Emma’s work with the guild today wasn’t over by a long a shot. After having dinner with her family in the real world she returned to Carria and Captain Davy immediately called her into a mission briefing. While she was investigating the tower the mayor’s aide had personally visited the guild to request assistance in a special mission sent to all the city’s guilds. City hall was requesting that all the guilds co-ordinate in a large scale operation to sweep the surrounding forests and report any danger they encounter.

“It’s a bit vague. Any danger? Wouldn’t that include the numerous goblin tribes living there?” Emma commented reading the briefing notice. The woman beside her laughed and decided to enlighten the new girl about the mission.

“Actually City Hall asks the guilds to sweep the area at the start of every season to basically to keep the forest’s natives in check. The Sun Warrior’s usually decline as that kind of work is below us but…”

“But it’s only been a month since the last sweep,” Davy finished the sentence. “It isn’t cheap to hire out all the guilds to search a huge area. If the mayor is conducting a second sweep this season and is hiring elite groups like us then he must be worried about something. We’ll accept the request. If there is a threat to the city out there then we have a duty to destroy it.” Emma didn’t want to spend the rest of her evening scouring the forests but being a Burning Sun Warrior had its ups and it had its downs. She was soon placed in a party with two others and given a map showing the area she and her party were to do a thorough investigation off.

“Try to avoid fighting the local wildlife unless you have to and if you find something of concern report back immediately. All I want for now is confirmation on the existence of a threat. Don’t risk your lives trying to get detailed information of it.” The nature of the mission meant forces would be spread thin. Most people had been put in a group of two and it was only because Emma was new that she was in a group of three.

“Yes sir.” Emma was paired with Vycan and a woman named Juliet. They had a large chunk of forest to investigate so to avoid wasting time they set off immediately.

* * * * *

Greggory descended the stone steps of the Vega hideout hoping for some high risk high reward opportunities.

“Look who finally showed up,” Dia greeted coldly as per usual. Greggory noticed that hideout was unusually empty.

“Was I meant to be here?” Greggory guessed he had missed something.

“When opportunity knocks you answer. City Hall has sent all the guilds out on a scouting mission. Even the Burning Sun Warriors have deployed most of their members. This means the guildhalls will be mostly empty giving us the opportunity we need to slip in and recover items of value.” Dia looked at Greggory with an impatient expression. “I see you’re content just standing around however. Did I mention I’ll be awarding a secret bonus to the person that steals the most surprising item from them?”

“Surprise you huh?” Greggory replied with devious thoughts entering his head. “So anything is open game so long it comes from a guild hall?” Dia nodded. That sounded fun. He quickly left the Vega base and headed towards the guild hall district carefully avoiding the town guards who were beginning to recognise him as a criminal. The guild halls were among the most expensive and well-furnished buildings in the city and usually the most well protected. Dia had been pretty vague about what he was to do so he just picked out a building at random and walked straight through the front door.

“Hello?” He called out. Even the guild reception desk was unstaffed. He hopped over the desk knocking over a chair and began searching for valuables. He opened up a long box he found and discovered a row of spare keys each with a wooden tag detailing what it was the key for. He hoped to find one labelled treasury but sadly it wasn’t there. It made sense the treasury key wouldn’t be kept unguarded plus he doubted treasure would ‘surprise’ Dia anyway. He needed something unique, something she definitely wasn’t expecting and one of the keys caught his eye.

“Women’s sleeping quarters… heh.” Greggory began giggling like a child as he grabbed the key. He made an educated guess about where the dormitories would be. He stealthily searched for the door his key unlocked. Fortunately this guild had been kind enough to label all the doors so it was little trouble fighting the room he wanted and unlocking it with the key. To his disappointment the women’s sleeping area was fairly plain looking and kept tidy. He hadn’t really been expecting anything but was still somehow disappointed by it. The dozen or so bunkbeds were all neat and tidy plus there wasn’t anything valuable on display. It almost looked more like a hostel room than guild quarters. Each bed had its own footlocker but they were all kept locked. The only thing there was really to steal was the contents of the clothing drawers and wardrobes, but that was precisely what had come for. He began giggling immaturely again as he rolled over to the first set of drawers and opened it.

“Cha-Ching.” It was filled with treasure, well treasure to a teenage boy anyway. Greggory fished out a pair of pink silk undergarments and in a bout of paranoia double checked nobody was watching before sniffing them. A lack of detergent in this world meant they had been washed with water alone so the feint smell of woman’s sweat still lingered. Panties, bras, even corsets, he began stuffing it all into his bag pack.

“What a haul, Dia is definitely going to be surprised.” He emptied the drawer and moved onto the next and whistled as he opened it. “Black lace. The tailors of this world sure know how to make a man happy.” He stuffed the contents of that drawer into his bag as well but stopped when he came across something unexpected. A small wooden box had been placed in the back of the drawer. It was very well crafted and made Greggory curious so he quickly opened it. He hoped for jewellery but when he opened the box he discovered it just had a round polished stone inside it. It looked nice but it was still just polished stone so was hardly worth much. That didn’t stop him stealing it however along a lot of underwear from the other drawers as well.

“Surprise you huh? I bet you’ll be surprised with this haul.” Greggory spoke like a dirty old man. He put the last of the underwear into his bag and pulled out the black lace panties again

“If nothing else surprises Dia these definitely will,” he declared unaware someone had heard his voice. Suddenly the door was thrown open and Greggory met eyes with the woman whose underwear he had clutched between his hands. He expected her to make some kind of high pitched squeal but that wasn’t what the women on this world did when confronting a thieving pervert.

“Repent now thief!” She drew her sword immediately and Greggory quickly kicked opened the window nearest to him with such force the glass and wooden frame broke from the impact. Before the woman could catch him he was outside and pulling himself up onto the roof of the building opposite.

“Thanks for the gifts,” Greggory mocked throwing the panties he had been clutching towards the woman. He began running up the sloped roof but suddenly lost his footing as the tiles beneath him froze over with incredibly slippery ice. The woman he had mocked knew a few spells and wasn’t about to let Greggory run off with her belongings. He fell from the roof flaying his hands around to try and grab something but found nothing. His left leg was the first thing to hit the ground and it hit the ground hard. His ankle bent unnaturally and intense pain surged through his body as it snapped. Greggory bit his lip and began to crawl forward determined to escape despite having a broken ankle.

This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

“Pain is all in the head,” he hissed. He pushed himself forward aware that the woman who had caused this would reach him soon. He wasn’t going to escape, not like this. His brain acted quickly to come up with a way out. He spotted a small dip in the ground that was too small to hide him but wasn’t too small to hide his bag. He pushed the bag into the hole then using one of the illusion stones made it look like there was nothing but grass there. Next he pulled out a vial containing a tasteless but very potent poison. He swallowed the contents without second though then began to crawl as far away from the hole as he could.

“There you are!” A voice called out as the woman came round the corner. Greggory continued to crawl as his senses became blurry. The last thing he remembered was being grabbed by the neck before letting out a dying breathe. His dead body faded away leaving the woman who had caught him clutching just his shirt.

“What the…” She had never seen anything like it before. Meanwhile Greggory was back at the cabin now as healthy as could be. His broken ankle was fully regenerated and not a drop of the poison that had killed him remained in his body.

“Probably not how Marty intended the respawn system to be used but what works works.” Greggory had put some spare clothes in his locker just in case this happened. The illusion gem had a life-span of less than an hour so he needed to get back to his bag quickly. He just hoped he had been able to lure the woman far enough away from it that she wouldn’t discover it by luck.

Greggory finally returned to the Vega hideout with his bag he heard Dia clapping at his return.

“You are a man who somehow gives us, a group of feared renegades, an even worse reputation than we already have. I’m happy you joined.” She seemed to know a bit about what had happened.

“What can I say; I have a talent for earning myself a bad reputation.”

“So how did you do it? Healing crystals? Teleportation? Doppelgänger magic?” Dia knew the guards were searching for a man who should have been crippled and had ordered all healers in the town to not treat anyone suspicious. Greggory however looked fine raising the question of how he had managed such a quick recovery.

“I like to keep my escape techniques a secret. No offence but you’re the least trustworthy woman I’ve ever met.” Dia took that as a complement.

“Thank-you. I already know what you’ve brought me although I’ve no idea why.”

“It’s simple. Step 1 is to steal underpants and step 3 is profit.”

“What’s step 2?” Dia questioned. As she was from another world she didn’t get the South Park reference Greggory was making.

“I also stole other things like this.” Greggory fished out the small box with the polished stone in it. He opened it up for Dia to see but as he opened the box her eyes widened and she dived forward and snapped it shut.

“Silence!” She ordered grabbing the box and setting on a piece of parchment. She drew a circle around it along with some runes which began to glow sealing the stones magic within the circle.

“I hope they didn’t see,” she whispered. “That spy stone is infused with demonic magic. Highly illegal and potentially very dangerous but also highly valuable if you know the right people. Where did you get it?”

“Stole from some woman’s underwear draw.”

“Hmm no wonder you got caught. She likely had a spell that alerted her something was wrong. Hmm what would a member of Iron Point want with an illegal spy stone?” Dia walked around the table with the stone on it pondering the question but couldn’t find an answer.

“Well it’s ours now although she’ll definitely want it back. Well that’s your problem.” Greggory briefly pondered if maybe he was making too many enemies. Well it was just one city; he could always set up shop elsewhere.

* * * * *

Emma returned to the Sun Warriors guild hall empty handed late that evening.

“All clear sir, nothing beyond the usual goblins and cave beasts.” Captain Davy marked the area she had scouted as clear on the large map that had now been laid out across the table. Several other areas were also marked as clear as other scout parties had already returned. However the area they had covered was still only a fraction of the forest.

“Take it easy for tonight, I’ll co-ordinate our results with the other guilds and tomorrow morning I’ll assign you your next search area.” Tomorrow morning? Emma had school and she didn’t want to skip a second day in a row.

“About that sir, I won’t be here until the afternoon.”

“Why? I hope you have a good reason.” She couldn’t exactly tell him it was because she was from another world and had to attend school there. She thought about caving in and skipping school tomorrow as well but decided to stand firm.

“I don’t live locally sir and have to…”

“Stay in the guild hall tonight then.” He wasn’t making this easy.

“With respect I have people who rely on me at home. I can’t stay here.”

“Ah I understand. I once had people I needed to care for. Alright report in as soon as you can. Dismissed.” Emma breathed a sigh of relief. Hopefully by tomorrow afternoon they’d have a better picture so she wasn’t just searching empty forests again.

* * * * *

Another arrow hit the bullseye on the target outside Marisa’s cabin. Marty heard her clap as she emerged from the wooden house but the expression on her face was that of boredom. The energy Marty had felt when he first met her was gone and he was beginning to suspect she didn’t care about him being around anymore.

“You’ve come a long way since you started but I think it is time for you to take the skills I’ve shown you and put them to good use.” She was definitely trying to kindly tell him their time together was over. It was something Marty as a social outcast was very familiar with.

“I can’t thank you enough for your help and ‘hospitality’.” He said the last word flirtatiously.

“Yes but it would be a waste to keep you here for myself,” she teased back showing some recognition of the night they had spent together. “If you want to truly show your appreciation then I have a request for you. Travel to Megl’din, join a hunting party and bring me the meat of the first creature you kill.” Megl’din, the capital of the human territory and home of the Grand Duke. The dark woods to the north east of Megl’din were filled with monstrous beasts whose meat fetched for a very high price. She was giving him a quest, one that would take days to complete. She had definitely grown bored of him. No wonder she lived alone. She grew tired of men so fast that marriage just wasn’t on the tables.

“Anything for a beautiful lady.” They were almost at the point in the main quest where they had to head to the capital anyway. Marty fired at Marisa’s target one last time before collecting his arrows and going in search of his friends. Unfortunately his attempt to find them was fruitless. When he logged off he saw that only Clement was still inside the game world.

“Maybe I should text him… No he’ll be fine.” Marty had homework he needed to finish. It was already late so he rushed through it getting most of it wrong. Since there was no penalty other than a word of warning about his grades he didn’t care. His life, like his friends had become about getting their real world duties out of the way as quickly as possible to spend more time in the virtual world.