[Shrubley, the Monster Adventurer] Chapter 84 – Oregano Gangsta IV

This was his first time eating in the guildhall, and Shrubley was incredibly excited. He didn’t know that the Adventurers Guild did table service! He had always seen adventurers going up and picking their food up from the counter in front of the kitchens.

Plates of fresh steaming food were delivered one after the other, and more dishes were brought out as Cal, the skeletal mage, joined them, making their party complete.

While Shrubley had his plate full of meat slathered in delicious and tangy sauces, Cal had a variety of milky dishes.

“You have quite the sweet tooth,” Shrubley remarked, seeing the piles of round melty ice cream scoops in his bowl.

Smudge scooted closer to the ice cream in poorly hidden interest. Hunger essence was certainly having an influence upon the young pink slime.

When Cal’s attention inevitably fell on him, the slime’s mouth and eyes spun around to his backside to pretend he was looking at something else all along. The whistling didn’t make the slime any less suspicious.

Cal patted his ribs which, even with the muffling of his velvet cloak, managed to clack with a hollow sound. “I have no flesh to get fat! I can eat all the delicious sweets I want and never gain an ounce.”

Shrubley tilted his head curiously. “Will I get fat?”

No one knew what that would even look like on Shrubley.

The skeleton shrugged and continued to shovel in the ice cream, La Nosca toast, macaroni, pancakes smothered in butter, three different flavors of milkshake, and of course a tall glass of milk beaded with condensation.

“Where does it all go?” Slyrox asked, studying Cal’s open ribcage with a mitt to her masked muzzle.

No one really knew, not even Cal, who was too busy eating to answer.

Once they were finished with the delicious meals, they retired back to their joined rooms.

The Guild often had accommodations for clans and parties of adventurers going out together. Most parties were four or five-man groups. Which meant that their accommodations had a central room where people could eat and relax with a view of the surrounding autumnal landscapes, with five doors leading off to smaller bedchambers.

The rooms were well-appointed, or so Shrubley thought. The furnishings were simple yet tasteful. Nothing ostentation, but definitely well-used and a little worn at the edges.

Just as he preferred. They had a lived-in sense to them that made him feel at home.

Once inside, Cal dropped onto the squashy faded-green sofa and sighed blissfully. He patted a belly that wasn’t there.

Shrubley really wanted to ask where the food went, but as soon as he sat down, he remembered what he wanted to do. Taking out the items Dynk had stolen, then given back to him, Shrubley set them on the coffee table in front of the sofa.

All eyes fastened to what Shrubley was doing.

Aside from the [Magical Map], Shrubley had nearly lost the other items. The [Essence Gem Box], [Guidance Stone Compass], and the 10 [Silver Coins], now reduced to 9.

“Pyuu,” Smudge whispered in awe. His gelatinous body hopped on the floorboards, then bounced on top of the coffee table to investigate the items more closely.

Fortunately, the slime wasn’t opening his mouth to eat anything. Yet.

“Muchly big quest reward?” Slyrox asked with barely contained excitement, slowly shuffling closer, one over-sized boot at a time. “For saving all the things?”

The village and the surrounding region were hardly all the things, as Slyrox put it. While this area did feel like the whole world to Shrubley, there were far more lands to explore with new people to meet, new sites to see, and new foods to eat.

His rooty feet yearned to soak up the mystical waters of far-away lands, even if said mystical water was one of the oceans the Druid had told him so much about. Perhaps the salty water would disagree with Shrubley’s composure, but he wanted to find out all the same. Even if the result was a rather unpleasant one.

I would much like to see the ocean! Not just an ocean painted out of Fantasy mana, but with my own eyes. And while the sun sets too! It must be beautiful.

He realized Slyrox was staring at him.

“Things?” Shrubley asked, tilting his bushy body to the side. “People are not things. Now places? Maybe. Places are possibly things. What do you think, Cal?”

“Don’t drag me into this!” the skeleton cried, as if the affair was a big row between friends.

“That’s not what Slyrox means!” Slyrox told Shrubley with a wagging mitt. “Is Earth-phrase from Havior.”

Shrubley thought that over. This Havior seemed like a strange one to Shrubley, but he didn’t mind the unusual. He found the out of the ordinary to be interesting indeed.

“Well, yes, these rewards are from my completed quest,” he told Slyrox, then something occurred to him. “My friends, did any of you finish a quest for quelling the serpentii threat?”

That caught each of his friends by surprise.

Cal’s green eyes burned brighter at that. Slyrox froze, her mitt stuck in the air mid-motion. Even Smudge stopped rolling towards the [Essence Gem Box]. His sideways face blinked out of sync.

Shrubley eagerly awaited their answer.

Coins and loot materialized out of the air, concentrated around each of Shrubley’s fellow monster adventurers.

For Smudge, there was a multifaceted glassy sphere that shimmered with magical energy. This item immediately caught Shrubley’s interest. On the surface, it seemed to be a fairly plain item, but with his burgeoning Copper senses, he could detect that the glass was more than it seemed.

After a few inquiring balloon-like squeaks, the slime squeezed inside of the sphere like a cat with a box. The sphere disappeared with a radial puff of mana.

“It is a shell of magic armor!” Smudge proclaimed proudly.

Shrubley nodded his bushy body. “Of course! This seems perfectly suited to your form.”

“Hmm, did you already bond it?” Cal asked, reaching out an osseous finger and tapping the slime. “Maybe that’s why it has disappeared.”

Smudge bounced, his pink shape rippling, unimpeded by the armor.

“Does it only respond to magic attacks?” Slyrox said, poking Smudge too.

“I think so!” Smudge said, sounding quite pleased.

“What if you change shape?” Shrubley asked, wondering what the limitations were.

Smudge blinked slowly at that, then his spherical body shifted into a cube.

“Well, that answers that,” Shrubley said, patting his friend, surprised and happy that his new armor did not interfere with the action.

Unfortunately, none of their quest rewards were on par with his own. Of course, Shrubley was too polite to point this out.

Perhaps their version of the quest wasn’t the same, or the rewards were reliant on an entirely different metric. What that truly was, Shrubley didn’t know, but he was intrigued all the same.

It was entirely possible that Shrubley’s rewards were fairly different because he was Copper Rank.

While the others looked over their items, Shrubley turned his attention to his status. Warmth welled up within him as the Shardscript confirmed what he had felt earlier.

I wonder if this kind of growth is normal? Shrubley thought to himself.

[Shrubley]

Race: Soul Shrub

Class: Sage Knight

Rank: Mid Copper

Adventurer: E-Grade (2-Star)

Level: 22

[Attributes]

Strength: 39

Skill: 38

Hardiness: 57

Willpower: 74

Arcane: 57

Restoration: 62

[Essences]

[Life (Prime)] (Copper II Rank)

● [Transference]

[Curiosity (Black)] (Copper VI Rank)

● [Lifelong Student]

● [Recycle]

[Nature (Green)] (Copper V Rank)

● [Bark Armor]

● [Budding Barrage]

● [Graft]

[Light (White)] (Copper V Rank)

● [Recovery]

● [Counteract]

He was immensely pleased to see his class, Sage Knight, proudly displayed there. It was important to him, a reflection of not only his strength but what he wanted to do with that strength.

His essences were coming along nicely. He had started his adventure with just Curiosity essence. Now we had a full set, complete with his prime essence, Life.

Shrubley felt a pang of loss at the events that had transpired in order for him to acquire the prime essence from the Guidance Stone of Vitality. He dearly wished there had been a way to save Mistress Ceasewane.

Once his friends finished going over their items, they turned to Shrubley’s still positioned at the center of the table.

Slyrox had acquired a new backpack, complete with an oversized pan hanging off the side. A new necklace glittered around Cal’s collarbone.

“We should pool our money,” Cal said. “That way, we can find better accommodations. Collective bargaining and all that.”

Slyrox managed to give him the stink eye without having any visible eyes at all. She clutched a little satchel that clinked merrily with the sound of riches. “You greedalox? Eh?” She poked Cal with a mitt.

“No! I don’t even know what that is!”

“Is thing greedalox tongue-flap,” Slyrox insisted. “Very tricksy!”

Cal, as so often happened when he was feeling threatened or a touch too much attention, or the wind blew unexpectedly, triggered his cloak’s invisibility enchantment and vanished.

“Calm yourself, Slyrox,” Shrubley said soothingly. “I think Cal only wanted to make sure we could all afford lodgings and food.” He turned to the empty seat. The depression in the green fabric told Shrubley Cal was still there. “I think we can trust each other to keep our own purses. We will make sure none of us goes without.”

There was a chorus of agreement at this, with Cal returning to the land of the visible mid-nod.

Shrubley motioned with a branch-like arm at the [Essence Gem Box]. “Inside that is an essence gem. I think one of you should take it. I should not be the only one with a full set of essences.”

Three pairs of eyes fastened on the small box.

“What if it is an essence none of us want?” Cal asked. “I already have Elemental and Mirror; I only need one more to finish.”

Shrubley nodded. “Then it will be put to good use,” he told them. “We can sell it or give it to the Adventurers Guild. I do not think anybody should use an essence they do not want.”

“But how will we get more?” Cal asked, wringing the tattered gold hem of his cloak. “They are very rare, even if we are somewhat elevated within the Guild, they will not simply give us any. They have bigger things to worry about.”

“I think our teacher might know what to do about that,” Shrubley said.

“Pyuu,” Smudge said in agreement, adding to the conversation in his own way.

Cal looked into the shadowy corners of the room. There weren’t many with all the windows open, letting in the crisp morning light, but Cal was never one to speak ill of somebody if they might hear about it.

He cleared his bone-dry throat and said, “Yes, but I rather think she has enough on her plate.” Once he was sure that there were no dark oppas or vampyrs lingering in the brightly lit room, he added, “Her lands are probably a mess. Rykal did a number on them, and I hear that the Count is… unwell. I do not think we will see the Countess for many years, I fear.”

Slyrox sat on the floor, discontentedly kicking her oversized feet. The koblin looked down in disappointment. A feeling Shrubley reciprocated. Even Smudge wasn’t in high spirits after hearing that.

“Then we will do the best we can do without her guidance,” Shrubley said earnestly, trying to encourage his friends. “In the meantime, I think one of you should open the box.”

There was another item that could give an essence, but he did not think it was likely to produce one yet. The [Essence Vessel] was something Shrubley could still sense on Cal with his nascent Copper abilities, but it didn’t seem ripe yet.

While his [Recycle] essence ability might trigger upon the box, Shrubley had the feeling that if he opened it instead of his friends, the essence offered would be one suited for him instead.

He already had what he needed. This was for them.

Slyrox, Smudge and Cal needed more essences until they reached the 3 required to form a class. Shrubley had come to this crossroads before, and it was an impossibly tough decision to make. So, he left it up to them to choose.

“You should use it,” Cal told Slyrox. “Smudge and I already have 2 essences each. You’re the only one with a single.”

The koblin nodded, her velvety green ears flopping up and down with the motion. “Thanking muchly,” she said excitedly, then reached over to the box and opened it. A brilliant light spilled over her masked face, yet Shrubley could tell by the way her ears perked up excitedly that she had found something tremendously valuable.