Training Expedition

The official announcement was finally made that at the end of the month, all Primaner who were part of a vanguard would be taking a month-long series of training expeditions to apply the basic survival skills they learned in actual dungeon environments. 

Theoretically, the expeditions would be an evaluation of their technical skills: camp and shelter setup, cooking, navigation, first aid, dungeon stabilization and perimeter security. More importantly, however, it would provide Cecilia with the first real opportunity to assess her vanguard's functionality.

In the classroom, vanguard members were treated like perfectly functioning cogs that would automatically operate as required when slotted into the vanguard mechanism. Cecilia knew, however, that this could hardly be expected in reality.

Cecilia needed to learn the capabilities of Macy—or rather Em's magic, and determine how to integrate it into their unit effectively. Previously, they had only discussed the bare minimum required for field exercises, but Em obviously had additional abilities that she demonstrated when she summoned the salamanders and Cecilia wanted to ascertain the full scope of her abilities.

Staring up at the ceiling as the minutes bled away, Cecilia envisioned different scenarios in her mind, and agreed with the conclusions in her textbooks that a three-member vanguard was not a fully self-sufficient unit. She still needed to fill her scout and healer roles, but Em might be able to cover as a scout with her magic in the meantime, and they would most likely not need a healer for proctored training exercises.

Selected Secundaner would also be eligible for the expeditions to squire but would still be held responsible for maintaining progress with their normal coursework. Cecilia wanted both Hilde and Bettina to accompany her as auxiliaries, but Bettina declined, reasoning that one of them should stay behind to ensure that nothing was missed during classes. Cecilia did not press the issue, since she did not want to override the priorities of the Secundaner for her own selfish whims.

Cecilia also needed to prepare a regimen for the cadets she was training during her month-long absence, amend her request to convert the administrative floor of the dormitory into her vanguard headquarters to include an atelier, and deal with the fact that there was an unknown person squatting in the central block. Petra had told Cecilia that she would resolve the matter with Macy (or Em), so she pushed the matter to the back of her mind.

To distract herself, Cecilia tested the limits of her sensitivity to other auras by trying to project her senses up in the direction of Petra's room. She thought she could dimly sense something. She wasn't sure if she could really sense her friend, or if it was just her imagination. She exhaled, relaxing her mind, an indistinct non-divine presence was nearby. Perhaps it was Em.

The pale light of dawn peeked from the edges of her draperies into her room. It was already time to get up. Cecilia couldn't recall actually falling asleep at any point during the night. She didn't feel physically tired, and hoped that it would not affect her later in the day.

* * *

The woman approached from the shadows when Cecilia and Petra entered the gloom of the cavernous dormitory dining hall after dinner.

"I'm Nadja Klose," she said, holding out a hand.

"Cecilia Gullfot." Cecilia took the woman's hand and shook it, while Petra gave Nadja a curt nod of acknowledgment.

"The dorm leader," Nadja stated.

"Yes," Cecilia replied. "I'm not here to throw you out, but I need to know why you are here."

"I've been living here for five years already," she said. "And I was here for another year or so as a student," she added casually.

"That must have been a while back," Petra commented dryly.

"Children today are so clever," Nadja replied back with composure.

"Can you tell us your story?" Cecilia asked.

"I was with one of the vanguards attached to Haus Adler, but I left after a while, and decided to move back here," Nadja stated.

Cecilia looked to Petra, who just shrugged and let her gaze wander off into the darkness of the hall.

"Uh, that's not a particularly compelling reason for me to let you stay," explained Cecilia hesitantly.

"I'm not bothering anyone," Nadja said. "And I'm the one who made it possible to get hot water for the baths without having to wait for eternity, or have someone stationed at the boiler all day long."

The words caught Cecilia and Petra's attention.

"Can you explain?" asked Cecilia.

"Well, you've seen how we have that small calorifer suited for the actual number of cadets in the dorm?" Nadja tapped her chest with her thumb emphatically. "Me. I'm also doing all the calibration, pipe venting, and minor adjustments behind the scenes that allow you to operate the boiler without issue."

"And you're licensed?" Cecilia asked with rising excitement.

"I have a Kesselwaerterschein, if that's what you mean."

"So would you be able to repair our main boiler?"

Nadja took a step back as the two girls leaned in toward her.

"Uh, I'm not sure..." she answered hesitantly. "I'm certified as a boiler operator, not in repairs..."

"I guess boiler repairs need inspection and recertification as well," Cecilia said, repressing her disappointment with reason. "We can't realistically do anything outside of official channels."

Petra seemed deflated.

"So, what role did you hold while you were in your old vanguard?" Cecilia asked after an uncomfortable silence.

"I was a hunter—a scout," replied Nadja.

Once more,  a sense of excitement rose in Cecilia. "Can you expand on that?"

* * *

Nadja could not believe that she was part of a vanguard once more. She had allowed Cecilia's earnest enthusiasm to infect her, transporting her back to the days when she first became a resident of the all-girls dormitory. She had bonded with members of her cohort in shared hardship, but as time passed, the girls were recruited away with promises of comfort and security. 

She felt anger toward the girls who left, blaming them for the slow, painful death of their original community, but when her time came, she left as well. She became the very thing she hated—leaving behind a lone remaining girl to bear the cold and isolation alone.

The event took place over ten years ago, but it seemed like so much longer in the past. The girl's name was Ada—Adelheid. They had been together the longest. She took Nadja's departure with grace, but Nadja was sure the event destroyed Ada's sense of self-worth.

Years later, she heard that Ada had died in Nodd. A 'heroic sacrifice,' that allowed her party to escape certain death. When she spoke to her vanguard members to find out more, they said all the appropriate words and displayed all the appropriate emotions, but they seemed to hardly know anything about her.

She began to question her own position in a prestigious Stiftungshaus vanguard, and finally walked away in a complete rejection of the elite system that broke her cohort apart in the first place. She decided to live in the shadows of the gloom-ridden dormitory where she felt she had committed her greatest moral compromise.

She made sure they had hot water, monitored their safety, and did whatever else she could to serve the current generations of forgotten girls and pay off an unpayable debt to the one she left behind. She was a ghost haunting her own past mistake, living in the space of the abandoned.

Just over two and a half years earlier, Cecilia had entered the dorm. Nadja considered her quiet and unremarkable until the tall blonde girl had rejected an offer to join the Wiltern Stiftungshaus. The girl then became dorm leader and started to take on many of the duties that Nadja had considered her responsibilities. 

She could not help but to hold the girl in admiration. She was hesitant about joining another vanguard, but Cecilia argued that being a provisional member would allow legitimization of her presence in the dorm. She only asked that Nadja join them on their training expeditions for the span of a month, and was then free to decide what she wanted to do afterwards.

Cecilia's cheeky little friend Petra's comment on her suitability to join their vanguard due to her age was the final push that made her accept the offer. Despite everything, she still had pride (or vanity) regarding her physical abilities. Certainly the short red-head was just being petty due to having been thrown across the room the previous evening.