Chapter 1: Money Problems

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What is a dream?

A goal to pursue in life?

A thing that every individual has?

Something that comes and goes, to be found and lost?

Or is it merely an evanescent thing, temporary and destined to be forgotten?

I’d like to say that mine isn’t like that, but I guess only time will tell.

“—so it goes just like that?” A boy, around the age of nine spoke with disappointment in his voice, “Why doesn’t the hero get a happy ending?”

A woman who looked to be in her forties smiled at him and said, “That’s because the hero didn’t follow his heart,” She pointed to her chest, where her heart was, “instead of taking his beloved to battle with him like they both wished, he chose to lock her up instead for fear of her safety and ended up getting seduced by a demon the evil warlord’s general summoned.”

The boy frowned at her, “That’s stupid,” he said, “what happened to him?”

She smiled and a bit of youth seemed to return to her face, “His beloved found out and in her rage, attacked the general’s fortress with a small force that she gathered by herself.”

“Did she win?” The boy said.

“Of course not,” The woman said, “she managed to defeat a few hundred demons with her companions, but they were outnumbered and had to fall back.”

“So the lady didn’t get her beloved back from the demon?”

“Gods, no,” She said, “reinforcements came shortly afterwards and they successfully took over the demon general’s fortress. The war ended a few months later too, so the kingdom began to prosper once again.”

The boy scratched his head, “So what happened to the hero?”

“Hm? He got some sense beaten into him.”

“So what’s the moral I’m supposed to learn from today’s story? Follow your heart?” He asked.

“No,” The woman shook her head, “it’s to not cheat on your beloved.”

“That’s it?” The boy said.

“That’s it.” The woman enunciated.

“—way! Make way!” A portly man with a handlebar moustache said to the crowd, “The Freinad delvers have arrived!!”

To his words, a loud cheer erupted from the nearly three hundred people in front of him. Sounds of clapping akin to the loud sounds of a storm reverberated throughout the open plaza of the town. The crowd opened up a path and a group of men and women numbering seven made their way to the stage the portly mayor stood on.

“Thanks for having us today, Mr. Welkins,” A man with fiery red hair said to the mayor with a smile, causing the nearby crowd to cheer with increased intensity.

The mayor, Welkins, responded not a beat behind, “The pleasure is all ours! It is an honor for such an esteemed group of delvers to originate from a humble settlement like ours,” The mayor said, “Please, have a seat.”

They all sat on the chairs that were arranged on the stage, expressions of pride and happiness on their faces. When the mayor found that everyone was seated, he gave an opening speech and said, “Now that the formalities have been addressed, let’s have Mr. Creighton say a few words.”

The fiery-haired man from before stood up and took the voice-amplification artifact from the mayor and cleared his throat, “Thank you everyone, for welcoming us today. As you all know, our delving group was named after the ruins that made us famous; the remains of the ancient underground city of Freinad!” Creighton said, which made the crowd erupt in a roar of cheering that made one’s ears ring.

“Freinad was a very dangerous place,” He said, “A plague that corrupted the spirit and made the flesh rot had swept across the city many years ago, and has made it home to many dangerous undead. My team and I had come close to death on many occasions, but after a whole month of exploration, we found the remnants of a dead dragon!”

“The death of that dragon had caused its death energy to sweep out and envelop the land, destroying the city of Freinad and making it a deathtrap for those who come in unprepared. The corpse of a dragon is the home of many treasures and it is this single exploration that has given us the opportunity to let the entire country know of our name!” Creighton said with vigor, “We have gained the support of the Union of Delvers and we can now make our little delving group into something more.”

Creighton sighed in nostalgia, “We’ve achieved so many things,” He said, “…but none of these things would have happened if this town had not given us its support.”

The crowd lapsed into silence.

“Thanks to the efforts of the guild staff and the mayor, along with the encouragement of you all, we managed to achieve all these things,” He said, “So now, we would like to extend our delving group into a delving company, and any promising youths from this town are absolutely welcome to join!”

The crowd roared in shouts, claps and whistling, and among the crowd was a little boy who looked at the seven individuals on stage, silently swearing in his heart that he would one day see the ruins of the ancient underground city Freinad for himself.

“What are you reading, Ravel?” A woman asked a child who looked to be around eleven.

The boy didn’t look up, his gaze fixated on the book as he said, “Auntie, did you know that a gigantic river of freezing molten rock separates this continent from the north?”

She tilted her head, “Yes, of course, it’s the Ice God’s Wrath right?”

“Yeah!” The boy nodded his head vigorously, “Isn’t molten rock supposed to be hot? Why does this as say that the river of lava is infinitely colder than the ice the mages in the capital can produce?”

“Molten rock is usually hot, yes, but from what I know, the Ice God’s Wrath was first formed when a nomadic tribe numbering in the millions angered the ice god, Vengrad somehow, and ended up being smited by the god himself during one of their great migrations. A beam of light descended from the sky and froze everything it passed through, decimating the tribe with ice so cold it melted stone. It has also started multiple…” The woman paused and looked at the boy who was no longer listening and had his bulging eyes glued to the book he held in his small hands.

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The boy suddenly snapped his head upward and shouted, “Fish fly over at the kingdom next to ours!?”

She laughed at him, “Yes, fish do fly over at the kingdom of Istirine. Come now, dinner’s ready.”

He set down his book with a thump, “Yes!”

My eyes fluttered open only to close abruptly under the sudden glare of the rays of sunlight that came from above. My back hurt due to the bark I laid on, but there was only one thing on my mind.

There it was, the path I wanted to pursue.

I was going to explore everything this world had to show me.

Without my knowledge, my body had stood up on its own and broke into a sprint, heading straight towards the town I grew up in.

The sky was already dark and the moon was out with the stars that shone brightly. I passed the town gates and the bored guards, the lively townspeople and rowdy delvers, and reached the place I called home.

I was breathing heavily and sweat covered my brow from the long run, but I refused to stop my run and opened the door with a bang. Inside was my aunt and her two children, who were playing with each other around the dinner table, while the food remained untouched due to them waiting for me.

My ragged breaths continued as the people in the room looked at me with shocked expressions. My aunt recovered from her shock first and said, “Ravel, I’m sorry about the entrance exami—“

“No!” I said, “That’s not…” I gasped for air, “important!”

She studied my expression and said, “You don’t look like someone who just lost his once-in-a-lifetime chance,” She said with a smile, “What do you have to say?”

I gasped for breath one more time before I sucked in a breath and mustered my courage, “I…”

I exhaled and stood in front of her firmly, “I want to go on a journey,” I said.

Standing there, I waited for the barrage of dissuasion, but what I got instead was a nostalgic sigh from my aunt, “That’s alright. Bring me some wine from Welterun when you return, okay?”

“Huh?”

“Wine. From Welterun?  A bit of a ways off to the west, but I’m sure you can make it. Be careful on the way there, alright?” She said with a smile on her face.

“What? Aren’t you supposed to stop me or something?” I said, dumbfounded by her answer.

“What good would that do? I went through the same phase, you know. Albeit a bit younger than you… I’m more surprised this only came up now—“

“Aren’t you worried I might die or something? I heard the world was full of things and people that want to kill anything and everything that moves.”

She laughed, “It is,” she said, “And I’m also very worried about you.”

“And you aren’t stopping me because…?” I said.

“Because,” she said, “I know you won’t give up on something like this with a few words of dissuasion. And also, it’s about time something like this came around, there’s a lot to see out there, you know? I wouldn’t want to deprive you of that, that’s how I met your uncle after all.”

I opened and closed my mouth multiple times to find an answer until I finally said, “…So I can leave by next week?”

She gave me a look, “You can leave any time,” she said, “granted that you have the money of course.”

My shoulders sagged, ‘Fuck.’

The reaction I gave prompted a laugh from her, “I’m not lending you any by the way, although I heard that the request board has been pretty full lately."

I grimaced now that the things I needed to do dawned on me, supplies, money, an actual route to go by, a map, and even more money.

My aunt tapped on the table impatiently and said, “Come on now, worry about your financial difficulties later, we’re starving.” She said as she took a spoon away from her three year old twins who had been playing with the food.

“Well, I guess a journey has to start somewhere,” I said and joined them at the table.

Dinner passed quickly, and a few of my questions were cleared up by my aunt who gave me a general idea of what I was supposed to do and avoid. She even offered to lend me her outdated map. It was given to me teasingly, but I appreciated the gesture still.

When I got to my room upstairs, I couldn’t sleep. Plans and ideas flitted through my head, filling it with ideas on where to go, how to make money, and how I could avoid getting killed by whatever it was that was lucky enough to come my way mid-journey.

Hours passed and I wasn’t able to sleep yet, but now I had a more concrete idea of what to do.

One, gather at the very least ten silvers worth of money from request or some other methods.

Two, learn some more magic to defend myself with, more money needed.

Three, join the Delver’s Union’s branch in this town for the added benefits. The entrance fee needed money.

And four, get as rich as possible to avoid any more of these frustrating money problems.

I nodded to myself and prepared to sleep, but the glare of the morning sun made it impossible to do so.

…Well, I guess this is as good a time as any to start working.

“…….”

I’m seriously starting to regret this decision.

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Author's Note:

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