“Mister Schmidt, I notice you also cut all the grass in the area again? Old foes of yours?”

  “Oh! Force of habit, Instructor. Sorry!”

  Johan had just lead a team against a bronze ranked monster called a suicide hare. Although, in retrospect, he had to confess that, really, he’d led them away from the suicide hare. It was a truly terrible monster to behold.

  The instructors had allowed Johan to read from Tome before confronting the fiend. At first Instructor Drakos had been inclined to disallow it saying that not having purchased a monster index before adventuring was a lack of foresight we should have to learn from but Instructor Konstantinos had successfully argued that Johan could easily afford it and simply hadn’t purchased one merely because of his ready access to Dave and Tome.

  Dave. Johan smiled thinking about the man. He couldn’t believe it when Johan had looked up the monster. He’d slowly collapsed to the ground with his hands over his face and shaken in silent laughter for a full minute at the sight of the terrible beast! He’d tried to explain but Johan wasn’t sure he had understood his friend properly. Something about the tale of a champion called Monty Python who had a transcendent grail and encountered a suicide hare in his adventures. Dave waved his hands saying that he thought the suicide hares were just legends and excused himself to go have a cup of tea, leaving Tome with Johan.

  The hares were noted in the monster index as hyper aggressive, with gemstones for eyes that could be harvested then cut to be used as focusing elements in many magical items and their fur was infused with elemental magic, making their pelts desirable for enchanters but this bounty was not for the faint of heart. Johan now had first-hand experience of the guile held within a suicide hare. The ravenous monsters would attack from hiding and fling themselves among their prey with a wild abandon that couldn’t be contained and, when they bit, it penetrated deeply, cleaving flesh and bone!

  Johan nodded to himself, reflecting that retreat had definitely been the correct option. Thankfully, they’d read in Tome that the Hares didn’t like to go into water, something about their elemental fur being wet, so Johan’s team had decided to wait until it was near a small, tributary river before their ill-fated attack.

  “Good enough,” said Instructor Konstantinos. “A better response would have been to refuse the contract but I understand that Instructor Drakos didn’t phrase the offer as a request.”

  She and Drakos shared a momentary competitive stare.

  “They ought to have refused the offer anyway,” said Drakos, airily. “An adventurer needs the confidence to assert the limits of their abilities.”

  “That’s true,” admitted Konstantinos. “So, although you didn’t use the best solution, your immediate retreat in the face of being outmatched is, as I said, good enough.”

  Drakos clenched his jaw at a distant mountain.

  “Thank you, Instructor,” said Johan to Konstantinos and turned to Drakos. “And you, Instructor. Where to next?”

  “Actually yes,” murmured Konstantinos, also turning to Drakos. “Where should we go next? That’s the last of the teambuilding isn’t it? Solo tests now?”

  Johan felt like he wasn’t supposed to be hearing this but he hadn’t been dismissed either and so, hovered awkwardly as motionless as a grazer calf as Mother Superior Dukas joined the conversation.

  “There’s no silver zones to the east,” said Dukas, whose demi-god level hearing had no doubt heard everything. “We’ll get more monsters if we split up so why don’t one of you use that magnificent airship that the Booker boy owns and take it across the river?”

  “He’s not letting his betters on it,” snapped Drakos.

  That was true. Sort of. Avril was on the Second Wind but Dave flatly refused to let any of the Adventure Society aspirants on board. Drakos had asked why and Dave had answered with his truly unique casual lack of care about anything in the world and said that it was because they were a bunch of C-words. Johan had been shocked, amused and then shocked that he was amused! And, Dave had just stood there with a perfectly straight face! He didn’t even bat an eye. Johan could only wish he had such nerve! If not Dave’s cynicism. Dave meant well, of course.

  “He’ll agree to it if I ask nicely and the young lords and ladies are made to remember to act like they’re guests when on board,” said Mother Superior Dukas.

  “Your goddess told you this?” asked Drakos.

  “Common sense told me, my dear boy,” said Mother Superior Dukas in her most matriarchal tone. “Now come.”

  And, so they did. Mother Superior Dukas swept away, leading the group straight to Dave.

  “Booker,” said Mother Superior Dukas. Dave had time to raise his eyes from Tome with an open expression for the arriving group. “I would like us to use your airship to cover more area for the next part of the trials with some of the noble-born on board? They will, of course, be well supervised.”

  Dave grunted, taken aback for a moment.

  “So long as it’s my idea of well supervised and not theirs,” said Dave, nodding. “Although, I admit, they’ve been a lot more tolerable since Johan had a word with them on day one. I just want some reassurance that some entitled dimwit won’t be endangering my crew or anybody else on board.”

  Johan squirmed uncomfortably at the attention suddenly directed at him. He’d challenged the young scions to enact their noble virtues righteously for the duration of the trip and if they did, as judged by Instructor Drakos, they could challenge any lowborn to a feat of arms at the end. Should they win, Johan would give them an awakening stone from his party’s collection. Executive Services didn’t have the rarest awakening stones, but had stones of the hunt, of the winds and of several types of animal which were known to be desirable. Naturally, their noble nature had demanded they accept the challenge to rise above others.

  “They shall be supervised by Konstantinos,” reassured Mother Superior Dukas. “And I shall impress upon them her ability to fail them for any failure of decorum.”

  “Wait, hang on” said Dave and his face flickered as he used Stop And Think. “No, damn. It should be Drakos with me on the Second Wind.”

  Everyone, even Drakos, who’d been staring hard above Dave’s head, did a double take in surprise. Dave and Drakos were two cats in a tub, as his mum would say.

  “If the goal is to cover more ground then the best split is all the aspirants with mounts go with Konstantinos,” Dave explained. “You can summon a few mounts yourself to make up the numbers, right?”

  Konstantinos nodded.

  “Yeah, so that’ll be twelve mounted and thirteen flying,” said Dave. “If we put normal people on all the borrowed mounts we can even have an almost even split of classes too. Which would be good to allay any accusations of favouritism, right?” both instructors nodded. “And, the nobs view you as one of them,” Dave nodded at Drakos. “So, I think they’re less likely to try and get away with anything if it’s you telling them what to do. No offence, Konstantinos, but because you were born a commoner, those little shits think taking instruction from you as a novelty to weasel out of. From Drakos, they view instructions more strictly.

  “No offence,” scoffed Drakos at the horizon.

  “No offence meant to her,” clarified Dave with casual ease. “I mean every offence to -”

  “Booker,” warned Mother Superior Dukas.

  Dave took a breath and clenched his jaw.

  “Apologies, Mother,” said Dave. “Just assure me, Instructor Drakos, that if the lord or ladylings are not on their best behaviour you’ll personally throw them overboard or… what-have-you?”

  “I assure you, Booker,” said Drakos haughtily, “that the upper class under my supervision will behave as I expect of guests in my own house or suffer my wrath.”

  “Thank you kindly, Instructor Drakos,” said Dave, giving the bow of a commoner to a liege lord. “Please make your selections. I shall await you with the captain on my ship.”

  Drakos gave the return bow of a liege lord dismissing a subject and moved off to collect and explain what was happening to the aspirants who were arrayed and separated by blood across the meadow they’d been watching Johan’s embarrassing but necessary retreat from.

  “Come along, Booker,” said Konstantinos. “I’m going to get the hare.”

  Some time later, Dave had been told to do the first solo fight when a small pack of gnolls had been spotted.

  “Yeah, I get it. You need to see what I can do if I get separated from my team.”

  “Instructor,” muttered Instructor Drakos in correction.

  “I mean, I understand the assignment, Instructor Drakos,” said Dave. “Looks like four gnolls, the contract says a pack of gnolls, I’ve read the entry on gnolls so there could be more. I’ll approach with caution. Is there anything else, Instructor Drakos?”

  The Second Wind drifted lazily backwards on its moorings as the last of the aspirants who didn’t have slow fall abilities or equipment finished climbing down. Dave’s audience stood in groups separated by blood, waiting for his one man task to begin.

  Dave began by taking a new item out of the inventory at his waist. Johan recognised it immediately; Reins Of The Discordant Steed. Johan winced, remembering the last time he’d seen Dave use it. Brisset had purchased it on Dave’s behalf in Pranay. Items with descriptions that referenced the dark gods were always unpopular and with the recent divine betrayal of Purity, more unpopular than ever so this mount had actually cost Dave very little of his wealth which was why Brisset was so confident in purchasing it on his behalf.

  Dave invested some mana into the reigns and threw them in front of himself. Light warped, upwards became inwards, gravity became a thought you could see in and, from the eldritch un-space around the reins a creature formed that was hard to look at, lifting Dave into the air as it imposed itself into reality.

  The thing that crawled from the eldritch space defied biology and belonged in nightmares. Its eight spindly, arachnid legs moved with a disjointed rhythm, each step a jarring staccato as raptor-claw tips struck the snow, unnaturally connected in pairs at each knee of its predator-like limbs. Its grotesque body, a blend of raptor and spider, stretched and twisted unnervingly, making it impossible to tell where one creature’s influence ended and the other’s began. Patches of coarse, arachnid fur covered its frame, while oily, iridescent scales gleamed faintly, refusing to reflect light properly. Trying to discern where one texture shifted into another was an uneasy task, as if the creature’s form rebelled against coherence. Glowing, multifaceted eyes, too many for comfort, pulsed with an uncaring, alien intelligence, flickering with a light not its own, as though the natural light of the world recoiled, refusing to touch what lay inside. Its scythe-like claws hooked into the ground, while its maw, filled with needle-thin teeth, opened and closed with soft, unsettling clicks, as if it were tasting the air of a reality it didn’t belong to. An aura of wrongness emanated from it, warping the very space around it, as though its mere existence was an affront to nature, time, and sanity alike.

  The author's content has been appropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.

  “KraKa-ka-ka-ka,” the creature half-clucked in a muted, muffled way that made everyone listening think the aberration’s throat wasn’t meant for vocalisation. Dave’s chattering audience of onlookers took a collective step back and many of the familiars present outright hid behind their bonded masters.

  “What… is…?”

  “Sweet gods! What’d you summon Booker?”

  “That feels wrong.”

  “...the way it moves or the way it looks at you…”

  “I will never forget this.”

  “Booker,” said Instructor Drakos with perfect, icy calm. “You’re not supposed to bring your own monsters to the trials.”

  “Heh, good one, Instructor,” said Dave with an appreciative chuckle.

  “You don’t seem affected?” asked Instructor Konstantinos who was, like Johan himself, looking straight at Dave and nowhere else.

  “I think it’s part of one of my racials,” said Dave and then waved. “See you all soon.”

  He turned the skittering aberration and made straight for the gnolls.

  Johan had grown up his whole life only hearing of the dog-headed, beclawed monsters named as gnolls but he’d been a little surprised to learn from Tome that similar iron rank monsters appeared all over the world. They were called margols in the great continent across the Byzas Strait where they were slimmer with larger claws, in Bharatakhanda - what a name - their features were described as more subdued with a shorter snout but would sometimes use weapons and in the jungles around Rimaros they were the feared Nahual who would attack at night in droves.

  Dave rode into battle on what he insisted was mundanely called an ‘arachnoraptor’ and when Johan felt his attention slipping back to the history and variants of gnolls, he knew that there was no denying that Dave was just not that interesting to watch fight. Honestly, he felt that Drakos should just give Dave the Adventure Society badge now so they could do something else.

  He forced himself to watch Dave’s battle and at least appreciate the planning and repetitive efficiency of it. Dave had opened up the battle by throwing a flaming grenade onto the closest gnoll and riding away, exactly matching the speed of the gnoll while turning in his saddle and shooting the pursuing monster with that wand enhancer that James had so cleverly made. When the gnoll closest to him died, he just did the same thing again with the next gnoll. He did this over and over while riding in a wide loop of a path. An endless path of slow death.

  Dave had shown this technique before in training. He’d called it ‘kiting’ and described it as a very practised method of his culture that he was keen to implement in this new place he found himself in. Johan found more glory in feats of arms with sword and shield but in the end, he decided that his mum was right; happiness takes a different path for every soul.

  After an excruciatingly long wait, Dave came skittering back on that disturbing mount. Johan understood why Dave insisted on using it though, in spite of its unsettling feel, it was a very, very fast mount.

  “Critique, Instructor Drakos?” asked Dave, dismounting and pocketing the reins while the mount shrank jerkily and irregularly into un-spaces with no apparent discomfort.

  “It was a bit slow,” remarked Instructor Drakos. “No spell slots today?”

  “Didn’t have to use them, Instructor,” said Dave with a shrug, “Maybe I could have got two at the start with falling paper bricks but I’d rather save spell slots for staying alive over maybe killing two gnolls.”

  “Thank you, Booker,” said Instructor Drakos, dismissing Dave. “Everyone back on the… transport.”

  The Second Wind had anchored in a clearing behind them, drifting in the biting winter wind. When the crew saw the aspirants approaching they threw rope ladders and lines over the side. Johan took one of the lines and started pulling himself up hand-over-hand as did others with strength or weight reduction abilities. Most of everyone else started scrambling up rope ladders.

  “All aboard?” bellowed Captain Dimont, sending a respectful look at Drakos who nodded after a moment. “Good. Weigh anchor! Let’s get underway to the next stop. Mister Booker, to the helm, if you please.”

  It wasn’t a request. Dave's map ability could give Captain Dimont a second by second knowledge of his exact location and since Telekinetic Scribe allowed him to erase his own pen strokes, he could safely write on the maps. At the raised section at the back of the ship where Captain Dimont stood, Dave started pointing at a map and the captain got them moving on an east-south-east heading to the next stop.

  The Second Wind sailed over the frostbitten landscape that glittered with melt, over trees, streams and all other aspects of the landscape that could drifted past while Sam leaned over the rails smiling at all of it. She was perfectly safe with her slow fall belt, of course, but Johan kept an eye on her just in case. It’d be inconvenient to have to circle back and pick her up. The Second Wind had a very wide turning circle.

  “Right there! Monster!” shouted Adrien Lefevre, jolting Johan from his thoughts.

  “Where away?” called the Captain, leaning heavily on the railings and his remaining leg.

  “Right there!” shouted Adrien, not understanding that pointing was quite useless for anybody trying to navigate.

  Adrien’s family were servants on a rural estate, familiar with the workings of the household. A skill that Johan had learned was surprisingly complex but it made sense. Those noble houses could get quite big.

  “Due east, Captain!” called Stibbons, one the the nearby hands. “Half a mile!”

  Captain Dimont commanded the airship to an angle that’d bring it over the indicated area.

  “Monsiours de Bourbon, de Montmorency, Mademoiselle de Laval and Blackwood,” said Instructor Drakos. “Make yourselves ready to disembark from altitude.”

  “Good luck, Edward,” Johan clapped his fellow commoner’s shoulder as they passed.

  The four named adventure society aspirants went and stood with Instructor Drakos at the back of the ship. Two of them had slow fall equipment and the other two had abilities that negated fall damage. The latter were remarkably common. Usually some kind of special attack they could use against the ground.

  “Hold her steady!” bellowed Captain Dimont after a quiet word from Instructor Drakos.

  Instructor Drakos and the four aspirants checked the ground for good landing spots one last time and leapt off the back of the Second Wind which the Captain proceeded to put into a circling pattern above the area. Johan stood in the designated area away from where the crew worked and gazed down at the distant figures about to take on the large pack of ratlings. Drakos was arranging the aspirants in a concave line to each fall on the foraging ratlings at once. Although the opening of the attack would be simultaneous, Johan had no doubt that Instructor Drakos had instructed that they not work together. They were testing the ability to fight alone today but it seemed that often the monsters were just too many, so the exercise became multiple aspirants fighting ‘alone’ at the same time. Dave had been an exception and was given the first one-man-only encounter since his damage wasn’t enough to reliably keep up with the other aspirants.

  The four on the ground engaged. De Montmorency used a song essence ability and attracted more than their share of ratlings. Drakos intervened and used his own abilities to redirect the ratlings towards de Laval and Blackwood instead. Blackwood jumped, clearly shaken, at the unexpected addition of the extra ratling and used a couple of explosive, long cooldown abilities to regain the upper hand. Johan winced a little.

  The encounter otherwise went well with each aspirant defeating their ratlings. The Second Wind descended to pick them up. Once she was on board, Edward made for Johan.

  “Johan, buddy, I need help,” he said in an undertone. “I need you to help me. The look both instructors just gave me. I dunno. I really need an Adventure Society badge and I can’t mess this up. I can’t!”

  Johan just smiled down at his new friend, washing away Edward’s desperation and filling him with hope.

  “Let’s go talk to Dave,” said Johan, moving to put a guiding arm around his shoulders. “I can help you with swordplay but strategy? Planning?” He gave the other man a wink. “You want Detective Dave Booker.”

  Fifteen minutes later, Edward carefully held in his hands what Dave called a ‘process flow diagram,’ centred around a ‘damage rotation.’ As he made his way across the swaying deck, his expression was a mix of determination and wonder, Johan eavesdropped with satisfaction as Edward approached Adrien, Charlotte, and Elodie, who were already eyeing the diagram with curiosity.

  “What’s that?” Adrien asked, leaning closer as Edward displayed the paper.

  “This… is a damage rotation,” Edward replied, a hint of excitement creeping into his voice. “I gave Dave a look at my abilities and he broke down the most efficient way to use them in a fight. Take a look! He even has these little side-paths for if things go wrong.”

  Charlotte was intrigued despite herself.

  “How does he know this will work? Does he have an information ability?”

  “Yes and it’s pretty precise,” Edward said, nodding. “You should ask him to make one for you too. It’s not at all how we’ve been fighting. It’s not ‘gumption’ and ‘feeling the moment’ like we’ve been told by the highers. He just talked with me about how I like to use each ability, my weapon preferences and a bunch of other things and then he made this and… well, I think it just makes sense. I like it.”

  “Maybe we should take a look,” said Charlotte, exchanging a piqued glance with Elodie. “What do you think?”

  Elodie eyed the paper with both suspicion and hope.

  “Let’s see how you do in the next fight, Ed.”

  Johan beamed, already knowing the result. Dave’s careful planning was starting to win them over.

  Adrien relentlessly drilled his new battle method with Johan for an hour before his chance to shine arrived. His essence combination of wheel, lightning, and resolute formed a juggernaut confluence. Volunteering at the next monster encounter, he was dropped alongside another aspirant onto a pack of galezard.

  Some encounters involved the entire group disembarking for a better view, like Dave’s lone battle, but for most, those fighting leapt off the back with Drakos while the rest did their best to watch from the poop deck. Adrien had borrowed Elodie’s slow fall cape - a piece of equipment the commoners had to share - and settled to the ground, already summoning the giant mono-wheel that marked his combat style.

  Johan smiled as Adrien resisted the urge to open with his only movement ability, dodging the hail of thunderous attacks the galezards hurled at him the mundane way, and closed in for melee. When the Second Wind was close in its controlled drift, it was possible to see Adrien’s lips moving as he fought, concentrating fiercely on doing it RightTM. His lightning-tipped spear attack landed with the force of his charge, followed by a crushing wheel strike. Then Adrien spun the wheel on the monster for extra damage, activated Resolute Defence, attacked once more and disengaged.

  There were a few other abilities mixed in, but Johan couldn’t see the flows of magic the way Dave could, and he certainly didn’t have Dave’s ‘combat log’ - something he envied. As a result, he missed many of the finer details, but he still thought it was a strong showing from Adrien. Adrien maintained his momentum, rolling out and away, relying on his speed for safety until another opportunity to strike came.

  The almost mechanical but mesmerising battle bore Dave’s hallmark approach. Adrien’s repeated spear charges on lone monsters with swift disengagement showed marked improvement over his previous method, which had been to ‘get in, stay in, and use everything in an attempt to overwhelm’.

  In the earlier group fights, Adrien had sometimes needed to be saved from monster aggression, but now, talking himself through the process with white knuckles on his spear, when three galezards descended on him at once, he extricated himself from danger using Whiplash Snapback without any hesitation, and, to Johan’s relief, didn’t focus on trying to hit monsters with the line of force damage produced by the ability - a mistake that had previously left him scratched up by a dire wolf.

  When Adrien returned to the ship, grinning triumphantly, Charlotte and Elodie exchanged a glance and their eyes scanned the deck, seeking out Dave.

  Booker leaned back against the rail of the airship, posture relaxed as the biting wind whipped around him deep in thought with his spellbook on the foredeck, framed against the sunset. Charlotte and Elodie had sidled up to him during a lull in the nightly disembarking. Their manner was easy with the camaraderie the day’s events had left between them.

  “Booker,” Charlotte began, her voice low but carrying an edge of earnestness, “we really owe you for all your help. We wouldn’t have gotten this far without you.”

  Elodie nodded with Charlotte’s words.

  “You’ve made a big difference for us, you know? It’s difficult when you can’t afford an information ritualist. Everyone can feel their abilities but we can’t break them down the way you can on a whim. And, well, it’s given us a real chance of passing these trials.”

  “Just helping out,” he said, with a wry smile and a casual shrug. Booker turned his eyes back to the tips of the distant alps as the Second Wind bobbed at the end of its anchor. “Besides, I’d have done it for everyone if the nobs hadn’t been such pricks, you know?”

  Booker didn’t try to push his will on them, didn’t press for gratitude - unlike the nobility he despised, he didn’t need it. He’d helped them, without question, because they’d needed it. He was exactly the kind of person they needed.

  Charlotte exchanged a look with Elodie. They’d agreed to cross this line but still, it was a lot.

  “There’s more we want to talk about. You’ve been… good to us. More even, than we expected, honestly,” Charlotte said carefully. “And we think you should know more about what’s really going on.”

  Booker turned his head slightly, just enough to let them know he was listening. He waited patiently, content. They knew he’d been keeping an eye on them from the start, piecing together everything about everyone. Thank the Builder he was on their side but also… maybe he wasn’t ready yet to know about the Builder.

  “Our sponsor gave us essences and pushed us to these trials faster than they should have, I realise that now,,” said Elodie, her voice dropping to a conspiratorial whisper in her confession. “Our cause lost a lot of people in the recent troubles, and our sponsor needs replacements.”

  She didn’t say “Betrayal Day,” but they knew that Booker would feel the unspoken weight in her words. She thought she was being vague, but he knew exactly what she was hinting at; the day Purity revealed Their true self. She was just glad that she could still deceive the detective a little longer. He was no doubt thinking that the ‘revolution’ had taken losses the same as the hated aristocracy.

  “And now,” Charlotte cut in, leaning closer, “we have the opportunity to repay you for everything you’ve done. Our trust has been earned, Booker, and we want our sponsor to know about you. Your help. The sponsor thinks bigger than just the trials; this is about toppling the whole system and I know you’re with us. You already have our gratitude but you’ll also have a place with us when everything changes.”

  Booker kept his expression neutral, although a flicker of dark amusement crossed his face for a moment. ‘Revolution’, they called it, which was still true on a deeper level. It was a fight to tear down the oppressive system. And now Booker was with them. Booker nodded, as Charlotte and Elodie had known he would. He’d been in the revolution before he even knew it existed. Soon, he’d see, as they had seen, that the Builder and Purity’s plan was the only way to make things right.

  “We’ve an opportunity coming up,” Elodie said quietly, glancing around to make sure no one else was listening. “A night-time attack on the caravan. The higher ups have orchestrated it. We’re going to make sure it’s the perfect chance for us to show that we belong in the Adventure Society. Maybe score some extra recognition and get a star on our badges while we’re at it.”

  A smile curled at the corner of Booker’s lips, though it didn’t reach his eyes. The look of a man who knew he’d just achieved checkmate.

  “Sounds like someone’s got quite the plan,” he said, his tone dry, almost amused. “I’m in! And, I’m guessing it’s happening on the last night? Because, that’s the only night we know where we’ll be.”

  They smiled back at him, pleased he could keep up.

  “You got it, Detective.”

  Charlotte and Elodie walked away, leaving him alone on his airship with the wind and the growing darkness. They had Booker on their side now, and they had a grand future with him on their side. Booker would be a part of the revolution he was hoping for and more. Because, Lord Builder was already waiting, ten steps ahead.

  instantly figure out to not attack nocturnal, ambush monsters at night? Was he sheltered? Or, just stupid?

  Anyway, I'm not sure my writing makes a lot more sense but I have opinions about when professional writing tries to make someone look smart by merely not being a raging moron.

  Let me know what you think!

  Thanks for reading,

  He Who Writes.