In the city, the people still thought of the war as impending. It still hadn't become a reality yet. People still went about their business as if everything was normal. By all accounts, for most people in the inner walls, life was pretty much normal.
However, things took a drastic turn when one ventured outside the safety of the walls. Battles were fought every day as the Gumina sought to weaken the defense before the arrival of the main army. At this stage, Tristan had yet to deploy many of its soldiers, choosing to send adventurers and other contracted workers to do the job. It was an effective defense against Gumina since they decided to throw money at them
The adventurers who accepted the hires would be renumerated for the day. For those in an adventurer team, a portion of their pay was deducted and sent to the adventurer team. The amount being given out was very good, enough to tempt many adventurers to disregard the dangers. They came here to fight, might as well make a quick buck while at it.
As with everything, remuneration was offered per rank. The higher ranking an adventurer was, he better the pay offered. It made sense since a higher-ranked adventurer would logically make more contributions to the war effort than a lowly one. This was also an incentive for the elites to take this up.
By now, the Dark Flames Adventurer team was doing all they could to contribute to the war effort. They were by far the smallest team on the battlefield, and that added to their pressure to perform. They also understood the need to leave a favorable expression in the minds of the new connections.
There was another dimension to this. Dark Flames was the least financially stable of the teams gathered. Lady Ellen came from a wealthy background, and that alone had been enough to maintain the adventurer team, but now it was proving to be too much. She had to find a way of getting the adventurer team to become self-reliant completely. Entrepreneurship was hard work.
Being presented with such a favorable source of income, Lady Ellen encouraged her people to seek out these opportunities. She intended to make a killing from the war, and everyone must participate.
Fighting a war was expensive and dangerous. Even as she cared about the finances, she still couldn't have her people dropping like flies all over. They weren't going over to fight stationary men who were waiting to be killed by them, the enemy did fight back, and if she hoped to earn anything from all this, she needed to find a way of buffing her people in some way.
After a fine breakfast, everyone in the Adventurer Team apart from the logistics department had made their way to the walls where the fighting commissions were being picked up. By now, all the good jobs had been picked up, so unless one decided to wait for those in place to conk up and die, they had to pick the less desirable jobs.
In war, the best jobs were generally the ones that kept you as far from the frontlines as possible. At the front, the situation was extremely liquid and uncontrollable. Death was barely a stone's throw away. Even if one was extremely careful, someone could come out of nowhere and sneak attack, ending you before you knew what happened.
With the best jobs taken, Lady Ellen and her team had to content to the less impressive jobs. Since there were not mass-recruitment jobs, indicative of an on-going or expected attack, the only other jobs available were scouting, infiltration and patrols. Even the patrol areas were less desirable since all the nearby places had been picked.
After walking around the area looking for any suitable jobs, Lady Ellen and her group were able to identify a few patrol jobs. Some of the ranged attackers went up the wall to aid in scouting and to serve as the Quick Response Force. Most of the other adventurers took the patrol jobs. Due to limited optimal patrol areas, some had to book in shifts to ensure they retained these patrol areas to the Adventurer Team.
While selecting the groups to take on the jobs, Lady Ellen was keen on retaining a few of her elites from taking on jobs. The way she saw it, this was a golden opportunity she couldn't afford to pass up.
While there were countless jobs for everyone, there were very few jobs available for the elites, and these were what she wanted. She did not feel that an Elite Adventurer Team Commander and her elite troop were suited to patrolling and other menial jobs. She had set her eyes on better jobs. Those jobs wouldn't be given out at the gates, for they were much too high profile, so she bid her team follow her.
In the forging room, a flurry of activity was going on as the adventurers struggled to meet the quota Barda had set for them. This was like a qualification round where they were supposed to make 10 pieces of equipment each.
After much thought, Barda decided to do the hardest and the most important task. He would refine the materials of all impurities. With this, he had some certainty that the finished product was at least sturdy enough and refined enough before production.
Due to the guidance of the reading materials, his overall performance had more than doubled, making it that he could make the materials as fast as was needed, even faster since the group waiting for the refined materials were also working at a snail's pace. If Barda had gotten some people who knew how to do basic forging, he'd be a long way and under much pressure, but since he was also just learning, he was okay with the group's starting position.
As they worked, the door to the forging room they were in opened. It was extremely difficult for just anyone to enter a forging room unless the person inside had authorized them. In cases where an adventurer had indicated that they were in an adventurer team, then the upper echelons of the adventurer team could be allowed entry. If one wanted to work in absolute privacy then they would rent a room as themselves, which was considerably more expensive.
20 adventurers of the Dark Flames Adventurer Team entered the room led by the Commander. Many of these Barda did not recognize, but he came to learn later that among these there were members of the vassal adventurer teams under them.
One thing about this whole group was that they were all Purple-ranked. Of course, the Adventurer team boasted of having more Purple-ranked adventurers, but these had to be the cream of the crop. Barda felt a little hurt not being in that team, despite knowing he was the strongest.
"Is the equipment ready?" Lady Ellen asked Barda.
Barda looked around the room and at the workers, he had with him. They all nodded to him, indicating that they had met their quota. They didn't know their roughly done work would be used by the very best the team had to offer. With this, Barda confidently said, "they are."
Having gotten the confirmation, Lady Ellen then proceeded to check on the various equipment that was laying on the forging tables. The other adventurers also did the same.
After drying up, only then did the newly-minted equipment display their magnificence. Barda had done a stellar job at refining the materials. He was also a fine teacher to boot, so the equipment was above standard. However, he didn't kid himself, he knew his recruits would take a while before they got the ropes.
Regardless, the products were well done, better than what was available in the market as stock equipment. The swords, spears, bows, and arrows each glistened with the bronze hue. Touching the materials, the adventurers were fascinated by their quality, and they couldn't wait to try them on.
Just as Lady Ellen was about to pick up one of the swords, Barda held her. This action had been well anticipated by the logistics team, so they stopped what they were doing to stare. Seeing this, so did the new arrivals, the Ace team.
"That's not for you," Barda said when he noticed a slightly vexed expression on the commander's face. He didn't offer any more explanation. He simply just walked to where he was working.
A curious Lady Ellen followed Barda, curious and excited about the prospect. For one, she knew Barda's character, and he wouldn't pull her leg like this, in front of everyone. Then, there were the excited faces of the logistic team as they anticipated the great reveal.
Barda pulled out his creation. Lady Ellen stopped thinking, stopped wondering and simply just stared. Seeing her like that, Barda couldn't help but jest, saying: "That is exactly how I looked when I first saw you. Do you like it?"