Chapter 3- New companion?

Having turned round, Leon is greeted with an unexpected sight. The person who had been following him turned out to be a blonde-haired woman roughly his age dressed in neat clothes.

As Leon's eyes gaze over at her, the short twin tail style and rosy cheeks makes him forget his words.

'She looks cute'.

"How about we go and get something to eat, I know a place".

Hearing the talk about food, Leon's stomach started to rumble, he hadn't eaten since breakfast.

'Also isn't this an opportunity to get closer with a girl, grandpa keeps harassing me about it, this will get him off my back for a while'.

"Sure, I'd be happy to go with you".

Following her, they end up at eatery just outside the baron's castle. Walking in to see many occupied seats, Leon follows the woman. She flashes a wave at the server before heading up to the second floor. Finding a quite place the pair sit down.

Looking at the menu, Leon notes that most of the meals are rather pricey, leading to him to think about it for a while.

"Ah, don't worry this will be my treat, does steak sound alright?"

Nodding in agreement, Leon waits as the server comes and takes their orders.

"I don't think we have introduced ourselves yet, my name is Leon" unable to deal with the atmosphere Leon gives his name.

"Oh, my name, you can call me Alice".

"Alright Alice. Thanks for the meal, what did you want to talk about?" Deciding to get to the point, Leon brings it up.

Hearing this, Alice takes of the sword at her waist and places it on the table. Sliding it over Leon grabs it. Unsheathing it he finds a sword rather like what he saw in the weapons shop.

"This is?"

"I thought I'd offer you my sword".

"Your sword?"

Stunned by the situation, he asks.

"Why would you give me this?"

"I'm a mage and fight with my magic ability, if it comes to having to use a sword, I would be in trouble".

"Also", she looks down at her feet making a shy little squirm before looking back at Leon "I'd like if you could stay with me during the hunt".

Struck by her actions Leon stammers "Isn't the ceremony meant to be individual?"

"Not at all, we are only required to stay the night in the forest and the best core we pick up is judged to find out who among us are capable".

"Oh, I see, then partying is probably viable. How will we split what we find?"

"We can try and split it as evenly as we can".

"Then we have a deal".

As the finish their talk, their meal arrives. As they eat the two discuss some basic plans for tomorrow, eventually agreeing to meet each other just before the ceremony starts. With that they part ways.

Leon leaves the establishment and begins searching for inns, going through several of them the sun finishes setting as Leon finally finds his grandfather.

Meeting up they both head into Feather's Inn.

"Have you had something to eat Leon?" his grandfather inquires as he fetches dinner from the front counter.

"I've already eaten, grandpa".

"Is that so?"

"Also, grandpa, here's your money back" Leon takes the bag of cores from his waist and tries handing it to him.

"I see the money I gave you looks to be about all there and you have a new sword, how did you manage that".

"I met a nice girl today and she gave it to me. I will be partying up with her tomorrow".

"Hoho, my little Leon finally has found himself a girl. Keep, the money, it was always meant to be spent on you anyway".

With his grandfather demolishing a jug of beer and his dinner they head up to their room. The room itself was rather bare, with just two single beds on each side. It was clean though, and after the days of travel Leon couldn't wait to sleep in a bed.

"Alright Leon, you best get some rest, tomorrow will likely be rather tough".

"Alright, goodnight grandpa".

"Night Leon".

Laying on his side, Leon takes out a large red crystal necklace. Rolling around the crystal, he slowly drifts to sleep.

Come morning, Leon wakes up and splashes his face. Dropping his body, he begins his morning exercise starting with push-ups today. After finishing his exercise, he goes and wakes up his grandfather so they can head down and have breakfast together.

As they eat away at their oatmeal like breakfast Leon's grandfather begins speaking.

"Leon, I have a couple of things to do today, so once you finish just go on ahead to the meeting point".

"No problem".

Finishing up the breakfast Leon gets up to leave.

"Good luck, and Leon, be careful it isn't just monsters that are going to be in the forest".

"Thank you, I will be careful".

Both leave the inn, splitting off with Leon headed for the town outskirts where the ceremony will begin, there he will hopefully find Alice.

Leaving the town, he finds that several dozen children have already started to gather round, the knights and supervisors spreading out near the forest edge.

After some time, walking through the other participants, he finally finds Alice, dressed in some magically woven robes.

"Hi there".

"Hey Leon" hearing the call out Alice skips over.

As they gather with the crowd, a knight takes to the stage. His bright armour adorned with a single serpent on his chest and shoulders. A large silver sword is hung on his waist.

"Hello all, I am William Broad, Knight captain of the great Serpent family. I will be overseeing this ceremony. I hope each of you who are aspiring to be hunters show your all and for the rest of you I wish you luck".

Stepping down from the stage, the baron's advisor takes stage and explains that they will all shortly leave for the forest and pass through the barrier. They will all be required to spend the night there and come morning, everyone is to present themselves here to be judged using the cores that they collected from the hunted monsters.

With the sound of trumpets sounding shortly after the man's speech, the others are pushed towards the forest.

Leon looking around finds many of them are nervous or even scared, whilst his thoughts are occupied on what monster he would need to hunt to be recognised. While in thought, Alice and Leon enter the forest.