Chapter 1: 1: A Chance Meeting

Adventuring was an occupation for the insane.

Everyone knew it: joining the Guild was as good as signing your own death warrant.

Every child had once dreamed of leaving their dreary daily lives behind to embark on grand journeys into the unknown, but reality was a good deal less shiny than the copper-store novels that told of great escapades by glorious heros.

Not many adventurers existed outside of the Kingdom of Tayan’s official Adventurers Guilds, and the few that did were little more than murderous vagrants. As for those who joined the guilds… well, the army was always open to an oathholder that wanted to fight, and the pay and hours weren’t nearly as horrendous. In every metric except autonomy, the military was frankly a superior option over adventuring.

Official statistics stated that nearly nine out of ten people who successfully enrolled with the Tayan Adventurers Guild never made it to the second tier of membership. Leaked reports claimed that the average lifespan of an adventurer was about nine to fifteen months after beginning. Survival didn’t mean a good life, either; even in the remote village where I had spent my teenage years, the sight of a travelling ex-adventurer missing body parts— limbs, eyes, and in a couple particularly nasty cases, the entire lower half of their bodies— was all too common.

Adventuring was a job for the insanely powerful and the powerfully insane.

And, unfortunately, a job for those seeking money and freedom who could not find a better job. I wasn’t sure which of the three categories I fell under. Maybe all of them.

With a long-suffering sigh, I reached the front of the line for Guild registration. It said a lot about this current generation that I could recognize three others in the line that had entered Yaguan Mage University with me just days ago.

Well, that was their choice. If they wanted to get themselves into an activity that would almost certainly get them killed, it was on their heads.

“Guild registration?” The receptionist at this branch of the Tayan Adventurer’s Guild was a man sitting behind a solid true-oak desk. He was bulky, his body a warrior’s build that belonged out in the field, not here, and the increasingly annoyed look on his face led me to believe that this assignment hadn’t quite been his choice.

“That’s what I’m here for,” I replied.

“Your form and your fee.” The receptionist stretched out a meaty hand, beckoning.

I procured my form and two golden suns, wincing at the price. Before I passed the coins to the receptionist, I scanned my registration form one final time.

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