Duskbound

Chapter 78

The temporary camp was all but abandoned by the time Jensen made his way back there. He'd spent most of his night in Beldrit, helping refugees get settled in. It was somewhat ghoulish to slot people into the homes left behind by the victims of monsters in this town, but that was how it went. He still thought it made more sense to send them back to Deshir, but given the state of the town, he could see why the people who were supposed to be living there weren't eager to return.

Besides, there was safety in numbers and Deshir had been devastated enough that a regular old monster horde coming out of the forest would wipe the rest of them out. He wouldn't be at all surprised to learn that the town ended up abandoned before winter set in. Really, he supposed it depended on exactly how many more monsters his master and Sildra found in the other towns.

I hope that innkeeper isn't a monster. I liked the food there.

With any luck, he'd get another night's sleep in a warm bed and a hearty breakfast before Torwin got them heading back south to civilization. Jensen could admit that he wasn't looking forward to that, not because of the walk, but because of the confrontation that awaited him at the end. His father was not going to be pleased that he'd deviated from his instructions, no matter how good the class he'd earned ended up being.

[You have completed a quest: Save the frontier from the source of the corruption.]

[Reward: 7500 decarmas, Grenadier's Flask]

"Hmm?" Jensen murmured. "What's this now? They must have finished with the other towns."

The decarma value was nothing, but he supposed it helped offset some of the money he'd spent blowing up that house. Jensen promptly ignored that part of the message and focused on the other half, the [Grenadier's Flask]. He'd seen some made by the combined efforts of alchemists and enchanters, but to the best of his knowledge, it wasn't a piece of gear available through the system store. Then again, it would take years to read everything the store could offer, and not a single piece of it was worth the truly outrageous asking prices.

The flask had the ability to fill itself with a volatile, highly explosive agent, and was enchanted so that, when thrown, it would shatter, leaving a swath of destruction wherever it landed. The cap of the flask would then start to regrow a new bottle over the next week or so, which would slowly fill itself again. Depending on the strength of the enchantments, it could be anywhere from ten days to two months between uses.

If it's a quest reward, I'd hope it skews more to the short end of the spectrum. He'd have to ask Torwin to use [Identify] when he saw his master again to get the exact specifications. They'd probably be back soon, since apparently, they'd wiped out every single corrupted seed bearer in the area already. Knowing the speed Sildra moved at and considering how tired she had to be by now, he figured it'd either be two to three hours if it was just Torwin or more like six to eight if it was both of them.

Either way, Jensen was taking a nap while he could.

* * *

The mana compass still pointed to monsters with a lot of mana in them, but Velik didn't go out of his way to hunt for them. There'd be plenty of time for that later; it wasn't like the champions were going anywhere. For the moment, he just wanted somewhere safe so he could properly rest.

"If you could call it that," Velik told him. "I don't really understand a lot of what happened out there, but I think the threat is ended."

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The two started walking to Celarut at Torwin's insistence. More specifically, they headed to the Raven's Nest for lunch. The time spent reaching town was filled with updates about what had happened, Velik describing the strange cave he'd been trapped in and the monster he'd found at the bottom of it. Torwin told him about the massive death toll the corrupted seed bearers had inflicted on the frontier, about the infestation that none of them had noticed despite it probably having been ongoing for a year or more.

"Sildra found them?" Velik asked in disbelief.

"More like she was the instrument of a god's will," Torwin said. "The quest came from him, no doubt. She spread it to us when we aligned with her purpose and helped her achieve what Morgus wanted."

"I didn't know gods could influence the system."

"Only in specific ways, if the priests are to be believed. Granting quests is one of the big ones."

Another example of things I don't know that I should.

He knew it wasn't his fault. He'd spent most of his life living in the woods killing monsters, and he was good at it. It was doing everything else that he was struggling with. Hopefully, Torwin would have some good advice about where to learn all the things a normal person was supposed to know by the time they were an adult. Velik had plenty of decarmas; it wouldn't be a problem to pay for tutoring or classes.

"There's something I wanted to talk to you about," he said, earning a curious glance from Torwin. "I kind of need some advice about the future."

"What about it?"

"I'm leaving the region as soon as I'm certain the monster threat is truly resolved, and I could use some input about what to do next. I don't really even know what my options are."

"Ah, that's good. I wanted to talk to you about the exact same thing. I'll tell you what, let's get a meal in our bellies first, and we can discuss what the world outside of your little corner has to offer."