Chapter 23
I saw the massive dragon turn its head away from Usa and I, and start the same bubbling gurgle that would lead to it spewing toxic gas at Tetsu and Raphtalia. Usa seemed to have more resistance just by being next to me, I was hardly effected due to the Shield, but those two...
"Usa run!" I commanded, holding out my hand to help me judge distance and angle.
The Dragon Zombie's head slapped into an Air Strike Shield, the pendulum momentum of its head bouncing off the roughly 45 degree angle of the ethereal shield, "Change!" I shouted, the flat plain of the Air Strike Shield switching to the double dog headed Black Dog Shield.
Tetsu and Raphtalia managed to evade the Zombie Dragon's breath weapon as it spewed a black and purple fog above their heads. Head locked in place by the biting dog heads, Clive landed a perfect shot into one of its empty eye sockets...
But all that did was leave a tiny hole through its head, gunk spraying from the tunnel Clive's arrow made through its skull. That wasn't to say the dragon wasn't upset though! With a mighty heave, it ripped itself free of the biting fangs of my giant Air Strike Shield (double dog version), and focused its attention on me again.
I just had to buy the others time to hit it again. "See how you like it!" I yelled, the face of the Acid Worm Shield coughing up a stream of acid from its mouth. I didn't expect much, but for a moment, the scales on its chest started to melt.
"I see it!" Tetsu roared, charging in again as the Zombie dragon's wounds started to close again, 'resetting' to its first, horribly mangled yet still quite functional form.
"Report!" I yelled back, taking a deep breath just before I was once again covered in black and purple fog.
It hurt, it burned, but past the watering eyes and the sticky feeling over my bare skin, it didn't harm me.
Tetsu crashed into it again, this time connecting with almost all her claws and clamping her mouth down over one of the bigger dragon's wing roots, "It's heart!" She called through a mouthful of slimy flesh, "AUGH this is disgusting!" She added, ripping sideways and pulling rotted scales and sinew away, letting it fall to the ground.
Its heart? Ha, that was something I was familiar with. But it was healing as fast as we were hurting it! "Sir!" I heard Usa call, "Help me light this! Give it to Kunshu!"
He'd followed my order, then took it one step further and gotten something to help. Except I was kind of busy and where WAS Kunshu...
As I thought about it, Kunshu jumped through the dragon's freshly healed wing, ripping through it anew then taking to the sky, then throwing her spear back down as she reached the apex of her flight. I was about to doubt how much good it might do, but instead of bouncing off or missing, it passed through the beast's throat, leaving yet another spray of gunk and blood, and buried itself point down in front of the beast. Kunshu however, didn't stop to look at how she had done, and instead zipped over my head to land behind me someplace near where I'd last heard Usa's voice.
That was all the attention I could spare, The Dragon Zombie lashed a clawed hand forward. Instead of bracing and holding my ground however, I put both my forearm and my palm behind it, and swung with everything I had towards the monster's palm, "Quill Shield!" I called it out, just to make sure it changed, instead of potentially missing the 'visualization' of the Shield's form.
The impact was tremendous, but not for me. The shock of the impact made the Zombie Dragon's claw recoil away, the quills of the Shield ripping its palm open. I didn't have time to admire my work, and I had to turn around and do it again as the massive trident jaw lashed down at me. The Quill Shield wasn't large enough though, and while its head recoiled as if I'd hit it with my fist and not a chest sized sheet of spiky metal, I felt its teeth rip through my upper arm and shin before repelling it's attack.
More pain, more of that oily sticky feeling, but I kept my feet, watching its head recoil, the feathers of another arrow appearing in its nose, making the Zombie Dragon gurgle in pain.
"They're lit!" Usa said, "Get it to open its mouth!"
The Dragon seemed to notice what was going on as soon as I myself felt the... positive energy radiating from the torches we'd gotten from the Pastor. Usa was about to get his wish, but not in the way he would want as that same bubbling gurgle started to build in the Zombie Dragon's chest again.
But then out of nowhere, Raphtalia appeared under the beast's chin, her body fading into reality through some magic effect. Performing the same sweeping upwards slash she'd used to behead the giant zombie/skeleton from the Wave in Riyute, she left a massive gash across the dragon's throat. Behind me, I heard Kunshu's wings hit maximum speed, and as the cursed breath foamed out of the massive slice Raphtalia had taken out of its neck, Kunshu zipped forward and at the last second, before I could call out to stop her, she folded her wings behind her tightly, and dove into the monster's mouth like a silver/black/gold/flaming knife.
Realizing she meant to sacrifice herself for the Hive (the rest of us), but not having line of sight to her, I frantically moved my eyes over the status screens. Party, select Kunshu, skill, Shield Prison, change Shield, Mush Shield!
Everything paused as the Zombie Dragon recoiled at suddenly having what amounted to a large ball bearing fly down its throat, the wound Raphtalia had given it closing up sluggishly as its unnatural life pulled it back together.
I hoped, prayed even, that this would work. "Sir..." Usa said from behind me as the Dragon seemed... confused.
"Two, one..." I released the Shield Prison.
And the dragon's chest exploded in a burst of holy fire.
Kunshu was on her 'knees' and shaking her head to clear the veritable waterfall of Zombie Dragon gunk that had fallen back down on her after the ball of 'anti curse' torch smoke had been let out inside it. But even with a wound that would have cracked a normal creature, from the dungeon or not, in half, the Zombie Dragon was slowly pulling itself back together again!
But I saw our goal.
Just behind Kunshu was a shard of purple glowing crystal about as big as a person's head. Jagged and uneven, it pulsed like a heart, and was, even as I watched, pulling the cursed flesh of the Zombie Dragon back to itself.
"Get clear!" I shouted, wincing as I tried to run forward. "Tetsu! Pull them out of the way!" Raphtalia, as fast as she was, was coughing toxic gunk out of her lungs, and Kunshu had been covered in the stuff from the explosion.
"I'll save you!" Tetsu declared, running past the two of them, her front arms, size and strength having no trouble scooping them up. It wasn't a gentle extraction, but there was usually only three ways something like this went.
It wouldn't work, it would work, or it would work and explode. I stood in front of the pulsing cursed heart of the Zombie Dragon, "Clive!" and made ready to stand in the way if it did explode.
From over my shoulder, a little diamond tipped arrow zipped through the air and landed on a flat face of the jagged shard of purple crystal. I raised the Shield, braced my feet, and heard the distinct 'snap' that was no different from a Magic Stone cracking in half.
I snapped back to awareness, feeling all my hurts, bruises, raw lungs, oily skin and throbbing headache trying to slam through my thoughts all at once. It hurt even more when I forced myself back to my knees, then to my feet, raising my arms up into a fighting stance even through the pain of my cut arm, leg, and bruised back.
I thought for a moment the field was quiet, but no, my ears were simply taking their time to recover from being too close to an explosion. My vision was trembling with the overflow of adrenaline as I snapped my head left and right to orient myself.
"gr..." Clive's voice sounded like I was underwater, and a moment later, there was a tug at my sleeve.
I turned, nearly falling as my legs almost didn't catch up to the motion, and felt that tug on my sleeve turn to a pair of hands on my elbow and back to hold me up. "Clive?" Yeah... Green patchy skin, weird eyes, fur cloak that had changed to match the stone around us. "Where... what..."
He took short breath and let it out in a sigh, then started to move me towards... "Gr."
Raphtalia, Usa and Kunshu were laying on the ground, their capes turned into pillows. Their skin was covered in something that looked similar to black mould, and their breathing was rough and thin.
Then I felt something through my boots, a heavy vibration as something got closer. I was just about to throw myself back into high alert, but I heard an energetic voice call out, "I got the water and extra medicine!" Two more stomps, then, "Oh! Boss! You're awake!"
Tetsu screeched to a halt, the claws on her back legs digging into the gravely stone, while her front legs were holding a pair of medium sized barrels, one under each arm. Also hanging off one arm was a leather bag that clinked ominously, but I didn't hear anything break. "How long was I out? Is it dead?" I looked around, but aside from the lingering negative energy in the air, I saw nothing but the lingering evidence of our fighting.
Best to be sure and ask a potentially stupid question, than not ask and be surprised later.
"There's still some glowing bits over there!" Tetsu said, "But they feel weird and I didn't want to touch them." She handed Clive and I a barrel each, then very carefully tugged the bag of glass bottles off her arm. "Um... Not long?"
Again Clive sighed, then started waving hand signs at me. "Explosion. Pull. Two minutes. Medic. Water." I ran the line of 'code' through my still foggy mind, "There was an explosion, you pulled them all over here. I was out for about two minutes. Sent Tetsu to get medicine and water?"
"I asked if I should get it!" Tetsu said as Clive nodded at my translation. I reached out to pat her snoot, "Heehee... praise me more... OH!" She shook off my hand, "Are they okay?"
I squinted my eyes shut, then opened the bag of medicine to look for the anti-inflammatory. While I did that, I looked at the status screen. The world was weird, but even I could appreciate 'status icons' for things like poison, paralysis, or... curse.
I looked down at myself, and yes, my clothes and bare skin was covered in the same black... stuff. Clive had a smudge or two on him as well, but Tetsu...
"Change forms?" I asked.
"Sure!" And with the usual puff of smoke, Tetsu stood in front of me, "Um..." I took hold of her arm, looked into her eyes, "What..."
"Maybe because you're a dragon?" I asked no one in particular. "Everyone but you has been cursed by that stuff the Zombie Dragon was breathing out." I knelt down, "Even me, but..."
"sir..." Usa caught my attention, "did we... is it dead?"
I put my hand on his shoulder, then gave him the same 'field check' I gave Tetsu. Cool skin, dull eyes, short breath. "It's not getting back up this time." I said, turning to Raphtalia. She had the same symptoms, and managed to open her eyes and smile at me when I started checking on her, "Good job, but maybe a little more warning next time."
She coughed, "you can't always be there to take all the burden. we have to help."
I pat her forehead, then stepped over her carefully to look at Kunshu. Aside from the black stuff over the gold/yellow of her chitin, she looked fine. I carefully brushed a hand over some of her fuzz, and her head moved slightly to look at what had touched her. "Easy. Relax a little." I lowered my head down to her chest, feeling the feverish warmth radiating out of her inner organs. Aside from cracking her open and looking inside, I had no idea where her heart, or any of her innards were really... But her heart was in there someplace, and beating. There was a rasp of something... air moving through lungs (I hoped)...
I knelt and looked through the status screens. Everyone save Clive and Tetsu had their name glowing in a dull orange (white was the normal colour), and looking a little deeper, I could see that all of our status was lowered. Lower STR, lower DEX, lower DEF... Okay, so a curse was just... an overall lowering of stats?
I looked over my shoulder at the remains of the Zombie dragon, and the still faintly glowing bits of crystal that lay in the rough centre of the 'blast' where I'd been standing.
"Will medicine even work?" Tetsu asked, helping Clive wash off what they could from bare skin with our water supplies.
"Well..." I went through the bag again, rather pleased Tetsu had brought 'two of everything'. That was a bit of my work too, since I had been buying and reusing coloured glass bottles to help make medicines easier to recognize. "Lets try a little of everything."
"sir... bandage yourself too..." Usa reminded me that I was actually hurt.
Nothing worked.
No, I'll correct a little. The bandages still stopped bleeding, but didn't start recovering HP. The antidotes helped with their breathing. But otherwise? The three of them weren't getting up without help.
It stung a little. I understood that stuff like this happened. I, and just about everyone I knew, had been like this at one point or another after a fight in the dungeon. But this? I suspected the only reason I was still on my feet was because, even cursed, I still had defence stats at almost double what the rest of my party had when they were at full strength.
I could feel that the curse in the air was still around too. Much lessened with that dragon really dead this time, and the crystal in fragments. But those fragments were still cursed, and if we left it here, it would continue to poison the air and water around Mirso.
I played the fight back in my mind. We could have stepped back a little, maybe led it around a little, found better ground to fight it...
I laughed to myself, drawing the looks of Clive and Tetsu. I waved off their concern and stepped away from our three downed party members.
No. 'What If' had happened. 'What now' came next.
I felt my eyes drawn to the glowing purple shards of crystal, and started walking towards them.
This was a curse. What I had, what they had, what the land had, and it all came from these bits of rock here...
"Boss?" Tetsu asked from just a little behind and the to the left of me. "Those are... I..."
I didn't look at her, but asked, "Take your time. Find the words." I encouraged.
"Its... It feels... I look at them and feel like I want them. But I see the pain it's caused my family, and I don't want them anymore. But then I look again..."
"Well, I'll be sure to wash them off first." I said, "Go back to them, and make sure they are wrapped up in blankets to keep warm."
I heard her feet on the gravel as they walked away.
I put the Shield on my front, flexed my fingers a few times, and clapped my hands together. First thing first. This curse I had on me had to go.
It was on this day, that the evening sky lit up over Melromarc. Brighter than the sunset, the top of little mountain range that contained Mirso and all its little satellite settlements, lit up with a flare of light. Purple, black, gold, silver, then fading away like the afterglow on your eyes after a camera flash. It lasted long enough to draw every eye in the kingdom, and those along the borders of Melromarc's neighbouring kingdoms of Faubrey, Siltvelt and Shieldfreeden.
Those closer to Mirso were treated with a different sight.
Originating from the mountaintop came all of the light, but those who were brave enough to look into it, spotted two things. Starting as a shadow in the purple light and miasma fog all around them, the head of a great canine beast appeared in the glow. Darker than even the cursed light, it started to burn with a faint gold edging, like the fingers of a million candle lights. The beast, thinner than a wolf, larger than a dog, seemed to breath in an devour the purple light, until those gold flickers of light changed to silver...
Then nothing but the light of sunset...
And a sudden dusting of hundreds, thousands of flower petals. All of various shapes and sizes, any one could tell they were from a dozen different flowers, not any one flower.
Anyone who opened their window, or stepped outside to look, the odd sight making them forget about the cursed fog in the air... felt nothing. Just the evening air on their face, and the feeling that something just on the edge of their range of hearing had stopped making such an awful noise.
I was screaming.
It was the same kind of noise I had made when I had purged the influence of Hardy from my body. I was well aware I was doing it, yet had no control to stop it, hoping that by the time my body could no longer sustain the effort of what I was doing, it would be done.
I felt every little particle of cursed energy moving through me. I pulled it up from the ground. Up from the water. Out of the air. Out of my friends. Out of the people of Mirso. Out of the bits of crystal heart that had once been the core of it all...
I was dimly aware of my status screen throwing all kinds of messages at me, but I ignored them. This stupid toy had only one thing I wanted from it right this second, and as I pushed through the error messages, the warnings, the stupid blinking lights, and dug through to the little 'Inventory' icon...
I cupped my hands, putting them over the gem of the Shield and clearing out each box of the inventory list I drilled through with my eyes. What did I want? Seeds.
From seeds no bigger than a grain of sand, to some the size of a cherry pit, I fought through the pain to toss a double handful of the random assortment onto the ground in front of me. I wouldn't do what I did before and try and hold in all that power.
I was going to fix this stupid place. Waves? Incompetent Heroes? Corrupt Nobility?
I almost missed the last error message as I dismissed it, bringing my hands together in what I hoped was the right sequence.
Curse Series:
Shield of Pride: ability locked:
Special Effect: Self Curse: Relinquish Your Pain Unto Me
I felt a surge of energy, and if I wasn't busy chanting out the mantra of cleansing I'd been shown by Yasaka when she taught me about 'how to be a land holding Kitsune', I'd have laughed.
But as a rush of cursed energy left my body, the spell finished, the effect only needing to happen now, I yelled into the air.
"I DON'T NEED A STUPID PIECE OF SCRAP METAL TO TELL ME HOW TO DO MY JOB!"
I screamed again, this time feeding my own energy into the effect, an amalgam of assorted flowers, vines, trees, mosses and bushes fast growing in front of me as I put the cursed energy and my own, into something useful, consuming the curse, reversing its purpose, and making it a blessing.
And like everything else I touched with my magic the tree had the mark of a Fox. The mix of vines, flowers, leaves and wood made the trunk of hybridized medicinal plants look like a riot of foxes playing up and down the bark and through the branches.
Then the light faded, and my stamina with it. I flopped onto my back, unable to feel more than the dull discomfort of sitting on my tail, as I looked up through the branches of my new tree, their swaying making it look like little foxes running through the fields.
It felt like I had the heaviest cat sleeping on my chest. It was even purring. Even so, it wasn't resting its full weight on me, so it wasn't suffocating... just warm and fuzzy and purring. I attempted to open my eyes.
"Kunshu?" I tried saying, since I don't recall ever seeing a cat in this world (just cat-folk... I wonder if they purr in this world too... would make it four of four if they did...)
"She hasn't let any of us near you since you fell over." I heard Raphtalia pout from someplace to my right. She sounded like I felt, like she was recovering from a bad fever.
"Sir? Did you do this?" Usa asked, also sounding weak, "It's... I've never seen anything like it."
I looked past one of Kunshu's fuzzy antenna, still not bothering to try and move my arms or legs, and regarded my work. "I didn't have a Sakura branch... But if you can't improvise, you don't live long where I'm from." A faint mountain breeze went through the branches, and I could imagine green and brown furred foxes jumping from branch to branch. "How do I look?"
There was an awkward pause.
Tetsu answered a moment later though, oblivious on how to 'read a room', "Your horns are so tiny!"
I sighed, figuring there would be a price to pay, but thankful they didn't actually hurt. Slowly, I started to move my arms, carefully so I didn't bump Kunshu's wings. "You are a good Bee." I said, giving her a pat, "But..."
"We've already set up a fire pit."
"We have water boiling Sir.
"Gr."
"Food will be ready soon!"
As worn out as they were, they still managed to set up a camp while I'd been out. So instead of getting up I just gave Kunshu another pat, "I'll just lay here until the soup is ready then."
By the time they were done, there was no hope of getting back to Mirso until morning. That was fine, even after a good (needed a bit more salt, but Clive made a reasonable version of my 'medicinal soup') meal and as little movement as possible, I could tell we were all far too tired to try and make it back in the dark.
So, we got the rest of the camping supplies out of the wagon and set up under the new... Fox Tree? I didn't even know if it really was a tree. Sure, there were tree seeds in the mix I tossed onto the ground, but it was like a weird amalgamation of every medicinal plant, vine, tree and shrub I'd come across so far.
Maybe I'd draw it before we left camp in the morning? The Book Shield had lots of free pages...
While I was sitting on a rock and thinking on that, Tetsu came over (in her much easier to hug girl form) with a thin canvas sack that was giving off its own inner glow.
"Boss?" She started, making me wish Delly was here. "I gathered up most of the dragon core."
"Most?"
She pointed to the 'tree', "I can feel there's a little in there. But it looks too pretty to cut down."
"It ate all that cursed power anyhow." She handed me the sack, and I looked inside. "Good. Not cursed even a little bit." I smiled, my new horns (yes, the same black with thin silver and gold veins that I've had... three times now...) itching a tiny bit. "What do you think? They are clean now."
"Well..." She looked at me, stepped a little closer, swept a hand behind her to move her tail out of the way, and plunked her rear onto my knee. "I can hear it. I... I dunno why I know. But I can feel that it is still in there... kinda? Sorta?"
She seemed a little sad, so I set the sack down and put one arm around her back so she could use my knee as a proper chair and partially turn to face me. "A voice? Memories?" This was sounding awfully familiar as well. "Do you still want it?"
Her look changed, and she surprised me with a slow shake of her head. "I don't think... I do! But... I don't think I'm ready yet." She reached down towards the glowing bag with childlike 'grabby hands' and I brought it up to her.
She opened the sack, and I looked in with her. There were two big shards, and a handful of little slivers. All of them were glowing with a dim red light, but I couldn't feel any cursed energy in them. I couldn't feel any cursed energy at all, now that I thought about it... I missed Kyoto...
Tetsu pulled me from my drifting thoughts by pulling out the largest of the two big shards. "I feel..." She looked sad, but let out a bit of a giggle, "It feels like Clive sounds when you wake him up for a watch."
From over by the fire, Clive replied with a low rumbling noise that was half snore, half grumpy cat.
"Yeah! Like that! Thank you Clive!"
"clickclick."
I held out my hand and took the shard from her. If I were back home, at the height of my power, I'd have tried really looking into it, like I had with Hagane's little soul shard that Issei made when he copied Ddraig.
But instead I just... looked through the window... so to speak. Touching it with just a whisper of my inner self.
"Boss?"
I set the shard back in the bag like it had become too hot to hold, and that itchy feeling in my horns returned. "Dragons, in every world I've been in, have always been powerful." I picked up the shards, one by one, and let the Shield store them. Amusingly, it listed them in three categories. 'Dragon Soul Shard', Dragon Core fragment, and Dragon Core fragments (small). However, what it didn't do, was unlock a Shield.
Huh. Of all the high powered materials I've found so far... This is the one you can't use?
"Did the Shield do something again?" Usa asked, coming over with a round loaf of bread, "It's still very warm." He cautioned as I took hold of the crunchy loaf.
"It... didn't do anything. And it puzzles me." I replied, pulling the loaf in half and handing the larger part to Tetsu, "When you think you're ready, I'll give it to you."
She held the still steaming loaf in both hands, blowing air over it to cool it down, "Keep it safe please. Ah-chomp."
I nibbled at my own half, and applied a well deserved headpat to the dragon-newt. "Almost lights out." I said, "Kunshu and I will take first watch."
Technically, I was the only one 'watching'. Kunshu, up above, in the blossoming tree, was just... crawling about the branches and sniffing at all the flowers. Not wanting to stop her, I didn't call her down until our watch was almost over.
However, I did leave enough time to pull out a little metal hair comb (something you'd find in a Geisha's hair) that I'd made, and brushed as much pollen off her fuzzy body as I could. There was so much of it, that not only did it actually 'qualify' as an item in the Shield's inventory (bag of mixed pollen), but I more than made up for the loss of seeds when it came to 'alchemy ingredients'.
Our return to the Fortress town of Mirso was met part way by that same guard, and a couple of villagers. He took one look at us, saw that we were alive but covered in 'battle evidence', and came over with a happy shout of greeting.
"Shield Hero! You all made it! After what we saw last night, we were hopeful but..." He did a 'I still count on my fingers' headcount of our party, "The Pastor wanted us to scout the old mine and find out what happened!"
Tetsu came to a halt, and I hopped off the driver's seat so he didn't have to look up at us. "We found... Oh boy... You know. We're all tired and want to sit someplace that isn't covered in gravel. I have some news, and some... rules that need to be followed so this never happens again." I put my palm on Tetsu's neck, and she used her big dragon hand to raise it up to her favourite spot just over her eye. "Think you can carry three more back the rest of the way?" I asked, giving in and rubbing her eye ridge with my thumb.
After a couple happy grumbles, she made a fist, stuck her thumb out, and pointed it over her shoulder in a clear 'hop on' motion (also a universal gesture in four of four visited worlds.)
It felt weird, but not in a bad way, to have the people of the town waving at my party and I as we rumbled down the main street of Mirso and to the church. Fame in Orario was really kind of annoying. People kept bothering you about stuff, or when things went wrong, blamed you for things you had no control over. Thankfully, my aversion to wild parties and being a known 'background player' in city politics had kept most of that down to a friendly wave or dirty look.
Here though, after being vilified the instant I showed up... Well it was kind of nice.
The Pastor, after serving tea, offering actual magical healing for what ever little pains we still had and fresh tea, listened to our tale of what happened. What we found, how we killed it, and how we cleaned up after ourselves.
I then got to the... awkward bit...
"So to deal with the curse left behind by the Zombie Dragon, you created a tree?" He was doubtful, but it was obvious he didn't want to call us out on it.
"It is a divine technique from another world." I replied, "People like myself," I looked back at my tail, captured it, and put it on my lap to pet, "are capable of manipulating curses. It's left a mark on me." I motioned to my little horns, "But all of that cursed energy, from here to the bottom of the mountain, was changed into a big tree. There was a lot of bad energy, so it's a very big tree."
"So the area is clear of the rot that has been making us sick?"
"There may be some mutated monsters around still, and you mentioned the farms on the other path up the mountain. But we'll thin them out on the way down if we can." I looked at my party, and they all nodded. Oh, except Kunshu, she was up in the church rafters looking for spiders and dust bunnies. "But, no matter what, you cannot cut the tree down."
"Something to do with the curse then?"
"The curse is contained within the life of the tree. It may take a several human lifetimes before that energy is used up safely. But if you cut it down, whatever cursed power is left in the tree will soak back into the ground again." I explained, "However, there are many medicinal plants growing on it. Feel free to harvest them once a season or so."
We all had a moment of teacup study before he replied with, "I will be sure to tell the people of Mirso, and anyone who cares to visit. Is it safe to travel there now?"
I looked to Usa, "Yes Sir." He replied, "I heard nothing but the occasional bird on our way back here."
"It may not be very far, but I'll go on a pilgrimage after lunch." He smiled, "Where will you go now, Sir Kodori?"
I sighed, "Seeing as the other heroes clearly have no idea how to clean up after themselves, I think we'll be going to Lerno. Last time Riyute heard anything from them, they were having a bit of a food shortage. But then the Spear Hero visited. They stopped buying food from the Hunters and Farmers of Riyute, but also visiting altogether."
"That spear guy didn't seem very good." Tetsu said, "Not like you at all Boss!"
"Not like us." I corrected, "Without you guys I'd still be out around Melromarc building primitive traps."
There was another moment of quiet, then, "Before you leave then." The Pastor stood, "I'll admit, I wasn't expecting you to return, but I still needed to clean the donation box." He shuffled over to a nice little metal bound treasure chest and opened it with a bronze skeleton key. He took out a thick cloth bag and came back, "For your service, I give you what I can."
I accepted the bag, noting that it was fairly heavy but keeping a firm poker face, not acting happy, or disappointed at its weight. "We will use it to improve." I said, not even looking inside and just hanging it from my belt. I wanted to show I was thankful, but not greedy. If this was what he could give, then I trusted him. Our party was getting closer and closer to self sufficiency anyhow.
"Be safe on your trip then." We all stood up, and he bowed to us. He then looked up, "Ah, don't forget your friend."
I looked up, but Raphtalia called out first, "Kunshu, come back."
Kunshu's wings thrummed quietly as she came back down, and when the Pastor gave her a bow of her own for helping clean, she gave him one of her well meaning but not very good headpats. Then she decided Usa needed a bee backpack and attached to him.
The way down was much harder than the way up.
Part way down, we encountered what most people would call 'a cursed swamp'. It wasn't literally cursed, and I would know! But the trees were twisted, there were lots of monsters (the overly helpful Shield's status screen marked them as 'poison' Tree/Frog/Bee/Fly). And everything smelled really bad.
If it wasn't for the large supply (or rather, what used to be a large supply...) of Shield made antidote, Tetsu's monstrous strength to all but ignore the poor road, and our teamwork, we might have been stuck there for more than a day. But even so, we made it through, I gathered some new shield forms (Poison Tree/Frog/Bee/Fly, with the Bee shield upgrading the 'Bee venom' to 'Poison Bee venom', a parallel evolution of the Shield in the Almanac) and all of us together continued our climb in levels.
Kodori: Level 35
Raphtalia: Level 38
Clive: Level 37
Usa: Level 36
Tetsu: Level 37
Kunshu: Level 36
I still wasn't as high level as Motoyasu was when I fought him. But something about the other three talking about how this world was similar to a game they played. Three different worlds, or timelines, three different games, yet all describing the same place.
And while all I had to go on was a book, it was obvious all these things had been made or written by someone who'd actually been here. That meant there was a way back. Maybe the book I read was from someone who wasn't from a time where video games existed? To be fair, that could have been anywhere as early as the 80's where I was from...
But those games obviously gave them some prior knowledge. And there were all kinds of hidden places that could be found if you just... left the safety of the city...
Tetsu brought my attention back from my thoughts, "Boss... I can't eat any of this stuff..." She pouted. "It all smells so bad!"
"I think I spotted that farming settlement the Pastor told us about when we stopped for lunch." Raptalia said, "But if you can't wait a little longer, well..."
"No... I'll wait... everything smells so bad here... even if you cooked it all nice, it wouldn't be the same." Tetsu pouted some more.
"Well, if the settlement has food to spare, or even a place we can make a nice fire, we have all kinds of food saved in the Shield." I said.
The farming settlement was both lucky and unlucky. They had just brought in a harvest, so they weren't in danger of starving. But the ground had been bad until last night, preventing a timely replanting.
This just meant we had to dig into our own food supplies instead of buying fresh stock here. That was fine. When we set up our little medicine stand, we added in (Raphtalia named it...), the Soup in a Shield Kitchen. For a couple of copper, you too could have a meal of wild meat and vegetables!
Yes, I gave her a headpat for the idea. Medicine sales were brisk, sure, but people would pay for novelty as well. And after our trip up and down the Mirso mountain, our medicine supply was getting low as well.
We were given a small area to ourselves for the night. There was no Inn here, so it was really just a corner by the chest high stone wall around the few buildings that housed the farmers and their worker dormitory. We didn't want to sleep in a (smelly) stable, or put a family out of their home for the night, so we just made do. It was why the wagon was so nice after all. We'd have to get back to converting it on our way to Lerno.
"Sir..." Usa called out quietly, "They were talking about you, the people here."
"Me? Or the light show on the mountain?"
He didn't bother clarifying, "You're not going to tell them?"
"Why?" I asked, maybe a little sharper than I meant to, "I'm not here for fame. I'm here to fight the waves and go home. I know that we'll end up famous eventually, I mean, they already knew Tetsu and the medicine we've been selling, even if it was only 'a friend of a friend of mine' kind of rumour."
He nodded, "It does feel good when someone says 'thank you' though..." He scratched at his lame arm, "Thank you for getting us out of those cages."
He was right. It did feel good. "You're welcome." I said seriously, "We still have a little time before lights out. Want to help me translate some of that spell book?
"Of course, Sir."
NOTES!
So yeah... That happened. And yes, obvious Genshin Impact reference is obvious. But now Kodori has enforced her own divinity on a world without Gods...
Next stop? Well, those who've read the books will know. Those who haven't... well of course Motoyasu screwed things up...
Thank you for reading! And if you want to see any full colour art, join the discord!
aKAQg4bnYu for the discord!
And my actual book, Were Too? is on Inkitt.
And! I'm looking into getting some story themed merchandise made. Join the Discord to find out more!
