CH56 (420), Standard Missions?! (1)

"I'm back," I announced my return sometime before our usual lunchtime.

"Welcome back, honey/Welcome back," Mom and Dad returned, and I could see that they were pleased with my rather swift return.

"So, how did it go?" Dad asked after I settled down beside them on the couch, and mom looked just as interested as he was.

"The order headquarter is just as impressive inside as it looks from the outside, at least from the portions I got to see," I said before describing some of the things I had seen in the hallways, such as the pictures and sculptures/murals of various scenes featuring guardians of old, or present, I guess, seeing how long some of them could live.

"Those sound really impressive," dad said with a bit of wonder in his tone, and mom had a fascinated look as well.

"Yeah, I would like to see those someday," she announced, which made me think back to the content of the rule booklet I read. Some mental searching made sure that my next words would not turn out to be false and come back to bite me in the ass.

"I've read through the rule booklet, and as far as I can remember, nothing in there says that I can't bring you inside and show you around a bit. Sure, there are quite a few places that you won't be allowed to enter, but some parts like the reception hall, a majority of the hallways, the plaza, the garden, and the dining rooms should be no problem," I declared while fishing out the rule booklet from my waist bag.

I saw dad eying the booklet as soon as I pulled it out and I had to suppress a laugh when his eyes kept following when I began to wave the booklet a bit. I still had to finish my narration, so I stopped messing around and resumed talking.

"Anyway, as I said, after I finished reading through the booklets I receive, I made my way to the mission center, and just as I promised dad, I did not accept any missions. I simply noted down the ones I found interesting enough so that I can apply for them later on and do them at my leisure," I finished up my trip description and pulled out the notebook in which I wrote the missions as well.

Dad seemed especially happy when he heard that I kept my promise, and his eyes were glued to the notebook after I pulled it out. I placed both the notebook as well as the booklet on the couch table before I motioned for dad to go ahead if he wanted, and he lost no time to snatch up both.

Mom was much more relaxed than dad and simply asked me what I was planning on doing instead of taking one of the books. I told her how I had made sure that most missions could be grouped together and that I was planning to clear a group each time I went out.

That way, I would be able to clear the 18 missions I needed to rank up in 5-7 mission trips depending on the missions I chose to clear. After I said that, mom asked me to move aside for a bit before she curiously shuffled closer to dad and studied the list of missions I made with him.

After they went through the mission book, we had to wait for mom to look through the ones she missed at the beginning. Once she was done as well, I could tell that the two looked rather satisfied with my choices.

"Those all seem pretty standard and they all look like pretty good choices," dad directly shared his satisfaction. "With your strength, none of these should pose any difficulties to you," mom added cheerfully and I could not help but worry for a bit whether that counted as raising a flag or not, but I decided that it didn't since it was a simple observation, so I gave her a nod.

"Yeah, none of these look overly difficult, at least not for your Pokemon, so you should be able to deal with them quite smoothly. I can see why you grouped some of them together," dad agreed with mom, but his words made me shudder for a very brief moment.

Did he have to emphasize the no problems part like that? That still counted as a simple observation right? I mean he did not mention anything about the possibility of something going wrong, and I believe that was one of the conditions for raising a flag.

Besides, since when did I worry so much about flags and the like? Maybe it was because it had been quite some time since anything did not go the way I liked/wanted. Mom and dad looked at me questioningly when I failed to respond, and I gave them a wry smile.

"I wanted to make sure to rank up as efficiently as possible," I ignored my momentary "blank-out" and agreed with dad's assessment. They went along with it and we began discussing what the best mission order would be. We finally decided that the Arbok group would serve as the best starting point.

The Arbok group consisted of 5 separate missions that all revolved around the Arbok line. One requested 2000 ml of pure Arbok Venom coming from gold-stage Arbok. Pure as in solely produced as well as stored in its venom glands and not produced or influenced by its poison energy, because there was a big difference between the two.

There was a mission that asked for a 5 star-Ekans below the (high) bronze stage. Another one asked for quite a lot of Arbok Shed skin, and the fourth requested a batch of Ekans and Arbok regardless of their stage. The only requirement was that they had at least two-star potential.

All four of these had the condition that any mission takers could not indiscriminately kill or harm any Pokemon during the mission unless it was to defend themselves. While they could not control the situation on-site, they did ask related questions during the mission hand over and they had ways to ensure whether one said the truth or not.

It was also the way they made sure that one actually did the mission since letting others do the mission was not allowed unless one teamed up with others and cleared it up with the order beforehand. That might seem counterintuitive to some, but I agreed with their approach.

Besides, it was not as if they did not try their best to ensure that mission-takers could actually deal with the missions they took. I mean that was the reason for the star ratings in the first place. Still, a big part of these missions was for experience's sake, forging in the fire so to speak, and even I got a stern warning from Vivian during her "Introduction" after she took a look at my profile.

She straight up told me, that while I did have a guard from the order following me in the dark, I should not rely on him or her since that would only be the case until my first Pokemon actually reached the dark-gold stage.

Moreover, according to her, while the guards would be following me during the mission, they would only step in if I was actually going to die. Otherwise, they would remain in the background, even if I ended up seriously injured, or if some of my Pokemon died.

I actually looked surprised at the last bit, but she just shrugged sympathetically, I did not even know that was possible and told me that my guardians would usually intervene before my Pokemon could die. However, missions were exceptions since anything that happened during missions was my responsibility due to actively taking up the mission despite knowing the possible risks/perils.

Apparently, accidents during missions were not accidents but possible/probable risks that everyone accepted together with the mission. Again, many would probably disagree with that, but I could see where they were coming from.

One did not have to like it, but that too was an experience/lesson, and from a certain cold and much too clinical perspective nothing was over unless I/you died. I would probably have been more perturbed if I did not have the possibility of flooding the place with my Pokemon or simply retreating to Utopia. Yet, I did, so my opinion was likely already affected a tad bit.

Besides, Vivian actually implored me to not go around seeking more danger than I could handle and not push past mission parameters even if I thought I could handle more, so the order was actively trying to dissuade such events from happening by warning people from seeking out the danger themselves.

Anyway, the fifth mission in that group was why I decided to take/group up the first four missions in the first place. It seemed like an Arbok tribe had pushed past its territory, which had affected the balance in the area, and more importantly, it also affected a few villages that were located in that general area.

The mission was to investigate the reason and if possible dissuade them or stop the problem if there was one. There was an emphasis that retreat was the priority if the problem was too big for me, or rather any mission taker, to handle. The mission information also included that the Arbok tribe had a gold-stage leader, along with two gold-stage sub-leaders.

Later, after we were done with establishing a tentative mission order, we had our lunch, and I spent the rest of the day as usual. The next day, after breakfast, I first spent two hours with my Pokemon, before heading to the Order Headquarters to accept the Arbok missions.

I directly headed to the mission center and went straight to the "junior" guardian mission counter. Thankfully one of the clerks was free, so I did not have to wait for my turn. "Good morning, sir," the lady greeted me politely before she got down to business. "How may I help you?"

"I'd like to apply for some missions," I returned and I saw her give a slight nod. "Certainly," she replied. "I just need your membership card and the mission serials," she followed up, and I handed her my card as well as a piece of paper on which I wrote the mission codes.

She busied herself for a moment and I heard her hum after typing for a while. Hearing someone hum like that was never a good sign, as far as I knew.

"Well, there are no problems with 4 of these missions, but there is a mission you can't accept since it has already been taken by someone else. Moreover, the mission is recorded as cleared, so the individual already completed the mission as well," she said, proving my assumption.

Still, if it was just that, then everything was fine. Honestly, for a moment I was worried she would say something against the number of missions I chose to take together.

"That's alright," I returned with a nod. "Can I ask which one it is?" I asked her and she smiled before nodding.

"Certainly, it is mission J180124, the one involving the 5-star Ekans," she responded. It seems like someone quickly took and dealt with that mission. Whoever it was probably simply bought the Ekans or already knew where to procure one, or maybe they already had one at hand that they did not need and took the mission due to that.

Regardless, I was left with 4 missions now, but that was okay as well. I mean there had been no guarantee that I would come across a 5-star Ekans in the tribe I was going to check out anyway.

"Alright, thank you," I simply expressed my gratitude. "I'd like to accept the other 4 missions, please," I informed her and she looked at the screen in front of her before looking at me.

"Are you sure that you want to accept all of them?" she asked a bit hesitantly. "I can see what you are hoping to achieve, but trying to chain missions like that can have unforeseen consequences. Generally, people that chain quests do so with 2 or 3 missions, not 4, so the chances of something unexpected happening are likely more probable as well," she warned me, but I still nodded.

"Yes, I would like to accept all 4 missions," I confirmed and she stared me in the eyes for a moment before releasing a sigh. "Alright, if that is your choice," she let out before she began typing some stuff. A moment later I saw something being printed before she looked back up.

"The 4 missions have been registered under your ID, so you have up to a week to complete them. The paper contains a map of the general area pertaining to mission J160139. Please, make sure you are careful while trying to complete the missions," she advised me before she handed back my membership card along with the map she printed out.

"Thank you," I returned with a smile before putting away my card and the map. "Have a nice day," I told her after that, before stepping away to let someone else take my place. I heard her wish me a nice day as well before she began addressing the person that came after me.

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