The giant form of the Guild Hall loomed over me, its obsidian dark wood sparkling under Novas’s light. It gave off immense pressure, like the force of gravity had just doubled. I’d entered the Hall hundreds of times over the years, but I’d never felt this before. Now that I was Blessed, or maybe because I was Chosen, I’m not sure, but when I looked up at the Hall, it was like I could feel the soul of every Adventurer who had came before me. The weight of all of their expectations, and their legacies. It was……a lot.

Brygid snapped her fingers to get my attention. “Hey, Emmanuel. You okay?”

I started, jumping back from her a half-step, the noise breaking the hold that the Hall had on me. I gulped, and gave a half hearted chuckle. “Hehe, kinda nervous for some reason.”

She nodded sympathetically. “Ah, yeah. I get it. Coming in here to sign up for realsies is totally different than just coming to visit, or do normal body training.” Then she smiled and smacked me on the shoulder. “But if there’s anyone who doesn’t need to worry about it, its you, Mr. S Rank.”

I chuckled, rubbing the back of my head. “Heh, yeah. Fair point. Come on, let’s head on in then.”

The entrance to the Guild was through a pair of gargantuan double doors, each at least fifty by fifty feet. The doors had to be that big in order to handle the huge influx of people that constantly came through. Anyone who had business at the Guild could simply walk in anytime from 8 N.V (That stands for Novas Time) to 8 N.X (Noxal Time), but it was Adventurers only after that.

Brygid and I smoothly stepped into the flow of people heading into the Guild.

The inside of the Guild Hall was just as grand as the outside was. Massive basket shaped torches hung from the ceiling by chains as thick around as I was. Each torch was twice the width of a man, containing a raging yellow flame which bathed the main entrance in a warm, crisp light, like peak sunrise on a perfect cloudless day. Guild banners stretched from wall to wall, thick cloth waving softly.

Hardwood floors, made of the same black wood that the rest of the Guild was made of, shimmered underfoot. They were enchanted with a powerful spell in order to keep them perfectly clean. Very useful when you had thousands of people tracking who knows what around. Dirt, poop, booze, blood; there was all sorts of crap people stepped in.

The main entrance was divided into three separate parts. The left, the right, and the back. Right was where all of the Guild services were located. That included all of the quest boards, messaging stations, ability training and skill teaching rooms, etc. The back of the room, including the stairs leading to the upper floors, was cordoned off for high-level administrative purposes. That was where you went if you needed to talk to someone in charge (And were important enough for them to actually come talk to).

The left section of the room was for the day to day running of the Guild. Thats where all of the clerks were, and all of their functions. That included registration, distribution of generic quest rewards, and any other ‘standard’ business you might have.

We headed left.

There were dozens of clerical lanes. Thats a lot, but even then sometimes it wasn’t enough, especially during seasonal events like the Festival of the North Star or Haunts-nacht, when tens of thousands of Adventurers were attempting the limited time quests all at the same time. Thankfully, the Guild wasn’t too crowded today, and I was able to just pick a line and walk straight up to the clerk. Brygid waited for me off to the side, picking out a chair and sitting down.

The clerk waiting at the counter was young, maybe about sixteen or seventeen, wearing the traditional, slightly frumpy Guild clerk outfit; a mostly blue dress with a small cream colored hat. Definite beast kin, with soft blonde fur over hazel colored skin, a beautiful contrast. Her cute round face had a smattering of freckles. Two feline ears peaked out from under a mop of curly brown hair, contentedly flicking back and forth. I’d imagine she had a cat tail too then, but the counter blocked me from seeing.

“Hello there sir, how may I help you?”

I put my hands on the counter, leaning on them, and grinned at the kitty clerk. “Oh no, please don’t give me any of that ‘sir’ crap. We can’t be more than three to five years apart at most…” I trailed off, looking over the clerical desk for a name plate. She had all the normal stuff; her Guild tablet (Big magic square with the Guild’s logo on the back.), a poster of a kobold (A sort of canine/lizard hybrid) hanging above a dark pit of spikes that read ‘Hang in there!’, and a big mug of Guild branded quills.

No name plate though.

“Uh…” Smoother than butter, Emmanuel.

The clerk giggled, reaching her right hand over the counter for a shake. “Hehe, fair enough. My name’s Gracie.”

I smiled at her, gently taking her hand. Her hand was super soft, covered in a layer of super fine fuzz. Was that hair, or fur? I was never really sure with beast-kin, but it felt like too stupid of a question to actually ask. Whatever. I shook, introducing myself. “My name’s Emmanuel. Pleased to meet you Gracie.”

Letting go of her hand and stepping back, I placed my hands on my hips and postured arrogantly, preening a bit. “Now, I’ve just recently got my Blessing, which I am, ahuh, very proud of, if I do say so myself. Obviously I’m going to be very famous, very soon. Be a dear and register me for the Guild at once. Chop chop!”

Gracie laughed and rolled her amber eyes at me. “Hah! I’m sure.” Then she focused on her Guild pad, picking it up and tapping at it with a long (and sharp) fingernail.

*Clack*

The pad lit up with a blue glow, and Gracie began to type. “You know, I’ve only been working here a couple of months, and I’ve already met more of that kind of person than I’d care to.”

She closed her eyes and sighed, though her fingers kept typing away. Impressive. “I have to deal with hundreds of people during my shift. On a good day, about half of those have some kind of stick up their butt and a substantially inflated opinion of themselves.”

I just had to laugh at that. “Hah! That’s the nicest way I’ve ever heard that put.”

Gracie smiled and winked. “That’s me! I find that the nicest insults hit the hardest.” She hit a few more keys and the Guild pad pinged. “Okay! Let’s go ahead and get you registered! Emmanuel, if you please, what is your full name?”

“Emmanuel Burroughs.”

“Mmhmm, got it. Age?”

“Twenty.”

Gracie’s triangular cat ears flickered up in interest at that. “Twenty? Little late to just be getting your Blessing, isn't it? Uh-n-not that there’s anything wrong with that, of course! Just, is there any particular reason you waited so long?”

“Well, since you only get the one chance, I figured I’d better go in there as well prepared as I possibly could be.”

Gracie nodded. “Oh, yeah, that actually makes a lot of sense. I ended up with a B rank, but maybe I could have done better if I waited too. I was just so excited to try it! Hmm…” She scratched her chin thoughtfully, then shrugged, placing the Guild tablet on the table in front of me, screen side up. “Well, whatever. I’m happy with the Blessing I got. Moving on! Emmanuel, if you would just place your palm on the screen please.”

I obliged, of course.

“Thank you! Now, the tablet is going to scan your body, analyze your Blessing, and register it to the Guild database. Then you’ll be all finished!”

The tablet beeped twice. A fuzzy green light appeared on the top of my hand, rapidly crawling its way over my body. I shivered. The light was viscous, and moved in a way that felt like I was being licked all over. Fuckin’ gross as hell, man.

Thankfully it only lasted about ten seconds, then the light rapidly receded back into the tablet. I looked at Gracie and cringed. “Uuugh, that was awful.”

She laughed openly at that, showing sharp, gleaming teeth. “Hah! Isn’t it though? Sorry I didn’t warn you, but I wanted to see your reaction.” I stuck my tongue out at her. She winked. “At least you only have to do it the once, right?”

“Yeah, at least there’s that.”

Gracie twirled the tablet back around to face her, typing again. “Alright, so technically you’re all done now. If you want, I can just give you your Guild marker and you can be on your way.”

“Oooooor?”

She leaned forward, whispering behind her hand conspiratorially. “Well, as you can probably see, I’m not super busy right now, and as thanks for being so fun to talk to, ie; not big old butthead, I think I can give you a little extra help. If you want, I can pull up your character sheet on here, review it, and give you some Quest recommendations that match up with you. That way you won’t have to go digging through all of the separate Quest boards.”

I blinked in surprise. “Damn, really? That’d be fantastic Gracie, thank you!”

Gracie nodded, smiling warmly at me. “Yeah, of course! Better that than me going back to just sitting here all bored.” A couple seconds of typing, and she spoke again. “Alrighty, I’ve got your sheet pulled up. Let me just…” Trailing off, Gracie’s eyes began skimming over my sheet as she scrolled downward.

After only about thirty seconds of reading however, Gracie froze, her eyes stopping dead in their tracks, widening in shock. Her eyes flicked to me, then back to the tablet.

I crossed my arms and cleared my throat. “Something wrong Gracie?”

She jumped a little in surprise, eyes shooting to my face again. She waved her hands frantically, stammering out a “N-not at all, E-Emmanuel. Sir.”

My lips pursed. ‘Kay, wasn’t exactly expecting that reaction. I uncrossed my arms, making a placating motion at her. “Woah now, where’s that coming from all of a sudden? You don’t have to call me sir, Gracie. Didn’t we go over that? In fact, I’d prefer you didn’t.”

She glared at me, making a ‘can you believe this guy?’ face. She leaned in far over the counter, bringing her face close to mine. “Yes, but that was before I found out you were an S ranker.” The last words came out in a hiss, with Gracie quickly scanning her head side to side, checking to see if anyone else heard her before leaning back.

I rolled my hands at her. “And?”

She threw her hands up in the air, professional mannerisms going out the window. “And what? You can’t just waltz in here with that and not expect me to freak out! This is huge news!”

I winced, leaning forward and placing my hands on the hardwood clerk counter. “Gracie, I would really rather this not be huge news. Maybe a little more low profile, know what I mean?”

Gracie adamantly shook her head, looking at me with a sympathetic frown. “No can do Emmanuel. Obviously, I would never make this public news or anything, but I have to report this to the Guild-master. If I knowingly just let an S ranker walk out the door, he’d have my job for sure. I’m sorry, but please wait here for a few minutes.”

I was left standing there, arms wide, listening to the sound of Gracie’s heels clacking on the floor as she ran off to report.

Well, that’s not quite how I wanted that to go. As if to rub it in, there was a ding. A different ding.

*Dong*

A notification forced its way into my view, not even letting me attempt to save it for later.

Quest recieved!

Name: Path of the Chosen: First Step

Quest Classification: Story Quest (Quest is mandatory. Quest cannot be refused. Quest will evolve as decisions are made.)

Quest Difficulty: ???

Recommended Quest Level: 1-10

Current Objective: Meet the Guild-Master, and see what he has to say to Foronea’s newest S ranker.

Objective Difficulty: Very Easy

Rewards: ???

Huh! A story quest? I’d never heard of a story quest before. I guess it had to be a Chosen thing. Interested to see where that goes.

“Uhhhh, was there a problem with your registration or something?”

I turned, and saw Brygid standing behind me. I sighed, pinching the bridge of my nose. “No, not exactly. When the clerk, Gracie, saw that I was an S ranker, she said she had to go report in to the Guild-master. I’d rather have just gotten to leave, honestly.”

Brygid shrugged. “I dunno man, I feel like you kinda should’ve expected that to happen. A’s are rare enough, you know? Much less an S. You should take this a little more seriously.”

I rubbed the back of my head, sighing. “I am taking this seriously, Brygid. I just want to keep a low profile for a while. If I get too famous too fast, I might not be strong enough to handle the people who inevitably come to try and fuck with me. Because you’re right, an S rank is a huge deal, and you know people are going to try and take advantage of me as soon as they find out."

Brygid’s head leaned back a bit in surprise. “Oh, fair shit. So you are.” Her cheeks flushed, and Brygid scratched her chin in embarrassment. “My bad. You know how you usually are though.”

I scoffed, and punched her in the shoulder jokingly. Mostly jokingly. “Tch, piss off, you.”

We kept chatting for a few minutes after that, just about normal stuff. How she’d/I’d been, how our parents were doing, you know. Everything seemed fine over at Brygid’s place. The business was doing fine and her parents were as happily married as ever.

“Yeah, their twenty third wedding anniversary is coming up soon, so I’m hoping to score something good out of whatever Quest we pick.”

A rapidly approaching clacking sounded Gracie’s return. She practically bounded up to the counter, then began hurriedly fiddling with something under her workstation. “If you two could just back up a step, please.”

Once we did, there was a soft *click*, and the entire counter swung forward in an arc like an opening door. Woah! Didn’t know they could do that. The counter had been perfectly seamless and you just couldn’t tell.

Gracie stepped back and off to the side, motioning me forward. Oh! She did in fact have a tail, a fluffy, bushy thing. “Emmanuel, please come this way and follow me.”

I nodded, then turned to Brygid and waved her forward as well. “Come on Brygid, you wanna get in on this too?”

She grinned, giving me a thumbs-up. “Oh hell yeah.”

We both walked forward, but Gracie held up a hand. “I’m really sorry, but I just need to bring Emmanuel. The Guild-master’s quarters are restricted access.”

I shook my head at her, crossing my arms sternly. “Sorry, but no. Brygid and I are a packaged deal. If I go, she goes.”

Gracie stammered out a nervous “B-B-But…”.

I walked over to her, and grabbed her gently by the shoulders. “Don’t worry Gracie, I’ll take full responsibility for this. I’ll make it very clear that I pushed for her to come along, and that you did nothing but an outstanding job.” Letting go, I gave her a wink and elbow nudge. “Hell, I’ll tell him to give you a raise too. Whatever they’re paying you, I’m sure its not enough.”

Gracie took a deep breath, then let it out slowly, the tension melting from her face and back into a smile. “Thanks Emmanuel. I won’t hold my breath, but I appreciate it.” She nodded at Brygid. “Sorry about that, come on. I’m sure the Guild-master can make an exception this once.”

-Ding!- Minor Skill Persuasion has levelled up to level 3!

-Ding!- You gain plus one point of Charisma! Total Charisma: 18

Oh, radical!

Brygid and I followed Gracie through the back of the clerical stations, passing at least fifty before arriving at a door with a picture of a staircase on it. Like everything else, the stairs were constructed of a dark wood, and perfectly spotless. It had a golden handrail for safety, as the steps were fairly steep.

We climbed three flights of stairs, then exited the stairwell. Gracie led us through several more hallways (And I hoped she would lead us out too. This place was confusing as hell.) before we stopped in front of a great ivory door. It stood in stark contrast to the black wood around it, the pure white stone gleaming under the light of the hallway torches. Without a single sound or signal, the ivory door began to silently glide open, revealing an incredibly ornate room on the other side.

Gracie turned to Brygid and I, bowing slightly. “And here is the Guild-master’s office. Please, enter. I will be here when you are done to take you back to the main lobby.”

We both nodded, and headed into the Guild-master’s room.

As soon as our feet went beyond the border of the door, it automatically began to swing inward, closing behind us with an almost silent *click*. Which wasn’t spooky at all.

Stepping farther into the brightly lit room, I started taking a good look around.

The first thing I noticed was that for being the Guild-Master’s office, there was a surprising lack of Guild-Master here.

The second was how much unbelievably cool shit there was in here. The room was huge, and every part of it was filled with some kind of antique. Banners from dead kingdoms hung from the ceiling, books in languages I’d never seen sat stacked on the floor.

Legendary weapons decorated the walls and filled glass floor cabinets; including, but not limited to; the sword Caladbolg, a six foot long greatsword with an aquamarine blade that curved on one side like flowing waves, but was jagged on the other side like the tearing fangs of a wolf, rumored to take the tops off of mountains with a single slice.

Armad, Axe of Heavenly Wind; a fearsome double headed axe that looked like it was heavier than I was, the two blades forged from solid jade, shaft crafted from the bones of Eiheldsur, Dragon of The Eastern Gale. According to legend, it was capable of felling entire forests with one swing.

There was even the Houyi-Hibow, the Bow of the Mourning Son, an eight foot tall great-bow with a smooth and subtle curve, that shone a gleaming red and orange at all times. It’s said that the Houyi-Hibow was created from a single shaft of Dawn’s light in order to quell a horrific, encroaching darkness, but was lost to the annals of time, the kingdom it was meant to protect having fallen long ago. How the hell it ended up here, I’m sure, was a story I’d never learn.

“Yoooo, this room is fucking awesome.” I whispered to Brygid, feeling like I shouldn’t break the silence for some reason. “How do you think the Guild got all this stuff?”

She shrugged, taking care to keep the noise down as well. This room just had that kind of atmosphere. “I dunno.” The fingers on her left hand wiggled towards a diamond knife (Literally: a knife carved from diamond) hanging on the wall. She grabbed her wrist with her other hand, forcibly pulling it away. “God, I want to touch something so bad, but that seems like a terrible idea.”

“An astute observation, young lass.”

The atmosphere changed in an instant. What had been respectful, almost reverent silence, was now one hundred percent pure killing intent, concentrated directly at the back of my head.

A wave of nauseating fear rolled over my entire body, threatening to send me to my knees. My legs trembled, bile rising in my throat. Beside me, Brygid fell onto her knees with a hard thud.

*Tap*

*Tap*

Two deliberate footsteps behind me. “You didn’t fall. Interesting.” The man’s voice carried power. Ridiculous power. The depth of a canyon, the rumble of waves breaking on rocks. The promise of an entire lifetime’s experience in retribution if you didn’t listen to what he said.

I bit my lip, and stamped the fear down. Come on body! Not the appropriate reaction for a situation like this! I know I’m just a rabbit to this guy, but even rabbits bite when cornered.

[Will Unbreaking Level One activated! You have resisted the Fear status! You have resisted the Prone status!]

I spun around on my heel, double tapping Lightning In a Bottle, the air around me taking on a tangy, tingly scent as lightning enveloped me. The clock on my HP started. Thirty five seconds.

“Who are you?” I thrust my right hand at the man accusingly. My left hand hung to the side, the first link of chain coming from my palm as I activated [Produce Chain].

The man’s thick eyebrows raised slightly, his lips—hidden under a dark, magnificently bushy mustache—quirking. “S rank indeed…” His hands came up placatingly, the killing intent in the air evaporating. “Relax boy. You don’t recognize me?”

“What? N-” With the overwhelming threat of death gone, I was actually able to focus and think for a second, while Brygid began picking herself up and recovering her composure.

The man stood six feet tall, though even without the killing intent, he had an aura that made him feel like a fucking giant. His eyes were silver, twinkling with a mysterious light in the shadow of his eyebrows. His nose was strong, mouth hidden under the aforementioned mustache. He wore a sleeveless purple tunic with loose beige pants. Both seemed to be made of some type of silk.

The man’s arms looked as hard as blue-steel, with some of the sickest tattoos I’d ever seen. His right shoulder held the image of a mighty furnace in the process of smelting metal, so detailed I would swear the flames actually flickered. The left shoulder bore a colossal mountain piercing the sky, rolling boulders tumbling down its front.

The lightning engulfing me fizzled away as I deactivated Lightning in a Bottle, fifty hp eaten away in the few seconds that took.

As it turns out, I did recognize him. “Y-You’re…”

The man chuckled, eyes glinting jovially. “That’s right, I’m the man you came to meet in the first place. It is a pleasure to meet you, young Emmanuel. My name is Guild-Master Y’mor Stálsteinn.”