262: Guild
I heard from behind me that Liane and Milo were both holding back their laughter.
“I’m sixteen! How can I be a mister now?” I said in protest.
This seemed to break them both as they didn’t hold back their laughter anymore. Even Rhyn had a very slight grin for a moment.
“Let’s get this paperwork over with,” I said with a sigh.
Inside the office itself, it was clear it was not made for more than one person, with it being a squeeze just to fit Rhyn and myself, with Liane and Milo standing at the doorway.
“Is there anything in particular you’d like to see?” Rhyn asked as she attempted to clean the desk.
“Two things: a record of your money, where it’s come from and the expenses from it, and the other would be any documentation on expectations, what you’re required to do,” I said.
Rhyn shook her head. “I’ll have the financial stuff, but there’s no written record of what needs to be done. It was information that was passed to me by the last person who ran the orphanage and it would be expected of myself or Via to pass it on to my successor.”
I waited for her to find the financial paperwork, and I was going to pass that straight off to Milo to look through, but there was something that I was curious about, and something I never thought to question when I was in the orphanage.
“You said that you came from the orphanage system yourself. Could I ask what class you are?”
There was a pause before she answered, “I am a steward now, but I started as a labourer, thankfully.”
“That’s rather uncommon for the orphanage, isn’t it?” I asked.
“I’ve come to learn it is, but from the orphanage I grew up in, it was fairly common since a lot of our training was done by helping craftsmen and builders in the city,” she explained.
“But you don’t do that here, obviously?” I pushed.
“No, the… No, sorry.” She seemed to want to say something there.
I felt like a push was necessary, and clearly Liane thought the same, as she spoke up from behind me, “We can’t fix anything unless you’re honest, so speak your mind.”
“Well, the thing is, we’ve been told we need to produce more soldiers and more adventurers or our funding will be cut,” she said.
“And who told you that, exactly?” Milo said, reaching out and taking the financial paperwork.
I sat there, wondering what to actually tell Rhyn. It felt like I could trust her, at least a little, but I didn’t know that I could trust her with the funds directly, not yet at least.
“I’ll be upfront about what my plan is going to be,” I began, seeing a nod from Liane behind me.
“I don’t want orphans raised to slaughter anymore, and make no mistake, Rhyn, they are dying before they even make it to the front lines against the demons; we saw it first-hand.”
There was a look of shock on Rhyn’s face as her eyes went wide, and she visibly grew paler, though she didn’t say anything.
“I intend to bring in proper instructors, both for magic, combat, and to properly read and write. Even if a child here wants to be a soldier, we will train them properly and have them prepared for the reality,” I said.
Rhyn shook her head. “It’s impossible; we could never afford that.”
“Leave the funding to me. I came in here fully prepared to have all existing staff removed, I’ll be brutally honest with that. However, I see that’s not required, but we need to drastically improve this place, from the building to the education,” I said.
Rhyn seemed to deflate. “I appreciate the passion, and we all want to help, but it’s never that easy. We can’t fight the King on what he wants, after all.”
“The system right now is not what the King wants, at least not when speaking with me,” I said simply.
I got up from my chair, noticing that Milo had stored all the financial paperwork away.
“Be prepared for the changes, and I hope you’ll embrace them. When I revisit, this will be a place to be proud of. For now, I need to go see Lord Farrow; we’ll return the paperwork to you once we’ve reviewed it all,” I said.
“I hope to see some change in the future then,” Rhyn said with a soft smile.
“Tomorrow,” I said as I left the office.
“Tomorrow?” Rhyn asked, confused, before it clicked. “Wait, tomorrow? We’re not ready!”
It took a little while to gather everyone up. Crisplet had finished creating statues for everyone in the classroom and was currently making them for everyone in the training yard.
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One orphan impressed Gilain enough to be gifted a real short sword that looked incredibly valuable and made Via’s eyes nearly bulge. Apparently, they were the only one who actually managed to hit him. I noted it was the sick girl from upstairs.
He also cast some binding magic on the sword itself so it couldn’t be taken from the child, as it would always be available for them.
I wasn’t unfamiliar with bound items, but I was surprised to see that Gilain was able to do it himself, as it was usually runescribes or dungeon loot that had it.
Leaving the orphanage, I couldn’t help but wonder if my proposed changes would be successful.
“We should separate to get everything sorted,” Milo suggested.
Hari nodded. “Before that, Liane, Lewie, was there anything that you noticed out of place?”
Luis shook his head. “Not that I could see, though the finance situation is concerning. Gerald is the first point of contact for the money to be distributed, though I know he personally has no real use for it. I need to go send off some messages, but I would like to come with you to see Lord Farrow.”
I nodded. “Sounds good.”
Jen and Liane went off to organise some builders to start the repairs, while Milo had to start reading through the reports, making sure we were not missing anything before we spoke to Lord Farrow, which only left Crisplet, Hari and myself to go to the adventurers’ guild.
I was not entirely sure how they would react to this job as it was not exactly standard, and I really had no idea what sort of people we would get.
It didn’t take us long to reach the guild, and it wasn’t as grand as the other ones I had been in. This was a modest two storeys, but it had some of the finest woodwork I had seen, with what looked to be living trees woven through the walls themselves.
“You know, if it hadn’t already been confirmed to be a weaver, I would have sworn this was a dryad’s work,” Hari said, admiring it.
“I’d like to see a dryad one day,” I commented.
Entering the guild itself, it was rather quiet compared to the other guilds I’d been in. To the left as I walked in, there were only two desks with two rather bored-looking clerks sitting behind them, and on the right-hand side, there were tables and chairs with a couple of groups sitting around, seemingly going through some gear, and a familiar face that I didn’t think had noticed us yet as he was buried in a rather large book.
I pointed Altin out to Hari, who just nodded, but said, “It’s fine, we’ll deal with that later.”
Making our way to the counter, the bored clerk behind it rattled off, “Here to hand in a job, or accept one?”
“Neither, we’re here to place a job,” I said.
The clerk raised an eyebrow, but, seeing my armour, didn’t think much of it. “Standard rate for guarding a caravan is one gold per week.”
“No, we’re not after that; we’d like to hire instructors for the orphanage, for at least six months,” I said simply.
The clerk just stared at us for a moment, properly taking us in for the first time.
“What orphanage?” he asked.
I let out a sigh, but Hari took over, clearly more experienced with this.
“You’re going to need a guild officer either way, so let’s skip the pointless questions,” Hari said bluntly.
“Yeah, alright, don’t get your armour in a twist. Your funeral if this is a waste of time though; I’m warning you now,” the clerk said, getting up from the chair.
To the side, the second clerk had just been staring at Crisplet.
“It’s so amazing. How did you get a fire elemental?” she asked.
“That’s our party member, Crisplet,” I said.
Crisplet just let off some sparks that very quickly faded before touching any of the wood surrounding us.
“How did you come across him?” she asked, clearly in awe.
I didn’t get to answer before the side door opened again, and an incredibly old lady walked out, which surprised me as all guild officers and leaders had been fairly fierce warriors so far, yet this lady looked as though a strong breeze would knock her over.
“You requested me?” she said simply.
Hari took charge again. “Yes, we have a large job we’d like to submit for two to three instructors: a mage, a healer and scholar, and a generalist at combat at the local orphanage for six months.”
She looked at Hari again before speaking, “Six months?”
“Yes, for now, we may extend it based on the success of this run, or we may find permanent instructors by then,” Hari explained.
“You understand there won’t be a discount because they are in the town, right?” she said, looking at all three of us.
“That’s fine, we have one hundred gold here to make it happen; however, we will have some fairly strict guidelines on what must be taught, and the orphans will need to be treated with respect as proper students. We won’t accept someone not putting in the proper effort,” Hari said firmly.
“No one will cheat the job on my watch. What are your guidelines before I accept this?” she growled out.
I practically leapt at the chance for this. I had been thinking about this constantly and gone over what I wanted exactly several times. “The students need to learn to read and write, and learn the basics of magic, enough to give them a chance for the system to provide the class. The combat instructor must teach them how to be functioning adventurers or soldiers before they are thrust into the groups here, and the healer, likewise with the mage, is to teach the children the art of healing through magic and potions, while assisting in reading and writing.”
The old lady stared at me for a long while. “This will help us as well. Getting untrained orphans is dangerous for them, and bad for our reputation when they are inevitably killed. We can take this job, though I don’t know exactly who will take it.”
There was a small cough behind us, as the mage Altin stood there, with his hand raised slightly.
“I apologise for eavesdropping, but I will happily put my name forward for that task. To be able to teach a future generation of mages is an honour and one I wouldn’t pass up an opportunity at,” he said.
The lady looked at him oddly for a moment. “Mr Tenebris, I don’t mean this as an insult, but you don’t strike me as the selfless type.”
He let out a chuckle. “I’m not, but a gut feeling tells me being associated with this group, even a little, will help me grow in my class, and I’ve rarely been wrong in that feeling, so what is six months?”
I had to make sure I took note of that surname, as it was the first time it had been used. I didn’t know how I felt about him teaching the kids, but there was no doubt he was a mage that wasn’t actively in a full-time group, though I would let Milo decide that.
“Thank you, Mr Tenebris. I will need to go over details with these three, but I will consider your name for the position once the job’s been made official,” she said before turning her attention back to me.
I didn’t even pay attention to him as he was heading back to his seat, but he said something that got my full attention as he turned away.
“Fate, it seems, smiles on us all.”
I paused, looking at him as he walked away. He didn’t even look back, so clearly wasn’t trying to get a rise or a reaction out of me, and I barely heard Hari and the lady behind me, only getting broken out of my thoughts by Hari.
“Trev, we’re heading upstairs to finalise the details with Fleur,” he said.
I shook the comment off, turning back to Hari. “Right, let’s do this.”