The Normal Farmer - Completed

Chapter 10 - Quest to Argoheria

Ronald turned back to face a smiling Feebles and the young couple that wanted to hire Duza’s Party. “Mister Feebles… and Mister Taly… Miss Ari… Since when are you…”

Taly was smiling. “We entered right after you, but you were so distracted talking with that woman in the green dress that you did not even see us. Love is such a beautiful thing, isn’t it? So, while we eat, can we talk with your Party Leader?”

Ronald pointed his hand towards Duza. “I think so, but you can ask her; she is Miss Duza Sonanji.”

Taly had some trouble stopping his laughter, and Ari elbowed him on his side. “Stop that, you stupid brat! Forgive this guy, Miss Duza; he has a bad habit of speaking before thinking. But you must also agree that seeing you like that after being told about your reputation as a dangerous Adventurer in this City is too surprising in its own manner.”

Duza nodded while frowning towards Mira. “Yeah, I knew it was a bad idea putting on this dress, but my sister thought it would look good on me, and it would also be appropriate for a walk around the City…”

Ari smiled. “She was right, you know? It does look good on you. And judging by the looks these guys around us are making, I am not the only one thinking that way.”

Duza took a quick look around, and she noticed some appreciative looks towards her. She felt a little awkward, and she didn’t know what to say.

Ari held her arm and pointed to an empty table. “Shall we sit over there? You may have some questions for us, and we have some for you as well.”

Duza pointed to the table where Ini, Ovaidel, and Reylom were. “Over there, near my companions. We need to join one more table to make room for all of us.”

“As you wish. Taly, dear, can you get some chairs for us? Or are you really waiting to see if someone works for you? Don’t you frown at me; move already! Sometimes I just don’t know what to do with him! Men…”

Duza smiled, and she went to meet the others. Ronald followed her, with Woof at one side and Feebles on the other. Mira and a servant brought food for everyone.

When they were seated, Feebles asked, “I don’t know if I can be here; you wish to talk among yourselves; I am not needed for…”

Duza interrupted him. “By all means, Mister Feebles, you were the one to arrange all this. If you didn’t talk about Ronald to them, we wouldn’t be here. So, first things first, who are you two?”

Ari slowly shook her head. “No need to know, for the completion of the job which we are hiring you.”

“Nevertheless, I need to know that, or at least be assured you aren’t being targeted by some envious Noble family that wants your lands. And also, to believe you won’t run from us without paying for the escort service.”

“That will not be a problem. No one knows us in this region, and we left our country disguised as Merchants in a caravan that was leaving. And trust goes both ways, Miss Duza. We trust in a man who was able to gain the trust of a wild wolf. We trust you because he does. As for the others… Well, let’s just say I don’t like what I see. A beardy tall man that looks angry with everything, another one who is looking at me with mischievous eyes as if he wants to undress me by force, and another one who is hiding his features under that hood over his head. But if you trust them, so shall we. As for the payment, we already told Mister Ronald the amount and our terms for the payment.”

While Ini was holding his laughter, Ovaidel was frowning, and Reylom choked on a piece of bread. Duza leaned forward and crossed her fingers on top of the table. Ronald had to put in a lot of effort to avoid staring at her cleavage. She didn’t seem to notice she had so much power over healthy men with her natural attributes.

“You can trust them; we have come a long way over the past few years. They may not look like it, as do I, in these clothes, but we are all very good at this job. The only one that I can’t vouch for is Ronald; we just met him yesterday. But it’s as you said if that wolf trusts him, so do we. But since he entered those doors yesterday, he has shown strong character, convictions, and an acute sense of honour. I believe you are in excellent hands if you choose us as your escort.”

Ari gave a small smile. “Okay, I will trust you on that. But if that man touches me weirdly or if I catch him looking at me while I am naked and taking a bath, I will kill him without any hesitation.”

While Reylom looked insulted, Duza tried to calm Ari, saying, “You don’t need to worry about Reylom. He used to be a Priest from the Diocese of Thetria.”

“That’s not even slightly reassuring. Priests from there are used to having their way, and many are rumoured to be misguided from God Seya’s Teachings.”

Reylom spoke, with a very serious look on his face: “That’s the reason I left Thetria. I couldn’t concur with some things I saw, and I couldn’t do a thing to stop it… Some Priests are already lost, but many others are honoured. You can’t put us all in the same bag. And I wasn’t looking at you in a weird way; I am surprised because you are very beautiful while being so young.”

Ari grimaced. “Either way, consider yourself warned, ‘former Priest’. It’s better for your health if I don’t catch you again looking at me like that. You may say I am wrong, or you may say you are trustworthy, but I can perfectly recognize a man who likes young women a little too much. You can’t fool me, ‘former Priest’, and I am also way more dangerous than I look. You would be wise about keeping yourself on my good side, or we are going to have some problems.”

Taly placed one hand over Ari’s left hand and squeezed it a little. “Ari, come on… I have already warned you about that. If a man tries to undress you with his eyes, that doesn’t mean he will try to do it by force… You must excuse my fiancée, Mister Reylom; she encountered some situations with Priests throughout our journey, and they didn’t go well. For them, I mean. But because it happened too many times and always with Priests, she tends to be a little… how can I say this… biased to think badly of Priests? Don’t worry, I will keep a watch over her behaviour, but it’s better for the sake of a peaceful journey that you avoid upsetting her. When she gets mad, I have a lot of trouble stopping her. She may not look like it, but she is an amazing fighter, capable of defeating everyone in this room, even if they attack at the same time. Not to mention her ability with Magic. That part is scary…”

Taly trembled a little and strongly shook his head as if he was trying to get rid of some terrible memories.

Ari made a forced smile and faced Duza. “Please don’t think badly of me, but everyone has experienced some trauma in the past. While some continue their lives as if nothing had happened, others have deeper wounds that are very difficult to forget. I hope this doesn’t complicate your job or make you deny our Quest.”

Duza looked at the others, and after receiving some nods, she agreed: “I understand why you may feel that way. But I would appreciate it if you took a deep thought on that part along the journey. Reylom might also save your life if trouble appears. Or die to protect you. You are right; he likes younger women a little too much. But he is also completely crazy about little kids. That’s why we always go on jobs where there are missing kids or someone kills one. Sometimes we lost the payment for a Quest because we made the poor decision of leaving him next to the assassins. There wasn’t much left to collect the prize after he finished…”

Taly looked around. “So, we have a deal? Good. And as agreed previously… here are five gold coins. At the end of our journey, we will pay the rest, along with an extra for the wolf and Mister Ronald’s cooking. I hope you can take care of the supplies for our journey, and it would be good for my headaches if every two days we could sleep in an Inn because Ari becomes very grumpy if she doesn’t sleep properly, and that always gives me headaches. What? You know you become very obnoxious without proper sleep, always nagging and complaining! Miss Duza, have you thought about the path we will take to get to Argoheria?”

Duza opened a map of that region that Ini gave her. “We talked about that early this morning. We can go by horse along Kwoghia, Rediorumia, and Thetria, get a boat in Thetria, and go by sea until Argoheria. I think that in less than four months we will arrive in Argoheria. Since you have a carriage, I want to ask if the wolf could be allowed to go on top of it to warn us of any danger around or ahead of us. How many horses does your carriage have? We must buy enough grain for our horses and yours as well.”

Ari smiled and shook her head. “Our carriage doesn’t have horses. I use Magical Cards to summon two Big Dark Bulls and those guys don’t eat.”

Duza and the others were surprised. Duza stuttered for a while: “Those… high-level Magical Beings… so, so rare…”

“Not to mention my other Cards. Now you understand why we started our voyage all alone? We didn’t need protection. I was the one who got tired of so much fighting. Taly, on the other hand, never gets enough.”

Taly was looking at the map and following the roads with his right index finger. He frowned for a while, and then he smiled while looking at Ronald. “Here is a thought… Considering that you could level up from your lower position as a Farmer, what do you say if, when we get to… here, near this curve, we both went for a one-day trip to Zakrosia, and we meet the others… here, in Thetria.”

Ari pointed at him with her thumb while smiling at Duza. “See? Better if we keep him under close watch, or he will sneak up to go to Zakrosia all alone.”

Duza was frowning while looking at the map. “Well… Ronald could take this opportunity to…”

Before she could say anything more, Ronald interrupted. “No, I don’t need to seek trouble. Normally, trouble seeks me out. We all want a safe trip without too much danger, correct? I think that little excursion to Zakrosia…”

Before he could finish, Riattus spoke next to his ear. “Go for it. Such a great opportunity for levelling up doesn’t appear so often. And this little guy seems like he can take care of himself if needed. I think he is way stronger than he looks. Or you could go all alone with the excuse of hunting. If you agree with his idea, you will have some problems explaining your stats, but we can take care of it with your Sphere. It would also be an excellent opportunity to test this group. If they can keep a secret about the fact that you have more Mana than you should, you will level up easier without the need to be so secretive near them. If we come to the conclusion they can’t be trusted, we just go to another country as fast as we can. Considering you can ride that Big Rat of yours, and since he is faster than a horse, if it comes down to that, you can get away from them really fast. It would be good if you said you have a Magical Being that can carry you, as long as someone gets a saddle for him and teaches you how to ride.”

Ronald continued his sentence… “Well, maybe it’s a good idea after all. I could improve a lot… And catch some hunt, in the meantime.”

Duza bit her lip. “Maybe it would be better if we all went so that you…”

Ronald shook his head. “No, only me, Woof, and Mister Taly will be enough. If we find more danger than we can chew, we just get away the fastest we can. I intended to level up while hunting, but killing some Monsters would be faster.”

Taly was all smiles. “Great. You can even take all the Mana Orbs, because I don’t need to level up anytime soon; I just want to kill some Monsters. I was told that their numbers had increased to a dangerous level, and sooner or later, they would start to invade the nearby countries. We could take this chance to thin them down a bit.”

Duza was still biting her lip, but because everyone was smiling and giving ideas to help Ronald decide on his actions if he encountered a great number of Monsters, she concealed her concerns.

But Ari noticed her and whispered, “Don’t worry, Taly is more powerful than he looks. If needed, he could eradicate all the Monsters in Zakrosia by himself.”

Duza whispered back, “Maybe, but Ronald wanted to lie low. If he levels up too quickly, he may attract more attention than he needs, and that can be dangerous.”

“We don’t tell if your guys don’t tell. Who knows? Maybe Mister Ronald gets so strong that he will be worthy of being with you. I noticed the way you two looked at each other. Don’t worry, your secret is safe with me. Just don’t let Taly realize that, or he will tease you a lot.”

Duza was surprised. How could she tell? Duza thought she was hiding her feelings from everyone, even from herself, but maybe that wasn’t the case. Or maybe Ronald impressed her more than she thought with his actions in the City.

It was as she thought from the very first moment she saw him entering the Guild. He was interesting. Very interesting indeed.

The rest of the meeting went smoothly, including the making of the list of supplies and quantities that they would need for the entire journey. Ari was happily rubbing Woof’s left ear while he had his head on her lap. Taly was looking at the map and measuring the distance between the Villages and Cities that Reylom and Ovaidel were pointing out to find where he and Ari could sleep every two days.

Since their carriage had enough space and the benches could be transformed into beds, he and Ari could sleep in there for one night and then spend the next in an Inn at the next village or City. The others could camp, and that would mean they needed some mules to carry camping material and extra supplies.

They had three mules and four horses, but with Ronald joining them, they would need another horse. Or so they thought, until Ronald said he only needed a horse’s saddle and riding lessons.

That intrigued Ovaidel, and he pointed at Woof. “What do you mean by saying you only need a saddle? You want to ride him?”

“Ahahaha! No, but I have one Magical Card I want to try out. I was told that I could ride that guy, but I never tried until now.”

Ovaidel was finally smiling. “Okay… Well, if it’s a Magical Being, we don’t need food for him, right? And when he disappears, while you recover your Mana, you can ride on top of the carriage next to Woof. Well, one less thing to take care of. It seems we will not spend too much money on supplies after all. I thought that one more horse, a mule, and grain for all the horses would be a lot of money. But with Magical Bulls pulling the carriage and Ronald with a Magical ride, things look very promising.”

Taly smiled. “Considering that supplies are on us, you are getting an immense sum of money for this escort job. This means you can sleep in an Inn from time to time instead of only camping out. This journey looks like it will be a lot of fun unless we encounter trouble, I mean.”

That remark earned him a punch on the shoulder from Ari. “Do you mind not saying that? Every time you say something just as stupid, ‘shilum’ things always happen!”

“Yeah, sorry about that, my dear. So, since we have almost everything settled, I think we can leave the rest with you guys. We could take the rest of this day to take a walk around. We went to a few places during the morning, and we even saw you two in the Market, but then four Guards appeared, making a mess in there before we could greet you, so we left to go hide in an old woman’s Card Shop.”

Ari gave one last rub on Woof’s ear, and she also got up. “Well, we will see each other again tomorrow morning for the final preparations. It would be good if you thought about what else we could need so that you could get it tomorrow so that after lunch, we could leave this City and start our voyage. One last thing, because we want to know a little more about this region and the people living in it, it would be great if, when we arrived at a City or a village, we could have some time to visit and talk with the people.”

Duza smiled, and she got up to make a slight bow. “As you wish, Miss Ari. Mister Taly, it was a pleasure.”

Taly shook his head. “Stop with the courteous treatment, okay? We don’t want to attract too much attention on our journey. From now on, we are Taly and Ari. Only that, okay? The only Mister here is Mister Ronald, and that’s only because he treats everyone as Mister and Miss. I don’t know why, but I tend to treat him like that too. Weird, right?”

They all looked at Ronald while smiling, and he just frowned. “What? Politeness is a virtue! You would prefer I resemble more with Mister Ovaidel, who always looks angry with everyone?”

Ovaidel snorted. “What do you mean by that? I am not angry!”

Ronald shrugged his shoulders. “You could fool me… You need to smile more. Or you will never find any friends…”