Chapter 8 | Ranking Up the Lanakiller Guild
“WE’RE home!”
The entire way back to the guild, I kept fanning my face in a desperate attempt to make my cheeks less noticeably red. It helped a little. Rinny threw open the door to the living room, loudly announcing our arrival, before immediately flopping onto the couch, ready to relax.
He really does whatever he wants, whenever the mood strikes him.
“Welcome back, Miku! How was it?! Did anything weird happen?!” Claire immediately rushes over to me before throwing her arms around me.
I’m not sure why she’s so worried!
As I hug Claire back, who has an almost death-grip hold on me, Ektor comes running over, equally as frazzled.
“You went to see Wells all by yourselves?! What were you thinking?! Did he say anything weird to you? That creep flirts with any woman he lays eyes on… It’s a joke to him, but he’s got so much dang sex appeal, he’s constantly getting himself in trouble with women who get the wrong idea.”
Huh? Really? While he did have a refined charm to him, I have no idea about the rest of that. I wonder if Claire knows what Ektor’s talking about.
The thought crosses my mind that if she had known, she definitely wouldn’t have let me go by myself. I turn to Claire.
“Oh.” It looks like she just remembered. Her mouth suddenly drops open as the color drains from her face.
Wait, she knew all along?! She just forgot? Claire, the girl who worries about every single possible scenario, forgot something?!
“Ugh! I totally forgot that Wells is one of the most popular characters…!” she mutters angrily to herself.
Popular characters? What the heck does that mean?
“But more importantly! What happened? Did he hit on you? Did he say anything weird?!” Still completely confused, I watch as Claire snaps back to her usual self with a vengeance.
Eep!
She grabs the fabric of my shirt in both hands, almost shouting in my face.
C-Calm down!
“Nothing went wrong. All that happened is we discovered Miku’s more of a precious, innocent cinnamon bun than I ever realized!” Rinny, who’s still sprawled on the couch, casually interrupts the fuss happening in the entrance to the living room.
“Hey! Rinny!” I whirl toward him. “I thought I told you to stop saying stuff like that!” All the heat that finally left my cheeks has come back with a vengeance!
“Wh-Why are you so embarrassed and flushed…?” Claire asks.
“Don’t tell me Wells sank his poisonous fangs into you?!” Ektor cries.
Why do they look so scary?! Before I can even process what’s happening, both Ektor and Claire close the distance between us and bombard me with questions.
“Ack! Eep! Wait! Calm down already! What’s gotten into you two?!”
They interrogate me until I tell them, in detail, what happened at Wells’ place and what we talked about.
It’s like they’ve been possessed! I kind of understand why Claire’s so worried, but there’s no way I’d fall for a man who’s THAT much older than I am.
“And besides, he has a g-g-girlfriend, so there’s absolutely nothing to worry about on that front,” I say.
Ektor and Claire respond at the same time, shouting, “You’re too naïve!”
They finally let me go, and I slump onto an empty spot on the couch next to Candice, who watched the whole thing in dumbfounded shock. She immediately begins comforting me from my exhausting ordeal. “The two of them are very similar,” Candice says. “I can tell. They’re both overprotective.”
She’s too sweet! So far, my morning’s been one heart-pounding shock after another, and it’s not even noon yet!
“Anyway, will things work out like this?” Candice asks. “If Wells and Marino don’t join us, we’ll have to look for two more people, right? I’m worried!”
I almost forgot until she mentioned it! That wasn’t even the most important part of all. I’ll fill Macro and Kiefer in on what happened after they wake up, but for now, I need to hear Ektor’s opinion, since he’s the official guild leader.
“Hm? There’s nothing to worry about on that front,” he says. “I already talked to Marino about it.”
“Huh? What?! Why am I only hearing this now?!” Claire, Candice, and even Rinny cry out in surprise. The others make sense, but how is even Rinny clueless?
“I can’t believe you talked to her without telling us, Ektor!” Rinny says. “There was absolutely no point in me going to see Wells then!”
“Sorry about that. I didn’t hear back from Marino until last night, right before bed. Besides, I’d still been planning on talking to Wells directly, so it wasn’t a complete waste.”
It seems as if Ektor found a letter waiting for him on his windowsill when he went up to his room last night. Marino has a magic ability that lets her send letters. If her response came late last night, it makes sense Ektor wouldn’t have had time to say anything until now.
“At any rate, that means we’ve got the members we need to rank up, right?” I hesitantly ask, only to be met by an equally vague answer, lacking any sort of excitement.
“Now that you’ve mentioned it, I guess we do?” Ektor says.
What’s wrong? Shouldn’t we be celebrating? I thought this was our goal?
“It just doesn’t seem real…”
That makes sense. Maybe he’ll feel more excited once his application is officially approved. To be fair, it doesn’t seem real to me, either.
“It was honestly a lot easier than we thought it’d be,” Rinny says. “We should throw a proper celebration once the paperwork goes through and we’re officially recognized as a high-tier guild.”
“That sounds great!” Candice cheers. “You actually think up decent stuff every once in a while, don’t you, Rinny? Let’s do it! I’m so excited!”
“Let’s have the party here,” Claire chimes in. “It’ll be easier than inconveniencing one of the local pubs or taverns. All right! Time to roll my sleeves up and put together another amazing feast!”
As everyone excitedly talks about plans for our party, I feel my own excitement steadily growing.
I’m so happy we did it!
“I can’t wait!” I exclaim.
The real work starts from here, which is why we should take the time now to celebrate. I can’t wait to tell Macro, Kiefer, and Angela! I feel like I’m toeing the starting line before a big race. My heart’s beating loudly with excitement. It’s a comforting feeling, far different than the heart-pounding excitement all morning. I can’t wait to see what tomorrow brings!