The training ground

Just like elf in general, Latvian Glassforest had fine features. His long light-green hair and blue eyes resembled a handsome prince usually told in romance fairy tales. The male elf was around 183 cm-tall, owned a slim yet muscular build, and appeared to be in his early thirties. Yet, since elf's life span was more or less four times longer than that of a human. He was at least a century old, an elderly in human's standard.

Upon reaching adulthood, Latvian decided to become an adventurer to satisfy his curiosity about a world outside his homeland and to test himself. The prodigy steadily climbed through the rank until becoming a gold ranker. After years of service and contribution, the Association appointed him as a Branch Master in Anspia. However, he was never one for desk job, and at the very same day recruited Balthazar as his second to handle all activities in the branch.

"Delegation is the most important skill for a leader!"

The line he always said when entrusting all the jobs to Balthazar and happily left to take on quests. It was a rare occasion for him to be in the office, and the staffs often forgot they actually had a Branch Master.

Being an adventurer taught Latvian many things that might never be learned if he stayed in his tranquil birthplace. Sense of accomplishment from completing quests and satisfaction upon receiving rewards, companionship based on trust with other people, blissful days of being with a loved one, and even despair of losing them. To prevent casualties from unprepared people in the future, he set high standard for those aspiring to be adventurers.

The staffs even gave him 'the devil' or 'newbie crusher' nicknames as he hardly ever passed an adventurer candidate when being an examiner. However, he heard those who failed came back stronger and managed to past the test splendidly under different examiner.

Today, on the Association's spacious sparring arena, Latvian was once again going to enact his role as an examiner.

The day before, his younger sibling, Salsahara, and her husband, Bregror, informed him they would bring a candidate to join the quest. Taking their position and the quest into account, Latvian expected the candidate to be someone well-known and powerful, and was surprised to know the man standing before him was not even an adventurer, soldier, mercenary, nor a knight. But, a businessman instead.

"What did they see in him?"

At this point, Latvian highly doubted his sibling's ability to assess people and gauge the quest's importance. Or, maybe the businessman pestered them to join to look for profit? That was possible. Though his unyielding spirit to make money was admirable, he needed to teach him that the quest was not a playground.

"Get ready to learn it the hard way" he said with stern voice.

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Alfraed looked around restlessly to observe his surrounding with empty expression from the arena, trying to remember the reason he was in this unfamiliar place in the beginning.

"Let's see, what should I be doing again?…"

Yesterday, Alfraed told the Association's representatives he wanted to know more about the quest, and agreed to be tested by the Branch Master to determine he owned sufficient strength to join. Assuming the test went well, he could hear the details afterward and see any opportunity to conduct sales or produce additional earning.

Upon hearing his decision, Elise made a terribly long, tired sigh. She knew her boss' intention, and disappointed with her inability to think of a better and safer action for him to take.

To clear away her frustation, she accompanied Alfraed for this occassion, and was now having a conversation with the beautiful counselor, Vanessa, next to the arena. Trying to get any worthwhile information that she possibly could.

Alfraed had come to the Association several times, but this was the first time he went to the large training ground located behind the Association's main building. Well, he had no reason to, his personal business usually ended after he met Vanessa or Balthazar.

When entering the ground earlier, Alfraed saw many adventurers focusing on their own unique practices. For him, the most interesting was when a mature and very well endowed woman who had a long, flowing red hair and dark brown eyes with a seductive witch attire conjured a black magic circle below a humanoid target, where the next moment countless reddish dark and pulsating hands emerged from the circle, fully wrapping the target.

Then, the woman threw five bones and while in the air each bone went through another magic circle she envoked, transforming them into skeleton soldiers equipped with rusty swords. Upon landing, the newly-formed soldiers rushed toward the restrained target fearlessly and stabbed it repeatedly with lifeless eyes.

"Ow gosh, failed again!"

Despite her skillfull performance of necromancy magic and dangerous attack plan, the witch was frustrated because a single bone did not manage to change form. Well, altering moving objects, more than one even, was extremely difficult and taxing to one's concentration. She needed more practices. But, Alfraed had a feeling it would not be long for her to master that skill.

Putting all that aside, Alfraed honestly did not want to know where she acquired the bones from, and neaby adventurers seemed to share the same opinion…

"Hmm?!" sensing curious gazes and rude thoughts toward herself, the witch glared at her surrounding.

Fortunately, Alfraed had already averted his attention a second earlier to the rest of the adventurers who had intense sparring on the arena, and successfully avoided her menacing stare.

The sparring was between two swordsmen with distinctly different styles. The first swordsman, despite his calm look, attacked aggressively, every slash and thrust was sharply powerful. Yet, the second roudy swordsman could smoothly parry and deflect each attack with his defensive style, and even lauch a counter attack when the first lest expected it. In the end, the second came out on top without taking any hit.

"Today is my win"

"Damn it! I'll win next time!"

The two rivals seemed to have been doing this for a long time, since they said the current score was thirty against twenty for the second swordsman.

When Latvian and Alfraed stepped on the arena, the adventurers knew what was going to happen and stepped down because they were already informed ahead of time that the Branch Master would test a candidate for the quest. But, all the adventurers did not leave the ground. They were curious, In fact, all of them were now watching the arena.

"I bet 100 Rune that guy only last 3 minutes"

"Nah, too long, 100 Rune for a minute"

"I think the newbie will lose without him knowing what happened. He looks weak. 100 Rune"

Harsh, too harsh. They were betting on how long Alfraed could last against the Branch Master, and none expected him to put up a decent fight. The young man was deeply saddened by their opinions.

"I bet for the Branch Master….. to acknowledge my boss to join. 1,000 Rune"

Elise heard their rude remarks, accompanied by Vanessa, she walked toward them and put an outrageous bet.

"…Madam, I know he's your boss. But, are you willing to throw away your precious money on an obvious losing bet?"

"Hmm? That's funny, I could ask the same thing to you…"

The manager answered with an air of intimidation that Alfraed never saw before, and the adventurers making fun of her immediately became quiet. Though, some were riled up by her provocation and bet even more. Alfraed could hear the total funds now exceeded 15,000 Rune.

"There's no way I'll let my employee lose money because of me. I got this!" said Alfraed to encourage himself.

Then, Alfraed looked upon Latvian who was now wearing a full-body armor with elegant golden decorations, and swung a two-meter great sword suitable for fighting giant beasts or end a fight in a single hit with one hand easily. That sword was practically bigger than Alfraed! Being an elf, he thought Latvian was going to use something like a rapier or twin daggers, not that it would be better for him…Still, it was beyond his expectation. All of it.

Alfraed nervously looked at Vanessa and pointed at how serious Latvian's preparation was, he was wondering whether this was really a test, not an actual fight to the death.

She showed a troubled expression that basically telling him in a reserved manner "The Branch Master always fight seriously with his full equipment no matter the opponent and occassion. Oh, don't worry about injuries, his sword was covered by potent magic cloth making it dull. You won't get cut, only suffer broken bones, and we have several capable healers standing by at all time. So, don't worry, fight freely. Don't worry!"

To be honest, there were many worrying statements in her explanation, moreover since she said "Don't worry" three times... As expected, this would not be easy. Nevertheless, Alfraed walked toward Latvian with determination...