Chapter 5 - meeting the blacksmith

When I woke up, I realise that Luna disappeared again, she must have return back home. Looks like I need to continue my journey towards the blacksmith. On the bright side is that all the knowledge that Luna shared with me now I could navigate the place without a hitch. But this is the time that I need to build my skill now.

Randy heads up the hill, he started to show some skills that was not even heard of. He could easily kill other monster without any supports.

If I want to survive, I need to build my own gun and other firearms. This crossbow is at least useful in this situation. The top hills had some sort of hut visible from a distance, so I headed there. There were bandits everywhere this time, like they were looking for something. The best way to deal with a situation is through stealth rather than head on. I kept my head down and moved slowly, as if I was a part of the environment. To make sure I wasn't detected, I made sure to stay close to the ground and sneak through the shadows.

Until yesterday, we only beat bandits, but with Luna's help, we survived without killing them. Now my instinct tells me that if I want to survive, I must kill them. I'm sure Uncle had a reason for training me to kill. I'm afraid of the consequences, but I know I must do it. I must do what I was trained to do and protect myself from the bandits. I must be strong and fight.

Taking advantage of one of the bandits looking around, I started to practice CQC (close quarter combat), the skill that my uncle taught me. Having slit the bandit's throat and closed his mouth, I concealed him in a bush and looted his tools and money. I then continued on my way, making sure to stay out of sight. I was determined to reach the place while looking at the task at hand. Killing is a strange feeling, not like killing animals that I hunt, because it feels as if I lost someone dearly, but at the same time I feel relieved that I survived. There was a commotion in the deep jungle of the mountains.

“Find that boy, he is hiding somewhere here” Someone important must be searching for a boy like that. I slowly pass through like those covert special forces in the games that I played before. Now there is a small group of them, but over the trees seems like two centipede is mating just above from their heads. I gotta find ways on knocking that bug off the tree. I slowly climb the tree and started to cut down the branch without noticing. It drop towards the bandits where they started to panic as the two centipedes started to attacked them killing them in a gruesome way as they slowly devoured them down. Sheesh that is nasty.

While I successfully took down a dozen of them, I couldn't help feeling that I should also find the kid. Ugh, what the heck!! If I don't help him, I'll have nightmares about it.

A bandit yelled, “hey found that kid!!” As I head towards where the bandits shouted, I see empty grasslands where that kid is surrounded, but I realise that it's a girl instead of a boy. She had a shield and a small mallet, though she is quite chubby despite for her small size. One of the bandit yelled at her.

Hey, quit running and work for us! ”

“you are trying to force me by making weapons so that you used that to kill people with no way!!” Making weapons? Do you mean that this girl is the blacksmith?

The girl managed to hold her ground by taking down a couple of the men, but one of them managed to hold her down and tie her up. It's time to figure out a way. I'll check my crossbow or maybe I have another idea. As I set my traps in the forest, I tied down my crossbow. Let me see what happens once I set it up, because I get the feeling one of them has magic powers. Let’s do this!!

I used my slingshot and take a shot at one of the bandits head.

“That hurt!! What the hell is going on!?”

“Look at that someone is there!!” I take the shot with the crossbow, I manage to make a bow from the forest tree. And started to shoot through the crossbow. The arrow manage to take a headshot towards one of the bandits. They taken the bait, and one of them use spells.

“losgadh!” A fire comes out from his arm and fired towards my crossbow. That is the opening, I took the shot and I manage to get another headshot to the conjurers head. Two kills, at least I manage to take down some of the dangerous threat.

“They took down our mage!!” One of them make towards me, while set the trap. One of them took a hit from my makeshift bear trap, the guy shouted in agony. I instantly took my knife and instantly slit his throat, and heads back to the bush.

“That guy just took down our strongman!!” Looks like they started to get agitated. There is still at least 10 of them waiting at the grassland. They started to gather around again, looks like I need to flush them out one by one. I tried to mock them using another slingshot towards their heads, annoying them but one of the started to experience fear as he shaken.

“This is not what I signup for!!” He ran away from the grassland leaving another nine. They started to gather and surround at the girl. I wanted to them move away from the girl. I took again another shot to the head. Another headshot and few of the left behind guarding the girl, while the others head out to the deep bush. This is it, I took my bow waited for them hidden from sight. Looks like one of them is alone, I slowly head behind him from the trees. Instantly pull him up, slit his throat. 8 more left.

I look around again for the bandit and I saw them group together, five of them started to look around. I tried to look for a distraction. This forest is filled with creatures that linger between the trees, I saw a large snake hanging from the tree. Seems like it's looking at them. I need to find a way again to cut the branch of the tree without the snake and the bandit finds out. I slowly sneak at the branch, and manage to cut the branch it drop directly at the bandits again. Looks like lady luck is with me again. While the giant snake is attacking the bandits, I head out to finding the other bandits, this is only 2 of them, gotta try take them down.

I charge towards them and shot another arrow at one of the bandits while one of the instantly killed by me, I stab one of the bandits down. Looks like this is an easy task, I head out again to find the remaining 5 but its seems the snake had its fill eating the 5 bandits. I’ll just leave it. Only one remains and it's the leader of the bandits together with the girl.

“So you the one that taking down my men… you’re good…” I rather not going to respond to his conversation I need to find ways without hurting the girl.

“How about a preposition?” He is negotiating with me? Or just wasting time.

“I don’t know about this though but I kinda in a hurry” lets try this approach

“This girl is highly valuable asset for our gang”

“What about a parley then?” Since they are bandits maybe they could understand pirate negotiations

“Parley…fine” ding ding! Finally progress!

“But since my men have been defeated by your own wits, you look interesting” this guy is average in height roughly at the same height as me, plus he doesn’t look like a bandit to begin with.

“I’m pretty sure that men of yours is not even part of your party then”

“Indeed they are, they are just hired grunts” kinda pity what I have done to them though

But the girl is pretty annoyed with us and started to voice out.

“Hey!! How about untie me?” She was released by the bandit leader, and we began negotiating. Before we started, the girls suggested we go to her place and reach an agreement.

“Well, we haven't introduced ourselves and this time it ain't sword slashing!!” It's kind of weird how we communicate. We were killing each other before and now we're going to have tea together. What a change of heart!

There was another problem before we even started, the commotion that I had released before such as the giant snake and centipede seemed to be heading our way.

“Is that how you defeated my goons?” The bandit leader start to pull back

“Ummm is this your idea of fun?” The girl wanted to run away.

“uh…any bright ideas?” I really wanted to run away.

“Since this is your mess, you better fixed it” the girl is really wanted to run away. Well then, I decided to run away but before even I started to run, the two hold me and started to warn me.

“There is no way in chance you getting out of this!!”

“If we die at least we’ll drag together” holy shit they really don’t want to let me go!

“You gotta do something about this!!” This is getting annoying!

“Then you know how to kill that damn thing!”

“Nope!” Both of them in unison

There is one way to take down that large snake but I kinda feel its a waste killing, what about tame it? I approach the seems angry snake, but I never expected it started to speak with us.

“You wretches hume’s!! How dare you throw me off the branch, while I was sneaking at them!! ” Wait, it can talk !? There has been an explosion of interest and it is getting out of control! What little that I know about snakes is that they are not just snakes but nagas. Apparently, my uncle uses this term to describe a hybrid human-snake. The head of her humanoid transforms into a humanoid form which she introduces herself.

“There is something that not always Hume always like this? I'm curious, who are you? ”

Despite that, she looks really young and cute...uh...what the hell am I saying? Despite being a Naga, she has beautiful eyes and luscious lips.

Wait, can't we negotiate so we don't kill each other..." she started thinking, and got closer to me.

“You’re interesting...but I’m not sure about those two..." huh? Oh crap, those two centipedes are heading our way. "What are the odds that they're just here to say hi?" She asked sarcastically. Yeah, right. They're probably here to make sure I don't cross the street without looking both ways first!

“How dare you ruin our lovely night...” Not again, this animal can say things too? I guess it's true what they say - animals can be more judgmental than humans!

“Uh..sorry? It looks like the centipede just got pissed off,” the Naga said to the centipede. Maybe we should just call it a day and go home, before he gets even more angry!

“mujhe ise sambhaalane do kyonki vah tumhen turant maar sakata hai” she talks sorta Hindi now. This world is really connected. It's clear she understands his frustration and doesn't want to risk it escalating any further. That's something I'd like to ask her.

"I recognize your dialect..."

“Huh? Can you understand what I'm saying?” Maybe a little, but I know some of it because she's trying to negotiate.

“Yeah...sort of...but I know you're trying to convince them, isn't it?” She grabs my arm excitedly. She is trying to show me that she understands the situation and that she is trying to negotiate. She is grabbing my arm to show her enthusiasm and she is emphasizing what she is saying by repeating it.

It's also my first! Two people interrupt our conversation, yeah I forgot they were behind me. I guess I'm so popular I don't even have to turn around to see who's talking to me!

I had to convince her that they were my friends after the Naga gave them a scary look.

“Hey!! They're my friends...right? I glared at them and they both nodded in agreement while terrified. "They were like 'Yes, we're friends, just please don't kill us’!"

In the end, the naga calmed down and continued chatting with the centipede until they turned off and went back into the forest. The way her eyes look at me now, it's like she wants more. She seemed to be asking for something more, something more than just a casual conversation. I guess you could say she's got a slithery way of asking for more.

Now that everything is back to normal, could you tell me who you are? So this is the part in RPG games where you get a new ally or rival, so I've gotta set a good word. It's your opportunity to introduce yourself to your new companion or adversary, and to tell them a little bit about yourself. This is a chance to show them that you are trustworthy and that you mean them no harm. Plus it's a chance to show off your charisma and make a good impression!

"My name's Orion, but you can call me Randy"

“I’m Seraphina, of the house Vipernox...” Suddenly the female dwarf had a light bulb moment as if she recognized the name.

“Vipernox?! Are you part of the great Serpent household of warriors? ”

Where did you hear about us? ”

"Well, as a blacksmith and trader, I've always met all kinds of people around the world..." Wow, she's a traveler.

It turns out that I forgot to bring food, so I started getting feral..." huh?..so if Luna hasn't eaten anything...shit, I can't imagine how she would transform. Hopefully it's just a kitty cat. If she turns into a lion, I'm in trouble! Then the guy started to join the conversation.

“Yeah…I know that condition for the beast-man not sure why is that to be natural…” natural!? It's a survival instinct you idiot!

It started out with the dwarf girl introducing herself "I'm Elowen Stoneforge" then the guy introduced himself "I'm Kline Elixirium, an alchemist" uh huh, so the guy's an alchemist.

We've got to introduce each other..." Suddenly the jewels Luna gave me glowed and she appeared. I'm getting a lot of glares now. I pretended not to notice and just smiled sheepishly.

“She is cute huh...” Wow, I had no idea I was so popular. What's with the jealousy?

“Hah? She just saved us from being attack by the centipede couple” smiling at me, she came closer to me

"Because of you." She pointed at my chest, while she look at Seraphina and Elowen I did not realise that Elowen is a looker even though she is a dwarf.

“Just one day, I’m not around look at what you getting at” Still, she looks cute when she’s upset, so it’s hard to imagine if she’s gone feral. But I had to avoid that kind of conversation and teased Kline. Rather than dealing with it, I decided to focus on making her laugh.

“Well, those goons of yours...what will happen to them now that you've abandoned them? We all stare at him. A few seconds later, he bow down and explains what's happening.

“Hey! I had no other choice! I owe them money!” Oh great, another confusion. An airhead Naga girl, a guy who owes money, and a tsundere cat girl, what a group of people. What else then? A rabbit girl, an otaku, and a hyperactive hamster girl! I guess it's just another day in the crazy world of anime and manga!

“So?” Luna started to get a yandere kind of expression of hers, talk about the inconsistency of her character.

Just let me join you guys!? can right? He's groveling down and begging on his knee. I know he's grinning and having a nose bleed as she stands there like that. You should just die, bastard! I don't even have a chance to see it!

“uh…white…ah! Wait sorry how about it?” Ah.. Dude, you just dug your own grave. Seeing Luna close her mini skirt and glare even harder at him. He got a really mean kick to the face, leaving him with a bloody nose and regretting his choice of words.

“And you Randy!! Did you get the job done? Wait, did I miss something?

“Oh shit!! I forgot my job!! In a flash, I dove into the forest to find the medical herbs while Luna chased me.

“Hey!! Where are you going now?!!”

“Dumbass!! I forgot about the herbs!!”

“Hey!! about that just come to my place then!! Elowen told us she planted it next to her house.

"At least I won't dive in the forest again." Well, at least i won't have to hear her complain when I trip and fall!

"Be careful again because you're going to interrupt someone making love... " Seraphina suddenly blinks her eyes at me while Luna pulls my arm. I could sense a charm from Seraphina, and she shouts at them.

“He is mine!! " Everyone went quiet, and then Kline grabbed my shoulder and said.

“Congrats, you are now bound to one vagina…” huh!? The guy with the dirty jokes. "Thanks Kline, I really needed that!" I said sarcastically, rolling my eyes.

Elowen showed us the way to her house, which is right next to this forest. It really makes my day. Although, I'm not sure if Elowen is taking us home or to the forest for a tea party.