Chapter Text
It was a relatively mild spring. For a season usually rife with rain and bursting of life, the weather held surprisingly gentle sunlight and, during the week, only light showers. Kabru wouldn't even be surprised if he saw a rainbow in any of the coming afternoons.
The day grew impossibly old as the sun finally had begun to set.
Each day for two weeks, Kabru had been doing odd jobs, volunteering, and favour-gathering. He worked from sunrise to sunset in order to ensure that his party could afford good enough provisions and better materials for their next dungeon raid. With each passing day, the increasing popularity of dungeon raiding bumped up the price of food and weapons, and Kabru eventually found himself working twice as hard each day.
Finally, though, it was his party's last day of hard labour. With beer mugs clinking, and everyone dressed for an adventure, the tavern boomed and merriment exclaimed all over.
In the table across from Kabru's group, he could notice someone else's party. They were a rather normal-looking buncheon of folks consisting of two tall-man siblings accompanied by another tall-man, an elf, a dwarf, and a halfling, to be precise.
The group, however, in reality, were far from normal. From observation alone, Kabru could tell that they were arguably the strongest adventurers in the tavern. Not only were nearly all of the members well-versed in some form of combat, as shown in their firm builds, but both mages seemed to have graduated from a prestigious magic school, thus having an insane mana reservoir. To add, not a single one of them appeared to be underweight, meaning that they had kept dying in the dungeon to an astounding minimum in their most recent trip. The group was also spending money as if it flowed freely, signifying that they had likely ventured far into the dungeon.
How far into the dungeon they went, however, remained a mystery to Kabru.
Similarly shrouded in mystery was the name of the taller, presumably older of the two siblings.
They were the famed Thordin siblings. Even their name was something befitting of some myth-made king. Thor.. It was the name of someone strong-willed; a warrior; a king and, perhaps even, befitting someone to be worshipped. To add, they even usually gave away a good portion of their own personal funds to those financially struggling in the town, and those former party members who were apparently too injured to continue adventuring (though it genuinely seemed to be nothing a little healing magic couldn't fix).
The entire thing seemed a little fishy to Kabru. Nobody could be that nice, especially not a dungeon adventurer. Dungeon adventurers explored for various reasons; rarely were they ever good reasons. Whether enticed by the idea of riches, of being king to an ancient kingdom, of fame, of glory, most adventurers had some motive larger than life that spelled their ultimate demise in the dungeon. The Thorden Siblings couldn't be any different from that.
But there, one table across from Kabru's own party, sat none other than the formidable party of the Thorden siblings. If anyone in the entire town had a shot of killing the red dragon, it was them.
The halfling was pouring some sort of alcohol into his cup. The black-haired tallman and the elf were busy looking at the younger one of the Thorden Siblings, who was laughing at something her brother had said, face flushed as if it were a habitual reaction to anything and everything. The brother wore a cozy red overshirt overtop a cream turtleneck to keep warm in the mellow spring. He couldn't have been more than three years older than Kabru, himself. Donning a natural-looking, softer smile, the brother spoke to them about something that Kabru couldn't catch between the laughing, the yelling, and excitement of the tavern.
In the midst of his people-watching, Rin tapped Kabru on the arm. She furrowed her eyebrows and gave him a pointed look, as if to ask what's wrong? in her own roundabout Rin way.
Seamlessly, he shifted his face and relaxed his expression, unclenching his fists that he never realized were clenched, and loosened his shoulders that he didn't notice were tense.
He gave her one of his natural-looking smiles. As always, she wasn't impressed.
“I'm okay, Rin.”