"Understood. I shall be there in an hour," Marianne gave a small nod.

When she walked out of the room, she saw Fariha sleeping soundly on the bear. She smiled once more at the sight. She herself was tempted to feel the fur of the bear as well but she must remind herself that she carried with her many insects that may upset the bear.

She left the guild building, heading straight to her inn. 

The inn was a little fancier than your ordinary roadside inn. It had room service for starters, and most people who stayed there were wealthy merchants who came to the city. It was indeed odd for her, an adventurer, to stay there but she preferred the quietness of the place over the more rowdy adventurer-filled inns out there.

Once there, she ordered breakfast, chicken soup with some beef sticks, and told the caretaker to carry it into her room. After waiting for a short five minutes, her food arrived. She kindly thanked the maid who brought them, giving her a generous tip.

After that out of the way, she began undressing herself. Of course, she could order the insects to just come out from under her dress, but with her yet imperfect control, there would still be a couple of insects stuck behind. To make sure that everyone got the food they wanted, she had to take off everything.

With her dress and undergarments lying on the floor, she ordered her insects to eat the food provided in the bowl on the table. Of course, it wasn't her own food. It was the insect food she had bought beforehand. At a higher level, she could just feed them with her own mana, but for now, they had to be fed physically.

She then took her own seat beside the insects, and began eating her own food.


An hour later, as promised, she arrived at the infinity gates.

It wasn't the first time she had been there, since she had inspected the place when she first came to the city. However, it still awed her the second time she saw it. So many adventurers walking to and fro; it almost made her feel lost. And the architecture was certainly impressive. Even she who didn't know anything about building construction could say that. And she could feel the twisting magic pulsing around, making her feel somewhat uneasy.

She looked around. As she went near the tower, she saw the orc sitting on the steps to the tower, with a wine flask on his hand. It seemed he had been drinking while he waited for the group to assemble.

"Ah, greetings. It seems I am the second to arrive," she said with a smile. "I thought Sir Grendrick would already be here. Perhaps he's inside?"