The next day in the Sword Kingdom.
Sirus was walking down one of the streets, searching for a 'Adventuring Guild' building that he had heard about. According to the innkeeper, missions ranged from just killing some weak monsters to personal missions from the king. Obviously rewards for these missions varied, but even the easiest ones sounded lucrative and Sirus was dirt broke.
Arriving at an old building that seemed to have been recently reinforced with brass and iron scaffolding, Sirus went inside and approached the front desk to ask a question.
He caught the attention of the guild attendant and asked: "Where can I find adventurer missions to complete?"
She directed an odd look at his face, but shook it off.
The lady responded by pointing at an adjacent wall filled with different size posters with writing on them.
Feeling dumb for not noticing them, he started to head over, but the guild attendant tapped his shoulder to catch his attention again and informed him: "To accept any missions from the mission board, you have to become a part of the Adventurer's Guild." She then handed him some papers, "If you want to join just fill out these papers and read the information sheet."
Quietly nodding his thanks he sat down on a nearby chair.
"We used to have something similar in the Magic Kingdom, but the king abolished it because it was apparently 'too dangerous for the average population' But I think he just didn't like the freedom it gave to the average person. Nowadays you have to pass a official certification test and join the royal army to take on missions like you used to be able to." Riria informed him in his mind.
He lightly nodded his head, so as to not seem crazy in front of the other people in the room.
Riria had been teaching him some of the common language, so he could read, albeit slowly.
Sirus then proceeded to slowly read the form he needed to fill out, it basically detailed that if he got injured during any of these missions it wasn't the guild's problem, and they wouldn't provide any assistance.
Sirus wouldn't have accepted their assistance anyways so that was all fine for him. He continued to read the sheet that the guild attendant had called the 'information sheet', slowly scanning through with Riria's assistance, this sheet basically described what different tiers of membership there were to the adventurer's guild, starting from bottom to top it was: Bronze Tier, Brass Tier, Steam Tier, Smoke Tier, Emerald Tier, Diamond Tier, and Herring Tier. With Bronze and Herring Tier's being the lowest and highest tiers respectively.
When you join the guild you have to successfully complete a mission before being placed into the Bronze Tier, and with enough completed missions you eventually reach the next tier, on and on until you are a Herring Tier adventurer. Completing a few higher difficulty missions will make you reach the next Tier quicker than completing many easier missions.
He then signed the forms and gave them to the attendant.
She looked through them slowly and nodded before placing them in a nearby drawer, while also picking up a small slate gray like item in exchange and holding it out towards him.
"This is your probationary adventurer's tablet, when you finish your first mission you can exchange this for a bronze badge." She explained while tying a small black chain into the hole in the tablet.
Noticing his gaze, she explained: "It's to wear on your neck."
He nodded and strung the tablet across his neck whilst walking back towards the mission board.
Each mission had a recommended adventurer tier written on it, signifying which tier of adventurer would likely be a good choice for the mission. It wasn't necessary though so both higher and lower tier adventurers could take missions of different adventuring tiers.
Looking at the board, Sirus noticed most of the missions were meant for the first three tiers, Bronze, Brass, and Steam. Because this was the capital city of the Sword Kingdom, there were multiple Adventurer's Guild buildings and among them this one wasn't particularly important, so they only had lower level missions for the lower tiers.
Sirus was hoping to find a mission meant for either the Emerald, Diamond, or Herring Tiers but he had no such luck. The highest tier mission on the board as of now was only Smoke Tier.
He sighed and turned around to leave and try to find another branch of the guild, but before his hand reached the door, it suddenly burst open to reveal two official-looking men striding towards the front desk at a brisk pace.
Support creative writers by reading their stories on Royal Road, not stolen versions.
They immediately exchanged a few words with the attendant and handed her a sheet of paper before quickly leaving.
After they left the attendant took the paper they had handed her and pinned it to the side of the missions board.
There were some other people in the building, but there were only a few, and none of them looked particularly interested in the paper, so Sirus turned back around and read the paper.
[Royal Army's Mission!
Description: Travel to the border of the Magic Kingdom and assist in holding back their skirmishing forces.
Danger Level: Extremely High
Recommended Level: 45
Reward: Varies on participation.]
The danger level was supposedly 'Extremely High', but the recommended level was only 45?
Riria helpfully chimed in his head: "The level of the average citizen in both the Sword and Magic kingdoms is only around 1-3. The magic academy I went to was a pretty prestigious one that started training you at the age of 14, and they provided lots of expensive ways to level up, but even still it took 4 whole years to make it to level 25. In the Sword Kingdom which doesn't use magic it's only expected that they have an even harder time leveling up than the Magic Kingdom."
"Huh," He said.
He pulled out his status.
Name: Sirus
Level: 77
Class: Swordsman of Wrath
Profession: Sinner of Wrath
Condition: Pristine [Shattered Mana Pool]
Stats:
Strength: 70
Agility: 56
Stamina: 42
Wisdom: 10
Sight: 38
Vitality: 51
Active Skills:
[Class Skill: Series Creation]
[Manipulate Wrath Aura]
[Series: Basic Swordsmanship]
[Series: Wrathful Sword Series]
Passive Skills:
[Infection Resistance]
[Pain Resistance]
[Intuition]
Item Granted Skills:
Blood Detonation: Blood that comes into contact with this blade will instantly explode
Flames of Wrath: Cuts from this sword will ignite wounds with the flames of your rage
(Vampiric Blood Bastard-Sword)
It had been a while hadn't it?
Sirus was now level 77 and had formidable combat prowess, so a mission meant for level 45's should be easy enough for him, not to mention causing problems for the Magic Kingdom was always a good thing to do in his book.
He pulled the mission paper off the board and brought it to the guild attendant, "I would like to accept this mission."
She took the paper from his hand, and after reading it she shot him a skeptical look and said: "This mission is for level 45's, which would be around the level of Emerald Rank adventurers. Are you sure you can handle it?"
Meeting her doubtful face with a frown, he responded, "Of course."
She still didn't relent and said, "You are only a probationary adventurer, it's best if you take one of the bronze level missions."
Slightly annoyed now, he debated whether or not to just gut the attendant and take the paper, but Riria read his thoughts and said, "If you go around killing random people, the royal army is going to come after you, and this is their mission."
Heeding her advice and deciding that killing her would lead to more trouble than not, he replied with a slightly forceful voice, "I can handle it."
The attendant rolled her eyes and wrote something down on a nearby sheet of paper and asked him when he would be leaving. Thinking it through, he decided on leaving in 4 days, mostly because he still had some things to do around the city.
Saying so, the attendant again wrote something down and finally handed the mission paper back to him along with another similar paper.
"This sheet has the details for the mission." She said while still looking down at the paper she was writing on.
He put the sheets of paper in his cloak's dimensional storage and walked out of the building.
Sirus had asked the innkeeper for directions to both the Adventurer's Guild building as well as directions to the nearest smithy. Lately he had been getting too many odd looks because of the flames where his left eye should have been, so, while he had the time he decided to try to commission something to cover it up.
Following the innkeeper's poor directions eventually led him to the smithy, albeit after a long time.
Heading inside, he laid his eyes on the shopkeeper, who was a short and bulky old man with gray hair.
He walked over to him and asked: "I'd like to commission something."
"And what's that lad?" The old man replied.
Sirus pointed to his left eye and said, "Something durable and with a high melting point to cover this up."
The old man looked at his eye with a curious face, and replied: "I can probably make summat up in a day or two, But do you have any money? I can't run a business for free after all."
Before Sirus could attempt to barter his Health Potions, a short old woman, with similar gray hair peeked her head through a nearby door.
"Nuor!" She screeched out, "You're bored as hell these days anyways, just make it for the poor boy!"
Nuor turned back to the woman: "You rotten wench! I was just about to make us some money, but you had to butt your sorry ass in!"
But the woman had already closed the door and left, leaving just Sirus and Nuor standing there.
"Damn you," Nuor directed at him, "I'll make it, but you'll owe me!" He said with a serious face.
"That's fine." Sirus replied.
Nuor nodded, "Alright then, come back tomorrow, I should have it done by then."
Sirus nodded his thanks and left the shop.
"What a nice old man." Riria commented inside his head.