Walking around hooded was one thing. Walking around clothed like a British aristocrat… definitely something else.
Back then people stared. But they mostly stared because I was tall and I was walking with half-deads and stuff.
Now, they were staring… directly at my damn face. Yes, my face was on full display, my bony fleshless face! Also, the damn clothes!
Some were staring, others were whispering, and then there were the typical praying bunch. Sigh. This was a walking nightmare. And the guild was how far?
One whole kilometer!
Argh!
"Something wrong, sire?" Sierre asked.
"Nothing. Say, you keep saying one of the guilds, but, how many are there?"
"About seven, I think," Escalor said. "The nearest one is the merchant's guild but since you wanted to visit the adventurer's guild, we're taking a minor detour."
Merchants. Adventurers. Then the others were probably something more like magic and medicine and all kinds of stuff?
"What do these guilds do?"
"They oversee individual business or adventurers. For adventurers' Guild, they take in quests from the townsfolk or the nobility and act as a middleman. They will make sure the job is done and the client pays in full; they will keep a small amount for them. Meanwhile, Adventurers will have a job. Everyone wins."
Made sense. One organization overseeing a lot of smaller organizations or people in this case, so they didn't go out of line and did their jobs right, kind of obvious. I could see why games and stories always had them.
"But who controls the guild?"
"The governor does. And the king controls the governor, and then the emperor, the king. Although, most guilds are intercontinental, hence they act on a neutral basis and only listen to the governor when they're cornered or have made a big 'oopsie'" Escalor snickered. "All the guilds have central hubs however which are again, neutral."
Huh….
Anyway-
Sigh… the damn stares were really digging deep. But at the same time, it was proof I was alive in some form. After all, I was here. And now that I was here, Let's make it work this time.
Let's at least not get scammed and die again. Assuming I could die and stuff.
***
Squeak.
The guild, or rather, the Adventurer's guild was a simple place.
You register with some insurance money. You do the quests they give you. And you get paid for it. They keep a bit of your money for taxation and well… other fees.
Basically, a job. But unlike a job, you decided what quests you were going to do, at least to some extent.
"Hey, that's a skeleton."
"What? I'm sure it's just a mask."
"What're you talking about, I could see through a mask and-"
"Maybe one of the castle high nobles?"
"Are you kidding me, they never come out!"
People were talking. There were all sorts of people here. Warriors, mages, rogues and all kind. I could tell them apart thanks to their clothing or armor of choice. And of course, their weapons. The mages in particular wore robes of three different colors: red, white, purple and all had either a stick or a wand. The warriors were hard to define as some had plate armor but carried a bow, while others wore leather but had a big fat axe on their backs. And then there were the other ones who didn't fit in any particular category I knew of; swords and spears, shields and staffs, double shields and so on. One guy was dual wielding a sword and a wand.
There were all kinds of people here and everyone was staring at us, or rather me.
And me? I was only staring at one person. Who wasn't staring back. Elf!
These people had at least some deformity and were classified under the term: Demihumans. Humanlike, but not human. Apparently, there was only one human country in the world and it was quite a way from here. But who cared about that crap.
There was an elf in front (Three meters away) of me. A hot elf! Or at least that's what I wanted to say. But there was nothing hot about this guy. And yes, guy. Long face, kind of thin, and kind of dead eyes. Also, he was in rags, not fancy elven clothes. What even was elven clothes though. 'This ain't a fairytale dude, chill.' Yeah, I had to get my head out of the gutter.
"The guild master will see you shortly," the lady said, coming back to the reception. She'd been gone for a while now. Particularly why we were still standing behind the reception like morons. "So, follow me."
This guild was mostly wooden and fairly big with the capacity to maybe comfortably hold about a thousand people at once. I saw only about fifty though.
We were led to a wooden staircase near the far east corner of the building. The stairs squeaked but they weren't weak. Once up, we were led again to the corner where one door was different. While every other door was wooden, this one was silvery in color. Didn't strike me as metallic but did seem odd.
"You may enter-" Came the solemn voice. We didn't even have to knock.
"Please excuse me," The receptionist promptly left.
Escalor opened the door. "After you, my lord."
I entered, followed by Siarre and then Escalor himself who closed the door.
"Greetings, my lord," The man welcomed us. Fair, blonde, a gentle face but fire in his eyes. "Aloglass Xe Borges," He stood up, offered his hand for a shake, and motioned for the chair before his table. "Please call me Aloglass."
And really, he did seem like a human. He didn't have any deformities like the rest of the people. Except for the long ears, probably an elf? I say probably because the one outside had clearly longer ears.
"Sean Jackson," I said. "A newly revived Skeleton." I figured it was about time to just come out clean. I wasn't one of their prime whatever. I was just another skeleton.
I hadn't mentioned my name to my companions so they were a little shocked at first that I remembered and actually didn't bother to tell them. Particularly why Escalor was so stunned he didn't talk for a good three minutes but then relayed my message anyway.
"So, it's true," the blue haired lady next to Aloglass said. "A skeleton really was born anew…" Light blue hair, leather armor, brawny.
"And we would like you to bear witness to my lord, so we may claim this information in our own lands," Escalor said. "We would like to use your network."
"Now hold on," There was another man in the room. Curly hair, black skin, one eyed. "Accessing the network means ten Hex coins." He was muscular but thin. In a way, he didn't seem all that special but something about him, something just felt off.
Coins. Apparently, these coins had value depending on how many corners they had. Hex coins or rather the six cornered ones were at the top. With just one coin you could buy ten thousand pieces of bread, or so Siaree had told me.
She'd already explained the other coins like the Traingular (Triag), the Rectangular (Quad) and Pentagon (Pent) coins before. They did have round coins but those were obsolete now and were just valued as less than Triag coins.
"We know that," Siarre said. "But we were hoping you'd waive that in favor of our lord."
"And what will we get out of it?" Aloglass said.
"I will join your guild as an adventurer," I said. Escalor translated on my behalf.
Brows raised, clearly surprised. Actually, all of them were. Even Siarre was a little surprised.
"You would become an… adventurer?" The one-eyed man paused. "Are you sure… my lord?" He seemed reluctant to trust me. Which was kind of understandable. I mean, I was a skeleton. A walking, talking skeleton…. "But you are a noble."
Noble?
I'd already made that part out for myself. But I wasn't part of their so called Top ten and I didn't live in their grand undead age. I was just another guy who died and got reincarnated or something. So, I didn't think they'd consider me a noble. A noble being, sure. But a full-fledged aristocrat? Wait, come to think of it, wasn't that exactly how everyone had been treating me so far?
Granted, I was a little slow at these things. scratch that, I was very slow. But- This can work… this can definitely work.
"Yes."
"If he wishes so, then so be it," Aloglass said. "However, the fee cannot be waived even for my lord. It can be halved, however."
Escalor sighed, "Half is achievable but we need to get this information quickly. We still have to pay back the clothing shop…"
"These three quests should at least fetch 30 Pent Coins," Siarre said; they'd already completed them on their way here. "Would it be possible to use the network and pay back the rest of 20 Pent coins later?"
Aloglass sighed. "Very well. But Sir Sean Jackson must register today and offer us some leeway if we ever get in trouble with the town governor."
I had a feeling I was getting myself dragged into random trouble. But I kind of welcomed this. Why? Because they were open about it. They didn't try to hide the fact that they were going to use me if they needed to. Which was why-
"And in return I would expect the guild to aid me if I were to get into legal trouble with the state in let's say another country," I said.
The blue haired woman snorted. "We are but a guild, a powerless organization, how could we-"
"You are but a guild, yes. But you are also all over the world. You are hardly powerless."
"You speak as though you plan to get in trouble with the states…" Aloglass mumbled and then cleared his throat. "Very well. We accept your terms and would honor our contract, as long as you would, but since you'd like to use our whole network as a bargaining right. We would appreciate if you helped mediate all our affairs with local lords should you be there." The man leaned forward, reaching for my hands.
Rather hard bargain. "Sure, why not?" I grabbed his hand- my bony fingers wrapped around his warm flesh. A nostalgic yet troubling feeling. I could certainly feel my mouth water… 'And I thought, I didn't need food.' Huh!
Blue writings covered our hands, and the writings stitched into our flesh, or in my case, bones and then disappeared.
Contractual magic, huh?