Chapter 5: New Beginnings

Monsters. They are beings who only care for evil. Many are consumed by it and they live to do evil. Other, more sophisticated species can think. However, they are not any better. It actually makes it worse, in a way. They have desires and reasons to do evil. They think of ways to do evil. It is in their nature.

Opposed to the monsters are the Church and Adventurer's Guild. They are the forces of light that help humanity in destroying the evil monsters. The Church is led by the pope and the archbishops. They are the symbols of justice in this world. They are known to be the kindest souls you will ever find. They have branches in many places. At their churches the people can seek aid for medical reasons. For this reason, the church is the only group with any real knowledge about the diseases.

They teach what has been confirmed, but most of their knowledge is not concrete enough to release to the public. They don't want to risk releasing false information. However, many of the problems with disease can be solved with magic. The bishops and above can use healing magic, and they can be found in any settlement that has reached large town class.

Speaking of that, settlements are divided into classes. The lowest class is village. It has to have a population of about 20. The place where I spawned was a village. Above that is large village. It has a population of at least 100. This is where you will start to get churches. However, at this stage, they just send disciples. These are priests-in-training who travel and lead a large village church to complete their training. After that, they can enter many fields such as medicine, faith, and battle. It is a complicated system, so I will explain it another time. The next class is small town. A small town has a population of at least 500, and if it gains some importance, can even contain a priest. They are disciples who finished their training and chose the faith route. There are many subclasses and ranks of priests, but I will leave that for another day. A medium town has a population of at least 2500 people and they occasionally have priests. A large town contains a minimum 10,000 people and they typically have at least 1 priest, if not 2 or 3. The next level is small city. That is where you first might see a bishop. If there is no bishop, there are at least multiple priests, and these have at least 25,000 people. A medium city always has a bishop and possibly multiple churches. It houses at least 50,000 people. A large city has 100,000 people at the smallest, and definitely has multiple churches. Above that is a major city, which contains at least 250,000 people. These are typically capitals, and it is not uncommon for an archbishop to live there. It is the highest rank of settlement you can reach, and there are very few.

The other power to oppose the monsters is the Adventurer's Guild. They are seen at large towns and above, and they are where people go for monster problems. The adventurers that are affiliated with them kill the monsters and earn rewards. They can earn fame and power. It is many a village child's dream to become an adventurer. There are 10 ranks for an adventurer. There is wood, stone, copper, bronze, silver, gold, platinum, ruby, amethyst, and diamond. Adventurers above platinum usually only take personal requests. They are the best of the best. Gina here was a copper adventurer. It was good enough that one could make a living off of being a copper adventurer.

Gina told me that her level was 3. It was quite high for a girl her age, even for an adventurer. Even one level makes a big difference. Just entering the game, I am still just level 1. The maximum level was 100, but anybody who can make it to that level is insanely strong anyways. There have only been few who could achieve it.

Gina told me these things as we walked.

"Where are we going?" I ask. Even though we've been walking for a while, I had just been following her.

"Well, first we have to get you into the Adventurer's Guild so you can fight. The closest one is in Ividica, a large town to the east. A~nd, it just so happens that there is an Omnistone there, so you can check your stats."

"Well, that sounds good. How far away is it?"

"It is about 20 miles from here, so we should be there tomorrow. Say, what kind of weapon do you use?"

"I've never really used one before. What do you think I'd be good with?"

"Hmm. I have a feeling that you would be good with a short sword. What do you say?"

"It sounds alright to me. Let's get one when we reach town, I guess."

"Okay, I should have enough. But for now, just take this."

She handed me a beat-up looking knife that looked like it had been used often. I gladly accepted it.

And with that, our journey began.