The following day as we'd agreed I met up with Raisa and Ruby for breakfast in town, during which Raisa once again dropped an enormous bag of white gold coins onto the table before us.
"Ok so this is half what I owe you for those potions you'll have to wait a bit for the other half, since we need to sell off some stock before I'll have enough to reimburse you"
"Wha only half…"
Quickly I deposited the bag into my inventory allow the thousands of white golds to join the others already milling around in my inventory.
Our food came and we sat in relative quiet enjoying the food until Raisa broke the verbal stalemate.
"So what are your plans now? Going to keep making potions?"
"Well I would but I'm out of ingredients, so if anything I'll head into the forest again to collect more, and see if I can find better ones to level myself up to producing standard potions rather than minor ones, that and I have a job from the guild to complete in the forest as well"
Flipping her knife around in her hand as if she were a skilled assassin.
"That so, well in that case I'll just have to join you"
"J.. Join me? But why?"
"I need to protect my investment after all, if anything happens to you then I lose my source of those superior potions"
"But if anything happens to you or ruby…"
"Oh don't worry about us from what i know i'm already a higher level than you should be, so we can take care of ourselves and worst case we'd have you and Kurama there to protect us"
"Thought you were the one protecting your investment, not having your investment protect you"
I let loose a verbal jab.
"Hmph! So you going to let us join or not?"
'deet deet'
An alert went off when she said this so I pulled up my menu.
"Fine I agree"
Clicking Yes at the same time as my verbal agreement, in my menu Raisa and Ruby both appeared as party members with Health, Stamina, and Mana bars similar to Kurama's showing up in my menu.
[Hm, I can see more detail than with the heads up display but still not much more than general knowledge, I still can't see her skills but to think she's actually a level 9 I wouldn't have guessed she was around the same level as me considering she's only ever expressed to be a merchant and didn't get involved in any combat on the journey so long as I've been a part of it so far]
Once I'd agreed Raisa quickly finished eating before running off down the street with Ruby in tow, declaring she'd meet us at the western gate in one hour.
~
Kurama and I meanwhile just casually ate our food since we didn't have any shopping or preparing to do.
"Hmm hey Kurama. You fight with your claws and biting right? But do you want a weapon?"
"aroo"
Shaking his head up and down with eyes visibly pleading to be given something.
"I see, well we can't give you anything to big due to your size, but perhaps a dagger or two would work, since you've got higher agility, or else a bow or sling for ranged combat"
Kurama made a couple quick stabbing motions with his paws.
"Hmm I see, well then here"
Pulling the two daggers out from my storage I slid them over to Kurama who grabbed them up and quickly slung the belts over his shoulders in a criss cross allowing the daggers handles to stick out only a little over his shoulders.
"hmm needs a bit of an adjustment"
Pulling out the leather armor I had in my inventory I ripped a couple strips from it, and used them along with my sewing set to modify the belts to be far more fitting and preventing slipping or movement making them into proper gear for the kobold.
As I was working on this I heard another ding ring I my head.
[Well I would assume I just gained the leatherworking profession, but without the leather itself there's not much I can do about it right now]
"Alright that should do how does that feel?"
Kurama moved around in a couple of different directions before drawing both blades quickly.
[Now that's menacing he's more like a Ninja fox now than a Kobold hah]
After having changed into our equipment my own standard leather armor, mantle, and twin swords. Kurama meanwhile wearing some modified light leather armor and the daggers slung across his back.
We made our way to the gate the time for our meet up with Raisa and Ruby was close at hand, so when we got there I flashed my guild card to the guard standing by and informed him that we are most likely not going to be back from our assign quest for a day or two.
"Oh yes the guildmaster did say we was giving a special request to an adventurer with a kobold, that means it must be you then"
"Satou! Sorry to keep you waiting"
"Huh Miss Salide?"
"Oh hey Raisa, you're not really late"
[I mean I know pocket watches aren't a thing here but my heads up display show's she's actually 10 minutes early]
When she finished running over, I noticed she'd completely changed her gear, when traveling she wore what I would describe as comfortable travel clothes, at home and in town she was dressed like a proper young lady though probably not by choice, but now she's dressed up in a white cloth robe, and holding a silver metal staff, does this make her a priest… er rather a priestess, or did she choose the coloring to match with Ruby?
"Um you look like you're ready to go, but are you really sure about this? I mean I do plan to go ingredient hunting but I do have a request from the guild to do as well"
"Yah course I do silly, nothing can stop a powerhouse team like us"
"Um…"
[is it just me or is she acting really weird right now…]
"Miss Salide are you joining this adventurer on his quest?"
"Yup that's right, me and Ruby here are going to be assisting him for today"
"But… wait you also have a kobold Madame? I had heard the rumors but even still it's much too dangerous for you to leave the city"
"Then try and stop me if you want but I'm leaving let's go Satou"
With that she just marched off through the gate ruby tagging along behind, dressed in a white kimono and red ribbons tied to each of her ears dutifully walking hand in paw with her master.
Kurama and I gave chase as the guard continued to shout out after her retreating figure.