There is Something gratifying about having a big payout, Alyx thought to himself. Whether it be your first paycheck at a new job or a pouch full of gold coins from selling a powerful weapon. With money in his pocket, a lot of immediate concerns basically took care of themselves. Food, shelter, clothing, all taken care of with a single conversation and a transaction that took less than ten minutes.

Not that Alyx was going to rest on his laurels just because he had made a little gold, he still didn't understand this country's economy yet. However, if it was anything like a video game or dungeons and dragons, he probably had at least a couple of week's worth of gold to play with for basic living expenses.

Whistling to himself, Alyx turned Southward, in the direction he believed the wizard tower and the quest to face its guardian would be. Hopefully, he was up to the task of defeating whatever the monster was and could snag himself a rare essence and another fifty gold.

As Alyx wandered through the Donnyville, he was shocked at how busy the place seemed and at the great variety of races that inhabited it. The elves had kind of painted humans as racist fucks like themselves. Still, as Alyx passed centaurs, a family of wolf people, a lone draconian, and even a couple of snake-tailed naga, this country certainly seemed open and accepting to him, though admittedly, humans did seem to make up the majority of the population.

He was going to need to ask somebody about the elves in the forest of mists at some point. Ah, maybe the wizard would know! He could ask them about it after he tried his hand at the quest.

As Alyx continued his journey southward, he felt someone tap him on the shoulder.

"Excuse me? Are you Alyx the shifter?"

To Alyx's great surprise, it was the rabbit kin from earlier!

"Ah! You're the exploding guy! oh um, zack, right?"

The shaggy main of curls atop the rabbit kins head bounced as he laughed at that." hahaha! That's me, alright! I have a letter for you, Alyx."

Blinking, Alyx raised his eyebrow at zack."Uh...I've only been in town for like...two hours tops. And I'm certain I don't know anybody in town, so how could you have a letter for me?"

Zack shrugged and offered Alyx a sealed letter, made of brown parchment and sealed with red wax, the symbol of a chocolate chip cookie on the seal itself.

"Wizard business, I'm afraid. The Old gal's got some kind of fortune-telling machine, tells her when she has visitors coming. Guess she had something she wanted you to know before she arrived?"

Taking the letter skeptically in his hands, Alyx flipped it over, looking for anything weird that might be on it. However, all he found was his name in what had to be the worst handwriting he had ever seen. That's saying something, too, because Alyx's handwriting looked more like chicken scratch than anything approaching language.

This encounter was starting to confuse Alyx quite a bit and put him a little bit on edge, to be honest.

"Why didn't you give me this at the adventurers guild? And how did you know who I am? Please don't take this the wrong way, but it seems weird to send a letter to someone you know will be visiting you shortly."

Zack, sensing that Alyx was a little bit off-put by getting the letter backed up a couple of paces and placatingly held up his hands.

"I can't speak for Miss Pottomus, but I only just got the letter. I overshot my landing, which is why I approached from behind, sir. As for knowing who you are, that's my amulet of delivery."

Zack explained and reached down to a necklace on his chest that was glowing a light blue—holding it up for Alyx to see.

Standard issue for delivery boys, it points in the direction of whoever you're delivering your item to and then glows blue when you face them, so you know who the package goes to. It's a pretty standard item, honestly. Parents use similar stuff to keep track of their kids in town all the time.

Alyx forced himself to take a breath. He'd just forced someone to use their customer service voice on him, which meant he'd definitely taken the wrong approach to the conversation.

"Sorry about that Zack, I've had a stressful couple of days, and I guess it's made me a little uncomfortable being approached by other people." Digging into his new pouch, Alyx grabbed five gold and handed it to zack. In true millennial nature, he paid for his transgressions in apologies and cash with the hope it would be overlooked.

Judging from the greedy sparkle in zacks eyes and the way his rabbit ears now stood up straight, Alyx had definitely over-tipped. Which is what he had been hoping for. Rule one, never piss off the people in the service industry.

"It's no big deal, sir; you have a nice day now." Jogging out to an unoccupied section of the street, zack weaved two spells in his hand, creating another explosion that sent the rabbit kin rocketing into the air in a massive leap. Alyx watched him rise and then fall in a great arch before he exploded again, launching himself forward, repeating the process over and over again, managing to stay aloft while doing so.

"I've got to learn to get used to that and to talking to people again. Not everyone wants to shoot you with arrows and kill you, Alyx; he's a freakin delivery bunny, not satan."

That thought in mind, Alyx broke the seal on the letter and was rewarded with a puff of sparkling pink glitter that erupted into a cloud around him. Coughing and sputtering as he waved the letter at the cloud in an attempt to get it away from him, Alyx was soon covered in sparkling glitter and was being given quite the wide birth by other people on the street. Several people gave him curious looks, and a few muttered about young people practicing magic in the street.

Luckily whatever it was, it was not indeed the herpes of craft supplies as the sparkles began to dissipate and fade. Grateful beyond belief that his only set of clothes would not sparkle in the sunlight forever, Alyx skimmed over the contents of the letter.

Hello Alyx, I am Lord Quintello De'angello Paroovious Squeakers the 12th, High priest of Logos and Wizard Extraordinaire. I regret to inform you that my guardian is undergoing maintenance and will not be up and running again until tomorrow. I will also be conducting experiments of great import for the rest of the day and do not wish to be disturbed by any hapless adventurers this day.

Kind regards,

QDPS.

"Huh. This might be the politest fuck off I'm busy I've ever seen."

Shoving his hands into his trouser pockets, Alyx stopped for a moment to think; his plans for the day had been to finish this quest and then see if he couldn't scare away a bunch of thunder crows.

Welp, he might as well make the best of it and head over to the merchant's home to see if he couldn't deal with the thunder crows.

Today was still a good day. Even if he had to wait to fight the wizard's guardian, he had mentioned maintenance. Maybe it was some kind of golem? That would at least be interesting, especially if he could absorb a golem essence.

What should have been a relatively short walk to the merchant's house ended up taking Alyx three hours, not because he got lost or anything. But because on the way to the merchant's home, Alyx stumbled across a bazaar filled to the brim with stalls that had all sorts of wonderful things.

By the time Alyx had managed to pull himself away from the many stalls, he had purchased a backpack, tent, bedroll, a fire starting kit, several days worth of clothing, a lantern, and oil. Down to only 197 gold but feeling much more prepared for the challenges ahead, Alyx grinned to himself as he knocked on the door of the merchant's home.

"Hello! I'm from the adventurers guild! I heard someone at this residence was having a thunder crow problem?"

It didn't take long for someone to answer the door, not the merchant himself but rather a butler-looking fellow, an older man dressed in a petticoat.

"Ah, yes, sir, welcome to the Coalist Residence. If you'll follow me, I'll bring you to the master of the house. He's just sat down for tea."

"Of course, lead the way."

As the butler lead Alyx through the home, he marveled at how the interior reminded him of a Spanish villa. Though the outside had the same stone and wood look as the surrounding buildings, maybe there was illusion magic at play? Or they only really cared about the interior of the building? Either was possible though it did seem weird to Alyx to only focus on one and not both.

Alyx had done his best to push his expectations aside when he had come into town. All of these various fantasy races, performing jobs in ways so different than what he was used to, was jarring, to say the least.

So Alyx was pleasantly surprised when this merchant household's head looked well, normal if a tad overworked. With a ball head and round spectacles, the man had to be well into his seventies, with noticeable frown lines creasing his forehead. He didn't even look up from the paperwork he was filling out when the butler lead Alyx into the room.

"Ahem, Sir. Someone to see you."

Pushing his glasses up against his face, Frank finally looked up from his paperwork and took in Alyx and the butler.

"Yes? Sorry, I've just, bah. It's the paperwork. You know how it is."

Alyx gave the man a pitying smile, having always hated paperwork himself.

"Indeed I do. I promise not to take up to much of your time, Mr. Coalist. I'm just here to deal with your thunder crow problem."

Frank Coalist's face split into a massive grin at the news, his face turning more into wrinkles than man.

"Finally, we haven't slept a wink since they started roosting. And for the life of us, we just can't get them to leave! If I can get a solid night's sleep tonight, Alyx, I'll pay you double what I posted for the reward."

"Well, who could say no to double pay in this day and age?"

Alyx asked with a laugh and stepped forward to shake Frank's hand, a handshake that was readily given, with Frank looking much relieved.

"Please, Alyx, make yourself at home; the blasted creatures only seem to return here after dark, so I'm afraid you have time to spare."

"Actually, sir, if it's alright with you, I'd like to get up on the roof and see if I can't find their nest. If I move it, they may not return at all."

Now Alyx doesn't actually know anything about birds, but that sounded about right to him, that and he would be bored if he was forced to sit around until night fell.

"Please, by all means, I leave it in the hands of an expert. My butler Walter can fetch a ladder for you then."

Alyx gave frank a nod and a smile, following the butler back out of the house and to a garden shed outside, not believing his luck.

His first quest couldn't be this easy, could it?