After being bamboozled into accepting a guide, we continued our walk to town and made it right before sunset. After we left the forest we found the main road to the town and followed it which made our trip much faster without all the pushes blocking our way. Alongside the road were a lot of farming fields and farmhouses. My new guide was kind enough to tell me that most of the town population were farmers and that not many people were willing to live the hard life of an adventurer. But because of how common monster attacks are, adventurers are also a necessity. It was a rather an interesting dynamic you could only see in a fantasy world.

The town had thick walls that were at least 10 meters high. There were also archer towers build layered around the wall. It appeared that there was only a single gate to the town and a small barrack was built in front of the gate.

Luckily we have made it to the gate before they closed and did not have to spend the night outside. There was a guard wearing a single iron breastplate standing in front of the gate. The guard stepped out of his position and started approaching us. He seemed to have wanted to ask us questions but stopped after noticing Maya.

“ Aren't you the Abomination? Did you go out with Rick’s party two days ago? Where is he and the rest of his party,” the guard asked with a cold look in eyes as he looked at Maya. 

“There was a bit of a complication while they were on their quest,” I replied in Maya’s place, “their party was attacked by a monster.”

The guard finally turned his gaze away from Maya and back to me, “and who the heck are you?”

“I am a traveler who was passing by when her party was attacked.”

“And let me guess everyone else except her died,” the man let out a sigh before continuing, “poor Rick, I told him that taking the Abomination for a quest was a bad idea. Look at him now.”

This guy was seriously getting on my nerves. If I did not need to enter the town right now, I would have already bashed his head on the city gates.

“Hey Richard, what is taking you so long?” another guard walked out of the barracks next to the gate and started approaching us.

“The Abomination got her party killed, again. She just came back with a traveler.”

That other guy started laughing all of sudden, “That damn Rick. I told him that fucking the bitch was not worth risking his life for.”

I could feel the veins in my head almost popping out of anger. I clenched my fist trying my best not to kill these two bastards on the spot.

“Can you two shut up?” I asked with a forced smile, “A whole party was almost wiped out by a single monster and you laugh at it.”

“Kid, adventurers dying is nothing new. Besides who asked those dumb asses to take her with them. Those idiots wanted to fuck the bitch they risked their lives for it, serves them right.”

“That is enough of that. We need to report this back to the guild, in case more of those monsters decide to attack the town.”

“Don’t get cocky with me kid, I know how to do my job. You can go in,” the guard spoke stepping aside to let us pass, “but I advise you to stay as far as possible from her. Stick too close and you wouldn't even know how you died.”

I grabbed Maya’s hand and started taking long strides towards the gate, trying my best not to focus on the laughter that came from behind me. I did not stop walking until we had crossed the gate and could no longer hear the guards.

“Using this as an opportunity to hold my hands, smart,” Maya started speaking with a smile as if nothing happened, “I’ll have you know that you are the first man to hold my hand in public, how does it feel to have such an honor?”

There was a moment of silence, the sound of a mother telling her child to come inside could be heard in the distance. 

“Is this how they always treat you? Blaming everything on you?”

The smile disappeared from Maya’s face and her face became solemn.

“...Today was far better than the norm.”

“I see.”

“Hey! Felix?” You are starting to hurt my hand. Hey!” Maya screamed taking her hands out of mine. Her screams woke me up and I had forgotten I was holding her hand and accidentally hurt her.

“I am sorry. I zoned out for a bit,” I apologized with a  pained smile.

“What good is your sorry. My poor hand,” Maya spoke waving her hand around, “I have you know that this is no way to treat a lady. I let you hold my hand and you almost broke it.”

“I am so sorry, my lady. I was a fool for treating you precious hand like that. If you are ever so kind as to give another opportunity, I will make sure to treat like a jewel.”

“Hmff. Do you think you only using pretty words will get you on this young ladies good side? Keep dreaming but this lady is not unreasonable, as long as you work you will get the opportunity to hold this young ladies hand once again.”

“Thank you, my lady,” I said tipping an imaginary fedora, “I will make sure to live up to your expectations,”

Maya started laughing at our skit and soon I joined in as well.

“Ah, I think you are starting to grow on me. Let us get going, I am going to show you around the town. I don’t want you refusing to pay me for being a bad guide at the end of the week,” Maya spoke after she stopped laughing. She turned around and started walking towards the center of the town.

I followed after Maya feeling more hopeless than angry about the encounter with the guards. A sense of defeat enveloped my heart. I felt so weak, not able to even help a single girl deal with her problems. I know there was nothing I could have done about, fighting those guards would not have improved Maya’s situation. But knowing this does not mean I have to accept my own powerlessness. 

I thought after coming to this new world, I would free of that soul-crushing feeling of being unable to change my own circumstances. Back on earth, I felt like I was in a cage, that there were only so many directions my future can take. The system and expectations of others were like the robotic hands of the machine pushing me to where I need to go without ever bothering to ask what I wanted. Which was why I quit university and pursued my own interest, I wanted to escape it all.

I even came to a whole new world for the sole purpose of being me and not having to lower my voice at the presence of others. But even now, I have to control myself least I make things worse for Maya. Damn it, this world has actual gods and I can’t help a single girl.

I let out a sigh and started looking around the town. The town was very quiet during the night time and there were only a few people on the streets. The streets were quite spacious even though they were not fully tiled. The house on the street sides were mostly wooden houses that were either one or two stories high. Everything was lit by street lamps placed at the two sides of the road.

“Where are we going?” I asked Maya picking up my pace to catch up to her.

“To the adventurers guild,” she answered slowing down, “I need to turn in the quest and report to the guild.”

“Can’t we do that tomorrow? What we really need is a bath and a warm bed to sleep on,” I told her, looking at my dust-filled cloth. After a whole day of walking under the sun, I was not smelling so good either.

“I agree, but all of those activities require money and we are currently broke. We need to go to the guild and turn in this quest so we can earn money.”

“But didn’t you fail the quest, you never did figure out what is causing the large increase in monster activities.”

“That is true, but those are not the only type of quest available at the guild, there are also monster hunter quests. We should be compensated for killing that monster yesterday.”

“If you are not getting paid for it why do you need to turn it in the old quest?”

“Guild policy. I have to report back so that other adventurers who take the quest after me don’t suffer the same fate. We need to hurry up, I can’t go another night smelling like this.”

We went through different streets until we arrived at a large building at the end of an intersection. The building was four stories high dwarfing all the nearby buildings. It had stained-glass windows and a large oak door. Above the door was a weather-bitten sign with the images of a sword and a staff overlapping in the form of an ‘x’.

The inside of the guild felt more like a tavern than an office building. There were drinking tables placed all over the first floor with adventurers eating, drinking and laughing out loud. The building was designed to have a hollow-ceiling that allowed you to see the floors above. I could see more adventures on the upper flowers as well. The actual guild facilities were towards the back of the hall, where guild attendees stood behind a counter, though a few of them could be seen drinking with adventurers.

“Is the adventurers guild also a bar?” I asked Maya.

“And a restaurant. This actually their main way of making money. They only act as intermediaries between quest givers and adventures and only gain charge a fee for posting a quest. The bar and restaurant is their true source of income. With adventures coming to here to rewind after a long quest they make quite the profit.”

Man, the guild was quite smart, turning a normal tavern into the center of the town.

We walked towards one of the counters at the end of the hall and queued up. I did my best to ignore the curious gazes that were on us. I expected this to happen as new faces must be rare here. I also had a suspicion that most of the gazes were not for me but the beautiful red-eyed girl next to me. I just hope none of them come over to cause trouble for us, but with the way these situations go, I highly doubt things will be so easy.

The queue finally cleared up and it was finally our turn.

“Welcome to Adventurers Guild,” a pretty counter staff greeted us with a smile. She had wavy brown hair and large breasts that gave her a mature look.

“Yes, we wanted to turn in a quest and register a new adventure,” Maya answered.

“Okay, and what quest would that be.”

“It is the quest to investigating the increase in monster activity. However, we failed the quest due to a party being attacked by a strange monster. We are able to slay the monster thanks to this traveler’s help but my party members died.”

The whole tavern grew quiet after that. The counter girl’s look grew weird as she started at Maya, or to be more precise at her eyes.

“Anyway the monster is dead and we want you to give us the reward for killing it,” I told the counter girl wanting to hurry this up. I really don’t want to deal with another red-eye incident.

“Ah, right,” the girl woke up from her daze, “I need a proof of the subjugation and about your dead party members do you have their badges.”

“Yes, give me a second,” Maya spoke as I went through her bags to take out three small bronze plates the size of a credit card and a palm-sized purple rock.

The bronze plates I recognized, but it was my first time seeing the purple rock.

“Wow, that must be at least a rank 3 monster, how did you guys kill it?” the girl asked curiously.

“With great effort and luck. Can you please hurry up with this?” I asked impatiently. What kind of question is that? I almost died killing that stupid thing that's how I killed it.

“Calm down man, I am just curious. Okay, that is nothing for failing to complete the quest, 50 silver for killing a rank 3 monster. Do you want to sell us the magic crystal as well?”

“No.”

“Okay, then 50 silver it is. Can you hand me the crystal so that I can imprint it?”

Maya handed the crystal to the girl. The girl removed a stamp from under the counter and stamped it on to the crystal. A blue adventurers guild mark, a sword laid over a staff, appeared for second before disappearing.

Maya took the crystal back from the girl with the money and placed everything back into her bag.

“Now for the registration,” the girl said taking out a sheet of paper and a quill, “all you need to do is put your information in and pay the registration fee of 10 silver.”

“What if I can not write?” I asked fearing that my passive skill will not able to translate what I write as well. I could not risk testing out the limits of translation skill right now.

“That is fine as well, we can put in the information for you. Just answer my questions,” the girl replied, “Name?”

“Felix Casimir”

“Age?”

…

After I told her all my basic information the girl asked me to drip a drop of my blood onto the sheet. I borrowed a dagger from Maya and did as I was told. The sheet absorbed my blood and transformed into a bronzed plate like the one Maya gave to the girl before. I picked up the plate and looked at the black writing on it.

Name: Felix Casimir Race: Human Age: 23 Level: 1 Class: Mage Subclass: Summoner	Mana: B (87) Sanity: C (54) Stamina: E (14) Agility: F (5)

It seems like the adventures card functioned like my status window albeit it shows less information. The way that scroll turned into bronze was really awesome. I wonder if I can one day transmute metal like that. I will spam create gold and ruin this world's economy then force them to switch to a metal only I can make.

We paid up the fee and left the guild before any crazy shirtless drunk adventurer attacked us. The first thing we did was to go to the public bathhouse to take a shower. Unfortunately, there was no mixed path so I could not admire Maya’s body. I was kinda hoping that with all the Outerdwellers that come to this world one of them would have been smart enough to force all baths to be mixed. I guess that is another thing I have to fix in the future.

After the bath, we went to a nearby a to rent out a room. Thankfully, we were not refused a room because of Maya’s eyes this time. It appears that the god of the economy out classes whatever god they believe put a curse on Maya. What did bug me was the fact that Maya wanted to share a room with me?

“Are you sure about this Maya?” I asked Maya while moving my hand to check on her temperature, “Are you sure you did not fall down and hit something while you were in the path?”

“I am fine, I am a healer why would I be hurt,” Maya pushed my hand off her head, “besides you had many opportunities while were alone and you did not squeak while I slept. What can you do now we are in town?”

I feel like am being underestimated.

“I only did nothing because I did not have your consent before,” I told her.

“Calm down,” Maya spoke a little terrified, “I just want to tell you something. Besides we will be sleeping in different beds.”

“I am sorry to miss. There are no more double bedded rooms available,” the innkeeper said giving me a wink while Maya was not looking. I never thought that pious followers of the god of the economy were so kind.

I grabbed the keys from the innkeeper before Maya could say anything and went upstairs to the rooms.

“Damn it, Felix nothing is going to happen. Okay!” Maya screamed behind me as she followed me to the stairs.

“Then there is nothing for you to worry about. And stop screaming other guests are trying to sleep,” Maya became quiet after I said that.

“Just open the damn door, I can’t be bothered with you anymore,” Maya spoke with a dejected look.

I opened the door to our room and inside the room. There was only one bed in the room with one closet and a night desk. I casually went towards one side of the massive bed and started taking my clothes off.

 “Wh...What are you doing?” Maya asked with a look of genuine horror.

“I literally fought a monster in these. Why would I wear them to sleep?” I asked silencing Maya.

“Well, you don’t have to take it off right in front of me.”

“We only have one room, should I change clothes in the corridor? Besides, you are the one looking at me as I change, why are you angry with me? Just close your eyes.”

“Believe me, Felix, I am going to make you pay for this,” Maya spoke turning away from me and closing the door.

“What, are you going to change in front of me as well?” I asked getting into my underwear and going under the blanket, “cause that would really scare me off.”

“Just shut the fuck up and go to sleep,” Maya spoke as she went towards the crystal lights and turned them off. I really need to study how those magic tools work someday.

Soon the sound of Maya changing her clothes could be heard through the darkroom. Such a hypocrite, doing the same thing you were condemning me for a few minutes ago.

“I am not going to bring up the fact that your doing the same thing you told me to do, but you can’t be so shameless to not allow me see. You clearly saw me.”

“Just shut up.”

After a couple of seconds, the sound of rustling clothes finally stopped and Maya finally got into the bed.

“You know, you turned off the light right now, but how are you going to put on your clothes in the morning?” I asked Maya.

The room grew quiet after that.

“I wanted to talk to you about the magic crystal,” Maya abruptly changed the subject. I already allowed you to do that back at the city gate, I am not going to allow it one more time.

“Changing the subject are we?”

“I took out the crystal from the monster's body after I healed and gave you the potion,” Maya persisted, “I didn’t trust you back then I wanted to take something out of the situation. So that even if you did something to me, it was not a complete loss.”

“Don’t worry, I understand. You have been through a lot. Besides this means you trust me now, right?” I asked.

“Strangely enough I do. I knew you for only two days and yet it felt like a long time.”

“That is not strange at all. Besides if you ever want we can always advance our relationship.”

“And there goes my respect for you. Trying anything funny and I will cast a sleeping spell on you again.”

“Again?”

“I cast a sleeping spell upon you the first night we met?”

I felt a headache coming.

“Wasn’t I supposed to keep guard that night? I woke up in the middle of the night expecting our camp to be surrounded by hungry wolves. You risked us getting eaten by monsters just because you did not trust me after I just saved your life. Do you know how stupid that was?”

“Hey, I was tired and scared, I was not in the best state of mind? Besides, I kept guard in your place and everything worked out at the end.”

“Maya?”

“Yes?”

“ I just lost all interest in you, my affection par for you just hit rock bottom. I am not even going to bother attacking you tonight.”

“Hey, What do you mean by that? Stop pretending to be asleep, we were talking a second ago. Felix?”