**[intro]**

All children in the kingdom of Amora have to contribute to society. Second sons or daughters are trained as heirs or artisans, younger children aid their family in labor or enlist at age sixteen to fight for their country, but the first child bears a specific burden for his or her family: the draft. At age ten, all children, unless they have an older sibling currently in the draft period, have to submit their name to the ticket pool. Initially, everyone has three tickets and equal odds, yet those with means created the three-ticket system to allow parents to buy out two of their child’s tickets. Given the deadly nature of the draft, most families with the ability to buy out their child’s ticket do so. The poor and working-class families, known as the root or trunk factions in Amorian society, have to combat the draft’s impact by having large families with numerous children born in close succession. The eldest child is mandated to participate in the draft until age fifteen, so for those five years (seven if he/she dies), the rest of the children are safe. For this reason, the average family has about five children, with at least one dying in the draft. Unlike military service, which is available at age sixteen and has a reasonable survival rate, the draft has a death rate of 80% for those chosen.

Amora is a relatively small country in terms of landmass but has over one million people. As a result of the large population, the country is always trying to expand its borders, yet it is limited by many dungeons plaguing the world. New dungeons form yearly, and old ones continuously spew out monsters that the army has to deal with. This greatly limits the ability to push into new land since there is hardly enough time to keep up with the dungeons as it is. However, Jerome Sinclair, a former dungeon diver, and soldier devised the ingenious idea of the Dungeon Draft. He used his years of experience both fighting and observing dungeon behavior to devise a system that would stop the dungeons from sending out monsters, thus freeing up the army to move into dungeon controlled territory and send in trained dungeon killers to certain targets, for only the cost of three children per dungeon. This was all possible by taking advantage of the phenomena where younger dungeons’ ability to create new monsters is limited when being delved by adventures. Since a party of three is under the maximum number of divers, the dungeon is required to limit its above-ground presence to allow the other two safe passage. Instead of a platoon of guards being put on each dungeon, only two are needed until all the draftees die inside. For his contributions to society, Jerome is known by the branch and leaf factions (the upper-class members of Amora) as a genius and savior. Still, to the lower factions, his name is synonymous with the devil.

However, lower classes do benefit from their child’s accomplishments in the dungeon. Jerome made it a requirement for the children to stay six months inside the dungeon or defeat it before they are allowed to return to the surface (if the dungeon is inactive for the whole six months, a retrieval team is sent). Teams rarely survive the higher-ranked dungeons for more than a few weeks at best, so the Dungeon Draft council made a scaled reward system for the families based on the rank their child was sent to and the length of survival. At times this is enough to boost a member of the root faction to the trunk or higher, so families train their elder children to have the best chances of survival even if they do not actually expect them to last the whole six months. This was done to ensure the children sent would not die in the first few days due to familial negligence.

**[Day of Draft: Aiden]**

Aiden Sayler glanced up at his mother’s frowning face as she scolded him for burning the soup. “Aiden! You are a level five cook now; stupid mistakes like this are beneath your ability!” He blushed and looked away, knowing it would never have burned if he hadn’t been chatting with the Mortenson's younger daughter. It had been worth every second of his mother's anger, but he still felt guilty as he saw the prominent worry lines standing stark on her aged face.

“Sorry, mom, I’ll get another batch ready. The lunch crowd will only have to wait a few extra minutes." They both knew that it would take far longer to cut everything up and simmer it to get the thick consistency the patrons liked, but for once, his mom let him off easy.

“I know it's the draft today, hun, so I’ll offer everyone an ale for the wait,” she paused to scoff, “watered-down, of course, while you get cooking.”

Normally Aiden was not allowed to run the kitchen alone and would assist his father, but his dad was off at the draft office buying one of his tickets. Ever since his brother passed away seven years ago, and his parents gained the money needed to start their tavern, they have been stressed over his turn at the draft. His older sister never had to go through the process and remained alive, but she was married in another sector with little interest in helping his parents manage their growing business. Aiden had spent the last seven years since they started the tavern being trained to one day take it over and give his parents a much-needed retirement. However, his brother’s protection from the draft expired a year ago when he was only eleven, and his parents had paid the steep ticket price last draft to limit his chance of being picked.

Unlike his brother, who they had trained to give the best chance at surviving, he had been groomed to be a chef, not a warrior. It was a risky move on their part, but he would have wasted his potential doing anything else with his luck and natural inclination towards tavern work. Dismissing the worry of the draft from his mind and focusing instead on the task at hand, Aiden began chopping some vegetables and concentrated on the small floating dot in his vision to see his status. Years of experience as a sous chef allowed him to slice carrots by muscle memory alone.

Aiden William Sayler

Level: 2

Age: 12

Faction: Branch

Class: ----

Traits:

People Person

(As a result of having the maximum potential in charisma)

Good Intentions

(As a result of lower than average wisdom)

Lucky Ducky

(As a result of higher than average luck)

Stats:

Strength: 6

Dexterity:7

Agility:6

Charisma: 10*

Intelligence: 5

Wisdom: 3*

Luck: 9*

Aiden always smiled at seeing his traits. He was blessed with two positive ones and was the pride of his family to have perfect charisma. Traits never said specifically what they did, but as a general rule, the higher your potential for a trait, the more useful it was. Only about 1% of the population naturally had a ten or a 1 in any stat. Typically most people's stats averaged to five or six, with anything under five or over six having the chance of leaving a trait, yet he had been blessed with two stats above the norm. After the ego boost that he received from seeing his traits and status gave him the burst of energy needed to clear away the last shred of guilt, he began peeling potatoes to keep his hands busy as he looked over his skills.

Skills:

Cooking: Lvl 5

(bonus: “making meals from mutton”: enhanced flavor of sub-par ingredients)

Knife proficiency: Lvl 3

Gossip: Lvl 3

Butcher: Lvl 2

Unlike his pride at his stats, Aiden felt that he was behind the curve in his abilities. His parents assured him otherwise, but he had yet to hit the skill cap for cooking after he had leveled. He had spent the last few years working towards hitting the next barrier, yet he had failed to reach it. His parents had spent good money helping him get to level two, and while the bonus for cooking was great, he did not think it was worth the cost. The only skill that came effortlessly was his gossip skill. It was also the one skill he failed to mention to his parents during their conversations as he did not want them to realize that his chattiness had reached the level where even the gods took notice. Despite the slight shame, he felt of being labeled a gossip, Aiden liked the skill. It might not have reached the point where he got any written confirmation of his ability in his skill sheet, but he felt like it influenced more than one might think. Aiden had definitely noticed this phenomenon once he got his gossip skill to three. Suddenly, he could remember details about recipes and instructions better and rarely mixed up the facts in his stories. His parents had been overjoyed at the change but attributed it to his cooking skill, and he was happy to let them continue to do so.

Daydreaming about skills and stats helped him pass the time during his meal preparation, and he was able to get everything ready and served with only a thirty-minute delay. He then got to resume his favorite pastime of talking with those seated in their spacious main room. The warmth of the heath and the joy of meeting new people let him forget about the stressful night he had ahead of him.

Later, while cleaning up the kitchen after the lunch crowd had thinned, he was reminded of why today was significant. Aiden could hear his mom and dad talking in the office alongside the kitchen. This was not a rare occurrence, but he had never heard his parents sound so heated. Money caused some disagreements at times, especially with all the depts they had, but his parents' loving relationship kept it from ever getting out of hand. Natural curiosity and boredom prompted him to lay his head against the wall to hear better to determine what was going on.

“I don’t think we can afford to buy the ticket this year Martha. We can put away money for the next one by using Aiden’s new cooking ability to skimp on ingredients. Still, it's just is not realistic to risk our business without any guarantee he won’t get drafted anyway.” His face jerked away from the wall as if burned, and he was reeling from the news that his dad was not willing to buy out his ticket as he had promised. From the way his mother’s sobs reverberated through the thin wall, he reassured himself that she was just as stricken by the news as he was. However, his stomach clenched painfully as she calmed enough to respond to his father and destroyed his world in the process.

“William! You promised last time that if he evaded the draft once, we would pay the rest until his fifteenth birthday. I went along with it and let him believe we had paid it, but only because I knew he had already passed, and we would pay off the next one. I can’t lose another son to it, honey... Jackson’s death tore me apart, and we need Aiden to take over the business someday.”

His father replied, though the walls muffled part of the response as his voice pitched lower, “.... Maya’s children.. no money to spare.. brokers swarming as we speak..”

Stumbling away from the voices that had just shattered the trust he had held for his parents, Aiden looked around at the kitchen, where he spent his days and tried to imagine one of Maya’s little babies filling his role. He had not felt anything negative towards his sister that morning but now would have screamed at her if he could. She never had to worry about the draft and, as a woman, got to avoid serving in the army by having children instead. Although only nineteen, his sister already had two boys, and now he knew that the second son, Arthur, would likely come to replace him in a few years if his luck failed him tonight, and he was chosen. He tried to calm himself down as the blood rushing through his body made him lean heavily against the large brick oven. There might be thousands of tickets drawn out at each draft, but his three would be surrounded by the tickets of his entire age group, and he would probably not get chosen.

Since this is the second draft and no new draftees are added until the solstice, Aiden knew his odds were worse than one in ten. As annoying as the name was, his lucky ducky trait made him feel safer in his chances. It helped that as a member of the branch faction, if a poor one, he has a chance to be on the reserve group and potentially would not have to enter a dungeon at all. His only other hope is to bank on drawing a rank one dungeon where even someone with his dismal fighting prowess could stand a decent chance of survival. Of those that survive the draft, the vast majority are from rank one dungeons. If he had the misfortune of ending up in a higher rank, well, he would be dead. Some made it out after the six months and were given examples of why the draft was fair, yet he thought the whole thing was idiotic. Huffing morbidly, he muttered to himself, “The only reason those people survived at all was by starting with high levels, and to think I was bragging about reaching level two...little good it’s going to do me in a dungeon.”

**[Later that Night]**

“The draft is commencing! Congratulations to those whose names are not chosen and a heartfelt thank you to those that will be serving our country this season. With the help of these courageous youths, our great nation plans to expand the borders by over two miles in every direction this year alone!”

Aiden stared forward blankly, sandwiched between his parents in the tavern’s crowded hall, waiting like the rest of those present to hear the names being announced on the grey speaking pipe protruding from the tavern’s wood floor. On draft days, all sound and air mages work together to project the announcer’s words to the public spaces throughout the district. Those with children in the draft had to listen intently as failure to show for the draft was punished by the entire family's imprisonment. He always found it a cruel way to enforce an already awful law. It had happened here once a few years back when a girl's parents tied her up to keep her from running away.

The next hour of listening half-heartedly to the announcer repeating names in his deep baritone voice nearly lulled him into a restless sleep, but fear of hearing his own name keep him trapped between boredom and terror. His father's quill, scratching the parchment next to him recording the names as they are called, was the only noise in the room. Anyone disturbing the vigil received glares from the entire crowd. Two times “Aiden..” is called only to be completed by someone else’s last name and his palms were bloody from the force of his own nails.

It is not until near the end that he hears another "Aiden" called, and he nearly ignored this one, but the following words, "William Sayler,” came immediately after, and a wave of grief suddenly hit him. His mother muffled the sound of the next draftee’s last name with her crying, but he heard “Rita Mae..” come from the pipe. The names coming after his will make up his team for better or worse. Whoever this Rita is, her potential might very well determine his chances of surviving the next few months, and he has never prayed harder than for her to be the fiercest girl in existence.