Chapter 75

Yefen sighed. "As much as I'd like to keep talking about this we probably shouldn't wait much longer to introduce you to the others. I just didn't want to follow the priests directly out. Besides, I need a drink."

Without warning, he suddenly stood up and started walking out the door. Caught off guard the six of us quickly got up, dropped our bags in his tent and ran to catch up with him. Yefen is not big and slow, his strides were so long that we almost had to jog to catch up. The first place we were headed was to an area that looked like some kind of outdoor kitchen.

Tarklin elbowed me, "He's always been like that, super impulsive. You could be having a serious conversation and then suddenly he whips out a set of dice and then we get drunk around the fire. Yefen's a great guy, you can trust him." I noticed Nora nodded her head in agreement but didn't say anything further.

Yefen stopped in front of a woman wearing a long brown coat and light armor underneath it. She stood in the center of a makeshift kitchen, grills and tables loaded with ingredients and younger looking hands cleaning things up and washing dishes, presumably after the dinner we missed.

"This is Aquilla, the woman in charge of food and provisions. She doubles as our quartermaster when she isn't working on our dinner. Don't piss her off if you want to eat, you wouldn't want the head cook skimping on your rations."

Aquilla smiled large. "Don't introduce me like that, you'll make me sound like a tyrant. I'm Aquilla, nice to meet you folks. There was rumors going around about the ones who destroyed this dungeon. This you lot?"

I nodded. "Yes ma'am. My name is Lilith and these are my friends, Bella, Torien, and Morrigan."

She snerked. "No need to be so formal with me 'ma'am.' But it is earning you some points. Keep up that respectful attitude and we won't have any problems. I'm good at keeping track of who's gone through the ration line before so don't try to play games with me, if there's any left when everyone is done you can have seconds but I wouldn't count on it. I hope you already ate tonight because you already missed dinner."

I shrugged. "We were in a hurry to get here so we haven't eaten yet but the four of us still have some dry rations in our bag."

"Sorry to hear that."

Yefen cut in. "These four are leaving tomorrow Aquilla, they won't join back up with us for a while yet but I figured it would be good to introduce them to everyone first." The large man grabbed a bottle of alcohol from one of the chests. Aquilla gave him a stink eye but didn't say anything before focusing back on us.

Aquilla turned and looked at each of us. "Makes sense. Well it was nice meeting you four. We can talk again later once you join us on a more permanent basis."

I nodded. "Of course. Nice to meet you Aquilla."

We were led away from the kitchen area to metal covered wood wagon. Sitting in a chair outside of it was a short and stout man, or dwarf? with a dark black beard and a grumpy looking expression.

Yefen gestured to our group. "Samuel, these are some new recruits that will be joining our dungeon team in the future." Yefen turned to us, "This is Samuel, a dwarf that primarily takes care of our armory. If you break your weapons and need them replaced, or you need tools to take care of your equipment, Samuel is the one to talk to."

Samuel replied in a deep smooth voice. "Nice to meet you four. If you need any help with your equipment talk to me. I don't really have the tools to craft you a new weapon in the field but minor repairs and maintenance work should be no problem. If you snap your sword in half I can give you a new one but try not to make a habit of it. This equipment will come out of your cut later and they ain't cheap to lug around. If you need to sharpen your stuff you can borrow a grindstone, or I can do it for you for a tip. Any questions?"

I shook my head and looked to my party who didn't have any questions either.

"Good. See you around." The dwarf lost any interest he had in us and went back to whatever it was he was working on.

Yefen then took us around and introduced the four of us to half a dozen other people that stood out in my mind less than the first two. I'm decent at remembering faces but terrible at remembering names and after the first few people I stopped trying to remember for the most part. I'm sure we'll have the chance to reintroduce ourselves at a later date. After the parade of people Yefen decided to introduce us to, he escorted us to an empty tent not too far away from the command tent.

"Since you were suddenly dragged out here to play hostage with the Tamin church humans, you probably weren't expecting to be on a night duty tonight so you can take this tent to sleep. I know it's not big but we don't have separate accommodations for your servants. I hope you all don't mind," he said nodding to Torien and Morrigan.

"That's alright Yefen, thanks for the tent." I turned to the adventurers sent to guard us. "Shall we set up a night watch?"

The two of them awkwardly looked at the collars around the necks of the catgirls. and I decided to cut them off before they got the wrong idea. "I wouldn't mind taking a watch in the middle of the night but Bella takes some time waking up so she should probably be on first watch. Should we go in pairs?" I asked.

Nora shook her head. "No need. The two of us will stay awake to guard you. You can go to sleep if you want. We'll sleep after we get back to town tomorrow. It's too much of a risk for us to sleep."

I felt like it was a bit unfair to sleep while the two of them were up all night, especially since sleep barely helped me much. I also didn't want to be vulnerable in this situation, it's not that I didn't trust our escorts, I do, it's just that I felt like protecting my friends was my job. I felt responsible for their safety.

"Then I'll stay up with you two. I don't need a lot of sleep and I'd rather stay aware of my surroundings under the circumstances." I turned to the rest of my party. "You three get some rest, it will be better if you are fresh in the morning."

There was only a slight hesitation before the three girls agreed and started climbing in the tent. Tarklin pulled up a few chairs and we sat by a small lamp while Nora brought our bags back from Yefen's tent before heading off to survey the surroundings. We sat there quietly for a while, the camp never completely slept. It was quiet for the most part but lots of people were still walking around, working on things, or patrolling the area.

It was probably half a bell later when Tarklin decided to speak. "That priestess, what's your deal with her? You were watching her a lot and she was staring back at you like a hawk."

I shrugged. "I don't know why she would be watching me but she... has crossed paths with Bella before. The situation is complicated. Once I saw her looking at me so intently I couldn't help but look back at her too on the way here. I don't hold any hostilities towards her if that's what you're asking but I wouldn't mind having a private word with her and Bella."

Tarklin shook his head. "Best not. I'm not sure what your circumstances with her are but she's in deep. I've seen it before, she's sucked into the Tamin church's crazy ideology bad. She's the worst kind, completely bought into their lunacy. That other paladin that was talking to Sir Yefen," he snickered before continuing, "he's more of the pragmatic type. He's doing it for the money or the protection, I doubt he gives two shits about their crazy beliefs. That's why the two of them are paired together, one is a zealot, the other is a realist. They're both loyal to the church but for vastly different reasons. A beastkin like you won't get anything out of the woman."

I sighed and let his words sink in. I'm not sure what to do. I'm not sure what Bella wants. With everything happening we haven't really had a chance to talk. And even if we were able to have a moment alone with the three of us, what could it possibly accomplish? The adherents of the Tamin church seemed like psychos, Bella was already affected by being around this woman, trying to get them in the same room might just make everything worse... Well, if it's what Bella wants I'll try to make it happen. If she doesn't say anything about it I'll leave it be. I feel like it's playing with fire if I try to get involved before being asked.

I turned to Tarklin. "Thanks for the advice."

The handsome elf smiled at me. "No problem. It's my job as your elder to put you young ones on the right track."

"How old are you anyway?"

He puffed up his chest. "I'm sixty-two!"

"Huh, younger than I thought. I expected you to be like... five hundred or something."

He laughed. "That was a joke. I'm rather young for an elf, way too young to be anyone's 'elder.' Five hundred is quite an extreme guess too though, only the oldest of elders in the elf villages make it to five hundred. Not impossible but quite rare. Surely I don't look that decrepit."

I smiled. "Of course not, I just have no frame of reference. I'm pretty sure you're the first elf I've ever had a proper conversation with."

"Oh?" he said with a huge grin, "in that case I should tell you a little abo—"

Tarklin was cut off by a sudden shouting at the edge of the camp, coming from the direction of the dungeon. Faster than I could perceive Tarklin was on his feet with his sword drawn facing towards the noise. I unzipped the tent of my friends and ushered them out. It hadn't even been a full bell since they laid down but with all the shouting they were all wide awake already.

By the time I turned around Nora was back. "A demon was chasing the Tamin church team out of the dungeon. They looked bloodied. The adventurers by the gate were still fighting them when I came back."

"Is anyone hurt?" Bella asked.

"Probably. It was a big demon," Nora replied.

"Lilith..." Bella turned to me, the question not needing to be said.

I nodded. "Lets go help. Bella is a healer, she can probably heal the injured."

Nora shook her head, "It's too dangerous, our job is to protect yo—"

"Please!" Bella cried.

Nora's eyebrows furrowed, she turned to Tarklin before turning to me.

I nodded. "Let's go help. We'll stay out of the fighting but we should at least see if anyone needs healing."

"...fine." Nora didn't look happy about it but she decided not to fight the consensus.

Tarklin and Nora stood at either side of the four of us as we walked through the camp. It seemed like pandemonium, tents were on fire, people were running around with buckets of water or weapons. It was chaos. However, despite the frenzied array of people frantically running around, it didn't seem like anyone was panicking. Everyone was moving with a purpose, this was the difference between a group of civilians and a group of adventurers.

When we could finally make out the entrance of the dungeon we could see two dread knights, a shadow horror, and dozens of dark shadowy monsters we hadn't run into when we were in there. A giant corpse laid on its side, spears still pinning it to the ground. All six of the Tamin church adherents were up and fighting alongside the adventurers but the large group looked like they were slowly being overwhelmed even as more adventurers joined the fray.

Demons were spilling out of the dying dungeon.

"Fuck," Nora said quietly. "Draw your weapons. So much for staying out of the fight."