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We arrive in the capital and it is already late at night when we leave Sabrina at the door of her house, since she is the only one who lives in the outer circle of the capital. Before saying goodbye, we agreed to meet the next afternoon at the guild to distribute the rewards of the trip.
After passing the second wall, we split up, each heading for our respective homes.
I decide not to wake up Ragnar and Julia, since it is so late. So, I quietly enter the house and, making as little noise as possible, go up to my room.
I wake up at noon and, after stretching a little in bed, I go downstairs with Azur on my shoulders to greet Julia and Mia. While I am walking I think, amused, of the expression they will put on when they see me. Upon reaching the first floor, I see Mia bored drawing in the dining room.
"Hello" I say, and I see her raising her head in confusion. She screams and lunges at me with her arms outstretched as if she wants to hug me.
I didn't think she would have missed me so much. I feel Azur jumping off my shoulder and see it fly to Mia, who hugs it and, turning around with Azur in her arms, runs up the stairs, ignoring me. It seems she didn't miss me specifically, I think as I watch her go up the stairs in amazement. I hear Julia's voice coming from the warehouse.
"What happened, dear? Why the scream?" and, since she has no answers, I see her peeking through the door. When she sees me, she runs towards me and hugs me saying "welcome home"
"Hello, I see that at least one of the inhabitants of this house missed me" I say and explain what happened with Mia.
"Don't take it to heart. Surely, she thought I wanted to talk to you, and that's why she yelled before she left" she says, with a smile on her face.
"Surely" I say and smile back "do you want me to tell you about the trip?"
"Sure" she says, her smile widening, as she points to the chairs by the table for us to sit.
I explain the story of the trip and she gives me a scolding when I tell her about the ghouls. When she finally stops lecturing me, I continue with the story. And, when I get to the man/goblin part, I see her clench her hands until they're white-knuckled.
At the end of the story, I say "that's why I wanted Ragnar's opinion. We don't know what to do with the body, but we thought we couldn't leave it in the forest"
"Ragnar isn't here... He left a few days after you left. He got a letter from a friend asking him for help with something. As you saw in the village you went to, the capital is having some trouble handling the problems of the villages that, in the past, were protected by the soldiers of the Crossroad Town. Joaquín complains about that every time he comes. And it's not for lack of soldiers, it's more than anything a matter of logistics... But it's not something that you have to worry about... I think you should take the corpse to the guild, as well as the bodies of the monsters and animals you have collected. The guild will check if the guy had a price on his head, and if not... " she says and, after a moment's hesitation, she continues "you won't have any problem, you just acted in self-defense and those of the guild are not fools. They know that nobody would carry the body of someone innocent to them trying to collect a reward"
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I kept talking with Julia for a while and, when the time I had agreed with my companions was getting closer, I called Azur through the link.
It comes flying in right away, followed by Mia, who doesn't like the fact that I want to take her playmate with me so soon. She throws a tantrum and, in the end, I decided to leave it with her.
Azur has a limit on how far away it can be from me. That limit is 6 km as it has increased with the level up of the skill, so there shouldn't be a problem. Although, I don't like the idea of going that far from my partner.
When I arrive, I see that Joseph and Agustín are already waiting for me. I greet them and after a while, Sabrina arrives. I tell them what I discussed with Julia and, following her advice, we decided to present the body to the guild.
After talking to the receptionist, she told us that, indeed, the guy did have a bounty on his head. He was a monster, and not just in appearance...
He had been a soldier from the Crossroads Town who, by surviving a fight against bandits, gained the ability to acquire the capacities of the creatures he ate. After acquiring the ability, the man became more and more violent. Until he murdered a colleague and fled. Since then, they have lost track of him and, although from time to time he appeared in a village and carried out a massacre, they never found his lair.
The reward for his head was 500 gold coins. That added to what we got for the ghouls, goblins, and wolf's corpses, plus the payment of the old chief of the village, and the payment of the transport that Agustín and Joseph bring with them; Leaves us with 405 gold for each one.
I can't believe how much money we managed to make on a few days' trip, but I guess we were pretty lucky. We could have ended up badly injured or killed in one of the mishaps we had.
"We have to celebrate this" says Joseph jumping up and down happily as he walks, when we leave the guild "any ideas?"
"How about we go to the beach?" Sabrina asks, looking at us alternately.
"It seems fine to me" I say, I don't care where we go.
"it's ok for me too" says Joaquín "I could take the opportunity to bring several daggers designs so that you can choose the one that most convinces you. Since, the sooner we agree on it, the sooner I can start working on it"
"Then it's decided! Shall we leave at 9 a.m. tomorrow through the south gate of the outer wall?" Joseph asks.
"Are you crazy? Think about what time you two and I would have to wake up to be on time" I say dismayed "I want to get some sleep before celebrating!!"
"Calm down, sleepyhead, I wasn't thinking of threatening your dream" says Joseph laughing, while patting me on the back "You have to think that now we have a lot of money, we can rent a carriage to take us to the beach! It would take us at most an hour to get to the south gate, and from there, after picking up Sabri, a little further to the beach"
"hmm, ok" I say tersely. I hadn't thought about hiring a carriage, but I suppose it makes sense if we want to come and go during the day.
"Bring several mana potions" says Sabrina, looking at me "tomorrow I'm going to teach you how to make the mana bomb"
"nice!" I say excitedly.
"I will be in charge of the food and the other things that we may need" says Agustín "but if someone of you wants to bring something else, feel free to do so"
After talking a little more, we say goodbye and I return home with a smile on my face for more than one reason. I have a lot of money in my inventory, tomorrow I am going to learn a new spell, and my friends are amazing. What more can I ask for?