Alex entered the guild hall with a smile.

  Several weeks had passed since the kobold extermination outside Tirat, and he had barely slowed down in that time. The missions had quickly blurred together—escort work along forest roads, clearing out small monster nests, delivering valuable goods, clearing out small monster nests. Lots of clearing out small monster nests.

  Bronze work, through and through. Nothing that ever truly challenged him, but enough to advance his rank up requirements.

  Mira, Rhen, and Joras had ended up being his default party for most missions almost by accident. After the kobold mission, they’d regrouped for another job, then another after that. While they’d initially struggled due to lack of experience, the trio were soon more than capable of completing the missions they took without needing to be rescued.

  The only reason it hadn’t been every mission was Alex himself.

  The others needed rest. Time to recover, to eat properly, to sleep more than a few hours at a stretch. Alex did not. More than once, he’d returned from a mission, handed in proof, and immediately scanned the board again, selecting another job before the others had even finished discussing where to get dinner. Those were the times he’d gone alone or joined other temporary groups, leaving Mira shaking her head and telling him he was insane.

  But his hard work had paid off.

  After several more missions and a few dozen more creature’s worth of blood, Alex had finally gained enough power to infuse a ninth body part after the last mission. Now, only one more was left before he could fully strengthen himself, and he felt that he would experience a large leap in strength when that happened.

  Speaking of growing stronger, this was also the first time Alex had seen how the people of this world trained.

  Due to how much time he had been spending with the trio, occasionally even sleeping on the road together, it was inevitable that they’d all learn more about each other. For example the fact that the trio had run away from their village when Mira’s parents tried to force her into a marriage with some asshole.

  Or that Rhen was training to be a body mage.

  It really shouldn’t have come as a surprise to Alex, given that it was the obvious path for an adventurer to take. What had surprised him was that Rhen had access to the knowledge required to do so.

  As far as he was aware, all three of them were from rather ordinary families, very solidly in the working class. This contradicted his existing knowledge that books on magic and the like were expensive luxuries only available to the rich. When he’d asked about that, he’d been met with a series of blank stares.

  As it turned out, knowledge on magic was not a restricted resource here, or in any other country the trio knew of. In fact, every library usually contained a few books on the basics of magic practice, including the one in Luterra. Sure, if you wanted some super-secret uber powerful spells, you would struggle to find them, but the basics of casting and body imbuement were common knowledge.

  Alex could only assume that Elara had lied to him in order to make him believe that her book was valuable. The other—more likely—answer was that it was just another quirk of Orenthia. He was beginning to think that his starting location was exceedingly unlucky.

  Alex shook his head to get rid of the distracting thoughts and focused on his purpose here.

  Ranking up.

  Today marked his eighth bronze mission. He’d checked, and the goblin raid counted as one too, which made nine. Combined with the two woods he’d done when he first joined, he now officially qualified to become a bronze rank adventurer.

  “See ya guys.” He waved goodbye to his companions.

  “Good luck.” Mira called back after him with a grin. “Don’t forget about us when you make it big!”

  “Sorry, but I fully plan on switching up on my day ones.” Alex shrugged helplessly, ignoring their confused looks.

  With a skip in his step, he made his way over to the reception desk.

  Polly wasn’t there today. Instead, another clerk he recognised looked up as Alex approached and broke into an easy smile.

  “Back again?” the young man said. “Let me guess—here to turn in another mission?”

  Alex nodded. “Something like that.”

  The clerk—Jeff—had neatly combed hair and a seemingly permanently ink-stained shirt. Alex had gotten to know him over the past few weeks through the sheer frequency of his visits to the guild. Jeff was almost always here when Alex came back from a job, and he made for decent company. They’d talked enough that the exchanges had shifted from purely professional to casually friendly, though Alex wouldn’t really consider him as anything more than an acquaintance.

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  Jeff had once mentioned, almost offhandedly, that he’d wanted to be an adventurer himself. He never specified what exactly went wrong, but from his expression Alex figured the reality of adventuring wasn’t as fun and exciting as he expected. Instead, he’d settled behind the desk, helping people who still walked the path he no longer could.

  “Finished my last Bronze,” Alex continued. “I was told that makes me eligible to rank up.”

  The man’s eyebrows lifted slightly. “Ah. Congratulations.” He pulled a ledger from beneath the desk and began flipping through it with practiced ease. “Name?”

  Alex gave him a wry look, which was hidden by the helmet he was wearing. “You know my name, Jeff.”

  “Yes, but I need you to say it. What if you’re some sort of demon that ate this poor young adventurer and are now wearing his skin as a disguise?” The young clerk joked, though Alex could see that about halfway through the sentence, it had turned into a genuine worry.

  “Fine, fine,” Alex raised his hands. “I’m Alexander. I joined the guild about two or three weeks ago. I’m here to rank up from wood to bronze. Happy?”

  “Very.” The young man nodded and flipped over to a page. After a quick read through, he marked something in the ledger then extended a hand. “Now I just need your current badge and a payment of ten silvers, and you’ll officially be a bronze rank adventurer. How exciting.”

  Alex handed over the badge and hesitantly counted out the money. “Is that it?”

  Jeff glanced up from the ledger, pen pausing mid-scratch. “Were you expecting more?”

  “That’s… kind of disappointing,” Alex admitted.

  He’d been expecting some sort of test. A trial. An evaluation. Someone important coming over to size him up. At least some sort of interview to mark his promotion. This felt very… anticlimactic.

  “Well, sorry to disappoint.” Jeff snorted. “There isn’t any ‘test’ of some kind because the qualifications to rank up are the test themselves. If you can complete twenty missions of your level—or even better, ten a level above you—then any test will simply reinforce what you have already proven. Guild resources are better spent elsewhere.”

  Having received the money, Jeff slipped it into a small box beneath the desk, then opened another drawer and pulled out a shiny bronze badge in the shape of a shield. It was heavier than the wood one and cool to the touch, its surface engraved with countless tiny lines and swirls—enchantments.

  “There you go,” Jeff said, sliding it across. “Bronze-ranked adventurer. Officially. Once again, congratulations.”

  Alex picked it up, turning it over once, then clipped it in place.

  “Still,” the clerk said, “you’ve been moving fast. Don’t burn yourself out.”

  Alex returned the smile. “I’ll try.”

  “Oh yeah, before you go,” Jeff knocked on his desk. “I hear a new replacement guild master has been sent by the guild. They should be coming in the next couple of days. I thought you’d like to know.”

  “Oh, that’s cool.” Alex nodded, unsure why he was being told this. “Thanks for letting me know.”

  He pulled away from the desk and left the guild hall, the bronze badge catching the light as he pushed through the doors.

  Alex didn’t head far after leaving the guild. His feet carried him toward the inn, following a routine that had settled in over the past few weeks.

  The common room was lively, warm with noise and conversation. Grenil was easy to spot. He sat at the front of the room, mug in hand, leaning forward as he spoke animatedly. Sophia stood nearby behind the bar, arms crossed, listening with an amused expression as Grenil launched into yet another long-winded story.

  Alex was noticed partway through and waved over enthusiastically. “Alex! Perfect timing. I was just getting to the best part.”

  Sophia laughed. “He says that every time.”

  Alex smiled faintly and took a seat, letting the normality of the scene wash over him. Grenil looked good. Better than he had in a long time. His face had more colour, his hands steadier as he gestured. Duran sat nearby as well, quiet as usual. Outwardly, at least, he looked fine. Alex had made sure to feed him at least once a week ever since the incident with Darcy, and he had yet to run out of mana since.

  Speaking of Darcy…

  Alex took a deep breath and cleared his throat when there was a lull in the conversation. Once he had everyone’s attention, he gave Sophia a meaningful look.

  “I would like to talk to you guys about something.” He watched as the innkeeper took the hint and wandered out of earshot. “I just officially ranked up to bronze. Now that I’ve achieved my short-term goal and money isn’t as much of a problem, I think we should discuss what our long-term plans are going to be.”

  Grenil adopted a serious expression, and even Duran shifted in his seat.

  “As we all know, despite doing our best to ignore it, Duran has a problem.” Alex leaned back in his chair and crossed his arms. “What do we do about the fact that he has no soul?”

  “Is it really that much of a problem?” Grenil countered. “Ever since you started consistently… refilling him, he talks, he thinks, he remembers. If you hadn’t told me—if that elf hadn’t told us—I wouldn’t know anything was wrong.”

  “That kind of is the problem,” Alex replied. “Outwards, functionally, he’s fine. But that doesn’t change the fact that he’s not. Sure, it looks like if I simply don’t let him run out of mana, he won’t shut down and forget things, but who knows what will happen in the future? Are you really saying you’re okay with having Duran return to the state he was in when I revived him last time, or worse?”

  Grenil let out a slow breath and leaned back. “But what can we do about it? Despite my age, I don’t really know how one would go about regaining a soul. That seems like the domain of the gods. Really powerful ones at that.”

  Alex hesitated. “That… is true.”

  He leaned back in his chair, gaze unfocused for a moment as he considered it. The truth was uncomfortable, but the old man had a point. There was nothing they could do for Duran right now—even if Alex were willing to do whatever it took, he needed to actually know what that was. He needed to at least find out where to go if he wanted to make a difference.

  “I’ll focus on getting stronger,” he said instead. “I still haven’t reached my limit in terms of mana, and I think something drastic will change when I do. It might give us some hints for how to fix Duran, since it is my power after all.”

  Grenil studied him for a moment, then nodded. “Then you best get to it, shouldn’t you? What are you doing still chatting with us?”

  “Damn, my bad.” Alex raised his hands defensively. “I didn’t realise that I wasn’t even allowed to rest here. I’ll get right on it master!”

  The two of them chuckled for a bit, then Alex got up. “But actually though, I need a break. I’ve been doing missions non-stop for the past few weeks, and even I’m feeling a bit worn out. I think I’ll take the rest of today and tomorrow off, and get back into it after that.”

  The others nodded in understanding, and Alex headed upstairs to rest.

  ‘In the end it still all comes down to getting stronger.’ He grinned. ‘I can’t say I hate it.’