After that second class had finally ended it was already yellow hour, which in Earth’s terms would be after 3 p.m..

Our minds and eyes were heavy, but what really pissed me off was that good for nothing clerk we chose as our career advisor was still sleeping. She got paid while sleeping on her job. Meanwhile I had to work 24 hours a day and sometimes more without getting a single coin out of it.

I was even discourteous to ask some other guild employees, but they hopelessly shrugged me off saying, “She is asleep.”

“Yeah I know. Wake her up then! I would like to report my quests!”

They were gone before I finished that sentence. Every one of them.

As for the contents of the course they slipped my mind right now. Elfin also remained silent.

“Are you also pissed at our career advisor?” I asked.

“No, but master is angry so I am keeping silence.”

“Why?”

I paused my angry steps and turned to face her.

“Are you scared of me?”

“Yes. NO!”

“I am not angry at you, my silly slave.”

“I know, but I do not want to provoke master’s ire.”

“You will not. Not is such a way, ever. Are you hungry?”

“A tad bit.”

“Shall we explore what adventurers eat in the guild’s cantina?”

“If master so wishes.”

“I asked about your opinion, dear. I already know mine own.”

“I wish to eat plenty.” She admitted.

We went down the stairs and entered the hall, which was comparatively empty. Likewise cantina had only a few tables occupied. I noted down that “dead” hour. It was the best to do business at the guild at this hour. We crawled up to the longest counter I have ever seen in a restaurant.

Before we asked anything the busy barmaid warned us without a glance, “Menu is on the wall behind me along with the prices. Waitresses are on the break. Order from me and take the dishes from the counter.”

I scanned through the available dishes.

“You have dragon steak?!” I exclaimed.

“Sorry. Just went out. Forgot to strike it out.”

She took a piece of chalk and drew a line through it.

Damn it. I wanted to try dragon meat at least once, to say ‘Tastes just like chicken’. Such a simple steak was worth 5 large silvers or half a small gold coin and it was quite a small portion. My statement might irritate everyone around, so maybe it was good it was not available today.

I decided on some unfamiliar meat with some kind of grain gruel and assortment of pickles. All of that somewhere in the middle of the local price range. Hopefully it would be agreeable with my palate.

“What do you want?” I asked my slave.

“Sorry master, what do you mean?” she jumped up and replied.

“What dishes have you picked for yourself?”

“I thought master..”

I did not let her finish.

“..would pick for you? Dream on. Here is the money. Buy yourself something.”

I made sure to hand her enough to buy whatever she wanted from the menu including my portion. She ran towards the barmaid that managed to already leave us. I slowly walked over there to eavesdrop what she would order out of curiosity.

She asked about low-mana meats and settled for some local fish and vegetables. She already had some mana so maybe medium-mana meats would be okay as well? Bon the other hand better safe than sorry – starting low-mana might be the best. Not that there was any indication of what constituted low, medium or high mana. You could feel mana content instinctively and perhaps be able to tell with enough sensitivity.

I ordered my own meal and we picked the table near the counter. I have noticed this species of fish was one of the cheapest dishes available on the menu.

I took her hand into mine and avoided eye contact.

“Now I am angry. Why do you always pick cheapest of foods? Do you really want to eat that fish? I gave you plenty of coins.”

“No, I, fish is okay,” she stuttered.

“Is it really? With such a price there is bound to be something wrong with it,” I expressed my concerns.

“It is. It is, master.”

I briefly wondered whether she agreed with me there was something wrong or if she reaffirmed her acceptance of this food.

“I feel like I am not doing a good job. As a master. Party Leader.”

“No, master..,” she tried to say something, but I stopped her.

“Ah, forget it,” I said and finally let go of her hand.

I might have grown in strength, but mentally I was still an introvert trying to put up a brave front. A mask of an always cheerful, always talkative extrovert was exhausting to wear. Maybe I am not suited as army commander? Maybe I should find someone to delegate such tasks?

Our food arrived at the counter and not a step further. When the pretty barmaid yelled her voice was like a symphony of broken engines. I grabbed mine and walked to the table, but Elfin almost toppled hers. I rushed and helped her.

“Get us something to drink. Non-alcoholic,” I ordered.

I put her meal on her side of the long table. The smell was.. not exactly appetizing. I paid for two cups of juice she picked and took one.

Elfin apologized to me.

“What for? Eat up!”

She started to eat, but slowed down mid-bite.

“What is it?”

“Nuthin” she mumbled through half-chewed food.

I stabbed a piece of the fish with my fork and tasted it. It was foul. Tased like mud. I swallowed it and washed it down with plenty of juice.

“That taste is utterly foul.”

She stared at her plate, avoiding eye-contact. Ever so slowly she lifted her fork.

“You don’t have to eat that.”

The fork dropped as quickly as it could.

“Just do not order it the next time.”

“Sorry, master.”

“No problem. You can have half of my meat,” I said and scooped the fish into the bowl I discretely took out of my storage.

It was still food even if extremely unpalatable. I could give it to any of the beggars loitering on the streets instead of throwing it away.

I did not feel that much hunger anyway.

I went back to the counter yet again and ordered an apple pie.

As we ate our halves of the meal we conversed further.

“Have you ever eaten an apple pie?” I asked Elfin.

“No, master.”

“I heard this one was made with honey and sugar. Oh, so dreadfully expensive,” I said and cut myself a slice, “so expensive.”

There was no reaction.

“So, so expensive.”

Still nothing.

“I guess I will have to throw it away as I cannot eat it whole on my own,” I ‘lamented’.

I bit onto the slice. Mhmm. It was so delicious I forgot to continue teasing my slave.

“Master needs not to throw it away. I will eat it for master,” she swore.

“Well. Help yourself!” I said with my mouth full.

We ate the entire plate together in silence. Only the sounds of devouring and the clatter of wooden utensils cut through this veil of silence. I was not sure If she got my hint through all that teasing or not.

“Ah!” I sighed with content.

“So tasty and sweet, master.”

“Indeed it was 6 keshes well spent.”

“6 keshes!?” she articulated silently in disbelief.

To answer her question I pointed to the price board over the counter.

“My god,” she exclaimed.

“For a cake like that I might get another slave. Ain’t the price ridiculous?”

“Master bought such expensive food,” she said feeling resigned.

I held reins of my twisted personality in and stifled a joke about not buying her to eat. I truly am a saint.

“Food is a given expense. It is basic need for any living organism. Best not to save money on low quality food items. It does not help that I like to eat well as well. Truth to be told I would feel bad if you ate any worse than I do. You just have to accept is as it is.”

She only spoke after quite a while, probably mulling my words over and over.

“Master is too kind for a useless slave like myself.”

“Not at all.”

I started banging my fingers on the table.

“I will return the plates,” she said and stood up.

The clerk was still sleeping. Should I not rain thunder and lightning just to wake her up? The only thing stopping me from doing that is that I do not know how to do that.

“What is master thinking about?”

The table has already been cleaned while I was checking that on the minimap.

“Nothing much. On the minimap our designated career advisor is currently sleeping in her bed. Still. At this hour.”

“How can someone sleep for so long?”

“Exactly.”

After a while I sighed and spoke again.

“Unless you have better things to do I suggest we pay visit to the Guild’s Public Library.”

“Yes, master!” she said and nodded her head energetically.

Library, that was available to all adventurers, was located on the upper floors of the guild. Only a few basic books were available for free reading. They were chained to the respective stands though. All the others were..

“200 monies for an hour of reading for all guild members.”

In other words 8 large bronzes, but again it referred to 3 Earth hours of reading. Everything was handwritten on expensive parchment and with expensive ink. The books made before the press, cheap paper and cheap ink were available were simply worth a lot. Exclusive knowledge must also be valued high.

That price was a reasonable one.

We leafed through the free books, but it was mostly about really basic stuff like guild regulations or stuff that was already covered in free classes.

Nevertheless I marked the tomes as must-read and tried to copy them into the Heaven’s Library. Only that those exact versions were already there. Looks like indeed every book ever written or brought to Thrope was somewhere in there. Maybe with exception of those hidden by gods themselves.

There was no diaries nor journals from Talakhe left. There were some left by other gods, but tackling them on for rare grains of wisdom was going to be very time-consuming.

Point being I stopped reading and approached the Librarian. Since Elfin was a slave I did not have to pay for her. An idea struck me, but unfortunately..

“No, she cannot enter alone. She is not a guild member. Why does every slave owner ask that? You think guild would overlook such loopholes?”

“Tsk.”

I paid for myself with my heart and purse in pain.

Guild’s Librarian flipped a medium sized hourglass the moment we entered. Then he proceeded to mark something in the wax on top of it. It turned out to be the same mark as my that on my Adventurer’s License Card. For some reason it only showed when the clerks swiped it on some fancy magical devices and disappeared shortly after. I tried concentrating Soul Sight onto the card. Or rather the Mana Sight as it turns out.

Eh, I was speechless, but my ‘id number’ in some strange runes was now visible well enough. Then seeing mana was a prerequisite to seeing souls?

Scratch that.

“Well. Go and explore whatever knowledge you want. Note down the interesting titles,” Is poke to Elfin and handed her a piece of coarse paper and a crude lead pencil.

Yet another thing to procure would be a safe graphite pencil. Do not want to get lead poisoning in another world. Maybe I would need to make those pencils myself.

Around me were several bookshelves and several inclined pulpits with more popular (and chained) books. First thing was to do a massive identification scan of the library. I leafed through a few of the works. I finally decided on bothering the clerk in charge of library some more.

“Are there any other libraries in the guild?”

“That is correct, but as a newbie you will not have access to them.”

“Such shame. Tsk.”

My suspicion was proved correct and thus I proceeded to rescan the whole building. Sorting findings took me a while, but finally I had several new virtual bookshelves.

For the remaining time I had concentrated on expanding my knowledge regarding the two subjects from today’s classes. From time to time Elfin would come over to share her findings. I happily exchanged knowledge. After all nothing in this library could ever be considered taboo and this in turn made me free to share my thoughts. Truly delightful.

When we were nearing the end of our time our designated career advisor Miss Sleepyhead stirred up and finally woke up. For some unfathomable reason she was headed in the direction of Public Library. Our direction.

Tough luck. We paid for the whole hour and we will read through all of it.

I hid behind a bookshelf near the entrance and listened to her footsteps.

On second thought it must be a simple coincidence to meet her in the library. She is not some kind of a homing missile, right?

She reached the counter and exchanged greetings. The male clerk was strangely polite. Ah, a beautiful girl will do that to most males, I guess.

“Is the slave-carry pair of newbies inside the library?” she asked

A slave-carry pair?

What the hell is that?

“Indeed,” he replied and pointed to our hourglass.

She thanked the man and jump-slided over the counter before the clerk could even think about opening it. Oy, are you not going to pay for entry???

She then proceeded towards the front of my bookshelf. She took out a few books and pushed the rest sideways. I saw her smiling face in that makeshift book tunnel, surrounded by knowledge most esoteric. She looked mad. Mad as to give a serious crazy serial-killer vibes. Her glasses were hanging just on the tip of her pointy nose.

“Hello there, mister Lynx,” she greeted me.

“Hi,” I replied while rising my eyes from the book I was pretending to read, “Oh. It is you. Are you finally awake? Or just sleepwalking?”

That was a very accurate jab. Even perhaps a critical hit. Her wide smile narrowed and became a little bit less crazy.

“I enjoy my mornings. In bed. Unconscious.”

“Whatever floats your boat, miss Lusinda.”

“Where is your slave?”

“Reading, somewhere around.”

“Taught her?”

“Nah. Previous captor did.”

“Captor?”

“Slave master.”

“Interesting.”

She was being kind of concise with her words today.

“Not really. What is a slave-carry pair?”

“You heard that?”

“Obviously.”

“It is when and adventurer relies on a slave to fulfill quests and climb up the guild ranks instead of his own strength.”

I was taken aback. I did not realize there was such a thing.

“Other adventurers would usually treat such a person as complete trash,” she added to make me more miserable.

“It is untrue. False.”

“You do not own a slave? Are you not wealthy? Are you not using your wealth and slave to carry you?

“Yes, yes and no!”

During shouting that I might have splattered some of my spit in anger. She licked her cheek. Eww. Disgusting. That tongue was quite long though. Was she even human? Was she a reptilian from the hollow Earth?

I casted a silent Status Check. Oh my myself!