Wins and Losses, Part Nine

Once everything was said and done, all Rin could say about the mission was that it left a bad taste in her mouth. Sure, the spectacle of the warriors fighting their way through the opposition had been cool to see, but she still didn't know what to think about the blatant disregard for their fallen adventurers.

She understood that maybe she was just naive, but it still felt wrong.

The remaining adventurers decided they would head out at first light. Most of them, along with the survivors, were asleep, as were the students, save for Cara and Olen who both volunteered to be lookouts for the night. Cara was watching over the students, near the road, while Olen was watching over the adventurers and survivors a short walk away. Before then, Rin set Silvy's death aside, as she did have something she wanted to do. She still had to ask them, and Cara, about those psychos who she'd run into in the caves.

She didn't really expect any of them to have real information, or for the knife and badge that her brother had sent her to mean anything, but she figured it was still worth a shot. If anything, maybe she could finally just let that all set in as just a freak occurrence and move on.

First, she went up to her teacher.

"Hey, Cara," she said, somewhat quietly so as to not wake anyone.

"Yeah?" Her teacher replied, and she only looked slightly tired in Rin's eyes.

"Can I show you that knife I mentioned?"

"Ah, right, right," Cara nodded. "I forgot you wanted to do that. Sorry."

"It's fine," Rin waved that concern away. She then pulled the knife out. "So, yeah, here."

Cara reached out and Rin passed it over to her, before reaching for the badge as well.

"Damn," Cara muttered as she looked down at it. "Fancy."

"And, uh, this, too. If you can."

She then passed her the badge as well, and as Cara looked at both items, Rin scanned her face for a reaction.

Cara analyzed both items for a while before she finally nodded to herself and passed them back to Rin.

"As for the knife, I'm not too sure. To me, it just looks like an expensive dagger, but I think you should show it to Olen, and get his take on it. The badge, though, well, that looks like the Mages Guild symbol. But, maybe an older version?" She tilted her head. "I'm not too sure. But, yeah," she said with a stressed-out face. "Considering those people we found on your first mission, I understand why you wanted me to look at this stuff."

"Should I send it to them?" Rin asked. "I don't really have any use for it myself. Maybe they'll know more about it, though."

"..." At that, Cara sighed. "Well, remember, Rin. They're still suspects in the whole investigation. At the very least, a little bit of logic says that the Mages Guild has some sort of connection to them, considering the fact that their Teleportation spellsign was used, even if it isn't a direct one, or if what happened with you wasn't done with their blessing. So, I'd say you should only talk to them if you know someone from there personally. And, well, you don't, right?"

She was wrong, though. Rin did know someone from the Guild. Someone Cara knew as well. Maybe they weren't exactly friends, but she did know her.

"Anyway, sorry, but, yeah. That's all I can really think of." She then scratched her head. "Your brother had this, though? Was he involved with the Mages Guild at all?"

"Not that I know of, but I guess I could check."

She figured that if anything held the answers to that question, it would be his journal. She just had to keep reading it.

"Hm. Well, the only thing I'd say we can check for sure is that knife. Take it to Olen, see if he knows anything about it."

"Right."

With that being said, Rin went and walked over to where the adventurers were. She could see most of them from here, along with the small campfire that burned between them all. Olen was sitting on the grass, smoking something as she approached him.

The older man raised a brow at her and said:

"Something wrong?"

"No," she shook her head. "Just wanted to ask you about something."

"Ah, what can I do for ya?" Olen asked with a polite smile.

Rin crouched down in front of him and showed off the knife.

"Have you seen anything like this before?" She asked. She made sure to keep a little bit of distance between them just to make sure she didn't come across like she was threatening him.

"Hm..." He narrowed his eyes at the blade in her hands. "I believe so, but... My, oh my, it's been years."

"Wait, really?" Rin raised a brow. She hadn't expected this at all.

"I'm not too sure, but I think this is Cardanian design."

Now, that was something she'd expected to hear even less.

Cardana, the isolated city in the west. To hear that this knife was of Cardanian design was just baffling.

[How did Tristan get his hands on something like this?] She asked herself, looking down at the knife.

"I remember this traveler I met several years ago who was carrying a similar knife to this one. They weren't exactly the same, his was much bigger, but still, it was the same general design. You can probably sell that for quite a few varols," Olen added. "Just don't let these vultures see that thing," he gestured at the sleeping adventurers around him.

"Got it," she nodded. "Thanks."

"No problem."

With that, the conversation nearly ended. Rin turned around and was about to walk away when something else came to her mind. She debated asking about this for a moment, standing just a short distance away from Olen, before she finally turned around.

"Uh, hey," she said, "can I ask you something else?"

"Go ahead."

"... About Silvy," she said, "how often do adventurers like her die on these sorts of missions?"

She wanted to know if it really happened so often that it could be considered normal for them to just discard her from their memory so soon. Olen shook his head with a wry smile.

"Kid, I'll just say this. Anytime less than half of the adventurers who attend a raid die on it, it's considered a victory. That should tell you everything you need to know."

---

"Goodbye, everyone," Olen said to the students when the morning came. "I hope this was at least a little informative for all of you."

That much, Rin couldn't disagree with.

Whether she liked what she'd learned or not, it did shine a light on what she'd be doing whenever she started going out on real missions. If the others were stuck thinking about the same things she was, then she couldn't tell. John and Carla were all smiles as they joked about random things, Eve was humming a little song to herself as she flew by Rin's side, and Dylan looked the same as ever. Just about the only one who seemed to have any real change in their demeanor was Seth, who looked even more distant than usual.

Rin watched him for a few seconds, wondering why he was acting like that. Seth noticed and their eyes met for a moment. After a few seconds, he didn't sneer, he didn't scoff, he just looked away.

[... Weird.]

Interestingly enough, Rin noticed that no one was talking about what they'd seen. That was just... it. They'd seen the adventurers fight, they'd seen Silvy die, and now they were walking back home as though none of that had happened.

And that was it. That was how the trip ended. No celebrations, no bright smiles as they talked about what they'd seen. Just a thoughtful group of students walking back to Libera.