Erevan had made it down the hill from the goblin encampment when he heard someone call out to him.

“Hey! Wait!” Marvela shouted after him. The hunter turned around and faced the slug lady. She quickly pulled her bag around and pulled out a bottle. She raises it towards Erevan as an offering. "Would you like to share a drink then?"

"I would never refuse a free drink." Erevan takes the bottle without any hesitation. "This was actually my first mission. Glad it went so well." Erevan tilts his helmet up and take a drink from the bottle.

The drink was not like anything he had tasted before. It was sweet with hints of spices and caramel in it. It tasted specifically like a rum and coke drink in a bottle. The two keep walking further from the goblin camp. Erevan was used to water, milk, and the occasional alcoholic beverage, feeling his perception of the culinary world being shattered. His time living in the wild with his father did not prepare him for any drink like this.

"It's not my first mission but it's been quite a while. I had to get outside soon or I would be having quite a bit of issues. I think that might be a good place to relax and drink. Edwin appears to have stabilized so I'm feeling a little bit better." She speaks as they walk, filling the silence.

"If you have more drinks like this then I’ll have to go on more missions with you.” Erevan smiles.

He notices, standing next to her, that Marvela is probably more than a foot shorter than him.

"Of course, I'm the one who brewed it after all. This is just a small part of the retinue of drinks I keep on me at any time. I'm taking it, you liked it?" Marvela asks. “Brewing drinks is a hobby of mine.”

"I absolutely liked it. This is amazing." Erevan lifts his helm and takes another swig of his drink. "My hobbies include hunting, siege engineering, and making really complicated machines that do nothing."

"Is there a reason you make machines that do nothing? Why not make machines that do simple things? Like cleaning or cooking? I have a simple machine I bought from the Hollow recently to help with my alcohol making. It helps filter out the residual chunks of my drinks." Marvela watches Erevan lift his helm just enough to show his lips. She purses her lips as if questioning his actions.

"I make the machines to keep myself entertained, mostly. I don't need them to have a function for me to want to make them. I often make unexpected discoveries I can apply elsewhere by doing this. I'm no artificer, just a simple engineer." Erevan explains.

"I see... I'm glad you like the drink. I've been using Hollow ingredients combined with surface ingredients to make rather unique drinks unknown to elsewhere. They're all custom made and I'm the only one with the recipe's since I'm the only one with a fungus farm on the surface. For some reason unknown to me." She flinches as if in response to nothing before sighing "Honestly its rare to go outside and deal with mercenary activities like this but my hand was forced thanks to one of my charges..."

"Well if Hollow ingredients are the secret, I'd love to learn more about the Hollow. Plus, I have never heard of a fungus farm. Guess you could say I'm not very well travelled." Erevan tries to keep the conversation light.

"Just because you've never heard of it doesn't mean you're not travelled, the Hollow only opened to outsiders recently. I had the unique experience of having been born there. Its quite different from the surface kingdoms thanks to my kind being the main populace." She flicks one of the antennae on her head to emphasize her species

"I never left the Barbarian Kingdom until today. This was my first time doing 'mercenary work' as you put it. I don’t even know what being a Chosen means.” Erevan shakes his head slightly. “It’s all so new to me.”

“It’s okay. The whole Chosen thing has a different explanation in each culture. Historians believe the first Chosen existed just over two-thousand years ago. A group of heroes called the Companions. From the first ten things just kind of spiraled out. More and more Chosen appear every day.”

“Sounds like the group isn’t very selective. Almost like we ended up Chosen by random occurrence.” Erevan pauses for a second before continuing. "If the Hollow is open to outsiders then I will have to make a point of visiting."

"If you do, I'd be careful. The society is rather alien to a lot of surface folks. The people are diverse physically and mentally and it is built three-dimensionally to allow full use of alternative movement styles. For instance, did you know I'm quite good at digging? When I first came to the surface I used to just dig holes and sleep in them to keep myself safe." Marvela explains.

"You dig? Like a mole. That's actually just impressive. I don't think there's any special thing I can do. And navigating a three-dimensional city sounds like a pain on the knees. I already haul a ballista with me everywhere." Erevan smiles imagining Marvela in an animal's burrow. "I wonder what engineering wonders we could create if I worked with engineers from the Hollow."

"The Beetle Crafters in the Hollow are wonderful at building. Either by digging spaces out or filling spaces. In fact I was likely to be a Beetle Crafter if I hadn't been a moss tender when I was born. Its why I can produce an Adhesive from my hands. It's stuff like that which makes them experts at building buildings. The Plague Renderers are better for machines though. Lots of ratfolk in there who like technology." Marvela notices Erevan has finished his drink.

The slug woman takes the empty glass from Erevan and place it in her pack. As she does she brings out two more drinks. These ones are bright pink and far more fizzy. Erevan takes one offered to him.

"As alien as your society sounds to me, it also intrigues me. The way it operates like a clan or familial unit. Would you have been happy following one of these paths if it were assigned to you?" Erevan questions.

"I was for a while. I grew up being a moss tender all alone on my farm. My family tradition was rather spartan, however. I was raised until I was a toddler then told to manage it by myself. I managed to survive but there were some struggles. By the time I was eighteen however I joined the Stings as a logistics personnel. Then I accidentally traveled through a waystone and since that was illegal I couldn't go back. That was about four years ago so I guess I was about... thirty-four." She pauses, taking a sip of her drink, as she closes her eyes. "I guess I'm somewhere between the two paths now. A moss tender that belongs to a stings lifestyle. I think I'd struggle without one or the other."

"I'm sorry if I dragged up any bad memories." Erevan closes his eyes for a second overwhelmed by a sense of empathetic pain. "I can understand struggling with one's path, although currently my struggle is having none. After my father's death I lost any path I thought I had. And the waystones were a way to move forward and escape. I couldn't imagine the pain of having a home and not being able to return to it."

"Thankfully recent events allowed me to clear my name. I've returned a couple times. Though now my farm is more of a home then the Hollow. The Hollow is more like a hometown that you like to visit every once in a while." She sips her drink before frowning at something and sighing "I don't think I can empathize with the loss of a parent when I don't even remember my own."

"Your upbringing sounds like it may have been harder than the loss I felt.” Erevan shrugs indifferently. “Where I'm from, my hair color would mark me as no better than a slave. My father stole me away to the far corners of the snowy wastes before I turned six. He raised me as a hunter, a free thinker, and with the utmost respect for life and autonomy. Our story did not have a happy ending." Erevan drinks the pink liquid. Savoring it. Desperately wanting it to brighten his mood.

The drink was fruity and sweet with a fizz to it. Similar to jungle juice with the amount of sugar inside of it.

"I can't say much. We come from vastly different places I'm afraid. I was on my own with my own autonomy in a society that cared about the whole and nothing about the singular. The law is everything there." She frowns again and sighs more exasperated

"I find war is rarely the best answer for a utilitarian outcome. You want the best from your actions instead of just mitigating your losses to get some meager victory." Erevan takes another drink, finding the fizz and sugar to be greatly enhancing his mood. "Maybe the vast differences in our paths is a strength. There is no need to call us different and leave it at that. You are unique and you make spectacular things. These drinks are unlike anything I have ever experienced." Erevan senses the frustration in Marvela. He purses his lips trying to think of a way to help.

“Tell me, why keep the helmet on?” Marvela asks.

“My people, if they saw me, would only see me as less than human. Lesser than you even. I am an omen of death and a slave in my nation.” Erevan answers honestly.

“Oh.” Marvela pauses. “I guess we are more alike than I realized.” Marvela says. The village comes into view as they continue walking through the jungle. “You get rather numb to what others think of you after a while. Here take this." She reaches into her pack and pulls out a bottle of each of the drinks she had let him try before giving them to him "I really should get back home to heal Edwin. If you're ever in Durstable feel free to look me up though. You'll see the warning signs around my home."

“Stay safe then. Thanks for the drinks. And I will make a point of visiting sometime.” Erevan says as they reach the waystone at the edge of the village.

“You better.” Marvella touches the waystone and be enveloped by a portal before disappearing.

Erevan touches the waystone and teleport to Yokind-Burg. Appearing in the snowy streets a black haired man approaches him. The man is scrawny, has tattered clothes, and wavy lined tattoos across half his face.

“Mr. Tolert is at the Valhalla Tavern.” The Crow says. “Up the road on the right.”

“Thank you.” Erevan nods to the crow and walk past him.

The Crow is stunned by being thanked as the hunter leaves the town square and heads to the tavern. Inside there is roaring music, lively Yokind-vikings drinking, and above the bar is the stuffed head of a mammoth. Erevan spots the red haired man from before in his nice but well used clothing. The hunter approaches the man and sit across from him.

“Did the mage live?” The man asks.

“Crenshaw lived.” Erevan replies.

“Good. I’ll contact the orcs and see if the mission was completed.” The man sits up from the table and walks to a back room.

Crenshaw walks through the front door and takes the seat across from Erevan.

“So, you like that awesome kill I got there in the end. Wouldn’t have been possible without all the damage you did to that mech.” Crenshaw smiles in a way that makes Erevans spine crawl.

“You did good. Do they all know you summon demons?” Erevan asks.

“Yokind-Burg knows. As long as Myandra and Catania don’t catch wind of it I’m golden. It's not like necromancy. I’m enslaving demons. Not innocent souls.” Crenshaw smirks and rests his hands behind his head. “Where’s our money?”

“The guy is calling the orcs.” Erevan states.

“Shit, you wait here, I’ll go around back.” Crenshaw stands up quickly and leaves the bar through the front door.

Minutes later the door that the quest giver went through opens as Crenshaw drags the man through it. His nose was dripping blood. The bartender shook his head at the sight.

“You don’t collect the money and then run out on adventurers. That’s like the first rule of this business. We kill people for money. That's literally our job.” Crenshaw shoves the man into a seat next to Erevan. Crenshaw takes a coin purse off of him and tosses it to Erevan. “Count it.”

Erevan dumps the coin purse on the table. There are two hundred gold coins. Erevan scoops half of the coins back into the purse and stands from the table.

“What, you don’t want to rough this guy up?” Crenshaw says to Erevan.

“Next time I see him. I’ll kill him.” Erevan states before turning and leaving the bar.