As they were approaching the City walls, Craydon looked at the metallic gate. Right at the top, stuck in the rock wall, there was a strange-looking head. It looked Human, but it had horns and had its mouth wide open as if it were screaming. Next to it, a Human torso was carved in rock as well, with his hand raised, piercing the strange horned head with a spear. The head was Human but with a very angry expression.
Meryda noticed where her father was staring, and she asked in a whisper, "What is that? Some sort of warning? Because for a decoration, it is ugly."
"I have no idea. For luck, perhaps?"
Craydon went silent and glanced at the Guards that were on each side of the gate, smiling at the approaching group.
As they were crossing the gate and entering the City, the Guards waved at Meryda, and they seemed genuinely happy to see her.
Smiling awkwardly, Meryda waved at them, and then her attention went to the strange buildings. Most of them were made entirely of wood, with only a few two-story buildings made of rock and wood. The buildings made solely of wood had roofs with red tiles, and the buildings made of rock had blue tiles all over the roofs. Strangely, Meryda remembered that the rock buildings had big businesses inside or were warehouses, and the wood buildings belonged to families.
As they were riding slowly along the main street, there were a lot of intersections with narrower roads also flourishing with people, horses, wagons, and houses.
On one of those intersections, a group of five kids, with boys and girls among them, came running, and while some were crying with big smiles plastered on their faces, one of them was visibly angry but also crying.
One boy, perhaps of Meryda's age, who had ears and a fluffy tail that resembled the one a dog would have, shouted, "You stupid brat! We thought you had died! Why did you run ahead instead of waiting for us? If we were near you, we could have grabbed you! I tried to jump after you to catch you, but these so-called friends stopped me! If you had died, I would kill them! And then I would find you and beat the crap out of your sorry butt!"
Meryda gasped, trying to remember the name of the angry boy, but she could only stutter, "I-I am s-sorry… I was too excited, and I wanted to see what was there… Is everyone alright?"
"Besides my stomach hurting ever since you fell in that hole? Yeah, we are alright."
It was then that the boy noticed the Slime that Meryda was holding, and he asked as he walked next to her horse with the other kids next to him, "You found a new friend, didn't you? Stupid, that is a Monster! Why do you have that thing in your arms?"
Pointing to the orange head behind her, Meryda answered with an awkward smile, "I found him as well when I fell in that hole. I was walking in a tunnel, and I first found the Slime, and then an egg. This cute guy hatched when I was looking at the egg."
The boy frowned and almost shouted, "And you also brought him with you?" facing Craydon, the boy asked, "What is your excuse to let her bring two Monsters to our City?"
"It was not my initial idea, but things happened… Pof Grinun… the angry Demi-Dog boy, Meryda's strange friend…"
"Who are you calling strange? And why that dumb look on your face? As if a Demi-Cat like you is better than a Demi-Dog!" With a frown, Fog looked at Meryda and asked, "He is acting weird today, you know? Maybe the fact that you almost died messed with his head! Are you going to stay up there instead of coming down to go with us? We have a lot to talk about! And a lot to punish you for worrying us so much!"
"I… I suppose I can go… right, dad?"
Trying to disguise his worries, Craydon answered, "Maybe we should go with the Guild Master. He might want to have a word with us. Maybe later?"
Pof Grinun glanced at the group of kids near him, and seeing them nodding, he said, "Okay, but don't try to escape! You know you deserve a punishment, and we all agreed that if you came back alive, we would put some sense into your thick head! Even if we had to beat you up for that!"
A girl, with the lower half of her body resembling a snake, pulled Pof Grinun's right arm and said, after quickly cleaning her tears, "We didn't agree on that! Not the beating part! We only said we would scold her and think about some sort of punishment!"
Pof shook his arm free and complained, "For a Demi-Lamia, you are too soft, Tetil Stog! You guys are supposed to be mean and vindictive! She scared us to death, and you want us to let her go with only some scolding? I want to squeeze her neck and make her promise she won't ever worry us like she did!"
Facing Meryda again, Pof Grinun pointed at the Slime she was still holding and said, "You better leave that thing and the weird lizard somewhere! If you get near me with them, I am going to slice them open! We will be waiting for you near our tree, right next to the market! If you don't go there in one-hour maximum, I am going after you and drag you by your hair! Let's go, everyone; we need to think about her punishment!"
With a wave, the group of kids ran along a narrow street, disappearing in the crowd. Craydon was looking at them and asked the worried Meryda, "You have a lot of friends, and they were worried about you. I remember that guy; he was the one who came to the Guild."
Meryda disguisedly pointed with her head to the enormous building on their left the moment the Guild Master stopped his horse and said, "The Guild of Adventurers and Explorers. I am not sure what time it is, but I think I remember you usually start making dinner for everyone by this hour."
"I think you are right, and I have a few helpers. Two boys and two… I am not sure if they are pets or slaves… Demons, if I recall the race name correctly. A lower species of Demons that are more like animals than intelligent beings. I named them Number One and Number Two because one has a scar on his head and the other has two scars."
Before Meryda could say anything else, the Guild Master opened the Guild door and was waiting for everyone to follow him.
The moment the search group, together with Craydon and Meryda, dismounted, the horses walked all alone to the large open door of the building right next to the Guild, where a young boy with dog ears and a tail was waiting. The stable, most probably, was what Craydon assumed as he watched the horses enter.
When Craydon entered the Guild, he saw the Guild Master standing in the middle of the room, and as soon as the last person entered, he signalled for someone to close the door.
He looked around, confirming that the group that went in search of Meryda, as well as the servants in the Guild and the Adventurers that stayed behind were looking at him, and he said, "We were lucky this time because we almost lost our youngest member! I thank everyone that rushed to her, and I thank the ones that stayed behind in case someone came with a Quest!"
He then faced the worried Meryda, who was trying to smile at the serious gazes upon her, and he warned her, "As for you, young lady, the next time you want to play Explorers and Adventurers with your friends, think about all of us, that will be worrying about you! It is not only your father that would miss you, you know? We all saw you grow up, and we all think of you as a member of our big family! I don't know if your father will ground you or punish you, but you must think about where you are going to keep your new friends while we all think about your punishment!"
Meryda snorted and complained, still with the Slime on her arms and the Salamander brushing her left leg, seated on his back legs on the floor. "First, my friends wanted to punish me for worrying them so much; now you guys as well? It was just an accident! I didn't do it on purpose!"
Dralro Jic, the serious Guild Master, answered, "We are going to punish you for your own good, Meryda. I felt my heart stop when your friend came rushing in with tears and snort all over his face, shouting that you fell inside a hole. Craydon, perhaps you and she should go to the back and wash up because you are full of dirt and mud. We all need to have some drinks to see if all this stress goes away. Don't take too long because you need to cook our dinner."
Craydon nodded, and he walked to the back door with Meryda right after him, holding the Slime and the Salamander running alongside her.
A servant, a woman with cat ears and tail, looked at the two Monsters, and with a frown, she asked, "Guild Master, why she has those things with her? They are still small, but when they grow up…"
"Don't worry about them. Meryda said she would take care of them. But the moment they try to bite or attack someone, they are dead. She knows that very well. They are only here to help her control her Magic, nothing more. She found them inside the tunnel she fell into, and until now, they have been peaceful and friendly. Let's see what happens in the next few days, and then I will decide what to do. For now, we need drinks! This was way too stressful!"
While biting her lower lip, the cat woman went to the barrels behind the main counter, with the two young servants going after her to get the cups for the group of Explorers and Adventurers.
In the back garden, Craydon was pulling the rope that was attached to a bucket in the well, while Meryda was grabbing a large basin from the shelter next to the Guild wall. She put the basin on the floor, and Craydon filled it with water.
After the third bucket, Craydon and his daughter started to wash their faces, hair, arms, and hands to get rid of all the residues of their tumbling down the hole inside the cave through which Meryda fell.
As they were drying themselves with the rags that Meryda also brought from the shelter, Craydon said, "You better go meet your friends, because they seemed really worried about you. Go through the back door of the garden while I go to the kitchen to take care of dinner. I have no idea what to make, but I will figure something out, depending on the ingredients available."
"What about Jelly and Lizzy? Do you think you can take care of them? You heard that kid; I can't take them with me."
"As long as they behave and don't try to eat me. If they lick me or even look at me weirdly, I am going to cook them."
Meryda crouched in front of the puzzled Salamander, which was seated on the floor on his back legs, right next to the bouncing Slime, and he stared at his new owner very attentively when she said, "You guys can keep my father company, right? Behave yourselves and don't annoy him or anyone else. Stay out of trouble because I will be right back."
With a rub on the Salamander's head and a slight poke on the gelatinous Slime, Meryda ran to the back door of the garden.
Craydon stared at the two Monsters and as he walked to the door that led to the kitchen, he warned them, "Follow me and stay quiet. I don't want any of my helpers worried about you two."
He opened the door and waited for the two Monsters to enter before closing it again. The sound of two young voices gasping in the middle of the kitchen made him look back, and he tried to remember their names. Two teenagers with dog ears and a tail. One had light brown hair, and the other had dark hair. Both were wearing simple clothes made of cotton and leather boots, and they were frozen, looking at the Salamander and the Slime that were at Craydon's feet.
"Hello… Emid Basson and Vasir Rez. We better prepare dinner because there are a lot of people out there waiting."