NOVEL NEXT 0064
They were late. While that was technically not quite true or possible, as Tanja and her party neither had an appointments on their schedule nor quests to finish after the war, they still chose to stay behind in the Flame Sea Shore to wait for the end of the war or to witness whatever spell the girls they defended were casting. Which now resulted in them standing in front of a rather crowded settlement.
Normally that wouldn't have happened, as at least another town would have taken care of some of the participants of a war, but with the recent demise of the First Meadow, only the Ice Sea Islands were left nearby.
Well, the newly formed divine realm did also exist, but so far no one and nothing managed to leave that place, not even a message...
Unfortunately, while the three did manage to hold out until the end, they were unable to watch the spell itself, as they had to evacuate before everything was finished.
"Told you we should have left earlier." The metal mage Xana reminded Tanja.
"Yes, yes. But weren't you also curious whether the girls would actually manage to defend themselves until the end of the cast or not? What spell a low level mage could use to cause a war?" The girl tried to deflect. She was already disappointed and annoyed that the spell got too dangerous to stay any longer in the Flame Sea Shore and now she had to deal with a large crowd.
"Not really." Maybe a somewhat true statement, since Xana did voice her opposition to staying longer than necessary in the war ravaged realm. But she also relented far too easily for someone having no interest in staying a bit longer.
A fact the blood affinity warrior knew, even though one could sometimes question her mental abilities. So, muttering a few curses and words like "Traitor" and "Spoilsport" under her breath, she turned away from her teammate.
She would have liked to fight it out, however she was well aware that it would leave her even more dissatisfied. The metal mage was too good of a counter to her own abilities. Something made even worse by Xana's defensive build. Just remembering that one time they actually fought made Tanja shiver. Evading the occasional attacks of the metal mage was easy, but getting through her defenses... She bunkered down for days behind her shield, blocking basically all her attacks and the few which actually managed to injure her through the metal barriers were quickly fixed with more plating. Normally the bleed effect would still sooner or later take its toll, but no, for some reason Xana even had limited control over her own blood.
Irritated from remembering their fight and now even more annoyed, Tanja trudged away into the settlement.
Scanning one restaurant and café after another, most were as expected already above their capacity. The few remaining ones even completely run out of ingredients. Weird, but the shops likely didn't expect so many people to suddenly arrive.
Who even came up with that tradition to celebrate after a war?!
"It isn't like we have to eat something now... And it's a waste of time and money anyway." Xana muttered quietly, yet still loud enough for her party-members to hear her.
"We got money from the fights and the quest rewards. If we don't enjoy life now, when then? Relax for once. You are now level 100, so, as long as you don't screw up, you have eternity in front of you." Tanja countered.
"Sorry for being who i am. I just prefer to focus on what is important and live my life to the fullest instead of worrying about everything."
"And how often would you have died without us stopping or saving you?"
The blood mage was about to answer, but Dan finally intervened. "I think you two should stop..." The illusion mage preferred to stay in the background whenever possible, but the continuous bickering of his two female team-members started to draw attention.
"Fine, fine..." Relenting, Tanja returned back to her search for cake.
It was a miracle that their party still existed, even though most of the time they got into verbal fights with each other and then there was that one illusion guy they forgot sometimes.
Walking through the town, the three suddenly found themselves in front of a familiar face.
"I see... So you survived." Tanja was the first to break the ice. For a moment she had been surprised that they ran into Marc, the earth mage they fought near the beginning of the war, then managed to escape and later annoyed their faction.
"Same here. We thought we managed to decimate your lines and forced you to abandon the quest objective, but who knew that the initiator was casting such a large scale spell..." While it wasn't exactly common for former enemies who fought each other to meet directly after the war, with healers being able to revive people it still happened more often than one would think. Especially so now, since there was only one town nearby.
"Yeah... It was quite the weird war. Though before we stand here and just talk, wanna join us on our search for a place with cake?" Tanja invited the mage.
"... You know that we were enemies just a couple of hours ago?" Marc asked sceptically.
"And are you still our enemy? The war is over. Neither faction has some long standing grudge against each other and we aren't even part of either." The girl argued. Marc wasn't wrong and they did fight against each other with their lives on the line just a couple of days ago, but there also was no logical reason for them to still bear grudges. None even died during their confrontation.
"Fine... But what about the rest of your party?" He relented.
"Oh, they are also-"
"Hey, you should ask us, before you decide things!" Xana interrupted the warrior.
"... Okay, okay. And, are you against it?" Getting annoyed again, Tanja asked.
"No..." The metal mage answered. She would have liked to rebuke the other girl, but couldn't really. With them being in a town, it was unlikely that they would be attacked and learning more about the war from the point of view of the other side would be good to know for future events.
"See." Having won at least the verbal fight, Tanjas' mood improved a bit.
Continuing to comb through the town, Tanja then finally spotted some free seats. Not a full table, but with the current situation, she couldn't be picky and at least enough chairs for their group of four were still free. Not that she would have been above it to separate from their new acquaintance to claim a table for three.
Quickly getting closer, before someone else tried to snatch away the place, Tanja was about to negotiate with the sole young woman on the table, but got beaten to it by the newest addition to their group.
"Jeanne."
The woman looked up from her half eaten piece of cake, sighed, then spoke. "Urgh... Another one of you. The contract has been fulfilled. In case you have questions or want to discuss anything else related to the war, you know where to ask."
"Ah, um, yes, well..." The man stammered, apparently not quite expecting such an answer from meeting the former ally again.
Though before their initial impression could get worse, Tanja interjected. "Stop! We are just here for the cake. Well, at least my party, so..."
"Hey! Don't just discard me after you drag me with you! Besides, i was just surprised to see Jeanne here, didn't expect her to be still around since everything was over."
"Well, some sacrifices have to be made."
"You two." Dan interrupted the two before everything could get worse, then turned to Jeanne. "Would you mind us taking the remaining seats? We are technically just here for the cake, but i'm sorry for my rather loud companions..." He didn't want to join the conversation, but with Tanja's temperament things were likely to escalate and then they could lose the table they had finally found.
Some negotiations and a few orders later they were then finally seated with cake in front of them.
"So you were also in the war." Tanja asked, breaking the silence which had settled over the table.
"Huh? You didn't know?" While information about here had been kept under wraps for most of the time, they did use her to raise the morale before the final fight so there shouldn't be anyone in the Flame Sea Shore faction who didn't know her.
"Oh, we were in the other faction, if you were known in yours." Tanja explained.
"... And why are you walking around with your former enemy?"
"Just picked him up. Thought it would be interesting to hear stories from the other side and i want him to join our party" The blood warrior exposed her plans.
"""Eh?""" ... To everyone's surprise. Not holding grudges after the war, was one thing, but inviting someone into your party you just fought days before...
"What? It should be safer to have more people and Marc has shown to be pretty strong. Or do you also want to join, Jeanne? Well... i don't know how strong you are... Marc?" The girl tried to argue.
"Can you at least ask your other party members before inviting people?" Xana interjected.
More than a few people at the table started to get a headache.
Though a couple of days later a new party of five would set out.