Side Story- How Sonya met Falk part one

Author's note

Hey all, here's the first part of your side story for the month. It's gonna be four parts total and I'll be releasing one each day as I do some final adjustments so hope you enjoy! Special thanks for giving me the pick this time because I've had the rough idea for this since I started doing these polls almost a year ago and this option kept not getting chosen. Let's see, other than that I'll have the actual chapter for the day posted in a few hours and the poll up after these four chapters are all out, so without further ado enjoy and happy holidays!

“This is a terrible idea. In every way that matters, it’s just downright dumb.”

“No matter how many times you tell me that Sonya, we aren’t going back. What’s the matter with a deep expedition?” Pelenia asked as they walked through the depths of the untamed lands.

As residents of a gate city, they weren’t able to get much work as adventurers unless they went through, hunting and collecting materials that requests had gone up for, but until then they’d always stuck to the shallows, able to get home without much trouble. Now, after venturing a few days from the gate with even more till they reached their destination, collecting some herb an alchemist was willing to pay out the nose for, they lacked the safety of any area that would be constantly thinned out, instead venturing farther into its depths where anything could be waiting to strike.

“The matter is the fact that I think one or both of us is going to die coming out here like this,” She said with a sigh, happy to complain her heart out as they went. She knew her sister would have gone by herself if she didn’t join along. Pelenia was just too free-spirited like that, as annoying as it was.

Or maybe I should just admit it’s carelessness and beat some sense into her.

Not that she ever would, as tempting as her sister made the option. She was always being dragged into her whims, for good or for bad. Even becoming an adventurer as soon as they’d been able to a year prior was an impulse from Pelenia, admittedly designed to keep them fed which she couldn’t argue against, but then it fell to Sonya to figure out all of the expenses of the act.

Renting a cheap spatial bag, buying a cheap pair of brass knuckles for the both of us, we’re able to save on food at least by doing some foraging while we’re out here, no matter how much it might suck so there’s that at least, but none of that compares to the rental price of-

In an instant, Sonya’s hands were on her sister, holding her in place to keep the girl from carelessly spinning around as they walked as if they were going through the city instead of a place where carelessness could get them killed.

“Hey, what are you-”

“Pelenia,” She said coldly, silencing the girl with her voice. “Do you know how much what you’re wearing costs?”

“Um-”

“Of course you don’t, don’t think I didn’t notice you not paying attention as I rented them for us. Even with as old as they are, tearing a fanet’ail cloak will wipe out any profit we can get from this, not to mention I’d have to leave you out here while getting another. Is that something you want to deal with?” She asked very clearly as she pulled her sister’s head, making her watch as she oh-so-carefully unstuck the one she’d been wearing from a branch. Something Pelenia had completely missed as they went.

“Okay, okay, my bad. You don’t have to be so grumpy about it though.”

Letting out a long sigh, she did her best to ease up on her sister, even if the girl never made it feel like a good idea. “If you didn’t show again and again that you only listen to what I’m trying to say when I’m stern with you then I wouldn’t need to take these things so seriously. Now come on, try and actually pay attention to the surroundings and let’s get this done as fast as possible.”

---

The days rolled by one by one until they made it to the approximate area they’d been told they might find what they were looking for. Despite Sonya’s concerns, the journey out had been less dangerous than she’d expected. They’d had a few times where they’d stopped to hide as they heard noises coming farther out in the woods, preferring to avoid any danger beyond their skills, but so long as nothing happened on the way back they’d be fine, all they had to do was find what they’d come for, so with the goal set they began their search.

They stuck close together, Sonya still hesitant to give too much trust to the good luck they’d had so far as they searched the ground, trying to find what they needed.

“Sonya, by your feet,” Her sister pointed out, stopping her from crushing the star-shaped herb they’d specifically come out for.

“Oh, my bad,”

“Ha, looks like it’s my time to shine,” Pelenia said, a glint in her eye as she ran off ahead.

“Hey, don’t-”

“It’s fine, besides, this is my forte,”

Well, I can’t exactly argue with that.

Her sister was consistently better than her at gathering quests, typically finding four or five times more of whatever they’d be looking for as they went out, but then Sonya more viewed her role in their little party to be the act of keeping them alive and making sure her sister remembered to eat whenever she was lost in her own little world.

And on that note, I should try and get us lunch.

Even if there were no major threats nearby, that didn’t mean a lack of animals entirely, and while she wasn’t the best at spotting things for gathering, Sonya had a good eye for movement, and despite how much louder her sister was than she should have been considering where they were, she quickly spotted something close by that hadn’t taken the chance to flee while it could.

Whatever the creature was, it was a mistake it wouldn’t make again. Light on her feet, she rushed to cover the distance to it, giving it as few signs as it could that she was coming before she lunged, grabbing the creature with her hands and giving a sharp twist, ending its life and securing them protein, even if it wouldn’t be much for two.

But what even is this thing? She wondered after getting a good look. Seven legs, five eyes, and a patchwork of fur and scales, Sonya was well aware that the ecosystem of the untamed lands was chaotic to say the least, creatures from hundreds of worlds living there after hitching rides with the mortals the gods had saved, and it resulted in a range of body structures, with not all of them necessarily being safe for consumption.

Well, I guess I’m taste testing so hopefully Pelenia’s life magic can handle it. She thought as she looked it over, even as her instincts screamed out that she wasn’t going to like the experience.

Of course, when it came to those instincts it was never a good idea for a person to listen to them when it came to unfamiliar food. A race that originally came from a world where some traits were shown to be fine for them could mean a quick death on another, and vice versa.

Hmm, I mean, succubi have a pretty good range of what we can handle compared to others and we’ve been eating whatever we found so far without any issues, but this looks so freaking weird. Should I just try and catch something else? Could always keep this as a backup…

Feeling herself hesitate, she turned to Pelenia, wanting her opinion as she saw both how far her sister had wandered with her eyes glued to the ground, as well as a rustling in the bushes to her side.

The question of their meal forgotten, this time she let her body be carried by those same instincts she’d doubted before, throwing herself to the girl with as much force as she could, pushing her sister out of the way as something tore into Sonya’s flesh.

She didn’t have the leeway to process whatever it was, as she shoved Pelenia out of the way the creature had taken her as an easy target instead. Claw dug through her skin but she did her best to ignore the feeling, instead focusing on her fists as she plunged them into the creature again and again as it pinned and scratched at her, feeling the metal of her knuckles tear through flesh and hit bone as she struck until it decided she was more effort then it was worth and tried to run off.

“Not letting you!” She yelled, trying to stop it, not only to get whatever money the kill would grant them, but to ensure it didn’t come back, but she couldn’t muster the strength. She was all but stuck to the ground she’d tried so desperately to push off of, looking down to try and see what held her in place and finding the severity of her injuries.

“Sonya stay still!” Her sister yelled, rushing to her side and placing her hands on the wound to use her magic, all while Sonya did her best not to scream. “God’s above, there’s so much blood, just don’t move!”

“Not so loud,”

“And no backtalk from you while I’m healing you!” She snapped back in her panic, immediately regretting it as she did. “I’m so sorry I should have been paying more attention but there was so much around and I was thinking of how much we’d make and I didn’t notice anything and-”

“Pelenia,” She spoke through clenched teeth, trying to keep her voice strong to get her sister's full attention. “Just focus on the healing.”

---

Hours passed as Pelenia carefully closed all of the major injuries, repairing the damage to her abdominal muscles that thankfully didn’t make its way to her organs, as Sonya focused on the minor ones that she knew she could manage herself before she was out of danger, though far from good shape as she laid there, light-headed and exhausted from the blood loss. Worse than any injury to her though was the damage to the cloak, and just what it meant for them.

“Well, there goes whatever we made from this outing,” She said in defeat. “Pelenia, I’ll wait here, you have to go get me a new one.”

“What, are you insane! That means leaving you alone here for two weeks to get it while you’re like this! I’m not good enough to do much for your blood loss either, you’re in no state to be left here!”

“Calm down. I’ll lay low, it will be fine. I can’t go back without a cloak anyway so you need to do this.”

“Then you take mine and I’ll wait here!”

“Okay, first of all if you don’t stop yelling everything I really am going to hit you, but more importantly not only would I take longer getting back like this, but it’s more likely something will happen to me on the way. Then what? You wait out here forever while I’m dead?”

“Don’t talk like that.”

“Sorry, but you get the point. You’ll be able to handle this faster than me. Also, it shouldn’t take you two weeks if you hurry unless you’re planning on taking your sweet time,” She tried to tease, even if her sister didn’t appreciate it.

“If you at least come partway with me…”

“The closer we get to the gate the more likely we are to run into others. I don’t know about you, but I’d rather not risk running into anyone who might take offense to feeling any charm I give off.”

Pelenia grimaced. Even if no one nation ruled over the untamed lands, that didn’t mean the more major laws didn’t come into play, including ones about inflicting people with mental effects. There were plenty of rumours of succubi having accidents just like this and the people around them acting violently to try and avoid the effects that came with being charmed.

“I’ll be fine,” She said, doing her best to give a reassuring smile. “Leave the bag and then I’ve got both our emergency food and tent so I’ll manage. I can try to work on healing myself a bit in the meantime.”

“Zeroth-level life magic is going to do basically nothing to help with the blood loss, and we don’t have two weeks of emergency food.”

“Again, what’s with this two weeks you keep saying? Run and cut back on sleep and I’m sure you’ll be back here in ten days tops. Push yourself for me a bit, would you?”

“That’s not the point.”

“Sure it is. I’ll use this time to try and improve my magic a bit so it will be fine, there’s a world of difference between it being basically useless and actually useless so don’t worry so much.”

Her sister was still clearly against it but didn’t see any other choice in the end, so after moving her sister from where she’d been attacked to what they both hoped would be a safer area she ran off as fast as she could, leaving Sonya to face the woods by herself for the days to come.

Author's note, the sequeling

I wonder how many of you expected Sonya to have more of a white mage role in her party since I've never elaborated much about her adventurer days in the main story. That was kind of an intentional choice that I'm sure Ben will be plenty shocked about as well when it finally comes up