Kazuya and Orihime sat together at a tavern in the lowland area. It was the tavern she chose for the both of them, and it was the largest among all of them, or so she said.
"Alright, big boy, what are you going to eat?" she asked.
Kazuya sighed, knowing that she would keep pestering him if he refused her treatment. So he gave in without resisting: "A small chunk of venison with a cup of mead," he replied.
"Excellent!" she said before ringing the bell at their table, signaling for a worker to attend to them.
They both sat together at the small table, and a young woman came there with a notepad in her left hand and a quill in the other, ready to take their order.
"Good afternoon, sir," she greeted, believing they were a couple, "May I have your order?"
But Kazuya remained as he was, with his hands folded and his eyes closed, not even glancing at her.
Then Orihime spoke up instead: "Please bring us two rations of venison and mead," she said to the young woman, who bowed slightly before leaving.
"Alright, Kazuya, tell me a lot more about yourself," said Orihime, but Kazuya remained silent, not in the mood for pointless chit-chat.
"Still holding back on me, huh?" "You know, even for a young and handsome guy like yourself, I doubt you would ever be able to find a free woman for a wife anytime soon," she said to him.
Kazuya frowned as he stared at her suddenly, not liking what he had just been reminded of.
"Just saying," she said to him, but he found nothing fun in what she said, staring at her with a slight fury.
An awkward silence followed for over a minute until the waitress returned in the nick of time with their order, serving it before the both of them in such a friendly fashion that it dissolved the tension in the air.
After serving them, she brought her hand to Kazuya, who was still not giving her any attention. So Orihime brought forth a small bag of coins and placed it in the waitress's hand.
"Thank you," the waitress said with a slight bow before turning to leave. "Enjoy your meal," she said.
"Finally, the food is here," she said as she grabbed her chunk of venison and took a huge bite of it before grabbing the cup of mead.
Kazuya could have kept staring at her intensely for reminding him of his wife, but he was getting tired of it. So, to get it off his mind, he grabbed the large cup of mead and gulped a huge amount of it down his throat.
She was impressed by the amount he was able to take in one sitting and hoped he could handle it and that he wasn't just trying to get high. It was a heavily fermented drink, so consumption without restraint could get the average person wasted within minutes.
"Whoa, take it easy, big man," she said to him, taking note of the amount of mead he had taken in one go.
After taking it all in, he closed his eyes and took a deep breath before staring her in the face again, but this time with less intensity.
"Alright, woman," he said to her, "start talking."
"I don't know, what do you want me to talk about?" she asked with a slight smile, causing Kazuya to arch his brow.
"I mean, where do you want me to start?" she asked.
"How about starting with the location of the goblin's hideout?" he replied.
"That will be a tough one," she replied right before taking another bite of meat.
"You know where it is," stated Kazuya.
"Well, how do you know that I know?" she asked.
"Don't play dumb with me, woman," he said to her. "You happened to be in the area where my map says the hidden hideout is, and you found a goblin and engaged in a fight with it already." That suggests to me that you have either found it or have at least found the way to it.
"Trust me, I don't know as much as you think I do," she replied.
"Then this was a waste of time," he said to her as he pushed back his chair, about to get up and leave immediately.
"Hold on, big man," she said to him, "I wasn't finished."
Kazuya leaned in, "Do you even have any information I could use to find the goblins?" "Or was your encounter with the goblin at the forest just a fluke?" he asked.
"Yes, I do have the information you could use, but it isn't going to be what you are expecting to hear," she told him. "It would be far less valuable, but very useful."
"That makes no sense," he said to her with a skeptic's gaze.
"Just sit back, because this talk is going to take a way longer time than you expect," she said to him.
So Kazuya drew his seat back inward, resting both elbows on the table with his palms joined together, and said, "Alright, woman. "Enlighten me," he said to her.
"I have a theory," she said to him.
"A theory?" asked Kazuya with another skeptic's gaze.
"Just listen to me, alright; whatever you do with it is totally up to you," she said to him as she opened her little waist-strapped bag and brought forth a map.
She opened the scroll and showed it to him. Kazuya was surprised by how identical her map was to his in showing the precise location of the goblin hideout. It looked exactly like his own, but he wondered how she was able to use it.
Then she pointed at the exact spot where the goblin's hideout was expected to be. "As you should know, this marks the location of the goblin's hideout," she said to him.
"I am aware." "It is on my map as well," he said to her, "but every time I try to follow it up, I end up walking around in a circle for some reason." When I think I'm stepping into the location, I find myself completing a circular walk around some spots I don't know about yet. It sounds crazy, but it's true.
"Yes, I believe you. But have you noticed the arrows marking the spot of the goblin's speculated hideout? "Have you noticed that unlike other spots on a typical adventurer's map, this location has arrows revolving around the spot instead of pointing at it?" she asked.
And it was at that moment that Kazuya noticed it as well: all the other spots indicating the location of vital places of interest had arrows pointing at them but not around them.
The funny thing was, in the digital map shown to him by Gaichu, the arrows around the spot were spinning!
"Alright, you have my attention," said Kazuya. "What do you think it means?"
"I think the static yet revolving arrows stand for a portal of some sort," she said to him. "I know it seems far-fetched, but it is the most logical conclusion to this dilemma." "What if, at the point at which adventurers are tricked into going in a circle, therein lies a portal?"
Kazuya thought about it for a moment and was a bit conflicted on whether to believe it or not. But given that he had nothing else going for him, he decided to give it a shot.
"So how is it that the goblins are somehow able to utilize this portal when we cannot even see it?" he asked.
"Well, I'm sure you are aware of the fact that goblins are becoming more intelligent and rebellious against humans recently, and there have been reports of assaults on little settlements and villages without proper defense," she said to him, and he remembered his village feeling suddenly furious about it.
But she explained further...
"I mean, think about it: If they have become intelligent enough to master the craft of physical warfare, what stops them from mastering the craft of hidden magic?" she asked him.
"Okay. "So what do you think is the reason behind the sudden enlightenment of those green bastards?" asked Kazuya.
"I have nothing on that." But what we do have is a logical theory behind the trick of the map. "With that, maybe we can think of something through which we can unlock the spell," she said to him.
"Alright, have you tried meeting with a mage or adventurer specialized in the art of hidden magic?" he asked.
"No, I haven't," she said.
Kazuya frowned. "Well, what is stopping you?" he asked.
Orihime chuckled before looking at him: "You are new to this town, aren't you?" The craft of hidden magic is an advanced one, only mastered by those with the highest magical quotient in the world. "Getting such special help from such special people would cost you a lot of money!" she said to him.
"Have you bothered to inquire how much it would cost on average?" he asked.
"No, why would I?" I am but a peasant, trying to make a living each day by hunting little creatures and precious minerals in minuscule amounts and selling them for barely enough money to feed me twice a day and pay for a room to sleep in at night. "Why would I bother finding out such information when I cannot even afford a little home of my own?" she asked.
Kazuya sighed, understanding the young woman's position on the matter. But he couldn't just give up on it entirely.
He needed it.
He also needed her.
If she was smart enough to come up with such a genius theory on her own (whether accurate or not), he felt he might need her help moving forward. Maybe she was the key to finding the answers he was looking for—the clue Gaichu was leading him to.