Rex thought over what he had just heard, finding the rules rather lax, or so they sounded at the moment. He was quite sure that, wer ehe to join one of these halls, there would appear a lot more internal rules, or at the very least guidlines regarding many different ideologies. Life, for example, what Oren told him about the hunters guild, heavily encouraging to assist other hunters, should you run into one who is experiencing quite the crisis. In theory, that could be written off as a simple and logical action, based on the innate good nature of humans, buy Rex knew better. Humans were agotistical and greedy creatures, so the creation, and encouragement of such actions were either out of pure neccesity, someone up in the chain of command benefitting heavily with it, or a way to surpass ones competition, reducing ones own organizations losses in what would be an eternal war of atrition against a common enemy- the nature of the world, and the monsters that it spawns as a result. Still, as a general rules, it was not all bad, not creating a situation like with the guild in the other world, where he could be forced to do missions he was not interested in. Then again, he had yet to see how the Guild handles the issue here.
"Right then, Lisa." Rex spoke, reading the name written on the girls tag that was attached to her shirt, right over her heart. "So, what can you tell me about therules of the guild?"
"Yes sir. Right away." the cheerfull girl nearly bounced and took a deep breath, probably prepearing herself for to blast Rex with another wall of text.
"So. Adventurers guild employes eight rank system- SS, S, A, B, C, D, E and finaly F. The lowest being F rank, and SS rank being the highest. In theory, there is supposed to also be an SSS rank, but that is only ever given to the hero, once he has defeated the demon lord, and by the estimates of the Oracles, that some thousand years or so away. So, SS rank is the highest one can get. All new adventures start at F rank, and while there are quite a lot of jobs that can only be taken by an apropriate rank adventurer, guild dose not, and cannot forbid you from hunting monsters as you see fit. There are quite a few instances where a Solo joins the guild, obviously as an F rank, rules be rules, then proceeds to exclusively hunt Borks, maybe even Orcs. Eventually being recognized as the C class adventurer that he is. The other way to raise ones rank is by taking on the quests posted by the guild. Depending on the rank you hold, a certain number of quests must be completed succesfully to be able to take a promotion exam. There are numerous adventurers who are can easily deal with the missions of their rank, but do not have what it takes to tackle the next rank, thus, said exams are rather dificult, meant to reflect the complexity and danger of the upper tier quests within said rank. Of course, there are also special quests, ones that are not combat oriented, and thus do not have a rank attached to them. Such quests can range from tutoring lessons, to acting as an escort for a lady, or gentleman to some posh event, though in the latter case, a minimal rank is usually required, but you get my drift, yes?" Rex nodded his head, thus far it was the standart fantasy ranking system, nothing new, nor complicated. Now came the crucial part.
"So, what about the rules that the guild expects adventurers to follow?"
"Yes, I was getting there." she answered as she took a gulp of water from the cup that she had on her counter. " In general, the guild goes with a hands off aproach, trying to interfere with the adventurers as little as possible. Still, the obvious rules apply. Do not kill your fellow members, do not steal from the guild and so on and so forth. The normal stuff that one lands in jail for, so nothing out of the ordinary. It is advised to use ones guild card as an identification tool, as most nations apreciate and depends on adventurers to solve quite a large percent of the problems that crop up all the time, walking and roaring, or otherwise. The guild provides a certain amount of privileges to its members and as such, expects that the adventurers will, in return either perform an elimination quests, or others with a certain number of them, or the total income from said quests reaching certain value in gold, based on ones rank, of course."
"And if the adventurer does not feel like taking quests for some time? Like women expecting a child and what not?" Rex questioned.
"Not to worry. In such cases one can simply pay the guild a certain amount of money, maintaining their status as an active adventurer. Or, they could chose to become inactive. In active adventurers cannot use the various benefits that the guild provides, except using the card as an identifcation tool, since no matter, active or not, it still is a great proof of ones identity. And once said inactive adventurer decides to restart theit adventurung, they can reactivate their status, though no more often than once a year, unless you of course get heavily injured and the guild finds it reasonable to do so. While we like to profit, as all people would, we dont want our adventurers to make risky decisions only because their deadlines are coming up. But back to the point. Once an adventurer reactivates their status, they have to retake a combat test, to ensure that they are on par with their previous state, qualifying them for their previous rank. There have been cases in the past, before this rule was implanted, that adventrers would get wounded, heal, but retain some hidden injury. Then, one back in active duty, take a risky mission and fail it, because they no longer have what it takes to pull it off. It is better to learn of such bad knews in a controlled enviroment, not out there, in the wilderness, losing ones life, and possibly the lives of their companions, all because they did not know of their weakened state."
"Reasonable." Rex nodded his head in agreement, liking the Guild's system so far. "What about special quests, ones that are aimed at a special individual? The idea of a forced quest does not sound appealing. And no matter where, there are always some bad apples within the basket, abusing the system."
"Yes. The guild has had such situations in the past, as much as it hurts me to admit it, so, to combat such actions, guild still allows for such requests to be made. A famous adventurer is a force to be reconed with, both on the field, as well as a show of ones status and purse. Escort requests in particular are geared towards such adventurers. Now, while the guild is willing to take such requests, allwoing anyone to make them, they come with quite the commision cost and the adventurer in question can always reject sad requests, it being annuled in the process, while the guild keeps the commision cost. Its a win win for everyone, well, maybe except the rich fellow who was rejected. He he. But they probably have a lot of coin to spend, if they think they can make personal requests anyways."
"So, no forced quests? Is that right?"
"Mostly? There is the emergency quests that a branch manager can issue, but those are in case of monster tide that heads for said city, or a dungeon break. Situations from where one could not get away anyways. The emergency quests are there to mostly pump up the blood and spirits of teh adventurers present, as it promises quite a bit of extra rewards for something you would have to do anyways."
"I do like the sound of that. So, how do I sign up?" Rex asked, a slight smile forming on his somewhat average looing face.
"Wonderfull sir. We allways welcome new members. let me set you up straight away." she spoke even more entusiastically, clapping her hands together with a bright smile on her face. Then, she pulled out a sheet of paper, a form of sorts and handed it Rex.
"Please fill out this form sir."
"Sure." Rex replied, as he started to read through it, filling out the empty lines with the information he was willing to provide. "Whats up with the different font of the text here at the bottom?" He asked the girl, having reached the last section of the form, where it questioned about the affinities of ones magic and such.
The narrative has been taken without permission. Report any sightings.
"Hmm? AA, yes, it is not mandatory to fill those. Thee are there if a mage wants to be hired as a teacher for said disciplines, or if the applicant is fine with guild considering his services when specific element mages are required. For example, sometimes lords try to reclaim new territories, or start a new city. For such an endevor one need quite the number of earth and water mages. Those rital spells to modify a large area of land are quite demanding. Or other requests like that. Holy element mages are requested whan a necromancer pops out and causes an epidemic or two, and so on and so forth. If a mage is interested in taking such quests, guild uses this information to reach out to said mages in question, speeding up the process many times over, since rarely any of the branch guild have the required personell within their local area."
"I will leave these blank then. Thats it, I suppose. Here you go miss." Rex handed her the sheet back and waited, as the girl excused herself and left her station, walking over to arather odd looking device, an altar of sorts, with a slot for sheets, like the one Rex had kust filled out. She then placed the sheet in the groove, and pressed on a nearby crystal. A few minutes later, she took a rather smooth card from another groove on the altar and returned to the counter.
"Here you go mister Rex. We are happy to have you aboard. Is there anythin elese you need help with?"
"Sure, I have these goblin ears that I need to hand in, can we do that here, or should I go to the other counter?"
"Its not a problem, allow me to take care of it." she said and then placed a tray on the counter pointing to it with her hand. Rex just shrugged, lightly smiled at the girl and proceeded to place the ears on the tray infront of him.
"Thats quite a bit og ears." she replied, scrunching her cute nose.
"Right, the merchant I traveled with said I should inform the guild that these all belinged to two groups, one of which had an archer among them. I would say at most a couple of day distance from here, were one to ride with a horse and not carriage, while peddling ones wares in the villages on the way."
"Understood. One moment please." she bowed her head and took the tray, leving Rex alone for a moment, dissapearing in the backroom. A few minutes later, she was back, placing two silvers and a few coppers for the monster bounty.
"Thank you sir, this information will help us pinpoint the goblin tribes precise location that much sooner. Anythin else?"
"Coudl you suggest any decent, but relatively cheap inn to spend the night, maybee even rent a room for an extended period of time? Dont think today there is much time left to head out."
"But of course. Here are the two I do believe to be the best suggestion." She then proceeded to tell Rex in detail about the location and specifics regarding both places, making a rather modest, but pleasant first impression on Rex, though half of it was probably because of Lisa was just that bubbly of a person and her explanation was quite cute.
Before Rex left, he asked another question. "Right, Lisa. last question. Do you guys, the attendants earn any extra based on the bounties that adventurers bring in, or a bonues for registering extremely profitable Solo's? You did a wonderfull job, would be a shame not to reward you with something. So?"
Lisas smiled bloomed even more as she nodded her head. "Yes, there are a few such things. While we do not recieve any bonuses for the hand ins of the quesst we confirm finished, there is a small trowback that we recieve for confirmed monster bounties, since those are just extra monsters that could otherwise endanger our people."
"Well, guess i know to whom I will hand in my ones. You are doing a great job Lisa. Thank you and keep it up."
"You are welcome mister Rex. And than you too." her smile widened even more.
"Its just Rex and see ya around." Placing his adventurer card around his neck anmd the coins in his pocket, he waved goodbye to the girl and left the guild, following Lisas dirrection towards closest of the two recomended inns. Unfortunately, the first one was full, so he had to backtrack to the Guild, and head out towards the second one, where he secured a room for a couple of nights and since it had gottne rather late, he ate at the tavern, a rather simple, but hearty and filling stew, and turned in for the night, heading to his room. He spent a few hours, expending his mana and growung his space storage, with it having reached the size of a fist, enough to house all of his coins for the time being. 'Good luck pickpokets stealing my money.' he smirked to himself as he laid down to sleep.
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As per ussual, Rex woke up nice and early, having laid to sleep slightly before midnight, or so he calculated. Glancing outside the window, that was luckaly situated to the east, he could barely see the first rays of the dawning sun beyond the horizon. As far as he was aware, there were no real winters here, only slightly cooler seasons, followed by the warmth season. They called them off and on seasons, the colder ones being off, the warmer ones - on, though the on part was never actually mentioned, with people only talking in a manner of season or off-season. Each year had two of both. There were slight differences not only in the temperature, but also what kind of special seasonal plants grew during that time, as well as the migrations of certain animals or monsters. It was particularily important for hunters, since some apex predators became extremely agressive during their mating seasons.
being aware of the season, he could estimate that it was about six in the morning. There were magical clocks, working on the energy that monster cores provided, but it was quite the luxury, with only the richer merchants and nobles having the deep pockets and connections to aquire one in this remote region of the nation. So, Rex made do with what was aviable to him. As he descended the stairs, he found a half asleep inkeeper in the central room where the counter stood. Asking if there was anything he could eat for breakfast and making do with last nights roasted pork remains and some sliced vegies, since it was too early for inkeepers wife to start prepearing breakfast, he quickly ate the food he recieved, thanked the inkeeper, paid and left the inn.
As he walked towards the Guild, he carefully observed his surroundings, noticing a few shady characters here and there, mostly doing their own things among their preffered crowd, or crew. 'Active underground it seems' He noted to himself, making a mental reminder to try and stay away from said groups, at least for now. He had much more important tasks to solve, like earning money and growing stronger. After all, only the trully strong could live freely and as they wanted.
Reaching guild was rather easy, the already somewhat uncrowded streets were near empty, some random drunkard stammering home after a night out with the lads, or the shady character here and there, waiting for his own dealings to proceed, or whatever else they waited for. The guild, was near empty as well, a couple of parties sitting around their own tables discussing whatever they did regarding their chosen jobs. He noticed there was only one attendant manning the counter, and he had not been here when he visited last time, clearly working the other shifts. The man looked middle age, with pale blue skin and elongated ears with pointy tips. He did look slightly tired, yawning evey now and then, looking at the clock that was placed behind the counter and him on the wall. Guilds were one of the few buildings where everyone could see the time, with their connections and resources, it would be quite embarasing to not have a clock.
As Rex was aproaching the counter with the man, another worker exited the backdoor, tapping on the mans shoulder, greeting him and exchanging a few words, after which the pale blue skinned man yawned once again, nodded and left through the door that the new attendant had just entered. While slightly interested in the race of the previous worker, he had more pressing questions to solve, thus he restarted his walk towards the counter.
"Hello there." Rex greeted the attendant, a middle aged lady with gray skin, and an average build.
"Morning. Hows can I help ya?"
"I was wondering, does the guild have a book with the common monsters, and the parts that should be submited as part of monster bounties? Also, If I could learn Lisas schedule, It would be helpfull."
"Yes, there is. We give one to every new adventurer after their first finished quest, if they dont ask for it. Gimme a moment to pull it up. As for the second question, what ya need that info for?"
"Right, Lisa was the one who registered me. She was extremely helpfull and all around a treat to interract with. Thought it was the least i could do to help her earn some commisions."
"That young girl is a bundle of joy and warmth. Cant blame ya for that. Will do both in just a moment kiddo."
"Thanks miss."