I awoke to the sounds of bells ringing wild, just blind ringing without tact or pause. Annoyed I got up. I get it today is the day the heroes meet. They don’t have to ring the bells as if the demons were arriving. At least nobody will miss it or oversleep.

I prepared myself without haste. Nobody would dare to say that I am late. In other words I don’t have to stress myself or my companions about arriving on time. The most important thing was about arriving in style. We could simply walk through the streets to the noble district and then to the castle, clothed in the clothes we used the last days. That would be lazy and spark another set of gossip about me. It would be better to appear properly dressed in some sort of way. The best way for me is to appear in my mercenary outfit to reinforce, that I am a warrior and not a delicate princess or something.

The best part was that I now didn’t have to hide my ears anymore. Hiding my ears the whole time so I don’t get discovered was straining. I simply don’t like covering my ears, to the point were I put of wearing a helmet till the last moment. It was a reoccurring comment back with the mercenaries in Ferian that I would die because of some attack to my head. Until now I was fast and acrobatic enough to avoid every attack to my head. It escalated to the point that some mercenaries made bets on who would manage to hit my head in sparring. To my surprise Wendel a higher ranked Archer managed to hit my head with a dummy arrow. Lucky basted got a years salary from all the bets he sacked. Haven’t seen him since then. He’s probably chilling somewhere on his spoils.

Thanks to Erin’s help I didn’t have to settle with a simple ponytail instead I it was braided. Erin even managed to braid some golden colored strings into my hair. The gold and the braid made me look more regal and sophisticated. For my clothes I chose my parade armor, contrary to my normal armor it had a higher iron contend. Meaning more plates of iron that protected me. Robbing me of the appearance of a thief and instead letting me look like a light knight focusing on speed and agility. To top my outfit out I put on my parade cloak. A small piece of red clot place on one of my shoulders. Like a knight in all those romantic stories. The cloak had my emblem on it A shield resembling a heart with nine weapons behind it. Similar to the common two crossed swords with a shield behind, just my shield was a heart and there were seven more weapons. Looking in Erin’s conjured makeshift mirror I totally looked like a noble knight.

The only thing left would be my armament. I never leave home without a weapon. Luckily I got the perfect weapon for a noble knight. It was a total lucky encounter, even more so that the previous owner was willing to sell it for an adequate price. I carefully placed the sword on my back, making sure that it wouldn’t interfere with my cloak.

It was not the newest or best kept, but the previous owner did his best. Its a long sword around 1m long with a long hilt meant for two handing. The hilt was long enough that I could two hand it and still had room to spare. The blade of the sword was broad and thick, but well sharpened. The tip of the sword was flat and not pointed like a normal sword. Yes it was an executioners sword. And yes I bought it from an executioner. Nothing better than to break up your appearance of a light noble knight with a big slap of sharpened iron calling itself executioners sword. I simply had to show that I was brutality behind beauty. It was kind of my shield against all those pesky nobles. An executioners tool is a surprisingly good weapon and good charm against nobles. I once turned up on a noble party with the metal blade of a guillotine. It was a funny party. The noble ran like a frightened mouses whenever I tried to approach them. I only was smiling nicely. After that execution weapons were officially declared as tools and thus not allowed to be displayed on noble gatherings. What a shame.

Erin on the other hand didn’t really change her outfit or her hairstyle. The only thing major change she made was exchanging her kimono for another. It was in a darker fuller red than her normal on. The main difference however was the golden embroidery of her emblem on it. Erin’s emblem was a stylized compass showing in four directions. It was designed in the style of an sigil, the magical drawing that determines the effect of a spell. In other words sigil is synonymous to magic circle. Other than that she didn’t change anything about her appearance. Still she somehow managed to look more royal than me. I don’t know how she odes this but she looks absolutely gorgeous.

After a final round through the rooms of our stay to make sure that we absolutely won’t forget any of our spoils we got during our stay, we left our room. On the hallway we had to wait a moment for Charles and Henry to leave their room. They too had cleaned dresses themselves up. Unlike me they had taken of some of their armor and had replaced it with cloth in order to look less like a knight on a battlefield and more like one attending to nobles. Their choice of weapon reflected that a single elegant slender one handed sword. The weapon of choice for a noble knight. Ideal to show of their swordsmanship and if they are in need they always have the second hand free in order to protect their noble. The final piece of their attire was a cloak just like mine. Theirs however was green and the emblem, was a simplified version of mine, most notable by having less weapons behind the heart shield.

“Are you ready? Nothing left in your room?”

I asked to confirm if nothing was left behind, or forgotten. They assured me that they had double checked and taken everything that they had.

With this we walked together down the hallway and stairs into the hall before the counter towards the entrance of the Inn. The owner was currently at the counter cleaning some classes. The moment she noticed our presence she stopped all her work and stared at us with wide eyes. Until no she probably thought we were just some high end commoners, but now in our attire she realized that we were much more. The moment the realization hit her, her face turned pale. She must remember how she treated us the first day, maybe she was even fearing for her live right about now.

We ignored her and headed straight towards the exit. I had to tuck Erin to the side once so that she wouldn’t take the straight path through the tables and chairs towards the exit. Apparently she was still pissed about the whole Ogre and Oni thing. This was slowly reaching the level of a dwarven grudge. I never expected Oni to be this hung up about that. I knew that they didn’t like to mistaken for Ogres and Ogres to didn’t like to be mistaken for Oni, but I didn’t knew that it was that bad. Especially Erin, she wasn’t the kind of person to lash out at somebody or get angry at somebody. I knew that there were some things that made her furious, but I never thought that this was one of the things that triggered her.

We reached the door and left not bothering to interact with the owner. Before Erin left she tuned her head glaring at the owner. Then a sigil lit up between her horns, enveloping them in a faint blue light. Then she turned around and broke through the upper frame of the door with her horns. Not bothering the bow down to leave. And with that we have officially entered dwarven levels of grudges.

“Calmed down? Or will this go on till one of you is six feet under the earth.”

“This ended the moment the moment I went upstairs the first evening. The rest was me just being petty.”

And that concluded Erin’s grudge, she wasn’t a dwarf after all. Obviously since Oni are no dwarves after all.

We walked only for a short while in to the next sideway, to our luck it wasn’t busy. Most would be going towards the noble district hoping to catch the glimpse of one of the heroes and not in one of the big sidestreets. The sideway was ideal small hidden and the walls were easy to climb.

“I planned to go via the roofs towards the noble district. Any objections”

“I haven’t gone by roofs since years count me Inn!”

Henry was more than motivated and neither Erin and Charles had something against it. Judging by how vigorous they climb the wall onto the roof, they to were pretty exited about. Although they hid it with emotionless faces trying to act all grown up. I won’t ever understand why someone tries to act grown up when they are with their best friends. We reached the roof in seconds and started running towards the noble district. Straight path to the glittering and shimmering center with the castle as its pearl. We didn’t even take a detour even if it meant jumping of from one side of the main street to the other side covering roughly 8m in one single jump.

Running around in broad daylight in a shining metal armor in broad daylight made it impossibly to hide ourselves. Not that we intended to. Not many did notice us, mainly because we were gone before they had realized what happened. The closer we got to the noble district the more commoners we saw. They were going to the gates hopping that there a hero would show up.

We had to stop on the edge of the commoners district to the nobles district. There was simply a too wide gap that we could jump to the next roof. Below us on the ground was a great group of commoners happily sheering. I quickly learned why, among the crowd near the gate leading into the noble district was another hero. I didn’t know him. I only know other heroes from stories. He seemed to be approachable and like somebody down to earth, he at least took his time to interact with the commoners.

“Let’s descent.”

Erin stated and so we did. With a mighty jump we leapt into the air only to drop down near the gates far enough from the commoners not to hurt them. We landed with a loud thud and dust swirling up obstructing the commoners view for a moment, before the dust went away to reveal us standing next to the gate. The dust was conjured by Erin by the way.

The crowd erupted. They couldn’t contain themselves. One hero they could admire was now five heroes to be admired. The hero on the other hand had drawn his knifes the moment he noticed us. Although he already had put them away the moment he realized we to were heroes.

He looked like a typical rouge, just his colors didn’t fit. He was way to colorful to be using these closes for infiltration and the like. He wore a tight set of clothes made of a vibrant dark blue cloth and metal pieces embedded in the cloth only in the most needed parts. His weapons of choice were of course two knifes the length of his forearm. He didn’t look like a hero or even a thief he had an average face and middle long dark brown hair. An ideal face to hide in the crowds if need arises.

The crowd was swarming us wanting to see us and hold our hands. They didn’t seem to be intimidated by my choice of weapon or Erin. After a quick glance towards Erin it was clear why, she had hidden her horns with her transparency spell.

After a short time we left the crowd and entered the noble district. Enthusiastic crowds are exhausting. They didn’t even know my name, cant blame them though. I come from the other side of the map. The other reason we left them so quickly is that Erin doesn’t have to exhaust herself to much with keeping up her transparency spell.

We took the next possible side road to leave the view of the crowd so Erin could drop her spell. The hero followed us. He didn’t seem to surprised when Erin ended her spell revealing her Horns.

“Oh you’re an Oni. That's why your hair felt strange.”

“You noticed it by the hair?”

Erin asked the hero.

“Not directly it seemed at bit strange, but I couldn’t say why. But I sensed that there was magic around you. In hindsight its pretty obvious. Now enough of that my name is Leon the Golddigger heroic thief of the Arcan Kingdom.” (Leon)

“Golddigger? How did you end up with such a title?” (Bara)

“I got it from the nobles of Arcan. They spawned a rumor that I had slept around with countless men and women alike to expose their evil deed. I am a hero of the commoners bringing dwon corrupt nobles whenever I can. They tried to drag me down with this rumors. It didn’t work somehow I managed to turn it around. The rumors weren’t wrong though I slept around with men and woman three in fact, we are still together to this very day.” (Leon)

“We are more similar than I thought. I too got my title from the nobility, who tried to belittle me. I still hate it however. My name is Bara an I am called War princess by the nobility. My companions are Erin, Charles and Henry.” (Bara)

We talked a bit more, while we walked onward s to the castle. It wasn’t really deep. We only talked about what we were up to during our stay in Ironwall until now and how the journey was.

After we reached the gate of the castle we were immediately greeted by a high ranking attendant and a group of maids. We didn’t even have to wait or confirm our identity. Then we where led by the attendant through the castle. Each room or hallway was more pompous than the previous one. Golden alloys, whenever there was need for metal, expensive woods, carpets and curtains colored vibrant in the most difficult to acquire colors, diamonds and gems used like they were as abundant as stars in the night skies and the walls filled with paintings and artifacts, one cut only guess their worth. Whenever I see those displays I fell sorry for the poor taxpayers.

We reached a door made out of marble, engraved with gold and ornamented with gems, as if someone tried to recreate the gates of heaven with opulence. The attendant aided by the maids opened the doors slowly revealing the room behind, which was equally pompous like the rest of the castle.

“The heroes Leon the Golddigger of Arcan and Bara the War princess of Ferian have arrived with their companions.”

The attendant announced our arrival before we entered the room nad left the moment we stepped into it closing the doors.