Chapter 9 - let's start for Real

a knightmare is often defined as a bad experience in form of an unpleasant dream or even a real event you wish you could forget but what if your knightmare is to not know if you even had any experience to begin with. what if you are nothing more than a prisoner imprisoned inside another's body and what you call dreams is real reality, those memories of events you never did those memories of pasts that never happened are your because you stole them. while being traped in darkness rina was again afraid that she wouldn't return that the real rina would take her body back. she was terrified but this time somethings reached out for her something warm and nice as if to tell her not to worry

„mission cleared, what mission? we never took one"

„look at the cp, thats double what we got in a years worth of time"

„the more interesting part is what stands below, icarus wings"

„i know that, that was the one who made wings and then fell"

„not quite. daedalus was the one who made the wings. icarus is the one who used them and died because he did the one thing he wasn't supposed to"

„i also want to fly. i wont be like dum icarus"

„it's not about intelligence but hubris. his hubris was his demise"

„even taking that of it it still sound dangerous to fly around without any training"

„but i want too!"

„we can at least look at it that doesn't harm. i too are delighted at the idea of flight"

both rina and marth opened the skill shop excitedly while lüziel was a bit more reserved about this

Icarus Wings

Class: local myth

Description: You are granted waxen wings to fly through the air freely. let them not touch the sun or they might melt! For those who always follow their goals these wings will bring them there safely.

Cost: 3500 tallon

Buy?

„3500 tallon even if we wanted we could get them"

„well you might can't but i can. i have saved up a lot of exp as i only used them for cheap basic things"

„that's unfair you're cheating"

„have you forgotten that by simply existing you got significantly stronger as me and even for me its a big chunk. 100 exp out of the 127 i have is not a small amount"

„did you safe them up to exactly get something good"

„it's not like i'm complaining but you just don't get it. never use anything but the bare minimum because what if you need that one specific thing at some point."

„and that point will never come. i see exactly what you are doing here but just like in video games you will simply never use anything with that attitude"

„rina tell him that he's wrong"

„i always use everything up. why would get something to not use it"

„not you too. well i guess you are right that collectors anxiety isn't getting you anywhere"

marth pressed the buy button and with 100 exp lost he now had his new skill pop up in his skill menu.

„and now you can figure out how to use it"

„why does that sound so sarcastic? it can't be that hard to do"

when he opened the skill menu and after pressing the skill icarus wings he saw an activate button where before was the buy button

„there gotta be a better way to do this"

„you need to ask kamaron he knows everything."

„you're probably right but for now this should suffice"

when he pressed the button 2 giant mechanical wings appeared attached to his back followed by marth falling to the ground

„…heavy"

„you're spirits don't seems as lifted now that you have wings, how… ironic"

while lüziel grinned at him tried marth to roll over to lie with the wings on the ground

„you ironic bastard i already knew that these needed to be around 8 meters long. i just didn't expect them to be this heavy for something that you use to fly. if i try i can stand up with this probably but thats the best there is"

„you are simply to weak. you are always so much weaker than us"

„i would love to see how you react to multiple kilo suddenly appearing on your back"

while they where enveloped in their play did it also garner a few laughing eyes from the ones around them. what it also attracted was the interest of the empress who happened to see them leading for her to pay them a visit. while coming closer she investigated rina but couldn't see anything left from yesterday.

„it seems that you are playing a comedy in the court. i would you please to refrain from disturbing the people working here."

„we don't play a comedy. that mean to say"

„i wouldn't be so sure about that. we probably shouldn't have done this right on front of the hospital"

lüziel started to notice the people looking at them

„they can laugh as much as they want as their laughter will not reach me when i fly above them"

while marth was doing his speech did rina cheer him on but the empress seemed to not be impressed by this

„it seems like all of you are again back to health and unoccupied judging from your actions. i would like for you to accompany me for a moment"

„of cause we would love to follow the goddess"

„you shouldn't overstate your flatteries or they will turn into ridicule."

rina looked confused at the empress

„but who even are you?"

„oh my you still don't know where you are, do you? well that matters little for now just follow m. this place is not suited to talk and please turn off that skill it is irritating to see you fail around with it helpless"

when marth opened the menu to turn of his wings the empress realized how inexperienced they where not even knowing such basic things

„you can simply call it by name. all unnatural skills can be called. it is not needed to open the system for that"

„i knew there had to be a way. this was way to convoluted. icarus wings"

with his word they wings disappeared into a cloud of dust that then dissipated into nothingness. lüziel on the other hand was interested by the other statement the empress made

„unnatural skill what does that mean"

„oh my what could that mean i wonder"

while the empress pretended to not know she turned around with which rina had realized her tails waving around

„fluffy tails! the tails are natural so they work for themself"

„clever girl, would you know follow me"

while rina looked proud of he ‚accomplishment' did lüziel looked a bit irritated from that answer murmuring to himself

„but they are not skills are they. aren't they supposed to be something they simply have, my arms are also not a skill"

the empress brought them to a garden behind the palace with flowers of all sorts of weird shapes

„it is such a tragedy that you came here just a bit too late to see the jahtori bloom. it is said to be a sign of a bright future when they bloom."

the empress was crouching before a patch of leaves baring no sings of having any flower or fruit coming out of it

„so why did you bring us here"

„straight to the point. it is not bad to be focused but being overly focused lets you miss out on a lot of things that happen next to you"

while talking did the empress turn from lüziel to marth and rina who where strolling through the garden admiring the flowers

„lüziel look these flowers are all funny and have red leaves"

rina who did experience the city being bed bound up until now was completely perplexed at the red fauna

„i really want to taste this but it definitely will taste as weird as everything here"

marth was looking at some green berries who stood weirdly out in the red around them

„i don't mind you taking some of the fruit as long as you ask. not all of them will be as healthy.

when marth ate one of the berries he immediately spewed it out again gaining a chuckle from the empress

„they taste like pure sugar, no even worse. why are the so darn sweet"

the empress turned back to lüziel

„i know i called you here to talk but you too should go look around. not everywhere you find a garden like this"

when looking around he saw mostly plant he could imagine existing on earth without him knowing say for the part where they are all red compared to the normal green they should have. the more interesting part was the different kind of fruits hanging on them had the shape of an upside down mushroom another was an elongated apple jet another looked like a star having long spikes come out of an overall round shape. out of the corner of his eye he could see rina running around touching everything she could find making him quite uncomfortable but he felt bad stopping her. he stopped when he stood before a tree with pitch black bark standing slightly elevated on its roots. it had long nearly rectangular leaves hanging down that where surrounded by a sort of flickering. at first he thought that he was just seeing wrong but with a closer look he was sure that there was something wrong.

„of all things getting drawn to the fihrlume. most just see it as one of many trees rare enough for even rakte to not know of it. tell me child what drew you to it"

„i'm not imagining this it definitely looks weird. it is as if something is blurring my vision when looking at it"

„interesting it seems you are one of the few selected to see it but you miss the ability to see what is truly in front of you"

„what do you mean by that?"

„come back when you can see this and it will all be revealed by itself"

the empress drew something in the air. together with what she said it was clear to lüziel that she meant more than simply her hand movement

„but i doubt that i could come here a second time. right now the only reason we are able to be here is because of kamaron isn't it"

„that may be the truth but you are capable of earning the right again from your own volition. it takes a lot to visit a ruler but it is not impossible but do not presume that i will recognize you because you where here once."

marth came up from behind looking at the tree before them

„why are you standing before this regular tree. there are so many interesting things here you need to see"

„i think i have seen enough. there is still the matter of why we are actually here"

„indeed, i think it is time to end this playtime."

the empress was going towards a table that was placed on a tiny island formed by the river going through the garden. when rina saw them go she hurried to follow them. the empress waited for them to all settled around the table before speaking.

„the reason why i have called you i simply out of curiosity. what would these people be that follow kamaron and dhstell. it is a good thing that you are curios and don't shy away from the unknown. but you should not over do this as it will lead to ruin"

she was looking at rina who went around quite recklessly. rina down fiddling with her fingers.

„so this was a test of sorts and it seems like we passed?"

marth was leaning on the table while speaking

„fear not there was no such thing as failing. i simply wanted to see how you would act"

„and what is your verdict after seeing us. i am quite intrigued by how the empress of an entire race would see us normal people"

„one is childish, one is to serious and the last daring"

while saying that she looked with each word to one of the three

„that sounds so mean. you tricked us to act that way that why. i'm not a child i'm all grown up"

rina looked insulted from what the empress said

„doing something to deny it is not a story of success."

„she does have a point that you are a bit more… free spirited"

„that being said these are no bad things. the mind of a child is that to question and find the truth where others believed the lie, only someone serious can reach their goals through hardship and being daring leads to progress"

„but you sure didn't simply go out of your way to talk to some nobodies fr simply that"

the empress through a bit before answering lüziel

„what is kamarons goal. i know he is working in something and now he suddenly picked up thirds. something is coming yet they intend to not inform the leaders"

„he didn't tell us of any plans. we honestly know little about him. he is helpful and stuff but never says anything about himself"

„so even to his students he wont talk. what is it that you seek. in that case what you do see him as. how does he act towards you?"

„what is this a criminal investigation?"

marth was taken a bit back by the demanding questions the empress gave them

„excuse my rudeness, this is simply the best opportunity i will get to gain information but it doesn't seem that i will gain anything of worth here. i should say tis to you now while gathered, this will be your last day in the palace. i cannot simply let strangers stay indefinitely and with your purpose of stay gone you have to go."

„predictable i was wondering when this is going to end"

„but i couldn't even explore anything. it's unfair that lüziel and marth can but i can't"

„it is not that you are expelled from the city you simply are no longer allowed to be inside the palace but i doubt you will be able to stay for long inside the city"

„why that?"

„were in a capital what do you think housing cost here. i doubt we can afford that"

„if you understand then thats perfect. you will not gain any special goodby so tomorrow in the morning please leave to not cause any issues"

when they left the garden did the empress split up from them and they where now standing there reunited but had to figure out what comes next

„the day is still long so how about we take a trip to the city"

rina looked happy about that waning to immediately run out

„wait before we do that we should plan. if we spent the entire day out we will be stuck with no where to go tomorrow. it takes priority to do that"

„buuuhh i want to explore. planing is boring"

„and necessary so get back and the more you help the faster we're done with this"

after convincing they went to their room

„so we are now no longer restricted by what we should do. i have a new skill so i would like to train with it a bit before we do anything but after that we should do a bit more challenging stuff as what we did up until now is becoming rather easy and we slowly run out of money"

„i thought the same we can manage but we need to change something as we get less rewards from the general quests"

„i want to go to more places. all we did was stay in the same boring place. there where so many funny names for places"

„personally i think we should go on a hunting quest. there are a lot that already are below our level and we will not get far with what we are doing right now. we have earned 5 hundreds of a percent we will be long dead before we finish at this rate and the highest rewards come from hunting"

lüziel looked at rina and marth before answering

„so one wants to explore and the other doing higher level missions. that means we would need to take missions outside of pauroe but i don't think it's a good idea to completely remove ourselves from there"

„but it's no fun if we always return. we already did this in the past so why can't we travel around"

„don't worry it will work in the end somehow. we are not stupid so we should find a way to make it work wile constantly moving even if we still know little about this world"

„i know what you're trying to do. you simply want to stay here because of the rakte"

marth started to move a bit backwards before screaming while running away

„kemonomimi girls are justice kemonomimi girls are life!"

„why is he allowed to have fun on his own. i also want to go"

„he isn't come back her we're not done. you acting up will not extend our stay!"

when running after marth they ended up in the city and with lüziel giving up on doing more productive things they went around exploring some things only new for rina other new to all three. after wandering around they ended up at a bridge

„look at this it's like the city is on a mini island"

marth was looking left and right to see how the river tightly surrounded the city as far as he could see while rina was staring inside the river

„there are so many fishies. our rivers never had this much fish"

„thats kinda weird. wouldn't you assume that this close to a city there would be less but here you can just put your hand in and probably get one"

„there are a lot but also all the same so this is presumably a school and if i had to guess they get fed a lot. they show no signs of fear while we are this close"

when rina put in her hand in the water came a part of them followed with her skill activating

„look all the fishies come over her"

„must be nice being able to cheat with this"

marth was also putting his hand into the water but none of the fishes came close to it

„i would say skill issue"

lüziel also attempted this and it may only be a few but some of the fished did came to him

„you don't even have the fitting skill for this"

„i'm not talking about the written ones"

while those two had their argument was rina entranced in a ‚conversation' with the fishes before standing up and looking around

„something is blocking their path. they cannot get away from this river"

„now that you say it for a river this does look awfully still"

when following the river they found a few tree that broke and fell into the river at a narrow part of it letting barely any water through

„well now we know why there is a problem but can we change it is another thing"

„the fire department does this so we need to ask them"

„rina your forgetting the important part that we have no idea if thats the same here or where they are to begin with"

„we can ask the lady from before"

„if i know one thing then that we can't do that"

„but why not?"

„she did indeed just skip over this but she is the empress of the rakte so she wont just let us go to her for something as trivial as this"

„in the end the only people we do know are kamaron and dhstell. they should know and it's not like rina would just ignore this and let the city deal with it themself"

lüziel was looking at rina but didn't even wait for an answer going back in direction castle. when they returned they searched for either kamaron or dhstell and found dhstell first. she seemed to be not as enthused with this as rina but decided in the end to deliver the message. after that they returned back to exploration taking up the rest of the day with that. at the end of their day to make matters simple did rina return to the hospital to sleep there for her last day. the next day when they stood up the next day they met up at the entrance gate of the palace.

„it feels weird to simply go without a word but an empress has better things to do as saying goodby to us i guess"

„not even kamaron or dhstell came to say goby this is so sad"

„well do they even know we're going. they probably know we go today but not when"

„so whats next?"

„pauroe first, then we take a mission and see where to go"

„you're really no fun. we can do that also here and stay by the rakte"

„we can do that later but for now we should stay near home where things are more familiar. we are only starting for real now."

before they could go did kamaron call them from behind

„wait before you go let me come with you to the gate"

„why that, we know the way"

„thats not the issue it's more that it will be rather expensive to go from the capital."

„kamaron is so nice but we can care for ourself"

„i'm rather thinking that you can't even pay to begin with. when i say expensive i mean expensive"

„like what"

„a thousand a person"

„that insane who would ever pay that much"

„it's the race tax combined with the capital tax. they don't want many outsiders get in so you simply make it to expensive for people waning to pay it. didn't i tell you that the capitals are mostly pure?"

„does that mean it's everywhere that expensive"

„depending, some go higher"

with this shocking news they gladly took the offer to get payed the way back and went together with kamaron to the gate that now that they could see it up close looked way larger than the other they saw. after paying did kamaron say his short goodby before returning back to the palace. after going through the gate they went first thing to the guild to search for a fitting mission. inside they realized how there was a lot of activity. looking closer at the people running around they realized that most of them looked like they had no idea what they where supposed to do.

„what's this supposed to be?"

from behind did someone answer marths question which surprised him as he didn't expect an answer.

„you ought to be new if you don't know this. it's newbies doing their first missions"

when turning around they could see someone with fin like ears skin of scales and with yellow eyes looking at them a manaked. they knew of them but never interacted with one up until now so seeing them up close let them see the scales that are normally hard to distinguish from regular skin from a far.

„but the new people came in a year ago so shouldn't everyone have already learned how to do this"

„it's the guilds fault. they take them up and train them for a year before letting them do missions. nice for new ones but for the other 99% it simply obnoxious that we have to deal with this twice with every batch of new thirds"

„we hoped to simply get a mission and go but selecting one in this mess…"

„ehy you are that girl that humiliated me! fight me right now so that i can destroy you!"

out of the crowd emerged someone they didn't now who he was but he definitely called them out pointing at rina

„i don't know who you are. i would never humiliate others that is rude and i don't like being rude"

„don't weasel your way out of this! i trained extra hard to kick your ass the next time we meet!"

lüziel stepped in blocking of the persons way to rina

„i don't know what you're problem is but have it somewhere else"

„you know how much they put me through because i lost that stupid fight, i deserve my revenge!"

marth suddenly remembered the face looking angrily at them

„oh i remember you. you're the one of the guild kamaron let rina fight with"

„so i'm not even good enough to be remembered now!"

„well you are small fry so why would we. you will simply repeat the same thing you did last, AT BEST"

from behind the manaked let out a silent groan

„please don't fight here it's already bad enough with all those thirds"

„you know what just beating you in silent means nothing when everyone saw me fail so you better take part in the beginner tournament and get far enough to fight me so that i can destroy you"

„you are a meany i don't want to fight anyone and you just shout at me. i did nothing wrong"

„i really don't want to get part of this but i have to stop you right there the beginner tournament is only for the thirds of the last year"

„well we are from last year"

marth turned around letting lüziel and rina deal with the rude guy

„oh you simply seemed like you would already know your way here"

„we do. as we said shouldn't be a year enough to learn the basics"

„ah you're guildless and learned how reality works right from the start. not many get through the recruitment without a guild so i didn't even consider it"

„let's just say we had our own special experience with that"

thanks to the guy shouting at rina rather loud did in the time marth spoke with the manaked a crowd form around them to see what was happening.

„just go away, i don't like you"

„you're not getting away that simple!"

„what is going on here!"

through the crowd forced himself a woman dressed in formal looking clothe

„he just shouts at me or no reason"

„oh i have my reasons. you simply pretend like you didn't do anything"

„i didn't, you are the mean one here"

„i don't care who it was but the guild hall is not there to do your fighting so stop or go"

„you heard her. just stop being annoying and leave us alone"

„he wants a fight right, let 'em have it. i think fighting in that beginner tournament sounds fun. kamaron told me that i am behind in therms of my body that why rina fought last time so i would like to see how i actually fare in a fight"

the guy looked deprecating at marth

„fine i fight him but if i beta him that means i'm better tan you and you have to pay up"

when he left did rina stretch out her tong towards his back

„you shouldn't make it worse"

„but i don't like him. he deserves this"

„i don't know what you did this year but it is proven to be a rule if you don't follow a guild that you are stronger"

„sorry that you had to see that mister manaked"

rina was apoligizing towards the manaked

„don't worry this isn't that bad. assholes exist everywhere and we simply have to deal with them. just make sure that you beat him boi"

„i will try but i son't know if i am weak in comparison or if i really are below the average"

„as long as you give it your all and don't lose when we could win. it seems that your little conflict has pulled away the crowd from the other places. better use this before everything returns to chaos"

the manaked quickly left them to go wherever he needed to be

„i guess we have no choice but to take the part in the tournament"

„but i don't want to fight"

„yeah don't pull us into this. you decided to do this we could have gone without it, but anyways when even is it"

as their first choice to search for it they went to the missions board seeing right in the middle a big poster about the tournament in question. announced for exactly the first day of the next year in the same arena rina ‚fought' before with a price money of 5k for the first 3k for the second and 1k for the third and 1k cp in addition for the winner. registration done over the system.

„next year that means we still have a good bit of time for that so we should take another mission in the meantime"

„well seeing how i need to fight it would be nice having something with combat"

called to action by this did rina blindly rip of a mission

„and the rina lottery piiiicked… well this locks doable. this is like the most average beginner quest have ever heard of"

„thats nica and all but let us lock at it somewhere else. i personally don't like being constantly pushed around"

moving out of the turmoil to a more peaceful place

„so what is the goal"

„monster hunt to get materials. get 5 to 10 jackalopes with good horns. the real challenge being finding them in the first place. not really what i meant but will do for now"

accepting their new challenge they went to the gate to get their destination finding themselves greeted by snow.

„this is so cold i don't want to be here anymore. i don't need to see the jackalope if it's so cold"

„common rina it's just a bit of a breezer"

„lüziel is lying you also shake"

„i have to admit this are not ideal temperatures. we should have looked what to expect before coming"

„you two are just overreacting. it's winter what do you expect"

while lüziel and rina where shacking did marth show no signs of freezing

„but in pauroe there was no snow or cold to speak of"

„meaning?"

„we don't have winter clothe"

„let's just get in the station and we can care for that there"

inside they first thing bought some winter jackets that they put on. after that they looked again at their mission to find out where to go. it lead them to a small shop selling different kinds of trinkets and accessories. when saying why they where there he simply said to bring the jackalopes to him dead and with horns intact and price can be discussed afterwards. knowing that this would take longer than a day they checked into an in nearby and prepared what was needed for hunting. first thing first was how to actually find them and then how to attract them. rina of cause being again to stubborn to use her ability to kill something. they spend two entire day searching in the library for information about jackalopes as most information was not useful for actually finding them, but they did find that what they mostly like had to search where snow jackalope who are of cause white being even harder find in the snow which didn't help at all. the next day they went around in search of suited traps. only at the fourth day they actually started with the hunting and they got lucky finding a group of 4 on that day that they caught the day after leaving day 7 for the search of the last and in 8 days they finished with 7 caught.

Mission Shy Horns cleared

Achievement: 0/1

a whole bunchnot cleared

Reward: 140 tallon * 7

20 cp

0 tallon

Monsternomicon update Jackalope

Bank: 1671 tallon + 980 tallon

Clear Progression: 998 480 cp - 20 cp

[You attracted the interest of a hunter

the stars will closely follow your hunts]

in addition to clearing lüziel also got a message popping up

„this just makes no sense. a whole year nothing i tried yielded results but now this random mission gives me this"

„why do only you get something like that and i don't. i did as much as you"

„that's because i have the skill and you don't you fuzzy head"

lüziel grabbed rina who was leaning over his shoulder to look at his menu ruffling her hair

„we already did some hunting missions. maybe you hit some sort of threshold"

„well not like it's going to change much right now. we still have over a week so up to the next mission"

„finally no more snow. i had enough of snow for the entire year"

returning back they saw that the number of people in the guild reduced but still was so high that it was probably pure coincidence that there where less today. but thanks to the reduced numbers they could more calmly look at the mission board seeing that there where way more low scoring missions compared to usual.

„guess makes sense that more beginner friendly quests get hung out when there are are more expected beginners"

„but they are all boring. there where so many fun missions that you didn't let me take before and now they are all gone"

„not like we can change it so we just have to suck it up. rina do your thing!"

and per rinas choice they picked up an extermination mission. the goal a bear running wild where it shouldn't. after arriving at their destination they noticed that something odd.

„everything looks so old. it's like out of a history book"

„when even rina notices it i am not making things up. even the ancient looking places we went to looked still modern to a degree but this looks like the midd ages, what was this place called duret enere larum, doesn't sound special"

approaching them was a man with rather shabby looking clothe

„are you the holly knights sent for our protection. thank the heavens that god didn't forget this small village"

as lüziel got irritated by this rather odd way of addressing them did marth take the role of answering seeing this as the perfect opportunity to roll play

„yes we are indeed the knights sent to slay the evil lurking within this city. bring us to your mayor to tell us what it is that you seek to destroy"

„why is marth speaking so funny"

„just let em do. it seems to work"

„of cause of cause. my humble self will bring you immediately to our mayor"

waling through the city they saw that most people looked skinny and compared to other places they went there where no fancy shops or anything and overall the village was so tinny that you could see its end to all directions.

„mayor i brought with me the holly knights sent for our rescue"

„heavens blessed us. ready some food we need to show hospitality tot he holly knights"

they brought them to a simply wood table and brought within wooden bowls a simple soup

„so this really is the midd ages"

lüziel was whispering to marth

„this is so tasteless"

rina knew not to show it openly but to her this food tasted like water

„probably no salt or other spices"

„what are they whispering. is the food not to your liking"

„do not fret we where simply wondering wherein the problem may lie"

„of cause. as oof lately hunter have encountered a terrible beast in the woods that already cost us one person. if this continuous we have no way of obtaining any meat and with alone our fields we cannot nourish the village"

„so tell us where did you see that beast precisely. even for it is not possible to search an entire forest fore one singular beast"

„i will naturally send with you the hunter who encountered it to lead you through the forest but they already left so please bear with us for another day holly knights"

„We wouldn't have it any other way. you sure have some quarters we can rest in in that case"

„naturally only the best for the holly knights"

he brought them to a rooms they was with certainty his own but he insisted on them taking it. after that marth ordered him to leave them alone for the time being

„you really seem to revel in this but what is going on. holly knights, being on the brink of starvation that doesn't sound like the place we usually go"

„they all looked so sad and ill"

„whyever it may be this is definitely not part of the rest. my best guess is that this is actually a place that is in the medieval times and we are here to do something they could never do."

„so we are like superheroes. we need to save these poor villagers"

„if they are stuck in the midd ages we are probable even something akin to gods having not only modern age technology but also this"

lüziel was pointing at his menu that he had opened

„that being said a bear is still a bear. we may be stronger and faster than we used to be but we aint beating a bear with our fists"

„i can make him my friend. i already had one bear friend"

„and then what, we can't take em with us or know where else to bring em to"

„violence is not the answer!"

„rina you can't just say that without giving us alternatives. violence is one answer and most of the time its a very effective one"

„then i won't help you"

„figures as much but you have to see it from the other side these people are in peril and need help"

„marth stop she clearly doesn't want to"

„we can't just let her get away with not wanting to fight anything. that will come to bite us at some point and she clearly has no problems with being in a fight if she can't choose"

„yes but forcing people to do something or having a choice and deciding to do it is a big difference"

„lüziel i don't need this, i know that marth is right but i still don't want to but i also don't want to let the villagers alone so i will help but i wont hurt anyone"

„with that problem fixed i want to try this. i have looked over the affordable things in the shop multiple times and i need to make a test of what to expect. this net is supposedly tough enough to hold multiple tons and i resistant to sharp things. perfect to catch something i would say"

„do you even know how to do a net trap"

„why ya think i propose this question"

marth was looking over to rina

„i know what you want but i can't. even if i wanted to he wont obey me"

„didn't you say you can just a second ago. can you at least make it follow you, all we need is him to run into it"

with rina nodding the plan was set for now in the hope that it would be that simple. the next day they got brought into the forest by the hunters showing them where they saw the bear. after assuring the hunters that they don't need them they went back letting the ‚holy knights do gods judgment'.it took them a while but with the help of lüziels ability giving him heightened senses he was able to make out where the bear was without them provoking it. nearby marth and lüziel set up the trap while rina kept watching the bear. when they where finished they showed rina where to go to and then she attracted the bear with it following her without hesitation. surprisingly was rina able to outrun the bear easily not only because she could easier maneuver the terrain but simply because she was generally faster than it. when reaching the trap the triggered it trapping the bear inside it and the net did hold how promised it inside with no problem showing no sign or tearing under the bear furiously trying to escape.

„i can tell you one thing a rope net wouldn't do this. i wonder what this stuff is made out of"

„i think we should kill the bear. he is harmless in this state. lets just tell the villagers and they can do whatever they want"

with lüziel saying that rina looked somewhat happy. the villagers at first looked skeptical when seeing the bear tied up but after seeing how well the net hold it despite it non stop trying to escape they started to praise them for their achievement. when returning to the village they got the well know window popping up showing their successful completion of the mission but the interesting part was that the villagers seemed to not notice the glowing purple window in front of the three speaking right through it something no one would do normally. after ensuring they they have no time to stay for the feast, to mostly not have to eat the rather poor tasting food, they returned with only a few days left for the tournament. as there was not enough time to take another mission they decided to rest which meant that marth vanished to somewhere ‚training' while lüziel and rina had to stroll the city to pass time. marth did not return even on the day the tournament started letting them no other choice but to go to it and hope he is there.

„at least his name is in the bracket but that doesn't say much"

„marth would never run away. he will definitely come"

„let's just try to get some good spots and the rest will sort it out by itself"

despite their best efforts the best seat they could get where in the middle of the row as the front seats where already booked before. to the first few fights they didn't pay that much attention as they where not interested in the fighting but simply how their friend would fair. what they did see was that this was mostly just a glorified martial arts tournament as no one used skills or weapons of any kind. finally with the 10th fight it was time for marth to appear.

„i told you marth would come."

„but now he has to show what he has to show for. this is not high level fighting but thats not my concern"

„marth just goes pow and wapow and will easily win. no one will able to touch him"

„in technique sure he probably has one up on most but raw power?"

for this round marth opponent looked like all the other who fought just like a normal person who probably for the first time in his life learned fighting a year ago. this fight was not flashy but it did prove a point marth was weak. it started as usual with both being on opposing sides of the arena and with the start signal it they went towards each other. marth was on the more cautious side holding a distance waiting for his opponent to act. he did not need to wait long as his opponent grew quickly impatient and made a strike forward. if not for marth being already ready to doge he would have been hit for certain. in comparison where his moves sluggish but more precise. he was by no means a master of his art but he was on a completely different level compared to his opponent. seeing this fight remembered lüziel at that time where marth fought elise but instead of intentionally losing for a long therm gain he had only one shot and that was exactly how he acted. the crowd did not like his cowardly behavior but this did not stop him continuing for an entire minute. you could see how slowly he reacted faster and faster to his opponent leading into his first hit cleanly aimed past his opponents attack direct at the face. you could hear how the crowd got somewhat excited that he finally attacked but to marth this proved something he feared, his hits had less impact than they should. from now on the fight turned into a dance but one that was growing increasingly tiresome for marth. he was as of now untouched and landed a few blows but his stamina ran quicker out than his opponents. nonetheless he continued and won his first round without taking a singular hit.

„so this is what it means to not grow on your own. his skill looks more like a hindrance as of now"

„that was so unfair marth did so much more but barely won. they should have given him the win way earlier"

„well the rules are knock out or surrender so he will have to do this entire spiel 4 more times to win but in reality we only want him to win 2 more time to beat that guy"

„but marth away for so long he sure has some awesome hidden power"

„thats the hope"

the next match they again didn't pay attention but the one after they did as this was with the person who made it their goal to have revenge on rina. as there was not much fighting with rina they saw for the first time they learned that he was despite his demeanor not that aggressive in the fight making him an interesting match for marth who could risk to be offensive. as expected he did win and the tournament continued with more fight they didn't bother to pay much attention to. there was a short break where the announcer talked for a bit between the first round and the second but it continued pretty quick with the next round. when ti reached again the time for marth to fight he now had to face someone who already beat at the bear minimum 1 other person raising the skill ceiling a lot which was the only edge he had in these fights. despite that was the beginning of this fight a repeat of the last as his opponent had not much chance as to play along. it got more interesting when the actual fighting started as this time did his opponent show a clear counter measurement to the hit and run strategy leading to marth first hit. it wasn't a full force blow and only into the stomach but you could see how much this did to marth still he continued. after taking that hit his plan changed drastically instead of wearing down his opponent he got way more aggressive taking intentional hit to trade with better aimed hits of himself. when the fight ended he was barely able to stand upright leaving it only up to the imaginary how bad it would get on the next round. before the top 8 fight started they had an intermission of halve an hour letting lüziel and rina attempt to find marth but they where prohibited to enter the fighters area.

„marth looked so bad will he really be fine. i don't like that he gets hurt this much because of me."

„he partially does this to find out where he stands so don't feel bad"

„but i still don't like how brutal this is. how can this be allowed?"

it was of cause obvious even to rina why they could go this far as whenever someone took any form of damage the first round they returned the second with with mostly just bruises showing the potency of medicine. during the third round you could easily see the spike in skill. while in the first most that dropped out where just people who liked fighting now you needed some sort of talent to compete. marth was now fighting in the third round against the bully.

„so you made it here just to get crushed by me. i have seen your cowardly fights don't think that that trick would work against me"

„well whatever you say. you probably can't even point out what i was doing so how should you not get tricked by it"

„it will be glorious when i beat that smug look out of your face"

„talk about anger issues"

this round started rather unexpected as contrary to what marth did the other two round he was taking the immediate initiative. this did give him the factor of surprise but not much else as he was still outclassed otherwise.

„so you do know how to fight but do you think those weak hits get me down"

he may acted that way but like all the other it was not like the hits did nothing but simply less than they should. after that he tried to grapple wit marth but he always slipped out of his range. what hit marth in the end was a kick blocking of his usual escape plane. it was clear that this was not the bullies strong suit as it looked rather floppy but it did do it's job. following this marth did try to get a bit of distance making it the time for the bullies to go on the offensive. marth could avoid any more direct hits but he did need to resort to blocking making his arms only not hurt because of the adrenalin. when trying to convert a punch towards him into a throw he slipped up by releasing his grip turning this situation into the worst case scenario of the bully getting a choke grip on him.this for certain would have been the end if not for marth ringing out 2 words

„ikarus… wings"

from his back exploded out 2 large wings knocking away his opponent while seriously injuring both of his arms who where cut through by the wings.

„what the hell thats illegal. ref why aren't you doing anything!"

„nothing happened in this fight was an illegal move, now continuo fighting"

„you can't be serious don't you see that he literally has 2 giant wings!"

this tantrum gave marth enough time to stand up after falling over from the weight of the wings combined with his fatigue.

„and who said that this is against the rules. because no one else did this? or because no one else can do this? nothing in the rules prohibits the use of skills it's just that no one has any to use to begin with"

„you asshole this does not count this fight is invalid, invalid i say"

„thats not for you to decide will yo now go onwards or a more fitting question would be are you capable of fighting with those wounds"

marth was pointing at his arms out of which blood flew like a river. seeing how his arms where hanging down it was obvious that he couldn't use them and it was also just a matter of time until the blood loss caught up to him. the fight didn't end officially there but the following attacks where barely mention worthy as even marth who was at his limit and significantly slowed down with his wings could avoid them with a halve hearted tackle being the best his opponent had to offer before his time ran out. marth moved on to the fourth round which after the last fight of this round had another short break.

„take that you idiot"

„so fighting is bad but heavily wounding that guy in particular is ok?"

„he is mean and rude, he deserves this"

„but to think he would use wings like this. but that could be everything he worked on the last days"

where marth was alreay struggling to keep up i his last round in this fight he was now hopelessly inferior to his opponent who also was skilled at fighting as much as he was. he did try his best but this honest fight was in fact to honest breaking it down to who could hit harder, faster and endure longer. at the beginning there was a blow trading that looked equal and the threat of the wings prohibited any form of grabbing making it easier for marth to attack safely but that alone was not enough ending in him getting knocked out in the top 4. the final fight looked like it was interesting going from the responses of the audience but neither lüziel nor rina where able to accurately judge it themselves. weirdly enough there was no deciding match for third place and instead it ended with 2 third places marth being one of them winning a total of 1000 tallon and 20 cp.

„so what was your great plan that didn't let you see us for multiple days?"

„it didn't work out but i gained some information. first of all skills have a cool down on activation and deactivation. 30 seconds for my wings at the very least. the other thing was the question where they come from and as you could see its expansion out from the center combined with something hard or sharp leading to a sort of spring loaded knife."

„and you tried to weaponize that?"

„that being said your back is not the optimal place for this stunt"

„i guess it's now time to take up bigger missions"

they rested another day before going to the guild picking a new mission. when they entered it the next day it was still as crowded as before or maybe even more with a lot of people talking about the tournament yesterday

„did you hear it. apparently someone completely crushed one of the brackets"

„yeah i heard that all fights ended in less than a minute"

„thats probably just exaggeration"

„i heard that it was someone who cheated themselves in to get easy money"

„you know thats impossible, you can't trick the system"

marth was listening into some of the conversations while walking past them

„they are definitely not talking about the tournament i was in"

„what are you talking about"

„ah nothing important"

lüziel didn't bother to ask more and turned his focus to rina who was starring at a big poster on the board

Olympus needs your help

Become a guard for the great Olympus searches again for new recruits to guar it gates.

You too can become part of history protecting these older than time grounds.

Sign up now and become a fully fledged part of Olympus.

Reward: 1500 tallon monthly + 600cp yearly

Place: Olypmus

Rating: for everyone

„recruitment?"

„we gotta take that. it's olympus how awesome is that"

„slow down there, this looks more like an job application"

„we can always just quit. what are they going to do continuo paying us, that will show us"

„i want to see the thunder grandpa"

„i doubt zeus would bother with the guards. but i have to say i am also intrigued by seeing things we thought where just myth"

after taking the ‚mission' up they went to olympus. looking around did the city look exactly as you would expect with building taken straight from ancient greek but with a few modern touches. the city surrounded a large mountain on which's top was a huge temple. their mission lead them instead into the other direct towards the border of the city which was surrounded by a wall to an assortment of building looking like a military complex. there where around 100 people who came and after no more came in a large imposing person in armor entered.

„i know you are all eager to start fighting for the great cause of protecting olympus but some of you who gathered here will not be allowed to go any further. only those worthy are allowed to protect the city, we will not have our defense fall because a bunch of maggots is defending it. only those who are capable defending against me will be worthy for this. and put some form into that tumult and line up how a solider is supposed to."

there was a wave of discomfort going trough everyone but they did as said and lined up in 8 rows. some people tried to get a spot as far back as possible to first see what is going to happen so their surprise was big when the solider went to the last row first and without a word or stopping hit the last person to the ground.

„do you think i didn't see that! in a real fight the enemy also isn't going to let others go first. such lazy behavior is not befitting of this job. you're out!"

not even waiting for the person on the ground to stand up he went to the next one kicking him down after him holding up his arms preemptively

„and never show your intentions beforehand or your enemy will abuse that, you're out!"

he then continued with some being able to block and others not until he reached rina. not like the others she moved out of the way of the punch going towards her and barely saw in time when he tried to sweep away her feet jumping backwards just to get hit out of the air to the ground with another punch.

„finally the first person who isn't so stupid and thinks she could take me head on and you didn't even slack of after just one hit. i hope everybody saw that. i hope you didn't think that those weak hits i gave you where anything of note. if i would hit at full force i would hit straight through those fragile arms of yours"

after that did halve the remaining people try to duck away some successful some now lying on the ground in pain. when he was finished a group of people came in picking up those who where hit followed by the solider kicking out those who failed.

„now that we have weeded out the hay it's time for an introduction. i am the captain of the west gate agammemnon. for the following year you will be pressed into shape befitting for a guard and everyone who survives that can become a real guard."

what followed was something that made marth quickly regret his choice of taking up this mission waking up early every day followed by training just to stay at the gate the rest of the day and anyone getting caught slacking of had to run around the city 5 times before they got food. thy where set on rotating shifts with 1 day of the week of. while lüziel and rina both had no problems with standing up early did marth despite his moaning never have to do the 5 laps which lüziel had to do once and rina 4 times. as the year went one some people dropped out leaving only 50 of the 100 people this started with and afterwards they respectfully declined the offer to join olympus as a guard. what they did learn during the year was that nothing of the myths they knew was left leaving only gods they never heard of and that a lot of them where quite arrogant acting even from the far they only could see them. after this experience they decided to not do something like this again so next up they took up a mission as support for hunting. besides them there where 5 other groups of which 3 where clearly the experienced ones.

„let's see how much this junk will help us"

„you shouldn't be that negative. you too where a beginner at some point"

„last time we took help from beginners they where complete failures and these babes are supposed to be better"

with each other speaking where two guys. the rude one having a long slender figure with weird goggles strapped to his head a jeans looking jacket with more pockets than should be possible all looking filled and a belt with different kinds of knifes attached to it. the other was a bit shorter than rina wearing a long smooth black coat that went from shoulders to feet covering his body.

„alright kiddos it's time to pick. only 1 pick no taksies backsies"

a woman jumped at them from behind wrapping her arms around them.

„i know susie you don't need to be this aggressive. even if i don't like it i am still a professional"

„great that we understand us"

she went to another man who was standing alone before someone of the third group spoke up. he was by far the shortest one among everyone here but despite that he had a deep voice making it odd enough for them to first not even realize who even was talking.

„it's time to tell you what where after. we are task to clean up this forest as there were some sightings of a foreign animal. we are not certain what it is but from the description it seems to be some sort of zylme. mushrooms are by nature parasitic and can ruin ecosystems especially on planets like this that have no intelligent live to fight them of"

marth, lüziel and rina where not the only ones confused by this as a look around showed. one of the other groups spoke up after hearing this.

„mushrooms since when can mushrooms destroy an entire fucking ecosystem"

„oh darling you think of how mushrooms are on the majority of planets but we are talking about ones that are like animals. they can walk, talk and most importantly fight back"

the small person took back up from what the woman said

„it is understandable that you are surprised by this but as susie said we are talking about sentient mushrooms here they are extremely dangerous because they infect animals and plants to reproduce making the host to a breeding chamber. on planets where mushrooms become the dominant life form they also take up most of the land life on the planet that is how that is how dominating they are."

„we are lucky that mushrooms getting sentience is incredibly rare. there are a few planets where someone brought mushroom live to and within a matter of decades most animal and plant life perished"

„don't frighten them. don't worry kids just follow what we say and nothing will happen to you. we are prepared for all possibilities, we wouldn't want some children to get hurt"

„anyways we will split up in three teams lead by 2 hunters each. those hunters will tell you more in detail"

they where split up simply by where they where standing closest to so rina, marth and lüziel paired with the one in a coat and his friend.

„let me say this straight up you simply follow our orders don't ask questions and we will have no problems ok."

„don't mind haneul he is normally quite nice but he has lost all his faith in people doing something they are not experienced in after one of our friends dying a hundred years ago in a big accident"

„thats horrible, i'm so sorry for what happened"

after hearing that did rina immediately apologize as if she where the one responsible

„it's not like i am some sentimental wreck i simply have learned my lesson that people have to prove that they can do something"

haneul made a rather annoyed face

„before i forget my name is shuchang. i hope that we will have a good time together"

shuchang made a slight bow while introducing himself

„i'm rina, and i will do my best to help out"

„i guess it's now our turn, i'm marthurwainian but you can just call me marth"

„and i'm lüziel nice to meet you"

„now that the introductions are finished let's go straight to the crux of this mission as we will have plenty of time to know each other later on. this mission will take about a year and on the worst case up to 5"

„5 years!"

„you think it's easy searching an entire forest for a probably small mushroom that might hide in the ground. we gotta turn every darn leave over and we can't miss a singular spore"

„that sounds like a larger than life ting to do"

„that's what the net is for, simply let me explain and it will become clear very quickly. what we know is that it is only in this area. there where already scans and no where else was found something. we used the highest level of tracking equipment so it should be right. what that means is that we use a great filter to only enclose the mushrooms which needs first a sample. so our first mission is finding an example regroup with the rest and then we can set up the net."

„but how can we help with all of this. we didn't even know that these things existed and now we are supposed to help?"

lüziel looked very skeptical at shuchang but instead haneul answered him

„as said just follow what we say and thats all you need to know. if we needed more hunters we could have found those but all we need is manpower and in that case it's a simple matter of cost"

„so we're cheap labor?"

„well technically yes,… but you could have simple not take up the mission so you apparently think that this is appropriate pay."

shichang looked a bit concerned

„it's not like we're just gonna run away now"

„great, great in that case let's go we need to search an entire forest."

„but just walking randomly around can't find anything"

now it was rinas time to look a bit confused

„you think we don't know that, just follow what we say ok. first we just need 1 exemplar so we go a bit deeper into our sector of the forest to do a rough search"

„and how are we supposed to know what we're searching?"

„it would be indeed problematic for you to discern the difference at a first glance. you know how the monsternomicon updates whenever you se a new species, just walk with t opened around check of everything you see and sooner or later you will find a new entry with the classification fungi. even if you my not realize it it has to be in your field of view if you get a new entry"

„and don't get us lost. just spread far enough out that you can see the person next to you and if you have any problem come right away"

hanoul was looking seriously at them wile wiggling his finger as if he was scolding them for something they did wrong. after that they spread out with lüziel, rina and marth following the advice of shichang. it was the first time that they really used the monsternomicon. when opening it immediately skipped through a bunch of registers ending on loßra wregd. on it where already a few registered filled and new popped up while walking around most of them with the tag insect. even after searching for an entire day the best they could find was a few birds, skittish mammals and lot's and lot's of insects making them regroup when the sun started sinking.

„ok there are a few rules before nightfall you need to follow. first take this and put it on as much skin as possible."

shichang gave all three something resembling a sunscreen tube on it written something in chinese they had to guess

„what's this?"

marth tried to decipher what was standing on the tube unsuccessfully

„to keep the bugs away. at night there are some nasty ones that are venomous. and when your done with that help us gather fire wood. we can't just chop down trees that wood is to wet"

after applying the paste they searched for nearby wood finding a large tree lying in the ground thats ‚gonna be the best they will find'. they repeated this routine for the next 5 days before getting a message to return. when gathering back up with everyone one group brought with it a black box that showed no sign of having an opening or nay texture.

„so what is it"

hanoul went straight towards towards the group with the box

„first things first gotta get this boi to a hospital. the primitive stuff we have access to wont help him anymore"

„i told you it's a horrible idea to bring newbies with us"

the person in question was carried by the person behind the one with the box

„no way that mushroom already got him that hard. what did you do to that poor thing knock him out?"

the woman from the last team was rushing p to the patient and taking him before preparing something

„what else where i supposed to do, stress makes it worse so i needed him to stay calm and the best way to do that is if he isn't conscious"

„what is happening is he ok"

rina was moving agitated from one foot to the other

„as of now not much but soon he will be dead if nothing is done. he probably went a bit overboard and got infected by the mushroom. no matter how strong you are if you breath in their spoor thats really bad news"

before them appeared a small gate that was in comparison to the chaotic big ones they where used to only showing one image.

„we will take care of this first. no one goes out before we return"

for an entire day all they could do was walking circles . the group that boi came with looked especial anxious while the other group just looked like they where bored not caring at all about this situation. the next day they returned without the boi assuring that all he needed was a month before he safely could come back. after that did the hunter gather around the boxy not letting the other come near out of safety reasons.

„so something that spreads spores i assume"

„it's a glitzpf, glzpfpf…"

„you mean a gzlefpneil"

„exactly, god i hate these dum unspeakable names. it was incredibly aggressive probably from the different environment it's in"

„so you're telling me we got one of the worst ones and they are extra dangerous, this job really sucks ass"

„still has to be done by someone."

they separated a bit before the small one said aegis barrier building a halve opaque sphere around the cube before he said ztkrfrjly. this made the box let out a dust cloud on all edges before unfolding. inside hidden was a oval shaped mostly gray creature that had nothing looking like real legs but instead thousands of of small appendages that all moves in a wave like pattern. on it's body where blue shimmering mushroom heads. sticking out from it'S body it had multiple long tentacles who where touching the ground around it. after a short while the tentacles moved quickly on one spot of the ground with two thicker ones extending out of its body as help as if trying to dig a hole but where stopped by the barrier that extended to the ground underneath it.

„that fucker tried to run away the second it sensed a possibility to do so"

„as to be expected from a ground dweller. to all of you if you see anything resembling this don't go near it. nothing else should be blue in this forest so blue means that you call someone, see tentacles call someone! those mushroom on its body can spew out a fine dust of spoors if it feels that an animal is near it, we don't want a second person to be infected"

3 of them then drew 3 circles around it and filling them with a powder. after that they took out of the system 3 coils they stuck into the middle ring to which the barrier attached to by itself and the powder started to have electric arks appear and die out between the rings. after waiting for a bit watching what they made they took spell tags they laid out around the contraption before each hunter returned to his group.

„the setup is done we now only need to span out the net far enough that its sure nose is outside"

„only he says."

„and what are we supposed to do?"

„you need to be conductors for the first layer. just stand where we tell you and hold this"

hanoul gave them a glass tube that had on its end metal caps pointing outwards like spikes with 4 rings that looked like you could turn them. they where filled with a dark liquid that had some shimmering particles go through. when rina saw the rings on the outside she immediately tried to turn them before haneul ripped the cylinder out of her hand

„has no one told you to not play around with random stuff. these rings are there to close this off. when we send you a message turn the outermost ring on both sides to a point where you see the star powder brighten up wait a few minutes turn it off again and only then you can move again while it's on you stay still and you never have your body blocking either side, ok!"

„star powder that sounds interesting"

marth eyes where brighten up when he heard these words

„it's jut called that way because this looks like space in capsule and the powder lights up like stars"

after rina got her capsule back she did hold it up to the sky looking at it with one eye

„now that you know what to do let's go to work wee need to do 5 layers if we want to single out a singular life form and we need to cover an enormous space."

shichang then stopped haneul

„you forgot that they have no idea how much space they should have. let's say you separate far enough to barely see the next person."

„that will make this even longer"

hanel did not look pleased by this but lüziel stepped up

„you could just tell us. we will figure it out, probably"

haneul eyed lüzuel for a while before saying something

„ok let's try it out, the distance it about 1.6 times as much as you can see. when you turn on the connector there is no redoing it if it works and otherwise you turn it off before moving it's up to you three to make it work"

they then went out trying to make a big hexagram. with their first attempt both marth and lüziel stood to far apart making it not work. it took them a few minutes before they figured out the right distance and when they turned the first ring at first a light beam shot out of the ends that formed a ring connecting them all next a barrier that looked different from the one at their base camp formed building a big dome covering the area inside the ring. all three where shocked when this wall shot at them but it just went through their fingers holding the connector without any problem. they had to stand a while before they got a message that they can turn it of after which they grouped back up with haneul and shichang who had put up 2 coils in the ground to which the barrier connected to. they then repeated this a few times getting better at gauging the distance.

„all we did was walking around but it made me already this hungry"

„i also need something to eat"

„i guess it makes sense you still need to eat and sleep every day"

„what thats supposed to mean"

„guess we need to hunt something down more often now. you go look for any type of fruit that looks edible we can decide later what you can actually eat just don't run to far away. oh but first set up the camp"

it was already dark when shichang and haneul returned with something looking like a mix between dear and pony. it wasn't the best meat but the hunger let them eat it without problem. the next few days they repeated this process before moving their camp. within the following month they started to get around surprisingly well starting to less and less feel like they could get lost in this forest. a few times they saw animals running around but most of the time they only hear them and as of now they did saw any gzlefpneil as well. every now and then they took a break returning back to the city to recover for about 1 month.

„you have seen nothing the entire time right?"

„there where so many funny animals. there was a bird with four eyes…"

„rina you do know he meant the mushroom"

„i didn't see any boring mushroom"

„well mean either and you marth"

„nope nothing even checked this thing but there is nothing of note"

marth was looking through a white menu while saying that

„thats weird there definitely should be something here. we started in the epicenter and they should spread out evenly. the other groups also didn't find much."

„let's just say it's because we only ran up the perimeter and didn't try to actively find them"

shichang was rubbing his temples before saying

„well whatever lets go to the second layer. i assume you never in your life made a barrier right"

„that would be correct. we have barely used any skills to begin with"

„well that is to be expected but you have at least advanced above the curve that should mean you're good at getting the hang of things fast"

„what's that supposed to mean, advanced above the curve"

lüziel looked puzzled at haneul

„wait you didn't know, oh you're not in a guild so i guess no one told you"

„why does this sound like something that's going to make me angry at kamaron for not telling us?"

„don't know who that's supposed to be but when applying for a mission your client gets some of you're information. name, race, affiliation, achievements and as thirds also cp all of this is given to let the client cancel if someone is coming he doesn't want like someone who doesn't show the signs of being capable of doing the job before they even need to meet. you can of cause turn as many as you want of but it aways looks strange if you don't want to reveal these things"

„ah no wonder that we only had to state who we are and instantly we got told what to do. there simply was no need to check if we where the ones who took up the job"

while marth seemed to understand this perfectly did lüziel show a more annoyed face

„yes and every random person just gets our information for fee"

„you are way to stiff lüziel. i do't have anything to hide"

to oppose lüziel negative view did rina pose proudly

„you can clear that later on doesn't change anything now. hop hop let's go to training we need to get this stuff into you"

they took out 3 coils making a small triangle that had a barrier looking similar to the the big spanning in between.

„this is normally not part for small ones but let's do the cohesive with powder as thats needed for a big barrier. the first step is easy just make small trench about 2 fingers thick and fill it with this."

shichang gave everyone a pouch that had silver powder in it

„that stuff is poisonous so you better watch to not get in your mouth"

„sometimes you really are like a mother haneul, always worrying way to much"

„well that one over there first thing first tried to play around with the connector"

„i'm not that one, my name is rina"

haneul just flicked with his hand. after everyone made their trench of powder around the barrier shichang continued

„this next part we need to do after with a barrier that size so you need to be really sure what you are doing. how i learned it was to take your hand like this thumb into the powder other fingers into the barrier and this will happen"

he hold his hand L shaped and when he touched both the powder and barrier the barrier started to form around his hand after which he took it away from the powder with the barrier stretching out between the powder his hand and the rest of the barrier. while he did that went some sparks up from the powder towards his hand.

„that looks dangerous"

lüziel was eyeing the sparks

„as long as you don't suddenly move your hand out it completely safe so make sure that if an aggressive animal gets near you to move your hand out slowly"

while saying it did he show what he meant before repeating the first steps again

„you can do it with both hands but at first only try one or the result is going to be to chaotic. what you now need to do may look simple but it isn't. those ‚dangerous' sparks are what where after, they are information carriers and we need them to spread. for me works best to take them with closed fingers and when one is about to hit you're hand you flick it up spreading you're fingers to serve as a sort of catapult. some do it by moving their entire arm and that is faster but for me inconsistent"

when he flicked up his hand as described and a wave rippled through the barrier. at first it had no form but after calming down you could see something akin to a river bed in which sometimes some sparks shot through.

„that is not hard, you just moved your hand a bit. i can do that easily"

„if you say so milady, you can prove me wrong by doing it"

rina went immediately to work with the first steps obviously posing no challenge but when she flicked up her hand like shown she screamed while pulling her hand quickly out

„as you can see this is not that easy. what you did wrong was at bare minimum that you moved your hand not through the barrier which made the sparks travels through your body"

„sound like an electric current"

„basically, just don't overdo it. if you don't get the hand of this instead of needlessly inflicting pain upon you we can just do what the other probably are doing and use technological help"

haneul stepped up to look at rinas hand to see if everything was ok but couldn't find any problem

„why not do that from the start. isn't the point of technology to make things easier so why learn this for this one time deal"

„it wasn't my idea, shichang thought he could try this as it's faster so if you can learn it we almost certainly will be finished before the others even with a delayed start"

„faster? how is using technology slower"

both haneul and shichang just shrugged

„don't ask us we have no idea how this actually works we just know that it is how it is. i heard something like our technology can't interact with hyper dimensional space but i have no clue what that's supposed to mean or remember anything else"

„hyper dimensional space now that sounds fun where can i look that up"

marth eyes where sparkling from the idea of hearing about something as extraordinary as this just to get mood killing answer of haneul

„ever heard of this thing called a library. instead of talking you should go to work"

marth followed this command but not without angrily mumbling to himself. after a few hours the only one who got the hang of it consistently was marth while lüziel was able to get it but still struggled. rina was the only one who was completely incapable of doing it even once which lead to her to sulk and lüziel trying to encourage her. watching them where haneul and shichang but the never felt the need to step in.

„remind me how long did it take you to get this right"

„i would say 2 or 3 days"

„so i do remember right that that boi is e genius in this"

„it's not like it's unheard of to get in within a day but rina is definitely the most normal one here. so it was good to try this out, eh"

„yeah yeah can't argue with results"

the next day they returned to the training and while lüziel was getting better did rina still not get it. even after shichang trying to find a way to explain it better became rina just increasingly more frustrated to the point where she simply didn't wanted to do it anymore. to not waist time on a fruitless endeavor did rina get a glove that had something like power lines go through it and after holding it into the barrier did the sparks snap towards it gathering within. it charging up for a bit before it could be released the same way it would work without but slower than flicking due to it only releasing it slowly. what it lost in time did it make up in functionality tho as it work without fail even for rina. now that everyone felt confident in doing it right they started their actual work which was way harder as they realized when they got told that they need to build a bridge with their entire body for that size. nonetheless did it worked fine but they started to realize how massive this task was and how much more tiring this was compared to the first part. every third day they needed to make a break and in addition they also had to fend of a bear like animal attacking their camp which in other words was nothing more than trying to prevent as much damage as possible before shichang and haneul returned from their hunt. an entire 2 month they did nothing but this and after they where finished they needed to take a 3 day break before doing anything else.

„so next up is the membrane. i hope you liked the first step as this is that but more complicated"

„i don't want to this is so boring. all we do in run around every day"

„well we could do it by handpicking if you are ok with checking every pice of dirt. no one checks this planet regularly to missing even just a tiny bit can lead to fatal consequences"

„you may not like it but the payoff is worth it. if we're done with this were capable to do anything we want for a while. so please just tuff it out rina i need to go back to the rakte"

„with how you're talking you should be banned from going there like ever"

lüziel was tying to put a stop into marth fantasies before they even started but this showed ineffective

„com on you to have to be exited about this just a little bit. have fluffy ears and tails and then there is that more primal aura surrounding them"

what did stop marth however was haneuls call to action

„i don't even want to know what this is about so stop yapping and listen this is important if you like your arms"

„wait what, hold up what are we doing that is that dangerous"

this threat meant for marth instead hit lüziel who went immediately into protection mode

„haneul is just making it sound that way but in reality its not going to come to that if you don't screw up completely"

„so it can happen"

lüziel kept looking concerned but shichang just went with it to not wast time convincing him

„well yes but just listen and nothing will happen. as said this is very similar to the first step but now we need to first use the first dial of the connector to span the membrane just like you did before followed by using the second one which you have to use to fit it onto the division. take your time and do it right and nothing can happen even if you're messing up"

marth looked at the barrier after he said that before replying

„you say that so easily but that sounds 10 times harder when we need to fit together 2 things that fluctuating"

„nothing you can do there. the bigger it gets the more sporadic it gets we simply have to deal with that"

with that they started and their first attempts where very time inefficient as they had to first even figure out how to properly turn the second dial. within a month they where only a third of the way done but marth started to write things down every evening just shoving rinas constant questions of what he is doing away with a simple

„you wouldn't get it anyways and i need to concentrate"

which upset her enough to to stop the questions for a few days before she forgot and returned asking. after 2 month they realized how much faster marth had gotten even compared to the hunters leaving only one questing he finally had to answer ‚how?'

„i have heard of genious being really good at this but even they usually take month to get that good what is your trick"

„wave functions. it took me a while to figure it out as i couldn't experiment around and only got limited information but this fluctuation follows a wave function that can be predicted and replicated with the right settings on this. it looks like magic but this is some serious advanced tech. if i could simply figure out what is written on the dials. they clearly mean something relevant"

„you're telling me that you did in your free time complex math equations just from looking at something like that? how is that even possible?"

shichang, haneul and lüziel where all baffled at this revelation while rina didn't seem like she even understood what marth said

„look it's not like i solved anything here i simply did approximations to get me a grasp what i need to achieve without constantly having to compare if it's fitting more or less"

„no no human being should be allowed to do this, i don't even understand what is really going on after hundreds of years experience and you just did that without knowing anything"

they may gained the knowledge of why marth was that much better but in the end did it not help the rest at all making this only last a week shorter in which they had to wait for the other 2 groups to finish, which they simply used to go back to pauroe and laze around. when the other teams finished their part they returned to create the ‚spine'. for this they had to first evenly spread out spell tags that they got from shichang and haneul. next shichang and haneul turned on the dials of their connectors before giving them back with the task to connect the barrier where the spell tags where to others far away by holding in one end of the connecter and turn on the first dial until the barrier connected run to the other and and do the same there. when they where finished the hunters realized how ‚swinging' the barrier was and they had to for now return back and call someone for help. marth was trying his best to see what they where doing but they did let him.

„now that we reached the last part this will be just a waiting game for you three. there is nothing you can do here other than keep watch and tell us when somethings is happening. programming a controller is way to complex to just explain it."

„so we just stand there and wait for what exactly?"

„so there are a few things that can happen. the spine cords can snap, the division starts fluctuating radically, the controller doesn't spread to a part or gzlefpneil start popping out of the ground"

„question what was a spine, division or controller again?"

rina tried to remember but those words just made no sense to her. haneul had to face palm before answering

„where doing this for how long and you still don't know what these names mean. if anything happens that feels like it should just tell us it shouldn't be hard to distinguish the good and bad"

for a few days did the hunters do somethings with the gzlefpneil they kept alive inside the barrier that seemed to not make it happy. when they where finished did the barrier start to react by pulsating out from small barrier waves of electricity that slowly extended more and more out. it went rather slow so it took a day before they even moved out from their main camp. while following the wave did haneul and shichang constantly do something with the connector that they didn't bother to explain. when it reached the first spell tag did the electricity shoot at high speed through the line connected with the end of the barrier.

„so that's why we did this i assume. it significantly speeds up the process"

at first everything worked out fine. now that haneul and shichang where occupied marth, lüziel and rina and to shoo away any animals that tried to mess with the coils for which they got the alarm that shichang had to inform him when something was happening but this posed no real issue. the first sign of the barrier doing something was when after a month of the controller progressing 2 gzlefpneil popped up as if they where pushed out of the ground with fruitless attempts to reburry themselves. they where quickly dealt with as haneul simply used the spine lines to triangulate out that space creating a smaller barrier to trap them to prevent them causing any issues. but this was no more than a precursor to what was to come as after them there popped more up and that may have been it for their group but they got an agitated message soon after from another group which at first was nothing more than that but it soon turned into a call of help.

„you stay here and keep watch. don't go near the center unless we say so"

„whats happening. this sounds bad"

„who knows, but it sounds like there is a lot happening"

„why can we never take part in the exiting stuff!"

„because we don't want you to get in danger we need to get you out off"

it took quite a while before they came back leaving them to just sit there and watch the barrier grow even more slowly. when they came back they looked exhausted and wanted to finish this of as quickly as possible. when they finished the final part of the barrier they got quickly kicked out by the hunters without much explanation letting them stranded with the question what happened with no one to answer it. at the same time did the mission completion screen pop up and for lüziel an additional message

[A Star was attracted towards you

A great hunter is willing to give you his knowledge

may your future hunts be successful]

„but i barely did anything you could call hunting"

„we worked so hard to get all those fruits"

„that's gathering not hunting rina. my best guess is that its related to the type of mission you clear. anyways i had enough of errand work and actual jobs. we are now for 3 years in this and haven't had any adventure"

„you said it yourself that this pays of better"

„but it's boring"

„i want to go to the sea"

„the sea?"

marth looked at rina a bit questioning

„i never was at the sea and it sounds fun"

„in that case i want to go to riastehc. that's way more exiting"

lüziel was looking disgusted at marth

„that's your first thought when hearing sea. in therms of animals we will find here an equal amount of exotic ones but you already know that don't you"

„marth is ruining all fun things"

„why am i a bad guy here., you saw tat mushroom thing there are surely crazy things on other planets"

„you are a lier your just after seeing rakte"

„even rina gets your intentions, just admit it and its at least honest"

„i get it, but i won't change my mind. it's not like it's going against the idea"

when they went to search for a fitting place what they found was that swimming beaches in the sense marth imagined them where uncommon in riastehc. lüziel and rina of cause didn't had that much of an issue with that but for marth this was a big letdown. this also meant that getting to seaside at a place that wasn't a harbor took the old fashion way of travel where they had to walk for a good bit away from the city before they had a good spot. lüziel used this as an opportunity to explore his upgrade to fallen star on the sea live while rina dived through the water to look at the fish. this at first seemed scary for lüziel especial when she was underwater for an excessive amount of time but when she with no problem got back to the surface he realized that his normal standards for people diving where now useless. in the following time they also explored different part of the beach before they returned back. looking at the date marth was shocked.

„this was 2 weeks, that felt barely like 1 how can my sense of time be so off, but wait now that i remember back that mission we did before we also did for month just one task over and over and it did feel like i got sick of doing it despite how boring of a task it was."

„but we did so much in that time, it wasn't boring"

„ok name 10 things"

„äähhm"

„why did i even ask. you can't even remember the 5 parts it took to make the barrier then there was camp setting and food gathering and the occasional dealing with wildlife"

marth looked disappointed at rina who looked sad at the ground while lüziel had started to think about what marth said

„you are right it's weird how much less it felt like compared to how long it took"

before sinking to deep into their existential they decided to go back to doing work. after 2 more relatively normal years they encountered for the first time a team out of people who started when they did of the tower guild. they heard that a year ago they started to get send out as teams to clear missions but never encountered one up until now

„move it scrubs you take up our valuable space on the mission board"

„that hurt why did you do that"

someone in leather armor tried to hit rina aside but she instinctively held against it thanks to the training she went through at olympus instead of budging.

„didn't you hear me move you are just some nameless scrub while we are an elite team hand picked by the guild"

„you are rude and i wont truckle to someone like you. there is more free space"

„you think we will take one of those lousy mission down the line"

„manners was definitely something they didn't look for when choosing it seems. we have as much right to be here as you so go back in line"

lüziel now stepped in but his words seemed to only provoke the attacker. he tried to grab lüziel but instead before everyone eyes he suddenly flew through the air landing on the ground pinned down by some hooded woman going from the voice

„know you're place punk"

with one quick chop she incapacitated him before going as quickly as she came vanishing in the crowd.

„thanks i guess"

„i know who she is or do i not, i don't know"

while the companions of the other team where quickly moving their friend away did rina start to thin about why that woman seemed so familiar

„i don't know anyone like that and we where together the entire time so you must misremember"

„no i too think there was something familiar. but they really pretend like they are the hottest shit for running around with stuff they don't even own, i though that people just exaggerated when saying that these third were incredibly terrible. anyways an outbreak, i have read about it. it#s when a gate opens that let's through random animals everything after level 4 is when it's to dangerous if you don't have fighting experience"

„so a 3 means…"

„that we can do it."

„that was not what i was getting at"

„but rina is right. an outbreak at our level is rare so we should take up this opportunity. let's do it"

with both rina and marth staring at him lüziel had no choice but to let himself get convinced so they took up the mission

Outbreak in Arikema

Objective: defend the citizen and help with stopping the outbreak

Loose Condition: the city gets destroyed or the outbreak growth

Reward: 6700 tallon + 860 cp for clear

50 tallon per killed Drötseicht

40 tallon per killed Lirulag

30 tallon per killed Gielfen Lafslenuve

5 tallon per killed Tarte

Achievements: 0/8 cleared

Description: A gate has opened in Arikema and endangers the city. Wild animals are terrorizing

the citizen. Defeat everything that escapes the gate and close the gate.

Time: 88:22:16:58

Place: Arikema

Rating: Level 3 Outbreak

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