After a few more minutes of idle banter and small talk, we finally reached the base.

It was a quaint thing. It wasn’t its own building, but rather a part of a larger, longer building that stretched throughout the entire street. A secure wooden door sat firmly in the center surrounded on both sides by simple windows. It probably had a second story, judging by its height.

As we hopped off the wagon, Ernas reached into his ouch, pulling out a single key.

“Nice huh? It ain’t the fanciest but it gets the job done.”

“Yeah, it's much nicer than the place I’ve been staying at.”

He looked at me questioningly,

“Say, what place were you staying at?”

“Ah...uhm...I was a vagabond back in my old land.”

The three looked at me, surprised. Arnaud’s face lit up in realization,

“Eh? So that explains how you can fight so well. Only a few people can survive out there in the wild.”

By this point Ernas had unlocked the door, pushing it open. As we stepped inside, I was immediately met with a sense of cosiness.

The door led directly to a small dining room and kitchen fitted with a simple stove and sink. The wooden floorboards creaked slightly when I stepped on them, but besides that the place was largely well maintained.

A stairway sat parallel to the far wall, leading up to the living spaces. Everyone started dispersing throughout the house, shedding their equipment along the way.

Ernas collapsed onto one of the dining room chairs, exhausted.

“Ahh, nothing beats comin’ home after a long journey.”

Syllica, who was situated similarly across the table, dropped her cloak.

“You can say that again…”

Arnaud loosened his collar,

“I’ll go report to the guild, they’re gonna have to send an eradication force to get rid of those goblins.”

“Can’t that wait for tomorrow? It's not like they’re going anywhere. Plus, the villagers had to have escaped right?”

Syllica rubbed her temples, “I didn’t see any villagers the whole time, so they must’ve fled before the goblins came.”

I cringed a little inside. I knew that they were all dead by now, save the women. The reason they hadn’t seen any villagers is because we slaughtered them all where they stood.

Ernas heaved a deep, tired sigh.

“True, I’d say we’re good for now.”

Arnaud shook his head, “We’ve spent too long maintaining a good reputation at the guild, might as well keep it that way.”

He waved them off, exiting out the door.

We sat in silence, not really having anything to do. After a few seconds, Ernas shot up.

‘That’s right! We still haven’t told you where you're gonna sleep.”

He stood from his chair and started making his way up the staircase, gesturing to me to follow.

He led me to a small dimly lit corridor. Three wooden doors lined the sides, most likely where the three stayed. We passed by them all and stopped just short of the hallway’s end.

Just above us was a dingy looking trapdoor. He pulled on the rope attached to it and with a mighty creak it opened, releasing a hefty plume of dust in the process.

After a couple coughs, he looked at me sheepishly.

“I mean, it’s a little dusty but it gets the job done.

I nodded slowly.

He jumped, propping his elbows against the opening to hoist himself into the attic. After a few moments of struggling, he finally made it into the space.

I leapt up and made my way into the opening in one motion. He looked at me surprised.

“That's some serious acrobatics you’ve got going on there.”

I brushed the dust from my cloak, “The place I grew up in was pretty rough.”

That was completely true. Countless ambushes and days of training made it so that I was muscular and nimble.

The attic was quite small, only consisting of a single room with a low, sloped roof. Surprisingly, a bed and cabinet lay pushed against one of the walls, surrounded by boxes of junk. A small window sat at the end, casting orange evening sunlight into the room.

Ernas wandered blindly to a lantern sitting on the cabinet and lit it, enveloping the room in warm yellow light.

“Sorry for the mess, we use this place as storage even though it’s meant to be a guest room.”

“Don’t worry about it, I’m thankful that you’d go as far as to offer me a place to stay in the first place.”

He nodded, placing his hands on his hips.

“Well, I’ll leave the rest to you. Clean, rearrange, do whatever you want, this is your room now.”

Before I could stop him he strolled back to the opening and slipped down back into the hallway.

“Oh, and I don’t think we’re going to be eating dinner today.”

He chuckled sheepishly to himself, “We’re all a little lazy, you see.”

His quick footsteps grew fainter and fainter until he presumably made it back downstairs.