Chapter 12: The Night Before the Journey to the Capital.

3 months have passed since the day I registered myself as an adventurer. Me and Paul both got promoted to D rank. Well, with the number of "gathering herbs", "house cleaning", and "delivery" quests… We finished. It's hard to not get promoted.

And we just accepted an escort mission this morning: protecting a caravan of merchants from here to the capital. It's a convenient way to earn some money while making our way to the capital.

I will just have to convince mom and dad to agree.

“Mom, dad, I’m going to the capital.” I said in the middle of dinner.

And both of them stop eating. Ok, mom is about to say something.

“And why would you want to go to the capital?” mom asks.

“Because I hear that the dungeon near the capital is full of treasures and rewards.” I say with a glint of greed in my eyes.

“No!! Many people die in a dungeon because of its traps and their greed. There’s no way I’ll let my little girl go there.” shouts my dad. Looks like he is out of his shock.

“You are not going to the capital and you are definitely not going to that dungeon ” he says again but with a serious tone.

“But why?” I ask him.

“What your father is trying to say is that there is a lot of dangerous things inside a dungeon and we lost so many friends in there that…”

There's a little pause and then she continues.

“ …is just that we don’t want to lose you too, for some useless treasures.” she looks a little sad when she says that. Ok, change of plan.

“Eh, I was just joking.” I said, waving my hands around in panic.

“There’s a merchant wanting me, Paul and a few other D rank adventures to escort him, plus his caravan, to the capital and since we already agreed to the quest, we can’t back out or we will suffer the penalty.” I say.

I show them the quest paper. I have a really bad habit of carrying around all the quest papers I accepted. I don’t know if it’s from my past life or from my current life. But I am glad that I have it on me now.

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After a minute of reading the paper, dad breathes out, relieved that his daughter isn’t doing something dangerous, but mom is looking at me, hard, with the word suspicious written all over her face.

Scary! It’s those looks again. I can feel a cold sweat going slowly down my back. Please stop looking at me with those eyes; it’s scary!

“Eh…Paul is coming with me too… so you don’t have to worry about anything.” I try to say something to make her stop.   

And it worked! But dad is angry now.

“I don’t trust that boy. You should stay away from him Lena,” he says and crosses his arms.

“Nonsense, Paul is a good boy. If he is with you, then I don’t have to worry much,” mom elbows dad while saying that.

“What was that for honey?” dad asks mom, confused.

But mom ignored dad and says, “If Paul is with you then you can go.”

“Really? 'cause I already packed my things. We will leave tomorrow morning, so I’ll turn in for the night,” I said, happy that she agrees and then running up the stairs and into my room. 

I can still hear dad asking mom why she hit him with her elbow, but I don’t care. Alice?

[ Yes? ]

“Is there a way for me to sneak into the dungeon without being found out by the knights, monsters, or the students?” I ask.

[ You have light affinity, right? and the skill {energy manipulation 3} right?]

“Yeah?”

[ Then you could try and bend the light to go around you and turn yourself invisible. ]

Like one of those fancy camouflage technologies the US was researching on?

[ Yes, but you can’t see when there is no light shining into your eyes so bend the normal light and used the {infrared vision} ability in the shop to see. ]

And how much does the {infrared vision} ability cost?

[ Only 1500 points. ]

Hm... That looks cheap enough. Then buy it for me, will you?

[ Done. ]

[ And here you go. ]

[ {infrared vision}: A low-level ability. Using their eyes, the user can detect infrared radiation. In other words, give the user thermal vision.

Cost: 1500 p]

Let's see what it looks like when activated.

“{infrared vision}”

And hey, it feels just like when I was using those infrared goggles, with the colors and everything else.

[ Yes, those goggles give you thermal vision, just like the ability. ]

Then why did you suggest we buy the ability when we could have bought the 500p binoculars? I’m started to feel a little angry, Alice.

[ 'cause with the ability, it is easier to turn yourself invisible and it will stay with you forever. ] 

[ While the goggles are cheaper, you can’t bring it to this new life. ]

Well, if you put it in that way, I guess buying the ability wasn’t the worse choice I ever made.

[ It wasn’t. ]

Fine. Now I will only need to practice and hopefully find a way to make myself invisible with magic. I still had 9 month left, No big deal, right?