The Runesmith

“Why don’t you just give up? No reason to be shy about your true feelings, I’ll be sure to take care of you well~”

Armand winked at the woman that was standing on the other side of this training ground. While she wasn’t quite his type it didn’t take much to get him going. He was sure to strike a gallant pose to show off his muscles that had grown since he reached his second tier 2 class.

“What’s wrong with your head, you’ve been spouting nonsense the entire time! And you call those things muscles? These are muscles!”

Grisalde the barbarian was on the opposite end, the moment she saw her opponent flexing to show off their physique, she returned the favor. Her body wasn’t behind Armand’s in any way and she was also taller. When she was striking that double biceps pose the other adventurers started whistling.

“Damn, that woman is huge, isn’t she larger than Armand?”

“He’s got a bit more volume on her because he is a man… but she isn’t far behind…”

Some posing enthusiasts that were in the peanut gallery started giving their opinion while the two showed off their goods. Other people that were here to see a fight started to complain, but not like the two muscle brains cared. They continued to strike poses as if this was some kind of body-building competition.

They did draw in the attention of a certain guild leader. The bald man that was in a different weight category started rubbing his chin while looking at the two young adventurers. His eyes were drawn to Armand who used to be part of the faculty of the guild.

“He did improve a lot but he still has a lot to learn…”

“Guild master, what are you doing…”

“Oh, don’t mind me…”

Solana that was within the office tipped her head to the side while looking at her boss. Aurdhan who was of the Goliath race suddenly started flexing his biceps while looking out the window. The shouts of the other adventurers didn’t go unnoticed but it was not something that they weren’t used to.

“Please, pay attention and stop doing that.”

“Hah, can’t have any fun around here… maybe I should give that brat his position back…”

While the guild master was getting scolded by his secretary another group of people were looking dumbfounded at the ‘fight’. Roland had rushed towards the fence and almost jumped over it to stop the altercation but the two just continued the flex-off.

“I’m really glad that you two aren’t blood-related…”

“Yeah…”

Elodia nodded her head while looking away, her face was a bit flushed after having to listen to Armand make a fool of himself.

“...But now is not the time, let’s get him over to the Church.”

To everyone's regret before any real action could take place, Roland along with Elodia rushed to the two muscle brains. He went over to Grisalde while Elodia had to contend with Armand and his antics.

“Wayland? What are you doing here?”

“Keeping you from doing… I guess It’s to late for that, just come with me and ignore that guy…”

“But he started it first, I won’t feel satisfied until I cleave his crotch in two!”

“You want to do it with that?”

Roland pointed to the damaged axe that she was holding, after the escape it had been damaged and needed to be repaired. Grisalde looked at her weapon and for some reason tried to hide the dented edge behind her back. As a heavy axe it probably could be used to deliver some blunt damage but against Armand who was a close combat specialist, it wouldn’t be that effective.

“Hey stop that, that hurts!”

While he was trying to convince the barbarian woman to give up, he heard Armand’s pleading voice from behind. There he saw a strange scene of a vast smaller Elodia yanking on the man’s ear. He looked truly pathetic with his shoulders and arms slumped forward. Even though the person pulling the ear didn’t have much strength, he was forced to move.

“Why do you always have to get in these stupid situations, I thought you’d mature after getting the gold rank, but it seems that you need to be scolded!”

Elodia shouted while tugging on his ear, the other adventurers burst out into laughter as they forgot about the bets that they made.

“Ha ha, Armand is going to get scolded!”

“Elodia, you’re making me look bad in front of the other adventurers…”

“You should have thought about that sooner, wait until you get back home, Armie.”

“Hey, I told you not to call me that…”

The people burst out in even more laughter after Elodia brought up a nickname from his past. It was clearly something that one would call a child and caused everyone to start shouting it at the man himself.

“I think Armie needs some milk from his mommy.”

“Hey look guys, Armie is going to cry!”

Some adventurers shouted out after getting some fuel. Armand was known around by many and had built up a bad reputation. There were many other men that disliked him for being popular with the ladies and this was the perfect time to throw in some jabs. They were safe in the crowd and confident of him not being able to tell where their voices were coming from.

“Hey, who said that… when I find you, I’m going to bash…”

“You’re not going to do anything, now start walking!”

“...”

Grisalde along with Roland continued to stare in silence at the scene that unfolded. Thanks to this strange performance before them it was clear that the animosity was dying down. He didn’t even need to repeat himself as she scratched her head before just walking towards the exit on the side. There Senna along with her two companions were waiting, all of them had stupid smiles on their faces.

“What are you looking at?”

“Nothing~”

The halfling just chuckled while Orson started mumbling something to himself.

“Hm, big muscles aren’t that bad…”

“Hoh, did ye discover something new?”

“Perhaps I did my friend…”

Roland wasn’t sure what the two were talking about, but they were looking at the muscular barbarian lady that seemed more oily than usual. Their gazes were focused on her thighs that were probably thicker than even Armand’s.

For some reason, it seemed that the woman rubbed oil onto her body that made it shine even more than usual. Perhaps it was a plan to be more slippery for the battle with a hand-to-hand specialist. Yet this was not the time to ask silly questions as they needed to get the troublemaker to the church for an examination.

“Hey big sis, why did you do that, I had to give all the betting money away…”

It was their lucky day, suddenly out of the crowd emerged Lobelia along with the two young men from the thieves guild. Renny the one that was part dog beastman and Jasper who had fox-like ears. They were the ones taking bets and weren’t given their cut after the bout didn’t take place.

“Oh, do my elven eyes spy a famous Runesmith?”

“Good to see you Lobelia, grab that idiot, we need to talk.”

After a less than heartfelt greeting he pointed to the mad Armand that was shaking his fist at some of the other adventurers. Most of them would probably bring this accident up for the next few months to come. Soon all of them excused themselves back towards the tamer side of the guild where he was supposed to get Agni registered Before going through with that, he needed to give Elodia’s two siblings an explanation.

“What?”

“Hey, keep your voice down or I’ll keep calling you Armie.”

“Hey, that’s unfair.”

After going to a more secluded location Elodia gave a quick explanation to both Armand and Lobelia. Both of them were shocked at the thought of being infected by some strange type of disease.

“True, we could sell this information to the guild for a nice margin…”

“Hey, who is this, I like her.”

Senna popped her head out to look at Lobelia talking about selling the info. The guild in this case was not actually the adventurer one but the one that worked underground with thieves. When the two spotted each other they could instantly tell that they came from a similar background.

“Wayland, who are these people?”

“Right, I should probably introduce you, these four were on the same mission with me and then helped me escape from Reeka.”

“Hah, more like we just clung to Wayland here while he did all the work, you should have seen him sling those spells around.”

“Speak for yourself pipsqueak, I did my part.”

Grisalde didn’t seem so amused as she remembered killing a couple of monsters on her way out. The others just chuckled and ignored the small outburst.

“You have my gratitude.”

Elodia moved towards the four and performed a little official bow before them. The four were taken aback by the gesture. They were all grizzled adventurers, so a heart-filled bow of gratitude wasn’t something that they were used to.

“So is this Wayland’s wife?”

Asked Grisalde after the bow of appreciation. The large woman just nodded her head back but on the other hand, both Orson and Dalrak remained quiet.

“His wife? Oh no I am just…”

Elodia’s face got a bit red after the statement, she looked towards Roland that for some reason felt a lot of weight on his shoulders. That look that she was giving him started making him sweat but luckily he had some people to divert the conversation in a different direction.

“So that’s Wayland’s type… those clothes are deceptive… is that an E… no I think it’s and F…”

“Mmm, the lad has a keen eye…”

“The hell are you two on about?”

After getting kicked in the shin by Senna both of the idiots backed away. Roland was surprised by the keen eye that Orson had when it came to women figures.

“Not bad…”

For one reason or another Armand nodded with approval at the two new adventurers he met. The three started looking at each other with a certain glint in their eyes before bursting out in laughter. This laughter brought frowns onto the female members of this conversation that started inching away from the trio.

‘I guess those three are equal in their perverseness, better not to leave Elodia alone with any of them. ’

Roland made a mental note of keeping his woman away from this trio of blockheads. He wouldn’t be surprised if not soon after they cleared things up, the three would start going to the redlight district together.

“Anyway… everyone, let's meet up at the church in fifteen minutes…”

“Do we have to?”

Asked Armand while throwing glances at Grisalde the new woman in town. Luckily after one ssiter from his big sister he just nodded. Agni’s papers needed to be taken care of which would take a bit of time. Thankfully with Elodia’s help, they were able to get these sorted out in about ten minutes.

…

“Here you go, please show this to the city guards whenever you take your tamed beast into the city. Also, remember to keep your beast muzzled at all times, if it causes any harm to a citizen, you will be held accountable for its actions.”

“Thank you.”

Roland nodded after seeing a stamp appearing on a small slightly above card-sized piece of paper. This thing was similar to an identification card, on the front it had his information written down while on the back there were six squares for a stamp.

It was clearly less intricate than the adventurer card that was not easily destroyed. Each time he gained a new tamed monster or his old one evolved he would need to get a new stamp of approval. The only magical part about this small document piece was this stamp that was radiating a faint mana fingerprint.

‘They probably have something to identify the stamp within the guild, it wouldn’t be easy to falsify this.’

While the document in itself would be easy to counterfeit the stamp would not. Perhaps in the thieves guild, there would be someone able to create a false card for a tamed beast that one didn’t want to have on the record. For instance, a poisonous creature could be tied to assassination but could be hidden behind a fake tamer card.

Some creatures looked similar to each other and could also have unique evolution options. Even wolf-type monsters such as Agni could evolve to have poison glands in their fangs if they were brought up in a poisonous environment. Food choices could also affect this as they did with his ruby wolf that liked to eat mana stones.

“I never get to see you anymore, want to go to the tavern?”

“Hm?”

After finishing his business he was hoping to quickly get the rest done soon. Yet when he returned to where Elodia was she was getting hugged from behind by a beautiful elf woman.

“The tavern? I’ll have to decline, I still have a few things to take care of… now let me go.”

“Should I?”

Solana was the one that was clinging to her old co-worker and making a scene. They didn’t have that much time on their hands so even with his aversion to social interactions he decided to go over to help Elodia out.

“Thanks for waiting, we can leave now.”

“Well, if it isn’t the famous Wayland, just the man that I’ve been looking for.”

“Hm?”

He didn’t like the sound of that, Roland intended to just give Elodia an excuse to leave earlier but instead, he seemed to be the focus of this ploy. Solana was quick to move toward him for a quick interrogation.

“Didn’t your mission involve Reeka? You probably heard the news, how did you manage to get here so fast?”

“I was just lucky and left before the incident…”

“That’s quite the luck you have there. The way back should be blocked, did you use a ship?”

Roland didn’t really want to talk about his involvement in the village incident or about the monsters in the city. There were probably records of him entering the guild in Reeka that Solana couldn’t confirm due to the attack. The only real proof was the ship that he arrived at, but he could always claim that he left the city right before the monster attacked.

“Yes? Now if you would excuse us.”

While Solana wasn’t his enemy, he didn’t have time. His closest companions came first, after everyone was checked he didn’t mind informing some of his allies about what truly happened there. Getting everyone in the city examined was something that needed to be done, Arthur was probably left in the dark even as the city lord. As his new boss, it would probably be good to inform him about the problem at hand.

“Wait…”

Yet when he was about to go he felt Elodia tugging on his robe. Her face said it all, it was clear that she wanted to explain everything to Solana but didn’t want to go ahead without his consent. Roland took a moment, the elven girl did help him in getting this mission sorted out quickly. Even though he almost died, it was his choice in the end.

“I’ll go with the others, you can meet us there after you are finished but on one condition, take Agni for now.”

“Awoo?”

Agni had been allowed into the guild filled with monster hunters as long as he had someone watching him. Roland couldn't go into the church together with his ruby wolf if Elodia wasn’t there to keep him company.

“Alright, be careful.”

Elodia smiled while nodding before turning back to Solana who was confused but intrigued. While the two were going to have a long conversation about the true movements of the Abyssal Cult he needed to get Armand and Lobelia checked. While the quartet of adventurers didn’t need a checkup they were still hanging with the new group.

When he arrived at the church without Agni in tow he could see two groups forming. On one side were the trio of leechers that were probably talking about women. On the other side were the women along with the two young men that hang around Lobelia.

“Hey, Wayland… Where is big sis?”

Asked Lobelia who was a bit confused.

“She stayed at the guild to take care of a few things, wait here I’ll go get Sister Kassia she will examine all of you.”

Luckily it didn’t take him long to get Kassia to let them in through the backdoor. Just like before Roland kept his eyes on everyone that was going in. This time around he noticed something peculiar, one of the people they came with looked strange. Their eyes started twitching and they started to sweat, it was as if they were feeling uncomfortable from being exposed to the environment of the temple…