Some Incomprehensible Requests

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'Fairy Tail' is the most prominent Mage Guild in the entire Kingdom of Fiore.

In terms of scale and strength, there are no more than five Guilds in the entire Kingdom of Fiore that can compare with 'Fairy Tail'.

Naturally, 'Fairy Tail' receives many requests from all over the Kingdom of Fiore every day, and they are all kinds of strange things.

Standing in front of the Request Board, Noah saw simple requests such as finding some items, simple requests such as driving away thieves or Magical Beasts, slightly more difficult requests such as dispelling curses that require the power of Magic to solve, and even advanced requests such as annihilating illegal Mage organizations and harmful Magical Beasts, and so on.

Generally speaking, the more difficult a request is to complete, the higher the reward will be, not to mention those that involve life-threatening situations, where the rewards are usually raised to an extremely high level.

However, these are temporarily beyond the scope of consideration for Noah, who has just become able to go out and work.

After discussing it with Erza, they both decided that the difficulty of the first mission should definitely not be too high, and it should not be too far away, otherwise, all kinds of troubles would arise if they were alone. Leaving aside whether there would be any danger, the efficiency would not be guaranteed.

Therefore, those tasks that required going to remote places, were highly dangerous, and those that specified the need to possess a certain type of Magic to solve were all excluded by Noah.

Erza had already torn off a request slip at some point, went to Makarov to receive the mission, and prepared to go out to work.

Noah, on the other hand, lingered in front of the many request slips on the Request Board for a while before fixing his gaze on one of them, reaching out, and tearing the request slip off.

"Decided?"

Makarov had been standing behind Noah all along, and he also saw the content of the task that Noah had chosen, and nodded.

"This task seems a bit strange, but the difficulty shouldn't be too high, but you still need to be careful. If you find that you can't solve it, or if you sense danger, don't be stubborn, just give up the task. You're still young!"

Hearing Makarov's words, Noah nodded, but his hand tightly gripped the request slip in his hand, and his heart surged slightly.

The azure sky is boundless.

The vibrant green field stretches endlessly.

On that endless green field, at the end of a path, a boy of only eleven or twelve years old carried a long, strip-shaped cloth bag on one shoulder, like a long, strip-shaped backpack reaching his ankles. One hand held the strap, and the other hand held a piece of paper, walking forward.

Along the way, many people grazing in the green field cast curious, doubtful, and scrutinizing gazes at the boy walking on the path, perhaps wondering in their hearts whether a child from some family had gotten lost.

In fact, along the way, Noah had indeed encountered many kind people who came to ask if he was lost, or was being touched by human traffickers who didn't know where they came from, which made Noah quite helpless.

However, this kind of encounter ends here.

At a certain moment, Noah stopped his steps and looked ahead.

A village.

A village not too far from Magnolia.

At least, Noah still arrived at his destination on foot, even without taking a carriage, although it took a lot of time.

Looking at the village not far in front of him, and then turning his gaze to the request slip in his hand, Noah once again confirmed that his destination was this village in front of him.

This request was issued by the Village Chief of this village.

Generally speaking, requests issued by villages of this size are either to drive away some wild animals, bandits, or something, or to find medicinal herbs and ingredients for treating illnesses. There are rarely requests with high difficulty or danger.

Therefore, Noah chose to accept the request issued by this village.

Of course, Noah had also confirmed the content of the request.

How should I put it?

It's hard to say if it's difficult or not, and it's hard to say if it's simple or not, but it's somewhat puzzling anyway.

With this feeling, Noah was led by a villager to a house and met the Village Chief of this village.

The Village Chief was an old man, possibly older than Makarov, leaning on a cane, bending over, with a white beard dragging directly on the ground.

"..." The old man first looked Noah up and down, then opened his mouth in a very old tone, saying this sentence.

"Welcome, guest from 'Fairy Tail'..."

Seeing this, Noah couldn't help but think highly of the old man in front of him.

Just now, from the old man's eyes, Noah clearly saw a hint of doubt.

Obviously, the old man was confused that the Mage who came to his village to solve the difficulties of his village was such a small child.

However, even so, the old man didn't say anything, nor did he seem to want to confirm anything with him. He first expressed his welcome to him, without showing the slightest dissatisfaction because he was too young.

Noah didn't know if the other party chose to believe that he had the ability to complete the task because he was a member of 'Fairy Tail', or if the other party planned to be polite before resorting to force. In short, the old man's failure to make things difficult for Noah at the first moment made Noah feel a lot more relaxed.

Although the last task of activating the Lake of Rituals was key to Noah, the contact, conversation, and negotiation with the client were basically carried out by Laxus.

Because of this, strictly speaking, this was also Noah's first time working independently, and he inevitably felt a little nervous.

The old man's actions dispelled this small amount of tension, making Noah feel lighter in his heart, and he greeted the old man.

"Village Chief, hello, I am a Mage from 'Fairy Tail', and I am here to help you solve your difficulties!"

"Thank you very much for your help." The Village Chief nodded extremely slowly.

"Although our village is not large, we still have one or two inns for travelers to use. If you need it, we will treat you for free. Do you need to rest first?"

"The sky is indeed a bit late now, and it's not very suitable for work. I would be very grateful if you could let me rest for a night, but before that, there are some questions I would like to ask the Village Chief." Noah picked up the request slip in his hand, his tone carrying a bit of uncertain inquiry.

"The request form states that the task is to drive away ghosts, but what's going on?"

Indeed!

Driving away ghosts!

This was the source of Noah's bewilderment!

Although this was a world where Magic was quite prevalent, even integrated into people's daily lives, there were also Magical Beasts that could endanger people's lives. Noah had even heard Makarov say that demons existed in this world.

But ghosts? Do they really exist?

Perhaps they do, but Noah had never seen one, so he couldn't help but feel skeptical.

It wasn't just Noah; anyone else would probably be just as puzzled.

After all, some ancient villages weren't as knowledgeable as the residents of towns and cities. Sometimes, they might mistake special phenomena, the activities of weak Magical Beasts, or the trickery of malicious humans for actual ghosts. That wasn't impossible.

If that were the case, the task wouldn't be difficult to solve. The fear was that there might be hidden circumstances, something Noah couldn't handle causing the problem.

Therefore, Makarov's suggestion was just to come and take a look. If anything seemed wrong, it was permissible to abandon this type of request.

In any case, if it really was ghosts causing trouble, Noah didn't have any means to drive them away, did he?

So, getting clarification was necessary.

Perhaps the Village Chief understood this as well. Seeing Noah directly ask about the job, he slowly began to explain.

"Actually, starting not long ago, the villagers who go into the forest to hunt have often heard the sound of ghosts crying!"