Adam awoke in the morning from his void-filled sleep. He was completely rested, his body light, as though he had surpassed the bonds of being a mere level four adventurer. His mind was feather light and as quick as light, filling with the knowledge of the world, beyond what he had once known. Now he had access to greater insight to the world and fate.

OMEN

17

17

Fate was kind to him today. He had the ability to allow for two things to go right today, and already he knew what he was going to use them for, or at least one of them.

He leapt out of bed and stretched, checking which spells he could choose as well as the spells he wanted to know today.

SPELLS AVAILABLE

Alarm, Language Insight, Mage Familiar, Magic Arrows, Sleep, Shield

He should probably summon a familiar, but that could wait. He didn’t want to reveal too much about his magic abilities just yet, even if some people already had a few inklings.

Plus he was a half-elf.

The fey blood within him already made some others suspect of him. It seemed as though elves had a penchant for magic within this world too, which sounded exactly about what he expected. He wondered if perhaps there were more to the elves than just the typical arrogant pricks that most media portrayed them as.

He descended the stairs to see Emma and Paul chatting together, the guild filled with adventuring groups. There were the typical few he was familiar with and no new additions. Jurot was already drinking this morning, Peron and the others were kicking it though Adam spied a parchment nearby that indicated a quest.

PERCEPTION

D20 (10) - WISE (1) = 9

FAILURE!

Of course he couldn’t really see what the quest was, plus it wasn’t a good thing to snoop.

Adam sat down and then relaxed, waiting for the breakfast bell to ring.

“Morning,” Adam said.

Jurot nodded as he finished his drink. “Are you to adventure this morning?”

“I might,” Adam replied, “I need to see what Paul needs with me though.”

Jurot nodded. “I will wait for you then.”

Soon the bell rang for breakfast. This time for breakfast there were two pieces of bread, some scrambled eggs, and a few pieces of hard fruit that were dark brown in colour on the outside and a cream colour on the inside. Adam bit into the fruit, which had the texture of apple, but tasted more like a peach with a bit of a sour tang. He continued to eat until he was done, finishing his drink well after Jurot had finished, who was currently laying back and rubbing his stomach.

“Adam, are you free?” Paul called out.

Adam nodded and then walked over to the experienced adventurer, who was standing beside the desk in his typical breast plate armour with his blade at his side as per the usual.

“We’ve been reviewing your performance, and after seeing the spar with Alten, we’ve decided that you should probably head up to iron rank.”

Adam’s brows raised in surprise. A rank up? So soon? He hadn’t really done much, had he? Was Alten really that strong? Well… he had been critically hit, and without his Samurai Spirit, he probably wouldn’t have had such an easy time dealing with the guy.

“Oh, thank you.” Adam winced at saying thank you, being reminded of how much he usually said the words. “Uh, great.”

“We’ll be needing you to pass a quick test,” Paul said as he motioned with his head. Paul led Adam around back and then grabbed out from his pocket a small white pearl as well as a small feather. “You said you were able to cast Identify, are you able to right now?”

“Right now? It’ll take me a few minutes, but I’m sure I could.”

“How long do you need?”

“About fifteen minutes or so.”

Paul nodded his head and then handed the pair of items over and then a small dagger. Adam received the item and Paul motioned his head to the small table and stool.

Adam sat down and then inhaled deeply. He stared down at the items. He picked up the dagger and then began to mutter some words of magic that flowed through his mind and onto his tongue. He hadn’t prepared the spell to cast using his mana, but since he knew the spell he could cast it through other means as long as he had the time to do so.

He hoisted up the pearl and then kept it between his thumb and index finger. He picked up the feather and tickled the dagger with the feather, which of course was an owl feather. He continued to mutter as the dagger began to inform him of what it was. It was a fairly typical steel dagger, but there was a hint of electricity to it. It looked and felt normal, but there was something to it.

ARCANE LORE

D20 (3) + SMART (4) + TRAINED (3) = 10

FAILURE!

A little while later his mind flooded with information. It was as though he had opened up a book and had read about the dagger, though some of the pages had been torn out.

UNKNOWN DAGGER IDENTIFIED

DAGGER OF RUIN

+1 to hit and damage.

On a critical hit, deals an additional die of damage.

Adam looked up to Paul and slide the dagger back to him.

“Do you know what this dagger does?” Adam asked.

Paul nodded.

“It’s a Dagger of Ruin. It hits a little harder than other daggers, especially when you strike true.”

Paul smiled. “I have confirmed that you are able to use the spell Identify. That’s very useful for a guild, we sometimes receive items that need to be identified and so having a wizard that is able to use the spell is useful. Would you be willing to do such for us?” Paul retrieved the dagger and the items used for the spell.

Adam blinked a few times. “We could work something out.” That kind of thing seemed like work, Adam wondered if perhaps it counted as a quest.

Paul nodded his head. “We’d be willing to pay you for such work.”

“How much?” Adam asked as he leaned in, intrigued.

“We’ll supply the items each time and we’ll offer you sixty gold pieces each casting.”

Adam refrained from whistling, for that was not a respectful thing to do, and he wanted to keep himself calm in order to think on the offer. That’s a lot of gold for casting a first level spell. Though then again, it might come by infrequently, and maybe he wouldn’t be around at the time and they’d get someone else to cast it instead.

“I’d like forty gold a cast, the items required to cast the spell after I’ve done so ten times, and free room and board while I remain.” Adam paused for a long moment. Then he recalled that he needed some coin in order to draw something. “Also ten gold upfront.”

Paul stared at Adam, and after a few seconds passed, he nodded his head. “Alright, we can do that.”

Adam was exhilarated by the fact he could finally buy the parchment and the ink in order to draw his blade design. Adam smiled and then the pair shook hands on it. Paul led him back out and then handed him ten gold pieces.

CURRENCY

19 Gold

20 Silver

20 Copper

“We’ll need your copper token back since you won’t be needing it any longer,” Paul said.

Adam nodded his head, but he was rather sad about it. He had helped create the token, but he assumed the guild needed it back so people didn’t use the token for nefarious purposes. Paul stamped the iron token once and handed it over to Adam.

RANK GAINED

Iron

Adam looked at the token. It was the same shape as the copper token, save for slightly less rounded edges, and it had his name right in the middle. His heart pounded wildly. He was iron rank now, meaning he was a pretty legit adventurer. He was no bronze rank, which was apparently when people started taking someone seriously, but iron rank was no copper rank. His fingers brushed along the ridges on the end, his eyes peered through the holes to see it was slightly thinner than the copper token. He looked up to Paul and nodded.

With that he returned to Jurot, who spied the iron token right away. “You have ranked up!” he exclaimed. Luckily everyone else had left and so it was just them.

“I have,” Adam replied.

“Ah! I will soon be there as well.” Jurot stood up and stretched his neck and then rubbed it. “Let us go and quest!”

Adam smiled. He was glad that Jurot didn’t seem to be annoyed or jealous. Jurot seemed to be far more mature than he had expected, which was great. He wondered if Jurot was as excited as he to go and quest today.

“Should we do a copper rank quest or an iron rank quest?” Adam asked. “Can we do an iron rank quest together?”

Jurot shrugged.

Adam walked over to the desk to Emma. “Morning Emma,” he said.

“Good morning, Adam,” she said. “Congratulations on your rank up.” She smiled.

“Thank you.” Adam smiled in return. “I was just wondering, can Jurot and I go on an iron rank quest together?”

“Depending on the quest, I can authorise that.”

“Oh, great…” Adam then turned back to nod at Jurot. With that he checked on the quest wall and then saw a few quests. There was a quest for slaying a few black bears which seemed to be a good idea. Black bears weren’t the toughest of bears, Adam and Jurot could probably both take on one with relative ease. He wondered how many black bears they could kill together in a single day as each one had a bounty of fifteen gold pieces just for slaying it. He took a moment to think.

‘We probably can’t carry more than two black bears…’

So instead he checked the brown bear quest and saw each one offered fifty gold pieces. That sounded pretty easy to do. He looked back to Jurot. “Brown bear sound good to you?”

Jurot nodded. “Let’s do that one.”

“Could we do the brown bear quest, Emma?” Adam asked.

Emma smiled. “Usually we don’t allow fresh iron ranks or copper ranks to take on a brown bear, but considering how you’ve already beaten one by yourself I don’t suppose it makes much sense for me to deny the request.” She handed over two blocks for them to pin on the wall. “Good luck.”

QUEST RECEIVED

Slay: Brown Bears

Fifty gold upon proof of killing a brown bear. We will part out the brown bear for a small fee.

Adam nodded and with that the pair left, heading out together to go and slay a brown bear. As they did, Thundersmith called out to Adam.

“Aye, Adam, have ya gotten tha sketches?” Thundersmith asked.

‘Oh, darn it!’

“Sorry Thundersmith, I didn’t manage to get the parchment or ink.” Adam turned to Jurot. “Would you mind if we left at noon for the quest?”

“I do not mind,” Jurot shrugged. “As long as we go and eat some buns together before we leave. You will pay this time too for making me wait.” Jurot grinned.

“Fine, that’s a good deal to me.” Adam laughed. He turned to Thundersmith and bowed his head apologetically. “I’m sorry, I’ll head over to the merchant and grab some and I’ll return and sketch it out for you.” With that Adam left to the merchant he had found the day before.

SMART

D20 (17) + SMART (4) = 21

SUCCESS!

This time he was able to recall where the merchant had been. Bozar was currently selling off a fine ink pen to a little girl. Adam waited behind her and then nodded to Bozar, who threw a nod in return. The little girl exchanged a single silver piece and then turned.

It wasn’t a little girl, it was the dwarf from the guild. She looked up at Adam in surprise before her face quickly shifted to a glare. “Stupid feyblood,” she grumbled as she glared at him, the look of death painted on her face.

Adam stared down at her for a moment and then stepped back. “Excuse me,” Adam said as she made her way away. Adam threw a look to Jurot and shrugged, who didn’t understand what had happened. Oh right, he probably didn’t speak dwarven…

“Morning Bozar, do you have the set?” Adam asked as his eyes fell across the wares.

“I have the set if you have the coin,” the merchant replied with a pearly white smile.

Adam nodded and handed over the ten gold pieces to the merchant.

CURRENCY

9 Gold

20 Silver

20 Copper

“A pleasure doing business with you,” the merchant said as he smiled further.

“You as well Bozar. May I ask how much a piece of parchment costs?”

“A piece of parchment is two silver pieces,” he replied.

“Could I order two more pieces?”

“Of course, two pieces for four silver, or you can have three pieces for five silver.”

“I’ll take the three pieces then.”

CURRENCY

9 Gold

15 Silver

20 Copper

Adam had no idea why he ordered an additional three pieces of parchment, but he thought he may as well. What if he ruined the first drawing for the sword?

With that he left. He held onto the set realising he probably should get himself a second pack he could carry small items out on adventures rather than leaving his pack behind. In fact, he probably should carry his pack with him…

If only he had a bag of holding.

He returned to Thundersmith with Jurot in tow. “Sorry about that, would you mind if we chatted together about the sword’s design?” Adam asked.

Thundersmith nodded his head. “Aye, we can do that. What were ya thinking?”

Adam then began to sketch what he had in mind last night, trying to recall all the little details he wanted. He didn’t want too much detail, just a touch here and there, a sprinkling of details on an otherwise fine blade.

SKETCH

D20 (4) - QUICK (1) = 3

ACTIVATED OMEN

D20 (17) - Quick (1) = 16

SUCCESS!

The dwarf stared at the sketch and nodded his head. Adam had sketched the handle and the blade separately, revealing basically a normal blade. He had thought long and hard about whether he wanted a katana or not, but he felt his insides cringe at the thought of being such a deep weeb, and so thought against it at the end.

“Aye, it’s a blade ah can do for ya. Ya want any details on tha grip?”

“No, no designs on the grip. Could you perhaps etch some designs into the inner blade?"

“What kind of runes?”

“Strength. Luck. Heart.”

“Aye?” Thundersmith looked up into Adam’s eyes. Adam flushed at the look, but Thundersmith nodded. “Ah can do that, no issues.”

“Great.”

“Aye, that’ll be all?”

“That’s be all, thank you.”

Adam left the sketch for Thundersmith so he could refer back to it. Thundersmith updated his time line though, apparently it’d be done at the end of the fifth day starting from today.

“Ah’ve got some work to do for some noble across the way.”

“Take however long you need, I don’t intend to rush you.”

Thundersmith threw back a nod and with that Adam turned to Jurot, who had been patiently waiting, intrigued by the sketch and their talk. “Bakery?” Adam asked.

Jurot nodded and the pair left to the baker. Adam followed Jurot’s lead, his nose recalled where the bakery had been. They entered together, but this time there was another at the front. It was an angry looking woman with dark brown hair and dark brown eyes, with heavy curves along her side. She noted the pair that entered, her eyes falling on their tokens before she nodded.

Adam ordered six jam filled doughnuts and quickly left, for her glare was far too much for him to handle.

CURRENCY

9 Gold

14 Silver

18 Copper

He turned to look at Jurot as they left, the barbarian already popping a piece into his mouth.

“What do you think? Was she your type?” Adam asked.

Jurot smiled.