Stand Once More.
"Taro! Taro!" a young girl's voice called out from inside the small house.
"Tommy! Stop bullying Clare!" Taro shouted as he put his sword to the side.
Taro was a 24-year-old man with short black hair. His body was well-built and caught the attention of most people that occasionally walked by their distant house. The small house was on the very edge of Kiddi Town. This small abode housed the 24-year-old Taro, his 18-year-old sister Yen, his 12-year-old brother Tom, and his 10-year-old sister Clare.
"Taro, time for dinner!" Yen's voice carried to Taro's ears.
"Coming." Taro sighed as he felt his stomach growling.
Taro opened the small front door and was immediately greeted by the sight of his brother and sister that almost looked identical with their ear-length hair and dark brown eyes. Had Clare not been wearing a white dress, she would be indistinguishable from her elder brother.
"Welcome back!" Tom smiled brightly at Taro entering with his sheathed sword.
"It's not like I went far." Taro smiled as he put his sword beside the door and grabbed a towel from on top of the counter.
He saw his sister, Yen, stand up from the corner of the small kitchen with four pieces of bread and a large plate with four mugs on it.
"Did you go questing today?" Yen asked with a smile.
"Yeah, did a small fetching quest this morning." Taro smiled lightly as he grabbed the plate for his sister and pulled a chair for her.
"Thank you." Yen nodded with a bright smile.
"And you?" Taro smiled. "How was training?"
"Mrs. Birnes really laid into me today..." Yen sighed in frustration.
"Practice makes perfect." Taro smiled awkwardly.
"I didn't mess up..." Yen looked at the ground. "I...used the extra fabric to make you this."
"..." Taro said nothing as Yen handed him a piece of cloth. He unfurled it and saw that she made him a headband that had two wings, one on each side. Taro inspected it more and saw that there were four names on the inside of the headband: Taro, Yen, Tom, Clare.
A small smile crept up his face. He then shook his head and frowned. "Don't use things that don't belong to you. Next time ask first."
"But she won't agree! That stingy woman won't even let a single thread go to waste!" Yen frowned.
"Don't be like that." Taro got up and grabbed his relatively large pouch that was beside the door on a small table right next to his sword. He took out five Copper pieces and gave them to Yen. "Give this to Mrs. Birnes tomorrow and apologize."
"But the fabric I used is probably only worth two Copper pieces. Maybe three, tops!" Yen protested.
"Then I guess two Copper pieces are the worker's fee." Taro winked as he sat down.
"..." Yen was about to say something then stopped herself and smiled. "Okay. I'll properly apologize."
"Good." Taro nodded with a smiled. He then turned to Tom and Clare. "How was school today?"
"Horrible! Max and Tom spent all day messing with the new teacher! We wasted a lot of time instead of learning!" Clare pouted.
"You...!!" Tom glared at his sister.
"Tommy!" Taro glared his brother as he grabbed the piece of bread and tore a smaller piece of it. "I don't send you to school to mess around! If you keep doing things like that, I'll just send you to Mr. Hinie as an apprentice!"
"I don't want to be a blacksmith! I want to be an adventurer like you!" Tom smiled at the thought.
"Tommy..." Taro sighed.
"..." Yen said nothing as she drank some of the hot water in her mug.
"..." Clare pouted at Tom with an annoyed glare.
"Tommy, I do this so that you don't have to." Taro said with a frown.
"But I want to!" Tom said with excitement.
"It's expensive to awaken and rank up. Awakening alone is around fifty Silver pieces. Unless you naturally awaken like me, there's no chance for you to become an adventurer." Taro sighed as he ate a piece of bread.
"So if I awaken, can I become an adventurer?!" Tom asked with a glint in his eye.
"No. Being an adventurer is dangerous work." Taro shook his head.
"But you've never been injured!" Tom protested.
"Yes, but that's because I only take fetching quests. I rarely fight monsters. Even when I do, I fight to run away and survive, not to kill the monster." Taro took a sip of his water as he hid the deep terror in his eyes.
"But if you don't kill the monster, who will?!" Tom asked with shock.
"We live in a town. It's not like this is a village. Others will take care of it. Others with higher ranks..." Taro sighed.
"Then why do you spend all your time swinging that sword every day?! Is it not to fi-!!"
"Enough!" Yen interrupted her little brother. "Eat your bread and go to bed!"
"Bu-!"
"No buts! Eat!" Yen said sharply.
"..." Tom quickly stuffed his face with his small loaf of bread and sipped quickly. He took a few more sips to finish his water then went to the living room while stomping his foot.
"What a child!" Clare scoffed.
"Come on. You too. You got school in the morning." Taro said softly.
"Ow, man." Clare sighed then quickly finished her food.
"..."
"..."
Yen and Taro were the only two left on this table for four.
"You didn't have to be that harsh with him." Taro sighed.
"I already talked to him about this a bunch of times and told him to not bring it up anymore." Yen looked to the side as she sipped on her water.
"Still, he's young. If mom treated me like you treat him at his age, I would have turned out unmotivated for anything." Taro looked softly at his sister, yet his eyes had a hidden emotion within.
"You're still unmotivated by the way." Yen looked at him softly. "I know what they say about you, Taro. The F-rank with enough skill to kill a monster...?"
"Just because I have the skill, doesn't mean I should do it." Taro frowned. "If I die, who will pay Mrs. Birnes? Who will pay the school? Who will take care of you guys?"
"Die, huh?" Yen seemed to lose herself in thought.
"..." Taro sighed. "Never mind that. Don't stay up too late. I'm going to bed."
"..." Yen sighed.
Taro went to the living room and saw Tom just facing the wall while sleeping on his side.
Taro smiled lightly then put out his own bedsheet and pillow and slept.
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"Early as usual, Taro!" a young woman with long white hair smiled cheekily at Taro who entered the Adventurer's Guild as soon as the sun rose.
"Hello, Eclipse." Taro raised his hand to greet.
"What kind of quest does the decorative sword want today? Fetching? Labor? Carrier? Or should I finally give you a hunting quest?" Eclipse, the receptionist, smiled at him.
"..." Taro frowned and fell into thought.
"Hey, Taro!" a man about the same height as Taro walked up to him and put a hand on his shoulder. "Listen, man. Sien is sick today. Can you please fill for him?"
"How much are you paying, Flinn?" Taro asked. He knew that the only reason that this man approached him was because an F-rank would be cheap for a porter, and that he could protect himself properly even as a porter.
"We'll give you a Silver piece!" Flinn smiled.
"Make that ten and you have a deal." Taro said calmly.
"Ten?! Are you out of your mind?! Ten is half what I make as the party leader!!" Flinn almost shouted.
"You get twenty and the rest of the party fifteen. Considering that your party has some E-ranks as well as D-ranks, I believe that ten Silver pieces is more than fair when taking into account that each of your members will get an extra Silver piece as well as a porter that can actually fight." Taro explained himself. "An E-rank porter knows his job. He won't fight even if his life counted on it. I, on the other hand, will help out whenever I can."
'Although he hasn't reached the E-rank in five years, he's still very knowledgeable as an adventurer...' Flinn's eyebrow twitched. "Fine. You get ten Silver pieces."
"Deal." Taro nodded with a smile.
"Very well, when you get back, I will divide the money as you've agreed." Eclipse nodded with a smile. 'Taro going into a dungeon? Everyone's gonna have a laugh about this!'
"Let's go." Flinn gestured with his head for Taro to follow him.
"Alright." Taro nodded and made sure his sword was in check.
After the two walked for a while, they reached the town gate.
"Flinn, what took you so long?" a young man who looked like he was in his late teens complained with a click of his tongue.
"I went to the guild to get a porter." Flinn sighed. "This is Taro. He will go with us for today."
"Pleasure to wo-"
"Let's go! We're already late!" Taro was interrupted by a large bag hitting the ground. He slowly sighed and walked behind the group after carrying the bag on his back.
The whole group walked for about half a day until they reached a cave.
"This is a D-rank dungeon. Molo and Cane, both of you will stay on your feet for this dungeon. Taro, you will stay at the far back. You will watch our backs and interfere if needed." Flinn instructed. "Now, let's go."
After a few hours of fighting, the group decided to sit and rest. During this whole time, Taro didn't have to draw his sword once.
'Being a porter really is easy work when you're with a good party.' Taro looked at his party resting before the boss of the dungeon. 'The Third Stone is like a well-oiled machine.'
"The monsters were all kobolds. The boss is probably a werewolf or a kobold king. Hopefully, it's a werewolf because a kobold king would have around four or five kobolds with him." Flinn commented. "If it's a kobold king, we want you to fight one of them for us, Taro."
"It's a D-rank monster." Taro noted.
"Just hold it back." Flinn commented. "We'll boost your cut to fifteen if you do."
"Sixteen. I'll be doing more than your actual porter would have." Taro sighed.
"Fine." Flinn nodded. The probability of it actually being a kobold king were pretty low, but he had to take precautions. "Everyone keep your wits about you. We don't know what the structure of the boss room will be."
Everyone nodded. Dungeons were usually cave like, but boss rooms were different in that they assumed random structures. One could be an underwater palace while another could be a small hut.
"Let's go." Flinn opened the door, revealing a blue gate behind it. All six people walked in with caution, weapons at the ready.
______________________________________________________________________________
"Hmm..." the young man frowned. "Looks like an abandoned castle."
He looked around at the furniture covered with dusty white cloth. The entire place was filled with dust.
"Careful...the castle might mean kobold king, but an abandoned house could mean a werewolf." Flinn looked out the window. "The moon's out. It's probably a werewolf, but stay focused."
"..." Taro felt slightly nervous. This was only his second time in a boss room. He would sometimes go to dungeons and clear out the monsters in the dungeon when he was in a bad place financially. However, he had only entered an E-rank boss room before. He also had a C-rank leader at the time which caused him to feel safe. Now, however, there was a real chance of death!
"Grrr...."
The group heard a growl from behind one of the furniture.
"EPSILON FORMATION!!!" Flinn roared.
Two pairs immediately flanked Taro with Flinn in front of him.
Light Seeker!
One of the two on Taro's right sent mana into a piece of paper and activated a scroll!
A light spirit appeared and pointed in a direction after looking around a bit. Two lights suddenly glowed from behind a covered table.
"Two?!" the young man flinched in fear.
"Focus!!" Flinn and Taro both dashed in!
"You're supposed to stay back!" Flinn roared as he clashed with the werewolf.
"Your party's useless!!!" Taro roared back.
Ding! Ding! Ding! Ding! Ding!!
Taro surprisingly kept up with the D-rank werewolf! Although kobolds and werewolves were both D-rank, werewolves stood at the peak of the D-rank due to their superior intelligence.
'I can deal with intelligence! I can't deal with pure strength and speed!' Taro thought. Although he was keeping up with it, he was only holding it back. He was purely defending.
"HELP ME!!" Taro's roar snapped the party out of their daze. This F-rank was keeping up with a werewolf! What kind of crazy nonsense is that?!
The party quickly ganged up on the one werewolf while Flinn held off the other one. Although they could beat two werewolves with only the five of them, they had only two close-range fighters. If one of the two messed up once, a total party kill was not out of the question. Flinn was experienced and wouldn't normally mess up. However, the other swordsman was young and inexperienced. If he died, the other werewolf would team up with the first one and kill Flinn. Without close-range fighters, the rest would quickly die.
However, with Taro's high battle IQ and skillful style, he easily covered for all the newbie's mistakes.
"AWOOO!!!" the party heard the howl of the second werewolf dying.
"Damn!" Flinn clicked his tongue after killing it.
"There's another one..." Taro gulped as he breathed heavily. "Damn it...I can't fight for long..."
Whenever all the monsters in a boss room died, everyone would immediately be teleported to the "treasure room" where all the loot would be.
"Let's use a return scroll." Taro suggested.
"If you're going to pay for it, then sure." Flinn scoffed.
"..." Taro bitterly looked at the ground. "So, what do we do?"
"We...We rest." Flinn said with hesitation.
"Are you insane?!" Taro's eye twitched. The rest of the party were just as surprised. Resting in a boss room was probably the stupidest thing one can do, especially in a situation like this where there were 'minions'. Minions would respawn and mess up everything before you could even rest back up.
"I'm sorry...I don't know what came over me..." Flinn grit his teeth. "We find the boss. Let's split up. The moment we find where he is, we run back here."
"That's even more idiotic!" Taro growled lowly. He didn't want to attract any more werewolves.
"Idiotic, indeed." a smooth voice floated into their ears.
"..."
"..."
"..."
"..."
The entire party froze as they saw a figure at the top of the staircase.
"Let me say, gentlemen. It was quite the fight." the mysterious man walked down in his fancy suit. He then smiled at Taro. "Especially you. Although you were outclassed in mana, strength, and speed, you weren't half bad."
"Who ar-!"
The young man was shocked into silence as Flinn grabbed his wrist and pulled him back harshly.
"Who am I? You walk into my home and ask me who I am?" the man chuckled. He then turned serious as he started morphing.
"A WEREWOLF KING!!! RUN!!!!" Flinn dashed back.
Everyone was immediately sent into a state of panic. A werewolf king was a B-rank boss!!! Even A-ranks would find it difficult to kill!
Whoosh!!
He suddenly appeared in front of Flinn.
"You can rest in my castle forever, boy." the werewolf king smirked.
SPLASH!!!
Blood splattered everywhere as the werewolf king slashed Flinn across the chest, killing him!
"..." Taro grit his teeth and turned to the werewolf with his longsword pointed at it.
"I...shall leave you for last..." the werewolf king smirked in a terrifying matter.
'Shit...shit...shit!!!' Taro was scared out of his mind. 'If only I had a return scroll on me!!!'
'Yen...Tommy...Clare...' Taro gripped his sword as he saw everyone else getting massacred.
"Now...your turn." the werewolf king slowly approached Taro.
"..." Taro grit his teeth and steeled his resolve. "AAAAAAAHHHHHH!!!!"
He roared as he ran forward and stabbed out.
"So slow..." the werewolf king easily dodged and slashed at his arms, severing both of them.
"AAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!" Taro roared in pain this time as blood gushed out of his arms.
"Hehehehe..." the werewolf king chuckled in ecstasy as he put his face right up to Taro's.
"AAARRRRGGGHHHH!!!!" Taro bit down on the wolf's snout.
BOOM!!
"DAMN BASTARD!!!" the werewolf king cursed as he smacked Taro away.
"..." Taro breathed slowly as he saw his ripped headband on the ground next to him in a pool of blood. 'Huh...? Is that my blood...? There's so much...'
Thud. Thud. Thud.
The werewolf king's footsteps sounded heavy in Taro's ears as he looked up at his blurry figure.
'I'm gonna die...I'm gonna die...oh god...I'm gonna die...' Taro thought with regret. 'I should've just taken a damn fetching quest. Damn it...damn you Flinn!! Damn you, Eclipse! Why didn't you stop me?! You knew how weak I am!! Damn you, Yen!!! You shouldn't have put the idea in my hea-...'
The werewolf king picked up Taro by the neck and looked at him with a growling expression.
'No...it's all my fault. If I make it out of here...I'll apologize to Yen...I'll apologize to Eclipse...I'll even apologize to Flinn and help with his funeral! So please!! Just give me a chance to live!!!' Taro's eyes reflected his emotions as tears fell down his face.
"Your tears...they...excite me..." the werewolf king licked his lips. "I haven't had such prey sin-..."
Thud!
He was interrupted by Taro's kick!
"..."
SLASH!!
Thud.
Taro's head rolled on the ground.
"Ah...I couldn't enjoy tormenting him. I guess sending out weak kobolds did the trick of attracting humans. Sucks that it's attracting other monsters like those werewolves. Now, to feas-...?" the werewolf king looked at all the bodies just to find Taro's missing. "Where did he go?!"
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{Courage}
{Resilience}
{Fear}
{Despair}
{Regret}
{Anger}
{Hope}
{Pain}
{Death}
{Stand once more with power…courage…and vigor.}