"I think it's here" muttered Gregory as the two of them arrived in front of a small house with a long path leading to it.
"You think?" Iustus was a bit worried at the lack of certainty, they had been navigating toward an unknown location without any map or anything after all, so he had thought that Gregory had already been there.
Gregory just looked around, paying attention to the various landmarks he had been told about by someone he couldn't remember and saw that it fit.
'...'
'...'
"Huh, are you not going to knock?"
"I am going to" the truth was that Gregory hadn't truly interacted with people pretty much ever since he had dragged himself out of that lake, only somewhat speaking with people from time to time.
He took in a deep breath and prepared himself to meet new people but was interrupted as a third person showed up.
The two boys and the newly arrived dark elf looked at each other, she just took a few step back and then forward to make sure the compass was pointing toward that house.
"Who are you two?" she asked, Gregory still had his fist ready to knock on the door.
"Hum, well, I am Gregory and this is Iustus, we came here to meet with people to help them deal with the sins, are you also here for that?" spoke Gregory as he dropped his hand and scratched his neck instead.
"Huh? No, I just... I just followed a compass here" she responded flatly.
"You followed a compass but why?" asked Gregory, seeing the compass in question in the dark elf's hand.
"It was the best lead I had and even the guy that gave it to me was sketchy as hell, he seemed to know what he was talking about but I didn't expect to be pushed toward another adventure" spoke the dark elf.
"Oh and my name is Aliara, pleasure to meet you, I am a hero by the way" she finally presented herself as stepped forward and knocked on the door herself.
The three of them waited in an awkward silence as no one came to answer the door for a good minute.
"Maybe no one is home?" suggested Iustus right before the sound of footsteps was heard but instead of coming from inside the house they came from behind their backs.
Turning around, they were faced with a sudden drop in luminosity as a shadow covered them, the shadow of the tallest woman they had ever seen and she was dragging some sort of mangled corpse as well.
"Can I help you?" she asked in a stoic tone and no one responded for a second.
Seeing that the two people that should definitely be older than him wouldn't speak up, Iustus decided to do it himself.
"Hello Ma'am, my name is Iustus, and these two are Gregory and Aliara, She is a hero and me too, we are here to assist the people of this house defeat the sins, would you happen to be one of them?" he said concisely.
"Did you hear that? We've got reinforcement" said the woman as she turned her head to the people behind her.
"Maybe our days of letting every enemy escape are over!"
"Do not remind me again"
After the introductions were all done, it was time to exchange information on their main targets.
"Lust is... She is definitely dangerous, her eyes hidden underneath the blindfold seem to be able to charm anyone that look into them and since she hides them, I can only guess that it is always active, she is also quite strong and is quite proficient with a dagger" spoke Gregory with an empty gaze.
"Me and Ilmna shortly ran into Wrath but we didn't engage in a fight so her abilities remain vague, she seems to fight using swords however, she carried three on her person" explained Milleral.
"There is also Oath Breaker, we had a short fight with him but he retreated toward the undead horde, which was led by some sort of battle necromancer, he is probably also linked to the sins, although he didn't seem to be one himself" added Molarine.
"Since we switched to the lesser sins... Apparently, the one that razed my village to the ground was Occult and he really just seemed like a dragon to me" spoke Iustus, looking away as he mentioned his village.
"On our way here, we also ran into two other, Euthanasia and Ingratitude, two freaky bastards, one is some sort of chimera made out of a sheep, wolf and human and the other was a skeleton with no holes on his face and with his fingers fused together"
"I don't know what Euthanasia can do but Ingratitude seemed to be able to use some sort of weird holy energy" revealed Gregory.
Knowing their enemies would be a great advantage but information was scarce and incomplete, it seemed like they would have to fight without knowing much at all.
"In any case..." Laura arrived in the room after finishing doing her divination using the mutated corpse Molarine had brought her.
"I have found who started the mutations, don't know what they look like but I can tell you exactly where they are" she added afterward.
"Then let's go! The first mission of our team!" Ilmna got all excited as Aliara simply raised her hand to get everyone's attention.
"I just wanted to tell you guys that I allegedly encountered one of the virtues" she said somewhat sheepishly.
"A virtue?! So they actually exist? Where are they?" asked Milleral, getting fired up just like Ilmna.
"..." the dark elf smiled nervously.
"Well, you see, I might have stabbed him"
"But! I didn't get any experience from that so he is most likely alive" she added immediately afterward.
Silence filled the room as everyone took in the information they had just been served.
"Why... Why?" that's all Milleral managed to say.
"The system asked me to..."
"Well, I doubt a virtue would die from just that, he will surely be fine" spoke Molarine with her arms crossed.
"Where are they?" she then switched subject by asking Laura for clarification, to which, Laura grabbed a nearby map and put her finger on it, pointing in the middle of nowhere.