The lure of adventure (part II)

When all was said and done, the adventurers guild an institution that branched off everywhere there were humans, dwarves, and elves.

There were rumors that it was an organization as old as time itself, and those were not much far from the truth.

Arcvelia was a difficult world to live in, it took champions of might and power to tame it enough to settle, and even so they managed to settle in a continent alone.

Each race had to find multiple ways to tackle the mysteries and perils of it to keep hold of their place on it.

One such way was strong people organizing to defend what they held most dear, thus forming the first bulks of civilization.

It seemed peaceful in large cities now, and truly it was so, but outside of the walls protected by powerful spells laid a nightmarish number of lurking monsters, prowling beasts, and hateful undead.

There were also those that, pushed by despair or ambition, embraced the way of the bandit, forming groups of like-minded individuals that survived ambushing unprepared caravans of supplies and raiding small settlements.

Each nation managed big threats from within and outside with the army, but moving an army meant a lot of money was involved, so the army only moved for key settlements, cities like Sesti or Mezzi, or main trading hubs.

For a small town, the task was left to strong individuals that acted for personal reasons like a sense of justice, duty, or for simple profit.

Even if the small town didn’t have a great amount of money some resources were possible to get only hunting monsters, and big towns requested those, it was a way to gain money.

As for bandits, they were usually sold off and if their stuff wasn’t already reclaimed by a specific request it was a free bonus that many adventures dreamed about.

Bandits at the same time offered a higher challenge, being more intelligent than monsters and not likely to go along being sold off without a fight.

Having that nature of helping and protecting, even somewhat motivated by money and fame was a reason that many a hero that came to lead humanity or other races rose ranks from the adventurers guild.

One of the duties given to the guild in Cesio was to actively seek somebody with the mark of the heroes on himself, and now one stood in front of the counter, not an ideal one by any stretch of the term.

While Rhea was occupied with that customer, on the other side of the counter in the exam room, somebody else was having a tough time.

Braska always was bigger than others, even since he was a child he was the one that got to do heavy tasks for his family, and as he grew up taking up arms to defend the country and his family seemed natural.

The strict discipline of the army and the noblemen's demeanor however made him quit pretty soon, he wanted to have a purpose, not to be a shining pawn to be simply disposed of in a petty squabble.

He took the profession of adventurer and rose ranks pretty quickly for his strong sense of honor and ability as a warrior.

It wasn’t always easy, he lost many dear friends, he lost an eye and even a leg but what he lost he made up and he accumulated experiences developing a pretty strong open-mindedness, resulting in him coming to lead the adventurer guild branch in Cesio.

The adventurers guild was pretty much his home, but even with all his experiences he never expected to be called down from his office by an examiner.

Examiners were usually selected from elite groups of adventurers that had retired from active duty or were experiencing a downtime, having to wait for one member to recover from injuries or to find replacements.

He took the paper the examiner brought him and focused his sight on the paper as a whole rather than the writings.

It was a paper made by Rhea after all and it contained a particular coding made of apparently casual marks of inks.

-A noble bringing a slave to fight his battles? A beast-man too, huh? He insisted on making her test and she turned white. Potential abuse, well to note it must be pretty serious abuse, but why still mark her good material? Things tend to turn sour when a slave is abused by the master, it’s not really a perfect system, why she would remain good material even being a beast-man?-

Braska turned his eye to read what was written on the page regarding the being described.

-Oh…eighteen circles, a good magic measure I see, those with such a measure that may come to stay with us are rare indeed. We could buy her from Etgas, or the current master, I thought that Rhea considered their demons to be torched at the stake like anybody else, maybe I was wrong.-

He scratched his short beard, his big fingers indulging over an old scar that marked his face, left of his chin.

It was a keepsake to never trust too much, cause anyone able to keep a blade in his hands was also able to kill.

It was one reason that some adventurers relied on slaves, usually those that could be disposed of legally, just in case.

A slave couldn’t disobey, it didn’t mean one could trust one even if it managed to earn said trust.

Storage magic was hard to come by, so most of the big groups relied on porters for their loots or needs, and such was their usual role.

Having one fight was rarer, and generally unsafe, forcefully ordering one to fight to the death meant suffering the backlash of the wounds and so it wasn’t even an option for running away from certain death.

He sighed and painfully got himself standing, even after all those years the wooden prosthetic he got in place wasn’t an ideal companion, but one he needed to avoid clutches; being in a certain position also meant looking the part after all.

He had to rush things up, even if he didn’t want to, a roar was echoing from the guildhall, so he had to show up anyway.

The first thing he noticed was the smell of burning wood, the flames on the counter, and that man, that had removed the bandage speaking to a female knight while throwing the bandage into the open flame without a care in the world.

Rhea was on her knees, behind the burning counter, her eyes wide open in shock, and he quite understood why that fat foreign man had a hero’s mark on his right hand.

Even without seeing it, there was obvious proof, the remainder of the magical measuring device that was melted down, at the core of the flames.

“Would it be too much to ask water mages to end this fire? Or do you want our guild base to burn down to cinders?”

He bellowed, as his eye moved from one side to the other of the room where the tables of adventurers were, the adventurers switched from shock to action and a couple of people stood up, taking out their wands.

As magic rained down on the counter, extinguishing the flames and cooling the metal down, the knight and the so-called demon moved both to reach the man, that looked at him, as the flames died down his eyes went from a deep green to a deep dark color.

He was tall, as much as him, but he had a thinner frame than his, he could tell despite the abundant layers of fat on him, his fingers were somewhat still slender and shook for some reason, he saw something similar in old people once.

He couldn’t be that old, so it was maybe a reason for which both girls were trying their best to talk to him, to understand his actions.

He smiled, looking straight at him, he had that look into his face, like a kid that had found a new toy to play with, a kind of look he had seldomly seen directed at him.

“I guess somebody else would like to hear an explanation, am I wrong miss guild employee? “

Braska gave a glance at Rhea, that pointed at the man still shaking, clearly scared.

“How was I supposed to know!? I thought it was the usual bragger!”

The knight sighed shaking her head puffing behind her helmet.

“That’s no explanation, that’s an excuse, now what exactly happened here? Did I not ask you to behave and not rise an undue accident, Thirteen?”

The man heartily laughed shaking his head, he was accepting of being called a number for some reason.

“Well, of all people here you should be able to guess what happened here, after all, it’s the same deal as in the castle when your little princess asked me to place my hand on the black sphere embedded in the wall.

I have to admit that one was louder, but well I wasn’t prepared for that. My ears rang for five minutes straight I swear!”

The female knight clicked her tongue under her helmet, her expression couldn’t be seen but from how she behaved it was clear she couldn’t stomach that man.

“So let me understand here, this man here broke the mana measuring device of the castle? And you let him come here to register ?”

Braska asked, quite dumbfound; it wasn’t like he couldn’t think of one day having a hero in his guild rooster, only it was more akin to a practical impossibility.

Like all guild masters before him, he was instructed by his predecessor about the heroes, aside from the mark that could appear in less obvious locations.

The average hero fought to protect, and rose to a position only to protect and care for others; that man didn’t seem to care for anybody, not even himself.

The knight nodded rising her shoulder plates; she sighed.

“If it was for me I would put this foul being on the forefront of the battle, even as a meat shield he would be useful, but he insists on not being a fighter even after dispatching four fallen and a turncoat alone.”

As the man called thirteen bursts into laughter again, Braska frowned, he knew what she was talking about, after all, it was a very specific terminology used by the kingdom’s guards and it was his job to be in the know of stuff.

The Furlon family was a long-time offender of the guild, it all began as their heir, Nila Raka began managing things; that was some time before Braska became its guild master.

Nila was a cheapskate, he offered the minimum reward possible, so only beginners answered the call.

The matter was that of course beginners weren’t prepared for the horrors lurking below the town, and it was rare that they had spellcasters along.

It was then natural that monsters began pouring into town from the sewers and things escalated in danger.

When Braska took over things were so tense that he had to give a clear cut to the deals, and Nila stopped relying on the guild.

It wasn’t something they could do something about, the guild had an image to protect, and couldn’t provide with totally free labor only because a noble asked so.

The sewers were akin to a noble’s domain in the laws of the kingdom, so the guild couldn’t mess with the rules too much.

Nila had brought his attention to the nonofficial guild, formed by ruffians and troublemakers that were a step away from becoming full-fledged bandits, but still somehow managed to keep a foot inside the limits of the laws.

Braska knew that Nila had managed to somehow engage a group of adventurers from there; they weren’t bad people, as far as the adventurer’s judgment went, but they were less than clean in their dealings.

They often required more money than it was established or took more time than it was given if the money requests weren’t met.

Being greedy wasn’t a sin, but acting upon it was, so they were officially expelled, and joined Nila.

The monster problem wasn’t solved, and Braska had headache after headache about recalling the noble asking to be able to issue a proper call to adventurers.

Braska had even thought about asking the king, but even if he was the adventurer’s guild master he was a commoner, so it took time and effort to be heard, and even when heard he was told they had the matter in check.

It all changed some days prior after there was some commotion for magic released again in the outskirts of town by the hero.

Guren came to the adventurer’s guild and asked him how much gold would be needed to fix the problem as a reward for the adventurers.

It wasn’t a coincidence, Guren knew that Braska wanted to serve the kingdom and had applied to be a soldier and so he appealed to his sense of duty.

It was a hard and long bargain, but in the end, it became a beneficial agreement for both and so the guild had put up the request for clean-up of the sewers from slimes and other oddities that had managed to enter.

Braska had then mobilized his eyes and ears so to speak and knew that Furlon and his gang had met their doom by the hand of the hero.

Having such an overwhelming amount of magic power he could see how he managed the feat, but there was still the problem that he faced them alone.

“Well, Xindi, I am not much of a fighter, and I don’t think fighting would solve your problems, after all, you wouldn’t need a hero if it could.

But it’s reassuring to see that there’s a man here using his head for a chance, someone who thinks, am I wrong, mister adventurers’ guild?”

Braska interrupted his mulling as Thirteen spoke pointing at him as he ended his argument.

He couldn’t understand what he was implying, but he could take a guess, after all now his job was to be the brain of the guild, no longer its brawn.

“My name is Braska, and I am the guild master, you speak like you don’t think conflict is the solution, but do you seek one? Know that even if I represent the guild, the guild is made of people ready and able to represent themselves if push came to shove.”

Thirteen clapped, slowly, scenically as he chuckled.

“I like you Braska, I really do. ”

He reached to his neck with his right hand where he had a pouch of sorts tied and extracted a weird deck of cards, he pulled out a card, on it an angel with two cups was on the border of a body of water of some kind.

Above the angel, a tilted cross a line and a vertex pointing down were shown, a symbol of some kind like the scribbling that was present below it.

He looked at the card, frowned, and sighed, shuffling it back to the deck, shrugging.

“It seems we both lack in patience, let’s begin fresh shall we? You may call me Thirteen, as I left the name I had in my world. I want to become an adventurer.”

Braska's disbelief was apparent, still, he looked back to Rhea that nodded, the woman finally had calmed down enough to get back on her feet.

“Yes I can confirm that he paid the fee, sadly his sheet of paper burned, but there was nothing of importance written upon it.”

Braska appreciated how Rhea could lie with a straight face, even with nothing to write she would have found a way to put in the code of the guild about the most important facts.

“Nothing of importance indeed.” Thirteen spoke, chuckling. “But well I warned you the meter would break, didn’t I? I hope I don’t have to repay it, it would be a problem.”

Braska scratched his right temple with his big hand, as he looked back to Thirteen.

“Well before we come to that, can you explain to me why you would want to become an adventurer? I mean, you are the hero am I wrong?”

Thirteen smirked, making a weird gesture where he waved his hand horizontally in place, before going back to shuffle his cards.

Those had to be special, or they wouldn't look the way they did, but much worse for wear, at least in Braska’s experience with normal cards.

“It’s complex to explain, but let’s keep things simple. I am not from Arcvelia, I come from a world called Earth.”

Braska nodded “Like the first king of Cesio, I know the tales. So the royal family dusted off the old rituals, what of it? I got that part more or less, but you are a real person, I mean you have your needs, your desires, why risk your life adventuring? It comes down to that.” he said, trying to give a further push to the man.

Thirteen smiled, closing his eyes he stopped shuffling his cards, he stopped even breathing for a brief moment before deeply inspiring.

He exhaled, and opening his eyes smiled showing his teeth.

“Well as you might imagine things are different from where I was. I am much more confident in my knowledge than in my magic as of now. I am told people fear me, well I can understand them. “ The knight coughed making him smile “I mean the right man in the wrong place can make all the difference in the world. Or so they say in half my world.

I guess you don’t wanna figure what the wrong man can do, am I right? Gotta make people acknowledge I am the right man so the fear could lessen a little. So I need some achievements under my belt if you catch my drift.”

Braska sighed, the man wasn’t speaking it all, but he was kept in check by the knight at his side.

“Listen, Thirteen, I can understand that reason, but you aren’t speaking it all, am I wrong? Speak freely that knight has no power here.”

Thirteen smirked again “ Strength lies in knowing oneself, on that we can agree right?”

Braska simply nodded, and Thirteen continued “Now how do you come to know yourself?

I mean, you make choices right? We all make choices, but in the end, our choices make us. They shape us, they define us to ourselves and others. You lived a lifetime here, you made an untold number of choices, you’re about to take one now. But consider you’re not fully free to make all the choices you’d want.”

Braska frowned “I believe myself pretty much free, and so are the people here.”

Thirteen’s smiled creepily now, caressing his beard. “Even so there are things you abide by, I mean law is important to an adventurer, or so the receptionist told me. To abide by the law you renounce freedom, that’s no brainier. I mean you could always break it and face the consequences, right? But the fact that you don’t want that conditions your choices, and your being.”

“I get it, I don’t wanna become a wanted criminal so I don’t do things I could. Get to the point, Thirteen. Why should I allow you to become an adventurer?” Braska growled, irritated.

Thirteen pointed at him “I was just about to. See, the fact is I come from kingdom nowhere, I look different, speak different” He pointed to his throat implying the location where the translation magic crest usually appeared. “ And I think different. So I act on different premises, I mean you could say I lack common sense?” He smiled impishly, pointing up with the index. “BUT, By working as an adventurer I hope to understand said common sense and how one is supposed to use his magic here.”

Braska narrowed his eye, the argument made so much perfect sense he felt conned.

He couldn’t deny there was a major uproar the first time that man’s magic power was felt, and the same happened the second time around.

An entire battalion was mobilized by the king to calm the citizen, to parade that everything was alright.

If that man that spoke in riddles and hid behind logic was to be trusted he wanted to understand how to restrain himself.

Heroes commonly defied common sense, so it was natural for one born in Arcvelia to know the nuances of his actions, one coming from outside was another story entirely.

“Vey well” He begrudgingly said, “Come with me, we are gonna test you like any other adventurer, you don’t wanna miss on common practices right?”

He said going into the back room.