Chương 121: Chapter 119: The Impossible Dream

We do stop at the next village, just a few hours later. It's not much of a town. Mostly it's just an inn, a blacksmith, and a few farms. Maybe a dozen total families. A way station as much as a village. We go into the inn, where a silver haired innkeeper gives us a crinkly smile.

"Please, come in," she says, her voice worn out from decades of use.

"Make yourselves comfortable. I'll bring you drinks." We settle into a table. We're the only ones in the common room right now. It's a nice inn, well appointed and well taken care of. The tables are polished, the chairs are comfortable, and the mugs she brings over are well made and clearly only lightly used. The whole thing makes me think that this inn hasn't been around for all that long. It doesn't quite have that lived in feel. There are no chips in the mugs, no scratchings on the tables.

The seats don't wobble, and there aren't any scuff marks on the floor.

"This is a nice place," Ash says as the woman brings over a tray of drinks. It smells like cider, and I'm eager to drink it. I feel like all I've had to drink in several days has been water, and a bit of flavor is very appealing.

"Thank you dear," the woman says.

"My husband and I just built this place a few years back." That explains the newness. I wonder if there was even a town back then, before the inn. It feels like the inn is what holds this whole village together.

"Why don't you join us, grandmother," Vincent says, giving her a wide smile. He looks around.

"Doesn't seem like you have much other business right now to demand your attention." She settles into another chair, pulling it up to the table and sitting down with the groan of someone who has spent many years in their body, and has come to certain agreements with it for the peace of all.

"We don't get many adventurers through these parts," she says.

"Usually it's just merchants passing through on their way to Marketplace."

"That's where we've come from, most recently," Ash says. The woman smiles and looks at Ash.

"Yes, I can tell," she says.

"You're outworlders, aren't you?"

"Is it that obvious?" I ask, giving her as warm a smile as I can manage.

"You're a different breed," she says, shrugging.

"There's something about you that sets you all apart. It's just a sensation that you give off."

"Like a vibe?" El asks.

"An aura," the woman corrects.

"You don't see the world the same way as the rest of us. Because the world is different for you than it is for us." She must mean the way that we come back from the dead. Which seems like as good a segue as any.

"Have you met any others like us recently?" I ask.

"Any others heading away from Marketplace?" She nods.

"You come through every so often," she says.

"Usually with coin to spend and simple desires to be met. Good food, comfortable beds, that sort of thing." This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

"Is that why you built the inn in the first place?" El asks. The woman shakes her head.

"There's always been an inn here," she says.

"But a few years ago, the one that had stood here since I was a little girl burned down. We weren't sure what we were going to do, until my husband, gods bless him, decided that he would rebuild. The whole town came together to help."

"That's a lovely story," Gigi says.

"Neighbors helping neighbors. It's a good thing." The woman shrugs.

"It's the way of the world," she says.

"You can't go through life only caring about yourself. You have to help others so that they'll help you. That's what society is."

"So the others passing through," I say, trying to bring the conversation back to the god slayer.

"Have any passed through recently? Like in the past few days or weeks?"

"Oh, sure," she says.

"Like I said, you come through every so often. I'm starting to get used to it. It's only been a few months since your kind showed up, after all."

"That must be strange for you," Vincent says.

"Having all these outworlders show up all at once."

"Not all at once," she says.

"More of a trickle through, over the course of several months. Maybe a full year." Has it really been a full year since the first of our kind came through? Has our world been ending for a full year? It seems like it's been ending a lot longer than that, so maybe.

"Anyone traveling alone?" Ash asks.

"An adventurer, like us, but all by themselves?" The woman nods. She gets up and walks over to the bar, coming back with a pitcher of cider to help refill our glasses.

"Aye, there was one," she says.

"Came through maybe a week ago."

"Was she a high level?" I ask. The woman nods.

"High enough that she didn't have to worry about traveling alone," she says. She looks at us each in turn.

"Higher than any of you." Gigi blushes at the comment. I'm guessing she's not happy being the lowest level among us.

"Do you remember what she looked like?" I ask.

"Sure, sure," the woman says.

"I remember what everyone who comes through here looks like. She was tall, with flowing dark hair. Looked almost human, but not quite. Like there was something else hiding in her blood. Kind of like you," she says, gesturing at Gigi.

"She had this edge of animal to her. Nice woman, though. Paid well." I don't know if that's a hint that we should be giving her money or not. Gigi seems to think it is, as she pulls out a pouch and sets it on the table with an audible clink of the coins within.

"Did she say anything about where she was going?" I ask. She has to be talking about the god slayer. Even if the old woman didn't give us conflicting descriptions, she still has to be talking about her.

"She was on a quest," the woman says, seeming to settle into a role for a moment.

"She said she was seeking out an impossible dream." I'm briefly reminded of the Man of LaMancha. To dream the impossible dream.

"What dream was that?" I ask. The old woman shakes her head.

"That she didn't say. She just kept saying she was seeking the impossible dream. I asked her where she was headed, and she just said she was seeking the setting sun." So west. The direction we're going. Maybe we're not just chasing dragons after all. I look around at the others.

"Thank you," I say to the woman.

"You've been very helpful." We all rise as one. Gigi starts shuffling through the little sack of party funds to find the appropriate amount of money to leave behind.

"You're not staying for a meal?" the woman asks, her eyes going wide in a bit of panic.

"Or for the night?" It's barely past noon. We're probably going to walk for another five or six hours tonight.

"No, thank you," Gigi says, pressing a few coins into the woman's hand.

"We're on a bit of a schedule. But we appreciate your time very much."

"Oh, all right then," the old woman says, giving her a smile that seems a bit painted on.

"Well, if you change your mind, I've got rooms enough for all of you." We give her a wave as we leave, re-energized to keep going west. Ideally, we'd get confirmation from someone else in town, but everyone else is busy working. It's early in the afternoon, and the farms require attention. So we don't stop anyone else to ask them. There's really not much reason to, anyway; I doubt the god slayer took the time to talk to the random people working the field when she walked through.

So we leave the town and start hurrying down the road, looking for the next sign of the god slayer.