Truffle McCabe teleported into the open square of Camp Drybone, looked around, and cursed. "Gods damnit," she said, "This fucking place again! Fuuuuuuck!"
It was raining in the desert, and a thin layer of dust was being whipped around by spring winds, moistened, tumbled, and transformed into a flying spray of mud. Within seconds of her arrival, her pants and boots were caked.
Glock McLargehuge teleported into the open square of Camp Drybone. Dirt pinged off his polished greaves and gauntlets, and the wind tousled his glorious dark mane. "Oh, hey Truffle," he said. "You wanna go do some quests?"
"Yes, let's do some quests," she said. "Please, let's just get out of this place as fast as we possibly can. Ugh. I fucking hate Camp Drybone."
Truffle held her chocobo whistle in both hands and produced a long, dissonant note. From somewhere unseen her chocobo, Kevin, materialized. Truffle climbed upon Kevin's back in a single practiced move, a hybrid hop-kick, and grabbed his reins. He trotted in place but held patiently to his corner of the square; Kevin would not think to leave without a direct command from Truffle. Chocobos were magical bird-beasts, accustomed to all manner of inclement weather and rough handling from their masters, and nothing if not perfectly obedient.
Glock blew his whistle and summoned his chocobo. Despite the roegadyn's enormous size, the bird-beast was more than capable of carrying his weight. The chocobo knelt down to accept its master, and together, Glock and Truffle rode off into the desert.
To the other folk of Camp Drybone, standing in their sheltering tents or doorways to avoid the sudden storm, the materialization of these two warriors was barely worth a comment. It was no understatement to say that, every day, a warrior would materialize in the square, summon an aetherial creature or two, and ride off into the desert. For them, this was business as usual, as common and predictable as sunrise.
However, this day was a remarkable one for Drippy Poseidon, for it was the first time he set eyes upon his guild-mates. For Drippy, too, had been standing there in the mud and rain. He had never been to Camp Drybone before; for him, this was all a new experience. And he was impressed!
Oh, Drippy could teleport and summon aetherial beings just like the others, and he had plenty of important quests to do, just like Truffle and Glock. But he hadn't yet obtained a chocobo, nor had he actually met another member of the Mighty Owlbears, the mysterious and shadowy organization that he had joined a few days earlier at the behest of Aladbross Siracha.
Wait, who?
Aladbross Siracha. You know, the miqo'te adventurer? Into fishing, a bit of a chef. Incredible sideburns? Hold on, I have a picture. Hm, well, it's not a good picture. But Aladbross is this guy.
Uh, yeah. He's a Mighty Owlbear, or rather, that's the name of his free company. His adventurer's guild. His secret society. Whatever you want to call it.
Drippy had known Aladbross for ages, well before Camp Drybone, but had only worked with him recently, when the two of them were hired to solve a problem for the good people of Gridania. That problem was a wackadoo bunch of kidnappers and killers called the Lambs of Dalamud. The Lambs had pledged their undying obedience to some sort of evil squid wizard, and were planning on doing gods-know-what to the poor people of Gridania. Typical wackadoo cult stuff.
They hadn't counted on us.
Drippy and Aladbross worked well as a team, and they were, in all honesty, very similar people: Armored wanderers with short attention spans and an almost maniacal zest for new experiences. Joining the Owlbears seemed like a natural thing to do, and so Aladbross extended the invitation, and Drippy gladly accepted.
"Gotta warn you, though," Aladbross said, "Our leader's insane."
"You probably won't meet Worfina Klingdragon for a while. She's off right now adventuring in another dimension. She's got a grudge against this immortal black dragon, and she kills him every Tuesday. Weird stuff. Also, she uses her phone to take screenshots, so that's a thing. You'll get used to it. We've all gotten used to it."
"Fair enough," Drippy said. "I've got a whole world of adventure head of me, and if that's the strangest thing--
"It's not."
"Oh. Um, well, okay. I'll take note of that."
"Also," Aladbross continued, "You'll really want to get a chocobo. Like, I get that we're both doing quests right now for the government of Gridania, and the grand companies, and the culinarians, and all those other people, but really, honestly, you gotta get a chocobo. It's life-changing. Do whatever you gotta do to make that happen."
"Noted."
He did note it. And he did what needed to be done. Drippy traveled far from the forests of Gridania, across wind-wracked seas to the deserts of ancient Thanalan. He rescued damsels, slew inhuman beasts, fought side by side with the Immortal Blades of Ul'dah, and held court with admirals and sultanas, sorceresses and spymasters before he found his prize.
But that is another tale, for another time.
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