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Arc | Chapter. 8: Adventurer’s Guild
🕑 Added 2023-05-29 12:59:22 +0000 UTCChapter. 8: Adventurer’s Guild
Ceylon had gone to bed with a lot in mind. And when she woke up, she was just thinking.
She didn’t know much about Arc, where she came from, what her past was like, or how she had gotten so strong. But now, she had a very small idea. And it sounded awful. It was a thing so far away from her reality that she barely comprehended it, but her small attempts at doing so made her feel…
Spoiled.
So what if the soup was bad? She had so many other things to deal with and she really complained about the soup— No, it was fine to complain. Ceylon understood that her situation wasn’t easy but Arc’s in comparison was…
Damnation.
And Ceylon felt like she had to do something about it. That she had to help Arc to achieve whatever she wanted to achieve. It was a small feeling now, perhaps she’d give up and forget the next day, but right now, she was going to act on it.
She opened her eyes and sat up right to look at Arc, but she paused. Arc was gone. Confusion flared through Ceylon’s mind as she searched around, and at the corner of her eye, she saw it. A blue card on the table. It was… made out of ice. A message clearly inscribed in it.
Ceylon blinked as she approached it and immediately grabbed it wincing for a moment as she shone it against the sunlight. And at that moment she finally read its contents.
“I left to become an adventurer. I’ll be back after. - Arc.”
Ceylon blinked.
Arc left to go to the Adventurer’s Guild?!
And she scrambled to leave.
There were things that Arc definitely didn’t know that could lead to disaster!
* * * * *
I was in a bad mood.
I dreamt of home, the land of ice, except, it had been a nightmare. I dreamt of the start of the training and constant struggle for death. It sucked. And now, after constantly asking people for directions of adventurers and getting unclear answers, I finally got pointed towards the Adventurer’s Guild. A large building at the center of the town.
Standing before the place, I took a deep breath, before striding forward and walking through the swinging double doors.
What greeted me was a boisterous hall with twenty or so people, all dressed up with weapons and combat gear. They were what I assumed to be adventurers. Though in spite of the confused gazes I got, I just strode to the front desk where there were clerks standing.
I picked one at random and walked towards them; it was a burly bald man with a long beard. The man met my gaze and spoke up with a gruff voice.
“What do you need?”
“I want to register to become an adventurer,” I said simply.
“That is not possible.” The man shook his head.
I immediately frowned. “Why not?”
“For starters, we are not recruiting at the moment, and you also do not have a reference.”
Confusion settled in my mind hearing him. “Recruiting… reference?”
“Yes.” He slightly nodded. “We only recruit new adventurers during certain windows, and those adventurers must have an already existing reference. This is to avoid ignorant people from jumping into such a dangerous job and dying fruitlessly. Of course, if you’re already here you should know all of this.”
He glared at me, clearly implying what he was saying.
“But—”
And at that moment, a man from the back laughed, standing up from his table with a wide grin. He wore evidently better armor than everyone else here, a longsword sat on his back, swinging side to side as he strode towards me.
“Of course she doesn’t know, come on now! She is one of those people that come in fancy equipment.” He met my gaze. “Did dad buy you that fancy jacket?”
My frown deepened as he finally stood before me, looking down on me.
“You, don’t have what it takes.” And he poked the center of my chest with his finger.
I immediately slapped his hand away with a frown. “Don’t touch me.”
“What are you going to do about it?” He poked again as my annoyance hit a new peak. “Cry to your father?” My fist tightened. “You do not belong here, so shut up and go make me a porridge—”
And I punched. I felt several bones break as the air broke, the man went flying through the air, shattering the doors of the guild as he was sent flying into the outside plaza before crashing against a building with an explosion of dust and grime.
I sneered. “Dumbass.”
When I turned to look at my surroundings, everyone was looking at me with wide eyes, clearly mortified at what I had just done.
Perhaps, I had gone a bit overboard…
* * * * *
Ceylon hurried to arrive. All the way there, she prayed from the bottom of her heart that nothing happened, and as she saw the Adventurer’s Guild in the distance, she was relieved.
Perhaps Arc hadn’t encountered issues—
And the door exploded as Ceylon yelped from shock. A scream of pain echoed and she saw a shadow streak through the ground. Rolling before hitting a building with a very loud thud. She watched the smoke clear only to see a bloodied adventurer.
Her heart skipped a beat as she ran towards the guild.
Something had indeed happened.
Immediately she arrived as she saw Arc standing in front of the reception desk crossing her arms, all while an unsettling silence was present inside of the guild. Ceylon was just about to step forward when she saw a door to the side of the hall slam open, and a man with a black coated walked out.
“What in the fuck happened?!” he bellowed.
And Ceylon immediately recognized the patterns lining the coat.
It was the Guildmaster…
* * * * *
I watched as someone came out from a door and immediately glared at me. Clearly some form of supervisor or manager.
“Are you responsible for the commotion?”
“I guess so.” I shrugged. “Perhaps if he listened this wouldn’t have happened.”
He let out a grunt and turned to the receptionist. “What happened?”
“An adventurer disrespected the lady and ignored her… request to not touch her, before he was.” The bald man coughed. “Punched and thrown out the door.”
The manager raised his brow. “You’re telling me a punch made all that noise?”
“Yes sir…” The clerk lowered his head.
The response seemed to make the manager ponder for a few moments, and as that was happening I felt a familiar presence near me. I turned only to see Ceylon as she stiffened for a moment, from some form of shock.
“Did you just sense me— no, ignore that. We have to leave now,” she whispered. “You could be arrested for what just happened—”
“So, I’m told you came to register as an adventurer?” The manager turned to me only to see me facing Ceylon. “Does your companion also want to register?”
Ceylon stiffened. “No, sir Guildmaster, only her.”
Guildmaster…? I didn’t know what exactly that meant other than he was the boss of the place. The man met my gaze for a few moments, seemingly evaluating it before nodding.
“Very well, an exception can be made. You are clearly cut above the rest in terms of skill.”
“Uh huh.” His words sounded a bit… I didn’t know how to feel about his compliment, but I still nodded after. “Thank you.”
The Guildmaster smiled to me for a moment. “Come this way, let’s get you tested. Your friend can come along.”
And with those words he walked towards the open door, where a large and long office clearly laid. I met Ceylon’s gaze for a moment, and she seemed more confused than anything. So I simply shrugged and followed after the Guildmaster.
We entered his office and Ceylon closed the door behind her. Meanwhile I took a seat behind his desk as he sat down. He looked at me once more.
“What is your name?”
“Arc.”
“Interesting name.” He pondered for a moment. “Okay, Arc. So, here is what is going to happen, your Tier will be appraised using this red stone here; an appraisal stone.” The Guildmaster pulled out a red opal from under the desk. It was as big as his fist. “Then once that is done, you will become an official adventurer and get all the paperwork.”
I blinked. “My Tier will be measured? As in, strength Tier?”
Ceylon looked at me weirdly, meanwhile the Guildmaster nodded.
“Yes is there a problem with that?”
“Is it necessary?” I asked feeling a bit apprehensive.
He crossed his arms, frowning. “I thought you wanted to become an adventurer, did I get something wrong here? Just place your hand on the stone, use mana and you’re done.”
Being with Ceylon had taught me that my strength was much more abnormal than I anticipated…
I hesitated but ultimately sighed with a nod. “I guess so.” I needed this for my future plans… “Just don’t freak out, I guess…”
The Guildmaster gestured towards the red stone that was at his desk, and I simply extended my hand and touched it. Its surface was flat and rather cold, and then, I pushed my mana into it. The red stone shone for a moment, before a screen flashed in front of me.
[ Overloaded. ]
It flickered for a moment, and then— it exploded. The red stone burst into thousands of pieces with a shrill noise as I blinked.
Meanwhile the Guildmaster had his mouth wide open. “Overloaded…? But… how?”
Ceylon too was looking at the remains of the stone with wide eyes. “Can’t they measure up to A Tier?”
Meanwhile I scratched my cheek. “I told you so.”
The Guildmaster turned to me, slowly standing up. “What Tier are you?”
“Does it matter?”
“Of course it matters!” He slammed his palms on the desk. “You could be the next hope of our country, you could be a savior—”
“I don’t care for that.” I frowned interrupting him.
“Right. Of course, you aren’t… Right…” He seemed to lose his mind as he began to mutter to himself.
Ceylon meanwhile turned to me and opened her mouth before promptly closing it and facing away once more. The sight made me feel a bit bad. But before I could even say an apology, the Guildmaster spoke up.
“How about we run a little test?” He walked towards the wall, where a mannequin rested. “You’ll attack this target dummy, using any skill that you are sure will destroy it. Then we will evaluate based on that and form your adventurer’s license based on that.”
I gave him a dubious look, but ultimately nodded. “Very well.”
He dragged the target dummy to the end of elongated office where I could see scorch marks lining the walls among other scratches and damages. Clearly not the first time this test occurred.
After setting it up, he gestured for Ceylon to stand behind me as he also did too.
“You may begin.”
I sighed, and extended my hand. Might as well go back to the beginning. And from my palm, ice began to form as a pristine spear of ice formed. I heard a mutter from behind me as I hefted the weapon with perfect balance. I drew back and immediately called.
“[Throw of Death]!”
And the spear blurred. Like a bullet it hit the dummy with a loud thud as I saw chunks of wall and rock fly through the air. It hadn’t exploded, but the damage had been much higher than I had ever anticipated.
All that remained was the torso of the dummy impaled on the wall along with the spear, it’s limbs torn from the force alone, strewn on the ground.
The Guildmaster behind me blinked. “But that skill is an E Tier skill… how can it be so… strong?”
I turned only to see him trying to work his jaw, while Ceylon gave me an alien look.
“It… an E Tier skill shouldn’t be able to destroy this dummy, or even a C Tier skill…” The Guildmaster muttered under his breath. “Just… how?”
Finally after a few moments of talking to himself, he turned to face me with a weird look.
“Arc this is, I don’t have the permission to award you such a high rank—”
And the door slammed open as the receptionist from earlier walked in. His eyes went wide for a moment seeing the slammed dummy but he immediately turned towards the Guildmaster.
“Urgent news. Ranedale is being sieged by thousands of Lesser Imera Spiders! It’s a C ranked threat! They are already inside the town!”
The Guildmaster immediately began to bark orders, and I simply paused.
The town was being attacked by the spiders I had unleashed into the world two days ago…
I turned to look at Ceylon only to see her evidently looking upset, I wanted to talk with her, but so long as the spiders were here, nothing of the sort would happen. At the same time, people could die from that.
A small sigh left me as I stepped past Ceylon and the Guildmaster.
“What are you doing?” he called.
“I’ll deal with it.” I sighed. “I’ll deal with the spiders.”
Before either of them could say anything, I muttered my skill under my breath.
“[God Step]”
The faster it was done, the better.
And in an instant, I found myself in the center of the plaza, I could already sense spiders in the town and in the vicinity. I didn’t want fame. I didn’t want notoriety. I didn’t want people to know about me. But there was something more that I didn’t want.
For my actions to endanger other people.
My mana coalesced at my hand as a single white bead of ice appeared at my palm. I took a breath as I dropped it, calling my skill.
That was why, I was going to end everything in a single attack.
“[Everlasting Glaciation].”
And the bead hit the ground— and erupted. A wave of ice exploded around me, turning everything white in a blink. Everything froze; the streets, the houses, the air, and all of the spiders.
In a single second, it had all become a land of ice. The spiders frozen in place, the plants and trees, the doors of the houses. Everything had changed, and at that moment all of the kill notifications came.
[ You have defeated: Lesser Imera Spider. Tier: C. ]
[ You have defeated: Lesser Imera Spider. Tier: C. ]
[ You have defeated: Lesser Imera Spider. Tier: C. ]
…
They had all died.
The Guildmaster ran out of the building. Other people joined him as he gasped seeing the ice covered town. Ceylon too rushed out of the building, but the first person to speak was the Guildmaster as he trembled, looking at me with a mortified expression.
“J-Just who are you…?”
A/N: Couldn't post yesterday, electricity died.
Comments
YoYo Crow
Wholeheartedly agree!
Jonathan Willis
I am thoroughly enjoying this.
