The siblings looted the bodies hastily and ran out of the town into the nearby forest, both shaken up by how many people they have just killed, and the fact that they nearly died.
"What do we do now?" Janica nervously asked James, her eyes slowly filling up with tears. "I don't want to die, and I don't want to start killing people either. I know you're okay with killing, but I really don't want to do it myself. James, the guild randomly tried to kill us, what if they do it again!? The pop up literally labeled the guild as evil, we've only been here a few days, what do we d-" Janica was cut off by James hugging her.
"It'll be fine Janica, we're gonna find the bastards that tried to assassinate us and kick their ass. I mean like this is the first quest pop up we've gotten so far, so it should lead us to the main culprit right?"
Janica plopped down next to a tree, trying to calm her breathing. James sat next to her, sitting in silence as the two of them tried to figure out what to do next.
"Well we shouldn't just sit here." James said, getting up. "We should start going to another town, this one isn't safe for us. Let me check the map and start heading there now."
Janica and James headed down a dirt road, heading down to the next town. The road was no longer in tall grassy fields, and instead was surrounded by trees and rocks, the typical forest. The sky was turning dark, and the smell of blood still stained the siblings' clothing.
Suddenly, the pair heard screaming nearby. The sounds of screaming were coming from a lit up cave, and the screaming was soon stopped.
"Should we check it out?" Janica said worriedly. "Sounds like the person screaming needed help!"
James grabbed Janica by the arm and rushed to the cave. When they reached the mouth of the cave, they saw shadows moving inside. James peaked a bit into the cave, and saw six men surrounding a chair with a guy strapped to it. The man was gagged and bloody, with cuts going down his arms and legs, but his clothes were surprisingly intact despite all of his injuries. The men surrounding him held bloody knives and also wore intact clothing.
"Haha, this guy screams like a girl, well boys, time to eat!"
Without thinking, James rushed inside, only to be tackled by someone standing guard on the inside of the cave. Janica, still outside, covered her mouth and watched in horror as James was tied up and dragged into a chair next to the other man.
"A kid? This guy won't have much meat on him, but we can surely make this work."
James was gagged and helpless in the chair, eyes wide in shock as the men held their knives at the ready.
Janica rushed in with a shield around herself and whacked the guard unconscious, then swung her staff at one of the men holding a knife, knocking it out of his hands. Janica hurriedly picked up the knife and stabbed a second man in the unmentionables, leading him to grasp at his pants and cut himself on the blade of the knife. Janica picked up his knife and kicked the second man in the face, turned to the third one a whacked him with the staff in one hand, and threw the knife at a fourth man. The two men that weren't injured lunged at Janica, only to bounce off of her shield. She quickly cut the bindings on James, who summoned a colt and shot the two remaining men. James pulled off his gag.
"Woo boy that was a bad idea of mine, now what to do with this guy?"
Janica cut the bindings off the captured guy, and he took off his gag.
"Thanks for saving me," The man said. "But you'll deeply regret that!"
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The man's clothes transformed into armor marked with a symbol the siblings didn't recognize. The man was now covered head to toe in red colored leather armor, with a hood disguising his face. He unsheathed a dagger that wasn't there before, and broke through Janica's shield, stabbing her in the stomach. James reacted quickly, summoning a shotgun and firing accurately at the man's chest, launching him backwards and killing him.
James rushed to his sister's side, checking the stab wound.
"Oof, that looks bad." James said quietly, looking at how much blood was leaking out.
Janica tried casting a healing spell on herself, but found that she had no energy left after using her shields. James pulled out a first aid kit he bought the day prior and covered the wound in bandages and gauze to stop the bleeding for now.
"I swear it's like everyone is trying to kill us for some reason. Janica, rest for now and when you get enough energy, heal yourself and let's get going."
The next day, Janica and James were walking silently towards the next village, still shaken up from the multiple assassination attempts that happened in only two days. They were nearing the next town when they spotted a group of people ahead of them.
"Do you think they're dangerous?" James asked, suspicious of the cloaked group ahead. "Surely cloaked figures are dangerous right?"
"They might be dangerous, so let's avoid them for now."
The siblings took a route around the group, and nearly avoided them until James stepped on a stick that gave off a comically loud cracking sound.
"SHIT SHIT SHIT, RUN JANICA!"
The group chased after the siblings and quickly caught up to them, only for James to turn around quickly and point a gun in their face.
"I KNOW YOU GUYS DON'T KNOW WHAT THIS IS, IT'S A HIGHLY DANGEROUS WAND, NOW I NEED YOU TO TURN AROUND AND WALK, OR THINGS WILL GET MESSY!"
The group looked at them under their hooded faces. The siblings couldn't tell what the group was gonna do, so they started slowly backing away. Suddenly the group pulled off their hoods and looked at the siblings with confused looks, throwing the pair off guard.
"Mate is this kid insane? You can't just point a highly dangerous wand at strangers you know!"
The group looked like a bunch of men in their mid 20's, all looking nearly identical to each other with similar clothing, beards, hairstyle, etc.
"Wait, so you're not evil?" James asked, still suspicious of them.
"Why would we be evil? Also why does a kid have a highly dangerous wand I've never seen before?"
James quickly apologized to the group before asking how far is the nearest town they were heading to.
After the group parted with the siblings, they were in a slightly smaller but still large town. The town was surrounded by tall forests and nice meadows, and was protected with a giant green forcefield like the previous town. There was no adventurers guild here, instead there was a building that could teleport people to locations for a price.
The siblings paid for a room in a tavern and immediately went to sleep, exhausted by recent events.
The next morning, James checked his phone and saw that the clock still looped. The battery was still 100% somehow, and the date wasn't showing. He checked out his message apps and saw none of them functioned correctly, he could only view previous messages. He checked Youtube to find out that it did indeed work, but there were no new videos he could access, only videos made before he arrived in this world. That was a relief for James though, since that would mean he has access to an app full of information that might be useful in a survival sense, tutorials, cooking videos, medical videos, etc.
Later in the day, the siblings were eating at a restaurant nearby. The food there was similar to diner food on Earth, but with meats they never heard of, so they stuck with eggs.
"Maybe I should learn my telekinesis spell." James told Janica. "I mean like maybe it'll be helpful later."
Janica was spaced out, so she didn't respond. "Oh, sorry James, I'm still thinking of something."
After breakfast the pair checked out the teleportation building. The building looked nothing like the wooden buildings nearby, and instead was a circular stone tower with pink lines running up and down it. At the bottom of the tower was a wooden door. The siblings stepped in and was greeted by the attendant behind the desk.
"Welcome to Tabatha's Teleportation Tower, I'm Tabatha, how can I be of assistance."
