“Hey bartender, bring me and my companions more beer and hurry up or you’ll regret it!” A man wearing black armour sat in a chair with his companions. All of them were experienced adventurers who must have looked death in the eyes many times. There was a young girl, whose clothes revealed she was a powerful magician, a man who could break a human in half with his bare hands and a beautiful woman holding a mug of beer in her one hand and a small dagger giving of a blue shimmer in her other hand. They were known as one of the strongest group of adventures with Gerald the black knight who was known for killing two of the last dragons while they still roamed around the earth as their leader, the group had exceptional people in it.

Jeanine the white magician, who mastered the art of healing magic when she was only twelve years old and in addition is known to possess multiple unique spells only she can use. She is without a doubt an exceptional talent one must look out for.

Richard the butcher who had earned his name by putting a whole army singlehandedly to flight, in the process killing one third of his enemies despite using only his fists as weapons, some say the reason behind his incredible skills is that he was cursed as a child and now possesses the power of a demon.

And last but not least Stella the queen of blades, a woman who was known for her incredible beauty but also for her skills as an assassin. While no one knows the exact number of her kill count, it is probably way over one hundred and those are only the kills she has outside the battlefield.

This group called ‘the night stars’ was feared by everyone in possession of common sense, yet the scene playing out in this bar was more than just absurd.

“Pay up first or you’ll get nothing. You should also refrain from using any threats or you’ll regret it, have I made myself clear asshole?” The bartender had spoken out a sentence, which was clearly suicidal. Not only did he disrespect Gerald the black knight, but he also straight up insulted him, his death wouldn’t be a pleasant one, that was for sure.

After a moment of complete silence, Gerald began to speak in a voice so sinister that one wondered if he was a knight serving the king in the first place. “Repeat yourself bartender.”

Without a moment of hesitation the man who wore a white shirt did as he was told to do. “I said pay up asshole.”

Jeanine turned away because she didn’t want to see what would happen next, Richard cracked his knuckles and Stella formed a sadistic smile on her face. Slowly the steel of Gerald’s blade being drawn out of its scabbard was echoing through the room, however his opponent still wasn’t impressed.

“No weapons are allowed in here, didn’t you read the sign, or maybe you can’t read in the first place?” The bartender’s situation got worse and worse every time he opened his mouth, however either he was completely oblivious to his opponent’s strength or had some kind of ace up his sleeve.

The atmosphere got tense and the heat of the room seemed unbearable. Only top class warriors, magicians or other people with incredible abilities were gathered in here, thus if one would start a fight, there was no saying what would happen next, the only thing certain was that this place would be completely destroyed in the process.

“You are dead.” Gerald spoke with anger in his voice as he pointed his sword toward the man who had just served him his drinks.

“No I won’t… But if you won’t put away that sword of yours, it’ll end up in your stomach.” The bartender grinned with confidence.

“I HAVE BEEN WALKING THROUGH THE SEWERS OF THIS TOWN, FOR FOURTY MINUTES.” Right before the situation escalated, a girl, drenched in, hopefully the rain pouring against the windows, entered the room through the door labelled ‘Bathroom’. Her anger could be felt throughout the room and seemed to be worse than that of Gerald, who winced at her sudden appearance.

“Who the fuck are you?” On Gerald’s face was complete confusion.

The girl answered in an angry voice. “Thank you for asking, I am Ruby and I am here to- DO YOU HONESTLY THINK THAT IS IMPORTANT RIGHT NOW?! I am here to save the heroes who are being held hostage here!”

“Which heroes?” The bartender was as confused as everyone in the room. Everyone just stared at the girl who had not only made an incredibly bold move, but also a bold statement, accusing them of kidnapping.

“Bitch what are you doing in here and what are you talking about?” An elder guy sitting in the back of the room spoke up asking the question on everyone’s minds.

She ignored the insult and repeated herself. “I know that you are keeping the summoned heroes destined to defeat the Demon Lord in here, send by the gods!”

“There is no god!” some random guy in the crowd shouted. “Shut up Timmy!” another guy shouted from a corner of the room. “That’s not my name!!”

After that awkward exchange, silence returned to the bar once again. Ruby cleared her trough and continued her explanation. “Eh, anyway, as I was saying, I am here for the legendary heroes are somewhere in this bar.”

“Okay, but why did you come through the sewers?” The bartender was very intrigued by what was going on and had completely forgotten about his quarrel with Gerald.

“Oh I will tell you why I went through the sewers! The asshole who owns this bar thought it was a good idea to make it only accessible for people with extreme skill who pass some kind of test! So my only choice was to get in through the sewers!”

“What are you talking about, I never needed to pass any test.” “Yeah me neither.” The whole room seemed to agree that they never did anything that could be considered a test.

“Oh stop lying to me! The aura around this building alone shows me that only strong individuals are in here!” Ruby protested to their obvious lie, however it seemed as if they weren’t lying at all.

“Listen girl, I don’t know who told you that bullshit, but this bar is open for everyone, it’s not our fault that the strong aura around this place keeps weaker people away. I do admit that there is a rumour going around saying something similar to what you told us, however have you even considered going through the front door?” The words of the bartender shut Ruby up in shame, because it was true what he said. After walking to this town for two weeks, she hadn’t even thought about questioning this rumour. But to her defence it seemed logical, with so many powerful people in one room, it seemed logical that one must pass a test, after all if everyone could just enter, then why would these warriors, wizards and other godlike people go in here in the first place? What could possibly draw them to such a remote place?

“A-anyway, I know that the heroes are in here, so you better bring them out here, or I’ll fight for them!” Laughter broke out in the tavern as slowly everyone got out of their seats.

“YOU, want to fight US? Are you serious girl? You wouldn’t survive for a second.” Sweat began dripping down Ruby’s face. He was right, she had her bow with her and some arrows but she was no match for the people in here.

This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

Right as Ruby’s death was sealed, a door got slammed open from behind the bar counter and a guy wearing a black lab coat came dashing out screaming at the top of lungs.

“GUYS I HAVE NEW BEER FOR ALL OF YOU!!!!”

“EYYY!!!!”

The whole room was going wild in excitement, some even began to dance and after one of the drunk guests started singing, soon the whole room was chanting a song, which seemed to be an often occurrence in this establishment.

Lay down your spear,

Lay down your sword and shield,

The magical rune is sealed,

AS LONG AS WE STILL GOT BEER!

For it they give up their crown

The cavalier, the volunteer, the balladeer

They all lay their weapons down

AS LONG AS WE STILL GOT BEER!

They laughed and danced and for the second time today, a bloodshed could be avoided by sheer luck. As Ruby stood there in the middle of the room, she looked at the guy who had just saved her life. He was whispering to the bartender and the two of them hastily sneaked through the door through which the guy with the lab-coat had just entered. Ruby somehow couldn’t shake this weird feeling she had, it was as if she had seen those two somewhere before. While everyone was occupied singing dancing and in general having a good time, she quickly followed the two men who had piqued her interest and looked through a small gap into the backroom of the tavern.

She looked at the two men more precisely and bit by bit she pieced the puzzle together. The Bartender was wearing a loose shirt as well as a blue tie. His black hair was as dark as the night and his piercing blue eyes had the colour of a waterfall.

The one wearing the lab coat was very different in appearance from the bartender. He wore eerie looking glasses on his nose and a shirt with weird shapes on it as well as some text she couldn’t comprehend. His messy copper-red hair went down to his shoulders and overall he looked like a reincarnation of the chaos god. With the beard stubbles on his chin and the eye bags that made him look sort of undead, he really did resemble some maniac loving chaos.

“The legendary heroes…” Ruby still couldn’t believe that those two were the heroes destined to save the world. While they did fit the description given to her and everything else also seemed to point to them, Ruby just wasn’t ready to believe that the heroes would work in some bar and serve the people alcohol, not that Ruby ever understood the appeal of it in the first place…

The room she was peeking into was resembling a dungeon cell, brick walls and no windows. The only source of light was coming through the ceiling, where iron bars were built into a small opening. And this opening was really necessary, because of all the fumes inside the room. Ruby had only seen a setup such as this in her sister’s room, where she practised alchemy, however the devices and weirdly shaped glasses, as well as the different materials used by the boy with the red hair, that she had never seen before. Could he be a genius when it came to brewing potions? She had heard about some exceptional talents who were able to mix potions capable of making one multiple times stronger than before, ones which transformed a human into a beast and even ones which gave non magic users the ability to permanently learn one skill. Could this boy also do such wondrous things?

He was getting more and more concentrated on his work as he began mixing thing after thing, from which Ruby had no clue what he was doing. She needed to get closer, however wouldn’t they see her if she entered the room? Now that she thought about it, where did the boy with the black hair go? She couldn’t see him anywhere, but maybe there was a secret door in the room? With him being gone, if Ruby was quiet then the red haired guy shouldn’t notice her, after all he was way too investigated in his potions.

She slowly opened the door and sneaked behind the boy muttering something to himself. He carefully took a potion and heated it up, then he used machine after machine, none of them Ruby had ever seen, however they looked really impressive with all their different shapes and materials they were made of. Then after a while the boy had filled the liquid he just created into a glass vessel and held it against the light. He looked proud as if he had just found the formula for eternal life and was so invested in his product that he ignored Ruby despite her standing directly infront of him.

“FINALLY, IT IS DONE!” That being said, he gulped the whole liquid down in one swoop. What would happen next? Was it a potion of enhancement, transformation or maybe something she had never heard of? The suspense was killing her and Ruby just boldly asked him in the heat of the moment.

“What is this liquid you just created, please tell me!” Ruby asked.

He looked at her in surprise but after a second of confusion he seemed like he couldn’t care less who she was or why she was in here. “This my dear, is something very valuable, something only kings and queens could afford.”

“Wow… Please tell me oh genius, what power does it hold?” Ruby asked in excitement.

He made a dramatic pause before answering. “This, is a legendary beverage called: ALCOHOL!!!”

…

“Excuse me what?” Her confusion showed on her face.

“You know, the thing inside wine and beer. The substance which makes people do things they regret for the rest of their life, that kind of alcohol. But this one isn’t good enough either…” He threw the bottle to the ground and the shards of glass distributed themselves on the ground. Ruby thought he was joking around. He had to be.

“No, you said it was something only Kings and Queens could afford.” Ruby was in disbelieve.

“Indeed, when I first arrived here, I visited a bar but damn, that shit you have can’t be called alcohol. I mean you really fucked it. It literally tastes like piss and the percentage you get isn’t higher than two… So we decided to save society and created real alcohol. And while I am no genius when it comes to chemistry, I do know a few things, or at least enough to make something that tastes better than piss.”

He talked with proud in his voice and seemed really passionate as he described the process he needed to go through to get alcohol which this world had never seen. Ruby just let him talk, she needed to sort her thoughts. “… and that is why we opened up this establishment, however from one day to the other only people with money and power visited us and the next thing I know is that we are considered millionaires? I mean I am not complaining, however I thought it would be harder than this…”

“Stop…” Ruby’s voice was faint.

“What did you say?”

“STOOOOPPPP!!” Ruby was practically in tears. This idiot was supposed to save the world? The lives of billions of humans laid in the hands of this guy?

“But, if you already created a better version of alcohol, why would you make this potion you just drank? Yeah, that doesn’t make any sense!” Ruby was grabbing every last straw she saw in the hopes of this all being a joke.

“Oh, yeah you are right, in theory alcohol should be enough, right?” His voice was filled with anger. “But, OH NO you have the ability [Immunity] so any poison is rendered useless, and guess what? THAT INCLUDES ALCOHOL!” He screamed at the skies, as if he was blaming the gods. “But I assure you, I will create some drug that I will feel and if it takes the rest of this shitty life!” Immediately he started tinkering on his machines again and Ruby slowly came to the realisation that this wasn’t a joke and that this guy was supposed to be a hero.

“Hey Dorian, who is that girl?” Out of nowhere the black haired guy reappeared in front of Ruby.

“Where were you Jamie? Using your ability to look inside women’s cleavage again you pervert?” The boy named Dorian gave the black haired guy named Jamie the drink he had just mixed.

“Maybe. Leave me alone, the emotional damage I take every time I use [Mind Control] is enough, I don’t need to hear your speech about morals again.” He drank the alcohol down in one gulp and unlike Dorian he had an extreme reaction to it. To not fall down he took a chair standing in the corner and sat down.

“Damn, that’s some good stuff right there. How high is the percentage?” Jamie asked.

“I managed to boost it up to eighty-five per cent, but it’s still not enough…” Dorian’s tone was beat down. To him, this was a sensitive topic and he had failed once again.

Then Jamie’s and Ruby’s eyes meet and Jamie realized they weren’t alone. “Hey, you are the sewer girl, right? What are you doing back here?”

“You know her Jamie?” Dorian finally took some interest to their intruder.

“Well know is a strong word, however she nearly got herself killed a few minutes ago.”

“Okay, okay, tell me girl, who are you and what is your business with us?” Dorian sat down in a chair next to Jamie and eagerly awaited Ruby’s response who was overwhelmed by the whole situation. Despite her head overheating, she got a hold of herself and began to speak in a loud and clear voice.

“My name is Ruby Morgan and I am here because of a prophecy, which shows two heroes bringing peace to the world by defeating the Demon Lord! Mister Dorian, Mister Jamie, I strongly believe that you two are the heroes the legend talks about, please allow me and thus the Morgan family, to assist you in your quest for peace!”

Ruby had worked hard on that introduction and if she may say so herself was quite proud of it. She looked at the two heroes as they stared at her in silence. Would they accept her as a travel companion? Was she good enough to assist them?

“How about no?” Dorian’s words cut her like a blade and she fell down to the ground. While she wanted to believe the reasoning was the shock, she was pretty certain it was the poisonous fumes she had breathed in.