Brawl

I headed to the guild and arrived there around 20 minutes later. By now Cleo and Turek should have had the time to register the Kura quest. Just as I got there I saw a commotion outside the guild and a crowd gathered to watch something. I wondered if there was street performance going on or something and thought I should check it out. Just then I heard Cleo's shouting at the top of her voice.

"What's wrong? You thought you could beat me now that you have your buddies with you right? You thought if you take my friend hostage, you can beat me up as much as you want huh? This time I am not going to let you guys go lightly"

I froze for a second when I heard Cleo's voice but quickly started making my way through the crowd when Cleo started speaking. She finished speaking just as I arrived and I saw that she was holding up a guy by his neck with this feet dangling and the guy was struggling to get down. He was using both his arms to try and loosen Cleo's grip but was unsuccessful. As I watched, he started losing consciousness, probably because of the lack of air.

"Cleo, Let him go! He might die!" I quickly grabbed Cleo's arm trying to pull it down. Cleo looked at me in surprise before saying "Ren, good you are here. Go check on Turek over there. I will deal with this scum. Don't worry I haven't killed anyone, at least for now..."

I saw that Turek was sitting on the ground as if in a daze. He had a swollen face as if someone had punched him in the face. That explained the carnage around Cleo. There were 5 or so people lying around Cleo unconscious. It seems they had tried to ambush Turek and Cleo when they came to the guild.

"Hey Turek, are you alright? Turek? Can you hear me?"

"Oh.. wha.. What? Yes I am not hurt that badly. One guy punched me when Cleo wouldn't fight with them. But Cleo… she.. She got really angry when she saw that. I think she beat them up so badly that I think most have them have broken bones. I thought she was going to kill that last guy. Good thing you got hear just in time."

If that damned shopkeeper hadn't wasted my time, I might I gotten here sooner to stop the fight. Then again, the fight might have been necessary anyway. I helped Turek up just as Cleo dropped the guy she was holding. It seemed he was still alive, just unconscious.

She came over and saw that Turek was still unsteady on his feet. I was supporting him but I was too short to be a good support. She put her arm around his waist to support him and asked "Are you fine Turek? Do you want to go to the healing center?"

"No no… I am fine.. I just need to sit down for a bit and I should be goo..."

Before Turek could finish his sentence, Cleo bent down, placed her right hand under Turek and picked him up in her arms. She started walking toward the guild and I followed quickly after giving a look look at the crowd that that still staring at us.

Cleo walked in through the door even as Turek kept saying that he was fine and that she can put him down. She ignored his pleas completely, looked around for an empty table and placed him on it. The table was one of the tall tables with tall stools so it was quite high. While she was shorter than Turek, she could still do this easily enough. She then started examining Turek's face delicately to judge the damage. Turek kept trying to say that he was ok but since he was being completely ignored by Cleo, he finally gave up and let Cleo what she wished.

After she was satisfied, she said "It doesn't look like any bones are broken. If I had found a broken bone, I was going to break all the bones in their body."

That sent a chill down my spine. Just what kind of violent teammate I have in my party! Good thing she is an ally and not an enemy. I wouldn't want to be her enemy, I thought yet again.

Since she was satisfied that Turek was going to be alright, she picked him up again like before and placed him down on the stool. Then she grabbed another one and sat down herself. I jumped up on the third stool myself.

After a few seconds of silence I finally asked "Is anyone going to tell me what happened. I know what happened in the fight but how did it even start?"

It was Cleo that answered. "It's simple really. We came to the guild and started looking for the Kura quest. We couldn't find it and asked the guild lady about the quest. She said that someone brought in so much Kura herb yesterday that they cancelled the quest until they need more. So we decided to look around for a new quest. When I was looking for another quest, Turek said he will go check if you are here yet. We had already spent 20 minutes here so I thought you might be here and I said OK. Turek went out but didn't return. Instead another guy came to me and told me to come out if I wanted to save Turek. I went with him and found some guys and one of them was the clown from yesterday. Another one of his goons was holding Turek."

She looked angry when she remembered that. I asked her to continue.

"Then the clown said that he wanted to pay me back for yesterday and he had brought his buddies with him to beat me up. I said I am not going to fight a bunch of fools which made him mad. He punched Turek in the face in response. Then I attacked them and beat them up. Simple right?"

There were 6 guys there and she beat them up just like that? How is that simple?

"You were able to beat 6 guys by yourself?"

"Well I wouldn't have been able to if they knew how to fight together or even how to fight at all. They are just a bunch of musclebrains with no idea how to fight someone."

"How do you know how to fight anyway? I thought you grew up in a village? Where did you find a teacher to teach you?" Now I was really confused. Cleo talked as if she knew how to fight while the goons did not. But then how did a village girl learn to fight better than city boys?

"Ehh… I never said I didn't have a teacher ok? I learned to fight in my village. " She looked away after saying that as if she didn't want to elaborate.