Chp.9: The new adventurers' guild

Keita walked the streets of the city using her newest avatar, which was what everyone else assumed was the tigerman named Tzegorn. Since Haku eliminated the old owner of that name and she took over, she had had to interact a lot more with the newcomers, which initially pleased her but then started to irritate her a bit. He had nothing wrong with fraternizing with newcomers, but he found them excessively pompous and often acted only to gain the sympathy of their interlocutor. For example, why were all the people who were on the street waving at her? When she showed up in her dragon body they never did, and even when she showed up in an anonymous avatar; they simply did it because Tzegorn was a big shot and they wanted to keep him quiet. Keita found this behavior of newcomers repugnant, since she (and her entire family) had always lived with the idea that if you wanted something, you had to do everything to get it. She had nothing against deceiving others, but in this case the newcomers were trying to deceive her not to rob her or get anything, but because they hoped that then she herself (or rather Tzegorn) would give them something of her own free will. Basically, they waited for the person in power to please them and in the meantime humiliated themselves by behaving like ass kissers. Keita found this pathetic and derogatory, and she didn't understand how newcomers could bear to act like that.

The fun part (or at least, what she thought was the fun part) was that the body he was currently using didn't even belong to Tzegorn, but was a combination of various parts of ogres, bears and tigers that created a body similar to that of the tigerman, while the rest was an illusion created by the invisibility rune. The only part of Tzegorn that was really there was the breathing apparatus, installed in the avatar to mimic his voice. The rest of the body… well, Keita didn't know where it was, but he could imagine what Haku had done with the rest of the body. Not that she was against it: if she had known immediately that it was Tzegorn who had caused Haku to get caught up in a sandstorm, she would have done far worse things to the tigerman. If there really was a place where the gods punished sinners, Keita would make sure that Tzegorn was desperate to visit it as long as she let him die once and for all. And she probably would never have given him that grace: she would have kept him alive for years, decades, even centuries, even if she would need to find a way to curb aging, and she would never have allowed him to live a single instant without the pain more heinous than she was capable of inflicting. From her point of view, Haku had been too good to give that bastard the possibility to die.

But it didn't matter, Tzegorn was dead now and Keita didn't want to give him enough credit to brood over him. It would have meant giving him some value, while she instead wanted to forget him forever. When a dragon crushed an insect, it certainly didn't need to remember the aforementioned insect, nor to repeat it to the whole world, even if this insect was a particularly annoying mosquito. That would have been the punishment that Keita would have given to Tzegorn, the only one that unfortunately by now she could give him: oblivion. Or at least, that was her intent… but since she basically had to put on his face every day and pretend to be him, it was a little difficult to do so, and it really irritated her.

She had to calm down. How did the newcomers do? Oh, right: deep breaths. Did it work? She wasn't very sure, it had always seemed a too fallacious method to her to be able to provide a precise estimate. Keita had no idea how channeling air into the lungs could have a calming effect, but surely focusing on breathing and lengthening the time of each inhalation and exhalation helped to not think about that negative thing that had happened… if it wasn't negative enough. Or if the breaths weren't regular enough. Or if the blood pressure was too high. Mh, it was really difficult to consider all the factors.

Oh, fuck. Keita decided to leave the silly methods of newcomers and use the classic one of dragons: emptying the mind by focusing exclusively on the mission he currently had. Mission that consisted in impersonating Tzegorn to perfection to discover all those who could potentially bring harm to her family. So far she had spotted a few people, but she was sure she could do better. In any case, if she was to behave like Tzegorn she also had to fulfill the duties of a tigerman, so when Zamor had come to ask her to find a very good warrior with some ability to observe and capture details, she couldn't have said no for fear that otherwise it would be suspicious; after all, from what she had understood while she impersonated him Tzegorn was considered by everyone to be a helpful person and very attentive to the needs of the city and his colleagues at the Council, even if he was a bit of an asshole and self-centered... and also a murderer, even if no one knew it. Besides, it wasn't such a big deal for her to find the person Zamor wanted, since she already had the perfect candidate in mind.

She walked to the West District of Iluvatan City, which only made her more irritated (seriously, she just couldn't get used to walking on two legs; he'd done it loads of times but still felt terribly wrong. How could newcomers use such an unstable locomotion system!?), but once she got to her destination the smile returned to her lips. The one in front of which she stopped was a very simple building, just a little bigger than the others (it seemed to have only two floors), above the entrance of which, however, hung the sign 'Adventurers' Guild'. She went in, and what she saw was a rather large well-kept room filled with well-armed people, who were either sitting at tables drinking or reading something from a bulletin board that was filled with papers probably bearing missions. At the end of the room there was what looked like a reception where the people present after having chosen a mission went to inform them of their decision or returned from that mission to collect the due reward.

Those were adventurers. Well, it didn't take long to figure that out as the building was literally called the 'Adventurers' Guild'. They were the first certified adventurers of Iluvatan City. And now Keita was looking for their guildmaster. "Atelas!" she shouted with the voice of Tzegorn. "Come out! I need to talk to you!"

She ignored the surprised looks from the other adventurers present, but after noticing it was her (or rather, him since they assumed she was Tzegorn) they shrugged and looked back at the bulletin board. Keita leaned against the door and waited: it wasn't the first time she came to ask Atelas for a favor since the latter had proved to be very helpful, and she knew that someone would go and call him and bring him there for her. The tigerman was apparently very loyal to Tzegorn; Keita had discovered this by chance, just a few days after starting to pretend to be Tzegorn: Atelas, who had just returned from the expedition together with Rhaegal, Corgorin, Serengal and the other adventurers, had come to her (or he, from his vantage point sight) to tell her what had happened during the mission. And so Keita understood that Atelas worked directly under Tzegorn and that he relayed much information on dragons to him. Rhaegal, Corgorin, and Serengal hadn't been too disappointed, since they didn't completely trust either Atelas or Dyana: it seemed too strange that they had suddenly become so friendly. However, Rhaegal had also been pleased after Keita had told him everything, for apparently Atelas hadn't revealed everything to Tzegorn, but had kept to himself the fact that the dragons had shared their blood with the adventurers; even if it wasn't very important information, Rhaegal had been happy to know that Atelas hadn't disclosed it, and so he had decided to give him the benefit of the doubt (although he would have kept a close eye on him) and therefore hadn't revealed to his adventurer friends that he was actually a double agent. Keita hadn't quite understood Rhaegal's intentions, but since Atelas was still her only lead, she had decided to please her brother and leave him alive in the hope that he would help her find other people who supported Tzegorn's cause. Unfortunately such attempts had so far proved fruitless, as Tzegorn seemed to have secrets even from his own employees, and Atelas never seemed to have contributed anything more than gathering and reporting information.

If she let go of the fact that he was a spy, Atelas didn't seem too bad after all: more than a cold-blooded assassin like Tzegorn was, he seemed like a simple dreamer who had had the misfortune of being in the wrong place at the wrong time and that she just wanted to help her people, a desire that is more than understandable from her point of view. In addition, Atelas had made a great contribution to the community, for he was one of the main minds that had founded the first guild of adventurers of Iluvatan City; indeed, after returning from their journey underground, Atelas, with the support of other adventurers, including Efren (who was a member of the Council) and even Rhaegal (and consequently also Haku) had obtained permission to transform an unused building (originally built as a warehouse, then abandoned for logistical reasons) in a guild. Thanks to the journal he had compiled many people wanted to become adventurers and Atelas, as well as Efren, Sarah, Martha, Lisah, Carlos, Rhaegal, Corgorin, Serengal and many others, wanted to allow them to be. Once the guild was established, it couldn't hold a candle to a regular adventurers guild, of course, but it already could offer many missions: for the moment they were limited to hunting sand worms or sand sharks, or defending the crops, or, more frequently, looking for a passage to the underworld; the passage located under the lake was in fact not suitable for intensive exploitation, therefore a new one was needed. Once it was found the guild could offer a lot of quests for exploring those caves, and then it would be quite an adventure. The Council also hoped that this research would be a success so that they could find out more about the underworld and be able to obtain resources from it. Atelas spent his days looking for this passage; at the moment he and Efren were contending for the position of guildmaster, but not because either of them wanted it, but ironically because both of them did NOT want it and they much preferred to be mere adventurers to be able to participate in the missions; in fact Efren too was becoming less and less interested in positions of power now that there were no more emergencies in sight (until that day) and he would have preferred to go back to doing what he liked and leave his seat in the Council to someone else, but he certainly had no intention of becoming a guildmaster. The problem was that the two of them were the only valid candidates at the moment, and therefore a feud had started between them to make sure that the other one got the position of guild leader.

Keita saw Atelas join her shortly after. "Sorry to keep you waiting, sir" he greeted, convinced he was addressing Tzegorn. "How can I help you?"

Keita smiled. A strong warrior, adept at spotting details to the point of keeping a journal, and also someone his brother Rhaegal got along with and wanted to keep a closer eye on: he was the perfect person for the job that she had to entrust him. "I have the solution to your problem, and in return you will do me a small favor. How about a way to directly access the underworld and... an adventure?"