Today’s the day that Remi and I get to meet a few possible additions to our party, since she told me that two people actually responded to the request she put up in the guild. Personally, I hope these two are somewhat experienced adventurers, since both Nazuko and Lilith haven’t been outside of Colonus yet. Meaning, that only Remi and I have actually completed a quest before. I’d rather not have to deal with too many newbie adventurers and I really would want someone dependable that I can rely on, since Remi is not the person to ask when it comes to general safety. I start my day by kicking Nazuko out of my bed. I swear, the girl sneaks into my bed when I’m not looking. I can’t even ask the servants to give her her own room—since I’m pretty sure she’s notorious throughout the capital and even the guards don’t seem like they’ve accepted my decision to recruit her yet.

“Hey there is a perfectly good couch over there why don’t you use it. If you sneak into my bed one more time, you’re sleeping in the dungeon. Also, isn’t there anywhere else for you to sleep, where did you used to live before you met me?” I interrogated.

“Eh, but your bed is so huge and warm. It’s way better than the wood shelf in the storage shed of a potion shop that I used to sleep on. Anyways, a master and their servants should live in the same place, right? You wouldn’t let me be homeless again, would you?” she asks as she makes a pleading face with puppy dog eyes.

Dangit, she’s abusing my weakness. Cuteness. And she’s guilt tripping me at the same time.

“Fine, you win this round,” I say reluctantly.

I think I’m forgetting something, something I wanted to do for Nazuko. Oh, wait, I know now. Remembering that she was the one who set up that lap pillow with Lilith I ask

“Hey is there anything you want, like a special knife or something. I do know a good blacksmith?”

“Hmm, I would like a hood or a cloak since my last one got thrown away by the servants when you ordered me to be assaulted with soap. Soap sucks, it gets in your eyes—and it burns. Hey Will, can I never use soap again?”

“No, make an effort to stay clean, if possible. That’s an order”

So she wants a cloak, huh? Well, I suppose that is standard thief attire. I take off my black hoodie and place it over her shoulders.

“There that should do for the meantime, before we find a good tailor at least”

It looks kind of cute on her since it goes down all the way to her knees, although it has taken quite a bit of a beating since I came to this world. There’s a small tear where that death mantis cut me, but otherwise it’s mostly intact.

“OHHH, It smells a little, but it’s really fluffy and comfy. Thank you,” she says as she rubs her face all over the fur inside the hood.

“With that out of the way, let’s head down to the guild, I don’t want Remi to yell at me again for being late,” I stated.

We head down to the guild using a portal, but Nazuko tells me to go first since she doesn’t want to get pancaked again. We walk into the guild to see Remi and Lilith talking to a large man with red hair who’s about 6’1 and a girl with blue hair who’s about 5’6. The man looks like he’s sporting a cannon on his back and has a flintlock at his side. I wonder what warclass he belongs to. He’s also wearing a light brown piece of leather armor and has a red bandana around his neck. The blue haired girl is carrying what seems to be a very decorative staff and is wearing a white robe similar to what Vasavir wears, the only difference being that there's a small window around her chest that teases a peek at her cleavage. That looks like a magician to me, although a rather alluring one. I call out to Remi and the four of them come up to meet us.

“Good morning, Will. Okay, so these two are the adventurers I told you about. This is Ryder and Azura. They came all the way from the state Zefren since they heard the hero was recruiting people. Unfortunately, these two are the only ones who have responded to my request, but nevertheless—I think they’ll make good additions to our team,” Remi says confidently.

Oh wow these two have cool names, I hope they’re really powerful as well.

“Nice to meet’cha,” Ryder says as he reaches out to shake my hand.

“G-g-g-greetings,” Azura says nervously as she slowly reaches out her hand.

“Now, now, don’t be so stiff—go on,” Ryder commands as he gives Azura a shove in my direction.

However he shoved her a bit too hard as she collides with me and we fall to the ground. I’m pretty sure I can’t breathe right now as I’m being suffocated by her breasts. This wouldn’t be the worst way to die.

“C-Can’t breathe,” I croaked.

“I’m sorry,” she squeals as she gets up as fast as she can.

“Hahaha, I suppose that’s one way to introduce yourself,” Ryder laughs.

Lilith has this look of disapproval on her face as she helps me get up. I wonder why.

“Okay then, you two—so first things first, what are your abilities?” I ask.

“Well Azura here is a support magician, she can cast all sorts of healing, strengthening, and weakening type spells. I’m a Bombardier, a special type of Archer. As for my abilities, well, it’d be easier to just show you,” Ryder states as he pulls that huge cannon off his back.

“Show me how?” I ask.

“Ryder, not here in the main part of the city, we don’t have the money to pay for property damage at the moment,” Azura claims.

“Oh, right, forgot about that, I guess we need a wide open area to show-off. Say, hero, how do you feel about having a minor duel with me so I can showcase my stuff,” Ryder suggests.

Why does everyone want to fight me? Can’t we just have a nice civilized talk with drinks spread about. Guess not. Well, I have recruited almost all my party members by fighting them, so why should this be any different.

“Okay, fine, I know a place where we can fight without causing too much damage to the city,” I say as I lead them to the nearest portal to North Point.

We enter through a portal and Azura and Ryder are yelling because they’re not used to falling out of the sky like the rest of us.

“Yeah, sorry about that, portals around here are a little faulty. Definitely not my fault though, just saying,” I lie.

We decide to head up to the open field where the knights usually train. Ryder requests that some of the knights give us a little bit of space otherwise they might get caught in the fight. At Ryder’s request, we start at opposite ends of the field. This is a disadvantageous start for me, since he’s an archer and I’m a swordsman—but this is mainly to show me his abilities so I gotta give him a chance. Taking a look around me I notice there is a bunch of people witnessing this fight, there’s even some of the people from the guild here taking bets on who’s gonna win. I wonder why people like to see me get beat up. Is fighting some sort of entertaining event here? I guess that’s what the modern colosseum is for, since it looks big enough to seat a thousand people.

“Alright, let's do this thing!” Ryder shouts from the other side of the field.

Well, at least one of us is enjoying this fight. I take a moment to use the power of the ring on Ryder:

 

He pulls out the huge cannon and starts to create what looks like cannon balls. I guess he has the ability to create explosives so I guess Bombardier makes sense. Although I do not like where this is going.

Battle Ost: 1812 Overture

“Let’s hear my cannon roar!” he says as he fires a bunch of cannon balls in my direction.

“Gah! Eek! Oof!” I say as I’m basically running around trying to avoid explosions going off in every direction.

Someone please help me! I take it back, I’d rather experience falling again as I think I’ve found the new worst experience of my life. There are bombs everywhere it's like I’m in the middle of a warzone. From a spectators perspective it would seem that I’m running around like a chicken with its head cut off. I start to run towards him in my direction and as I prepare to jump off a large rock it starts to glow and blows up underneath me sending me 30 feet in the air.

“HAH, I see you’ve stumbled across one of my self made landmines. I’ve littered the whole field with rocks that can explode if you set them off. Feel the power of a bombardier!” Ryder boasts.

“Oh no, Ryder has lost himself in explosion frenzy again hasn’t he,” Azura states as she watches from afar.

“Is Will going to be okay? It looks like chaos out there. I really hope I’m not in the area when Ryder lets loose,” Remi says nervously.

“Agreed,” Nazuko says in tandem.

“I’ve beaten him up worse,” Lilith claims.

“You’ll get used to it,” Azura responds.

It’s a good thing my aura is protecting from these explosions, but I don’t know how long I can last since there is explosions going off every other second. I’m covered in dirt and dust from all the earth that has been sent flying up in the air. I think I’ve made it about ¼ of the distance towards him, but the landmines are close enough in proximity that one landmine is setting off the other landmines. There’s debris heading in every direction and some of our spectators have gotten hit in the head with the amount of rocks flying as a result of the blasts. Lilith takes up a shield to protect herself and some of the bystanders watching. However none of the rocks land remotely in her direction. I avoid the next landmine I set off and some rocks finally do head in her direction, but the rocks somehow manage to hit everyone around her except her. I guess that’s her godlike luck working, I could use some of that at the moment. Ok now I’m about halfway through the field and Ryder is still launching bombs and cannonballs like a madman.

“Hoh, you’ve managed to get this close to me without getting destroyed by my blasts. I like your spirit Will, but it's time to show you one of my special attacks,” Ryder says as he prepares a bunch of ammunition next to him.

He puts his cannon aside and starts to chant,

“Brighter than the sun

O heavenly starlight, give me your strength. . .”

OH NO, chanting is BAD. From what little I’ve read of the forbidden spell books when someone begins to chant something it means they are about to use a really powerful spell.

“OH SHIT, EVERYBODY RUN FOR YOUR LIVES!” Azura screams as she begins to run in the opposite direction.

Everyone seems to take her advice as they start to run in her direction as well. It’s basically mass hysteria as everyone’s trampling over each other in an attempt to get away. Unfortunately for me, I can’t run away since I’m probably the one Ryder is targeting and if I ran in their direction they would get caught in the blast too. What do I do, what do I do? Think, Will, you’ve got to have some way to counter this next attack. If his ability is to summon bombs then I just need to redirect the bombs right. I think I have one attack that can do just that. I get in position and start my counter chant.

“Raging Winds I summon thee,

Breathe upon this land as thy see fit,

Seek no Retribution for chaos,

And Give Birth To Destruction”

Ryder continues his chant as I can feel all the magical energy in the area being gathered up by the both of us.

“Gain the reach of a solar flare,

Bring down the reign of fire,”

We both finish our respective chants and unleash our attacks.

“TORNADO!”

“BOMBARDMENT!”

Suddenly, I can see a bunch of large bombs being materialized in the air and the bombs begin to drop over my head. If I’m counting it correctly there’s around 30 large bombs falling from the sky, each one looks like a small missile. However, the F3 tornado I just summoned as a counter starts to suck up all of the bombs in the area. The ones Ryder summoned from his spell, the landmines, his cannonballs, all of it. I plunge my sword into the ground to avoid being sucked up by the tornado however Ryder is not so lucky as he gets sucked up by the tornado and starts to get hit by some of his own bombs. Some of the bombs end up escaping the pull of the tornado and one of them lands right in the center of a crowd of people watching the fight which sends them flying in all sorts of directions including my tornado. This would actually be hilarious to watch if it wasn’t for the fact that I’m in danger as well. The last few bombs end up hitting the arena and a few buildings nearby, causing a few to collapse. I can see a few people wearing white and black uniforms emerge from the rubble looking dazed. I’m really glad Quincy’s not near North Point at the moment or at least he shouldn’t be. He’s usually held up in his room reading books at this time or something like that, so I’m sure he’s fine. I also hope that I won’t be held accountable for all the destruction and property damage that Ryder and I have caused. As the tornado weakens and all the remaining bombs go off Ryder is sent flying out of the tornado and bounces on the ground for a bit like a ragdoll. The tornado ends up moving in the direction of the nearby forest and heads away from the field. We both look like we’re beat up so I won’t use my swords to finish this fight. Instead I decided to give him a bit of punishment as I run to him as he gets up and I give him a right hook to the face. He stumbles back as I continue to give him a few more good punches. As I try to give him the finishing blow he dodges it, then proceeds to whip out his flintlock and shoot a few explosive rounds at me. The impact of those shots aren’t enough to put a hole in me, but they do send me flying back a bit.

“Heh, since we’ve gone this far I might as well show you my final, ultimate attack. If you survive this, then you’ll be the victor of this bout,” Ryder states.

“Oh god, please don’t tell me you have more. I think we’ve done enough damage to the surrounding area. I think we can stop for now. Hey, are you listening to me? STOP! STOP!” I yell, but he ignores me and starts one last chant.

“Heavenly Mother of Explosions

Hear my Call and answer my prayers

Let this star’s final act shine bright

And Give Birth to a SuperNova

MOAB!”

I look in terror as I see a bomb the size of a small house slowly materialize in the air above us.

“ARE YOU A FOOL, WE’RE ALL GOING TO DIE AT THIS RATE!” Azura yells from a distance.

This comment scares me. How is it that this world keeps coming up with chaotic ways to kill me? There’s no way I’m going to die like this, but summoning another tornado would probably make this situation worse not better. I’d run for it, but my legs are barely able to move right now.

“Everyone go through the nearest portal, we have to escape North Point,” she commands.

Everyone begins to head through the portal back to the main part of the city, including a few scared knights. The last few people remaining are those belonging to my party and Azura. At least they’re here for me, but they totally should have gone through the portal. It's what I would have done. Wait. Portal. That’s it, I remembered that portals can also teleport objects as well not just people. I raise my hands up into the air and use all of my remaining strength to open a circular portal that’s at around 50 feet in diameter. The large house sized bomb falls through the portal and detonates about 2 miles in the sky.

I have only one word to describe this: EXXXXPLOOOOOOOOOOSIOOONNN

It looks like a rather beautiful explosion that has about a blast radius of 5000 feet. It creates that mushroom cloud effect and the shockwave from the blast is enough to make everyone fall over. That would have definitely done some major damage to pretty much everyone in the area if it went off on the ground. I wonder if I would have survived it? For once, I’m glad my portals end up sending things to the sky. I see that Ryder is lying facedown on the ground unable to move. I guess that attack really took everything he had. I stumble over to him and declare my victory.

“Ryder, I win, also—let’s NEVER EVER do this again,” I exasperated.

“So, what do you think of my power. I’m pretty strong aren’t, I?” He says while still lying with his face in the dirt.

“I think it’s very impressive, but swear to me that you’ll make your best efforts to not blow up our party.”

“Yeah, I guess I can get carried away at times, but yea I swear.”

“Good, then welcome to the team,” I say as I fall over on my back.

I see Azura and everyone else begin to head over to us now that the threat of imminent doom has gone away.

“Geez, Ryder can you be anymore of an idiot than you already are?” Azura asks she gives Ryder a karate chop to the head.

“Come on, don't be like that, it's been so long since I got to go all out,” he argues.

Azura begins to reach out her hands and a green light starts to come out. I can feel my wounds being healed by the second and it feels awesome.

“Please, tell me I don’t have to fight you too?” I plead.

“Don’t worry, I’m really not the fighter type, I think fighting Ryder is enough for the both of us,” she answers.

Remi comes up to us to announce her future plans.

“Okay guys with all that intros out of the way I think we should all go a quest together. I think it's important to see how our team currently synergizes.”

“You want to go already? Please tell me it won’t be another quest we obviously can’t take on,” I groaned.

“It will be different this time, we have a bunch of talented people and we’ve become stronger too. I’ve been doing quite a bit of training in my free time so I’ll show you my new power,” she brags.

Suddenly I can see the imperial knight Marianne come out of the portal to North Point and she heads over to where me and Ryder are lying.

“You two. . . are in a lot of trouble,” she states with a bit of anger in her eyes.

“Clearly, all of this was his fault,” I say as I point my finger at Ryder.

“Hey! I didn’t cause all of that damage this time” Ryder argues.

“Oh and who was it that created that tornado,” Marianne says as she stares at me.

She proceeded to tell me about all the damage that tornado caused. Apparently it didn’t go away when it left North Point and it kept going until it reached the city. The knights had to call in Vasavir in order to stop it. Luckily, we got off with some minor punishment since most of the damage was done away from the main part of the city. Ryder now has to pay for the property damage he caused to North Point and I have to do community service for a day. I’m still a long way from ridding myself of this menace nickname; if anything, my actions reinforce it. At the end of the day, we all headed back to the castle to eat, but Azura leaves Ryder lying in the dirt for what he did. That’s kind of harsh, but I guess this is their relationship, so I’m sure he’s used to it.

Today has been a rather explosive day if I may say so myself. Ryder and Azura seem like quite the dynamic duo, so it seems like it will be fun to have them along. Well, as long as their efforts are directed towards the enemies, that is. Part of me can’t wait to go on our first quest as a party soon and it’s almost time to pick up my weapons and armor from Vulcan, so I can’t wait for those too. I hope they’re really cool and stylish. I know I shouldn’t be prioritizing looks over safety and effect, but aesthetic matters when people look at you. I don’t know if I’m doing this hero thing correctly, but I’ll get there eventually.