The Quantum Wanderer

“Marcelo! Long time no see! How are you?”

“Lu! Long time no see!” I pick my cup with ale and approach their table. Sure enough, Aeson and Tar are there, they were all having the breakfast soup.

“By the gods! Congratulations!” Tar interrupts.

“What?”

“You are a mithril! I never imagined that I would befriend a mithril before! Congratulations! What level are you right now?”

I extend my sense to check their levels, they are a little bit stronger, but just a little bit. Nothing like my cheats allowed me to grow.d

“I got a couple of levels, yes. But you guys are also stronger.”

Lu is looking at me with an inquisitive face. Her head is tilted to the side. She is not really buying the couple of levels, but then it doesn’t really matter.

“What kind of quests have you guys been getting?”

“We arrived here with a escort quest. Other than that, we have even participated in a Fenrir hunt. It was… Well, we are alive.”

“What happened?”

Lu interrupted while Tar is now looking towards the floor.

“The expedition in Angelica is kind of pulling all mithril adventurers. I am actually surprised that you are not involved. There was a need for hunting a monster, but we didn’t know what it was. Since there are no mithrils around, it was a big expedition with lots of steels.  We discovered it was a Fenrir, but that was too late. We did get the fenrir, but a lot of adventurers suffered death or maiming. We just had no idea on the difference in levels between hunting a plated rhino and a Fenrir. Hearing is different than watching. I know it was kind of stupid.”

“Good thing you all are well. That was a big risk.”

“Yes. Never again. At least we can say that. A lot of good people cannot say anything anymore…”

…

“Do you know what kind of monster is the expedition in Angelica going to hunt?”

“I have no idea. Since you guys have been traveling, I would expect you to have more information than I  do. On everything.”

“Tell me about the everything! As of late, there has been so much happening! Nobles dying in duels, I had never heard of that before. Nobles generally use a champion, and consequences generally don’t reach them. Then there was the dragons flying over the whole land. Did you see that?”

“Of course. I think everyone saw that.”

“What are you theories?”

“I don’t know, I am not a dragon. It could be a migratory thing…? Some birds migrate, right?”

“You are so not fun! Really? Thousands of dragons, flying in formation, no less, and your theory is something like that? Not a world end or something? The second coming of Wrax?”

I shrug.

“Other than the recent hunt, how are things with you guys?”

“Things have been going well. I expect us to get to mithril if we survive some more years grinding. That is our plan for now. Grow into that direction… What about you? What have you been up to?”

I remember all the things that have been going on. There is a lot. Let’s start with the latest one.

“I kind of settled down a little bit in this city. I am living with my fiancées. We are going to have a destination wedding.”

“Congratulations!” Tar gives me a strong slap on the back, but I don’t really feel it. I don’t even move. He shakes his hand.

“What happened? You feel like a rock now!”

“I told you, I got a couple of levels.”

He pokes me on the shoulder, but his finger doesn’t go deep at all.

“Are you casting stone skin?”

Lu nods at Tar, that stops the questioning. Lu is the one asking now.

“Where are the brides? How many are there? You mentioned fiancées in plural… We have to meet them.”

“They are in the Schools. Do you want to go there?”

“Oh! Are they nobles? I heard that only nobles or rich merchants are able to attend.”

“No, but they are mithril adventurers as well.”

“That explains it. Which school are they in?”

“Some in the knight school, one in the magic school.”

“I heard that the entrance exam for the knight school is not easy at all.”

“It is not that hard. Specially since people are attending to learn, right? And they already were adventurers, so it was easier for them.”

“Alright, let’s go!” Lu says, and stands up.

I pay for my beer. Muninn and Huginn land on my shoulders. Lu looks at them.

“You got yourself another one?”

“Yes, they are a great help, actually. I like them.”

Both crows caw. Lu and Aeson look at the crows intrigued.  We go to the schools on foot. Some time later, we arrive there. It is already close to noon, so we are walking towards the cafeteria. The girls might just be in there getting together in the noon interval.

A lot of people around are looking at us with a suspicious look. The requiem warriors are not as well dressed as most of the students here. Most people in the schools have a better condition, specially considering the high tuition fees. We just ignore them.

We reach the cafeteria. There is a big commotion going on in there. A couple of knights pass by us. I can hear a very short of their exchanges.

“Is it true? I don’t believe it!”

“Yes, they are in the cafeteria right now, we can check.”

The two knights go inside the commotion. I hear a very annoyed voice.

“YES! FOR THE THOUSANDTH TIME, YES! WE ARE GETTING MARRIED! YES, IT IS TO THE SAME GUY! YES, IT THAT GUY MARCELO!”

I giggle. They are managing to get Cecilia pissed off. The requiem warriors are looking at the commotion, really curious. Everyone likes some juicy gossip.

“LADY RUBY, DON’T! HE IS A NOBOD-AAAGGGGHHHH”

I can hear some people commenting.

“He should know already that no one talks badly of that guy in front of them…”

“Do you think that is going to be permanent like little winter?”

“No, he is still awake. Perhaps the wedding is softening her a little bit…”

The group of adventurers are still trying to see who is in the middle of the commotion. I touch their shoulder.

“That was the voice of Cecilia. She is one of my girls.”

“What is the name of the other ones?”

“Opal, Shandon, Aquamarine, Ruby.”

All of a sudden, I feel some weight being slammed onto my back while the crows fly away from my shoulders.

“My lord! You came to visit us!” Ruby hugs me. She jumped over the whole commotion. I reach my hand back and caress her face.

“This is Ruby. Ruby, these are Lu, Tar and Aeson. They are an adventurer group that I worked with back in the day.”

Ruby dismounts me slowly. She shakes their hands. They are looking at her and the place she jumped from. It was not a small jump.

Some of the guys from the commotion are looking our way. Ruby and I interlock our hands.

“YOU ALL, OPEN A PASSAGE! OR ELSE!”

That was Shandon. A corridor opens up, and the girls are sitting on the benches, close to the table. We all go through the corridor. I sit in the middle of Opal and Shandon, Ruby sits by the side. Aquamarine and Cecilia are on the other side of the table. I can feel a lot of envious and hateful looks my way, but I just ignore them.

“Hi girls, how is the day coming along?”

“Exactly like I expected.” Cecilia answers, gesturing towards the people around. The guy that was probably kicked was taken away by some friends, probably to the infirmary. I kiss Opal and Shandon on their cheeks.

“These are Aeson, Lu and Tarr. They are an adventurer team called Requiem Warriors. I did a couple of quests with them in the past. Right before I met you, Cecilia.”

“Nice to meet you.” Cecilia is the first one to shake their hands, then Shandon, Opal and Aquamarine follow suit.

“All five of them? Good for you, pal!” Tar slaps my backs once more. Now he does that without restraint, but it doesn’t make any difference for me.

“How was my lord back in the day?” Shandon asks Lu. Lu giggles at the way Shandon talks.

“He was about the same way he is now in the way that matters. We always knew that he is stronger than he shows. He was always kind, and a trustworthy friend. How is he now?”

The girls are quite satisfied with that answer. Opal was going to talk, but Cecilia interrupted her.

“About the same, about the same. Are you guys going to get any quests?”

“There is a steel level monster hunt that we are going to do starting tomorrow, and two days from today we are going to join a caravan of merchants on their way to Angelica. Normal stuff.”

“Cool, we enjoy getting the eventual quests as well.” Cecilia takes a look out the window. “It is already time to get back to classes. If you would excuse us…”

Cecilia, Aquamarine and Ruby stand up. Opal and Shandon stay sitting down, hugging my arms. Cecilia sighs.

“You do realize that you can do that almost any time you want, right?”

“Yes, sister.” Shandon sighs. They  both let go of my arms, and we stand up. The girls go back to their classes, the commotion following them. The people split up when the girls do to go to their own school.

The adventurer group and I go back to the guild, to have some more ale. Muninn and Huginn land back on my shoulders. Lu stares at them again.

“They really enjoy being there, right?”

“I think so.”

“You do realize that there is a god called Wrax that has two crows, right?”

“Yes, their names are Death and Rebirth. Not the case here. This guy is Muninn, and this girl here is Huginn.”

“How do you know she is a girl?”

“Females are a little smaller than males. Besides, Muninn can be kind of an asshole some times, while Huginn is really gentle. I stand by my statement.”

We all laugh a little. We get back to the guild, and we talk about their adventures. When I notice the day is coming to an end, we say a quick farewell, and we split up. They go to an inn, and I go back to my home. I could invite them, but it would create a lot of questions, so I decide against it. I go home, and at right time I portal the girls in.

“Are your friends downstairs?”

“No, I left them to get back to their inn. It would raise too many questions.”

We start going downstairs, towards supper.

“They were steel level, right?”

“Yes, I think that they are getting close to becoming mithril, though. They did gain some levels after we last met. They didn’t participate in the quest to kill the goblins, because of Lu. That was right before you seduced me…” I giggle.

“Yes, the hero of Frolk!”

“How was that, my lord?” Opal asks.

“That happened before I got strong enough to face a dragon. Goblins are humanoid-ish monsters. They reproduce by kidnapping and raping women. Because of that, the guild prohibits teams with women to participate in hunts.”

“But then the women just have to not be caught, right?” Opal asks. Cecilia is the one to clear the rule.

“The guild doesn’t allow for weak women to go after them. If a mithril wanted to do that, they would be able to. Weak adventurers sometimes overestimate their abilities.” Sometimes even seasoned adventurers do that. Right, mister passed out after killing the kraken?”

“Ouch!”

“Anyway, Marcelo went ahead and killed all goblins in the region, and saved some women.”

“Didn’t any of them… Want to mate?” Aquamarine asks.

Cecilia sighed.

“A couple. If it weren’t for your dislike of women, you might have bedded them.”

“I never disliked women!”

“Sorry, I didn’t know you that well at the time, I wasn’t sure…”

She puts her tongue out and laughs.

The dragonesses look at me. Aquamarine is the one to ask.

“Did your sexual preferences changed after you met Cecilia, my lord?”

Cecilia is holding her stomach and laughing a lot.

“No, Cecilia lied to those women behind my back, so that they would not hit on me.”

Aquamarine looked at Cecilia, as if she were a genius. Cecilia smiles.

“If it weren’t for me, we would another 5 sisters, at least!”

“Very nice one, sister!” Shandon compliments. I am shaking my head. I lift my fork and open my mouth, but I don’t have the right words to answer this. Cecilia is still laughing, and now the dragonesses are laughing with her. She turns to me.

“Oh, shush. You are going to have a lot of holes to stick your dick in pretty soon.”

I tilt my head. I know, I already am satisfied in that aspect. Of course, I have the Y chromosome, and I am pretty sure that the drive to want different women is written somewhere in there. I would not act on it, but every man I ever knew has that drive. It probably is an evolutionary advantage, so it just happened.

I stop to think about it a little bit. We do have some other urges. If we are eating and someone messes with our food, we get angry. We hold ourselves in depending on the rules of the place, but everyone is bothered by that. But tendencies should not define us.

I shrug the whole thing off, and I change the subject.

“We have to go to Hikari’s in-laws’ funeral tomorrow, in the morning.”

“It has been 2 weeks already?” Cecilia asks.

“Yes. I would normally say that time went by fast, but so much happened… I feel like I could write a whole book with the stuff that happened lately.”

We finish our supper and retire for the night.

Next morning, we wake up and have some fun. We go down for breakfast.

“How do you think the funeral is going to go, hubby?”

I saw that Cecilia was looking at me with some malice, she wanted to see my reaction. I giggle. In my mind, we are married already, I have referred to them as wives several times.

“I don’t know. Edward was worried with some local power struggles, but he said that he was going to do something about it. I guess we are going to see. Wifey.”

We have breakfast and get dressed for the funeral. I inspect Akiko’s inn. The room we used previously is empty, I portal us there. I unlock it and we come out of it. From there we go to the front desk. The person there wasn’t expecting someone from that direction.

“Good morning… sir… How can I help you?”

I can see that she is signaling a couple of guards that were in the corners of the room.

“We are looking for Akiko. She might have mentioned us. Our nickname is ‘honored guests’.”

“You? Oh. You are supposed to meet her and the baroness in her mansion.” She looks at the guards that are approaching and shakes her head slightly. They turn around and go back to the corner of the room.

 We walk out of the inn, and go to the mansion. The guards look at us, and open the gate. I am easy to identify, with one crow on each shoulder.

“Are you sir Marcelo?”

“Yes, and these are my… fiancées.”

“The baroness and her mother have been waiting for you. This way, please.”

We follow him, we are taken for a big room, where the corpses, still inside the ice casings are displayed. There are several flower arrangements around, but the two most impressive ones are displayed on easels, one on each side of the four corpses being displayed. They are the most imponent ones. One says ‘In this hour of pain, the Empire supports their forever friend, Hikari the baroness Meerwasser’. On the other one, ‘The guild is sure that Hikari von Meerwasser is going to lead the baronage with justice and clemency. We present our condolences in this time of need to our forever friend’.

I have a very hard time holding my laughter. Yes, that would definitely be enough to hold any power struggle. It would take a long time for people to investigate how willing the Empire and the guild would be to intervene. And if someone comes up, there is always the option to let them have a talk with Piotr. He has a gift for convincing people.

Hikari is by the bodies. Akiko is close to her, and there is a noble close to Akiko. Akiko points discreetly in my direction with her chin, only the noble by her side saw that. There are four guard behind the noble, all of them with very shiny armors.

We first reach Hikari.

“Good morning, baroness. My condolences in this sad time.”

She rubs her belly and nods at us. We step closer to Akiko and the noble.

“Good morning, honored guest! How was your trip here?”

“It was uneventful, thank you. How are you and Akiko doing?”

“Safe, thanks to you again, honored guest. I have no words to express my thanks.”

At this point, the noble besides her bows.

“You are sir Marcelo, I presume?”

“Yes. Who are you?”

“Marquis De La Salle, at your service. I am a marquis and ambassador to the empire. I am stationed near by, I have already shared my location with lady Akiko.”

“Thank you so much. Your support at this time is being… “ I look around, I can see some nobles talking among themselves by the corners of the room. Their expressions are really somber. “ life saving.”

“I must say, sir Marcelo, your figure is every bit as described by the duke.”

“Really? What did he mention?”

“He said that you would be certainly accompanied by five beauties, none could equal in Andrea. And you might have one crow on each shoulder. I came half expecting the crows to be stuffed, not alive ones. You do realize that there was an event in Esdohr where a note was left, right?”

“I have heard it casually from the guild. I am an adventurer myself.”

“Of course. Did you get the information that there were pictures of crows on the note?”

“Really? You don’t say…” I giggle a little. His mood changes, though. I think even Akiko noticed his shiver.

“He also mentioned that you are very agreeable and fair.”

“I try to be.” I shrug. Akiko intervenes.

“He is almost a god of justice! He helped us escape injustices in our previous land, and come here.”

“Well, I am glad that everything is going smoothly. Oh, I forgot to introduce myself to your fiancées.” He bowed his head. “Your beauty is just hypnotic, mesdames. Marquis De La Salle at your service.”

The girls were all using dresses. Cecilia stood in front of him, and did a courtesy.

“I am Cecilia, Marcelo’s fiancée.”

“I am Opal, my lord’s fiancée.”

“I am Shandon, my lord’s fiancée.”

“I am Ruby, my lord’s fiancée.”

“I am Aquamarine, my lord’s fiancée.”

“Your group is fantastic, sir Marcelo. I am somewhat skilled in telling levels apart, but I have to say that I cannot fathom what level any of you have.”

I shrug.

“I have led an adventurer life, it allowed me to get a couple of level throughout the years.”

“Of course. I would never pry. I see that the ladies have engagement crowns. When is the wedding?”

“Right! I almost forgot.”

I hand Akiko’s invite to her. I whisper in her ear.

“Unfortunately, I can’t include Hikari in this invitation right now. She doesn’t look too stable. There are a couple of things in the wedding that I would prefer not disclosed.”

“Of course, honored guest. Don’t worry about it. I will not share any secrets unless you allow so.”

She gets the invitation, and places in her holding bag. The inn business has been going well for them, apparently. I remember how expensive those things are. I look around the room, the local marquis is talking to his captain, the failed spy project. He is actually berating him, and the captain is raising his hands, trying to apologize. After a lot of berating, the marquis recomposes himself and comes towards our group.

“How the cycle of life is! Life lost, future life gained! The extremes are almost poetic, funeral and wedding.”

“Good morning, marquis.” I bow. The girls do a courtesy. La Salle bows as well. The marquis bows back, in a sloppy lazy way, as if we were beneath him. “Have you got in touch with any dwarf recently, mister Marcelo?”

“I can’t say I have.” I can feel a tool on his hand receiving an infusion of mana. It is the size of a large copper coin. The way it is reacting to the sound of my voice and then vibrating, I can somewhat guess that it is a lie detector of some sort. I wonder if it captures stress on the sound, or perhaps something else. Not that it matters too much, though. I would prefer to end things peacefully, but sometimes I don’t have that luxury.

“Why? I am sure the marquis have way better artisans than I could ever find.”

“Yes, but with the disappearance of the dwarves, things are so expensive. What used be a silver is now a gold.” This is a local expression to say that something’s price shot up. Not necessarily ten times, but it increased a lot. I really don’t like being close to this guy.