Chapter 31: Interlude
Lucky Harvest PoV:
My life had taken a direction that I never would have expected, I began polishing my spear once again as I sat alone. It had been a few days since Arcane Hope and his group left the village and a lot had changed in a very short amount of time, a good number of the older ponies had opted to stay in the battle scarred village and help rebuild. While a good chunk of the younger villagers including me had decided to travel and help found the guild. There’s nothing left anchoring me here now that father is… gone and there’s only one place I want to be. Arcane Hope is the reason my life changed so much which means he needs to take responsibility and let me stay with him.
I gazed down absentmindedly at my spear and thought back to the battle, it was horrific but I remember vividly the whirlwind of pure power and destruction that Hope wielded. I know that I'm too weak to travel with him, but that’s going to change. One day I won’t need this magic weapon he made for me, I'm going to get stronger all on my own and beat him in a fight to show him that I won’t slow him down. Then I'm gonna march right up to him and… I huffed and shook the heat out of my cheeks. Rising from my seat and replacing the blade on my spear I continued my walk through South Town, this place is way louder than home.
After the leaders of Arcane Hope’s tribe traveled back here and proposed their guild idea to the chief of this place it was smooth sailing from there. All it took was some talk of more money and less monsters and they were sold. For now everyone that’s joining the guild is staying in an inn nearby or is camping just outside of town. I was lucky enough to share a room with a few of the members of the tribe.
There wasn’t a militia sponsored quest board yet, but some of the locals have started to try and employ some of the tribe for something. I knew of a few who were employed as guards for a jewelry store, though I was pretty sure the two weren’t the best fighters despite their background. I arrived in front of the inn and eye’d an older griffin local that had been glaring at the entrance. I sped up my pace as I passed through the bar area trying to avoid speaking to anypony, I was tired and pretty irritable and didn’t want to deal with any of the odd parts of Hope’s tribe.
“Ah… So the Solar Dragoon has finally returned, have you finished training your inner flame?” I suppressed a groan at the slightly nasally voice and turned to glare at the corner of the tavern room, there leaning against the wall in what looks like an uncomfortable pose was a forest green coated colt wearing a black cloak that barely covered his slightly singed black mane. I rolled my eyes at his question and suppressed a vengeful grin at the memory of our last meeting. In some weird attempt to try and prove himself as the ‘chosen one?’ He challenged me to a duel. I refused at first as I had better things to do than to listen to him prattle on. It wasn’t until he called my strength into question that I decided to take him up on his challenge, it was laughably easy and he realized his mistake once my spear ignited.
“... Where’s your foal-sitters at?” My voice came out flat and emotionless despite the annoyance I was feeling, I felt the usual anger bubble up at my failure to express my emotions. I’ve been struggling with this ever since the battle, I’m sure Hope could help me with this. The colt flinched slightly at my question, the group this annoyance tends to hang around included a mare that I was rooming with. She tended to be the voice of reason when this one gets out of his depth or says something stupid.
“ The only companion I need is the shadows, I-”
“You should have been waiting for us back at the Militia Outpost” Cutting off the inane ramblings of the colt was the voice of reason that was River Creek, one of the few actually normal members of Arcane Hope’s Tribe. Entering the Inn were the other three members of their group, River herself, The ever-silent Hollow Root, and SlipStream the pegasus. I didn’t really have much of an opinion on the rest of their group as it wasn’t her place, but she can say that in her personal opinion they do rank higher than the rest of the tribe.
“ U-uh I had to… compare training methods with our Dragoon friend here” I sent another glare towards the sweating colt as he shrank into himself more. My glare was mirrored by River but hers was decidedly more bemused unlike that of the colts brother who was silently laughing at his brother. Turning my attention completely to River I saw that she had finally changed her apparel, I had heard her talking about changing up her equipment to help her combat ability. Whereas before she usually wore a regular gray vest that matched her coat, now she wore a sea blue robe with white lining. She no longer wore a bag but instead had a medium-sized water tank strapped to her side, I assume it helps her with the kind of magic she specializes in. I have seen her shoot an apple off a fence post from acres away.
“If you had stuck around, you would know that we just got offered our first quest from the Militia” River’s pride tinged words instantly caught my attention, a quest!? I had thought it would have taken more time before quests started becoming available. My small bead of excitement quickly fell apart as I remembered I wasn’t a part of their group, I didn’t let my disappointment show however.
“Because of all the ponies that were…lost so close to the forest, the timberwolf population had skyrocketed. There’s now an open quest for anyone to bring in a set of timber wolf fangs for two bit each, that's four bits per wolf but wait there's more! If we bring in an Alpha timber wolf’s ‘knot heart’ then we can get thirty bits!” River’s excitement was slightly contagious, I had never earned that many bits in one sitting before! The pulse of disappointment in my heart grew stronger again as I reminded myself that this wasn’t any of my business. Turning away from the excited group of adventurers, I started making my way back up to my room.
“Lucky? Where ya goin?” The confused voice of River stopped me in my tracks, I turned back to look at the group of four with a puzzled look on my face.
“Don’t you want to come too? This is the perfect quest for you, together we can’t lose!” They all looked at me with such happy expectant faces, even the little nuisance was looking at me and smiling… ignoring the heat on my face and letting only the slightest of smiles grow. I nodded and let myself get pulled into the impromptu meeting, maybe working in a team could help me get stronger faster. After all… Hope had a team watching his flank, why shouldn’t I have one.
Being away from home for the first time was a fantastic experience, I wasn’t sure momma was going to let me join once we had heard about the heroes planning on opening a guild. Now here I am walking down a forest path with two super strong heroes, though they do look a bit silly at times. I hid my giggles as Mr. Flare tried and failed again to swat at some bugs that were buzzing about, my giggles quickly stopped as I almost tipped over from my bag leaning a bit too far to the right. My sudden fall was stopped just as fast as it started by Coral Shelf who was always close by to help. I whispered a quiet thank you up to him, I had to be quiet. Mr. Flare doesn’t like it when I make too much no/ise, he hasn’t told me why yet. I think he’s secretly training me to be super sneaky. I remember a story my Grandad used to tell me from back when he traveled around Equestria. It was about a griffin scout who was so sneaky, so stealthy, that he could out sneak a shadow. That's one of my favorite stories. I wonder when they’ll really start teaching me. I’m so excited that I could just-
“Oof!” Just walk head first into a tree, I had stopped paying attention after I started thinking about the Griffin story… woops. I heard Mr. Flare gave a deep sigh while I was rubbing my head, it didn’t really hurt, I just didn’t want any splinters in my mane.
“Alright, we’ll make camp here” And just like that I perked right back up, it was time. Time to start my training to become the best hero ever! Quickly rolling out of my bag straps I ran over to Mr. Flare and stood ready with an excited look on my face. Mr. Flare was in the middle of unloading his pack and weapons until he saw me approach, he just looked at me for a while before speaking.
“And what do you want, kid?” The question kinda caught me off guard (What’s a kid?) but I shook it off and plowed on anyway. A hero doesn’t second guess himself and neither shall he.
“Aren’t we gonna start training?! I promise I'll do my best!” Mr. Flare squinted a bit at my shouting which I sheepishly apologized for, then he got an odd gleam in his eye. I saw Coral Shelf slowly draw closer from behind Mr. Flare, he looked oddly serious about something.
“So you want to train huh? Sure, I’ll train you if you promise to do whatever I say…okay?” I didn’t pick up in his tone or his wording or the way Coral flinched in the background. All I was focused on was how much stronger I was about to become, I puffed my chest out and looked Mr. Flare in the eye like how momma taught me.
“I Promise Sir!” I didn’t realize how much I was gonna regret those words.