rank.
I can’t complain about Ranju’s performance or his management of the costs. If I can put him in charge of human resources later down the road, I could leave this workshop completely in his hands.
“Arri, how are you feeling?” Laurent asked, glancing at where she stood before the boiler.
“Yup, I’m feeling great!” Arri extracted an incomplete [Earth Stone] ore from the boiler.
“You’re taking it out already?”
“Yes, if I allow it to cool once at this point, the quality of the [Earth Stones] rises.”
“Huh. Interesting.”
“It takes a bit more time though. Ranju-san was the one who pointed it out; I wouldn’t have noticed otherwise.”
“Really?”
Arri hammered the ore a few times, then returned it to the boiler.
She was now able to grasp quite clearly how many times she had to hammer the heated ores.
It’s weird. Before, I wouldn’t have been able to do something like that at all. And now, it’s so easy. It’s all thanks to Laurent-san.
Laurent felt a complicated tangle of emotions as he watched how far Arri had come.
Already, she had outgrown his guidance.
Before long, the student would surpass the teacher.
The lonely feeling he had at the thought was something he was familiar with.
And just like the others he had taught until now, Arri could stand on her own two feet now.
“Laurent-san, if you could prepare more coal, please?”
“Oh, sorry.” At Arri’s voice, Laurent returned to reality, shaken from his thoughts.
“Well, s**t. I’ve been leaving it to Ranju so much lately; I’ve lost my touch.”
“He’s really amazing. Work has been so much easier because of him.”
“Yeah, I’m no match for Ranju.”
“But you’ve been away more and more often recently. I thought it was too bad,” Arri whispered, her face going red with embarrassment.
Laurent couldn’t hear her well. “Hm? What was that?”
“Nothing, Laurent-san. Thank you.”
“Huh? O-Okay. That was unexpected. Is everything alright?”
“Before I met you, I always thought that I was doomed to a cycle of finding jobs and being fired from them. But now I’ve been able to raise my skill to this level. The fact that I can demonstrate my ability in refinement is all thanks to you.”
“No, all I did was wake up something that had been dormant in you.”
“Laurent-san, if you want to, tonight—”
At that moment, Laurent noticed that there were black plumes of smoke billowing from the boiler.
“Wait, Arri, the ore is burning. Is that okay?”
“Eh? Ah, ahhhhhh!” Arri rushed to put out the fire and take the ore out. She was dismayed that she’d wasted an ore.
“I guess it’s no good without Ranju here. It looks like I just ended up distracting you.”
“No, that’s not—” Arri squirmed, her face red.
If he found out that she’d made a mess of it because she’d been thinking about him, she would die of embarrassment.
After that, Arri refined [Earth Stones] without making another mistake, but the first failure of the day still rang in her ears and she only managed to refine nine more A-grade [Earth Stones].
——
Ranju returned with more ores in the afternoon.
“Nice work. How was it, Ranju?”
“I got some good ores. I’ve worked in loads of mines before, but this mine in particular seems pretty good.”
“Great, let’s debrief.”
Laurent and Ranju went into the workshop eagerly and started the debriefing session.
They talked about the size of mine, the quality of its ores and the personnel they would require.
“Can you find me five people with an [Ore Mining] skill of at least B-rank and five others for transportation? If we have them, I can increase Arri’s output of A-grade [Earth Stones] to fifteen a day,” Ranju said confidently.
“Does the ores’ quality make that much of a difference?”
“Yes, the better the quality of the ores, the better the rate of high-quality [Earth Stones] that can be refined.”
“Alright, I got it. I’ll sort something out for the required people.”
“Thank you.”
“Arri’s break is almost over. I’ll head over to the Quest Reception and make a request for the job. You should prepare to support Arri.”
“Yes.”
Laurent made to leave promptly to secure more talent. It was then that he noticed someone entering the building.
Who could that be?
When he walked to the workshop’s entrance, Laurent froze. Someone he never could have expected was there.
“Deanna-san…”
“Good afternoon. How are you, Laurent?”
She entered the workshop, her disdainful gaze sweeping over Laurent, a cold smirk painted over her lips.