Chapter 14

"Daryl!"

"Hey, Daryl!"

Several adventurers shouted in excitement as they saw Daryl and his group walk into the Gladstone Guild. The half elf behind the counter smiled brightly and waved at his group from across the room. He happily waved back at her and walked over to the group that had shouted at him as he entered the room and sat down. Taking a cup of liquor from the table and chugging down a few gulps of it before exhaling exhaustively.

"Daryl, you should have been here this morning!"

"Why? Did you finally do a job properly without supervision?" Daryl joked as he laughed at the old man before him. The man scoffed and stroked his beard with closed eyes.

"He's not joking, man! Some fancy rich kid who is an adventurer came in here!" a young man in his twenties flopped his body against Daryl, drunk and barely able to stand up as he spoke so loudly the whole room couldn't help but glance over to wonder what was wrong with the young man.

"What's so great about a rich kid being an adventurer? I've seen all types in my travels." Daryl sighed as he thought back over the years of him adventuring across the land. He felt he really had seen a great number of different types of people.

"That ain't the most fascinating part, man!" The drunk kid laughed loudly as he thought back to what he had seen earlier in the day. "That kid had a huge wolf with him!"

"A wolf?" Daryl paused and thought for a moment before looking at the old man to see him stroking his beard still while nodding along with the conversation. "What did it look like?"

"It was huge!"

"It was scary powerful!"

"I thought it was gorgeous with that grey fur and bright red markings, there was even a beautiful crystal embedded on his head!"

Several adventurers started joining in the conversation as they kept on rambling about the wolf. Some of them stuck on how strong the wolf was while others, especially the girls, marveled at the beautiful crystal and markings that were on the wolf. Daryl could not find the words to speak. His thoughts were racing as he wondered if he had simply wandered to the same town as the wolf he had seen back at Silvervane.

He had been present the night the Silent Butcher came into the town and slaughtered everyone. Daryl had tried to fight back against the massacre and had even saved several people that he got safely out of the town, but ended up injured and pulled out by his group. Regret had filled him that he could not stay and fight, but he had known if he stayed he would had died there while he had several people he had to safely help escape that he was lucky to even save the ones he had.

"So he did make it out alive..." he mumbled to himself out loud. His group shook their heads as they knew he was thinking about whether or not it was the same wolf that had follow them around back in Silvervane.

"It might not be the same wolf. The one we saw did not have markings on him." His friend whispered to him from behind.

"You don't know that. The wolf was grey and large! It could very well be the same one." Daryl chuckled at the thought of running into the beast again.

The wolf was a free spirited beast and he was well aware of that, but the idea of running into him again had him feeling rather amused at the idea. The wolf is wandering with someone new here, so he pondered over the thought of wanting to know if the beast had finally taken to someone. Shaking his head he did not find the idea possible, however, considering how easily Vorbuk had followed him around and just walked off when he was done with his group. Vorbuk had even let him buy and put a collar on him just so it could sneak into the town til it decided to leave.

"Do you know who the wolf is wandering around with? Who is the rich kid?" Daryl asked curiously.

"No idea!" The old man smiled pridefully at Daryl.

Daryl could not help, but sigh at the image of the old man smiling. It felt like the man was proud that he had no idea who the kid was that the wolf was walking around with. Who holds pride in not knowing something? That felt like a joke to him and he couldn't help but to laugh awkwardly at the old man.

"If you want to know the kid took a job here so he will probably be back soon. No matter what job that kid picked up with that beast by his side I doubt anything will happen to him out there. The aura of that beast alone was enough to make any man shake to their very core!" The old man picked up his glass and drank slowly as he watched Daryl.

Daryl's group could tell by the look on his face that Daryl was contemplating on staying just to find out if the wolf was the same one they had seen before. They exchanged glances with each other as if to see if any of them were willing to try and persuade him to give up the idea and just keep moving. In the end they knew it would not be any good even if they tried so no one was willing to bother with the idea. The group slowly turned to head out of the Guild while Daryl watched them all leave.

He knew they were going to go on without him, that was how his group was. They knew if Daryl wanted to do something badly enough then they were best to just let him be and he would catch up in the end when he was done with whatever he had set his mind to do. The group was loyal enough to stand up and fight to the death with him in battle, loyal enough to stop him from doing anything that would get him killed, but smart enough to not stop him from doing something he desperately felt he had to do. That was the thing he loved most about his group of adventurers; they were loyal, but knew when to step aside and let him be himself when the time came for it.

"I guess I will be spending the day here to see this rich kid and his wolf." Daryl smiled at the old man and turned to look at the young man drunk that was still leaning on him as if he was a perch to keep himself up. Sighing to himself at the drunk young man he shook his head. His mind just hoped that he was not staying for no reason.