Soul of the Warrior

It wasn't complicated getting to the Adventurer's Guild. Theyaih was segmented between coastal and inland, but it was one decently sized city. If Reivyn had to guess, he would bet it was slightly larger than Magron. The portion of the city they could see on the coast from the Dungeon was only about ten percent of the size of the settlement.

Everywhere they walked, they were greeted by locals dressed in colorful clothing. Not only their clothing, but the buildings themselves were a wide array of vibrant colors. Most buildings were plain other than their tile shingles, but the shingles represented every color of the rainbow and all the various shades in between. Reivyn kept his head on a swivel taking the view in.

The flora of the island was equally as colorful. There were vibrant flowers everywhere. The tropic trees and grass were all green, but it was overshadowed by everything else. Reivyn assumed the presence of the colorful plant life to be not only the inspiration for the cloth, but the source, as well.

None of that really mattered to him, though Kefira and Kimberly did "ooh" and "ahh" every ten steps. Serilla and Vyria were much more silent in their appreciation of the surroundings, but Reivyn caught them staring more than once with his Divine Sense. He didn't say anything, though, and he was sure they would have denied it even if they were caught red handed.

Teilon casually plucked a flower and made an elaborate gesture of sticking it into Kimberly's hair. Kefira eyed Reivyn sideways with an air of expectation. Not willing to fall behind his best buddy, Reivyn surreptitiously snipped a red flower that perfectly complimented Kefira's eyes with a little bit of Air Mana and deposited it above her ear with his magic. The little display, while discreet, didn't go unnoticed from the others, and Kefira beamed a beautiful smile as she strutted down the street.

The island was much larger than could be seen from the entrance of the Dungeon with the majority of the landmass on the other side of the hill. Even so, it didn't take the Party very long to arrive at the gates of the Adventurer's Guild.

"You go on ahead," Teilon said, leaning against the decorative wall surrounding the building. "I don't have anyone to send a message to, and I'd rather not stand in line when I can lean out here."

"That's fine," Reivyn said. "It'll only take a moment to get everything squared away."

Reivyn left the group behind to head inside, but Kefira hopped to keep pace with him after a short exchange with Serilla. Reivyn looked down at her, quirking an eyebrow.

"We've been apart for months," Kefira said, looping her arm in his. "Even just standing in a line, I'd rather be by your side."

Reivyn smiled and patted her hand as they walked into the building. It wasn't nearly as opulent as some of the other branches Reivyn had visited, but it wasn't run down or anything. There was a hall leading straight ahead from the entrance that presumably led to offices, and the reception area was off to the right.

The interior was empty aside from one receptionist leaning with his face against his hand, elbow on the desk. He looked supremely bored, and Reivyn couldn't fault him. There was nobody here.

"Looks like there won't be any lines," Reivyn chuckled.

"Yeah, without too many visitors and just the one Dungeon, that we know of, it makes sense that there aren't too many people in here," Kefira concurred.

Their voices carried across the hall, and the receptionist immediately perked up and looked at the new arrivals. He flashed a smile at Reivyn and Kefira as he straightened his outfit.

"How can I help you, today?" He asked.

"We need to secure four rooms and send a message," Reivyn explained.

"Certainly," the receptionist answered as he pulled out a dusty tome from under his desk. "Each room comes standard with two beds. Just show me your Adventurer's Badge and I can get you annotated."

Reivyn fished in his pouch for his Adventurer's Badge and handed it over. The receptionist used his standard magical device to scan the badge. He reviewed the contents as he transcribed the information to the tome. He paused after entering Reivyn's name.

"I see that you're a member of a defunct Party. Are you here with the other members, or..."

"Two of them," Reivyn nodded. "Teilon and Kimberly are still in the Party, but the others have since gone their own way. We have some new additions to replace them, though."

Kefira handed over two badges before the receptionist could prompt them. He simply nodded his head and scanned the badges while using the device to remove the other members from the roster of the Party. Reivyn glanced at Kefira with a question in his eyes.

"I grabbed Serilla's badge," Kefira explained. "You didn't see that?"

Reivyn shook his head.

"Unless I actively push, I only see the outline of your hand," he answered. "I don't typically invade others' privacy unless they're an enemy, and I would say you are about the furthest thing from one as can be."

"One final question about the rooms before we move on to the message," the receptionist politely waited for them to end their short conversation. "Ms. Kefira, are you going by your alias or your real name?"

"Real name," Kefira said. "Same with Serilla."

"Very good. I have you all set up. Here are your keys. The rooms are on the second floor, and you can find the stairs at the end of the hall." The receptionist pointed down the hall leading in the opposite direction they had come from the entrance. "I see that you're eligible for a promotion, Mr. Reivyn. You have the accomplishments for several more promotions, actually, you just require the time in grade before you're eligible. I'll go ahead and take care of that real quick for you.

"Now, what message would you like to send, which branch to send it to, and to whom will it be delivered?"

"Delivered?" Reivyn asked. "I thought messages were sent and held until someone came looking for one."

"That's only for the lower level ranks in the Guild," the receptionist explained. "Now that you're ranked up a couple of times, you're afforded more options. You can have a runner send it to the person in question once the message arrives at the closest branch. It's a small fee of two silver."

"That sounds great," Reivyn nodded his head. "The message will be sent to Ameliyn and Silfa at the Imperial Palace in Willowan, Wispan."

"I have to remind you that our runners won't be able to hand the message over directly to someone in a guarded dwelling like an Imperial Palace," the young man interjected. "They'll have to hand it off to a gate guard, but the official seal of the Adventurer's Guild should get it inside to the people you want to notify."

"That's fine."

"Ok. I'm ready for the message."

"One will be from me, addressed to Ameliyn, and one will be from her, addressed to Silfa," Reivyn quickly explained. The receptionist nodded.

"Dear mother," Reivyn said, clearing his throat as he thought of a delicate way to put it. "We're perfectly safe and sound. Nobody's hurt or missing. We had a minor, um, accident, in the teleportation corridor. We ended up way out in the transition hub between our Local Group and - " Reivyn looked up at the receptionist. "What's the name of the other Local Group?"

"Orion Six."

"-Orion Six. We're stuck here for just over a month as we wait for the teleport destination to line up with our Local Group again, but then it shouldn't be too much longer before we arrive back in Willowan. We'll send another message once we're enroute."

"Is that it?" The receptionist looked up from where he was entering the information.

"Love you and miss you, mom," Kefira added. She pointed between herself and Reivyn. "You can add it to the end of both of them. You love your mother, right?" Kefira looked up at Reivyn expectantly.

"Of course!" Reivyn said. "What kind of a question is that?"

"Well, the ladies in your life like to hear it every now and then," Kefira said, flipping her hair back.

If that's not a hint, I don't know what is, Reivyn thought. He leaned down until his mouth was almost touching Kefira's ear. He could see it turn a shade of red with his Divine Sense as he got closer and she felt his breath.

"I love you, too," he whispered.

"Mhmm," Kefira nodded her head in satisfaction.

"Alright!" The receptionist exclaimed, drawing their attention back to the third person in the room. "Unless you want to pay out of pocket, I'll just withdraw it from your Party fund."

"The Party fund is still active?" Reivyn asked, his eyebrows shooting up.

"Oh sure, it's still getting regular deposits of a couple silver a week," the receptionist answered. "You still have a valid copyright for a Dungeon strategy on the books, and people are still buying it regularly. There's been a couple of withdrawals over the years - from your other Party members before your Party entered inactive status - but there's still a couple hundred gold's worth sitting in there. Do you want to make a withdrawal?"

"That won't be necessary," Reivyn shook his head. He had plenty of coin on his person. He might as well leave it in there and forget about it until and unless he ran into an emergency.

"Very well. Was there anything else I could help you with today?"

"Nope, that's everything," Reivyn shook his head. "Thank you. You were very helpful."

"No, thank you," the receptionist countered. "This is the most I've got to do in the past several weeks. I've been bored out of my mind."

Reivyn chuckled.

"Tell you what, we'll come back in a couple of days to purchase the relevant dossiers on the local Dungeon. Give you some more busy work."

"Certainly," the man nodded. "I look forward to assisting you."

Reivyn and Kefira gave the young man a little wave as they turned and left the building. The others were in various states of relaxation as they stepped out, but they all perked up when they noticed Reivyn and Kefira return.

"That was fast," Teilon said.

"We were the only ones there," Reivyn shrugged. "I went ahead and updated our Party, by the way. The others are out. Kefira and Serilla are in." Reivyn looked over at Xudrid and Vyria. "I assumed you two didn't want to officially join our Adventurer's Party."

"Oh yeah, we're only provisional members, anyway," Xudrid replied. "We can make use of basic services like sending messages and getting lodging, but we're not affiliated."

"Are you guys not allowed to be?" Reivyn asked.

"No, it's not that. We can change our status if we want to, but our purpose in gaining Life Experience this time around isn't centered around Adventuring, so we never saw the need."

"That makes sense. Alright, well, here are your keys," Reivyn handed out a key to each pair. Teilon and Kimberly, Xudrid and Vyria, Kefira and Serilla, and he and his father were all paired up. "There aren't too many places we can go while we're here, so let's just make sure we're all here on the day the teleport circle connects to our Local Group."

"Sounds good," Xudrid said.

"We'll probably spend a lot of time together, anyway," Teilon said.

Reivyn nodded his head at that.

"I'm going to go wander around while you kids spend some time together," Refix said. "Let's say... three day vacation?"

Reivyn tilted his head as he looked at his father.

"Three day vacation? What's after that?"

Refix's eyes gleamed in excitement.

"Why, training, boy!" He held his arms out wide with a grin on his face. "This is the perfect opportunity to practice some amphibious combat. It would be a shame to let it go to waste."

Reivyn rolled his eyes, but he secretly agreed with his father.

"Umm, do you expect me to be there?" Serilla spoke up, her voice quivering slightly.

"All hands," Refix replied with a serious expression. Serilla gulped before nodding her head. She took a deep breath to calm herself.

"What about us?" Xudrid raised his hand.

Refix narrowed his eyes at the cultivator.

"Are your names on the roster of the mercenary company?" He asked back.

"Yes, sir," Xudrid subconsciously stood at attention. Refix continued to stare at him. "Right."

Refix nodded his head.

"Then it's settled. We'll meet out here at dawn in four days."

With that, Refix turned about and strolled into the city. Teilon shared a look with Kimberly before turning to Reivyn.

"We're gonna go ahead and go do our own thing today," he said. "We'll meet up with you at the tavern tonight, and we can go get a meal or something tomorrow, all of us together."

"Sounds like a plan," Reivyn nodded.

Teilon and Kimberly followed after Refix, hand in hand. Xudrid simply waved to Reivyn as he and Vyria wandered off to go explore the city on their own. Reivyn turned to look at Kefira. She clapped her hands and bounced in excitement.

"Come on, come on. I'm just dying to get some of the local outfits I saw on the way here."

She grabbed Reivyn by the arms and practically dragged him along to the fate that awaited him.

---

Reivyn had resigned himself to a dull day of shopping. It just wasn't his thing, and whenever he got dragged along, it was like a hole opened up in his heel and drained all of the energy out of him. He didn't want to disappoint Kefira, though, so he put a brave face on it. He knew there was no fighting the excruciating day ahead of him.

He changed his mind real quick, though, when Kefira sought his "expert" opinion on how the various outfits looked on her. That plugged the hole in his heel right up. He had a pep in his step and a smile on his face.

The day was quite enjoyable.

---

The Shifty Eye was a respectable establishment, but it got loud and rowdy just like any other watering hole. Reivyn scanned the building with his Divine Sense as he and his friends approached. He quickly found Kahl with presumably his wife and a couple of the others that had been with him during the day. Reivyn inspected the rest of the people inside the tavern and saw that they looked mostly like they were part of the local militia. They all at least looked like they had combat Classes.

Reivyn strode through the open door and nodded to a surprised waitress. He shifted his eyes in the direction of Kahl. No pun intended with the gesture, he mentally chuckled. The waitress followed his eyes and nodded back. Reivyn wove his way through the crowd with the others following on his heels. Xudrid and Vyria had opted out of the meeting, but everyone else was present. Refix looked eager to finally unwind after months on the front lines.

Kahl spotted them coming and stood up to shake hands with Reivyn and the others as they approached.

"Good, you made it!" Kahl said with a wide grin. He and his wife already had near empty tankards in front of them. His wife was a petite lady, but it looked like she could hold her own with the alcohol. "This is my wife, Scherry. Wife, these are the travelers I told you about." Kahl introduced everyone to his wife.

He must have a social Skill for memorizing faces, Reivyn thought. I know I wouldn't have been able to remember everyone's names after only hearing them once before I acquired the Skill.

"It's a pleasure to meet you all," Scherry said. Kefira stepped forward and exchanged a dainty handshake with the woman. "I hope our son didn't cause you too much trouble with his antics."

"It was no trouble at all," Reivyn waved her concerns away. "He actually helped us by bringing Kahl to us to give us so much needed information."

"As long as it all turned out alright. I hate to think what could have happened if a rookie squad had been on duty."

"Eh, if it was a rookie squad, they probably wouldn't have been able to hurt us, and we wouldn't have hurt them. Don't worry about it."

"Alright, alright. Enough of that," Kahl interjected. "We're not here to ruminate on 'what-ifs,' we're here to drink!" Scherry just smiled at her husband as she sat back down and took a sip from her own tankard. "Waitress! Bring a round for my new friends!"

Reivyn sat down next to Kahl opposite from his wife. Kefira sat next to Reivyn, and the table wasn't so large that the others wouldn't be able to hear the conversation. With everyone's increased Perception Stat, the ambient noise would have to be a lot higher to prevent them from engaging in the conversation.

The waitress brought tankards of the same thing Kahl and Scherry were drinking. Reivyn accepted his and took a tentative sip. It was slightly bitter but tasty, and he could tell that the enhanced alcohol was only enough to bite if he paid attention. He took another, larger sip, and set the tankard down with a nod.

"They got the best brew on the island, here," Kahl said, raising his eyebrows like he was sharing a secret. "And if you want something a little harder, they got that, too."

"This will be fine, thank you," Reivyn said. "I want to be able to keep my wits about me, tonight."

"What little wits he has," Kefira said with a chuckle. "You should see him when he gets really drunk. He's fun."

"I'm sure he is," Kahl laughed. "But you're right. We did come here to exchange information. It would be a shame if we did all that talking and couldn't remember the next day."

"Right, right," Reivyn nodded his head. "Well, first of all, the news of Terran Three. We don't have the full picture, but what we do know is pretty dire. A suspected Tier 6 empire is waging war on many of the Tier 4 empires. Last I heard there were fourteen active invasions."

"Twenty," Kefira interjected. "Several of them were over before anyone knew what was happening and they either moved on or more forces joined the war."

Reivyn and Kahl both glanced at Kefira in surprise.

"Well, twenty fronts," Reivyn corrected himself. "I don't know about all the other Regions, but we're part of a mercenary group to help bolster the numbers. We were in a place called Vairo, and they were doing something to meddle with the local ambient Mana. It was going haywire and getting sucked to a location behind their lines.

"They fielded so many soldiers that they were intentionally throwing their men into the meat grinder to force Achievements on the survivors - at least, that's the speculation - and we thought we were doing a decent job of holding them back for a while." Reivyn took a deep breath. "We were wrong. They sent twelve high-Level soldiers out when we did something they didn't want us to do, and they took out 10% of our forces with one strike.

"They could have rolled over us at any time, and that's happening in twenty different Regions right now."

Kahl took a long pull from his tankard before setting it down with a somber expression.

"Vairo, you say? I've actually been there, once." Reivyn gave him a questioning look. "It's only a couple jumps away," Kahl explained. "All of us combat Classers go adventuring on the mainland a couple of times, just like everybody else does."

Reivyn nodded his head at that.

"Well then, it looks like it won't be all that long for us to make it back to Wispan, after all," he said. "It was directly connected to Vairo. Though, I imagine we'll have to add some additional jumps to circumvent Vairo. No telling what the landscape will look like by the time we can get back there. Best to just avoid it and go around."

"Yeah, I don't envy you trying to find your way back in that mess," Kahl shook his head. "If they're in a place directly connected to your empire, I can't imagine you all feel safe."

"None of the fronts have been geographically connected, yet," Kefira replied. "There's a pattern to how they choose their targets, but we haven't figured it out fully, just yet. We assume we're safe for a little while longer, but plans are already being put into place in case we suffer the same fate."

"Well, at least there's that," Kahl nodded. "Alright, you told me about the news from the mainland - and it's pretty big news, at that. I'll be able to save a lot of people a lot of headache and heartache with that information - so it's only fair I reciprocate.

"You wanted to know about the other Local Group we're attached to. It's called Orion Six, but it's not as interesting as the Dungeon. It's mostly the same as on your side, so I'll start with the Dungeon.

"It's four floors deep, and the biggest thing you have to know is that, other than the top floor, it's completely underwater." Kahl paused for the exclamations of surprise. "There are a few out of the way rest areas with pockets of air on each floor, but all the fighting will be done in the water. If you haven't practiced three-dimensional combat and/or water combat, I would suggest sticking to the top two floors until you're comfortable. Fighting against things that can come at you from literally all directions is a completely different dynamic than fighting on dry land."

"I have a bit of experience keeping an eye out above and below me," Reivyn replied.

"That's a good start," Kahl said. "You'll need to instill it in your companions, though, too. I'll only give you the gist of what to expect. If you want more detailed information, you'll need to purchase the packet from the Adventurer's Guild. It wouldn't be right to step on their toes, after all."

"That's fair."

"Glad you see it that way. Not everybody does. Anyway, here's the broad strokes of what you can expect..."