###
“Whoa!” Gilbert slammed both his hands on the table, amazed at Zayne’s current rank, “This calls for a celebration!” He lifted his hands high. All his raucous antics garnered the gawking eyes of the passersby, with Wyne covering her face out of shame. “Let’s get something to eat!” He wrung an arm around Zayne’s neck, “We’re super proud of you, man. Wyne’s been worried about you non-stop when you stayed in there with those men.”
“Alright, alright, cut it out.” Wyne moaned from behind, trailed by Oswul’s constant snickering, “So you said that you’ll head out tomorrow? Where?”
“Somewhere around Burg…” Zayne trailed off, debating to share about his departure in detail, but he chose to spare as little secrets as he could to the siblings, “There’s a… new dungeon that we are granted the opportunity to clear along with the dispatches of the Emerald council.”
The siblings each breathed a wow upon his revelation. None seemed to be jealous of his privilege, instead, they appeared to be supportive of him, “That’s great and all, but isn’t it dangerous?” Oswul spoke next, “Are you sure you’ll be safe, Zayne?”
I’ve done riskier things than this. Zayne wished to utter those words, “I’ll be fine, the others looked… strong. They’re somewhat queer with their mannerisms, but I sensed absolute confidence in their abilities. So yeah…” He was certain that he’d be the weak link within their hastily made party, “I hope I can contribute enough to not weigh them down.”
“Bah! Don’t worry about that!” Gilbert gave his back another light tap, grinning. “So… about that celebration…”
“I’m afraid I have to pass. I can’t sit still, no way I can rid of this feeling until I do something… productive.” He waved his hands, “What about you guys? I’d love to celebrate and have fun, but...” Zayne wished to simply hunt or peruse the tower, but the key refused his will; its cooldown was still in effect. “I wanted to do all I can before leaving.”
“Unfortunately, the marshes are a no-go until the kingdom declared that land safe, and god knows how long that will take,” Oswul answered Zayne’s question without him asking, “So our best bet will be the missions, or hunting in the plains. We all know there are no monsters left in the plains, so our best bet is…” He leered on the crowded noticeboard, “-there.”
The siblings nodded at one another, “Alright. Let’s go.”
###
Zayne found an empty spot below the noticeboard peppered with papers stuck on its surface with differently colored pins. After a few minutes of ogling, he surmised what each color meant; Red meant a hunting-based mission, Green meant a gathering mission, Blue would be escort missions, and gray was allocated for missions that did not fit those basic descriptors.
“This one’s nice…” Wyne mumbled when her eyes landed on a red-pinned letter. “What do you think? A Merloc party is seen roaming beyond the farmlands in East Basin; all in all, it’s a pretty basic request, but the reward is nice.” She held it high, allowing the wandering eyes of the others to see. “60 silver for a bunch of Merlocs. Not half bad.“
“Merlocs?” Oswul chimed in, “I’ve read about them once, they match the goblins in endurance, but paling in strength. Most considered them a step behind the goblins in terms of difficulty.”
Their heads turned to Zayne. 60 silvers? Not bad. “I’ll take it. How long will this mission last?” He had to reach the south game on the next morning, it’d be a bad look if he was late—or worse, missed the caravan entirely.
Gilbert tilted his head, “If we found the monsters quickly, it would take a few hours, tops. If we didn’t… Well…”
“Merlocs don’t roam far from the spot where people see them. They’re quite selective in choosing their habitat.” Oswul added, “And if we can deal with the goblins, we can surely deal with them too.” He grasped the letter from Wyne’s extended hand, “It said that we should talk to a guy named Restin before we partake in the mission. It appears that there’s more to this mission than what is written here.”
They took the paper along when they waited behind a line reaching Pherey’s counter. She stamped their slip—that’s what she called it—with a chirpy yes and a few words of encouragement, then pointed toward the eastern exit while reminding them to talk to the mission giver first. Apparently, it was a crucial step in fulfilling requests unless stated otherwise. She perked when Wyne inquired about A.P.—adventurer points. “Oh! You’ll be rewarded with points as you finished guild missions, and once you’ve contributed enough, you’ll be granted a chance to promote.” She clarified with an exhaustive grin. “You can only earn points from finishing missions at your current rank, and this one is…” Pherey turned the slip around, “F-2. So Zayne won’t get any A.P. for this mission. Is that okay?”
“I’m good.” Zayne nodded. They turned back after handing in the slip, waded through the ever-increasing crow, and encountered a few familiar faces. The snobbish noble whose name had left Zayne’s memory snorted when he zoomed past, acting as if the siblings never existed. Wyne simply smirked, mentioning that he’d failed his license test with a vengeful mirth. She didn’t know why he was here when Zayne asked, nor did she care.
An excited Gilbert failed to contain his fervent spirit, clapping both his fists together, his ardor irresistible, “Let’s do this! Our first mission together, damn I’m excited.” Zayne smiled as they exited the hall as a group, talking and sharing their dreams of the future now that they were officially an adventurer. The shops filled their sights, filled with parents or friends gifting their child a new weapon, armor, or stones as a present or a celebration. Gilbert found a violet-tinted store and turned to his siblings.
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“Oswul, Wyne, you’ve saved enough for a stone, how about we get it before leaving? I’m thinking of buying one too.” His query piqued Oswul’s eyes, who flew toward a rather quiet store to his right. Wyne held a disinterested gaze. “Zayne? What about you? I see you using a lot of skills and spells, and they appeared kind of random, is that by choice?”
“Yep.” Zayne shirked the question off with a dismissive nod, “I just don’t have the kind of coins to be picky. Gotta use everything I can get. I’ll wait here, you guys do your business.”
###
“This can be useful,” Oswul held a pebble-sized stone in his palm, weighing it with a slick grin, “My second active skill, finally.” His brows stiffened when he gritted his teeth as he crushed the stone within his palm. “Phew…” A light glint of circular light wreathed his figure for a second, then dissipated as Oswul closed his eyes. This marked the first time Zayne saw a person consuming a skill stone, “Okay. I got it all set up. We’ll try it out later.”
[Hawk’s sight]. A skill augmenting the user’s visual cortex, allowing them to see further and make out differences in color and depth. That was what Oswul said when Zayne made a point to ask.
“A few guilds asked me to join,” Zayne spoke when they reached the plaza near the housing district on the east, “What about you?”
“Well… some of the bigger guilds gave us this-“ Oswul reached his back pocket, retrieving a rectangular letter, “-it’s a tryout permit for the Blue lions guild.”
Blue lions? “That’s the one where Brenhart is, isn’t it?” None of the blue lion’s scouts approached him, but Zayne could’ve sworn he saw their emblem back outside the monolith. “What’s your plan?”
“We’ll see.” Gilbert replied this time, “To be honest, we’re still unsure of which guilds we wanted to try out for. Blue lions guild is great, but we’re kinda hoping of…” His speech trailed off.
“The scarlet Phoenix.” Wyne resumed Gilbert’s words, “Well, they’re notorious for their inane selectiveness.” She sighed, placing both hands on her hips, “We’ve promised our father to join this guild after being an adventurer, for reasons.”
“I see…” Zayne himself wanted to see what the Emerald council looked like. “What happens if I don’t have a tryout permit?”
Oswul answered with a lower voice, “You’ll have to apply yourself, but the acceptance rate that way is… very low.”
The housing district breathed an eerie sense of peace, contrasting the busy and oftentimes raucous ambiance of the Guild and commerce district. Here, the streets aired a gentle breeze, and the lack of the constant masses allowed the passersby to exist in peace. Multi-storied houses stood high in a sporadic manner, disparaging their owners from the less opulent ones, colored with a sense of aesthetics and balance, casting the district in a pleasant, serene light. The lack of shouting and debauchery allowed the residents to sleep and perform their daily duties well, reminding Zayne of Burg in a queer way. People of all ages were seen chatting and playing in the garden oftentimes placed before the entrance of their households. Inside, no hearth was erected, replaced by the same many light-emitting bulbs used all across Basin.
Zayne turned his head higher to his left, noting the differences in the shapes of the homes from the base level to the ones above. “Noble houses,” said Wyne when Zayne made a point to ask, “A few originated from Basin, but most of them are just extensions from the other noble families, no doubt to make their presence known here.” A few portly men were seen chatting up with one another, wearing expensive garments adorned with expensive gold trimmings and embroideries, their faces red with either the heat of their general snobbishness. Wyne turned her head away in shame from their display, “Please, don’t associate us with them. We might be nobles once, but never had my father looked like them.” She worded them with a slight venom in her speech.
The east gate pulled when Zayne showed his license. A blast of farm air gusted forth, starting from their feet, filling their noses with the smell of wheat and hard work with a tinge of manure. Acres of farmland stretched their vision, green mixed with pastel, pastel mixed with red, and the red grew from scarlet to violet, violet to yellow, and yellow to white and green again. Flower gardens, Zayne noted and of course, all the herbs and plant materials used in alchemy appeared here too, albeit a rarity amongst the wheat and dairy farms. The beauty aside, the stench of shit stained the serene image.
Moos, oinks, and caws blared upon their arrival, their feet squelched the damp flooring as they made their way into a farm where the mission letter described; a giant timbered house with a red roof, it said. A youth in his twenties saw their arrival with a welcoming smile, especially so after he saw their letter. “I’m Restin! Are you from the hall? Finally! The Merlocs had killed most of my livestock and my guard dogs. I have to house most of my dogs inside, look-” He tipped the door to his home slightly, and out came the barks of terrified animals, “-can you deal with this quick?”
Zayne asked, looking around. “You said the guards helped you? Can’t they deal with this issue themselves?”
“They did, but I spotted more when I patrolled the outskirts last night, there’s a lot of them gathered near a grove over there.” He said, wiping the sweat off his brow, “The attack came out of nowhere, and those owning the farms nearby can’t risk another random pillaging of their livestock. The guards insist the Merlocs never cross the river, but after the attack, we don’t know what to believe anymore.” He said with a grunt and a sniff. “Come with me. Let me lead you.”
The group trekked past the whimpers of quivering animals as they stepped past a dilapidated wood gate, “One broke through last night, it took…” he paused and wiped his eyes, “Well, it took Doggy’s life and only stopped once those guards cames. Rest in peace, my dearest pig. He’s one of the fattest you’ll ever see in these farms, ever, what a bad way to go.” Pig? Isn’t his name-
The fences erected all around had seen better days. Claw and axe marks dug into them, wood beams curved and splintered from the passage of time and the occasional turbulent weather. “The guards won’t chase them past Basin’s outer territory. Unfortunately, their responsibilities only stretch as far as our border goes, any further requires the involvement of the military.”
A massive swath of brown land greeted them when they reached the ends of the farmlands, with a flowing rivulet chiseling a border between the farmstead and the wilderness. Restin pulled his hand, hinting at a growth of trees in a distance, “There. I spotted a few of them piggybacking dead cows to that spot. What do you think?”
“Let us take care of this.” Gilbert grasped the handle of his sword with impatience. Restin turned tail and went back to his home, glancing over at their backs once in a while.
“It’s not too strange for the Merlocs to randomly show up in the farmlands, I mean, look at all this food-” Oswul mentioned what was floating in their minds, the recent goblin attack was too fresh for them to ignore, “So the odds of a death wraith being involved is small. Too small for us to really think off-”
“But not zero, right?” Zayne intercepted, “It’s fine. I’m certain none of those guys are left.”
Because Mordred has hunted them all. He wished to say, but he kept his lips shut, and his eyes drifted away from Oswul’s prying gaze. “Let’s go.”
###
Greens and barks webbed their sights as they penetrated the forest wall. Vines and low-hanging branches rustled and waved when Gilbert pushed his giant sword through, with Zayne scouring from above, Oswul trailing close behind his back. Wyne held her staff between her chest, ready for any sudden attack.
“No Merlocs so far.” Oswul leaned on one of the larger barks atop the thicket, surveying the distance. “But I see splotches of blood over there. It looks fresh, but until we inspect them up close, there’s no way to tell for sure.”
“Okay… let’s head there, Gilbert, be ready.” Oswul’s hawk sight appeared to be more useful than Zayne thought, the things he described never registered in his vision, even after he’d leveled up a decent amount. At times he wondered if what he said was even real, but Oswul always proved himself right every time, and they learned to never doubt him again since. It sucked that Zayne couldn’t use skill stones the way the others did; his skill set depended on the essences dropped by his foes.
A rustle in the leaves stopped Oswul dead in his tracks. “Enemy, to the right,” He said, raising his right arm.