Parting the Party

„hurry up dhstell! we need to get to the other side of the universe in 1 hour. unless you want to pay the absurd amount of costs from using the transport rift over that distance and we already will struggle to reach there in time using gates"

„i heard you alright. i told you that i don't want to go there anyways why would i care about some dum humans"

„you do know that i also are a ‚dum human' and besides i too came to riastehc to help you"

„you don't count you are way stronger"

„you pretend that rakte are somehow better than humans while knowing that they lak slightly behind"

„aarrrggh, ok ok i understand i can't win an argument against you. let's just go"

2 figures ran across the streets too fast for the normal person to even see but definitely feel as they got pushed away. they both stopped in front of an entrance behind which was visible a huge gate with a green squirling liquid like substance filling it. around it where thick walls with guards patrolling them. at the entrance was a long queue of people waiting to get through.

„why is there so much traffic today? we need to get through 20 of these and with this we would take over a day"

„i told you we should go earlier"

„no i told you that and you said that it would be fine waisting time"

she ignored him them clench her fists

„i don't see the problem with this we just need to break through"

she started to run but but immediately hit an invisible wall

„i thought you two wanted to watch the newcomers of earth, but i kinda expected this. i am not just giving those away for free so pay me back later"

another woman came towards them, in her hand holding 2 golden tickets

„your a life saver helictair. next time i see you i'll pay you back"

both went to the second ticket counter that only had 2 other people waiting there and with no time got to the gate gate walking through it to the next city

„you are always so chaotic kamaron. how can you plan something that takes hundreds of years but not be time there when the second act ends?"

lüziel, rina, marth, elise and bob where surrounded by so many other people that they couldn't even see where they where. they heard lot's of shouting but couldn't make out what it was.

„what is this, who are all these people"

marth was pushing some people away to get to the rest

„looks to me like they gathered all the winners"

the crowd stopped moving when a figure appeared looking similar to yhvlton

„i can understand you confusion so let me explain the third act. this act is all about clearing different missions to reach the final graduation mission. you are free to do whatever missions you can pick up and get rewarded with completion points depending on the difficulty and when you earned 1 000 000 you can do the graduation mission. you are not forced to do this but it will give you lots of advantages so it is advised to work towards the goal of graduation. if you have questions you can search out the tower guild you can see down the street, they will provide you with necessary information. you are now also able to use the entire system and will be able to earn tallon via missions or jobs. in addition you have to care for your own lodging and food."

the yhvlton like being snapped and they started to hear people calling out for them like a market place seller. the crowd started to disperse and move towards those calls but some waited and stayed back looking at will happen. under them where lüziel, rina, marth, elise and bob. they where now able to see what was before them seeing a large bustling city.

„so now starts the part of the rpg where you have to grind with side quests to get to the final boss"

marth was attempting to move out but got stopped by elise and bob who both started to speak at once. bob decided to let elise go first who reluctantly accepted

„i have to leave you. i got completely destroyed in the last mission and i don't even know what i should have done against it. i will first have to search the thing i was missing before i feel comfortable to not fall behind the rest of you"

„but you could just learn with us together why do you need to leave"

rina was looking sad at her partially because of her recent loss but also because of elises announced department

„i have seen clearly that i was lacking something very important and i would just be a hindrance while you can focus on the goal ahead if i only chase my past"

„you sound so humble. i didn't even know you know how to do that"

„get over here you dork and i show you how humble i really are"

elise was grabbing marth putting him in a tight grip with her arm around his neck.

„that hurts you madman"

„i too want to leave the group. i don't think that i am fit for you. i joined because i thought i could protect others but in the end i was the one who got protected and it took me so long to figure out how i could finish my mission that i wan't to instead seek out what this new world has. i was not sure to go on next but now that this is what s next i know that i don't have to fight any more."

„no not you too. in that case i forbid you to leave"

rina was tightly holding on to marth who was still in elises grip

„could you both maybe let go of me"

„it seems that we will for now part ways but i'm sure we meet again"

„don't think i'm just running away. when i have found my answer i will quickly catch up to you"

elise was letting go of marth proudly announcing her glorious return she plans to do

„just you wait if i come back i will be stronger than anybody else you have seen"

„if we really do this than we should at least have some form of contact. if this is a message feature it surely can safe someones number"

marth was clicking randomly on buttons in the message window and then found an add friend feature. within it stated that you have to overlay this window with someone else's to add them

„there we have it. all of us should add each other."

they all pulled out their message window and after a bit of searching got to the part marth was on, then they overplayed the windows and whenever they did the name the appropriate person appeared.

„this now means goodby. i am sure we will se us again at some point"

both boba and elise waved goodbye and went towards the crowed. as marth, lüziel and rina wanted to go they saw a big commotion in the distance with people being moving aside as if making space for someone.

„finally we're here. we don't know if they already got snatched up by other guilds or teams so you search from the right and i the left"

„and what am i supposed to do. i am not someone who can just make people follow them."

„just knock 'em out, WITHOUT KILLING, and get him or her to a side street without being noticed. i hope you know how to restrain yourself"

the person he spoke to started to run and then jump on the rooftops to get a better view. he also started to run using the main street first to get to the dock. while running he tried to doge as many people as he could but simply pushed away those that where in the way. when he reached the dock he was surprised by something very unexpected, there standing where not one but two. he opened his chat and wrote at his companion.

„i found them. get over here and get the other."

„two but there was only 1 supposed to be"

„doesn't matter just come and get the girl"

he could hear behind him that she was approaching by the big commotion she made but that didn't matter at the moment and he just ran at lüziel, knocked him out with a hit on the neck and then ran away carrying him in a time frame to fast for anyone else to notice what even was happening. right behind hime came she to pick up rina the same way and they both disappeared in a side street. all marth could see was that in the blink of an eye lüziel and rina disappeared after some shadows appeared in front of them. he barely could notice where the shadows went but pinned it down to the side street being the only place in the direction the seemed to move being a spot where you could hide. he tried to get as fast as he could through the crowd to where they possibly went and when he reached there he could see a man carrying lüziel and rina right next to a woman who had a conversation that promptly got interrupted when he popped up behind the corner.

„…two of them. where is there!"

„i told you to not get noticed this just makes this more annoying to deal with"

„how could i know that one of the newbies had a high level observation skill"

„what do you want from lüziel and rina!"

they both looked at him then continued their dialogue

„i guess a friend makes it to. he noticed not because he could notice us but because he noticed them disappear and he was just luck enough to search here first"

„well I DON'T CARE. i am not a babysitter so this is your problem now"

with those words the woman walked down the street with her 9 tails moving wildly around.

„why do you always have such a short attention span. you know that you still owe me something when i alone checked riastehcs ports because you couldn't bother to do so."

„that's why i did help you right now"

„absolutely no sense of duty if it doesn't interest her. you over there you are those guys friend right? come with me. and this is by the way not a request but a threat if you value your live."

he was picking up rina and then move down the street to catch up to the woman. for marth there was nothing left to do but just follow and hope that he get's some answers if he does. they walked a good while in a hard to keep up tempo for marth when they finally reached a stairway up a hill on which's top was a lookout platform overviewing the city.

„can't we just kill him. no one would care if we do so and it saves us a lot of work"

„you know you could just have gone back if you really wanted to"

„and pay for the transport? in that case i rather would do this nonsense"

„can you please tell me whats going on."

when marth said that did the woman go to a nearby bench and laid herself down pretending to sleep.

„i think fist thing on the agenda is an introduction. i am kamaron the rude one over there is dhstell and you could say we are doing something like a guild recruitment"

„and you kidnap people for that"

„i did say it is just kind of like a recruitment"

kamaron was turning around to lüziel and rina who he had dropped on a bench patting them on the cheek attempting to wake them up.

„no reaction maybe a bit of water would help. you don't have any water at hand do you?"

„why would i we just came here, more importantly what do you want from us we have nothing to offer"

„except for your life. i didn't really expect you to have much of anything, just take this and get some water from the fountain down the stairs with this. we can talk when all of you can listen"

he was pulling out of the menu a drinking bottle and threw it at marth but in a speed that he did not expect bouncing off his face. this lead to some laughter coming from the bench where dhstell was ‚sleeping'.

„sorry i expected you to you know react to that"

marth was rubbing his forehead and then pick up the bottle from the ground going down tho the fountain while muttering to himself

„they don't really seem like bad people but what could they want from lüziel and rina in specific. but at the same time they speak about killing others like it's nothing"

as he came up kamaron where just sitting and waiting there

„if that doesn't wake them up than we just have to wait. at least no one is here right now because the second act just ended"

kamaron was taking the bottle from marth and just chugged the content at lüziel and rina who woke up very distressed and confused.

„what i ha-a-ahh. why does my neck hurt this much when i move it"

lüziel was holding his neck with his hand while making some pain filled expressions

„i think i don't feel so good, everything is swirling"

rina on the other hand looked like she would throw up any minute

„great you hit her to hard. don't you know what the word restrained means"

dhstell was just shrugging with her shoulders and didn't even bother to open her eyes. kamaron was pulling out a bottle from the menu and then took some pills out of it

„here take them. that will make it better, i hope"

„you hope? i don't even know who you are and you expect that we take pills where you hope they work"

„why is this so annoying! just take it or leave it, i really don't care as longs as you don't die"

marth was walking up to lüziel who was right now in his protection mode

„just take them, i doubt that that would be the way he would attempt to harm us from what i have seen"

marth was taking the pills and gave them to rina who happily without thinking chugged them down

„marth? so like do you know them?"

„no clue, they just picked you up right in front of me and then brought you here"

lüziel looked at kamaron who was right now in the process of convincing dhstell to stand up

„HE KIDNAPED US AND YOU ARE JUST CASUALLY STANDING THERE!"

bhind him lüziel heard a loud bluargh followed by seeing when he turned around a rina bent over the bushes

„are you ok?"

„yes! it feels like i just got rid of all the haziness with that"

„well you don't look like your totally ok"

marth was looking at rinas shaking knees

„that just comes from the nausea. but now she probably should eat something, there is a cafe near here that has some good earth based food"

kamaron was jumping back the moment he said that they should eat something followed by dhstell standing up faster than she laid down before shouting

„to the cafe!"

„well and that. at least dhstell will not annoy us while eating"

„and i don't even care that you said that if you pay"

„what is even going on, why are we waking up in this random place and now are supposed to follow the same people that kidnaped us"

lüziel was majorly confused looking at marth and rina who just followed them

„i get that rina doesn't really think about this situation but you"

marth was shrugging his shoulders

„it's not like they couldn't force us to get somewhere they already did it once and i also don't have the feeling that they would want to harm us and i do believe in my skills to gauge people"

at the cafe they took a seat a bit hidden by trees in the corner

„so you promised to explain things now do it"

marth was looking tense at kamaron with lüziel joining him while rina and dhstell where fixated on the menu card

„this is all so normal. where are the interesting alien foods"

rina was looking disappointed at kamaron

„i did say this is a human cafe. you wouldn't know what to order anyways if you don't know what is sold"

kamaron was calling over a waitress then everybody ordered

„don't just ignore my question this nonchalantly"

„there is a lot to say so this will take time anyways. let's start with the basics. you know nothing about the third act outside of that useless introduction you got right"

„well it's not our fault for immediately getting knocked out"

lüziel was starting to loosen up realizing that his and marth tens attitude was not befitting of this

„i just couldn't let others get you so i simply took the path of least resistance. you saw the others waiting on the path in front of you, that where guilds or solo groups trying to recruit new people."

„then that unfair you didn't even give us a choice"

rina was angrily pouting

„in the end all that matters is what comes out of it. you aren't even that bad off with this as there are not only people who want to help but also those who search cheap labor with the people that don't know any better."

„and that makes you different how?"

marth witty comment didn't concern kamaron who just continued

„in the case of humans this can get especially vicious as humans stand at rank 17 of the species so a lot of people of lower ranked species want to abuse that boost themself. at lest they don't know that humans actually would stand around rank 9 to 6 with some better measurements or it would be even worse."

„diffrent races? wait a minute…"

marth was looking at dhstells tails suddenly changing his entire expression and posture. he now realized what he was looking at, 9 fluffy white tails with red tips, pointy ears on top of the head, a flattened nose with next to them whiskers, slim eyes with vertical pupils and sharp claws for finger nails there was only one explanation for this. kamaron who knew what was about to come tried to stop him before he said it but he realized to late

„… a cat person!"

with a loud bahm did flew marth out of his seat right into the wall leaving a hole in it. that by itself was not as surprising to kamaron but what piqued his interest was when rina suddenly screamed in pain

„i expected him to learn flying but this is quite something. i don't expect that you are simple extremely empathetic. wait let me see our back"

without hesitation went kamaron to rina pulling down on her clothe at the neck seeing a tattoo like symbol on her back

„what are you doing!"

„sit down boi do you even know what this is. this is an extremely rare curse. i could probably count the number of people i know that still live and are able to use something like is with 2 hands"

„i don't know the one who did our last mission said that this was something to let rina grow"

kamaron was going over to lüziel shaking him viciously

„tell me who was it, what madman would give this to someone completely new. this might as well be a death sentence for 99% of people"

„his name was like krif, no i think it was cliff or something like that"

„cliff? is he trying to ruin our plan or is he trying to help he sure had an idea and now he did this…"

while kamaron was mumbling something lüziel couldn't understand he realized that no one in the surroundings payed attention to the knocked out marth in the wall except for an extremely angry waitress who walked over to them

„you are 4th act right that means you will pay for this. it is your job to tell them about the dos and don'ts."

„why does this sound as if it where something normal to happen?"

the waitress looked at lüziel and angrily continued

„this happens so often when humans see rakte but NORMALLY when a 4th act one is guiding them they are supposed to teach you some manners"

„she is talking about calling rakte cats. it no matter what something you should't do to call any race by the animal you know that closest resembles them as it is quite insulting to put them on the level of animals. in case like racte and humans where the races are relatively close it's not uncommon that those words become heavy insults of mockery."

„i nothing like those dumb miserly cats. save that deep in your brain or i will burn it in there myself"

dhstell was waving wildly wis her fork at lüziels head. a flop sound brought lüziel attention back to marth who was now lying on the ground bleeding out of his head while rina was still whimpering on her seat

„do something! it's your fault that he is injured"

„well technically not but your right that i can't just let him bleed out that would make cleanup way more expensive. this will be an expensive day"

he was pulling out bandages and went over to marth. he lifted him up a bit and then started to tightly wrap them around marths entire head.

„i'm amazed how small his injury are"

„i am not just some berserker but i know that thats something you choose to forget every time"

kamaron picked up marth went over to the waitress and did something with the menu which lead to her happily going away then he put marth on a chair before sitting down again

„now back to you. that curse you have is dangerous, i could remove it with a lot of work but if cliff did this i will just observe for now. if you ever feel like you can't take it anymore come to me. under those who know of it it has gotten the nickname soul breaker. you could just choose to lay low for now and wait out the time but those who choose to not do that will with absolute certainty change their character and in only few cases it's for the better"

„if you can remove it why won't you. you pretend to care about us but if rina has something called ‚soul breaker' thats just ok"

„though about what the word punishment means. you think that those tiny wounds are anything mention worthy. if you really think that is so bad i could just punch a bit harder next time to end it right here"

dhstell was shortly stopping to eat to say that but returned immediately back to her work

„it's not THAT simple but i trust in cliffs judgment as he will probably be forced through watching everything you did before making your end of act 2 mission"

„and what are we supposed to do with that now!"

„stop it lüziel, i choose to go through this. what meaning would it have for me to try to oppose the examiner when i am not ready for the consequences"

rina who now loked better again stoped lüziels complains

„at least she has some guts"

dhstell was giving a few claps to rinas speech

„i think that should be enough of this. we completely derailed right now. what i was meant to say is that those people at the harbor where scouts to get the beginners into binding contracts and depending on their prestige there are all kinds of mischievous things going on. those who are trying to pick up high rated races often do salve contracts while extremely big organizations make extortion contracts."

„isn't that the same?"

„pretty much. if you're lucky you either get a mid size organization or a real party. those search legitimate members. also the race specific guilds are not the worst even if they often lack on resources. another option would be to go completely without. that has a high death ratio as you need to figure out many key informations yourself but it does lead to some strong individual people."

„and that would make you? when are you pulling out your contract"

lüziel was looking halve stern halve questioning at kamaron

„don't worry about that we neither need new members noir resources. let's call this voluntary work what we are doing. our goal is to pick out the strong ones and let them grow up properly"

„why is she so means then"

rina was pointing at dhstell who was twitching with her ears when she said that but kept on eating

„it's just that dhstell doesn't have much interest in other races but my ‚you are my wife so you have to help me' card was quite convincing"

from marths direction came an indistinguishable murmuring until his hands found a way to remove the bandage from his mouth and eyes

„you can marry c…"

a stare cold enough to freeze air was directed from dhstells direction to marth

„…other races. that's like an impossible dream come true"

„they are called rakte ok, it's not that hard. but yes even if i don't like what you implying here so how about we don't talk about this. maybe in 50 to 100 years when you have grown up we can talk about this."

marth and lüziel where looking baffled at kamaron with rina counting something with her fingers

„but in 50 years i will be so old and in 100 i would be 118. i don't think i will live that long"

„my bad i forgot to tell you with completion of the second act will the system adapt your bodies to it. one effect of that is that you live around 18 times longer so humans would become roughly 1500 years old. the third act is where that transformation is happening and thats why you can way easier grow right now than when you reach the 4th act. it's effectively childhood 2."

„that's too insane to be real. the romas where alive 2000 years ago so that would make it only 2 life spans ago."

kamaron was thinking for a bit then answered

„i remember romas. those guys are all brats that don't know whats best for them. their parents where already arrogant but at least had the strength to back it up but now they are only a shell"

„wait, are you trying to tell us romas still exist?"

„they are now in their 4th generation but yes. i remember someone like poisodon who was one of the most impressive sea fighters you would coma around during his time but he died so long ago and they are now in such a sad shape that i couldn't bother to remember their names properly"

„poisodon? do you mean poseidon god of the sea, but thats only a myth"

„think of any important figure of your history out of legends and myths and you probably can find their offspring still running around. to begin with they only where what they where because they went through the same you right now have to do and became so powerful that they where called gods by their own race. earth is a special case as around 1500 years ago these so called gods messed up with a religious conflict so that earth is a banned zone for a few thousand years now. normally grintß visit their home world regularly being treated as gods, demons or whatever the culture calls them"

„so you are telling e someone like santa clause is REAL!"

„he is as real as it gets he after all watches over earth very closely right now. he has some sense of duty to protect it from other grintß trying to mess things up again"

rina was jumping up and to the displeasure of the other customers started to scream

„santa is real, santa is real! i told you that he exists!"

„what a reaction about someone that barely does anything"

„what do you mean isn't he supposed to bring presents to the kids of the world if they where good"

kamaron was starting to laugh

„bringing present to kids, that old guy. all he could bring you is a boring story. where did you got that from"

„you're lying santa is super nice and he always brings the kids happiness"

rina was crossing her arms and looked exaggeratedly far away from kamaron

„you talk like you would know him but you didn't even know he existed an hour ago. now i understand what other mean when they say new ones of banned species are saying the weirdest things. it makes sense, humanity hasn't had any grintß visits in 1500 years so the legends of grintß that visit them become myth over time changing drastically from what they really are."

„how often does this happen. this sounds like something happening often"

„the selection every 200 years. there are different reason why but mostly it boils down to there have to be only born members of the species and the previous ones are almost all done with the third act"

kamaron may answers one of marth questions with that but the more he spoke the more questions he got

„let's stop it for now marth. i don't think we will get far with this as there are way to many things we don't know. let's just say we wanted a crash course of what we need to know what is the most important right now"

kamaron now took on a more serious look thinking for a good while before answering

„so i will shorten it down for now and you can just ask later when new things become important. first of all know your limits. you will be doing for on average 100 years, if your good 50 and some genius do it even in 30 years the third act. it mostly is just do as many quest as you can and the further you get the better the quests get. despite the main human guild being called tower guild apparently after the third act this has nothing to do with climbing a tower. i don't know why they call themself like that if in reality you're jumping randomly between planets to do quest. you can find quests by simply finding people who need help or by official quests. the first will be quite random as the system has to calculate it on the fly so you can get lucky or unlucky in therms of rewards but the second has a trick. in the tower guild you will find a blackboard with quests. you can take any you want with no restriction so be sure that it isn't something out of your league but the real trick is that on the boarder are the quest no one wants to do. some of them are just hard and the people who could do them won't bother to but the others are often long lasting quests. you still have your old sense of time made for a 80 year lifespan so seeing a quest take 3 to 6 month seems a lot but if you do the math the reward to effort levels make it worth it and most importantly something people overlook is that a lot of the long quest come with ‚free' living as long as you do well in the quest."

„i remember that that goat said we need to pay for our food and living. so that was meant as we will live our lives like a normal person working for money to buy living necessities."

„yes but more importantly second NAMES. we already went through this don't call other races by animals they look the most alike. mips don't care they are way to intelligent to care about this stuff but you will have a really hard time when you speak like that. if you don't know the races name just describe the features but don't use animal names. a lot of races are very prideful about what they are so you will get into fights with that sort of thing."

kamaron was knocking marth on the back of the head to remind him letting both marth and rina wince from the pain

„and the probably most important third part, always think what could be the worst thing the other party wants from you. it's not only the end of the second act but all the time there are different parties trying to get something out of dummer people. and in this case dum also means unknowledgeable. be most afraid of those who look like in your case humans that try to convince you they are human. the standard look for an intelligent animal species is mostly similar to what you know so there are species that have only slight differences to the human look and they try to trick people with that. it all ties to the race rankings. don't ask me who started it but there are now ‚official' rankings of all 670803 races that exist. between only a few thousand spots difference the general strength of a races are equal but there are significant differences between races that are tens of thousands spots apart and then there are also the top 100 races known as the best races who have way more significant differences between each other than anywhere else are the ones where other races become very aggressive in recruiting them. just try to stay away from anything race related for the third act. it never goes anywhere good and always is pointless to begin with"

„so this boils down too don't be racist don't be stupid.. isn't that mostly common sense"

„you will say that now but let's see in about 10 years how much your opinion has changed. for now that should be it. before choosing your first mission you should also look a bit up about where you're going. it's not needed if you get a hang of it but at the start you will be pretty clumsy for normal things."

kamaron was standing up making himself ready to go then remembered to exchange contacts

„if something is just message me. if i don't answer it's simply to stupid of a question but i will try to help"

„before you go i have to ask. why are you saying quests isn't it called missions?"

„is it missions now? those things change over time to fit the people. for all that counts we don't even speak the same language. right now the system simply translates. didn't you think it's weird that you can perfectly understand everybody with no problem. only things like names can't be translated that well as their meaning stem from external factors."

they exchanged contacts with kamaron and then he left them alone dragging dhstell behind him

„of all things that happened to us how is another human the weirdest thing"

marth was trying to make sense of the situation they got dragged into but just couldn't get it all together

„the moment i started to fight giant bugs i stopped questioning the reasons behind things. all that matters now is what to do next."

„i want to do a mission. i don't like sightseeing"

„there you have it, let's just go with the flow"

the three decided to go first to the tower guild as being told from both kamaron and he mips as they had no other point of reference to go of what to do next. kamaron was looking where they where going from a far to watch that they didn't do anything stupid but he lost them as a familiar voice behind him spoke to him

„so are they it. we could find the next one at any of the other races most likely for it"

as he turned around a pair of one deep black and one white eye with star shaped pupils looked at him. it was helictair who followed them to here with a delay

„space! haven't you heard of privacy"

„i was just looking what you where looking at. so are they it there aren't many other races we could look for"

„most definitely the problem is the who. there is only one supposed to be but two have the markings of it."

„interesting. at least we found the last missing piece, took us long enough. this will be fun after all who do you think is it."

kamaron didn't really thought about this as he was just let it sort out itself so during his prolonged thinking pause dhstell bumped in

„it's clearly the girl. the guy is like whatever. he has some things going for him but the girl feels way more different"

„i only could get a glimpse of them so it's hard to say for me but i too think it's the girl"

„when you saw them up close why even ask if we found them? but i wouldn't be so sure, it's really hard to say as they are bonded extremely strong. thanks to us only being 7 we didn't see what happens if you are this close with someone like us for large chunks of your life."

„you really think it's the boi! make a bet out of it, whoever sets on the right one can command the other for 1 command"

dhstell was leaning over to look closer at lüziel and rina

„1 command for a bet that is nearly random. make it 3 and i'm in"

helictair was extremely surprised when kamaron said that

„you really are going to up this, since when where you a gambler?"

„this is one of the most important events in our live so if i go out than i will do it in stile"

dhstell was sharply looking at him then reach out her hand and when they both grabbed the others hand a purple window appeared above them with their bets content written on it followed by a black mark burning into the backside of their hand

„now i will finally be able to make you shut up when i want to"

„i'm glad i got over her. not only did i see an anomaly but now i see kamaron take a disadvantageous bet. that's two first in my life when i thought there where no first left over"

when lüziel, marth and rina got closer to the main street the crowd grew thicker and on the main street they barely could move without having to push someone out of the way. they pushed their way to the tower guild until they stood before a revolving door that constantly pushed people out and in.

„everything is so busy. is that just because of the new people or is this normal"

marth was exhausted panting from trying to get through the crowd

„there where so many weird people. some had wings, other tails and other had scales. this is so exiting"

„this really is your perfect fantasy world except for the part where everything is so advanced. isn't it always in a middle ages setting"

„why should they be stuck in the middle ages, the middle ages suck"

„it's nice that you have such an interest in all of this but she shouldn't continuo to block the way"

lüziel was pointing at annoyed looked people who moved around them

„then lets go in. we are in the search of our first real mission after all"

inside was a big lobby with multiple counter that all had a big i above them and queues before them.

„he said that there would be a blackboard somewhere with the missions"

they where trying to look around but it was hard to search anything in this chaos. it took some time but they found the blackboard and as kamron said there was a boarder of mission while the middle was way more spacious

„look at these expected times. a year, 5 years, i get why no one would want to do them"

„that one"

rina was pulling off a mission and with that a window popped up in front of her

Summer Protection

Objective: help the shepherd to get his sheep through the summer

Loose Condition: the shepherd lose to many sheep to continuo on

Reward: 50 tallon daily + 1000 tallon on clear + 250 cp

Achievements: 0/1 cleared

Description: the shepherd needs help against wild animals attacking his herd during the summer. help him defend his heard for 6 month. he offers you his barn for sleeping and will give you one meal a day.

Place: Murim

Rating: for everyone

Add Mission?

„a simple guarding mission. it's still is halve a year but thats way less than the others. 50 daily for 180 days is 9000 total and we probably need to spent near to nothing for housing or food. there are others with higher end rewards but i doubt that after taking of living fee it's that far of or even worse"

„you're so good at math!"

rina was looking amazed at marth

„it's not like thats hard math"

„to me that doesn't sound so bad. it's a bit questionable what wild animals means after having seen those things from the beginning but when there are sheep how much weird animals could there be"

marth was leaning over rinas shoulder looking at the mission

„don't worry i can just befriend them all"

„it was surprising how you got a bear follow you around without problem but don't think that that just works for everything"

„lüziel isn't that perfect for rina. her skill is king of nature so getting in contact with animals is probably the thing she needs to get better in it. by the way that place murim, isn't that a fictional realm. is really everything we called stories and myth a real thing?"

„murim, never heard about that, what is that?"

„the martial art realm but i suppose even martial artist need sheep for wool."

„by the way how do we get there anyways. no matter how good the deal is it doesn't matter if we can't get there"

„the info is over there so we could just ask. didn't they say we should go here if we want to know something"

„we have to go to the central gate and show this mission"

marth and lüziel where looking at rina questioning her new found knowledge

„and how would you know that?"

„kamaron said so!"

rina was showing her messages showing a chat with kamaron

i want to the murim

rude but i am used to this. it's for a mission right?

yes

go to the central gate and show you mission. they will bring you right to where it is but it will cost 200 tallon per person

where is that?

just look for the center of the city. bigger cities are build around the gates so they are often centered. if you get there within a few hours you can also skip beginner rush hours

thank you

„200 per person we have the money right now but looking at these rewards that would mean they all are 200 less per person in you team. that makes so many completely unviable."

„nothing says you can only take 1. it would work if you do 1 trip for multiple missions"

when they accepted the mission in everybody's missions list appeared new summer protection. getting out of the guild was an equally as daunting task as getting in trying to now move against the stream of mostly incoming people. outside they where now tasked to fin the central gate but that did take long as they saw further down the main street a huge green portal that they didn't saw before.

„that makes life easy. what else could be called a gate when not that"

„how did me not see a huge ass portal before"

„simply wasn't what we looked for so why would we. there are enough new things for us to discover as is"

rina was taking the lead in going to the portal while those where occupied talking.

„wait don't just go alone!"

the closer they came the more they realized how big the gate actually was, easily enough too fit a house through it. figuring out where they had to get in was easily cleared by the big door of the building surrounding the gate

„it's like a train station"

„suddenly i can picture really well how this would look like at rush hour. we're lucky to get her early"

on the inside they could see a few small shops and on the other side 4 counter gating the doors towards the gate. above them where electronic billboards advertising different thing they didn't know what they where and also having a few warnings for different places. when they went to the counters they only had to wait for a few minutes for the line clear.

„number of people and destination"

the person behind the counter looked visibly tired and constantly looked over to the clock next to her

„we want to the murim"

rina was first talking but lüziel stepped in

„we want to do this mission"

he was showing the mission they picked which was followed by an annoyed yawn of the woman

„why did i need to get new ones right at the end of my shift! you know how to give me that mission?"

lüziel was shaking his head which lead to her leaning above the counter pointing at a button at the bottom of the menu

„click there, then choose share and lay it on the table"

when he was doing as told a paper like the one they used to get the mission appeared in his hand which he laid on the counter. the woman took it and threw it at a machine behind her. the machine was scanning the paper and then making 3 tickets.

„six huny for that but you don't know how to pay either right?"

not even waiting for lüziels response did she again lean over the counter pointing him through the menu to the item shop and then his bank. there he was ordered to go to official transactions. he was now given the option to input an amount of tallon but didn't have the needed 600. this let out another grown from the woman who pointed at rina who was standing next to lüziel.

„you got that what i showed right now, then you can give me missing amount"

rina was a bit helplessly trying to fumble her way through the menu but finally found where lüziel was and put in the missing amount. the woman punched in the tickets and stamped them then gave them to lüziel and whisked them through. as they went through the door all 3 where staring in amazement at the sight before them

„this is really not just a dream. i can handle people looking not like humans and animals being disproportionate with extra features but this is indescribable. auh"

rina pinched marth to proof that he wasn't just dreaming

„what was that for"

„you are awake"

what the where looking was a giant portal emitting a green light. inside where like hards images floating around that seemed close yet far at the same time. from looking at it you would say that you can go deep inside of it but they could see that it was only a few centimeters thick. when someone went near it the shards flew over to that person making a clearer image but immediately dispersed again when the person vanished in the image

„i also want to try that"

lüziel was grabbing rinas arm to keep her from running a lone through the gate

„you don't even have the ticket who knows what would happen if you move through that without."

„let's all move together to be sure we get to the same place"

when they came closer to the gate shards where flying their direction building an unknown environment as image. they carefully stepped through it but all it took was one step and they ended up in a similar but not quite the same place. the tickets they where holding all disappeared the moment they passed the gate.

„nothing happened"

rina looked disappointed thinking they where still at the station

„no this is definitely somewhere else. i can't see any skyscraper and this place feels more more rural"

marth guess was confirmed when they went through the station and saw a smaller city. the streets now where only filled with a few people compared to the masses they had to went through before and building where more wide than high.

„you can even see fields way in the distance. this really is a countryside"

lüziel was looking at a far away field down the road

„so somewhere here is supposed to be a shepherd. i can see something like that fit in here but how are we supposed to find someone without any information"

marth was opening up the mission. on it the place had changed from murim to suhjiti street 37

„it changed when we got here?"

„all we have to do now is find the street. the map should help us for that if it has anything to do with the maps we know"

they sat down on a nearby bench and opened the map showing an overview of the city they where in. at the top of the map stood dehre in thick letters. on the map the streets had names written on them just like any map they knew from earth with their location being marked by a blinking dot. behind them stood in capital letters ‚dehre central gate'. it took them a while looking through the different street names even when only searching at the border of the city where they expected a shepherd to be but they finally found it on the other side of the city. on their way there they could see a lot of tailors for not only close but all kind of things made out of wool with a large amount being focused on weapon related accessories.

„look at those kimono they look so beautiful. i want wan!"

„and look at those prices. we are not even close to afford anything like that."

„it's really hard for us to judge if we are just poor of if this is extortion, but thinking about 1 gate travel being 200 per person that would probably mean we are just poor."

they continued down the streets every now and then stopping to look at shops or the map. when they reached their destination they could see a large meadow with sheep graze on it

„they look so fluffy"

rina was running to the edge of the fence where some sheep resided trying to get them to move to her. out of a barn next to the meadow a man came out talking to them

„not many find their way down here, are you the ones who came to help with my sheep"

it was a round man with a short beard having cotton over his dungarees

„yes we came for ‚summer protection'. are you the one who asked for help?"

„that's great, that's great. come over here and you can help me out right away. i need someone to get these sheep to get in the barn to shear them."

he was waving them over to the barn he came out off.

„weren't we supposed to do protection and not farm work?"

„that too, that too, but young lads like you sure can help out an old man with his work while your at it"

not wanting to look rude they went off seeing a few shorn sheep standing in the barn with wool fluff all over the ground.

„they need to get their winter wool shorn of or it will be to hot for them during the summer, so herd 1 or 2 at a time over here and i will do the cutting for now. you can do it later if you have seen it a few times"

without further questioning they began with their work. for lüziel and marth this task was rather difficult as they didn't knew what to really do but for rina it was but a simple polite ask and the sheep where following her.

„must be nice to be able to command animals for something like this. we're working our ass of for one sheep and she just needs to say one word"

„i'm not commanding anyone. i simply tell them why they need this and ask them to if they could come with me"

it took the entire rest of the day but before the sun completely set they finished

„great work, i never had anyone who can control animals to help. this will make a lot of work way easier in the future. let's go in and then i can make us some food"

„what about our real mission aren't we here to protect the sheep"

„are any of them hurt if the answer is no i would say you did your job perfect for today. i will explain more tomorrow for now let's just finish the day of."

„i wonder there are so many advanced technologies so way are you cutting your sheep with the hand?"

lüziel was pushing marth aside who was just standing there after the farmers answer

„they're a special breed. the wool is especially soft but that makes it so that machines can't easily cut it without damaging it. by the way you worked the entire day for me and i didn't even tell you my name, it's barnaby nice to meet you all. with how you helped me today it looks like you will be great help for the farm."

„but we we're called to protect the sheep not do farm work"

marth caught back up

„you protect the sheep i give you your money you do farm work i give you food and a sleeping place. if you don't won't to work do those things yourself young lad"

„i like to work with the sheep they are all so nice and fluffy"

„you don't count you can just let them do whatever, we had to do actual work here"

„don't undermine missies work just because she has a good skill for this before looking at yourself. you're work was subpar at best while he did his work great without any skills"

„i'm just not cut out for this stuff"

lüziel was patting marth on the back

„don't worry you get used to this over time."

„why are you so good at this"

„grew up on a farm, had lot's of contact to animals etc."

inside barnaby's house he went to the kitchen set up a stew while the three searched seats on the big table he had in the kitchen

„so let's make this official you all want to do this job. as long as you help me out on the farm will i give you food and let you sleep in my barn. the barn may smell like sheep but it has some small rooms i can make sleeping place in. when there are any attacks during day or night your work is to send those bastards back to the woods were they came from. i already lost enough sheep to this as most youngsters just don't want to do such a boring task"

„even during the night and when are we supposed to sleep when we do work during the day"

„that's what i pay you for but don't worry you wont need to do that much. i am aware that i can't expect you to do full work and night watch at the same time. foods ready, eat a lot to get the power you can get for tomorrow"

after they ate barnaby brought them to 2 small rooms in the barn where he laid out a few blankets. when they got woken up did the sun just start to rise.

„this early and we already have to stand up"

„thats how the farm life goes"

while marth looked still quite sleepy both lüziel and rina where up and awake.

„we should plan how to do this before we continuo. there has to be at least 1 person that does night watch. let's just switch every week, that way we don't completely ruin our sleep schedule"

„then let me start i rather sleep the rest of the day than stand up this early."

„you know that you have to do it at some point"

„just let me sleep for now"

after telling barnaby their plan they started with their farm work. the first week was quite uneventful with farm work on the day and no visitor either at day or night and the next one to do night shift was lüziel. with marth now instead of lüziel the work got a bit harder but he only took 3 days to get somewhat used to it. near the end of the second week the first visitor came. it was during dusk as marth noticed wolfs stroll near the fence waiting for them to leave. all they did until now was farm work so they had no real idea what to do.

„lüziel wake up, wolfs are here"

lüziel was woken up by an agitated rina

„i get it, i'm awake"

they went near the wolfs from the other side of the fence and tried to shoo them away but they just responded with barking back. rinas skill also did not work for this outside of her knowing that they where searching a way in

„what now? we can't just stand here the entire night"

they tried throwing smaller stone at them and when they hit rina let out a quiet scream

„i totally forgot over these 2 weeks. so we also can't attack them"

luckily after a few hours did the wolfs give up on entering. the next day they returned and went away in a similar fashion. right after the change to rina being night watch they this time didn't got woken up by her directly but rather by rina screaming loudly in pain. when they came running out what they saw where the wolfs having caught 1 sheep while the other gathered around rina like a wall to protect her.

„this is bad we need something to force them away with force now. i grab rina and you try doing something. you are better in using weapons then me"

marth and lüziel jumped over the fence with marth running toward the sheep tying to pull out rina who was barely conscious from the pain. without thinking lüziel grabbed out of the shop a sword not caring fro his own safety striking at the wolf. he badly wounded one but the others attacked him to the best of their abilities. weirdly enough did the sheep jump in protecting lüziel giving him the chance to pierce the others with the once that crawled already back through a hole under the fence only being able to angrily bark at them. when they tried to get back in the one who first went though got pierced through the head by lüziels sword making the others completely give up and flee. the ones left inside the pasture we quickly finished of.

„ARE YOU OK!"

marth came running at lüziel who suddenly felt dizzy and passed out. when he woke up he was lying on a bed having a weird smell come of his arm. barnaby saw him moving and came over

„i'm glad they didn't hit you too hard. their fangs have a poison in it that is especially dangerous to humans. what i can't explain is why the missy is passed out she has no wounds or anything"

„where is rina"

lüziel was trying to stand up but had weak knees

„take it easy, i don't think she is in any danger you should rather care about your own safety"

marth was coming into the room having heard people talking

„what the hell happened, those sheep where protecting you like they where guard dogs"

lüziel turned over to marth and it took him a minute to remember what happened

„i don't know they just jump into the way"

„it must be the missies doing with her skill but i thought you where beginners but that skill would need to be on a high level to do something like that even after passing out"

„we just have to wait until rina is better, maybe she can say something"

it took a total of 3 more hours and the sun was already starting to rise when rina woke up

„are you ok, does anything hurt, do you feel ill"

rina was quickly sitting up grabbing lüziel

„are the sheep ok, they wanted to protect me but they are so weak"

„protect you?"

„don't worry about them. they took some claw and bite marks but nothing medicine could fix. if not four you guys i would have lost another 3 or 4 but it was only one and i doubt those damm wolf coma back any time soon after what you did do halve of them"

when marth was walking in he got a glimpse at rinas back and first didn't think about it but then with a second look he realized something odd

„so since when does rina have a tattoo on her neck that is so easily visible?"

„what are you talking about i don't have any tattoos!"

„my eyes would say other"

lüziel was going behind rina and then saw it for himself a tattoo like pattern spanning from one shoulder to the other that rina didn't have before. he was to the annoyance of rina trying to rub at it but that didn't change anything

„would you not just do that ,even if it's you i don't like people just do that"

„it's not going away"

barnaby was intrigued by their talk and also looked at it scratching his head

„it looks like a curse but i never saw any curse this big with such a weird pattern"

with barnabys words it made click in marth head

„there is the curse that one examiner gave rina but that wasn't like this. you could barely see it before even but it does looks similar. did the curse evolve?"

„evolving curse such things only exist in old stories that barely anyone tells anymore. if they really would exist why does no one know about them?"

barnaby was starting to rant of into some stories he remembered but the three didn't pay attention to that

„if this will happen every time we have to fight something will rina be fine. we can just stop and search a saver work instead until it is gone"

lüziel was looking concerned at rina

„no i don't want to do something else"

„i don't think it will directly harm rina, did the examiner say that it is supposed to make rina stronger the real issue was what it did"

„rina i leave it up to you. you are the one who suffered from this and i said i will respect your decisions more so i will accept whatever you want to do"

„i want to continuo! i don't like the pain but i know that this is something i have to do"

„ok that should settle this but i too am a bit worried so we should ask kamaron for advice he seemed to have some knowledge about this.

with that decision the group didn't end the quest and did what they did before. when they contacted kamaron all he asked was how much longer their current quest was and when they told him he just said after that and didn't respond to that question anymore. it was as barnaby said and the wolfs didn't show themselves for another month and when they returned marth and lüziel already thought out what to do as defense. at the same time did rinas skill add sheep to the list of familiars and with that did the sheep of the farm follow her without any hesitation making it easy to lead them away from danger. with this the second attack was easily avoided. it was now their 4th month working on the farm and they didn't have any other big incidents with only 2 more low effort attacks of the wolfs. during that time they wandered a few times around the city but the small amount of money they had they didn't buy anything outside of some strange foods. it was in the middle of a heatwave when they heard a giant explosion out of the woods. barnaby came running towards them shortly after.

„he is back! help me get the sheep out of here this will be easy for you so it should go fast"

„what is going on, what was that right now?"

„it's the calamity of the shrine. i may have hired you to protect my sheep but this is something even advanced fighters struggle so we have to get out of here"

thanks to rina all they had to do was to let her lead the sheep out of the pasture to a meadow on another end of the city. all of them being curious did they return back to the farm and it took only 10 minutes until lots of heavily equipped people came to the entrance of the forest. it was at least 20 people split in 3 groups. when some stray wolfs ran out of the forest where they quickly dispatched of. this lead to rina experiencing a lot of pan but thanks to the distance it was not so much that she would pass out. first the forest started to burn in black flames followed by the breaking and falling sounds of trees. what came out of the flames was a huge figure. it moved like a gorilla with 2 strong arms in the front but on top of the shoulders these arms where attached to was a wolf like head attached with long fur covering the neck. the tail was thin but long with a sharp looking claw at the end and the legs looked like muscular hairy frog legs. all over his body where shining rune like symbols in dark blue and out of some where coming the black flames that the forest where burning in.

„quick into formation don't let it into the city. reinforcement will come in an hour so we have to hold out until then."

the gathered people where putting up 2 fronts 1 out of shields and 1 behind it. the people behind where doing something the three could make out what it was but when the calamity of the shrine sprang at them swinging its massive arms did it smash against a wall of air leaving a crack in thin air. at the start it looked like the defense was successful but nearing the 45 minute mark where a loud shattering sound hearable and some of the people in the back row fainted at the same moment.

„5 barrier mages are fainted!"

„fire is spreading to the houses!"

„the ground is starting to melt!"

it was then that lüziel, marth and rina decide that they shouldn't stay there any longer and ran away

„this is a monster! how is anyone supposed to deal with this if 20 people can't even hold it down!"

„is everything alright, you look bad rina"

„i am ok, it's just nausea"

„it's probably from the people fainting right there. luckily we weren't close enough for rina to feel it full force"

when they arrive back where barnaby and the sheep where did rina lay down as she was already completely drained of all color.

„did something happen!"

„don't worry she will be fine after a bit of time"

„i am more worried that you suddenly came running here like fleeing from something"

„it simply became too dangerous for us to watch it longer but sone should reinforcements come so it will be fine."

there where some loud noises hearable during the remaining 15 minutes but when another large chunk of people came through the streets, everyone fully armed, they though that it would soon end. what they did not expect was when after another hour lots of houses caught black fire and the calamity was walking through the streets with around 30 people trying to fend it of unsuccessfully.

„this is bad. when even the royal guards can't handle it that means this city is completely lost"

„there has to be someone who can deal with it or otherwise it would have not been only a problem right now"

„there was but those where outsiders that came after a emergency mission. that will take at the bare minimum a few days before help comes. i wont fault you if you want to flee before it's to late but if really want to help me please help me bring my valuables and herd to the next city. it's a long march to foot but i will pay you extra for it"

lüziel was looking at marth and rina having a flash of brilliance

„kamaron said that we should call him if we had problems. don't you think this is exactly that"

„and what is he supposed to do fi those can't do anything?"

„i don't know but does it hurt to try"

when they contacted kamaron he first didn't respond with marth giving lüziel a said so expression. right when they where ready to go with barnaby got lüziel a simple message ‚hide for 5 minutes'. it took a lot of convincing for barnaby to wait even 5 minutes when the city was now completely engulfed in flames but from a distance they waited not even 5 minutes as with one instance a large chunk of flames blew away.

shortly before when kamaron got contacted by lüziel

„what the hell is this supposed to mean"

dhstell was pushing kamaron away to look at the message

„sounds to me like the nuhfdefan but that was supposedly sealed away tightly and even if they shouldn't struggle beating something that weak"

„to us it may be weak but you are right that normally they should be able to re seal it again. i'm worried that something unexpected happened or more precisely that someone played with literal fire here"

„if you're so worried about your pet project why 'aint you helping them"

„you know that i can't do that right now"

kamaron was pulling up the messages window. he typed at 5 different people with one responding with ‚whatever i'll do if no on else does. i'm the only one who doesn't have something urgent to do right now'. kamaron then typed at lüziel ‚hide for 5 minutes'

„so you're leaving it up to her. weren't you trying to prevent helictair to meet up with them"

„i rather do that than the possible alternative"

when helictair came out of the portal was she surrounded by black flames

„are those the prison flames. what are they doing here!"

she took out a scythe and took a fighting stance. with one big swing a veil of darkness came out of the scythe swallowing the flames and disappearing as quickly as it came

„this will be way more problematic as i thought. something strange is going on. i guess i finally have something urgent i need to do for the foreseeable future"

when helictair came out of the station she saw a group of people fighting a nuhfdefan but this was not like the one that supposedly was sealed here. it was a little bit bigger than it should be but more importantly the runes on his body looked weirdly deformed.

„thats not the deffy we heard being here. he is way bigger than he should be at his age. it's nearly grown up despite having still 10 or so years till adulthood"

„you over there, run! this is dangerous!"

one of the man fighting the nuhfdefan noticed helictair and signed her to run away. she instead decided to approach them and a stray attack of the nuhfdefan went her way.

„watch out!"

with one arm she knocked away the tail heading for her then turning to the others

„you are the ones who should run away unless you want me to kill you first before dealing with this one"

she pointed with her scythe at them completely ignoring the nuhfdefan and when he noticed her just standing there made her his new attack target. with one mighty swing of his arm tried it to knock out helictair who herself didn't want to deal wit this at the same time as she dealt wi the other people so she simple took the arm with enough force to let blood spew out of it and smashed it into the ground.

„if you don't want to be next run. i'm only saying this because i feel like being nice right now but if you aren't gone if 12 second i will no longer care"

one of the people being there started to recognize her pointing frightened at her

„those symbols all over her body, i know who she is. she is the slaughter demon!"

all of them made a step back when hearing that

„you still cal me that but i didn't do anything in the last 200 years well whatever scram or die i will now start"

they all ran a couple meters back and when they where far enough away pulled helictair her menu out

„i'm not as good as dhstell but can't just let them see me doing this. with a pice of night it should be even for me doable to shroud this area"

between the others and helictair a pitch black fog appeared making it impossible to see what was on the other site. during this time did the nuhfdefan stand back up ready to attack her again

„back to you, i can't just kill you or those run will disappear so i need to contain you instead. this weapon really is no good for one to one combat, i need something else instead. what a nuisance"

the nuhfedfan attacked again but now helictair instead went in dodging the attack while swapping out her scythe for a small dagger. she then thrusted the dagger deep into its arm slicing open part of it. it responded by screaming loudly in pain and with a burst flames emitted all over it body.

„tsk what idiot gave you the ability to just use the prison flames as weapons. is this supposed t be a sort of experiment"

around helictair a small bubble formed where the fire didn't go to as if trying to avoid her.

„haven't used this in ages lets see if i still got it"

with another strike to the other arm halted the nuhdefan completely it's movement followed by helictair kicking it to the end of the street

„in old time this would have been enough to completely dominate something this weak and now i can only tie it down. maybe i shouldn't have listened to kamaron and kept on using it?"

with one quick dash she got to it taking it and throwing it out of the city back to the forest where it came from. with another few attacks they stood before a temple that looked like it was recently destroyed. she quickly went to work and made a square around it then wrote something on the edges of the square before halting and thinking a bit

„so i guess i will need a year or so, in that case i don't need a strong barrier"

she continued by writing more things on the square, then pulling out different items using them on it. when she was finished a marine blue fog appeared in the air around her work and when the nuhfdefan finally was able to move again it tried to get out but every time it did so the fog gathered around it becoming so thick that it couldn't move any further.

„so the kids are here might as well look at them when i'm already here."

after the flames blew away where marth, rina and lüziel able to see a black fog rising up around where the calamity was followed by a loud scream of anguish like they never heard before. they could see how flames in a straight line towards the forest started to get blown out before it got silent with the only sound hearable being the burning of the flames.

„my word, what was that right now. it's like a god struck down and vanquished the calamity, or maybe it wasn't a god but the devil himself purging a smaller evil. i have never seen anything like that in all of my years living"

„don't tell me that was kamaron! if 50 people can't even scratch something like this and he simple annihilates it how much strong does he have to be to do this"

all 4 where standing there in shock not able to fathom the event they saw in the far way distance, but their shock got interrupted by rina who noticed someone moving towards them from the forrest

„someone is coming from where the beast went too!"

„i should than you that you stand so far away in the open that i can easily see you from the forest or it would have taken way to long to find you"

a woman approached them. her clothe showed small burn marks but overall she showed no signs of any damage. if not for the burn marks and her coming from where the calamity went to you would have not be able to guess that she probably just fought this monster. when she got closer they saw her unnaturaly white face while the rest of the body that wasn't covered by her clothe was wrapped in bandages. one of her eyes was white and the other black with a yellow 4 pointed star where her pupils where supposed to be.

„you know i thought that maybe kamaron was overreacting over his pets being potentially damaged or that maybe you just didn't knew what was going on but it turned out that the trip over here was definitely worth it"

„are you the one who did that right now?"

„you could say that depending on what you meant with ‚that'. wow i really didn't expect this much… sheep when first meeting the next one for the first time"

she was walking up to rina looking closely at her with her star eyes then swapped over to lüziel and checked him out afterwards

„i get why he betted on you but looking more competent doesn't mean much for this"

lüziel was trying whisk her away before answering

„what are you talking about?"

„don't mind me just talking to myself. so what now even with the nuhfedfan gone is there a lot of damage left that first has to be fixed"

„madam i don't know who you are and you apparently have fought of the calamity which i am grateful for but you should explain yourself more before just popping in"

she was flicking with her hand in response

„i only came to see those two up close. i will be gone right away. but he didn't tell me you also have the same curse as me. it's not as advanced but you only have it for not even halve a year so something has to have happened to make it grow that much in this place"

„you know what that thing on my back is"

„the same as you have?"

„sou see all of these, thats how the curse looks after a way longer time than you will have it. what is more interest is how it has only one big branch instead of lot's of small ones, something had to have died around you for that to happen"

„and what if it did?"

„you're tougher than i though. if you try to get a bit more to the edge you could make something useful out of it. well that's it for me you should probably help with that"

she was pointing at the city where lot's of people came helping to extinguish the fires before they spread more. when they looked back to where she was did she already vanish

„have you seen how many and detailed ones she had. if that is really the same as rina has and she only got that little from 1 death i do't want to know what you would need to go through to reach that amount"

rina was shaking a little with the thought of that. instead of further standing there they started to help and this was especially for rina hard who constantly felt like having burning all over her body to the point that she had to leaf at some point and let them do the rest.when they finished the last flame was the only light source left in the night. despite everything that happened they still had to wake up normally the next day the sheep didn't wait for them to recover.after another week where mostly all big damages repaired and after a month you barely could see what happened. during that tie no one dared to go into the forest but when the repairs where done there was one attempt looking what happened with the calamity with the, leafing the forest as fast as they entered showing that it was at the moment impossible for them to enter for some reason that not even the best people they had for curses and the like could remove. thanks to what happened there was nothing left to attack the sheep anymore so for the last month all they did was normal farm work before finishing their first mission.

„you where a great help to me and you are always welcome to come back but for now i should pay you what i promised"

Mission Summer Protection cleared

Achievement: 0/1

no lossesnot cleared

Reward: 1000 tallon

250 cp

0 tallon

Bank: 2011 tallon + 1000 tallon

Clear Progression 1 000 000 cp - 250 cp

„at this rate we would take how long to finish this 1000000 cp, that would be… 4 for 1000… and that a thousand time so 4000 times 6 month… so we would take just the totally normal amount of 2000 years to finish at this rate"

„don't worry young man not even everyone finishes the third act. people like me choose to rather go on with their lives like they used to before. if you are not interested in fighting all you need is accessible without for an easy life"

„i am not against no fighting but i do have my ambition and want to clear this. being on a farm all day is not for me"

„i like the sheep but i don't like being at the same place all the time. it sounds fun to travel this magical world"

barnaby chuckled a bit

„magical well thats the young ones for you"

„we also someone behind us who probably wouldn't let us just sit down and nothing. he also promised to meet us to talk about what rina has so we can't just sit down here"

„i absolutely forgot that, he did promise to meet us. maybe the cat girl again with him"

rina smacked marth after he said that on the head

„what was that for"

„saying cat girl is rude, thats what kamaron said"

„marth is just eager to meet another wall up close and personal"

„you still remember that!"

„it sounds like you are talking about a rakte. they can be especially stingy about this so you shouldn't call them a cat but it sounds like you already met the fate of what happens if you do."

„i get it the cat girls are called rakte"

after their goodbye they had to buy another ticket to get back and this time the question was where they even came from to begin with. when contacting kamaron they did it not only for meeting up but also to know where to go. it was a bit rough but they where able to buy the tickets without further help. back in pauroe they realized how much less noisy it was compared to their first time here.

„so this is how it looks without the rush of and for new players."

„to think that most of the rush came not from us new people but scouts really puts into perspective what of a big deal all of that is"