NOVEL WEB Chapter 61 - First Sighting
Novaris. Quin. 905. AGC.
Nodel. Waning Crescent 🌘. Day 28.
Rose arrived in Wildwood City a week or so ago. She had been sent there as part of her final training. She technically had already graduated as a Warrior of Sol; she just needed more combat experience. She and her comrades had learned everything they could from practicing back in the city. And like every other initiate, they were sent out into the world actually to do their jobs.
Effectively, they were all stationed around the world in areas where they could get some training while still staying relatively safe. This meant they were stationed somewhere on the continent until they were strong enough or had enough experience to be moved to other, more dangerous areas.
So, as far as Rose knew, this would be her new living space for the foreseeable future. There was a small chance that she could be moved again to another spot on the continent, but it was very low. Still, as far as places went, Wildwood City wasn't that bad.
Arriving at the city, she had instantly felt at home. The city felt as if it was Alloy but, with nature, turned up to the next rank. Where Alloy had parks and other green areas sprinkled throughout, Wildwood City was more like a forest with buildings and civilization sprinkled throughout. Rose was already fond of exploring and causing a ruckus, so Wildwood fit her just fine as she could run around and do whatever she wanted when off duty. Something that she had been doing for the last week or so since she arrived.
She and the other three initiates who came to Wildwood from other places on the continent had been given a month off to relax, enjoy, and explore their new home. Afterward, they would go out into the wilds as groups or could even sign up in the Adventurers Guild or assist the guard. It didn't matter what they chose as long as they started getting proper combat experience.
She and her associates had talked about it and decided to do their own separate things. Two of them would join the Adventurers Guild and get some combat experience. One was looking into the guard, and Rose herself wasn't sure what to do just yet. At first, she questioned why there were so few of the initiates in the city since it put her in a difficult spot, but after thinking about it, it made sense as Sol’s Temple was not as grand as the one in her home city. In fact, most other churches did not have a strong presence here as Amphis did.
The goddess preferred to keep this small piece of the wilderness to herself, and even though civilization still existed here, she still preferred to keep it under her control. From her teachings, Rose knew that the only reason why Wildwood City even existed was that the Goddess of Nature still wanted to push out the Realm invaders from the world. Well, at least the not very well-behaved ones. To do so, she needed a base of operations, and for this particular area, that was Wildwood.
In her exploration, Rose had found that her favorite part of the city was the giant tree. It was something truly unique to look at and it amazed her as to how something could grow to be so large. Rose also loved seeing all the new types of people that she hadn't seen before back in her home country. Now, she wasn't sure if it was just from her lack of exploring the ports, but it was her first time seeing satyrs, dryads, and the elephant folks along with the half-treant people.
In her need to explore the city, she had visited most places that could be of interest. This mainly involved visiting taverns, shops, and the general marketplace that the city uses to sell goods. Of course, there were also some other much more exciting areas, such as the entertainment district, which was smaller than back home, but it still had certain spots to help entertain the masses. This included the arena, a few gambling spots, and a theater. She also visited the Adventurers Guild and was completely amazed that it was based in a giant tree.
Thankfully, she did not need to visit any of the inns as she could stay at the temple. Either way, she met many interesting folks and hoped to spend the rest of her time before she began learning more about them and making some new friends.
Thinking of friends, she was reminded of the one friend that she hadn't seen in a while. Rose wondered how Jasmine was doing. She had disappeared one night from Luxana’s Temple, and the whole thing had caused a ruckus. Somehow, the entire temple had been encompassed in a barrier, not allowing any of the clerics to leave. Thankfully, the barrier had disappeared around one or two days after it popped up.
Rose and all the other initiates had asked her superiors what had happened and how someone could just put a barrier around a church like that. However, they had all been silent and told them to carry on their duties and not worry about it. The whole thing seemed odd, and everything surrounding Jasmine's disappearance and existence was incredibly mysterious, which worried Rose.
As she was walking down one of the busy roads in Wildwood, thinking about her friend, something strange happened. Rose felt as Sol descended into her soul. The last time that happened was when she had taken the oath, and the deity had not spoken to her since then. She had also not spoken with the deity since she hadn't needed to reach out for anything, and she knew that the god was always watching.
Feeling the god in her soul made her pause, and she stood still, causing a few people around her to grumble and move around. Rose was on the sidewalk and had been looking straight ahead when she had stopped. She had not changed her posture and was still looking straight ahead when she felt the energy of her god infuse her eyes. As the energy did its thing, everything got much lighter. All the shadows disappeared, and in front of her, an approaching figure glimmered.
Rose watched curiously as the glimmer dispersed, and she saw that walking towards her was Jasmine. She saw the look on her face as her friend recognized her but did not move to do anything and simply walked by. Rose couldn't do anything either and stood there, shocked at what she had just seen as her god dispersed from her soul, and the magic that had been infused into her eyes disappeared. Feeling that the god had left knocked her out of her shock, she quickly turned around to find her friend, but she did not see her. It was almost like she had disappeared into nothingness. However, that couldn't be right, and thinking back. There was an illusion that Sol’s power had broken. However, thinking about it, maybe the illusion was not broken; instead, she had just been able to see through it. In the end, it didn't matter as she now knew that her friend was in the city and even if Rose couldn't find her. Jasmine could certainly find Rose.
After a couple of months of traveling and getting into various dangerous and sketchy situations, they were able to make it to Wildwood City. They had both chosen to come to this city for a variety of reasons. It was the place furthest away from any real civilization where people might be looking for them. Though it was still a dangerous area, it was not as dangerous as the two twin continents, the wild continent, or as odd and unknown to them as the desolate continent. Additionally, since the city was ruled by the Goddess of Nature, who didn't have an affiliation with Luxana or any other gods outside of the other two that made their small nature pantheon, the twins had felt that it was the best place to lay low and possibly power up until they could stand up for themselves.
There had been other options like heading to the Magus Empire and speaking with whatever soul specialist they could find. However, once again, their weak status would put them at risk of somebody throwing them in a dungeon to study them. These things were unacceptable, and it was better for them to buy their time until they could fend for themselves.
The twins had been in Wildwood City for three weeks, and after signing up with the Adventurers Guild and doing some minor questing to afford a decent living, they had settled into Timber Inn. It wasn't extravagant, but it would do. The inn was an interesting place managed by a treant named Prak. What made it interesting was the fact that it wasn't a building. The whole thing was situated in a park. There was a small office where you would check in with Prak, pay your fees on time, or ask for the treant’s help. Otherwise, you would live in a tree in the park forest. Each tree was large and hollowed out enough to have simple amenities within.
From what the twins had seen, most trees had three floors. These floors weren’t very big, but they were sizable enough to let someone like Jasmine live comfortably. The bottom floor was a guest and relaxation area and was the only way into the tree. From there, you could reach the second and third floors through a ladder. The second floor had a simple bed, a few drawers, and a bit of empty space. Finally, the third floor was the bathroom. The whole thing was odd as it was connected to the tree. It had a magical shower, sink, and other things for daily necessities, all of which had the usual water enchantments. Things were odd because all the produced waste was directly fed into the tree or ground to help the tree flourish. The idea was a nice change from what the twins had seen on how most waste was removed in the rest of the continent.
Overall, the inn had few fancy things, making it fairly cheap to stay at. This would then allow them to go out to eat every day since they weren’t very good at cooking. Jasmine had wanted to learn, but they had been too busy surviving.
So far, Wildwood City hadn't been bad, and they had been enjoying themselves to some extent as they had explored it. Naturally, they couldn't really team up with anybody else because of their existence. There was also the fact that they had to drain mana from entities, which would put them on some target list. This all meant that the road to power would be a long one, but considering they didn't have to worry about dying of old age, it would be feasible.
Just as they had been settling down to their new lifestyle, change came abruptly to their life as they were walking down one of the busiest streets in the city. They had spotted someone they didn't think they would see again for a long time. Even more surprising was the fact that Rose had been staring at them as if she could see through their illusion. Of course, that worried them, and as soon as they passed the stunned Rose, they quickly disappeared into the crowd.
However, they now knew that Jasmine’s friend was in the city, a decision had been made to make contact.