They looked at each other before Alex sighed. “Try to be more subtle the next time you see a non-human for the first time.” He continued with a deep voice, “Aric and Kael told me about you. I would like to express my thanks to you. It was an important mission and the new Rift means new resources for our guild.” He looked at Erik. “We will set up a new base there and have a spatial formation built to shorten the way to the island. We’ve already worked out the details with Aric and Kael.”

Alex put his hand in a drawer, took out a carrot, and bit off a piece. "Now that everyone is here, let's get to the part about your rewards."

Chapter Begin

“One moment!” Erik raised a hand as he turned to Aric in his seat. “Why didn’t you wait for me? I told you I wanted to see his reaction!”

Alex and Kael snorted and Aric shrugged his shoulders before he answered, “We’ve waited before we noticed that you were going to be late.”

“As always,” Kael interjected as Aric continued.

“I’ve other things to do than standing around, waiting for you. My father gave me a list of things to do, my schedule is filled enough as it is.”

Before Erik could answer Alex spoke up. “Me too. Let’s get done with this.” Hearing their guild leader, Erik sighed and fell back into his chair.

“Are you a member of any guild, Elijah?” Alex turned to Elijah and asked before he took another bite from his carrot. His chewing filled the entire room as all eyes landed on Elijah.

Elijah shook his head before Alex asked, “Would you like to join the Lepus guild? We’re always in need of competent members.”

Originally, I didn't want to join a guild. The more I interact with others, the greater the risk that people will find out I am from another world. I know too little about this world. But then again, I shouldn't get into that, which might just draw more attention to myself. Elijah thought as he looked Alex in the eye before looking at the other three in turn.

But then again, the guild is a source of information for me. If I'm smart about it, I can benefit from joining the guild. And they're the only people I know, so I could use them to make connections in society before I start looking for a way to return to Earth on my own. Or at least find out how and why I ended up here.

I will use the guild as a safe environment to get stronger and gather information.

“Are there any conditions that I have to fulfill? What obligations would I have to the guild?” Elijah asked, turning back to Alex.

“You must share 10% of the loot from a rift with the guild. If it's items, you can keep them, but this doesn't apply to mana stones. The value is calculated and the tax to the guild is paid accordingly in credits,” Alex answered, taking another carrot from his drawer.

Aric raised his hand. “We have lots of guilds we are on friendly terms with. Thanks to Alex and his extensive circle of friends we have contractually agreed discounts for the rifts those guilds control.”

Alex chuckled and he began to tap on the table with his rabbit-pawed hand. “Our guild has only existed for two or three years but I have invested a lot of time, effort, and resources into it.”

“Sounds good to me,” Elijah put his hands on the side rests of his chair, “In that case, I would like to join.”

As soon as the words left Elijah’s mouth, Erik leaned over and patted Elijah’s back. “It’s great to have you here, welcome to Lepus, freshman!”

Kael nodded at Elijah with a smile while Aric also patted his back and welcomed him to their guild.

While everyone congratulated Elijah, Alex stood up and walked to a closet to his right. Elijah noticed how tall the Hopkin was before his gaze landed on the guild boss's feet. He had rabbit's paws for feet and wore no shoes. Elijah would have expected his legs to have been structured differently, but contrary to his expectations, the legs were like human legs.

Alex grabbed a small watch and tossed it to Elijah before sitting back down.

Elijah caught the watch and inspected it. He had seen similar devices on the wrists of the trio and already knew what it was. A Nexus Watch.

Two leather straps were attached to either side of the watch, which would serve to attach it to the wrist or forearm. The watch or rather the plate resembled the screen of a smartphone but was much smaller and decorated with numerous tiny, intricate engravings that covered both sides.

Why is it called Nexus Watch? Nexus Bracelet fits more. Elijah thought before he looked at Alex, who nodded.

“It’s yours. These things are not valuable, about 100 credits each. Almost everyone uses them. This is also just a mass-produced model. It will suffice, for now, the expensive models are just status symbols anyway. But it’s better than the one Aric gave you,” Alex explained.

“You have to insert some of your essence into the watch to bind it to yourself. The device will save your ID automatically. You have to hold your watch against another one to save other people's contact details but it is also possible to enter the ID of others manually,” Kael explained. Elijah was about to insert his essence into the device he was holding before Alex interrupted him.

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“Get it done later. Now let’s move on to your rewards,” Alex holds his open palm above the table, startling Elijah with the appearance of four fist-sized white beads.

Aric and Erik leaned forward in excitement and even Kael’s eyes widened in surprise.

Alex pointed at the beads with his half-finished carrot. “All of these are the [Devastating Blow] skill. You have done a very good job and deserve this reward.”

“Can the guild afford it, boss? We would also be-” Aric began before Kael interrupted him.

“Grateful for the generous reward.” Kael finished Aric’s sentence before he stood up, took one of the beads, and returned to his seat.

“Just take it.” Alex watched how each of them took one of the beads and stood up when Elijah took a step forward.

The guild leader extended his hand to Elijah and smiled while saying, "Welcome to the guild Elijah."

Two more items appeared in his other hand, which he handed to Elijah. "I have made it a habit to give each new member a welcome gift." He pointed to a small strap. "This is the insignia of our guild and serves as proof that you are a member of Lepus. You can put some mana in it to send out a call for help. All members of our guild within five miles will receive a signal. The band will move in the direction from which the signal was sent. It won’t work within rifts."

The other object was another bead. "I want to give you this skill shard. It's the [Wooden Thorn] skill, and looking at your wooden body, it's probably the perfect skill for you.

Elijah's eyes lit up as he accepted the gifts and returned to his seat after thanking Alex.

“Would you be interested in selling me the shard?” Aric asked, his eyes on the skill in Elijah’s hands.

“I don’t know how much this skill is worth, but I’ll probably use it myself,” Elijah said, holding both skills in each hand.

“The skill is quite common in other kingdoms. I’ve spent years traveling around and accumulated a good number of skill shards. Now leave, I’ve to write a letter to Lord Malakar about the rift owner rights,” Alex grabbed a pen and began writing on thick, worn-out paper that lay on his table. Elijah wondered why he didn’t send a message with the Nexus Watch instead as they left the room.

As soon as the door behind them closed, Erik increased his pace and walked ahead. “See you guys later! A couple of workers wanted to come over for the walls of my apartment.”

“Who’s Lord Malakar?” Elijah asks, following the other two through the long halls of the headquarters.

“He’s a Duke and the local noble. Whisperwind and the surrounding cities fall under his dominion,” Aric explained and Kael added.

“Every new rift has to be registered as soon as possible. The guild has to pay 30% of the earnings we make with the rift to Lord Malakar.”

“I don’t like him,” Aric said. “But I would never say that in public. He’s a greedy man who only follows his own goals. My father met him a couple of times. The man exploits his own men.”

“How so?” Elijah asked while glancing into a room they passed by. A group of people sat around a table, discussing something.

“Never mind, it's not important. Elijah, if I were you, I would use or sell the skills as soon as possible." Aric changed the subject.

"Why?" Elijah was puzzled.

"It wouldn't be the first time Alex took away an expensive gift from a new member and replaced it with a cheaper one," Kael said. “

"What, really?" Elijah stopped for a moment before catching up with the other two with quick strides.

“But in his defense, he does value competent members and it has happened several times that he has given out skills to strengthen his members. We hope you will remain a member of our guild for a long time,” Kael added.

The three began walking down the stairs as Aric turned to Elijah. "Do you even know how to use skill shards? You just have to pour some of your essence into it. Try it. If you want to absorb both skills, you better do it here in the building."

Elijah nodded. They reached the second floor and walked past a group of other Lepus members. Elijah saw two of them glance at his skill shards as they walked by. As they walked, Elijah followed Aric's instructions. First, he tried to pour some essence into the skill shard. The first few attempts failed until he finally managed to get some essence in.

He met resistance and had to concentrate a bit to get past the blockage.

With a little more willpower, he managed to push more essence into the shard and felt his essence begin to circulate through the shard on its own.

The feeling was strange. Elijah still felt the connection to the essence and knew he could influence the process, but he was unable to manipulate the essence in the shard any further. His gaze was focused on the shard in his hand as he followed Aric and Kael through the guild.

A brief moment of panic filled him as he watched the sphere in his hand dissolve into particles of light and flow into his body.

A new feeling awoke in him and it was as if he had rediscovered a new sense of perception that had always been there.

He directed his inner gaze to his soul and saw a small spherical energy cloud floating at the place where his heart was. Elijah knew instinctively that this was his soul.

The skill he absorbed was hovering at the edge of his soul.

"You can move the skills around in your soul. The closer the skills are to the core of your soul, the stronger they are in their application." Aric's voice pulled Elijah back into the situation and he hadn't even realized he had stopped.

"Every person has two slots in the core of the soul. You don't get another slot until Tier 4, and then with every tenth Tier after that. These skills are called Heart skills and can be trained faster than other skills in your soul. They also consume less mana over time. After that come the subsidiary skills. Each of them has four slots as Tier 1 and two more with each new tier. These skills are mostly skills that are used to supplement the Heart skills," Aric explained, while Elijah began absorbing the second shard. He sighed when the skill vanished in Elijah’s hands.

“Do you see the segments in your soul? Apart from the core, your soul is divided into two circles. The inner and the outer." Elijah nodded in response to Kael's question. The three moved aside to make way for another group of members. Aric smiled and nodded to the others in greeting as he continued their explanation.

"The outermost area of your soul is for unimportant skills that you should still have, simply because of their usefulness. These skills are called tertiary skills. There are even people who call this area of the soul a garbage dump. As far as I know, absorbed skills can't be separated from the soul anymore, but I'm not quite sure how that was." Aric looked at Kael for confirmation but he didn't know anything about it either and just shrugged.

"I would store the two skills as subsidiary skills. You can change your mind later if you want one of them to be a Heart skill."

After Aric saw how eagerly Elijah listened to him, he ended his explanation with a laugh. "Dude, why do you know so little? Knowledge of skills is the basics of basics." Elijah felt uncomfortable and didn’t know what to answer. Kael came to his rescue.

"You forget that there are still kingdoms where education of this kind is knowingly denied."

"Alright," Aric clapped his hands together. "I have a few things to do. What are you two doing?"

"I'm going to relax today," Kael said.

Elijah smelled his clothes. He smelled like sweat. "I really need some new clothes."