Taddle Quest

Roko watched the questing beast from behind the trees as it rested in front of the entrance of the cave. It seemed to be looking around, waiting for Gavrav to return. Amathea sat on its back, unmoving, staring blankly at the ground. She wasn't fidgeting, looking nervous or for anyone to come help her. No behavior that would suggest she was kidnapped. Just a somber princess on the back of a giant beast. Something was definitely going on. How should he approach the situation?

Before he could think long, the cry of a falcon called from overhead as Aves landed on the branch of a tree not far from him.

"Right." Roko nodded, "If they're in position, let's get started."

Aves nodded and Akagami let out a low ruff, following Roko as he began to approach their targets. Upon coming into view, the questing beast hissed and stood up, apprehensive but not quite threatened enough to immediately run into the cave.

"Fancy seeing you here princess." Roko called, "I was under the impression you were being kidnapped."

"Roko..." Amathea replied blankly, "So you've come."

"I've been asked to come return you to the castle. There are quite a few people who are worried about you. The assumption is you've been kidnapped."

"...Can I ask you to tell everyone I won't be back for a while?"

"Sure, but I'll need a reason why."

"..."

"The current assumption is that Gaurav kidnapped you. That story's not going to change no matter what you tell me to say. So either way, Gaurav's going to get blamed for your disappearance no matter what unless you give us a little more details."

"...You wouldn't understand."

"Try me."

Amathea looked away, refusing to reply.

"Well, then how about I tell you exactly how the story is going to go right now if I just go back." Roko said, "So when I come back without you, an immediate reward will be put out for your safe return. Subsequently a bounty will be placed on Gaurav's head for your supposed kidnapping. Considering you're of royalty, the amount would be pretty massive."

"..."

"The story they'll tell is that you were forced into everything. The betting ring, the animal fighting, everything. And that you were kidnapped by Gaurav so he could squeeze money out of you. He'll be branded a traitor to your country and all blame will be forced on his shoulder. Imprisonment would just be the starting point. If they're feeling malicious, they could set up a completely unfair farce of a trial to get across every one of his wrongdoings and then some. Once public favor is against him, he won't be able to find work again, making him leave his hometown. If he's lucky, he might find work in another city but if I had to guess, he'd be lucky to start a new life in another country entirel-"

"No!" Amathea suddenly spoke up, alarmed but quickly quieted back down as she looked away again. But she couldn't hide the distress that haunted her mind.

"What else did you think would happen?" Roko pressed, "This is the normal response when you're around such high profile company. It's a miracle if they don't just immediately execute him."

"But..." Amathea's hands tightened over her arms, "Gaurav loves our country more than anyone."

"Country?" Roko said, "You mean the Kingdom of Fallor?"

"All the money that Gurav's made from this betting ring, he's been setting aside to help pay for public services in Fallor." Amathea explained, "Charities, infrastructure, military. He trained hard to become an accomplished knight to garner fame. He's always been doing things like this to try and boost our country's standing in the world."

"So he's a patriot." Roko shrugged, "Doesn't change the fact that he went too far this time."

"Yeah but..." Amathea said quietly, "To banish someone who loves their country so much...it doesn't feel right."

"Well they're not going to put blame on their own princess if they can avoid it. So it's either you let Gaurav face the consequences of his actions or you risk your own neck to...do what exactly?"

Amathea bit her lip, withdrawing into her mind to try and sort her thoughts.

"Or." Roko spoke up again, "You can ask me for help. And I'll do what I can to help both of you."

"You'll...help us?" Amathea looked at Roko, confused.

"I don't like Gaurav but I'm sure we can live without ever having to interact with each other in anyway in the future whatsoever." Roko shrugged, "I don't think Gaurav's the type to go over the edge so I don't think he needs to be jailed or anything. So if you don't want him to get crushed under the consequences of his own actions, I'd be happy enough to support you."

"R-Really?" Amathea gulped.

"Yeah. The exact details of what happens to Gaurav is up to the judge but between the victim and the enforcement both vying for leniency, I'm sure nothing too bad will happen. Worst thing that can happen, he'll be retired as your knight and really, that would be a good opportunity to get a new knight."

"..."

"So what do you think?" Roko offered the princess his hand, "Let's try and end things peacefully."

"No..." Amathea said quiet at first before she shouted, "No, I'm not leaving! Quess!"

Before Roko could react, the questing beast hissed and ran into the cave.

"Dammit, now we have to do this?!" Roko scowled as he began to run after them, "Aves, go tell Helena to get ready to intercept them!"

Aves nodded and flew off as Roko and Akagami entered the cave after the beast and the princess.

The questing beast was fast. That much Roko already knew. There wasn't a chance he could catch up with it if it was running at full speed. But now they were in a cave, one that barely had enough room for the beast and filled with irregular bumps and turns, slowing its speed immensely. Still not quite enough that Roko could catch up with it but he was managing to keep pace behind it. Though for how long, he didn't know, he was pretty winded already. The plan was to corner it at the end but Roko was starting to think he wasn't athletic enough depending on how long this cave was. So his mind began to turn to how he could force the questing beast to stop. And nothing came to mind as continued to run as fast as he could after the beast in question.

"Akagami." Roko gasped, "I don't suppose you can stop him somehow?"

Akagami barked confidently as he drew his wooden dagger from his side and sprinted forward, overtaking the questing beast before he spun around and landed a slice into the chest of the beast, slashing across its side as they passed each other. The questing beast hissed as it recoiled from the blow, stumbling to the side. But as Akagami soared past the questing beast, the questing beast's tail whipped around and slammed the wolf into the side of the cave.

"Akagami!" Roko cried as he quickly stopped to check up on Momo's pet.

Akagami was whining a little but almost too quiet to tell. The poor animal tried to pick himself back up but fell back down, unable to put weight on the injured leg that was bitten by the Gytrash a few nights ago.

"Stay back and return to Momo when you can move." Roko ordered, "Let her know where we are once she's dealt with Gaurav, just in case."

Akagami didn't seem happy about the decision but barked affirmatively as Roko turned back to the questing beast. The beast was still stumbling forward a bit from the wolf's attack but quickly recovered and before he knew it, Roko was back to running full speed after the giant animal, delving further into the dark cave.

There was a sharp regret Roko had for giving that early order. Not only did it result in Akagami getting harmed but he was now short one more option for combating the questing beast. But his options weren't that good anyway. He could barely keep up, much less attempt any sort of action. What could he do now other than chase? If he wanted to get a leg up on on the questing beast, he'd need something sort of advantage to leverage over it. If he knew the layout of this cave, he'd probably fare better. But there was no way he could-

What if he used analyze?

Roko mind froze even as his feet continued to propel him forward. The thought had just wandered into his mind and his immediate reaction was that it was impossible. A spell of that level and complexity was completely out of his power level. On the other hand, scan does outline the target while analyze provides tracking. Maybe if he could mix the two...but how would he even do that? He's never even heard of mixing spells in class before but there wasn't any harm in trying right? Isolate one part of scan in his mind and since scan doesn't work on inanimate objects, the base spell should be analyze right? So the castphrase he should use is,

"Analyze."

Directing his eyes at the ground, an orange ring seemed to burst out of the ground and roll over their the surface of their surroundings. Passing over Roko, the questing beast, everything until it began to disappear off into the distance where Roko could no longer see or feel it. From how neither the questing beast or Amathea seemed to react to this pulse, Roko assumed that nobody could actually see or feel this magic like he did. And before long, a 3D map in orange appeared in his vision, revealing an intricate system of tunnels that Roko did not expect. A small moving light on the map marked what Roko assumed was his location. Roko had figured it was a straight path through the mountain but there seemed to be a few different paths they could take. Examining it a bit further, there was a somewhat straight path they could take if they took the right paths but was that the right idea? The turn was coming up soon so he would have to think quickly. Roko muddled it over a moment. Then drew his sword.

The path will split into two in a moment. The left path was the straightway to the end of the cave where Helena was waiting. And from what he could tell, that was exactly the direction that the questing beast was going to take. So Roko took up his sword and threw it, stabbing it into the wall of the left path. Startled by the sudden attack, the questing beast changed direction down the right path, as Roko intended. He stopped for an instant to pull his sword out of the wall before following the questing beast towards the right path.

Now the path they were going down does loop back to the exit. If you could make a 20 feet wide jump across a chasm. Something that Roko had no doubt that the questing beast could make. But this was prime opportunity for the questing beast to lose him, if he could make the jump. Roko moved the sling that was still holding the egg he has been taking care off to his chest for safety. All of a suddenly, the questing beast scrambled to a stop as the road ended into a sharp drop. It looked down to see another tunnel it could jump to, down at the chasm that stretched out into the darkness and back at Roko who had fallen behind for a few seconds after manipulating them to this point. The questing beast shifted its body, readying itself, before it jumped. Roko made one last dash and jumped as well, grabbing onto the tip of the questing beast's tail, holding on for dear life as he was pulled across the chasm. Desperate to not fall into the darkness below, Roko gripped the tail with his hand while holding onto his sword with the other. The moment the questing beast landed on the other side, Roko could feel the tail swing up as the beast braced itself against the recoil from its own landing. At this point, Roko let go of the tail, using the momentum to sail forward, over the head of the questing beast, twisting his body in midair to land on his feet. Skidding across the ground, Roko managed to stop himself before he could fall and looked up at the questing beast, now with his back to a chasm and with him barring the way forward.

"You want to try this again?" Roko gasped.

The questing beast hissed and lunged forward, baring it's fangs at Roko. Roko brought up his sword and blocked the attack, pushing his sword against the snarling snake head as it bared its fangs at him.

"Quess, no! Stop!" Amathea cried out and began pulling back on the thrashing beast.

The questing beast reared back as Amathea tried to stop it from attacking Roko. The questing beast struggled against Amathea's attempts before it slammed back down and swung its huge head around to smash Roko into the side of the cave. Roko coughed as he felt a few bones crack under the impact and his fatigue begin to drag his mind into unconsciousness. Fighting to keep his vision intact, Roko could feel the questing beast stumbled past him.

"W-Wait..." Roko said as he pushed himself up, "Don't...you..."

Roko pushed himself onto his feet, the more the fought, the more he regained control over his struggling instincts, stumbling after the questing beast as fast as he could. According to the map, there was another split road ahead of them and if he couldn't get the beast to take the left path which would return them back to the path towards the exit, they would be going deeper into the cave network. If he couldn't at least see which path they took, they would no longer have any good way to find them, much less catch up with them. Roko ran as fast as he could, propping himself up against the wall as he watched the beast come up to the split path ahead...and see it turn right.

"No, not that way!" Roko cried but to no avail as the questing beast began to enter the rightmost path.

Unable to stop them, Roko could only watch as the beast carried the princess deeper into the cave...until a sharp roar came from down the tunnel and the questing beast was attacked, pinned against the wall by a manticore.

"Ctesias?!" Roko said, surprised.

"Owowow..." Amathea picked herself up after she was thrown off the questing beast from the sudden attack.

"Nya!"

A small creature leaped off from the manticore's back and ran up to Amathea.

"Nyinx?!" Amathea cried, as she picked up her pet sphinx, "What are you doing here?!"

Nyinx just purred as it cuddled up in Amathea's arms. With the questing beast held against the wall, Roko breathed a sigh of relief and stumbled over,

"Good thing you didn't go down that way." Roko said, "This cave gets pretty complicated, "You might've never found your way out."

"Roko..." Amathea looked at him with a pained expression on her face, "I'm sorry. I'll return with you peacefully now."

"...Let's try this again." Roko knelt down, "If we try really hard, we can hide any mention of names leaking out around this incident. The most relevant parties will probably know the details but if you try, you can probably keep them from causing a stir. I can help hide you but it's up to you to keep Gaurav by your side. Got it?"

Amathea looked surprised at Roko's words but slowly a soft genuine smile appeared on her tired face, "Yes! Thank you!"

"Good." Roko sighed, "Then can you answer a question for me?"

"What is it?"

"Why do you want Gaurav to be your knight so badly?"

"...He promised me that he'd teach me how to be more confident."

"Putting aside whenever or not he actually did anything like that for you, you could just have someone else help you. Why Gaurav specifically?"

"...Gaurav loves his country."

"So I've heard."

Roko waited patiently as Amathea fidgeted, uncomfortable with the answer she knew she had to give. Roko was about to drop the question when Nyinx noticed her discomfort and reached up with her paw trying to touch her partner's face. Seeing this, Amathea cuddled her little pet more.

"Gaurav know how to make the country better." Amathea replied, "He has the ideas. He has the strength. He has the love. I… ...I'm...so scared. I don't know what I'm doing. I'm too scared to speak. I'm a failure of a princess. In comparison, I'm..."

Amathea shuddered as she began a soft, quiet crying. Something she was clearly putting all her efforts into suppressing. Seeing this, Roko breathed a huge sigh.

"I was wondering if I'd ever meet someone like you."

"Huh?" Amathea looked up, confused.

"Every princess I've come across have been so frighteningly competent. No fear or doubt. No need for orders or worry. It's really quite disconcerting at times."

"Eh?" Amathea blinked, "Eh? Eh?"

"It's normal to have fears." Roko said, "It's normal to not know what to do. That just makes you the most relatable princess I've seen in this entire school. But give yourself a little bit of credit. All this talk about what you're scared of, you haven't said you wanted to stop being a princess. You've never tried to run away from all this. That's amazing in its own right."

Amathea looked away as her face began to grow red from embarrassment, "T-Thank you..."

"All that's left is to find your way forward." Roko said as he got up, "And it seems you already have an idea of how you want to proceed. You just have to focus on it."

Amathea rubbed some tears out of her eyes and nodded.

"Let's get out of here then." Roko said as he offered Amathea his hand.

Amathea reached out to accept Roko's help before a large hiss alerted everyone to the questing beast. The beast suddenly pushed itself up, throwing Ctesias off before slamming the monster against the wall. Stumbling back onto its feet, the questing beast reached down bit onto the back of Amathea's shirt, lifting her up in its mouth.

"What?!" Amathea cried as Nyinx fell out of her arms and landed on the ground.

"What the-" Roko tried to get in front of the questing beast but its tail whipped around and threw him away behind the beast. Roko brought his arms up to protect the egg on his chest from getting hit and managed to land on his feet but the questing beast was already running away, back up the path they came and running around the wall into the left path.

"Wait..." Roko grimaced as he moved the egg back down to the side of his belt and ran after them again.

Roko was able to rest slightly after talking with Amathea so he managed to catch up with the dashing beast but he was still unable to overtake it. The path they were taking did lead back to the surface where Helena and Roland were waiting but he had to do something as well. And there was something he could do. In a few moments, the path will lead into a sharp drop. About a seven feet long drop before continuing on towards the surface. A normal person could easily carefully drop down safely and such a fall would be nothing for the questing beast but there wasn't enough room to jump down the wall while keeping momentum. The beast will have to stop and land before returning to a run. In that instant, Roko could jump right off and land on the questing beast's back. Hopefully from there, he could figures out some way to stop the beast, rescue Amathea or maybe hinder it in some way to help Helena and Roland when they reach the end of the cave. And in no time, Roko could see the drop he was anticipating appearing in front of them. Like he thought, the questing beast slowed down and made a small hop to land on the ground beneath, completely stalled by the tight walls of the cave. Breaking into a sprint, Roko made an early jump, throwing enough forward momentum to fall over the edge, making the shortest jump he could to try and land on the questing beast. But as he fell, he could see the haunch of the questing beast pull up and in one fearful instant, Roko could see the beast's rear legs aim up at him. The questing beast kicked, landing a critical hit against Roko's entire body, slamming him into the stalactite lined ceiling of the cave. As Roko fell and his mind began to shut down, he could feel his bones crunching and rocks falling. In the distance, Roko could hear the questing beast run off as he slammed into the edge of the drop and fell off it onto the ground once more. His vision dimming and mind failing, Roko was certain he was dead as the rocks from the ceiling fell on top of him.

And then Roko woke up. It was a slow wake up, barely comprehending the fact that his mind and body was starting to work again until his mind finally caught up and he began try and observe what was happening to him. And what he saw was the ceiling of the cave. The stalactites where he was slammed into were now flattened. They probably broke off and fell. After they stabbed into his body. Perhaps they were still in his body. But then how was he still alive?

"Roko?! Roko, speak to me!"

Trying to turn his neck, head and eyes upwards, Roko could see a familiar face he hadn't seen in a while, "Corissa?"

"Oh thank goodness!" Corissa smiled, "I'm so glad I managed to find you!"

"What's going on?" Roko tried to look around to limited success but he managed to see something in the edges of his eyes. Something that was pulsing over his body. And now Roko was able sense some sort of slimy substance covering his entire body.

"What is this?" He asked, still a bit too delirious to express the right confusion he was feeling in his voice.

"It's Sumi!" Corissa cried happily, "She's my pet slime!"

"Your slime?" Roko said, "Is she eating me?"

"No! Sumi's a healing slime!"

"A...healing slime?"

"Yeah! I've been spending the entire week trying to turn my slime into the type of slime that I wanted! Stephen told me all about how many different kinds of slimes there are but they're all scary so I wanted to make my own type of slime! A healing slime!"

"..."

"It took a lot of effort. I had to look for a ton of healing herbs but that didn't work quite well so I tried giving it a ton of healing potions but it still wasn't working quite well. In the end, I had to actually feed Sumi some actual wounds before she finally understood. Look! She's even a pretty pink color!"

"...So I'm not dead."

"You were in a really bad situation when I found you." Corissa nodded, "I had to dig you out of the rocks and you were so beaten and broken that there was no way we could carry you back to the castle to receive help in time. Thankfully, I knew this would happen so I bought Sumi along."

"You knew?" Roko said, his brain still catching up, "About everything?"

"Everything." Corissa nodded, "The fighting ring, Gaurav, Amathea, everything."

"How?"

"Information networks."

Roko groaned.

"Just kidding." Corissa giggled, "Helena and Kaguya were kind enough to keep me filled in on what was going on. Sorry I couldn't help. I was really focused on training Sumi. I really wish I could've been there. A masked party sounds like so much fun."

"Hnn...nggghhh..." Roko grunted as he tried to push himself up.

"Don't strain yourself!" Corissa yelped, "You're still healing!"

"Corissa?! Is that you?"

"Sir Stephen!" Corissa cried as their teacher ran up to them, "Everything's okay here!"

"I see." Stephen winced as he looked at Roko's condition, "That's good."

"You came in the direction of the cave exit." Roko winced, "You have to know, what happened to Amathea and the questing beast?"

"We've managed to capture it and retrieve Amathea safely. Helena and Roland were having trouble subduing it until Varis arrived."

"I see."

"I'm so glad to see everyone alright." Stephen breathed a sigh of relief, "Err...for the most part. Momo managed to defeat and restrain Gaurav as well. Rest assured, I'll make sure Gaurav gets his due punishment for everything he's done."

"Don-" Roko groaned again as he struggled to push himself up to a sit, "Don't...do anything to Gaurav."

"What do you mean?!" Stephen cried, "He's the one responsible for everything!"

"Don't do anything." Roko repeated firmly, "Don't even let anybody hear about the names related to this incident."

"But why?!"

"I'll...tell you tomorrow..." Roko moaned again as his head began to grow dizzy again, "Just...please."

"...Alright. The return of all the animals to the forest has been postponed to tomorrow so we can wait until then."

"Oh that's right, I forgot we were going to return them to the forest!" Corissa cried, "I was kind of hoping to keep Sumi..."

"Sumi..." Stephen said grimly, "So you made you slime into a healing slime?"

"Yeah! It took a lot of effort!"

"I see." Stephen shook his head, "I'm...sorry. Sumi...your slime might not survive in the wild very well now."

"What?! Why?!" Corissa cried.

"A wild ecology is balanced by eating and being eaten." Stephen explained, "By making your slime a healing slime, you've made it so their main diet, what they're going to seek out to eat, are wounds. Healing slimes attach themselves to dying and wounded animals and survive by 'eating' and healing those wounds. Maybe that will work for a while but what if it finds a wounded predator? Even if it latches on and heals that animal, the predator might turn around and try to eat her."

"What?! Why would they do that?!"

"It's just how the wild works. Charity is something that's not commonly observed by animals. When a creature recovers from near death, they tend to be pretty hungry and your slime is also a convenient snack. The only paths forward for your slime now is to continue to risk her own life healing others or to develop into a different kind of slime with a different diet that'll allow her to survive more easily but then she wouldn't be a healing slime anymore."

"No way..." Corissa said, horrified, "Sumi..."

The pink slime around Roko began to gather up and move off of him, moving over to Corissa in a strangely concerned way. Corissa looked at her slime and quietly hugged it, holding back some tears that leaked from her eyes.

"Could we not keep it around?" Roko asked, "We could keep her in the castle. She'd be a massive asset."

"I don't doubt that Zadkiel would allow it." Stephen sighed, "But a creature with healing powers is supremely valuable. You know how useful unicorns are and they don't even close wounds. If we keep the slime...Sumi around, she'll just become a target for greedy humans and honestly, that's more dangerous than wild animals. If we can't keep her safe she might suffer abuse from humans but in a wild environment, she might be able to evolve into a form that can survive. We prepared these animals to live in the forest and we can't just decide to keep one around. We plan on isolating the Paramnesia Wildwoods for a year or two to help foster its growth as well so she's really much safer here, relatively."

"But-"

"It's okay." Corissa spoke up, "It's fine. I'm sorry, Sumi..."

Stephen scratched his head, looking guilty, "Look, we can talk about it tomorrow. When you're ready, come join us outside the cave. We have prepared a way to return to the castle easily so we'll be waiting."

And with that the teacher left. Roko sat there for a moment, letting his body build up strength again as Corissa quietly continued to hug her pet slime. Roko tried to think of something to say, someway he could convince them to keep Sumi instead of returning her to the wild but he couldn't really gather his thoughts together without his head starting to pulse with pain. Frustrated with his condition, Roko pooled his strength together and pulled himself onto his feet.

"Roko?" Corissa looked up.

"Let's go." Roko said, "We can rest and think at the castle. No point in staying here."

"But wait, your egg is missing!" Corissa cried, "I didn't have time to mention it before but it's gone!"

Roko reached down to the sash that usually carried the egg he was entrusted with. Sure enough, the egg was missing. Probably lost when he was knocked into the ceiling.

"We need to find it!" Corissa cried as she stood up and ran over to the rubble, "Even if its broken now, we need to confirm it! Maybe it's still intact! Maybe we can restore it!"

Roko watched as Corissa began to dig through the rock and sighed.

"Leave it."

"Huh?!" Corissa turned around, surprised, "But your egg!"

"It's fine." Roko said as he turned around and began to leave, "If it's dead, it's dead. If it's not, it'll find a way to survive on its own."

"But..." Corissa looked conflicted.

"It's fine." Roko repeated, "I'm confident it will find a way to live without me. Let's go."

Roko began to walk off. Corissa glanced back at the debris, clearly strongly conflicted but ultimately, she stood up and followed Roko out of the cave. Bringing a somber end to this adventure.