Through the gate just in front of him, Jason can see building styles that must come from all the kingdoms within a large radius. Not even houses themselves stick to a single style. Some places will have the bottom floor differ from the top. Others have that crazy grown over the years look that happens when a family keeps adding on to a place with time.

If Jason was to be honest with himself, the next area is where he would shop if that was his plan. Instead, though, he walks over to one of the guards idling next to the open gate. “So I’m new to the city and forgot to ask my friend before I went out. Where is the Adventurers guild at?”

The guard smiles and shakes his head and laughs in a good natured sort of way. “It is easy enough to miss. Despite their attempts to make every guildhall look the same, they still made it match the style. Anyway, you weren’t actually all that far off. If this main road is like the spoke of a wheel, you need to go one spoke over to the right and then back some. Since the area next to the wall is kept clear, you can follow it to the next gate. Now have a good day.”

While the guard seems happy enough, his words are that monotone “I’ve said this a million times” vibe to them and the smile was just a bit too plastered on. Still, Jason doesn’t take offense to this. The guard’s job is basically to repeat similar things every day. Can’t really blame him for being tired of the script.

Though as Jason walks along the wall, he considers what he can actually do at the guild. It isn’t like he can pick up a subjugation quest and skip town. He could always leave for the day, but any quest for within a day of a city like this isn’t going to be of much interest to him.

The next gate is ahead of him and Jason sighs as he turns onto the road. One of the two guards at the gate notices this and laughs. “So I guess I don’t need to tell you the Adventurers guild is down the road?”

Jason rolls his eyes but after another sigh shouts back with a heavily sarcastic tone of voice, “Adventurers Guild? Could you give me direction?”

The guard just laughs and shakes his head as Jason continues walking down the road. The other guard at the gate rubs the bridge of his nose, “Seriously Jerren, you need to stop that.”

Jason, however, is out of range to hear any follow up though and is left to his thoughts again. As his mind wanders, one thing keeps popping up to the top. ‘I should use this time to work on my irl cultivation. While I haven’t been doing too much with it, I might reach the doorway within this training montage of a week.’

Then, before he can think much deeper on it, he spots the guild. Or rather he spots several adventurer looking folk all walking into the same building. While in the more crowded area, the guild was able to take up several spots without looking too out of place. Jason might have even walked right by it if no one had been entering the building at that moment. Still, now that he has spotted it enters the place and looks around.

Not that there is much to see. Even with the design restrictions implicit with having a place within the inner wall, they’ve managed to keep the heart of the guild hall. Off to the side is the bar, at the back a door leading to all kinds of things, and across from the bar is a hall for skill trainers.

Almost without thinking, Jason’s feet take him towards that last one. All of his current skills are increasing in level, but he didn’t have all that much versatility. While he wasn’t sure if he could find a skill that will work for him here. It is a better use of his money than buying cheap stuff to haul around.

Inside the hall everything looks similar to the shinefish hall, the groupings were even similar. Still, none of this organizational effort will be too much of a use for him. What Jason needs right now is some training for his Energy and he can’t feel a single Energy user in the hall. It is worth a look around though, as not every skill needs to pull on one’s power pool.

After idling in the training hall for a while, Jason finally finds something to learn. On the edge of the ranged and magic area there is a lady teaching the power expulsion skill for ten gold. This is almost all his coins, but since the skill works with any power.

As he walks towards the lady for what must be the fifth or sixth time she cackles, “Well, are you going to buy or just window shop some more? Not that either of us seems to care one way or another. I have nothing but time on my hands and you apparently aren’t much better off.”

Jason laughs, “Lucky you, this time around I actually am going to be buying a lesson. After spending way too much time wandering around here, I’ve decided to learn power expulsion.”

The lady nods, “Okay, one lesson on power expulsion. While I don’t guarantee you will get the skill, I offer a discount on further lessons for the skill. Though I must admit, if you can’t pick it up by the fifth lesson, the skill just isn’t for you.”

Jason raises an eyebrow, “I would assume you would want people like that to earn some more change.”

The lady shrugs, “I don’t work on commission. All the money goes to the guild and I just make a salary. Mind you, I prefer it this way. Sure, some of the other tutors might do better on commission, but the skills I teach are all auxiliary and relatively low cost. And it isn’t like we aren’t being well paid. We wouldn’t stick around otherwise!”

Jason shrugs in return, “Fair enough”.

Akhier

Thank you for reading! Next two chapters are free on my Patreon ( 247 and 248 ), five chapters beyond that for only a dollar, and many more for five dollars (two chapters release a week at this tier).