Since the fight appears to be over, and we've cleared this particular room, I pull up the party and quest interface.  Running my eyes over the glowing information, something catches my attention.  "Interesting," I mutter quietly.

A soft whine comes from near my knee.  Shi-Shi's moved closer to me.  He cocks his head at me. One of his ears, the black one is up, the other ear, the white one is drooping down.  His pale eyes move from me to the interface hanging in the air.  "Oh," I point to the interface.  "Read Rodrick's updated information," I tell the elven shifter.  His blue eyes skim the entry, then his furry body stiffens, a soft growl slipping out.  "Yeah.  Would've been nice to know first.  I'd have refused to join up with them if I'd known."  Shi-Shi nods then gives an exaggerated sigh.

Swiping at the entry in front of me, I move to another screen, "Oh shocker.  Will you look at that.  Stats show exactly what I thought they would."

Shi-Shi huffs, another copy of the interface appears right in front of him.  He pokes his nose at one of the buttons, causing the interface to speak out loud.

"General Battle Statistics for Quest: Cave of the Spider Queen.  First place Tessa Firequill for damage caused to enemies.  Second place Persephone of the Libra Empire for healing.  Third place Shi-Shi of the Elven High Forests for damage caused to enemies.  Forth place Brian Hook for damage caused to enemies.  Roderick Bink unplaced, no damage, no healing, and no positive achievements."  I almost wince at the last part.  But, he deserves it.

The interface gets the lovebirds' attention.  They get to their feet and amble over to us.  Brian slightly in the lead. "What was that?"  He asks us.

"That was the interface letting us know how we're doing so far," I tell him.  I point to different things.  "Here you can see who's killed what.  Or healed who."  Out of the corner of my eye I can see Shi-Shi lift up a paw and swipe at the interface near him.  He seems to be looking for something.  "There's a part that shows how far along we are on the quest too, so we can decide when to use our rests, or how to divide up any loot we've managed to pick up."

As Brian and Tessa are messing with my interface, checking out the different options, Shi-Shi starts growling.  Automatically I start looking around for more spiders.  There aren't any.  Instead, the shifter taps at something on the interface causing it to start reading out the loot statistics so far.

"Loot drops and allocations for Quest: Cave of the Spider Queen.  Listed in general stats placement order.  First place Tessa Firequill no loot.  Second place Persephone of the Libra Empire no loot.  Third place Shi-Shi of the Elven High Forests no loot.  Forth place Brian Hook no loot.  Roderick Bink unplaced loot list as follows, One golden ring with opal ungraded now equipped by Roderick Bink.  One molten ring of fire grade basic.  One iron dagger ungraded now equipped by Roderick Bink.  One wooden staff ungraded.  One set of leather boots ungraded.  One set of lucky bone dice grade minor now equipped by Roderick Bink.  One crossbow light ungraded.  Five torches grade basic.  Two bottles of elven wine ungraded now equipped by Roderick Bink."

"Stop," I call out and press at the interface hanging in front of me. Pulling up the full list of equipment picked up from this quest so far.  Silently scrolling through it I can see all of it was collected by the little thief.  The little fucker has also gone and equipped some of it too.  My reasons for accepting this quest have nothing to do with the weak loot to be gained here.  Yet having someone blatantly steal it out from under us enrages me.

Turning to Brian, I tell him, "As Group Leader you can override any loot allocations and force it all into the Party's Group trove.  Meaning we get to share it out.  Fairly."

"I can?" The fighter queries.  Flowing blond hair.  Trimmed and neat blond beard.  Piercing dark blue eyes.  Tall with nicely sculpted muscles.  Brian appears to be the quintessential human leader.  Appearances are deceiving though.  His actions leave a lot be desired.  The more we interact, the more I suspect his good looks are all he has going for him.  He's gullible, naive, and with the IQ of a dead cabbage.

"Yes," I then have to spend a few more minutes coaxing him through calling up his own interface, which, as he is the Group Leader, has additional tabs to it for the Party.

He points at his interface, "Somethings wrong with it.  Look," He's noticed Roderick's updated information too.

Leaning in against Brian, Tessa also reads it, hissing between her teeth, "Well that explains a lot, my love."  She touches the interface hanging in the air.

Reacting to the human Mage's touch the interface speaks out loud, "Roderick Bink.  Thief. Grade basic.  No positive achievements.  Two negative achievements."

My ears perk up at that.  Shi-Shi leans against my leg and whines.  Looks like he caught that too.  Before anyone else can say anything I ask, "What negative achievements?"  The interface obviously doesn't answer me.  "Brian ask it what the negative achievements are."  He's the Group Leader it'll answer him. 

It takes Tessa elbowing him and encouraging him to get him to ask.  I'm not disappointed by the results in the slightest, "Roderick Bink, negative achievement: Attempted Fratricide gained multiple locations.  Negative achievement: Loot Ninja gained Quest: Cave of the Spider Queen."

"Fuck," I breathe out slowly.  Then I have to ask, "So who's the brother Roderick keeps trying to murder?"  

Frowning, Brian shakes his head, "He doesn't have a brother."

At my feet Shi-Shi snorts.  "I'm with Shi-Shi," I say and point at the written evidence glowing white in the air in front of all of us.  "The interface doesn't lie.  Roderick has a brother.  And he's tried to murder this brother more than once.  Clearly he hasn't told you everything about himself."  It takes a while for groups to become parties.  No one tells everyone all about themselves in one sitting.

"No," Brian tries to explain.  "I grew up with him.  In the same village.  His mother never married.  She only ever gave birth to Roderick.  No one knows who Roderick's father is.  He's a bastard,"  In more ways than one.  "The others in the village would pick on him and his mother.  So, my father stepped in and made sure they at least got enough food and firewood."

It's Tessa who points out, "So, Roderick could have more blood family, on his father's side then?"

More whines from near my knee.  Glancing down Shi-Shi's pressing a button on his interface.  "Oh, Shi-Shi's right," I remember with a start.  "As Group Leader you should have access to our genealogy panels.  It'll tell you our family connections. The interface will know who Roderick's father is."

Both Tessa and Brian stare at me.  I tell them, "As a Group Leader, you'll need more information about your team, so almost nothing is hidden from you.  You have to make judgement calls throughout any quests we go on.  You can't make those judgement calls if you don't know things about us.  Go on.  If you're not comfortable reading Roderick's yet.  Try my one."

In a few minutes the interface is spilling information about me, "Persephone of the Libra Empire, profession Channel, grade unfettered."  Most of them stop and stare at me.  Unfettered are almost unheard of inside the Empire, let alone outside of it.  "Three main achievements.  Achievement Greater Gate Breaker gained Quest: Mines of Molten Ore.  Achievement Deal Breaker gained Quest: Mines of Molten Ore.  Achievement Devil Breaker gained Quest: Mines of Molten Ore."

Ignoring their looks I point at the relevant part of the interface, "There.  If you tap there, it'll tell you about any genealogy, or family tree, I have in this world."

Every time the interface announces this particular piece of information I wait for it to have updated.  So far it never has.  I've been told it never will.  I wish it would though.  "Persephone of the Libra Empire.  Summoned outworlder. No blood family in Alaria.  Married by Soul Bond to Lord Byron Magnus of House Pegasus, deceased, Soul Bond broken and burned.  Remaining Soul Bonds available three."

Interrupting the interface I start pointing at Byron's family tree, "You can use this to follow back someone's family tree.  Even if the person isn't aware of a family member, they'll show up.  There was a huge scandal in the Magnus family, where an aunt tried to pass off someone else's kid as her spouse's.  The interface soon put a stop to that."  There was a massive family fight and last I heard they're still feuding over it.  "You can suppress the interface for a time, but never for long.  So go on, try Roderick's.  At least you'll know who his father is."

Tessa and Brian are staring at me with their mouths open.  Shi-Shi's sitting back on his haunches with his head cocked to one side, eyes squinting as though he's in thought, or has constipation.  "What?"  I ask them annoyed at their staring.

Swallowing loudly, Tessa gives me an awkward curtsy, "You're a Summoned."

"For fuck's sake," I grumble.  I should have gotten them to check one of the others' information.  People are so weird about the 'from another world thing'.  "Yes.  I was summoned to this world.  Yes, I'm human.  Life goes on.  Can we please get back to the main subject at hand."  Attempting to redirect them to the answers I want, "Who is Roderick's father?  Come on Brian.  Don't you want to know?"

Suddenly there's a discordant clang noise, with the interface stating, "Quest: Cave of the Spider Queen failed.  Insufficient Party Members.  Roderick Bink has left the Party."

"Oh fuck," Grumbling I cross my arms.  "I bet the thief took all of our loot with him too.  The little shit.  Oh well.  Back to the Guild.  If we stick together we'll only need one more member to take this quest again."  I'm more than happy to try this again with Shi-Shi and Tessa.  I suppose if he got proper equipment Brian might not be that bad as a Party Member, but not as Group Leader.  Tessa would be a much better fit as Group Leader.

Brian's still staring at me, "What?"

Faster on the uptake Tessa explains, "Roderick's left.  Without him we don't have enough people.  This quest needs a minimum of five people.  There are now only four of us."