“What do you mean I can't meet with the Guild Master.” Jacob almost shouted at the female clerk. “As a White Journeyman Ranked Adventurer, I have the right to request a meeting with a Guild Master, no matter the branch of the Guild.”
“I am aware of that Sir.” The brown-haired and brown-eyed woman clerk, seated behind her counter, replied. “But my answer remains the same. You can not meet the Guild Master.”
“Why? Is he not here?”
“He is.”
“Is he so busy with something major that he can't be bothered with somebody of my Rank?”
Shaking her head, the woman answered. “I am not privy to that kind of information. So I can not tell you even if I wanted to.”
“Then go and deliver my request for a meeting to him.” Jacob demanded as he stared at the woman.
Despite flinching under Jacob’s gaze, the clerk still shook her head in denial. “I can't. The order I received from the Guild Master was that he be not interrupted no matter the circumstances calling for his attention.”
“So… He is doing something important then?” Jacob fished for an answer.
“I would not know, Sir.”
“Then can you tell me if he had mentioned when he would be free?”
“I am afraid not, Sir.”
“Hnng…” Feeling like the conversation was going in circles, he suddenly felt a hand fall on his right shoulder. Glancing back, Jacob saw Paul shake his head. Noticing it, Jacob’s thoughts settled on Plab B. Nodding with understanding, he put his hand into the small pouch hanging on his belt, and from its insides, he pulled out an item.
It was small, crystalline, and very valuable.
Putting it on the counter directly before the female clerk, Jacob saw her face light up.
“That's…”
“I want that exchanged into coins.” Jacob demanded with his tone, though next his voice lowered enough for only the female clerk to hear. “Before you say anything. I am aware. I can get a bigger prize if sold to somebody else. As such, I will take half of its value directly in coins. What happens to the other half is not my problem… Understood?”
“Sir…” The clerk, having worked for years as a front desk clerk, knew what Jacob’s intent was for her. Hence, her mind warred with itself because that was a lot of money for a simple clerk like her. After all, while she was technically a registered Adventurer, there was a vast distinction between her who never fought Nightmares or divided into Nightmare Gates. “I… I will see what I can do. But I can not make promises because the orders of the Guild Master precede everything else, and while it's tedious sometimes, I do like my current job.”
“Is that acceptable with you, Sir?”
Grunting with displeasure, although it was more of an act, Jacob replied. “Fine… Just be quick with the exchange. It was a tough journey getting here.”
Nodding with glee, the brown-eyed and brown-haired woman, wearing a refined and green colored wool top with a matching skirt around her legs, nodded and quickly grabbed the Essence Crystal before leaving the front counter and entering the door behind her.
What would happen there, Jacob ignored.
He simply stared around himself and noticed the few men sitting and relaxing.
The moment their eyes met, all of them shifted theirs as if afraid that Jacob might just jump on them for wondering what he had just given the female clerk. Thankfully, none of them were above the First Rank of Essence Mastery. Thus, Jacob had nothing to fear from them.
Still, presenting a tough front would discourage them from snitching to their superiors. After all, every Adventuring party always had to have at least one Second Ranked Essence Master.
Done staring at them, Jacob took notice of his own party members in question before settling his gaze on the boy calling himself Adam.
“Adam.” Jacob suddenly called out, causing the boy to flinch slightly before centering his golden eyes on him. “What are you doing? You have some beef with them?”
“Ah… Nothing like that.” Adam replied nonchalantly. “Just my stomach aching to be filled with something decent. I hope we can find a good enough place to eat.”
“I see. Then we can ask the clerk once she returns.” Jacob offered. “Even if it's small, there should be a few Inns associated with the Guild.”
“I don't mind where, as long as I can taste anything good enough.” Adam added.
With the conversation over, moments of silence transpired between the party of four plus the extra.
Even the other members of the Guild siping their beer were unusually quiet.
Then, a creaking sound disrupted the relative silence, and the female clerk returned through the door behind her counter.
In her hand was a small pouch that she immediately placed on the counter before Jacob.
Not one to deny the professionalism of the Guild, as it might jeopardize his current attempts, Jacob simply took the pouch. Yet, just as he wanted to confirm with her, the clerk grabbed a white sheath of paper, a feather, and a glass bottle of ink and placed them before him.
“For both our sakes, it's best if there is a written request to hand over.”
Nodding, Jacob grabbed the simple quill and began writing down his request. Not being one for fancy wording, he kept it simple at first. But when it came to the actual content of the request, he was a bit stumped for words.
After a bit of thinking and one glance at Adam, that, as well, got taken care of.
“There.” Jacob said before posing a question. “Any Inn you recommend so you will know where we are to alert us when the Guild Master is free to meet me? Ah… Preferably with decent foot options if possible.”
“Yes. It's called Humble Dwelling.” Nodding and listening to the directions, Jacob said goodbye and left the Guild building. Evelyn, Martin, Adam, and Paul followed right behind him.
When the five of them had left the building, the female clerk with the name Elizabeth, or Elzi as her family, friends, and colleagues called her, took a deep breath before taking the just written message. Glimpsing at the message and shrugging her shoulders, she stood up from her chair and made her way up the stairs beside her counter.
Her destination was the smallest floor, the third floor where the Guild Master’s office resided.
Once she was before the door with a plaque bearing the words Guild Master, she knocked on the door. When no reply came, she knocked again, only harder this time. Then, just as she wanted to knock for the third time, a rough voice spoke up.
“I've given an order not to be disturbed.” The rough voice said.
“I remember, Sir.” Elizabeth replied, trying her best to hide her nerves. “But just now, a White Journeyman Adventurer from out of town came blazing into the Guild seeking your immediate attention.”
This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road. If you spot it on Amazon, please report it.
“So what? Are my orders easily pushed aside now?”
“Not at all, Sir.” Elizabeth quickly spoke up. “I've tried multiple times to convey your order. However, this Adventurer was very, very adamant in meeting you. His tone was determined enough that his request be met. Once I denied enough times, he even wrote a letter saying it be given to you, Sir, at your earliest convenience.”
Saying that, Elizabeth noted no immediate reply, so she just waited and waited before speaking again. “Sir… Will you take the letter now, or should I dismiss it for later?”
“Alright… Come in and let me see it.” The rough voice ordered.
“Yes, Sir.” Taking a deep breath, stealing her nerves once more, Elizabeth opened the wooden door and entered her Guild Master’s office only to note nothing amiss within.
There were no people, aside from the man acting as the Guild Master of this branch, who looked to be between his forties and fifties and sporting white hairs on his rather darker skin complexion.
Similarly, white strands could be seen on his somewhat braided beard extending down his face and chin.
“What are you staring at? Do you have a letter or not?” The Guild Master pressed upon his clerk.
Being reminded of it, Elizabeth ignored the rather empty desk of paperwork and quickly strode into the office before placing the white sheath of paper containing Jacob’s message on the table.
Giving the older man a small bow, Elisabeth inquired. “Should I immediately send them a note alerting them that his letter had been received? Or should I delay it?”
“Later. I am busy for now.” Not seeing the busy part of the sentence, Elizabeth nodded and made her way outside, closing the door before going to the first floor and back to her front counter.
The Guild Master, on the other hand, stared at the white sheath of paper with a somewhat absent look in his blue eyes, which were a rarity for his dark-skinned people.
Moment after moment passed before his hands finally moved and grasped the white sheath of paper. Turning it over and reading it, the Guild Master glossed over the initial part when his blue eyes settled on the important bits. The bits that mention a Third Ranked Nightmare Gate of the Historic kind before a string of letters and numbers, that made no sense at first sight, appeared.
Six Came First… Five Followed Their Steps… Fourteen Remained… Yet… Only Four Would Enter Inside! Where am I?
“Six unknown and five known?” The riddle may be simple in front of this Guild Master, yet it still took him a long time to reach a conclusion, as if he had been going over it multiple times in his head. “One Grandmaster and three further unknowns.”
“Sigh…” Releasing the sigh, the middle-aged man ignored the rest of the letter for a moment. Then, when enough time passed again, his blue eyes settled on the words below the riddle. But that part was simple since it only conveyed the names and ranks of the Adventurers involved in the party.
However, when the last name reached his thoughts, something rang inside the Guild Master's head.
Nonetheless, just like the rest of him, it felt distant and hidden, there and yet hard to quantify.
“Adam… Adam… Adam…” The Guild Master kept repeating in hopes of dredging from where the feeling resided, but no matter how much he repeated the name, it just would not reveal its truth.
Still, knowing it was important, the Guild Master, also known as Unseen Hand, spoke up. His voice neither strong nor loud, echoed out of his room and right to Elisabeth’s ear.
Perking up at being called so soon, she hurried back to the Guild Master's office before stopping by the door and knocking.
“You called, Sir.”
“Come in.”
“Yes, Sir.” Almost immediately, Elizabeth found herself inside with the blue eyes pouring over her figure, only there was nothing predatory about it.
No, one might call it even absent.
“Describe to me the Adventurers.”
Asked and ordered, Elizabeth did just that. However, only when she described the last one, the youngest one, had Elizabeth noted the string of curiosity seep from those blue eyes.
“Alright… You can go back to your post.”
Hearing and obeying, that was what Elizabeth did, thus once again leaving the Guild Master to his
“Golden eyes?… Adam?… Golden eyes?… Adam?” The Guild Master repeated once again, only now the ringing in his mind was stronger, much stronger. Yet, for some reason, the veil hiding the information from him remained in place. “I know I know it, yet I can't recall it. Why can't I recall it? I have a good memory. It should have popped up the very first time I heard the name…”
Not quite understanding, yet not giving up, the Guild Master continued chanting Adam and the words golden eyes.
Meanwhile, on the western side of the town, inside the Baron’s residence, a figure sat on an expensive couch with his legs crossed.
In one hand, he held a wine glass filled with a dark red beverage. His hair was both long and free-flowing over his shoulders. At the same time, its prime color was bright red, with deep blue shades adoring its lengths. On top of that, he wore extremely pleasing and pricey clothes made with the same red-blue theme, only in their case, the prime color was blue instead of red.
While sipping on the wine, he listened to the report given by the Baron’s steward.
“Golden eyes?… Adam?… Golden eyes?… Adam?” The man chanted with his mouth while his unusual red-blue eyes contained an absent gaze within them. “I can sense their significance to me, and I can't recall why?”
Thinking on for a few more times, the man slipped on his wine a few more times before shaking his head in resignation. “Forget it… I have better things to do… Like… Like preparing for the Ascension Ceremony. Yes… The Ceremony… The Ascension Ceremony… Is that not why I came to this place… Yes... Yes… The time is nigh for the Ceremony…”
“Ah… What was I thinking again?” The man murmured to himself. “Ah… Yes… The Ascension Ceremony. The time is nigh for it… Yes… Yes, it is.”
“Nigh… So nigh!”
On the eastern side of the town, inside the mid-sized chapel, right at the end of the large prayer hall, stood an altar before a magnificent sculpture made of white marble.
It depicted a woman of beauty, with a summer dress hiding yet enveloping her curves displayed through intricate carvings of some unseen wind blowing the dress in one direction. Her hands rested above her head harboring a perfect sphere within both palms.
All around the female sculpture, a soft golden glow could be detected. However, said soft golden glow was concentrated the most within the sculpture's palms, and therefore, the perfect sphere held aloft within said palms.
Before the sculpture, lots of candles were laid out, and before the candles was an altar, an altar made of pure white stone. On it, a book could be seen. However, what made this book special was that it was made entirely of Light, yet none would have realized it was so if they had not witnessed its sudden appearance or disappearance.
Currently, two men stand before the altar and the book.
One was a deacon who had seen and now relayed what he’d witnessed. The other is a priest who leafed through the pages of the book.
When the needed page appeared, both pairs of eyes settled on one particular line, the newest line.
A line containing a name, but not just any name.
No.
It was The Name.
The one and only name all Church members who were privy to browsing the book learned about yet hoped to never witness personally, for if they did, trouble was either not far behind or already beside them.
However, unlike how it was spoken and rumored about and compared to the deacon, who had a look of despair, the priest did not despair.
No.
The priest hoped.
Almost instantly, after witnessing The First’s Name, he tapped four times on his body with a clockwise motion starting from his forehead to his left shoulder, then to the solar plexus before going for the right shoulder and then back to the forehead, thus completing the circle representing The Light of the World, Ina.
“Blessed be The Goddess for sending…” Ceasing for a moment, the priest attained an absent gaze in his eyes. “What was I saying again?”
Panic-stricken already, the deacon stared at the priest beside him before remembering to urgently invoke another Miracle.
“Clarity!” The Deacon almost shouted before tapping the priest's right shoulder. Additionally, recognizing his problem, the deacon urgently spoke up. “Marcus. That was my last Clarity Miracle for the day. I keep losing you, and The First’s Name has appeared. There is no mistake about it. What am I to do?”
Blinking his eyes a few times, Marcus’s mind sharpened, causing him to instinctively tap four times for a quick non-vocal prayer to his Goddess before speaking to Brian, his deacon, on what he needed to do.
“Find Him… Bring Him here and tell Him to…” Just as the last words meant to leave Marcus’s mouth, they vanished from his mind. Yet, unlike the previous time, it was not just his memory that vanished. But all thoughts, thus Making Marcus just stand there as if there was no mind present inside his head.
Seeing Marcus that way, Brian quickly did a four-point prayer before calling forth two Miracles, though different from the last one.
“Sleep! Recover!”
The moment the Miracles got Cast, the priest's body began leaning left, and if not for Brian's quick help, it would have slammed right into the stone floor.
“Oh… Merciful Ina, Save thy pious followers from the clutches of Misters Ani.”
Prayer done, Brain carried his priest like a sack of potatoes with a worried face into the inner sanctum of the chapel.