"The old Guild Core shattered?" Eisen asked, confused, and Serio slowly nodded his head in response, explaining why this seemed to have happened, "You see, Guilds aren’t created through Guild Cores but contracts between people and the world. When you five, the founders and last members of your Guild back then, got rid of your experience, the Guild disappeared as well, and the connected Guild Core shattered in response." Serio explained quite naturally, and Eisen couldn’t help himself but frown.
"Alright, we’re talking about that wording later... But for now..." Eisen muttered to himself and stepped toward the large table at the side of the room, slowly placing the Guild Core where it seemed to be supposed to be placed, the center of the table, and then looked at the others behind himself.
"We’ll figure out if we can connect her to the new core later; for now, we’ll just add a Guild Core." Eisen explained quite swiftly, before slowly pouring his mana into the Guild Core, prompting a notification to appear in response.
[You have activated a Guild Core for the Guild
[
With a slight nod, the old man turned back around toward the others, "We’re now a Rank 1 Guild, so we can activate the Town Core in a bit." Eisen explained, so the others slowly nodded in response, although Brody seemed to be rather curious about something, "That’s cool’n’all, but why exactly are there so many Core Guardians ’round here?" He asked, and then the old man realized that he hadn’t told the others about the situation yet at all, and then began to move his fingers through his beard, before turning toward Serio.
"I think it would be better if he explained it. I don’t know all the details yet either."
And when Eisen told the other Originals this, they all looked toward the Core Guardian standing there, while Eisen slowly made his way over toward the Guild Core Guardian sitting slumped-down on one of the chairs around the table, trying to figure out if she had any damages, and Serio began to explain what Eisen had been told quite swiftly as well.
In the meantime, Eisen began to slowly shave off some of the parts on the Guild Core Guardian’s body, although she seemed to be in the best condition than any of the other Guardians, maybe with the exception of Serio.
But either way, it didn’t take long for Eisen to fix her until she should be able to function correctly, so he then just had to figure out how to connect her to the new Guild Core.
"...and so, to sum it all up, this town has always been a safe haven for those that peaked and their comrades." Serio exclaimed when he finished explaining the basics, and the other originals looked at each other for a moment and then nodded.
"Gotcha, then." Brody said with a slight sigh, before crossing his arms and sitting down on one of the chairs at the table, and seemingly instantly, Serio began to smirk slightly.
And he did so, even more, when the others also sat down at the table, although none of them understood why exactly he was acting that way. So they just asked. "Is everything alright?" Jyuuk asked, and Serio nodded his head immediately.
"Of course, everything is more than alright. To be exact, everything is just as it’s supposed to be." Serio said with a slight smile, but the four originals didn’t really understand what he meant, so Eisen, having now really finished everything up, took a closer look at the table and then just chuckled.
"You’re all sitting on your old seats." The old man pointed out, and the others looked at him, confused, even Serio seeming quite surprised. So, Eisen explained. "Jyuuk, your chair is the only one with an open lower back, because of your tail. Brody, the table in front of you is scratched up because you have the tendency to get a bit impatient when you’re bored. There’s a slight dent in the table directly next to Xenia, where I’m guessing she always used to place her staff, while a few spots of the table in front of Evalia are a lot more deteriorated than the rest of the table. I’m pretty sure she ended up painting some parts of it and then removed the paint when she noticed I would get mad at her, but then ended up removing the protective layer on top of the wood a bit as well." Eisen explained, and the four Originals looked at him with smiles.
"Damn, you’re taking the backstory really serious, aren’t you?" Evalia asked with a wry smile before Eisen slowly let his eyes drift over toward Serio, who just slowly nodded his head to tell Eisen that his deductions were correct.
So, Eisen just stayed silent and looked at the Guild Core Guardian. "Serio, what’s her name?" The old man asked as he slowly tried out a few things, such as pouring his mana into the Ego-Golem Core in the center of her chest, and Serio simply smiled. "Ruth."
"I see... then, Ruth, let’s try this out, huh?" Eisen muttered with a smirk and kept some of his mana inside of her Ego-Golem Core and then moved the rest over toward the Guild Core while leaving all of it properly connected so that he could ’hook up’ Ruth and the Guild Core with each other.
And when he did so and let go of the control over his mana, it seemed to just nearly instantly disappear while the Guild Core and Ruth’s Ego-Golem Core slightly lit up for a short moment. Then, Ruth began to move again and slowly sat up on the chair she was sitting on before looking around.
"Ah, sorry! Was a me-me-me-meeting scheduled for today? Ehm..." Ruth muttered in a slight panic, stuttering in a similar way that Constant did before Eisen removed the bug, before disappearing in a cloud of mist before a sound of shock came from a small room connected to the one they were currently in, and Ruth swiftly reappeared again.
"Sorry... All the be-be-be-beverages went bad... I know I was supposed to keep track of it..." She apologized before she slowly seemed to realize that something was off, "Wait, no, no, you all left... And I was wai-wai-waiting here for you before... No, the Core Sha-Sha-Sha-Shattered, but..." Ruth started muttering confused, but Eisen slowly placed his hand onto her shoulder and began to explain what seemed to have happened, before Ruth nodded her head in response.
"I... I see. But the-the-the-then you did it, huh? You managed to get rid-rid-rid-rid of your experience?" Ruth asked, and once more, Eisen frowned in response to that wording before the old man stood up and started looking around, noticing that there were numerous, seemingly tiny enchantments all over the walls of this room, and then looked over toward the other Originals.
"You four, for just a moment, consider the possibility that this isn’t a game, but that this is a true, real world. Just consider it for a moment." Eisen told them with a deep frown, and after looking at Eisen confused for a while, Xenia scratched her cheek.
"Eisen, what are you talking about? That’s kind of... insane..." She pointed out, and in response to all of the worried faces in front of him, Eisen could only do one thing. Smile like a madman.
"Perfect. Ruth, Serio, let me guess, this room was made for us all to talk in complete freedom to each other?" Eisen asked, and without hesitation, the two Core Guardians nodded their heads.
"Exactly so. As expected of you. This room was made to make it impossible for deities, even the Great Goddess or the Man standing above her, to listen in on anything that would be said in here." Serio explained, with his arms crossed behind his back, and Eisen slowly nodded his head and headed toward the chair that seemed to have been his own back in the day.
"Perfect," Eisen said with a smile, looking at the other Originals. "Then let’s talk."
---
"But... No, that’s... That’s just insane..." Evalia replied, confused, and the others seemed to be in a similar state of disbelief.
"Exactly, that’s just impossible, isn’t it? That kind of thing isn’t actually real!" Jyuuk explained, and Eisen nodded his head in response. "Of course, it isn’t supposed to be real. But as far as I’m concerned, it is. So I have some requests from all of you for now." The old man told them, and nervously, the four other Originals listened to him.
"One, do all you can to finish the tasks given to us by the Puzzle-Box as soon as possible," Eisen told them, and of course, they all nodded their heads.
"Two, try to subtly find out leads that may only make sense if you had a perspective of a Player, while also knowing that this world might be real." He added next, and once more, the other Originals nodded in response.
"And three. Never, under any possible circumstances, speak about the fact that this world might be real outside of this room." The old man said, but this time around, the others seemed somewhat confused at it.
"Wait, what do you mean? Why shouldn’t we talk about it?" Brody asked with a frown, "If this ain’t really a game, then shouldn’t we tell people about it?"
"We should, obviously. But we can’t, that’s just it. The moment that we speak about it, someone or something is trying to make us forget about everything connected to such thoughts, or just think of it as normal. There’s a chance you’ll think nothing of this conversation then either, and all of this was for naught." Eisen pointed out, so Brody slowly nodded his head, somewhat settling down.
"Well, at the very least, until any of you start seeing a red notification." The old man added, and the moment that he did so, both Ruth and Serio rushed in front of him.
"An Artificial Notification?!" They asked nearly simultaneously, and Eisen just slowly nodded his head. "If that’s what they’re called, then yes. It started appearing after I was made to forget about everything a few times. It tells me to ’Speak to Grardour’." He explained, and immediately the two Core Guardians nodded their heads.
"I see, of course, that would be a great place to hide informative items for you." Serio muttered out while cupping his chin between his thumb and index finger, before Eisen raised his brows in response.
"Could you explain? If you remember, we don’t know anything." The old man said with a sigh, and swiftly, Ruth jumped up and started to tell them about it.
"Well, there were a lot of Dou-Dou-Dou-Dours here a few hundred years ago, right? We held a meeting he-he-he-here, didn’t we?" She asked, and Serio slowly nodded his head. "Yes, yes, that was a thing, wasn’t it? What a fun time that was seeing such great figures." The Town Guardian replied with a light chuckle, while Eisen just stared at them with a frown.
"Once more, who is Grardour? And what are Dours in general?" Eisen asked with a sigh, and Ruth nodded her head in response.
"Ah, so-so-so-sorry! Well, ’Dour’ is the term used to ref-ref-ref-refer to a Giant-Clan’s Chief, a Giant-King basically. And ’Grar’ is the word for ’Flames’ in Iötum... So the Grardour is the King of Flames, as in the Chief of the Fire-Giant Clan!" Ruth explained, and Eisen looked at her surprised, seeming to remember Ailren mentioning different Giant-Clans back when they first spoke to each other in Eisen’s Dreamscape, where he received a Quest from the Ancient-Gold-Dragon in the form of a cat.
"I see, and why exactly do you think I’m supposed to speak to the current Grardour?" Eisen asked the two Guardians, who just looked at each other for a moment and then back at Eisen.
"Well, it’s quite simple, really... You are the son of the first Grardour."
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