First Day
— Main Guild Branch —
It was early in the morning in Orario. The sun had just started rising and people slowly woke up to prepare for their day. The guild had already welcomed adventurers, but there weren't that many this early.
Among the crowds, two elves were speaking to a red-haired werewolf.
"Did you join a familia already?" Asked Rose monotonously. Usually, it took would be adventurers a while before they found a familia, but considering these two's abilities, she was not surprised they did it within a couple of days.
"Yeah, we joined Hecate familia just yesterday." Replied Nico a little blearily, unused to waking up so early, he was still a bit out of it.
"We wanted to register as adventurers and go to the dungeon today." Cassian was fine. He was accustomed to waking up early in the morning, especially when the showers at the orphanage were completely free this early.
"Right, let's begin the registration process." Rose then started explaining the basics of adventuring and guild relations to them. How the guild took no responsibility for any losses sustained in the dungeon and how illegal activities could get them blackslisted or persecuted.
"Now fill out these parchments with any relevant information you wish to provide and sign the waivers that you accept the guild's rules."
They filled it out with basic information: Name, age, status as orphans, lucking out and receiving higher education from some academics, explaining their literacy and overall education, and working as guards for some time. Technically none of it was a lie, they grew up in an orphanage, went to school, and the matron occasionally asked them among others to keep watch and make sure other kids didn't sneak away during the night. As such, it wouldn't trigger any god's lie sensor if they had to reiterate their background.
Rose took time to go through everything they wrote down, noting that they didn't provide a place of birth, but she dismissed it and accepted everything. The guild didn't care about one's background and past as long as they were willing to become adventurers.
"With that over with, let's move on to the next step. The guild employs a system of advisors to assist newbie familias and adventurers, they will provide the necessary information regarding a number of subjects, including the dungeon. The service is free of course. Do wish for one?" Asked rose and received an immediate nod of affirmation. 'Good, at least they're not stupid or prideful enough to turn that down, unlike many others…'
"Please provide specifications for the kind of advisor you wish for. Things like, gender, race, experience, methodology, and so on." Allowing adventurers to choose gender and race would lead to obvious outcomes, but it was intentional. If it took a cute advisor girl to get new adventurers to listen to their lessons, thus increasing their survival chances, the guild was more than willing to take that slightly dirty measure.
"Well, a female advisor would be best, a beastfolk, werewolf specifically, red hair, cute face, perpetual frown, no-nonsense and professional attitude. Yeah, that's about it." Spoke Cassian with the most innocent of faces to the shocked and annoyed face of the receptionist.
"You- Are you sure? You're an elf, there are plenty of elven advisors in the guild, Sophie for example." While gesturing to a cute-looking pink-haired elf.
"Oh no worries, I have no problems with other races." Replied Cassian with the same saint-like smile, irritating Rose even more.
"Apologies Mr. Suncrest, but I have no intention of going out with you if that is your intention." She countered bluntly. She would never date an adventurer. She didn't want to deal with the stress of wondering whether they would come back alive or not every day and the pain of being left alone if they didn't.
"Well, it's a good thing I'm not interested in you romantically then Ms. Rose. I wish for you to be our advisor due to your high experience and competence." Cassian answered, sincerely this time.
Rose was reluctant, she didn't like being an advisor, and she didn't want to be one, but with such a detailed description as well as the fact that she currently had no other charges, she was certain to end up being assigned to them. That is one of the reasons why she acted so cold, so that people didn't want to pick her. The times when she was still selected, she could wiggle her way out because of the clear lecherous desires of the adventurers who picked her, but this time that wouldn't work.
"Come on Ms. Rose, think about the pay raise you will receive if you advise two highly successful adventurers." Cassian put the final nail in the coffin.
"Fine… But! You will listen to everything I tell you with utmost attention, follow my instructions when applicable, and do your best to learn everything I teach you to the letter! I will quiz you every week on the subjects I taught." With great reluctance, Rose finally begrudgingly accepted it, but not without laying down some ground rules. If they were to become her charges, then she would do everything within her and their capabilities to make sure they survived.
Plus the pay raise did sound nice…
"That's everything we ask for." This time Cassian wore a genuine smile and Nico was grinning cheerfully. Rose found a small smile gracing her lips too, but she quickly wiped it off. Getting attached only invited more pain…
Thus began a three-hour-long session of Rose drilling all the basic information about the dungeon, adventurers, and the first floors to the two newbies. In the end, Cassian and Rose looked satisfied, while Nico had steam coming out of his head while swaying.
The two bid her farewell and went off to the dungeon to start their first day as adventurers, after buying a shield for Nico and two bags for drops for a total of 8,000 valis, while Rose remained at the guild.
'They listened and dutifully absorbed everything I taught them. So much better than the average blockheaded adventurer.' Rose was satisfied with the progress and the responsibility both of them displayed. Maybe this time… This time it would finally be different… 'No! No attachments and getting close to adventurers! Not anymore…' The past decade and a half left far too many wounds on her heart. She couldn't endure more…
— Tower of Babel —
Currently, Cassian and Nico are descending down the spiral stairs into the dungeon. They would start at floor 1 and slowly make their way downwards to get used to it.
They were nervous. Realistically Cassian knew there was nothing within the first few floors that could threaten him but descending into what basically amounted to a death trap full of ravenous monsters hell bent on tearing him limb from limb was still a somewhat anxiety-inducing ordeal. He would have to be inhuman to not feel nervous.
Finally, they entered the first floor and Cassian noticed one thing.
"My Medallion is going crazy…" His Witcher Medallion was vibrating so hard that it was practically jumping up and down on his neck after they entered the dungeon.
Ever since entering the city, his medallion would slightly vibrate upon passing certain adventurers, presumably those with magic. Elves triggered this reaction most often. But it had never had this strong of a reaction to anything before.
The medallion was sensitive to magical energy and the dungeon was causing it to go crazy.
Cassian willed some of his own mana into the medallion to calm it down, reducing its thrashing to a dull soft vibration. After all, it wouldn't be useful at its intended duty of sensing magical phenomena if it kept going wild. But it was a good reminder for Cassian just how dangerous of a place the dungeon was and to not get cocky because of his measly power.
The main path on the first floor that continued until it reached the second floor had dozens upon dozens of branching smaller paths that all the adventurers coming down and staying on this floor took so that they could get away from other people and hunt monsters.
Cassian and Nico took one of the free paths and started traveling on it, searching for monsters. Cassian took the lead with his sword out, while Nico prepared to chant while guarding his body with the shield he bought.
"Watch your back. The monsters can spawn from anywhere, including behind us. Just because I'm leading in the front doesn't mean they can't ambush you from the back." Warned Cassian to which Nico nodded determinedly, he was a bit scared but wouldn't let his guard down. 'Although with my hearing I'll be able to hear a monster spawn and approach us from the back easily, but it's best not to tell him that. Overreliance on me will leave him vulnerable and defenseless when I'm not around.'
Finally, a group of two goblins appeared in front of them. Looking like deformed green feral humanoids, with snarling faces and glowing red eyes.
Cassian smiled slightly and prepared to dash at them before being cut off - "Tempest's edge, carve! Wind Blade!" - A crescent wind blade shot from behind him and bisected the charging goblins.
Cassian threw an annoyed glance at his smug little brother, before looking back at the goblin's corpses, a look of pain passing through his eyes.
"Rose told us about this, but there goes my last my last bit of hope that the monsters operated on anime mechanics and not novel and manga…" Muttered Cassian with Nico's despondent expression matching his. They felt dread at the amount of corpses they would need to dig into for their drops.
Finally, Cassian butchered the first corpse to determine the exact location of the monster crystal, before simply using his hand to rip out the chunk where it was located from the second corpse. Nico was glad he did not have a blade to perform this duty yet but knew he wouldn't get away from it long, thanks to his brother.
"Dibs on the next group." He sighed and claimed the next group, which happened to be 3 kobolds, anthropomorphic dogs.
The first kobold charged and immediately tried biting Cassian's throat out. He sidestepped and brought his foot down on the kobold attempting to bite his ankle, crushing the kobold's head. The last one followed up on the first one's attack and attempted the same but it received the same sidestep, but this time his blade swung and beheaded it as it sailed beside him.
The first kobold was now trying to claw his back, but Cassian heard the exact moment it leaped and rolled to the side before immediately lashing out with a thrust of his blade and piercing the still airborne kobold in the head.
The battles were over quickly, goblins and kobolds were too slow and predictable, and their instincts and intelligence were even lower than regular predator animals, so taking them down was simple. They could only pose a threat to Nico if several managed to get within arms range of him from different directions as he was not a melee fighter.
The anime did not do a good enough job of portraying the situation on these floors properly. There were tens of thousands of adventurers within Orario and around half were level 1. That meant the first floors were packed to the brim with adventurers and the brothers constantly ran across them, in contrast to Bell, who always seemed to be practically alone down here.
It was both a good and a bad thing. On one side, the sheer number of people here made dungeon crimes, such as ambushes, pass parades, and stealing practically nonexistent as they would be quickly detected and known. On the other, the monster spawn rate could not keep up and thus were rare.
Cassian and Nico would either have to dive at night when the number of adventurers was much lower or descend lower. And with the ease they had with these monsters, the choice was obvious.
They descended to the fifth floor on their first day, barely encountering difficulty. The dungeon lizards were the new monsters on these floors, but they were ambush killers, jumping on adventurers from ceilings, and with Cassian's senses they never pulled the 'ambush' part off. As such, they were downgraded to self-air-delivered loot, to be slashed in half by Cassian or blasted into pieces by Nico's wind cannon.
They decided to leave the 6th and lower floors for tomorrow and end their first dive here. Thus concluded their first day as adventurers, with unsurprisingly little challenge.
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The monsters on those floors are too weak to provide challenge, so the fights were kinda underwhelming, but the fights will get more exciting and dangerous as they dive deeper.