Hans couldn’t believe how many children were in the guild hall. Between the Gomi children he had been teaching and the eleven tusk-touched children who had recently arrived, only one empty bench remained. When he learned that he was taking over the Gomi chapter and heard how small the town was, he imagined that seven or eight children in a single class would be a huge success.

Now there were 21.

“If we get any more nice days, we’ll train outside again, but we might not get to do that until next year,” Hans explained to the children. “Until then, we’ll have class in here. For today’s lesson, you all get to choose what we learn about. Your first option is how to properly fill out job requisition and completion forms so the Guild can more easily log your work.

“...Or we can talk about monsters.”

Choosing was easy for the class. “Monsters!”

“Yeah, that’s what I wanted to learn about too,” Hans said, smiling as he flipped to a specific entry in his bestiary. “Who here has heard of a snallygaster?”

One of the new tusk children raised her hand. “They live in the mountains and eat children!”

“They don’t specifically target children, but they do live in the mountains.”

Hans held up the open bestiary, showing the class an illustration of a bird with the scaled tail and legs of a lizard. Its ostrich-like neck stretched and curled, looking longer than the rest of the creature’s body, ending with a beak that looked dangerously sharp. Tentacles half the length of the monster’s neck ringed its head like a lion’s mane. And it had wings.

“Snallygasters tend to live alone. A male and female will briefly nest together, but as soon as the eggs are laid, the mother chases the father off, presumably to prevent the male from killing its own children when they hatch. Females tend to be as large as or larger than a horse, with most males being smaller.”

Continuing the lesson, Hans explained that the snallygaster used its tentacles to attach itself to its prey. While the suction cups held on, the beak rapidly carved a wound in its victim, a motion that he described as similar to the needle in a pedal-powered sewing machine.

When he saw a few faces trade curiosity for fear, he assured the children that snallygasters lived far from Gomi, and even the people who lived close to their native habitat saw them only occasionally. They preferred mountains in tropical or near-tropical climates, building nests high up on the sides of cliffs in the areas least accessible to people. For the most part, they fed on goats and deer.

“Here’s a challenge, and don’t answer right away: If you had to hunt a snallygaster, how would you do it? You’re allowed to ask me as many questions as you like, and for our newest students, I know this is your first class. I still want you to guess with us. It’s okay if one of your ideas doesn’t work. A lot of my ideas haven’t worked.”

The new students seemed to relax, and the class began quietly thinking of how they would hunt a snallygaster.

Quentin was the first to raise his hand, asking, “Does it have any special abilities?”

Hans smiled. That was a good question. “Only its tentacle attack.”

A few seconds later, Kane asked, “Is it nocturnal?”

“Nope. only hunts in daylight.”

“When does it have its babies?” Loddie asked.

“Before I answer that, tell me why you asked that question?”

Loddie hesitated but eventually got the words out. “Animals are meaner when they have babies.”

Praising Loddie for clever thinking, Hans added that if it was early in the mating season, that could mean fighting two snallygasters instead of one.

“Does it have tough skin?”

“It has scales all over its body, even under its feathers. They are most vulnerable to piercing weapons and pretty resistant to slashing weapons.”

“What rank is it?”

“Males are Bronze and females are Silver. Telling which is which from the ground while they’re flying is tough, though. If snallygasters are reported to the guild for eating farm animals or travelers, they typically set the job at Silver because of that.”

“How do we fight it if it can fly?” Gunther asked.

“That’s for you to figure out.” Hans grinned.

The children talked amongst themselves, comparing ideas and debating which methods would be best. Leaning back in his chair, Hans listened in, happy to hear that the experienced students were asking the right kinds of questions and encouraged to hear the new students participating and being outwardly curious about the lesson.

When the room began to quiet, Hans took that to mean the class was done planning. Starting with the youngest students first, he listened to plan after plan. As was to be expected, the first several answers were more fantastical than practical, the kids proposing things like giant fireballs or advanced lightning magic.

The nature of the answers shifted significantly when it was Gunther’s turn to answer. “Umm… me, Quentin, Chance, and Kane formed a party.”

A few students complained that wasn’t fair, but Hans calmed them down, saying that they were never asked to hunt alone. Many adventurers thought that way, to their detriment. The sooner an adventurer thought in terms of “we” instead of “I,” the more their chances of success improved.

Gunther did his best to explain their party’s plan. When he began to struggle, Hans let the other members fill in the gaps. Though the pieces came out of order, the party’s full plan started with a cow staked near the nest to lure the snallygaster to the ground. When the monster landed, they would throw nets over it, half the party holding it down with ropes, the other half moving in for the kill.

Gently critiquing their plan, Hans suggested they avoid pitting their strength against a monster, ever. The snallygaster wasn’t the largest creature, but it was likely far more powerful than they realized, making it unlikely that they could hold it down. The safer approach was to assume that the monster was stronger than the party, always.

His next concern was the bait. Sometimes, bait was the best choice. The drawback, however, was that the rest of the plan hinged on the monster choosing to take it. Monsters often didn’t pursue bait, as many of them were smart enough to be skeptical of a free meal. Additionally, adventurers had few options for keeping other monsters away from the bait. Snaring the wrong creature was a real possibility, presenting a whole new host of problems. Big problems if that monster outranked the adventurers’ initial target.

“Everyone was very creative with their ideas. I’m proud of all of you. I have one more question: Why did no one attack at night?”

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Umms and uhhs moved through the class. “You said it was active during the day,” Kane said.

“Exactly, so at night we can be pretty sure of where the snallygaster will be.”

“Isn’t killing something sleeping dishonorable?” one of the new students asked.

Smiling, Hans said, “The only goals that matter are finishing the job and bringing the party home safely. I’d rather attack a monster in its sleep than fight it head on.”

To wrap up class, Hans told the story of his party’s encounter with a female snallygaster. At the time, he was Silver and traveled with Mazo the halfling Blue Mage, Gret the human Rogue, and Boden the dwarf Spearman. The most difficult part of the hunt, according to Hans, was finding the snallygaster’s nest in a maze of uncharted mountain crags and cliffs.

Once they found the nest, the party journeyed around to the backside of the same mountain as the nest, and hiked to the top, camping a few dozen yards from the summit.

“Gret had been studying trapmaking and alchemy, so he brought along a device that would explode on impact. The plan was to drop the device on the nest from above while the snallygaster was asleep, so we waited until night and snuck into position.

“Before anyone asks, no, I won’t show you how to make Gret’s device.”

“Awwwwwwww!”

Chuckling, Hans continued. “Gret took his time lining up the drop by moonlight alone. If his device hit even a small rock on the way down, it would miss the nest entirely, so it had to be perfect.

“When Gret was satisfied, he dropped the device, without bothering to tell the rest of us. By the time we figured out why our Rogue was taking cover, the whole mountain shook. A huge swath of the rockface where we stood cracked and fell away, catapulting down the mountainside. Once the ground stopped shaking, which took a while, we took a look at the damage.

“The snallygaster was gone. Gret’s explosion either vaporized it or the small avalanche buried it. Either way, there was nothing left of the beast or the nest, which meant we had nothing to turn in to complete the job. We gave Gret a hard time about that one for a long while.”

The children sat still, enraptured by the story, hoping to hear more. “Do you still go on adventures?” Harry asked eventually.

Shaking his head, Hans said that he only went out if he had to. After a career of collecting injuries big and small, he felt he was a liability in a party of Golds. He couldn’t fight like he used to, and he was more prone to getting hurt again, which also put the rest of the party in danger.

“Don’t adventurers have healing spells?”

“Yeah!” Harriot added to her brother’s question. “And healing potions!”

“Spells and potions can be pretty miraculous. They have saved a lot of lives, but the idea that they heal someone completely is a misconception. Whatever needed the healing won’t heal perfectly. In fact, it’s a little bit weaker after each heal. If it’s a serious injury, like a broken bone or worse, it can actually heal incorrectly if you aren’t careful.”

In some popular stories, the hero fought through grave injuries with a healer at their back, stitching them back together as they charged ahead despite the seriousness of their wounds. Hans said that was pure fantasy. Not only could healers not work that quickly, the hero would be a hobbling mess if they managed to survive.

“Okay. That’s all for class today. Remember, Miss Mazo sent us another delivery of books. If you’d like to borrow one to read, sign it out with me and bring it back in one piece.”

Mazo had indirectly supplied the books Hans mentioned. The Guild Master used the gold she left him to order a few kid-friendly storybooks, figuring that might help beat back the winter doldrums when they came. He had asked the merchant for 40 but got 12, which was fine. Children’s books could be hard to find.

Outside, the steady rain was now mixed with small flakes of snow. The ground was still too warm yet for it to accumulate, but that would happen soon enough.

Hans hoped the tusks Theneesa sent would arrive in time.

***

The last caravan of the season came and went. They didn’t bring more tusks with them, but they did give Hans a wax-sealed envelope emblazoned with the Adventurers’ Guild crest. Two more tusks had arrived since the fall festival, but neither of them knew Theneesa. Luther’s volunteering to wait in Osare over the winter was a small relief–at least the tusks wouldn’t be stuck there alone and unsure of what to do next–but he worried for all of their safety.

If tensions continued to rise, they would be stuck on the wrong side of the snow, and no one from Gomi would even know they needed help until the thaw.

Back at the guild hall, Hans sat down to read the letter.

Guild Master Hans,

This letter is sent to inform you that a formal complaint has been lodged against you by a senior member of the Adventurers’ Guild. The grievance alleges that you are unfit to be a leader within the Guild. We take these complaints seriously, and we endeavor to address the grievance with the utmost fairness and consideration.

In light of kingdom-wide conflicts, we are postponing the hearing on this matter. We intend to return to this matter when the war is complete.

There is no action for you to take at this time.

Adventurers’ Guild

Hoseki Chapter

No name was signed to the letter. There was only an official stamp.

After rereading the letter twice more, Hans set it down with a sigh and rubbed his face. He knew that the “senior member” was most likely Devon. Mazo and Theneesa had said as much with the information they shared. How much support he had from other officials was unclear. With Devon’s popularity, Hans couldn’t convince himself that the Platinum lacked allies.

A delay was better than the immediate end to his place in Gomi, but he could still feel the guillotine blade hovering above him. That awareness kept him on edge. He was growing to love it here, and it could be taken away from him at any moment with a pen stroke hundreds of miles away.

***

Later that day, Hans visited Olza’s shop to ask after her progress on designing new experiments for the purple flower. When he arrived, the sign on her door was flipped to close. Confused because they had agreed to meet at this time, he tried the handle. The door was unlocked.

Sticking his head inside, he meant to call for Olza to see if she was home, but he heard soft sobs before words could leave his mouth.

“Olza? It’s Hans. Are you okay?”

Listening as he stepped quietly, he saw Olza’s feet sticking out of the doorway behind her counter. He came around the corner, finding her leaning sideways against the wall of her lab, her head between her knees, her arms wrapped around her shins.

“Hey,” Hans said softly as he knelt, “What’s wrong?”

“He found me.” Olza held up a letter for Hans, keeping her head down.

Addressed to a “Rita,” the letter was signed by a Diamond-ranked adventurer, the one Olza dated in Raven’s Hollow and escaped by moving to Gomi. He wrote as if they were still madly in love and that her disappearance was the kind of “confusion that often distracted beautiful women.” According to the note, he intended to “retrieve” her before winter, taking her back “home” to Raven’s Hollow.

The words creeped into Hans like some kind of verbal ick. He suspected it was exponentially worse for Olza.

“It’s looking like he won’t beat the snow,” Hans offered.

“That’s worse. I don’t want to spend all winter knowing he is waiting on the other side.”

That was fair. Hans felt the same about his Guild hearing. “Would you like me to sit with you or would you rather be alone right now?”

Olza scooted over for Hans. “I cursed myself by blabbering to you about how much I liked it here.”

“What do you mean?”

“At the fall festival, when we walked back together.”

Hans stared at her.

“You don’t remember, do you?”

“Bits and pieces.”

She wiped her eyes enough for Hans to see her roll them.

“Can I do anything?” Hans asked.

“I don’t know. I don’t think so. I don’t know what I’ll do if he comes.”

“Could probably just let Galinda know and that’d be the end of him.”

That got the alchemist to laugh. If she could still do that, that was a good sign.

“And that damn flower!” Olza stood. “I’m fine. Sorry. I just had a moment. How about you? Are you okay? You look distracted.”

“Me? No, I’m fine. Never been better.”

***

Open Quests (Ordered from Old to New):

Progress from Gold-ranked to Diamond-ranked.

Mend the rift with Devon.

Complete the manuscript for "The Next Generation: A Teaching Methodology for Training Adventurers."

Identify the unknown purple flower from Olza.

Protect your place in Gomi and maintain control of the Gomi chapter.

Find a practical solution for a planar leak. Bonus Objective: Find a solution that uses only resources available in Gomi.

Expand the Gomi training area to include ramps for footwork drills.

Do something amazing!