Sailhin turned around and shook her head.

“Well, I think you’ll find we’re quite eccentric ourselves. Two elves, a human, a goliath, a beastkin, and a dwarf. Adding you wouldn’t change much, elves would still be the majority.”

I let out an awkward laugh, that really was an oddly diverse group of people. And if I was half goliath like Alcoroth was hoping, it’d make things interesting. I’d have to bring up being half to them at some point though.

“Even with whatever that limb thing is, I don’t think any of us would care very much.”

“See doesn’t it seem perfect.”

Kayden put his hands together in a praying manner.

“Please just go, I really don’t want to have a conversation with people about you.”

He was still hiding a lot from me, but did it matter? Even if he had access to the fortieth floor would I even see him up there? If I did, I guess then I’d appease Alcoroth and question him a bit. But if it took me months to climb to the twentieth then it’d probably take us a good amount of time to get to the fortieth.

I sighed and looked over at Alcoroth who gave me a nod.

“Well, I guess it works out well then.”

“Good, great, let's get the others and we’ll head to the elevator and send you on your way.”

Kayden stood up a bit more energetic, but he still seemed quite tired. I turned my sight off but could still see his real appearance. If it only altered the perception of people who didn’t know what he really looked like, that felt like a complicated thing to enchant.

“Well, I’m sure throwing that guy out the door woke Dodger up enough, and if Dodger is that awake Brick is too. I’ll go get the others.”

Sailhin grinned.

Well, I guess I’d get a chance to spar with her. That’ll be fun.

“Yeah, I’ll be right here.”

Sailhin turned around and headed back into the building.

“Are you sure about them?”

I looked at Kayden as he shook his head to try and wake up.

“Yeah. Two fighters, two mages, a rogue, and a tank plus you. It makes a really well-rounded team. Plus, one of the fighters is practically a tank himself.”

Conveniently well balanced that is. But it also was a team that was very recently thrown together. The pairs would work together well but would there be a problem when we got to the point of needing to work together?

I mean I’ve been doing everything on my own so far so it's a great question as to whether or not I actually need a party other than the vague quest I got.

“That sounds like a decent group.”

Alcoroth was lounging in the air sliding through menus. If he could see mine, it’d make sense he could see their pages. I couldn’t ask him about it now. I hated when he talked to me around others when he knew only Mezu and I could see him. If I could talk to him without others, it’d make things easier, a shame I couldn’t do it now to talk about the fact that Kayden was hiding his appearance.

The narrative has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

“Kayden! Was Sailhin telling the truth? We get to head up?”

I turned to see a beastkin walk over with a dwarven girl.

“Yeah, we have to make this quick too so where are the others?”

“Dodger got into another fight and didn’t get to finish eating so she’s trying to get enough food in,” the dwarf said.

“Well, if she’s holding us up from leaving that’s even worse than her just not getting enough food,” the beastkin said.

What type of beastkin he was, I wasn't too sure. He wasn’t an ancestral kind.

The coloring was of his fur, light brown mixed with some white and black. His tail was rather poofy but not overly long and his ears were quite small and rounded. It was confusing. The ears reminded me of a bear, but the tail was like a fluffy cat? I don’t know, either way, I felt like it really wasn't a question I should or could ask him.

His hair itself wasn’t too long and on one side of his head, he had a braid-like bang thing with a beaded bottom. Which was in the opposite position of the one that was on the dwarf. The rest of her hair was in various sizes of braids of varying lengths some of which had tips that seemed to be burnt off.

They were both relatively short, he obviously being the taller one. Neither of them wore heavy armor meaning they weren’t fighters. He was probably the rogue and she was a mage? I mean by process of elimination. I assumed that Sailhin was a fighter, and by the sound of it Dodger was the tank and Brick must have also been a fighter. So, the remaining person was also a mage.

An elf came out of the hall next looking around briefly before coming towards us. He was shorter than I was expecting and as thin as I would normally think an elf would be. He had long light brown hair and was generally just a neatly put together person. His clothes were elven in design but just seemed to be casual wear.

I guess that none of them actually were wearing their gear currently. I had mine on, but that’s since I didn’t have clothes outside of my equipment any more.

“So, this is the new person huh?”

Being distracted by the elf I didn’t notice that the beastkin had gotten closer to me.

“Nice to meet you. I'm Lefty, this is Dot.”

He held out his hand and I took it, shaking it.

“Quartz.”

“Who’s the little guy?”

“Uhh we’ll do his introductions later, where's the other three?”

“They’ll be out soon. The cook is making Dodger a snack bag right now,” The elf said.

He had gotten close enough to talk to us now.

“I’m Paeris by the way, Sailhin mentioned there was a… another elf.

He hesitated, didn't he? He could tell I was half. Why didn’t he mention it outright though? That was sure to come up later.

“Quartz.”

He smiled softly, attractive people just felt different.

“Oi! Sorry for holding us up. But Laria wanted to send me off with some of her snacks!” The goliath, I’m assuming is Dodger, called out as she Sailhin and a tall dark-skinned man walked over.

He, I’m going to assume Brick, was Dodger’s height and his eyes were a bit lighter than I was expecting, but not as light as Sailhin’s. His hair was in dreads and tied up and back away from his face. A few of the shorter ones hung a bit in his face and I could see that they had metal rings in most of them of varying thicknesses and sizes.

“We’re finally getting out of here and the only thing you could think of was food?” Dot asked, grinning.

“Laria’s snacks are great. I'm sure you’re gonna miss them too.”

“Laria only makes you good snacks because she has a crush on you,” I heard Paeris mutter in elvish, annoyed.

“They’re quite the lively bunch aren’t they.”

Alcoroth tapped on my shoulder as if him speaking didn’t get my attention enough.

“We better hurry this up, I won’t be able to keep him asleep for long.”

I almost jerked up quickly before realizing that would wake him up even faster. So, I gently but quickly picked him up.

“Uhh Kayden… I think we should get going, I don’t think he’ll stay asleep for much longer and this place doesn’t really seem like the best place to, well… you know.”

Kayden stood up quickly, “Yes alright you guys let's get going quickly.”

“What’s with the rush?” Dot asked.

“Apparently there is a limb thing that we shouldn’t go around showing people.” Sailhin said, “so let's get going. Dot has all our stuff right now so we’re all ready to go.”

Kayden started walking first and I followed behind him and the rest of the group came behind us.

I heard some rattling and turned around to see Dot pulling out various things from a storage spell and passing them around.

That looked similar to the thing Alcoroth could do, but he only did that for some of the stuff he was actually willing to look after.

As we started back up the walk towards the elevator, I felt Mezu stirring in my arms.

“I’m gonna go ahead!”