Chapter 41 – The human, the cat and a wolf
"What the hell?" Muttered Rey standing at the corner of the street watching the E-rank newbie walking the streets without any worry, when suddenly his whole body shivered with goosebumps. He looked at the roof of one of the buildings and met the eyes of a woman crouching there gazing at him with feline eyes and licking her lips as if seeing a delicious dish.
Rey shivered even more, while quickly turning his gaze away.
"Damn this woman. What the hell is wrong with her? I knew it would be troublesome to ask for her help." He muttered again and carefully followed behind his target that just started to move again.
"You just wait." Whispered Keena crouching on the roof while gazing at the man that evaded her clutches for so long. This stalking and following has awakened some of her hunting instincts making her excited. Just that the target of that excitement was in the end not the surveillance object but the man she desired. The man that she deemed worthy. The only human that she considered as skillful in the arts of hunt as her.
"Such a charmer. This is the best date I ever had." She whispered looking at Rey while licking her lips. Her black short fur tail, peering from under her minidress, was swinging from side to side.
*****
Noah walked around the city enjoying the views and delicacies sold in street stalls, while staying all the time in the center of the two people's attention. When he was tired he just sat on the bench on the central plaza with his eyes closed. And once it was time for meeting he turned and walked towards the Adventurers Guild.
His minimap showed that the surveillance stopped once he was inside the guild building.
"Mr. Lewenred you are early."
"I was too nervous, Miss Louriat. I tried to calm down while taking a stroll in town but couldn't really take hold of my emotions. I feel dispirited now. Could you please sell me a potion?"
"Yes, of course. Please don't be overly anxious Mr.Lewenred. You are going in the team with the best adventurers in town, as well as city guards. I doubt they will allow any danger to befall you. Great rangers are very valued in the guild. So we treasure you too.'
"Please call me Noah. I feel strange being a Mister.
"Here's your potion then, Noah." Said Miss Louriat with a smile taking out a light blue potion.
Noah paid the price and drank it immediately.
"By the way. I totally forgot to stock up on necessaryes from being anxious. I would like to buy a few more potions for spirit restoration as well as health restoration. And a ration for the mission duration."
"All right. Here's the potions, but you should go to the dining room for the ration. Also the meeting will be in that room over there." Said guild attendant showing him the way after she took out the potion.
Noah took the potions and put them in his fake bag he ways carrying with him. He did not know how long he was under the surveillance and it would be strange to take out potions he stole from slavers girls if his stalkers people knew he never bought any. He felt he might be over cautious, but better be oaranoid than imprisoned.
Hell if they followed me for a few days they may have even seen me change my face when I went to the red light district. I should be very careful from now on.
Noah watched from the corner of his view at his stats seeing how the mana stat slowly creeped up for some time, feeling a warm feeling circulating inside his body from the potion he drank before.
After walking around the town for hours with two opened lock on target view screens, his mana almost reached the bottom, making it the real reason for being weary and dispirited.
After stocking up on necessaries he went up to the meeting hall to wait for the mission instruction to begin.
******
"Keena! You stupid cat! Where the hell were you? We are late for the meeting. Jake's nagging will have no end later, because of you!" Screamed the woman standing in the inn's hall dressed in full battle mage armor.
"No he won't." Said Keena, rolling her eyes from annoyance while opening the door to her room. "Not this time."
"Huh? And why not? Wait. What's with the get up?" Said the woman entering Keenas room after the girl slipped inside and started to take off her dress.
"Help me with it first. It's too damn tight." Said Keena trying to slip the dress over her head but got stuck.
"Were you on a date or something?" Asked the girl in battle mage armor while helping Keena take off the dress.
"No.I had The Date."
"With who? I thought you said Rey is the only one for you." Said the girl questioningly.
"Oh and he totally is!" Answered Keena taking off her stockings.
"Wait! You were on a date with REY?"
"Mhhhm" voiced Keena.
"Rey that avoided you like plague? No way! How did that happen?"
"Oh turns out he is just a shy boy. But he is totally into me. Brought me to such a great lunch and then took me for a nice walk with all the feline cat tribe courtship rituals honored. Ummm, that was some nice hunting we went to." Said Keena with a dreamy voice.
"You lewd cat, you are totally drenched! What the hell?"
"Told you it was The Date. The best I had. He is totally mine tonight!" Said Keena licking her lips while putting on her armor.
"Are you in heat or something? We are going on a mission. Can't you be serious for once?"
"I am." Said Keena with a cunning voice. "I am very serious about this night."
******
"So how was it?" Asked Jake standing at the door peering at Rey putting on the boots.
"That crazy cat woman totally wanted to pounce on me. I thought she would attack me in the middle of the street."
"Not with you and Keena. The newbie. What was he about after hearing the info?" Asked Jake with a smile.
"Nothing. Absolutely nothing. Did not care at all. Sat at the bench, munched apples, looked around shops simply window shopping, then walked back with not a care in the world."
"I see. So he does not have a close connection with the underground. At least we can trust him on this mission."
"What's with him anyway? Why such a bother?" Asked Rey standing up.
"I can't tell. But there's a reason."
"Okay. If you think it's justified, I believe you." Said Rey.
"Thanks man. For risking your innocence when asking for Keenas help." Said Jake with a smile.
Rey suddenly felt a shiver ran through him, that he had an unpleasant premonition from.
"You know what? I think I totally fucked up this time. I feel like I bit an arrow with her this time. She totally thought it's a date, though I literally told her it was not. I just need help with a task. But it looks like she misunderstood me even more from that."
"Well I am sure nothing bad will come out of it." Said Jake with a cunning smile.
"Funny. Very funny. You will regret this when you find my corpse torn to pieces by a crazy cat in heat." Said Rey with a serious face making Jake laugh aloud.
*****
Noah watched these two interaction of people on his target lock on screens while face palming himself.
/What the hell, people? Were you surveiling me or flirting? Do your damn job!/
Well at least be got this awesome peeper…spying skill. At first he thought that skill's effect would stop once the targets were out of his reach. But leaving the skill active showed him that it was not so easy. This time system really outdone itself. Even when the targeted people were far away from him, his screens kept transmitting the picture and even voice after a few tweaks from the system. It sure increased the mana cost, but was totally worth it.
*****
Short time after people started to arrive. Teams of all kinds of people in different clothes and armors streamed into the hall taking positions all over the place with serious looks on their faces.
Noah sat in the hall as if a bunny among wolves. Every person entering the room from the looks of it is a high leveled experienced fighter. From warriors to mages, all these people exuded the auras of confidence and malice of a person that was through countless meets with death yet survived to tell about it.
The more people streamed into the room the more uncomfortable gazes Noah caught from the surroundings.
Soon Noah saw the team he met at lunch entering the room.
The Jake guy walked through the room while others stepped away from his path like grass. With his huge stature he was at least one head above everyone else. Kail, Boby, the guy that followed him the whole day, Rey and a girl he did not see before followed into the room after him.
When Jake passed by Noah he patted him on the shoulder, nodding slightly without saying anything.
The last one was the team of the Cat woman that stalked him from the roofs. Two women and three guys walked into the room with confidence no less than Jake's team.
"Alright." Said Jake when the hall's door was closed. "Let's start the briefing."
"All of the present here received the guilds order so all of you should understand what this means right?"
"Double pay!" Said one of the guys in the room, making others laugh.
"Nice hearing you all joking. Alright the matter is serious. We received information that there is a branch of the dark society in our region." Said Jake and the atmosphere in the room darkened with many gloves crunching from clenched tightly fists.
"Many of our brothers all over the country lately fell by their treacherous hands. They stab from the back and attack when we are at the weakest. And they have not a shred of honor and humanity in them. Today we attacked one of their bases. If we have a chance we should get a hold of a few of them alive, to get more information on their operations. However I believe it may be a hard task. Right now we believe that at least one B-rank level team of assholes inside the base, so it will be a hard fight." Explained Jake.
"Before that, Jake." Said one of the guys interrupting the briefing.
"Yes Edd?"
"Why's a newbie here?"
"As I said, they have at least one full team equal to the B-rank adventurers team. That means at least one high class ranger or assassin and one high class mage. And it's their home ground. We need to scout area well if we don't want to die from placed all over the place traps before we even reach them."
"However much you all think your teams scouts are good there is only Rey and Keena who can lead you through the territory full of B-rank assassins traps and mages hidden magic circles." Said Jake
"What does it have to do with the newbie?"
"Noah. Can you summon your companion please?"
Noah looked at Jake surprised and then summoned the wolf from his homework folder.
Giant Alpha wolf appeared out of nowhere and stood over Noah with bared teeth in growl.
People in the hall tensed up.
"As you can see, he's a tamer and has a companion beast with the highest scout skill. As we need at least three teams to surround their base well, we want the third team to cooperate with Noah as the monster wolf's sensory skills would be a lot better than any other scout here. This way we can be assured to travel safely in 3 teams"
"The team of humans, cats and dogs? Can I be in the first?" Someone else asked in the hall.
"The wolf team is the best place for a dirty dog like you." Said the other one.
"You come here and tell it to my face arsehole". Started to argue people.
Jake shook his head. Adventurers were never nice fellows. Especially when they were in mass inside a closed room.
"Enough. We will split teams equally according to the already predefined rule."
Noah stored the wolf back and the amount of uncomfortable gaze lessened quite a lot after Jake's explanation.
"Jake I got why we need a wolf. But can we trust HIM." Asked Edd interrupting Jake again and pointing at Noah.
"I will vouch for him." Said Jake. "If you trust me, you can trust him. I will also move with the third team myself so this should tell you something, right Edd?"
"Fair enough." Said the man that questioned Jake the whole time.
"Alright. Look at this map." Said Jake, taking out the map of the Greenville surrounding area. "Our target is this village. We believe that at some time a few weeks ago it was captured by the dark society and criminals impersonated the villagers as a cover up while doing their dark deeds in Greenville and surrounding areas. You all heard of the increase of caravan robberies in the area lately, right? We believe it's their hiding spot and center of operation."
"What happened to the villagers?"
"Reports show, that the original village members have not been spotted for a few weeks now. We don't know what's their status. We'll see for ourselves when we get inside."
"Few weeks." muttered people in the hall with angry faces. They understood deep inside what this meant for the people living there.
"How the fuck we over looked something like that?" Someone asked in the hall.
"No one thought that they would be so brazen to commit something like that within the perimeters of Greenville. They always operated covertly before that. Capturing a village on the premise of one of the biggest cities full of adventurers is something else. We were not ready so it took time to investigate."
"Damn it, these jackals really getting out of hands, what the fuck are nobles doing? It's their goddamn job to fight threats like that spreading inside the country."
"Finding a non corrupt noble is harder than finding a friendly adventurer, Edd. You know that, right?" Said Jake, making people smirk.
"This is one of the reasons why the city lord made a direct request to the guild to deal with it. He is afraid the information will leak if he starts mobilizing too big of a squad of city guards. So the help from city guards will be limited. They will be on a stand by as a backup if we get into too deep of a trouble."
"As if I should believe those lazy shittards would come to help us at all if we need them." Said Edd.
"I don't believe it either, Edd."
Mission briefing carried on after that. After that they broke into several squads and went out of town with a setting sun enlarging shadows over the forest full of monsters.