"Hello sir, and welcome to our shop!" said a brown haired, round eared beastman from behind the wooden counter.
The chipper voice of the shopkeeper rang Kinyuki from his thoughts as he shut the door behind him. It had been twenty minutes that he had been in town and he's become a bit exhausted both physically and mentally. He carried several shirts under one hand, two pairs of pants in the other, and five boots were tied by the laces to the metal pole. The shopkeeper, noticing his haul and fatigue, was quick to respond with a question.
"Is everything alright? I hope your hunt went well." The shopkeeper asked, knowing that there had been an influx of new customers from out of the country.
"Well, uh, yes. Yes it did. Do you sell items here?" Kinyuki asked sheepishly.
"Yes we do!" The shopkeeper exclaimed. "Since there have been more people coming in, we've been running out of stock, so It'd be great to have an extra shirt or two."
The beastman shopkeeper's face had frozen in that moment, retaining the same warm smile, but with widening eyes, like a deer in the headlights. Kinyuki took this as the shopkeeper accidentally admitting to a lack of product, and decided to begin his transaction of clothes for whatever armor was available. Kinyuki smiled, putting the shopkeeper at ease, as he was partially glad that everything was working like an RPG.
He knew he wouldn't have any money when heading into town, so after mulling over how to mediate this, he assumed that he'd go around and look for trouble and money would follow. He found trouble in the form of slime enemies, and there was no shortage of the short, teal creatures. They littered the outskirts of Humble Village, but they were easy to smack around and, as expected, they dropped the occasional coins and even certain objects like leather armor and boots when killed.
After getting the second set of shoes, he began to realize why the was an increasing amount of slimes with clothes in them, and a lack of people that looked like they were from his world. Hearing how the shopkeeper was out of stock made him even more auspicious about the thought of adventurers dissolved into slime nutrients. Kinyuki tried to look around the shop to find something to distract him from that thought, only to find a board covered in pictures warning about monsters, which didn't help him at all.
Beside the board, there was a cloaked figure surrounded by piles and piles of books. Kinyuki was more surprised that he didn't even notice this side of the room at all. Realising that this would be a good time to read up on where the hell he is, or gain some kind of skills, he went over to greet the bookkeeper, who responded in a very soft, but generic way.
"I sell books of many types, with many different techniques that could help on any journey."
"So you have-" Kinyuki started to ask, but the bookkeeper raised a hand to stop him.
"Before you ask, no, only women who are gifted with the Gods' graces can wield any magic at all." The bookkeeper sighed in a way that said they'd been asked that several times this day.
"Well that's unfortunate." Kinyuki muttered, as his eyes glanced at a musty dark blue book.
He couldn't read the language on the cover, but there was a picture of a person beating a tentacle monster with their bare hands. The spine of the book had the words "Monster Fighter" on it. Kinyuki took the book and read some of the contents, which were thankfully not in the same language as the cover. From what he had skimmed, it seemed as though it was some sort of monk class, mostly focusing on fists and feet, and some basic weaponry, all perfect for what he had now.
As he browsed further, he noticed a weird circular pattern which asked for a few items for an elixir of some sort, which added to his intrigue. This is what he needed to survive, and he had enough coins to purchase it, as well as a leather backpack to carry more stuff from the shopkeeper, who was complimenting him something fierce on his look.
"Graceful! Stylish! This backpack suits you perfectly!" the shopkeeper gushed.
"Heh, ya ain't bad yourself shopkeep." Kinyuki replied smiling, causing the the beastman's ears and tail to twitch in surprise, revealing the shopkeeper to be a tanuki.
The bookkeeper gave an almost inaudible laugh at the spectacle, as Kinyuki headed out. Thinking back, he had remembered that he had passed by a cafe of all things before he found the shop, and he could use a breather and something quick to eat before heading to the forests to find Figaro.
:::
Figaro wasn't going to fail his friend, but damn it was going to be a hard time. 'For Heckkin's sake, Kinny I'm a volleyball with vines for hands, I can't fight all these experiments.' he thought, scudding across the stone floor. He didn't want the think about how the 'your really a monster' conversation was going to play out, and pressed onward. Wherever his heart was, it was racing at the thought of another freak of nature trying to eat him. He had spoken too soon as something had slowly slithered out of the shadows.
It initially looked as if it was some kind of slime, but it was in the form of a woman whose lower half reminded him of a slug. It giggled at him, gyrating it's top half which mesmerized Figaro enough to forget his troubles, until her head began to swell. Her head then had burst open with dozens and dozens of plump maggots that began wriggling their ways towards him. Figaro couldn't have run faster if he tried.
"WHY GODS?! Why does the stupid place hate me so damn much?!" Figaro cried, as he was about to make his way down the stairs and finally out of this nightmare.
He passed a giant caterpillar and a few goblins, the stairs almost in reach, before he heard the loud bang of an opened door. Out of the darkness came a pale face with hollowed out eyes and an arm that stretched and contorted itself to catch the fleeing tentacle monster, who would rather take his chances with the caterpillar.
Thankfully, the bug didn't attack and was slower than he had thought, and he moved behind it to find something he thought was almost to good to be true; A sheathed sword, short, but it would do the job. As he took it out to inspect it, three goblins holding butcher knives had found him, growling at the glistening sword.
"It's mine, find your own!" Figaro exclaimed, "Stay back or I'll-"
One lunged at him mid-sentence, and Figaro swung instinctively. The goblin went down with one blow, half melting into a bubbling goo in front of the others. Figaro, not wanting to get any closer to them, jabbed the sword at another goblin, his tendrils stretching enough to plunge it without getting to close. He decided to use his stretching to his advantage, and grew his tendril long enough to hit the caterpillar that was minding its own business back down the hall. He used another tendril to grab at the knives the fallen goblins had as he formulated a plan.
His plan was simple, lure both of the beasts to the door with the creepy hand so that he could finally get out of this mess. It may have worked too well, as it seemed that he had nicked both of the monsters enough that they both decided to work together to kill him. Now he was scuttling away from a stampeding caterpillar with a goblin mounted on top of it.
Unfortunately for the bloodthirsty new duo, they underestimated the speed of Figaro's tendrils and the pale monster's hand. Figaro made it past, tumbling down the stairs, as the pale monster latched on tightly to the front of the caterpillar. The goblin rider jumped into the darkness to attack, but all that could be heard from Figaro's side was an audible crunch as the caterpillar was dragged in as well.
He finally made it to the front door, but just one enemy remained. A hulking beast in metal armor that guarded the door tirelessly. Figaro had been scared of this thing from day one, and hadn't had the courage to even attempt going near it, as no other monster was near this side either. One of the tendrils that held a knife was prepped an ready, and as he let out a battle cry, the knife flew quickly into the face of the metal monster. It crumbled to metal pieces on impact, and Figaro realized that it was just a suit of armor.
He began laugh, but then the noise of a hungry pale beast had caused him to ram the door with all his might, scudding off to find his friend
:::
Kinyuki had sat down cross-legged in the border between the forest and the village. The most important part of his 'training' involved fighting more low class monsters that he already had, but he was more excited that frustrated about what came next in his booklet. He was sitting inside of a circle of ancient symbols, and opened a flask that was with him. He then took some herbs and spices, and poured it on all of the symbols. Going to the cafe was the best idea that Kinyuki had when coming to Humble Village as it had also managed to help him understand something else about the magic in this world.
There were magicians, but there were also alchemists. Alchemy was also based on the gods and spirits, being words that they have given to all mortals to help them create potions and materials that could heal and transform certain things. Most of it has been used for more practical purposes, and most don't become more than merchants, deciding that going on adventuring parties was pointless when they could make more money by selling to several different parties in a much safer environment.
It would be a good skill to learn, and the waiter at the cafe was so polite that he had gave him an alchemy basics book for free, at the chagrin of his superior, a female wolf beastman with long black hair. This was different though, as it was supposed to show him how strong he had become.
As the symbols glowed, Kinyuki had started to see that he was also glowing with a dark blue hue. He looked back to the book, reading that this was his natural aura, and that the green glowing spot in the middle of his body was the energy that was gained by fighting the monsters. Most other adventurers let this energy flow outwards over time, but the ritual presented in the book would be a much faster way to distribute the energy.
'Experience points' Kinyuki thought, but then the image of people being eaten away in ambivalent slime monsters with the clothes being left behind. This wasn't a game, and as simple as the mechanics of this world was to understand and use, it would be foolish to rely on every cliche. He noticed that the glow on his body had flickered like fire when he thought about it, and decided to continue.The booklet had then said to focus on that energy gained at the core, and start pulling it apart bit by bit, and send the bits to what ever parts of the body that the reader would want.
Kinyuki did as such, imagining it dripping away like raindrops on a windowsill. To his surprise, it had actually worked, but the small green dots reminded him more of glowing green ants crawling around to his forearms and thighs. He refocused, pulling apart every bit of the energy and placing it in every part of the body. If he was right, laying a good foundation would be more beneficial that just pouring it all into a few choice places.
Finally, the last bits had traveled to his head and finally the green glow had melded with Kinyuki's aura, and he got up, feeling more rejuvenated than when he had arrived to Humble Village. He then and thrust his hand into the sky triumphantly only to then notice that there was another creature three knives and a sword staring back at him, its one eye caught in astonishment. It then smiled wider than Kinyuki had every seen anything up close smile.
"Dude that was Heckkin' awesome, I didn't know that guys could even use magic at all! You gotta teach me so I can, uh, go and do some stuff with my friend." It exclaimed.
Kinyuki was taken aback by this, but as the wheels began to turn in his brain, He then said, "What, Figaro, ya gonna catch ladies with glowing tricks?"
"Well I dunno, I haven't thought it through- KINNY!!" Figaro gaped, "It's you!! How'd you know it was me?!"
Kinyuki laughed, and was a little thankful about how everything, despite being somewhat predictable, still led him to find his way to safety and his small friend who's truly the only being he knows who'd say "heckkin'".
"Hehheh. Lucky guess. What took ya, pal?"