Ezra looked down at the sheet of paper with a frown. It had the location along with the payment and the quest-giver. West Alley, Borna Peron, 2 silver. People passed by him on the left and the right. One person barely avoided slamming into him. Ezra’s lips turned down into a frown. How on earth was he supposed to find this ‘Borna Peron’? He didn’t know the city, he didn’t have any information.
“Wait, you haven’t activated the Quest Submodule yet?” Filamenta said.
Ezra’s eyes snapped toward the spider on his shoulder (wait, when had she transformed?).
“What do you mean?” he said.
“I mean,” Filamenta said. “For things that are common knowledge such as public locations, the System keeps track of all these things. How did you not know this?”
“Oh, shut up, no one told me,” Ezra said. He was quiet for a moment before his breath turned heavy. “How do I activate it?”
Filamenta gave him a side-eye. “Perhaps I should just let you figure it out alone.”
“Or you could just tell me. We’re… partners, right?”
Filamenta cackled, her body rolling around in fits.
“The way you say partner is the way I say ‘mortal enemy!’” She stopped laughing after a while. “Just say ‘Map’. That’s it.”
Ezra furrowed his eyebrows together. Could it be that simple? He looked in front of him and gulped.
“Map,” he said.
A blue box appeared at the corner of his vision, it had a map of the surrounding area, marking the little houses and shops. The map had clear icons, such as a sword and shield, indicating the location of the weapons and armor shop. In the middle of all this was a blinking gold cursor.
Ezra turned to the left. The cursor turned with him. In one of the buildings, a red pointer floated up and down conspicuously.
“Now say ‘Quests’,” Filamenta said. “Trust me.”
Ezra hesitated for a second before nodding.
“Quests.”
A new blue box appeared, this one formatted as a list. At the top, there was one with a green marker next to it saying ‘Defeat the Horned Rats!’. There was a little arrow at the end of the list.
Ezra reached out and clicked it.
[Defeat the Horned Rats!]
[You’ve been assigned(?) by the mercenary guild to take care of some Horned Rats! Defeat the Horned Rats and establish yourself within the guild!]
[0/10 Horned Rats defeated]
[Reward on Completion: 2 Rat Horns, 250 XP]
Ezra blinked.
“This’ll be useful,” he said. “Being able to see at a glance how many enemies there are. Not only that, but a map?”
“The map is limited,” Filamenta said quickly. “Don’t rely on it. It only takes into account known variables. If you don’t know something—or rather, if the System doesn’t know something, then it won’t update to change the information. It’s not omniscient.”
If it wasn’t omniscient, then what was it? What exactly was the System? Who made it? Why? Ezra had just accepted it because this was Fantasy Isekai Land and that was normal, right? But the more he thought about it, the odder it seemed.
Ezra shook his head. He didn’t have time to contemplate this stuff. He clicked ‘X’ and went back to the quests screen. There was another quest sitting underneath the first.
[Slay the Demon Lord!]
Ezra snorted. That one wouldn’t be happening for a while. He glanced over at the floating castle in the distance. At its current distance, a normal eye could barely make it out as anything other than a spot in the sky. Ezra could see it, though. He could see the pointed roofs and the thick walls, the streams of flying monsters circling it, the obsidian stone, and every little detail.
His goal. His endgame. The destruction of the Demon Lord and Ezra’s own ascension to the top. He’d become the strongest and no one would be able to challenge him.
Filamenta snorted.
Ezra broke out of his reverie. He frowned, then started walking toward the red cursor on his map.
“What?” he said.
“Power for power’s sake is a stupid goal, Ezra,” she said. “But it’ll make you stronger, so I won’t criticize you for it. If it ends in the Demon Lord’s death, you could want to become a pony for all I care.”
Ezra brushed off the words like they were water flowing off a duck’s back. Filamenta’s opinion was irrelevant. Also, if she could kindly get out of his head—
“Oh, shut up, I was out of your head. It’s just that your obsessive thoughts are so damn loud I couldn’t help but hear it.”
Ezra ignored her and continued walking.
----------------------------------------
There was an old man outside the house. The windows had been destroyed, while random sections of wood had fallen off. Ezra frowned. Seemed like the horned rats had done a fair amount of damage.
Ezra approached the old man in front.
“I’m a mercenary,” Ezra said.
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The man—Borna Peron?—raised a trembling finger at him. “You’re the nameless merc! The one with one eye!”
Ezra raised an eyebrow.
Borna shook his head. “Everyone’s been talking about how you killed the Giant Lizard! What are you doing here?”
Ezra stared at him. The seconds stretched on for what felt like minutes. It hadn’t even been two hours since he killed that lizard. How…?
Borna’s head started to leak sweat. He glanced between the house and Ezra.
“Oh, you’re here about the Horned Rats? But… why would you do that? These are much easier to kill than a Giant Lizard.”
Ezra felt a hot spike of irritation rush down his spine. He clenched his jaw, then crossed his arms.
Borna bowed quickly.
“I apologize for questioning you, sir!” he said. “It’s clear you’re here as some sort of act of charity, I shouldn’t be wasting your time.”
Act of charity? Hold on, that’s not right, he shouldn’t let him get the wrong impression—
“Well, sir,” Borna said. “I’ll get down to brass tacks. The horned rats are destroying my house. They’ve ripped the place apart, driven me and my wife out. We sent out a request, but due to all of the disasters that have been rocking the guild recently—like that Giant Lizard—they haven’t had time to attend to us.”
Ezra’s left eye twitched. Was this guy just going to keep talking? Ezra held up his hand.
“What are they like, these Horned Rats?” Ezra said. “I’m new to the country, and haven’t had the chance to deal with the local wildlife.”
Borna made a ‘ah,’ sound before speaking. He nodded.
“Horned rats are like normal rats, except that they’re very aggressive, and removing them tends to result in a gored stomach.”
“Oh.”
“Well, sir, I’ll leave you to it. The door’s unlocked.”
Filamenta hummed from his shoulder.
“Nothing dangerous about them,” she said. “Except for the fact that they’ll try to gore you. Some people…”
Ezra took a deep breath, then opened the door and entered.
The inside of the house was dark and unlit. The only light to be found was leaking from the outside due to the many holes and gaps in the building’s construction. Pieces of wood and stone lay on the floor.
A skittering noise passed by Ezra’s left. His heart rate shot up and he took an involuntary step.
“Recall.”
Filamenta disappeared from his shoulder with a golden flash before reappearing as a needle in hand. Despite Ezra’s high perception, he was still finding it difficult to make out what was happening.
“Seriously? You just got the skill, too.” Filamenta lit up. “Ezra, come now.”
Ezra glared down at his weapon. He was about to talk when he realized what she was speaking of. He froze in place, then clenched his jaw.
“Oh, figured it out? Took you long enough,” Filamenta said.
Ezra grumbled. “Shut up. [Mana Perception].”
The world dimmed, replaced with blue flecks and dim lights. Ezra looked to his left. Nothing at all. He switched to his right, but all he saw was blackness.
He looked up.
Out of the corner of his eye, there was a quick flash of blue. The sound of padded steps echoed through the house in time with the blue light’s movement.
Ezra jumped into the air, speeding toward the creature in a single move. He flipped off [Mana Perception].
The Horned rat was large. Nothing massive—more like a medium-sized dog. Kind of disturbing given the fact that it was a rat, but Ezra preferred not to think about that. Its red eyes glistened in the darkness as it watched Ezra swoop down.
The horn angled toward Ezra in some kind of attempt to gore him Ezra reached out and grabbed the horn, and his momentum dragged the creature to the ground and smashed it into the floor. The monster squealed and let out a pained screech. Its feet flopped around in an attempt to stab Ezra.
Ezra pulled back his needle and then stabbed it.
The monster died instantly.
0/110
At that moment, Ezra heard about a half-dozen other rats appear on his left and right. Snarls and grunts filled the room. Their eyes were staring at him hatefully from every direction.
Ezra grinned. This would be fun.
----------------------------------------
It wasn’t fun.
You have leveled up!
You have received 2x Rat Horns!
There was a clatter as the spiral horns fell to the wood floor in front of Ezra. The creatures had scattered after he’d killed one more. At that point, it became a slow grind of searching out each of them and putting them down like animals. Which made sense, given that they actually were animals. Sort of. They did turn into dust like other monsters so that probably made them monsters. And animals. Ezra decided that this was a stupid line of thought.
He’d only gotten a single level out of the business, but this would at least count toward allowing him to go on tougher quests for the guild. He reached down and picked up the horns. After a moment’s consideration, he stored them in his belt. There was a good chance he’d be able to sell them at the guild or something. As Ezra stepped out of the building, he idly wondered if the drops were normal. If that was the case, why hadn’t he gotten drops from other monsters?
Off to the side, there was a man with spiky hair and a massive sword looking toward him.
Ezra ignored the look. He reached up toward his chin and rubbed it—oh wait, he had some kind of spirit partner. He looked at her.
“Why haven’t I been getting any drops?” he said.
Filamenta crawled up his arm, heading for his shoulder. “Because you’re an idiot—“ she stopped. “Well, no, I suppose it isn’t unreasonable that you don’t know. You need a skill. [Hunting]. You’ll have to get someone to teach you at some point, it can’t be found through your skill tree because the designers of this System are idiots.”
The man in the background with the big sword flipped a coin in his hand. It spun down and the man snatched it out of the air. After looking at the result, he nodded.
“I’ll get the skill later,” Ezra said. “For now, we have a quest to take care of.”
Borna caught sight of him and looked at him with a slack-jawed expression.
“Young man, your clothing is covered in blood!” he said.
Ezra looked down at his arms. So they were. He looked back up.
“Yes,” he said.
Borna blinked before shaking his head. “Well, I think I can pretty well guess that the animals are all dead or scared off now. Can you give me the quest paper so I can sign off on it? I could do it at the guild, but since you’re here...”
Ezra reached into his belt and pulled out the quest—
“Greetings.”
Ezra looked to his right.
A man was standing there—the man with the spiky hair and the giant sword. He was looking down at Ezra with a cool expression, his eyes like steel. He was wearing a loose coat. Underneath it, he didn’t wear a shirt, instead relying on bandages to preserve his modesty. Thankfully, he was at least wearing pants.
Dumrivil - Legendary Hero of Heroism - Lv. 44
Ezra turned back toward Borna. “Please sign this paper.”
“W-wait!” Dumrivil said. “Hold on, I have some questions to ask you!”
He fidgeted with his coin and absentmindedly tugged at the ends of his long red scarf.
“Who even are you?” Ezra said.
“My question as well,” Filamenta said. “This guy seems like an absolute dumbass.”
Instantly, the man’s eyes narrowed and he crossed his arms. He raised his chin, giving him a look of superiority.
“My name is Dumrivil,” he said. “B-ranked Master Mercenary. I am also known as one of the four great keepers of the Balance. You may ask how I earned such a prestigious title? Well, to answer that, I must go back to the very beginning—“
“Does this guy shut up?” Filamenta said.
“—You see, it all started with the formation of the Mercenary’s Guild. Back then, the times were different. Astralyte had yet to be discovered, and—”
Ezra looked back at Borna. “I still need you to sign this.”
“W-wait!” Dumrivil jumped in between Ezra and Borna.
Ezra looked up at him with an unamused expression.
Dumrivil smiled awkwardly and scratched the back of his head. “I get that you’re a busy guy, so I’ll just cut things short.”
Ezra tried to walk around Dumrivil.
Dumrivil’s eyes shot open and he jumped to the left, blocking Ezra’s path.
Ezra glared up at Ezra before engaging his Dexterity and jumping to the left. Dumrivil followed, handily blocking him.
“I promise I’ll let you go in a moment,” he said. “I just need to ask some questions.”
Ezra growled. “Make it quick.”
Dumrivil laughed awkwardly. He fanned himself.
“Right then!” he said. “I just had a few quick questions. I saw you fighting that Giant Lizard and I was really impressed. See, I make it a habit to know everyone of importance, but you just… came out of nowhere. ”
Ezra tensed.
Dumrivil smiled, furrowed his eyebrows and tilted his head.
“Who are you?” he said.