Chapter 6: Gliding Exam
/hello, everyone! I just wanted to say that I don't remember when the character quests start to take place, so I'm starting with Amber's in this chapter.\
Amber, Paimon, and I get back into the city and Amber leads us to a restaurant that was in what I assumed to be the main 'hub' of the city. We get to the restaurant apparently named 'Good Hunter', and I start looking at the menu. I guess Amber noticed because I feel a tap on my shoulder, I look over at her, "What's up?" I ask, "Don't worry about the menu, I got it covered." "Okay, I trust your judgment." Amber goes up to the woman at the booth and orders something called Sticky Honey Roast, of something like that. We sit down and wait, after about a minute of sitting around I decided to keep myself occupied, so I messed around with some ice. I created a flower from ice, then had it turn into a knife, then I had it become a small version of Wolfric.
That was a mistake, my mind wandered off to memories of my old friend, I crush the ice and let it fall on the table, then I take Wolfric's core crystal out if my hammer space. I just sit there looking at the crystal, I felt a tear in my eye, it fell down my face, I have the tear float over to the crystal and have it float through the hole in it. The hole was created by Jin, do I hold Jin against it? No. Jin was not in the right mind, he didn't mean to anyway.
"Traveler? You okay?" Amber's voice pulled me out of my thoughts, I sit up and put the crystal away into hammer space. "Sorry I got lost in thought." "What was that rock you were holding?" Paimon asks, "The last thing I have to remember a close friend." I say with a sad smile looking at the almost night sky. Our food is soon brought to us, two large plates with some kind of meat covered in honey.
I was still a little bitter from letting myself go down that part of memory lane, so I started reminiscing on good memories, the laughs and battles I've shared with Yusei and the rest of our team: Team 5Ds, I made up the name during the crisis of the dark signers, back then there were only 5 signer dragons we knew about, the name of the team stuck even when Crow got Black-Winged Dragon.
I took a small amount of food from the plates, enough to keep me going. Amber and Paimon were eating large portions of food, they look over and see me eating about 1 plate's worth of the meal. "Your only eating that much? You didn't even eat that much this morning!" Paimon exclaims, "I do a lot of moving around, I had to train my body to not have a big appetite, as most of my meals were in the wilderness, I haven't actually had any big meals for years." "Really?" Amber says in wonder, "So do you not visit cities or towns that often?" "It's not that, most of my travels led me to be outside of settlements." I finish my plate and turn to Amber, "Hey is there any place I can stay the night, like an inn or something?" "Actually there are spare rooms at the knights headquarters, since you accepted the title of Honorary Knight, you should be allowed to stay in a room as long as you are in Mondstadt.", "Oh nice, I guess I'll have to ask Master Jean?" "Yep, I'm sure she'll allow you." I get up and immediately create a bag full of mora, I looked at the prices earlier and decided since I'm the guy, I can force the girl to pay, even if she's the one treating me. "Oh you don't have to pay, I can handle it." "No, no. Where I come from it is rude for the male to let the female pay, plus it's my way of repaying you for treating me to a meal." I set the bag on the table and then set off towards the knights headquarters, with Paimon in tow.
We go to Jean's office and ask about empty rooms, she hands me a key and tells me where the room is located. I thank her, and we go over to the room on the second floor, on our way, I noticed some of the doors had signs on them telling who lived in each room, I passed by a room titled: 'Eula', and found a door with no sign right next to it, the door to my new room. I create a sign on the door saying: 'Honorary Knight: Colton' and unlocked the door. I walk in to see a simple room, with a closet, bed, nightstand with a lamp, and a desk. I create a small bed just the right size for Paimon to sleep comfortably, then I let myself fall onto my new bed, and I instantly fall asleep.
The next morning I wake up peacefully in my new bed, I rub my eyes and look at the clock on the wall, it read 7:45. 'I had a great sleep, been a while since I slept on a real bed.' I look and see Paimon sleeping soundly, so I decided to not disturb her. I instantly de-create my current outfit and simultaneously create a clean version of that exact same outfit, that is how I can wear the same clothes every day and still always be in clean clothes. Yesterday I saw a training ground just outside of the headquarters, so I decided I'd practice a little before Paimon wakes up and we start the day.
I walk out of my new room, and quietly, as to not wake anyone up, walk through the hallway and down the stairs, no one was around, I walked out of the building and walked over to the training ground.
When I got there I saw a bunch of objects that appeared to be training dummies, I decided to not use them as I'd probably break them beyond repair. I take out my newly made sword and created a statue of earth in front of me, I decided to make the statue look like Don Thousand just because he was one of my most recent 'Big Bad Evils' I've taken down. I close my eyes and start to focus, I swing my sword horizontally then diagonally in swift calculated movements using my electricity to speed up my movements, I then perform 1 last powerful swing this time using light to make myself even faster. The statue was in pieces, I had the pieces reform into a new shape, this time it was a miniature version of dark beast Gannon. I jump back swapping my sword for my new bow, and I pull back the string and fire a regular arrow, it bounced off of the statue. "Figures" mumble to myself, I then switch to firing elemental arrows at targets I keep creating, working on my accuracy.
"There you are!" I hear Paimon's voice nearby, I turn and see Paimon with Amber walking towards me, I put away my weapon and meet them halfway. "Paimon got worried when Paimon woke up and didn't see you around, why didn't you wake up Paimon?!" Paimon complains, "Geez, good morning to you too." I say, "I didn't want to disturb you, you where sound asleep." "Hey Honorary Knight?" Amber chips in, "Yes?" I ask responding to Amber. "Yesterday when I gave you your wind glider, you looked like that was the first time you've seen one, by that logic I assume you don't have a gliding license, am I right?" "... you need a license to glide?" "And that means no, you don't have one." Amber says with a frown. "Luckily I can act as an instructor for you to get one, you just have to take a simple gliding exam. Here this is the gliding manual, read through it until you get the general idea, then come find me." Amber then walks off, I open the manual and start reading, I did not expect to find a children's story in a manual. After reading the story I go and find Amber.
"Oh Honorary Knight, did you finish reading the manual?" "He sure did!" Paimon says, "Although Paimon is confused on why there is a children's story in the book?" "Huh? Let me see the manual I gave you." I had her the book, "Oh shoot, this is the story I've read as a child." Amber puts the book away and pulls out a bigger one, "here this is the manual." I take it and open it, 'sure is a manual alright', I skim through the first few pages before shutting the book and putting it away. "So how does this exam work?" I ask, "This exam is simple, all you have to do is glide around some buildings without touching the ground, nothing that difficult." "Okay then, when do we start?"
I was maneuvering around tall objects and building while gliding, it was pretty easy, especially since I was manipulating the air to keep me air borne. "Halt! You up there cease gliding this instant!" I listen to the voice and let myself slowly glide to the ground, "I am Otto of the Knights of Favonius, show me your gliding license now." The knight says to me, "Ahh, about that-" I started to say before Amber runs over and interjects. "He's taking part in a gliding exam right now." She explains, "Oh well then, you picked the wrong time to be performing an exam, there's been sightings of that thief named Raptor around the city." "Raptor's been spotted?!" Amber asks, "yes apparently he was caught trying to rob a store, then he escaped the city, but now without receiving damage to his wind glider." "If his wind glider is damaged, we might have a chance on capturing him!" Amber then turns to me, "Sorry but we'll have to put your exam on hold." "It fine" I reply, "if we have a chance on capturing a criminal then let's take that chance." Then we set off outside the city to follow the trail of this thief.
After some investigation, we found out he went into an empty domain, we went inside and had to fight our way through groups of thieves called Treasure Hoarders, of course I didn't kill any of them, I only knocked them out, without giving any serious wounds, we then bound the hoarders with ropes so we could take them in later. We then find Raptor, at the other side of a chasm, "Hah, you knights will never catch me now! Huh? Who sent children after me?" Raptor said, in response I quickly pull out my bow and shoot and arrow right next to his head. "Consider that a warning shot!" I yell as I put my bow away, "How did he get over there?" Paimon asks, I look at the chasm, and noticed some wind energy about halfway from the location we are at to Raptor's location. "There's a wind current." I say pointing to it, "hey why don't we treat this as the rest of your exam?" Amber says to me. "Sure why not? Let's catch us a Raptor!" I say as we both run forward and jump, we both deploy our wind gliders and move forward. As we were getting low, we reached the wind current and gain enough height to make it across. Once we reached the other side we confronted Raptor, after some brief resistance from Raptor, consisting of him trying to attack us, and me knocking him out by hitting him with the side of my new claymore, we bound him up and took him and the rest of the Treasure Hoarders to be properly detained.
Amber and I were currently outside of the knights Headquarters, it was getting close to dusk, and we had just eaten at good hunter, with me paying again of course. "Hey thanks for the help with Raptor" "No problem, glad I could help." "Anyway a deal is a deal, here is your very own gliding license!" Amber hands me a small license with my name on it, I smile and say "Thank you." We both enter the building and off to our respective rooms, I notice my next door neighbor, the person who lives in the 'Eula' room left their door open. 'Huh? Must be forgetful, who ever they are' as I walked by the door, it shut, 'Or maybe they just got back from whatever they were doing.' I just brush it off and unlock my door and enter my room. Paimon appears from whatever or wherever she goes when she pops up out of thin air, and flops down onto her bed. I de-create the boots I'm wearing and I lay down under the covers, I turn off the lights and try to fall asleep.
/there we go another chapter is done, next chapter is Kaeya's little wild goose chase, and the introduction to Ruin Guards\
