Chapter 128: Holisnow
———Lynda———
<10: 02 am>
“Huh. That’s rather appropriate.” I said as I looked up in the sky. The snowfall is coming back and painting the area in white. It’s the holidays. So there’s not much for any of us students to do than relax and do whatever the hell we want. There’s a school trip on Thursday, but it’s not like we have anything else better to do anyway. Lots of places are still renovating and being repaired, tourist destinations and other places aren’t really available for us. It’s probably the only place we really have to go to for anything resembling a vacation.
So right now, I’m just gonna relax in my backyard and not do anything else. I’m still feeling low on energy after all that stuff that happened yesterday.
Thankfully, he didn’t charge me more than I made on that day, but the return is still… not great, to put it lightly.
Drinking hot chocolate in this cold weather… Yeah. It’s really nice.
…I really don’t have anything to do, do I? Maybe I can go into… Nah, still tired. Better to not squander the time I can use to relax and recover. Even that doctor told me before leaving to not try anything funny for now.
———Kenni———
<10: 42 am>
“Well I can’t really say that those kinds of things ever happen. It’s mostly the same faces around here!” I replied, a bit amused at their remarks. “Outside of that streamer from outside. I haven’t really been seeing any trouble from fellow adventurers.”
“That’s because they were all scared shitless of you. Even before that stunt two days back, they all know how unpredictable you are.” Gregori said, sounding rather frustrated. “Why are you here so early anyway?”
“What? I don’t exactly have anything else to do. With the holidays there isn’t much to occupy the weekdays.” I think it’s pretty obvious what’s going on, surely a smart guy like him already figured that out. “The same could be said about you, you know that, right?”
“Unlike you who holed up in a dungeon for most of her free time, I haven’t been in one for a few days now. I’m starting to get rusty.” He said, as if that’s a better excuse. Also, we went to a dungeon not too long ago, that kind of reasoning isn’t that smart for a smartass. “So are we going to continue the dungeon run or not?”
“Why not? We’re only starting. With two of us, we could get to floor forty no problem. Mainly because of my skill, of course.” I should be able to get there even without his assistance, but we’re not aiming for a big long run here. No need to go further than that for now.
“Alright then.” He said before walking forward, taking the lead before we could discuss any plans. Guess we’re just going in guns blazing then.
———Karra———
<10: 59 am>
“And… we’re live!” I exclaimed. Not really any real plan for this one, but I don’t really have anything else to do anyway. This will be fine.
{Welcome back!}
{Hi}
{Hello}
{Scoop?}
{Where Wiina?}
“Okay folks. Stop being so hasty. I didn’t even get to say anything yet.” I said as I moved along the quiet snowing street. It’s a casual chatting stream, nothing more to it than that. “How has everyone’s day been? It’s the holidays, after all.”
{Pretty okay}
{So what are you doing today?}
“Just simple chatting for today. I mean I guess I could answer a few innocuous questions that have nothing to do with the incident two days back. I still can’t talk about that. I have no info on those, as you all know.” I need to make that clear so I won’t have so many questions I can’t answer flooded in… then again it doesn’t really work last time now does it? “Okay chat. Where should we go today? Just chatting is probably not super fun. I’m pretty confident with my speed. Where should we go? I know you guys probably don’t know about landmarks around here, so just… throw some suggestions.”
{Rooftop?}
{Inside a dungeon maybe?}
{You got one of those monster places nearby?}
{How about Philadelphia?}
Who in the world is suggesting another city… Is it because of what happened back then?
Well I’m just gonna wait until enough comments suggesting a place came in, then we can start a poll. Let’s go with four of the most popular ones, at least that I can see… Why is there so much Philadelphia!? Stop with that!
Ugh. What a mess of a chat. Hopefully once the poll starts there isn’t any unreasonable place.
“Just so you know, I can’t go to outer space or in the ocean just because some of you guys said it. I can’t do something like that.” I said before hopping onto a rooftop just so I can be alone and chat while not disturbing anyone. I’m kinda surprised there haven't been people complaining to me about this behavior.
Now since I’m only looking at places I can reasonably go to, that has to unfortunately include Philadelphia, since this town is basically at its outskirts. It won’t take long to technically enter it.
Okay then… Let me just look through all the suggestions here… There shouldn’t be too many that even counts. A bunch of troll answers come in, can just ignore those…
“Alright, I guess we can go with these fours…” I muttered before setting up the poll on my phone while my shoulder camera moved around just to show more of the current scenery. It’s snowing right now and I want that to be seen clearly, to get some good shots of the city in the snow. “Okay, so we have… Dungeon, the mall, the local cheesesteak restaurant, I didn’t even realize how many of you know about that, and then there’s… Philadelphia. Why.”
Of course I can’t actually just deny the request since it’s not as if it’s that hard. Just that I might cause some public disturbance by how fast I am moving around. Hopefully they don’t actually vote for that… They’re gonna vote for that, aren’t they…
———Lerim———
<11: 34 am>
“Why are you still here?” He asked, trying to not sound annoyed even though he definitely is. Is guildmaster work that stressful for him to start complaining about trivial stuff like this?
“Why not? I’d rather save the electricity. How many times am I gonna say that? Besides, I think I’m a pretty good deterrent to people causing trouble.” There’s a bunch of people who are fearful of me. Kinda uncalled for considering how much good I have done for the community. Like did they forget who killed those snakes for them?
“I’m surprised you took that whole deal so well, considering… you know…” He said, starting to sound a bit awkward. There’s a few things he could mean by that. What ever could it be?
“If it’s more beneficial for me in the long run, then it’s fine. If I stress out about this way too much I’m gonna get some bad wrinkles later on.” Sometimes the best thing to do is shut your brain off and forget all of your worries. Can’t really do that in an obviously dire situation, but right here and now during the time where people don’t really do anything? I think that's a fine time to be more relaxed. He should also be more relaxed. I mean he doesn’t really do that much in the first place. Seriously, what does a guildmaster even have to do?
“Sometimes I have to wonder if you’re the smartest person I know, or the… opposite.” Hey, what in the world is that supposed to mean? “Alright then, I’m not going to bother you with that. Maybe help out the other adventurers. Some probably tried to go into the dungeon now that they have more free time.”
“At that point it has nothing to do with me now, does it?” I can’t really help someone if they’re already dead or near-death. I have some healing spells, but I doubt it’d be enough to bring someone back from the brink of death. “It’s not like we have a system for renting out fellow explorers. The process in general is very barebones. Just go into the dungeon and get some stuff. This place doesn’t even have good pay.”
“It is a quick way to get cash, at least.” He said, trying to say something positive now that he has to work as the head of the branch. It’s a stable job for a guy who has mostly just been a vigilante fighting anyone who gets out of line. Too bad for him that a lot of people are still traumatized from that battle a few months back. When was it even? It’s at least two months ago, I think.
Having the building roof starting to collapse on you while you were fighting for your life against a bunch of dangerous criminals will do that. I’m kinda surprised I don’t have any trauma from that, which is nice since I don’t want to spend money on a therapist.
“Not a lot, but hey, basically zero requirements aside from a really long and pointless interview.” I sarcastically mentioned. It’s probably good enough for some people. I mean you don’t really need to have any discipline for this. “So, aren’t you gonna go back to your office? It’s not like the holidays applied to you.”
“Please don’t remind me…” He said before taking a long sigh. “I’ll go relax in my room then, if that’s what you want.”
And there he goes. Hopefully he can actually get some time to take a break. The fact that they have no idea how to organize means that they don’t know when a guildmaster should or shouldn’t be working. They’re doing these things on a shoestring budget and only a few weeks worth of deliberation.
Now let’s see what nonsense is on the news today.
“<And now onto the recent news. It has been discovered that the salt from the recent world-wide event is decided to not be harmful. So do not be afraid if anyone has chosen to pick it up and consume it, though we still recommend everyone to not use it and send it to your local explorer’s assembly.>” Does anyone actually call the guilds that anymore? Guild is a lot shorter, just saying. Anyway, this doesn’t really matter for me, I already sent it to the guild the moment that snake rain was over with. While I don’t really mind free salt, it’s also already quite cheap and it’s better to not risk my health in the first place. “<In terms of damages. The total value is still being calculated, but at this point and time it is believed that the cost for fixing all the damages that has affected the whole world to be in multiple billions dollars and counting.>”
That is not really surprising. Even though a lot of snakes were killed before they could even hit the ground, the ones that do are way too strong for most people to fight, let alone kill.
In this town alone the total number of people who can fight those things could be counted on one hand.
“The hell do you mean I only get four dollars!?” Someone yelled out while I tried to watch the news to kill some time. Looks like the poor receptionist is getting harassed for this.
“I-I’m sorry. But this is what the experts have calculated. Please understand. We can hand over the money right away.” She said, looking rather terrified. The guy isn’t big or anything, but he does have quite the ugly expression on him due to how bad his mood is right now.
“That won’t cut it! Get me more than double that!” Why is this guy in such a bad mood? It’s not like the low pay is not known to the public.
“I-I really can’t! It’s against regulation…” She meekly said, trying to get the guy to calm down.
“You damn bitch!” He screamed out, taking out his club, looking like he’s going to hit her. Too bad the guildmaster isn’t here right now. Guess I have to do this myself and use his name just so all the blames go to him.
*Swing* *Dash* *Strike*
“Urghgh!” I struck him right in the stomach before he could swing the club down and hit the desk, causing him to collapse to the floor and drop his club. Looks like he’s not dead. Good. Looks like I still remembered how to hold back. Been fighting so many monsters lately that I’m afraid I might slip up.
“Sorry, no violence in the guild, especially against the staff.” I casually said before looking at the receptionist. “Let the guildmaster deal with this later. Explain the situation to him, and make sure to not say anything you don’t need to, got that?”
She nodded, clearly frightened. Now then, let’s bring this guy to the healing room. Is there anyone stationed there right now?
It’s easy enough to lug this guy to the room… Doesn’t look like there’s anyone here right now. Alright then, let’s put him on the bed and let the others take care of it.
And now time to go back and watch the news, wasting my time away but not wasting any money on having stuff in my house running.
Funnily enough this place is probably not as cold as outside, with all the snow. So it’s not like I need to be here if I want to relax in a place that isn’t hot and damp, but the snow is really not good, might make me catch a cold.
Hmm… Yeah, doesn’t look like there’s any other news even worth listening to. Now it’s just more mundane stuff I don’t care for…