The electronic noise of my smartphone’s alarm got me to sluggishly crawl out of my futon. I then washed my face, got dressed, and headed downstairs to the dining room. Elze and Linze were already awake and having breakfast. I took my seat and Micah brought out some food for me as well. This morning’s menu was bread with ham and eggs, vegetable soup, and a salad. What a delicious way to start the day.

The three of us headed out to the guild as soon as we’d finished eating. It was pretty crowded since it was right near the middle of town.

The first floor of the guild’s building was laid out like a restaurant. It was a lot more cheerful than I thought it would be. I’d pictured it in my head as a bar where ruffians would hang about, but it looked like my fears were unfounded. The female receptionist met us with a lovely smile as we approached the counter.

“Uhm, we’d like to register with the guild, please.”

“All right, then. That’s no problem at all. Would that be three for registration, then?”

“Yes. All three of us,” Linze replied.

“Will this be your first time registering with the guild? If so, I can provide a basic explanation of what it means to register with us.”

“Please do.” The gist of it was that the guild would take the requests of individuals or groups, publicize them, then take a small fee upon completion. That was how the guild worked.

The requests were split into ranks based on how difficult they were expected to be, so someone with a low personal rank couldn’t accept requests aimed at those of a higher rank. However, so long as half of one’s party were of a high enough rank, they would be able to accept such requests even if the others in the party didn’t meet the rank requirements.

Upon completion of a quest, one would receive payment. If one failed a quest, however, they would be charged with breach of contract. Hrmm... I need to pick and choose my work carefully.

In addition, if one continued to fail multiple quests, then they would be deemed a low-quality individual, and their guild registration would be revoked as a penalty. Were that to happen, one would never be able to re-register with any guild branch in any town.

Other stipulations included: if one did not accept any requests at all for five years, then their guild registration would expire; one could not accept multiple requests at the same time; concerning subjugation requests, one must hunt the monsters in the designated area, else their work would be deemed invalid; as a general rule, the guild would not directly involve itself in personal dissent between adventurers, unless such dissent was judged to be harmful to the guild itself... Anyway, we received a pretty thorough explanation of the rules.

“And that about sums up the explanation. If you have any further questions, please direct them to the appropriate individuals.”

“Alright, got it,” I replied.

“Very well. Please fill in and return these forms with all of the required details.” The receptionist handed us three blank forms, but I couldn’t read a single word on them. When I informed Linze that I couldn’t read or write, she agreed to help me fill out my form. Hrm... I knew that being illiterate was going to cause me problems sooner or later.

The receptionist then took the registration forms and held a pitch black card over each of them in turn, seemingly casting some sort of spell. Afterward, she took out a small pin and told each of us to spill a little bit of our blood onto the cards.

I did as I was instructed, took the small pin in hand and pricked my finger with it, then rubbed a small amount of blood onto the surface of the card. Some white letters floated up onto it... but I still couldn’t make heads or tails of what it said.

“Each of your personal guild cards has a little spell on it that will make it turn gray if handled by someone other than its real owner for longer than a few seconds. It’s a simple anti-forgery mechanism. Also, should you happen to lose your card, please report to the guild as swiftly as possible. For a small fee, we will be able to issue you a new card.”

The receptionist took hold of my card and stood there for a few seconds. Just as she’d said, it eventually turned from pitch black to a dull gray. The very moment she placed the card back in my hands, it snapped right back to black. That was a really cool trick. I wondered how it worked.

“With this, your guild registration is complete. All available work requests are posted on the board over there. If you see one you would like to accept, please confirm all details and apply for it through our quest clerk.”

The three of us stood in front of the board where the quests were posted. Our guild cards were all black, signifying that we were at the beginner level. Our cards would apparently change in color as our ranks rose, but right now we could only accept quests aimed at beginners.

Elze and Linze busily pored through each quest notice one by one, but I on the other hand...

“...Not good. I seriously need to learn how to read and write, and fast...” If I couldn’t understand the details of a job, I was never going to get anywhere. I made a mental note to put evenings aside for studying my reading and writing.

“Hey, hey, Linze, check this one out. The reward’s pretty decent, and it seems like a good place to start. How about it?”

“...Yeah. This one doesn’t seem so bad. What do you think, Touya?”

“...Sorry. I can’t make any sense of it.” Elze had been merrily pointing out the request in question, but her finger drooped slightly when I said that. Ngh...

“...Umm, let’s see. It’s a request to go out and defeat some beast monsters in the forest to the east. They want us to hunt five Lone-Horned Wolves. They’re not very strong, so I think we can manage. Oh right, the reward is eighteen copper.” Linze was polite enough to read out the details of the quest to me.

Eighteen copper, huh... Split evenly between us, that would make for six copper each. That could pay for three nights of lodging. Not bad at all.

“Fine, let’s go with that,” I decided.

“Okie dokie! I’ll take this to the clerk.” Elze tore down the request notice and headed on over to the quest clerk.