Chapter 234 – Coming home.

“I’m feeling like a new man!”

“Aye, thare is nuthing better than crakin’ a cold beer in th’ mornin’.”

“Don’t get used to it, we are running out of coin because you two bastards always throw it away on cheap booze and whores and now we even have a freeloader with us.”

“Who you calling a freeloader?”

“You.”

Senna pointed at Grisalde who was eating some food with the others. Roland was sitting between the two women that continued to shout at each other. This reminded him of the first time he met them, that time Senna was escaping under the table while Grisalde tried to bash her head in.

Orson and Dalrak were ignoring the two while enjoying their food. After the party of five left the port they were forced to rest at the nearby tavern. Due to a small refugee problem, they needed to wait for the carriage. It would be leaving soon so they were just having breakfast together before departing.

While everyone was being loud and obnoxious Roland was just looking outside while tapping his fingers on the table. Even though the danger was over he was feeling restless. The trip back home would be faster on the carriage but for some reason, the worrisome thoughts didn’t leave his mind. Soon everyone noticed that the table was starting to shake and the source of it was their new runesmith friend.

“Wayland?”

“Huh?”

He snapped back to the real world as Orson called out to him. His strength was above regular tier 2 class holders so it wasn’t that hard to make the tableware clutter.

“Is something bothering you, Wayland?”

“Oh… I guess I’m just a bit anxious about returning home…”

“That’s surprising.”

Senna chimed in from the side and actually looked somewhat confused after he blurred out the answer.

“What is?”

“Well, don’t take this the wrong way but you don’t look like someone that is bothered by many things…”

The other three nodded in unison while finishing up their food which left him also a bit confused.

“Hey, even I get anxious from time to time, do you think I’m some kind of golem or something?”

“Now that’s a good way to put it!”

Senna laughed out which brought a frown to Roland’s face. It seemed that his quiet demeanor was attributed to a lack of emotions. This was not true as he felt that he was similar to everyone else, just a bit introverted here and there. Yet his new party members apparently didn’t feel the same way.

“You know that I can hear you right?”

Roland raised his eyebrow at Senna, who was sticking her tongue out at him while laughing. After shaking his head he made a mental note of trying to fix his introverted ways. Perhaps with the number of people increasing around him, he could stop replying in short one-liners and actually hold a conversation that doesn’t include runes or business.

“Let’s go, next stop the city of Albrook!”

“Aye!”

A few of them cheered as the time to leave for their new destination was upon them. They all had met up with him outside the city and had never actually been there. Albrook had become a new destination for adventurers and they all were interested in the new dungeon but also mostly about the possibility of gaining more gold.

Thanks to Senna’s skillful mouth the adventurers were able to land a temporary position as guards. They would protect the small caravan of travelers and get a free ride. While Roland had enough left to pay for this trip there was no reason not to take up this offer. Thanks to his and Grisalde’s golden adventurer cards they were instantly hired.

The journey back home was an uneventful one though. No monsters had crossed their path and neither did any bandits. Yet this didn’t stop Roland from constantly activating his debugging skill every time they came to a halt. After what he was through he could not trust his eyes anymore. Those evil devices were also portable, at any moment a cultist could appear and put everyone under their spell.

Even tier 3 people from the church were unable to break it, only he thanks to his unique skill could. If at some point in time the cultists came to realize this fact his life would be forfeit. At such a time his only hope of survival would probably be the church, not even his noble heritage would be of much use.

…

“So you can’t recommend anyone?”

“Well… there is one idiot… I mean person but it would be better if you didn’t speak with him too much…”

Roland wanted to roll his eyes at the questions that Orson was giving them. It was as if his mind was only filled with ass and tits. Even after passing out on the ship, Orson was already itching for more fun and asking about the red-light district.

He never visited those types of places unless he wanted to visit the thieves guild so he had no idea what to say to his new friend, the only person that could probably point him in the right direction was Armand. Yet when looking at Orson he could not shake the feeling that they were quite similar.

“Stop with that stupid shit!”

Senna smacked the back of Orson’s head as he was derailing the conversation.

“So back to those dwarven union bastards!”

“Such a pity, that thay wid do such a thang.”

Dalrak shook his head after Roland described the years of his back and forth with the merchant guild and the dwarven union. He informed them about the price gouging and all the small things they tried to do to force him out of business.

“But you must be a good craftsman to last for so long.”

“I know a thing or two, luckily Runesmiths don’t grow on trees and rarely move away from the main cities.”

Everyone nodded while he continued to explain the power dynamics that were in the city. He colored everyone in a mostly gray light while putting Arthur slightly above them. Though Senna was mostly interested in the thieves guild and a way of getting in contact with them.

“Can you bring me along the next time you go to the market?”

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“I guess if I bring you as a guard then they will have no problem letting you in..”

As a member of the black market, he would be able to bring in bodyguards. Yet if Senna wanted to actually perform missions for the guild then she would need someone to vouch for her. Roland knew a few people like that with Lobelia being on the forefront.

“It’s good to have people in high places!”

“She will decide though, I can only introduce you.”

He shrugged as Lobelia had the freedom to disregard Seena’s plea. There was a possibility as Senna was a guild member but belonged to a different region. The underground guilds weren’t as tightly connected as the ones like the adventurers guild, each one was slightly different. Depending on the guild master she could very well be refused entry.

“So that’s Albrook?”

“Yeah.”

After the conversation was over and some more time had passed they had finally arrived at their destination. The chimneys from the dwarven workshops were constantly releasing smoke into the air but besides that, the city seemed peaceful. As always he could see new people stuck at the main gate and this small caravan would probably be the same.

Yet even though his new friends were all looking at the medium-sized waiting line his attention was drawn to another place, towards the forest. There he could not see any smoke as he had designed his workshop to filter all of it out instead. He had promised to help them in the city and introduce them to some of his acquaintances but being stuck in a line was the last thing that he wanted to do now.

“This might take a while so…”