As Ryuji looked at the Receptionist at the guildhall, he smiled and opened his pouch. “I have a bit of money and for some reason, I can remember how to count. All I have on me are small copper though so if the fees are too much I’ll need to go back to my room and get more money. I hope it’s not more money than I have.”

The girl shook her head and began to sum up all the various fees. All said and done it would be just a little over three large copper and Ryuji then paid her and gave her a little extra for her help. As he told her that she blushed and rushed off to get the documents that would need to be filled out.

A few moments later she came back with a few papers and began to fill them out in his stead. When the time came for him to sign, he wasn’t sure how to proceed so the girl sounded his name out and showed him what that would look like as a signature. What she wrote looked like nothing so much as a broad wavy line with a couple dots and a straight line above it. So having, at last, a signature he did his best to reproduce what she had written down for him.

She told him which document was the city registration form and which one was the country registration form. Finally, it came to the guild registration form and she began asking him what type of weapon he used. That was a problem because he didn’t have one. She told him that ownership wasn’t an issue as long as she could put down what type he preferred but he had no idea.

She decided to finish the rest of the stuff up before proceeding with the guild registration. “Okay, I’m just going to replace the stuff in your pendant with these documents. It’ll only take a second. All I have to do is set the crystal lens up for it and wave it above these documents.”

Ryuji stopped her. “Is there any way that you can put those documents in before the others? I just somehow feel that there may be something important about those things already in my pendant.”

She smiled and told him it wasn’t a problem. Just like that, she waved the screen above the papers and they were recorded on his pendant. She told him she would scan the guild paper into it later. She then led him out the door he entered and through one of the ones on the back wall.

The area on the other side was mostly wide-open space with dirt floors even. She explained that this was the guild’s training area and that he would need to try out some of the weapons and figure out which ones he was good with since he couldn’t remember. She first led him over to a long narrow spot marked off to the side of the indoor field. This one had some targets set up at various distances down its length and he understood that this was the archery range. Ryuji had seen some of these that were used by the archery club out behind the school but he wasn’t part of that club.

A lithe young man who also appeared to be an elf came walking up and greeted them. “Oh, Good Morning Rayna! What brings you to this side of the wall today? Perhaps this young man? Hi, My name is Goldenleaf and you are?”

As he said his greeting, he held out his fist in what Ryuji figured was some method of greeting. As such, Ryuji held his own fist near the other elf who pushed his fist against Ryuji’s and then pushed a bit harder for only a moment before dropping his hand so Ryuji did the same. “I’m Ryuji. Nice to meet you.”

Goldenleaf looked puzzled for a moment and Ryuji knew what was coming. “What an odd name, where did you say you were from?” and so Ryuji spent the next few minutes explaining his made-up backstory.

At the end of that, the other elf looked a little bit more relieved. “Ah, I see. I think I know the birds you spoke of, is the sound actually like this?” He then made a strange warbling screeching noise that somewhat resembled Ryuji’s name.

Ryuji just shrugged explaining that he wasn’t good at bird calls, a somewhat weak excuse, and they quickly moved on to the testing. Ryuji tried out throwing spears, daggers, and hatchets but he was terrible with all of them. He also tried to shoot a bow but surprised everyone by being even worse at that. As he and Rayna, the guild employee who had yet to introduce herself walked away Goldenleaf just stared after him with a look of utter disbelief.

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Next, they approached a burly man in an intricate robe who appeared to be in his mid-thirties. “Good Day Glace, I need you to examine this fellow for me. I’m hoping he’ll have some kind of a blessing because he doesn’t have any skill with ranged weapons and you know how Locke is.”

The man that Ryuji now understood to be some kind of priest or cleric approached him and looked him over for a moment before standing right in front of him. He asked to see his hands and then held Ryuji’s hands for a couple minutes before letting them go and looking back at Rayna. “It seems that he received some kind of blessing from a god but he has the blessing himself not the ability to bestow it, sorry.”

Rayna sighed and thanked the man named Glace and motioned for Ryuji to follow her. They made their way over to another man that Ryuji could only assume was Locke. This guy was a mountain of muscle and had a very arrogant attitude as he talked to the people around him. Even as Rayna brought Ryuji towards him, he began to get a sneer on his face as he looked Ryuji over. This was an expression that they were both very familiar with. Ryuji could tell that this man viewed most people as beneath him. Ryuji knew all too many people in his highschool who viewed others down the length of their noses.

Once they were standing next to the guy Rayna looked up at him and put on a very fake smile before continuing. “Good Morning Locke, I have a new one for you today. This is Rheehugee, he’s trying to apply for a mercenary license but he didn’t have any luck with any of the other tests. I was wondering if you might spare him a few moments to test his ability with a weapon.”

Ryuji thought about correcting the girl but decided that it was close enough that it wasn’t worth thinking about and the other guy, Locke, didn’t look like he paid any attention to her anyway. That suspicion was confirmed by the man’s next words. “What are you bothering me for again? Let me guess, you want me to train this scrawny twig. Well, come on, twig, let’s see what you’ve got.”

The next moment the man was shoving a long, heavy but purposefully blunted sword into his hands and walked a couple meters away. he turned around and faced Ryuji and held his sword up in one hand. It took both of Ryuji’s hands to hold the sword up as he faced the sneering brute.

Locke looked at him for several seconds before snorting with a grin on his face. “Well come on, attack me with that sword, or do you not even know how to swing one of those?”

Ryuji was mad about the man’s taunting attitude. Suddenly he felt something within him, a fiercely burning fire that gave him reassurance. He wasn’t sure what it was but he knew he could do this. He dashed forward at his fastest speed, and he was pretty sure of his speed considering he was a soccer player. He held the sword to the side and swung it in an arc at the man’s exposed ribs yelling at the top of his lungs.

Ryuji wasn’t sure what happened next but there was a blinding white flash and he felt a cool sensation on his back. When the white faded, he could hear laughing and the man was standing over him shaking his head. As Ryuji regained focus, he could see his sword on the ground next to him.

As he started to get up, he heard a furious young girl yelling at Locke. “Did you really have to hit him so hard? What if he had died? You’re such an ass!”

Locke stood there grinning the whole time as he answered. “Oh shut your mouth, Rayna. I didn’t hit the pretty boy that hard, he’s just weak. That’s not my fault. And you, what the hell were you thinking yelling like an idiot. I almost got hit because I wanted to hide my face in embarrassment for you. If you do that when I check you out with any of the other weapons, I’m going to knock some of your teeth out. Here’s an ax, see if you can hit me with that, twig.”

Ryuji tried to swing the heavy ax at the man but could barely hold it up, let alone hit anything with it. In the end, the other man contemptuously kicked the ax out of his hands with one foot and very little effort. Next, he tried using the spear but he didn’t fare much better. It just felt so awkward to him and Locke knocked it from his hands with little effort. Then he tried the mace and though it was lighter than the ax it was still far heavier than anything that he could wield.

When Locke offered him a blunt dagger, he saw the murderous grin the man had and turned it down. He already had several bruises and his wrists and hands were numb and hurting at the same time. He knew he couldn’t do anything against this man no matter how much he wanted to.

Locke just turned away and walked back toward his cronies. He stopped about halfway and turned to look at Ryuji. “Well twig, I guess that’s about it. Too bad, I guess you’ll have to try again some other time, like maybe after you die and come back as a real warrior!”

This got a scowl from Rayna and riotous laughter from the group behind Locke. Then after a few seconds of laughing at his own joke, he acted like he was wiping a tear from his eye and went on in a more pensive voice. “No, but in all seriousness, if that’s all you can do then you really aren’t meant to be a mercenary. Just go home and be a merchant or whatever it is you’re trying to avoid. You’ve run out of options. You don’t have any blessings, you can’t use any ranged weapons, and you can’t use any close-in weapons so unless you think you can convince the crazy old wizard to take you as an apprentice you’ve hit the end of the line.”