Chapter 65

Hedin took longer than expected to return from the Hostess of Fertility but thankfully by the time he did, Bell had her head in the game, and I managed to make some good money selling some of my more exotic potions to the Freya Familia. Like the Danger sense potion that would highlight traps as well as Hunter potions that would highlight people with murderous intent so they could try to sniff out Evilus members.

Granted I wasn't sure how it would work on people as when I tested it in the dungeon, it just visually highlighted the monsters within my vision for me to see. Which made sense due to the dungeon monsters having little else to their personality other than murdering any surface dweller they came across.

When Hedin finally met us outside the property I blinked at the sight before us as not only was Anya there. But Ryuu was there as well.

"Uh hello, it's been a while since we have been to hostess but are you guys going to be coming with us into the dungeon?" I asked seeing how Anya was still in her sort of maid outfit and was wielding an ornate mostly bronze spear while Ryuu was clothed in her tight-fitting white shirt and bloomers of all things with her wooden sword.

"Yes Jake, Syr asked me to help watch over in the dungeon... And for you to come to the Hostess to celebrate your level up as well." Ryuu added with a soft smile that hid a bit of steel making the request come out kind of demanding.

Bell on the other hand clapped her hands together gleefully at the thought. "Oh, the Hostess of Fertility has awesome food! Jake, we should go there after our expedition to celebrate." She said and I shrugged as at this point the cat was out of the bag in terms of avoiding Freya. With Evilus running around, it was all hands on deck.

"Nya! Let's get going. The sooner we get into the dungeon. The sooner I get to my days off to relax!" Anya added rather excitedly which fit her more happily go lucky personality that I knew of her. But honestly, as I looked at her, I noticed a sadness in her eyes which didn't really make much sense.

Taking in their weapons and such, I brushed a hand through my hair as I spoke. "Alright, well me and Bell are mobile mage fighters for the most part. We use our magical weapons to fight from a decent distance. But if needed we are capable of fighting in close melee so long as the numbers of monsters aren't too ridiculous." I finished with Anya and Ryuu nodding in understanding compartmentalizing the information so that later on our fighting could be smoother in the dungeon.

"That is fine," Ryuu said dismissively. "We have experience in running within all types of parties so we can act as front liners if you need to chant or something," Ryuu said without a change to her placid expression, but Anya nudged her making the elf look at the brown-haired cat girl in annoyance.

"Remember Jake doesn't need to chant to use his magic Nyah!" Anya said excitedly and my eye twitched as I remembered how Anya fucking said 'Nyah' in every single one of her sentences even if she was getting the crap kicked out of her, she could get a Nyah in the middle of her grunts as she got a punch in the chest. "By the Nyah!" Anya started before Ottar bored of our small talk flicked one of her cat ears making said cat girl crouch down holding the top of her head with tears in her eyes at the stinging pain.

"Get going, Anya... And be careful." Ottar said brusquely before his eyes snapped to his fellow Familia members and then sent an unspoken message between all of them before they in unison walked away shoulder to shoulder towards Freya's mansion.

For a moment we had a bit of an awkward silence before Anya stood back up pouting as she massaged her ears, but she was now wearing an 'odd' smile that confused the hell out of me. "Well let's get going I guess." She announced and then kicked her spear to make its bottom lash out so she could hold it across her shoulders as we walked through the streets of Orario.

But as we were walking through Orario I saw a lot of people rushing around and not paying other people more than a glancing glance before they kept on with their business and were clearly trying to get to wherever they were needing to go and seeing my odd expression on how the people were seemed to be in such a rush Ryuu spoke softly.

"The people are scared of Evilus's return... Not only do they have a good deal of the Level sixes, but the commoners don't know if they have another great Evil that can match the previous generations Evil's great evil in the Silence and Predator, level sevens that came to wreak havoc on Orario for their own reasons." Ryuu spoke as Anya sighed.

"Nyah I remember those days... All the killing back then is kind of what pushed me away from being an adventurer to begin with." Anya said softly before shaking her head. "But if they are back, we as the good guys need to get a lot stronger as those crazies don't have limits and live truly only to make people suffer," Anya said strongly before she grinned taking me and Bell's hands. "Well come on let's go!" Anya yelled excitedly as she all took off running with me and Bell being pulled behind her.

Thankfully with our Hermes boots and other stuff, me and Bell weren't completely swept off our feet and forced to crash and burn. But we most certainly couldn't match Anya who was a pure Dexterity and Agility adventurer with skills to match.

"Anya... Actually, I stand corrected they managed to not fall when you pulled them." Ryuu started to scold Anya as she caught up to us at the entrance of the dungeon but seeing us fine and not really disheveled at all she realized we didn't eat dirt when Anya pulled us along. "Jake, will we be using that tunnel we made to get to Rivira?" Ryuu continued to ask me and I hummed in thought before heavily nodding.

"Yeah, the nineteenth to twenty-fourth floor, has a lot of jungle-themed stuff I need. For bosses and extremely potent potions, weapons, armor, and a bunch of stuff." I said grinning at the thought of throwing a couple hundred Bee Nades at those damned Dis Sisters. Let's see how they deal with thousands of frothing mad bees with magically enhanced stingers and venom.

Honestly for as much as the dungeon here in Danmachi sucked ass and was even more annoying and dangerous than the normal area's in Terraria... The jungle in Terraria was by far the worst area the game had and I was glad I only needed to deal with things that were half as annoying in the dungeons versions of the jungle compared to the Terraria version.

Damned turtles that can fly and jungle mimics gave me PTSD...

"Alright girls let me show you the glory of mechanical travel and not having to run and fight all the damned way to Riviria," I said proudly as I took out some simple carts for us to ride down into the depths of the dungeon to get to Riviria in literally record time with Anya and Bell screaming with joy as we headed down while Ryuu just held a stoic face that couldn't hide her unsettled expression when the tracks made abrupt turns as the tunnel had to curve lest I simply dig past the dungeon.