Kirisho smiled softly and held her snow-white hand forward toward Eisen's to greet him back. "Nice to meet you too, Eisen. I'm Kirisho. It's a pleasure. It seems that you have passed the last test. Congratulations on becoming a Champion, then."
She giggled lightly and held her hand in front of her mouth while closing her eyes, making Eisen smile in response. "Thank you. This is really unexpected, though. I figured that this wasn't regular mist, but I never expected it to be a person…"
Eisen's words made Kirisho slightly jump in surprise before tilting her head to the side. "Erm… Person? You think of me as a person?" She asked in confusion, and Eisen nodded with a frown.
"Of course, aren't you? I mean, I don't really care whether or not you're a Monster, Elf, Human, Fairy, or literally anything else. You seem nice enough, and Ailren trusts you enough to let you guard the entrance to this place. So yeah, I think of you as a person." The old man explained, leaving Kirisho's white cheeks to slowly turn a very soft, light pink.
"I see… Thank you, Eisen. Would it be alright if I asked you something?" She smiled, and Eisen nodded.
"Sure, I don't mind. What do you want to know?" He said, and Kirisho nodded slowly.
"Who… is Hanako?"
Eisen opened his eyes wide. He wasn't embarrassed about anything that he did during or immediately following the test, but he completely forgot that he, well, was supposed to have forgotten. But now, he can't just pretend as if him saying Hanako's name never happened. So, he decided to take the truth, and mix it in with the story that Ari prepared for the originals.
"Ah, well… Somehow, I remembered a certain person during the test while seeing you and h earing what the voices told me. Hanako… she was my wife. But she passed away a long time ago. I guess I just kind of got emotional because of that." Eisen explained and Kirisho began to show a sad face.
"So it was something like that? I see… I'm sorry that I reminded you of her, Eisen… But… I have to go now… I'm feeling quite tired…" Kirisho said while struggling to keep her eyes open, her figure slowly losing shape.
"Then sleep well, Kirisho. Let's talk again sometime." Eisen smiled, and Kirisho nodded lightly, before she slowly turned completely back into mist, filling out the whole room once more.
Eisen turned around and looked at Ailren, who was watching with a curious look. "This was quite interesting. She usually doesn't talk all that much. And I can say for sure I have never seen her blush before." The Dragon chuckled lowly.
With a frown, Eisen simply ignored him and began to ask what was worrying him. "Is this simply her life? She is asleep for hours, days, or even months, and when she can wake up, she can only do so for half an hour?"
Ailren sighed and looked at Eisen with a sad face. "Yes, but it hasn't always been like this. You see, Kirisho is a Mist Spirit. She lived a short but happy life, and for certain reasons I am not in liberty to tell you about, in death she wasn't allowed to move on to the afterlife. She was trapped in this world through a wicked creatures' curse, and was as such bound to an amulet in a dormant state. That amulet was one that I coincidentally found during one of my travels, and through my Truth Seeing Eyes, I was able to discern that there was a soul trapped inside and freed her. For a while, she was basically like a regular person, sleeping at night and wide awake at day, but then something happened a few years ago. A group of adventurers made their way to this mountain and through to my treasury while I was out, and Kirisho was all alone to take care of this cave. The adventurers found her and immediately tried to kill her, thinking she was some kind of simple monster in the form of a woman. Soon enough, they figured out that the amulet was the source of her being and were able to shatter it into pieces. An important part of the gem embedded inside of it stayed intact, allowing Kirisho to continue living, although in the state you see now. Sadly, the adventurers took the rest of the gem and amulet with them."
Eisen turned away from Airlen so that he couldn't see his face at this moment. Instead, he looked into the mist-filled room. "That's a horrible thing… Ailren, is there any way I can help?"
"Hmm, do you mean it?" Ailren asked with a surprised frown, and Eisen nodded. "Yes, I just want to help. Something like this isn't nice to look at… Kirisho is here, but she isn't at the same time. Every once in a while she is capable of talking to others. That's no way to live, is it?"
"I'm glad that you want to help, Eisen. Then yes, there is a way you can help me. During Kirisho's fight with the adventurers, one of them lost their Identification Tag. I have it in the treasury. You might be able to find out who and where this group is."
[New Quest - Stolen Shards]
[Description] A group of adventurers destroyed the amulet in which the Mist Spirit Kirisho was sealed, taking the majority of the shards with them. This left Kirisho in a state that only barely allows her to consciously exist. You want to help, and thus the Ancient Gold Dragon Aylrentyrth asked you to find the adventurers, and as such hopefully the shards of the amulet, with the help of one of the adventurers' identification tag. Find the stolen shards and combine them together again.
[Reward] Kirisho will be able to live a normal life again
[Failure] Kirisho will continue living the life she currently has
"That sounds like a good place to start, yeah. Thanks, Ailren." Eisen said before reading through the quest notification and then waving it away, and then followed the dragon back to the treasury, where he quickly gave him the small iron plate in the shape of a dogtag. It had a small engraving which he couldn't recognize, as it was neither a language that he knew nor a symbol that he's seen before.
Ailren looked at Eisen and smiled. "I hope you can find them. Now, the tests are over. Do you want to get back to Melroe? I'm sure your friends are waiting eagerly for your return. I can fly you back there again if you want." He suggested, but Eisen shook his head.
"Thanks, but I'll probably just walk. I want to give Aulu some proper experience to handle different terrains, so a descent from here would be just perfect. I'll come visit sometime again, though. And thank you for the chance to be a champion, Ailren."
"Of course. I am glad that things went like they went."
And like that, Eisen grabbed his things out of the workshop and made his way down the mountain again, with Caria on his shoulder and Aulu following behind him.
---
"Alright Caria, I'm holding it tightly and it can't escape, so go ahead and kick it, alright? As hard as you can!" Eisen said while holding a Rank 1 Stone Mole so that it couldn't move. During the descent, whenever they came across a monster that was weak enough for him to easily beat without much trouble, he would try and let Caria attack them as much as she could so that she would get a portion of the experience to rank her up. Right now, she still couldn't really do much at all, so he wanted to get her to rank up so that she would unlock the INT and WIS stats, and with that, mana.
Like that, she could learn a number of different skills that she wouldn't be able to otherwise. Since Eisen wanted to raise her toward being someone to rely on for different herbs and plants to use for alchemical concoctions, possibly even to have her run a small farming plot once Eisen found a nice spot to build a house.
The tiny myconid nodded her head and ran up to the stone mole to kick it as strongly as it could. Of course, that still wasn't very strong, but it was enough for the system to recognize her as one of the attackers before Eisen finished the mole off.
As Caria couldn't do a lot of damage, she also didn't get a lot of experience, but at the very least it was enough to have her rank up before they reached Melroe again. To be fair, Eisen went out of his way to look for monsters when he saw that Caria was getting closer to ranking up.
When she did, Caria turned into Myconid Child, doubling her size. On top of that, she even finally gained two arms! They were just small stubs, but it was better than no arms at all, right?
Seeing her new tranformation, Caria looked up at Eisen with her dot-like eyes happily and jumped at him, for once giving him a real hug.
"It's fine, Caria, I'm happy about it too, trust me. Now, how about we get back to the Inn and see if we can practice some mana manipulation later, alright? If I can do it, then I bet you can as well!" Eisen laughed out loud and waved at Aulu to make her follow him as they came closer and closer to Melroe while sitting Caria down on his shoulder.
It was somewhere around early evening, and the last of the laborers that were working outside of town were now returning as well.
Eisen walked through the crowds of people that wanted to meet up in order to go drinking after a long day at work, and made his way toward the Inn. It took a while longer than it usually would, since Aulu didn't know how to walk through crowds like this yet and simply walked straight ahead so that she simply pushed everyone aside if Eisen didn't specifically told her where to go.
Even so, after a while they made it to the Inn safely. Eisen walked through the front door and then stepped up in front of the front desk to talk to the Innkeeper.
"Oh, old man! Haven't seen ya in a few days! Where've ya been?" The Dwarf asked in a loud voice once he set eyes on Eisen, causing the old man to chuckle lowly.
"Yeah, I was doing something a little out of town. Say, are Bree and the beasts we came with last time here?" Eisen asked.
"They're in their room. Ah, that Monkey kid woke up as well yesterday, so he should be in there too." The Innkeeper explained, and Eisen thanked him before making his way to the large room on the bottom floor where him and Bree brought Jyuuk and his beasts a few days prior.
He knocked on the door and heard someone rush to the door that slowly opened up a few seconds later. "Yees~?" Bree asked with an already bright smile that only grew brighter when she saw that it was Eisen at the door. "Ah! You're back! How was it?!" She asked excitedly and pulled Eisen inside of the room to talk to him.
Inside was the other person that the Innkeeper mentioned to be awake, Jyuuk. He was currently seated on one of the beds, feeding his beasts. When he saw Eisen, he immediately stood up and walked up to him. "Eisen! Bree told me you were on top of some mountain! Come on, tell us how it went! And… what are those two?" Jyuuk asked slightly confused, and even Bree looked curiously at Aulu.
"Ah, let me explain. First off, this is my cute little girl Caria! She's a Myconid! She actually hatched out of the egg that you gave me." Eisen explained.
"So that was a Myconid egg? Interesting!" The Monkey Beastperson exclaimed and leaned in closer, which made Caria try and hide behind Eisen's head somehow. Bree tilted her head, though, and asked, "But she seems a little bit bigger than before, right?"
"Yeah! She ranked up not too long ago. On my way down the mountain, I killed a few beasts and had her attack them as well so that she would get some experience to rank up. She grew in size and got arms, but other than that, she's the same as before." Eisen explained and held Caria forward on both of his hands to basically show her off. Both Jyuuk and Bree looked at her a few seconds, until their gaze inevitably moved over to Aulu.
Eisen then told them about the tests that he got from Ailren, and how he created Aulu as an automaton in order to use all of his most important skills. He then showed them the effect of his new skill as well so that they knew what it looked like.
After he finished his story, Jyuuk leaned back against the wall. "Oh? Maybe I should go see that Dragon as well…"
But Eisen shook his head to advice against it. "I wouldn't, if I were you. First, I don't even know if you can simply go to a dragon and ask him to test you. If one of them thinks you're worthy, then they will approach you themselves. Also, I'm not too sure how well the Truth Seeing Eye would fit to you. Sure, you could probably use it to identify different monsters and plants, right? But maybe another dragon would find interest in you that can give you a gift that fits much better to you. For me, it's perfect. It let's me easily identify different properties of tools, weapons and materials. I can tell most of it myself, but I can't really do so with magical materials. Maybe I'll be able to see the flow of magic at some point or something, and considering my two magic related crafting skills, that would be perfect. Well, it's your choice, but I would wait for a dragon to ask you to take the tests. I'm sure it will happen, don't worry."
Eisen explained to Jyuuk, and he ended up sighing loudly. "Yes, that makes sense. So, Eisen, what do you want to do next?" The Beastperson asked, and Eisen chose to tell them his plans.