- Day 18 into Day 19 -

Ogres, Part 1

With the inn come tavern in a complete panic over Nadeem’s sudden and seemingly unexplainable death, I decide it best to use [Warp] to teleport to the top of the stairs from the wagon to avoid the whole situation. After all, if I just walked into that powder keg, I have no doubt the remaining five would claim I did it and we’d have to fight again... They’d be justly right in their suspicion and action of course, but it’ll just end the same way, making their friends’ death even more pointless this time. At least this way, Larry gets to keep his face, and both his eyes.

As I walk along the short corridor, Risk unexpectedly comes out of a room, obviously going to investigate what’s causing all the ruckus downstairs, well, I should have expected it. Seeing me, however, he stops at the doorway, greeting me instead.

“So you caught up. Any idea what’s going on down there--”

“Some guy died.”

He’s looking at me suspiciously. I answered too quickly didn’t I. Damn it.

“I see... Why do I get the feeling you had something to do with it?”

“Because you’re suspicious by nature?”

He’s not accepting that answer either.

”Honestly Risk, I doubt even you would believe me if I explained this one. I can honestly say though that I was nowhere near him when he died”, I let my voice trail off, “This time anyway...”

He folds his arms and leans against the door frame, donning a stern look.

“Oh for Pete's sake, fine. The short version then; I got into a fight with Nadeem and his five friends down there. I cast spells on two of them, one of which caused Larry, the man you can hear shouting right now to tear his face off and the other caused Nadeem to get possessed by a beast or something, probably a demon now I think on it--”

I mean, Deter has to be a demon. Agamenty’s book has chapters on sacrifices and rituals, and that’s where I learnt it so yeah, ergo facto; a demon, clearly.

“--I completely underestimated the spells I used on them and regretted the whole thing immediately, so I sold Nadeem’s soul, that’s the guy they’re all shouting about, to turn back time and undo it all.”

Risk blinks twice in quick succession, sighing loudly before standing aside and letting me in.

“...Bored. I clearly remember you saying that.”

Risk mutters quietly under his breath while letting me slide by. I don’t know if he believes what I said, or is just choosing to go with it, nonchalantly. In either case, I’ve gotten out of the conversation.

“Yes, well, I’ll allow you to say I told you so if you really want to.”

“Uh-huh. Just stay inside the room. I told the granny I was a caravan guard, it’d be odd if I didn’t go take a look.”

“Right… Oh, if the others aren’t sleeping on your way back, perhaps we should have a meeting about plans for the journey and our little stowaway?”

“Stowaway? Ah, so you know?”

“That Emily was hiding in a crate? Yes, you told me in the previous timeline.”

“I…”, he shakes his head, “I’ll be back.”

Oi, Oi! If you didn’t want to know all the crazy I have to deal with daily! Then you shouldn’t have asked! …Though I really can’t blame you for being sceptical of this one, even I’m having trouble rationalising any of it. I mean, Einstein did say time was relative, but to actually move through time, keeping your own sense of it relative? I don’t know how that’s possible at all… Then again, resurrecting inside someone else's body, on another planet, in another galaxy is also highly out there. I think I’ll genuinely go crazy thinking about this one, yet as usual, I do believe I have a theory that involves the wave system that could explain it. But it’s so wild it can’t possibly be even close so I won’t. I need more information. For now, it sits in the ‘Uh-huh’ pile of unanswerable situations I’ve gotten myself into.

Hmm. The room Risk’s left me in is rather dark. The only light source is coming from a small candle sitting on a round table at one corner of the room. It barely illuminates the room enough for me to see three beds, one of which is clearly Risks, so I decide to take the one against the far wall and lay down on the uncomfortable and slightly smelly bedding.

…I think I’d preferred to have camped out under the stars…over this...

…

“Master?”

“I-I’m awake!”, I throw myself up quickly, slightly confused, “Oh, Emily… Ah, Emily.”

My senses, having returned to me notices its Emily at the door calling me. Risk isn’t in his bed, and it’s still dark so I couldn’t have been asleep for long before she called out to me.

“Ya don’t look surprised to see me?”, she asks timidly, seemingly expecting her reprimand, “Did Risk tell ya I was here already?”

“He did, come sit down. I guess it’s better we do this now while we’re alone.”

She lets the door close behind her as she takes a seat beside me.

“Master, I--”

“Emily, I do not care for your reasons for coming. It’s not that I can’t understand why you have done this, but I told you that you couldn’t come. I expected you to respect my decision on it. Do you think Kate, Hannah and Millie wanted to be left behind either?”, I pause, not to give her chance to respond, but to make her think on it, ”Of course they didn’t, yet they stayed because they knew the dangers involved with what we are trying to do. It simply boils down to this Emily. You are not capable. You will likely get someone killed. If you doubt me, go talk to Katharine and hear her story. You will be returning home tomorrow, and that’s final. It’s that simple.”

She gives a dejected nod and slight sigh before seemingly trying to say something but the words won’t come to her.

“Look, I’m not angry with you for this. Yes, I’m a little disappointed in you, but I forgive this childish outburst easily if you understand why we aren’t letting you come with.”

The door opens, and Risk walks in, spotting us talking. He gestures to see if he should leave, but I shake my head.

”Anyway, head off to bed Emily. I’m exhausted, we’ll talk more in the morning.”

She gets up, nodding again before heading for the door. Risk moves aside for her before closing the door behind her.

“She looks upset.”, Risk throws the comment out while walking over to the table with our only light source on, “Gave her a proper telling off then?”

“No, no. Something worse.”

“Worse?”

“Yeah, I told her I was disappointed in her.”

Risk lets out a chuckle, “I see, that’s worse alright. So, time to talk or you want to hit the hay?”

“I’m pretty beat, but I can spare a minute, what’s up?”

“That guy, Nadeem. You really did that?”

“Not me personally. Some creature called Deter, but indirectly, I am at fault.”

“Well, I’ve seen corpses Aburi, but I’ve never seen the like of that before”, with the poor light, I can barely make out Risk’s expression but he looks to be grimacing, “It’s like all his… It’s like he’s been dead for centuries, Aburi. Like some crypt kept corpse and those that witnessed it happen claimed it was like watching him age unnaturally quickly.”

“That makes sense, sort of. Deter turned back time in exchange for Nadeem’s soul so it would explain the ageing done to Nadeem.”

“Aburi, they say he begged something to stop, screaming over and over that the ‘algoth’ is real, ‘tales are true’, ‘help me, help me’, just over and over in a loop while it was happening, like he was experiencing all the years in mere moments...”

Again, it makes sense. I tried to cheat Deter by having him turn back time. He likely just took Nadeem into his dimension where time flows differently to here and returned him once he was finished with him… Again, I know I should feel guilty for what befall the man, but I seemingly don’t…

AE, anything on that term, ‘algoth’?

[** Negative **]

Very well. Start a callback. If we come across a node with any information relating to that term, alert me to it, please.

[** Callback registered **]

Another handy thing I learnt during another one of today's screw ups. AE can monitor for information I desire and should I enter a location with information on it, AE will alert me to it and show it to me if I wish. The downside is that I have to know what I want to find before entering the node.

“Did they have any idea what this ‘algoth’ referred to?”

“No”, Risk shakes his head, “No one had heard the term before, nor did they know what he meant by the ‘tales are true’”

“Well, there’s not much we can do about it now… I can see you want to say something Risk so come on, out with it.”

“It’s...”, he hesitates, “No, it’s nothing. Just try to be more careful with those powers of yours, yeah? They’re weapons of death, not hapless whims for your curiosity.”

I feel my eye twitch at the comment, but I’m unable to fashion a response as he’s completely right. I used unknown spells on individuals out of a desire to blow off some steam and pure curiosity. If I had bothered to think, I would have thought better of the idea and perhaps chosen to go hunting instead. Monsters can’t tell tales after all.

“F-fair point. Anyway, I’m going to turn in. I’ve honestly had enough of this day. Let the next one be better.”

Risk nods and blows out the candle, but chooses to remain sitting at the table, as if lost in his thoughts… I study him for a moment before turning over to face the wall and close my eyes.

…

“Aburi? It’s morning. Aburi--”

“Ripper!”, I shout out, suddenly pulled from a dream I already can’t remember, “Huh? Risk? Ah, morning, it’s morning right.”

“Yeah, time to get up. The others are waiting in the room next door. Let’s have that meeting and get back on the road. Daylight's wasting.”

“Right...R-right!”

I jump out of bed and spot a small basin of water sitting on the table, replacing the candle that previously occupied its space. Noticing my eye line, Risk calls from the doorway.

“It’s fresh, I’ll be next door with the others.”

I wash my face and armpits as best I can without soap... *Sigh*

*Blink*

Better. Much, much better.

HP: 5440 / 5440 MP: 31279 / 31279 ST: 3626 / 3626

Hunger: 52% Thirst: 61%

Blood State: Normal

Damn. I fell out of the ‘greater’ bracket. Well, Emily’s here so silver lining and all that I guess, but I could also find an excuse to go solo hunting later. Sitting at normal means I’m good for today anyway. For now, let’s go next door.

My gawd am I stiff as a post. I did not sleep well at all…

As I walk along the hallway, I hear Emily talking with Bella. It’s clear Bella is teasing Emily about something from the tones. I can’t really hear the full conversation, but one sentence was loud enough to understand and made me chuckle.

‘But ya’ll be helpless without me. Who's gonna cook and do the chores!’

I thought we’d rotate the chores honestly, but I guess she does have a point, we could use someone to do it instead. Besides, thinking about this logically and with a night's rest. I’m thinking it might make more sense taking Emily with us until we reach the last town before the dungeon and leave her there. It’ll give her experience and help her understand why she cannot enter Aslogia with us. She’ll have to take care of herself in the town though if we do this, however, which she’ll probably accept now and try to get out of later… But the immediate problem is how do I offer this after my last conversation with her, without it seeming like I’m rewarding her lousy behaviour… For crying out loud. Seriously, the girl’s nineteen years old. Why is this even a problem? Is it because she’s not lost her ‘innocence’ yet that she still feels like a little girl? She’s too old to be my daughter, yet this is exactly how I would imagine a nine-year-old would get on… I guess I do have a fault in this, I sort of treat her like my daughter over a woman… Though she keeps trying to sleep with me; Okay, that’s enough of that tangent! Moving on before I make some Electra Complex reference. Which I just did, ugh.

I enter the room and see everyone sitting around on the three beds dotted around the place with Risk seated at the table. The room's layout is the same as ours, so much so that if it weren’t for the bedding, you’d swear this was the same room. Katharine gives me a warm smile while mouthing ‘Good Morning’ to me as I close the door behind me. I smile back, saying thanks in return.

“Well, I see everyone’s already ready to move out so I’ll keep this as brief as possible. Aslogia is eight more days travel for us by cart but the expedition troops are moving a lot slower than us, so we’ll need to reduce our pace to ensure we arrive after them and not before. There were a number of ways we could go about this, but I decided on an opportunity that offers for more teamwork would be best--”

The B1 ranked quest I took from the Adventures Guild in Sinki is two days travel from here. A short detour off course, but will give us two days in a minor dungeon. A dungeon is a lavish word for it though, as according to the description it’s basically a cave consisting of two floors. The request description calls it a minor dungeon though as there is apparently a core somewhere inside.

The request is simple enough. Enter the minor dungeon, kill the Beth Ogre's Den Mother and return with its head. Having dealt with a Beth Ogre before, I’m confident we can handle it, though remembering Risk’s talk in the bar when we first met, I kept the target a secret when explaining the goal to the others.

By heading to this dungeon and completing the request within two days, we should arrive at Aslogia pretty much the same time as the expedition force. EXP, training, points and kills time. A quadruple win I believe.

“--So head to the dungeon and kill monsters.”

“Ah, I hope it’ll be awesome, like waves and waves of spiders, or thousands of skeletons! Let’s get going already, I’m getting hot just thinking about it!”

“Calm it, Bella, it’s still two days away. Sybil lass, can you ready the horses? Take Emily and Katharine with you. I need a word with Aburi.”

Seems it’s Risk who takes charge today. Everyone nods and heads out, leaving just Bella, Risk and myself in the room.

“A barrier”, Risk looks to me with a stern look, “We have something to discuss.”

I oblige him and raise one.

“That guy that died last night--”

Bella interrupts Risk and jumps in.

“Risk said you sold his soul to a demon?”

Risk told Bella? I guess given the situation, he probably had no choice… I doubt he told her everything though.

“Yeah. I don’t know how it all works, but yes. The spell I used was called [Forbidden Commandment], and yes. I do see the irony in the name now.”

“Well”, Risk puts his hand on my shoulder, “best you not use that again any time soon.”

“You don’t have to tell me twice. My spells are not toys, I got the lesson.”

“Good.”, Risk removes his hand and turns to Bella with a smile, “So, what’s the real target of your little quest then?”

I involuntarily chuckle. I can’t get a single one past Risk anymore, can I?

“You got me. We’re hunting a Beth Ogre’s den mother--”

“Yes! I knew it would be something crazy!”

Bella literally jumps up in the air, clenching her fists on hearing my words. Risk just shakes his head.

“A den mother?”, he lets out a sigh, ”And you’ve allocated two days for this?”

“Yes. It’s a good opportunity. If we can’t handle it, then we can hardly handle Aslogia, right?”

Risk hums on it, agreeing in premise that I have a point.

“Fine. But Aburi, I think you’ll be regretting this one.”

“Why?”

“Nope, not telling. I’ll let you see this one for yourself. We should meet up with the others and get on the road.”

Bella’s excited and Risk has humour… I have a feeling I’ve made a mistake with this, but we will see.

“Fine, I’ll lower the barrier and meet you by the cart. Best I keep my presence as hidden as possible.”

They both nod in agreement as I lower the barrier and use [warp] to land in the back of the wagon. Sybil happened to be there as I did, but I got no reaction from her as if she expected me to do it…

“Sybil, do you know an old woman named Sarah?”

She gives me a single nod while moving everyone's bags around and lifting out a set of champ bits.

*blink*

“Could you take this to her and apologise that I couldn’t stop by but some… things have happened, and I’ve had to leave suddenly. But I’ll drop by on my way back through.”

“Sure”, Sybil lifts the chest, putting it back down immediately after and giving me a wide look, “Gold?”

“Good guess. It’s Sarah's, I was looking after it for her”

“Okay. You ready the horses then.”, she hands me the bits, “I’ll take this.”

Erm, I have no idea what to do with these?

“Ah-- Katharine. Could you show me what I’m meant to do with these?”

“These? Oh, the bits.”, She lets out a slight laugh, “Just put them in the horses' mouths, tighten the straps and… Come with me. Really, a merchant whos never readied a horse before. Watch.”

Katharine pats the horses down, seemingly calming them before showing me how to do it.

“Now you do the same for Cassandra”, she gestures at the horse beside the one she just readied, “Then I guess you can help me ready my Harry too.”

I point to the horse beside Cassandra that Katharine already readied. Katharine discerns my question without a word spoken.

“Amy”

“Did they already have names--”

“Sybil named them yesterday”, Katharine smiles, half giggling.

“Of course she did. What about Bella’s horse?”

Katharine raises an eyebrow, her giggle turning into full laughter, “Maximilia, the Destroyer.”

“Bella named her own horse, right?”, I ask, also laughing at the randomness of the name.

“She did, yes.”

“Well, we’re in your care girls. B-be gentle, it’s my first time.”, I follow Katherine's instructions and ready Cassandra, before proceeding to hook the horses up to the cart and helping Katherine saddle Harry.

“We all ready?”, Bella asks, coming out of the Inn with Risk just behind her. They were in there for a while now I think about it.

“Yep, just waiting on Sybil coming back”, I say as I feel a tug at my top, “Wah. Ah--”

“Hide presence”, Sybil smiles up at me, “Works better.”

...Ah. I feel myself burst out laughing upon realising she was looking for an opportunity to do that after my failed attempt earlier.

“Indeed it does… Do you guys want breakfast here or should we just wait until our first rest stop for the horses?”

“Better to get on the road”, Risk cuts in before anyone else could answer, “No point hanging around is there.”

I get what he’s trying to say, so we all take our respective positions. Yet again, I happen to find myself in the back of the wagon, but with Emily this time. Risk’s reasoning makes absolute sense but I refuse to let this be my permanent placement for this entire journey!