Stepping off the boat, I winced at the oppressive environment. The air above the ground seemed to shimmer as the heat radiated off the sand and stonework, and I had to take shallow breaths to feel like my lungs were not burning.
I immediately broke out into a full sweat, made even worse by the fact that I was loaded down by my absolutely monstrous greatsword and my pack of possessions over my leather armor.
“First time?” a sailor laughed as he passed me while unloading cargo, having seen my expression. “You’ll get used to it. We landed at the worst time of day for it, though,” he said with a grimace. “Not that cap’n will let us wait for the evening to unload.”
Grunting a response, and empathizing with the man who would be unloading boxes in this sweltering heat, I stepped away from the pier and pulled out my map of the region. As I began to navigate my way through the city I began to forget the heat, at least momentarily, as I took in the sights and culture around me.
Haklan was a beautiful city. Unlike the white stone of Mirut, the dark brown stone of Roko, or the gray stone of the more northern walled cities like the capital, Fespen, and Gurt, Haklan was composed of sandy beige. That might have sounded dull, but on top of the sandy beige was a total riot of color.
Textiles were hung around the city, some as decor and others available for sale, and there was a wealth of texture and beauty that my eyes greedily devoured. When I looked closer, I saw that some of the hung textiles created a shade barrier for the buildings, which probably kept some of the heat off, and there were awnings and canopies of shade cloth on a number of the roofs.
I was more or less alone as I walked through the city. Most of the locals were probably hiding out indoors at the peak of the day instead of suffering through it like I was, but I expected the city would likely come alive in the evening as the light began to fade and the air was less painful to exist in.
The handful of people I did see mostly all shared similar characteristics. I met pairs of purple, red, and orange eyes, nodding greetings to the people with their black or silver hair, sometimes having the unique, striped blend of the two that was characteristic of people of Al’Tiolese descent. I also saw some people with eyes and hair more like the Horuthians I saw more of in the northern Kingdom, and the occasional person who looked like they shared both heritages.
With all the beautiful fabric on display, I made a mental shopping list as I walked, thinking about souvenirs for Sera and the other people in my life, but my attention was sidelined entirely when a familiar smell wafted past me.
Is that… coffee? If there’s been coffee in this world this whole time, I might scream.
I allowed myself a small detour to find the source of the smell, and found a small cafe tucked into a shady nook of a sandstone building.
“Hello?” I called out tentatively, putting down my sack for a moment and trying to get some airflow into my armor to cool down in the shade.
“One moment,” I heard from a room behind the counter. An older woman shuffled out, looking at me in surprise. “Not many people are looking for a warm drink at this time of day.”
“Ah, well… I’m new here.”
“You from the north?” she asked, and I nodded. “Most northerners don’t particularly care for nikopi.”
“Nikopi?”
She motioned for me to come look at her counter, and I stepped up so I could partake in the drink that had stimulated my senses. Sadly, it was not actual coffee but was a similar, strong drink made from the bean of a different tree that produced a long pod. There were ristras of the pods on display, and when she knocked one it made a fun sound as the dried beans within the dried pods settled.
Ordering a drink, I watched her prepare some pre-shelled beans to turn them into the drink. She used a small hand grinder to break the beans down into a fine powder, which she placed in a muslin-like cloth bag, which she expertly bound to the lip of a specific carafe. She boiled some water in a small kettle, then poured it over the ground bean slowly, until a dark steeped liquid poured through the bag.
Filling the carafe to the point that the bottom of the bag was submerged, she let it sit and steep for a while, clearly having years of practice and not needing a timer. When she was ready, she unhooked the bag from the carafe, and turned the spent grounds into a bin, then put the steeping bag into a bucket of water to soak and be cleaned.
Rather than serve the drink in the carafe immediately, she poured it into a cylindrical container, then quickly poured it back and forth between that and a second identical container. “To cool the drink and get some air into it. Helps with the bitter flavor.”
When she was done, she poured the beverage into a mug-like cup, and pushed it towards me on the counter.
“What do I owe you?”
“On the house,” she said with a grin. “Always a pleasure to watch a northerner drink their first nikopi. Welcome to Haklan.”
I nodded my thanks, and gave the drink a sip. It was not quite as good as coffee, but it was the closest I had come to it in decades. I swirled the drink in my mouth, exploring the flavor, and swallowed, a grin spreading across my face.
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“Well I’ll be. A rare reaction for a first timer.”
“It’s stronger than the tea in the north, but that suits me fine,” I said with a wink.
I could see myself wanting to drink more of the nikopi, so I asked her about her supplier, got the name of a local merchant, and added sacks of the beans to my mental list of planned purchases. After saying goodbye, I headed back out into the intense day, and focused my attention.
Eventually, I found myself before a large structure that somewhat resembled the one I was already familiar with from the capital, which was hardly a surprise given that this building was based on one in Roko which in turn was based on the one I had helped construct there. I made my way through the front doors, shutting them quickly behind me to keep the heat out. The interior was significantly cooler, and I allowed myself a moment to delight in the respite from the desert air that I had walked through to get there.
A few heads turned towards me from the tavern area, looking me over with interest before returning to their lunches or drinking. One man snored loudly at a table where he had fallen asleep. A server scurried by and shot him a frustrated look.
I stepped up to the reception desk, and a young clerk looked up at me in surprise. “New in town?” she asked.
“Fresh off the boat.”
“Well, welcome to the Haklan Adventurers Guild! Are you here to register as an adventurer?”
“I am,” I said with a smile as I swept a bit of my hair back from my forehead. “My name’s Deklan.”
“Pleasure,” she said with a smile in return. “Where did you come in from?”
“The capital.”
“Are you a member of the Guild there? If so, you don’t need to register again.”
“Oh, uh… no,” I said, trying to think of an explanation for why that might be. To her credit, she did not ask; adventurers came in all types, and it was not the Guild’s intention to pry, only to provide a means for people to get by and help the community.
“So,” she said, after getting through some of the basics of registration. “Children start at Wood rank, and apprentices start at Stone rank. We usually recommend adults start at Iron rank and work up from there, so that they can establish a history of experience with the Guild and other members. It helps when partying up, because experienced adventurers like to know who they’ll be working with. However, when people already have experience coming into the Guild,” she said, eyes flicking to the huge sword on my back, then back to me. “We also offer a measurement service with a special scale that can start you at a higher rank. You can also use it in the future to advance your rank further, although you do need to have done a minimum of quests with the Guild to prove yourself, no matter what the scale displays. It costs one silver to use.”
Obviously, I was quite familiar with the adventurer scale, but I just nodded. “I’d like to get measured, then.”
The receptionist nodded and disappeared into a backroom for a moment, where the scale was presumably kept for safe-keeping, given that it was constructed from gold. She brought it out carefully, and set it on the counter in front of me.
“Place your hand here, and push a little magic into the artifact. If you can’t activate the enchantment, I’m afraid you’ll have to start at Iron rank.”
I reached forward with my hand, but did not push magic into the artifact right away. I knew I would show up as Gold, and I wondered if that would be a bit too much attention. Knowing how the scale presented itself, rather than activate the enchantment, I created an identical illusion of the artifact activating, and displaying my rank as Silver, instead.
The receptionist reached forward and touched the scale with her finger, and a screen appeared with her ranking in the same space as mine. I blinked, then realized it was a safety test, since if the scale had been truly activated by me, she would not have been able to activate it as well. Whoops. Guess they already thought about cheaters.
She frowned at me. “One moment, please.”
I grimaced as she stepped away from the counter and whispered something to another receptionist, who quickly disappeared up a staircase. A few moments later, I saw Gorban and Shirel step out onto a balcony overlooking the Guild’s mezzanine. Their eyes narrowed on me from above, and I sighed.
As I had practiced with Atlessoa, I lifted my hand to scratch my cheek, then tapped my chin three times with my thumb while making eye contact with Shirel. She gave an almost imperceptible nod as an acceptance of the code, then whispered something to Gorban, before stepping back into the Guild Leader’s office. It’s a good thing Shirel was here, I thought, while Gorban continued to watch.
A moment later, the second receptionist returned and whispered something to the first, who turned back at me with a slightly forced smile. “Great. Silver rank, then. I’ll get your membership in order.”
Once everything was sorted, I arranged some lodgings in the attached inn and thanked the receptionist. I turned to check out the quest board, figuring I could take a look, grab a meal, then check out the city in the evening, but Gorban was no longer up on the balcony. Instead he stood directly behind me.
“Walk with me,” he said.
I followed silently as Gorban led me out to a training yard. It was still the height of the day, so there were no adventurers out training, despite the shade cloth that was strung up over the space. I felt a familiar shift in the air, and glanced over to see Shirel already present. She had cast a silence spell, I figured.
“I don’t like breaking the rules of the Adventurers Guild,” Gorban growled. “Why has the Spymaster sent you?”
The signal I had given Shirel only told her that I was working with Atlessoa’s spy network, not who I was in particular.
“I’m on a mission from the king to check out some dungeons in the south for a potentially valuable resource. It could upset the balance of the Kingdom if it fell into the wrong hands.”
Gorban frowned. “What resource is that?”
“Something akin to beast crystal, like how tamers transform their beasts. This crystal corrupts them instead, making them powerful and out of control.”
“I… see. Why did you falsify your rank?”
“To lower it. I didn’t want to stand out.”
“Oh?” Gorban said, this time with interest. “Hmm. Prove it.”
The man walked over to the racks of training weapons and hefted up a large staff, similar to his guandao in length but without the glaive-like end. He glanced at me—frowning slightly at the size of the sword on my back—then grabbed the biggest wooden greatsword they had on hand.
Really, Gorban? In this heat? With a sigh, I stepped off to the side and set down my actual sword and my pack, which I still had on me as I had not yet had a chance to even go to my room. When I walked back to the middle of the training arena, he tossed me the practice sword.
I caught it easily, and Gorban exploded into motion.