This Quest is Bullshit - Chapter 153

Chapter 153 - Nothing Like a Wedding to Bring People Together

The party arrived in style.

Eve grabbed the attention of everyone milling about outside the venue as she came plummeting out of the sky, shimmering sapphire dress billowing in the wind, only for her fall to stop short six inches from the ground, allowing her to land is if from a small hop. She patted down her dress just in time for Reginald to appear in the sky above the clearing.

The wedding guests didn’t need to be told to step back.

His phantasmal wings pushed no wind around, sparing Eve the effort of fixing her dress a second time. Judging from the looks of a few of the better-dressed guests around, she wasn’t the only one thankful for that.

Wes was the first to disembark, looking the spitting image of a noble courtier who absolutely did not want to be one. Art hopped off after, looking rather dapper in his little doublet. Preston followed, taking his job as officiant seriously enough to actually dress like a religious leader.

Upon receiving his letter, the Church of Ayla had been perfectly happy to send their new Paragon a truly ostentatious set of gold-trimmed white robes. From they way they hung loosely around his chest and hips, Eve got the impression they’d once belonged to someone else. She refrained from making the obvious jokes, certain that Wes had beaten her to them.

He handed something to Wes. “I need to go talk to Alvin. Why don’t you drop off our gifts at the table?”

At Wes’s nod, Preston turned on his heel and strode through a white wooden arch decorated with roses, maneuvering around the mostly-empty chairs to slip into the tree that marked the entrance to the lungeon.

With a moment’s thought, Eve materialized the Ar-gold crown atop her head as a golden circlet with a single sapphire at the front, her choice of gem matching the rest of her outfit. As the crown appeared, a wrapped parcel popped into existence in front of her. She caught it.

Preston had taken one look at her pile of potential gifts and immediately selected a vase that generated fresh, seasonal flowers once a day. He hadn’t let her wrap it, recognizing that as a train wreck waiting to happen, and had instead taken the few minutes to do the job himself.

Eve looked over at Wes. “In we go?”

Wes shrugged. “In we go.”

A rather eclectic crowd milled around both the seating area and the open space to the left that held the table for gifts and the bar. About a third of them were human, including a few adventurers and a very frightened-looking group in their Sunday best that Eve recognized immediately as Alvin’s family. The resemblance was uncanny.

Lina’s friends and family made up the next third, the all female gray-skinned rusalka dripped water upon the grass as they walked around and socialized with all present. Eve watched with a keen interest as two of them approached two of the older Alvin look-alikes, the former doing their best to be polite and friendly as the latter practically cowered.

Wes stopped her gawking in its tracks.

The final group represented among guests consisted of every type of monster Eve had ever heard of, and a few she hadn’t. She waved at Yssifiroth the tentacle monster and his wife as they passed, thought he seemed not to recognize her. She cringed.

Peeling her eyes from the endlessly fascinating set of attendees, Eve deposited her gift upon the growing heap on and around the table set out for them, and promptly led Wes to the bar. What were weddings for if not drinking at ten in the morning?

It was as she, Wes, Art, and Lumy stood—or floated in Lumy’s case—in line for drinks that Eve heard the voice behind her. She didn’t have to turn around to know who it was. She’d recognize that dialect anywhere.

“Well, wouldja look who it is. I didn’t think I’d be seeing you here.”

Wes was the first to greet the dark elf. “Hi, Brady. It’s good to see you. Where’s your brother?”

“Oh, he’s around here somewhere,” the lone Midden brother replied. “Probably getting into mischief.”

Eve shook his hand. “Glad to see you’re still around. How do you know the happy couple?”

“We’ve been making stops here for a while now,” Brady answered. “You’d be surprised what kind of hand-me-down gear high levels will give ya in exchange for some of Alvin’s cooking.”

Eve grinned. “No, I don’t think I’d be surprised at all. I’ve had his cooking.”

“Well there ya go,” Brady said. He peered around the adventurers to watch the slow-moving queue. “It looks like we’ve got some time on our hands. What’ve you all been up to?”

“Oh, this and that,” Eve said, just in time for Wes to jump into retelling everything that’d happened since they’d helped the Midden brothers fix their cart in the snowy woods over a year ago.

In the half hour or so it took to Wes to get through the tale—including brief breaks for Eve to make wisecracks—the drink line moved forward approximately eight feet. Apparently the giant mantis in a tuxedo they had serving drinks couldn’t do so particularly quickly, a trait Eve could understand given his lack of hands.

Funnily enough, by the end of Wes’s outlandish true story, Brady Midden expressed interest not in their priceless artifacts or dangerously cursed ring, but the encoded diary Eve had found in the ruins.

“Do ya think I could take a look at that book of yours? I’ve been practicing cryptography as a hobby for a bit now. Carl Midden keeps telling me it’s a waste of time, but I’ll show him, I will.”

Eve blinked, conjuring the ancient journal from a hidden pocket. “Yeah, of course. I’ve been beating my head against this cipher all week.” She handed it over.

Brady accepted it with two hands. “I’ll get this back to you soon as I can. Wouldn’t wantcha thinking I pulled a fast on one you.”

Eve smiled. “Thank you. I’m really dying to find out what’s in there.”

Wes rolled his eyes. “It’s a teenage girl’s diary. It’s probably full of nothing.”

“I’ll consider it a puzzle, then,” Brady chimed, secreting the book away.

Ooh, ooh, it’s our turn! Art’s message pulled Eve and Wes from the conversation as they turned to face the bar.

The giant mantis bowed his head to Wes then Eve. “Sir, your majesty, what can I get you?”

“I’ll take whatever that is,” Wes replied immediately, pointing at a pitcher of something fruity next to a collection of champagne flutes.

Eve blinked, still parsing through what the bartender had just called her. “Um, make that two, please,” she blurted out.

The mantis clutched the pitcher between his two segmented arms, moving slowly and carefully to avoid a spill. He handed them their drinks one at time, following up with a glass of juice for Art. Once more he bowed his head.

Wes waved goodbye to Brady as the party moved on. Eve’s mind was elsewhere.

“You heard that, right? He called me majesty.”

Wes shrugged. “You are wearing a crown.”

“It’s a circlet!” Eve insisted. “Art’s wearing one too.”

Sure enough, the young trellac still wore the enchanted silver circlet he’d claimed from the Dragonwrought vault.

“Maybe he couldn’t see it over the counter?” Wes offered.

Or maybe he can tell you’re a queen! Art sent.

Eve scowled. “How? It’s not a title or a class, it’s just an ability. Besides, monsters don’t have access to Appraise.”

He might not have Appraise, Art responded, but there are all sorts of variations.

“Either way, I show up as an Emissary, remember?”

Wes’s eyes flashed blue. “Um… About that…”

Eve rounded on him. “You’re kidding.”

“See for yourself,” he said, leaning in so she could see the reflection of the blue screen in his eyes.

Level ?? Monarch Ascendent
Mythic Tier 4 Class

“Gods damnit,” she muttered, sinking back. “Emily’s not gonna like this.”

Wes blinked. “Emily? The queen of Leshk? The one we lied to and then got her entire city drunk to escape the prison of? That Emily?” He snorted. “I don’t think what you Appraise as is really your biggest problem on that front.”

Eve sighed. “That’s fair. Still, there goes any chance I had at avoiding attention whenever we step into a town.” As she looked around the crowd once more, she noticed that word of her station appeared to be spreading.

Monsters and humans alike gave her party a wide berth as those with access to Appraise or some other form of identification whispered in the ears of those without. About a quarter of the guests bowed their heads as she passed. Eve groaned. “I didn’t sign up for this. Can someone tell them I’m queen of a dead kingdom with zero subjects?”

“It’s okay,” Wes said, patronizingly patting her on the shoulder. “Just open your mouth and they’ll know you’re not real royalty anyway.”

Before Eve could respond with the devastatingly clever retort she absolutely, totally had prepared in the moment, a chord of organ music rang out through the grassy clearing, signaling the time had come for everyone to take their seats.

The song—performed by a black mass of tentacles in a dress that could only be Yssifiroth’s wife—played just loud enough to make conversation awkward without being overly intrusive, no doubt an artfully chosen volume to incentivize people to wrap up their socializing and sit the hells down. The party obeyed.

“Question,” Wes said as they stood at the back of the aisle trying to decide where to sit, “I understand the sentiment behind the ‘pick-a-seat-not-a-side’ sign, but did they really think it work when half the seats are underwater?”

Eve glanced over at the rows of white chair submerged in a chest-high pool where Lina’s family gathered. She snorted. “That sign almost feels like a trap. Please everyone, sit in the water with all the rusalka. It’s perfectly safe.”

“Eve!” Wes hissed, slapping the side of her arm. “Don’t be racist.”

Art ushered them down the aisle to a collection of four seats in the sixth row, keeping a spot clear for Lumy even though the phantasmal remnant floated above them anyway. Reginald settled in in the open space behind the seating along with a few other creatures that couldn’t use chairs or would otherwise block the view of anyone behind them.

Once all the stragglers had settled, the organ music transitioned to a slightly different tune, cuing Preston to enter from the lungeon. He climbed up onto the wooden platform up front, clutching a holy book Eve was absolutely certain he hadn’t owned forty minutes ago.

It was as he stood there, looking all official in his ill-fitting robe while he waved to crowed of monsters and humans alike that Eve realized he really was the best choice for the job. Who better to formalize the union between a human and a monster than someone connected to both a human goddess and the goddess of beasts. Preston bridged the very gap that Alvin and Lina would that day.

“You know,” Wes muttered to her, his eyes fixed on the stage, “for all he complains about them and for all he tries to distance himself, you gotta admit, he makes a damn good priest.”

Eve snorted.

“Seriously, though,” Wes continued. “Look at him. He’s not holier than thou, he’s not trying to teach a lesson or preach some moral code. Hells, he’s literally up on a platform and he’s not looking down on anybody. He just wants to help people. That alone makes him twice the Priestess as anyone at that damned church.”

“Yeah,” Eve said as she smiled and watched Preston leaning down to chat with people in the crowed, “I suppose he is.”

With that she leaned back in her seat, took in a breath of the fresh forest air, and listened to the shift in the organ music.

The ceremony was about to begin.

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