The midday sun was scorching and bright, warming people's bodies in this bleak, windy early winter season. Barrett pushed open the pine wooden door of the Adventurer's Guild and stepped onto the street. He had just gone to the Adventurer's Guild to register the adventure team "the Last Defender of the Way" in the roster, and casually browsed the task board for any interesting quests.
Barrett strolled leisurely along the street, not worried about getting lost. As a seasoned wandering adventurer, he had visited the capital of Re-Estize multiple times five years ago.
The kingdom's treasury clearly lacked extra funds for renovating buildings, so most roads remained unchanged, even more rundown than before, while only the mansions of the nobles stayed grand and luxurious, still undergoing constant expansions.
Barrett casually ducked into a small tavern by the roadside. The tavern's furnishings were simple, with few customers. He pulled out a chair and sat down, shouting to a middle-aged woman behind the counter, wrapped in a light purple headscarf. "Give me a mug of malt beer."
Before long, a large oak mug thudded onto the table, spilling a few drops of the deep red liquid inside. Barrett was somewhat surprised, because this wasn't the malt beer he'd ordered, but pricey red wine. And the hand gripping the mug's handle was sturdy and powerful, with messy black body hair covering the arm.
Barrett looked up and locked eyes with a half-bald burly man. The man wore a silk thin cotton jacket, his beer belly slightly straining the buttons. He pulled out the chair across from Barrett's table, plopped down into it, still holding another cup of red wine, clearly intending to drink with him.
This guy looks a bit familiar... Barrett pondered. In a flash, he recalled the burly man's name, then shoved back his chair, stood up, and prepared to leave.
"Hey! Barrett, old buddy, why are you taking off the moment we meet?" The burly man called out Barrett's name and stood up to grab his arm. Barrett smiled helplessly and sat back down in the chair.
"It's really been a long time!" The half-bald burly man sat back down too, leaning forward and pushing a large oak mug on the table toward Barrett over and over. "Let me think, we haven't seen each other for at least four years, right?"
Actually, it was five years. Barrett gazed at the burly man across the table with his warm expression, old memories bubbling up in his mind. He replied, "Long time no see, Hank."
The burly man drinking in front of him was named Hank Lawrence, a mithril-level adventurer who had worked alongside Barrett for many years. Back then, they were both in an adventurer team called "Magical Gorgon," syncing perfectly, pulling off plenty of risky quests, and sharing a bond forged in the fires of life-and-death battles. But later, due to some rotten circumstances, they had no choice but to split up.
"Let me think, the last time we parted ways, you left a note." Hank lifted the large oak mug and took a sip of red wine, savoring the flavor of those memories. "The note... how did it go? Oh, yeah—wait two days!"
Hank set the mug down, the smile vanishing from his meaty face. "You know how long we waited? Seven months! And we still fucking never got you back!"
His thick, sturdy palm slammed the table with a BANG, and he went on, "Later, the captain heard you'd shown up in the Kaias Forest south of the Theocracy. My gods, no idea how you even got over there. In the end, the captain told everyone to scatter—each to their own home, each to their own mom."
Barrett grinned awkwardly, unsure how to explain.
That was indeed an embarrassing chapter from the past. Back then, the Magical Gorgon adventurer team was in a small town in Re-Estize, picking up a secret mission from a group of mages to collect shapechanger blood in the wild forest.
After going through hell and high water, they finally wrapped up the job. Barrett, on behalf of the Magical Gorgon adventurer team, went to the mages to collect the reward. The greedy mages tried to cut the payment, claiming the blood quality wasn't up to snuff, while the greedy adventurer figured he'd busted his ass more than expected and deserved a bump in pay.
Barrett got into a heated argument with a few of the mages, and in the end, he walked away with the reward he wanted. But the sneaky bastards tricked him into a small teleportation circle, dumping him straight into a primitive forest south of the Slane Theocracy.
Barrett eventually made his way out of that endless wilderness, but that hefty payout? He blew most of it trading with an elf tribe in the forest for food, water sources, and maps—leaving him with next to nothing.
Once he was out of the forest, Barrett sure as hell didn't dare head back to his old teammates. He had no choice but to keep up his lone-wolf adventurer life for the most part.
Thinking back on his days with the Magical Gorgon team, Barrett felt a real pang of nostalgia. That was a genuine elite squad—every single member a burly, rough-and-tumble tough guy. Even the sole cleric was a beast of a man, slinging spells from afar with a staff in his left hand while hacking away up close with a short sword in his right.
What stuck with Barrett the most was their captain, an orichalcum-level adventurer. Not only was he a master fighter, but he had a humorous and witty personality, kind and approachable, with killer charisma that could wrangle all the wild and unruly guys in the team into one cohesive unit. When it came to leadership skills, who knows how many times better he was than his current captain, EeDechi.
The reason their adventurer team had such a weird name like "Magical Gorgon" was because the captain owned a piece of armor made from gorgon hide.
Though the leather armor was beat-up, it always came through in the clutch, blocking fatal hits for the captain more than once. So, he wanted to name the team "Magical and Impervious Gorgon Hide Armor" to bring the group some good luck. But after the team members kicked up a huge fuss against it, they cut it down to just "Magical Gorgon."
Lost in those old memories, a faint smile tugged at Barrett's lips. He picked up his mug and took a sip, then laid out the whole story from five years ago—how he bickered with the mages, got suckered into the teleportation circle, and clawed his way out of that primitive forest.
Hank listened while sipping his drink, nodding here and there with a look of real concern. When Barrett finished, Hank magnanimously waved it off: what's done is done; everyone hits rough patches they can't control. The fact that old friends could reunite now was already a gift from Gaia.
"You not doing the adventurer thing anymore?" Barrett eyed Hank's getup, which looked nothing like an adventurer's. His once mean mug had softened with some extra padding, and a beer gut poked out under his linen cotton shirt.
"After you bailed, we picked up a few more gigs, lost two or three guys. Everyone got pretty bummed out—you know, adventuring's never a forever job. Captain divvied up all the cash fair and square, team broke up. I quit the life too, took my cut to the capital, and opened this joint."
Hank slumped back in his chair, jabbing a finger toward the counter at the back of the tavern, his voice dropping a notch.
Barrett felt a spark of surprise—he hadn't pegged this place as Hank's. Hank had always been a hardcore boozer, claiming to be a wine-tasting wizard. Running a tavern now? It suited his dream life to a tee.
The now-chubby ex-adventurer set his mug on the table and let out a sigh, "Like the old saying goes, only the ones who hang up their swords get to kick the bucket in their sleep—keep swinging, and you're headed for a cripple's life or an early grave."