Adventure

I walked into the town, cherry blossoms in my wake. The petals beautifully fall on the path as I walk through the grove.

I smile melancholily, remembering those who had passed. My feet crunched onto the rocks, sand and dirt. “Hey, you there. Come join us for a drink!” One of the guests at the tavern I was going to stop by later yells out to me, holding up his drink, his hand shaking like crazy. I roll my eyes, the drunkards probably aren’t even five drinks in, and they’re wobbling dangerously in their chairs. I pity them when they become sober again.

This is a town of dwarves, famously known for its cherry blossom ale. Of course, as dwarves are, they like their drinks and food strong, in alcohol and spices. Despite the name, cherry blossom ale is actually one of the most spicy and rich ales. This is Mara-Ni, the kingdom of the Northern Valley, after all. It’s a very laid back kingdom, with it being mostly farmers and brewers who live there, with the weather being immaculate for farming, the dwarves produce is some of the best around which is why they’re famous for their ale.

Back to the town, I was heading to the nearby adventurers guild to turn in some of the herbs I collected for my quest. Although a simple job, it was just fun to relax and not be constantly diving into dungeons and risking my life fighting monsters. I head into the building, walk up to the front desk, and hand over my herbs. The lady at the desk takes the herbs, weighs them, before handing me four copper. “Have a great day.” I say, and the desk lady nods “You too.” I now go back to the tavern I passed before on my way to the adventurers guild. I walk in the door, and immediately a wave of cheers and applause from the guests erupts. I chuckle, going to one of the tables, and grabbing a drink of ale, cherry blossom, of course.

Suddenly a yell pierces the air, and immediately I look around, and am on high alert. The sound is from Maggie, one of the elderly dwarves that works in the groves. The emergency bell tolls loudly as residents hurry out of the surrounding area. It’s a monster attack. “C’mon” says one of the more buff men, with green skin and tusks “Join us, it’s time for a hunt.” Although in a normally dwarven town, Jargob was an orc who absolutely dwarfed the short residents (pun intended). Thankfully for him and the dwarves-as they hate being reminded of their short height- he spends most of his time on the farm, only going out for times like these, when he can fight monsters, or to drink with the other monster fighting adventurer dwarves. I grin, and follow him.

We head to the monsters, who are just on the outskirts of town. Jargob takes out his giant club, many dwarves their axes. I take out a bottle that is filled with sand, smiling excitedly. I step up to the monsters, which are rat-like creatures, their ugly faces twisted into deplorable shapes. Opening the bottle, I take out a handful of sand, using my magic to control the sand, grouping them into tiny daggers that I shoot at the rat’s eyes. They whisk through the rats disgusting pale yellow eyes, and their shocked faces crumpled as they fall to the ground with thumps. Seven monsters of the thirteen fall dead. Jargob and Dargen, a dwarf adventurer that spends more time in the tavern drinking ale than actually fighting monsters, but is a decent fighter anyways, using his axe to take down around three of the remaining enemies, Jargob smashing the rest to pulp with his club. Many other dwarves around us are dealing with other rat monsters that had popped out from the surrounding bushes, but it had soon calmed down.

In total, there were around twenty rat monsters that had emerged. “It seems to meh like the monsters just keep increasin’. I guess there’s a dug’n (dungeon, although he pronounces it dud-g-n) nearby.” Says one of the older dwarves as he squats in front of one of the rats, digging around in its chest for a monster core. He chucks it, and the rest he had collected in a bag, then throws it to me “Take it to thee avnch’er (adventurer, he pronounces it ah-v-en-ch-er) guild thingy.” He waves his hand and speaks with a thick dwarven accent behind his long white beard. “Alright” I say. I take the cores to the guild, which exchanges them for 40 copper. I went back to the tavern, where all the other fighters were, and handed them out evenly. Eight people actually participated in the fighting, so they got five copper each.

As I was handing it out, one of the more drunken soldiers walked up to me “Be’ing stingy boy.” He drawled in a drunken tone, looking at my drink, which was just cherry juice. I just looked at him with annoyance. “Well unlike your drunk ass I want to be coherent tomorrow and not dealing with a hangover.” I sat down on one of the bar stools. The drunk from before was causing a stir, but I just ignored him for now. As he walked up to one of the other tables where a bunch of civilians were eating and started to disturb them, one of the other people started to stop the drunk. Flicking a bit of sand out of the jar, I condensed it, and sent it flying at the drunkard, cutting his hairy arm lightly. “Annoy them more and it’ll be more than a light cut.” I warn, before taking a sip of my juice. The bar falls silent as the man stares at me, the person trying to stop the drunk stopping dead in their tracks.

The drunk breaks out of their hold, and starts to walk over menacingly. “You dare try act tough, kid?” He said, and pointed to my drink “You’re drinking juice, for everything’s sake.” He says throwing his hands into the air, before slamming them down onto the bar. “So why don’t you take your juice and pretend to be an adventurer self to bed and take a nap.” He raised his voice as he said this. He grabbed my juice, throwing it across the room to smash onto the floor. To his and the patrons surprise, the glass, now smashed into pieces floated from where it had crashed on the floor, and floated to be behind me. “That was a stupid move, soldier. You should know better than to provoke an unknown enemy.” I say with an angry tone, then turn to the bartender, who is shocked like the rest. “I apologise for the inconvenience. I hope you can understand.” I bow, and the glass reforms on the bar. The juice is still on the floor. The bartender smiles kindly with a hint of surprise. “Oh, no, that's fine. I’ll just grab a cloth and wipe it up. Thank you for not causing too much of a scene.” She then heads off to find a cloth in order to get the juice off the floor. “I apologise on behalf of Gerdolf, he’s a great person, but just absolutely terrible when drunk.” Says a woman who was helping the drunkard up off the floor to which he had collapsed on before. “No, I understand.” I wave it off and sit with the rest of the adventurers, ordering another cherry juice.

Jargob laughed and patted my back heavily as I returned. “Did you see his face!!! It was hilarious.” The others laughed with him “He was so shucked (shocked, although he pronounces it sh-oo-ck-ed)” says one of the other dwarves. “Hunestlie (honestly, pronounced h-u-n-est-lie.) he’s stooopid if he thinks he can take on the Devil of the Sands.” I smirk at my old nickname “He was quite stupid.” We laugh and drink the night away.

In the morning, I pack my bags. Despite staying in this town for two years, I think it’s time for me to move on to the next place. I walk to Jargob’s forge first, waving him goodbye, before going around town and saying my goodbyes. When I was finally finished, I walked to the Battle Grove. A memorial for those who lost their lives last year in a fight against a monster horde that attacked the town suddenly with no warning, killing many. I kneel before the graves, paying my respects as I leave a dash of sand on the graves, signifying my respect as I stand up and start to leave. A smile upon my face, I finally walk out of the grove, confident to leave the dead behind, and onto the gravel road heading to the next town.