01.33 - A Parenting Journey Through Another World: Raising Kids While Adventuring

“Did you say cookies? ” Tia's voice could be heard from inside the living room.

“Aunty? What are you doing here?” Kei asked.

“Had a… chat,” Tia said after grabbing two of the cookies and starting to munch. “With your mom,” she said, mouth still half full.

“I still think your transformation is a bit… weird,” Reiko said. “But it’s true that Tia is in a similar position. It’s just… I knew Tia’s human forms first. I barely register her as a dragon. But with you, it feels like I am losing my son.”

“But Kei’s still here,” Tia said while still chewing. “Those are really good,” she added. “You should try some.”

“Yes… and no,” Reiko said, then finally grabbed a cookie herself. “Oh those are pretty good. Fluffy, but with a crunch. And all without my recipe."

“We had two failed batches,” Kei said. “These cookies were the third try.”

“Are you sure your current appearance isn’t a failed batch too?” Reiko asked.

“That’s different,” Kei said.

—

Reiko’s issues with Kei’s new form slowly faded. I couldn’t tell if Reiko had truly accepted the change, or simply made peace with the new normal.

Another new normal also arrived for the kids. Their average age right now was around fourteen.

Most of them would have chosen a calling by now, if we were back in Lichtheim, but things were different here, especially in the outskirts of the outskirts.

Since we couldn’t keep our isolation forever and wanted the kids to see at least a bit more of the world than the surrounding forest and our few tips to the nearby villages, it was time to register with the local adventurers guild, this time under a third alias.

Ryu, Hermes, Kei, and Inari were the first group and went out with Kentaro and Tia.

Reiko and I lead a party made up of Nagi, Nami, Akatsuki and Ariel.

We all registered using ‘Transform’ and aliases in the adventurers guild in ‘Weißfels’. Reiko was opposed to this at first, but there was no other way. For all we knew, we could still be wanted.

Reiko and I would only supervise the kids and jump in if things went south. Whatever the quest, it was on the kids to figure out how to fulfill it.

Their first quest sounded simple.

Something or someone was breaking into storages and stealing meat from nearby farms. Their job was to find the source of the problem and solve it. Be it to capture a human thief, slay a stray monster, or otherwise.

The kids immediately tried to use ‘Tracking’, on the scene of the most recent crime scene, but it failed. If it was a monster, it must have been one that covers its tracks.

I could have intervened this time. My tracking skills were a lot better yet, even Hermes or Ryu’s would have been sufficient. But me solving every problem was not the purpose of this exercise.

A few of the remnants on the scene, such as hairs and some light claw marks indicated the involvement of a monster.

As such, the kids decided to catch it.

Their first attempt were basic rope snare traps around simple lures. They put up half a dozen near the village. Some with logs and weights, some with medium sized rocks.

When we returned the next day, the traps had snapped.

Around twigs.

If it was a monster, it wasn’t one of the idiot kind.

The second attempt involved more sophisticated covered pitfalls. They were very well hidden with dirt, leaves, and branches. Not to be outsmarted again, they added tripwires and a dropable net to the pit.

As we checked the results of our efforts the next day, every single pit had collapsed, with the trip wire triggered and the net on the ground.

Inside we found…

Rocks.

To add insult to injury, our base camp supplies were raided between the early morning and the time we returned after checking on all the traps.

Bloody bastard had played us for fools.

We restocked our supplies during the next three days and kept laying more and more elaborate traps.

To no avail.

It was on the morning of the second week that we left base camp to check on the mechanism again.

Or that’s what we wanted our cunning foe to assume.

We had left most of our supplies at the camp, but that wasn’t all we had left there.

Nami and Nagi were using ‘Camouflage‘ and other advanced skills to avoid detection.

They followed the culprit back to its home base after it successfully raided our base for the second time.

It was a bit of a gamble.

There was no time or subtle way to inform us of their position without alerting the enemy.

Nami and Nagi opted to leave clues along their path. Broken twigs, Scratches on trees, or moved stones.

Subtle, but enough for lower level ‘Tracking’ to work its magic.

We met up with our two scouts and arrived near our target’s den after a good two hours of march through the forest.

It was a burrow under an old, dead, hollowed out tree. Probably buried out by some other monster or animal.

We made sure to stay far enough away not to alert our target.

The four kids made sure Nami and Nagi shared their intel before we rushed in on the enemy.

It was great to see them remembering the basics. System knows they have been avoiding more of my instructions and attempted lectures than I’d like to admit. At least as of late. Regular teenagers, I guess.