Chapter 1: Might As Well Start at the Beginning!

Sunrise, the crack of dawn.

Awe-inspiring. Peaceful. Beautiful. The promise of a new day.

Such phrases are usually attributed to sunrises, but for a certain girl sleeping in her bed, it was more of an annoyance. Oh no, not annoying in a I-hate-this-peaceful-world sort of way, actually, she loved sunrises. It was more annoying in an alarm clock buzzing in your ear sort of way.

Yawning and rubbing her eyes, she sat up slowly from her bed and layered blankets and looked out the window at the purple, pre-dawn sky. She slips quietly out of bed and softly walks out of the room, her eyes half-open. Warming the stoves and the bath water in preparation for breakfast and her parent's baths... just normal, everyday things in her daily routine. What was never routine however, were the events happening outside the windows. While quietly waiting for the aforementioned items to be ready, she often looked outside from the second story of her house and onto the busy streets of Prontera. Even before dawn, those adventurers would run up and down through the streets, intent on their own business. It was far from ordinary... how these people called out for things; bought and sold... one could spend the entire day watching things happen in Prontera. Glancing back at the position of the rising sun, the girl quietly goes back to her daily chores...

After bathing and changing out of her nightclothes, the girl has a hakama and kimono on, as well as a large red ribbon tied in her hair, and works quietly at making breakfast… and stops when she looks at a Pecopeco egg. "Hmm… should I?" Her gaze goes over to the corner of the kitchen, where an odd contraption that looks like a large metal capsule with a little spigot coming out of the bottom part and many pipes coming from the top. "Well… Daddy did say it works…" She picks up a bowl from a cupboard and then walks over to the capsule.

The girl opens the capsule like a flip-top lid and sticks the Pecopeco egg into the bottom part of the capsule. She shuts the top part of the capsule with the bottom part, and the two parts fasten together with a click. Steam starts puffing out from the pipes on top of the capsule. The girl inclines her head and then quickly runs to the other end of the kitchen and hides underneath a table placed in the center of the room.

The capsule suddenly explodes in a blast of black smoke! And the girl shakes her head and sighs from underneath the table.

"Good morning, Alaylle!" calls out a deep, yet cheerful voice.

"Aahh!" The girl bumps her head on the bottom of the table. "Ouch ouch ouch ouch ouch!" She gets out from underneath the table and rubs the top of her head. She turns around happily towards the man. He is tall, with an athletic build, yet not too muscular... and he could certainly use a closer shave to get rid of his whiskers. His hair is a dark brown, and looks more like a tuft rather than any actual hairstyle. "Good Morning Daddy! Don't do that! My poor head…"

"Whahaha! Sorry about that, Alaylle!" Alaylle's father blinks his eyes and looks over at the now black capsule. "Uhh… I thought I heard something explode. I guess it still has a few bugs in it…"

"Daddy! You need to spend more time testing your inventions!" Alaylle lightly taps her father on the head with the bowl in her hand. She then puts the bowl underneath the spigot of the capsule. An egg white and yolk flows out of the spigot and into the bowl. Alaylle blinks her eyes and looks into the bowl.

Alaylle's father grins triumphantly. "See! It works!"

Alaylle groans and points at the black soot. "You call this working?" She walks over to a drawer and takes out a hand-operated drill-looking device. "I'll just crack the Pecopeco eggs the normal way…"

"Aww… not gonna use the Egg Cracker again?"

Alaylle gives a dull glance back at her father.

"Bwhahaha! Joking, I'm joking!" Alaylle's father waves his open palms at Alaylle while laughing awkwardly. Alaylle can't help but giggle.

"Say... is your mother awake yet?"

Alaylle shakes her head, "Not yet..."

Alaylle's father smiles and locks his fingers together. "Good! Good, I want you to go to Geffen and get a few things I'm going to use to make a gift for your mother... don't worry about your chores for today, I'll take care of them."

Alaylle pales a bit at the mention of this, and Alaylle's father laughs again. "Don't worry about it, don't worry about it! Your mother will help me." Alaylle relaxes visibly and her color returns.

Alaylle's father fishes through his pockets and places a bag of zeny on the table. "There, 30 1,000z pieces... took a long time to save... but, I want you to go and buy 50 blue gemstones-the kind used for spells... not the normal jewelry kind. It's a pretty long walk... so you should start after breakfast! Your mother likes how they shimmer from the inside..."

"I like what from the ins-yawn... Oh... excuse me... the inside?" asks a soft voice from the doorway of the kitchen. The woman is nearly identical to Alaylle in appearance. So much so that one would easily mistake one for the other should they not look very closely.

Alaylle turns quickly in the direction of the woman. "Good Morning, Mommy!"

"Ah, umm... you like... the... uhm... insides of boiled Pecopeco eggs!" Alaylle's father says quickly while presenting her with a boiled Pecopeco egg.

Alaylle's mother shakes her head and laughs softly.

Alaylle can't help but giggle as she turns back towards finishing up her breakfast preparations.

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After a breakfast filled with Pecopeco egg jokes, Alaylle prepares to head off to Geffen. She takes with her a basket with some apples to eat for lunch, a red potion in case something bad happens, her father's zeny pouch, and of course, a map so she doesn't get lost. Walking towards the west gate, she watches the adventurers run on by, while making sure she doesn't get in their way. Upon reaching the west gate, Alaylle stops and gulps nervously.

Alaylle whispers quietly to herself, "I-I've never been outside of Prontera before... I wonder... what's it like?".

Taking another nervous gulp, she slowly walks out of Prontera's gates into Prontera field...

End of Chapter 1

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Chapter 2 preview!

"Bloop bloop blooooop!"

Alaylle: "Oh m-my... Wh-what is that!"

"Hmm... it's kind of cute!... But... why is it looking at my basket like that?"

In the next chapter! "Don't Feed the Porings!"

Alaylle: "Th-there's so many... N-no! Stay away! That's mine!"

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