Chương 26: The Monster Hunter Guild

Kirby was a haggard, gray-haired man, sitting behind a desk overloaded with similar stone tablets the reception lady had sorted through.

"Come in, boys, come in," he greeted them, smiling, "You're here to register with the guild?" Evan and Oliver nodded nervously.

"Fantastic," Kirby said, waving them closer.

"I need to take a look at your ledgers so I can fill in the details on your registration forms." Before Evan could ask how exactly that worked, a prompt appeared in his field of view. [Kirby Alberi is requesting access to your ledger. Allow access? Y/N] Evan selected yes and stood still, as if moving might somehow disturb Kirby's inspection. He expected to feel something as the other man rummaged through his stat screens, some kind of intrusion, but nothing happened.

He was about to ask if everything was working correctly when Kirby let out a low whistle.

"A mythical affinity. Now that's something I've never seen before, and that says something, young man, because I've been doing this job for a very long time."

"Uh, yeah, I kinda… stumbled upon it."

"Don't worry, you don't have to reveal where you got it from. The guild requires a lot of information from its members, but that's not one of them." Evan waited patiently while Kirby studied his stats and recorded every detail onto one of those stone tablets with a pen. The entire process took almost fifteen minutes, and then it was Oliver's turn. Finally, Kirby put away the tablets with a satisfied nod.

"Alright, boys, last step. I'll have to ask you for the admission fee, I'm afraid." Both Oliver and Evan handed over the five hundred mana stones. Kirby watched them pile up the stones on his desk with a frown.

"You two need to visit a bank to have those mana stones fused."

"To have them what?" Evan asked, puzzled. Oliver explained it to him.

"Banks can combine multiple mana stones into a single larger stone without them losing their mana. Ten, a hundred, a thousand… I've never seen a mana stone with a value over a thousand, but I guess they exist." Evan looked at the huge pile of stones on Kirby's desk and nodded.

"Yeah, I see why this would be more practical."

"The yearly fee is due on the day of the winter solstice," Kirby said.

"So you've got plenty of time to save up the money. Please make sure you pay on time. The late fees every year are causing Jane from next door a huge headache."

"What about the percentage of the loot we have to give to the guild?" Evan asked, "How often do we have to hand that in?"

"Oh, that only applies to official guild-organized expeditions, but you have to be at least rank 5 to join them, so no need to worry about that yet." Evan and Oliver grinned at each other.

"That's a relief, because right now we need any mana stone we can get."

"That's how it is when you're just starting out," Kirby said with a mild smile.

"But work hard and make the guild proud by killing lots of monsters, and you'll soon find yourself with more money than you know what to do with. Do you two have any other questions?"

"Uh, no. I guess we'll figure the rest out as we go?"

"We have a guide for new members." Kirby handed each of them a stone tablet filled with glowing letters. To his surprise, Evan quickly found out that touching the lower right corner of the tablet erased the letters and replaced them with new words, almost like flipping a page in a book or swiping on a smartphone.

"The tablets contain the official rules of conduct, a list of guild houses all over the continent, a list of training courses and personal trainers you can book here in the Stormhaven headquarters, and a monster glossary with useful tips and strategies about how to fight them." Evan flipped through the pages. Training courses? A monster glossary? This tablet alone was already worth the admission fee. Kirby returned to his desk and took two shiny metal badges out of a small wooden box.

"Here you go. Your badges. Copper for now, but you can earn a higher standing and a prettier badge by joining guild expeditions and completing mission, posted either on the guild hall boards or on local boards in more remote towns and villages that don't have guild houses." The genuine version of this novel can be found on another site. Support the author by reading it there. He carefully placed the badge in Evan's open palm.

As soon as the metal touched his skin, he felt a tingling warmth spreading from his hand to the rest of his body.

"They print on you the moment you touch them. You can use them as identification. They'll grant you access to all guild facilities all over the world."

"What comes after copper?" Oliver asked, holding his shiny badge with a proud smile.

"After copper comes bronze. Then silver, gold and diamond," Kirby explained, "But only very few guild members ever earn their diamond badge." Evan was happy with the copper badge for now. The front of the badge showed the monster hunter guild's symbol. A sword crossing a monster fang. The plain backside carried an engraving: Evan Randall - Celestial - Rank 3. He had it in writing. Evan was now an official member of the Monster Hunter Guild.

With their brand-new badges proudly pinned to their chests, Oliver and Evan returned to the auction house to make good use of their guild member discount. As they made their way to the skill gem vendor, weaving through the bustling crowd, Evan pulled out his guild tablet and looked through the pages. Just as he'd hoped, he quickly found a long list of recommended skill-gem-affinity-combinations. Maybe this would help him make a decision about which gem to buy. He was worried about making the wrong decision.

Who knew when he would reach rank 4? It could take him months, even years, to earn the next two skill slots, so he needed to choose wisely, because whatever skills he got, he would be stuck with for a while. Oliver's Earth affinity was easy to find. It was quite high on the list, with other affinities rated common, like Stone, Ember, Glass, Cat, or Lizard. He skimmed over some uncommon affinities like Water, Shadow, or Bear. Alex's Storm affinity was rated rare in the list.

He found it right next to other interesting-sounding things like Starlight, Magma, and Dream. There was a very short list of epic rarity affinities, which included the Plague affinity that one aristocrat had forced his entire family to take before getting into some kind of war with the guilds. Harmony, Omen, Titan… and then the list ended. Confused, Evan flipped a few pages back and forth, but to his disappointment, he found nothing about his mythical Celestial affinity.

"My affinity doesn't show up in the list," Evan muttered.

"I'm not surprised," Oliver said.

"I told you it's super special. They probably don't have any data on it, so they can't include it."

"Lucky me."

"You really are lucky, man. A mythical affinity… some people would kill to get their hands on one of those. Literally, by the way. You need to watch out for that."

"Huh?"

"When a mana user dies, there's a very high chance their body will drop a shard of their affinity and a somewhat lower chance an intact affinity crystal will be left behind as loot." Evan looked at him, eyes wide.

"Are you telling me people might literally murder me to loot my dead body for my Celestial affinity crystal?" Oliver scratched the back of his head, looking uncomfortable.

"Yeah, I'm afraid that's something that could happen. So you either never ever use your skill, because they would quickly give you away, or you become stronger very fast." Evan shook his head.

"I should've known there was some kind of catch. That's great. Just great. It's not enough to be thrown into a completely different world with freaking monsters roaming around… now whoever's responsible for that also decided it would be funny to paint a big fat target on my back." Oliver gave him a sympathetic look. He hesitated a moment before he spoke again.

"If you want out of our team and want to try to live a normal life, I get it. I'm sure you could find normal work around here. You would be much safer that way." Evan didn't even consider the suggestion. Gain cool magical powers and then hide away and live an ordinary life out of fear?

"Absolutely not!" Oliver looked startled by the sudden emotional outburst.

"Okay, so we're…"

"We're going to hunt some monsters. That's what we're going to do." Oliver raised his hands in a defensive gesture.

"I'm on board, Evan. No need to yell. But before we head out, we need to fill your skill slot. Have you decided which skill gem you're going to get?" Evan returned the guild tablet to his inventory with a huff.

"Since this list is useless, I'm going to pick whatever I like best. I'm going to pick the Gem of the Projectile. That'll give me a ranged attack option, hopefully. That the one weakness in my skill set at the moment." Oliver grinned.

"Listen to you. You're starting to sound like a proper Ascender." Evan tapped the badge on his chest.

"Guild registered!" With his good spirits returned, they went back to the gem vendor, where Evan purchased the Gem of Projectiles for 578 mana stones. A hefty price, even with the guild member discount applied, but Evan felt good about his choice when he put the shimmering green gem into his inventory. The next stop was the affinity crystal store. The vendor behind the counter looked pretty bored, but his face lit up when he spotted two customers approaching.

"Good day, young monster hunters. How can I be of service?" Oliver puffed out his chest a little, clearly enjoying his new status as a guild member.

"We want to buy a Metal affinity crystal."

"Then you're in luck. I have a few left from the guild's last raid. They smoked out a Steelclaw lair and brought in a huge haul of Metal affinity shards and crystals."

"Great. We'll take one."

"All right, that'll be 6700 mana stones." Oliver's face froze.

"Wait, what?"

"With the guild discount and all?" Evan asked. The vendor nodded.

"I already subtracted the appropriate amount, yes."

"But we sold our Stone affinity crystal for much less," Oliver complained.

"How can that be? They're both common crystals."

"They are, but Metal is very sought after because so many crafters use it. Supply and demand, young man, that's how it works." Faced with their economic reality, Oliver visibly deflated.

"Damn it. We can't afford that, Evan." Evan put his hand on Oliver's shoulder in a comforting gesture, then turned back toward the vendor.

"Not yet, but we can earn more money, Olly. Can you put one aside for us if we promise to return with the mana stones later?" The vendor pursed his lips.

"How much later?"

"How much time can you give us?"

"Hm… a week. That's the best I can do. Like I said, Metal affinity crystals are a hot commodity."

"Okay, we'll take it. A week from now, we're going to be back with the money."