Chapter 2: A Stone's Throw Away
I wake up the next morning and ruffle my hair. Last night was definitely interesting. Never before had I thought that we could quantify our experiences and skills in such a way. I slide my worn boots on an look them over. Their dark leather exterior has been worn smooth over time leaving a shiny yet scuffed appearance. I slide my hand over them thinking about all they had been through. They weren't mementos by any stretch of the imagination, but I liked them all the same. I get up and walk over to the dark wood table by my bed and slide the worn chest out from underneath it. I open it and retrieve from it a simple metal dish. I pick it up and place it on the table, then close the chest and sit on it.
"What tinctures would we need for a quest? I suppose we would need some basics, energy recovery, blood clotters, and the like," I mutter to myself.
I open the closet and look through the various powders that I had made from rare herbs and plants.
"Let's start with energy recovery," I decide.
I retrieve two bags from the small shelves and sit back down at the table facing the dish. I open the bags again and sniffing the contents to make sure I had grabbed the right bags. After dumping a small coin-sized amount of both into the dish, I return the bags back to their places.
"Moon root and jade grass. These make that pill right?" I say tapping my bicep. I glance at the white and green powders. "Yeah... Both have light aspects."
Satisfied I sit back down and extend my hands over the dish. I breathe out and close my eyes. I open them again to see the familiar flame spring forth from the dish and the powders beginning their hectic dance inside the flames. I focus on the patterns of the dust and wait. Slowly the dust begins to change its crazed orbit into that of a disk. Quickly I focus on the powers and from my mind reach out and separate that one disk into four. Soon the dust follows my command. At once I clench my hands. The fire sputters out and all that is left are four tiny light green balls twice the size of a poppy seed.
I scoop up the small pills and place them into a small glass bottle and cork it. I lift the small glass to the light and look through the pills. They glow a light hazy green. Unhappy with the little orbs I place the bottle in front of me and contemplate where I went wrong. Two item fusion is the essential basics for any form of medicinal work. I had flipped through the notes of other alchemists and seen the complexity of higher rank medicines. Some of those involved adding and removing reagents during the process. I could barely form separate pills, let alone combine them properly. I had been too quick on the solidification of the pills. 'If they had absorbed more of the heat they would have turned out better,' I thought. Each aspect of the herbs must have a very controlled heat as well as a fine manipulation. If either of these basics was neglected the quality of the product will suffer, and even worse, might fail.
I get up from the table and pace around a bit to calm down. It always frustrates me when I know I could do better. I settle down again and re-seat myself in front of the table. I flick the latch open on my notebook holder and slide out the leatherbound book. I open it to the page about the medicine I had just made.
"Jade Energy, huh?" I mutter.
I record some more information about its production method then snap the book shut and return it to the holder. I pick up the bottle containing the pills and slide it into one of the slots on my belt. I slide on my gauntlets and latch them, get up, and head to the forge. As I stroll to the forge that seems jettisoned from the main housing, I glance up to the sun which has only crawled a few inches above the horizon. The grass concealing small rocks and stones, licked the edges of my boots leaving trails of slobber. I look up again and I have arrived at the forge. The familiar tinking had increased to the normal ring of a smithy, even this early in the morning.
I remove my shirt and bandoliers again and get to work. I pick up some of the scrap metal that the others had deemed useless and began to practice moving the metal. The bright white glow of the metal fade to a dull red as I continue the rhythmic drum of the hammer. Slowly I begin to realize what I wanted this fragment to be and began to work with a purpose.
The scream of the metal as it hit the water marked the end of its stress. From the water, I pull out a small leaf. Once again I look over the leaf and sigh.
"Needs more work," I mutter.
"Well, it looks fine to me," returned a booming voice.
Startled I drop the leaf back into the water and look to see a large man standing over me.
"You must have been absorbed in your work, you didn't even notice me watching you." He laughs. "My name is Samuel. I am the master blacksmith here." He extends his hand
"Ah, my name is Fulnis, but you can just call me Ful I guess."
I extend my hand as well and firmly grasp his outstretched hand. In return, he tightens his grip until my hand turns whiter than it should be. I try to compete with what strength I could muster but to no avail.
"Not bad kid. You might be promising after all!"
"Thanks," I say.
"I might be willing to take you as an apprentice, however, you would have to bring me something first." He grins.
I nod. "An eye for an eye."
His grin slides to a more serious face. "If you can obtain a decent amount of mithril, I can train you."
"But isn't mithril an uncommon metal?" I ask concerned.
"If you want to be my apprentice, you must show that you are motivated." He replies
"Based off that, I assume you won't give me any leads."
He nods.
"I will attempt to obtain some then. I can not guarantee that it will be quick."
He nods again. "I look forward to when you bring it." He smiles, says goodbye, then walks off.
I walk over a jug of water and splash my face and wipe my arms and chest off. Then I slip my shirt and bandoliers back on and head back to the dorm. The sun had picked up its pace and was now a third of the way across the sky. The gray stone of the dorm shimmers as I approach the dorm. I grasp the groove in the stone door and wrestle it open, with my sore arms, and walk inside. The cool air inside feels great. I glance around and notice that the bed, that was once occupied, is vacant. The naked makeshift manakin also draws my attention. Perhaps she is training? I open one of the pockets on my belt and retrieve a pill that I had made earlier. I swallow the pill and stretch a bit.
"Still sore, but at least I don't feel like I'm going to pass out," I mutter.
'Perhaps I should ask Valkah about any leads on mithril' I think. I stretch my arms once more and head outside again in search of Valkah. After wresting the door shut once again, I head in the direction of the main hall. Earlier I had seen other combatants, heading back from the main hall, complaining about someone's training. My feet meet the mountains of emerald grass as I walk to the hall. It isn't hard to see why people would live here. Unlike Hawic which is a dwarven city carved from a mountain, this was a town built around the mountain base. The dense treeline around the base of the mountains could be ominous if it weren't for the occasional house. Of course, the guild hall was on the top of a hill south of the largest mountain. The familiar pentagonal stone building comes into view, however this time, I notice a large square building off the back side. I walk into the hall and am once again greeted by the smells of a tavern, food, booze, and body odor. Well I at least know that the body odor is probably from what I can assume is a sparring pit. As I walk through the building, A large man calls out to me.
"Hey, rookie! You want to play poker?" he says
"I would like to at some point, however, I have some things I need to take care of," I reply.
"Hah! Do you need to work out? You look like a stick!"
I ignore his remark "Yes, actually I am going to train. Can you point me to how to get to the sparring pit?"
"Oh, you want to spar with someone? You barely look like you can hold a sword! If you want to get your ass beat, it's through the door over there" He points to the door behind him.
I look at the door a bit confused. It didn't look like there was a room coming from that side of the hall? Is her just telling me to get out? Questions like these swarmed my head, but I pushed them out and headed for the door. I grasped the handle and pulled open the door. Sure enough, there was certainly an arena on the other side. Upon entering iron and sweat assaulted my nose. The air was electric with excitement as the small crowd surged at the ringing of steel. The crowd itself seems to be around 100-300 people. This was strange as I never saw enough dorms for these people. I turned around, then saw multiple other doors on the wall behind me.
"Ah! A rookie bewildered by the 'Hole in the Wall Arena'. Seems he must not know about magical portents." I overheard someone scoff.
Well, that explains it. So it's a magical doorway that leads somewhere? As my eyes wander the crowds I notice crests and blazes. These symbols are that of other guilds! So this is an inter-guild arena?! My eyes, now wandering with a purpose, scanned the crowd for Valkah. The smells, sight, and noise created a cacophony and caused my head to begin to spin. I spun on my heels and headed back through the door marked with a sword with a red edge.
Exiting the Arena in the Wall, I am greeted again by the avid poker player.
"You didn't tell me it was literally an inter-guild sparing pit! I almost got lost. Where the hell is Valkah?" I ask irritated.
"Oh, you should have just asked that. She is out back at our training grounds, probably helping the newbies. She's on noobie duty after all."
So that is why she greeted me so, makes sense. But I can't help but feel a little irritated. 'so she only helped me because it's her job.' is the only thought that burns through my head, increasing my irritation.
My eyebrow begins to twitch angrily. I guess this is what I get for not asking the right question. I grunt my thanks and head out the back door into the room I had seen earlier.
As I enter I see valkah engaged in combat with a humanoid made of straw, wielding a greatsword. Its burlap skin barely holding back its straw flesh, was cut easily by Valkah as she invaded its range and slashed across its midriff. A puff of straw appears and the golem falls over, sending its greatsword crashing to the ground. She straightens up, turns around, notices me, and then greats me.
"Greetings," she says grinning.
"Hello. So, you have been training out here? The poker ass directed me to the Arena in the Wall, but I guess that is partially my fault."
"Bigger guy, look's like he's lost almost every game his played?" She asked
"Large, but definitely not in charge," I reply.
She giggles much to my surprise. "Yeah that's Enrick, don't pay him any mind. I mean unless you want all of his coin."
I crouch over the golem and start looking it over. The straw and hay are slowly weaving back together. In the smaller cuts that had already mended, the burlap skin began to grow and weave the cuts closed.
"You did a number on that golem. It's so interesting how they heal themselves" I get up, face Valkah again, and start to walk to the nearby weapon racks. "Can you assist me in training? I'd like to do group combat so that I can be prepared for a fight in a party. Plus, I'd like to get to know how you fight."
"You want to spar with me? no offense rook, but you don't look like you could even wield a light sword" she replies
"Yeah, it may not-"
Suddenly, I notice something rushing towards Valkah from behind. Immediately, I push her out of the way with my left arm and send the right fist flying upwards at the figure. My fist connects with the forehead of the figure, but it gave in and squished. Then much to my surprise, something tickled my arm. Hay was floating around in the air. No, I had punched the head of the practice golem so hard it had torn the head open. I'm lucky that wasn't a person, otherwise, my hand would be broken.
"Oh..." I sputter.
"The fucking hell was that fo- Oh..." Valkah says
I lower my arm. "Uh... It can recover from that right?" I ask nervously.
"Uh, maybe? I've seen them come back from a lot of bad things. Uh, maybe?" She says bewildered.
I crouch down and inspect the golem. Unlike last time the plant fibers don't seem to be growing. I glance at Valkah and look back at the golem again. The fibers slowly begin to start snaking back together again, but it seems much more sluggish than last time, almost stunned.
I stand up again. "It looks like it will be fine. It just might be uh... a little stunned. If golems can be stunned." I say.
I continue to stand there awkwardly as Valkah says nothing staring at me. During this period of awkwardness, the golem manages to heal and gets up. It glances at me then goes to stand over with the other golems. Glancing down at my feet, I realized that I had stepped outside of a large white ring on the floor.
"So how do these things work? Does it have something to do with being inside the ring?" I ask.
Valkah shakes her head. "Umm, Yeah," She replies.
I raise an eyebrow. "Okay? ...Well, this is awkward."
"Ya, think?" rings the retort.
"Well, do we want to practice together now? I still have no idea how to use the golems."
"Uh... No... No... You just removed that one's scalp." She winces
"You could literally cut one of those things in half if you tried... Right? How is scalping it worse? They don't have bones! If they did I would have broken my hand on its skull."
"What did you just say?" a fire springs forth in her eyes "You know what, Fine let's do this," she says haughtily.
"Uh.. I wasn't-" I try to say.
Valkah steps into the ring. "No golems," she says. Then turns to me, eyes aflame.
I look at her, utterly confused. What did I say wrong? I could try to talk her out of her anger, but I get the feeling it will only make things worse. Me and my fat mouth. I close my mouth that I just discovered was open and step into the ring. I reach into my bandoleer and retrieve one of the pills I had made prior. I toss it to Valkah.
"Here. If we are going to fight, we are going to do it on fair grounds. It is a Jade Light pill. It will help recover your energy."
She swats it away "Do you really think I'm that weak?"
"No. I did not know how long you had been training, and I was trying to be nice."
I reclaim the dashed pill, put it away safely, then raise my fists. Immediately, a slash comes across at my chest, and I manage to deflect it. The dull practice blade ringing, as it comes back for another chance to finish the chord. This time, I manage to knock the blade back further breaking her onslaught. I lash out a palm strike which she catches with her forearm while guarding her abdomen. It is returned with a gust metal which I barely manage to dodge. Palming the blade further in its path I slide past her on her right, only to be met with a dagger. A red streak appears on the outside of my shoulder in answer to the daggers blow. I turn in time to catch her sword falling from the sky, and manage to parry it away with my knuckles. From that same motion, I send the fist flying forward, only to have the ring of steel answer its call. My right fist sitting against the flat of her blade supported with her dagger. Sending the left fist forth, I manage to knock the dagger out of her hands, but all that wins me is a kick to the side. Seeing the moment I jump forward and return the kick at her ankles knocking her off balance. As she topples backward to the ground I lash forward and punch at her face. Realizing what I am doing I pull the punch and stop it before I hit her.
"That was luck. Do you want to go again, or are you still upset by something you read too far into? I know you are on rookie duty, but that doesn't mean you have to treat me as if I am a fool. I am a rookie, not stupid." I say bluntly. "I would still like to be friends, but friends on equal terms, not master and speck of dirt. Now, do you want to go and get food and makeup?" I offer her my hand to help her get up. She grabs my hand and I help her up. A devious, but warm grin spreads across her face.
"Food sounds good, also good job, not many can beat me in a one on one."
I scratch the nape of my neck. "As I said, it was luck. Now, where do we even get fo- " My stomach interrupts my sentence. "I uhh... may have forgotten to eat yesterday, cultivating and all."
We walk back to out of the sweaty training grounds and back into the overly warm yet welcoming guild hall. We make our way over to the tables following the wafting scent of food. I hadn't noticed it before, but there was a window into a small kitchen with one person grumbling behind it. He is obviously the cook with that sour attitude. I nudge Valkah.
I whisper, "How do we get food without pissing off the cook?"
She shrugs "I don't know, I normally cook for myself. Plus then I know there's no spit or any other unwanted fluids in the food."
I stop and stare at her briefly.
"AAAAnnnyway, I guess that won't hurt. Is there anything you want to make?" I ask as we turn towards our dorm.
"I mean, what you want. Name it and I can probably make it, that or burn it. Cooking skill's fifty-fifty at this point." she replies.
I raise my eyebrow. "Your full of surprises aren't you. I can try and make something. It might not be good, but at least it won't be burned."
"I mean there's that too, but you won the fight. So food cooking duty is on me," she says matter of factly.
"Soup."
"Kind?"
"Soup."
"I can keep this up all night- Shit its noon- all day."
"Feesh"
"You mean the fish with legs that runs?"
I nod.
"Do you know how much of a bitch that is to catch?"
I pull a dried fillet out of my messenger bag and hold it out.
"Ah, well there's that too. You just carry dried feesh around?"
I ignore the question. I take my hand an reach into the bag. when the bag hits my shoulder, I look up and notice a gaping mouth and wide eyes. I look down at the bag again which was too small to contain all of my arms.
"Riiiight. I have a magic bag stitched to the mouth of this bag. It is essentially a magic bag, just more durable."
I toss the fish steak to Valkah who catches it.
"And you want soup of this?" She asks
I nod again. She sighs heavily, then says fine.
A half hour later, a small pot of soup is slowly bubbling over a small stove.
"Beetch here's your feesh." Valkah shouts.
I close the alchemy book I was holding with a thud. "I'm right here you know. No need to shout."
"Oh, I know," she replies sarcastically.
I place the book on the bed and clear off the small floor table. She places the pot metal on the table in the burned dip in the center of the table. She procures two very different looking wooden bowls from her side of the room and only one small wooden spoon. She sets the items on the table and takes a bowl and the spoon. She grabs the pot and pours some soup into her bowl then offers me the pot. I take it and fill up my bowl, a warm fishy scent greeting my nose. I begin to sip from the bowl.
We continue eating in silence for a while.
"Uhhh. This is pretty good," I say awkwardly.
"Guess I got the good fifty percent then," she replies.
"You seem to like metal a lot. Do you know where we could get a large quantity of mithril?"
"First, How do you know I know about metals and their alloys? Second not a whole lot, It's lighter and harder than steel, but other than that I know nothing on the matter. I have never had a chance to sit down and look at the stuff"
"To answer your first question, you stayed with me the entire time I was fixing your blade. In addition, you also were very incredulous when I said I could fix your blade, meaning you know something about metallurgy. And the rest was just an assumption."
"Well, I mean, you're right. It's the one thing I love in life, you know? As for me staying while you fix my swordbreaker. I just didn't want to see anything bad happen to it."
"Yeah, but you stayed there for multiple hours. Most people wouldn't stay for that even if they loved their weapon."
"Let's just say it means a lot to me, okay." she snaps irritatedly.
I sigh and keep eating. "Why does she keep getting mad? I must be saying something wrong." The thought rolls through my head. I pass it off, deciding that I should wait till we know each other better.
"So no leads on the mithril. Perhaps there's a quest on clearing out a mine? I might be able to find something about what are signals for mithril deposits in one of my books."
"I mean there might be, Haven't looked at that damn board in weeks. Why the interest in mithril?"
"Eh. Samuel asked for mithril to train me in blacksmithing. I could probably learn it from a book, but a personal teacher is always better than a book."
"I mean he is a good person to learn from on that kind of thing, but why does he need it? You know what never mind I'll ask him myself later"
Having said that, we get up from the table and clean up, then head back to the main hall. We approach a board to the right of the administrator's desk that I had missed in my awe at the arrival. Or, it could have been my anxiety for being someplace new. We peruse the quests on the board and find a few interesting ones to take a look at. Taking the rough parchment in hand we walk over to the drab administration table. Elris is sitting at the table half asleep until he sees us, at which he jolts away and pats himself down. My lips quiver as I try to hide my grin.
"Hey, Elris we'll take these two, they're close to one another." She says joyfully.
Elris seems unaffected by her ridiculous comment. He slides open a drawer and shuffles through it. From it, he procures two more papers. Unlike the other pages, the black print was much smaller and much more detailed. He puts them down in front of us.
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[Unstick my Shaft!]
My iron mineshaft as of recently has become
infested with monsters, and I need your help
in removing them from the dark deep crevices.
[Location: 2 days travel north]
[Expected Enemies: Spiders, ???]
[Danger: Stone]
[Reward: My gratitude, Anything you Find]
--------------------------------------------------
I look up from the paper at Elris, who was clearly enjoying himself.
"I have no words. Why did I have to read this with my eyes?" I ask.
"The... Requester was very adamant that the mineshaft he was talking about did, in fact, contain stone, and was a part of the earth." Elris said while struggling to keep his face straight.
"Well, I guess we gotta explore his crevices now!" Valkah says hyper-enthusiastically.
"Stop the carriage, let's look at the other one first," I say.
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[Rock Hard Men]
Some men came out of nowhere from the
mountains. We tried to drive them off but
our weapons didn't make them go soft.
They are a nuisance that must be finished.
[Location: 3 days south, 2 days east of Karn]
[Expected Enemies: Minor Golems]
[Danger: Metal]
[Reward: 20 silver]
--------------------------------------------------
I look up from the quest sheet and try to stare a hole into Elris' head.
"This is your doing, I know it. I don't even care at this point. Let's go beat up some hard men!" I say sarcastically.
I take the quest for the removal of the golems, roll it up, and put it into my bag. I then turn to Valkah.
"So when do you want to head out?" I ask.
"That sounds like a lot of handwork."
I stare at her.
"What?"
I continue to stare at her.
"Like what you see?"
I close my eye and turn around.
"Guess we will start tomorrow," I say loudly.
"Nah we still got daylight, let's go beat some men." She says walking past me. She turns grins then opens the door, and I aggravatedly follow.
CREATORS' THOUGHTS 
Fulnis
Fulnis We tried a new thing with formatting the quests. We will see if it catches on. In addition, this is all that we had written up to date. We are working on chapter 3 currently. No solid ETA considering we both write as a hobby and things have been busy for us.
Weekly Power Status
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Ranking 
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stone