Roland found Hans in the training yard, pulling weeds around the perimeter and repacking dirt where a stray sword or shield cut a divot in the earth.

  “How’s the season treating you so far?” Hans asked.

  Quentin’s father smiled. “I haven’t spotted the Merchant on the Mountain but the hunting has been good. Seeing a lot more moose activity this year too.”

  “Glad to hear it.”

  “Looks like you’ve been busy. I hear Eduardo hammering all the way out at my place, and Willow won’t stop talking about lessons with Miss. Olza.”

  “We’re getting there,” Hans said proudly. “We don’t have a full blown apprentice program yet, but it’s progress at least.”

  “Is now an okay time? Our schedules haven’t aligned very well these past few months. I’m worried I won’t get the chance to talk to you for another month if I don't bother you now.”

  “Yes, of course. Tandis caught you up, I take it?”

  He nodded. “If Izz and Thuz will be with us, I’d be much less worried about taking the boys to Osare. Still not excited to put Kane in a situation like that, but his mind is pretty well set.”

  “Safety won’t be an issue with them around, but yeah, that doesn’t stop people from being people.”

  “Are we decided then?” Roland asked.

  “Uncle Ed is due back here soon. Once we talk to him, we’ll know for sure. Boys will have a little under four more weeks to prepare.”

  Roland said he didn’t see Quentin as often as he would like now that hunting season was in and Quentin was up the mountain as an Apprentice. He did know, however, that the boys had followed Hans’ recommendations on fitness and drills to prepare for the tournament.

  “Glad to hear it,” Hans said.

  “How do you think they’ll do?”

  “That’s always hard to say, especially for an Apprentice's first tournament. There’s a good chance they get matched against an Apprentice who has been at it for two years rather than a few months, and first tournament jitters are pretty common. That said, the boys have fought more gnolls and goblins than half the professionals on this side of the kingdom. Other than a bunch of people watching, a tournament should feel less stressful.”

  The hunter nodded as Hans spoke. “I appreciate you talking me through it. I’ll let you get back to your work.”

  Quest Update: Confirm Uncle Ed’s decision on the Osare tournament.

  After another twenty minutes, Hans was satisfied with the state of the training yard. He found Yotuli in the guild hall with several books in front of her. She had a look of helplessness, which was always an odd expression on the powerful face of a tusk.

  “Mr. Hans,” she said, “How do I know if I’m getting this Cleric stuff right?”

  You’re tired, but she needs your help. Suck it up.

  He sat down across from Yotuli. “Where are you stuck?”

  “The very beginning? Maybe? I have no idea.” She looked to be on the verge of tears.

  Two weeks or so had passed since she shared her desire to pursue the Cleric class, which wasn’t all that much time as far as training was concerned, but she was likely falling into the same hole that slowed Honronk’s early progress in studying Black magic. With no hints of progress, Yotuli had no way to assess and adjust. All she knew was that her every attempt to use a Cleric ability was a failure.

  Hans asked her to share more about what she had tried.

  “I’ve been trying to learn Inspiration,” she answered. “We don’t have any Cleric books, so I’ve had to cobble a few things together from where our spell tomes talk about how Cleric abilities work, but it’s all just crumbs.”

  He encouraged her to continue explaining her process.

  “I call upon my faith in Daojmot and visualize it as a sort of current moving through me. I kind of ‘ask it’ to give me the ability to use.” Daojmot, the spirit of bastards and wanderers, was Yotuli’s chosen belief for her Cleric path.

  “And then what happens?”

  “Nothing. Always nothing.”

  “I know that successful Clerics tend to be of the zealot personality,” Hans said. “Their faith is total and unshakable. That usually makes for a miserable friendship but it’s what they need to call upon their abilities.”

  “I don’t think I have doubts…”

  After thinking, Hans had two ideas for Yotuli to try.

  The first was to learn as much as they could from a zealot and mirror their practices. Zealots often wore symbols or insignias to represent their beliefs. They had scripted prayers and mantras. They meditated, sometimes for hours.

  Perhaps something as simple as a charm on a necklace helped to make their beliefs more tangible, and tangible things were harder to doubt.

  He went to his desk, and after sifting through a few drawers, returned with one of the wooden medallions Galinda carved for the chapter’s camping trip earlier that spring. She assumed Hans would lose some of them, so she carved extras. Hans felt that was a wise choice.

  “You don’t have to use this, but it’s here if you want it,” he said, handing Yotuli the carved bear head of Gomi’s town insignia. “If you have a symbol for Daojmot in mind already, you should use that instead.”

  Yotuli said that she had no such images in mind and thanked him for the medallion.

  “My second idea is to talk to Becky,” Hans said. “Me? I doubt everything, especially myself. Becky, though, her belief in nature is pure. Completely pure. Druid magic is a bit different from what I understand Cleric abilities to be, but it’s worth a try.”

  “You think she can help?”

  Hans shrugged. “I honestly have no idea, but no one anywhere near Gomi believes as strongly in something as she does.”

  “Except for me.”

  Smiling, Hans said, “That mindset is a good sign. Check back with me in a week or two and update me.”

  Yotuli promised she would.

  ***

  Hans held two fresh copies for the first volume of The Next Generation: A Teaching Methodology for Training Adventurers, admiring the cleanliness and consistency of the handwriting. The scribe had done an exquisite job and worked far faster than she had estimated. He was so impressed that he commissioned a third copy, which he intended to store somewhere separate from his original manuscript. The thought of a fire or flood ruining his only copy terrified him.

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

  As for these two copies, one would be mailed to Theneesa when the next caravan arrived, and the other would be for the chapter. Anyone would be welcome to read it, but he suspected Izz, Thuz, Terry, and Quentin would use it the most as they were actively teaching classes.

  He still needed a pen name, however.

  He heard Olza at the door before he saw her. “Are you in here, Hans?” she called. When she turned the corner, he saw a clear glass bottle in her hand.

  “Is that?”

  “Uh huh.” She set it on his desk.

  “Is this the only bottle?” He uncorked it and gave the fool’s root vodka a sniff. Yep, it was strong.

  She pursed her lips. “I really need to give you alchemy and chemistry lessons,” she said. “I’m distilling these in my lab. My equipment is meant for small batches of potions, not bottle after bottle of vodka.”

  “How many did you make?”

  “Five. There’s yours, and there’s one for Charlie, Galad, Luther, and Uncle Ed.”

  Hans stared at the alchemist suspiciously.

  “Okay I made six, but the last one is mine. You can’t have any.” She noticed the manuscript copies on Hans’ desk. “Are they done already?” she asked as she inspected the craftsmanship. “These look great, Hans.”

  “I need your opinion on a pen name,” he began. “Would it be in poor taste to adopt another author’s pen name? A long dead author.”

  Olza said that question was odd. “What’s the pen name?”

  “Haynu B. Dumas, but hear me out. The books are out of print, and the current generation of adventurers has probably never heard of them. Also, it’s pretty well accepted that there was no singular author for the books. Haynu was more of a character than an author.”

  “Wasn’t the point of using a pen name to get people to take the book seriously?”

  After a few head wobbles, Hans admitted that was true. “It feels right to me, though, and I think Gret would have gotten a kick out of it. If no one reads it, at least I’ll have that.”

  “Sounds like you made up your mind already.”

  She was right. He had. He flipped to the title page of each copy and wrote Haynu B. Dumas in the blank space beneath the word “by.”

  Quest Update: Complete the next volume (Iron to Bronze) for "The Next Generation: A Teaching Methodology for Training Adventurers."

  Damn it feels good to make progress on that quest.

  Hans tossed a cold cup of tea out the window and poured a finger of vodka to replace it. He looked to Olza, signaling an offer to pour her one as well.

  “It’s pretty early.”

  “Kids’ class is over. It was a tough one too. The grappling units are always the hardest.”

  Olza relented and accepted the offer.

  When Hans slid a cup across the desk to Olza, he said, “Okay, so you owe me a pour from your bottle.”

  The alchemist rolled her eyes, took a sip, and recoiled from its strength. When the burn had passed, she shared that her weekly lessons with Willow went well so far, but Olza recently learned that Willow was reteaching each of those lessons to her friends. While Olza found that to be a sweet thing for the child to do, it also felt kind of sad.

  “The bigger towns have academies and universities. We should do something like that in Gomi without all the fees and politics.”

  The Guild Master chuckled.

  “What?”

  “The other day you were saying you weren’t sure you wanted to stay. Now we’re talking about building a school.”

  “I’m sorry that my emotions are complicated sometimes. Like yours are any better.”

  Hans couldn’t argue with her there. He liked the idea, especially for the Gomi winter. Most of the town had nothing to do when the snows came. The chapter’s collection of books was already functioning like a library, with all manner of townspeople borrowing this or that or reading a spell tome in the guild hall for the sake of their own curiosity and nothing else. Perhaps the plan should account for their needs too?

  “Hmm,” Olza said, thinking. “Make it part school, part library.”

  “Oh, I really like that.”

  New Quest: Help Olza establish a school and library in Gomi.

  “What can I do?”

  The alchemist scowled. “I can manage, and you don’t need another project. If you want, you can make a list of books you’d like the library to have, but that’s it. Nothing else.”

  “Okay.”

  “Promise me.”

  Quest Update: Step away from the school and library project to let Olza execute her idea.

  Quest Complete: Step away from the school and library project to let Olza execute her idea.

  A completed quest is a completed quest. Thank you very much.

  Standing in the doorway, ready to depart, Olza said, “Don’t get too excited yet, but Galad thinks we can have a distillery running by fall, depending on a few items we have to order.”

  Thank the gods.

  ***

  Later that afternoon, when Hans sat down to continue his research of the manual, he had the sudden awareness that Gret held the same book in his hands at one point. Academically, he knew that from the start, but for a reason Hans couldn’t explain, he felt like Gret was there now.

  Like an inscription scrawled at the front of a book, he felt as though two moments in time had connected. Gret was right there, holding the same book, a moment away. If only Hans could talk to him.

  Hans returned to his apartment desk with his fool’s root vodka and his dirty tea cup.

  Fuck you, Gret, he thought, shooting his first pour… His first if he started counting at the top of his apartment stairs and no earlier.

  Abandoning his methodical study, he flipped ahead, looking for entries about the Diamonds from his generation. He soon found his Guild Master’s notes and started to scan each page. So far, every Guild Master had handled their records of Diamond quests a little differently from every one else. Most were just the color of the quest, the adventurer’s name, their ability, and the item they found for the Guild. Some Guild Masters noted that information as it came, so one Diamond quest entry might have nine or ten entries of other stuff between it and the next quest record. A few Guild Masters had a dedicated page to keep the records in one place, but only a few.

  His Guild Master took the latter approach, thankfully. That made this easier.

  He found a page divided into a table with a list of adventurer names down the side. The columns across the top read, “Quest Coordinates, Type, Anticipated Enemy, Ability Earned, Item Retrieved.”

  For example, Mazo’s read:

  Mazo the Blue Mage – 4275.3668, Path of Mana, Blue Dragon, Legendary Mana Pool, Dragon Egg

  Hans bit his cheek.

  Path of Mana? What the hells does that mean?

  He didn’t know what that column represented as he had not seen it used in previous entries. This was the danger of skipping ahead, he realized. He made a note to explore that curiosity further.

  He read Gret’s entry next:

  Gret the Rogue – 1707.3436, Path of Shadows, Labyrinth, Shadow Form, Enchanted Globe

  And he found his own:

  Hans the Adventurer – 3379.236, Path of Strength, Terathan Hive – FAILED x3

  Active Quest: Progress from Gold-ranked to Diamond-ranked.

  Seeing the entry reminded him of how the poison felt, surging through his bloodstream like a torrent of broken glass. He could smell the mustiness of the underground hive mixed with the sickly sweet smell of the silk binding him. He had told his arms and legs to fight, to escape, but they ignored him. His eyes were the only part of him that moved as he hung in the web, waiting to die.

  He closed the manual and sat back in his chair.

  I thought I was ready for this.

  He refreshed his cup and abandoned his desk for the rest of the day.

  ***

  Open Quests (Ordered from Old to New):

  Progress from Gold-ranked to Diamond-ranked.

  Mend the rift with Devon.

  Using a pen name, complete the manuscript for "The Next Generation: A Teaching Methodology for Training Adventurers."

  Expand the dungeon with resource-specific monsters for each of Gomi’s major trades.

  Find a way for Gomi adventurers to benefit from their rightful ranks in the Adventurers’ Guild.

  Secure a way to use surplus dungeon inventory for good.

  Confirm Uncle Ed’s decision on the Osare tournament.

  Finish transcribing the manual and decide on the next course of action.

  Help Izz and Thuz bring new opportunities to their home village.

  Investigate the locations of old Diamond Quests.