Odd Morning

It can't be denied that among all the cities in Poma kingdom, Oddtown always had the best mornings. Some living houses yawned in the distance, an orchestrator bird prepared his musical sheet to lead the other birds into their morning symphony, a feline in the distance made sure to sleep hugging the cock as a threat for if he dared to cock-a-doodle-doo him again he'd become dinner. Truly beautiful in its own maddening way.

Tenpao woke up with the chilly smell of nature invading his nostrils, with the brief scent of morning dew and steel- STEEL?! Tenpao's hand slammed his cabinet open, he downed a pill and reached for his trusty swords leaning against the cabinet, yesterday he didn't bother taking out his light armor before sleeping and as a result, his back was a pain. It didn't matter now, though. He rushed out of his room and- "Oh my deities." The ground was littered with squirrels holding knives.

"Squeaak!" One squirrel shouted and pointed the knife at the very last room, Lulu walked out with both paws in the air and with three squirrels holding knives close to her throat.

Just what is happening?

The door next to Dwelms room opened, revealing an elf using her staff as a walking stick and nearly jumping like a scared cat as the squirrels covered the entire floor, "EEeeee-" next to her, Dwelm also opened the door while holding the bag of coins, which promptly fell to the ground and thus became propriety of the squirrels. Dwelm and Bushy's surprise went further as the squirrels opened the bag and began counting the bronze coins inside.

Tenpao rubbed the bridge of his nose before addressing the wolf amidst squirrels, "Lulu, what did you do?"

"Pampkin may or may not have loaned two hundred gold from these squirrels." Tenpao began to think that that gnoll pumpkin was actually its head, he kept his eyes leveled with Lulu as if waiting for even worse news, "They only accept the old coin shape." It got worse, Poma golden coins used to take some resemblance of apples, however nowadays, it was simplified to a base round format. Tenpao couldn't bail Lulu on this one.

"Why did you make a deal with squirrels?!" Bushy pulled her hair with one hand while the other shakily held on onto the staff, "Of all things, squirrels!"

"Well, it's because cats are cruel and dogs make Pampkin feel uncomfortable!" Lulu shouted, the squirrels put their knives right on her throat deciding very much so that her tone wasn't respectful.

Bushy pointed her finger towards Lulu, "People, Lulu! You should've taken a loan from P E O P L E !" If she could approach her to shake Lulu by the collar, she would've.

"BUT PEOPLE-" Lulu stopped as she could feel the cold steel at her throat, so she simply glared at Bushy.

Dwelm finally snapped out of his stupor, "Let's all calm down. Isn't there a way to solve this amicably?"

"Squeak, squeak-squeak Squeak!!" One of the squirrels shouted, the ones with knives on Lulu's throat lowered their weapons a bit and tapped her shoulder with their feet.

"He said that we could retrieve some stuff from a nearby ruin for them." Lulu began as one squirrel climbed from her legs to the top of her head and whispered to her ear, "The artifact, acorn staff."

Dwelm stroked his beard, "We can keep anything else we find?" The dwarf spoke, Bushy raised her eyebrow and Tenpao went back to stroking the bridge of his nose.

"Squeak squeak..."

"If you come back with the acorn staff in a week..."

"Squeak! Squeak squeak, squeakers."

"We don't care! But if you don't, we'll murderlize everyone in this house." Once Lulu finished all squirrels dispersed leaving behind a map of Poma kingdom with a big red X southwest of Oddtown. Bushy looked utterly terrified while Dwelm had a wide smile - Tenpao could predict incoming headaches he was going to have with this. "Pampkin will be right back, Pampkin needs to get rid of that weapon for Jacinto."

"Y-you're not bailing on us, are you?!" Bushy said, her face losing color by the second.

Lulu stared at Bushy, her snout forming a visible frown. "Pampkin would never leave friends behind! What do you take Pampkin for, a jackal?!" Lulu stomped her way to the staircase, "Pampkin was going to show you the dislocator teleportator, but now Pampkin isn't! Humph!" And trotted downstairs, once no one could see her anymore a sudden white flash illuminated everything, then there was no sign of the gnoll.

"Haa... A ruin after we barely finished our first quest alive... I'll go fetch a health potion for Bushy at the pharmacy." Tenpao said and so too descended the stairs.

Dwelm grabbed his crossbow and tsk'd after seeing a dent on it, "I'll go do some patchwork, you should figure out that new spells of yours." And he too, descended the stairs.

Bushy slowly approached the map on the ground, with curiosity she began to look and guess how much time it would take for them to reach the ruins. "Ffffrick..."

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Tenpao's walk was relatively monotonous. Sure, there were a few aware trees that greeted him and three enthusiastic dragons that spoke with him about how they wanted to grow and become big strong adventurers or mercenaries, Tenpao guessed they were attracted due to his armor and swords - they eventually found a bird practicing their mating call in front of a dog and decided to bother them instead. 

Grimlin Hospital, a medical facility created by an Imp. Although Poma Kingdom accepts all races doesn't mean that religion does, as a block from here there was the Church of Radiance. Demons always had been in a bad light since Tenpao could remember, he never truly understood why they had the fame of being considered evil - especially one that went out of his way to create a hospital that common folk could afford to go into. 

The Grimlin Hospital, However, wasn't his objective. What was, was the pharmacy at the other side of the street - a stone building with windows displaying various potions, at the top the image of a smiling black cat sith with the words 'Miro-Miro's Pharmacy' alongside it, Tenpao frequents this place to buy his pills. 

He gently pushed the door and was greeted with the ringing of bells, the inside air was conditioned to be a bit chilly which was beneficial for potions and alchemical reagents, the aisles were filled with potions of hardening skin, water breathing, berserker, and the most common, healing. Tenpao picked the nearest potion of healing, one that was not taller than his hand then Tenpao walked to the counter where an ice phoenix was promptly stationed.

"Ka-kau!" Tenpao stared blankly as the phoenix carefully opened the cash register.

Seems like Miro is out for the day, "Alright." Tenpao took out a golden coin and put it on the table, the phoenix promptly took it and struggled to give back nine silver coins, throughout all this interaction Tenpao felt like he was in some sort of fever dream. Eventually, the bird managed although the coins were a bit chilly to the touch it wasn't detrimental.

Without further ado, Tenpao grabbed the potion and pocketed the coins, waved his hand, and left the store.