🏆 THE AMBY AWARDS 2023 TOP PICK - DIVERSE LIT 🏆
It's Rin and Hye-jin against the world. Or so it should have been.
Nagara Rin and Joon Hye-jin, college sweethearts and passionate gamers, have lived a fairytale marriage. Not even a decade after did...
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"Those fur-coat guys," I started.
The woman raised an eyebrow. "The Hunting Raids," she supplied.
I rolled my hand in the air. "Yeah, them," I tilted the cup to my face to take a bigger gulp. Man, this was growing on me. It's a miracle I was still sane and not seeing red. "Are they constantly attacking people and stealing from them?"
The woman stuck her bottom lip out. "They're a useful scouting party when they're not out there terrorizing the town," she said. "Since they got a new Captain, it's been harder to keep them in check, especially when they've been amassing huge numbers by the day."
Was this the quest? Was I supposed to be uprooting this rabid organization? And what's a scouting party? I was sure those didn't exist back when this was still a game. We're either adventurers or not.
"But we can manage," the woman sniffed and drained her cup. That fast? "They are mostly easier to steer back to the right direction if we remind them where they stand and what is bound to happen should they fail to abide by Mystriae and the Empire's rules."
Oh, it's not a quest. Still, to think that they would have decapitated me and people would just say it's a mistake on the Hunting Raid's part. Wow.
Before I could fully resign from this grim conversation, I scratched the side of my cheek. The cut on my other one still stung, though I wasn't sure if it stopped bleeding or if it ever would. The pain was still there, though. "And you mentioned this...dragna-something," I tilted my head to one side. "What is it?"
"Dragnasand—the most powerful guild in the Central Tower. We're directly under the flagship of the Central Empire and aim to keep the forces of the netherside at bay," the woman explained.
I bobbed my head. Those sounded familiar, so all good. "And your party?" I asked. "You're part of it?"
The woman rolled her shoulders. "Not to brag, but not only are we part of it, we're the head party that we don't have a separate name," she said. "We carry the very name of our guild. We are known as the Dragnasand Knights."
"That's right," a different voice rang from behind us. I turned and came face to face with a creature that didn't make sense. It was a dragon, but it stood on two feet with human-like appendages apart from the presence of scales, claws, wings, and tails. Slitted yellow eyes trained towards me. "Rare of you to bring a friend, Mirani."
The woman, Mirani, scoffed. "That's none of your business, Valren," she said to the person with bright, yellow scales. She eyed my cup. I've yet to reach half. She jerked her chin towards another person behind the one who spoke. "Nice to see you, Yaora. Found some good metals lately?"
"No," the second newcomer said, dropping into the stool next to me. This one had green scales. They looked and probably felt like the jade stones my grandmother used to have on the altar back when I was a child visiting the province. One nod at the fox-headed person behind the counter sent them scurrying. A regular, then. "Damned patrol taking up all my time. Tell Cavya to lessen my time if he wants good weapons to last us in Riekhallow."
