1.25 Three Second First Dates
The next few days were simple.
Wake. Eat. Learn. Eat. Learn. Eat. Read. Sleep.
Wake. Eat. Learn. Eat. Learn. Eat. Read. Sleep.
Wake. Eat. Learn. Eat. Learn. Eat. Read. Sleep.
The monotony continued to be a blessing and a curse. Vicktor was learning more and more, learning how the world worked and how he might slot himself into it. He kept improving his physicality, meditation ability, and knowledge of both the dangerous of the and how best he might defeat them.
There were a couple of enemies that he could not find easy ways to defeat, mainly those who flew or who attacked from trees. He had the ability to protect him and a potential party from those attacks, but he didn't have any way to easily attack back. Not unless the enemies were particularly foolish or slow and could be tricked into flying into spike or deadfall traps.
Alar and Nora were still reasonably comfortable with the prospect of taking down such a creature, but Vicktor was still apprehensive, it was quite a hard counter to his abilities, but such things were common. Huge explosions from fireballs were as deadly from pressure as they were from heat, but those aspects could be blocked with clever magic.
The flame wolves of Doru Ita to the south, could melt armor into slag with a fiery bite, but treated leathers or specific engravings could withstand the scorching heat.
Nora had even heard of mages and chosen with inscriptions explicitly designed for extreme temperature control, insulating against both frostbite and heat stroke. Apparently there was some debate about how to handle the heat generated as well as the body's sweat glands. If not treated, the body would rapidly overheat, an hour of simply existing was enough to be equivalent to a mild fever and death could occur within 3 hours.
Alar had partially dismissed Vicktor's worry, saying: "It's just an engineering problem that can be solved, it's always about what trade-off's you are willing to bear. Maybe it can be turned on and off at will or there's some way to vent the heat."
It sounded correct in theory, but Vicktor still had doubts. Perhaps it was like the transmutation of lead into gold, technically feasible, but hideously inefficient...
Vicktor's daily monotonous schedule was interrupted when he received a letter.
'news from Master Tosk perhaps?'
It was not to be, but it was scrawled in a familiar hand and stamped with the divine scales of Ultar.
Selia had returned!
Dear Vicktor,Vicktor's heart fluttered in his chest, surprised by how much he had missed the dragonkin.I hope this finds you well. We arrived in Allium late last night. My party wishes to celebrate a successful quest with drinks and food.
A certain horned member has been yapping non-stop about you and "that bird-boy-toy"
It got really insufferable when she got hurt, her legs got torn up fairly badly. It would have been cute if she actually used his name more than one in twenty times.
I know this is a roundabout way to ask this, but given your friend is about to intimately know her third horn, would you be interested in going on a date tonight? I'm not sure if you would consider this a first or second date. Our party will be at the same inn as last time.
I'm not opposed to sneaking away again, but it's always fun for everyone to brag about their recent deeds. Havlan borrowed an idea from you that they will want to tell you about.
Come on by if you can.
May the wind and sun be at your back,
Selia
He looked over towards Alar's bunk, the avian was still, intensely focused on his own letters, after a few moments, the avian turned the page over. To Vicktor's chagrin, there was a second and third page. The third page towards the bottom seemed overly wrinkled, like it had been wet and then dried again.
Alar began to get positively flustered, his beak slightly ajar and his eyes were just a tad too wide and focused on the writing. After finishing the third and final page, the man brought the final page up to his beak. His eyes shot wider than Vicktor had ever seen them.
"She didn't!" Vicktor laughed.
"She did", Alar responded, still partially stunned.
"Well I guess I know what our plans are", Vicktor said, still laughing.
"Let's find Nora and find some water to drink, we are gonna need it huh?"
Nora pushed in the double doors of the inn, striding in, hair loose on her shoulders with far too much poise and grace than she had shown moments before, teasing the feathers off the poor owlkin apprentice.
She wore the same black leather outfit that she had worn to the adult bookstore earlier in the week. It was back to being one solid dark hue again. It showed far too much skin. A new necklace adorned her throat, a silver and gold symbol of Eldurel, three elderberries encased within a drop of blood.
Vicktor followed behind a few steps back wearing his usual robes. Alar was surprisingly shy as he entered several steps behind him.
"Hey, over here!!!" yelled a familiar drunken voice. Havlan was swaying on their stool, waving with both hands. Vicktor glanced at the people around Havlan, who were looking back over at them, or at least trying to. Team Shallot was properly hammered.
As the apprentices approached, Havlan yelled again, "guess all three of you got your letter's huh? Havlan was so bored yesterday, everyone was writing, no-one was fighting, Lav didn't even write a letter! HA!", Two large sets of hands forced the still laughing leather-wrapped person down off their stool and onto the ground.
'Wait, three letters, wasn't it only two?'
Vicktor turned to where Nora had moved towards. His eyes went wide, Nora and the Chosen of Calva, Meryl, were making out, hands draped around each other.
Viktor turned to Alar, to see his thoughts on the development, but he too was occupied. The avian was exploring the mouth of Gralgra who held the smaller avian up by his rear.
"Ahhh, the depravity of the common folk", came a warm deep feminine voice. Vicktor turned to the sound, Selia was looking at him with a warm smile, similar to the one that she had given to him right before their own previous depravity. Instead of armor, she wore a simple low-cut gown of purple linen, it hugged every inch of her scaled flesh. Her wings hung behind her, tight against her back. One of her horns was missing a few inches. "Are we to partake in a similarly common display of desire?"
Vicktor wondered how deliberate her word choice had been. He decided to lean into it.
"My dear lady, may I request a chaste kiss? There are many commoners in this establishment and I would not besmirch your honor in such a house of lusty debauchery!"
He paused for a moment, then added in a quieter tone, "this time..."
Selia grinned wickedly, "Verily, I do intend to do far, far more, but forsooth, A chaste kiss and for you to lend an ear is all I demand at present, my lord."
She stepped forwards, easily a foot taller than him. His eyes moved from her pronounced silver bust to her twinkling eyes. Closer still, she lowered her head, he raised himself up on the balls of his feet. Their hands met, holding onto each other gently.
Their lips met in a quick, simple kiss. Warmth flooded Vicktor's heart and mind. He could taste the alcohol on her breath, it was a surprisingly inviting feeling.
Vicktor returned his heels to the cold stone floor as Selia regained her royal posture.
They smiled warmly at each other for a few moments, hands still clasped, heat pouring between their connection. It was as if time stood still.
"Havlan buy Vicktor drink! Stories and traps!!!", said the shorter person, before Lav grabbed their
Vicktor continued smiling, "Alright then, tell me of battles and beasts! Definitely tell me how Selia's horn got hurt!"
The four of them walked back over to their seats. Leaving the more impassioned folk to their business. Selia's and Vicktor's hands still intertwined.
"So there we were, defending this poor gods forsaken caravan against a pack of wolves, all remarkable beasts. Gralgra and Selia were on the forest floor, protecting the flanks of the aurochs as they pulled along the wagons." Lav took a large draft of ale. Others took the opportunity to advance their intoxication.
Alar, Nora and Vicktor had all had to catch up, so they had started with some particularly strong brandy. They were a bit behind the Chosen, but only just.
Alar was once again sitting on Gralgra's lap, the two were flushed and giggling uproariously at everything.
Nora and Meryl were only slightly more composed, they kept leaning into each other, whispering something, causing the other to go red in the face, trying to hide it with more drink, only exacerbating their blushing.
Vicktor and Selia were far more composed from an outsider's view, they sat next to each other in a bench, holding hands. They did not whisper. Vicktor's face felt warm, a combination of the alcohol and the feeling of another so close to him for an extended period of time.
Vicktor and Selia's hands stayed between them, but they were not idle. Their hands danced across the others, touching insides of palms, backs of hands and tracing fingertips.
Havlan just sat, drank and listened. They seemed not particularly interested in the budding relationships around them.
Lav smiled nigh constantly, eyes moving around checking on people every once in a while. It was surprisingly motherly despite them all supposedly being of similar age.
Lav continued, "I stayed at the back of the last wagon, healing where I could. The guardsmen were quite brave and well equipped, but they are only marginally more powerful than the mundane. We had lost two guardsmen at this point and another five were wounded. Will and Tara. Will was killed in the initial ambush and Tara died of blood loss before I could get to her."
She sighed, then took another drink, checking to see if anyone's mug was empty.
"Havlan and Meryl were on the top of the wagon I was in. Most of the guardsmen were on the other wagons, crossbow bolts raining down. It's unfortunate that we weren't able to collect the bodies of the wolves, which would have gone a long way to helping the families of Will and Tara."
"Havlan impatient! Get to the good part!" said Havlan, jittering in their seat.
Nora whispered something into Meryl's ear, whose normally pale face turned crimson.
"Yes, Yes. We were able to kill off all the wolves and then stopped the wagons to make inventory and do additional healing. But, while we were stopped, an owlbear came to sniff out the bodies."
Vicktor decided to lean into the drama of the situation again, "That's an enhanced beast! Last time I checked you were all tier one, that must have been a hard fight!"
"Last time you checked, yes" Lav laughed, "I'm sure you'll check again when it's socially polite to do so. For the sake of suspense, please keep it in your pants."
Nora and Meryl began to whisper and chuckle again. Gralgra leaned forwards and just licked the back of Alar's feathered head, a shudder running through him.
"So, the owlbear, as big as an auroch, has a beak bigger than your head and claws a foot long. Honestly, he was just as or even more terrifying than I had expected."
"The first we noticed of him was when he bit the leg clean off a fallen wolf, with a soft pop. It raised up its maw and swallowed the leg whole. Then he let out a deep booming cawww. Selia signaled for the carts to start again, then her and Gralgra moved towards the back of the caravan."
"Gralgra was the first to strike, delivering a blow to the creature's side. The owlbear barely responded. I saw that weapon pulverize a wolf skull not an hour earlier. Selia struck next as it tried to take a bite of a guardsman. Her sword came away red, but only about four inches from the tip."
A round of repressed chuckles came from the eight drunk idiots. Even Lav gave into the mirth a little.
"The guardsman lost their sword arm, clean through his armor, but he was able to scurry back to me where I stopped the bleeding. Adam, I think his name was."
Selia continued the story, hand still dancing over Vicktor's, "We tried to whittle the beast down, but we could only deal light blows. Meryl was able to hit it with her ray of false death, but it only slowed the creature instead. Havlan was able to get an eye with one of their daggers, but that mostly only enraged that stupid bear. That was when Gralgra tried something dumb."
Gralgra pulled her birdboytoy closer, before retorting. "It wasn't dumb, we were out of our usual tricks and needed to try something else. I thought it was a good idea to try and break one of their legs. Lav is really underselling how fast that fucker was. It dodged even before you swung sometimes. So I tried to bait it into a charge, so I could use the momentum to break a foreleg."
"Such a dumb idea", Selia retorted.
"It worked, didn't it?" Gralgra huffed.
"You got mauled for it!" Selia said with a worried face, "You got trampled! I had to drag your enormous ass back to Lav. You should lose some weight."
"What do you think? Alar?" Gralgra said, holding onto the nervous avian.
"I think you're fine, you have a lot of muscle and that's going to weigh a lot, I'm not sure how much you could realistically lose" Alar said, moving feathered hand up to Gralgra's neck.
Lav brought the conversation back, "Anyway, I try patching her up, but I quickly realize she's not getting back into the fight anytime soon. That's when Havlan came up with an idea."
"Havlan look ahead, see leaning tree, remember how Vicktor beat us."
"It was honestly bullshit and it shouldn't have worked, Havlan", Meryl finally joined the conversation.
"But it did! Selia held off the beast for over a minute while we set up the deadfall trap," Havlan said. "Only a little bit of horn damage. Havlan drops the tree on the owlbear's back, spine goes CRUNCH!!!"
Lav continued, "Selia finished off the squirming beast. A two-handed blow straight down on its skull!"
"Hey, Alar, Vicktor. That was an excellent story. But I think these brave Chosen deserve some rewards for their service to humanity?"
Alar squirmed in place, "I think we should, but I want to know if anyone reached tier two?"
"Just me", Selia said slightly nervously, although that means that everyone else isn't too far behind.
"Speak for yourself", Lav said, "My requirements are different than yours."
"Still, it's just a matter of time. And speaking of time, It's getting a little late, and it's time for those rewards Nora mentioned."
"Stay safe, no creation, or destruction of life!" Lav chuckled fiercely.