First Quest
#3 of Caeliars
Here is the second chapter of this new series... again not sure about pace of this and every other series so sorry. DX
PLOP
"Alright Randall, with that you are now officially an adventurer with the guild."
Armityle watched as the gazelle at the receptionist desk handed over the crystalline card to Randall, the young rabbit taking it with his left paw as Nel was wrapping the bleeding index finger on his right paw in a bandage cloth.
"I didn't know you had to be stabbed to make one of these things..." the youth muttered, taking his new adventurer ID with him as he and the shark made their way to where the wolf and other shark had been sitting and waiting for the process to be complete. Nel slipped into the booth opposite of the two with Randall followed suit, looking up at the wolf and sharks before he spoke again.
"So what was the purpose of needing blood?"
"It's so that it can bond with you. Each of the cards have a low-level enchantment on them that use the connection from your blood to automatically update your status, skills, rank and such without you have to mess with it yourself."
The wolf replied to the question as he took his own card, showing that his own was silver in color than the clear one that the rabbit held, but both had the same information showing. The sharks also pulled their adventure ID cards out, which were more of a medium grey.
"As your rank goes up, the card grows darker, but your photo and name won't change as everything else I said before will increase just like on your menu screen. A Rank 5 like you start out clear, then you go to light grey, medium grey, silver, and dark grey. I have silver for Rank 2 because I've had more accomplishments than Nel and Neil here who have the medium grey for Rank 3. Once you clear a few quests you'll be able to go to Rank 4 and be light grey instead of clear."
Armityle then put his card away as he kept looking over at Randall, the brothers also doing the same, the three of them letting him continue to ask questions and each giving an answer in turn. The four spent nearly a half hour talking together before deciding to walk towards the board and select a quest for them all to take as a way to celebrate the rabbit getting his adventurer card, with Randall himself being the one to choose. He stared at the board for a good while, looking over the many different kinds of requests that the guild received, before deciding on a simple monster material retrieval he saw. It was only when the quest was approved did the wolf decide to speak up again.
"Alright, now that we have the quest, we gotta get you properly prepared."
"Huh?" was all the wolf head from the rabbit as he turned and started for the guild entrance. He looked back over his shoulder and saw Nel and Neil both already following him, with Randall having to run to catch up with him. The wolf smirked a bit at that as they left the building and he turned go down one of the side streets in town, waiting until they were in far enough to not be seen before he turned back around to look at the boy, who was looking at him confused.
"You said you were gonna get me prepared right? So why are just in one of these back alleys?"
"Do you remember what we said when we introduced ourselves Randall? That we were the staff of the Autumn Moon Shrine?"
"Yeah, does that have something to do with this?"
"Heh, guess that duke really didn't let his slaves learn much once he got them huh? The Autumn Moon Shrine is the most recognized shops on the continent. Weapons, armor, clothes, crystals, potions and more are made there between Nel and I. People would cause a stampede if we were to open the shop anywhere close to the town," the wolf said, reaching up and lifting the necklace he wore, showing off the pendant to the younger male, a wolf's head looking down with a crescent moon around it.
"This is the shrine in storage mode. It is both our home and our business outside of adventuring. Since we can't really just open it up to give you a proper tour and fitting for more clothes then the slave loincloth you're wearing, we'll just have to wait until we're done with the quest and on to the next town to get you fully prepared. Until then I do have something that you can use that'll work well for you as a sorcerer."
The wolf let go of the necklace and held up his left paw, showing the ring he wear on his ring finger, letting Randall see the blue circuit pattern that ran across the white crystal as activated it. As the ring started to shine and glow, a dark portal opened in front of his paw. He reached in and pulled out a card from its depths, letting it close as he handed the item to the rabbit. The young male took the card and looked it over in confusion.
"An item card? What kind of item is this... Bakugetsu (Curtain Moon) thing?" the rabbit asked, which got a chuckling from the three older males around him.
"Bakugetsu is a mantle for you to wear. It allows you to fly and the hood also has the enchantment for Recognition Inhibition, so even if the duke himself were to look at you, he wouldn't know he was staring at one of his own, albeit former, slaves."
Armityle watched as the rabbit blinked with his mouth agape, looking back down at the card again in his paw, and a second later the card glowed before disappearing, with a black mantle appearing on Randall's body. The wolf looked him over before giving him a nod.
"Now why don't you test it out? Try thinking about rising off the ground."
He watched as the rabbit looked at him and then down at the mantle on his body, clearly trying to concentrate on the foreign thought of flying. The wolf and sharks stood there looking over the younger male before he finally started to float, slowly rising off the ground until he was eye-level with everyone else. The rabbit's eyes went wide as he looked around and started squirm around in confusion, which caused Armityle to smirk as just a few seconds after he began to wiggle around, he dropped down back to his feet.
"Heh, you know you gotta keep at least a little attention on what you're doing kid, or else you might end up falling from a much higher place. But I think that's enough of a test run, how about we actually head out for the quest to get you some experience eh?" the wolf said, as he held up the quest poster, taking a better look at it.
~ * ~ * ~ * ~
FROOSH-OOOOSH!
Armityle watched from a distance as Randall shot a pair of blaze arrows at another jackal-like monster, one cutting off a tentacle sprouting from its back and the other piercing into its shoulder, setting the limb on fire and causing the beast to roar in pain. The rabbit, however, didn't let up on his attack and hit the monster with another two arrows to the back, cutting off more of the tentacles. Nodding at the affective strategy, the wolf decided to help his new teammate and used a wind spell to gather up the writhing tentacles and pull them over to Nel, who caught each one and stored them in his magic bag.
Randall soon floated down beside the wolf and offered him a smile, looking proud of himself for managing to take the monster down and complete the quest. His face then turned into a look of confusion.
+120 +120
+120 +120
+120 +120
+120 +120
"Hey, why did I just get two experience gains? And... why are you getting experience too?"
Armityle chuckled a bit before he spoke, his face still rather indifferent.
"Because you're part of our team now, so you get to benefit from two of my special skills: Double Experience and Share Experience. Just watch, that tentacle jackal is getting back up."
The wolf turned toward the monster just as it got back to its feet, panting heavily and glaring at them with hate-filled eyes. Armityle stepped forward and slowly began to walk towards the beast, just as it let loose an ear-splitting roar and charged at him, to which he replied by jumping forward as well. He ducked under the monster's jaws just as they tried to close on him, before he swiftly brought his fist up against its sternum-
"Flash Fist."
-and sent the beast flying backwards, crashing hard against a tree and snapping it in half from the heavy weight of the creature and the force being put upon it. The tentacle jackal twitched as it fell against the ground, before going still, blood dripping out of its limp and open maw and pooling under it as Armityle turned back to look at Randall.
+320 EXP +320 EXP
+320 EXP +320 EXP
+320 EXP +320 EXP
+320 EXP +320 EXP... LEVEL UP!
"Heh, see? No matter who does what, we all benefit from it... and looks like I just gave you enough to reach level 16 too."
He smirked a little as he saw the boy staring almost dumbfounded as he walked back to him, before he finally came back to his senses and spoke up.
"What sort of skill was that? I've never seen someone punch that fast before or heard that name."
"If you really must know, it's a skill I stole from a naruiea gorilla years ago," the wolf replied, staring down at the smaller rabbit and shrugging his shoulders. "And if you want to really know then I'll tell you as we had back to town so we can get the tentacles back before they lose the ooze your client wants."
After saying that, he started heading back towards the carriage, with Randall, Neil and Nel following right behind them. Neil hopped in first and set down on the front, as he and the others set down in the bed, before he turned towards the hydra as Neil was grabbing the reins.
"Alright Shika, time to head back."
Several hisses were the only response the hydra gave before he started off, dragging the carriage behind him.
~ * ~ * ~ * ~
Armityle sat down across from the rabbit, waiting until the carriage had gotten into motion before he spoke again, sighing softly as he stared at how curious the boy looked.
"Before I tell you anything, there is something we have to go over. Do you know the different ways to summon your menu screen?"
"You say status when you want to be the only one to see it and status open to show it to others right?"
He watched as the curious expression Randall had turned into confusion as he was asked to explain the different ways to call the screen. The wolf smirked a little, chuckling softly as he nodded in response.
"That's right. Usually you only keep what your menu says to yourself or share it with family and teammates, but often when you are part of the guild you have to share the information to the guild masters so that they can ensure you are not a threat and accurately know the power levels of their adventures. Status Open."
As he spoke, he lifted his right hand and flicked his index finger in front of him, summoning his own menu screen that the rabbit was now able to see as well.
"I'll say this now, what I am going to show you is something you are forbidden to share with anyone, that is an order understood?"
He saw the brief look of fear flash across Randall's face at the word order, and saw the slave crest underneath his cloths flash purple for a brief second, but the look softened when he realized no pain was going to follow it.
"Sorry about having to do that with you Randall, but this is something I've only ever shared with Nel and Neil here, and here is why," he said in response, flicking the screen to push it in front of the rabbit.
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Armityle R. Lv. 222 Samurai
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Status Condition: Normal
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High Beast (Wolf) / Male / 23
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Title(s): Monster Slayer ** +**
Blacksmith of Magic Weapons
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HP: 11200/11200
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MP: 10200/10500
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Money: 2 A 306,283,082 F
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Magic
Force Lifestyle Mind
Spacetime Star World
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STR: 1090
DEX: 1064 AGI: 1096
INT: 996 VIT: 989
LUC: 36
|
Armityle watched as his eyes went wide and looking back over to him, then back at the screen again, as if doubting what it said. This actually made him grin a bit.
"L-level 222 _High_Beast? Is... is this for real?"
"It is, and normally I use the Fake Patch skill to change the information in case someone has Appraisal or similar skills to see the status of others. Because I completed Fake Patch and my level is far higher than anyone else, even those with stronger skills like Judgment Eyes cannot seem my real information. This is how it looks to whoever might glimpse at it with those kinds of skills."
He says, waving his hand behind the screen, causing the letters to shift and change as the rabbit looked back down over it.
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Armityle R. Lv. 55 Samurai
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Status Condition: Normal
| |
Beast (Wolf) / Male / 23
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Title(s): Undead Slayer
Hearty Eater
| |
HP: 3600/3600
| |
MP: 2500/2500
|
Money: 83,082 F
| |
Magic
Fire Force Lifestyle
Lightning Wind
|
STR: 400
DEX: 360 AGI: 350
INT: 400 VIT: 320
LUC: 36
|
The wolf watched him stare back at the screen a little bit more before he sighed and leaned back, which he took as enough of seeing the screen and snapped his fingers, causing it to vanish into thin air. Before long, the rabbit looked back up at him, staring at him with piercing and questioning eyes.
"If you have such a crazy status like that, why are you keeping it a secret? You could go to any castle on the continent and be given your choice of any position in their court or even be the knight of the king himself, heck you could be the king with that much pow-"
He cut the boy off before he could continue speaking.
"Have you ever really looked at what people in the king's audience look like? Or thought about all the stresses those kinds of life are like? Sure you have all the authority you could want and boss people around however you like, but you'd always be in the eye of everyone around you and expected to handle any situation that comes up."
Armityle couldn't help but chuckle lightly as he shook his head, leaning back against the frame of the carriage as he looked up at the sky, though he could still see the rabbit from the corner of his eye.
"If I did that, I wouldn't be able to travel the world as we are now, getting to see all sorts of different sights... or rescuing a certain rabbit and other sorcerers from a pompous duke who thought too highly of himself, right?"
His poor excuse of a joke wasn't lost on Randall as he watched the boy gulp a bit and nodded, his ears flopping back behind his head in embarrassment at not even thinking about that fact. He looked back down at him and pointed at both Nel and Neil before he spoke again.
"I also would not have been able to meet these two and get them as strong as they are. I fake my status to be about a quarter of my real level, but these two are already at level 65 and 85 thanks to my share experience and double experience skills, which has made them much stronger than most you'd ever meet."
"That still doesn't explain how you were able to surpass level 100. I thought even heroes were not able to do that and only monsters could?"
He stared at Randall for a few moments after being told that, before sighing lightly and turning to look at Shika, watching as the hydra was running at his crazy fast speed.
"True, monsters are the only ones that normally can be above level 100. However, High species and those with the Hero titles are also able to surpass that limit, although even they can only reach a certain height of 120 to 150."
The wolf saw the boy about to open his muzzle and speak again, but he cut him off with a raised finger and continued to speak, his voicing a little deeper and more serious than before.
"And before you ask why I'm even higher than that, I'm afraid I will have to disappoint you there and not say. I haven't even told these two and, truthfully, I'll die before speaking the truth since the risks for the method outweigh the benefits and far too many would die in the process and even more would if someone evil managed to succeed."
He watched as a hint of fear and uneasy flashed across his face, then looked back over at Nel who was looking at him with an uneasy expression as well. He reached up and stroked him on the top of his head lightly, electing a light chur from the smaller male and making him smile again.
"While I cannot tell you that, I can help you get as strong as these too if you continue to stay with us and see a lot of things beyond your wildest dreams..."