During the week, Yunan and the others barely left the room, they looked tired and haggard. Fae would come by every day and order the kids around for while before she leaves them well fed and cleaned up, even Drogon seemed like he lost his appetite during the time the juniors were depressed.
"We are still too fragile, i thought that we had steeled our hearts after going through so much" Reina said the first voluntary words the kids spoke since they returned. "Maybe we are still too young, you know. no matter how hard we try to be adults we are not adults yet after all" she just voiced her thoughts to no one in particular.
"I think we chose the right thing by not meddling with things above our own tolerance, I would rather feel down and depressed than turn into a monster before i know it" Leol also did the same. " I am glad we have been taught by those idiots. At least they did not treat us like kids and tried to protect us, they treated us like they would their own."
"Well Friday is tomorrow, whatever big thing they are trying to get us into, i think it would be a good distraction. I owe Lili a hug too, i was wrong. I now understand why Lili was right, we should just enjoy being kids as long as we can. Because adults don't have the luxury to walk away from the darkness." Yunan also made a point.
It was not a conversation or anything like that, it was just a few kids voicing out their inner thoughts with each other, there was no other purposes than just sharing what is in their minds.
"I think i deserve more hugs, well i need all of them, i need hugs when i wake up, i need to be hugged to sleep, and everything in between. i deserve it for lasting this long and staying sane, so all of you should hug me all the time." The response Lili got was not the affirmation she expected but a smiling "pervert".
After that the exchange turned into a talk about puberty and when it was going to hit and how it will change everything, it was amiable and jokes and laughs were exchanged for the first time in a week, maybe they are still not fully healed but its a start nonetheless.
When Friday morning came with the inevitable Fae invasion that marks every notable event, Fae was standing dumb at the doorway when she found the kids dressed up, and in the middle of trying to get Drogon to spit out something it was chewing on.
The kids followed after a sad Fae and fist bumped with Lucian, who was waiting outside. As revenge for not getting to dress up the kids she took over Reina and embraced her until they met the rest of Debauchery.
For once Balin was a bit fidgety and nervous, he had groomed his beard from whatever monstrosity Fae called a braid last night, he was dressed like proper gentleman. When he saw the kids he looked around them making sure they were dressed properly.
"We are heading to the lonely mountain, we will meet the masters of the Dwarven empire and Balin is nervous that something might go wrong, he has not been there in a while and if he can not impress the oldies he needs to make sure they won't be displeased with us" explained Dustan who, for the first time ever since the kids met him, did not look like an ugly orc but a handsome one instead.
Yunan passed his storage ring to Dustan "do me a favour and sell everything inside, we need so many monster corpses and cores to feed Drogon, today he was chewing on some globe with mana in it." Balin looked at the valyrian dragon angrily and reprimanded "never eat enchanted items, if you get hungry bite them until they feed you, got it?" Then he turned to Yunan and company "let's hurry to the guild, it time you got your own accounts and we can deal with the trash as well as the food in one go".
The trip to the guild was fast, all the kids had to do was fill out a form and that was it, next they met the banker and gave him their rings to appraise and liquidate into gold, the banker almost had a heart attack when he saw how big and how full the first ring he picked up was, he took a look at the other rings and actually had to take a moment to calm down. "There is too much, we can not appraise all these today so you have to leave them behind, follow me".
The banker led the party to an empty vault he estimated to be big enough "please empty your rings here" he instructed the kids who did as told and emptied their rings into the vault, a moment later the vault was bursting with the luster of treasured items and golden doubloons, while the banker betrayed a look of greed from his eyes. "It will take a few days for us to verify its worth, please be patient" he said while obviously gulping the greed away.
Dustan fixed the man with a good old orcish stare and the greed vanished and was replaced by integrity, afterwards the party bought all the monster corpses present in the guild at that moment, Before teleporting to their destination the literal doorstep of the lonely mountain, the last abode the Dwarven masters chose for their best forging and home for their best works across the years.
At the doorstep there were two Dwarves who looked like metal statues, the were what you expect to see when you hear the expression 'armed to the teeth'. After examining the arriving party they nodded towards Balin who led the party between the two guards and into the gate that was built on the face of the mountain