“To be fair,” I said after we entered the mansion again, addressing Seralyn. “This powder goes beyond just fueling this weapon. For example, you could strap a pouch of it to an arrow, a fuse inside, and then have it explode after striking a target. I’ll be honest, that was my first intention. Actually getting a working gun wasn’t something I’d expected.”

“I’m starting to think you’re a fan of explosions,” The archer replied with a sly smile.

“And you are not?” I replied with a smile that easily rivaled hers. “You were practically drooling after each shot… and before… and during. Hell, you were drooling the entire time.”

“Okay, okay. You got me there. Can’t wait to see what Dworag is going to cook up next. If he can translate your idea as well as the first one, we’ll have a great time.”

“I have an idea he will be able to. Might take some time, but he’ll get it done for sure.” I was suddenly reminded of a topic we discussed earlier and grabbed the gun with the pouch of ammo, then looked for the largest caliber bullet we had with us.

“Got another bright idea?” Vealriah asked with a spark in her eyes.

“Nah. I just want to show you something. Remember what I said about pens?”

I placed the bullet at the end of the barrel and held the gun upside down, rolling the sphere across the table, as if it were the ballpoint of a pen.

“This is, in short, how they work. Imagine the gun is filled with ink, and this ball rolls through it and applies ink on the paper.”

“Ingenious,” Draco commented. “No need to reapply ink at all, and it looks easy enough.”

“The concept is easy, I agree with you there. Unfortunately, it’s not nearly as easy as it looks because the parts involved are ridiculously small. Good luck putting a pen together.” I heaved a deep sigh as I covered the weapon again. “Anyway, do you guys have anything you wanna do?”

“Probably talk to my dad to procure more ammunition. I mean, if we’re going to scale things up with these cartridges, we might as well make sure we have stock.”

“True,” I agreed with Velariah. “But I mean, besides that?”

“Sniff tomes? There’s plenty of time before dinner. I’m sure we can get our hands on a map soon enough.”

“Tome?” I asked. “Hell, let’s start with that map and maybe work on a route if necessary. If we plan to go to the capital, I reckon we can get some other info there.”

“True that,” She said. “I suppose we’ll head upstairs. Hope you won’t miss us.”

“I’ll be fine. I’ll go check on Minia… and Gray if I can find him.”

“Looks to me like Elly has taken him for a walk, but she can’t be gone for long. Well, take care.”

With a quick wave of her hand, she led the others upstairs as I retreated into our bedroom. The first thing I did was put the weapon and accessories aside, and the second was to lay down on the hammock to relax and watch as Minia skittered closer.

“Hey there,” I whispered. “Are you hungry?”

She wasn’t. I suppose that was one thing spiders had up on humans. They didn’t have to eat nearly as much.

I supposed humans could go without food for a while as well, technically speaking, but there weren’t many people that would submit themselves to that when food was available.

She did seem to want something else, though.

“Thirsty?” I asked.

That was it. She was thirsty.

Just as I was getting comfortable. Oh well.

I got out of the hammock to grab a few drops of water from the sink. I imagined that would be more than enough.

Seeing her jump on my hand and suck up the few droplets of water was a sight I’d never imagined I’d see. Nevertheless, it was interesting.

“I can’t believe you don’t get bored around here. Hopefully, we can get things sorted around here. We plan to take you with us on our adventure.”

She couldn’t speak, but she was excited about hearing that.

“Yep. We’ll travel the desert, looking for a specific bean that grows in the jungle beyond it. Who knows what we will run into? Either way, it could be pretty dangerous, especially for someone of your size, so we’ll have to be extra careful.”

She felt my worries and danced around on my hand before seemingly taking my thumb in for a hug. It had me smiling as I relaxed further into the pillows.

----------------------------------------

“Elania!”

I heard Velariah call out as she stood at the side of the hammock, wildly shaking it. It only took me a moment to realize I’d fallen asleep, and as much as I wanted to be quick back on my feet, this bed was just too comfortable.

“Crap,” I let out. “I’m sorry.”

“Sleepyhead,” The elf replied with a chuckle. “I’ve already let you nap, but dinner’s almost ready.”

“Holy. How long was I out for? What about the map?”

“We have one. Don’t worry. We’ll look at it after. I’ve also asked my dad for more bullets. He was surprised but would get it done - a lot more this time.”

“Great. I suppose I’ll try to stuff myself so we can have more saltpeter as well soon enough.”

Velariah burst into laughter which died down into giggles all while shaking her head.

“That does sound like a good idea. From the sound of it, we’ll burn through our gunpowder in no time.”

“Nice pun.”

“I know, right?”

My mishap wasn’t talked about even after we finished our dinner. I’d stuffed myself as much as I could to Velariah’s amusement and went straight to inspecting the map she laid out on the table.

“There are several issues,” She stated, pointing at the circles on the paper, which I assumed were towns. There was a larger square all the way up north which I made out to be the capital. Even further up north, there was a certain border with trees drawn beyond it. That had to be the jungle – our destination.

“First, there are very few roads, if any at all on our way, which will significantly hamper navigation. Second, there is the issue of water and supplies on the way. This, however, is something we can easily prepare for. The last issue is our method of transport. We need to get that wheel idea working as standard carts will just sink into the loose sand.”

“True,” I commented. “And I’ll admit that I’m not entirely certain if the silk is going to be enough, but the elven wood we ordered will be useful no matter what, for the other solution is to increase the width of the wheels.”

“You mean we just put more wheels on the vehicle?” Velariah inquired.

“Yeah,” I said, nodding. “We replace the axle with a much longer one and strap, I don’t know, five, six wheels on each side. Then, we place the wood on the wheels horizontally, creating cogwheels of some sort, before covering them with a thick layer of silk. There is no doubt in my mind that moving that through sand will be an issue. We may have to get a lighter type of wood for the wheels though.”

“Plenty of choice in that regard,” The knight reassured me. “Even here in town, there are plenty. It’s good you told me about it though. Now I can reserve a bunch of wheels. It’s not like they cost a fortune or anything.”

“Sounds like a plan.”

“Anyway,” She continued. “Back to the journey. Let’s assume we have all of the prep sorted, how do we proceed? I would suggest going from settlement to settlement as much as we can so we have much lower chances of getting lost.”

“How big are those settlements?” I asked.

“Not big. There isn’t much in terms of hospitable land to be found in the desert. Nevertheless, people have settled down in and near oases in particular, to keep trade routes safe.”

“And here I was about to ask why people would live there. I could have guessed that myself, too.”

“Yeah. They also act as checkpoints. You see the Zerdanians are very careful when it comes to outsiders, so expect that we get questioned as well. Good thing is that we have certain… connections.”

“You mean your dad?” I asked, smirking.

“How did you guess?”

“Just a hunch.”

There were smiles all around, but one subject hadn’t been discussed yet - Minia. Though, I didn’t feel like that was something that needed discussing with the others. Velariah and I would probably look for a way to bring her with us in private.

“Navigating from oasis to oasis shouldn’t be too difficult,” Velariah continued the main topic. “I don’t think so at least. There are, at most, only a few days in between them. At least, from what I can see. I’m not familiar with the area. I’ll definitely ask my father for some more info when he has the time. As for tomorrow…” She took some time to look at each of us. “Do we have any plans?”

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I shook my head.

“None here.”

“Me neither,” Seralyn added.

“What would you think about visiting the guild in the morning?” Draco suggested. “See if there are any quests open?”

“It would be refreshing to do a quest again,” Velariah concurred. “It’s been a while. Actually, I suppose the goblin extermination technically counted, but you know what I mean.”

“Variety?” I asked.

“Exactly. I’d love to do something else for a change. Even a delivery or something to the village-beyond-the-mountains would do.”

“That would be an interesting excursion. I’m sure we could also stop by Ember to see how she’s doing. We kind of promised to stop by again someday. Did you hear anything else about the wildlife there?”

“About why they were acting strange?” The knight reacted. “Most likely because of the volcano erupting. That’s my guess at least.”

“I would have thought as much as well. Also…” A thought was suddenly shot into my brain. “What about the stuff we got from the dungeon?”

“We’ll have that appraised at the guild tomorrow,” Velariah said in a carefree manner, and with a shrug. “Kantasia knows way more about this kind of stuff than I do. I’m pretty sure my dad knows exactly what it was as well, but hey. It’s more fun to find out on our own, and he knows that.”

“Well,” I said. “In that case, I suppose I’ll head to bed. I know I had a nap earlier, but I’m still quite tired. Not exactly sure why.”

“I have an idea or two,” Seralyn said with a smirk. “No, but really, you’ve been far too invested with things today, and I’ll be honest, so have I. I think I’ll call it a day, too.”

She was surprisingly… nice about all this.

“I’ll prepare our things for tomorrow morning then,” Draco added. “So we can leave early and get the best quest.”

“Alright,” Velariah said with a nod as she folded the map. “Let’s hope we can get something good tomorrow. Good night.”

We all said our goodnights before scattering. Before going to our room, however, I did make my way over to Gray who’d been sleeping in front of the hearth the entire time. The poor pup must have been worn out by Elly.

I petted him softly and he woke up briefly but dozed back off right after. Hopefully, it would help to not have him forget about me.

“What an interesting day,” I said after closing the door behind me once I’d entered our room. “I can’t believe everything went so well.”

“I can’t believe Arch was so easy-going about all this.”

“I can,” I replied with a nod. “Knowing you’re the first person in the world to see something new is quite the honor. I imagine the same goes if that ‘person’ is a dungeon. I bet all the other parties he sees coming in and out are just boring compared to us.”

“I suppose that’s true.”

“It’s good that we stayed alert nonetheless. I don’t ever want to be put in the situation we were in earlier. Still, it’s useful to have a being like him help us out. For that, I’m grateful.”

“And you’re helping out Seralyn… a lot. I guess she finally got her cool new weapon, huh?” She asked with a smirk referring to a comment the archer had made a long time ago.

I chuckled and smiled.

“I guess you’re right. Her inherity is so incredibly powerful, though. I’ve had this in mind since the moment she told us exactly what it was and lo and behold, it works. I’ll be honest, aiming these primitive guns is a pain in the ass, but she makes it look easy.”

“And how about using it as a self-defense tool? You know, for yourself?”

“I’ll find a way. It’s going to be small, a pistol, which is basically the same, but much much smaller, and generally shorter range.”

“You’ll find a way,” Velariah said, smiling as she took off her clothes. By the time she finished I’d already taken my shirt off and tossed it to the side, eager to accept the kiss that I knew would come. When it was finally there, I felt myself relax, and just allowed the events of the day to wash off of me.

I could almost fall asleep like this.

“I thought you were joking earlier, but you really do seem tired,” She commented after breaking away.

“Yeah,” I replied. “Today was busy but fun. Can’t wait for tomorrow to discover what the loot actually is.”

“Neither can I,” She said as she climbed into the hammock, her head moving as she traced the wall, looking for Minia, and stopping when she found the spider. “Well, look at that.”

“Hm?” I let out before climbing on our bed.

I then found the spider. She was standing on top of a cocoon of sorts with a hole in it, and the moment our eyes met, she waved at me, a sense of pride coming from her.

“Well, well, well. Seems like someone has made herself a little home.”

“It looks cozy,” Velariah commented. “If only there were tiny pillows to put in there.”

“I’m sure she could make those herself if she wanted to, but I have a feeling they aren’t necessary. Nice job though Minia.”

I could feel that if she was able to smile, she would have.

“I reckon that has drained you quite a bit too, if your body works anything like mine. Want something to eat or is tomorrow okay?”

She was fine waiting a bit, and I gave her a quick pat on the back before taking Velariah in for a hug.

“We really should start thinking about ways to take her with us,” I whispered. “Would a terrarium work? Won’t it get incredibly hot in there?”

“I don’t know, but that sounds like the safest option, at least when it comes to travel. We can just put it next to us in the wagon and keep an eye on her. If there’s anything wrong, I’m sure she can let us know by wildly waving or something.”

“Did you understand that, Minia?” I looked at the spider who started nodding with her little pedipalps.

“As for temperature,” The white-haired elf continued. “Well, I’m sure we can leave the top open, get a cold stone with us if necessary.”

“How long do those last?”

“Depends on what type you get. The ones we use to cool our food are incredibly cold and those last about a week. We don’t need one with that intensity, though. The ones I’m thinking about last for a month or longer.”

“You know, in a way they are batteries.”

“I suppose they are, if you need cold. They are transportable too. We’ll definitely take a few with us on the way.”

“Sounds like an excellent idea. I may have to get something to cover my rear as well. Can’t imagine black doing too well in a hot and sunny environment.”

“Worries for later. Let’s just go to sleep right now before you get even more fired up with ideas.”

“Agreed,” I whispered before clapping out the lights.

“Good night Minia, Velariah.”

“Good night.”

----------------------------------------

I had some amazing sleep, so good that when Velariah woke me up, I wasn’t mad in the slightest. I was fully awake in no time, and didn’t feel groggy at all.

A true Christmas miracle.

I wondered if a holiday of such scale existed in this world. So far, I’d only seen one, and it was local. A quick change of clothes and breakfast later, we were out and about with our loot safely tucked away in Draco’s backpack.

Elly had given us the vital information that Valtheril had left just before us and was headed to Master Pylanor. We intended to catch him there after a quick visit to the guild.

Once at the adventurer’s hub, we were presented with a dilemma. The board was stocked with quests, and we wanted to get the best there was, but at the same time, there were the objects that the lizardman was unloading on the counter.

I took a quick look around to notice that there weren’t that many people here quite yet. In fact, the building had barely opened. The fire in the kitchen wasn’t even on yet.

So I chose to sate my burning curiosity regarding the stones and ore first. The clerk had already started inspecting them, holding them up before a candle to get a better look.

“Interesting,” She muttered, raising my expectations even further. Yet, she didn’t seem keen to give an answer just yet.

This was torture.