“Just a hint come on!” Bryson asked sweetly as he kept pace with Viola.

“By the Six! How are you still on this! Aren’t you usually the quiet one, head in the land of imaginary?” Viola said irritated at the constant badgering of questions.

Ever since they left Tufnut’s house it seems that Bryson was bitten by the curiosity bug on regards to Viola’s past. He had been trying to pry for more information throughout the trip into the forest as they were in the middle of completing their second task.

“Come on, it’s not just me. Marsh is curious too.”

“It is quite the bombshell to drop.” Florence readily agreed as she walked behind them.

“Can we focus on the mission?”

“I would but, it’s been kept very vague!” Bryson said loudly over to Mary.

“I told you that you need to procure a specific flower from a magnolia tree.”

“I don’t even know what that looks like!”

“I do.” Florence offered.

“Be quiet Marsh.”

“What makes this tree so special?”

“I can tell you that it's in the contamination zone.” Mary said.

Viola looked around her noting pointedly at the half-dozen adventurers as well as the large moving suit of magical armour that joined them through this trek. She noted how many of the adventurers that had originally joined them on the journey all split off to take other quests and commissions. As she looked around, her eyes rested upon Spencer who quickly and awkwardly turned his gaze from her.

“Oh, you don’t say?” Viola said sarcastically looking back over to Mary.

“Hey I don’t want to be so vague either. But these are orders from the Duchess herself, and I don’t want to defy her orders.”

“Why couldn’t we at least take the cars? They’re made to be offroad.” Bryson complained.

“Order from-”

“Orders from mother yes. You don’t need to finish that.” Bryson grumbled as he turned to Sable, “Can you believe this? What’s mother planning?”

“Uh… I’m not sure.” Sable said as she periodically glanced over to the suit of armour that followed a few body lengths behind her.

Bryson glanced over to the armour, “I am jealous that you get to use that and not me.”

“Huh? Oh yeah. It’s cool I guess.” Sable said absentmindedly.

“What can you make it do?”

“Just fight I think.”

“Well that’s going to be useful soon. How are you feeling?”

“I guess.” Sable said not paying much attention.

“Is everything alright?” Bryson asked concerned.

“Yeah. Uh, why?” Sable asked paying a bit more attention.

“It’s just… we’re cool right?”

“Y-yeah.”

“So why don’t we talk that much? I mean I end up talking to the small Frost more than you. In fact you used to just ignore me and now sort of ignore me. We have a quick conversation and you just leave.” Bryson said starting to quiz Sable.

“It’s just that there’s a lot for me to think about.”

“Like what?”

“Like… how much further before we get there?” Sable said ignoring Bryson and quickly walking up to Mary.

“Who just leaves in the middle of a conversation?” Bryson muttered.

Florence looked over to Bryson and stared at him in silence for a long moment, “Yes, I have never seen you do that before.”

Bryson whipped his head over to Florence, glaring at her he was given a blank expression in return, “Shut up Marsh.” Bryson said.

“Heh.” Viola chuckled to herself watching the interaction before asking Mary, “How did you and Mother get acquainted?”

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“I met her back when I was just starting out. She needed to hire some hands and I just happened to be one of them. She liked my work and kept me as a business partner. Got pretty close over the years.” Mary said with a shrug.

“Why does she keeps hiring adventurers? She can easily have contracted workers.”

“It’s easier to manage. The official Coldwater troops take care of the main center cities while adventurers take care of those on the outskirts.” Mary explained, “It’s good business for us adventurers.”

“Huh.”

“Hold on. We’re here.” Mary said cautioning them to slow, “Spencer, scout ahead.”

“Yes ma’am.” Spencer said heading forward and past the bushes. A couple moments later he called back, “It’s there, clear for now.”

Mary gestured everyone to follow. Upon clearing the bush, everyone was greeted with a strange sight. Before them was a grassy plane with a large tree in the distance.

“Is that the magnolia tree?” Bryson asked.

“Yes.”

“Why is it so big? And why is it the only tree there?” Sable asked.

“The contamination.” Mary said.

“So what do we do now?” Bryson asked.

“Each one of you are going to pick a flower from that tree. Straight from the branch.”

“That tree’s as tall as an apartment!”

“Exactly.”

Bryson gave an annoyed sigh as Viola asked, “That’s still too simple. There’s something else isn’t there?”

“You bet. Go down and find out.”

“Wait, isn’t that too dangerous?” Spencer suddenly said concerned.

“We’ll be watching over them.” Mary assured him, “So Lady Viola, what will you Coldwater’s do now?”

Viola looked over to her siblings who both only shrugged in response. Looking back over to Mary she said, “I guess we start. Come on.”

The trio was joined by Florence and The Omen. As they walked their way through the ankle-high grass looking around for any signs of danger. Florence carefully leaned next to Bryson and whispered to him.

“You see anything?”

“Yeah, something in the leaves.”

“What is it?”

“Don’t know… it’s not part of the tree is all I can say. Can’t tell if it’s one thing or multiple things. Too much magic.” Bryson said looking up. Why does it have to be the contamination zone again? He wondered as he tried to figure out what he was seeing.

“What are you whispering about?” Sable asked.

“Just trying to figure out what’s trying to surprise us.” Bryson said.

“You think it’s up there?” Sable said looking up.

“Yeah.”

“Omen, move to the front.” Sable ordered and the suit of armour complied trudging forward.

“Still nothing coming.” Viola said looking up as the armour was now in the front standing guard. Waiting for a moment Viola decided to keep moving forward. Upon reaching the base of the tree they all craned their necks upward to look at the tree head.

“So how do we even get the flowers once we reach there?” Bryson asked, he guessed this thing was as tall as a fifteen-story building.

“The Omen might be able to climb it.” Sable said.

“Let’s try that then.” Viola said.

“Alright, Omen climb and retrieve those flowers.” Sable commanded.

The armour moved forward until it was at arm’s length of the tree. The moment it’s arm made contact with the trunk of the tree several loud shrieks could suddenly be heard. Suddenly shooting down from the tree were countless flying creatures forming a swarm.

“What are those?” Bryson yelled.

“Some type of flying contaminated beasts!” Florence shouted back as she pulled her firearm. Firing at the most concentrated clump of creatures a massive clump of creatures immediately disintegrated.

“Holy hell.” Viola said looking at Florence incredulously, “Where did you find her?”

“Less talking more getting out of this!” Bryson shouted as the swarm got ever closer.

“Get back now!” Mary yelled as she and the rest of the adventurers rushed forward just in time as the first wave of contaminated beasts reached them.

There were dozens of them already on them with what looked like hundreds more approaching. Fortunately these adventurers proved to be worth their money as several creatures were quickly dispatched in a flurrying of drawn blades and magic.

Upon half of a beast corpse landed next to Bryson he was able to get a good look at it. It was roughly the size of a large dog and resembled an extremely lizard-like bat. It had two large fangs and large leathery wings.

What caught Bryson’s attention were the patches on the creatures that practically glowed with mana. Never got to get a good look at one of these things before. He thought staring at the corpse. The reality of battle however stopped him from approaching the corpse.

Florence now moved fully in front of Bryson began to blast at anything that looked to threaten them. Over her shoulder, Bryson saw the armour suit standing right over snatching any creature that neared and allowing Sable to strike them with her blade freely.

Viola stood her ground blasting at the beasts around her. Magic circles surrounded her as she fired beams of energy from them. As more of these strange bat beasts approached a spinning whirlwind of blades came flying in.

Spencer Khan like a mini tornado came flying through the air, each hand armed with a blade. As he spun he seemed to gather speed and momentum and easily cut through everything in his path. Landing in front of Viola he looked over to her.

“Are you okay?” He asked with concern.

Viola blinked in surprise before giving him an annoyed glare, “Just focus on surviving.”

“Don’t worry I won’t let you get hurt.”

“Spare me.”

“You kids need to hurry! We only have a few more minutes before we have to pull out!” Mary shouted for all to hear.

Okay, so need to scale this stupid tree in just a few minutes. How do I do that? Bryson looked around. While it seemed that his help wasn’t necessarily needed in dealing with these beasts, he had to use this opportunity to complete the mission.

That Flash Step could help. But this is a lot taller than the tree we practiced. Also, I suck at doing this. Bryson thought as he absentmindedly bent down to pick up a small handful of grass.

As he looked over to Mary he noticed one of the bat creatures glide low and towards her blind spot. Bryson quickly threw the grass blades in his hand in their direction.

The blades gently floated downwards as grass does normally for a second before freezing midair. Immediately they then shot forwards at ridiculous speeds turning neon green as they travelled. The trip was short as the grass blades quickly made their way into the bat.

As it gave a dying screech Mary whipped around and noticed the now riddled-with-holes creature. Looking over to Bryson she gave him an impressed nod of approval.

Bryson’s mind however was still preoccupied with getting up the tree. Well, Flash Step needs to be used, I do have a couple of spells in case I mess up. But I need to get a bit further up first. Hmm. Bryson looked over to Florence.

“Marsh.”

“Yes?” Florence said not taking her eyes off the creatures flying around the air.

“How far can you throw me?”