Returning to questing was difficult, and so Ermes kept things slow for a bit. After every excursion, they had a day where he would not approve them for a quest, but in return, he did put the heat on other people to make sure nothing stayed on the board long. It was much like before: Talking to people who'd seen something, looking for tracks, and walking. Lots and lots of walking.

"I've got something different for you", Ermes said one day. "A confirmed monster. A lesser tyrant wasp has been causing trouble in a village to the north-east. Are you familiar with tyrant monsters?" They weren't. "What sets them apart is that they're extremely territorial. They pick an area and kill anything that tries to enter. This one picked the southern part of a village. Other than that they're what you'd expect from a wasp the size of a torso: They're quick, agile, and fly, but they rely on those for defense. They're easy to kill if you can hit them.

"Consider this a bit of a test. I want to make sure you're good to fight and that you'll do it smart. If it gets too much just run away, tyrants don't chase. Much."

A day and a half of walking later they arrived at the little village. It reminded Vittorio of home - but then all the villages he'd seen did, really. He'd come to realize there wasn't all that much to his home village. A handful of houses by a dirt road, a local gathering place, some with a shop. As a child, he'd thought of the village as a centre. Now he knew it was just a middle.

Finding the wasp was as easy as walking towards the buildings, Ermes not underselling its territorial nature. Some three hundred meters out from the village Vittorio heard an angry buzzing. Gloria drew her sword and raised her shield as he raised his wand and gathered himself. As the buzzing grew louder Vittorio concluded that if this was a lesser tyrant wasp, he was not looking forward to seeing a greater.

The monster that bore down on them was about a meter long, its body segmented with a large, bulbous lower section ending in a stinger as long as Gloria's sword. Its wings, while large, did not seem big enough to carry its weight. They looked to be no longer than Vittorio's arm. The most unpleasant aspect, at least to Vittorio, was the face. The compound eyes were alien and strange, and the clicking mandibles beneath them somehow looked more menacing than the stinger.

It buzzed in close, jabbing at Gloria from a distance as if to scare her off. She approached instead, sprinting forward as fast as she could, but it was not nearly fast enough. The insect darted back and up before moving in again, this time trying to stab down from above the shield.

A narrow cut appeared on its side as Vittorio managed to clip it with Wind Weaponry. The wasps erratic movements made aiming extremely difficult - once again made even more difficult by Vittorio not being able to see where the attack went - but at least it did not seem to realize what he was doing. It was entirely focused on Gloria and based on the following flurry of attacks, seemed to blame her for its injury.

The stinger was no match for her shield, and while she couldn't do much else for now, Gloria was at no real risk of injury for the time being. Vittorio tried using Suspend to interrupt the monster's movements but it recovered immediately - if anything the sudden change was more of a problem for Gloria. He returned to trying to shoot it as he considered his options. It was too fast and agile, and he too slow, to trap it with Suspend. Stumbling Hex only worked for walking and he doubted it'd change much if the wasp was already on the ground. Agonizing Hex? Pain only seemed to make it angrier.

That left two tools: Wind Weaponry, which he was already using, and Swelling Hex. He hadn't found a use for that one yet and had never inflicted it on anything so he had somewhat put it out of his mind. It seemed like a good time for it, but there was a problem: He needed to firmly target a part of the target's body. Interfering with the wings was the obvious choice but he could not picture how they were attached. He simply did not know wasp anatomy. He decided to try something else.

There was a revolting squishing sound followed by incredible pain in his left shoulder. Looking down, Vittorio saw the monster's stinger impaled just under his clavicle. It would seem that swelling the wasps lower segment had somehow forced the stinger out at incredible speed. All three combatants paused for a moment as they tried to come to terms with their new situations.

The wasp, bereft of its primary weapon, in agony, and still maddened over the intrusion into its territory, decided to try and eat Gloria's face. It hit her shield, her sword hit it, and thus it was all over. The bisected bug fell to the ground. Gloria rushed to her friend's aid.

Vittorio was still dazed and in shock, and just stared at the stinger in his shoulder. His mind couldn't quite take it in. He saw it, how it entered his body, the blood staining his chest, and he certainly felt all of it, but he could understand it.

"It's okay Vee, it's okay", Gloria said as she hurried over. "You'll be fine, we have potions." She took a sharp breath. "Vee? Hey, hey! Look at me."

Vittorio looked up. He saw Gloria. That made sense. "My shoulder", he said.

"I know, I know. You'll be fine. I need to pull the stinger out, okay?" He nodded. Gloria was there, that's good. She always knew what to do.

A second bout of terrible pain snapped him out of his stupor as Gloria pulled it free. The now gaping wound bled profusely, and he pulled out a healing potion and drank it. His mind cleared further and the pain subsided to a terrible, dull throbbing. He still felt light-headed.

"I'm uh... I'm dizzy", he said.

"It's the blood loss", Gloria said. "Tarcisio told me about it. Potions are no replacements for a healer and it takes time to get back to normal when you bleed a lot. Come on, let's go into the village and rest a bit."

The townsfolk were more than welcoming, rushing out to greet the two as soon as they saw the danger was passed. A middle-aged man came over and helped Vittorio stay steady as most of the rest simply thanked them and asked if there was anything they could do. Before long the adventurers found themselves sitting in a small, pleasant kitchen eating slices of fruit to the sound and smells of cooking. A young woman had seen Vittorio get injured and insisted on helping him. She was rubbing an herbal ointment into Vittorio's shoulder and telling him how brave he was, despite his insistence that Gloria was the brave one. Gloria, for some reason, found the whole thing very funny.

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Dinner was a fine thing, and though they ate with the family who'd first invited them into their home, every family in the town insisted on contributing. Fatty pieces of meat were served with generously spiced, curried root vegetables, fried egg, rice, more fruit slices, bread with creamy butter, and ale. Vittorio was embarrassed about how much he ate, but Gloria told him that was normal after using a potion, and he did notice the dizziness went away quickly once he started eating.

After they were finished they were given a small bowl of candied nuts. Knowing how expensive that was they tried to refuse, but the old woman who'd brought them grew stern, telling them they would not shame her by having her be the only one not to give them something. They ate the nuts under her supervision.

Their hosts insisted they stay for the night and take their bed and would not take no for an answer. Gloria got them out of it by regaling the pair of how as adventurers, they were so used to sleeping rough under the stars that they found beds uncomfortable. They spent the night in the garden. Vittorio was extremely uncomfortable.

They waved goodbye to the village near dawn the next morning, walking off and eating their donated breakfast of dried fruits, bread, and cheese. The woman who'd helped Vittorio the day before kissed him on the cheek and asked him to make sure to come back soon in case there was another monster nearby. He told her they would of course come back and help if there was another request they could do. Gloria found that funny too.

"You know she was flirting with you, right?"

"Who?"

"Who? Who? The girl who was rubbing your chest last night and kissed you today!"

"She was? ... She was!" His face got incredibly warm all of a sudden. "I uh, I wasn't expecting that."

"You should come back and visit. See if any monsters are lurking in her room maybe." Seeing he was getting uncomfortable, she decided to take it easy on him. "Seriously though, I bet you can expect more of that. Just keep your eyes and mind open, you know?"

They came back to Pogna around midday the day after, and as they approached the doors of the guild hall Vittorio could hear Pachakuteks delighted laughter. It was one of his favourite things about her: When she laughed, she laughed, full-bodied and with all her heart. The smile hearing it brought to his face fell as he entered and saw with whom she was laughing. Sitting there, with Pachakutek, Nuno, and Tarcisio were the last people he wanted to see.

"Mother? Father?", he asked. He'd been doing well for weeks now, slowly growing more confident in his choices and comfortable with who he was. As his eyes met those of his Mother - cold, angry, calculating eyes above a smiling mouth - he felt much the same as he'd felt back home. The way he'd always felt when he knew punishment was coming and there was no escape. Mother's eyes made it very clear there would be none.

"There he is!", Mother said, rising to her feet. "There's our little adventurer!" There were laughs all around.

"Vittorio, why haven't you told us about your parents?", Pachakutek asked. "They're so nice, aren't they?"

"It's been too long, son", Father said, also standing up.

"What are you doing here?", Gloria asked, moving in front of Vittorio.

"Oh Gloria, I didn't see you!", Mother answered. "We're here to see our son of course."

"I don't think he wants to see you, though."

"That's hardly for you to say", Father said. "Well, Vittorio? Will you speak to your parents? It was quite the journey."

"No no, I'll talk to you."

"Good", Father said. "But perhaps we should do it in private. I'm sure you don't want your mother to embarrass you in front of your new friends."

Vittorio didn't think they would actually do anything in public - they'd always kept his disciplining private. On the other hand, they would not be leaving until the three of them had had a talk. "There are meeting rooms. We can borrow one of them." He started walking off to the hallway to the left, Gloria joining him and his parents following. They found an empty room. Mother told Gloria to leave, and Vittorio asked her to. As they shut the door on her she gave Vittorio a look and a nod, and then leaned against the wall, trying to listen in.

As soon as they were alone his parents dropped the act. Father moved off to the far wall, while Mother placed herself between Vittorio and the door, well inside his personal space. She looked him up and down and sneered.

"What a joke", she said. "When Celeste told me what you'd done I couldn't quite believe it. You're stupid, but I didn't think you were this stupid. She's been telling all kinds of stories, you know? About how mean we've been, and how you didn't deserve to be punished, and how children should be let loose like rabid dogs the way she's done with Gloria. But here's the thing: The people in town know you. They know how useless you are. More than one has told me I should've been harsher."

Behind her, Father nodded. "He has barely any scars. I always said keeping his face unhurt was a mistake, nobody would care about a busted lip. Or broken nose."

Mother nodded. "I've been soft. I always have been with you. When you were born I took you into the woods to leave you, but I changed my mind." She shook her head. "Too damn soft. No more. You level five yet, boy?"

Vittorio shook his head. "Four."

Father sighed and rubbed his eyes, while Mother groaned. "Not even level five... You are absolutely useless, you know that?", she said. "When I started out as an adventurer I was level five in three weeks, and here you are not yet five after more than two months. Ah well, no helping it I suppose: I'll get you to five, then we'll go see a [Class Guide] and have your class changed, and then you have a debt you need to work off."

Vittorio tried to get some spit around his dry mouth before gritting his teeth. "No."

Mother leaned in closer. "What did you say to me?"

"I said no. I'm not doing that. I'm keeping my class and staying here. You can't make me do anything. Not anymore."

Mother moved forward, forcing him to back up a few steps. "Listen here, you useless, pathetic worm. I wasn't asking your opinion, I was telling you what's going to happen. You're only making things worse for yourself. Come quietly."

"No."

Mother's fist buried itself in his belly, driving the air from his lungs. "Next time is going to hurt", she whispered in his ear.

But Vittorio wasn't listening. As he bent over and took a first shaky breath, something happened. He suddenly felt terribly cold.

Outside the door, Gloria was straining to hear what was going on. The room wasn't warded or anything, but the walls were thick and the door well-fitted. A few people had passed by but she paid them no mind. She heard a soft thump, as of a chair falling over. She itched to go in but knew she shouldn't. When the thump was soon followed by a much louder crash, however, she feared the worst and shoved the door open. Not in a dozen lifetimes would she have guessed what awaited her.

To her left, sprawled against the wall, was Vittorio's father, a dagger buried to the hilt in his eye socket. He was clearly already dead. Vittorios mother had collapsed and overturned the table as she held her hands against her neck in a vain attempt to stem the tide of blood rushing from a deep, savage cut. Vittorio himself stood by his mother's feet, his face and chest covered in his mother's blood. He showed no emotion whatsoever and could as easily have been looking at a rock as at his murdered parents.

When he spoke, he did so in a voice not his own - rich, strong, and loud. "Thus always to tyrants." He turned to face her, and his eyes were just as cold, just as empty as his expression. "Rejoice! Thine oath is fulfilled, and justice is done this day."

Vittorio shivered and staggered, suddenly looking drunk. He looked around the room with a wild, horrified expression, and promptly threw up.