When Anastacia finally came to, she had been moved to the porch. Gilbert was sitting next to her, eating the rest of the food he had gotten from Rosie while waiting for the necromancer to wake up. He had already harvested the ogre’s nails and teeth, as they could be sold off to alchemists for a bit of extra gold.

He noticed that Anastacia opened her eyes and put aside his lunch. “Did you have a good nap?” He asked and pointed up to make the necromancer look there as well. “If I were you, I wouldn’t look down at your clothes. I tried wiping some of it off, but that dress is a goner.”

Anastacia looked anyway and immediately threw up over the side of the porch.

Gilbert laughed. “The farmer said you could have one of his late wife’s dresses for the trouble, since this didn’t go exactly like the notice said.”

The old farmer was piling up branches and small logs on top of the ogre’s corpse, that was still lying in front of the house, and trying to move its limbs a bit. For a man of his age, he was a really hard worker.

“What is he doing with the body? We don’t have to clean up as well, do we?” Anastacia worried and looked back up before she would have to throw up again.

“Nay, he said he’ll burn it and use the ashes as fertilizer. No idea if that makes sense or not, but at least it won’t be left to rot and attract wolves or anything.” Gilbert shrugged. “The dress is on the chair over there.”

Anastacia was relieved that she wouldn’t have to get rid of the body, she would have not made it through chopping it apart into more moveable pieces. It would have been possible for her to reanimate it with necromancy to just walk it back into the forest, but she had a strict policy against doing such things; dead things should stay dead after all. Though still feeling a little wobbly, she really wanted to get out of the bloody clothes and somehow managed to get up and go inside to change into the old dress. It more or less fit her but had a horrid looking flower pattern on it, most people would have probably stuck with the bloodstained ones instead, but sadly that wasn’t an option for Anastacia.

She stepped back out and could hear Gilbert failing to hold back laughter. “Oh, shut up, or I’ll throw up on you! I’m sure he has a dress for you too.” Anastacia threatened him.

The farmer had finished building the pyre and walked over. “Well would you look at that! You remind me of the good old days with Edna.” He said and winked at Anastacia.

“Uh… Yeah. Thanks for the dress, it’s… not covered in blood.” Anastacia struggled to compliment her new attire. “Can you burn these too? I don’t think the blood is going to come off.” She asked and offered her old clothes to the farmer.

The farmer nodded. “Just toss then into the pile.” He said and nodded towards the pyre. “Now I do believe I owe you folks a bit of coin for your bravery, that was a might fine scuffle!” He continued and handed Gilbert a pouch of coins. “I put in a bit of extra for the ogre, I really had no idea there was something like that out there.”

Gilbert quickly checked the insides of the pouch, not because he didn’t trust the man, but because it was something a smart adventurer got into a habit of doing. There were cases of people paying with counterfeit coins and moving away before the guild returned to ask for the money. Usually the guild would hire adventurers that excelled in tracking to do it, but even then, there was no guarantee that the person would be able to actually pay. So knowing the basics about identifying counterfeit currency was something that was heavily encouraged.

“Seems to be all here. Pleasure doing business with you, sir.” He said and shook the farmer’s hand before turning towards the road leading back to Valor. “Anna, thank the man, so we can go.”

Anastacia thanked the man for the dress and tossed her old one into the pile of branches, leaves and ogre before hurrying to catch up with Gilbert.

Though a bit late in their schedule, the pair was still well on track to get back to the inn while dinner was still available. While walking, they went over the fight with the ogre and how it could have gone horribly wrong very easily. Usually forest ogres are not something two adventurers go against, normally it would take five or so, or three skilled ones with a good plan to take one down relatively safely. In most cases, arrows and swords had no success against the creature’s thick hide and fat, so the parties had a mage to deal the final blow after the others had tired the ogre out. Poisons were also moderately effective, but it required multiple hits with arrows in places where its skin was easier to pierce, and so was very risky.

The wound on Gilbert’s arm wasn’t anything serious, but it still grossed out the necromancer. “Aren’t you going to patch that up?” She asked and pointed at the gash.

The adventurer took a look at his forearm. “Nay, it’s not that bad, and I didn’t think we’d need gauze today, so I didn’t pack any.” He shrugged.

Anastacia frowned, tore off a sleeve from her dress and tied it over the wound. “It was making me feel sick.” She said and gagged just from thinking about it too much.

Gilbert laughed. “Aww, now you’ve gone and ruined the guy’s dress.”

“It was ruined while it was being made. At least now it did some good in the world.” Anastacia said.

With the wound dealt with, they returned to their conversation. Both of them knew that they had just gotten extremely lucky, since there was a whole host of ways it could have gone very wrong. If Gilbert had failed to hold it still long enough, it would have no doubt worn him out eventually, and there was nothing Anastacia could have done alone. Both of them agreed that they really need at least one more person in their party.

“How much gold are the ingredients going to get us?” Anastacia asked to change the subject to something a bit more cheerful.

Gilbert calculated the price with his fingers. “Should be at least three thousand or so, they’re pretty rare but not in great shape. Together with the rewards, we’ll both get a decent chunk of money, though it’s still a joke for downing a forest ogre.” He said.

For the rest of the walk, Anastacia listed different things she wanted to buy eventually, and Gilbert tallied up their costs as a goal for the fresh adventurer. Before they even realized, they were already back at the gates of Valor.

They walked past the woman lying on the bench without looking at her, because she was clearly awake now and suffering from what was probably a hangover of the century. Unfortunately for the pair, the woman noticed them and stumbled up from the bench, kicking over a couple of the bottles at her feet.

“Ah! The tiny necromancer! I’ve been looking for you.” She greeted Anastacia cheerily while pulling her pure white cloak back on. Under it she was wearing almost a full set of plate armor, which was also spotless and without a flaw or a dent. Her curly fire red hair was also miraculously untangled and her slightly tanned face bright and clean, to a point that the only way Anastacia knew that she was still drunk was her unstable stumbling and a noticeable odor of wine.

Anastacia didn’t want anything to do with her so she barely turned to look at the woman when speaking. “Why? I have no business with your kind.” She scoffed.

“Don’t be like that. I never did anything to you or your friends, did I?” The armored woman insisted on talking to her.

Going over the incident at the inn, Anastacia realized that what the woman said was true. She had not spoken a word nor done anything, it seemed more like she was just being dragged along.

Gilbert still had his suspicions. “Where’s your asshole friend?” He asked.

The woman laughed. “Alex is in the jail until he starts to behave. Knowing him, it’ll take years at least. Besides, he’s not a friend, he simply tagged along to ‘protect’ me because he heard there was money to be made here in Valor. I’m just going to leave him there. Honestly, I’ve wanted to get rid of him since day one, but he just didn’t seem to die no matter how many bandit camps I steered him into.”

“Is that so…” Gilbert muttered and rubbed his chin.

The woman turned back to Anastacia. “Oh! I should introduce myself!” She realized and bowed to the necromancer. “I am Emilia, an ex-priestess of Sylvia, currently only a devotee of her, unrelated to the church of dipshits. As a sign of good will, may I heal the wound on your friend’s arm? I’d heal your sense of style, but that’s beyond my means.” She laughed and grabbed Gilbert’s arm before even getting a permission to do so. She tried to grab something that should have been hanging from her belt but wasn’t there. After a bit of looking around, she pulled an ornate one-handed mace from behind the bench and wiped some dirt off it before giving it a quick kiss. The mace began to glow slightly as Emilia began her prayer and placed it on Gilbert’s wound.

As the wound grew shut before their eyes, Gilbert felt a burning sensation on his arm, that wasn’t quite pain but not pleasant either.

“That should do it.” Emilia happily said and hung the mace from her belt. “So how about we grab a drink and talk business?” She suggested and ushered the pair of adventurers through the gates.

Gilbert had to visit the guild office to register the quest as completed and pay the tax from the reward. Since it was supposed to be a simple quest, the whole party wasn’t needed for it. He was fine leaving Anastacia alone with Emilia since they were in the city but did tell her to go straight to the inn.

Some of the guests in the tavern recognized Emilia from the incident and seemed surprised to see her back inside, together with Anastacia too. When the necromancer and devotee sat down at a corner table to wait for Gilbert, someone told Rosie about the situation and she came out of the kitchen to see what was up.

“Why’s the strumpet of Sylvia with you? Where’s Gil?” The innkeeper asked and glared at Emilia.

Anastacia opened her mouth to answer, but Emilia beat her to it and stood up. “Your name-calling hurts me, miss tigress. I make no excuses for my ex-companion’s rudeness, but I for one find both you and your inn very charming. But enough about that, I am here to make an offer to your tiny friend here.” She declared and pointed at the necromancer.

Rosie frowned. “You talk too much, I asked Anna, not you. Say another word and I’ll toss you out.” She threatened and turned to Anastacia.

“Honestly I have no idea. She said she had an offer and we figured she hasn’t actually done anything to us so why not just hear her out.” Anastacia shrugged.

Rosie didn’t respond and instead just disappeared into the kitchen to get a plate with an assortment of sausages, cheese, crackers and grapes on it and placed it on the table – considerably closer to Anastacia than Emilia.

“How was your first quest?” The tigress asked, intending to ignore the devotee of Sylvia until Gilbert returned. “And what the shit are you wearing, did you turn into someone’s grandma out there?”

“The deer were all dead, there was a forest ogre, so we killed it. I got blood on me and threw up, so I had to change my dress.” Anastacia listed while shoving the snacks in her mouth like there was no tomorrow. “Got the money though.”

“You and Gil killed an ogre? Just the two of you? Are you okay?” Rosie worried and took Anastacia’s hand.

“Yup, we got kind of lucky. Hopefully we’ll find one or two more people before the next one.” Anastacia nodded and continued to gobble the snacks with her free hand.

Hearing that made Emilia extremely excited and she clapped her hands together to interrupt the conversation. “This is better than I could have hoped for! With Alex in jail, I could use a couple of companions that aren’t shitty racist twats. You and that big fellow certainly seem like you could use someone watching your backs and keeping you intact. So this is what I suggest: Let's form a party!” She said and pointed at Anastacia.

Rosie wasn’t too keen on the strange woman, so she was immediately skeptical of the suggestion. Even though Emilia certainly seemed like she could handle herself, she wasn’t exactly high up on the list of people the tigress would trust her friends' lives with. “And what exactly do you bring to the table? Aside from the smell of cheap wine?” She asked and snarled at the devotee.

“I bring with me the blessings of My Lady Sylvia of course!” Emilia declared and hoisted her mace towards the ceiling. “Also, I’m adept at hitting things with this and my fist.”

Anastacia thought about Gilbert getting hurt during the fight with the ogre. There was nothing she could do to protect him in any way. In fact, if there was more than one foe, she would be the one who needed protecting since she had zero experience fighting hand to hand. A second capable pair of fists would go a long way to give the party some freedom.

“I hate to say this, but she does have a point.” Anastacia admitted and grabbed the last sausage from the plate.