RuRet as well as his two allies walked back towards the town of Levelgreen, a handful of undead, a small remainder of the already gone undead army, dragged the wooden cart filled with tied-up thieves who decided to turn a new leaf and surrender.

No actual fighting took place, just some pleading and a few people passing out and bumping their heads on something.

“Maybe the jGuardians will take them?” RuRet wondered, glancing over to the thieves.

Hearing the guild that arrested him mentioned, Zack protested.

“We shouldn’t! They’re still looking for me!” he exclaimed.

“It’ll be fine!” he assured Zack.

He gave him a reassuring smile.

“And if it won’t - then we’ll topple their guild and get on with the mission!”

Jasper walked quietly, somehow, RuRet’s literal army of undead, combined with his confidence, slowly made him consider the possibility that RuRet did take over a continent once with two unnamed allies.

“The game was pretty empty back then… maybe he could have taken a few zones… but a continent?”

He looked up to the fishman with an analysing stare.

“What is his end-game here?…”

Seeing RuRet turning his head to reciprocate Jasper’s staring, he shifted his gaze to Zack.

“Look at him…” anger began to build up inside Jasper.

“Thinking he’s some sort of hero…”

Jasper gritted his teeth.

Even just looking at his detested foe made his blood boil far more than looking at RuRet, his literal captor.

The group entered Levelgreen where all the people living there recognised some of the thieves.

“Isn’t that Jake?”

“That’s Blendy!”

Chatter spread amongst the locals, most of the thieves averted their gaze.

RuRet cleared his throat.

“Hey, so… like… we’ve capture the thieves…” he began.

A few people cheered.

“But it turns out that they were the quest givers.” he continued.

“So… I guess, unless somebody wants them, we will release them into the wild or something,” he explained.

Zack’s face was red with embarrassment at how RuRet decided to extort the villages out of their gold.

Visibly panicking, the villagers all chipped in for a slightly strong-armed reward for RuRet and the gang.

From the crowd of people emerged a young man, he hurried over to the party with a small wooden box filled with gold coins and the occasional ring or gem.

“Thank!”

RuRet accepted the box with a smile and counted the coins within as everybody watched him tensely.

“Twenty-two… twenty-three… twenty-four…”

A few of the villagers shot the group unpleasant looks, though most focused their outrage on the thieves who caused this.

He stopped counting as soon as he reached thirty.

“Alright, we got the reward!” RuRet exclaimed.

He handed the box back to the man who originally brought it to him and turned to Jasper and Zack, handing them ten gold coins each, the equivalent of five beers or two full meals.

“Thanks…” Zack said bashfully, he felt bad for essentially extorting the money from the villagers, he was considering returning it.

In one, swift motion, Jasper just snatch the money from RuRet’s hand without saying anything.

Still confused, the box-holding person returned into the crowd and started figuring out how to divide all the remaining money, like… who’s thirty-gold did RuRet take? Should he charge everyone one gold? But there aren’t exactly thirty villagers…

“Now then, how about we rest up at the inn?” RuRet suggested.

Silently, the group entered the wooden building, at the counter sat a frogman reading over a re-written book from the game.

Looking around for an empty table, RuRet noticed one by the till.

The group marched past the fireplace and several occupied tables before eventually reaching their destination.

Much like the till itself, that section of the room was elevated above the ground, the wooden railing overlooked the floor only one or two feet down.

“What can I get you guys?” asked the frogman, not leaving the comfort of his chair.

“GREETING!” RuRet exclaimed.

“We three weary adventu-” he was cut off by Jasper.

“Wine, red.”

RuRet’s expression went from excited to melancholic in an instant.

“Why can’t I ever say my line…?” he muttered to himself, he planted his face on the table.

“C-can I get some water, and something to eat?” Zack asked, his eyes jumping from RuRet to the frogman.

The innkeeper nodded.

“Sure, and what about the fishman?” he asked.

Not lifting his face off the table, RuRet shrugged.

“Do you guys have that cherry-apple stuff?” he asked.

The frogman looked behind him to the kitchen where a new shipment of the jGuardian drinks was just in.

“Yeah,” he replied.

“I’ll take two…” muttered.

“Sure,”

With that, the fishman hopped off his stool and made his way to his kitchen.

“Why did you ask the villagers for money? I mean… Threaten them?” Zack inquired.

“I mean… I’m sure they’d be more than happy to feed us after helping them out.” he explained.

RuRet nodded.

“Probably, but A - it’s be awkward to go up to them and say: hey, we don’t want a reward, but do you want to throw us a party?”

“And B - I’m not trying to be a hero, if I act all selfless then the next thief incident or some town raid, the villagers might get the wrong idea and hope either I or some other adventurer does the job for free.”

He shrugged.

“Thirty gold coins is the equivalent of, let’s say… fifteen mossbacks assuming you do not sell any of the loot.”

“It’s a win-win.”

“They don’t think I’m a good person, I get money and the thief problem gets solved!” he shrugged.

Jasper sat with his feet on the table and his arms folded.

“What if they didn’t pay you?” he asked.

RuRet smiled smugly.

“Who knows~” he replied.

His two companions didn’t think it was above RuRet to actually let the thieves go.

Not long later, a younger-looking frog-person walked out of the kitchen holding a platter carrying the group’s beverages.

They were clad in a stuffed mossback-costume.

They were a bit smaller than the game would typically allow.

If they had to guess, the group would have assumed this character was the innkeeper’s son or daughter, though children have just ‘spawned’ out of nowhere before in the isekai.

As in, literally just popped into existence with an actual poof of smoke.

If in doubt, blame Zeus.

“The other stuff will be done in a bit!” the mini-frog announced.

“Right.” the others nodded.

RuRet scratched his chin.

“I don’t have many zombie-kids in my army…” he muttered.

His two party members shot him judgemental stares.

“DO NOT!”

“DON’T EVEN THINK ABOUT IT!”

RuRet lifted both hands in defeat.

“I WASN’T, I SWEAR!” RuRet cried.

The group observed the mini-frog’s journey from the table and back to the kitchen.

They tripped half-way-through.

Falling to the ground and laying there confused for several seconds before climbing back up and continuing their journey as if nothing happened.

“...”

“...”

“...”

“Isn’t this technically child labour?” RuRet asked.

“I think it’s more of a mascot thing…” Zack explained.

Jasper agreed.

“Mm-hmm.”

RuRet looked up and folded his arms.

“Let’s see… at this rate we have a few days spare…” he began.

The other two looked at him.

“I think we should get you guys some proper weapons…” he began.