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Chapter 153: About Olive

“Assholes,” Rodrick said. “It wasn’t your fault.”

Olive arched an eyebrow and a small smile pulled across her lips before falling away. “I appreciate you trying to make me feel better, Rodrick, but it was my fault. I accepted the Challenge. If I hadn’t, I would have been able to back Jason up and he wouldn’t have gotten killed. I wouldn’t have lost my arm.”

She’s not wrong. If she’d communicated to the others about her Challenge, that fight would have gone differently. They might have even won.

“His death may be because of the Challenge, but you had no way of knowing that would be how it turned out,” Arwin said. “You made a mistake, but you can’t let it hang over you forever.”

“I won’t,” Olive said, but it took her a moment longer than normal to answer Arwin. “The point is you need to stay away from Challenges. They’re curses. If you get an option to accept one, you need to deny it. The Mesh will wait until you’re at the worst possible spot and then spit on you while you’re down.”

“Whatever happened to your Challenge?” Anna asked. “Do you still have it?”

“No.” Olive shook her head. “And good riddance. It already took one of my arms. I don’t need to lose more. I haven’t seen anything from the Challenge ever since I woke up on the sand. I have to imagine the Mesh just decided I deserved nothing and took it away. But Reya… can you still refuse the Challenge?”

“I didn’t have an option,” Reya said. “The Mesh just gave it to me.”

Olive’s face paled. “What is it? What are the risks?”

“It hasn’t said anything about that. I’m just meant to find a way to master Wyrmhunger. It doesn’t say there are any consequences or anything like that.”

“That probably just means they’re hidden.” Olive’s voice had more than just a note of bitterness in it.

“Mine does,” Arwin said. “But, unlike what you were offered, mine is tied directly to my survival.”

“What? How?”

“I have a… condition,” Arwin said slowly. “It’s from my class. Yes, I can make magical items, but that isn’t without cost. I have to consume them as well. One every few days.”

“Every few—” Olive cut herself off and swallowed. “You’re a walking gold sink.”

“And one that just keeps getting worse,” Arwin said with a nod. “My Challenge gave me a chance find a way to fix that. Granted, the consequences of failing it are just straight up death. I suppose that balances it a bit.”

He hesitated for a second. There were a lot of things he felt he could have said about Olive’s story, but most of them came from experience that he’d yet to reveal. Experience he wasn’t so sure he wanted to reveal.

It didn’t help that nobody was speaking. They’d all fallen silent. Reya’s fingers twitched as she seemed to debate if putting a comforting hand on Olive’s shoulder would be appropriate. Rodrick and Anna looked indignant on Olive’s behalf, and Olive just looked concerned.

To be honest, from what Olive just told us, her former group doesn’t even sound that great. It’s hard to fully judge someone from just a short snippet of a story, but they didn’t seem like they really cared all that much about her. Then again, she clearly returned the sentiment. I suppose it doesn’t matter. Mentioning that won’t help anyone.

“You aren’t alone,” Arwin said, finally finding his words. “And even if you say you aren’t blaming yourself, you can’t take responsibility for others. I may have done the same thing you did if I’d been in your shoes.”

“That’s the reason I’m telling you this. Challenges aren’t worth it if you can avoid them. They’re just asking for the Mesh to lay a trap for you. Don’t make the same mistake I did.”

“You only made one mistake,” Arwin said. “And it wasn’t failing to stop the golem’s sword.”

Olive’s hand tightened at her side. “What was it, then?”

“Not telling your group about the Challenge. I don’t know what dynamic you had with them, but it’s difficult to fight together with someone when you don’t know what they’re dealing with. That said, I don’t know what your relationship was with them. Perhaps telling them wasn’t an option.”

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Olive didn’t respond for a second. Then her shoulders curled forward and she let her hand loosen as she slumped forward and sighed. “It wasn’t. They wouldn’t have believed me. And, if they did, they would have been angry.”

“As I said. Assholes,” Rodrick said.

“Not the time,” Anna muttered. “Saying that doesn’t help anyone.”

“Then you did what you could,” Arwin said. He was all too aware of all the secrets he was still holding close to his own chest. The hypocrisy of his words wasn’t completely lost on him, but the one saving grace was that his secrets weren’t going to directly affect the outcome of a fight. “You’re only as good as the people around you.”

Even if Arwin had wanted to reveal the rest of his secrets now, he couldn’t quite bring himself to. Any talk of the Hero or demon queen after Olive had just shared something that personal just felt like it would overshadow her.

“I guess you’re right,” Olive said, shaking her head. “In the end, that isn’t what this is about. I wasn’t trying to get pity. I was warning you about Challenges.”

“We’ll be careful. As careful as we can be, at least. If we want to be safe, then we need to be strong. The key to advancing is the appropriate amount of risk. Not too much. Not too little. Just enough that we can all handle it.” Arwin said. “And, if we’re working together, we can take on risks that we can’t bear on our own, such as Jessen and his Wyrms.”

Olive gave Arwin a small smile and inclined her head. “Wise words.”

Something about her tone told Arwin that she didn’t quite buy what he’d said, but that was fine. He didn’t expect Olive to come around right off the bat. It would have been odd if she did. He’d certainly needed more time to come to terms with things himself, and it wasn’t fair to force her to higher standards.

“Maybe we should get the blood moving,” Rodrick suggested, sliding down from his chair and unwrapping Anna from their blanket bundle. “Who’s coming with Anna and I to bring shit back from the forest?”

“I’ll come,” Olive said.

“I’ll focus on making us money,” Arwin said, nodding toward the door of the tavern. “My smithy is waiting for me.”

“What about you?” Anna asked with a look to Reya.

“I’ll stay back and help for a bit,” Reya said. “If you guys need more help, I’ll head out and meet you later.”

“Sounds good.” Rodrick piled the sheets on a stool and gave her a sharp salute before joining Anna and Olive in heading out into the street.

They had the right idea. The day was still young and a certain anvil was calling to Arwin. He nodded to Reya and headed out himself. There was still quite a bit that he wanted to make and he had a number of materials to work with.

And a number of materials to figure out how to work with. I’ve got Jessen’s armor… I’m not sure what I’m going to do with it, but I’ll be damned if I don’t make it work for me. That’s not to mention all the bug bits and Wyrmling scales. I’m mostly out of Brightsteel again, but I do have my Maristeel and around 300 gold with what I got from Jessen.

Arwin continued to muse to himself as he headed back to his new smithy and unlocked the door with the key. The anvil sat in anticipation beside his hearth, just waiting for him to start his next project — but the stone building was empty.

Ah. Have to get all my materials and bring them over.

That took just a few minutes, and he soon had everything piled into a corner and waiting expectantly for him to get back to work. There were a number of different items that were on his urgent-make list.

Gauntlets and greaves for himself. A reusable arrow. Armor for all the others. Objects to sell, and more items to eat in general. He’d gone through most of his bracelet supply as well. Those had proven invaluable for short boosts in fights.

It really is odd that I get more use from drawing all the power out of them at once rather than using them normally, but one method uses magical energy and the other doesn’t. Inefficient but powerful. Can’t complain.

He thought for a few more seconds. As it stood, everyone was starting to become quite powerful in their own right — and especially for their tier. Anna definitely needed armor the most out of everyone, but she needed something reallylight, even more so than Lillia’s gear had been.

What she really needs is leather. I don’t think she’s going to be well suited to walking around in anything I normally make.

He would try, of course, but he didn’t have high hopes for it. Perhaps if he found something that gave a trait that lightened something. Until then, the strongest net positive he could make would probably be an arrow. Until he had one, his bow was useless.

The bow’s already half-made of Maristeel anyway. Might as well finish that bit up.

Arwin summoned a ball of [Soul Flame] and tossed it into his new hearth. He took a second to appreciate it before picking up a piece of Maristeel and starting to polish the grime off it.

He got no more than a few minutes into his work before he realized that someone else was standing in the room. That was something of a surprise, as he was normally pretty bad at noticing just about anything while he was working.

Arwin turned to see Reya standing in the corner of the room. She shifted uncomfortably from foot to foot, then noticed that Arwin had spotted her.

“What’s going on?” Arwin asked, still scraping at the Maristeel. There was no reason not to multitask.

“I wanted to ask your advice.”

“Ah. About the Challenge?” Arwin asked. “I’m not sure how much I can say, but I meant what I told Olive. I don’t know what the Mesh’s goals are beyond generating challenge, but as long as we handle things as a team, I think we can get through them.”

Reya pulled her dagger free and idly rolled it across her knuckles. “Yeah. Uh… that’s not really what I wanted to ask about. I mean, I agree, but that wasn’t it.”

“Oh.” Arwin glanced away from the Maristeel. “What is it?”

“It’s about Olive. I’m not sure what I’m meant to do. You had good advice last time, so I was hoping you could help again.”