Chapter 116 - 116. You See, You See... Overshot In Realm Of Mind

"Alright Rodney, according to Missus Macleod here, it seems agreeable to take all of you in as junior members. Since there are twenty of you here, where do you all sleep in the night?" I asked out of curiosity since I don't think they would be spending at the Tavern for the night and I wondered if they carried any camping gear to spend the night just like NoOne in the Northern Forest.

"We sleep around the sidewalks, the town square and if we get chased away by the patrol guards we would move aimlessly until we were heavy with sleep and rested anywhere we could."

"We are used to doing that and answering to your bubble thoughts, we do not have any camping equipment with us," Rodney replied with a resigned look on his face and the thoughts of the past few sleepless nights crossed his mind again.

"Ingles and Jane, would you mind sharing the bed with 2 of these girls each in your room?" I asked and they were more than delighted to do so. "That's settled then, the 4 girls may sleep in the room upstairs while all the boys would settle themselves on the main hall below. I will get some bedding, blankets and pillows for you tonight."

"Mister Macleod, there are actually six girls here and they are masked to hide their identities. They have a dark history and they joined us because they need to hide from the authorities. It's not that they were guilty of something but there were wronged and accused of something they never did." Rodney explained and the two girls exposed their faces by removing their masks and taking out the hood.

"Please forgive us for masking our identities, Mister Macleod. We were working in a household as a housemaid when one day a friend of our boss decided to do something fun with us, and we didn't even laugh at that time. So one morning, we both ended up sticking a butterknife each through his loaf of bread at breakfast and we ran off from the house."

"The girls are speaking the truth, pity the innocent loaf of bread. I'm sure it wasn't being sent to the infirmary immediately afterwards right? Tsk...Tsk...Tsk...such a tragic end for that loaf of bread. Don't worry about the loaves of bread here, I doubt they would take revenge against the brutality." Patricia assured me and the two newly exposed girls.

"Alright... Is there any more hidden girls in the group that we should be aware of?" I asked Rodney and he responded that there aren't anymore. "OK, Kayla... These brutal bread killers will be sharing your bed with you tonight ok? Do you have snacks that resemble like a bread? If you do then you better hide it well... I won't want them to have a case anymore with the loaves of bread."

"Don't worry Daddy, I've got no such snacks inside my storage bag except for some gum, lollies and lots of candies... Yyeeaayyy...."

"Oi... Oi... I don't want you to be a toothless Ranger-Assassin-Wizard ok? Remember to..."

"Hit hard, hit fast and kill swiftly and silently..." Kayla cut my sentence short as I was wagging my finger at her.

"Not that Kayla... Remember to brush your teeth before going off to bed..." I informed her in a resigned state and realised that she may have used all her allowance to pile up on all her goodies and snacks instead.

....

"So... Tomorrow all the twenty of them would swear allegiance on our Castle Keating-Macleod and would be a full-fledged junior member. I thought of getting out children to Level up to 5 before taking in new adventurers and definitely, those live in ones."

"But frankly, am I doing the right thing in a wrong manner or a wrong thing in the right manner?" I asked Patricia as I shrugged my shoulders, spread my hands and looked exasperatedly while she patted my chest and said, "You neither do the right thing nor the wrong thing, the most important thing is you follow your heart."

....

"Hii Hii Hii... Come let me show you the rooms" Kayla and Jane raced stairs and were followed by the 4 girls whom I had not named them in this chapter yet, while the other two girls followed behind Ingles and Adam slowly. They were elated that they were accepted by the Keating-Macleod by chance and were thankful towards their lucky stars.

Prius and Rebecca volunteered to let the 4 rooms upstairs to be shared by the other 14 boys as it would be unnecessary to purchase more bedding to put up with the accommodation.

At last 3 boys shared one room each while the other remaining two boys shared with Adam. He was delighted to have room buddies staying together with him and shared whatever belongings he had with them.

"We now have twenty adventurers under our wing and I think it would be enough for this moment. We have no other accommodations if we were to meet similar cases in the future. May God guide me in making the right choices for the moment. These junior members would likely be the backbone for many adventurers to join in months to come."

I finally said and arranged the right words to say and Patricia, Prius and Rebecca all claimed that the path that I had arranged was all preplanned by God Himself. "We arrange which paths we would be going, but God himself would determine where it would lead," Prius said as he places a gentle hand on my shoulder.

"Yeah... I guess so, my dear brother in law. God and his little Angels are sure looking after us right now under this Castle Keating-Macleod."

....

"Dear... I would be spending some time meditating tonight... I would away for some hours. You may check on me downstairs in my study... I would begin after supper." I said and Patricia nodded as she knew I was speaking the truth. I wonder if she knew I was bullshitting when I mentioned about the wisps that duplicated all the clothes from the Atelier, Blake's weapons and Bruce's trinkets.

*Ding* She knew all along, you fool... Hahaha hahaha hahaha...

"Haiyoo... This system is ever eavesdropping on me... Help me out to check on my progress tonight yeah? I would be making some Level 8 iron ingots and then I'm going to fuse the 20 camouflaged battle gear for them."

"I'm going to be long in the Realm of Mind since I would be levelling up my Smithy skills and make Level 15 Iron ingots." I thought aloud and I could feel the existence of the system within me as I can feel it winked at me somehow.

When the children had settled in their respective rooms along with their new Adventurer friends, I showered before I went down to the study and meditated to enter the Realm of Mind and heads to the Fusion Chamber to check on my Level 8 iron ingots and found that I still have a bucket full of them.

"Our children are wearing these marshland camouflages, I think I'd better make the black ones for the adventurers. Their current ones that they are wearing are just plain clothes and cannot be classified as armour."

"Thinking back... I wondered how they are before they embarked on being an Adventurer. Right... Well, maybe one day they would open up to us and tell their story one after another." I said to myself as I arranged a tunic, gugel, pants and boots for them and started to fuse with the Level 8 iron ingots. After fusing them, I duplicated in queue for 20 sets of all the clothes that I had fused.

I went to the other Fusion Chamber and duplicated 20 Dragon Fang Dagger, 20 Assassin's compact one-handed crossbow, 20 set of throwing knives and 20 long swords. In this way, these new adventurers would be the next new breed of Ranger-Assassin-Warrior-Wizard right after they had pledged their allegiance. If you want to be the best, you need to be a versatile fighter.

I went to the Blacksmith zone next and removed my tunic as I fired up the furnace and threw 3 pieces of iron ores inside it and pumped the bellows. After it glowed fiery red I picked the pieces up and set them on the anvil.

"900 strikes to make a single Level 15 iron ingot... Well, here we go again." I said and then system interrupted me saying I just need 700 strikes to make it to Level 15 iron and was down to 200 strikes lesser.

"Thanks, system, I owe you one," and I started hammering as an offscreen crew had an led counter set up for me so that I would know how many hammering I had done and doesn't need them to be there to count manually for me.

*Tink! Tink! Tink! Tink! Tink! Tink!*

1 piece...

5 pieces...

10 pieces...

50 pieces...

100 pieces...

200 pieces later...

I finally dropped the hammer and realised that I had gone for more than 40 hours in the Realm of Mind and that means I had been gone for more than 12 hours in the real world. "Alamak... I've forgotten the time and I missed half of the morning already. Sheesh... Being engrossed in my own self makes one too selfish... I'd better hurry back to the real world already..."

I logged off from my meditative state and heads to the real world where I emerged from the study, soaking and dropping in my own sweat as I've just come out from the sauna. Patricia was waiting for me patiently and handed me a towel for me to cool myself first, have breakfast and then guide the new adventurers to pledge their allegiance to Castle Keating-Macleod.

"I'm so sorry dear, I was too busy levelling up that I had forgotten the time. Oh my gosh... Look at the time. Where are the children?"

"Its alright dear. I know you are telling the truth, it's already past 9 and our children are performing their tasks as we speak. They would be done in a while bit to witness the pledge of allegiance. You'd better hurry and get changed, it's as if you had peed in your pants and you were sweating the whole night."

"Thanks, dear..." I kissed Patricia on her lips and bounded the steps three at a time and heads into the shower to cool myself off. Soon, I stepped out and was wearing my full battle gear, with all my weapons strapped around me.

"Look... Daddy is here now... And we are just in time to witness the pledge of allegiance." Ingles remarked as she saw me walking down the steps in full regalia and Adam ushered the new members to enter the hall and assemble before the two coat of arms what were adorned right in the centre.