As the first of the players reached them, their emotions hit Jonah like a hurricane of negativity. He once again activated his calming aura instinctually, which helped everyone who passed them a little, but only enough to make them look up from the floor.
"Do you know exactly how many foreigners were in the courtyard for the celebration?" He asked the question loud enough that anyone with an answer could provide it, but the best he got was from the guard.
"Can't say for sure, but I think about five-thousand..." Solemnity dominated his tone, looking at the defeated faces passing him was like watching the remnants of a lost battle retreat in shame.
"They'll adjust, it will be difficult, but they'll get there." Orcette spoke quietly so as to not inadvertently provoke any hostile reactions.
As the tide of displaced-players marched past them, they saw many different races and classes. They didn't say it aloud, but they were both going to make a point of studying them all later, the knowledge in those entries could be the difference between life and death in this world.
Jonah was thinking about potential outcomes, he had seen enough shows that depicted their situation to have a good idea of what to expect in the coming days, weeks, months and years and was trying to think of a way to give the captain that information in a way they'd understand.
"Orcette, let's go, we need to meet The Captain and tell him what to do next."
"I think I know what you mean, it doesn't take a genius to figure out what some of them are going to do..." Orcette looked away in the end, she wasn't a people person, but she didn't want to imagine how many of them would be dead soon, whether by getting caught unprepared or by suicide at their perceived hopelessness.
They said goodbye to the gate-guard and headed toward the fourth-ring.
As they walked against the flow, Jonah made sure to stay as far away as possible while still keeping the whole width of the parade of pessimistic players so they could have at least a little comfort.
"Hey!"
The voice was unfamiliar and faint, almost drowned out by the combined footfall of the entire line.
"Hey!"
Orcette was the one to hear it and tapped Jonah's shoulder.
"Hey!" Now that they were actively trying to hear it, it was much easier to and they followed it to see a small figure on the far-side of the march, but it felt rude to cause a ruckus and in the end Jonah gestured to the end of the procession which was now approaching.
The figure kept pace despite them being a fair bit shorter, but it was too difficult to make them out through the wall of people between them.
When the end of the line passed and the stranger was clear to see, she bowed down a full ninety-degrees. "I wanted to say thank you. I don't know how, but you made me feel better, didn't you?"
Jonah ran an eye over her, he was almost certain she was a human and a rogue of some kind, the light clothing, hooded cloak, padded shoes, daggers. She was the hardest kind of player to judge.
Most hardcore gamers and fantasy fans won't choose Human on principle, but some do because they can either play the role more intimately or because the stats tend to be fairly well rounded.
Rogue types again were hard to judge, they had incredible crit rates in a lot of games and usually have access to a host of debuffs and skill specialties and yet new players pick them because they're cool and edgy.
Her body was small, maybe somewhere between the dwarf in the courtyard and Gregor, that of an early teenager of thirteen to fifteen by his best guess.
Her hair was pulled into long, cartoonish twin-tails and blood-red in colour.
Her skin was pale with a pinkish-twinge and her eyes were a dull grey
In the end he decided to believe in the ability the Angel entry mentioned to detect lies, but of course he now knew that he had to be careful not to lie as that could have consequences.
"I did, sorry I can't do more child."
"Sorry, you speak kind of strange, are you an NPC or a player? I can't tell."
"NPC? Player? What do you mean?" His tongue burned, warning him that even that was dangerously close to a lie.
Orcette saw Jonah's plan and although she didn't understand the reason behind it, she played along, noticing the twitch in his jaw and doing the math.
"Really? Damn, I thought you were players..." The girl grew teary-eyed. "...Sorry, I'm only fourteen in the real world. I wasn't even supposed to play the game because it's my brother's, but he was a jerk so I planned to ruin as much as I could for him."
Jonah and Orcette both had the same thought about that sentence. 'Damn, this kid goes for the critical hits IRL too.'
"So, what did you wish to ask us?" Jonah continued after fighting to keep his thoughts inside.
"Oh, nothing..." She squirmed a bit, then began to cry lightly. "...I was going to ask you for help. I don't play games... I don't want to die."
Jonah didn't sense treachery or deceit, but still couldn't rule it out since he didn't know how it worked. Ultimately, he decided to tell her the truth, but in a way that she would drop any facade.
"Girl, open your interface and follow my instructions..." He paused while she followed his instructions and stopped smiling. "...Good, now select "Book Of Lore" and read the entry for Angel."
The girl recited it, then looked at him confused. "Sorry, I still don't know. Are you a Player, or do you just know because you're an Angel?"
Jonah looked at Orcette. "You're call, I'm not going to complain either way."
She got an eye-roll in return and laughed at him, then he turned to the girl. "We're Players, you can come with us, but only if you stay quiet until we find somewhere to teach you a few things."
The girl's face lit up and she fell in line and followed closely behind Orcette.
"Girl. Get any closer behind me and I won't be as nice."
"Sorry! What did I do?"
Jonah stopped and turned around. "First of all, sorry I forgot. I'm Jonah, this is Orcette, what's your name?"
"I'm Kayla. Kayla Simmons." Jonah and Orcette, physically facepalmed.
"Is that your name IRL or the game? Please don't say "both", Kayla."
"Err, um, both." They both screamed lightly into the hand they each had over their mouths.
"Kayla, that is very dangerous. You should never use your real name in a game like this. Not that that will mean much now I guess, but it would still be better to use a nickname. You should only use your real name to NPCs, okay?"
"Yes, Mr. Jonah."
"Secondly, you're a rogue. They specialise in killing from behind, robbing etc. In short, when you move behind somebody, you're threatening them." Jonah was doing his best to be strict but not mean, unfortunately that was difficult and they had to spend a good amount of time getting her to stop crying.
When she had, they continued and now she walked a little more than her arm's length in front of them, she had been told to try and act overly relaxed and a little bit brainwashed. A role she was playing to perfection and given that she stated her inspiration as "my brother playing video-games, throwing him under the bus.
They didn't even reach the gate before a man moved to meet them, offering the same greeting as the guard at the fifth ring. "Hail! I am Captain Kieran Aslin. You must be Lord Jonah and Lady Orcette..." His eyes fell to Kayla and evaluated her intensely. "...Did this girl try to rob you, or...?"
The man was clearly a career soldier, straight-backed, squared-shoulders, left-hand tilting his sword forward and right hand across his chest and ready to switch from respect to retaliate in an instant.
His hair was dirty-blonde trimmed just enough to not get in his eyes and tied-back for good measure.
His eyes were a dark hazelnut and the bags around his eyes and the creases in his otherwise youthful face, spoke of long-hours of stress and work, a trait to be expected in the guard captain around a grand event welcoming thousands of strangers.
He was fully dressed in scalemail armour, with thick platemail pauldrons and gauntlets which spoke of either a unique style of fighting, or rank difference in uniform, considering the other guards all dressed in chain mail suits under thick, padded leather coats, trousers and hats.
Jonah was impressed when Kayla managed to maintain the act, but recognised she was probably just too scared to break character. "No, she was in the courtyard, but didn't seem to be as far gone as the others. I couldn't in good conscience leave her alone. On the note of the others though, I have seen similar things in the past and you should organise patrols in the surrounding area, there is a good chance some will attempt suicide."
"Lord, anything else?"
"Check waterways, we are down river and if people drown themselves it could contaminate the water. If you have any adventurer or mercenary guilds, you should put out a recurring job for at least three months."
"We are grateful for the sage advice Lord, an angel's wisdom is a welcome blessing in such times. Now, may I ask you to escort me?"
"You may, but would it be possible for me to ask a couple of questions first?"
"You are far wiser than I, but I will do my best." Captain Kieran spoke with a slight bow and approached in case any of Jonah's questions were sensitive in nature.
"I wish to see my charges sheltered, how much is lodging or permanent property?"
"Most inns in town are three copper a head, a night. A three room house rented would be fifty silver a month on average and the same home would be one-hundred and fifty gold..." Captain Kieran narrowed his eyes as he ran some mental calculations. "...If you wished to make our land your home, I could introduce you to a property manager. No promises, but they may offer you a discount."
"That would be most appreciated Captain Kieran, before I continue, may we drop the titles? I don't require such respect when I am but a servant of the heavenly realm."
"Of course, Jonah. Frankly, I find them rather stuffy myself, now your next question..." He made a relaxed gesture with one hand to accompany his call for continuation.
"I was unaware mortals had limitations on slime hunting until earlier. My charge killed nine, maybe ten with projectiles, one with another slime core depending on how it's counted, two by clubbing their cores and two by stabbing them with the tip of her totem. Should we report those numbers to someone in particular?"
"Thank the gods you stopped at those numbers, but truly, you must be talented to handle that many in one go, Orcette."
"I can't rely on Jonah for everything, I want to be able to help him as much as he helps me." When Jonah didn't sense a lie, he turned to face her and she pushed him as she started to blush, forcing him to catch himself with his wings again.
"Hahaha! Seems your maiden is pure-hearted, Jonah. As for reporting, usually you'd report it to the adventurer guild you mentioned. I'll show you there when we're done, you'll need somewhere to sleep until tomorrow at least."
"Thank you, my final question is more of a request, might we be able to head to the Dubio's shop first to sell the slime cores?"
"We can go that way, sure. It's not far out of the way."
With that, Kieran turned to lead the way. As they walked, he basically just asked for as much detail as they could give, which Jonah was happy to give.
"...So they think they're Player's in a game that just became life or death is what you're saying?" Kieran scratched his head. "I can certainly see why that would leave them so defeated. Like a child swinging a wooden sword and decapitating his friend..."
"Kieran, remember there is a child present please."
Kieran turned and saw that Kayla had grown pale and on the verge of tears. "Forgive my absence of mind, I didn't realise she was still aware. She seemed deeply enthralled."
"My aura fights negative emotion, it is that conflict that leaves her seeming that way, but she is still very much aware."
"My apologies little one, I didn't mean to upset you..."
Not long after that, they reached Dubio's shop and all walked in together, nearly giving poor Dubio a heart-attack at the group before him.
Given his profession, they also gave him the same report in case he had any concoctions that may be of assistance, but unfortunately he was clueless and could offer nothing in the way of hypothesis or theory.
Orcette handed over the fourteen cores and received her forty-two copper and a warm fuzzy feeling at her first quest completion. "Well, worst case, I can afford an inn for a while."
"I'm surprised money is a concern for an Angel."
"It's not, he has his money, but I want to pay my own way as much as possible. He's my guardian angel, not my keeper or family."
"Noble indeed, I thank you for your report and I think I need to process before continuing, but I'll take you to the adventurer guild and get you all registered so you have IDs and then I'll leave you so Orcette and the young lady can rest."
"I'd be grateful, take care Dubio, we may be back tomorrow to make sure Kayla is equipped."
"Of course, Jonah. In the meantime, one thing I can offer the young lady is this. Children are remarkably resilient and often respond better to sweet and calming better than bitter and healing."
He ducked behind the counter while he was speaking, then jogged round to hand her a small brown bag.
"Sweet and calming?"
"Candy and a few cups worth of herbal tea, with a cup to drink it from. I imagine you can conjure hot water with which to brew it."
The gesture helped Kayla recover some of her colour, but she kept her promise and remained silent, leaving Jonah to speak on her behalf.
As they left Dubio's shop, he showed them out and waved them down the street, leaving Jonah with a bittersweet feeling as he thought to himself. 'If people were this nice back home, I wouldn't be so happy to be here. Sorry everyone, I hope you can still hear me, but I don't ever want to go back to that world.'
When he glanced at Orcette, he could see she was thinking the same thing more or less, albeit in a totally different context and when she was done they made eye-contact and nodded knowingly.
They wound through the streets, heading from the main street to the East into the third ring then up and towards the North.
The style of buildings changed dramatically from, mostly residential, spotted with a few small businesses to guildhalls, warehouses and larger business fronts.
They eventually came to one of the largest halls in the area, marked with a swinging sign that was stamped with a compass face on top of a pair of crossed swords and a shield in the centre of the compass face.
The building itself was hard for Jonah to make out for some reason, but to Kayla and Orcette they could see it was brick from the floor up to waist height the wood, or at least wooden panelled up to the first-floor.
The same was then true up to the third which was topped with a thatched, timber-frame roof.
Overall it was a strange blend of western architecture through the ages, including tudor, elizabethan and a dash of modernity with metal bars covering glass windows which seemed too sophisticated for the setting.
"You okay, Jonah?" Orcette asked upon seeing him squint and twitch.
"Apologies, I forgot to mention, the guild is shielded by powerful perception-blocking enchantments. It holds confidential records, so spying is a constant threat and requires constant vigilance in turn."
"Makes sense, I'll adjust, it's just my first time seeing this."
"That is surprising, you must be thousands of years old, or were you created for purpose?"
"This body is a new creation at least, but we should go inside, I'm led to believe loitering is in bad taste."
Kieran laughed with agreement then stepped inside ahead of them.