“I’m so sleepy,” Daniel said, staring at the morning sky.

Priests of Croelius were busy leading rituals for their worshippers, but thankfully, none bothered him. He groaned. This hunting event didn’t consider any poor Morvina followers, whose sleep cycles were messed up. As a result, he had gotten three measly hours of sleep before his neighbour woke him up. He missed alarm clocks.

Leaning down, he picked up his new leather backpack and rummaged through it, going through a checklist. Three days of dry rations, a waterskin, his combat robe and his priest robe, a water cloak, a bedroll, and a small kitchen knife. He would’ve liked to bring along torches, but Finnean surely had some magic for that. Alas, he was too poor for any healing potions.

“Any minute now,” he said, waiting at his designated spot. Then, as if summoned by magic, three figures appeared in the distance. Behind them, two large lizards dragged an empty wagon.

“Ah, Daniel. Fancy meeting you here. Listen, I’ve got a desperate request. You see...” Finnean jogged next to him, out of breath and slightly panicking. Then, he started to explain what Daniel already knew. Finnean was a damn good actor.

More importantly, his eyes wandered over to the two other figures. To his right was a lithe man in his late twenties dressed in wyvern leather armour, a sword sheath strapped to his belt and a hand crossbow on his back. He sported short, messy black hair and had a pointed chin - his expression sour, his complexion paler than a corpse. Similar to Daniel, he had dark bags under his eyes.

To his left was a woman his age, wearing chain-link armour, dragging a massive crimson greatsword behind her. What immediately stood out was her black hair, styled as a bob cut, with the tips of her hair becoming violet. She looked at the scene with annoyance, and as he met her gaze, he noticed that one of her eyes was orange, while the other was green.

“I’ve got nothing better to do anyways, and I’m always down for an adventure,” Daniel said, ending the play that likely wasn’t needed. Still, best to be safe. The older man clicked his tongue as he stared at Daniel's fully stocked backpack.

“We’ve found our fourth, eh? Let’s go and find a village with some cosy hay to spend the night at. The sooner this competition is over, the better,” the man yawned, his voice hoarse.

“What? How are we going to find monsters then? We need to go deep into the plains,” the younger woman shouted at him at full volume, completely ignoring everyone around her.

“It’s just a silly competition. Who cares?”

That provoked a full-out cry of outrage from the woman and developed into a one-sided argument as they started to make their way to the western gate. The man looked unbothered - Daniel doubted he was even listening to what she was saying. Then again, he looked like a walking corpse.

“Could we introduce ourselves first? It’s awkward not knowing your names,” Daniel said, diplomatically breaking up the argument. He was feeling second-hand embarrassment as practically everyone on the street was staring at them now.

“My name is Corvin, and this is my niece, Thalia. Don’t mind her, she’s always like that,” he said, ruffling her hair. He yelped as she kicked him in his shins.

“Finnean and Daniel. We’re charmed to meet such unique individuals,” Finnean responded, a polite smile on his face. “Why don’t we introduce our abilities to each other? We’re companions, after all.”

Then, without a second's delay, he continued. “I’m a mage of some skill. I can use my magic to animate figurines and dolls,” he said, noticing the looks of unease from everyone. “Unlike other groups, it means we won’t have to take watches. They’ll protect us day and night.”

Daniel stared at Finnean with surprise. To be fair, he had never asked him what his class was, but he just assumed it was something normal. He could only imagine what skills someone of his class would get. Corvin started to speak up, but before he could finish a word, the girl interrupted him.

“I’m the strongest one here,” Thalia said, raising her sword to the air, “and Ophelia agrees.”

Both mages shared a look of confusion before Corvin chimed in.

“It’s her sword. Told me she could hear it speaking one night. I think she’s just crazy.”

A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.

“Shut up. Ophelia says you’re a good-for-nothing freeloader that can’t even wipe his own ass properly.”

“Alright, now you just made it up,” he chuckled, which sounded more like rubbing two pieces of metal together.

“Though, she is right in a way. I’m not a good fighter, not even remotely, and especially not against beasts. My bag of tricks works the best against humans,” Corvin grinned, ignoring Daniel’s look of dismay.

Seeing as Thalia wasn’t going to say anything more, Daniel thought about what he could do. He had been practising like crazy the last two days, and he hoped his skills wouldn’t let him down.

“I guess my abilities are more suited for scouting. I can spot anything living around us and scout our terrain. Of course, I can also fight,” he kept his introductions vague on purpose. There was no need for others to know more than needed about him.

“What a dysfunctional party. They just had to give us two oddballs,” Finnean whispered to him, which prompted a strange look from Daniel. He was sure the warriors shared the same thoughts.

When they arrived at the edge of the city, the guards let them through the western gate with a look of annoyance, and he quickly saw why. Five other groups of four, just like them, strayed from the path and headed into the majestic plains that stretched until they merged with the horizon. Emerald-green grass reached out to grasp their knees, weaving between the occasional wildflowers of every hue.

In a moment of wonder, he made the mistake of using his Reaper’s Eyes. Unobstructed by anything, he witnessed a sea of thousands of souls, each moving with their own rhythm. Every butterfly and caterpillar had a soul, no matter how big or small. Unfortunately, not many of them would count for his gate. Either it judged a soul based on how big it was and allowed entry only for those, or it was some other, unknown factor. Regardless, he was hunting for big game. He also made a note to never stare at the grass with his ability.

“If it doesn’t matter where we go, could we head straight west? I’ve got some things to ask any villagers we meet along the road,” Daniel piped up.

“Why not? I think with puppet boy here, our plan should be to travel a day out, set up a camp, and then spend some time hunting. Maybe we can ask around for a nearby waterhole and stake that out,” Corvin responded, and since no one else spoke up, it was settled.

The first minutes of the journey were spent in awkward silence. Before long, it was broken by Daniel, who asked Finnean to further explain magical theory to him. For the last two days, he had been teaching him the basics of spellcasting upon hearing that Daniel had already learned Mana Manipulation. Unfortunately, he had the same flaw many talented people did.

“Well, you just twist the spell formula. What do you mean? No, I don’t know any techniques for doing it. I can’t explain it properly, but you just... twist it.”

He had figured out how to rotate his Soul Scythe, but Finnean had told him he could do so much more than that. A single spell could be manipulated in a thousand ways, and when you did a particularly good job, you even earned a skill from it. Daniel was still far, far away from that point.

As for the other party members - Corvin didn’t speak much, and Thalia would occasionally whisper to her sword, which would send shivers up Daniel’s spine.

“Right. Let’s come up with a proper strategy,” Finnean said after half an hour of travel, having finished formulating his thoughts.

“Since Thalia wants to win and Daniel wants to level up, we need to find the deadliest monsters we can, and a large quantity at that. Filling up this wagon isn’t going to be enough - that’s the bare minimum.”

What he said immediately grabbed everyone’s attention. Corvin frowned as if he already knew what Finnean would say.

“Spit it out already,” Corvin sighed. “I was hoping we would be able to relax and hunt some rabbits, but no. We just had to get a madman. Suppose all mages are madmen.”

“What I’ve got here is something I’ve acquired from an alchemist. It’s called the Beast’s Folly, and the moment I unleash the scent, it will attract every monster within a mile,” he pulled out a small, airtight box. Every inch of it was covered in runes. Thalia’s eyes immediately began to shine.

“Come on, open the box. Let’s fight,” she said, practically vibrating with energy. Daniel swore he heard the sword let out a whine, like an excited puppy.

“Not now. If we decide to do it, it’ll be when we’re familiar with each other in combat and we’ve stacked every advantage we can. Even then, it will be incredibly dangerous, but in the worst case, we can just flee. In theory, they shouldn’t pursue us.”

Finnean’s voice was too uncertain for Daniel’s liking, but he agreed with the methods. If he couldn’t handle that, then what chance did he have of surviving Velkir?

“We should find an easily defensible spot. Perhaps next to a river, so that we wouldn’t get surrounded.” Corvin groaned, but he immediately started thinking of a strategy.

“I was thinking open plains would be better. It would allow us to fire off spells from far away and give us an escape option towards the side with the least monsters,” Finnean argued. Corvin didn’t relent.

For the next hour, they went back and forth, exchanging strategies and planning how to best kill as many beasts as possible. In a way, even if Corvin’s expression was beyond grave, this made the both of them closer than before. By the time the party encountered the first sign of trouble, the two even shared a laugh before yelling in pure panic. There was a simple flaw to any of their assumptions, and her name was Thalia, who was currently charging straight towards danger.