4. Adventurer’s guild

At dawn the first trays of sun woke Waldina up. A quick glance to her surroundings and she was sure of it: She was still in the game world. That lowered the likelihood of extremely realistic long dream quite a bit. On the other hand, it became more likely that her new reality was in fact that of the game’s. The purple haired ninja became more determined and she made a plan for her day’s activities. She was in need of Adventurer’s card and membership of Adventurer’s guild. On top of that she desperately wanted to get her hands on water and fire magic books as it would help her daily activities a lot. Not to mention all the weapons she needed to buy. Vermell, the boss for the first stage-exam, wasn’t exactly an easy opponent.

All in all, there was a lot she needed to get done.

Quickly Waldina put on her black ninja dress, shorts and thigh belts. Then she put on her weapons, swords to their sheaths, shurikens and daggers to thigh belts. Next she took a bit of money out of the bracelet’s storage and transferred those to her pockets. Finally she headed outside.

As soon as she got outside she turned from the main street to one smaller street. The street was full of restaurants and cafés, as it had been in the game. Each place had a couple of tables outside and a lot of people eating or otherwise wandering around. The view reminded Waldina of her hometown’s summers, marketdays and terraces full of happy people.

The slightly wistful ninja entered one small cafe and went to order breakfast for her. In Inizio’s culture the breakfast was mainly bread, eggs and milk. Fruits were luxury goods in Inizio, but the farming industry itself was doing rather well. Waldina herself quite liked bread with eggs so she really didn’t mind.

After receiving her order Waldina sat on a table just outside the café. The table was nicely under the sun. Townspeople around her were noisy and excited about the new day. She could recognize a lot of NPCs from the masses but there were also quite a few she couldn’t recognize.

Watching strangers got Waldina thinking whether there were other players than her in this world. If she, by some mystery luck, had ended up here, it wouldn’t be that weird for others to be here either. Yet none of the strangers around her looked like the players she knew. As she didn’t want to confuse anyone with questions about a game and reality, she kept her mouth shut and enjoyed her breakfast.

After enjoying the freshly baked bread and drinking a glass of milk, Waldina finally left towards the main street again. The sun felt terribly good on her skin and she’d rather stay by the nice café for a long, long time. Now that she thought about it, it had been a long time since she last sat leisurely enjoying the sun's warmth. Yet perhaps it was better to leave sunbathing for another time. At the very least she’d like to complete her first stage-exam as soon as possible. And before that she had a lot of tasks to complete.

Finding the Adventurer’s guild was easy for Waldina. The building had large signs which could be seen from far away and this early in the morning there were quite a few adventurers gathered in front of the building. Next to the building's door there were two bulletin boards filled with quests for adventurers. Inside the building there were more bulletin boards and more quests. The only thing separating these quests was their importance and the payment offered. Usually the less important and less dangerous quests were put outside. That contained for example gathering herbs and helping around town.

Waldina found her way past the many adventurers and got to the building’s door. She opened it and stepped into the spacious lobby. On her right there was the famous bulletin board full of quests. On her right there was a lounge open for everyone. And the service points were right in front of her. Each point had their own worker which helped the adventurers who needed help.

The ninja headed for the first open service point and met the blue eyes of the blond lady. The lady’s blue eyes were shining so brightly as she smiled at Waldina. Waldina smiled back at the lady nodding slightly.

“Hello. How can I help you?” the service lady asked with a vivid voice. Waldina lifted her left hand uncertainly and pointed at her bracelet: “Hi, umm I arrived at Inizio yesterday and showed this to the guards who told me to stop by your guild.”

The lady’s eyes widened with surprise as she glanced at the bracelet shining with purple light. She checked through Waldina’s profile as the ninja showed her stats and information through the bracelet. The service lady got more excited and amazed by the second. After a while she took out a form from under her desk and said: “You may write down your information on this form. For the Adventurer’s card which doubles as identification and pass. Meanwhile I’ll stop by our guild leader to talk about your bracelet.”

Waldina nodded and cursed her actions yesterday. Had she known seeing the bracelet would cause such a commotion, she would have rather just silently paid the admittance money to the town guard. She really didn’t enjoy the extra attention she was receiving even now.

Yet it was far too late to regret that now. And so Waldina took the form offered to her and wrote her information down on the paper. At some parts she hesitated for a little while about what to write and ended up checking her status from the bracelet. If she looked like a kid to others, it would be rather problematic to say she was an adult and the other way around. She really didn’t want to gather even more attention.

Name: Waldina

Age: 16

Specialty: Ninja, spy

Skill level: Unknown

Past experience: Beginner

After filling the form Waldina had to wait for a while before the service lady came back. When she did return her cheeks were slightly red and her eyes shone with even greater excitement. She signed for Waldina to follow her and took her to the guild building’s second floor. Waldina took the form she filled with her and walked upstairs behind the lady.

The second floor was a lot quieter compared to the first floor. It seemed to be mainly space for guild service workers. At the end of an aisle there was one door ever so slightly open and the lady took Waldina straight there.

“Hello, welcome to Inizio and to the Adventurer’s guild”, a low voice called from behind a desk placed at the end of the room Waldina walked in. A man was sitting there with a stern but friendly smile on. “Please take a seat.”

“Thank you”, Waldina responded as she sat down on a sofa facing the desk.

“Iris, would you kindly fetch the testing crystal from downstairs?” the man asked and the blond service lady left quickly with a sharp nod.

Following Iris’s leave the man, guild’s leader named Plato wished to see Waldina’s bracelet, its features and her stats. Plato looked at it with great interest and nodded approvingly. He wrote down to Waldina’s information that she held a special artifact which only she herself could use. Then he explained that the bracelet reminded them of an ancient civilization's technology which they could not replicate. There were a couple of more similar artefacts and the guild held high interest towards them as they could hold immense power. That explained somewhat the interest it had garnered.

The conversation ended right as Iris knocked on the door and walked in carrying a huge crystal ball. She carefully put the crystal in front of Waldina, on a small table.

“Hold your hand on top of the crystal and let it check your mana and energy. This is how we check your current level and potential”, Iris explained and Waldina inched towards the crystal.

The crystal ball felt warm to her hand as she let her fingers rest on top of it. That warmth ran through her body and made a round circle. The warm movement felt strange and Waldina had to focus as to not inch away from the crystal. She was so focused on the feeling and her reactions to it that she didn’t notice the crystal ball glowing in rainbow colors nor Plato’s and Iris’s admiring reactions.

“Wow. You can now move your hand”, Iris stated and wrote something on a piece of paper.

“You are way more talented than you wrote on the form”, Plato noted as he read through Waldina’s form. The ninja herself was looking at them with a skeptical expression. She couldn’t make out what they meant. After a while’s wondering she ended up asking: ”What do you mean?”

“Your basic physical state, power, stamina, and special skills seem to all be B-grade, and you are still growing. You are a little lacking in the mana department, but that’s not that important for a ninja”, Plato spoke out his perceptions and smiled contently. It wasn’t everyday that he got to meet new talents who were already powerful even as beginners.

“Oh, that’s great to know”, Waldina muttered not really knowing what else to say. Her reaction made both Plato and Iris laugh.