Although the search is normally supposed to take not less than a day, Gah-Hal manages to find the first trace only after 4 minutes. The traces he found are three trees that clearly look cut with probably an axe and two trunks.
Might be coincidence, but Gah-Hal thinks otherwise, because after taking 60 steps he saw the convex in the ground. He looked at it from behind the trees and saw that there is a door on it. Looks like a reasonable trace and Gah-Hal could now go back to the guild to give report, however he didn't want to finish it that easily yet.
He moved away from the trees and closer to the convex. From the closer look it looks like a shelter made out of clay and mud. It looks like it could fit around 8 hobbits sleeping inside.
As he approached the door, he heard some talking inside with some laughs. Whoever is in there, it looks like they are on break.
Gah-Hal not wanting to wait for them, simply opened the door and walked in not caring if he breaks anyone's privacy. The moment he took a step inside he saw three humans sitting on the tree logs and holding poorly made mugs with probably a juice in it. They stopped talking and laughing and instead looked at the boy with a little shocked face sitting without movement.
"There you are, I guess. If you are the people I'm even looking for." Gah-Hal says closing the door behind him.
Two guys stood up and placed their mugs on the poorly made table next to them. Third guy stood in his place still holding a mug.
"Alright fine. Since we were found then we will say the truth." Villager C said.
When he said it the fourth villager showed himself peeking from behind a wall as shocked as the others.
"We just wanted to have a place to spend time in away from the village where our wives complain at everything we do together. They are saying we aren't good husbands, because we spend too much time with others than them. All five of us were tired of this. I suppose there are even more of such men in the village who are like that." Villager C explains.
Two of the other villagers nod their heads.
Gah-Hal puts his hands into his pockets and nods too.
"That's a way to go, however you being away for so long made even more troubles for everyone in village since they currently think that there is something bad lurking here. I wouldn't be shocked if they thought you are dead to be honest. You could've at least came back home after some time." Gah-Hal gives his opinion.
Villager C shrugs.
"I admit that this location is actually hard to go to. A lot of small trees very close to eachother. Also the mud hat. Impressive. But whatever." Gah-Hal praises and takes his hands out of his pockets.
"I was only asked to find traces and I got a bit ahead of myself by interacting with you so... See you." Gah-Hal opens the door while saying it and leaves the hut the moment he finishes his sentence.
"Mission success. Maybe I will get a bonus for dealing with it so quickly." Gah-Hal says to himself proudly.
After his short monologue, he started heading back to where he came from, this time without teleporting. It wasn't even a hour since he started this quest. He finished it 30 times faster than average professional adventurer would afterall.
As Gah-Hal walks through the woods going to where he came from, he stops for a moment as he hears rustles that definetely aren't made by wind.
He turns his body towards the rustling sounds and stands still while holding his thumb in his robe pocket holding the rest of the hand outside of it.
"As I mentioned earlier, they may think something bad may be lurking here." Gah-Hal says to himself not really quiet.
Suddenly something jumps out from the leaves ahead and above of Gah-Hal's head in quick speed.
"I was right-" Gah-Hal is interrupted.
When he is interrupted he immediately covers his face with his arm taking a single step to the back. In the last second he managed to block the attack with his forearm. The thing that attacked him is a young vampire who sunken her teeth into Gah-Hal's forearm.
Almost immediately after the fangs have pierced the boy's skin, the young vampire still biting the adventurer attacked with her quite long claws which Gah-Hal managed to dodge by moving his arm further so her claws couldn't reach him.
Young vampire is still biting and trying to claw boy's arm now. As she claws through his clothes, Gah-Hal takes a quick spin and successfully throws her away as she loses her grip on his forearm.
"Abandoned vampire child. I feel bad for you-" Gah-Hal is interrupted again.
As Gah-Hal speaks the vampire child rushes at him again with fast speed and tries to pierce his chest with her claws, however Gah-Hal manages to move to the side and grab her clawing hand by wrist, pulling her up by it and then quickly pulling her wrist to the ground making her lose her balance.
Once she is on the ground, Gah-Hal stands on both of her wrists and keeping her torso on the ground by keeping his hand on her chest. His free hand is kept in the air that looks like he is about to punch her really hard.
As she struggles and tries to break free, Gah-Hal uses more force on both her chest and wrists to tire her out or make her calm down. His face is neither serious nor happy, it's between that. Like he doesn't want to hurt her too much.
After 8 minutes of straight struggling to break free, the vampire girl finally calms down keeping her eyes fixed on his. She still shows bloodlust in her red eyes.
"Easy now. You want to hurt me, but I don't want to hurt you just yet. Nothing bad will happen to you if you don't attack." Gah-Hal says and puts his free hand on the ground next to her lying body.
"I will now get off of you and you will kindly just stand up and talk with me. Okay?" Gah-Hal says and gets off of her without even her responding first.
The vampire girl stands up slowly still keeping eye contact with boy. Once she is standing with a little tired posture she breaths a little harder than normally looking at Gah-Hal's eyes with her face turned downward.
"If you satisfy me with your answers I will give you as much blood as you want." Gah-Hal says sternly.
Vampire looks at him and breaks the eye contact this time looking at his entire body. After a while she looks back at his eyes with her breath more calm.
"Where were you left and who did that?" Gah-Hal asks.
Vampire swallows and takes a stands straight.
"I don't remember where I was left, but father was the last person I saw." Vampire said.
"How long were you lurking around?" Gah-Hal asks.
"I lost count. 2 years I suppose." Vampire said.
Gah-Hal immediately stopped showing signs of seriousness and smiled.
"That's all. Thank you." Gah-Hal says and slowly walks towards vampire.
Vampire got startled and felt threatened so she took few steps back along with each step that boy took. After 5-6 steps she stopped walking backwards and started hissing trying to scare Gah-Hal, but he kept approaching.
Boy seeing that rolled up his ripped sleeve and kept slowly approaching her showing his forearm.
Vampire stops hissing and looks at his forearm unsure if he's trying to lure her closer or actually trying to be friendly. Whatever the thought it was, she rushed at him and bit his wrist keeping the eye contact with Gah-Hal looking if he's going to try something.
Shockingly for her he just stood there with smile looking at how she has her fangs sunken in his skin. Seeing this she took a quick sip of his blood then stopped to see if he's gonna do anything this time.
Seeing no change in reaction she took another sips of his blood breaking the eye contact this time. She looks at his arm as she calmly drinks blood from his wrist. She doesn't feel that threatened anymore.
She feels like if she doesn't do anything else she will be fine, so she simply just keeps sipping until she gets enough or until the boy does something.
"That's good. Big step to trust." Gah-Hal says looking at her with smile.
Normally Gah-Hal would kill vampire no matter what, but in this case it's different. He feels like he could have a use for vampire who would trust him.
4 minutes have passed and the young vampire is still drinking. She looks like she regained a lot of strength since the first seconds of confrontation. Her skin isn't as pale as it was before and her posture doesn't look tired anymore.
She is very calm now. Keeps her teeth in Gah-Hal's wrist with her eyes closed. It's almost like she's relaxing.
Gah-Hal however doesn't look weak or like he's in any pain. He is just standing still allowing the vampire to satisfy it's thirst.
After 5th minute she takes her teeth off the wrist and looks at the boy.
"You are still fine?" Vampire asks.
"Light work. No need to limit yourself." Gah-Hal says kindly.
"Why are you letting me do that?" Vampire asks.
Gah-Hal shrugs.
"I guess I felt bad for you and I was in good mood I suppose." Gah-Hal replies.
"Joking. To be honest, you could be a good help in future." Gah-Hal adds.
Vampire girl stops holding Gah-Hal's wrist and looks at him with a little confusion.
"Just don't worry about that. You will like it." Gah-Hal says kindly.
Vampire girl looks at him for few seconds and takes a quick look to the right. Then she looks back into boy's eyes without bloodlust now. She looks at him with her red eyes trying very hard to trust him a bit more.
"Good thing for you that you are a little protected from sunbeams. In other case you wouldn't be as active as moment ago." Gah-Hal says.
Vampire girl nods.
"It hurts." Vampire says.
Gah-Hal bows a little towards her and looks deep into her eyes. She looks at him with unsure expression.
"How about I give you a name if you don't have one already?" Gah-Hal asks.
Vampire nods.
"How about... Empress?" Gah-Hal suggests.
"Empress? Why?" Vampire asks.
"Cause Im sure you will be leader of powerful vampire's pack." Gah-Hal answers.
"Uhm." Vampire girl says.
"Yea. I guess it will work for you." Gah-Hal says.
Vampire girl thinks for a moment.
"Okay. I will be Empress then." Vampire girl says.
Gah-Hal hearing that stops bowing and stands straight with holding his hands together.
"Im happy you like it." Gah-Hal says while still looking at her.
Empress looks at her hands and clenches them.
"I'm sorry for that." Empress says.
"Don't mention it. It's nice experiencing something new." Gah-Hal says.
"So... Are you letting me go? You won't chase me?" Empress asks.
"Wait wait. Not yet. You may be in danger sooner or later. Do you have some kind of nest or something where you hide?" Gah-Hal asks.
"Uh. A hole under a tree I found. Not much space there." Empress says.
"Okay well. Here's the thing. My blood should be enough for you to stay in hiding for around 2 days if you hibernate there. Some bad people may come here very soon and I want to make sure you are safe." Gah-Hal looks into her eyes assuringly.
"Hunting for blood is in vampire's nature, but sometimes you have to make exceptions." Gah-Hal says.
"But I can protect myself. I can kill some people." Empress says.
"Sometimes you may not be so lucky. Do what I say. You will hibernate so the time will pass quickly for you. In 2 days I will come back here and take you somewhere more safe." Gah-Hal asks.
Empress hesitates for a moment, glancing around the forest as if contemplating her options. She seems torn between her natural instincts and the unusual offer of protection from a human who fed her.
"You promise you will come back?" Empress finally asks, her red eyes looking around Gah-Hal's face.
"I promise. I have a feeling you're going to like the place I'll take you. It'll be much better than hiding in a cramped hole under a tree or risking going out of the woods." Gah-Hal assures her with a confident smile.
Empress nods. She's not entirely accustomed to someone treating her with such kindness, especially considering her nature as a vampire.
"Alright. Okay. I will kill you if you don't." She says sounding threatening, but also risks with trusting him.
"Yes, yes. In 2 days you will change a lot when I come back." Gah-Hal says with a smile.
Empress nods and takes few steps back. Then she turns around and jogs out of boy's sight deeper into the woods.
Gahes seeing her go keeps smile on his face thinking of possibilities that befriending a vampire could bring. He also feels happy being able to experience something new that could normally end up with death.
Boy turns around and continues going to where he came to the woods from. Although a lot of things could go wrong with someone actually finding her, he stays calm and trusts that they will meet again.
Once he leaves the woods and gets embraced by sunshine, instead of teleporting he decided to go on foot back to the guild to not show how easy it actually was. Though he wants to show his potential he doesn't want to be that obvious and that sudden. He wants to have fun. Afterall, he finished it much quicker than anyone would expect.
Meanwhile, Wilderness of Occupied Vrelis
Fae is galloping on her horse through the path which definetely looks forgotten. She holds onto her running horse. As she rides, her horse suddenly starts slowing down. She sees three people standing on the path.
These people are wearing the same robes as mages from the Empire. Her knowing these are 'her' people stops the horse and looks at them from the horse's back.
"Message?" Fae asks.
"King of Glazes wants to see you as soon as possible. He sent you 3 teleportation stones to Glazes, Vrelis and Singard." One of the men says.
"Why is that? What's the hurry?" Fae asks while getting off her horse.
"Allegedly it's something about nobility that are allegedly indirectly sabotaging him from outside of his territory." One of the men says.
Fae looks at them for a second before approaching them.
"At least he sent the stones. Wasted some of my time by going there it seems." Fae says and takes the stones that the men are holding out for her.
"Anything else?" Fae asks.
"No, Ma'am." Man says.
"Alright then." Fae says and walks back to her horse.
When she walks to her horse, the men behind her are spreading out from the path walking in different ways. She checks the stones for a while and puts two of them into the bag on horse's back.
She looks around for around 10 seconds and puts her hand on her horse mane. With a swift motion, Fae mounts her horse, adjusting her robes as she prepares for the teleportation. When she is prepared, she takes one stone and holds it into the air. After a second it starts to glow with blinding blue light.
The air around her shimmers and in an instant, she disappears from where she was just now. The next moment, she finds herself in the familiar surroundings of Glazes. The gates of the town is right ahead of her.
Without wasting any time, Fae guides her horse to the direction of the gate and slowly walks there. Knights seeing her don't do anything else than continuing to patrol. Some of them pretend they don't see her and others just look at her for a short time.
Fae does nothing else than just heading towards the castle where king Potimas resides and connects all the information together inside her mind.
Meanwhile
"I guess this is enough. Four potions in total for two of us." Hogel says while leaving the alchemy shop.
"Scrolls now maybe? We got potions and tools. Will you fit them in the bag?" Hanna asks while leaving the alchemy shop with Hogel.
"Yea. Still a lot of space in it... Alright. Scrolls. Where do we find them? Some magician?" Hogel asks.
"Maybe. Let's look around." Hanna says and looks around.
As Hogel and Hanna navigate through the streets of Glazes, they inquire about magical scrolls. The townfolks direct them towards a normal looking building known for selling various scrolls, books and even potions.
Upon entering the building, they are greeted by the the scent of herbs. There is one person inside who is, an elderly man who is eating some kind of soup. He looks away from the wooden bowl and looks at the potential customers.
Man stands from the chair and stands a little to the side of it leaning a little by it. He looks like he barely stands on his legs.
"What do you need?" Elderly man says.
As both teammates get closer to him they stop. Hanna looks around the place.
"We would like to buy some scrolls if you have them." Hogel says.
Elderly man turns around and goes to the shelves.
"What kind?" Elderly man asks.
"Something supporting or for defence. Eventually one for offence." Hogel replies.
"Anything more specific?" Elderly man asks.
"Uh. Something that will mostly protect?" Hogel says.
Man checks the shelves and after 20 seconds he takes out one scroll and places it on desk nearby.
"Anything else?" Elderly man asks.
"Well. One more defensive scroll and one supporting scroll if possible." Hogel says.
Man looks into the shelf again.
"The first scroll is watery barrier which sometimes blocks most things from going inside thanks to it's pressure. It will last..." Elderly man says and looks at the first scroll.
"...18 seconds." Elderly man says.
"That's alright." Hogel replies.
Elderly man then takes out two other scrolls and puts them on the same desk next to the first one.
"The second defensive scroll summons an orb that flies around summoner and attacks whenever any threat tries to hurt them. It lasts 5 minutes." Elderly man says.
Hogel approaches and examines the scrolls on the desk, considering their potential uses. Hanna watches with keen interest, her eyes narrowing as she assesses the magical inscriptions.
"And the supporting one?" Hogel asks.
"This scroll can be used on anyone. The target becomes more precise and much faster than normally. This version of scroll however is a little updated so it also negates pain until it's effects wear off. It lasts 24 minutes." Elderly man explains.
Hogel nods, pleased with the selections. Hanna looks particularly interested in the supporting scroll.
"I've seen some magic and I can use only a little of it, but these look very promising. We will take them." Hogel says.
"It's not that hard. Learning new spells is easy depending on level of the spell. The hardest part is learning how to release certain amount of magic. My spirits help me a lot with that." Hanna says.
"Maybe soon I will learn some more of it. I need motivation for that." Hogel replies.
Elderly man rolls the scrolls and holds them in one hand.
"That will be 65 silver coins." Elderly man says.
"Even more than I expected. Alright..." Hogel says and looks into the pouch.
There aren't enough silver coins inside the pouch so Hogel decided to pay with one golden coin instead. He took it out and held it in his fingers for the man.
"Let me see if I have a change." Elderly man said and looked into the chest.
This big chest had a great amount of both bronze, silver and golden coins. It looks like it has like 400 bronze coins, 500 silver coins and 20 golden coins. This man is so rich.
Hogel looks in awe at the man's wealth. It's almost finding a treasure.
"Are you making these scrolls yourself?" Hogel asks.
"I am. I was once teaching a magic in Geldgard's Magic Academy, but now Im retired. My magic is no longer on it's peak and making one scroll takes longer than when I was in my prime." Elderly man says taking silver coins one by one.
Hogel looks at the chest and nods. He looks at the shelf with many different scrolls on it.
"You really like magic then if you keep making these scrolls." Hanna says.
"I like it, but it's not the only reason I'm making the scrolls and selling them. I want my children and grandchildren to take inherit everything I've obtained in my life." Elderly man says.
Hanna nods and looks at the painting above the fireplace.
"I see." Hanna says.
After around a minute an elderly man closes the chest and places the silver coins on the table for Hogel. Hogel does the same with golden coin. After receiving the change, man also hands Hogel three scrolls which he then hides into the bag.
"Thank you." Hogel says.
"Thank you too." Elderly man says.
Hogel heads to the exit. Hanna right behind him.
"Goodbye. Stay healthy." Hanna says before leaving the building.
Elderly man doesn't reply and just sits on his chair to finish up his soup.
Hanna and Hogel now outside the building walk to the main road while Hogel tries to put the scrolls into the bag so they won't get destroyed.
"If he doesn't need it that much, why wouldn't he just give it to his grandchildren, but instead waits for them to inherit this?" Hogel asks.
"He doesn't want them to spend it too quickly maybe?" Hanna says.
"What's the difference if they could spend it after inheriting it anyway?" Hogel asks.
"Maybe he thinks that the mourning will let them know how important money will be when he passes away." Hanna says.
"I doubt it would change their way of thinking like that, but depends who his grandchildren are. Maybe someone actually mature and responsible. Whatever, we shouldn't talk about other person's life." Hogel.
"You started this topic." Hanna replies.
"I know. Sorry for that." Hogel replies.
Hanna and Hogel are now on the main road and continue looking for something useful.
"Do we even need anything else?" Hogel asks.
"I don't think there is anything else here that would be legal for us. We are probably reckless thinking that Gahes will go with us against something light like wild animals. You remember how I told you about him killing vampires? What we have right now is probably the minimum for what he may have in mind." Hogel says.
"He gave us like entire day to prepare right? We also didn't spend too much from what he gave us so." Hanna says.
Hogel looks inside the pouch.
"Right. But what else could we get? More scrolls? Carrying too much potions would be bad idea. Unnecessary weight and risk of breaking the glass." Hogel says.
Hogel thinks for a while as well as Hanna.
"Scrolls then. Though the current spells are quite decent level, we won't be able to use them more than once and we don't know what Gahes may come up with." Hogel says.
"Probably the best thing to get right now." Hanna replies.
"Wait. What about... Ah nevermind." Hogel says.
"What was that? Tell me." Hanna asks.
"I was thinking about just knives. These aren't banned tools, but could be ineffective especially when I have a sabre and bow. Unless you want one." Hogel says.
"I'm clumsy if it comes to weapons. I put my faith in spirits most of the times." Hanna says.
Hogel nods.
"Mhm. Whatever one prefers." Hogel says.
"Well. For the scrolls we go again." Hogel says and turns around.
Hanna turns around too and walks along with Hogel back to where they bought the scrolls.
Meanwhile
Fae is reaching the gates of castle where King of Glazes resides. Once she is close she gets off her horse and leaves the horse tied up to hitching rail. She dusts herself off and approaches the guards.
"King wanted to see me. I'm Fae Piaust." Woman says.
Guard took few seconds before moving away from the entrance and gesturing her to enter. Woman went past the guards, through the small court and into the castle where she was allowed in by another two guards.
She is then inside the castle which looks decent. Not too luxury, but also not too poor though it's closer to luxury. It's quite spacious inside with guards at almost each passage. She approaches one of the guards.
"Tell King Potimas that I'm waiting." Fae says.
Once she said it the guard she talked to nodded his head and walked away towards the stairs while she went the other way into the diplomacy room. The diplomacy room is bedroom sized room with a throne in the middle standing by the wall, a carpet leading from throne to window made from metal bars and paintings on ceiling.
There are no other seats in this room except of throne which is supposed to be for monarchy. She stands to the right from the throne and stands there until king arrives. By the time she's waiting she takes out few small papers from her handbag and reads what's on them.
All of these small pieces of paper have a seal on it which proves that these are most likely documents approved by Emperor. She reads these without saying anything while waiting.
She reads 1st, then 2nd and is in middle of reading the third paper until the door to diplomacy room opens.
The King in person arrived. Young blonde king who looks like he still has a lot of live ahead of him with humble outfit. No typical king's cape on his back, no crown and no luxurious clothes, just something that middle class civilian would wear.
He walks up to the Fae spreads his arms out.
"Lady Fae. Thank you for actually using a telportation stone." Potimas says keeping his arms spread out, but with no intention to hug her.
Fae bows a little and looks at his eyes.
"Why, thank you for letting me use these." Fae says and puts the papers back into her handbag.
King Potimas then connects his hands and goes to sit on the throne. With quick gesture of his hand he shows that he formally starts the meeting.