Another day, another quest. Lately, that was all Shin had been doing. It was one request after another. His time in Crocus, although well spent did not provide a source of income. Instead, he spent more than he earned. However, since coming back to Oak town, he had been bringing in a steady profit for himself. These D-rank request were a nuisance for sure but they paid decently well. As a result, there was little room to complain. So today was going to be no different. With a confident swagger in his step, Shin made his was toward the bad request board in the center of town.

"Shit," Shin thought to himself. Arriving at the request board he found he was not the only one as there were several other individuals looking at the request board. This is what he got for sleeping in. As the individuals scanned through the request board, there was one request that caught Shin's attention from afar. From afar, it appeared to be an older request, one that must have been left up for a long time. Once he got a few meters closer, he took a closer look at the request. It's writing was somewhat faded and there rips all around. It must have been trapped under all these requests only to just see the light of day. Hell, it must have been fate. Wasting no time, Shin tore the request off the board and began to head in the direction he came from.

As he read the request over, an expression of disappointed appeared on his face. No wonder the request had been untouched for so long, it was scavenger hunt. The client had asked for the request taker to find three item: an old plant, some burnt wood, and a chunk of metal. This had to be the most generic items any scavenger hunt had asked for. There was more to it as well. Written underneath the items was a location he was supposed to take the items to once he had collected them. Letting out a sigh of annoyance, the red-haired mage tucked the request into the pocket of his leather jacket. He wasn't about to do this request alone, oh no. Instead, he would bring Ghastly along.

Ghastly had been left back at the hotel he had spent the night in. Originally, he did not plan to bring it along but with nothing better to do, it would be a good learning experience for Ghastly. These past few days had been like taking care of a dog. He had to teach Ghastly had to behave like a tamed creature, not some wild thing. It was always up to mischievous things like spooking people and playing pranks. However, like a dog it occasionally let its curiosity get the best of it. It also came with its annoyances but for the most part, it was proving to be useful as a recon partner. Hopefully, he would get to see it in combat soon enough. For now, the focus would be on completing this lackluster scavenger hunt.

The logical way to go about completing the scavenger hunt would be to find the easiest items first and save the most difficult ones for the end. In terms of the request, the easiest thing to find would be the burnt wood as all he needed was wood. His fire magic could do the rest. Finding an old plant should be easy enough as there was forestry throughout Oak. A metal chunk would probably be the hardest as it would most likely have to be bought from a shop or stolen. With a plan in motion, Shin and Ghastly took off to find a piece of wood.

It took about two minutes before Shin and Ghastly found a few wooden planks placed up against the wall of a furniture store. Grabbing the biggest piece, Shin decided he would burn it once he had found the other two items. On his way to find the old plant, he found himself staring at magic shop. These days, magic vendors carried ores on them so it was not a far cry to expect a magic shop to carry some metal. Stepping in, Shin looked around and found a chunk of metal the size of his fist. This is where Ghastly came into play. As the vendor yelled at Shin for bringing a piece of wood into his shop, Ghastly appeared in front and scared the daylights out of the man. In that instant, Shin took off from the shop with a chunk of metal and piece of wood in his hand. Finding an old plant surprisingly took longer than expected. The simple description of an old plant was vague making it difficult to pinpoint what exactly counted as an old plant. So, Shin looked for the oldest plant he could after hours of frustration and took it with him to the park he was supposed to meet the client.

As he got to the park, he dropped the items onto the ground. Stretching his back, he lit a flame on his right hand as Ghastly gripped the wood piece in his teeth and allowed Shin to burn the wood. "Oh my, nicely done!" said a gentle voice accompanied by some clapping. Appearing from beyond the woods was a beautiful looking lady. However, she wasn't just any lady, she was the witch of Oak named Serena. Bringing his flame to a halt, the witch disappeared and appeared in an instant, her arm wrapped around Shin's shoulders as she caressed his cheeks. "You poor fool, this was no scavenger hunt! You simply found some items that I needed! AHAHA!" Bursting into laughter, she stepped away from Shin as the items he had dropped had disappeared. In their place was a bag of jewels. "I hope to see your beautiful face again mage, and do take care of that Ghastly. I would not want to see a creature of darkness go to waste," she added on as she winked and blew a kiss in Shin's direction before returning to the woods she came from. Annoyed, Shin grabbed the bag of jewel from the ground and took off back to the hotel. That witch sure was a bitch.