When they entered the Inn Ron quickly smiled at them and welcomed them into the Inn.
"Oh you found your friends, I'm glad! I was so happy when my father said that you could bring them."
Jason smiled and nodded, "Your father seems like a nice man, we'll make sure not to trouble him so much and we will pay him back one day."
Ron shook his head and returned to his desk, "Don't worry about it Jason, I'm just glad that we could help. I'll leave you now so that you can take both of them to rest."
They said their goodbyes and he took them into the room. The friends entered and began looking around with open mouths. Now that he thought about he was a little depressed by the size of the room but that was because of his life on earth. To Eric and these three, this place was like a whole house. They finally had four walls that provided them with protection.
"Alright before you do anything else we have to get you cleaned up."
After cleaning himself with a cloth he still felt dirty and well even if it wasn't as sanitary as he wished the public bath was probably the best way to keep clean.
He tossed them their towels and clothes, "These are for you, now follow me".
Jason had seen the bathhouse earlier so he didn't need to ask for directions. They walked to the large stone building and came in. There was a young woman who received them and charged them, 3 copper, for each.
They walked into the male side and he was surprised to find small pools that would fit about 5 people. He thought that there would be one large one where everyone would be. Jason couldn't help but feel uncomfortable seeing so many man's bodies, he was used to showering with the boys of the orphanage but that was different.
After quickly taking a shower they all changed into their new clothes and left the place in a hurry. The men in the bath kept whispering as they pointed at them so he was not the only one who felt uncomfortable.
They returned to the Inn and when they were inside the room he looked at them before speaking. "I started working as an adventurer so I'm going to have to go, the two of you take the day to rest but tomorrow you are going to go along with me and start working. I don't have enough money to register the both of you as adventurers but you need to earn your stay so you will help. In exchange, you will have a place to live and food to eat.
The two kids nodded and laid down their blankets and prepared to sleep on the floor. Jason didn't have anything that was worth much in the room so even if they decided to ditch him he wouldn't suffer. He doubted that would happen though, Eric's memories showed him that as long as people are taken care of the possibility that they would turn on you is low.
Thanks to the anime, mangas, and memories he felt like he could make the right decisions.
When he arrived at the Adventurers Guild he looked at the requests and couldn't help but feel annoyed. There were several requests but they involved heavy lifting which at the moment was not a good idea.
"Carrying stones in a job site...…. Help carry iron for blacksmith...…..Clean the public toilets...….Oh, this seems like a good one, collecting Sky Berries. It's repeatable, doesn't have a time limit and it pays a copper for each fruit. The only requirement is that you must collect 20 fruits to receive a reward. That means this is worth two silvers it's not bad."
He took it to the register and had it assigned to him, "Umm would you happen to have any information on the sky fruit that could help me?"
The young woman nodded and pointed at the stairs, "You can find helpful guides on the second floor."
Jason thanked her and went to the second floor where he asked for a book on vegetation. In the end, he bought three books one told him about herbs and all kinds of fruits, while the other ones spoke about animals and the continent he was in. It cost him 3 silvers and he thought it was a good deal, after all, Eric like himself was young so he didn't know much about the world.
Since he needed a place to hold the fruits that he was going to turn in he decided to buy 3 sacks for 9 copper.
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While he left the safety of the city he found the section on the sky fruit and found a place where he should look. After about an hour-long walk he started to find some Sky Trees which were given their name from their fruits. The Sky Fruits was blue with white areas looking like clouds in the sky. They were the size of a mango but they were oddly shaped like a cube. From below the large number of fruits made it look like the tree canopy was the open sky.
From what he could see and what he read in one of the books each tree had about 100 to 130 fruits so having enough to collect wasn't much of an issue. The problem was that the tree was pretty tall and he didn't have a good way to climb the goddamn tree.
He wanted to use his sword to see if he could climb that way but he didn't want to risk it. Suddenly as he was about to stand up and walk away he heard a monkey-like noise. He looked up and was barely able to dodge a fruit that was falling down. When he looked back up he found 8 four-armed monkeys jumping from joy. He was surprised by their blue and yellow coloring.
Two of the monkeys quickly grabbed four fruits and threw them down at him. Jason quickly used his hand to touch the fruit in midair and store it in his storage. When the monkeys saw the fruit disappear they began to jump wildly as if they were laughing.
Jason smiled but that smile was gone as soon as he saw that all the 8 monkeys had fruits on all four arms. They went down the line and began throwing it at him causing a rainfall of fruit. Jason wildly swung his hands, storing them inside his storage space, but some of the fruit still hit him and splashed all over his body, clothes, and armor. After an unknown amount of fruit throwing, the monkeys seemed to get bored and they stopped throwing fruits at him. He picked the fruits that fell to the ground for him and the other two to eat later.
He said his goodbyes to the very helpful monkeys and walked away.
When he entered the city again he was laughed at by the guards who seemed very friendly. As he was about to reach the guild he brought out the second sack of fruits and walked in.
"Oh, I see that you had quite the adventure haha."
He smiled and nodded "I sure did, those monkey sure know how to have fun."
"Oh, are you talking about the Sun Light Monkeys? The Sky fruits are one of their favorites and they are very protective of the fruits even though they are easy to find. Having to climb the tree and sometimes battle the monkeys is why the fruits are valued at a decent price. Now I count these 56 Sky Fruits in these two sacks. That would be 5 silvers and 6 coppers."
'Protective of their fruits? Battle the monkeys? But they were throwing them at me.'
The assistant then signed the paper and placed it over the card and scanned it on the crystal ball. The seal on the card shined in a blue light and she pulled it out and returned the card and gave him his money.
"Congratulations on completing your first request, is there anything else that I can help you with?"
Jason nodded and pointed at the paper she had just scanned, "Since this is a continuous request and well I'm not that suited for most of the ones there do you think that I might be able to keep this request from now on?"
The receptionist nodded and drew something on the request sheet and returned it to him. "Here just bring this along with you whenever you want to turn in the fruits, I'll just put another sheet up in case more people want to take it as well."
"But what happens if the people who asked for the fruits get too much of them?"
"Well usually that might be the case but the person who asked for the request is an owner that has a large number of dessert stores. Sky Fruit is one of the most popular fruits but it's somewhat of a hassle to get. If you kill or injure a sky monkey the blood will attract all the nearby monkeys and well they are stronger than they appear."
Jason nodded and thanked her, when he was out of the Guild he nearly wanted to yell out from happiness. "Those damn monkeys have given me a gift haha."
He went back to the public baths and got a new change of clothes from his storage. It was uncomfortable to go there but it wasn't as bad as going to sleep all gooey and blue.
"Hey, Jason welcome back."
"Thanks Ron, have my friends given you any trouble?"
The kid shook his head, "I haven't heard from them since they came into the room with you, they are probably sleeping."
Jason nodded, "Yeah it's a big relief to get out of the Slums and be in a place that has four walls. Anyway, I'm tired so I'm going to get some rest, could you tell your father that I would like a bucket of water in the morning? I have to clean my armor."
Ron nodded and as Jason was about to walk away he remembered something. He took out four Sky Fruits from one of the sacks and put it on the desk. "These are for you guys, I collected more than I needed for a request and well I don't want them to go bad. They might be slightly bruised but they are fresh."
The kid looked at the fruits and after getting thanked Jason went back to his room. It was still early in the day but his arms were sore. He wanted to keep it secret that he had a storage space so he had to carry one of the sacks for a good while which was pretty heavy. Not to mention that his sword and armor also had some weight.
He slowly opened the door and found the two delinquents snoring as they slept on the floor.
'These little, while I become a fruit punch these bastards are here sleeping. Then again I am the one that told them to rest. Damn it just wait till tomorrow.'
He kicked both of them awake, as they woke up the two of them looked around and seemed to realize that everything that happened to them was real and not a dream.
Jason brought out 4 fruits and the skewers that he had bought earlier that day. They were still warm so it meant that just like in most mangas his storage space stops time.
"Eat this, since it's been a while since we ate food like this we easily get full so this should be enough for today. I'll come back later."
'I can't believe I forgot to buy something for me to eat.'
He went to the place next door and ordered some beans, rice, and a small stake. The meal itself cost 6 copper which was good.
After he ate he practiced the sword movements he had learned in the past, it was a bit sloppy at first but it got better.
As the sun came down he decided that it was enough and he went to his room and laid in bed, which still didn't feel comfortable but he wasn't going to have those two bastards sleep in the bed while he slept on the floor.
- - - - -
[Jason West]
[Age:13]
[Subjects: 2]
[Daily Subject Points: 4]
[Total Subject Points: 0]
[System Upgrade: 10,000 SP]
(Gacha Roll)
(Loyalty)
(Equipped Equipment: N/A}
(Skills: N/A)
(Storage:)
-4 cursed gold
-11 silvers
-3 copper
-637 Sky Fruits
-Urumi Sword
-Iklwa Sword
-Leather Armor Set
- - - - -
"Wait? I'm getting 4 points now? Each one of these bozos was only giving me 1 SP. What happened now?"
After thinking about it for a little he decided to look at the Loyalty section.
[Tristian Makva, Age: 14, Loyalty: 26]
[Jack Riverfall, Age: 13, Loyalty: 29]
"Is it because their Loyalty went up? If that's true then I have to make sure to get that sucker at 100 percent but how exactly do I do that? Anyway, at least their loyalty is no longer at 0 so I can rest more comfortably. 100 to 130 fruits per tree my ass, look at how much those goddamn monkeys threw at me! Though a good portion of them was fruit that I missed and had to pick out of the ground I still got a ton of ones that didn't get damaged."
"Tomorrow I'll pretend to get up early in the morning and fill up the sacks so that those idiots can help me carry them.