The rest of the week flew by. Every morning we would head over to get some training by Hiroaki. I would check on the classes for the day, but I had little interest in almost everyone. Why would they teach state management or town management here?

Draf said he would get me an entire list of the classes for next week, and I scheduled another lunch with Kadler. We hadn’t done another quest since the Fyrbees and Luin seemed to be getting a bit more restless with each passing day. When we settled in for dinner at the Tallow and Flame, I finally asked her about it.

“What’s wrong, Luin?”

She gave me an odd look before turning back to her bowl of chopped-up meat.

“You don’t seem your chipper self the past few days.”

She pointed up and to her right. “This blinking eight-eight torments me.”

“Can’t you just tell it to close?”

She blinked a few times and looked up at me. “What?”

I laughed at her adorably confused face. “Look at it, and will it to close.”

“What do, ‘will it’ mean?”

“Hmm. Tell it to close inside your head like you're thinking but at the box.”

I watched her scrunch up her face as she looked towards where I assumed her progression tracker blinked away. A moment later, her eyes lit up, and she jumped up. “It’s gone! Papa is the best. Good, good,” she said before she hugged my arm.

“Well, isn’t that just adorable? Is there anything else I can get you two?” Obbah, one of the Tallow and Flame inn owners, came over and asked us.

“No, thank you. Would you let the boys know we’ll need the tubs tonight?”

“Sure thing. Excuse me,” she said as she went over to the other group at the bar.

After dinner, we went up to our room and relaxed in our baths.

The next day we had the day off from training and decided to grab a quest or two and try and level up. We grabbed the same Fyrbee quest again, and I found the two other quests a bit higher on the board.

The one for the royal jelly had a GCP of only ten but a reward for five gold per bottle of the jelly. The quest for the live queen had a GCP of twenty-five and a reward of ten gold for a healthy queen. The quest also mentioned I’d have to buy the taming nets to capture the queen. When I asked Draf about the nets and their price, I decided against the quest. I’d have to capture two of the queens just to cover the first damn taming net.

Before leaving, Draf let me know Kadler could do lunch the following day, and I gave him the go-ahead to inform him that it worked for me. On the way out of town, we stopped by one of Luin’s favorite food vendors and bought a bunch of the sticks of tasty mystery meat. I stored more than half in my bag for later. I had found out the bag kept them in stasis and would come out as hot as they went in a couple of days ago.

On our walk towards the Fyrbee nest, we talked about Luin’s magic and for her to only use it as a last resort. Her passing out would lead to more issues if we were in the middle of combat. I was amazed at how well she caught on to talking and speaking about what was on her mind. She was technically only a few months old but could speak and understand like a ten-year-old. I wonder if the evolution she went through sped some things up a bit.

“Luin, what do you want to do in your future?”

“Travel with papa.”

“I understand that, but is there anything you want to do? We may have many lifetimes to travel together. What else do you want to do?”

She seemed lost in thought for a while before speaking up. “Luin wants to win The Guild Tournament! No Kobold has even fought in it before. Yep, yep. Luin will win!”

“Wait, what? What tournament? How did you even hear about it?”

“Kizso spoke about it. Told Luin of the amazing fights and even showed Luin moving pictures at the tavern.”

“Moving pictures? A movie? Where? When?”

“When you went to the hive. Town tavern had what Kizso called a recording crystal? It was all exhilarating,” she said as she began punching the air like some kind of boxer.

That was interesting. I guess I never had the time to sit down and have a drink at Ray’tha Rise’s tavern. Little Luin seemed to be a born glory hound.

Sometime later, We spotted the massive trees up ahead where the Fyrbees made their homes. As we drew closer, I thought I heard screams and stopped. I couldn’t tell what direction they had emanated from.

“Luin hear cries for help.”

“What direction?”

Luin pointed to our right, towards a large hill past a field of wild grass. I picked Luin up, startling her as I threw her over my head and told her to grab on. I pushed my Speed Aura to the maximum and flew towards the shouts. Cresting the hill, I spotted a group of what looked to be kids fighting against some kind of bird.

It was a mixture of an Ostrich and a Velociraptor. The teens were not winning the fight. I could see two of them huddled together on the ground. One was bleeding, the blood glistening in the sun, and could be seen from here.

Another with a sword and shield was between the two on the ground and the beast. They were doing their best to keep it away from their injured companions and were screaming for help as he smacked the beast's head away with the shield.

I let Luin jump off my back, and I sprinted down towards the young group. Summoning a Tier 2 Ice Lance, I waited for my opening as I came around the tall warrior and impaled the spear into the beast’s body. Seeing the beast turn into green sand, the kid jumped back with a surprised yelp. Seeing me, the warrior’s legs gave out, crashing to the ground.

“Thank the gods, you heard us. Help Jono. He’s been gravely injured.”

I looked back at the two huddled on the ground. The girl was holding who I believed to be Jono and crying as she rocked back and forth. I didn’t need to check. I could see Jono’s glassed eyes and the amount of blood on the ground. He was already dead.

“I’m afraid there is little I can do for him now. I’m not a healer.”

“No! Get him to The Guild’s Healer, she can still save him!” screamed the girl.

“Can she raise the dead?”

“Yes, he just died. We have half an hour to get him to someone with Resurrection! Please, we won’t make it in time, can you carry him?!? She screamed and went back to rocking back and forth.

I looked down at the panting warrior. He nodded to me.

“Luin, stay with these two! Here take these,” I shouted to Luin before giving the warrior a handful of the sticks of meat.

I bent down and grabbed the B Grade core, popping it into my mouth.

[ System Notification ]

Rank B Jade Core has given 20 Energy

5% Bonus: 1

6 Energy converted to 58 Mana

Toxin System: 152/200

I moved over to the two on the ground and pried her arm from the still-warm corpse. I lifted the body into a fireman’s carry. Luin had made it down the hill and was now petting the girl's head. I almost chuckled but fought to keep it in. “Follow, Luin back to town. She will know where I’m at.”

“Luin?” The crying girl raised her head and looked around, finally spotting the blue Kobold who was stroking her brown hair.

The girl gasped for a moment before hugging her. Good, they didn’t seem hostile towards her soI began running up the hill and then over towards the dirt road. The body seemed lighter than I thought it’d be, and I began to push more into the Speed Aura spell to go faster. As much as I hate to admit it, I kept thinking about the blood getting all over my clothing.

Not more than fifteen minutes later, I caught the sight of Mythtide’s walls in the distance. They were growing incredibly fast as I ran. I began shouting for the people and guards at the gate to part ways. One of the guards on the wall must have seen the body across my shoulders and began to blow a whistle. The crowd parted with yelps as the guards began pushing people out of the way.

Not one word was spoken as I ran past the gawking crowd and into the town. I went down the main street and took a right, yelling to get out of my way as I made my way to The Guild. I slammed into a small man and yelled my apologies as he fell to the cobbled street and began to yell. His yelling was cut off a moment later but I didn’t have time to look back and see why.

I cut the spell as soon as I reached The Guild and yelled for a man to hold the door. The startled man jumped out of the way as he kept the door open and I zipped inside. I was surprised as soon as I entered the hall when Vylria was already waiting just inside with a cot at the door with two others.

“Place the body on the cot, hurry!” she commanded worriedly.

I did just that, feeling no remorse for tossing Jono’s body onto the cot like a sack of potatoes. I backed up and turned as a hand rested on my shoulders.

“Bloody hell, man. I couldn’t keep up with you. You owe me a gold piece, by the way. I paid that noble off you crashed into.” the older Human with his hand on my shoulder said before he winked at me.

Looking at the man, I could see he was part of the guard but didn’t have the full uniform I had seen the rest wear. He saw me looking at his attire and chuckled.

“Guard Captain Yokota. Saw you carrying that adventurer from the wall and called ahead to Vylria to get someone ready with the Resurrection spell. Then took off after you. What kind of spell were you using? I could barely keep up.”

“Nice to meet you. Name’s Zeal. How did you call ahead?”

Before Yokota could respond, a brilliant white light flashed almost blinding me. I swore I heard something like a harp and trumpet sound off, but it was gone before I could figure out what happened.

“Great job, Kaede. The spell was a success,” said Vylria.

I looked over at one of the two who was waiting for us with Vylria. The teenager had lifted his shirt up and looked just above his navel where the rune for Life was now blazing yellow on his Stigmata. The kid seemed to be crying as he looked down.

Coughing from Jono brought my eyes down at the once-dead body. The massive bite that had been at his neck was gone, but the boy still looked incredibly pale. I watched Vylria bend down and place her hand on his chest before the hand glowed. Jono’s skin began to pinken a bit and he groaned.

“Where did you pick this one up, Zeal?” asked Vylria absently while tending to Jono.

“Near the Fyrbee territory. They were fighting something that looked like a mix between an Ostrich and a Velociraptor.”

“Can you describe it? I have no idea what those beasts you named are.”

“It had a circular body, with a long neck. Lots of teeth, and two muscular legs with very large talons. Its arms were tiny, but they too had claws.”

“How many were there?!” asked a very distraught guild receptionist.

“Just the one,” I said.

“Where are Jono’s teammates?” asked the same receptionist.

“I left them with my companion, Luin. So I could bring him back here.”

“Oh no,” said the receptionist.

Just then I was torn away and looked towards Luin’s location. I could feel fear and something else from the Kobold. She felt determined.

I looked back at the receptionist.

“They’re pack animals. There is never only one,” she said.

I slammed on my Speed Aura and flew out the doors of the Adventurer's Guild. I wished I had learned that damn Air spell to fly. I needed to get back to Luin as fast as I could. Outside the gates, I finally heard shouting behind me. I glanced behind me and could see Yokota running not far behind. He waved at me and pointed ahead. I pushed myself even harder, hoping I wasn’t too late.