Chapter 18: A Smelly Pair

Chapter 18:
A Smelly Pair

 

WITH THE FIRST DAY of class over, Emma and I left the academy and headed for the guild hall. We figured we might as well take on a request while we were out and about.

“Noir, don’t you think everyone’s gonna assume we’re dating?”

Emma chatted as we walked, but I couldn’t get my mind off Maria. It would cost me 8,000 LP to remove the curse. If I wanted to manage it, I was going to have to figure out a way to farm a massive amount of LP.

While I was lost in thought, I noticed a copper coin on the ground and picked it up. It looked like something someone had dropped.

“But, you know, I didn’t expect you to just surprise me with a kiss like that, Noir! O-of course I know you must’ve needed to do it because you used your Great Sage skill for some reason, but still!”

I found another coin. It was kinda weird to find two so fast.

“Hey, are you listening? Wait…did you find another coin?”

“Seems like it.”

“Must be your lucky day.”

Lucky… Oh, right, it must be thanks to the Good Luck skill on the sword! I’d had the sword on my hip all day. That explained the rapid succession of good things happening.

“That reminds me,” I said. “I wanted to ask you something about Maria.”

“Why are you bringing her up when you’re spending time with me?”

“This is serious!”

“Is it really?”

“She’s going to die soon.”

“Wait a minute, that really is serious!”

That’s what I said!

Emma’s face went white as I explained the Sixteenth Year Death Curse. She clearly agreed that it was desperately unfair that such a kind and courteous girl was on the verge of death.

“I want to help her,” I said.

“Yeah… Yeah, me too! But let’s get to the guild first.”

There were adventurers from all walks of life in Odin, and the receptionists knew all about skills too. They must have had to study them, or they’d have a tough time while registering new adventurers.

“Hello, Lola,” I called as we walked in.

“Mr. Noir?! Uh, why are you here now?!” Lola hid her face behind her hands. She seemed…flustered?

I tilted my head. Weird. “Sorry, school started today,” I explained, “so I’ll have to stop by in the afternoon from now on.”

“I wish you woulda said earlier! I’m not prepared! Give me ten…no, five minutes please!” Lola bolted through a staff door, still hiding her face behind her hands.

I had absolutely no idea what had just happened, but one of the other receptionists took pity and filled me in. “She’s fixing her makeup. She didn’t think you were coming today, so she was a little sloppy about it.”

I suppose Lola did look a little different today, but she had such nice skin that I was sure she’d look stunning without any makeup on at all.

“Noir,” said Emma. “Forget about that stupid tarted-up receptionist and let’s go.”

“I can’t do that, she’s my manager.”

“You’re so stupid,” she muttered.

“Thanks for waiting!” Lola burst back through the door, wearing a warm smile and flawless makeup—I assume.

Once she was settled at her station, I asked her about the Sixteenth Year Death Curse.

“Hmm, I’ve heard of a few death curses before. Unfortunately, the survival rate is incredibly low. They’re sometimes conferred as curse skills by attacks from demonic monsters.” She could also recall some historical adventurers who perished after failing to lift similar curses.

“So, there’s no way to get rid of them?” I asked.

“Typically, you’d go to a priest, or holy woman, or someone like that. They can lift less serious curses.”

“I’ve got a friend who needs this sort of help, so if you know someone good, I’d appreciate their name.”

Lola brought a finger to her chin. It must’ve been a difficult question, especially since she was probably taking my financial situation into consideration too. “It’s not that I don’t know anyone who could fit the bill. I do have a friend who is a very talented cleric, but she doesn’t have much experience with curse skills.”

“But she’s good at what she does?”

“Extremely. She’s removed many such skills, but…”

“Please introduce us.” If her services were going to be expensive, I could always just introduce her to Maria directly. I mean, her family was loaded, surely they’d pay anything for the chance of Maria’s survival.

“I can’t make any promises, but I’ll talk to her. I’ll ask her to make some time tomorrow.”

“I appreciate it. Though, while we’re here, do you have a request for us today?”

“I did just get something in. What do you think of this?”

The request was for the delivery of yomir herbs. They grew in the forest, but it was exceptionally difficult to tell them apart from their deadly poisonous counterparts. It wasn’t a job Lola would usually offer to someone who wasn’t an expert, but she made an exception for me since she knew about my Discerning Eye for Items.

“We’re swimming in requests for them, so bring in as many as you can find. They’re 10,000 rels a piece.”

I couldn’t exactly say no to such a juicy prospect.

“But I have to warn you, there are trolls in Jibbon Forest. They seem to congregate near where the yomir herbs are found.”

“Thanks for the heads up.”

With that, Emma and I set out for the forest. We had to hurry. We didn’t want to get stuck there after dark.

When we got there, it seemed we’d worried too much. Aside from the occasional bird chirping, Jibbon Forest was dead silent. I’d been there once before as a child with my father, so I had a feeling about where the herbs might grow. After about a five-minute walk, we found the spot I had in mind.

“Hey, yomir herb has white flowers, doesn’t it?”

“Maybe that’s it then.”

The lush carpet of white flowers was pretty hard to miss. I used my Discerning Eye for Items on it.

Poison. Poison. Poison. Poison. Poison. Poison. Poison. Poison. Poison.

Well, that wasn’t great. As an aside, poisonous herbs apparently also had grades. All of these were C-Grade.

“Well?” asked Emma.

“They’re all low-grade poisonous herbs.”

“Hmm, I guess we have to go deeper into the forest. Let’s get going.”

Soon enough, we found another spot where a different plant with white flowers was growing. I asked Emma to stand guard while I checked, but then we heard a rustling sound overhead.

“Grrrr!”

“I don’t think so!”

“Gyah!”

That really startled me. A goblin was hiding up in the treetops and tried to drop down and ambush us. In a split second, Emma slashed it with her daggers before it could reach me. She looked so cool, slicing it to ribbons in midair, but her approach wasn’t without its flaws. For example, my arm got splattered in blood.

“Oh, sorry!”

“It’s fine. Not much you coulda done to stop it.”

“Here.” She offered me a handkerchief.

My family wasn’t in a financial position to buy them very often, so I didn’t carry one regularly. I felt a little bad about getting hers dirty. The goblin’s green blood was really sticky.

“Don’t worry about it,” she insisted. “That one was cheap!”

“You’re too kind.”

“Heh, I know. I’m 50 percent kindness, you know.”

“What’s the other 50 percent?”

“Well, um, it’s, uh, y-you know…”

“I know what?”

“My…my feelings for…”

“For?”

“Look, Noir, I—”

“Look out!”

A goblin leapt out of a shrub. Pretty crafty. It must’ve been lying in wait.

It lurched toward Emma, but I darted forward and felled it with my sword. My new two-edged blade was exquisitely sharp. Just grazing the goblin sliced its throat open. That must have been thanks to the Sharp Edge skill.

“Oh.”

“I-I-I-I’m fine. Yeah! Totally—blegh!” Emma started puking. Turned out my technique could use some work, too. She’d gotten a face full of goblin blood. The stench was even worse. Sure, you could wipe it off, but it wasn’t easy on the nose. Emma was gasping for breath. “Ugh, I’m trying to hold it together, but the smell is awful.”

“The two of us pack a pretty big one-two punch now,” I said. “I bet we could clear a room without lifting a finger.”

“Ah ha ha ha, everyone’s probably going to avoid us when we go back to town. Even our families.”

“Now that’s depressing.”

“But not us, right?” Emma said. “We’re partners in stink.”

“I’m not sure how I feel about that.”

I decided to try making a skill that could remove the smell.

 

Deodorize — 80 LP

 

I was trying to save LP to help Maria, but I didn’t feel like I had much of a choice. We’d be social pariahs smelling like this—maybe even exiled from the town.

“Ha!” I started by Deodorizing myself. The skill seemed to work by removing the stink from whatever I touched. The one catch was that really egregious smells would require a different skill—Super Deodorize—but I hoped this was enough for goblin blood. Upon sniffing myself, I appeared to be in luck. “Sorry for cleaning myself up first, Emma.”

“Hurry up and use that on me too!”

“Tell me a joke first.”

“You’re the worst!”

“Hey,” I said. “you pull it on me all the time over lunch.”

“That’s different…”

“Come on, get it over with.”

I waited. Emma groaned and sauntered over to a nearby tree. She placed one hand on it, and used her other to flip her hair over her shoulder. “Even if the whole world turned against you,” she said. “I’d still be on your side, Noir.”

“I don’t get it?”

“Oh, come on! I thought I’d come up with a cheesy line that stank as much as I do.”

“Would you really though?” I asked. “Stick by me.”

She nodded. “That’s one thing I can say with confidence.”

“Then say it like you mean it.”

“I absolutely would!”

That made me genuinely happy. I went ahead and deodorized her.

Crap, this is no time to be screwing around, we have herbs to find.