Although Kary was unable to see herself from top to bottom, thanks to the lack of any mirror in the proximity, she had an active enough imagination to picture herself wearing the seemingly simple adventuring garments gifted to her by Asteria. They weren’t beautiful or pretty, taking practicality to its extreme, but it wasn’t as if Kary cared much for fashion, her usual clothing on Earth being more often than not the first pieces on the pile of clothes sitting on her wardrobe. Although Liz loved to poke fun at her sense of beauty, or lack of thereof, nothing she said motivated the girl to change the lackluster way she dressed herself. After all, there was no need to pleasure anyone, not even herself, as her only interactions with people were on school, with most of her day being spent alone in her mother’s apartment, studying during the afternoon and reading fantasy stories throughout the night. All this to say, if it helped her stay alive, then the aesthetics mattered little. Though thinking about it a little more, now that she was under the protection of someone who seemed to be very, very important to the maintenance of the State she now live in, perhaps she should care a least a little bit about the way she presented herself. She still wouldn’t wear dresses like the one she had been forced in the day before unless there was no other way, but maybe she would spend a little longer choosing which clothes to wear from now on.
That, however, would be a problem for future her, as the present Kary was much too preoccupied inspecting her current clothing to care for any of that. Appearances aside, the girl couldn’t help but notice how comfortable the light armor was, while paradoxically being very hard, if the dull sound from her knocking on it was any indicator. Even if she knew very little about prices here in the capital, it was abundantly clear that the entire set must’ve cost a pretty penny, or some equivalent from this world, easily making it the most expensive gift she had ever received. Not that topping the few things she had gotten from her mother before everything went to shit was particularly hard, but still, it was nice knowing that Asteria cared for enough to do such a thing. It was a weird thing. Although Kary wouldn’t consider herself to be particularly emotional, she found herself unable to contain that tears swelling up from the corners of her eyes, dripping down her face before plunging down to the ground, leaving behind a salty taste in her trembling lips. She wanted to thank the knight, perhaps even hug her, like she had done to the girl not long ago, ask her why go to such lengths for someone like her, but still, no sound left her mouth, her entire body paralyzed in both apprehension and fear. Fear that she would be rejected, that she would be cast aside, that she had been simply someone that had sparked some mild interest from the knight, someone who held no real value aside an immediate interest.
Ever since she had arrived in this world, there had been little time to think about such things, as more often than not she spent her time training, listening to others talk, or simply sleeping. Yes, there were a few time of leisure, where she had been allowed to let her mind divagate through the ethereal nothingness of her mind, but there had never been any reason to ponder about such fears, her present troubles too significant for her to spare any thought to belittle her savior. Now that things had calmed down, though? She had as much time as she needed to feed her paranoia, her unfounded fears that settled in the deepest, darkest crevices of her mind, gnawing, worming through her gray matter, clouding her thoughts, polluting her thinking, driving her down an endless staircase of self-deprecation. It wasn’t something she was unfamiliar with, but that didn’t mean she hadn’t entertained the idea of never having to worry about such things ever again, now that she seemed to be in a nice household, surrounded by seemingly nice people, in a world where she was seemingly free to do whatever she wanted.
Thankfully, she wasn’t allowed to dwell on such thoughts for long, or perhaps she would have melted into a bubbly mess right then and there. Despite being quite thick-headed from all the conflicts she had been up until now, Asteria had been forced to develop the ability to at least superficially sense changes in mood In order to better lead her troops and work together with them, and currently Kary’s face was like an open book, displaying the rueful swirl of emotions flashing through her, almost none of them good. For a brief moment, the knight panicked silently, her inexperience dealing with youngsters contrasting with the knowledge acquired through hard-fought battles, making her eventually settle with the same stratagem she had used not even an hour ago. A big, bone-crunching hug, that cared not for the water dripping down their clothing, or the hiccups through which the girl tried and failed to speak. From afar, the singular maid of the mansion could only watch with a warm smile on her face, before once again returning to her duties, her mind spinning theory after theory about what could have possibly happened that had brought the two of them closer together in such a short timeframe.
Once Kary seemed to have recomposed herself, Asteria slowly let her out of her grasp, her serious face scanning the girl’s complexion for any irregularities other than the slightly flushed cheeks and the drying marks of the fallen tears. After a gentle pat to her head, the knight smiled broadly, not a single trace of the previous tension visible on her face, the gears inside her head already changing pace as soon as the crisis seemed to be averted. After all, she had acquired these clothes with the intent of seeing the girl’s dreams concretize, and anything less would be more than enough reason for her to turn her sword against the world itself for daring to bare such a cute girl from achieving her dreams. Although their interaction had started as nothing more than mere novelty, over time, the knight had started to truly care for the girl, to the point where such thoughts, as bizarre as they may be to an unaware observer, had become surprisingly constant in her day-to-day life, and, with her recent successful attempts at breaking through the tough emotional shell that Kary had built around herself, Asteria felt like such thoughts would only increase in quantity.
“Are you alright now?” She asked, some apprehension still creeping through her confident voice.
“I-I think s-so. S-sorry about t-t-that, I —”
“Shh… Don’t worry about that. It’s alllllll right, it’s all right. You don’t have to apologize for such a small thing. If anything, I should be the one apologizing for making such a cute girl cry like that. If you ever need a shoulder to cry on, please, please, please don’t hesitate on telling me, okay?”
“T-t-thank you…”
“Now! With that out of the way, why don’t you try becoming an adventurer, just like you said you wanted to? After all, you already had the skill, and now you even have the appropriate outfit, so there’s nothing holding you back anymore, is there?”
“No… no, there isn’t… I think?”
“Why do you ask me, when that depends only on yourself?”
“Can I… can I truly become an adventurer? I mean… with everything you’ve done for me already, I would expect to be forced to repay you… or something. I just… didn’t really expect to be simply told to go out and… explore. Ah! S-sorry if that sounded rude!” Resisting the urge to once again pat the pale girl’s head, the knight answered with her brightest smile so far, stretching so far up it threatened to split her face in two.
“I see, I see… Well, you aren’t wrong for thinking like that. There are surely some nobles who would gladly enslave you for life through little favors here and there. But I’m not like that! You can ask either Gunther or Marta about that, and they’ll gladly badmouth me through my back, so you don’t have to work about that. What you should be thinking about is if you’re okay not fulfilling this dream you so feverously told me about just because some random knight said so? Would you accept ditching your entire life to serve besides someone you barely know?” Thinking about her previous life and about how plainly she had been forced to live, Kary immediately shook her head.
“I thought so. And that’s perfectly fine! After all, is there anything more human than pursuing one’s deepest desires? If becoming an adventurer is what you truly want, then I won’t stand in your way. I won’t ask you to change your mind, or to reconsider your decisions. That would be simply disrespectful to you and the path you chose to take. Instead, I’ll keep helping you until you are able to be truly independent, capable of walking from north to south, east to west, without shedding a single droplet of sweat. Now come with me! I’ll show you to the guild. Come on, it’s not far!” Asteria said, already walking towards the door, leaving behind a dumbfounded Kary. After a moment of hesitation, the girl followed after the knight, barely stopping herself from outright running as she tried to catch up with the overexcited Asteria. Although some might think of it as unbecoming for a woman her age to be displaying such childish actions, Kary could only laugh at the absurdity of it, the usually stoic knight running through the streets like a mischievous boy who had just managed to prank someone.
Like a scene directly out of a Sunday morning cartoon, a very goofy high-speed chase ensued as the knight ran down the big street where her manor lied, going down, down the hill, passing through scared bystanders at ludicrous speeds, followed moments later by a similarly fast girl who, try as she might, found herself simply unable to shorten the distance between them, contenting herself with simply having the crazy woman within her field of view. With their speed, they reached the central plaza within less than a quarter of an hour, though the state they were in varied so much one couldn’t help but wonder what the heck had happened to them, as Kary had become a half-melted puddle in the middle of the cobble street, her adventuring attire helping little to prevent the heat from seeping through her much too white skin, where it there stayed for the duration of the run. While she heaved and huffed in an attempt to recover her breath, Asteria showed herself as the perfect picture of plenitude, not even her clothing showing any signs of the hell it had been forced to go through just moments before. When the knight had said that she wouldn’t let Kary go until she could run from one side of the world to another without sweating, perhaps she had been a lot more literal than the girl had given credit for, though she wondered if there was some specific skill that reduced the rate of transpiration of her body. If there was, how would that even work on a scientific level? Would it be just bullshit magic, or would it be something that affected the body on a microscopic level? Well, such ponderations would have to wait, as Asteria, having judged Kary to have rested enough, once more began to move, though this time at a more reasonable pace, towards the largest building by far within the plaza, what the girl assumed was the famed adventurer’s guild.
Even though the doors were wide open, the knight stopped just short of the entrance, just looking at the brown room inside with a complicated expression, patiently waiting for Kary to get to her, which, all things considered, didn’t took particularly long. Peering inside, Kary found herself speechless, her jaw just shy of comically falling to the ground as her mouth became quite the inviting hang-out spot for insects. She didn’t particularly knew what to expect, her only knowledge about such places being, one again, the stories she had read under the dead of the night, making it so that there was very little for her go off from. Still, considering the pretty much universal description of guild halls being messy, chaotic hellhole where fights were commonplace and drunkards came to drink themselves to death, she expected something… different. Not the clean, well-polished floorboards, or the orderly queues for the clerks’ booths, or even how well-lit the place was, despite the lack of any big windows. It was all so alien to her that her brain simply short-circuited for a brief moment, refusing to ditch the knowledge she had acquired through hours and hours of reading fantasy stories in favor of simply accepting the reality in front of her. The atmosphere, the serenity of it all, the organization with which everything was handled, it was almost as if a customer service office from Earth had been transported to this world after being adapted so as to properly fit with the medieval ages vibe, though the quality of the service seemed to be way too good for Earth standards, from what little time Kary had to witness it.
“This is the guild, Kary. Quite nice, eh?” Asteria bragged, as if she was the one behind the counter, helping all kinds of adventurers from all walks of life. Her playful tone was enough to bring the girl back from her shocked state, even though internally she was still wandered what kind of sorcery would force so many people, a few of which seemed to be strong enough to bring down the entire building if the breathed just the wrong way, all nice and respectful. Dismissing such thoughts for the time being, the girl chose simply to answer honestly Asteria’s question, reserving her theories for when she had the leisure and the time to overthink about it.
“It’s… certainly something. Definitely better than what I had expected.” Hearing that, the knight couldn’t help but cock her head to the side curiously, an act that might have been viewed as particularly cute by someone unaware of the woman’s identity, but utterly terrifying for someone who knew how strong she was and how willing she was to demonstrate the insurmountable gap between herself and most common folk.
“Oh? How so?”
“Umm… so… well… I kind of imagined a… darker place. Y’know, fights, ruckus and all that. But it’s just so, organized that I find myself wondering why did I think that way in the first place.” Of course, Kary knew exactly where her prejudice had come from, but, as there was no way to explain it to Asteria without revealing her identity as an Otherworldler, she just used the fact that she had never been anywhere near one of these establishments to blame her preconception on ignorance.
“Huh… It is quite strange you would think that. Despite how rough they have, adventurers are usually quite the respectful group, though there sure are outliers to that. I do wonder where you got this idea from. Hmm… strange, strange, quite strange, indeed. But not too unexpected, I guess?” Turning to the girl, Asteria continued.
“Well? What are you waiting for? Are you afraid to get inside there?”
“Wha— Are you not going inside with me?!”
“Hah! Nope! That’ll be your life from now on, Kary, so you better get used to it. Talk to one of the attendants, get your abilities rated, pick a quest you feel comfortable taking, and go live your life! Me being there with you will only hinder you in the long run. Trust me, you have more than what it takes to do this. And besides, you gotta start learning from somewhere, right? The earlier you get the hang of it, the more efficient you’ll be with these quests, and the more experience you’ll get from it all, right? So you just gotta go!” After finishing her speech, the knight forcefully pushed Kary into the building with inhumane force with a bright smile on her face. As the girl skidded through the pristine wooden ground, flinging her arms around in an attempt to reduce her speed, she heard one last thing from Asteria, her voice somehow reaching the girl through the sound of her boots scraping on the floor:
“Oh, and keep in mind that if you begin to get lax with your training I will know, so don’t you dare take it easy just because I won’t be there to check on you, okay?”
Halting to a stop around halfway through the hallway, Kary looked backwards nervously, cold sweat dripping from her back as she stared at the empty doorstep. Trying her very best not to look too conscious at the number of eyes intently staring at her, she lowered her head, quickly making her way to one of the shortest of the queues, standing right behind a man so tall and burly she was unable to see anything in front of them, his large back blocking everything from the relatively petite girl. A few moments later, the entire queue moved with surprising coordination as a boy seemingly younger than Kary passed through them with a serious look on his face, hands gripping tightly at a cheap sword standing beside his body, with nothing to protect the boy from the sword or the sword from the natural elements in sight. As the queue continued to move forward, Kary saw more and more people, some human, others not, some alone, others walking and laughing with a group of companions as they all headed outside with their respective quests to fulfill. From heavy armors to skimp clothing and short daggers, there was a little bit of everything there, people with the most diverse jobs walking in and out of the building, the queue ever shortening, until the big man in front of her reached the front. As Kary had no idea how to interact with the workers, she listened intently to their conversation, dead set on figuring it out.
Stolen novel; please report.
“Your tag, please.” The worker said with a most bored voice, as if he had been forced to go through this proceeding many more times than what he would be willing to admit.
“Here you go.” The man replied, in his hands a small, rectangular card that seemed to hold some information, although from this distance Kary was unable to figure it out. Peeking from the side, the girl saw as the bored clerk picked up the tag and placed it on the desk, running his fingers through it before turning to a huge book by his side, bigger than the dictionaries Kary had seen on her school’s library. With practiced expertise, he flipped through the pages, until eventually setting on some seemingly random page on the latter half of it. Eyes swiftly skimming the page, he quickly set on a particular line, addressing once again the man without even looking at him.
“Berg, B-rank adventurer, number 10008976 on the registry, is that correct?”
“Very.”
“What business do you have with the guild today?” In the same monotone voice, the man in the counter continued his barrage of questions, to which the adventurer leisurely responded.
“I would like to receive a quest.”
“Hmm… okay. Let’s see what jobs we have available for you today. Do you want something in particular?” He said as a he skimmed another book on his other side, close enough to the other book that the only thing visible was the clerk’s face in between.
“I’m looking for fighting quests, and I don’t mind if they’re ranked lower or if they are far away. I just… need to do something to clear up my mind, y’know?”
“Hmm… let’s see, what we can offer you… Oh!” Getting his hopes up from the faint trace of emotion displayed by the employee, the adventurer quickly asked:
“What? Did you find something good?”
“Yes, quite. There are some bloodhounds pestering a farm on the village directly south from here. You’ll reach it if you just follow the main road to the south. C-ranked, no specific party requirements, fifteen silver as a reward. Is that satisfactory?”
“Oh… oh…! I like that. Yes, I’m quite pleased with that. If you may, please sign this quest under my name.”
“Alright. And… done. Next please!” After writing something on the quest book, the clerk promptly kicked the adventurer out, though the man seemed to already be used to this treatment, as he only flashed a wry smile before going on with his day. Finally, it was Kary’s turn, and to say that she wasn’t nervous would be nothing short of a lie. Although her nerves had been eased by the seriousness with which the man in front of her seemed to take his job, it also made her all the more afraid to commit some egregious mistake in front of him. Swallowing the saliva that had been accumulating in her mouth as she intently heard the conversation between adventurer and guild employee. Hiding her slightly trembling hands behind her back, she approached the clerk, who promptly stared into her, almost as if he could see her very soul buried deep inside her body. Of course, his abilities were nothing like that, but the intensity with which he looked at the girl made it seem like it.
“You… are new here, aren’t you? I haven’t seen your face here before.” To Kary’s surprise, she was immediately spotted as a complete noob, the entire script she had been meticulously preparing in her mind thrown out of the metaphorical window just like that.
“Y-yes…” She meekly replied, to which the man behind the counter very slightly smiled, his stone expression easing just a tiny little bit.
“I see. Are you already an adventurer, or were you planning on becoming one?”
“O-oh… I want to register as one!” She replied, her voice growing more confident as the string of words left her mouth.
“Figures. Well, I’m not being paid for doing that. Oi JERRY!” The sudden shift from his monotone voice to the sudden yelled startled Kary quite a bit, though it wasn’t as bad as finding out that she wasn’t in the right place for registering. If she knew there was someone in specific she needed to talk to, she wouldn’t have stayed on this damned queue for so long. It was frustrating, but, more than anything, it was very, very embarrassing for someone who didn’t like to stand out like Kary. If she could, she would’ve dug a hole right then and there to hide herself from the stares pointedly hitting her protected back, even though doing such a thing would most definitely only draw more raised eyebrows in her direction. From the back of the room, an older gentleman came through a wooden door, its slight imbalance causing the bottom side to scrape against the floor, the harsh sound traveling far and wide, shushing any and all conversations in the hallway.
“You called?” approaching as if he had all the time in the world, Jerry addressed the clerk in a much livelier tone than what Kary had grown to expect. It was surprising, to see so much energy coming from a balding old man, especially compared to how utterly bored the clerk sounded like.
“Please go with Jerry here. He’s the one in charge of registering new adventurers and making sure they don’t get killed. Though, judging from your looks, you probably come from a pretty well-off family, right? So you must have received some sort of training, I assume. Still, as a small advice, please don’t be discouraged when you have to start by the simple quest, ‘kay?” In the same tone with which they had been talking up until now, the employee urged her to go with the old man, waving his hand dismissively as he used the back of his other hand to support his head, his half-closed eyes looking not at Kary, but already at the next person in line, as if begging for her to let him do his job. With a small chuckle, Jerry asked the girl to come with him, the contrast between eager new adventurers and this particularly employee always giving him a good laugh.
With no particular choice, she simply followed the man to a secluded room, where there was only him, a table, some documents stacked on top of it, and two chairs. Still with a bright smile on his face, the old man was quick to sit behind the desk, surrounding himself with the smell of ink that he had grown to love so much over the many years he had spent as a nobody officer. It was a nice, high paying job that didn’t demand much of his expended neurons, where he was only very rarely forced to stay after hours, and that was usually only when something very out of the ordinary happened. Although he liked his job prior to this one, he couldn’t deny that it was for the best that he had decided to settle down when he did. Now he was able to coach young, sometimes promising, young adventurers, watching as they grew stronger and more confident on their abilities. Even if he still had to bear with the weight of knowing that some of the people he had initiated would end up dead somewhere far from civilization, he wouldn’t ditch this job for anything. After all, it was one of the few things he still had, so he couldn’t help but cherish it with his whole heart. Pointedly ignoring Kary’s stare, the man let out an awkward cough, before finally addressing the girl in front of him.
“So… you decided that you wanted to become an adventurer, yes?”
“That would be right.”
“Alright. It seems like you’re already set on doing this, but I am still required to ask if that’s really what you want. This is a very dangerous job, y’know? Death is an everyday companion for even the weakest of adventurers, and losing comrades is… well, it’s par with the course.” Seeing the determination on the girl’s eyes, the same look so many other folks have given him, he could only sigh, as he found it particularly hard to shatter these kids’ dreams with the harsh reality. Of course, he could always try harder, exaggerate stories to scare them away from the profession, encourage them to live safe lives in the comforts of the walls of the city, but he couldn’t bring himself to do that. If that was what they truly wanted to do, than the best he could do would be to support them throughout their journey.
“Hah… you won’t change your mind no matter what, right? Well… just… just be careful, alright?” Hearing the seriousness in his voice, Kary could only nod her head confidently, allowing the old man to relax a little bit, knowing that the future adventurer in front of him was at least willing to listen to his instructions. After picking up a blank page from the bottom of the pile on his desk and moistening the tip of a weird-looking pen in a small bottle of pitch-black ink, he began to ask her the standard questions, things he asked each and every single aspiring adventurer that had ever passed through this room.
“Okay, so, first things first, may you please tell me your name and your age?”
“My name is Kary, and my age is… umm… sixteen. Yeah, sixteen years, is how long I’ve been breathing.”
“…Alright, noted. Do you have any problem working with other people, Kary?”
“I don’t… I don’t think I’m a particularly good speaker, but I am very much capable of following someone else’s lead.”
“That’s fine… next, how do you plan to fight, either alone or in groups? That is, what role do you see yourself playing on combat?”
“…Since I use a sword, then I guess I would be a frontline fighter.”
“Huh… It might not be appropriate for me to say that, but it is quite unusual for girls like you to take on such strength-focused positions. But if it’s what you desire and what you are proficient in, then who am I to butt in? Hah… well, I think we are done here, girl. I won’t pry any further, as doing so would be nothing but a huge disrespect towards you, and it’s not like we need any more information about you. For now, you’ll be listen as an F-rank, which is just a probationary rank in which you’ll be assigned a few different quests, each of a different type, through which we will evaluate a bunch of things about you. Is that alright?”
“Of course. I think… it would be pretty weird if you just allowed anyone to just become adventurers right away. So I like this system. But… if possible… I would already like to do a quest, not matter how easy it may be. Please…?” Seeing her excitement, Jerry found himself unable to turn her down right away. He knew that it would take a few hours for her tag to be engraved, and that someone was technically only allowed to go adventuring with their respective tags in hands, but, at the same time, how could he say no to such a cute pleading face? It was quite the moral dilemma, though thankfully the old man was quick to think of a provisory solution: simply give the girl a provisory tag and hand her official tag to the clerk she had talked to earlier, so that she could do the quest she so very much wanted while at the same time being able to receive the official guild-ensued tag once she returned. It was a flawless plan, or so he would say. Quickly scribbling a hand-written, singed tag for the girl from a loose piece of parchment he had gotten from somewhere, he explained his devious plan to Kary, to which she readily agreed, her desperation for going out and experiencing what it meant to be an adventurer reaching new heights after knowing that she would officially become a member of the guild. It was exhilarating, nerve-wrecking, and, above all else, freeing in such a way that she had never experienced before. Yes, she would be bound to the guild by virtue of her tag, but that little piece of engraved, perhaps even enchanted metal would allow her to travel anywhere she wanted, the perfect excuse to travel the world, to explore each nook and cranny of this new world, to experience everything this world had to offer.
As soon as she received the piece of parchment and a mission to collect some medicinal herb, the girl bounced out of the guild, her excitement scaring off some of the other adventurers, before coming right back inside in order to ask someone about the appearance of the herbs she was supposed to gather. Her face beet red, she quietly sat at the back of yet another queue, trying and failing to ignore the shy laughs and snickers coming from all around her. It seemed that, ever since coming to this world, the number of occasions where she wanted to become a mole and dig towards the center of the planet increased tenfold. At least, she didn’t remember fumbling so constantly in her old world, though that might be just the side effect of actually interacting with more than one or two different people a week. In a way, she was actually proud of how far she had managed to come in such a short period of time, even attending parties, although not by any choice of her own, something that she would never ever do in her previous life, even if someone coaxed her to go. Not that she was invited to these types of events in the first place.
After a few minutes waiting in line and a quick chat with a much more lively clerk about the characteristics of sun shrooms, as they called this particular herb the girl had been asked to gather, she once again set off south, running like a madman, even though this time there wasn’t anyone to chase after. Simply put, the hype she felt for finally becoming what she had only dreamt of was just too much for her to bear, and so it overflowed, the liquid excitement externalized through the silly grin in her face, as well as the random jumps and somersaults she began doing in the middle of the street, embarrassment be dammed. This was her first quest of hopefully many more, and she was going to enjoy every second of it, even if it meant that her future self would live to deeply regret this decision. Due to the architectural design of the city, she could simply go down the main street and leave through the gate, where the outside world awaited her. Nobody questioned her on her way out, and nobody sought to pick a fight with her after she found herself away from the protection of the tall, thick stone walls that protected the city from any external threats. Perhaps it was just the heart of someone who had spent way too much time reading repetitive, boring, and same-y novels on their free time, but Kary thought that it was quite disappointing, even if it was ultimately for the best that nothing bad happened. Not even the quest she had directly been handed out from Jerry was anything particularly especial, only asking that she collected precisely fifteen of these so called sun shrooms, one of the most common medicinal herbs around these parts. As the name would suggest, it grew pretty much anywhere the sun managed to reach, going so far as to be considered a pest in some particularly sunny regions, requiring the local guild members to occasionally cull the fungi numbers down.
According the clerk’s info, the capital was one such place, where the surrounding forests had all been cut down throughout the years, giving way to precarious houses that in turn gave way to better made, better structured homes as the city expanded, leaving to an ever-growing buffer between the city itself and any actual forest. Although there were seldom monsters in this region, as there was nowhere to hide from adventurer parties, making it a prime gathering spot for merchants not yet able to get inside the city and rookie adventurers going on their first… well… adventures. Making her way past stationary carriages and seemingly normal folks carrying around baskets filled with different types of plants Kary failed to identify, the girl eventually found herself in a nice, empty area, filled with mushrooms that seemed to have been extracted directly from a painting, the red hue from their very tops melting into a more yellowy color at the bottom of the cap giving it an otherworldly feeling that the girl had yet to fully experience, even after so many encounter with staple fantasy things and beings. Although she kind of regretted immediately leaving without considering the usefulness of a basket, like the other adventurers had done, nothing would be able to sour her mood as she collected one mushroom after the other, tucking them in between her arm and torso, their white stalks protruding from the other side as she silently and efficiently did the rather easy job.
She didn’t particularly enjoy plucking out mushrooms from the dirt under the hot midday sun, but she didn’t really hate it either. At the end of the day, she understood that it was only a temporary job before she was able to move on to more dangerous, and probably more exciting quests. It was kind of like the initial slog through a game, doing the same few safe quests over and over again in order to get easy experience points, even when it becomes extremely unviable to keep doing this. Of course, Kary would never allow herself to stoop down to such lows, but, for now, such simple quests would have to do. Just the fact that she would be getting something out of this was already enough to make her think that it had been worth it, and that’s not even factoring the fact that, once she completed all the required quests to rank up, she would have much more liberty to choose what tasks she wanted to do, making this initial stage a little more bearable, though not by much. Although she might have rushed this first quest more than she would’ve liked, she still felt quite refreshed by the light exercises she had done today. It was different from the way she had been training with Asteria, and all-in-all, it was a much more pleasurable experience, even if it didn’t strengthen her quite as much. As she finished gathering the mushrooms, the girl began to think that she might enjoy even these menial tasks, after all, even if it was for completely different reasons to why she wanted to go for this line of job so much. It was a fun, leisure time, with no stakes, no monsters chasing after her, no threats to fend off, nothing, even though deep down she did want to happen. Chuckling at the improbability of such a thing happening, she simply continued to grab mushroom stalks, a light, carefree smile on her flushed face.
