There was a ringing in my ear as I swatted my hand towards an non-existent alarm. It seemed my body was naturally making an alarm sound to wake me up which seemed convenient. Slowly opening my eyes the ringing would cease to happen and it would be replaced with the loud voices of adventurers from the downstairs dining area. Outside my room, I could hear other tenants making their way down to the area and it seemed that I was not the only one waking up before sunrise. My body was naturally drawn to waking up early, probably due in part to me having fallen asleep before the moon even came up. Noticing that I hadn't changed my clothes, or that I even lacked a change in clothes I decided to just gather my belongings, lock my room up, and begin my day with a healthy breakfast.
Finding an open table to sit at, I would order a small breakfast of eggs and hashbrowns. Quickly getting the food I had ordered, I shoved it into my mouth and was done with my meal in a short while. Leaving 5 copper coins on the table, I would make my way out of the inn and onto the currently dark yet starting up streets. As I walked through the nearly empty streets, I would watch as vendors began to set up shop. Stores began to open up and city life was generally getting into the motion of the morning.
Today's mission was to find and join the adventurers guild, a continuation of yesterday's agenda. I had no information on what the guild looked like or even if it would be open at such an odd hour, but I would still try my best to find it. I had stupidly walked out of the inn without asking for any information about the guild so I decided to stop and ask a vendor near me. The person was a fruit salesman, a middle aged man with a slight beard growing. Placing baskets of fruit on a stand, I would come up behind him and wait for him to notice me. It wasn't long before the man turned around and told me,
"Sorry son, we dont up for another hour."
"O-oh um, I-im not here to buy anything, may I as-"
"Then why the hell are you here?"
I was a bit startled by the way he had quickly responded before I could even finish my sentence. Gathering myself once more, I would begin to say,
"As I was saying may I ask you a question?"
"Well isnt that a question right there?"
"That not what I mea-"
"I know thats not what you meant son, now whats the question"
"Can you tell me where the adventurers guild is?"
"Ahh the adventurers guild, well I mean its pretty obvious where it is. But just look for the big building down this road way, you should be able to spot it because it's about as large as a church would be."
"Thank you."
"Yeah no problem, here…" he would toss me an apple "You're gonna wanna have a snack if you're going to the guild. Good luck son."
I would nod and make my way down the street. That man was an off fellow, maybe I'll go buy some stuff from him later.
As I made my way down the street, I would soon come across one of the few buildings with its lights on and people coming and going from it. It was as the man had said, the guild building was as large as a church with the face of the building towering over any of the two story buildings to the side of it. With a white sort of marble face, I expected once I walked in for this to be something like the nobles branch of the guild, but it turned out that was just the aesthetic choice of this city's guild hall. Inside was a totally different feeling compared to the outside. With wooden flooring and tall ceilings, the guild hall seemed huge. Magical lamps lit up the room being suspended from chains coming down from the roof. Around me, hundreds of people stood together in groups. The area directly from the doorway was on the second story. The common area required you to walk down two flights of stairs before coming into the main floor. There the receptionist desks and quest boards were all down there, also tables and areas for resting and meeting up with party members made up a majority of the space.
Making my way down the steps, I would begin to make my way to the line that had piled up waiting to meet with one of the receptionists. In front of me were many different parties of adventures each with their own agenda. When I was at the main entrance and saw the line, I saw some people standing in alone while others were with comrades. They either were empty handed hoping to speak with a receptionist about god knows what, or had quest items from the day prior that they were now turning in. Also some had private escorts and seemed to be signing up just like I was.
Waiting in line did not feel half as long as it had when I was standing in the hot sun. Listening to the people around me, I could hear light hearted banter between teammates as well as serious conversations between party members, all in all the feeling of standing in this guild was a rather calm one as opposed to the craziness that the city had shown me yesterday.
Finally coming up on my turn, I would make my way to the desk that was flagging me down. There were currently six of ten available counters operating and they all were in little cubicles with a wall and a sort of glass plating in between the receptionist and the guild member. Using sound amplification magic tools to speak through the glass, the guild receptionists would have a little hole in which the member or they could slide items through as a means of item or goods retrieval. Sitting behind the glass wall was a woman with black hair and glasses, she was dressed in proper receptionist attire which was a white long sleeve undershirt with a blue sort of vest over it. As for pants, it was a simple black and on the left side of her chest was this city's guild insignia.
"Hello, what can I help you with today?"
"Can I register for the guild?"
"May I see your ID card?"
I would put the wooden card that I had gotten yesterday from the gatekeeper and she opened the little hatch and looked at it.
"Okay I'm gonna have you come into the back. There are some preliminary tests that you need to take in order for us to place you into the proper rank. Please just head to the door on your far left, I will meet you there."
Looking to my left, I would see a single door on the wall that seperated guild workers from members. Nodding understandingly, I would make my way towards the door as I saw her get up out of her seat and begin to walk towards the same door I was. Getting there before I did, she opened the door for me and I entered. Behind the scenes there was not really all that much that seemed to need to be hidden. There were piles of papers, all of which seemed to be quest requests, filed into folders. There were other male workers moving stacks of items and taking inventory behind here. Following her to a room in the back, I would be looking around as she explained what the first aspect of the test would be.
"Where we are going currently is the magic power testing room. This is where we'll see whether or not you have an aptitude for magic use. Most people have a small magic power, meaning they will never be able to use magic in their daily lives or for combat. Those who have a magic power of 20 are eligible to become mages. Those with magic power of 40+ are seen as either having already trained in magic, or have a natural affinity for the ability. These people are classified as wizards. The higher magic power your, are the different types of class and tests you will be given."
Walking into the room, there was a large crystal like ball in the center atop a pedal stool, in front of it was a small metal plate with a hand-print on it. With the receptionist standing near the door to the room, she would tell me to place my hand on the plate. Doing so, I could feel something that felt like it was tugging on my skin. Feeling a slight tickle, the crystal ball would begin to fog up before displaying the number twenty four in it. Writing this down the lady would say,
"Congratulations, you have the ability to become the mage class. Onto our next test, this will be the mage type test. Here you will be put into either a support role, a summoning role, an offensive role, or a miscellaneous role.
The support role is known for their ability to either buff, de-buff and or heal teammates. They are highly sought after and a key component in a party.
The summoning role is a special type of mage rarely seen, with their ability to communicate with the spirit plane summoners are able to call upon the aid of these spirits to fight for them. Depending on what spirit they call, they can fit into any role of a mage, though generally the spirits are weak and do not heal strongly or do much damage.
Offensive mages are those who can only use attacking spells. Some attacking spells can cause de-buffs, but those are rarely seen on beginning mages. They are also another key part in any successful party.
And for the final mage type there is the miscellaneous type. These mages are able to use all the magics previously described and are generally only found in people with an initial magic power of 60 or higher.
The way we test to see what type of mage you are is by having you put your magic power into a magic circle in one of the guild rooms. This comes in the form of placing your hand on the circle and pushing the magic power through your hand or simply dropping your blood onto the magic circle."
Her explanation was so long that we had long since gotten to the magic circle which was in another room in the back. Standing there politely, I had waited for her to finish before she handed me a knife to make a small cut on my hand to drop some blood. Doing so the magic circle began to glow and soon a white puff of smoke came up from the circle. Looking at the lady, no visible emotion was apparent on her face, but she soon said,
"Wow, you're an oddity. Congratulations, you are a misc. mage. Now we will move onto the physical aptitude test. Follow me to the field in the back."
Walking close behind her to the back, we would come out into a large field with training dummies at one end and a field at the other. Walking towards the field, a weapon rack would come into view. On the rack were a plethora of weapons from maces to throwing knives. Looking at the weapon rack the lady said,
"We will be testing which weapon suits you best. Depending on what weapon you are either most accurate with or do the most damage with, that will be your melee weapon. If you show no affinity for a melee weapon you will be thrown into the mage class, if you show an affinity with a certain type of weapon, I will then tell you what class you have, if you show an affinity with all, well I wont even go into that because I doubt it will happen. Okay, now just grab a starting weapon and begin."
The weapon I first grabbed was the one I felt the least confident with, throwing knives. Picking up the full set, I stood behind a white line and began to throw them at the dummy. As they hit, an indicator appeared over its head. Looking at it, I asked the woman what it was. This was the first time she had shown emotion on her face the whole time we had been here, that emotion was confusion.
"What indicator? I'm simply judging on how deep your knives pierce the target. Now continue."
Seems like I'm the only one who can see it, weird. Continuing to throw the set of knives, I only missed two on the stationary target. I then moved onto the bow. A wooden bow, I grabbed the quiver of 20 or so arrows and got to work. With the accuracy of a god, i pierced through my own arrow on the final shot. To keep this short, I managed to do well with every weapon and was given the class of "Magic Warrior." We then moved onto the final test, battle experience. Moving to the arena, she told me to wait for other combatants to appear, she said that these would be fellow try-outs. It wasn't even 5 minutes before I saw that kid with his bodyguards come out to take his melee weapons test. Doing terribly with every weapon, he was given the offensive mage class. With a entitled look on his face, he would make his way to the arena. His proctor would begin to discuss with mine on the rules of this test and he would stand beside me. Trying to play nice, I would say,
"Um hey there, my name is Eu-"
Before finishing my sentence, the boy would spit at my feet, causing me to move my foot out of the way.
"Ey what the hell is that for?"
I would spat out as he looked at me. We were both around the same height, but what he was wearing was pearly white clothing with golden accents on it. I should have known from that moment what kind of a person he was, he was a stuck up noble. You know, I always wanted to believe in the best in everyone, but this guy was seriously living up to an image that I had no idea where I had seen before of nobles.
"Shut up, pig. I don't want to know such trashes name."
A bit taken aback by the words he spat at me, I would flip him off before turning towards our proctors who came over to us. Explaining that this would be a simple duel, the rules were that there is to be no aiming for a kill shot. We are to only use minimal force to strike at our opponents. They would provide us with an accessory that could prevent a fatal attack if it came at us. The aim was to stop the opponent without activating said accessory, but if it did activate little to no penalty would occur. Allowing us to go and choose out weapon, the boy would already take out a dirty tome from one of his guards' satchels, and I would choose the spear as my weapon of choice. Walking to both ends of the arena, my proctor would stand in the middle and then yell "Fight!" To signify the start of the spar.
Beginning to chant phrases from the back of the stage, I would begin to rush in towards him. Having this been the third day of which i could remember, it seemed my body would have to work off of muscle memory. As I was rushing towards him, I noticed him start chanting as he pointed towards me, soon a fireball would come from his finger and shoot at me. It was fairly slow and fell before me, but it was enough to stop my advance. Not wanting to run through fire, I would stop in my tracks and choose to run around it, but soon another one was shot at me and another and another. Before long, I was stuck at half stage, dodging his projectile attacks that couldn't reach me if I stayed where I was. Looking over at his face, I could see that he was slowly getting more and more irritated by my dodging and staying out of range of his attacks. This seemed to be in my favor because when I dodge his next fireball, he stomped his foot and began to walk towards me. Maybe he thought that since I was going to get closer he should instead which I sort of laughed at. If I were using an offensive mage capability, I wouldn't push my target, rather I would force them to come to me. He had been doing this for a while, but he was impatient. As he got closer he shot another fireball at me which I dodged by simply strafing right then as he chanted, I moved in closer to him. After repeating the process three times, I got close enough to be in striking range. Sadly, or not, he didn't notice this until the butt of my spear was in his gut and he was throwing up onto the arena grounds. Looking over at my proctor and his who were judges, they looked at one another before pointing to my side of the arena and calling this duel over.
I had won my duel and was awarded the E-rank, one rank above the lowest rank, F. I had followed my proctor back to the back room and my ID card was processed into a copper card. This new guild card had a set of carvings in it on the back which could be scanned and show my official guild data anywhere that had a scanner. Also, the front of the card now also displayed my class and guild rank along with my name, age, sex, and city of origin. I had officially become an adventurers guild member and made my first enemy.