"Nothing is normal about this situation!" Rae yelled out, staring at the party in front of her with a perplexed expression. Of course, they were all exhausted and injured through the battle just now, but beyond that, they acted just like they did when taking out a wave of moles while they were making their way to the fifth floor the day before. This fact not only confused, but also irritated Rachel.
"Then how do you expect us to react?" Lynol asked in a blunt tone, locking eyes with the group's handler, "Isn't this what you wanted? A party filled with people strong enough to not care for something like this?"
Rae glared back at the swordsman in front of her, and soon let out a loud sigh, "Fine. But I guess it's more important to just head back into the settlement now so that everyone can heal up before we head back outside." She said, turning around to head back to the boss room's entrance. But before she could, Foster exclaimed, "Before that, don't you think there's something else we need to do?" He asked, and Rae looked at him, unsure what he meant.
"We just beat a never-seen-before boss. That's a big deal, right? Personally, I don't want to deal with people like Kyla coming after us." Foster pointed out, while the cleric, currently busy healing the more imminent injuries to Octer's body, suddenly snapped her head around, "What's that supposed to mean?"
Foster glanced at her with a light smirk, "You know exactly what it means. You're a weirdo. But that's fine, all of us are. You about dungeons, me about space, Lynol about swordsmanship, and... actually, Octer is the only normal person in our party. He's our rock." He added with a wink directed at the shield bearer, who was trying to hide his slightly embarrassed expression.
"What are you suggesting?" Lynol asked, "Things like this are a big deal. That monster was far too strong for this floor, so we need to share its existence with others."
"Obviously, yeah. Just that this information won't be coming from 'us'. The stuff that the boss dropped for us can be hidden easily enough, so officially, we just encountered a King Mole, like the majority of others around. If you want, we can even say we encountered the Rat Knight, if you want us to stick out a little more as a party without being bothered by people." Foster explained, "And then once we're back on the surface, I meet with some people I wanted to interact with anyway, and I trade some information with them. Anonymously, obviously. And then, that information is going to slowly spread throughout the city."
Everyone thought about Foster's suggestion for a while, but the one that was first to complain about it was Rachel, "Why would we have to go through all this trouble? And if you do it that way, nobody is going to believe it anyway."
With a grin, Foster shook his head, "Of course, maybe at the start. But once the information spreads, people are going to want to figure out where it came from. It's going to be impossible to hide from it forever, so sooner or later people will probably figure out it was us, although the kind of people that would be the first to find us should be keen on keeping a good secret for themselves. And when that time comes, I'll have come up with something else to deal with it. Don't worry, I've dealt with this sort of thing for nearly two decades now. I know how it works." Following his explanation, Foster quickly picked up all of the things dropped by the Lord of the Cave, so that they could have a better look later, and then started to head over toward the door.
But after a few moments, he realized just how silent everyone was. He looked at them with a wry smile, "Did I say something wrong?"
"No, nothing... 'wrong', I guess, just... how old did you say you are again?" Octer asked a bit confused, and Foster slightly tilted his head to the side, "I'm 23, why?"
"Erm... nothing, it's fine." Octer replied quickly, as everyone got up and walked to the door, with Foster in the front. Still confused, Rachel walked over toward Lynol, quickly whispering to him, "Do you know what he's talking about? What kind of things did he do when he was a kid?"
"...I have a rough idea of the life he used to lead, but even I don't know what he did as a child." Lynol told her, "And I have no interest in prying into it either."
---
A gust of cold air hit the party's face as they stepped out of the building. They were finally back on the surface. Even though they had only spent two days in the dungeon, it felt like forever, considering what happened down there.
"It's getting pretty late now, how about everyone just goes back to rest for now, and then we can have everything appraised tomorrow?" Rachel suggested, slightly patting the pouch hanging by her hip that was filled with all the small magic stones that were dropped by the monsters of the first five floors.
"Appraised? I thought the magic stones are evaluated by weight." Foster pointed out, as Rachel quickly explained before Kyla could intervene, "The magic stones, yes, but the cloak and that purple crystal are magic items. We need to have them appraised to figure out their effect."
"Huh... I thought that the purple thing was just a special kind of magic stone or something."
"It looks like some sort of crafting material. So it might be possible to enhance something with it." Lynol suggested, "But more important than that, who do we go to? Doesn't an appraisal show the source of the item as well?"
Rachel thought about it for a moment, and then looked at Foster, "What do you think? The appraiser might figure out what happened, like Lynol said. Do you think it's worth it?"
"Nope. Listen, just leave it to me for now, I'll figure it out somehow." Foster said with a confident grin on his face. The others didn't seem all too excited about the idea, knowing the kind of contacts that he would most likely bring these things to. Realizing this, Foster grinned at his friends, "Don't worry, you can trust me with this. I think I already know who to bring these things to."
"That's right, let us just try and trust Foster for now. If he messes up, we can still have him work to make up for it." Lynol pointed out, slowly convincing the group to leave everything to Foster, who stared at his party a bit annoyed, "Right, right... speaking of work, though. Did you get enough info on what we can do now?" He asked, looking at the group's handler.
Rae raised her brows surprised, and quickly nodded her head, "Yes, I did. Obviously, you're even stronger than I thought you were. I mean, you took care of that thing while I was just standing there, still trying to figure out what was going on. I have a rough idea of what sort of people could complement your party well, so I will reach out so some people if you're fine with it."
"That would be great, thank you for your hard work." Octer said, smiling lightly, "Should we split up for now, then? Ah, you will sell the magic stones for us, right?"
"Of course, that's my job." Rae said smugly, "Let's meet in a few days, and I'll have the money from this dive for you guys. Should come down to quite a sum, especially with that rather big stone from the boss." She explained, and with that, the group split up, all making their way to their respective accommodations.
Soon, the three fighters found themselves back in the Red Riverside Inn, where they went off to their own rooms without exchanging many more words. They were all rather exhausted from their first dive into the world dungeon, so it made sense. But despite his exhaustion, one of the three stayed up. He took off his clothes, and changed into another outfit that he had recently bought. In order to hide it for now while making his way to his destination, he simply put on the cloak that the lord of the cave dropped. A completely black suit like that was easily recognizable, after all.
Foster walked back through the Inn, and quickly made his way to the commercial district, where he soon found himself in the bottom layer. Once there, he took off the fur cloak and placed it into his bag, instead taking out the white bone mask inside of it.. He pressed it onto his face, and tied his hair into a bun, "I guess it's time for Odin to come out again."
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