I am saved by a water elemental

I try to swim down and away from the sinking vine, but some of my armor seems to be stuck to it. I can’t get out on my own. I need someone to help me. My lungs are burning up. I can’t hold my breath for much longer. Someone, anyone, please, help me.

All of a sudden, I feel a strong **** pull me down, away from the barbed vine. The part of my armor that was stuck on it rips, but I don’t care. Then the **** pulls me sideways. The vine sinks further next to me and then I am brought up to the surface at high speed. As soon as I breach the surface and I am above water, I take in deep breaths of air.

“Thank you, Kiara.” I say breathily. “You saved my life.”

Then I see Kiara burst out of the water in front of me. She is supported by a shadow construct of hers. A large one which keeps her suspended in the air. Kiara’s clothes are soaking wet and her hood is sticking to her face. She sticks a hand inside her hood and lifts it so she can see. Her black lipstick is running out and it’s messing up her chin, though her nose and eyes remain hidden in shadows.

“My my, Darx. You certainly keep surprising me.” Kiara says.

Hang on. If Kiara is in front of me, then who saved me from the water?

I turn my head and look at the person holding me. It is not even a person at all. She certainly looks like a person, because of her human features. It is also definitely a her, because she looks feminine. But her entire body is made up of water.

“Looks like you summoned a water elemental to save you.” Kiara explains. “Here I was, doing my best to get to you as quickly as possible and declare the mission a failure because you needed help. Then all of a sudden, this one appears from out of nowhere, yanks you away and rushes you to the surface.”

There are so many things for me to think, but right now I just want to be on solid land. I tell the water elemental to bring me to the rest of my group and she delivers.

I take a short break and watch Kiara clean the lipstick off her chin. After a feel a bit better I pull out my adventurer card. I wanted to see the [Summoner] skill on there. It should be, right. Instead, I see that my rank went up again. I’m a B rank now. Not only that, my [Dual Slash] skill has changed into [Triple Slash].

“Interesting upgrades you have there.” Kiara tells me as she reads along with me over my shoulder. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen a spellsword with the [Summoner] skill.”

My class is still nothing but question marks, but Kiara really seems to think I’m a spellsword. Wow, so I’m a B rank templar, capable of using runes AND performing summoning. I should really send another letter to my mom. She will be so proud of my progress. And Oliver. I should find a way to tell him too.

"Another thing i should mention." Kiara continues. "You just summoned that water elemental in a very unusual way."

"How so?" I asked.

"See, normally a summoner is supposed to perform a ritual. Once which calls spirits to him. Then he selects one and makes a pact with it. You made a pact with a n elemental spirit without performing that ritual."

I did not even know a ritual was the needed to begin with. I just pleaded for help from anyone so as to not die.

After informing my friends of all my progress we went back to the first cave. The one where we defeated the snapping turtles. Shalia closed the hole we went through so the secret Cave can remain a secret. Then we grab the turtle shells we previously collected and carried them to the carriage we come with. Kiara helped out as well, this time, as our dungeon test was over. The water elemental helped as well. After that, I dispelled the elemental and we all went into the carriage to travel back to the castle.

We were all talking about our first dungeon and basically relived the whole thing. We spend hours talking and were back in Riledo before we knew it. As we passed through the city, I opened my bag of holding and pulled out one of the eggs. It was pretty big. Big enough to fit in my entire hand. The omelet you could make from just one of these has to be huge.

While thinking about food, I get reminded of my friend Oliver. In fact, we’re going through Dark Dragon territory now. Didn’t he say the inn he works at is close on the border between Midnight Dawn and Dark Dragon?

I tell Kiara about Oliver and the inn he works at and ask her if we can make a little detour. Kiara nods and informs the driver about the change in plans.

When get there I am honestly surprised at how busy it is.

“Wow, that’s a lot of people.” Shalia remarks. “Your friend must be pretty famous.”

We enter and we quickly see nearly all the tables are full. Two of them are even filled with people wearing blue capes. Those must be members of the Blue Legion.

A woman with a few years on her comes over and welcomes us. She proposes to guide us to a table, but I tell her I’m a friend of Oliver and I’m just here finally meet him again after 6 months. After asking for my name, she heads off into the kitchen. A few moments later, Oliver comes out.

“Darx!” My old friend says as he comes in to give me a big hug. “About time you found your way here.”

“I wish I could have come sooner, but I got told to train in the castle for a month.” I tell him.

“Yeah, I heard from Mia.” Oliver asks. “Nice work, bro. It’s kinda like what Amelia went through. Only people with a high rank get to do that. So, how did your awakening go? I can’t wait to hear what skills you got.”

At first, I had wanted to tell Oliver everything. Including the weird question marks on my card. But when he dropped Amelia’s name, I remembered how he is still on good terms with her. Kiara had told me not everybody shares his adventuring secrets with everyone else. Some people might want to use that knowledge against you. Suppose Oliver tells Amelia about my awakening, and then Amelia tells Kase. That would be bad.

I decide to tell Oliver I’m a B rank templar and that I have both the [Rune Master] and [Summoner] skills. These are 2 skills I’ll be showing off in combat anyways, so little secrets there. I also introduce him to my team members and tell him about the quest we have been on. Then I pull out one of the eggs and show it to him.

“Darx. This is amazing. I could whip you a good meal with this. Want one?” Oliver asks.

“Actually, I was wondering if me and my friends could sell a few here.”

It seems like my friends got the clue and each of us pull another giant turtle egg out of our bags.

“I’m going to have to ask the owners. Hang on, I’ll be right back.”

Shortly after, Oliver returns with the old lady from before and she suggests to pay 27 copper for each of the eggs. We decide to sell her only half of the eggs, the other half we will bring back to the castle and hand them over to the kitchen staff. Since we had an uneven number of eggs, I also decide to take one of mine and give it to Oliver for free.

“Take this one home with you and make it into something good for Emma. How far is she, by the way?”

“She is in the last month. She could be giving birth about any day now.” Oliver says. “I’ll make sure to tell her this one is a gift from you. She’ll love it. Please, Darx. Stay a while and let me prepare some of these turtle eggs for you and your friends.”

I talk it over with Kiara and she says it is almost dinner time, so we might as well stick around. She also suggests to pay for it. Since it is during her mentoring, she can have the royal guard reimburse her.

We sit down at a table and have a drink while I tell my team members about my past with Oliver and how skilled he was in cooking before he came to Riledo. When he returned with our food, they quickly realized I was not bragging for him. In fact, I have to admit myself that he had gotten even better in the last 6 months. But that is to be expected.

After the meal, as we make ready to head back to the castle, Oliver manages to talk to me away from my friends.

“Hey, I heard about what Mia.” He says. “She and Roland came to my uncle’s home, the place where Emma and I are staying at. She really needed to talk to Emma about it all. I was just wondering if you were holding up allright.”

Having the memories of Mia admitting she cheated on me resurface was not easy. It makes me all nervous, but also curious. “What did Emma say?”

“She told Mia that you should have been told. Mia expressed she was afraid you would slack your training if she had and kept going on about your rank. Look, I get it. If you had gotten a letter from Mia where she dumps you, of course you would feel like shit. If it was me in that position, I might skip out on training for a whole week, maybe more. You might have gotten C rank instead. So, I get where she’s coming from. But I think, in the end, I would have preferred to know.”

I have to admit, if I really had received a letter like that, yeah, I would have felt miserable enough to skip out on training. At least for a few days. I guess, by waiting to tell me, she made me feel the pain when it was the right time to get exposed to it. Still sucks though. Mostly because in the end, there was never a need for her to worry about my rank.

“I’m fine. Thanks for asking.” I tell Oliver.

“Hey, at least now you can get a new girlfriend.” Oliver says, giving me a comfort tap on the shoulder. “So, what do you think about the one with the cat ears? She looks cute.”

“She may look cute, but I’m not sure if I can handle her.” I joke with Oliver.

As the carriage brings me back to the castle, I continue thinking about Oliver’s words. I guess it is about time for a new girlfriend. I’ll first finish my training in the castle. Then I’ll start looking for someone.

When we arrive at the castle, we unload the turtle shells from the carriage. The castle’s quartermaster inspects them and tells us they are of good quality. He is even willing to pay for them. They are even priced higher than the eggs, 38 copper each. That is 2 silver and 10 bronze for the eggs at the inn and 4 silver and 56 bronze. That’s nearly 7 silver total.

We also head to the kitchen and hand over the rest of the eggs. This time, we specify that we are gifting to the queen as a way of thanking her for having given us this chance to become friends and train under multiple experienced mentors. While the queen has already had her diner this evening, the head chef says he will serve one of these eggs for her and her daughter as breakfast and make sure to let her know it came as a gift from us.

While on our way to our rooms, Sophie suddenly stops us and says, “So guys. When taking the eggs out of my bag, I found this.” And she shows us the little box the pirate captain was holding. The box whose looting caused the undead pirates to wake up. “I had completely forgotten about it.”

“Well, open it.” Leona says.

Sophie opens the box and in it we find 12 silver coins. 2 for each of us. It is so perfect that I am starting to suspect Kiara might have set the dungeon up for us and that tomorrow, a royal guard might be send to the dungeon to reset the secret cave for the next group of trainees.

We decide to divide our earnings between ourselves, which comes down to 3 silver and 9 bronze each, with 2 bronze to spare. Most of us immediately put our earnings away. Ryul just holds it in his hand and stares at it for a while.

“Something wrong, Ryul?” Shalia asks.

“Before I came to Riledo, 3 silver coins were my life’s savings.” Ryul says. “Now I’ve made 3 whole silver in just one day.”

I get his shock. It was difficult for me too to make this kind of money way back in the village. But I have been saving up for longer and put effort into it. Ryul’s decision to get his awakening was less serious than mine.

Sophie places a hand on the elf’s shoulder and says, “Ryul, your life doesn’t need 3 silver to be saved. I’ll heal you for free whenever you have need of it.”

We all look at Sophie with a weird expression, aside from Ari who just sighs.

The next day, during breakfast, we tell Wendy all about the dungeon we had been on yesterday. Miranda isn’t here this time, she is at the table with Dante and his group. But Wendy is listening to our story with all of her attention. She is quite pleased that I was able to rank up again to B rank and even more amazed when she heard I can summon elementals now.

After our story, Wendy tells us that her team hasn’t done a dungeon yet, but she heard Syvis and her team have done a dungeon already as well. That one having a couple of cyclopes at the end.

Hearing about this, I now doubt that Wendy is going to do the same dungeon we did. But if Dante wants to teach her about secret caves and passageways like Kiara did, she and her team should definitely try to find one. After all, our dungeon’s secret had quite a nice reward.

Later that day, I went with my damaged armor to the quartermaster and asked him if he knew someone who could repair it. He told me the castle has a couple of skilled craftsmen and it will be fixed. For free even, since I incurred the damage while in service of the queen.

After training I went to the library again and wrote myself a new scroll of runes. The one I had got too damaged when I fell in the water after Shalia’s vine bridge gave out. I’ve also decided to add some earth runes to it this time, in case we again need to change a dungeon’s walls to reveal a secret. The story Kiara told us about the pirates having only 1 earth mage and the dangers of losing that one person has me a little worried. It would be better if I was some kind of back-up earth mage in case something happened to Shalia.

Two days later the quartermaster came to me with my armor, fully repaired now. Training continues like usual for the rest of the week and Wendy and Miranda went on a dungeon as well with their team. Like expected, their dungeon was a different one altogether and they each made 3 silver coins from it.

On the de evening of the last day, I asked Kiara for a favor. I wanted for my friends in my current team, as well as Wendy and Miranda, to be able to go to the highest point of the castle. Kiara agreed and after collecting my friends, we made the long trek up the stairwell of the castle’s lookout tower.

When we finally made it up there, we all had a very good look over the city. I remember back when the guards let me on the castle walls so could see it for my first time. This time, viewing Riledo from so much higher, is even better.

I point at the guildhall for the Knights Hospitaler for my friends to see. Kiara then took over and pointed at a lot of other guildhalls, including those of Midnight Dawn, Oblivion and obviously also the Dark Dragon guildhall.

The next morning, after breakfast, we are asked to return all the weapons and armor we have borrowed from the royal guard. After that we are send to our rooms to collect our belongings. We will be leaving the castle after all. Bets not leave anything behind.

After that, we gather at the courtyard where Harold is waiting for us. It is a bit odd to see all my friends in the same clothes as the day i first met them, especially Wendy. For a whole month, i have seen her in armor, but today she is dressed in rags again.

Harold then tells us that today is the end of our training and it is time for us to make a choice. If we wish to join any one of the three big guilds, all we have to do is walk up to the mentor that was sent by that guild, provided we have an invitation, of course. If we wish to join the royal guard, all we have to do is walk back into the castle. If our decision is anything else, like joining a smaller guild, starting our own guild, or leaving Riledo to become an adventurer in a different city, we are to walk out the gate and into the big city.

Alright then. The first possibility is to join my mom’s old guild, the Dark Dragons. The only problem is, it’s my mom’s old guild. She had quite a reputation and maybe all of her old friends will expect the same from me. Especially since I am a B rank like her. I even have my dad’s rune mastery. Would I be able to take on that kind of pressure?

Then there is Midnight Dawn. I would come into that guild with no expectations placed on me.

I kinda feel bad for Syvis. She’s a good woman, and I wouldn’t mind joining a guild that she is with. But it is also the guild that Kase has joined. Then again, would Kase really weaken his guild by going after one of his own guild members? If I do join Oblivion and he tries to come after me, the other members might start to fear him.

Or perhaps I could join the Royal Guard. If I work for the queen, I should remain out of Kase’s range. I would even be able to start meeting Kathleen again.

Suppose I were to start my own guild, how would I even name it? Would Ryul join? Leona would definitely be a welcome member. Maybe I could ask Wendy to join.