Fortunately, I managed to get out of that little fix after some coordination and breathed a sigh of relief. The amused looks from my parents made me grimace though, and even Masa refused to meet my eye for a few minutes after that. Argh…
To distract myself from my ridiculous gaffe, I continued observing the people around me, but making sure to look where I was going this time. Not only were they not carrying any weapons, many of them were not even carrying bags at all. Their clothes were also lighter than what you would usually wear during the middle of autumn. Masa and I had thicker jackets on and my parents were wearing outdated-looking leather vests.
Speaking of which, the cut of their clothing fascinated me. Most were wearing a loose-fitting haori or poncho-like jacket with a long skirt or loose pants over tights and a long-sleeved turtleneck. That combination looked both comfortable and easy to move in. Maybe I could get a set or two too. It certainly wouldn't look too out of place even back on Earth, although it might be too hot for Singapore or Malaysia.
I was too busy planning my future wardrobe as we walked, but we finally arrived at our destination—the Mercenary Guild. Actually I had no idea this was our destination until we arrived, but apparently my parents had planned to come here from the start. Well, registering as a mercenary would make sense if we were to earn a living here, but I didn't really want to have to deal with hunting requests. And I hadn't really tried fighting humans before, so I was probably not cut out for escort requests either. So…herb gathering all the way huh…would that be viable at all? Hmm…
The guild building was one of the largest "fruits" I had seen so far. I expected it to be another branch of this artificial tree, but we stopped right in front of a fancy stairway with a gate that had a banner saying "Toshi Mercenary Guild". Descending the stairs led us into the "fruit" itself and the guild proper. Unlike the simple layout of the Nevda Town's Adventurer Guild, this guild house felt more like a bank in terms of layout. There was a small seating area right in front of the ten counters and a separate partition for a restaurant where many people were seated around tables and having their dinner. I assumed they were mercenaries, but despite the happy expressions and open mouths, I couldn't hear a thing coming from that direction. Did they have some kind of magical soundproofing?
We headed straight for an empty counter and proceeded to register as mercenaries. The whole process was so proper and official that I couldn't shake the feeling that I was registering for a bank account. The receptionist was explaining about ranks and such, but somehow her droning voice made it sound so boring that I tuned her out. Masa was smiling and nodding for some reason though. Did he prefer this kind of structured system?
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I was looking around for the request board, but there wasn't any. The guild receptionist instead showed us to an area with cubicles and showed us how to operate the window to view the requests. Self-service counters? Wasn't this just an ATM machine?! This really was a bank after all! I wasn't sure whether to feel amused or annoyed. Where was the adventure? Oh wait, the job was called "mercenary", not "adventurer", huh. I guess it certainly had to do with money…
Shaking my head, I took a closer look at the requests my parents and Masa were discussing. My dad gave me a backward glance and a thumbs up. We were going to start with some simple requests, right? Right? "Devil's Heart-strings" was just the name of a part of a plant, surely…
~*~
"DAAAAAAADDDDD!"
"You can do it! It's not that hard!" My dad yelled his encouragement from the sidelines.
"MUUUMMM! HEEEEEELLLLLP!!!"
"You've got the hang of it, Masa, just cut that part!" Mum was focused on training Masa and barely noticed my shout.
I was in the middle of the harshest workout of my life, jumping over tendrils stretched in my direction and dodging bullet-like pollen grains. All right, they did technically choose a herb-gathering quest, but no one told me the plants here were so active! And they were now actively trying to maim Masa and I as we approached to cut off a few stamens from the large flower in the middle of the plant.
Well, yeah, I would probably fight back if someone wanted to harvest my *ahem* parts too. This huge plant was shaped like a gigantic pitcher plant with human-sized "pitchers" dangling all over the ground. It wasn't normally dangerous to people, since the digestive fluids were slow-acting and its modified leaves were green, so it could photosynthesise anyway. However, it was a different matter during the flowering season. The plant only produced a single large flower and needed as much nutrients as it could get during this time to produce its fruit later on.
The flower produced an almost hypnotic fragrance that attracted animals that it could both manipulate to help it pollinate and consume. As such, we were wearing thick masks covering our entire faces to protect us from this deadly fragrance. If that wasn't enough, the plant could move its tendrils to entangle one's feet and shoot pollen directly to incapacitate its prey. The pollen was around the size of a typical bullet, and they were being shot out of the plant at similar speeds. And thus I was jumping around and dodging almost literal bullets like a mad woman. Masa appeared to be having an easier time, judging by the comments from my mum, but he hadn't managed to cut off any of the stamens yet.
Why were we allowed to handle such a dangerous request, you ask? Of course, it was because we were a four-person party with two veteran mercenaries. Never would the receptionist have expected that the two veterans would step back and let the two novices attempt the quest on their own. I reckoned my parents felt it was safe because they could step in whenever we were in trouble, but it still felt as if I was in a fighting game with an opponent who kept on coming out with combos. Even with my enhanced "stats" that I was not at all sure were even real, I was tiring fast.