A young man sat on the stairway of his rundown apartment building. He took the last cigarette out of his last pack of cigarettes. He sighed as he lit it. He had been laid off from his last job as an overnight clerk at a gas station. The company had gone out of business due to the opening of a mega mart across the street. He was fortunate to be receiving unemployment, but the small check that he received was not nearly enough to cover his expenses.
One might think that he was a bum, but the truth was he was actively looking for a job. The problem was that he did not have any education. The year was 2050, and these days most jobs required a person to have an education. There were a few jobs that would allow a person to scrape by, his previous job being one of those types.
He sighed once again as he looked at the filled-out application in his hand. The application was for the newly risen adventure guild in his town. 5 years ago, the world had changed. Dungeons had randomly appeared in the world. His town had been spared of this issue for most of this time. Not only his town, but his entire country had been spared. The dungeons had appeared mainly in the east, the continent of Asia being hit the hardest.
From there the dungeons had spread like a plague, slowly taking over the world. Finally, three months ago their small town in the middle of nowhere had been infected. The dungeon that had begun to plague their town was only a newborn dungeon and produced the weakest of monsters. But this did not mean that the monsters were something that was easy to handle. Therefore, a new branch of the military had been formed.
This branch was called the adventurer's guild. The guild did not have stringent requirements for their recruits, and the pay was decent. The problem was that the was a high fatality rate for adventurers. Only a fool or someone with no other options would willingly choose this path. That is why the government had given increased incentives for recruitment. Still, the incentives only brought in a couple of recruits, and the adventurers guild was always understaffed.
Th young man hardened his resolve as he stood up from the steps leading into his apartment building. He had no other choice but to go down this path.
The town he lived in was small, and it only took him a couple of minutes to walk to the guild. The guild itself was only a small office building, around the same size as a salon. In truth the building had once been a salon, and the government had simply remodeled it to suit their needs.
Once the young man stepped inside, he was greeted by a large desk that seemed to fill the small reception room. Behind the desk was a woman in her early twenties. She had brown hair, which was worn up in a bun, and wore glasses. She wore the uniform that was synonymous with the adventure guild. Black military fatigues. The fatigues were in the same design as the army uniforms that were common in the turn of the century, ACUs. The difference was that they were pure black. Her last name was listed on the left side of her chest, and her branch on the right. Below them, in the middle was her rank.
The young man briefly collected his thoughts before he began to speak. "Staff sergeant Franks I am here to sign up for the adventurer's guild. I have already filled out the application." His voice was rather soft as he spoke, but he did not hesitate as he spoke the words. He remained standing as he spoke, pushing forward his application on her desk.
The woman did not immediately speak, or even acknowledge his presence as she continued to type on her computer. The action did not disturb the young man, he knew that a woman of her rank had far more pressing things on her mind than the recruitment of a nobody. He stood there patiently waiting for the woman to respond.
He stood there for a total of 30 minutes. He did not move, nor did he speak again. The process was something he was used to. He had previously served in the army for 4 years. When he was honorably discharged, he had received the job at the gas station. With his time served having been only recently he was still accustomed to the mind games the military liked to play with the recruits.
Sergeant franks finally looked down at the application before her. She did not bother to look up at the potential recruit before her, but only silently read the information.
"A high school dropout, it seems that you immediately joined the army once you turned 18. You have experience, but no education. However, on the job training is far more valuable in this line of work than a simple degree. You do understand that the adventurer's guild is nothing like the other of the military correct? You will receive missions, but how you accomplish the mission is up to you. We only care about results."
The young man nodded. This information was already known to him. The adventurer's guild was basically a bunch of mercenaries. They would be assigned a mission and a deadline, but everything else was up to them. These missions however were rather fair. The level of the mission a group could receive was dependent on the average rank of the party the person was assigned to.
The rank a person obtained was based on the number of missions they had successfully completed. The higher a person's rank, the more missions they would have to complete to rank up. A new recruit such as himself was always assigned the rank of private. After their first successful mission they would be ranked up to pv2. Pv3 required an additional 3 successful mission. Specialist required 6 more after than. To reach higher than specialist one would have to display leadership abilities, as the ranks of sergeant and above were normally in charge of a group of people.
The staff sergeant began to speak again. "The first and tenth dungeons you clear are the most important. The first will give you a talent as a reward. Talents are what are depicted in movies these days as superpower. Unfortunately, you have no choice about what your talent will be, even though it will determine your path as an adventurer. The tenth dungeon is where your talent will evolve. That is why after your tenth dungeon you will be considered a specialist. This is where the true area of growth will begin. Once your talent evolves it will be able to grow alongside you."
"In many ways the talent will define you. Fortunately, you will have a small choice as to how evolve your talent. This seems to be a small compensation the dungeons give us, to allow us to best maximize our potential. There are many other steppingstones along the path, but those are the only two that you need to be aware of for the moment."
"At this point, normally your application would be given to a group of sergeants, and they would decide between themselves who would receive you. However, at this point in time my squad happens to have need of fresh recruits, so I was given the right to recruit any that come in. Your experience with the military is a plus, but to be honest with the rarity of applicants these days we are forced to make do with what we can. "
The staff sergeant extended her hand. "Welcome aboard private Stark. "