Let's Go!
After waking up in a much more timely fashion than the previous day, Luna and I headed to the dining hall to get some breakfast. Luna was excited to try pancakes for the first time. I, meanwhile, was impressed with the local tree syrup. I had been concerned that it would not live up to the expectation I had from my childhood of having excellent local maple syrup.
After a hearty breakfast, we cleaned up and found our laundered clothes and cleaned armour waiting for us in the change room. Luna helped me strap on my armour as I quickly washed the debris and dirt from my gauntlets. I had not cleaned them since my fight with the Guildmaster, as they had been sitting inside my Storage.
This morning, all our orders from yesterday were delivered to our room in the hotel. Luna and I organized them out on the bed and floor. Once we had them all organized, I placed everything into my storage space. Luna had gained permission from Marcy this morning to use the kitchen, between the hotel's meal preparations, to cook some dishes. That way, we would have remade meals ready and tucked away in the stasis of my Storage, still warm and ready to eat while we travelled. Today, however, we had the meals we had requested Marcy to prepare for us. It consisted of extra helpings from last night's dinner.
Setting out from our lodgings, we retraced our steps from our first day here to find our way back to the east gate. Nearing the town entrance, I spotted Jeorge, the guard. Shooting him a large grin, I watched as he blanched with fear as he turned to make an excuse not to be here. The guard at the gate handling departures was not present the other day. He asked to see our ID, and upon seeing the adventurer's tags, he inquired if it was only a temporary departure for a quest. "Yes, it is. I am new to adventuring, so I am just curious, does the short-term nature of our planned time away from the town change something about the departure process?"
"It just changes that instead of marking you as a stand are, we keep track of whether you have returned. That way, in case you don't come back, we can inform the relevant people. In your case, the guild. And on that note, I don't know if you have heard about people going missing in the southern forest. Be careful if you are headed that direction." Smiling my thanks for the cautionary warning, Luna and I headed out of the town.
After walking for several hours, we had found ourselves having passed into the deeper part of the forest. We now were in an area where little natural light managed to suffuse the foliage's dense cover. That is not to say that there was not any light. A bioluminescent moss coated the trees' trunks in this area, providing light that allowed us to see, even though the sun's light was not present. We both stared at the otherworldly site in awe as we took in the splendour. The forest called memories of the underwater exploration biographies I had watched on TV in my old world.
As we continued through the darkened woods, we felt the air get chilly, and we started to hear the hooting of owls. I pulled out light hoodies for each of us as the temperature plummeted what felt like ten degrees. While I was getting the clothing for us, Luna turned and stared into the nearby brush. My body tensed in preparation for a fight as I was unsure what caught her attention. Luna quickly turned back as she sensed my battle aura flood the area. "It is alright, John! I just spotted one of the mushrooms we are looking for!" Luna hastily explained while placing a hand on my shoulder. I relaxed and pulled her in for a kiss. "Good job, babe."
"Babe?" Luna questioned while striking her adorable head tilt pose. "It is a pet name couples used in my homeland. It is slang for baby, which is also a pet name, but more of an antiquated or formally romantic one, I guess." I scratched the back of my head as I tried to condense several hundred years of lingual evolution that was much too far beyond my expertise. Getting to the point, I explained, "Just know it means that you are precious to me. And that you are someone I will do my utmost to protect." Luna smiled, cheeks tinged pink by the affirmation of my feelings for her. She pulled me in for a kiss of her own, "The same goes for me, honey. I love you."
"Graaaaah!" Ugh. I spun around to face the noise. Ten goblins were charging our spot from the depths of the sea of trees. Little bastards just had to ruin a precious moment. I watched as the green-skinned little devil that was leading the charge launched a crude spear. The spear hurtled in an arc through the air towards our position. My mind found its trajectory, and I realized it would soar past my left ear and hit Luna. I felt my temper rise at the thought of it harming her, and my body prepared for war. My battle aura spilled out of me again. Adrenaline flooded my system, causing my perception of time to dilate. And the playlist I created the other day kicked on. Out of ethereal speakers above me, a riff sounded from an electric guitar. My blood sang with the battle hymn.
As the spear was passing my shoulder, I spun and locked my fingers around it. I pulled it into a U-turn as I completed my 360-degree turn. While spinning, my eyes met Luna's; bewilderment at the strange music was plain to see on her face. Now facing the goblin again, I brought around the spear with its existing momentum before adding more power from my twenty points of strength as I launched the spear. You could hear a ferocious howling for a split second as the spear ripped through the air. Now making contact with the goblin, the spear punched through him, not seeming to slow in the slightest as it tore through his gut. It severed his spine before exiting at nearly the same velocity it entered.
The weapon plunged through a tree until finally stopping, with only a hand's width of its shaft sticking out our side of the tree. Meanwhile, the pointy end had punched through the skull of a goblin that had been crouching behind the tree. The cowardly enemy's death was made clear by the corona of gray matter and gore that blossomed from behind the trunk. Spotting two archers near the back of the line aiming at us, I punched out with my elementally charged fists. I summoned the power of lightning, and from each hand, a ghostly looking apparition of a fist made from blue electricity flew forward. They separately sought out a goblin apiece, finding their prey frozen in place by the mystical force they did not understand.
As the lightning fists landed, the raw power contained within coursed through the little green humanoids' short hunched forms. Blue arcs of electricity hunted for the quickest route to the earth as they returned to nature. Some took a pathway through the air, lighting up the surroundings as the electricity manifest in flashing bolts. However, the majority found its path of least resistance to either be through the goblin or across its skin. As the vast current flowed through the bloodstream, it boiled the blood. With nowhere to go, the now vaporized combination of oxygen and other chemicals ruptured through the pores of the pitiable creature's skin, saturating the area around it with rich oxygen. The current that ran along the skin ignited hairs and the bits of cloth worn by the monster. The spark of the ignited clothing consumed the generous amounts of oxygen around it.
Where two goblins had stood, now there erupted two fireballs, each launching debris in the form of rocks and other nearby forest floor coverings outward as deadly shrapnel. The razor-sharp pieces of hurtling death mainly went far afield, but some now situated themselves in half a dozen different goblins. With only a single goblin remaining unscathed, I launched forwards, completing the twenty-metre dash in the blink of an eye. The goblin, finally noticing my presence, attempted to raise its shield. But shield or no shield, my fist was unstoppable as it cratered the earth where the goblin stood. His body provided less resistance than the ground as all that remained was a red steaming crater in the dirt.
Standing and turning to look at Luna, I found her running over to me. "John, are you okay? You have blood all over you." I looked at myself. I had gotten the last goblin's viscera all over myself. "Let's go find somewhere for me to clean this off. "I think I hear a stream over there." Luna pointed in the direction from which the goblins had originated. "Thanks, babe," I smiled at her.
While we worked in the nearby stream to clean me off, I explained the music system to Luna. I showed her a variety of different songs that I had set in my playlists. She appreciated the analog-sounding music but had a hard time understanding the appeal of the more synthetic sounds. I played some country-western tunes for us as I got dressed in a new outfit. "Let's get some foraging done, little miss." I tipped a non-existent cowboy hat to the confused beast-woman.