Of the many celebrities and famous people that made up the elite of the kingdom, two in particular made their success through the form of music. The Love Bards, as they called themselves, was a group consisting of three bards, all playing different instruments, who went around the kingdom doing shows and performing. The other one, Death Paladins, were also incredibly popular in the music scene because none of the members were actual bards, but instead, people with different jobs who just wanted to play music. Many would argue for hours on end which of these two bands was the best. These arguments could sometimes get people really stirred up, especially if alcohol was involved. However, it was very rare for them to escalate into full-on brawls. Unfortunately, for Aurus’ patience, the adventurers at the tavern got into one of these arguments, and it did escalate, a lot.
As soon as Nia had left his office, only to be interrupted once more by a crashing noise. Unlike the crash he had heard earlier that day, this was a sound he was very familiar with, a chair being thrown on the ground. Aurus knew it could only mean on thing, the adventurers were fighting again. The reasons were always stupid, and he was always the one to clean up their mess. Sometimes he really hated his job, but sadly he was the only one who was capable of doing it. He opened a drawer in his desk and pulled out the glove he had put in just moments before.
This should do the trick.
He put the glove on and left his office. Nia was not on her desk anymore. She was probably downstairs, trying to figure out what caused the fight. It didn’t matter to Aurus why the fight started, only that it had to end. He made his way downstairs and found the entire tavern fighting each other. It wasn’t just warriors or rogues fighting, it seemed even the mages got into it as well, casting buffs and healing when needed. The bards were swinging their musical instruments around like weapons, hitting anyone that dared to disagree about who the best band was.
He spotted Nia a few meters away from the whole thing, next to Karla who was cheering. In fact, most of the workers of the Info Desk and the kitchen staff were cheering on the fighting, some were even placing bets on which side would win. From where he stood, Aurus could not see any sides to this, not that it mattered much since he still didn’t care for the reason behind the fight. He got as close as he could. His serious look did not break even as a chair flew by him and crashed on the floor. He lifted the glove towards his face and placed the base of his thumb near his mouth.
“Thu’en.” He whispered.
The glove didn’t seem to do anything, that is, until he lifted his hand and snapped his fingers. The sound of the snap reverberated like thunder across the tavern, silencing everyone in a few seconds. A few chairs dropped to the ground as the adventurers realized that before them was the guild master. Two of the more experienced adventurers approached Aurus.
“Gherson! Good thing you’re here. Tell this idiot that The Love Bards is the best band in the kingdom.”
“You must be crazy if you think Gherson likes such a stupid band. Death Paladins is obviously better.” The other adventurer replied.
“How stupid do you have to be to…”
“Shut up!” Aurus silenced them both. “I have an announcement for everyone.”
They made their way back and sat down on half broken chairs. Getting them all replaced was going to be painful for the budget, but Aurus decided it was better to think of that later.
“We have a high priority quest currently being processed and it will soon hit the Info Desk.” Most of the tavern lit up. High priority meant a high reward, and a lot of recognition. “This one will be a bit different from the usual high priority quests.” The tavern quieted a bit at those words.
“Most of them are open for everyone to participate, but this time it will be limited to gold level adventurers or above.” A visible groan could be seen in the tavern as silver and bronze adventurers became bitter. “We are putting in this limit because of the nature of the mission.”
“But what if someone in our group is gold level but the rest is silver.” A mage interrupted.
“Then technically he can accept this quest and the rest can tag along, but this will not be easy. So if you think you can rely on the skills of the single member of your party that is gold rank or above, then you are wrong. The objective is simple enough: gather tea leaves.” The tavern grew loud again with the sounds of adventurer’s sighing in relief and talking amongst themselves.
“Listen up!” Aurus quieted them once again. “A few problems will make this hard. The first is the time limit. We have two weeks to finish this quest. The second problem is where you will be gathering them: Grove Valley.” The tavern was silent but didn’t seem to react too much to the news.
“If any of you have been paying attention to the News Board, you would know that there is a goblin camp currently camped out in Grove Valley.” All of the adventurers stirred. “Judging from your reaction you didn’t know this. Well, now you do. Please read the News Board, you might keep yourselves from getting killed, which is why I’m saying this quest won’t be easy. You’ll need to go in and get out quickly, without being seen.”
“Goblins are not that hard to kill. Why do we need to worry about sneaking around? Do ya think we aren’t strong enough to take on a few goblins?” A dwarven warrior with a proud look on his face spouted. Most people there agreed with him.
“That’s not the point. I’m sure you are all perfectly capable of handling a few goblins.” Barely capable if I’m being honest. “The point is we all know how persistent they can be. You alert one of them and you risk bringing the entire camp to the city, and we have spent enough money on the town reconstruction. It also might not make you the most popular adventurer if you are the reason that civilian’s lives are put in danger. I’m sure all of you can defend the town fairly well.” Not really. “But someone who has to hide in their house all day while the city is being invaded might not see it the same way.”
He managed to convince quite a few of them with that. All he had to do was target one of the things they most valued, popularity. Aurus learned very quickly that appealing to the adventurer’s sense of purpose or some sort of noble honor didn’t work quite as well as saying that it wouldn’t make them popular. Despite that, he saw that some of them still seemed intent on rushing the camp. He knew exactly how to deal with that.
“And if you, for some reason, still believe that you can rush in the camp and not agro all of the goblins there consider this. For every goblin you manage to bring back to town, there will be a reduction in your reward money.” Aurus said dealing the final blow to the second thing adventurers valued the most, money. The tavern grew silent.
“Any questions?” He said, once the silence had settled.
“What do the leaves look like?” A rogue asked from behind a knocked over table.
“They are yellow with a shade of green at the sides. They are not common at all so distinguishing them from the other plants should be easy.”
“How much should we gather?” A young man asked.
“Enough to make tea.”
“What if someone is already heading there?” A woman with cleric robes questioned.
“Then they… What?” Aurus paused.
“Yeah, I heard Dorus’ party was heading in that direction.” Someone from across the room noted.
“But wasn’t the quest they took closer to Gavel Forest?” An elven archer added.
“Yeah, but I heard they were going to take a shortcut through Grove Valley to get there.”
“But it’s so much quicker through Gavel Pass; it leads directly to the forest.”
“Not during spring season. Gavel Pass is a nightmare to cross through the spring season.” They began arguing about the logistics of reaching the forest, while Aurus processed what the cleric had said.
“How long ago was this?” Aurus pointed towards the cleric.
“A few hours ago at most.” She replied.
That idiot is going to provoke the entire camp! Aurus’s eyes widened, he furrowed his eyebrows, as his expression grew even more serious.
“Critical priority quest!” Aurus screamed at the arguing adventurers, they all fell silent. “Whoever can stop Dorus’ party from reaching Grove Valley gets one thousand gold!” He pointed towards the door.
As if they had just been fired out of a gun, all of the adventurers left the tavern, not even bothering to fix any of the mess they had made just moments prior. Aurus could not have cared less; in fact, his mind was racing to figure out how long they had to set up defenses just in case the quest failed.
“Should I warn the people?” Nia asked from behind him, her eyes just as wide as his.
“Yes. I’ll go warn the town guard and the garrison. All of you should know what to do.” He shouted to the rest of the staff, who promptly began to clean up and prepare for the worst.
He stepped outside and looked up. If all went well, they should be back with good news just before sunset. If his luck that day was any indication, the goblins would probably arrive around that time as well. He immediately stepped on some broken glass from his office that hadn’t been cleaned yet. The goblins were most definitely going to arrive at that time. Things couldn’t exactly get much worse than this. He held back a sigh and headed towards the garrison.
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The sun was beginning to set, marking the end of one of the worst days in Aurus Gherson’s life. The amount of things he had to fix and take care of during this day was equivalent to about a week of regular work. He wondered if he had been cursed when he woke up this morning. He had spent the last few hours talking with the commander of the town garrison and organizing the city for defense. It didn’t help that none of them believed him until the adventurers returned with the news that the goblin camp had been alerted. His mind wandered as he stood, arms crossed, watching over the empty street from the inside of the tavern. The windows were partially barricaded. Giving him enough space to see part of street from the inside, but not enough space for anyone to jump through them should they try.
The critical priority quest had failed like he expected. By the time the adventurers had reached Grove Valley the whole camp was already after Dorus and his party members. Despite risking their lives constantly for gold or recognition, the sight of about 1000 goblins rushing towards them was discouraging. They ran as quickly as they could back to the city, with the goblin army in pursuit. Thankfully for them, goblins aren’t the fastest runners so by the time the army had reached Anderess the defenses were already set. It was also quick work alerting the citizens, thanks to the town guard, who made their way through the streets warning everyone of an impending attack.
Now the streets were empty. All of the guards had positioned themselves along the city wall; the adventurers remained outside ready to fight with the support of the city’s defenses. The people in the city were hiding inside bars and taverns around town; even if their homes were comfortable places to hide in, it was easier to manage a lot people if everyone knew where they were. The guild tavern in particular had quite a few people hiding inside of it. The tables and chairs were arranged to provide cover just in case the invaders made their way inside, and the people sat comfortably near the back. Aurus knew this was a bit of overkill; it was already quite unlikely that they would even breach the wall surrounding the city, but one could never be too careful. Even from inside the building he could hear the occasional explosion outside the walls. Probably another volley of cannon fire or a magic spell.
Aurus had armed himself with a sword, hanging on the left of his hip, and the Gale Glove, still on his left hand. He had put on a dark blue long coat, the symbol of all official guild masters. He did not like it, mainly because it was very itchy around the neck area, but wore it anyways since he had to be easily identifiable by the town guard. That was the standard procedure for any attack on the city, but he still felt the coats could be more comfortable.
The guild workers sat together with the townspeople and talked amongst themselves as if it was just another regular day. Even a few merchants were nearby and decided this was the best place to hide. A familiar face approached Aurus; it was the same merchant he had to drive away earlier that day.
“Hey Gherson. That is a nice coat. Would you be willing to sell it?”
“I would if I could.” He scratched his neck. “It’s an official coat. Can’t sell it.”
“What about that fine lookin’ glove? I’m sure we could agree on…”
“Not for sale Carim.” Aurus interrupted the man.
“Alright. Alright. I get it.” He stood beside Aurus. “What’s the sword for? Are you gonna fight with it?” He asked in slight disbelief.
“No, I’m going to stab myself with it.” Aurus replied, keeping his gaze focused on the outside.
“Well. Then can I keep your coat and that pretty glove when you do?”
“No.”
“Aw c’mon! You’re not gonna need it where you’re goin.”
Aurus stared at Carim before replying. “Don’t you have someone else you could be annoying right now?”
“No one there has anything good to sell, plus they don’t want to buy anything!” He pointed towards the group of people near the back of the tavern.
“You’re trying to sell them things… inside the guild?”
“Ah! Well… you see…”
“Go back there and stop bothering people before I throw you out of here.” Aurus said calmly.
“I gotcha.” Carim replied confidently before going back to the group.
Aurus was sure that he wouldn’t stop trying to sell his garbage wares, but at least he was leaving him alone. Nia was next in line to come talk to him.
“So? How are things looking?” She asked curiously, looking outside.
“Seems fine. I can still hear the occasional blast, but nothing out of the ordinary.”
“That’s good.” She said cheerily. “I got rid of the warning for Grove Valley on the News Boards. I don’t think we need it anymore.”
“Good job.” Aurus said while keeping his gaze outside.
“Can… Can you…” She hesitated a bit. “Can you fight? I mean… can you fight well?”
“Well enough to defend the people if that’s what you’re worried about.”
“Oh ok. It’s because I always see you with that sword whenever there’s an attack but I’ve never seen you fight.”
“I was an adventurer before I became guild master, so I know a thing or two.” He glanced at her.
“Yeah, but even when the walls were breached in previous attacks you still didn’t fight.” She pointed out.
“It’s because I didn’t have to. During most of those invasions there were at least a few adventurers and soldiers inside the city.”
“I guess you’re right…”
It was true that this situation was a bit different that previous attacks. For once, all of the adventurers were outside the city. There were a few town guards inside but they were stationed near the Town Hall to protect the mayor and in front of some of the larger bars. There was no one visible in the streets, a sight that made Nia a bit uncomfortable. This wasn’t a usual attack from a rival kingdom or a mercenary army, it was goblins. In most cases, goblins are preferable to the other two, but this attack came out of nowhere, and the town had barely any time to prepare. If they had known beforehand about this they could’ve easily requested reinforcements from a nearby city or even the capital. The highest ranked adventurers were off on long-term quests, so their help couldn’t be summoned on time. They were fighting with what they had in hand, this made Aurus more worried than usual.
“Maybe I should get a short sword. Just in case I need to fight.”
“Can you fight?”
“I know a thing or two.” She smiled.
“Then get a short sword. I’m pretty sure we have a few spares at the shop.”
“Maybe later. I want to practice a bit more before I start swinging it at actual… you know… living things.” She scratched her forearm as she said this.
“Mmmhhmmm.” Aurus replied. He listened to another explosion and his attention redoubled.
That last one sounded closer than the rest. Another explosion fired further away, calming Aurus down.
Adventurers, for the most part, were complete idiots, but they were good at fighting. Even Aurus recognized how much damage a group of adventurers on a quest could cause. He had seen firsthand how they jumped into most situations thinking about the loot first and then worrying about surviving. Sometimes they had what he called moments of clarity, where they would recognize how insane the situation was, and think about survival first. The events happening outside of town was evidence of that. He half expected them all to fight the goblins in Grove Valley. Instead they opted for the smart choice of leading them to the city, where it’s defenses could give them the edge. Even if the risk of the goblins making it into the city was high, it was still better than letting several dozen adventurers perish.
“Seems like things are getting pretty heated.” Nia commented.
“Looks like it. At least it’s on the outside, not that it should’ve started in the first place.” Aurus spoke a bit resentfully.
“At least we won’t have a goblin problem in Grove Valley anymore.”
“True.” He conceded. “How are the people?” Aurus looked back at the gathered townsfolk.
“They’re fine. Nothing to worry about.” Nia replied confidently.
Aurus could see that the townsfolk were getting restless. A combination of being forced to stay in the tavern and surrounded by people they didn’t like was probably the cause. The mood had definitely soured since they had first arrived, and some people certainly did not help. Carim, the old vendor, was still trying to make a profit by selling stuff to an annoyed looking woman. Meanwhile some children had decided to play a game Aurus could only describe as screaming incoherently for as long as they could. None of his workers attempted to calm them at all and seemed to be enjoying sitting on the bar and gossiping. He spotted somewhere among the small crowd a man sleeping on the floor. How he wished he could do that.
“Nothing to worry about.” Aurus replied sarcastically.
“It could be a lot worse. It could be like the crowd this morning.” Nia shuddered as she remembered the image of a bunch of people ripping the clothes off a dead body.
“I’m sure the crowd this morning was a lot calmer than these guys before they started fighting.”
“Yeah… They almost seemed respectful of the kid.”
Before Aurus could say anything, there was a knock on the door. Because of the noise, only Aurus and Nia heard it. Glancing outside, they could see that it was an official messenger, probably bringing some news about the fighting.
“I’ll go outside to see what it is. Try to get at least one of those idle idiots to calm these people down before we have a third fight in our hands.”
“Yes sir!” Nia replied. She wasn’t going to fail again.
Aurus walked outside to greet the messenger. His attire was mostly green and blue, the same blue of Aurus’ coat, with the kingdom’s seal sewed on the shoulder. This was the official government Post Office attire, which allowed people to recognize him as someone who delivers messages, letters, and packages. Despite all of the magical advancements society had made up until this point, communication magic was still very rare. The Post Office, in addition to handling everyone’s mail, was in charge of distributing any important information across the city as quickly as possible. To maximize efficiency they provided most of their postmen with stamina potions, but the fight outside demanded that most of them be used for the soldiers defending the city. The young man looked tired and out of breath.
“I…. have…. news…. for….” He spoke in between breaths.
“Just breathe for a minute.”
“Thanks….” The man barely whispered.
The messenger’s face was bright red and his breathing was heavy. Aurus could see the sweat pouring from his face to the floor as the man was bent over with his hands on his knees.
Did he really run that far or is he just too used to stamina potions? Probably stamina potions. These guys barely do their jobs without them. Aurus thought while looking at the sad state of the man.
The man stood for a few more moments panting as if he had run an entire marathon in a few minutes. Aurus winced as he heard a chair hit the floor inside the tavern.
Nothing to worry about, riiiight.
“Whew… Got some news for Aurus Gherson.” He got up breathing a lot better but with his face still red.
“That’s me.”
“Yeah, I know. Just needed to confirm it.”
“I’m wearing the official outfit.” Aurus pointed to his itchy coat.
“True, but someone might have stolen it.”
“You’re saying someone would go through the trouble of stealing the coat and impersonate me perfectly; just to hear the news about a fight I have nothing to do with.” Aurus said with a straight face.
“I don’t know maybe…”
“Tell me what it is Elwin.” He interrupted.
“Ok! Sorry Gherson! They are almost done dispatching the goblins, so it should only be a few minutes before they give us the all clear signal. Also, the mayor is calling a major assembly for everyone once the fighting is over.”
“Thank you.” Aurus turned to go back inside as the man ran off to his next destination.
The tavern was quieter than when he had left. Nia stood near the entrance smiling proudly.
“You took care of it.”
“That I did. With a little bit of help of course.”
“I assume the chair hitting the floor was part of the help.”
“That was Karla’s definition of being ‘nice’ with the people, but I reminded her that whatever she destroyed, she would have to pay with her own salary.”
“Good job.” Aurus said, slightly impressed.
“So what are the news?”
“The fighting is almost over.”
“Great!” Nia breathed a sigh of relief at the knowledge it was almost over.
“And the mayor has called in an assembly once we get the all clear.”
“Great…” Nia’s sigh of relief turned into hesitance. “I hope he doesn’t talk about breezes again.”
“Me too.” Aurus tried hard not to remember that speech, to no avail.