Purple Sweet Potato pondered, "Let's contact the President. It wasn't just the demon I spotted earlier, I also saw a demon. If Oprah were here, it would be okay, but it's just the two of us now, and we absolutely can't handle it."
"..." Black Snake had a slightly different opinion.
He didn't believe he couldn't handle Rhode.
As long as he had accurate intelligence, his Mimicry Magic could silently ambush on the opponent's path, and no matter how strong the opponent was, they would be easily assassinated if they didn't react in time.
Over the years, he had dealt with many well-known mages, especially the new-style mages who relied on powerful tools and were arrogant.
Purple Sweet Potato, seeing his expression, knew he was unconvinced and continued to persuade: "Besides, the President plans to make Raven's Tail a Legitimate Guild, acting now would affect his plan."
Hearing his companion say this, Black Snake had no choice but to agree.
The two of them noted the location, quietly retreated into the woods, and found a secluded spot to contact their President.
...
Rhode felt that someone had been watching them just now, but he didn't pay much attention, because whether it was the purple giant crab or the winged person, they both attracted attention.
Of course, he and his wife were inherently eye-catching, sometimes perhaps not in a friendly way.
But he couldn't just haul someone out and beat them up for secretly looking at them—maybe consider that when Fairy Tail really turns into a Dark Guild someday.
Under Rhode's rapid flight, they reached their destination quickly.
It was an ordinary small town, far less developed than Magnolia. On the road outside the town was an exaggerated crack, as if someone had slashed it with a knife or sword.
A few people were pushing carts with sand and stones from the crack, seemingly to repair the road.
Rhode and Mira felt a jolt in their hearts and thought of the same thing: "Could this have been Erza's doing?"
It couldn't be ruled out, they needed to ask later.
"We're going down now." Rhode gently blew out a breath, and a faint green mist enveloped them, causing their figures and the mist to 'disappear.'
"What is this?"
"Alchemy Mist, allows us to enter a camouflage state, similar to invisibility."
Rhode gently landed with Mira near the people filling in the hole, intending to listen to what they were saying.
The few remaining people had no awareness of two additional figures beside them and continued their conversation.
"One or two more trips should do it."
"Yeah, those wretched people only cause us trouble!"
"Shh! They're very strong mages, it would be bad if they heard you!"
As Rhode and Mira listened, they grew increasingly uneasy, it really seemed like one of their own might be responsible.
"Didn't the mayor hire mages? Why is the Black Knight Bandit Group still active?"
"Maybe they haven't arrived yet, or perhaps they're already investigating."
"Let's hope they're not like those mages from before, who'd run at the sight of the Black Knights."
After listening for a while, they felt a mix of emotions, relief that the road destruction wasn't caused by Erza, indicating the locals were still quite welcoming to outside mages, and concern as the coachman said provision had been delivered but the townsfolk seemed unaware of them.
These folks didn't seem to have additional information, so the pair headed for the town, finding an inconspicuous spot to reveal themselves.
Mira asked directions from a lady at a roadside shop before heading to the town center.
They were received by the mayor's secretary.
Rhode presented the newly filled request form, "Hello, we're mages from Fairy Tail here on a commission to see the mayor."
"Please follow me." The secretary looked pleasantly surprised and led them to knock on the mayor's office door.
The mayor didn't seem too pleased: "The appointment time has long passed, why are you so late? And why aren't you the ones we agreed on?"
This was their fault, so Rhode decided to take the blame for his companions:
"Sorry, due to some unforeseen circumstances the originally tasked companions couldn't come, and we are here to fill in for them. To express our apologies, a portion of the reward can be deducted after the task is complete."
Every word they spoke was noted in Rhode's mind as a record against those unreliable comrades, hoping they had legitimate reasons for being absent.
Thinking about it, Rhode sighed internally, from another perspective, he hoped that his companions had just missed out due to being careless and were safe.
Perhaps it was Rhode and Mira's good attitude that softened the mayor's expression, but he frowned again, "Just the two of you? The Black Knight Bandit Group has eight members, none of them are easy to deal with. Last month..."
The secretary tried hard to give signals to the mayor, but he didn't notice, he sighed worriedly and continued,
"Last month we hired ten mages from the Earth Spirit Wheel, but they backed out after just scouting and ran away."
Mira asked suspiciously, "Mages don't easily abandon tasks, were the opponents too strong?"
The mayor lit a cigarette, "They all left together and came back with two in a coma and eight bruised and battered. They hurriedly apologized, returned the deposit, and ran for the hills."
The deposit generally represents the total task reward, and while it's not much, returning the deposit means acknowledging their guild took the task but couldn't handle it, which is quite embarrassing.
Six years ago, this would greatly affect a guild's reputation and ranking.
Nowadays, while less impactful on rankings, it still essentially means losing clients in that region.
Unless absolutely necessary, they wouldn't do that.
In Rhode's impression, the Earth Spirit Wheel was part of the same Local Guild Alliance as their guild, not a major one but not unknown either.
Logically, they should have improved considerably over the last 6 years, right?
Yet they were beaten to the point of giving up the task.
"I don't know if you noticed when you came, but outside the town there's a huge crack in the road.
"That was slashed by Aites of the Black Knights as a provocation, knowing we hired mages. So if you're not strong enough, maybe you should run, or call for more help…"
"Cough cough…" The secretary finally couldn't hold back and coughed to interrupt him, "Mayor."
The mayor looked at her disapprovingly, thinking it was very rude.
The secretary had sweat on her forehead, admitting her oversight, she assumed the Mayor would recognize him: "Mayor, this is Mr. Rhode from Fairy Tail, one of the Ten Wizard Saints who single-handedly took down five Dark Guilds."
"..." The mayor held the cigarette between two fingers, suddenly feeling a bit awkward.
Saying the Ten Wizard Saints lacked strength, telling him to run away and such…