Quests at Last?

Hurriedly escaping the old man, Foo soon arrived at the adventurers' guild by following the signs. To his great dismay, he could actually see the inn in the distance further away down the street. He just happened to take the wrong direction. It was a 50 percent chance, so it is highly understandable...

Ignoring all negative thoughts, he pumped up his enthusiasm and entered the guild. Quest time!

The room was quite deserted, only a pair of new faces was sitting at the tables, talking at a reasonable volume. A bit curious about where everyone where, Foo approached the desk instead of looking for a quest right away.

At the desk stood Einar, greeting Foo enthusiastic when he approached. He had clearly not heard about the food bill yet. "Greetings Branch Master!" He said. But Foo again refused this title: "No please! I am clearly unqualified to be a branch master. I cannot possible take up this heavy role. I am just an adventurer passing by."

Einar became disappointed when he heard that Foo were planning on leaving. But deep inside he was relieved, as he too were afraid of this catastrophe on legs. Orders from above said that he should try to keep him as a branch master, whatever it took. But what if he offended him? That would be a disaster! So he could only sigh.

"Where are everyone?" Foo asked. "Hmm?" Einar, answered. A bit at a loss on what to say. He couldn't possibly say `The were so afraid of you that they all run away!`. So he had to choose his words carefully. "They... went to do a quest in the capital. The rewards were pretty good, so they all wanted to give it a try. It is a quite boring quest though, and the rewards only involves a branch master position." He was lying through his teeth. There was indeed a quest at the capital, but it would normally not even be worth the transportation fee. The part about the branch master position was also a complete lie. He cleverly used it as Foo showed some disinterest in this branch master position. Things would, after all, get quite awkward if Foo started to ask questions about this quest.

As Einar had hoped, Foo lost all curiosity about the quest after he heard about it. He then went back to his original goal. "Hey, do you know if there is any goblin subjugation quest around here?" This is a classic first quests for adventurers! Well, herb gathering was also a classic first quest, but that was just way too boring! As Foo was quite confident in his fighting skills, he had after all quite some experience from all the fighting games he had played, he instead choose the goblin route instead.

"Ah, yes" Einar answered. "There is one for subjugating goblins here in the forest. There should be around three goblins that have set up a camp near a mine. They propagate quite quickly, so it is important to get rid of them as soon as possible. It came in yesterday, and no one have taken it yet." Handing him a paper with a map and instructions. But then he became worried, and looked at Foo with a concerned gaze. "But are you sure you can handle them? I do not think that they can understand your words, so your attacks are likely ineffective."

Foo wanted to cry. ``What do you think about me?! That I can only attack others with words? Just because my opponent fell before i could attack, you think i am incapable of attacking?`` It took some minutes before Foo could squeeze out the words: "No, i will be fine! I am quite confident with my combat skills!"

"Ah, yes!" Einar exclaimed, clearly enlightened. "Even the heavens would caught blood and faint because of your words, so how can some mere goblins stand a chance?!"

Now tears really were threatening to fall from Foo's eyes. ``Are you praising me? Why do I feel that you are insulting me instead?!`` It took Foo's entire willpower to refrain from showing Einar his combat proficiency first hand. With a great self control, Foo walked out of the guild, ignoring Einar's cheering that more likely than not held praises for his potent words.

``Gah!`` Foo thought. ``Time to vent some feelings on some goblins!`` Civilized men like Foo would not argue and fight with others just because they spoke some harsh words. No, like a true gentleman they went and brutally slaughtered some innocent monsters instead.