Early in the morning, after a silent yet heartfelt breakfast, the group quickly made their way to the adventurers guild to speak with their temporary boss. The way to the guild was filled with the noise and smells of hard work, everything from rivaling bakeries to smithies and butchers placing the various meats gained from hunting on display. The city had woken up hours earlier, but it was only now the shops and various places of interest opened proper. Spotting a store that sold various grilled meats, prepared in many ways, Heracles left to get some for the road. Which was funny to Diana, as the adventurers' guild was quite literally across the street.
Making their way through the double doors at the front, they were greeted by the sight, smell, and sound of adventurers going about their mornings routines. About half of the people present were standing in front of a wall positively covered in glowing squares. Whenever an adventurer either found one they liked or touched one by accident, the glowing square followed them back to their tables, where their teams were seated. Diana even saw a much sleepier Scar trying to drink some strong alcohol while rubbing his eyes at the same time. Across from the quest board, a long desk with receptionists working for the guild were seated, going about their day or speaking with someone about the details of the quest they had accepted.
Diana walked up to a receptionist who, guessing from the length of her ears and nose, must've been way over a hundred years old. Just by sitting her, her body was shaking like a leaf in the wind. But that did not stop her from recognizing who was standing in front of her.
“Ah, you must be the ones from the university, yes?” She didn't let them answer, as he continued speaking. With a shaky hand, she reached out and placed a spell on the group. After a few attempts to get it right, she pointed to a door that was previously not visible.
“The guild leader is up the stairs, the door at the end. No need to knock, the door opens on its own.” The receptionist reached into a pocket and gave everyone, including Vita, some candy before waving them away. It was a nice enough of a gesture that Vita considered healing her. Only for a moment, that was quickly voted down by the Vita council as that would've been too kind of an act. After all, they hadn't done anything too evil in a long time, and the council was getting impatient with the lack of it.
The stairs up to the second floor had plenty of taxidermy of beasts and monsters of various sizes, many of which Vita recognized, yet just as many were new. The large barkbear took up a surprising amount of space, yet Vita recognized it as a juvenile. There was an insect that shared many traits to that of a mantis, yet its size and the fact it clubs instead of scythes told a story of something brutal. How they managed to taxidermy a mantis, Vita had no clue. But that did not stop Vita from attempting to take a sample from its shell, in the case its DNA was still intact somewhere within it. To Vitas surprise, however, a thin shell magically protected these taxidermies. It, most likely, kept dust off it or protected it as a whole. Unfortunately, it wasn't made to stop something like Vita from getting through it.
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A bunch of Vitas stood there on the large, reflective surface of magic. They stood together, looking down and brainstorming how to break through without triggering any potential alarms — if any were present. Enter through the bottom and take a sample from there? Find a weakpoint and carefully peel it apart?
Or, as a couple of Vitas decided without asking anyone, shaping into a massive spike and piercing right through. Those Vitas would be sent to shit shoveling duty, but still given a pat on the metaphorical shoulder for opening the way. The surface of this mantis was, in general, rather durable and could in theory withstand multiple hits from someone like Heracles. However, once broken, it would be the guaranteed death of the mantis. It had no proper way to heal from its wounds if they were any larger than a small crack. For the clubs, however…
-Vita POV.-
HOLY SHIT, WE STRUCK GOLD!!!
Why are you being loud? Can you be more quiet, because we are trying to do something no sane being would want to. Studying.
I'm BEING LOUD BECAUSE WE STRUCK GOLD!
Firstly, gold has no value to us. We take what we want or subtly invade the bodies of those in the way. Second, if you found something worthwhile, just say you found something worthwhile.
Ok fine, killjoy. The material that makes up the club is not only arranged in a manner that makes it harder than anything we have, it vastly outperforms anything we found earlier in the Worlds Tongue.
Wait, elaborate. What do you mean by “vastly”?
You have no idea. If we had this during the play fight against that girly looking dude with red hair, we could've just covered ourselves in this material and been fine!
Ain't no way, that's way too good. There has to be some kind of downside to it, right? Like, it breaks after a few uses or that it can only be safely used once a day before it starts degrading?
No! That's the craziest part of it! It just takes a lot of energy and resources to make new ones, something the mantis would've done naturally when molting! Meaning that if we do somehow break the clubs, we can just make more!
Ok, ok, you have me and the rest of the Vitas here hooked and convinced. What's the cost?
A stupid amount of carbon.
… And where is the issue? We have an infinite amount of bones growing in that magical cancer cell.
We need a couple kilos worth of pure carbon to make a single club with the volume of a human hand. :)
Do that smile again, and I'm going to actually kill you to see if we feel any empathy for our own.