Hal grinned and looked over at her. “The future.”
The rest of the morning was more of the same and over breakfast under the awning of his wagon, Hal offered Guild Invites to each of his friends. Though only those that had proven themselves were given the role of Council.
Vorax was given the role of Treasurer, to the enjoyment of everybody at the table. While Komachi, being the little furry egomaniac she was, was given the role Komachi.
“Komachi!” she happily chirped once Hal gave her that special role. It was, functionally, no different than the core role of the Guild. But that didn’t seem to matter.
His koblin friends were given the unique role of Koblin Advisors, and as much as Luda didn’t particularly seem to enjoy it, she was given the role of Oracle. Her followers were given roles based on their skills.
As much as Hal wanted to give Luda a role that was more appropriate for her based on her wants and needs, it was hard to argue with nearly every person there. Luda took it all in good graces, though he could tell the worry held just behind those sparkling blue eyes.
He would have to keep an eye on that situation and see how it developed.
Afterward, he gave an announcement just before they left. Standing atop a crate that was holding the Guild Bank coffer, he addressed the entire caravan.
“I don’t like to give speeches, so I’ll keep this blessedly short,” he said with a sheepish grin. A blush of nerves warmed his face and burned his ears as nearly a hundred eyes – mostly squinting, dwarvish ones – turned his way.
“That you all have come to join us is no small thing and I appreciate Clan Bouldergut’s friendship more than any of you can know. To that end, I would be proud to offer any of you who wish to take it, an invitation to my newly formed Guild, the Bravers. Join of your free will and know that your standing among the caravan does not change no matter your choice.”
With that, he stepped down and sent out an area-wide Guild Invite.
Faces brightened and perked up in surprise as the prompts washed over the dozens upon dozens of dwarves in the area. Rondo, of course, received one, as did the stowaway koblins. And he already gave the Rangers an elevated position. The bulk of the invites were for Durvin’s sturdy clan and he hoped they would accept it but he’d understand if they didn’t.
“Surprised ye ain’t scrapin’ yer balls on the ground with how heavy they must be, boy!” Durvin roared. He was loud enough for several nearby dwarves to give a hearty laugh. “Ye ain’t even think to ask me!” He raised one thickly muscled fist and shook it at Hal. “By the stones, yer an interestin’ sort!”
Durvin has accepted your Guild Invitation.
Durvin is now Rank: Council.
Without setting anything to private, anybody in the area would see when somebody joined the Guild. This was precisely what he was hoping would happen.
While he wouldn’t have been terribly upset if the dwarves preferred to stay within their clan only, that didn’t mean he wasn’t going to try to convince them. And there was no better way to convince a dwarf than with another dwarf.
Every dwarf in the caravan saw the same notification. Not just that Durvin – their clan’s patron – accepted the invite but that he was elevated to a position of esteem befitting his importance to the surly folk.
It had the desired effect and Hal was soon inundated with acceptance prompts.
Your Leadership has risen to Level 22(27).
+1% Party damage (+27%).
+2% Leadership efficacy (+54%).
You learn Commanding Presence.
Commanding Presence
Effectively coordinating those in your group has made commands and tactics second-nature, allowing you to add another member to your party so long as you remain its Leader.
Party Members +1 (6 Total).
Finally, Hal thought. Not because he felt he deserved it, but because he was waiting for so long that he wondered if Thirty-seven might have been wrong about it.
Granted, he was also at 19 Leadership for a long time.
Apparently, getting a host of dwarves to join his Guild was leadership material. Which, he guessed it was. A part of him wondered just how much having the skill – as well as the boosted CHR – factored into the dwarves’ decision to join him.
Soon after, the caravan was up and rolling to the south and west.
With the way already mapped out, they were making good time. Everybody seemed a little bit happier, a little uplifted by the day’s events. Talk in the wagons seemed jovial and Hal heard more than one mug of “holy water” toasted to the Bravers.
Not a single dwarf rejected the offer.
It was an amazing turn of events that even his most optimistic projections failed to account for. The Guild was already gaining EXP as people performed their daily tasks.
The Guild EXP wasn’t anything major. Surely not enough to get another Guild Level so soon but it was already ticking up past 40 by the time the sun had climbed high into the sky that day.
“So what’re we going to branch out into first?” Mira asked excitedly at the table they were all seated at.
45
The wagon bumped and swayed, jostling dishes and anything not fastened down earlier in the day. Everybody at the table reflexively reached out to steady their cup of tea. A habit none of them would miss once they were back in proper, stationary buildings.
He was going to build a town. A real town. It still seemed like just a dream to him. Shaking his head to dispel the distracting, grin-inducing thoughts, he focused on Mira’s expectant face. In the weeks of travel, she grew out her hair, letting the shorn sides begin to grow out.
“You’re so spacey lately!” she complained. “Are you even paying attention, Hal?”
Hal waved off her playful attempt at poking him and shook his head. “It’s a lot to process. What were we talking about?”
“Well, in the lull about boring things like taxation and how we’re going to fund things, I had the brilliant idea to ask a very core and thought-evoking question: What branching Archetype are we going to choose first?”
“Mercantile wouldn’t be a bad choice,” Ashera said, taking a sip and eyeing the rest of the table over the lip of her mug.
Elora leaned back, crossed her arms over her chest, and snorted. “Adventure is the obvious choice. We’re in the middle of the wilds if you haven’t noticed and it’s about to get a lot more wild before we find a place to settle down.”
Angram nodded and leaned his elbows on the table, ruby eyes darting back and forth. “There are good reasons the Shiverglades are largely uninhabited.”
“Adventure does sound pretty good,” Mira hedged, rubbing her chin thoughtfully. She didn’t seem convinced.
Hal turned to Noth. Like many of their conversations, she stayed quiet and observant but rarely interacted. “What do you think, Noth?”
The once-Reaper started and blushed when she saw all eyes upon her. “I… think Authority would be a good branch to extend into.”
“Why’s that?” Hal asked, though he had a good enough idea.
He wouldn’t make his choice until he could see what the archetypes opened up. At the moment, they were grayed out. He couldn’t investigate them further because he didn’t have a Guild Perk to spend and his Guild was still Level 0.
In the event he couldn’t see any further than the names, he would likely find himself torn between Adventure and Authority.
“The way Hal described the Authority Archetype sounds like it would impact every aspect of the Guild no matter what branches we decide to follow later. Provided, we are not locked to a single branch?” Noth looked to Hal as she spoke and when he shook his head in answer she pressed on. “An overall improvement to the Guild would benefit all Guild actions and might make every specific Archetype more potent without locking us into anything specific.”
“Why wouldn’t we go pretty deep into Adventure?” Elora asked, but Hal noted that she was more intrigued than combative.
&
nbsp; Noth shrugged and sipped her tea, gathering her thoughts. When she set the mug down, she looked at Elora. “I do not know much about the way things work on Aldim. I’m newer even than Hal, but it is my understanding that a great deal is hidden from you, yes?”
She motioned to Hal with a pale hand. “The description Hal has given of his own Fabled Classes is backed up by what you all have shared with me as I tried to learn the curious systems that govern life on this star. It would stand to reason then, that this Guild system is no different. We may unlock another Archetype that is currently hidden.”
“Yes, but that doesn’t mean that we couldn’t benefit from whatever the Adventure Archetype offers in the meantime,” Angram countered.
Noth inclined her head, conceding the point. “Be that as it may, Authority may have direct impacts to the core functionality of the Guild. A function that we have not fully understood. If we arrive at the Shiverglades and unlock a gathering or crafting Archetype of some sort and are in dire need of materials that may be better to use.
“And if the Authority Archetype has made it easier to acquire Guild Experience from more activities in any way, we would be able to pursue that new branch faster. Or we may find that the Settlement Archetype is of great importance, more so than any Adventure. The same would hold true.”
Ashera was nodding along, the silver filigree around her pointed ivory horns glinting in the light streaming in from the nearby windows. “She has a point.”
“Why, because we might want to make a bakery instead of killing things?” Mira asked.
“No,” Ashera said, shaking her head. “Because a point in Adventure would be wasted on Settlement or Mercantile even – at least as we sit here speculating on things neither of us fully understand – while a point in Authority would not.”
“If we were ten or twenty members strong, perhaps,” Elora said. “But we are many times more in number. We hardly need to be so parsimonious with how we grow the Guild at this early stage.”
Mira smacked the table and pointed at Elora. “Don’t you go using your big words on me, you know I’m dumb!”
Komachi snickered behind her paws at that. She then slid across the table on her belly towards Mira, jostling mugs out of her way.
Elora rolled her eyes at her. “We don’t need to be stingy.” She reached out a hand to Komachi and pet along her back as she passed by.
“Oh, yeah but we don’t know how much Guild Experience we need to Level Up, do we?” Mira asked. The little pobul lounged beside the Dragoon, sipping from her own tea mug between her dexterous paws.
Mira eyed her like she was up to something. The little furry pobul had begun to garner a well-deserved reputation for being quite the prankster. When it seemed that Komachi was just there to enjoy her company, Mira smiled down at her and slid a cookie toward her.
Komachi happily dunked it into her tea, proceeded to lose half of it in the tea, then discard said tea and ate the remaining cookie. She pointedly ignored the slowly dissolving cookie-tea mixture that she pushed toward Mira.
To which, Mira took a cue from Komachi and pointedly ignored it as well.
“That’s a good point,” Hal said. “As it stands I have no information about how much more we need or what the next Level might be.”
Ashera pursed her lips in thought. “I would not be surprised if a deeper understanding or awareness of the Guild was awarded through the Authority Archetype. It seems precisely the sort of thing that would do that, given the description.”
Back and forth they went for the rest of the day, discussing the various futures they might take. More than a few laughs were had at turning the Bravers into a Mercantile Guild, with Mira arguing that everything had a price.
It was amazing how quickly everybody shifted to thinking about the future, about the possibilities that were now open to them.
Even Elora seemed to look forward to what was to come. The realization of a dream finally on the cusp of coming to fruition. Hal couldn’t remember a day when he felt more uplifted.
Aldim had done a lot of kicking him when he was down. It always felt like the world was designed in such a way that as soon as he came close to achieving something good, he had to be stopped. Like it was some cruel twist of fate.
Not this time. He was used to having his hopes dashed, but he wouldn’t let it happen to those who had joined him. Whatever might come to stop him, he would meet it head-on.
And so, the next day he wasn’t terribly surprised when the caravan slowed and Yesel joined them in the wagon with a tight expression on her face.
“You’ll want to come and see this,” she told Hal.
In the middle of working on the third stage of his yet unnamed bone falchion, Hal nodded. “Only took a day,” he remarked with a wry grin.
It had been hard working on the weapon when he could feel the rising tension of something bad coming his way. That was the way of the world. For good or ill, Aldim didn’t seem content to let him gain something and be in peace.
Bone falchion in one hand, its empyreal shardite edge glinting in the midday sun, Hal followed Yesel to a spot a dozen yards from the caravan. As the color of the crystal edge shifted between yellow and blue, he looked southward to another caravan. This one smaller and in incredibly poor repair.
Even from the mile distance between them, Hal could make out a bit of movement. The carts formed a rough circle between two staggering towers of crystals.
They could go around the group and the pass between but it would add time to their trip and venture into territory not already mapped out. The alternative would be to press on and come within spitting distance of that other group.
“What would you like to do?” she asked, in a surprisingly deferential tone.
“Let’s see what they’re doing.” Though Hal knew they were here for the caravan, if not him. He saw them from the air not too long ago and he was surprised it took them this long to force a meeting.
“We could take a karak and ride out,” Yesel offered.
“No. We’ll meet them with the full force of the Guild. If they have something to say, they can say it in front of everybody.”
Tightening his grip on his falchion, Hal turned away and went back to his wagon. As the caravan started off again, he donned his armor and got ready for a fight.
There was no telling whether or not this group meant any harm but he doubted they would be out in the Mirrorlands – very clearly following them – for any peaceful reasons.
Slowing once more, Hal stood and formed up his party. Invites went out to Ashera, Noth, Elora, and Mira. Ashera gave him a skeptical look but she didn’t argue with him about it.
Angram kicked up his feet onto the table. “Shall I be the liaison, then?” he asked, already guessing at Hal’s plan.
“No,” Hal said with a grin, tossing him the last invite. At Angram’s surprised expression he added, “New Leadership perk. I can have six party members instead of five now.”
“About time,” the Ranger said, hopping to his feet.
“Go on ahead,” Hal said. “I’ll just be a second.”
46
Using Shifting Mask, Hal changed his appearance to his elven counterpart. A form he was getting comfortable with using.
“Are you really expecting a fight?” Ashera asked him as they strode down the slight incline. The towers of opaque purple-and-blue crystal cast them in shadow as they neared the other camp. Noting his disguise she added, “You think they know who you are, even out here?”
“Until we’ve got a bastion of safety, I don’t see the reason not to take a little precaution,” Hal said with an exaggerated wink. “The last thing I want is another brush with Hirash.”
Behind them, the Bouldergut Clan came out in force. Dozens of hairy bronze-bearded faces showing support by gripping battleaxes that gave off a dull gleam in the shadow.
Hal suppressed his grateful smile at seeing Durvin at the head of the group. He knew that the dwarven leader would be the firs
t one to rush to join the battle if anything went wrong.
The closer they came to the wagons, however, the less Hal thought it would come to that.
Unlike their own wagons, which were new and expensive with modern conveniences that made the trip tolerable with a modicum of comfort, those before him were barely functional.
The wagons were more like canvas-covered carts. The wood was splintery and had long jagged rents in places. Canvas coverings flapped where they hadn’t been properly tied down.
Wagon wheels lay broken and shattered. Large bundles of canvas lay rolled up on the ground in odd haphazard positions.
Hal pulled up a dozen yards away from their camp. Though he didn’t complete the weapon yet, he used a scabbard from one of the dwarves to keep it fastened at his hip.
He would get a better scabbard made later. But for now, he wanted it close at hand without having to hold it.
The last thing Hal wanted was to start a fight with whoever was in the camp. Walking up to them with a show of force and waving a sword around was hardly one step removed from openly attacking them.
Only… nobody was coming out.
“Maybe they’re scared,” Mira offered, placing her shining halberd upright and leaning on it. She swayed back and forth like a little kid growing increasingly bored and about to start a tantrum. “You do have a whole bunch of angry little thick men behind us looking quite menacing.”
Hal suppressed a shudder. “Did you have to say it like that?”
Mira gave him an innocent smile and a little shrug.
“Let’s go see what’s going on,” Hal said, motioning them to follow. Instinctively he started to Splice aberration and eldritch essence. Something didn’t feel right and he wanted to be on guard.
His party fanned out around the blocking wagons. A shrill cry went up, and a bizarre tableau met Hal at the center of the circled wagons.
Karaks. Four of the riderless creatures were gathered at the center in all manner of plumage, though he noted most of them were either red or black.
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