The next day, Lan woke with the sun in his eyes. Why is the sun so hot? he thought. With a start, Lan sat up before groaning and falling back onto the bed as memory fragments of the night before came back to haunt him.

Lan decided that he really wasn't a fan of hangovers. Even if this one wasn’t quite as devastating as the day before, he still had to fight to stay on his feet. After checking his tome, he looked in the mirror to make sure there wasn’t anything else on his face. There wasn’t, but what he did see made him pause.

He still looked pale and thin, and his cheeks were sunken. What he didn’t see were the dark circles around his eyes. Maybe it was just that, but to Lan, it seemed that some of the colour had also returned to them.

If this was one of the old tales. Lan would have said it was a sign that a shroud had been lifted from his eyes. But he thought it was probably just that he couldn’t remember the last time he had so much sleep. Which was good enough.

Somehow, he managed to make his way down the stairs and meet the same girl from the day before. When he asked her to bring a bath to his room, she didn’t even look at him or acknowledge his request.

But after his life-saving breakfast, only slightly ruined by another attempt to make small talk with Leah’s father. Lan found a bath waiting in his room.

After a long soak and feeling ready to rejoin the land of the living, he dressed, packed up his armour and spear, and headed out.

Though he had promised to choose a combat class, he wanted to ask Lock and the others' advice about which class to go for. Somehow, it hadn’t really come up with everything else going on. Now he would just have to ask someone at the guild.

Once again, Lan had to carry his coin with him, so he made sure to try to look like he wasn’t worth robbing while looking for anyone who might see through his strategy.

[Skill: People watching – level up, 1 -> 2]

Managing to reach the guildhall without incident, he stepped through the doors and was greeted by the same energy as before. One that he now knew was made up of people who were ready and willing to step up and face whatever and whenever the city needed them to keep the people safe.

It wasn’t the glory of the inn, and not all the people in the hall inspired the emotion. If he was being honest, it was more the guildhall itself than the people in it. Most of which glared hatefully at him as he passed. Some looked disgusted, and the best reaction he got was from those that ignored him.

There were one or two people who nodded to him, those who he recognised from the inn. Although one of them started getting angry looks himself until he looked away.

Aside from those two, Lan didn’t see anyone from the inn. Although Lan couldn’t see their levels. He knew that Lock and the other’s levels were in their high twenties, which was average for adventurers. Judging by their armour and clothes, most who went to the inn had to be around the same level.

Looking around, he got the feeling that those around were a little lower level, and most seemed to be Copper and iron ranks.

Many of them also didn’t seem to be in a hurry to take on jobs.

‘Oh, hello there, Lan!’ Realising that he had reached the front desk, Lan stopped and turned to the receptionist Mari, whose smile twitched before she looked like she would cry. ‘I’m so sorry!’ she said, grabbing Lan’s arm. ‘To think that I let you go on a guild job when you were so low leveled. You must have felt pressured to go with me all but placing your tag on the stone. I'm so sorry.’ Mari said, shaking his lower levelled hand with enough force to almost lift him off the ground.

‘Mari, please… stop.’ Lan manage. For someone that seemed so unflappable, she really did fall apart when she was… flapped. ‘you are going to… rip my arm off!’ noticing what she was doing, Mari gasped and let go.

‘Sorry.’

‘I should be the one apologising.’ Lan said, trying to ignore the fact that they were somehow drawing more attention. And the fact that some of the previously indifferent looks had turned hostel left Lan with the impression that more had figured out who he was or thought he was harassing the happy-go-lucky receptionist. ‘I shouldn’t have taken the job or at least said what my level was. Sorry, I didn’t mean to cause you trouble.’ Lan lowered his head, which only seemed to fluster Mari even more.

‘No, please don’t do that!’

‘Then can we agree to forgive each other?’ Lan tried,

Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.

‘Fine.’ She said in a small voice and sighed. ‘although now I feel like you were tricking me when you apologised…’

‘I meant it. I didn’t even think about the fact that I could have caused you a lot of trouble if they had decided to blame you. But we said we would forgive each other, right?’

‘Hmm, Right.’ Mari nodded, somewhat defeated.

‘Good, because I could use some help with picking a job?’ Lan said, shrugging.

‘Oh!’ Mari said, the return to a familiar topic bringing back her shining personality. ‘Of course. However, I’ll be keeping a closer eye on what jobs you try to take.’ She ended with a half pout

‘Please do…’ Lan laughed nervously, knowing that he had long used up all his luck with the guild job. If he believed in The Balance, he would no doubt trip and break his neck on the way out.

‘Okay, seeing as I didn’t have the chance to speak about this before. I’ll explain to you the way guild jobs work.’ She pointed to each of the four boards in the main hall. ‘the board with the copper frame has F and E-ranked jobs. The Silver D and C. The platinum B and A. Lastly, Mithril, S and SS rank jobs. Although you will be glad to see that there are very few of those jobs, and the ones there are the only Kingdom-wide contracts, so if you ever reach S rank, it will be first come, first serve.’

‘Good to know.’ Lan nodded, looking at each of the boards.

‘There is also a blackboard for guild jobs that we bring out when those are called. As for taking jobs, just find one that you think you can do and bring the poster to one of the other receptionists or me. Each job has how many adventurers that are needed to take the job on the poster. Remember that you can have more than the required amount, but not less and the reward amount is not adjusted, so it’s best to stay to the amount necessary.’

‘Right.’ Lan nodded along.

‘If you need a party, there is nothing wrong with just going up and asking if others are willing to allow you to join. There are plenty of adventurers that do not have parties and work with many parties. Also, if you find a party, you can take on jobs one rank higher as long as two members are that rank. Oh, unless it’s a permanent party.’

‘Okay,’ Lan said, looking around. Somehow, he got the feeling that he wouldn’t have to worry about that. ‘What about going up in ranks?’

‘Oh! Well, ranking up involves gaining enough guild points at your current rank. Once you have enough, you enter an evaluation, in which you will have to complete three jobs of the rank you wish to raise to. Failing those jobs will remove half of your gathered points. The number of points you will gain is calculated upon completion of the job. Guild jobs don’t count toward your Guild points. Lastly, people can make personal requests, but someone will be sent to find you in those cases. And that should be it if you have any other questions. Please feel free to ask me.’ Mari smiled.

‘I don’t see anyone above Iron rank in the hall. Why is that.’

‘At a certain point, you’ll find that most adventurers become more motivated and like to leave early in the morning. Also, I think it helps them get the pick of the jobs.

‘Right, thanks for the help, Mari.’ Lan said, picking up his armour and turning to face the hall. Even for Drill jobs, he had to be too low of a level. Although it was an uphill battle, he had to find people to party with. So Lan bit back a sigh and walked up to the first group. It was a group of four drills. All of them looked a little younger than Lan, and all four frowned at him as he stopped in front of them.

‘What the hell do you want, scab?’ the tallest of the four said, still having to look up at Lan.

‘S-scab?’ Lan repeated.

‘We heard the story about how you made it, so the guild master had to put you with a silver rank team. So you could rake in their team bonus.’

‘I didn’t even know that bonus was a thing when I went out there.’ Lan tried, so that was what they thought about him.

‘Well, now you know, and you aren’t going to be getting anything from our hard work.’

‘Wait, I never.’ Lan started but didn’t try to stop them. It was one thing working with people that disliked him. It was another working with people who felt they had a reason to be hostile.

That is what he told himself. The real reason he couldn’t explain was that he couldn’t bring himself to beg. It seemed wrong the idea of fighting alongside someone who he had grovelled to… No, he would rather go it alone if it came to it.

The next group he approached had a blonde female rogue, a large dark skin Shielder and a red-haired Lancer. As Lan stopped in front of them, they just smirked at him.

‘Before you say anything, I just want to say that if you are willing to work with me, then I am okay with going without pay. All I am looking for is the chance to gain some experience. I won't get in your way. You don’t even have to look out for me.’

‘Yeah, and what about it? We don’t care if you plan on paying us. We want nothing to do with a loser like you. And the fact that you think you can just waltz up to us and act like you are a real adventurer pisses me off. Why don’t you just go and die where no one can see you.’ Without another word, Lan moved to another group.

‘Sorry, we don’t have time to watch over you.’ Of the three so far, that was the nicest, but as Lan tried to persuade the grizzled man in plate amour. He just shook his head, and he and his team walked away. The next few people and groups were almost like one of the first three.

‘You can come with us. Only if you are okay with being a human shield. In fact, all tell you what. If you can block ten hits for us, we might even bring your body back.’ A blonde man with a tattoo of a snake along his right eye said. ‘Better yet, we will even pay you.’ As the four-man adventurer party Laughed, Lan walked away, stopping before reaching the next group, who looked to be gearing up to let him know what they thought of him.

‘To hell with this.’ Lan breathed, leaving the party looking almost hurt as he walked over to the Iron Board, all while jeers came from the hall. As Lan scanned the board, noting a standing order for goblins.

They would pay for any goblin killed if the ears were brought back. As Lan tried to reason with the morbidity of carrying around ears, he noticed someone standing next to him.

Looking, he was greeted by a very small elderly man with a long pointed beard and odd brown robes the likes Lan had never seen anyone wearing before. The old man was stroking his beard, humming and harring as he looked Lan up and down.

‘Is there something I can do for you?’ Lan asked, not sure what the man was doing.

‘Hmm…’