'I was told you’d be coming here!' The spritely elf spoke. He was much older than he looked but lacked no less energy. The vitality of the elves was something to be enamoured, but his apparent age appeared to be in the hundreds, that even his vitality couldn’t hide the time worn look, darker eyes and knotty smile. He was in a shirt and coat over the top that it drowned him in it. The man’s voice sounded upper-class. Something that Ashur hadn’t ever got on with.
'Right…' he would walk through the doors and have them click behind him as the Secretary pulled them closed.
'You don’t seem all that surprised.' Ashur called out as he came closer. The man albeit his apparent age had no trouble walking to Ashur and offering his hand.
'That I am, I’m usually informed when an adventurer comes. Not that they all come here, mind.' His voice and eyes were erratic as were his hand movements as he explained away how quickly he had learned of Ashur’s arrival. Maybe it was a system thing that he ‘learned’ of when someone arrived.
Ashur didn’t know that the woman had contacted him with otherworldly means. He didn’t need to know, either. In a whole world of people, out of the way it didn’t surprise him at all that he would be made aware of the rare people turning up.
'I feel welcomed then. Does this happen often?' Ashur wasn’t good at mincing his words or being over enthusiastic with his words.
Naska shook his head.
'Oh, no. We don’t get as many adventurers as you might think. We have two small craftsman guilds and sometimes we have adventurer parties but that’s about it.' The man would open a window, bringing in the breeze as he spoke and then back over to Ashur. Their rasped voice carried across the room - filling it with the age of experience it was due.
Ashur also noticed the other person as well, it was another guard, or for what Ashur thought was the guard. He was wearing the same kind of Armor that the guard downstairs was… but it was just better quality. His shoulder blades were pinched, and his chest was out, and he didn’t budge his face up or down to Ashur to mimic authority.
He was just there, watching silently. It did unnerve Ashur a little bit, but he didn’t externally share it.
'We get a small number of adventurers like yourself, but because of our location we aren’t exactly favoured.' The man was honest and brutal with his opinion.
'Why?' Ashur asked.
'If you’re travelling to one of the two Kingdoms, there’s a better, and safer route. That’s all.' He crossed his arms as he spoke to Ashur.
It was also why Ashur had picked it in the first place. It was out of the way and a pain in the ass to get to one of the main kingdoms, which left him ability to do what he wanted.
'Then how’d you know I’m an adventurer?' Ashur asked a second question, undeterred by the man’s attitude.
'Well not most people seem to appear from the air itself, nor defy death – I can just tell. Most people can, actually.' The elf’s responses gave a subtle but insightful answer: NPCs could tell adventurers were who they were.
'So… what brings you here, Ashur?' the guard interjected and finally got to the question, and Ashur had almost forgotten why he had turned up.
'Well, I want to be useful and have some stuff to do, make some money, live a simple enough life. The usual?' Ashur gave his answer gingerly as he didn’t completely know what he wanted just yet, head tilted away from the Guard.
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The Guard seemed to barely accept the answer, looking to Naska and then to Ashur again. 'Well, there’s a fair few things going on. This village sees many travellers because we happen to be in a good position to get other villages even if a bit out of the way - but forget people coming from the larger Kingdoms. It’s not so good to get to Regalia or the other bigger villages if you know them.' Naska was happy to share information to the new adventurer.
Regalia was the Northernmost Kingdom. The path was through a gargantuanly thick forest that he had seen before on the map. That was, if the map was as correct as Book had said initially.
The other man was still sizing him up and Ashur’s eyes flit back and forth between the elderly elf and human.
'Actually, I saw a few things going on with caravans and carts. What’s up with that?' It was always three times a pattern, and there were more than just three carts pulling through the area.
'Oh, nothing important, just caravaners and all the life. Nothing to worry about.' The man smiled. A lie, of course, but no fair answer would be given to someone they had just met – Ashur hadn’t done anything to build any trust just yet. Ashur knew he was pushing it so would just accept the answer for the time being. He had dealt with far too many bureaucrats and couldn’t spare the time for them and their instant responses. Already, he was holding his suspension of belief and getting into it.
'So, you’re looking for things to do, yes?' The elf would say, while looking toward the other man and sharing some sort of glint between them.
'Yeah?' Ashur responded, like he had already said earlier and didn’t need to repeat himself.
'We could always use an adventurer for one of our routine checks. The not dying is always quite a large perk.' The other man scratched his chin as he spoke. Ashur noted the man held a deep voice – much deeper than most men, and it was smooth and held the experience of leadership from it.
From what it seemed already, Ashur didn’t like him although it was in a way he couldn’t explain. Perhaps it had been in a tone or phrasing that meant that he was expendable because he could return.
'Sign me up.' Ashur was going to dive in head first with it. Was he about to get a quest?
'Well, we don’t know what you can do. We wouldn’t want to send an adventurer into danger unnecessarily of course.' The elf was a bit sheepish but still made fair sense. They were still crowded over the table. From it, Ashur could see a map of the village and various markings and drawings on it. Though, there were also markings and drawings about areas outside the village too.
'So, what are you? You look as though you command a sword?' The elf finally gave the million-dollar question. Ashur looked confused.
‘I don’t know what you mean.’ Ashur would bite his lip, wondering what he had just thought about.
Now that he thought about it, he hadn’t read anything about classes. How in the hell did he choose a class? He didn’t overlook over anything during the tutorial, did he?
'Do you only use a sword, or what?' the man spoke with a firm question, one that didn’t really have many options to answer with.
As he had learned in the tutorial, there was something that he could do to remedy this. His eyes would focus on a random point on the table in front of him as he searched his memories… or FAQ of what he was looking for.
And he found it.
Learning a class is never as simple as it might seem in Sanctity Online. Adventurers are hardy people who do not fall to the clasp of death and as such are far more renowned and skilled than most normal people can ever hope to become before their mortal coil expires.
Classes in SO are dictated purely by the progression and route that someone takes in combination with their skills and stat points.
An adventurer can take a class from level 10 and above by visiting their respective trainers, from which they can begin to learn class exclusive skills.
An adventurer has a max of two (2) classes they can learn if they meet the specific class requirements.
Classes are different from jobs or skills, where classes dictate boundaries and skill ceilings in other areas. Jobs can be numerous but are limited to eight (8) slots. Skills on the other hand can be learned on the go and the sky's the limit.