It was still 3 in the afternoon, but the Adventurers Guild that’s also served as a bar already bustling with people drinking here and there. The loud laughter and chatter made Erina’s ear buzzed a few times. Sometimes she thought to herself that she wasn't cut out for this kind of job. But her friends insisted that she was doing a good job.
It’s already been more than 10 years she worked as a receptionist at the Adventurer’s Guild. In the first few years, every day wasn’t as bustling as how it was now because at that time the guild hasn’t served as a bar yet. But one day the charming yet irresponsible guild master came back from his long journey. “How about we made the guild serve as a bar? That way the money commissioned to the adventurers will flow back to the guild,” was what he said. But he left the guild again one week after issuing such a big project.
Even though the order to run a bar in the Adventurers Guild issued by the guild master was pretty vague and he didn’t even give a requirement how would the interior of the guild remade, it turned out quite well. A long U-shaped counter made from a 100 year old white oak, several shelves, a dozen of round table and a hundred of chairs was added and arranged in an orderly manner.
Although she has worked for years, she still couldn’t get used to the crowded atmosphere of the guild. Her work was a monotonous one and the adventurers rarely talk to her.
“Hi Beauty.”
“Hi Carl,” Erina answered flatly.
“Ha-ha... did you miss me, my girl?”
“Of course not and I’m not your girl!”
“Ha-ha! Don’t be shy... sooner or later you’ll become my girl ha!”
“Shut up and hurry hand over the proof of subjugation Carl”.
“Ha-ha... even though you seemed to be shy but in reality you’re so eager to have me ha!”
“Not you Carl just hand over the proof of subjugation or I’ll just record it that you failed the subjugation quest”.
“Okay.. Okay.. Here’s the core of a class 3 magical beast for ya. That bastard was a tough one, I nearly lost my life to him but too bad for him I was stronger ha!”
“Why didn’t you just die then,” Erina cursed, then took the core and recorded the mission history onto Carl’s adventurer card.
“Thanks Beauty,” Carl winked, took his card back and walked out of the Adventurers Guild.
Carl was one of the few adventurers who coveted Erina for her body and looks. In the first place, the reason why the adventurers never had a long conversation with her was because they’re afraid of Carl.
After Carl is gone Erina continued what she was doing before interrupted by Carl ‘idling’. Erina was bored with nothing to do and she wasn’t allowed to help in the kitchen as her cooking skill are practically non existent and if you asked her to recite how many kinds of chicken she know she’ll answer 3. Fried chicken, boiled chicken and roasted chicken.
“Why the long face Erina-an?” Asked the girl in her twenties who wore a uniform with the same pattern as the one Erina wore.
“No, it’s nothing,” Erina replied while shaking her head.
“So Carl-un teased you again?”
“Yeah but it was nothing, I’m just bored. I don’t know if I can keep working as a receptionist”.
“Come on now Erina-an I remember that you said the same thing 10 years ago but in the end you never quit”.
“I think it’s hard to quit when you’ve grown accustomed to it Iremi”.
“So why did you keep rejecting him?”
“Huh?”
“Carl-un, Erina-an why did you keep rejecting him, he’s quite handsome yanno and he’s already class 3 at such a young age”.
“Humph, he’s only class 3 yet he boasts like hell, in my hometown there’s even a 10 years old child who’s a class 5. Besides Carl is a womanizer I know it from the way he looks at me, he’s only after my body”.
“Hooh.. by the way you never tell me about your hometown Erina-an”.
“That’s a secret~”.
“Oh yeah have you heard Erina-an?”
“Heard about what?”
“It’s Kenji and Bard they made quite a big scene in the market this morning”.
“Kenji the Windchaser and Bard the Destroyer? What happened?”
“Apparently Kenji killed bard’s younger brother that worked as a bandit”.
“So who’s the winner in the end the both of them are at the peak of class 2 and can fight neck to neck with an early class 3?”
“the winner is the city guards they arrested them before the winner was even decided, Well it’s their fault for laying waste to the northwest district of the market”
“Uh.. it’s time to go back to work, we’ll continue our conversation later Erina-an” Iremi said as she entered the kitchen.
“tring~”.
The bell rang when someone entered the guild. The one who entered the guild was a man in his twenties. He was quite handsome, his hair are quite long and his bangs are covering his left eye. He was on spot on her strike zone. He wore a soft and fancy looking long sleeve shirt underneath a nice looking black vest which seemed to offer no protection at all. He also wore some rough looking long black pants and a stylish shoe.
‘He seems to be some sort of a noble form a foreign country’ Erina thought to herself.
“Welcome,” Erina greeted her with a smile.
“I’d like to register as an adventurer” the man replied.
“Please fill the form and after that place your hands on top of this ball it will measure your power,” Erina instructed him.
“I couldn’t read or write this country language”
‘I thought so’
“Then I’ll write it for you sir for 10 copper is that okay?”
“Yes please do so”.
“What’s your name sir?”
“Mahendra.. Mahendra Wijaya”.
“Job?”
“Just fill it as an agility based swordsman”.
“Age?”
“22”.
“Sex?”
“Are you joking?”.
“That’s all now place your hand on top of the crystall ball”.
Mahendra did as she said and the crystall ball started to glow. The machine under the ball produced an azure colored card with red engraving. It was written Mahendra Wijaya and Class 0 in an language of the country of Azure Empire.
“Here’s your card and is there anything else I can help with?”
“Oh.. Yeah, I want to take some mission to gather some herbs”
“Ah.. There are a variety of missions to gather herbs in the outskirts issued by the Pharmacy Guild in the board right over there”.
“Thank you”.
Then the man walked to the board and took a few posters and left the adventurers guild. ‘Newbie huh... it’s quite rare for someone of his age to stay in class 0. It’s even more odd if you add the fact that he was a noble from a foreign country’ Erina mused to herself.
~|~
I stared at the quest board, but it seemed that there are no more mission about herb gathering or plant harvesting issued. It’s been 2 weeks after I joined the Adventurers Guild and I slowly accepted that this wasn’t Earth. The name of this city is Andrastea. I thought this was a village, but it turned out to be a city.
The herb gathering quest is out of stock which meant I have to start subjugating low leveled monster in the outskirts. I approached the counter to ask some advice.
This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.
“Hi Plant Hunter-un what do you need today?” the girl behind the counter asked.
“It’s not Plant Hunter but Mahendra I have a name please remember it. So you’re on duty today”.
“Yeah Erina’s is on a day off. You’re quite famous yourself yanno, Plant Hunter-un there’s no newbie that aced all the herb gathering quest just in two week like yourself”.
“it’s just nobody did it that’s all, everyone can do it if they wanted, just give me some advice on the low leveled class 0 monster”.
“Oh so you’re goin’ to hunt class 0 monster now? Just don’t overdo it Mahendra-un destroying the ecosystem is a bad thing”.
“yeah I know… I know… So tell me which one I should take?”
“Hm... take the rabbid subjugation quest, remember to cut their horn as the proof of subjugation, you can take their body it’s quite delicious yanno it’s quite a worthwhile quest for a newbie such as yourself even though the comission is just a few dozen copper”.
“Alright I’ll take that one then, thanks for the advice”.
I took the Rabbid subjugation quest from the board and left the Aventurer’s Guild. Apparently I was nicknamed Plant Hunter by the adventurers, because I always carried a herb gathering or plant harvesting quest. But the good thing is because I repeteadly carried out the task issued by the Pharmacy Guild’s they gave me a 10% discount on their product.
Finally after 2 weeks I can buy one of the most important thing to an Adventurer except life and skill it is ‘Equipment’. Of course I wouldn’t be able buy something fancy like a magic imbued sword yet but nevertheless I still looked up to it.
I arrived in front of a shop called Bloodstain, despite it’s gloomy name it is one of the best shop to buy an armor and weapon. Then I entered the shop, inside the shop is as gloomy as the shop’s name. It was a bit dark but that wasn’t a big problem.
“Welcome to bloodstain young one what do you seek?” ask the one eyed dwarf, I heard his name was Izaac from the people in the guild.
“First I need a good set of leather armor for a beginner such as myself which doesn’t hinder my movement, quite resilient and I prefer it to be black”.
“You have quite a taste for yourself young one, wait a second I’ll bring something that match your taste”.
Izaac entered the warehouse and came out several minutes later.
“You’re lucky I still have this one left I’m sure you’ll love it. it was made from a peak class 2 monster the nightmare jaguar it’s just 95 silver perfect isn’t it”
It was a pitch black armor that seemed well crafted.
“95 silver! No way that’s basically a rip-off old men don’t take me for a fool no matter how good it is it’s just a plain armor made from a class 2 beast without any enhancement. I’ll take it for 50 silver”.
“80 silver and I’ll give you an enhancement”.
“70 silver and give me agility enhacement and weightless enhancement more than 70 then I better look in another shop I still need to buy some weapon”.
“Fine 70 silver then I’ll start to engrave the enhancement what kind of weapons do you need?”
“I need a light but sturdy katana and a wakizashi(short katana) with the same preferences”.
“Just go to the katana section you’ll find what you need there. There’s no more bargain unlike armor all weapon here already has a fixed price”.
I went to the katana section just as he said. There are a lot variety of katana here, from a pitch black katana made from a meteor to pure and flawless snow white katana. From a simple looking katana until a katana that’s often seen in a lot of anime.
My eyes are fixed on a certain katana. A dragon was engraved on its black scabbard. The description of the katana is only ‘A Katana That Grow Stronger With it’s User’. Perfect, that way I didn’t have to change my katana when my strength outgrow my weapon. With this katana I didn’t have to worry about that this katana is basically the one mentioned as ‘a katana is half of samurai’s soul’ as it could grew stronger along with myself. I decided to pick this katana although the price was a whooping 25 gold but it didn’t really matter much.
Next is wakizashi, I picked one named Blood Red, it’s a weapon that got stronger the more it kills and the more blood it absorbed. It was a fine black-reddish wakizashi. Although it sounded like a cursed weapon but it wasn’t. It cost 5 gold. I picked the weapons and went to the counter.
“Oh.. you’re done picking the weapon here’s your armor”.
“Here’s 30.70 gold for the armor and weapons. It’s sure quite costly but the performance are sure top notch”.
“Hm.. wait I didn’t remember putting these two in the shelves”.
“So what old man, you wouldn’t say such thing as I’m not worthy enough or you wouldn’t sell your masterpiece wouldn’t you?”
“I’ll sell it.. maybe it was a fate for you to me these two masterpieces”.
“Thanks old man, and I’ll borrow the change room for a bit”.
After changing and used the armor now I certainly felt more like an adventurer. The katana and wakizashi are hanging on the left side of my waist. I named the katana Void because except for the dragon engraving on the sheath it didn’t has any special feature. The katana itself looked simple and humble even though it was an amazing katana hence it was named void.
‘Status’
[Status Window]
Name: Mahendra Wijaya
Strength: 1.5
Agility: 2.0
Intelligence: 1.7
Skill:
Chef Intuition (Innate)
Gourmet Market (Innate)
I already knew how to open my status two weeks ago. I asked Erina after I’ve finished my first mission, at first it wasn’t as high as this but I kept working out and it pay off rather well my strength gone up from 1.3 to 1.5 my agility from 1.8 to 2.0 and my intelligence from 1.4 to 1.7.
I arrived at the outskirts where the rabbid usually dwell. I kept the sound of my footsteps as low as possible. ‘Krrssk...Krssk’. I heard some noises behind the bushes. I approached the bushes slowly. It was a rabbid eating. Eating its own kin. This monster wasn’t as cute as the one pictured in the subjugation poster it has a long blood stained horn, sharp claws and awfully sharp fang.
I slowly walk behind the rabbid and then slashed down at its back. It shrieked. It looked at me with full of killing intent and charged at me. I blocked it with Blood Red in my left hand. But its horn managed to graze at my left hand and blood start flowing from the wounds.
After its horn grazed my left hand I readied my katana and slashed down at its neck. The head was separated from its body. I disassemble the horn form its head. As for the rabbid it was eating of course I took its horn too. As for the body I plan to use it as a trap.
I dug out a hole and filled it with self-made wooden spear then covering the hole with some large leaves and put the body of the half-eaten rabbid on top of it. I didn’t know whether it’ll work or not but I’ll wait. About 30 minute later there are 3 rabbids looking at the trap curiously. They came near the trap and began sniffing. After that the 3 rabbids stupidly fell for the trap they even fought each other for the meat.
I took the three dead rabbids from the pitfall and went to the river and clean myself. After cleaning myself I lights up a campfire because I planned grill the rabbids. After cleaning the rabbid I began to grill it and soaked it in the seasoning which made from the leaves, roots and flower in the forest and of course I didn’t forget to cover it with honey.
After 15 minutes the rabbids are ready to eat. I took one of the grilled rabbid and started to chew it. Hm… The meat are soft and a bit bouncy when chewed and the seasoning are absorbed into the meat nicely and the fresh fragrant made me couldn’t stop eating the grilled rabbid. Dangerous! Rabbid are Dangerous! I could be addicted to it. Although the rabbid itself is quite dangerous it’s also dangerous for the stomach. It’s Dangelicious!