The Orin oracle country. The country is said to have a strange power structure.

　Olin also has a king. But the real rulers are the temple forces, who speak for the gods. But three hundred years have passed since the gods lost touch and the miracles of the gods ceased to exist. The temple forces were unable to listen to the oracle, and they were in a critical situation due to the decline in their voice and the decrease in the number of believers.

　Therefore, the temple forces stopped their decline in power by teaming up with the royal family. They sold false oracles to the king and the nobles through the king, the contents of the oracles were checked by the royal family, and the prayer fees were divided among them. In return, the royal family gave the temple forces five percent of the salt sales as a guarantee of authority and a stable source of revenue.

And the temple forces, with their source of income, rose to power, albeit second only to the royal family.

　It looks like Dionne's story is going to continue as she heads to Orin.

'Does this mean that Olin has taken such forceful measures at the request of the temple forces whose revenues have fallen... But if the oracle is in power again, wouldn't the congregation's contributions have returned?

Some... but there are no recorded miracles, and the content is ambiguous because it's a false oracle. If a nobleman declares something different, it will be treated as a misinterpretation of the declarant. Besides, ordinary people are still not allowed to receive oracles, only regular events.

　It seems that the temple forces have changed to only selling authoritative false oracles while making interpretation the responsibility of the nobility.

　However, the royal family's guarantee of the false oracle (eliminating anyone who doubts it) contract is a state secret. I've been looking into it, and the intelligence agency in Xina feels horrible too...

　You're not going to secretly stand behind me or anything, are you?

'I see. So most of the money comes from salt. So in an effort to get it back as quickly as possible, the temple forces as a nation put pressure on Xina. However, they weren't satisfied with the lowest bid price. It's grim!

　As for the temple forces, they thought that Xina would easily fold under Orin's pressure. But Dionne was surprisingly stubborn with her suggestions and negotiations. The bee thought it was an accident, but maybe it was an assassination attempt by the temple forces.

'If it's just a leak of information about the bid, I can somehow continue to survive Kishina even if I'm found out, by assuming it's my own personal corruption. If it's a forcible invasion, there's a security treaty I've signed with neighboring countries. However, the aim of the temple forces was to replace the Xina head of state.

　If the breathtaking head of the temple power is voluntarily subordinated, the security of the surrounding countries will not be triggered. But Mr. Mendale will not be subordinated. If he's an alternative, he needs legitimacy, and the disruption will be minimal and short-lived, or else the security will be triggered.

'No matter how many Orin oracle states we have, we can't make enemies of all the surrounding countries. So you want to use Xina as a puppet and the temple forces will keep the legitimate ones in check and assassinate the mayor of Mendale?

'Yes, that's right. I'm sorry to say, but we've had a traitor from the branch of the family from the founding of Xina.

　Mr. Dionne turns over with a somber look on his face, confessing the betrayal of his people. Mayor Mendale takes over the rest of the story. The content of the story was the spark that Xina was holding and the actions of the traitor.

　The explanation began with the story of the spark first.

　Kishina had long ago discharged sewage from the sewer system into a giant swamp nearby. Still, when the population was small, it was not a problem because of the swamp's natural purification capabilities.

　However, when the population exceeded 50,000, the environmental degradation of the giant swamp began to exceed its natural purification capacity. As a result, the number of living creatures in the swamp decreased and the sanitary environment deteriorated, and the aquatic sub-humans living in the vicinity suffered from food shortages and plagues.

　The lizardmen, on behalf of the lizardmen, appealed to the culprit, Kishina, demanding improvements and compensation.

　However, Kishina at the time was chronically underfunded due to a large diplomatic budget. It was unable to budget for wastewater purification and swamp water quality improvement, and the swamp's environmental degradation accelerated due to the rapid growth of the urban population. As a result, the relationship with the aquatic sub-humans deteriorated year by year.

　Tensions between Kishina and the aquatic sub-humans in the swamp grew to the point of conflict.

　However, Kishina succeeded in securing security from the neighboring countries just in time for the conflict. The mayor immediately started negotiations with the sub-humans around the swamp, as he had more money in his pocket. A settlement was reached with the construction of a purification facility using slime and a subsidy for the completion of the facility as well as aid supplies.

　Lesen Kishinau, a member of the Metropolitan Assembly and a branch of the family, was in charge of the construction of the facility.
　However, another problem arose.
　Last year, the purification facility, which was on the verge of completion, was destroyed, and reconstruction was hampered.

　The huge swamp that drains the sewage water is shaped like a gourd, with a large difference in size. It used to drain into the smaller one, but years of sewage had made the smaller one eutrophic.
(The smaller one is now called a sewer swamp.)

　Sewage marshes have been subject to frequent freshwater red tides for decades, and many of their original inhabitants have disappeared, leaving only the few species that were able to adapt to specialize and thrive.

　But it wasn't just the common species that were able to adapt. Exotic demonic beasts from Riento that could breathe air, the [Foot Hireo Catfish], also proliferated. One of these monsters won the top of the ecosystem, and a giant hexenbiest called the Lord (Nushi) was born that was over 15 meters long.

　Moreover, the Hireo catfish can land for a short time. Finally, last year, an incident occurred where a Nushi landed and destroyed the nearest septic tank from the swamp and ate all the slime. This is a new problem and the reason why the rebuilding has stopped.

　Apparently, the slime's special move is a highly corrosive poisonous fog breath that uses the sewage that has accumulated in its body.

　In order to get rid of this Nushi, the officer in charge, Lesen Xinau, recruited a wide range of extermination mercenaries. Among them, Krugel, an extermination mercenary specializing in aquatic demons, emerged.

　Lesen installed Krügel as the captain and formed the Anti-Nush Destroyer Squadron with the assembled mercenaries. It is said that they are currently proceeding with what is called Operation Deathlord, which was Kriugel's idea.

I'm sure you'll agree that Kriugel is ostensibly a freelance extermination mercenary. However, a few weeks ago, our agents discovered that he is an agent of the Temple forces. Most recently, we also learned that he bribed Lesen with money and threats, and we have documents to prove it.

　The traitor is Lesen Kishinau. He is said to have a branch family line and a right of succession.
　Next, we talk about the plans of Grugel, an agent of the Temple forces.

　Krugel's goal is to have the Nusi attack the Aquatic People's settlement. He sets up the ringleader as the mayor of the city and encourages the aquatic sub-humans to rise up. The plan is to take advantage of the chaos and take down the mayor and his son if a conflict arises, and then give Lesen the credit for resolving the conflict by defeating the ringleader and installing him as mayor.

　Apparently, Dionne was uncomfortable with Olin's easy rejection of the fraudulent bid and had him investigate what he was up to. And what it turned out to be was this.

　It's amazing that there's even evidence that Lesen was bought out.

　In addition, I should add that Kriegel's recruitment was before the bandit army attacked the rock salt antique. According to the planning stage, it's around the time when Sailor-sama may or may not be appointed as the dragon ambassador.

　But if it was at that stage, the only salt market that Orin lost was the Sailor territory.

''Now then, can you tell me more about my work?　If it's an extermination, we'll do something about it, but Lesen and Krugel are internal affairs, so we'd better get a move on there as soon as possible. If there's a fire in any of the surrounding countries outside of Olin, they'll intervene, won't they?

　Well, I understand what's going on, and rock salt is a distant cause, so I'll cooperate but... To be honest, I'm tired of this rather complicated and long-winded story. If it's good enough to kill a monstrous-looking catfish, I'll do it, okay?　I don't know.　

But I'll tell you what, once you've accepted my request, I'll be able to...

　What? You're not going to kill a monster?　So you're the one doing the dirty work... probably an assassination of Lethen made to look like an accident. But you see, I'm an exterminator of the Alps, specializing in demons and bandits!　Assassination is outrageous, and I don't want to do the dirty work, even if the pay is good!

Assassination in secret?　If you even have evidence, why don't we just execute him for foreign interference or civil war already?

　I've already decided to reopen it. Civility?　We're already out of stock, what is it?　And then he made a cumbersome gesture of sliding his neck with his hand knife.

''Ryota-dono you're an investigator, you know the diplomacy of a small country can be troublesome, right?　Can't we stop pretending to be a bother with this simple kind of conspiracy?　And I'm sure you'll be paid accordingly.

　Valetera.

　Well, as a small country, you can't use the foreign crime system even if you know it's the work of a big country, because you're afraid of the backlash. So, they assassinate Lesen and Krugel before Orin realizes that they're being manipulated, and then they get rid of it as an accident or death by illness, and then nothing happens?

　But you've got good agents on the ground there, too.

'I know what you want me to do, but I'm an exterminator in the Alp, and I'm only authorized to exterminate demons and bandits. Besides, from what I've heard, Xina's agents are quite skilled. I don't think I'm in the right place, do you?

　Morally, I want to side with Xina. If it's for a good cause, I can do it alone. But the assassination would cause trouble for my friends and Alpes.

　I'm starting to feel like the potential threat to me is higher for the mayor.