“Thank you,” I sighed as I grabbed both of the keys and handed one off to Vinessa. “Alright,” I chuckled. “That’s the room situation dealt with, those 2 better be grateful I’m paying.”

“Based on previous events and the living situation of Nigiel Keth and Roby, this hotel would be a massive upgrade,” Escalate announced.

Roby slowly turned to face him with a screwdriver already in his metal little hands. “I’ve spent my entire life breaking things and rebuilding them. Escalate, hope you don’t add yourself to that list of things that I just break  >:[.”

“Based on your previous modifications to my body, I hope I’m not added to the rebuilding list either.” And with that, Roby walked toward Roby with the screwdriver ready to dismantle him, but Vinessa quickly picked him up before he could even do anything.

I clapped my hands together as I looked down at my watch. “Alright, it’s currently 12:30, so I’m about to go explore and get something to eat. I don’t really care what you guys do, and I’ll be seeing you all later.” I snapped my fingers as I made my exit through the hotel door. Alright, Ghoul Town, let’s see what ya got.”

 

Surprisingly enough for a place that has the word Town in it, there was a lot of things to do. The food was really good. I had a medium T-rex steak with some special sauce.

I went walking around that area just to admire the scenery and the atmosphere of the place. There were quite a lot of people of all races walking on the road without a care in the world. It’s quite relieving, if I do say so myself.

Compared to the city I’ve grown up in, it was a lot more chaotic and cruel. Even though I did grow up in a good area and had rather decent people around me for most of my life, that couldn’t shield my vision of the cruelty that was just a little deeper in the city. And I guess, due to the peacefulness in my life, I somewhat wanted to experience it.

I sighed through my nose as I walked close to the wall so I wouldn’t bump into the crowd of children coming my way. One of the children tripped over their own feet and fell face first, causing them to drop their ice cream, which they had in their hand.

I hold the laughter in as I slowly help the child to his feet and dust him off. “You good, kid? You look like you just ate that concrete.” I said as I noticed pieces of stone lodged in the child’s teeth.

“Huh,” the child said. He then licked his teeth, then proceeded to try to spit out the small stones. I quickly turned away from him to hide my amused smile as I reached back and pulled out my wallet and grabbed 1 silver piece.

“Here you go, kid,” I said as I placed the silver piece into the child’s hand. “Go buy yourself another ice cream to wash the rest of those pebbles out.”

“Thank you, old mister.” The child smiled at me.

“Alright, so give me my coin back,” I slightly laughed. The child ran away back in the direction she came from as soon as I said that.

I let out an amused sigh as I got back to my feet and immediately felt light-headed and needed to place my hand on a building wall for support. “Maybe I am old.”

I continued walking down the cement sidewalk and just began looking at all the buildings to find one that would peak my interest. But it seems as though my lust for shopping left me at some point, and I just settled on a bench inside the town's park.

I dusted the old brown bench, then proceeded to slowly sit down like some type of 50-year-old who had just gotten off work. I let out a releaved sigh as I adjusted myself onto the bench, and now I fear that I may never move again due to how comfortable I’m feeling now.

I sat on the bench and admired nature for what seemed like 15 minutes until an old man walked toward the bench.

“Hey youngin, you mind If I sit here?” The old man asked. I looked over at him and saw that he was not a regular old man.

The dude was 6 feet tall with tan skin, wearing worn-down black and blue dapper clothing. He  had a cane in his hand that I don’t think he needs, and a gold stop watch across his neck. But the most noticeable feature was his build. Despite him being an old man, he had the build of a warrior. Matter of fact, now that I looked closer at him, he seems to have a scar across his right wrist, and a noticeable amount of hair growing down his neck that seems a little too thick to be natural.

A werebear.

“Sure,” I simply shrugged. The old man then sat down on the right me, and the sound his bones made as he bent his knees sounded like bubble wrap. “Goddamn unc, you good?”

“Woof,” the Oldman let out a small laugh. “Eh, just the younger years catching up to me, youngin—don’t worry. They’ll catch up to you too.”

“Naw, I’ve got to doubt you on that one, sir,” I laughed. “With how peaceful my life has been going, I feel like I would be in a little better condition than that.”

“Is that right?” The old man said as he sat his cain by his leg and leaned back against the Bench. “Then pray tell, what do you do?”

“Well, I'm a mercenary recruiter.”

“Ah, a main ex-mercenaries retirement job.”

“Oh, no, I'm not an ex-mercenary,” I quickly corrected.

“Oh I know. You look way too… In mint condition, to have been one,” The Old Man smiled.

I looked back at him as I somewhat felt insulted by his words, even if he’s right. “What does that mean?”

“You know exactly what that means. But to put it into simpler words, you look like you’ve only ever been in 2 or 3 fights in your entire life.”

“Well jokes on you, sir. It was 4 fights.”

“Yeah, well, that’s a big difference,” the old man chuckled. “Eh, but besides that what else did you do.”

“Huh, well…” I began thinking for a while. “I worked in a mailroom last year.”

“Wow, I couldn’t have thought of a more boring job even if I tried.”

“I was a data entry worker.”

“And you somehow topped that,” the old man said in disbelief.

“I was a paper feeder as one of my first jobs.”

“Alright, stop,” the old man quickly interrupted. “What was the most interesting job you ever had?”

I began thinking about all the multitudes of jobs I've ever had and tried to pinpoint one that I would ever tell stories about, then I finally settled with one. “Mercenary recruiter, that would have been my most exciting job.”

“Why is it that one?”

“Because I got attacked by a skin runner wielding a machine,” I explained with a small laugh.

“Oh wow,” The old man leaned forward. “Now that’s a story, do tell.”

“Well, I was on my lunch break, so I exited the building and headed to the coffee shop that’s right down the street. Halfway there, I looked left down an alley and saw an old man in sweatpants wearing only one flip-flop, charging at me with a full vending machine propped over his shoulder.”

“What the hell?” the old man muttered.

“So as you would expect, I immediately ran in the opposite direction. That guy chased me all the way into the woods. In the middle of me running and dodging him, I managed to accidentally stab the guy in the neck, but all that managed to do was send him into his second phase.” I let out an exhausted sigh.

“So let me guess, someone finally came to help you beat it?”

“Oh, no, I managed to kill the thing myself. It was mostly luck, though,” I explained. “I managed to lure that thing toward a hole that led to a mining cave. Thankfully, I practice judo a little bit and managed to throw the thing over my shoulder, but when everything worked out, the skinrunner sent one of its tentacles at me and pulled me down with him.”

“Yep, got to watch out for those tentacles. One of my buddies had to get his arms reattached because of that,” the old man laughed.

“I don’t remember much after that, only that I woke up with the skinrunner dead right beside me, with the doctor thankfully tending to me and taking me to the hospital.”

“Heh, if that isn’t divine intervention, I don’t know what is,” the old man grunted as he proceeded to stretch a little bit. “When did all this happen?”

“2 days ago.”

“2 days!” The old man said in shock. “That was an interesting two days.”

“Yeah,” I sighed. “So now I’m here with a group, and I’m trying to meet up with my employer to tell him what happened.”

“Ah,” the old man pointed. “So, who traveled with you when you came here?”

“Um, the doctor who saved me, two robots, a racist vampire girl in an owl costume, and a werewolf that somehow looks like one of Satan’s attack dogs.” I said while stretching my neck.

“Wow, quite the odd band… You just said a werewolf?” The old man leaned forward.

“Yes, a natural-born, surprisingly enough.”

“Wow,” the old man let out a laugh of disbelief. “I haven’t seen one of those guys in 158 years.”

“Damn!” I blurted out.

“That was actually one of the reasons why I sat down with you. I knew the scent was familiar, but it’s been so long that I’ve forgotten what it was.” He explained while ignoring my outburst, he then turned around and looked at me. “He’s here?”

“Yeah, well he’s possibly still outside the gate. The Guardsmen stopped him from coming in for some reason,” I explained while looking behind me.

“Hmm,” The old man sighed as he leaned back against the bench again. “It’s unlikely that they’re keeping him there just because he’s a werewolf, even if he’s a rarity. It must be something else.” He looked away for a moment. “Something dangerous.”

We then sat in silence for a while, with the sound of people playing and laughing in front of us. Seeing all these people with their family made me feel a little homesick, and it makes me wish I had called my mom before I was chased through that forest.

I need to buy a new phone.

“Hey, youngin, I have a question,” the old man said.

“Shoot for it,” I answered.

“What’s your goal in life?”

I opened my mouth to answer his question, but nothing came to mind no matter how hard I try to remember.

What was my goal in life…. Did I ever have one?

“Hmmm, not surprising,” the old man sighed through his nose. “I was just like that back when I was younger.”

“Like what?” I asked.

“A man who works to have money, but has no real goal to work toward.” He then grabbed his cane and rested it between his legs. “Before I was a mercenary, I was a car salesman. I worked every day to finally afford a place for myself, and once I finally got enough money, I bought a small house. At that moment, I felt like I had just won the world, that everything I had just worked for was worth it.” He then laughed to himself as if he had just told a joke that I failed to catch. “But how I felt quickly changed within the time span of a month. I realized that I didn’t really have anything. I had stuff like a house and a car and a bunch of other things, but none of those things brought me joy or interesting stories to talk about. I didn’t even have a family to share it with, no real friends to brag at, no real exciting memories to look back on.” He then looked up at the sky.

“I just felt… empty,” He finally muttered.

He then went silent and, after a while, finally said something to keep him talking. “Then what?”

He then looked back down and gave me a light smile. “Then one day, as I was driving to work, I spotted a building on the side of the road that said volunteering for a raid.” He let out another amused sigh. “I shrugged my shoulders as soon as I saw that sign and continued to drive to work. But the sign stayed for multiple days, and every time I drove past it, I grew more and more interested. It was like it was… calling to me.”

“Then one day, I stopped by the building and walked in. I only wanted to check out the place and leave, but the people there said I was a perfect fit for it and gave me some documents saying that I agreed that me dying during this raid isn’t on them.” He then mumbled something under his breath that I wasn’t able to catch. “I hesitantly signed the paper, and they told me to come back in 3 days. In those 3 days, I’m not even going to sugarcoat it, I was scared shitless.” The old man laughed.

I laughed at his sudden outburst. “I can imagine, they gotcha.”

“Oh yeah,” the old wiped his face. “I was cursing myself up and down for that stupid action I just did, but when I looked at the paper, it said that I wasn’t forced to come even though I signed it. At first, I was happy and just continued working like I usually did, but then, on the day of the raid, I was driving to sign. Then I thought to myself about how much I wanted to do something different for once, and after a moment of pondering, I turned and went toward the raid building.” He paused for a moment as he tried to catch his breath. “They were glad to see me there, and there I met some interesting people who signed up just like me. The employee’s then fitted me with armor that could fit me and a cheap weapon of my choice, then transported us to the raid area.”

“Huh, what was the raid?” I asked.

“An undead horde, nothing too dangerous,” the old man laughed. “But I would be lying if I said I didn’t have any fun. Every undead skull I smashed open sent a jolt of excitement through my spine, and for the first time…. I felt alive.” The old man smiled. “After that, I continued to volunteer and fight against creatures I wouldn’t have even dreamed of fighting back then until one day I quit my job and became a full-fledged mercenary.” He then looked at my watch and raised his eyebrows.

“Welp, that’s my cue to leave,” he slowly rose to his feet. “But what I'm trying to say is, do something exciting for yourself. And try to work toward a dream, your still young, and you have plenty of time.” The old man smiled as he walked away.

I watched him leave, and once he was out of sight, I went right back admiring the view of the park, only this time with something on my mind.

“Work towards a dream,” I whispered to myself as I looked around the park. My eye’s then locked onto a child with a toy bow. “Hmmm, a dream.”