“Dropping the sword off would have been sufficient,” Dunfoo said, speaking to the smith who stood in the middle of his lab. Yotuli sat a few feet away from the halfling, and Hans moved to join Yotuli.

  The smith grinned and shook his head. “This is not a sword you slide under the door.”

  “I’m sure it’s very nice.”

  “You like showing off your work,” Hans said to the halfling. “Give someone else a chance to do the same.”

  “I have no doubts that it’s a lovely blade.”

  “‘Lovely’ is too weak a word.” The smith held up the sword, still in its sheath.

  The bear head pommel was intricate, so detailed that the teeth looked as if they might actually be sharp. Instead of iron gray, this material was a smokey black with white highlights that shifted as the metal caught the light. Contrasted against the darkness of the material, the shadows seemed even deeper, giving the bear head a strange kind of life that wasn’t possible with plain iron. Camahueto leather, also dyed black, hugged the slightly oversized hilt–lengthened to Hans’ specifications, of course.

  The smith gripped the hilt while his other hand held the sheath. He gently pulled the blade partially free of its case, revealing a smokey black edge that looked like a deep navy blue when Hans looked at it just right.

  “May I?” Hans asked, his voice soft and timid, if not a little shaky. He hadn’t gotten to hold this sword yet.

  The smith handed the weapon over with a smile.

  Hans set his grip on the hilt and savored the feeling that spread through his body like the heat of a stiff drink. He felt stronger, sharper, like he could conquer anything. Already boasting a big dumb grin, he drew the sword.

  All of the smith’s swords were well-crafted, and that was true of this one, but the edge of the blade was as thin as a strand of spidersilk, sharpened so finely that it looked odd to the eye, like something unnatural, something impossible to be man-made.

  “Fuuuck,” Hans said. “I don’t ever want to put it down.”

  “Yes, a black sword is quite the dramatic piece,” Dunfoo said. “It’s a shame the bluing won’t last long.” Bluing was the process the smith used to make the blade appear black.

  “Could we not add a Hardening enchantment?” the smith asked.

  “We could, but that would take even longer than Holy. I’m booked up until-”

  “I’ll wait however long you need,” Hans cut in, his eyes never leaving the sword in his hand.

  “Do you need me to come back another time?” Yotuli asked.

  Dunfoo shook his head. “We can still do the blessing. Hardening comes last in the process. I’ve got a lot of work to do before that can happen.”

  The halfling held out his hands. Reluctantly, Hans sheathed his sword and gently passed it to Dunfoo.

  As soon as Dunfoo accepted the blade, his eyes went wide. Then he scowled.

  “You troll fuckers,” the halfing spat. “You didn’t think I might need to know you were using pure gods damn valorite?”

  “I thought the surprise would be more fun,” Hans said.

  “Valorite. Pure fucking valorite.”

  “Please stop yelling that,” Hans urged. “We did the bluing to make that less obvious. The world doesn’t need to know I’m carrying something worth more than Hoseki on my hip.”

  “You don’t think the enchanter needed to know we were using a different material?”

  Hans grimaced. “The honest answer is no, I didn’t think about that.”

  “Why did I think it was a good idea to move to a town full of adventurers?” Dunfoo groaned as he set the sword on a workbench.

  “Would you rather not work with pure valorite?”

  “I didn’t say that, now did I?” Dunfoo gruffed, turning to look over his shoulder only briefly to glare at Hans. “There’s no enchanter more qualified in the alliance.”

  The halfling crossed the room, pulled a desk drawer open, removed a Bunri book, and returned to the workbench. Standing on his tiptoes for a better look, Hans saw Dunfoo filling the page with some kind of alchemical calculation. Olza had similar notations all throughout her work, but Hans didn’t know what any of it meant.

  “What are you-”

  “Shh,” Dunfoo hissed without turning.

  The room sat quietly. Yotuli made a surprised face, which got Hans to giggle. The halfling shot angry looks at both of them and went back to work.

  Ten minutes later, Dunfoo reached for a set of goggles and a metal tool the shape of a pen but with a blunted point. He pressed it into the middle guard between the hilt and the blade. Purple smoke hissed out of the metal as Dunfoo drew a perfect circle no larger than a copper piece.

  The smoke, instead of wafting into the air, sank to the ground like heavy fog. Hans had seen similar reactions in Olza’s work, and she explained that some gases were actually heavier than air. Most of them were rare or invisible to human eyes. Even with that knowledge, however, seeing smoke fall still seemed unnatural to Hans.

  “Miss Yotuli?” Dunfoo stepped away from the sword and let his goggles hang around his neck. “She is ready for your blessing.”

  When Hans initially approached the Cleric to perform the blessing on his sword, she was hesitant. She had never done something like that before and did not want to ruin an exceptional weapon. Dunfoo explained that her blessing should be no different from any other prayer she would offer. He said to think of the blade as if it were a person charged with a Holy mission. If her faith was pure, the blessing would take just fine.

  “You are the protector of bastards and wanderers. You see the forgotten. You see the downtrodden. You are the champion of the discarded and the unwanted. Yours is the hand that raises when the rest of the world turns away. May the spirits of bastards and wanderers give you strength. May Daojmot bless you for standing proudly among bastards and wanderers.”

  Yotuli stepped back when she finished her prayer.

  “Did I do it right?” she asked.

  Dunfoo pulled a loop from his pocket. Dozens of lenses hung from the circle like keys on a keyring, their shapes and colors and textures varying wildly. He thumbed through several before stopping on a piece of diamond-shaped black glass. He held the dark lens over the circle on the guard and squinted.

  “Well done, Miss Yotuli.”

  “That’s it?”

  “For your part,” Dunfoo grumbled. “I have many hours of work ahead of me.”

  “Oh.”

  Did you know this story is from Royal Road? Read the official version for free and support the author.

  “Faith isn’t visually impressive, I’m afraid. I can assure you the blessing is in place. My talent and the Holy water will take care of the rest.”

  Hans opened his mouth to ask how long that would take, but he held his tongue. Instead, he said, “Thank you, all of you, for doing this.”

  “True gratitude is reflected in coin,” Dunfoo replied.

  Hans laughed. “Right. Of course it is.”

  A round of greetings got Hans’ attention. He looked up from his guild hall desk to see Charlie shaking hands with adventurers as he made his way to the Guild Master. He had a box in his arms, and it smelled like apple pie. Hans very much hoped the pie was meant for him.

  “Guild Master,” Charlie said, stopping in front of the desk. He did not, however, set the box down.

  “Mayor,” Hans replied.

  “Folks getting off the ferry said the snow’s here.”

  “Oh yeah?”

  “Mmhmm. Won’t be long before the pass is closed.”

  “I appreciate the update.”

  “A few months ago, I was told that a certain set of bones couldn’t be moved until the snow melted. Summer has come and gone, and the bones ain’t moved.”

  Active Quest: Relocate the titan bones to the dungeon entrance.

  “I haven’t intentionally put it off,” Hans said. “Things just keep coming up.”

  “Are we waitin’ another winter then?”

  “Probably.”

  Charlie let out a resigned sigh. “Very well. I’m going to find Galad and see if he needs any help packing for the trip.”

  “Charlie.”

  “Yes?” the Mayor paused a few steps away from the desk to look back at Hans.

  “What’s in the box?”

  “Apple pie.”

  “Who’s it for?”

  “Guild Masters who clean up after themselves.” Charlie turned and strolled toward the door. Hans thought he caught a smirk on the Mayor’s face as he did.

  “That’s playing dirty!” Hans yelled.

  Charlie shrugged, waved, and shut the guild hall door behind him.

  ***

  “With Wargod out of the dungeon, our field trip to Hoseki should be a lot less stressful,” Devon said in between gulps from his waterskin. “That’s a weight off my mind.”

  Hans laughed. “All of my stress comes from worrying about you guys. You, Galad, and Yotuli are taking the biggest risks. Removing Wargod is kind of like cutting down on chores.”

  “If you have any advice about how I should play this, I’m open.”

  “The visit to Hoseki you mean?”

  “Yeah.”

  “After seeing how you handled the Prince, I’m not sure I can really contribute. You’ve had way more practice with that echelon of society, and you seem pretty good at it.”

  “Rodrigo isn’t his father,” Devon replied. “All Rodrigo needs is to feel like one of the guys and to get his ego stroked a bit. The King is smarter and much more serious.”

  Hans thought. “Letting Galad handle things has worked pretty well for me so far. His brain is a lot better with leadership and diplomacy than mine.”

  “I’m going to have to say something, though.”

  “Can’t just do the handoff like you did with the Merchant?”

  “I doubt it.”

  “Be direct,” Hans began. “Don’t let anyone rile you up. Stick to the facts. Remember why you’re there.”

  Devon nodded.

  “That’s shit for advice,” Hans added. “I know that’s not really anything.”

  “What if it all goes to shit?”

  “Get our people out with as little bloodshed as possible, I guess.”

  “If it really goes to shit, it’s not going to be a little.”

  “I know.”

  “And pretty much all of that blood would just be innocent folk following orders.”

  “Yeah.”

  Devon sighed. “I’ve been debating asking one of our riders to come along. I don’t like adding a fourth, but that would mean someone watching the birds while we’re getting our audience. Leaving them unattended feels like asking for trouble.”

  “That’s smart.”

  “This pisses me off so much,” Devon said, dropping to sit in the dirt. “Devontes the Paladin. What the fuck is that?”

  Hans listened but didn’t speak.

  “Do you think the Merchant was bullshitting about me being selected by my god and all that?”

  “It’s possible, but I don’t see why he would lie.”

  “There’s no way I’m the best person he’s seen. How the fuck am I the pinnacle of good? Gods.

  I’m a fucking asshole.”

  “Is this you asking or is this you venting?” Hans asked.

  “Both.”

  “Even within the alliance, cultures can vary pretty dramatically. Dwarves are more communal than humans. Lizardmen do a lot more to live in harmony with nature. And halflings… Well, halflings are halflings.”

  Devon chuckled.

  “What I’m trying to say is that we have no idea how close our idea of ‘good’ is to your god’s idea of ‘good.’ The tall ones lived in a very different time, so who knows how that affected their values. The only real insight the Merchant gave us there was that the tall ones valued peace. I feel like it’s implied that they were pacifists, but that’s me taking some liberties that weren’t explicit.”

  The Paladin spit a mouthful of water into the dirt. “We know it’s not tied to being lawful. We break a few dozen laws every day.”

  “That’s true.”

  “Gods, forget it. Ready for another round?”

  “I don’t mind talking about this,” Hans said.

  “I’ve done this thousands of times.”

  Devon bounced in place. He likely didn’t need the small warmup to come out of a break this brief, but Hans suspected years of doing that pre-boon made it more of a ritual now than an actual physical need.

  “I never get beyond the kids. No matter how much I twist it, I can’t see a way that cutting down children is anything but evil.”

  “I know this is hard to talk about, so please tell me to shut the fuck up at any point, but maybe that’s your answer.”

  “I don’t follow.”

  “If you didn’t go to Tsumi, at best the kingdom loses a bunch more soldiers. The orcs would still use tusk kids as vessels, so they’re gone no matter what. The more likely outcome, though, was that those soldiers get decimated like was predicted. Then the orcs would move on to hurt more people and to use more children.”

  “My lesser evil makes it good?”

  “Shit, man,” Hans said. “I don’t really know anything. I’ve just seen around here how much weight good people carry for everyone else. Galad had to sit on the news about tusk numbers until the Prince left, and even then, he had to be the one to decide that everyone keeps working. I’ve had monks argue with me that a lie by omission is no different from any other lie, and lots of cultures would mourn for weeks if that many of theirs died. Whole cities would shut down. Gomi didn’t have that option, so Galad made the call to take that responsibility off of everyone else.”

  “I admire Galad as much as anyone, but that’s not quite to the level of massacring children.”

  “No, it’s not,” Hans admitted, “but maybe being ‘good’ has very little to do with arbitrary rules or even with how you feel about yourself and your choices.”

  “Then what does it have to do with?”

  “Sacrifice. What your choices do for other people rather than what they do for you. Maybe?” Hans drew his sword and walked across the canyon toward his starting position. “All the best people I’ve ever known would never describe themselves as ‘good people.’ All I’m good at is killing. I know fuck all about philosophy or whatever.”

  Hans assumed his stance.

  The Paladin launched a Blade Beam and followed it with a Dash. The clash of sword striking sword echoed through the canyon but was soon drowned out by destruction.

  Active Quest: Learn to help your advanced students as much as you help beginners.

  Had Hans succeeded in doing that here? Though the conversation felt productive, Hans wasn’t sure about its real impact. That was another benefit of teaching beginners: the success of a lesson was typically plain to see. More advanced students needed smaller tweaks and adjustments, making much of their late-career progress invisible to anyone but themselves, if even they could see it.

  And helping advanced students outside of the training room was even worse. Hans had no real idea of what worked or didn’t.

  But he was trying.

  Open Quests (Ordered from Old to New):

  Complete the next volume (Bronze to Silver) for “The Next Generation: A Teaching Methodology for Training Adventurers.”

  Learn to help your advanced students as much as you help beginners.

  Relocate the titan bones to the dungeon entrance.

  Master your Diamond boon.