With large and purposeful strides, Mary-Ann makes her way to the building of the adventurers guild's branch.

Due to a large number of people that are walking the streets, she needs to bob and weave between them but thanks to her lithe and agile body, she manages to slip between even the most densely packed groups of people.

Soon enough, she pushes open the door to the branch building and walks towards the counters.

Since there's only one counter open at the moment, there's a small queue consisting of three people.

With a quiet sigh for the time she'll waste, she goes to stand in line.

A couple of minutes later, she's at the front of the queue and standing before the counter.

With a big smile on her face, the woman seated behind the counter asks:

"How may I help you today? Are you familiar with the services we provide or would you like me to list them up for you?"

"I'm quite familiar with the services the adventurers guild provides, thank you. It is one of those services I would like to make use of now."

"Certainly, how may the adventurers guild be of service?"

"I would like to undergo a Progress determination and purchase a Progress card, one that will update itself. I'm afraid I lost my previous one a couple of weeks back."

Mary-Ann leans closer towards the young woman behind the counter and whispers to her:

"If possible, I would like some discretion whilst my Progress is being determined. Would you mind contacting the head of the branch for me? If he or she has been kept up to date on the political front, she'll recognize me and get my need for... secrecy."

"Certainly, I'll contact her immediately."

She picks up a quill and writes something of a notepad that's lying next to her. A couple of seconds after she finished writing, text starts appearing underneath the text she wrote.

One of the more interesting breakthroughs In magical communications of late is a notepad that can be magically tied to another notepad so that when someone writes on one notepad, the same text appears in realtime on the other one as well.

Granted, for people who have to deal with a high volume of messages from a lot of different people every day, this might sound like a lot of work since you would need a notepad for each person or place you would like to stay in contact with so for a fair bit more gold, one can buy a notepad that is far more advanced and that can handle the incoming messages from multiple different pads at the same time and the is linked to multiple pads at once.

 After a glance at the new text on her notepad, the woman behind the counter stretches out a hand and points it towards the lounge area.

"Please take a seat in the lounge, the branch leader will be down here in about ten minutes."

With another quiet sigh for even more wasted time, Mary-Ann takes a seat in the lounge.

Since she has nothing better to do, she takes to studying the adventurers that come through.

Some are here to turn in slayer quests, using body parts or bloody items as grizzly proof that they slew their target.

Others are here to turn in gathering quests, turning in copious amounts of common ingredients or small amounts of rare ingredients that can be used in various professions like alchemy, blacksmithing, leatherworking and others.

And then there are some that want to register to become an adventurer. These people are usually very young, most of them barely an adult, and have never held a blade before nor do they have any combat experience.

People like this are lured in by the promise of gold and fame and are likely to die young.

Some of them might make it in life and become an average ranking adventurer, one that will only be able to live from week to week since the pay is usually not too good.

And in the very rare cases, some of these youthful adventurers might make it one day in life and become a successful and well-known adventurer, one whose power or cunning or deeds know no bounds and thus becomes known in the entire kingdom and maybe even in the neighbouring kingdoms as well.

Eventually, a petite brunette with straight hair that reaches her shoulders walks down the stairs at the back of the room.  Even though this place is supposed to be safe and protected, she still wears her armour, a full set of armour made from brownish leather, and walks around armed with a bunch of daggers.

As the woman is walking towards the lounge, Mary-Ann sees her looking at her.

You can tell the moment the woman recognizes her for her eyes become as big as saucers.

Immediately after, her face becomes a carefully crafted mask as she starts looking around, presumably to see if someone is paying more attention to her or to Mary-Ann than usual.

When she reaches Mary-Ann, she beckons her to follow, all the while taking in the room and the faces and reactions of those that are in this room.

"If you would like to follow me please, yo... ma'am"

Stiff as a board, she turns around and walks towards the stairs, still taking in the room and only looking back towards Mary-Ann once to make sure she's following.

She takes the stairs two at a time and hurries with Mary-Ann in tow towards her office.

Holding open the door, she waves Mary-Ann in.

"Please enter and take a seat."

With Mary-Ann safely inside, she quickly glances down the hallway to ensure there are no people lingering around that are not supposed to be there before closing the door and locking it from the inside.

With the slight caress of a rune, she activates the sound dampening field that lines her room to prevent people from eavesdropping on anything that will be said in this room.

With the necessary precautions taken care off, she lets the mask in which her facial expressions were frozen in slip from her face, showing an expression of relief and anxiousness. With a jovial saunter, she makes her way to her chair and sits down. With her hands steepled before her, she gazes at Mary-ann for a second.

she then bows her head towards Mary-Ann and says:

"Your Highness, allow me to introduce myself. My name is Candice Vonk, leader of the adventurers guild branch here in Domwik"

"A pleasure to meet you miss Vonk, I have heard many good things about you although I must say, most of what I know about you stems from the fame and prestige you earned in your days as a sneak and scout."

"Those days are long past now, I'm afraid. For some foolish reason, I've decided to lead a less active life and settle down maybe. When this reached the ears of the top management of the adventurers guild, they pounced on the opportunity like a puma would pounce on its prey and offered me the position of branch leader in what they described as a quaint little town with hardly any traffic passing through it. Now I'm stuck with a job that gives me more stress in a week than I would feel in a month."

"Yes, you don't strike me as the bureaucratic type although it is difficult to imagine you allowed to let yourself get ... persuaded in this way."

"More like suckered into it, actually. But my recent past is insignificant at the moment. I'm more interested in you, Princess. Last I heard, you were kidnapped from an inn while your escort was poisoned and cut down to the last man. I'm curious now, how is it that you are here now?"

"I was indeed kidnapped. My captors kept me prisoner in the dragon mountains but through a stroke of luck, I managed to escape. I was hastily making my way towards the capital when I ran into a bit of trouble here in the village."

"Oh? what kind of trouble? Anything dire? Anything you want me to handle? As the leader of this branch, I carry quite a bit of influence here in Domwik."

Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

"Don't worry, the matter has been resolved already. It is just that, Even though I managed to handle the trouble quite well, I'm left with some confusion and questions. This is where I was hoping you could help me out, all the while making sure to keep everything to yourself. Such as the fact that you saw me here and what service I require from the guild."

"You have my word that anything that is said in here won't leave the room. Now, what service can the adventurers guild provide for you?"

"I need the guild to determine my Progress and would like a new, self-updating progress card while we're at it. The people who kidnapped me took my previous card away from me and I didn't manage to get it back during my escape."

"I'll have someone bring over our measuring device right away."

She bends forwards a bit and quickly writes down something on a notepad that is distinctly bigger.

Not even two minutes later, someone knocks on the door which Candice opens about half way.

After she gets handed an item, she closes the door and puts all of the security measures back in place.

With her seated again, she puts the item she was handed on the desk in front of her.

The item is, unimaginatively, called a Progress determiner. It is shaped like an orb that is cut into eight equally big pieces that are connected with each other through glowing rods. Thanks to the rods, there's plenty of space in the middle and sides of the determiner to fit a person's hand and part of his or her arm into it. And just to be sure, the rods can be turned to widen the gaps in between the pieces so that people with a more... stouter build can fit their hands and arms in as well. The orb-like item rests on a small pedestal which is capable of inscribing the information on a metal plaque, or as nearly everyone calls it, a progress card.

Another thing the determiner is capable off is getting a base reading of someone's progress and then linking their Progress through magical means to an enchanted card so that whenever there's a change in their Progress, the card will update itself.

"I'm guessing you know how this works, so I'll spare you the explanation. Normally, the guild would charge a person quite an amount for a self-updating Progress card but since you are in somewhat of a unique and precarious situation and since your family is wealthy enough, I'll just bill them once I learn of your safe arrival in the capital."

"That sounds wonderful. Even though my uncle must be worried about my safety, for safety's sake, I can't let any more people know I'm free and well until I make it to the capital."

"I fully agree. Now, please place your hand in one of the openings and we'll have you back on the road in just a couple of minutes."

Doing as instructed, Mary-Ann puts her hand, wrist and part of her arm into the determiner.

As soon as Candice places an enchanted plaque in the inscribing slot and feeds the determiner a bit of mana, it starts its determination and glows blue and yellow whilst doing it.

Just minutes later, the glow fades until it is completely gone, at which point Candice takes the plaque out of the inscribing slot and hands it over to Marry-Ann.

The moment of truth for Mary-Ann. This card will, hopefully, clear away some of her questions and confusion that followed after the incident of the previous night.

  Progress card     Name: Mary-Ann of Ralomar: Rank: 1 Vitality: 1.1 Dexterity: 1.2

Strength:

1.1 Magic: 1.1

Titles:

- Princess of the kingdom of Ralomar

- First Agent of

Aaron Lightblade

Holdings: An unnamed mountain in the Dagon Mountains

Abilities:

- Danger Sense

(slight) 0.1

- Evolving abilities

(Tied to unknown source)

One might not realise it due to the fact that Mary-Ann has a great Pokerface and thus will only see a pensive expression on her face. But make no mistake, she is thoroughly surprised at what she sees on her card.

Last time she checked, before she was captured, she was rank 0.

She was just an ordinary person with stats all below 1.

One has to realise, most of the population of this world is a rank 0 since it takes a lot of work and dedication to raise your stats high enough to get past the 1.0 threshold. Farmers, butchers, bakers, smiths and nearly all others with normal occupations will fail to rise to rank 1 in their lifetime. There are some exceptions of course.

People who join the adventurers guild will receive training to increase their stats until they break through the threshold and it is even free for them if they manage it to do it within five years. The hardest part of raising your stats is the magic attribute since it is hard to learn magic on your own and costly if you want to learn magic from a certified teacher.

This does not mean that people with a normal occupation can't get to rank one though.

If they manage to get an attribute to level 2.0 or higher and two other attributes to level 1.0, they won't need to raise the last attribute to level 1.0 as well. This only works if they have at least one attribute that is double the required level though and thus makes it so that rank is not determined by averages. Yes, (2+1+1)/4= 1 and, for example, (3*1.5)/4 = 1.125, this still does not mean that having three attributes of level 1.5 raises your rank to 1.

Those that do make it to rank one despite not having every attribute at level one usually have a magic level that is really low. On the other hand, their highest rank is often strength if they have an occupation that involves a lot of manual labour like for example blacksmiths or dexterity if they have an occupation that requires a lot of precision, agility and focus such as hunters or those with a less... legal occupation.

Thus it is a surprise to Mary-Ann that she got to level 1.1 in every attribute and even to level 1.2 in dexterity since she never got the chance to train since her capture. In fact, she expected her attributes to be lower than before her capture due to malnutrition and the occasional abuse.

Another thing that she finds surprising is that she gained abilities somehow. One of them is the likeliest answer to how she woke up in time to ambush her would be attackers. Even though her Danger Sense is at level 0.1 and thus is ranked as Slight, it is still extremely useful since most people don't even have it.

Well, they do have a danger sense, but that one comes from intuition while this Danger Sense is magical in nature and thus superior.

But most surprising of all, she has an ability that makes no sense, one she has no idea of what it does or where she got it from. Her card even agrees with her and is as of yet unable to identify the effect and the source. The only thing it is capable of is determining that the ability has a lot of potential and is thus likely to evolve. And due to the fact that it actually says Evolving abilities, plural, there's a distinct possibility she will get more abilities when it evolves.

Finished with her examination of her Progres, she looks back to Candice, who had been patiently waiting there for Mary-Ann to finish her examination of the card. Seeing that Mary-Ann is finished with her examination she asks:

"Is there anything else the guild, or me for that matter, can do for you?"

After giving it some thought, Mary-Ann shakes her head.

"Not really, but thank you for the offer anyway. All I need now is to reach the capital and do so in an inconspicuous manner. I could request an escort of course and I know for sure you and the guild will be handsomely reimbursed for it but that will only draw too much attention I'm afraid."

"I understand. In that case, the only thing that is left to do now is to wish you godspeed princess. I will eagerly await word from the guild that you arrived safe and well in the capital and will sleep a lot better at night knowing you are behind the walls of the keep and surrounded by guards."

"Thank you. And don't forget to send the bill for my Progress card to my uncle as soon as you hear of my safe return."

Candice deactivates the safety measures and with a cheery wave, Mary-Ann hoists up her bags and sets off again towards the capital.