With several issues still needing to be addressed, we decided to defer to the most experienced of our group and tackle Elane’s suggestion first. Namely: we needed to recover any valuables the thieves left behind.
According to her, killing a thief meant you had the right to take their possessions, no matter what they were. Doing this would not earn you the Thief tag, it wasn't stealing, but it wasn’t quite as simple as it sounded.
Anything a thief stole becomes their property, but only in a sense. The stolen object still technically belonged to its original owner as well, obviously. But it was the fact that the object also belonged to the thief that allowed them to exploit the rules.
This little loophole of sorts is what allows thieves to give, trade, sell or horde their stolen goods however they wish, instead of spreading the Thief tag like a plague by trying to hand their loot to someone else.
Conversely, the trade-off for earning the Thief tag affected the thief negatively in another way as well. Nothing they owned previously or would ever own again would be entirely theirs. Stealing from a thief wouldn't earn you the thief tag, either. But as they were so hated, nobody cared if you stole from another thief regardless. If caught doing so by a third party, it could almost be expected for them to look the other way.
However, should the thief die, ownership over a stolen item is more or less thrown into limbo. It’s reset, and the item belongs to nobody because its “current owner” no longer exists. So, it becomes as free for the taking as any pebble you’d find on the side of the road.
Most of the time, a thief-hunting quest sent to the Adventurer’s Guild demands a specific item’s return, and not returning it if you found it could land you in hot water. But that’s only because you accepted the quest as it was written. Otherwise, it was up to you if you want to return it.
It was because of this that the cat-kin’s essence crystals were at risk. As they were without an owner and effectively just a part of nature, anyone could walk up and take them. We had to act fast.
Not that this truly mattered. The only people in the forest were the cat-kin and us, but it was still best that we remove the potential danger. So, we teleported straight into the middle of the thieves’ camp to begin our search.
I witnessed Tillmann’s death with my own eyes, while the girls saw to the rest of the thieves, so when we arrived back in their campgrounds, it was eerily quiet. We’d waited long enough for Yua to be sure the Brawler Bear and the other surviving animals had left the area, so we were definitely not in danger anymore. Still, the air was thick with a tension that seemed to only affect me. But I dealt with it.
“This place is a mess,” Yua said, casting a somber look over the damage our fight caused.
“You think your father’s going to be mad? It is his forest, after all.”
“No. At least, he better not be.”
After lecturing me for most of our trek through the forest, and after several near-death experiences at the hands of her verbal tongue lashing, Yua finally made time to question why Tama hadn’t shown up. He’d promised her he’d be ready to fight and he clearly broke that promise. And unfortunately for him, there was no amount of “but we made it out okay” that could stay her anger.
I believe this was why she decided our return trip to the village was going to be our last stop before we left the area. As doting a father as he was, seeing Yua again no doubt would have overjoyed Tama, but making him happy was the furthest thing from her mind right now. Instead, she helped me search the thieves’ tent.
Unfortunately for the thieves’ old belongings, Yua tore through them as though they were made of paper. Watching her clench her teeth as she ripped crate lids off with her bare hands instead of using a crow bar made me desperate to change the subject as soon as I brought it up.
“Hey, uh, about the whole becoming a bandit thing Tillmann mentioned. What’s that all about?”
Yua’s ears flicked, but she didn’t answer. She was too busy pinching her nose shut after opening one of the crates of food. Apparently, they hadn’t been checking to see if their food rotted.
This left Elane to answer as she effortlessly flipped Tillmann’s bed over to check beneath it.
“It’s simple. You steal something, you become a Thief. But if you commit an act of unjustifiable murder after becoming a Thief, you then become a Bandit.”
“Okay, but isn’t that just another tag? Nobody would notice as long as their careful.”
“That’s true, but it’s also more serious than that,” she said, squatting to check the recently disturbed dirt. I quickly told her that Tillmann must have filled the hole I left when I snuck in and she let it be. “You become a Thief, and anyone can request the guild to capture you, or they can enslave and sell you. But Bandits can be killed on sight and nobody would bat an eye.”
“A life for a life, then?”
“Exactly. Anyone can take down a bandit if they want, but it’s usually left to the guild or any knights in the area.”
That explained why Tillmann was so merciful at first. If you could call that mercy. He was just saving his own ass by not pulling the trigger himself. And Silvano was going to run off somewhere where nobody would ever realize his misdeeds, so getting his hands dirty didn’t matter.
Nodding to myself, content in how I no longer needed to skirt around my lack of basic knowledge, I went to help Elane in her search so Yua could blow off some steam by ripping through the crates. Or rather, I’d spotted the large chest at the foot of where Tillmann’s bed had been.
Material Destruction removed the chest’s lock in its entirety. I’d missed my chance last night, but now we’d earned our end-of-dungeon loot!
Expecting to see loads of shiny, expensive things of inscrutable origins such as piles of gold, jewels, enchanted goods and more, I threw the lid open and…
“Wow, really…?”
“What?”
Leaning over my shoulder, Elane peered into the chest and shrugged.
Inside the chest was… nothing but metal-working tools. Tongs, chisels, wet stones and hammers galore. All of it was shockingly well-maintained considering how much use they saw, but still. The thing was packed, just not with anything fun.
“What’d you expect,” Elane asked with a flippant wave of her hand that made her chest bounce. “He was here to earn coin. Not hide it.”
“True…”
As disappointing as this was, I stored all the tools in my item box anyway. I may not need them, but the steel they were made of could be scrapped and reused for Material Destruction.
I closed the lid and Elane smirked at my obvious disappointment, but then an idea widened her eyes.
“Hold on. If I’m remembering right…”
Shoving her face inside the chest for a closer look, she poked around until she found whatever it was she was looking for. With a brief “there it is,” she tugged on a small string I’d missed and the bottom of the chest popped open.
“A false bottom?”
“Yup. Fool kept his passphrase the same, so I figured his hiding spot would be the same. And look at this.”
She pulled out a fist-sized leather bag out of the hidden compartment and tossed it to me. A familiar metallic clink sounded as I caught it.
“Old Rock-Muncher didn’t know it, but half our guys used to know where he kept his personal stash,” she said, digging in the chest for more. “Kind of hard to hide it when he has to make a bunch of noise pulling all those tools out first.”
“Hard to believe he’d make such a stupid mistake after all his successful scheming.”
“Eh. Dwarves are often slaves to tradition. Do something enough times and it basically becomes tradition. Like with their love for smithing and mining. They don’t crawl out of their mother’s pussy and head straight for the forge, but they do live their lives by being around them constantly. It naturally became a habit he didn’t want to give up. Keeping things the way he was used to having them is just who he was.”
“Right…”
I opened the bag and was greeted by the gentle twinkling of a handful of gold coins and essence crystals. Assuming the crystals to be the ones we saw him sneaking for himself, I let out a small sigh of relief.
Naturally, we’d already found the large stash of coin they had from their previous shipments, and as exciting as it was to see all that gold in one spot, I’d already decided it belonged to the cat-kin. So, with a tear in my eye, I stashed it out of sight before it could tempt me.
Likewise, we already checked the thieves themselves for valuables, but we hadn’t found any crystals on Tillmann. Or what was left of him, anyways. Trudging through the gruesome aftermath of the battle to collect loot was just part of an Adventurer’s job. But, even after forcing down the bile that tried to claw its way up my throat after seeing what the bear had done to him, all he had on him was a couple of broken potion bottles. That and the cylindrical object he’d used to inspect one of the gems back when we first spied on him.
Unfortunately, while the object, an Occult Lens, was a magic item similar to a magic candle, it was somewhat common. So, it wasn’t worth much compared to an enchanted item. And unfortunately for us, its ability was rather lackluster. All you could see when you poured a little mana into it and held it to your eye was an object’s info box.
Yea. It gave people the ability I already had, but in a much more limited fashion. It only worked on objects, not people. Aiming the thing at Elane did nothing more than zoom in on her ass after she stood and obscured the sight of her face. The Occult Lens was great for a merchant without the class or the Appraisal ability, but it useless to me.
I marked it as something to sell and tossed it into my item box. Deciding that what we found in leather bag was Tillmann’s personal stash, I opted to claim it for us.
Seeing this, Yua’s ears perked and she shoved a hand into her short’s pocket. She produced an essence crystal and tossed to me without much care.
“When did you… Ah.”
It was the crystal I pulled from the barrier stand. She must have pocketed it during the commotion and forgot. With a shrug, I tucked it away and looked the stand where it had fallen in the commotion.
It didn’t break when I ripped the crystal off of it, nor did it burn in the fire. It was covered in a fine layer of dust and ash, but its silvery gleam still managed to peak through in places.
I picked it up and, a quick cast of Appraisal later, I asked, “You think we should keep or sell this? It’s worth quite a bit, but…”
“Hmm… I’d say sell it,” Elane said. “It’s good for defending an area, but only if the person that casted it stays under it. Meaning you have to rely on others to fight off your attackers while you watch. That, or hope they just get bored and leave you alone. Also, sleeping under that thing is a nightmare if you don’t have a roof to block the light.”
“And it makes your teleportation magic useless,” Yua added. She was on her knees now, ass up in the air as she pawed through some bags. She pulled out what looked like a glass elephant with folded wings, eyed it with a curious flick to her tail, and continued. “Also, it’d trap Mana and me inside it.”
“True. You’d be better off teleporting everyone away than using it… Ah, there it is. I knew he’d have some!”
Finally leaving the chest, grinning, Elane held up a worn-out bottle. I quick glance at its info box said it was Edelgarde Ale. It was likely a dwarven brew and likely very potent.
I held out my hand to Elane and her grin vanished. Reluctantly, she handed it to me and, after a brief tug-of-war that I won, I stuffed it in my item box. Her shoulders slunk in a pout, but this is what we agreed on. Since she refused to give up drinking entirely, I’d hold all her booze in my item box. It was the one place we could keep it where she couldn’t reach, after all.
“I don’t think the crystals are here,” Yua said.
“They must have hidden the rest somewhere.”
Reluctant to have to search the hard way, I tossed the barrier stand into my item box and started putting anything and everything that could vaguely be useful in with it. We’d keep the things like sleeping bags and the still-edible food, but the rest would be canon fodder for Material Destruction and either disposed of or repurposed.
Soon enough, the tent and everything around the camp was gone. After a quick check to make sure the crystals didn’t get sucked into my item box on accident, I heard a pleased whistle.
Elane, leaning on her axe, smiled approvingly.
“That ability is really handy.”
“Yea. I can’t do much about the damage done to the forest, but we can at least make it look like it’s been fixed.”
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“I suppose so,” Elane said. She stretched her arms over her head and, while I was busy trying not to stare at her chest as it shifted under her coat, she smirked. She then immediately ruined the peaceful mood. “Before we finish searching, I think it’s about time we burn the bodies.”
“Burn them? Wait, don’t tell me, will they become undead if we don’t?”
The thought of a zombie Tillmann rising from the grave to take his revenge sent a chill tearing through my spine.
“Alright then. I won’t say it.~”
Elane, however, laughed and started towards the nearest thief’s body. Showing her assumed vast experience, she didn’t so much as bat an eye when she hefted the body by the collar and tossed it into the pile of corpses after saving us.
“It’s not as common as you’re thinking,” Yua said, taking my hand. “People only rise after death if they still had strong feelings of regret or hate. Even then, it’s really, really rare.”
“And explaining the different kinds of undead they could become and how would be too boring and time consuming,” Elane added, showing Tillmann’s corpse no more mercy than she had during their fight as she threw it into the pile.
Yua was right, this world is not peaceful. And I needed to adapt.
Squeezing the hand she tried to comfort me with, I left her side to help. She, however, followed without a word.
By the time we made it over to where we fended off the thieves’ ambush, I had to stop myself from casting the Body Wash spell every five seconds. I helped Yua carry the body of one of the men she’d beaten to a pulp, but it might as well have been made of lead. The sensation of holding a body, a person, that was supposed to be warm to the touch with life, only to find that it was cold and limp, was horrifyingly sickening.
This used to be a living, breathing person. A person full of thoughts and desires and now it wasn’t. Because he attacked, and because Yua defended herself, he was no more than a lump of carbon that needed to be disposed of.
As her husband, I felt responsible putting her in that position, but this was how things had to be. This was the result of our interference; it was only right. This was what I had to be prepared to do, for the sake of my girls, if not myself.
Steeling myself into accepting this conclusion, we were finishing up when I spotted something glittering in the grass. Remembering the exact shade of silver that colored its metal, I picked up the pieces of my sword.
The Parundum longsword was supposed to be exceedingly durable. If treated properly, I’d rarely ever have to sharpen it. And yet, the dwarf had shattered it with barely any effort. Had I not hesitated to use lethal force to end the fight sooner, he wouldn’t have snuck up on me and broke it.
“…”
Elane asked to keep Tillmann’s hammer as a memento of a lost friend, but the rest of the thieves’ weapons were fit only for scrapping. And, after seeing what was left of my sword, it should have been in the same boat, but I still needed it.
Gathering all the pieces into my item box, I used Material Creation to instantly reforge it. I was no blacksmith, so I couldn’t tell if it’d hold up in a fight, but it at least looked exactly as I remembered.
I returned the blade to its sheath and tied it to my belt.
“Next time,” I said, giving it a pat.
“Hmm?”
“Nothing.”
After digging a trench around the bodies so the fire wouldn’t spread, I shot several Fire Balls into the pile to set it alight. Opting not to comment on the smell of burning flesh that immediately covered the forest for the sake of Yua’s scrunched-up, sensitive nose, we retreated to the cave that caused all this to begin with.
“Mana?” Yua called as the three of us stepped into the cave.
For all the dangers the thieves said this place held, I had to say that it looked to have been mined and secured by professional contractors, not a bunch of thieves. If there had ever been cave-ins in the past, you’d never know it.
Our little cat girl had dashed away at full speed the moment she claimed she heard the spriggans moving about inside. To make up for all the trouble I’d caused her, I let her reunite with her woodland buddies while we handled the cleanup. But we were going to need her help before we could go.
“Mana,” Yua called again after receiving no response. “Come help us find the crystals!”
“Crystals?” echoed a cute voice. From deep within the cave’s depths.
Soon after, a pair of footsteps sped along through the cave until Mana emerged from the darkness. As a cat-kin, she could see somewhat well in the dark, but I was surprised she didn’t at least ask for a torch. Adding to the surprise was the two that quietly trailed behind her.
Knowing that the spriggans were capable of controlling the forest animals made me clench up a little at seeing them, but I was distracted by their how calm they were after what happened. Even more so, the masculine one was carrying a large box in its arms.
“We already found them! Look!” Mana said, pointing excitedly at the box.
As if the small cat girl had ordered it to, the spriggan bent forward for us to look inside the box. What was inside it was about three times the number of crystals Erhard had smuggled from the thieves. And mixed in with them were a few amethysts.
“See?”
Puffing up her small chest with pride, Mana congratulated herself for completing the task we all set out on.
“Tillmann must have hidden them in the cave to keep them away from us.”
Not the best hiding place, since it’d be the next place we’d look after clearing the tent, but he was limited on options inside the barrier.
“Wow,” Elane said, leaning over the box. “Never seen so many of these in one place before.”
At this, as if offended by her abundant cleavage, the masculine spriggan tilted its head and pushed the box into Elane’s chest just hard enough to knock her back a step. It passed the box to her and pointed towards the mouth of the cave.
When she raised a brow in confusion, Mana interpreted for her.
“It says humans aren’t allowed in their cave anymore.”
“What? How did you… But I had nothing to do with the thieves! And Husband is also a…”
“Big Bro is my mate, so it’s okay.”
Baffled at the unfair treatment, Elane gawked. Undaunted by this, the spriggan’s whip-like arm slowly pushed against her shoulder until she gave in and turned. Then it pushed against the center of her back.
“Fine, fine. Geez,” Elane huffed, but started walking. “When you’re done, I get to hug Kitty all I want!”
At the spriggan’s gentle, if not forceful, insistence, Elane left the cave with only a couple of complaints. But at least they didn’t seem to want to fight over the crystals.
“You know,” I said, turning to the spriggans. “If it wasn’t for her, you wouldn’t have your cave back.”
The spriggans nodded in unison, but were otherwise visibly unmoved. I suppose the actions of the thieves were the cause of the entire forest’s ecosystem being thrown out of whack, but it’s not like she had anything to do with that.
Once she was gone, however, the masculine spriggan gave a half-nod to the other. The feminine one nodded back and softly coiled a vine around Mana’s right wrist. Then it reached out and did the same to my left. It tugged us both gently and I followed along as it slowly brought us together.
With a flick to her ear, Mana grinned up at me and when we were close enough, she let the spriggan guide our hands together. Her slender fingers easily laced between mine. I’d told them we were mates back when we first met. This must just be their way of acknowledging that.
But then, with our wrists still bound, the bark of both spriggan’s chests parted and began to emit a green glow. The memory of the terrifying end the thieves that tried to fight them had faced got the better of me and I braced myself. Had it not been holding us so gently, I would have expected a swarm of insects to fly out and drain us both dry. Instead, thankfully, only two flew out.
A pair of fireflies wafted out, their glowing abdomens lighting the cave like a pair of beautifully dancing torches. They landed on our foreheads, one to each of us. It was hard not to give in and brush away the ticklish feeling of their tiny legs clinging to me, but when I caught sight of Mana happily blushing, all other thoughts faded.
The spriggans lowered their heads and the lights in their chests began to glow ever brighter. They fell silent. Well, even more silent, like they’d fallen into deep prayer.
“What are they doing?”
“They’re giving us their blessing as mates.”
The question of why someone other than her parents felt the need to do such a thing popped into my head, but I pushed the thought away. I squeezed Mana’s hand just a little tighter and she leaned into my arm, her tail swaying.
[New Title Acquired: Friend of the Spriggans.]
The title held no extra description, nor did it come with any effect, but all the same, when the fireflies flew back to the spriggan and it let go of us, Mana jumped into my arms. Throwing her arms around my neck, she pressed her lips against mine.
After everything that happened today, I let myself enjoy her kiss until it reached its natural conclusion. Not just because she parted her lips from mine with a happy, blushing smile, but because she wrapped her legs around my back.
Looks like I was going to have to carry my bride out of here.
“Thank you,” I said with a small laugh as I slipped my hands beneath Mana’s thighs to hold her better. “But, do you think you could bless Yua and me as well? And Elane? The, uh, human you sent outside.”
Naturally, Elane was new to them, but I had told them about Yua. Their lack of a properly emotive face made it hard to tell if they understood what I was asking. The spriggans’ reactions were as limited as always. So, while they silently looked to Yua, it was up to her to respond.
“It’s okay. I didn’t spend time with them the way Mana did. Let this be for her.”
“If you’re sure…”
The dents making up the spriggan’s eyes seemed to soften in unison. The masculine one reached a vine out to Yua, patting her lightly on the head. She gracefully accepted their thanks with a happy flick of her tail, but it looks like Elane wasn’t going to receive the same treatment.
We were then quietly ushered out of the cave. I could practically hear the spriggans saying “now get out of here you crazy kids” as the vines they pressed against our backs guided us to the exit.
Once we all left, the feminine spriggan waved a twig-like hand and the greenery surrounding the cave’s mouth grew and expanded until it was completely hidden.
And, holding true to her word, Elane snatched Mana out of my hands the moment I let my guard down. Smashing the girl’s face into her breast, Elane kicked the box of crystals over to me.
“Trade.”
“Hey! Stop trying to kill me with your boobies! Put me down!”
Shaking my head as I quietly enjoyed the sight of those two getting along, and of Elane joyously rubbing her cheek against the top of Mana’s head, I stashed the crystals in my item box.
The spriggans, though, looked understandably confused.
After checking on the fire, I confirmed that it had done its job. Fire magic must burn hotter than a normal fire, because the thieves had already been reduced to a pile of ash. I quietly reshaped the soil with Material Creation and buried them beneath it.
Ready to be done with this place, I moved onto the last task we needed to settle in the forest.
Taking their apparent mastery over mother nature itself as a sign, I took the guild quest slip out of my item and presented it to the spriggans.
“Before we got caught up in all this, we were searching for these flowers. Do you know where we can find them? We’d like to collect as many as possible.”
The pair bent over to examine the paper and were still for a while. Before I could question if their eyeless faces could even see the details of the drawing, the feminine one wrapped a vine around my wrist and started pulling me towards the trees.
“Oh, um. Thank you. Elane, let’s go.”
“So cute. So cute. So cute!”
Her exasperation coming in the form of a long sigh, Yua dashed over to the blonde and helped pry Mana out of her arms. Elane put up a fight, but gave in rather easily after seeing me dragged away.
Having my second wife hand delivered to me by my first was fun and all, but Mana jumped onto my back and nearly choked me when she tied her arms around my neck. Elane rushed after us and immediately set upon trying to convince Mana to ride on her back instead.
We followed the spriggans through the forest until we stopped in what looked like a random part of the forest. I wasn’t sure if I was expecting a full-on meadow filled with flowers, but that certainly wasn’t what we were shown.
A small cluster of trees stood apart from the rest, not in distance, but in how their bark was just as green as their leaves. Not knowing much about trees myself, I might have assumed they just weren’t fully grown yet, but they were just as wide and just as tall as any of the others. They could have blended in with the rest of the forest, were it not for the deep purple Connifery flowers that hung like bells blooming across their roots.
Oh, and the fact that the trees started moving as soon as they came into view was also a dead giveaway.
Rooted firmly to the ground as trees should be, they still managed to bend and twist their girthy trunks to face us as we approached. Three jagged holes were cut deep into each of them in patterns reminiscent of faces, but they held no emotion in them.
The sound of wood creaking, like lumber being bent to its limit just before snapping, erupted from their mouths in controlled bursts aimed at the spriggans. The spriggans, from what I could tell, took this in stride and waited patiently for them to finish. I had to read their info boxes before I let myself speak.
“… Bleakwood Treants. Yua… you didn’t mention treants being in this forest.”
“Because I didn’t know. This is the part of the forest we’re really not supposed to be in.”
“And it’s easy to see why,” Elane added. “Treants are just about everywhere, but these ones are extra nasty.”
She paused. Since we stopped, she’d been trying to pull Mana off my back, but my newly blessed wife was stubbornly refusing to let go. The best she could do was pull Mana hard enough to stretch my shirt where she gripped it. Finally, Elane gave up and crossed her arms in a pout before continuing.
“Hmph. These things are the primary reason why I suggested you buy Cure Poison potions. See those things on their branches?” she pointed up high, specifically, at the dark orange bulbs that could easily be mistaken as fruit. “If they manage to hit you, those bulbs release a cloud of poison dust that’ll likely kill you. Assuming the hit didn’t kill you first. But treants are easy to spot if you’re paying attention. Although, you’d be in trouble if it was too dark to tell.”
“And they’re all above level 20. Must have been plenty of people that weren’t paying attention. Sorry, Yua.”
She shook her head. “That’s probably why only our best fighters allowed to come out here.”
As we spoke, the spriggans seemed to be working through a conversation with the treants, as, while the only ones making any noise were the treants, the spriggans occasionally pointed to the Connifery flowers.
The treants, however, didn’t look too pleased. I think. Hard to say with their faces barely moving, but at least neither looked ready to let the conversation turn violent. It really pays to be friends with nature.
“Mana, do you know what they’re saying?”
“Hmm? No. Why would I?”
“What do you mean, why? Like twenty minutes ago, you were talking like you understood what the spriggans were saying.”
“Hehe. Don’t be silly,” she giggled, poking my cheek. “Spriggans don’t talk. I just play with them a lot, so I kind of understand them... Kind of.”
“… Then how do you know they blessed us?”
She grinned as she nuzzled her cheek against mine and, with full confidence, said, “What else would it be?”
“…”
I took a breath, thought over the myriad of options left to me and nodded to myself. Wrapping a hand around Mana’s slender thigh, I pulled her around to my front. Holding her up by her bottom, I hugged her tight, kissed her little sakura lips and enjoyed the sight of her happily swishing tail while the spriggans negotiated on our behalf.
Then I tossed her to the wolves. To Elane.
“Kitty!”
“Wha! Hey, Big Bro! Betrayer!”
I watched Mana clench her teeth, cheeks blooming with a pink hue, as she was once again pulled into Elane’s breasts. She fought and squirmed and pushed against them with all her might, but it was as if those glorious mounds had a gravitational pull greater than that of a black hole. And it was a force that affected only her. The small cat girl was force to succumb to their abundant softness.
“Nooo…!”
I steeled my heart against my own jealousy as Yua sighed.
As we fooled around, the spriggans seemed to have concluded negotiations. The feminine one stooped and began plucking the flowers from the treants. I took a step, intending only to help, but the masculine spriggan put up a vine to stop me before kneeling to help the other.
Forced to stand by without any sort of proper explanation, and as the treants stared at us, the spriggans quickly finished collecting all the flowers they could from the first one. The feminine spriggan scooped the pile up with her vines and handed them to me to store in my item box. As she did this, the masculine one laid a twig-like hand on the treant. Seconds later, little green buds began to sprout where the flowers had once been.
Assuming the compromise they’d come to likely boiled down to something like only the spriggans being allowed to pick the flowers, but only on the condition that they then aided in their speedy regrowth, I waited patiently for them to finish.
In the end, we were only allowed to collect from seven of the treants, which totaled 32 Connifery flowers. I didn’t know the recipe for Cure Poison potions yet, but since health potions brewed in batches, I figured this was plenty.
With this, our first guild quest was finally complete.
The fact that it was supposed to be a simple, low-level quest for beginner Adventurers nearly brought a tear to my eye, but I stayed strong. We still had to actually turn in the quest and I still had to brew my half of the potions to complete Madame Turquesse’s side mission. Only then were we allowed to rest.
I sighed and my feet suddenly started to ache.
“Are we heading back to Amoranth now,” Yua asked, trailing beside me.
“Amoranth… No. Not yet. We still have a few things to take care of in Guerraway before we leave.”
Remembering the man we left waiting, I turned to Elane, only to find her carrying Mana princess style. Elane proudly wore a dopey smile, but Mana looked exhausted as her head became a kickstand for the blonde’s right breast. I looked to the axe jostling about on Elane’s back.
“Elane, you mind helping out with something?”
“Hmm?”