As Jonah and Kayla finally reached the main path, Kayla immediately broke down and her legs gave out as the adrenaline burned out. Orcette moved to comfort her, looking at the laceration to her shoulder and pulling out the potion and splashing a bit onto the blood wound and surrounding scrapes.
"How's Jonah?" Orcette asked while examining Kayla for any other wounds.
"Muddy, a bit singed, why are you worried after the lashing he took from the plants. I was only worried about what could have happened if he decided to smite an area of a dungeon."
"Smite?"
"Yeah, you know, big beam of holy fury that turns everything to dust. The Guild-Master and I read all the stuff we had on Angels, course, we don't know what Jonah can do but better safe than sorry."
Orcette nodded then slapped Kayla on the freshly healed shoulder to give her the all clear, then grabbed her shoulders firmly. "Do you have any idea how worried we were?"
"No, but I know it was a lot..." She looked back at Jonah. "...I'm sorry, really. I heard you talking about me and got scared."
"Scared? We were praising you girl! You ran off because you were scared you impressed us!? If you were my girl, you'd be heading home and stuck doing chores til you learned some damn discipline. If Jonah weren't an Angel he'd be dead."
"Luckily you're not his girl. So, tell us what you mean." Her tone was firm as she spoke to Kayla, but her eyes moved to Lucas.
"I was scared you'd leave me. When my mum and dad saw me hunting with the tribe they said no one would ever want a girl who hunts with a knife on a string. Then I heard you guys saying it was all killing and I thought you were getting ready to leave." Kayla sobbed.
"So you ran off before we could leave you? That sounds silly, Kayla. It isn't what we meant either, but that can wait til we get home. Now..." Orcette looked over at the mud they saw her cake onto his wings. "...Why did you cover him in mud?"
"He smelled like that plant he warned you about before, I thought he might have gotten covered in it somehow and that the mud would cover the scent." Lucas' hand fell on her head and proceeded to give her something between a head pat and a noogie.
"Very clever thinking for a stupid little girl, good work. We're more than half-way, so it makes no sense turning around, but if you run off like that again I'm tying you up and dragging you. I would rather do something evil than let you get yourself killed."
"I really am sorry Lucas."
"Kid, I know, the problem is that sorrys don't bring adventurers back from the dead. In this business, don't be sorry, be better than you were yesterday. Proving you are is the only way to make things right."
"That means he's gonna be mad the rest of the day, but if you are good between now and tomorrow he'll forgive you." Orcette translated as though he were speaking a different language.
Jonah started pulling himself to his feet, then decided it was best to set an example and apologised to the others for underestimating the situation with the disorienting effect of the forest.
"...I shouldn't have been so overconfident, I didn't fully understand the situation."
"Yeah, I'm sorry too, I put too much faith in your race. I doubt anything but one of the snakes could have done any damage, but the spiders could have suffocated you as well, I was just as reckless." Lucas scratched his head as he apologised, then he stepped aside to make way for Jonah.
"Kayla, next time you're scared, run to us and not away from us, okay?"
"I will, I promise. I'm sorry I didn't get to you sooner, I had to fight a snake first..." The sudden revelation made them all drop their jaws and Lucas held out his hand for her ID as she told the story.
[Name] Kayla Simmons
[Race] Human
[Class] Rogue/Scout
[Level] 3
[STR] 15
[DEX] 100
[CON] 20
[INT] 68
[HP] 20
[MP] 40
"Well, Little Twinkle..." Lucas started as he looked up from the ID. "...Don't know how you did it, but you must have been quick on your feet and used your head. Looks like that cut to your arm and fighting through it bumped your constitution. You must have also put a lot of effort into using your magic somehow."
"Why do you keep calling me "Little Twinkle"? My name is Kayla."
Lucas laughed, his delight in her achievement bringing his cold treatment to a quick end. "It's guild talk, for a rookie with a bright future. It means the same, but stops little adventurers getting big-headed."
The fact that Kayla didn't like it being the point went over her head and made the others chuckle, especially when Lucas made a gesture that simply said "point proven" before he looked back at her ID and read out the description of her latest beastly ability.
[Serpent Strike] Weapon skill that makes the user's thrown weapons hit twice on a clean hit. Costs 20 MP whether the attack is successful or not.
"...That Little Twinkle, is just another reason to keep calling you it, just don't think about using it unless you're sure it's gonna hit. Anyway, let's keep moving, it has been a while."
Lucas didn't wait for them to agree, but kept pushing forward as the others fell in line and gathered their wits again.
As they marched through, Orcette kept close to Kayla and while Lucas led, Jonah was following close behind. The formation was a strong hint that she wasn't as out of trouble as she had thought for a second, even if she made for the opening, Jonah would simply block her path with a wing.
"I'm not going to run off again..." She muttered, her tone still thick with guilt.
"Kayla, no offence, but you said that at the beginning. Trust isn't so easily repaired, even if people talk to you calmly, it doesn't mean you've repaired what you've broken." Orcette explained, patting her on the back to comfort her, but making sure she didn't mistake the gravity.
Kayla nodded and accepted the lesson gracefully, then Lucas sighed and told them to spread out, pointing out that her throwing knife would be useless if she didn't have room to swing it...
As they continued through the dungeon, the balance of creatures completely flipped and the carnivorous plants that Jonah had fought, as well as the snakes, became more common than the other types and less dangerous creatures.
To lucas, it was basically a milestone that he could use to tell how much further they had left to go.
"About a Kilometre and we'll be at the end, get ready though, we'll find a massive two-head snake there that is far from friendly. Jonah, when we get there, focus on defence, your wings and durability skew the results for these two."
"Results?" Orcette echoed the word with annoyance, anything test related just reminded her of the hospital and bugged her.
"Did I not say? This is your grading assessment for the guild, it goes in that black square on your ID card. Usually, people just start at black and work their way up, first colours then letters then crests. Since you made it here from your home countries, treating you the same way was deemed insulting."
"So you're testing us for a bump start?"
"Exactly! Glad you got it, I intended to just suggest you start at black because of the memory loss, but honestly after this it would be a waste."
Jonah looked at Kayla and tapped her with the tip of a wing. "Choose. Punishment and over, or lecture and a moody atmosphere?"
"Punishment and over please. I already know where I messed up and I really won't do it again."
"Lucas, Kayla starts at black and I want her banned from solo-questing until Orcette or I say otherwise. Now can you explain the rank order and structure a bit more please?"
Lucas looked back and smiled, then gave a nod and went into a droning explanation that made his boredom in doing so apparent.
The colours were considered rookie-ranks and could only do basic quests and had limited dungeon access, which they were able to bypass on this occasion because they had Lucas with them. They ordered black, blue, purple, red, orange, yellow and white; which most people reached in two months.
They could only enter dungeons in groups of six or three with a letter rank C or above present, though Lucas was quick to clarify that he was a crested member and not barely enough as though it wasn't obvious.
"What about the Lettered ranks?" Orcette pushed, eager and excited to learn more.
"Guys, I thought Kayla was the one being punished, can't you ask Lottie about this stuff?"
Jonah and Orcette laughed at how much he seemed to hate doing anything that was even vaguely mundane, but they could also understand it. To Orcette, she saw it as a hospital chief taking a blood sample and to Jonah, it was like the CEO inducting the newbies.
After that though, Lucas didn't have the chance for idle chat, it may have been nothing to him but distracting the others would have been lethal.
Snakes, plants and larger versions of the spiders seemed to be engaged in all-out war, easily the most visceral display of survival of the fittest they had ever seen. The sudden difference in difficulty was staggering, the endless slogging through blood and beast was both physically and mentally exhausting.
The only reason they were able to keep pushing smoothly, was because they were levelling up and getting refreshed as they went.
They quickly fell into a strange and chaotic style, one that shouldn't have worked in the slightest, but was getting them through it so quickly Lucas began looking at his own experience like a joke.
Kayla focused on knife-sniping spiders, Jonah decapitated serpents with his wing and Orcette withered any plants that got close. For the most part, Lucas was pretty inactive, only attacking reactively and to do last minute saves when something surprised Orcette or Jonah.
"I honestly don't know how this is working so well with you all jumping around all over the place, but keep it up. When we reach the other side of the war we'll take a break, then go for Sir Slither."
"I'm sorry, "Sir Slither"? Is that its actual name?" Orcette froze in horror at the thought of being trapped in a game by people who would name a dungeon boss like that, which made Lucas need to zap several creatures and tell her to stay focused.
Aside from that one little slip-up, which Lucas accepted responsibility for, they reached the spot he mentioned in no time at all...