CH215

“Onk, what brings you here?” He called out cheerfully, giving them a wave which they returned in kind, though giving off an apologetic feeling as they did, even without a face to show it.

“Hello Ben, I’m sorry to bother you like this while you’re working, but there’s a bit of an issue and I need you to come to the guild with me.”

He immediately felt himself tense up as Falk stood to the side, looking curious as well. “Why, what’s going on?”

“There’s been a call for an emergency quest, as a rank four adventurer you’ll need to participate so you need to be briefed on what’s happening.”

He felt himself deflate as his teacher chuckled. He knew this was possible ever since he first ranked up, but had all but dismissed it from his mind. To be called for it now was nothing but a pain.

“Poor luck boy, if you’re being briefed then that means you’ll need a couple weeks to do it instead of handling it immediately, looks like I’ll get a bit of peace and quiet.”

“Actually Falk, Ceselee was adamant about making sure you showed up as well,” They said, continuing their apologetic tone.

“What? I haven’t been an active adventurer for well over a decade, why am I being dragged into this when I have a business to run?”

“Ah, she told me to tell you, and please bear in mind that these are her words, that ‘if you have some sort of problem with it you should have made sure to officially quit before it became an issue.’”

As his teacher grumbled Ben gave him a wide grin. “Looks like you get to enjoy my company for a couple weeks then.”

They were led to a back room of the guild and found Thera already seated and waiting, positively vibrating with excitement as she looked at them while taking seats of their own.

“Can you believe it?” She asked as she grabbed Ben’s arm. “Not only do we get to do an emergency quest, but it’s one with a rank limit of four! What do you think we’ll have to do?”

“Probably something that people without combat skills like me should stay far away from,” He told her dryly.

“Oh don’t be like that, don’t you have three combat skills now?”

“At level zero! And I’m pretty positive marksmanship does nothing but improve my aim a little!”

It had been exciting when he got it, but the only change was that he was a bit better at hitting targets and his eyesight had improved slightly, nothing major. He was still no good with his gun, it had just become a little easier to use effectively.

“You’ll be fine. Depending on what the quest is, they might actually want you here for your skills as a craftsman anyway. Being able to properly maintain and repair weapons is pretty important after all, and worst to worst I’ll protect you,” She told him, giving him a friendly nudge. “Actually, I’m more surprised to see you here uncle?”

“I’m just here to suffer for not bothering to properly quit once I decided to move on to permanently focusing on my smithing, and I doubt Ceselee will put up with me giving my resignation now. I’ll just suck it up and help out a little.”

“Speaking of actually, Sanya didn’t come with you?” Ben asked her. “Weren’t you both at the clinic today?”

One of the few things he knew about Falk’s past was the fact that he used to adventure with both Sonya and Pelenia. With the one there he would have expected to see the other as well, though Thera was quick to correct him of that assumption.

“Aunty made sure to properly resign when she switched to clinic work so they couldn’t ask her to come. It’s a shame though, it would have been fun to have her join us.”

“Why does it seem like you’re treating this like it’s going to be a trip?”

“I mean, at least for there and back it will be, since we don’t know what we’re dealing with at our destination it’s a little harder to say.”

“Love the optimism. Anyway, how many more people do you think will arrive?” He asked as he looked around. Other than them there was a group of three he recognised, namely Sachel and her party, as well as another three he’d seen around but never spoken to, all appearing to be a hybrid species of cyclops and some sort of bird people, with one large jewel-like eye and beautiful red feathers. If it wasn’t for the taboo around using materials from sentient races he would have asked about buying some for their look alone but assumed that even without the ethical concerns they might not want to be approached about such things.

He was sure there’d be more coming, but Thera surprised him with her answer. “This might be everyone, maybe a couple more since they haven’t started yet.”

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“What? How are there so few? There’s always plenty of people in the guild when we come for our quests?”

“The majority of people get stuck at rank five. One of the reasons we’ve both been able to rank up to four so easily is probably because we both have demons recorded on our cards, it shows a certain level of competence, even if we aren’t full-time adventurers like the others here,” She explained. “Rank three is even harder to get, I’m pretty sure the only person in town at that rank would be the guild master, though we’ll be well on our way to getting there depending on what the quest is and how much we contribute.”