"Y-you know, I never really expected to be using those dance lessons we learned so quickly."
Selene said as she drank the 3 aether potions Aiden had given her as a booster to keep her arm normal for longer.
"Im more surprised by how much Thalia was willing to spend on these dresses, especially beatrices."
I said as I looked over to Beatrice and Thalia. Beatrice seemed to be not fond of the idea of the dress Thalia had bought her, it had been fitted well, but considering that Beatrice had never worn clothes tighter than the string of a cloak when it rains around her neck, she was probably struggling with the sudden lack of mobility.
"Sit still, if so much as one of those stitches breaks, I'm charging you for it!"
Thalia hissed, a strange level of animateness on her face as it seems money would drive her to emotion in a way she normally wasn't. She pulled the strings on the back of Beatrice's dress as she pinned her down, Beatrice's claws left small lines in the wooden floor as she hissed with the increasing tightness of the dress.
It was at times like this a pang of jealousy rose up for the guys in our group. After we had been released from the opening ceremony that Aiden and jax apparently thought was our first round of actual events, they had gone back to the inn and taken a proper bath. Spent around like 3 hours resting with Aiden doing some alchemy and Jax napping. They then went to grab lunch, came back, 2 more hours or rest, before getting changed and ready in 20 minutes despite 10 of those minutes being suit shopping, and SOMEHOW looking good.
In contrast, after the opening ceremony we had immediately gone to a dress shop, got sized, came back, bathed, applied makeup, fitted the dresses, decided between jewelry, helped explain some concepts of fashion to Beatrice, and we were only just wrapping up. It was rather frustrating to say the least.
Despite my complaining, I did feel a bit better when Aiden and Jax were both slack jawed when we came out of our rooms.
Yes, YES, fawn over me, this is 6 hours of work, let it be known!
I thought as I stepped headed downstairs portion of the inn to see a few looks from people. It also helped that because we were sort of guests of honor, they had sent a fancy vehicle to pick us up. Though the experience was a bit dulled by everyone focusing on the wrong parts of the ride itself.
"Its so smooth, what kind of metal do they use for the springs I wonder?"
"I-I bet its enchanted, maybe they can be heated or cooled by the driver to adjust for terrain severity."
Aiden and Selene said, both looking at the floor with awe struck expressions.
"Holy cow, my fur practically vanishes into this fabric, I could go through a full shed and nobody would know."
"Plus the fabric is so soft, if we got some for the ATV we would never have to clean again."
Jax and Beatrice said, pawing occasionally at the seats. I looked out the window where people were watching us as I felt a bit relieved, knowing that they didn't seem to see my party members impressed over weird aspects of this whole ride. I at least wasn't alone as Thalia seemed to be composed, sitting calmly as if trying to space out despite Aiden and Selene next to her. I understood the feeling, but in a way it was comforting to see someone acting somewhat normal about this.
As we approached the venue I saw a massive ornate marble building with other similar vehicles dropping people off inside as they seemed to be some of the other adventuring teams. Some wore clothes as fancy as ours, while others seemed content to just wear their adventuring gear with a few accessories. They left weapons out for obvious reasons but I was curious to see what they used to stop people from using skill based weapons, like Selene's claws, or if it was a courtesy thing.
Heading up the marble stairs, there was a shift in atmosphere that reminded the rest of us of our grueling training with instructor Lily back at the Therindor estate. Beatrice on the other hand seemed nervous by how out of place she probably felt, though going from the woods, to a fancy party in a dress costing 5000 gold, I don't blame her for being worried about doing something wrong or out of place.
Walking beside us up the steps was another group of 6. They wore nice clothes, but they wern't overly fancy or stylish as they glanced over and waved to us.
Leading there group was a taller human, around 6'4 or so with a mustache and a short beard around his chin. He seemed to have a bit of stomach, but it seemed to come more from muscle than fat as he had a build like a seasoned farmer or miner. He wore a navy suit that seemed somewhat off color wise, but that might have been because of it being tight in some spots. He seemed to be talking to a dwarven man at his side who had a head and beard of black hair so thick you could only see his nose, and the area around his eyes. His beard was combed and braided in a seemingly extensive way as he wore a simple black suit that fit him like a glove. His hands were oddly muscular, in the kind of way you only see with craftsmen. Behind them an elven woman walked, a head of long seemingly dyed cyan hair ran to her middle back as she wore a regal looking cyan dress that looked to have cost what the others clothes cost combined. Small gemstones here and there. Her eyes had a strange blue glow to them as strangely enough, she wore a small satchel that contained what seemed to be a book of some kind. Behind her a lightblood fox woman with orange hair tied in a pony tail and wearing a simple dress skirt and nice shirt was wrestling with her collar like she might pop a button. Preventing said button from popping was a human man in priestly blue robes who was wrestling with her.
"Its *grunt* too tight.*hiss*"
"No, its *grunt* not, we are not *strain* buying you another shirt for this thing, you *hiss* broke the last 3 because you said they were too tight."
The two of them said as they argued. Following behind them watching the pair bicker was a fullblood brown bear wearing a simple bowtie. He seemed amused by the pair fighting as he stood on his hind legs, and walked around as if he had practiced this. Something that Aiden's friend Larz didn't seem to think was as important.
As we made our way to the door, a crier called out.
"Now arriving are the party of Hogs feet, and Leftovers and Co."
We both turned to the other group with what I can only assume was a matching expression with the silent question of
"Thats your party's name?"
We ended up heading in as Aiden and Jax seemed to split off to go talk to the other two we had heard had been woken up with them in the lingering dungeon and the rest of their party. Who consisted of an elven woman with a blonde pixie cut in a set of formal pants and a simple white button up. A spider fullblood that was the size of Jax wearing a small vest, and oddly enough a figure who was wearing all black with a mask that seemed to have a strange beak of some kind like a crow who was wearing a strange thing around his waist like a ring to keep people from getting close to him. This would have struck me as odd if not for deep green ribbon tied around his arm that marked him as the plague class.
One of the other type classes that use disease as their core energy, they have a passive aura that causes damage and rot around them, as such they wear a green ribbon somewhere visible as a way to warn people not to get too close, but it seems like they also have the protection of the circle around themselves in case someone is shuffled in a crowd I guess. I watched them as I stood near the drinks table, Thalia with me as I heard a strange noise, a noise almost like... a pig.
I felt a small tug at my dress as I refused to look down, but felt my face tense into a forced smile.
"Thalia, pray tell why is Sir oinks a lot at such an ornate party?"
Thalia refused to look my way as I turned to see her staring ahead stone faced. I looked down at the small piglet, his little can on his head like a makeshift helmet as he looked up at me, his little tail wagging as he made small snorting noises.