Waking up on the rather large bed in our hotel room, I could feel the gentle air coming from Ailya’s sleeping figure as it brushed by me. Lifting my head to look at the girl whose sleeping expression never failed to bring me peace and comfort, I brought my hand up and began to caress her hair as the little elf laying on my chest woke up.

One thing I had learned from all the nights we spent together was that, unless I ordered her to continue sleeping, Ailya would always wake up a few seconds after I would, no matter how much I tried to not move in order to not wake-up the adorable girl. So it was meaningless for me to worry that my actions would wake her up.

Seeing Ailya’s bright smile as she stared at me with her sleepy face, I decided to be the first to break the silence as I asked her:

“What should we do Ailya, Should we run away?”

After hearing my question, the smile on Ailya’s face dimmed slightly as she began to seriously ponder my proposal.

Coming to a conclusion, Ailya brought her face closer to mine as she hugged me tightly and said:

“I’ll follow you wherever you go Alex. No matter how far. No matter for how long. No matter how dangerous the journey is. I will always follow you regardless of where you choose to go. So long as you allow me to of course.”

Hearing her ‘confession’, I smiled as I wrapped my arms around the little elf in front of me and rubbed my forehead against hers and said:

“You silly girl, didn’t I say that we would always be together.”

Smiling brightly at my response, Ailya hugged me even harder as she said:

“That’s why, I don’t think it’s a good idea to run away. Although I’ll could probably escape by changing my appearance and mana signature. I don’t think Alex would be able to since you can’t change your mana signature. I’m pretty sure if we try to run away, she’ll be able to track you down eventually, and who knows what she’ll do to us then. After all, she did warn us against attempting anything…”

Hearing Ailya’s rather sensible advice, I decided to forgo running away for the moment and instead began to think about something else that had been on my mind. And that was the adventurers guild.

After bringing our bags up, the receptionist, whose name was Dean, began conversing with us as well as offering us some valuable information. Most likely, he knew we weren’t from the area, and was kind enough to answer some of the questions we had. Since he was offering, I decided to ask him for information about the guild, the directions to their building from our hotel, and if he knew how easy it would be for a low level mage to find something suitable.

Surprisingly, he said that just by virtue of being a mage, there would be some sort of demand for my services. And while I could party up and do hunting or gathering quests, It would be easier for someone of a low level to accept a formal job application posted by the guild, and take the opportunity to develop my level and skills further before advancing on to something more dangerous.

While I kept his advice in mind, I was actually a bit excited to see what possible quests would be posted for us to take. Although with only the two of us, I knew that the actual number of quests we would even be able to do safely would be extremely limited. While we were able to progress rather well in the labyrinth, it was only because we had the three boys to aid us and act as shields against the monsters attacks. Ailya and I at the moment, were simply unable to properly defend ourselves if we were to get overrun by monsters, no matter how weak they were.

Regardless, I was in very high spirits today thinking about visiting an actual adventurers guild, as it was something I had seen in countless games, novels, and anime. While I had been quite shaken yesterday due to our meeting with Charlotte, I finally put my [Meditation] skill to use yesterday, and managed to calm my chaotic emotions down.

One thing that did make me feel a bit unsettled while I was trying to use my [Meditation] skill yesterday, however, was the manner in which Ailya had decided to use her [Prayer] skill.

Since I would be using my [Meditation] skill for a while as I decided to finally make some progress in leveling it up, I thought that it would be a good idea for Ailya to use the time to make progress on her own [Prayer] skill. And after asking Ailya, she happily agreed to my proposal.

Although I knew that she was using me as the basis for her [Faith] and [Prayer] skills, I didn’t expect her to show this in such an open and clear manner. I had expected her to pray while keeping my image on her mind, not for her to kneel next to me and begin praying while facing my direction in such an earnest fashion. Seeing her so earnestly praying to me, I was once again reminded just how much the girl idolized and was loyal to me.

Deciding to put the events of yesterday to the back of my mind, Ailya and I went and took a shower in one of the hotels indoor baths before getting dressed and heading out. As we were leaving, we found Dean still manning the reception center along with another man and woman as he asked:

“Good morning young madams, heading out for the guild?”

“Good morning Dean. Yeah, we are.”

“Alright then, stay safe you two.”

“Okay~”

Waving him goodbye, we began making our way to the guild along the path that Dean had laid out for us yesterday.

This time around, while we had looked out of place in this rather wealthy area of the city yesterday, we were now beginning to look more out of place the closer we got to the adventurers guild. As the appearance of the people in the area began to appear more rugged in nature.

During my time here, I hadn’t seen many people carrying weapons or any sort of equipment for that matter. However, as we inched ever closer to the guild, I was finally beginning to see people who looked like proper adventurers. Seeing people dressed up in armor while carrying weapons, a sense of anticipation began to fill me up as I was once again reminded of the fantasy nature of the world I was currently in.

Finally seeing the guild building, I was amazed that it was actually as wide as Dean had claimed it to be. However, the thing that caught my attention the most was the buildings layout. It wasn’t a wooden building with batwing doors as were often time seen. But instead, it was a rather imposing building made out of a rather durable stone-like material that made it seem extremely durable. Passing through the entrance which’s doors were wide open, although guards could be seen standing at the sides, I finally entered a real adventurers guild in another world.

Entering the guild, I immediately noticed that there wasn’t a bar nor any other place that gave the inclination that people congregated there for merrymaking. Instead, there was a wide open space in which people could be seen walking around with a receptionist area at the end of the room. In the receptionist area, you could see quite an amount of windows with with each having its own line of people lined up to it. There was also a passageway that allowed access to the rest of the massive structure to the side of the reception area. Seeing the rather dull looking place, it appeared more like a DMV than what I imagined an adventurer guild from a fantasy world to look like.

Looking around the place, I noticed that the walls were covered with different notice boards with each notice board filled with papers that were most likely quests. Approaching one of the baords, I could see a label that read ‘Missing Persons’ as flyers with descriptions of people and simple sketches littered the board. Looking to the board at the right, a label that read ‘Lost Items’ could be seen. And as I looked around, this same pattern was repeated so on and so on. As I steadily arrived closer to the reception desk, I finally reached a section were hunting and gathering quests could be seen. The quests that appeared all seemed to have been put up by private individuals, with no guild or government requests to be seen. It appeared that the quests on the wall were all general requests put up by individuals, and not large quests or basic goblin hunting quests that could be seen in your regular game.

Turning my head towards the reception area, I could see a group of adventurers discussing with one of the receptionists as the receptionist pulled out different flyers and handed them to a young man who seemed to be the party leader. It seemed that not all quests were posted for everyone to see, and that if I wanted access to more profitable quests I would have to formally join and meet whatever criteria they had before receiving such quests.

Raising my head and reading the sign that said ‘New Applicants’, I began making my way to the rather short line of new applicants as I prepared myself to become an adventurer. Hopefully by becoming one, I could properly increase my strength, so that I would no longer have to fear people like Charlotte and gain the strength needed to be a Demon Lord…