Garami's PoV:

"Hmm, the 'Fallen Knights Order'..." - Garami

And here I thought our Guild's name was tacky.

"*Cough*, we have our story. I'm sure you can understand." - Knight Leader

"Yeah, yeah, Percy." - Garami

I waved my hands to Percy, or as he's better known as; the knight leader Percel. His crew of armored madmen (I still can't grasp how they're not being cooked in those metal cans!) sounds like they're quite famous back in Velantas. I never had the chance to meet them directly, but in terms of "adventuring levels", his group may be equal to us.

I mean, those Raptor mounts they have? They've been scouted from the Water-Knot. I FINALLY remembered where I had seen these guys before! Those knights are the ones who invaded the 3rd floor of the Water-Knot! I remember being busy dealing with those boom-bots led by the Baron's two lackeys. What were their names, Break-bot and Wheel-bot? No, that's not it..., whatever.

In short, I knew about Percel and his knight brigade before, even if we never got the chance to cross paths when I was staying in Velantas City. They knew about me through my reputation, so they decided to exchange words instead of swords. The other knights and their dino steeds are on the lookout for other parties interested in knowing about Bloom's smoke pillar, but honestly, I don't feel like I could ever beat this guy in a fair fight.

It's just my hunch, but I think only Mira and Noire could ever hope to stand a chance against this guy's "sacred spear", or whatever it is. The rest of us are either demons, the undead, or related to the latter category. Hmm, now I'm starting to feel like our Guild is suffering from an overspecialization sickness.

"Still, Lady Garami, you have yet to say what your purpose here is." - Percel

Whoops, this ain't the time to be side-tracking. Ignore the demon-slayer spear for one second, Garami...

"My Guildmates and I are on a treasure hunt. For a quest." - Garami

"Aha. Now I understand. Just to be sure, this quest has nothing to do with Solomar?" - Percel

"Huh? Solomar? No, if anything, you could say it's from Lo..., it's from a local." - Garami

Ugh, I almost spilled the beans about Flint. I'm almost certain he's someone who fled the dragon country for some reason. He got damn shaky when he met Revi, mistaking her as a Loitanian. You wouldn't react that way if you weren't on the country's bad side. However, all this is just my speculation. It's not a topic you can easily bring up.

It's also not something you should tell someone with such a huge "Lawful Good" aura coming out of him like Percel. If Flint turns out to be on Loitan's most wanted list, this guy could try to bring that samurai otaku lizard to justice. It's safer to keep quiet, so I won't risk losing my best source for obtaining a katana. I'm also somewhat of a samurai geek~.

"A local...from this Sekarot Desert then. That should be fine..., then again, that cult has stretched their claws to many territories..." - Percel

The knight guy started mumbling to himself after I gave my dodgy answer. It looks like I'm not the only leader character with a tendency to get off the rails regarding the current topic.

"Excuse me, it was nothing. Our party is in a hostile relationship with those persons. I hope your Guild is in the same situation." - Percel

"Forget hostile, we haven't even been in contact yet. I already told you, we're just here to look for the goal of some treasure map our client ordered us to solve." - Garami

"Oho. Then it's safe it say you are not aware of the aether-charged diamonds hidden underground." - Percel

"Glad you're finally on the same page as...!?!?" - Garami

"Diamonds!? Did you say diamonds?!" - Bloom

"Thank you for the easy-to-understand reaction." - Percel

Hey, hey, hey! You're talking about one of the hardest materials you can find on a planet! Terra Sol might be home to some fantasy-cheating super metals, but diamonds are still the king among common gems (as in those not mutated by magic). Noire lamented that she could never get even some diamond dust for her accessory making, and as an Alchemist, I share her resentment.

Could the sparkly gems be the treasure spoken of in Flint's treasure map? I hope not. I wanna bring some with me home.

With that in mind, "Please, continue," I urged Percel to continue feeding us info. If the whole park is a giant cover to keep an illegal diamond mining business a secret (or so I believe), then there's more than enough for everyone. Rather, we should sort things out fast. Mira's probably sniffed 'em out now and is busy harvesting them like a farmer during autumn. If we're to keep a good relationship with these white knights, we gotta share some of the spoils before everything's confiscated by our resident black knight.

---

Mira's PoV:

"This is ****ing nuts!" - Mira

*CRASH!!*

"I can't believe I'm saying this, but..., just for today, I HATE DIAMONDS!!" - Mira

Shouting let me vent some of my anger. It may not improve my situation directly, but just calming my seething head is a pretty good development in my book.

After entering this so-called "treasure den" place to look for a way to get to Alf underneath the ground, I instead ended up in a wacko place that's similar to the pirate ports I've only heard about in my bedtime stories. Man, thinking back, Solomar didn't have a single decent story to tell the kids.

Palm trees can be found every here and there, pubs filled with rum can be seen on each street, pirate flags decorate every street lamp, broken bottles of rum make it impossible to walk the streets unless you're wearing solid boots, even large sailships that's been used as roof or decorations on top of the buildings, barrels of rum used as chairs outside the pubs..., did I mention all the rum? I did? Good. Because they gave me an idea.

Reading on Amazon or a pirate site? This novel is from Royal Road. Support the author by reading it there.

One of the pubs I mentioned before has a giant barrel filled with the mentioned booze. Said barrel is leaking a little, causing the firewater to run down the walls and making the whole area stink enough to cause a certain Princess to go on another genocide spree.

Dodging the giant pincers of my pursuer, I ran up to the pub, wishing I had a nose clip or a gasmask, and positioned myself with my back literally to the walls of the pirate meeting spot while posing with my greatsword, trying to act as a delicious target for another pincer punch.

The monster swallowed my bait whole and performed a straight right that would make both Monks and Brawlers green with envy. Its "fist" may be large, its boxing form almost perfect, but it is sorely missing the speed that makes people like the Princess and me shine. Side-stepping the giant gem of a punch wasn't too bad, even if it felt like I saw my late dad flash before my eyes for a second there.

A nasty sound came from the building and large cracks started to form from where the pincer landed. They reached the barrel with relative ease, causing the overdramatic signboard to fall straight onto the face of my (current) mortal enemy. The wood cracked apart, causing the rum to land straight onto the creature's face.

After taking a single look to confirm the barrel hitting its mark, I quickly skedaddled away from there and started to find a place to hide within the many streets of the pirate town. One reason for this choice is that I can't defeat this enemy on my own. The second is that you should never try to duke it out with a drunk opponent. It's both unknightly and "accidents" may happen.

Climbing up a hill and taking cover behind a shop (the only merchandise is, surprise, rum), I took another look at my current nemesis. Its appearance is, what shall I say... A giant lobster. That's the best way to describe it, I guess...

To fill in some more details, it looks like a giant pirate ship that has been covered with some diamond-like gem tissues, or maybe it's better to say the ship's been coated and trapped like a bug in ancient amber. The diamond-like gems cover most of the ship's underbelly, creating 12 legs to walk around with, a tail at the end, and a pair of super-sturdy pincers that it can use both as boxing gloves and mobile guillotines. There's also a "face" on the ship's front, with black diamonds forming 2 pairs of eyes and a large mouth.

Maybe we could say it's a diamond lobster that uses the shell as a home? Like a hermit crab. Now that I have the time to think about it, Alf did mention before that crabs and lobsters are relatives. How fitting.

Still, this diamond pirate ship hermit lobster...

"Wow, that's a mouthful." - Mira

Okay, let's stick to the name "diamond lobster" for now. As for how I know it's made up of diamonds... All my phantom swords generated from my silver arm Extra Skill all got blunted with one swing. That stupid amount of hardness leaves me without a doubt. Those are the famous diamonds I've only heard talk about in Solomar and by Noire.

Maaaaan... I WANT THEM! Now that I'm a good distance away from those giant pincers, my greed is starting to flare up again. Just one of those legs would be enough to fund the Guild for a month! Still, there's other stuff to prioritize...

Extra Trial: Grey Park Attraction: "Pirate Torturalte's Treasure Den" Requirements:

* Medal OR Treasure Map:

* Medal: "Pirate", "Valuable", or "Samurai"

* Map: "Grey Park"

* Grey Park Trial Ground: "Pirate Torturrite's Treasure Den"

Quest Content:

1. Locate the hidden stash of the pirate king "Torturalte" hidden somewhere in this virtual pirate den.

2. Evade the "Deca Diamondeater Doomship" with all your might.

1. Seriously, don't try to fight it. You'll die.

3. Show your inner pirate soul to the world.

4. Failure condition:

1. Escape the virtual pirate den without having obtained the treasure.

Rewards:

* Pirate king "Torturalte's" secret stash of pirate loot from a different continent.

* Possible rewards from the "Pirate" or "Samurai" categories:

* Extra Skills.

* T3 Skills.

* Ex-rarity Items.

Failure penalty:

* Unable to access Grey Park Trial Grounds for the next 168 hours.

This System Message window appeared in front of me the moment I stepped into the "attraction" building, right before the scenery around me changed to this rum-reeking excuse of a port town.

In short, this is the same sitch that the Princess said she ended up with that led to her obtaining the Zahhak Extra Skill she loves to shoot at the stronger monsters. Come on... I know that treasure maps can lead you to Chaos Dungeons and Haunts, but nobody told me that "forced participation" Trial Grounds were also a thing!!

Bad World System design aside, things are getting complicated. This place might be the "goal" of Flint's treasure map. Garami said the lizard smith has a love for Wakoku culture, which means stuff like katanas, ninjas, and samurai. The country is located on the Luxuria continent west of the Invidia continent which we are on.

All these facts added together make it obvious that the treasure Flint requested is the secret stash of this "pirate king". Rather, isn't Torturalte a fantasy character from Solomar? What have they to do with a Trial Ground located in the Sekarot Desert?

Mysteries are getting solved and discovered here while the diamond lobster is making a funny dance downtown thanks to the booze. The problem here is the question if I should fight or flee. From the quest content, it seems one can flee this "attraction" whenever one wants, but at the cost of not being allowed to reenter the Trial Ground for the next 7 days. Plus who knows what will happen to the treasure map that's still in my pocket. Then there's the problem of Alf disappearing and the Princess going radio silent on me....

You know what, who cares about fleeing? The gold and Dublons are right in front of me. Finding the treasure and fleeing from this overgrown wedding ring is one idea, but seeing how much pain this park's been to us, I'm starting to think we deserve some extra rewards here. The carcass of a giant pirate ship lobster would be wonderful for Garami. As for Flint... He can get any potential pirate stuff. If I win any from this Trial.

Now, let's start the operation: "Get every Bonus Requirement reward"!! And I'm starting to see how to clear this mess of a trial in style.