[Shrubley, the Monster Adventurer] Chapter 87 – Oregano Gangsta VII

In the training rooms of the Adventurers Guild, Cal worked on his cloak. While a repair powder might do the trick, the skeletal Mage wanted to practice his own mending skill. This darksilk had saved his life, and that of his friends, many times.

The least he could do was a proper job. Repair powders were limited consumables, supposedly excellent in the field because of how fast-acting they were. Not that Cal had any experience of that, yet. Much like Shrubley, he yearned to see more of the world. And he wanted to be prepared for it, too.

His group had some repair powders in their possession, but not enough that he could fritter them away. They restored the durability of many kinds of items, but not fully.

Cal fixed up the stitching along the inner lining, using nothing other than a modified serpentii fang. He would have liked to try a more traditional needle one of the local weavers tried to introduce him to, but the skeleton didn’t have the knack for it.

Using bone seemed to do the trick.

His [Weathered Darksilk Magician Cloak] had always been the lowest rarity because of its condition. He hoped that he might be able to do something about that.

Still, Cal wasn’t particularly confident. He knew he was terrible at stitching. Crafting, of any kind, felt far beyond his capabilities. He certainly had no crafting proficiency to speak of. They were quite rare. Even combat proficiencies were extraordinarily difficult to acquire for a Mundane Ranker like him.

Threading mana into his finger bone, he worked along another torn patch that had been damaged by a serpentii attack. Just thinking of one of those snakes startled him greatly, and his threading mana slipped away.

Only then did he realize what he had been doing.

And Cal had no idea how he could do it again.

Shaking his skull, Cal went to work again. After a little while, he was incredibly surprised by the result. He had even gathered an audience. Smudge’s eyes went wide as a purple-blue shimmer of faint mana passed over the cloak.

[Weathered Darksilk Magician Cloak]

(Equipment)

(Copper Rank) (★☆ Uncommon)

An old cloak woven from darksilk, much of its protections and enchantments have worn off through time and use. Only a glimmer of its majesty yet remains. Recently mended, some of this cloak’s enchantments have been partially restored.

Imprint: Extends spellcasting range. Increases resistance to magical and physical attacks. Grants [Hide].

[Hide (Copper)]: When infused with mana, the cloak will render the wearer hidden from mundane and magical means up to Copper Rank.

“Its rarity has improved!” Cal puffed out his ribcage in pride. Now his trusty cloak was a bit stronger.

Smudge studied the cloak closely. Although the slime couldn’t read despite multiple attempts at learning, he could understand Shardscript just fine. “It was… Primitive rarity?”

Cal nodded. “Yes, now it is two levels higher.” He wasted no time in donning his cloak. It immediately warmed his bones.

Shrubley entered the training room and sat down on a nearby bench. Slyrox, who was training her [Tornado Kick] on a speed bag in the corner, dropped to the ground and waddled over to him.

She no longer got dizzy from the ability, and she could control it with a surprising degree of skill despite only a week’s worth of training.

The entire monster party finally had trainers and time to work on themselves without the threat of death all around. Though they all agreed, secretly, that they missed the Countess and her disreputable oppa.

They had grown faster under their tutelage.

More than that, they had felt like a family.

“Did she say yes?” Slyrox asked, holding her mitts together.

Shrubley nodded, kicking his little rooty legs with their new knobbly knees back and forth as he sat on the bench. “We have enough left over for ourselves,” Shrubley told her.

Smudge bounced over, and Cal joined them last, flourishing his cloak like Remal the Bard would, making sure everybody saw how much better it looked now.

“Then we’re really going?” Cal asked, after Shrubley congratulated him on his cloak’s new rarity. “Without the Countess?”

Shrubley nodded. “She is busy. You heard what the Count said. Her lands are in disarray. We are on our own.” He looked at each of them in turn. “You do not need to come with me. Taamra will treat you as the proper heroes you are.”

“But you’re going,” Cal said. It wasn’t a question. Cal knew.

“We are adventurers,” Smudge spoke up, choosing his words carefully. “Together.”

The slime formed three-fingered hands out of his body and clasped them together into one fist. While his intentions were to be rather… wholesome, the effect was unfortunately unsettling for all those in attendance.

“I would be honored if my friends joined me,” Shrubley told them earnestly. “But it will be dangerous. I do not know the way, and there are many who will have no idea of our deeds here. We will be starting over again with every town we visit.”

“Slyrox is already starting over,” she said, crossing her arms, then stuck one mitt out and tried to make a thumbs up. “Muchly thankings for the offer, but Slyrox agrees with Cal and Smudge, we adventure together.”

Cal shivered, remembering the cold reception they received. He didn’t think Shrubley saw it like that, and even if he did, the little shrub would no doubt feel it was a challenge to be surmounted.

Cal didn’t think Slyrox understood the reality that Awakened monsters faced on Almora, but he did not want to presume what her life had been like before coming here. It was possible thinking, talking monsters were ostracized there too.

“Then we will leave at first light tomorrow,” Shrubley said.

“Don’t you want to see the orphanage built?” Cal asked. It was all Shrubley would talk about for the past few days. He reached out to each and every person who had professed that they wanted to help him and Taamra, and somehow managed to loosen their purse strings.

Cal had no idea how he did it.

These were people who had tried to kill them, run them out of town, or at the very least wished very nasty thoughts about them. Now they were giving him money! And not a small amount, either. Even with the reconstruction efforts nearly finished, the materials were not cheap.

Those Steel Rankers had worked for free, but you could not simply take from carpenters, stonemasons, and alchemists without paying them something for their wares.

“I trust that Miss Sel will do the right thing,” Shrubley said.

Cal had the sneaking suspicion that Shrubley did not want to be in Taamra when it was built. As if he didn’t want the credit for it.

That made no sense to Cal.

Then again, Shrubley often made no sense to him, and yet following him regardless had always ended up for the best, so Cal didn’t voice his concerns.

“I already have camping supplies, and the Aking farm has agreed to give us a ride as far as the edge of the Haalften lands where the mountain pass makes the road difficult,” Shrubley said. “They will be here tomorrow morning.” He looked around at the training room. “I think a good night’s rest is in order, so we are prepared for the road ahead.”

Shrubley got up to leave. While Slyrox and Smudge finished up their training, Cal followed him out into the hallway. They passed a few adventurers who gave them a hearty smile.

“You weren’t really going to leave us, were you?” Cal asked once he caught up to Shrubley.

“It would be a parting of ways,” Shrubley told him as they climbed the steps at the end of the hall. More adventurers greeted them as they passed. There were so many people signing up now that it sometimes seemed like half of Taamra was part of the Guild.

“So you were!” Cal said, trying to accuse him.

“I must live the life I wish to lead.” Shrubley turned to him on the next landing. “There is so much world to see, my dear friend. So much wonder and magic to witness. Do you want to stay here forever, resting on your laurels?” He placed a wooden hand on Cal’s bony shoulder. “There is no harm in that. But that is not the life for me. I wish to see everything that I can, to feel foreign waters on my roots, to drink in the rains of a jungle storm…” Shrubley sighed in imagined pleasure.

“You know I will stay by your side no matter what,” Cal told him. “I know you get the wanderlust, but sometimes it is good to rest and recover.”

Shrubley nodded, his eyes sparkling with mirth. “Healing is good, and I have done that. If you are not ready, there is no shame in waiting longer. We all must go at the pace we can.”

Cal chuckled as they continued up the steps. “You’re not going to get rid of me that easily. Besides, now I want to see these jungles and foreign shores you speak of! Do you think they have different kinds of milk there?”

“Most assuredly!” Shrubley told him. “I bet there is even blue milk.”

Cal gasped. “Surely not! What milk would be blue?”

Shrubley opened the door to their room and giggled. “The best kind.”

***

“Miranda!” called the Count.

Countess Haalften groaned in her coffin and turned over. Sose wriggled in her arms and slipped out of the coffin, poking his nose out.

When the footsteps of her husband grew louder, Sose slipped out to bite his ankles as he always did when the fool tried to wake her up early.

“Ow!” the Count cried. “Why do you always bite me?”

“Because the Countess needs her beauty rest!” Sose barked.

“There is much to do. Our lands are in disarray! The peasants wish to speak with the Countess.”

Sose poised to bite him again, but noticed that he didn’t sneer the way he usually did. After the hullabaloo of the Snake Lord, Rykal, the Count and Countess had been on the outs. Sose didn’t blame Miranda. She was rightly upset with the Count for admitting Rykal into their home in the first place.

If not for his rank idiocy, then none of the horrible things would have come to pass.

And now the people of Taamra recognized not only Shrubley and his monster pals as proper heroes, but they included the Countess among them!

That, in Sose’s opinion, was the true reason Miranda was so mad at her husband. Every hour of every day, somebody wanted a problem solved by the heroic Countess Haalften.

Instead of living in semi-fear, she was now a Hero. Which meant she was approachable for quests of all kinds, no matter how mundane and stupid they were.

Cow stuck in a tree? Better call on the Countess!

Demonic chicken eating the goats? The Countess will know what to do!

Goats with fiery gas? You guessed it, the Countess!

It never ended. No matter how many times the Countess tried to stop it, the people now saw her as an affable, if mildly eccentric, hero. The carefully crafted mystique she had built up over the decades was gone, and it was all the Count’s fault.

Worse, the people didn’t want the Count to do anything, which further incensed the egotistical man. You could hear the Count grumbling about “Shrubley the Monster Hero” all hours of the night as he paced through the gardens or stared morosely out on the widow’s walk.

That, perhaps more than anything, was why Miranda slept later and later into the night.

Miranda had written several times to Shrubley, but never received a single reply. He was a hero now, and it had clearly gone to his head. She was happy for him, she truly was, but would it hurt to send a single letter back her way?

Despite herself, she missed the ragtag bunch of misfit monsters.

As Sose and the Count argued outside her coffin, Miranda finally came up with a plan. A horrible, gut-wrenchingly bad plan that would set everything aright.