The Vermillion was one of the empires that controlled most of the land in the continent, it had grown a ton in the past 6 years becoming one of the most successful ones.
But human greed doesn’t stop growing, and neither does war.
A lot of hatred encounters between races had happened, people needed a way to protect themselves, they needed a way to move outside the citadels and the main cities.
The neutral territory was dangerous, and outside the city's territory was also dangerous, but there was nothing more dangerous than those two at night since that incident.
Vermillion, Blackstone, and Okumura empires were at war, and it was a tough one, hundreds of thousands of lives were lost and they were about to get a conclusion until the fourth empire appeared.
War is expensive, resources to teach magic are expensive, weapons are expensive, and maintaining different cities is also really expensive, and the Kings, lords, and nobles of each empire knew that but there was no other choice than fight, fight until only one of them ruled the whole continent.
But one day, a sudden request from the empress of the Vermilion empire reunited the other ones in a place, in the daylight in a room they wanted to discuss a sensitive topic that could bring joy to their people.
“PEACE?! Have you gone mad Henrietta?”, a middle-aged man with a gray looking beard screamed. “There can’t be no peace, we’re damned to go to war until one of us becomes the legitimate ruler of the whole continent, you know it!”.
“I know that Sebastian”, Henrietta answered. “But it’s time that we stop this madness, we can not keep fighting each other when there’s a bigger problem ahead of us and you also know that!”.
“I know but I don’t think peace it’s gonna happen as you want it just because we share a common enemy”, Ishida said.
“Right, but don’t see it as peace, see it as a truce until our common enemy is no longer a problem”, Henrietta added.
“I hate to admit it but you’re right this time”, Sebastian added too. “We don’t know much about him or her and we might have time to prepare, but I think we would make more progress if we don’t focus on killing each other”.
“I agree”, Ishida said.
“Then it’s all s-“, Sebastian was interrupted instantly by Ishida.
“However, I don’t believe a truce will be the solution. I’m not gonna sit here and ignore all the atrocities that people within the Blackstone and Vermilion empire have done to my people, and I don’t think you, Henrietta will allow that either, there’s a long list of things that the Blackstone have done to your people too”.
“Yeah but don’t think we’re friends or I’m on your side because I agree with you”, Henrietta said. “I also won’t forget what your people did to my people”.
“Then what's the proposition? We came a long way here to discuss peace and our people are outside these doors waiting for an order”, Sebastian said.
“I think the best way to solve this is indeed a truce, but each nation will focus on its people and make progress in its warriors, and when we’re 1 year before the dawn of time, we’ll reunite and discuss the assault”, Henrietta added.
“Sounds like a reasonable way to end this, I agree”, Ishida spoke.
“I agree too, I’m interested in how this would end”, Sebastian added.
“Then it’s all set”, Henrietta also spoke. “LET THE SCRIBE IN!”.
The scribe entered quickly as demanded by the leaders, and picked up a document that was halfway written and waited for the order to start writing.
“I assume that you all finished reading the documents that I left in front of your places, if there’s any objection or petition to change it then let's be ready to take the oath”, Henrietta said, “You can start Sebastian”.
“I, Supreme General Sebastian Frederick Blackstone, swear by blood to follow the oath and command my Empire according to the Treaty ''.
“I, Empress Henrietta Van Vermilion, sweat by blood to follow the oath and command my Empire according to the treaty”.
“I, Ishida Lei Okumura, sweat by blood to follow the oath and command my Empire according to the treaty”.
...
“And that’s how we ended up in this situation, thanks to that reunion 5 years ago and that treaty I got arrested because of War crimes against the Vermilion Empire and ended up here”.
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“But there are few mercenaries that end up in prison, why did you?”
“Oh I was in the Vermilion territory when the treaty was signed so that means that if I got caught I’d be accused of war crimes, luckily it was only one year and I think that year finishes...”., he said.
“Hey you, yes you number 13, your time is up, your year here is done so you can go”, said the guard while he was opening the cell. “Prisoner number 13, first name Alaric, last name unknown, is free to go”.
Alaric began stretching his body as he was walking towards the cell door.
“I hope you don’t come back”, the guard said.
“Ohh that’s so nice of you”, Alaric replied sarcastically.
“No I meant I hope you don’t come back, I hope a demon kills you tonight and eats your guts”, the guard said. “I don’t want scum like you walking in the same streets as my children.
The guard spits at Alaric’s feet but he did not mind, walked past him, and exited the prison.
“And to think that I spent a year there”, he mumbled to himself. “I guess I have to find a tavern quickly so I can start doing quests and get some money”.
He sighed.
“I’m really broke and I don’t even have a place to sleep”, he thought while he reached in his pockets only to see that all he had were 2 silver coins.
He arrived at the tavern and went to the front counter, where a young woman was waiting.
“My name is Ria and Welcome to The 7 Seeds Tavern!”, she said enthusiastically. “How can I help you, sir?”.
“Umm, I want to take a quest”, he said.
“Of course!”, she said. “Just show me your rank and tell me the group size or if you’re part of a guild and their ranks so I can show you some quests according to your level”.
“Rank? Guild? What do you mean”, he asked, seemingly confused.
“Oh you’re new to this?”, she asked, also seemingly confused.
“Y-Yeah”, he replied.
“Well, that’s not a problem I can explain to you and tell you the basics if you have time”.
“I do”
“Well, ranks are divided in 5 without counting the “unranked” rank, so there would be unranked copper, silver, gold, red gold, and adamantite, with copper being the least rare and adamantite being the rarest, and the prizes of the quests are based on their rarity”.
“Ohh so for example a copper rank will get for example 50 copper coins-20 silver coins while an adamantite rank will get like 300 gold coins in one quest?”, he asked.
“Exactly”, she replied. “Also you must become part of a party, quests around here are not that dangerous but they’re still dangerous, and if it’s at night they will be even more dangerous so I recommend you to be careful, if you still want to be an adventurer after listening to that I can help you fill your application form and after you pay the fee you can come here and get your rank with your name on it and your quest”.
“I do, thanks”.
“Alright, let’s start”, she said. “What is your first name?”.
“Alaric”
“Alaric, alright, last name and middle name?”.
“I don’t have a middle name, but my last name is Darkfeather”.
“Darkfeather? I’ve never heard that last name before, well next question, what is your height, Mr. Alaric?”.
“6’3”
“I see, what is your age?”
“18 years old”
“Got it”, she said while writing. “Your hair color and eye color?”.
“Black hair and purple eyes”.
“I see, and what is your fighting style? This is not required but it would help you a lot to specify, and this is tricky because if you say the truth here it may help you in official terms on something like an academy or a job, but if you lie and someone discovers it your whole application can be marked as fraud and you’ll lose all the progress you made as an adventurer”.
“I understand but I don’t have a certain style, I mean I do but it’s not just one style so I can’t specify”.
“Okay let me help you out since you’re not an experienced adventurer I’d assume you don’t have more than one style like you say you do, so I’m gonna put magical since I don’t see you carrying any weapons and I sensed a decent amount of power coming from you since you stepped in the tavern so I’m gonna write down magical type, is that good for you sir?”.
“I guess it’s accurate enough”.
“Alright then we’re almost all set”, she said. “ I need 2 silver coins because it is the fee and tomorrow you can come here to get your copy of your information, your rank, and your first quest”.
She leaned towards him and started whispering something.
“I recommend you to go find a party that needs one more person right now before you exit this place”, she said while she handed him a piece of copper with a string to attach it to him as a necklace or his clothes. “Take this as your temporary rank so it proves that you’re an adventurer to them, you’ll need other people to survive outside of the cities of this village”.
“Alright, thanks”.
Alaric took the piece of copper and he put it around his neck while he walked toward one of the tables in the tavern.
He sat there drowning in his thoughts for a while until 3 people sat at his table and started talking to him.
“Hey! We are a party of 3 and we were wondering if you could join us if you’d like”, said the guy of the group, his hair was blonde and he seemed friendly and outgoing. “You seem strong and I sense a good amount of magical power coming from you so I told the sorcerer of the group to run a small magic scan and she said you’d be good for the group, I hope this doesn’t sound too creepy to you haha”.
Alaric kept staring at the guy analyzing him. His purple eyes were so intense that with his height added people usually viewed him as a pretty intimidating guy.
“What is your name”, Alaric finally spoke.
“L-Luke, Luke Greensfield”, he said, clearly intimidated by Alaric aura and intense stares. “You seem strong because of your muscles and you seem like you have a decent magical power so I think you’d come in handy for our party”.
“I see”, Alaric said while changing from looking at Luke to looking at the girl on the right. “It would be nice to be part of a party”.
“So you accept?!?”, Luke said, weirdly enthusiastic.
“Yeah I think”, Alaric replied.
“YES!!”, Luke said out loud.
Alaric was interesting in the outcome that the formation of that party would have, and he was also was wondering why Luke was so thrilled by him being at the party.
“Well, the blonde girl with green eyes is Enri, she says she doesn’t have a last name so we just call her Enri, the Brunette is Misa Matsumoto”, Luke said. “Enri is a physical combat class specialized in assassin subclass and Misa is the magical class specialized in healing and distance attacks. I am a physical class specialized in close-range combat. Your class must be magical combat right?”.
“Yeah, I guess”.
“What is your subclass?”, Misa asked.
Alaric remained silent.
“I get that you don’t trust us but we would like to know your subclass so we know how exactly you could help us”.
Alaric did not want to give too much information to the new people he just met 30 minutes ago so he thought of what he could say.
“I guess you could say my subclass is general magic, my strengths are reinforcing spells and my weaknesses are healing spells”.
“General magic? Is that a thing?”, Luke asked Misa.
“Yeah, and it’s not rare at all actually”, she replied. “I think he’d be really helpful”.
“Alright, then it’s all set, welcome to our party!”, Luke said. “Let’s meet here tomorrow at noon, we’ll be waiting for you!”.
They got up and walked away, and Alaric started thinking more about everything.
He got up and went out of the tavern and walked for a while looking for a place to sleep. He found an old cart with harvest straw on it. He accommodated them in a way so he could sleep and then laid sideways using his arm as a pillow, waiting for the next day.