Pebble, Bard, Phil and Fred's food finally arrived at their table, breaking them out of their television stupor. They each got fried chicken and French fries except for Phil who ordered the spiciest wings on the menu.
"Holy mother, this actually looks amazing!" Said Bard as he forked the chicken and inspected the piece of poultry above his plate.
Fred attempted to pat down his beard and mustache so that it would get out of the way, but he was unable to achieve any sort of success. "Do I need to get a hair tie or something?" He questioned.
Pebble appreciated the meal in front of him and began eating silently. Bard noticed his lack of humor.
"So, what's your first skill, Pebble? Mine was pretty cool, but probably not the most helpful. I got to select 'Perfect Pitch.' So now I can immediately determine the key of whatever sound I hear." Bard shrugged, "I'm hoping it's more useful later, but I needed to go down this path to get something that I really want later in the skill tree. I had 9 points left after that and I've used most of them for various instrument mastery skills. I got one cool skill too due to a 'unique trait combo' that I'm saving as a surprise."
'Must be nice to be able to see your skills ahead of time.' Pebble thought inwardly. "I got a skill called Rock Throw and it's honestly better than it sounds." He replied, "What about you Phil? You said something about an oil gland?"
"That's right, it's a skill path that exists due to my race selection and this is the skill that will eventually lead to my human evolution. For now, I can secrete oil which allows me to move faster." Phil started eating faster which the team immediately recognized as a typical stress response from him.
"We'll get you back to being human, Bro. It's our main goal as a team." Pebble said as he offered him a fist bump. Phil let his knuckles connect with Pebble's and nodded, but kept his mouth shut.
"What about you Fred? What's your first skill?" Pebble asked the bearded wizard.
Fred chuckled and put his chicken down then wiped his mouth, "Let me tell ya, I got a skill called 'Sentient Tool.' At first I thought it was just making fun of me. I was pretty annoyed, but then I summoned that first tiny violin when you first got beamed into this world. It changed my mind on this skill entirely. I'm willing to bet it's one of the most overpowered skills on this planet." Fred said in a tone that was similar to a story teller trying to capture a child's imagination over a campfire.
"Sentient Tool? It can't be that strong right? It's your first ability." Pebble said before he realized how strong Rock Throw had been for his first skill. It had helped him through what he thought would be an impossible situation. It wasn't unthinkable that Fred's ability was a strong one as well.
"Okay, so you'd like a demonstration. Allow me." He held up his napkin like a magician and let it fall to the ground revealing a flying fork. He looked at the fork and smiled, "Hello, my pronged little friend!" He pointed at a man who was trying to flirt with his waitress and wasn't paying too much attention. "I'd like you to sneak over there and steal that man's steak."
The fork looked ecstatic to receive such a task. It was practically vibrating in anticipation. It floated low to the ground and along the side of the bar until it was close enough to the man's table. It then waited for the waitress to walk by and the man's attention to be diverted. Like a cat pouncing on its prey, it leapt from its position to the man's plate and impaled the steak. It looked back at Fred with the steak in its prongs and nodded before floating up just below the ceiling and making its way back over to the team.
"Order up! Who wants a nice medium rare steak?" Fred asked.
In the distance the man shouted, "Hey! Where'd my steak go! Waitress!!" And the team tried their best not to laugh.
"Okay, case proven, that's absolutely an amazing ability. How long can you keep it up?" Pebble asked.
"Only for about a minute." Fred replied and the fork began to panic after hearing his words. It looked at the group individually before falling to the table and dispersing into smoke.
"Why did that make me sad?" Bard asked, "Is it dead? It seemed to like us."
Fred shrugged, "I'm not sure, I'm still kind of getting used to this myself."
"Alright! I've seen enough out of you!" A tiny gnome came up to the table and grabbed Fred's beard and pulled it down until his face hit the table.
"OW," Fred shouted.
"This wise little f*ck walks into MY establishment like he owns the damn place. Then, on camera, I hear this man say," he upped the pitch of his voice while he mimicked Fred, "It's my personal quest to own this place!" His voice returned to normal, "Now I check the cameras again, because I don't like you, and you know what I see? I see tier 10 magic being used to steal a f*cking steak from one of my daily patrons." The gnome shook his head in disbelief and pulled out a pipe.
"I mean, the gods be damned, tier 10 magic, being used on a simple man who can't even think with the right head." The gnome took a big drag from his pipe. "I bet you think you're hot sh*t, right? I bet you're the group of new Heroes that were just summoned. Well guess what, you ain't the first! I was a Hero too back in the day, I just don't give a sh*t anymore." The party couldn't believe their ears.
"Wait, are you Mr. Puffy?" Fred guessed now that his beard has been released.
"Yeah, yeah I am. I am Puffy, in the flesh. I used to come from a place called Earth about 50 years ago. I hail from the great country of Japan." Puffy looked happy to reminisce on his old home.
"Whoa, we're from Earth too!" Pebble said.
"Shut the f*ck up!" Puffy shut him down abruptly.
"Yes, sir!" Pebble replied.
"Here's what's going to happen. You're going to pay for that man's steak. The three of you are going to leave, and this bearded fruit cake is going to stay behind and work for me."
There was a moment of silence before Bard spoke up, "Excuse me?"
"You heard what I said. That was tier 10 magic. This idiot was summoned today and he can use the Sentient Tool skill? Get the f*ck out of here, life ain't fair." The gnome looked genuinely depressed.
"So, uh, Mr. Puffy. We've just been summoned and we were just about to start our own adventure. I can't work for you, sir." Fred responded.
"You can't?" Puffy whistled and a whole staff of floating kitchen supply came floating through the doors to the back. "What if I taught you a thing or two?"
Bard could see that Fred looked interested, but he wasn't about to leave a friend behind. "Listen, why do you even want him? It looks like you're doing fine on your own."
"Well, we don't get many wizards here in Aegis. He's a wizard and he's from Earth apparently. I haven't been able to progress my skill tree in years. It's why I quit adventuring. I saw your summon spectacle, you were all so very fortunate to be advanced summons. I was told that I was a white summon and that I would eventually reach my limit." His voice became defeated again, "Look around you, this is my limit. Maybe your friend will help me advance a little bit" He shrugged.
"Are you content with this?" Bard asked. Pebble nodded along as if that was exactly what he wanted to say, but he was glad that Bard was taking the lead.
Puffy's eyes dilated for a moment and Pebble noticed, he wondered if that meant Bard's charm had an effect. "I mean, it's cozy! It absolutely isn't a bad gig. I get to meet lots of interesting people and make good food, but honestly, I never took Tiamat seriously. Until it was too late. When I got summoned here, it was 50 years ago and I viewed this as an afterlife, ya know? I figured, I worked hard in my past life so I'll just be chillin' here. However, when I reached the point that everyone started to count me out, I guess I started counting myself out too." Puffy walked away briefly and came back with an extra seat. He put it down next to the table and sat down.
"By the time the political climate hit the fan again, I was already retired. They were looking for solutions and no one, not even once, considered me. That might not mean much to you guys, but I've lived in this world longer than I've lived on Earth now. This is my home, the hindsight has really made me regret not doing more." He stopped talking and waved his hand at a waitress beckoning for a drink.
The waitress came and placed a drink down for him and everyone else at the party, "How about a toast? I know you charmed me, but I'm not mad, it felt like therapy." He raised his glass, "To the new Heroes! Please don't make the same mistakes as I have. Retirement ain't bad, but you should contribute while you still can."
Bard spoke up quickly, "Sorry, I genuinely don't know how to turn it off. We almost got freaky with an attendant earlier." Puffy laughed at his comment.
Everyone took a sip from their drinks after the toast then Bard continued, "Okay, Puffy. So you're not fully content is what I'm getting here. Why don't you join us for a bit and show us the ropes? You can be a Hero again."
"Me?" Puffy's eyes lit up. "I'd be honored, but I'd have to make preparations for the bar! Wait, are you being serious or are you just joking?"
Bard looked around the table at his friends, "I was being serious, does anyone have any objections with this?"
No one objected, Pebble ended up speaking up first, "Not to be that guy, but are you joining on your own free will or do you think you might be influenced by someone's words perhaps?" He was nodding towards Bard.
"I was definitely being charmed, but I'm on board. To be honest, this kind of feels like…" Puffy was going to continue before Pebble put his hand up.
"For the love of all gods, don't say fate. I've had enough of that today." Pebble said.
—
Meanwhile in Glurt's private office, Glurt was sitting at this desk looking at a tablet. On the tablet was an image feed of Pebble and his party. The Throne Holder was currently in the corner checking out Glurt's bookshelves.
"Huh, lots of fiction. You struck me as a non-fiction type of guy, Glurt." The Throne Holder said.
"I like my bullsh*t delivered when I expect it." Glurt replied, "There's nothing wrong with some escapism."
"Fair enough, how's our boy doing?" He asked as he put a book back on the shelf.
"Looks like they met my dear friend, Puffy." Glurt chuckled as he grabbed his liquor and stirred the glass.
"I'm not sure how you managed to coordinate that so quickly, but consider me impressed." The Throne Holder said. As he walked over and clinked glasses with Glurt, "To the Hero's party."