It was four when we got there. I was able to get a refund on the dress even though it was already incredibly cheap. I guess it was better I got the dress because I wouldn't have been able to get a refund on a sheet I cut for a ghost costume.
We headed to the guild afterward. We had five hours to kill before it was night. The guild had a lot more hustle then we were used to. A crowd surrounded Baydí. We squeezed past some people to look. Baydí looked excited.
"It's been going so well! I've been enjoying training all the little adventures for the tournament in a week. You should see all the mistakes they made that would have killed me if I made them during a fight."
A group of older adventurers all laughed around her.
"Thankfully, they have room for mistakes."
"Baydí? Are you getting enough sleep? Your eyes look extremely baggy." Someone asked her.
"Not a lot of full dragons but this is normal for four eyes." Baydí stood up and laughed loudly. Her sword jingled against her armor.
"Where are you going?"
"I do think I should take a little nap. It's been a lot of work with the training camp, and I don't want to over do it." Baydí slipped past the crowd as they continued to talk to each other.
She ran right into me and Stella while she was walking out.
"Oh, isn't it the Phoenix and her cousin?"
"It is." I responded.
"Hows it been? You've only been to one day of my camp. How you holding up? Using that method I showed with mana?"
"I haven't. I haven't found a time."
"I have. Pretty frequently too." Stella responded.
"Huh? When did you?"
"I had time while we walked from places or at night."
"That's great. Phoenix you follow after your cousin more."
"Alright.. I'll try."
Stella and Baydí talked for a bit longer without. I just stood there with my fingers tapping against my leg.
"Sweet! Well I'd love to talk more but it's been tiring talking lately so I'm off to sleep. Have fun and do well." She walked past us before turning one more time. "Don't be scared to come by again. I'd love to have ya."
With that she turned away her sword rattling against her armor.
"Let's find something quick that will be quick." I hopped towards the quest board, examined it for a while and grabbed a sheet. "Let's do this one."
I waved one with a decently scary tall creature on it. The creature stood on its hind legs. Its four extremities were the color of dark red blood, and its body was covered in a long coat of fur. The fur had a rippling texture of the same dark red color. The fur itself was light yellow.
"Heo."
"We got this, it's only one rank above us."
"Let me see its details." I handed it to her and she scanned a QR code on the paper. "Mhhh"
"What about it?"
"It's not a strong one of its kind. If the arms or hair are brighter then it's stronger apparently. It can attack both like a wolf or humanoid. The hands on this one don't look to have claws. It was spotted within the capital's dark red line, so not too far out. Towards the city AppleSteel."
"Thats probably where all the applestones come from."
"We'll its a very rabid beast and considered an anomalied beast because its record wasn't till a century after the fool's death."
"That means it can have very special abilities…"
"Yeah. We can technically take it. It's said that we should watch out for a dash the most…" We decided on the quest to eliminate it
After a forty minute car ride, we got to the city. The streets were packed with small stalls. Each stall sold small metal trinkets. People walked between the stalls, most of them walking with dragging pockets. The prices on each were incredibly high. We stopped by a stall with hand sized metal swords.
"Would you be interested in a pocket blade?" A crouched young man asked.
"Could we look at them?" I asked, He'd probably push us off if he knew how broke we are.
"Absolutley!" He grabbed one with the most expensive price tag.
"Ohh, it's kinda heavy. What's it made out of?"
The man stared at me for a second, blinked his eyes, then a sharp glint appeared in his eyes.
"It's an applestone alloy with iron, but the rare applestone is mixed specially by myself to maximize its usage because of its brittle nature."
"SEE! I knew applestone was rare! That swindling Angel took all of it from us."
The man again blinked and pointed towards the sword.
"Put a small amount of magic into it."
Stella reached over and did it before I could. The sword's handle grew to fit my hand before the blade shot out.
"Wow.." We both said in unison.
"Very unfortunate we're broke." I said handing it back to him. He took the blade and looked blindly at us…
"Could I ask why you are here? In AppleSteel?"
"A quest to kill time, we got a date with a few pumpkins."
The man stood there baffled as we walked off. Once we were far enough I asked Stella.
"Why did you put magic into it?"
"I didn't trust yours"
"Fair"
The quest had specified that it had been seen a little outside the city and had gotten close sometimes but no one was scared enough to eliminate it. The amount of sightings in AppleSteel was high and attacks were regular. Like most base monsters, average people could easily dispatch them, even if they work an average job and could be the farthest thing from fit, but evil monsters require years of training to get rid of.
Anomalied monsters were given their category for a few traits they share. One is they are never seen before and pop up randomly. Two is eventually they are seen as having specific requirements for them to be born in, they aren't born from a parent. That at least makes it easier for laws to be put in place to prevent them, but with the amount of Anomalied that exist not everyone knows what causes them. The strongest Anomalied are the seasonal Weather Eaters. Their condition is extreme unnatural weather or the change in it. They have what is called a strand of destruction, named after the Hero of chaos. It's the oldest Anomalied monster, which makes some think it's not Anomalied but rather an animal monster with just a specific spawn.
This Anomalied is called a Derstboil. They are born in hotter areas with frequent loud sounds or just a loud sound in general. This is what makes them so bad, the extremely easy requirement for them. With this, loud things have been banned worldwide, like explosions, guns, things of that nature. Of course because of certain extreme monsters, explosions can be obtained with permits. Magic can recreate guns and as long as they're made quiet and of course the government knows you have one they are allowed. Most of these laws are made by the United regions of Mila, who require all other states to follow, Kalmic and Fayha being the only to really strictly follow it. The other two states could care less.
We headed to the back of the city after looking around and admiring how broke we are. Stella I could see was, with a small amount of magic, continually spinning it. My flames at the top of my head bounced around playfully. The hilly land opened up to mountains and at the base of one, right outside the city, was a small little cave. Most likely a previous dungeon that hasn't collapsed. Dark red human footprints led into the cave.
"We don't have time to go look for it in there, Heo."
"Yeah, we might have to abandon this one, and it would have been the first anomalied we fought."
"Unfortunate. We spent money on a car ride here and everything."
"The town was nice to see. Even if everything was way too expensive." Turning back around, I pull out my phone. "We wasted around two hours, it's kinda dark now. Let's head back."
"Ok"
Spinning on our feet we headed back. After a few steps I shot the cave one more glance. Kinda is a shame I don't get to fight that giant hairy bloody mess.
Stella turned to me, then to the cave. Her eyes widened. Light yellow fur stretched from ten feet up to the floor where more lay. Dark red arms shot out and stood at the side of the creature. Legs that popped out of its fur and stretched down in a grotesque look. More dark red little stings or spikes crawled across the fur. The creature stood on its back legs, which were more animal shaped than human. Its arms ended with three fingered hands. The nails on the hand were missing, so were the claws. The hands being closer to a human's meant one thing, the specific creature has eaten one of us before.
Stella's fist tightened around her new staff. The small rectangles on the staff sharpened into points. The handle of the staff lined itself with a pattern of grip tape interwoven intricately and perfectly even. The yellow grew brighter, outshining the bronze. She lifted the staff. I grabbed the flames on my head and smoothed them back into horns, curling part of my hair in with it.
"It's weak, so don't expect the greatest amount of intelligence. Stay back and fire off spells."
"Got it."
I ran up on the monster. Its hand fell like an anchor. I easily dodged. I pulled gravity around my hand and lightened my entire arm. My arm flew faster, and, once it landed, I increased the weight. The derstboil's body flew to the side. I hopped back to examine it.
The fur simply wafted back to the first position. My hit barely hurt it. The body fully landed on the floor, in a position similar to a wolf. Though if the wolf was a human in a costume. It pranced out, encircling me, and leaving nasty stains in the ground.
Stella's staff fired off a flaming pumpkin. It was odd seeing her shoot that out in a battle where our lives were on the line, but that was probably the pumpkin Queen's intention when granting us that. If the boost from the pumpkin wasn't strong enough, the staff seemed to boost it slightly. The ball hit the creature and knocked it on its side.
Hoping at the opportunity I jumped above it and landed as hard as I could, switching my weight exponentially. The fur of its body was easily passthroughable and I landed weirdly, twisting my leg. The dark red of the derstboil burst into flames.
I grinned my teeth, pushing myself as far away as I could. I hopped back only to save my clothes. I doubt that fire will hurt either me or Stella. It stood up but Stella had dropped multiple spears around it. Pure magic spears instead of fire. It was trapped between them.
I formed a blade of gravity, and poured just enough to fill it with magic. It wasn't nearly as deadly as my flames but I doubted the flames would hurt it that badly. I rested the blade as I shot towards the creature. My leg jolted with just enough pain to drop me on the floor.
Stella lined another spell and I was recovering. The derstboil's dark red lines flared on its fur. The yellow fur moved off the center of its body and wrapped around one arm. It was a mess looking. Two arms coming out of each other, the same thing happening with the legs. The arm winded up and shattered a spear. Then it grabbed another off the ground and threw it at me.
The spear flung with incredible speed. I blinked and thought of the universal being skill. I reached to activate it in my head. My body had almost teleported, the way I hurled myself away from the thought. Fear encroached my head and drool spilled over my lips as my eyes welled up and sweat covered my body. The hair on my body all stood up like little daggers piercing into my skin.
The spear was in the ground a few feet in front of me. My horns had become jagged and some of the ends poked into my head. My sword had disappeared as I no longer was able to focus on it. Sometimes I wonder if this is what it feels like to have hero syndrome. This fear and delusion. I was finally able to shake it off and the derstboil was already heading towards me.
It got close and the extra red lines on its fur disappeared and its legs got thicker. Then a sudden jolt and it was in front of me. Its speed was the thing it was known for in battle. I rolled out of its fist, forming another sword as quickly as I could. It shot again towards me. My arm was hit as I dodged. It repeated this dodge.
Stella couldn't attack it while it was moving this fast so she switched to my defense. She laid two flaming shields around me. Both with pumpkins carved into the base. Eventually the sword formed. Once the derstboil dashed and deflected off a shield I slashed at it. The sword cut the fur, some fell off but the rest of my sword followed the direction the hair was moving and flowed between. It seemed infuriated and the fire on its body grew hotter. It even kinda tingled the air around us.
The fur moved to all four of its legs, and the yellow hue grew darker. It shot at me way faster than the other dashes had been and the spear combined. I couldn't dodge it. Its fist landed on my chest and probably shattered a rib or three. I fell and tried my best to maintain the sword. Its body only grew hotter. It stood up on its hind legs again. It released a devilish howl. It dropped back to the ground preparing to dash again.
I recalled information I overlooked because I knew the monster wasn't strong. At higher levels of this monster it can and has been documented to break the sound barrier.
The goblin slash performed down in the dungeon was nowhere near as deadly as this. Not even the keeper could use a dash this quick and proficient. Stella's shields moved in front of me. The next dash shattered both and blocked some of the blows but it quickly switched angles and shot at me again.
When I was in the dungeon, I was able to mimic the goblins slash which was just a little different from this. I don't think I could break the sound barrier... I used the slash and dodged the attack with most of my body. My left arm popped out of socket. I used it again to dodge back, Stella had another barrier on me then two. I was able to fix my arm before turning to properly face the hurling creature.
It looked at me with, maybe, a sense of curiosity. I dashed, swinging the sword forward, and with the momentum, whiffing the attack, and spinning with a chunk of gravity laced kick. Its body conversed, and I hopped back once more, getting a decent enough distance.
It stabilized itself and shot towards me again with deadly speed. This time, I used the goblin slash, timing it perfectly to throw the blade deep into the fur. I released the gravity and an explosion of magic incinerated the fur and left the four connected limbs exposed. The two pairs fell from each other, leaving two arms and two legs wiggling on the floor.
"Ew." Stella said, forming a spell to kill them.
A hint of my flames was in the explosion, and what didn't instantly evaporate burned to ash. It was fire resistance, not immune. Not yet immune. If I fight another, spells work better than trying to cut their fur off.
"You think they're two different creatures now?" Stella looked at me and at the damage I obtained. Her face grew pale.
"HEO! YOU'RE VERY HURT!"
"I know, my arm was dislocated too."
"W-we need to get you to a hospital."
"I'll be fine, let's finish them off." Stella looked down and shot two spears into them.
"They're dead. Let's go, NOW!" Stella said.
I leaned down and grabbed the two vile body parts. "What are you doing?" Stella said as if she were my mother.
"Do we need proof of kill?"
Stella sighed and reached for her phone. The two dark red body parts connected and conversed in my hand.
"Ew!" I threw a handful of gravity magic at it. Its blood splattered on the floor and around me, finally dissipating into just a liquid. Stella leaned down and snapped a photo of it, with me covered in its blood next to it.
"That'll be good."