“Well done,” Hans said as the three adventurers caught their breath. “The way you coordinated your attacks was beautiful.”

“Is there a footprint on my back?” Becky asked, trying to look over her own shoulder to see.

Lee brushed the dust away.

“Dwarves don’t appreciate that kind of thing,” Becky grumbled, “but I’ll let it slide. Teamwork or whatever.”

Lee apologized and said she hadn’t planned it originally, but the opportunity was too good for her to pass up.

“Well?” Bel asked Hans. “Give us the critique.”

“You worked together like you had run as a group for years rather than weeks, so overall, I don’t have many complaints. My biggest piece of feedback–don’t get too riled up Becky–was Lee’s jump at the first ogre.”

“Really?” Lee asked, confused but not offended. “That went pretty smooth I thought.”

“I don’t disagree that it worked out well, but I usually say ‘jumping attacks are bullshit.’ That’s not to say they can’t be useful sometimes, because they can, but most of the time, they are a bad choice.”

Hans continued his explanation, saying that any sort of jumping attack, especially one with the airtime of Lee’s early leap at the ogre, was unnecessarily risky because an airborne adventurer couldn’t change course. Once they left the ground, they were locked into a trajectory, unable to stop or dodge or adjust.

“You are all experienced enough to know how much can change in a blink,” Hans said. “Attacks like that make you feel more mobile, but that’s your brain tricking you. Mobility is about choice, and you’ll always have more of that with both feet on the ground. In this case, the rapid attacks from Bel and Becky kept the ogre distracted, but any monster with that size and intelligence is capable of swatting an adventurer out of the air.”

Lee nodded, processing the feedback as she replayed the events in her mind. “At least it looked cool.”

Hans agreed. It looked very cool.

“That Force Wall trick is a good one,” Bel added. “I’m glad we practiced that. It opens up so many more options for us.”

The tusks had a great deal of practice using Force Wall in a manner similar to their fight with the ogres just then, using it to box in or surprise enemies to create an opening for Lee to strike. Casting Push to throw herself backward away from the wall was new to Lee. Adventurers had experimented with such tactics before but usually did so against solid surfaces. Lee was one of those adventurers.

The results of those experiments were unimpressive.

The strength of Lee’s Push spell would punch through or dent most surfaces at close range. If she aimed Push at something more rigid, like a mountain side, the spell would fling her backward but not as intended. Any uneven points in a surface strong enough to survive the impact could send the adventure in an unpredictable direction.

Force Wall, however, was immovable and magically flat, perfectly so. Thanks to Theneesa’s guidance, Bel’s magery training prioritized practicality over showmanship from the start, giving her a great deal of practice within the school of Force spells. Her ability to aim and shape her Force Wall was more advanced than most mages ever bothered with, so very few parties had the option to use Push the way that Bel and Lee could. If they did, they weren’t likely to have a frontline Spellsword proficient in Push.

“Time to practice Pull next,” Hans said with a smile. “Assuming I’ve convinced you by now.”

“You have,” Lee admitted.

Becky asked how their tactics against the ogres compared to the tactics his party had used on the job originally.

“Mazo has never once tried to be quiet, so we didn’t have the Silence spell as an option.”

“Master Theneesa has some odd stories about Miss Mazo,” Bel said. “That description matches what we’ve heard.”

Hans chuckled. “I’m sure you’ve heard some good ones. At any rate, myself and Boden went in first with Gret providing cover with arrows. Your party got here faster than ours, so when we arrived the two ogres were having a contest throwing skulls. Their position was a little better because of that, but not by much.”

Zalora buffed Hans and Boden with protection spells as they fought, but Mazo waited to cast. As they expected, the sounds of battle attracted the rest of the ogres, who came charging predictably out of their camp and down the mountain path. Mazo hurled spell after spell at the charging ogres. The front ogre died in the first flurry. The second ogre fell off the path, cartwheeling down to the rocks below. The third ogre chose to jump, preferring to risk the fall over absorbing spells head on.

Stolen content alert: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.

Those second two ogres survived the drop but broke too many bones to do anything more than wallow in angry pain until the adventurers finished them off.

For this present journey, the trip back out of the canyon was as uneventful as the trip in thanks to Becky’s spirit hawk.

On the way, Bel spoke. “Mr. Hans,” she began, “Master Theneesa said your relationship to the Guild was…unconventional.”

“You mean bad.”

“Yes, bad.”

Hans said it was fine. He made some enemies–his fault as much as anyone else's. Some other things didn't work out. These things happen. You know.

“Right. We’ve heard Master Theneesa say many of the same things in lessons as you do, word for word. Her respect for you is even more clear now.”

“She was always a good kid.”

***

Shutting the door to his dungeon cabin felt like lowering the gates of a walled city, blocking out the dull roar of an approaching army. The chaos of the growing dungeon campus would still be there when the gate was raised again, but for now, all of his problems were on the other side of that door.

The ogre valley run went better than he could have hoped, so by any reasonable standard, now was a time to celebrate a job well done. His old drills continued to produce results, and his new drills filled the gaps as he intended. The trio of lady adventurers he had just observed had spent the majority of their training not under Hans, but he was pleased to contribute to their growth.

Becky got more practice hunting in a group and seemed to realize that she had more potential than she once believed.

The tweaks to Lee’s footwork and timing shaved away a few lingering inefficiencies and bad habits, making her every movement and attack crisper and more effective.

Bel used her spells more thoughtfully in battle. She and Lee had always worked as a team, supporting one another in the fray of a fight, but now she was reading the attacks of her comrades far better, as if seeing the battle from their eyes. With that improved perspective, her party’s attacks looked like they came from one brain. Synchronized, organized, and strategic.

The conversation on the way out, however, soured all of that for him.

Adventurers like Bel and Lee never meant any harm with their questions. He had learned as much from years of fielding the same kinds of queries, but that didn’t change how it felt for him to have to explain why he wasn’t taken seriously in the Guild or why he was a failure in several areas of adventuring.

Why aren’t you at least a Diamond?

With all of your combat knowledge, why aren’t you a tournament champion?

Why aren’t you still adventuring with Mazo?

Why are your classes not as popular as the ones taught by Platinums?

Can you really take any credit for Master Devontes’ success when his skill level is so far beyond yours?

The conversations were almost always about what he hadn’t done, as if he needed to be reminded of his long list of unachieved goals.

Active Quest: Progress from Gold-ranked to Diamond-ranked.

Hans thought of Gret, Boden, and his own hypocrisy. He taught his students that running with the same party was ideal for the sake of communication and cohesion. Gret and Boden had done that with Hans, but they threw their lots in with an adventurer who couldn’t keep up, forcing them to join new parties when they advanced beyond Gold.

If they had cut the deadweight earlier, perhaps they would have spent more time with better party members. Gret could have had the support of a skilled and trusted comrade on his final job, perhaps preventing his unnecessary death. With a different party, Boden might have been spared the jobs that drove him to drink. A better adventurer than Hans would have prevented more death and pain at nearly every moment of Gret and Boden’s adventuring careers.

Still in his full gear, Hans sat at the edge of his bed with his head in his hands for several quiet minutes. Realizing he was wallowing in his own self-pity made him feel even more pathetic. He stood and slapped himself in the face a few times, attempting to snap himself out of his doldrums.

It didn’t work.

Sighing, Hans scrubbed his face with a wet rag. A tapping came at his door, like someone knocked with the tip of a single finger and nothing else.

A sparrow landed on Hans’ shoulder when he opened the door. He closed his eyes, and exhaled slowly.

“What now?” he asked aloud.

Across the way, green leaves on a low tree branch shifted, forming the approximation of a face. When the Lady of the Forest spoke, her voice seemed ethereal, as though it existed with no true source.

“Two Golds have come through the pass,” she said.

“What’d they look like?”

The Lady’s face disappeared, the leaves returning to normal before Hans could finish his question.

“Gods damn it.”

***

Open Quests (Ordered from Old to New):

Progress from Gold-ranked to Diamond-ranked.

Mend the rift with Devon.

Using a pen name, complete the manuscript for "The Next Generation: A Teaching Methodology for Training Adventurers."

Expand the dungeon with resource-specific monsters for each of Gomi’s major trades.

Find a way for Gomi adventurers to benefit from their rightful ranks in the Adventurers’ Guild.

Secure a way to use surplus dungeon inventory for good.

Investigate entering Kane and Quentin in the Osare combat tournament.