Fable Seekers#3

The First Quest

Marco sat with nothing on his mind but boredom. He sifted through the pile of papers in front of him before turning to the other Fable Seekers. He noticed each of them laughing at him.

"Why is there so much paperwork?" Marco groaned loudly. He heard the laughter spread around him as the other guild members join in.

"It's just to cover the Guild's back. With us doing quests for so many different Kingdoms and Organisations there are a lot of regulations to go through." Sven beamed at Marco.

"I just didn't expect that joining an Adventurer's guild to be so... Uptight." Marco admitted which caused the others to laugh again. Alex moved closer and sat down beside Marco.

"Let me explain, This is literally the only paperwork you will ever have to do as an Adventurer. The guild takes care of everything else. This is something like an initiation for the newcomers. It also serves to check the intellect of the guild members. The paper work gets more complex as you go along. The moment you ask for help or start making mistakes is how your intelligence is graded."

"So what do I do when I've done what I can?"

"Just go hand it in to the lovely receptionist over there. I'll come with since you'll be registering with our party." Alex pointed over to one of the desks to the right of the room. When Marco had entered he'd been surprised by how normal everything seemed. There was a row of desks at the back where people filed for quests or confirmed their completion. Along the walls were quest boards of different difficulty and from the entrance to the desks were tables littered with the Adventurers of the guild. Catching up, comparing weapons or sharing tales of their exploits. Marco had also been surprised by how much his idea of what a normal guild should be like matched with the view in front of him. Marco stood and walked with Alex to the receptionist.

"Hello, How can I help?" The lady behind the desk asked. She wore a neat uniform with the guild's insignia.

"Hey Sammy, I'd like to register this newbie to my party once you've finished processing his ID." Alex winked at the girl who only scowled at him. She peered over his shoulder to look at Lily who tried to avoid her gaze.

"I've told you before Alexander that my name is Samantha. Now, how can I help young man?" Sam peered over the desk to see Marco hesitating. He passed the paperwork over to her. She had seen them before. Kids with talent being roped into joining parties just so the party had a higher member count. More members meant more quest options. It was a foul practice in her opinion and she had never thought the Fable Seekers would resort to such tactics but how else could she explain the experienced adventurers suddenly taking in a young boy.

Samantha carried on marking his paperwork, surprised by how she hadn't found a mistake yet. She was confused when she reached the end with no mistakes at all.

"Marco Diaz?"

"Yes Ma'am?" Marco replied quickly. Polite, Sam took note of the trait on the paper in front of her.

"Would you kindly place your hand on this mark and confirm that you received no assistance when reading your application and with filling it in." Marco nodded and placed his hand on an 'X' on the desk.

"I, Marco Diaz, received no help with my application. I filled it in by myself with no further aid." Marco finished quickly surprising both Alex and Sam.

"You even read the small print on the back?"

"Were we not meant to?" Marco asked confused. He looked at Alex who only shrugged.

"It's written in an ancient language that disappeared from usage 300 years ago?"

"Oh I see, so it's like a translation? No wonder there was a mistake in the wording!" Marco sighed. Sam asked what he meant and Marco pointed to one of the runes. Alex looked over his shoulder and then back at the group. He had never even heard of anyone reading that.

"I think it's meant to say 'Adventures exist for me and I exist for Adventures.'" Marco stated.

"And what does it actually say?"

"Well it's not exactly wrong just if you read it as its written it says 'Exist Adventures me for and Exist I for Adventures.' I mean it's basically the same just a poor translation I'd say."

"Where did you learn to read it?"

"Oh in Heckapoo's dimension. When I was taking part in the Trial of Heckapoo I came about some ancient texts. Knowing I needed experts I tracked down some dimensional scholars who taught me to translate their language. Without that I don't know what i would have done." Marco chuckled. Sam looked down at the paper with a smile.

"Wait here a second Mr Diaz." Sam asked before leaving her chair and heading into a back room. Marco turned to Alex confused.

"What's wrong?"

"Well I'm just guessing here but I don't think they've ever really dealt with anyone like you before. Most people join here and then many years later take the trial.. Not the other way round. Anyway how much of it did you fill in anyway?"

"The whole thing." Marco watched as Alex froze looking at him.

"THE WHOLE THING!" Alex said loudly causing everyone to stop talking and look at them both. Those close enough to have heard more of the conversation started gossiping between themselves. Marco breathed a sigh of relief when Sam returned from the back room.

"Sorry about that Mr Diaz."

"No problem Ma'am but you can just call me Marco." Marco smiled widely.

"Okay Marco, then you can call me Sammy." Sammy smiled back as Alex started to pout.

"Is everything okay?"

"Yes it's just you have a few circumstances we have to consider. Since you read the whole of the paperwork I'm sure you know of the truth spell cast on the mark. You passed without lying and by doing so you showed you have an incredible head on those shoulders. Your accomplishments as the Princess' friend have also been added to your application due to Queen Moon's request."

"Wait what?"

"Didn't you know? We received a letter of recommendation from Queen Mewni of the Butterfly Kingdom herself. Added all together here is your guild ID card." Sammy passed the card to Marco letting him and Alex see.

'Marco Diaz, The Red Knight
Affiliation: The Butterfly Kingdom
Class: To Be Chosen
Guild Rank: A
Magic: Level 1
Combat: Level 8
Intelligence: Level 9'

Marco stared at the card with both pride and confusion. He wasn't really sure of what to make of it when Alex took the card off of him.

"Alexander!" Sammy lectured.

"What is with these stats? Rank A? Two stats almost level 10?"

"Is there something bad about it?" Marco asked concerned. He was hoping that he wouldn't let his new friends down.

"Bad? No these are amazing stats! Marco you aren't far from having stats higher than even our party."

"Wait.. Why are they so high?" Marco asked Sammy politely.

"It was set like that for several reasons.

Firstly, by making you Rank A it will mean the quests your party can accept are not limited.

Secondly, It is a decision based on two main factors. One is what you have accomplished before and what we expect you to be able to perform with ease.

Finally, it seems you are new to magic so have the base level for magic, in the future you can register a list of spells you are able to perform as well. Combat is based on you having completed Heckapoo's Trial and has been put to one level lower than the next lowest level of a person who has completed it. Intelligence is based on your application. Personally I believe it should be 10 but the guild master believes you have room to grow. The gap between 9 and 10 is akin to the gap between 1 and 9. We expect great things from you Mr. Diaz. We hope you won't disappoint."

/

Marco couldn't tear his gaze away from his ID card as he followed the party. He was overwhelmed by how happy this one card made him. So focused on the card that he didn't notice the others stop in front of him and bumped into Tank.

"Sorry.." Marco apologised quickly, feeling very embarrassed. He looked over to see everyone staring at a house in front of them.

"What is it?" Marco asked. Lily tore her eyes away from the house to answer him.

"It's a small estate for sale. We're saving up to have a base of operations. You get personal requests and its great to have a place to come home to. Plus family of the members could move in and not have to be separated for so long. It's just too expensive."

"How much is it?"

"For this estate? 250 Gold coins."

"How much do you have?"

"Collectively we've raised about 25 Gold. It's hard to earn gold quickly as you need to do harder and more dangerous missions. For that you need to prepare which costs more. To save up enough for even this estate it'll take us another 5 years at least." Lily sighed deeply but instantly regretted speaking when she noticed Marco looking down. She nudged the others and indicated to them.

"Anyway how about we get going on our first Quest Marco!" Sven called over. Marco's face lit up as he ran after them. For their first quest Alex has chosen for them to hunt some tree goblins. They seemed to be a group of creatures that lived in the wood land and waited for people to stroll in. They'd then attack them, stealing their possessions and eating their corpses. It was standard for new adventurers. Although he had a higher than normal status the team needed to see what he was capable of so took him to the quest location.

"Alright Marco, this ones all on you is that okay?" Alex called over to him as Marco was stretching out his arms.

"Yep I'm good to go whenever you are?"

Tank stood up and face the cave and woodland before them. The quest they'd taken on was to wipe out the goblins that lived in this area. They often pillaged the Mewman settlements nearby. Marco almost laughed out loud when he heard such a cliché quest was given. He asked about the goblins and found out they were considered to be something lower than a monster. Monsters are capable of speech and communication but goblins are more savage creatures that attack on sight. In order to get a true idea of Marco's capability they had Tank use one of his abilities to draw all the goblins out of their hiding spot.

"AGGRAVATION!" Tank smashed his gauntlet against his shield over and over again letting a crashing sound echo out into the surrounding area. He kept up his technique until he felt content. Tank moved to take a seat on the make shift bench the group had made from a fallen tree. They watched on as Marco closed his eyes and faced the cave. Silence seemed to have taken over the area as Marco breathed deeply.

He let the sounds fill his ears and his other sense take over. There was a light breeze blowing towards him that at first was the earthy smell of the woodland but changed to a foul smell of rotten flesh and blood. His ears that only heard the swaying of leaves and the breathing of the friends behind him heard the clattering of feet and metal. His first movement was to step to the right avoiding the rock that came hurtling towards him. Left, Right, Down and then Jump. Simple movements that made it clear to his attackers that no amount of rocks was going to harm the man in front of him.

A shrill scream announced the first charge of the goblins. Footsteps drawing near let Marco know what to do next as he pulled his leg back before sweeping it into the boney chest of a goblin. It's skin was rough and littered with scars from constant fighting but the force of the timed kick left several of it's ribs cracked. The sound of them cracking seemed to be lost among the screams of the others that charged him. Marco used the momentum of his first kick to bring his elbow into the jaw of another. He stretched his arm out and punched another away before ducking and kicking down two more that tried to impale him. Marco grabbed one of their small spears and flung the goblin back to the area with the most movement. He quickly thrust the spear into the skulls of the two nearest goblins ending their lives quickly. He felt something rush past his cheek and sighed realising that one of the goblins had tried the rock again. He grabbed the spear, freeing it from it's bloody hilt, and threw it straight through the heart of the fool of a goblin that didn't learn from it's earlier attacks.

Marco continued to take out the weaker and more blood thirsty of the goblins with each move before having to open his eyes due to the number of corpses now on the floor. He didn't want to be too over confident and make a careless mistake. Letting the light fill his eyes for the first time he looked down at the dark green liquid that covered his hands.

"Green blood? That's different." Was all Marco thought before grabbing his dagger from his side and rushing into the larger and clearly more powerful goblins hiding at the back. Marco figured from how much like a game this had seemed so far these must be either the goblin leaders or hob-goblins that evolved from the stronger goblins. His theory was proven correct when his initial attack hadn't killed the first of his new enemies. Sadly for his evolved foe it only took one more slash of his dagger to rob it of its life. The other hob-goblins that were watching all now tried to attack the enemy before them.

Marco quickly ducked as a blast of heat passed over his head. He looked up and noticed one of the goblins holding a golden staff in it's hands. The staff clearly was a gain from previous battles as it's red jewels and detailed engravings could never be achieved by such savage creatures. Marco remembered a sort of common knowledge from a game he use to play. "Take out the mages first." Marco jumped and kicked off of the head of the hob-goblin who tried to crush him with a large club and rushed towards the goblin mage. Fearing for it's life it fired blast after blast towards Marco. He easily punched the fire away. He thought about what Lily had told him about talent being a vital part of being a mage and how if a mage is weak even a fire ball will be nothing more than hot air. He smiled before pulling his palm up to the goblins chest.

"FIREBALL!" Marco felt his energy drain slightly but otherwise felt fine as a large ball of fire burst from his palm and engulfed the goblin. It dropped the small staff before screaming and running till its body gave way to the flames. Marco picked up the staff and got a better look at it. He noticed that it seemed to have a detachable part and pulled the base off revealing it to be a short sword. He smiled widely thinking how perfect it was and that it was his lucky day. He turned to face the remaining few goblins. In his left hand was his black dagger he received from Moon, still dripping with blood, and in his right the short sword. He raised the sword high and yelled loudly.

"LUMEN!" Once again he felt the drain from his body but noticed it was significantly less than his previous use of magic. He rushed forward before spinning into his foes. His short sword immediately sliced the head off the closest hob-goblin as it remained dazed from his blast of light. The dagger he plunged into the next ones heart. Continuing it's earlier momentum the sword sliced across the penultimate goblins chest causing it to shriek in pain and fall to the group. The last opponent was the hob-goblin that had tried to crush him with a club. It swung wildly forcing Marco to jump back. It didn't let him approach until it had regained it's vision. It threw away it's club and snarled at Marco. Never one to miss such a hint, Marco sheathed both his weapons before cracking his knuckles with a smile.

The hob-goblin ran at him and punched with all it's might only to shatter the ground as Marco had jumped up and landed on its shoulders. It tried desperately to grab him but it was too slow as Marco jumped backwards before rushing forward and striking it in the throat with such force that it immediately passed out from the pain and fell lifeless to the floor, no longer able to breath with a crushed wind pipe. Marco picked up his belongings and walked back to his companions as they gave him looks of both shock and respect.

"That was mar-" Alex started to congratulate the boy when Lily pushed past him and picked him up.

"FANTASTIC! Great job my apprentice! You used two spells in quick succession and managed to find yourself a rather adequate staff sword. Those things are rather rare in these parts since most mages don't bother to train their bodies but just buff themselves with magic." Lily explained as Marco quickly pulled his notebook out and took notes. The guys were all laughing as Alex stood waiting to tell Marco well done but all chances were gone now that they were in Student and Teacher mode. Alex sighed before turning to the rest.

"How about we go earn our part and collect all the loot before we clean up this mess. Don't want anyone finding all these dead goblins and thinking we were lazy adventurers." Alex sighed before moving with the others.

/

Upon returning to the guild the group were surprised to find out that the hob-goblins that Marco slayed were actual considered C Rank creatures due to them killing adventurers before. Marco and his group were rewarded with 50 silver apiece, which ending up with them cheering in joy. Creatures that had killed adventurers were given a bounty that meant you got paid double for their kills. The original quest would have gained them 5 silver apiece but thanks to the hob-goblins their rewards grew ten-fold. Marco had found out that for a single gold coin you would need 100 silver. For one silver it was 10 bronze coins. Marco thought about how the group had managed to raise 25 gold coins and realised he would have to complete that same quest with the same conditions at least 50 times before reaching that. Given that such conditions were considered extremely rare he doubted they'd ever get that lucky again.

Marco turned to his companions who were still cheering about the money they had made. The goblins had gathered a decent sized amount of loot so their collective profit for this mission had been 4 gold. 2 gold, 50 silver for the quest and 1 gold, 50 silver for the sale of the loot. The guild brought weapon and loot found on missions for a fair price. Marco thought about their earlier mention of raising 250 gold. It didn't seem so much at first but thinking about how they had only earned 4 gold seemed to bother him.

"Hey everyone, would you mind waiting here for me? I'll be about an hour?" Marco asked his group all of a sudden. They looked at him confused.

"You heading out?" Sven asked curiously.

"Yep, Just need to run a quick errand but I'll be back." With a wave Marco rushed over to the desk where Sammy was sitting. He whispered something to her which made her laugh and then she walked out from behind the desk before leaving with Marco.

"Have I just been out done by young Marco?" Alex chuckled, not noticing the glare he received from Lily.

"I'm sure that's nothing to worry about, He doesn't seem like a skirt chaser. Plus he has a Princess waiting for him at home." Sven laughed loudly. He almost couldn't believe Marco's origin story.

"We shouldn't jump to conclusions. Trust the boy." Tank spoke lightly before taking a seat at a nearby table. The others surprised by their companions faith in Marco followed suit and waited patiently for him.

2 Hours Later.

"So Marco? Do ya want to tell us what your big secret is?" Sven was growing bored of the suspense. Marco had taken almost two hours to return then ushered for the group to follow him. Sammy was now driving their carriage as they all climbed in.

"You'll see!" Marco smiled widely. He let himself take in the quiet between them before hearing Sammy call from the front.

"We're here!" Marco jumped out of the carriage followed by the rest of the group. They turned to see Marco standing in front of a pair of large metal gates.

"Marco, why are we here?" The group looked at the mansion like estate behind Marco clueless to why Marco had brought them here.

"Well Lily mentioned earlier you lot had a dream to buy one of the estates in the city to use as a base and a home."

"What does this have to do with this place? Even if we spent the rest of our lives working this place looks like it would be at least 450 Gold?" Sven added sighing at the gravity of their situation. Personally he just enjoyed the journey and thought aiming for the 250 house was too much to ask for.

"More on the mark of 650 Gold Coins. Well I thought about it and I've decided I want to be one of the Fable Seekers!"

"Marco? We already made you a Fable Seeker?" Alex chuckled. Lily and Tank however had already guessed at where Marco was leading the conversation. Both remained silent not wanting their hopes to be dashed.

"True but I want to help build that dream and if I had the power to do so... I wanted to do it. I have enjoyed the time I spent with you all from Master Lily to Tank's amazing food. I want Sven to teach me how to sneak like a boss and I want to learn how to use this sword that I found properly from you, Alex. I want to start my two years with a blaze of glory. Today was amazing, it was like a dream come true... So I want to do the same for you." Everyone stood silent as Sammy smiled wide.

"When I left for my journey I told you the Queen gave me two things, my dagger and some gold. What I didn't tell you is that the gold I was given was 650 Gold pieces and I was told to use it to get through the two years." The groups faces dropped in surprise. They had spent ages trying to get a fraction of the gold that was by their side for the last few days.

"So I want to, As Marco the Red Knight, New Recruit of the Fable Seekers invest in our time together. May I present you, in all it's glory, the new home of the Fable Seekers. Welcome to The Reverie Estate." Marco thrust his hands back pointing at the estate as all the adventurers were frozen.

Alex was the first to react as he rushed forward and hugged Marco. He could feel the man sobbing as he cried out in joy. Tank fell to his knees as he stared at the gates before erupting in a loud yell. Sven kept waiting for someone to tell him it was a dream and started to pinch himself over and over again before tears started to swell in his eyes. Lily smiled as she wiped away her tears. She walked over and hugged Marco and Alex. They felt a thud as Sven joined in and then all were lifted into the air and Tank hugged them all tightly. Sammy's smile filled her face as she sat back on the carriage and watched as the adventurers cried in each other arms. One dream had been fulfilled, a new one was soon to be born.