spoil of war
Waking up the following morning, Alex gazed at the still sleeping guards. Most have already recovered after a good night of sleep with all of them level 1 adventurer from the guild. Only those that received the gravest injuries were still down.
In passing, he nodded to Naaza, already looking after the wounded, and if needed, changing their bandages.
Exiting the casern, he lightly sniffed the air. While the odour of blood was still prevalent, a part of it had been washed down by the night's downpour, cleaning the settlement's reddened cobblestones.
Wolfing down the small portion of food he gratefully receives from the soldier in charge, he looked around.
At the top of the wall, soldiers were actively cleaning the few corpses, putting them in small, mine cart-like contraption. Seeing that his help would better be appreciated at the wall's foot, he walked to Eina.
"Ah, Alexander, good morning." Smiled the guild employee when she sees him.
"Good morning, Miss Eina. Need a hand?"
"Hum. If you could start to gather your kill that would best, thank you." Said her, taking a second to think, before pointing at the different stack of corpse forming. "We have started to separate them through the arrows left in their body.
Alex nodded before starting to retrieve the nearest bodies. As they were near the wall, he didn't have difficulty in founding them, as most have another goblin skewered with them.
~~~
During the following hours, Alex pile grew and grew, showing that most of his kills came from his archery skills. With the soldiers' help, twenty-two guards and fifty men, it was a force of one hundred able men who actively sought to clean the settlement.
The settlement proper had been the first to be emptied, starting by the square, the alley between houses, then the walkways around the wall. Rather than separate the bodies in a pile, the women had begun to extract the core, speeding the process.
The cores would be accounted before distributed later, under Misha supervision while Eina stays outside.
By the time they stopped to take a break and eat, the settlement was nearly cleared, leaving only the corpse to be processed.
By the end of the day, the settlement was free of corpses, and the wall's foot was starting to clear. After having been accounted, the coreless goblins had been stacked on high piles, before being burned. The pyres were still burning in the morning when the men departed to work on the fields.
As much as they wished, they couldn't lose two consecutive days and not tend their fields, at the risk of leaving wild beasts to ravage them.
~~~
The two next days had the same flavour as the one after he woke up. Alex found that cleaning after a battle was as gruesome than defending a place. With the lack of the villager's hands, the timeframe lengthen.
By half day the third days, all bodies have been separated, the arrows retrieved, leaving only the cores to collects.
On their side, Eina and Misha work was partially done. The horde's total had been accounted, the reports filled, leaving only the distribution of merits.
"Alexander?" Called Eina, their meal finished.
"Yes?"
"We need to discuss the following matters. As you are the one to have brought down the three hobgoblins, different possibilities are available. It more or less three choices. You could choose to sell the corpse to the guild, who will skin it and process the leather. Keep the corpse and leave us the skin to process. Or keep everything and seek someone to process the skin for you.
For the first choice, you would earn fully, as we would take the skin. The second choice would lower your keep but leave you with the skin after. On the third, the guild had no say in it, but would likely buy the skin.
Each solution had its advantage and inconvenient."
'CS?'
-Better sell them the one with blown head and asks them to process the two others. Even if they had holes from the arrows, its nothing you can't correct.-
'Ok, thank you.'
-Don't mind it.-
"I will sell the headless one to the guild, and ask for you to process the two other for me please."
Eina nodded happily at this. While they didn't lack supply, the guild more than most receive badly damaged corpse, leaving few patches of leather exploitable. With the one he sells to them, only the neck would need to be removed, leaving all the rest.
"Sure! We will need some days to skin and prepare them before sending them back. Since we will return, I could also process the cores for you and send the money?"
"Sure, I will start right now." Said him, taking out a lent hammer, bringing it down on the ribcage, broking the bones, before opening the goblin.
~~~
When seeing the core, Eina faintly gasps, making Alex look at her.
"Is there something wrong?" Asked him a little lost as her reaction.
"You truly un-blessed?" Whispered Eina for herself. She saw the damage he had done with his arrows, and the distance he could cover with it. Never had she heard that an un-blessed adventurer had such might. That why they tough that he lied at first, wanting to hide from which Familia he was. Now that she had the proof beneath her gaze, she couldn't but accept that he was indeed nothing, if extraordinarily strong, more than an average teen.
"How can you tell by seeing the core?" Asked him lost.
Breathing in, while shaking her head, she crouches down to his side, poking the core in his hand with the tip of her charcoal.
"I didn't tell you before, because I was thinking you were lowering your age. Cores react differently to people. First, you need to know that, each time we did an action, a faint trace of our stamina leaves behind a magical trace. This phenomenon is noticeable in monster hunting, for the simple reason that it what condense the magic inside the cores. When one kills a monster, this energy enters it, and seal the magic in, even if indirect, as long as your action is responsible to the monster's death, it would act. This is why we encourage party, because the more you hunt, the more stamina spend to condense cores.
You need to know that, through blessing, adventurer gathers Extalia, magic particles that 'up-grade' the body.
Another rule is that the older one is, the lesser are the chance for the body to accept the blessing.
Due to those previous rules, un-blessed adventurer, called level 0, crystalise the extalia they can't gather in the monster cores. Until receiving a blessing, all the Extalia are seals in the core. As you see, the golden specs inside prove that the entire extalia is sealed inside.
As those cores are overloads with magic, the guild generally brought them two times their basic values.
Regretfully, this also leads some unscrupulous gods to form a contract with unaware young. They would send them to the dungeon to kill monsters, bolstering they gain at the risk of their lives. If you encounter a god, accept nothing short a blessing, or they will exploit you." Explain Eina seriously, having seen too much of those used teen send to their deaths.
~~~
Eina explanation surprised Alex, as once again, nothing of the sort has happened in Danmachi. He was grateful for her words, as it prevented him from being swindled from the value of the cores and falling into a deadly trap, not that he had any intention to enter Orario so soon.
"Thank you, Miss Eina, for your warning; I will leave it to you to exchange them for me, then." Say his gratefully.
"Alright, I leave you to your work. That would make thing easier from our side, as you were the only one in your case, of overloaded cores are your own." Say her for herself, while walking to the tent to warn Misha of Alex situation.
~~~
Alex passed the rest of the day to retrieve cores while two soldiers would take off any un-broken arrows and charge the corpse to the nearest forming pyre.
All corpses were burning before sunset, even the three hob-goblins, already skinned, the would-be leather stored away.
"And, with this, our task is finally complete." Say Eina, looking as the last pyre was finally lighted. Turning to the gathered crowd, she and Misha took their tablets before calling the guards.
Each was first given the cores from shooting the goblins.
"It had been accounted that 587 goblins had been slain through battle. As it is customs through the guild guidebook, with a party under 40 members, each of you will receive 2%." Say Eina, while the soldiers give twelves cores to the families of the dead's guards. "The remaining 28% will be sold and the money shared under your own terms. Now Alex." Called Eina, turning to him, who stayed a little apart. As the trade was a private matter, she took him further from the group.
"The three hobgoblins will be evaluated, and their price adds to your additional spoil. Your kill had been evaluated at 359 goblins, 84 variants and three hobgoblins. In normal time this would traduct with 3.590; 2.520 and 210, but as yours are overloaded, the guild will give you 12.640 Valis. It may be a lot, but it's not." Say her immediatly, unwilling to give him false hope. Biting her lips a second, she added."If you plan to become an adventurer, I would advise you not to do it until you reach a better income. In the means time, try to accumulate some cores. We sell starting pack for 25.000 Valis at the guild. It contains a steel knife, a leather pair of glove, a stamina and health potion in. Few buy it, but it can save your life, more so for those who directly face hobgoblins.
Another option would be finding a job here but tries to avoid Orario until you're ready, alright? Life in Orario is high; without a starting income, you would not survive long. You wouldn't die, but gods usually hunt for desperate people to offer them a contract."
"I will, thank you for this precious advice, miss Eina." Said him with a thankful voice, a sight she wasn't familiar as all other new adventurers think themselves superior to pesky monsters."
"Then it goodbye, for now, Alex. Captain Marron will stay in the surrounding for another two days, tracking the trail of the hobgoblins before returning to Orario, take care." Say Eina saddened, she had found his presence refreshing and much more accustomably than those in the city.
"I will." nodded Alex.