The six of us decided to press forward. It was still early in the day, and our success in hunting had given us all a boost of energy. We wanted to ride the success wave a little while longer. So we stayed out in the forest for another few hours hunting. We had killed another six goblins by the time we were done, bringing our total number of kills for the day up to ten.
The group talked it over and decided to stop after that. We needed to break down our kills so that we could bring their claws and fangs back to sell. We did the math, and if the goblin bits sold for the same amount they had the other day, we would walk away with fifty copper. Or one silver. We had been able to learn the currency system through our trips to buy food or sell what we could.
Fifty coppers made one silver, twenty-five silvers made one gold, and ten gold made one platinum piece. It was simple enough math to keep track of; the only problem was how difficult it was to make that money. We would have to be out here every day and be just as successful in our hunts every time to start having a living wage. But I didn't feel like thinking about that right now. The group was happy with what we have done today, and I was too. It was, at the very least, a good step forward.
After we were finished breaking down what we needed of the goblins, Tim said a prayer over what was left, and I buried them using my displacement skill. We then headed back towards the city. We were on the main road talking about the day we'd just had. The main talking points were about the four in the group who showed off their combat skills for the first time today.
Grace had used something called "Captive Shout," Which was a skill that allowed her to pull the attention of low-level monsters to attack her.
"When they taught it to me, I didn't think it would be useful, like why would I want to get a monster to attack me?" She laughed at this, and I couldn't help but agree with her. 'I don't think that I'd be brave enough to do something like that.' I thought. Derek had used a skill called "Quick-Step," Which allowed him to move faster by putting magical energy into his feet.
He told us that his teacher said that it could be used on other body parts, but he'd have to pay her for the next lesson to learn how. Sarah's skill was probably the least noticeable unless you were paying a lot of attention. She was embarrassed to tell us what the skill was called after hearing the cool skill names the others had just mentioned. But I reminded her that my skills name was "Displace Dirt." So she decided it was ok to tell us.
"It's just called 'Aim Better.'" She infuses one eye with magical energy, and it's like she can see her target like it's standing just a few feet away. It also changes her eye from a deep brown to a glowing green, which I thought was pretty cool, honestly.
"Some of these teachers don't like to get creative with their names, do they?" Derek said. "They should have called it something like 'Eagle Eye.' Or something cool like that." Sarah nodded her head in agreement. There was only about an hour left on our walk back to the city, but we still decided to take a break and have lunch by the side of the road.
Lunch, unfortunately, only consisted of bread and water, so that was pretty disappointing. But Laura reminded all of us that as soon as we sold all of this, we'd have enough money even to buy some dried meats if we wanted. So we all perked up thinking about what dinner we were going to have tonight.
We sat there for a little while after we ate, just enjoying the sunshine and chatting about what we were going to buy with the money that we made today. I got up to use the bathroom at the woodline, but when I did, I saw a shadow of something coming down the road. It was the main road that was heavily traversed by adventurers and merchants, so I didn't change my plans and went to do my business.
By the time I got back, the shadow was much closer, and we could tell that it was another group of six adventurers. They drew closer until they walked up to us.
"Good weather today, huh?" Said the guy in front. He was dressed in a full set of medium-sized armor, minus his helmet, which he had at his side. He had a big white beard and a head of gray hair as well. 'It must be hard to breathe in that thing.' I thought, looking at his helmet. "How are you doing today?" Grace, our unspoken leader, decided to talk to him.
"Doing well! Just finished our first successful day of hunting, so we're just heading back to sell our spoils at the market place." The man grew a concerned look on his face.
"You mean the Travelers Guild, right?" We all looked at him with confused expressions on our faces, and he sighed. "No one's told you about the travelers guild, have they?" Grace shook her head.
"Would you mind explaining?" He nodded, understanding the situation.
"The Travelers Guild was founded by some of the first people to slip into this world. They discovered how hard it was to come to a new world and learn a new way of living." We were all listening to the man talk intently.
"The Guild helps new travelers such as yourself as kind of a self-contained market place. You can find quests, maps, food, and other items for much cheaper than the civilian market place." Our faces fell hard. We had been paying way more than we needed to for those items. I asked Tim for the map.
"Excuse me, sir, what would something like this go for at the Guild?" I asked while showing the man the map. He took a careful look at it, then gave me an answer.
"A map like this would probably go for about fiver copper." I felt like crying. I spent fifteen copper on this map. By the looks on my friend's faces, they all felt the same way. "I was wondering why you'd go sell your items to the vendors at the market place when the guild usually offers double the money for the same items." Laura started to cry this time. We had faced so much hardship in just the last few days that we'd been here, and there was a place that could have helped us out so much. It was just incredibly frustrating.
"Poor girl!" A female Witch that stood in the back of the man's party cried out. She came over to hug Laura, and Laura, who was in a poor state, welcomed the hug.
"How long have you guys been here?" The man at the front asked us. Grace answered once more for us.
"Just under a week." He nodded.
"That makes sense. I'm sure that things have been challenging for you since you arrived. Let me do something for you." He asked for some paper and a pen from someone else, and they gave it to him. He then asked to use my back to write on, which I obliged. "This is a letter of introduction to the guild explaining your predicament." He handed it to Grace, but we all knew better at this point to accept an item without first learning the cost.
"We have no money to pay you for it right now." Our leader explained to the man. He let out a jolly laugh.
"It's not for sale. I'm giving it to you." He explained back, pushing the paper into Grace's hand. "It's been thirteen years since I came to this world, but I still remember how hard it was in the beginning. If it hadn't been for some dumb luck and the Travelers Guild, who knows, I'd probably be dead by now." The older man's group nodded their heads in agreement, and some of them rolled their eyes and snickered. Probably some inside joke.
"I'm Jakob; people just call me Jake, though." We each shook his hand and introduced ourselves. After that, he explained where the guild was in the city to us so that we wouldn't get lost on the way there. "Well, it was nice meeting you guys. I truly wish you luck in the days to come! We best be getting on our way, though." We each thanked Jake and the members of his group before both parties went their separate ways.
There was a mixture of emotion going on in the group right now. Partially we were happy that we'd made this discovery. The other part was depression because of how much time and energy we had wasted by doing things the way we had been doing them. We no longer talked as we walked, each of us were too busy thinking about all the things that could have been avoided if we had known about the Travelers Guild when we first got here.
We could have bought more food, better gear, and who knows what else. We might have even begun saving already for our next lessons with our teachers. We hadn't made a whole lot to begin with but it was enough to make us wish we'd done things another way. Walking through the city gates though excitement started to make it's way back into me.
I thought about how things were going to be different now. We were better at hunting goblins, we'd learned about the Guild. 'Things are looking up.' The Travelers Guild was located close to city hall which was in the center of town. It didn't take long to find it.
The building was a huge stone structure with pillars. There were giant black banners hanging from the front of the building in between each pillar and each banner had a giant golden "T," on it. 'A little on the nose but ok.' I thought. There was a stair case that led up to some heavy wooden double doors. We pushed them open and entered into the building.
It was amazing on the inside, it had similar decorations like the one outside, but also vendors lined every wall aside from the back wall farthest from us. There was an open kitchen with a desk in front of it where people could put in food orders. The middle area looked similar to a cafe, and there was a second and third level that we hadn't even seen yet. I was blown away thinking how amazing this place was compared to the broken down slums that we lived in.
A boy in his teens wearing a suite approached our group as we were still staring at the inside of the building.
"Excuse me. Are you new Travelers?" He asked. Grace nodded to him managing to close her mouth which had fallen open with shock like the rest of ours. "Oh great! Are you here to join the guild?" She then fished out the letter that Jake had written for them. Grace handed it to the boy and he took it from her. He read every word very carefully.
"Ok. Sounds good!" He said in a cheerful voice. "Usually it's at least one gold piece to join the Travelers Guild, but since Jake is the one introducing you we're going to wave that fee for now until you Travelers get on your feet a little bit better." 'What luck! I wonder who that Jake guy is if he has that kind of power?'
"Well my name is Sean, and I'm the Guilds onboarding manager, so how about we get your team all registered, and then I can show you around! How's that sound?" Sean gave us a big smile, then turned and told us to follow him.