NOVEL NEXT 19: The Debut of the Ass Clap Associates
The morning sun began to rise, peeking out over the buildings that made up the landscape of the Rexan capital. As trees swayed in the wind, dancing as the world began to begin moving, with people traveling to work, children going to school, and stores beginning to open.
Near the Adventurer’s Guild, one of the taller, larger, and more popular buildings in the city was a lone figure. Standing against the front wall, rubbing her eyes and hugging her two swords, Kaitlyn waited, enjoying the morning chill while waking up.
Waving at an adventurer acquaintance as they walked into the Guild building to get a quest for the day, Kaitlyn went back to staring off into the distance, watching her breath make condensate in the air, creating a small white cloud in front of her.
“What was the point of a meeting before the sun had even risen...” Kaitlyn complained under her breath, watching people meander by, having just woken up, “Jayce... you really gotta schedule things better.”
Before getting lost in her thoughts once more, Kaitlyn was interrupted by a shout, looking up to see an energetic Rachel followed by a sleepy and hungover trio made up of Oliver, Josephine, and Damien.
Jogging over, Rachel, with an enthusiastic greeting, came to a stop before Kaitlyn, asking, “Have you been waiting long? Sorry we were a little late, dragging people out of bed this morning was a real pain.”
Following her comment, Rachel mouthed, ‘Oliver’, with a not-so-subtle hand motion, before chuckling with a light salute, “Anyhow, team leader, I’ll see you in there~ I’ll go get a table for our previously planned breakfast.”
“No... I’ll come with you,” Kaitlyn murmured, sighing as she watched the other three stagger along towards the Guild, “Let’s just start without them, I’ll order them some of the Guild’s anti-hangover drinks.”
With a tranquil expression and a wise nod, Rachel held the door open for Kaitlyn, “Okay, sounds good, let’s just find a table near a window or something to settle down at.”
However, contrary to her calm expression, on the inside, Rachel was ecstatic, ‘She’s going to come with me!! Look at me go, smoothest lesbian in the 2 dimensions! You got this Rachel, be smooth, calm and collected, be zen!’
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Settled at the table, plates of breakfast spread across the solid dark wood table, the party made light conversation as people woke up. Having chosen a table that was adjacent to a large window, the otherworlders, having come up with a team name, explained to Kaitlyn their logic behind it.
“... Really? Ass Clap Associates? Like... why...”
“Okay... okay... I know, we all know it’s bad,” Rachel began, having put down her utensils to explain, “We couldn’t think of anything better... or good in general-”
“IT’S GOOD, OKAY?!” Damien shouted, indignant that his brilliant naming sense was being slandered, “This is the best party name ever!”
At the other end of the table, the one farther from the window, Oliver, along with Josephine, both half-asleep, ate their food in silence, ignoring the commotion from the other three, making some light conversation.
“How did you sleep?”
“Like shit.”
“Me too...”
“...”
“How’s the food?”
“...Alright...”
“...”
Ignoring Damien’s outbursts of energy before going back to being a zombie, Rachel nodded, “So... yeah we just decided to go with the A.C.A. since we didn’t have anything else that was better...”
“I-... I see...” Kaitlyn nodded, still a little bemused but deciding to just go along with it, “You should go register it at the front desk before we leave then, just go to the lady over there and tell her, it shouldn't take too long.”
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“Ahhh~ The wind feels so nice~” Oliver rejoiced, his hair being blown out of his face, “so... Ogre extermination was it?”
Walking down the forest path, the party now a ways away from town, Kaitlyn nodded, staying alert for any potential surprises.
Moments later, as the party was moving down the path towards where the ogres had been spotted, Kaitlyn stopped the party, turning back to whisper, “Few ahead, three on the left and two on the right.”
Seeing the newly-minted Ass Clap Associates move towards the three on the left, Kaitlyn pulled the Damien and Rachel back, motioning for the party to go towards the two on the right, “The rest should be in that direction, so kill those two and keep scouting, the three on the left seem to be venturing off, so I’ll just quickly kill them and meet back up with you two.”
With a light nod, Kaitlyn prepared to run off towards the ogres before freezing and looking back at the four, asking, “... You all can kill 2 ogres, right? Like... confidently, yeah?”
“Yeah... Ogres are B-ranked, you know?” Josephine reminded, wrapping her fists with some cloth, “We’re pretty much like low-tier A-Ranked Adventurers. We also out number them two to one, we should be fine. If we’re not, we kinda deserve to die.”
The rest of the party nodding in agreement, Damien murmured, “Yolo, too.”
Jabbing Damien in the side, Rachel pulled Damien along while beginning to walk towards where the ogres had been spotted, “No need to worry about us, we do have a fair amount of training, A-Rank is quite powerful!”
Shushing Rachel, Oliver nodded with a light smile, “We got this. Go slaughter them over there.”
Reassured by their reasoning and a little embarrassed that she had forgotten they held many advantages over the ogres, Kaitlyn rushed off, unsheathing both of her swords while running through the undergrowth.
“... Stinky.”
Crinkling her nose, Kaitlyn was once again reminded of the lack of bathing habits most monsters had, along with their great tenacity to smell as bad as possible.
“I really need to figure something out that’s not monster killing... Jayce you were right...”
Still a slight distance away from the two ogres, standing half-concealed by a tree, Rachel watched as they lumbered along, following a creek upstream, the three ogres searching for any life to massacre and feast on.
Each ogre, about three meters tall with slight variations in height and posture, scanned the surroundings. In their hands were large clubs, about the size of Kaitlyn herself, being used to smash anything that moved, creating small craters and pushing clouds of dirt and rock into the air.
Gripping the hilt of each of her swords, Kaitlyn took a deep breath, casting a haste spell on herself before leaping forward, reading to slaughter the ogres before her.
