78 - Local Hero

Sable watched the two conscious adventurers climb up the rubble pile and out through the tunnel she’d created. Ethan carried her staff for her, and also stayed behind to keep an eye on Sable as she carried Merry, probably to see if she needed help. Sable, of course, handled the task without problem. She didn’t have a physically-oriented class and the grace and might that came with one, but she was more than capable of climbing up a slippery pile of debris with her hands full—especially when she took a careful pace, an injured woman in her arms.

Merry felt surprisingly light. Despite having just got done throwing boulders and excavating a cave-in, it was the weight of another person’s body in her arms that disoriented Sable. There was no way she could’ve easily carried another person like this back in her last life, and though she’d had plenty of opportunities to acquaint herself with her new strength, for some reason this action was the one that hammered home just how strange things had become. How different her new body was.

Back out under the sun, Quintin was waiting for them. The older man plainly looked relieved, though in his subdued, stoic manner. All he gave was a simple nod to Ethan and Velvet, and a, “Glad to see you three made it.”

“Quintin?” Ethan replied. “You came too?”

“He tracked you three down,” Sable commented, finishing picking her way down the outward slope of the rock pile. “I doubt I would’ve found you otherwise.”

“Ah,” Ethan said. “Well, I can’t even begin to thank you two enough.” He breathed in to go on a longer spiel, but both Sable and Quintin waved the thanks away.

“Let’s worry about getting back,” Sable said. “She’s suited for travel? How gentle do I need to be?”

“Uh, sorry?”

“Can I run the distance?”

“Back to Sunstone? The whole way?” Ethan glanced at the tunnel Sable had excavated, probably remembering such a feat was hardly out of her capabilities. “Right. That … shouldn’t be a problem? She’s an adventurer after all. Durable. Some jostling around won’t be bad for her.” He hesitated. “I think, at least. I’m no healer.”

Sable frowned, then reluctantly said, “We’ll only take a brisk pace to be careful.” At the speed Sable wanted to run, it would be more than a little jostling.

Without a reason to dally, Sable set off in the direction she and Quintin had first come. Quintin followed without hesitation, though Ethan seemed surprised. What had he thought? That they’d stand around and chat? As much as needing to get their teammate back to town, Sable hadn’t intended to spend her day like this—she wanted to get back too.

Ethan and Velvet jogged to catch up, each sparing glances for the troll she’d killed as they passed it. They took up pace next to her, undoubtedly to stay close to their friend. They were fortunately in good enough shape to trek through the forest unimpeded, though it was hardly hostile terrain.

“So,” Ethan said. “You were passing through, you said? From where?”

“Down south.”

“That’s a given,” he said—since stronger adventurers were almost uniformly from the south, the northern parts of Auldstone too sparse with magic to create stronger ones. “But what parts?”

“The Berinthian Hills?” Velvet asked.

Sable looked at the woman, and she blushed.

“Not to make assumptions,” she coughed. “Just, that’s where most beastkin are from, right?”

“Thereabouts,” Sable said.

The two adventurers sensed that Sable didn’t want to chat about her past, or her circumstances in arriving to Sunstone, but that didn’t mean they were discouraged. They simply pivoted topics.

“Don’t even have a scratch on you,” Velvet said. “It was that easy? The troll?”

“Easy’s understating it,” Quintin said, grunting. “Never seen anything like it. Took all of five or six spells. Almost thought it’d take just the one.”

The response from the older man wasn’t helping with the low profile Sable would have preferred to keep. She prevented her nose from wrinkling as the two young adventurers turned fascinated looks to Sable.

“You’re a mage? But how are you so strong then?”

“Enchantments,” Sable said. “I empowered myself.”

Ethan and Velvet nodded. “That makes sense,” Ethan said. “Still, never seen a mage that can toss boulders around, buffed or not. We got lucky you were passing through.”

“And that your mom tracked her down,” Velvet commented. “The guild didn’t send you?”

“No,” Sable replied. “There wasn’t an active quest.” That had been how Miss Draper had put it. “Liana didn’t mention it either.” Though that had hardly been her job, and Sable realized that might sound like she was blaming the receptionist; she doubted it was her job to tell every passing-through adventurer about an overdue adventuring party.

Ethan frowned. “But we were more than two full days over schedule. Figured they’d have took notice by now.”

“Eh,” Velvet said. “At the same time, that’s hardly rare for adventurers. And who would they send anyway? They’d have to make a request to Rosemoon to find anyone strong enough to come help us.”

That had also been Miss Draper’s deduction. It seemed she was well informed. As a fretting mother to an adventurer, Sable supposed that was to be expected. “It seemed you three would have lasted a while longer,” Sable said. Obviously, with an unconscious team mate, they weren’t in great straits, but not overly dire ones either. Ethan and Velvet seemed more or less unharmed.

“Maybe a day or two more,” Ethan said. “But we were running low on water, so no. Still could have turned out badly.” He sent a concerned glance to Merry. “And it’s really not great to be keeping someone under a health paralysis potion for so long. Didn’t have many other options, though.”

“How was she hurt?”

“Took several hits from the troll. She broke her arm, but that’s mostly healed. It’s the stomach blow that’s the worst. I think it’s infected, something the potion won’t heal. That troll’s club was a nasty piece of work.” He twitched, then looked at Velvet. “Think we should go grab it? Maybe the healers will need it to know what’s wrong.”

“Better safe than sorry,” Sable said. She gestured. “Go. We’ll wait.”

The procession took a short pause, and soon Ethan returned lugging along the impressive mace the troll had used as a primary weapon. It had bits of rusted metal—iron nails—sticking out of it, and Ethan held it up and inspected the weapon. “It even looks poisoned,” he said. “Nasty thing. Still can’t believe you took it out so easily.”

Sable didn’t reply, since there wasn’t much to say. Ethan obviously wanted to know her level, but she generally wanted to talk about herself as little as possible.

The two adventurers at least grew less talkative as they began the hike in proper, returning them to the calm quiet that Sable had spent the forward trip in with Quintin. Soon, they’d found their way to the edge of the Silverleaf Woods and back onto the path. That path merged to a road, and from there, it was two hours brisk walk—at an adventurer’s pace, double a regular person’s—back to Sunstone. The sun was fortunately still out, though evening wouldn’t be long. She’d wasted a good chunk of the day on this unexpected errand.

The attention she received on returning to Sunstone was unfortunate—and equal parts awkward and enjoyable. Naturally, she liked receiving accolades for her feats, but she’d come to Sunstone not wanting to make waves. She could have told the three to keep her intervention on the down-low, but that might only have garnered more attention.

Velvet carried Merry to the healers, and Ethan accompanied Sable to the adventurer’s outpost. They gave a brief overview of the event as a report, standard procedure for the Adventurer’s Guild. After that, Ethan offered for him and his group to properly share their thanks after they’d gotten cleaned and rested—the next day—but Sable informed him she planned to be gone by then. He seemed disappointed at that, then, after a few more attempts at thanking her, Sable was left to her own devices.

For the rest of the day, Sable explored the city of Sunstone, as had been her initial plan. She started by checking out the guild outpost, namely the quest board—which was just a task board, but given a thematic name. It was rather barren, or at least, of anything interesting. Towns in more dangerous zones would constantly have monster hunts or similar, but Sunstone’s was merely filled with collection quests for alchemy reagants or simple hunting requests. While somewhat interesting, there wasn’t much to pour over, so she left in short order, waving a newly fascinated Liana goodbye.

She visited the inn Liana had recommended earlier, since hunger was creeping up on her with evening approaching. News of her intervention for the missing adventurer party had spread fast, so Roland, the [Cook], refused to let her pay, insisting the meal was on the house. Sable realized protesting was pointless, so accepted the gratitude. An unfortunate amount of people came up to her to strike up conversation. Even deflecting almost all questions, nobody was discouraged, and she spent the evening chatting—or at least listening, being chatted to and probed for information. If anything, the cityfolk of Sunstone seemed delighted by her mysterious background and stalwart refusal to answer anything beyond the superficial.

It did accomplish her goal of mingling with native humans of the world, and picking up a general air of what they were like. Unsurprisingly, despite of course having their own mannerisms, habits, and customs, they weren’t all that different from the goblins, or even humans back on Earth; people were people everywhere.

To end the day, she explored the market. This served a few goals of hers: first, the overarching one of familiarizing herself with people, and secondly, she picked up a few mundane items. The grooming supplies she’d raided Skatikk for had been, well, made for goblins, not half-dragons, and here, Sable was able to pick up combs, soap, and other such items that were better suited to her.

She continued to be the intrigue of the town, though merchants weren’t as eager to offer freebies as Roland the [Cook]—if anything, Sable suspected they sensed her wealth in the way sharks would blood. Her time spent in the market thusly provided a much needed experience of handling bartering and haggling, as well as familiarizing herself with what each coin of bronze and silver was worth, though Sable still suspected she’d been scammed at least once or twice. Her quick reputation in Sunstone hardly would stave off the unscrupulous looking to make easy money. That didn’t bother her too much, since she was here more for the experience than the deals, and she had coin to spare. She didn’t burn through even a single gold coin, and had brought an entire bag along. The material was quite valuable—more than Sable had expected.

Soon, it was time for Sable to set off. Leaving after sunset drew a surprised reaction from Liana, but at the same time, Sable hardly had the same safety concerns to worry about as a regular person, so Liana didn’t think it was too odd—though she had expected Sable to at least spend the night. She would have, but she was still drained from her fight against the [Frostfang Titan] and couldn’t waste the night by not [Recuperating] on her hoard.

Trekking out in the wilderness, putting a long distance between herself and the road, much less the city, Sable transformed, and used the canopy of night to obscure her ascent into the sky.