"Here. Take this." Faust, the bushy-browed bald merchant, says to me while handing down a muted-red dagger with a golden hilt and a wooden grip.
I take the dagger being so kindly offered to me into my hands. Now with the comparably dull blade in my right hand, I turn it around a couple times to get a good feel for its weight and size before looking at my menu. Seeing that it has been equipped in my weapon slot, I read...
[Dusky Rose Dagger T3
Dagger: Is Applicable
Damage: 40-90
A dagger made of rose tinted steel.
Feed Power: 11]
It does more damage than my sword on average, so it's still my win, even though I won't be getting that Platinum Dagger that gives a vitality boost. Still sad about that anyways.
A short while ago, we had ended up working out a deal in which the bald man, who told me that his name is Faust, would give me a tier-three dagger in return for my 'cooperation.' Basically, we keep our mouths shut about the scamming that went both ways, and the other things done today, like me using a dagger for example. Apparently, he has a reputation to uphold, and so do I for whatever reason.
Before all that, I had proven to him that I am, in fact, a priest by using my Healing Tome. He believed us and couldn't help explain the phenomenon that is... well... me. Yeah me, I guess I shouldn't be using the dagger as a priest, so I will need to keep that under wraps to avoid drawing unwanted attention to myself or something.
Despite not caring if people know that I'm a priest who can use daggers and other weapons, Queston still told me to shut up about it. He may have an explanation as to why I am this way, or so he says. So even though I don't have a history of respecting his opinions, I will give him the benefit of the doubt this time and keep quiet about my ability.
I unequip the dagger and place it into my nearly filled inventory. There are only eight slots for my baggage, and now that seven of them are filled with my gear, I realize that I should probably find a safe place to store these, like in the orphanage or somewhere else safe. Since I'm worried that I may be forced to leave something behind the situation that my inventory becomes full, I must do so in a timely matter.
"Yoosh!" I stand up from the chair I was sitting on and swing my arms in excitement.
"I hope that it's to your liking?" Faust asks, probably about the dagger he had just 'gifted' me.
"Yeah, It's good. Thank you." Just need to go through the pleasantries, gotta keep my image polite and consistent.
He just nods his head towards me and says, "This way," while directing us with his outstretched arm towards the nearby door. I look at Queston and Truudfluue to make sure that they are ready to go. Queston is the only one who confirms my silent question with a nod of his own.
Faust ends up leading my entourage back through the Glad to Smile Guildhall and towards the exit. We leave through the entrance door and out onto the courtyard at a quickened pace, but before we can leave the premises, Faust shouts out, "If you ever need anything, you know where to find me!"
I look down at the grass under my feet while thinking. Yeah, sure, dude. I will come back to find you... Never! What do you mean 'if I ever need anything?' Like what, you want to lose another bet or something, huh? Piss off!
Shaking my head in mild annoyance while a mocking smile grows on my face, we walk through the courtyard. I lightly chuckle to myself while lost in these thoughts. Since my back is turned towards the guildhall, no one sees me being a goof, well... almost no one. Truudfluue, who is by my side, is looking at me with a weird face.
"What?" I say while addressing the brown-haired Canadian.
"Nn... Nothing." Truudfluue shakes his head.
That's right, nothing. Exactly what I thought.
Queston abruptly pops up to the right of my peripheral, so I ask, "So, where to next?" Now that we are done exploring the bazaar and the guildhalls, are we going home, or going to see the realm, or...?
"I don't know. I think we should probably head back right away and tell Daryl what happened." Queston sounds somewhat impatient about it.
"Didn't you say that we would look at the vault and the realm!" Truudfluue protests against Questons's opinion.
"Yeah... but..." Queston starts but gets cut off.
"Please...!" Truudfluue begs.
Queston sighs and says, "Fine, fine! We'll take a look at the vault and the realm portal. They're on the path home anyway, so why not." while waving his hand in dismissal. It seems like Truudfluue has some sway over Queston's decisions.
"So, to the vault first, or the realm?" I jump in and ask the two.
"The vault, the realm portal is closer to home," Queston explains and starts leading us onwards towards what I believe should be the Vault of Heroes.
---
"Yeah, so basically, it's just humans around here for the most part. Peoples of difference are uncommon to come across in this district," Truudfluue informs me.
"Ah, okay, cool... I guess," I respond, kinda disappointed at the news. I guess no hot alien chicks for me then.
"We're here," Queston says as we come to a stop in front of a giant golden cube that takes up the entire plaza we're now standing in.
We had walked for only about an hour before we got here. The place we're at now is really crowded with passing people just doing their own things. This seems like a primary gathering spot, I reason, given that I have only seen this many people so far in the market square.
Given Questons's words, I would assume that this is the Vault of Heroes. Truudfluue and I walk up to the giant cube to get a closer look. I remember that Truudfluue has not seen it yet, so this is our first time together. Just looking at the cube and the crowd around makes me feel nostalgic about something, but I can't quite put my finger on what it is.
Inspecting the cube, I see a large archway on its face with curtains draping over it. I see a blue rug with bright blue wavy designs leading up to the archway and continuing inside. All around us are people who are either entering, leaving, or just loitering around the box. Most of them look to be wearing casual wear, but a few are decked out in bulky gear, and some are carrying heavy-looking backpacks or dragging around carts of supplies.
Walking around the cube a little bit, trying my best to avoid bumping into anyone in the crowd, I notice four separate entrances to the cube, one on each side face with the same arch, curtains, and rug. The cube was too large to see all of it from where we were previously. Truudfluue seems to decide that he is done looking from the outside and moves to enter the cube.
Queston was following right behind us as I joined Truudfluue and peeked my head into the cube. With my head now inside, I am absolutely astounded by how prestigiously shiny everything looks. The corners of each wall are slightly raised, and I see red cloths beneath the piles and piles of gold. Goblets, coins, crowns, everything gold that you can think of are in here and just waiting to be plundered... Of course, not by me... Clearly!
"Wow!" Truudfluue mutters in awe as he looks around the interior of the cube.
A woman with a big wooden cart filled with wood and cloth textiles passes us as we stand in wonder. She makes her way into the center of the cube, where I see four rectangular openings that appear to lead downwards. The woman drags her cart down one of the holes with her, and I see her disappear from view before I hear the creaking of a large-sounding metal door being opened and then subsequently closed only two seconds or so later.
"What are you two waiting for? Go in." Queston hurries us along with his words, and I feel a sudden push on my back, making me stumble into the cube.
Managing to find my footing and stand tall again, I now find myself in the interior. It takes a second to catch my bearings as I stand around doing nothing, just taking in the view, but something quickly catches my eye. That something is a long golden cane with a beastly-looking head and emerald green eyes, so I start to move towards it.
Once I arrive at the item, I bend down and reach to grab it. Since I only want to look at it closer, I don't think there should be any problems with doing so, but when my middle finger touches the rod, I receive a mild electric shock, and I swiftly back my hand away.
"Yeow!" I involuntarily yelp out in distress and fall back on my butt.
"What are you doing? Were you trying to steal it?" Queston runs up to me and asks while nealing down to make sure that I'm alright.
"Nn... no! I just wanted to look at it... but I guess I'm not allowed to do that." I honestly didn't have any intention of taking it. I just thought it looked cool and wanted to have a closer look.
A couple of people rush into the room and look around in a slight panic due to my yelp. It's once they make eye contact with me that they seemingly calm down and shoot a knowing smile our way. I guess this is not the first time, nor will it be the last time someone tried to grab the valuables in here.
The majority of the people who ran in leave out the way they came, but a few go deeper into the center of the golden cube and down the rectangular holes. Now that I'm closer to the center, I can see that in each of the four holes is a carpeted ramp that leads down towards a golden door. Perhaps the door is what leads to the vault? Only one way to find out...
"Is that the vault?" I point down towards the door and ask Queston who should know the answer.
The old immature me would have totally already gone down the hole to find the answer myself, but If I had learned anything in these past couple of seconds, I should not touch unknown gold things, like that door, for example. The only problem, I don't know how long I will remember this valuable lesson. I'll try to solidify this experience in my memory... Done, I will remember it forever.
"Yes, the two of you should go down and enter the Vault of Heroes. I will wait out here for you two when you are done." Queston explains.
"You aren't coming in with us?" Truudfluue asks Queston, who just made it clear that he will wait out here.
"No. I can't go in the vault. It's for heroes only. I'm a native of the nexus." Queston responds.
Well, that sucks, doesn't it? Hmm, never mind, I don't even know if the vault is all that useful or not, but, interestingly, only heroes can go in... What makes us so... exclusive? Wait? Does that mean the people who just entered were other heroes? Like that woman with the cart, for example. Was she a hero?
Anyway, I want to be the first to head in, so I walk down the blue carpeted ramp towards the illustrious door. When I get close to it, I don't see any section underneath my inventory popping up telling me that I can magically enter a portal, so I push the heavy gold doors open.
Now that the door's ajar, I see a menu appear saying "Vault" and a white "Enter" button underneath. In front of me is a white and yellowish screen of magical awesomeness that seems to be a portal I stick my hand in, and I discover that it's basically just an intangible screen of white and yellow magic light that happens to be floating around inside the door's perimeter, but the cool thing is, I can't see my hand anymore... Should that be cool? I think it is.
I turn around to see Queston and Truudfluue watching me, but I don't pay them much mind, and I say "Enter" without a second thought. Suddenly and very rapidly, I'm pulled through the door and into the portal. Hardly processing what just happened as my vision goes black for less than a second before I regain it, I now find myself standing in a small, barely-lighten wooden room.
"Whahh?" I mumble out in confusion and look around in a sudden panic.
Swiftly scanning the room, I only find an empty shelf and a brown wooden chest stacked against the wall directly ahead of me. Behind me is a simple wooden door. That's about all that I see in the room, which makes me feel weirdly uncomfortable. I thought that maybe the vault would have more glamor and pizzazz to it or something, like the cube.
Since nothing is stopping me, I cautiously move towards the chest, wanting to see if there's anything inside. Once I reach it, I bend down and attempt to open it. Luckily for me, the top is easy to lift to display the goods inside... which happens to be nothing. Go figures.
A new menu section presents itself underneath my inventory that shows another eight empty slots. I look into the chest absentmindedly for a second before a sudden hypothesis comes to mind. What will happen if I move my items to the chest? So I drag my Bronze Short Sword into the first new slot with my finger. The bronze sword magically apparates in the chest, diagonally jutting out from the top.
Sooo... this will probably be my storage from now on. I can make this work.
Moving the Plain Kitchen Knife into the second slot, I see it appear on the bottom of the chest, just lying down next to the sword. I then move the bronze sword back into my inventory, and the sword disappears from the container. I now understand that the new slots are chest slots and that the things I place inside will actually appear in the chest. I wonder what will happen if I fill it to the brim?
Hmm... but I don't really care to answer that question right now, and I'm more thoughtful about what I should store in the chest. I probably don't need my Ring of Minor Defense anymore, so I will just keep that in there. Dragging the ring into the chest slots, It appears inside.
Looking at my inventory again, I don't think I have anything else I should part with. I have the sword, the staff, the wand, and my robe. All of which seem pretty important. Well... I guess that my sword is kind of useless because of my new dagger, but it's longer... No, if I need range, I can just use my staff or wand.
I promptly move my sword back into the chest as well and try to shut it, but the chest's lid is stopped by the sword and is forced to stay open. Reaching my hand into it, I move the weapon around a bit, but it's too large to fully fit in it, so I give up and just leave the chest the way it is.
It should be okay if I just leave it like this, though, as long as other people don't come here... speaking of others, is this like a personal vault, or do I have to share? I sit and think for a second, but I realize that I should probably not worry about this for now. Those bridges will be crossed if and when they come.
Now, with only three out of my eight inventory slots full, I am confident that I won't need to leave anything behind if I get more stuff to carry around. I turn around and face the door that I spotted behind me. Walking up to it, I place my hand on the door. No signs or screens show up telling me I will be teleported if I interact with it, so I gently push it open.
The door opens to reveal an outdoor area and a long winding white stone path. I guess there was more to the vault after all.
Cautiously, I walk out of the wooden room and onto the path to observe my current surroundings. All around me are grassy hills and the occasional tree. Off in the distance is a pool of water, and I recognize what I believe to be some ducks hanging out in the pond. A couple of sheep grazing on the distant hill is something I also notice. It's all a pretty unusual sight for a place that is supposed to be a vault and not a reserved park.
There are also stone statues of different-looking men and women littering the paths that zig-zag the entire area. I can't see them much due to their distance, but they don't seem all that special. A large cathedral is also towering over the stone walls ahead of me, and I wonder what that will be. Maybe it's there because I'm a priest? I'm not sure.
Since there is a white-tiled path leading me to a nondescript stone-walled enclosure, I think I may just follow it. I can see that it's not very long and will only take me maybe twenty seconds if I walk fast.
Walking down the short scenic path, I am met with one of the statues I previously noted, and I stop to admire it for all that it's worth. It seems to be an archer-looking girl with long elf ears and that stereotypical Robin Hood cap. She looks rather stoic from where I'm standing, looking down at me with a somewhat threatening glare. Doesn't seem to be the type of person I would like to mess with. There also doesn't appear to be any words or signs indicating who the person might be, so I'm left unsure of their identity. Growing bored of looking at the statue, I stop investigating it and continue walking forward.
Once I reach the enclosure, the first thing that catches my attention is a large wooden gateway directly opposite where I entered. The wooden opening appears to lead to an equally wooden fenced-in area, but that same portal-looking stuff from before is blocking the way. This time, the magic portal screen of the gateway is what I think to be colored blue and green. It looks to be representing a landscape with blue sky and green grass from this distance, but I may be wrong.
With a spring in my step, I start walking towards the gateway, but I stop when I spot a familiar floating white oval. Recognizing it as the Nexus Portal, I decided to slow my roll and look around a bit more. I notice that wayyy to my left is the cathedral that I had previously wondered about.
The cathedral looks interesting, and I debate going towards it for a second, but It's far away, and I happen to also see a large hole in the ground made of rocks and other rubble that's much closer to me. Now that I see that, I'm not sure what I want to check out first. I look around a bit more, but there doesn't seem to be anything else of worth in the enclosure, so my current choices for exploration are between the cathedral, the rock hole, and the colorful gateway.
Choices, choices, choices...
I think I will just look into the rock hole to my right first because it's closest. Moving over to the tunnel entrance, I reach the large opening in the ground and look down into the hole, but all I see is a dark pit and a steep rocky slope that could probably be skidded down if needed.
I can't help but frown while studying it. Usually, I don't like to jump into potentially dangerous things like this without first putting in some thought... Anyhow, I slide down the hole because screw thinking, I live for adventure.
Funnily enough, it isn't all too deep, and I'm almost immediately met with the rocky bottom. I successfully avoid hurting myself, which is good, and something I wish I could say more often... Now that I'm grounded, I can barely make out a doorway of some kind just a couple steps ahead of me. Everything is super dark, and I can hardly even see my own hands.
Taking careful steps forward, I discover that there is, in fact, no door, but instead, it's another opening with that portal magic stuff. This time, it's probably really dark magic stuff, given that I can't see it very well.
When I get close enough to the opening, I read "Daily Quest Room" with the "Enter" button underneath. I have no clue why someone would put the Quest Room in a dark cave. Maybe it collapsed or something? But I kinda doubt that somehow.
It's really a no-brainer on what I should do, so I utter, "Enter." I once again feel that pulling sensation, and my vision goes even darker. Only a second after do I feel a smidgen of light enter my eyes, and I'm met with a new cave room. The first thing I notice is the lit candles around me. They illuminate the room enough to showcase its stoney interior and the piles of gold just lying around.
The ground I'm standing on seems to be furbished and is made of stone bricks, but the wall is just cave. I almost instinctually walk up to the gold coins to inspect them, but I then remember what I told myself. 'No more touching strange gold things!'
With everything seeming... uh... Natural? I'm just gonna walk further into the cave to see if there is anything related to this quest business the room promised as its namesake. There is only one direction for me to go, and that is forward, so forward I go.
Now that I'm 'forward,' I enter another more appealing room. This room has a long wooden table on the opposite wall that splits the place into three sections. The section I'm in has a big golden door to my left. It's attached to the wall, and I'm pretty sure that it's the portal that will lead me back to the vault.
To my top left is a section that's blocked off by the long table. It appears to have bookshelves with books and a table with a notebook on top of it. There is nothing special about that section, but the segment to the right is infinitely more appetizing. There are chests full of gold and piles of coins scattering the ground. I spy a couple of swords and spears intermixed with the gold, and there is a rusted copper statue of an angle at the far end of the wall.
Walking up to the table, I expect a screen to show up, but nothing happens. I don't get any notifications, I don't find anyone to talk with, there aren't words telling me what to do, I can't even reach over the table because there is a magical forcefield preventing me from doing so... Yeah, that exists.
Searching around the cave rooms for a while leads to nothing, leaving me confused and lost. I don't even know why it's called the Daily Quest Room if there aren't any quests to obtain. All that is left is to go back to the vault, which I do, and I end back up in the chest room.
I can't help but notice that the chest has grown in size, and the sword is no longer preventing the chest's top from closing. Opening the wooden chest, I find the sword lying on its side at the bottom. It appears like the chests will resize themselves to fit their contents while I'm not watching, which is pretty nifty. Since there isn't really anything for me to do here, I end up leaving the room and heading back towards the enclosure from before.
Now in the enclosure, I make my way over to the cathedral-looking building. I only say it looks like a cathedral because I don't have any other words to describe it. There aren't any crosses or anything decorating the walls or roof, but there is a large section of red and blue stained glass near the top of the building. The glass all comes together to form a flower-looking pattern, which is why I say cathedral-looking.
I walk up to the large brown doors that lead into the cathedral. Once I get close enough, I push them open to reveal another glowing portal. I get a screen reading "Guild Hall" and red words underneath them saying "Not in Guild."
Ohh! That makes sense. It's not a cathedral; it's a guildhall, duh! I knew that! Well, it seems like I won't be entering that yet, which just leaves the last place to explore.
The big gated opening.