Skill Generation
The village was bursting with life.
Crowds packed the streets. Some were buying, some were selling.
"For a village, this is…"
Far too big. What ringed the place wasn't some slapdash palisade, but proper walls. The streets were wide, and the press of people coming and going was considerable. You could have called it a city and no one would have argued.
She was still taking it all in when—
Dooong—
A bell tolled.
"That sound…"
"The time is already drawing near."
"H-huh? Wait—who…"
When had he gotten there?
An old man was standing beside her as if he had always been.
I didn't even sense him…
No presence or not, how did anyone walk up without making a sound? She was just starting to raise her guard when he spoke.
"Heh heh. What's a young lass so wary of, hmm?"
He'd caught her at it.
"How…"
"What's there to 'how'? You were bristling at me like a cat with its fur standing on end."
I was doing that…?
"Anyway, I'm nothing but a worthless old man, so you needn't pay me any mind."
And with that, he was gone.
"What was that…?"
She'd entered the village according to plan. The problem was that she had no idea what she was supposed to do now.
No. If this was a tower, you went in, you got a quest, you cleared it, and you moved on to the next floor. That was how it worked, right?
Except here, she hadn't received a single quest.
Worse than that: money. She was painfully short on money. Of course the Tower's currency wasn't the same as the currency outside, which meant she was flat broke.
If only there were some way to get her hands on cash…
Where am I supposed to get money…
"Maybe I should ask the community…"
Sure enough, the comments started pouring in the instant she posted.
Just hit the village, total newbie here.
Looks like you need money to do anything…
How are you supposed to get some?
The Guild, huh.
She searched the community for it and pulled together whatever information she could find.
You can take requests at the Guild, or sell materials there.
We're gonna be killing monsters to level up anyway, right?
So don't go dumping the materials you get off them.
The second-largest building in the village.
That one with the orange roof, then?
She pushed the door open and stepped inside the Guild.
The interior was… well. It felt like a tavern.
A huge bulletin board was plastered with papers, and even in the middle of the day the place was packed with people drinking. In the middle of all that noise, every eye in the room swung toward the person who had just opened the door.
My stomach's turning…
If the hood hadn't been covering her face, she would already have thrown up everything in her stomach.
Stay calm…
She headed straight for the counter.
"Hello! Welcome to the Guild! What can I help you with today?"
The receptionist lit up the moment she approached.
"I was wondering if I could sell some materials…"
She set the monster materials she'd gathered on her way into the village on the counter. Thanks to her Cooking skill, the butchering had come with a nice little assist.
"Selling monster materials, I see! I'll have these appraised!"
The receptionist scooped up what she'd laid out and disappeared into the back. A short while later, she returned.
"I've confirmed materials from a Dire Wolf and a Horn Rabbit. That's eight hundred gold in total. Without an Adventurer's Plate, twenty percent will be deducted. Speaking of which, do you have an Adventurer's Plate?"
"No. I don't."
So the monsters she'd killed had been called Horn Rabbits and Dire Wolves.
"If you register as an adventurer with the Guild, you'll be issued a plate. If you don't have one, I'd recommend having one made this time."
"Does that cost money?"
Even just thinking about selling monster materials going forward, it would be worth having one.
"The registration fee is two hundred gold."
"Could you deduct the two hundred gold from what I'm receiving and register me?"
"That's possible."
"Then please do."
"I'll need a name for the registration."
She hesitated at that.
I could use an alias, but…
Inside the Tower, she wanted to stand as she was.
"Ruind."
The receptionist confirmed the name and went into the back again.
An adventurer, huh. Concepts that used to show up only in comics were just… ordinary, here in the Tower.
While she was turning that over, the receptionist came back with something in hand.
"Here is your Adventurer's Plate, and the remaining four hundred forty gold."
She took a plate made of bronze.
"Thank you."
She offered her thanks and left the Guild.
She'd already looked up Adventurer's Plates on the community. There were eight ranks in total, and bronze was the lowest. You earned merit by completing requests or selling materials taken from monsters. Once you'd accumulated enough, the Guild would put you through a test.
Pass the test and you can rank up, they said…
She held the plate up toward the sky. It blocked the sun and caught the light, flashing bright.
This was fun.
In a Tower still stuffed with things she didn't understand—why was that? It felt like she had finally taken her first real step.
Four hundred forty gold was not a lot of money. By her own conversion, it came to maybe forty thousand won—thirty bucks, give or take. Call it one gold to a hundred won and you'd be close enough.
What she bought with that gold was nothing grand. A small dagger from the smithy, a hoe, and a pickaxe. Those three things. Which meant she was broke all over again.
Wait. Was being able to buy three things a miracle?
Come to think of it, she'd gotten a pitying look when she pulled out her money…
Anyway. She needed to earn. Without money she'd be sleeping on the roadside, and she wouldn't get to eat anything good. She could cook for herself, of course—but that was a matter of mood!
And to earn money, she had to clear requests.
Which was why she was standing in front of the Guild again.
…Maybe she should have spent a little more carefully?
No. Every bit of that was necessary…!
The dagger was for butchering monsters. The Cooking skill's assist had gotten her through it somehow, but she'd bought the blade to make the work easier.
Having grease and fat clinging all over my hands was seriously disgusting.
On top of that, dressing a carcass by hand inevitably dropped the quality of the materials—and material quality was the price the Guild would pay. Necessary expense.
The hoe and the pickaxe were for herbs and ore, respectively. Most of the Guild's delivery requests were herbs and minerals. And with her adventurer rank as low as it was, the requests she could even take were limited. Short on cash the way she was, she had to grab whatever she could get.
She pulled four requests off the board and took them to the desk.
"Two herb-gathering requests, one mineral-gathering request, and a Horn Rabbit subjugation. Confirmed."
As long as she had Cooking and Appraisal, she could identify herbs just by looking at them. Ore, though… that would come down to luck.
And so she took the requests. And then—
Ding!
A quest window she'd never seen before bloomed into view.
Herb Gathering 1
Obtain Hwalmyeongcho and submit it to the Guild. (0/10)
Herb Gathering 2
Obtain Mayeongcho and submit it to the Guild. (0/10)
Ore Gathering
Mine coal and submit it to the Guild. (0/25)
Subjugation Request
Defeat Horn Rabbits and submit their horns to the Guild. (0/10)
So taking a request made it pop as a quest. Easy to read, and a perfect fit.
"All right. Let's go."
What she had to do was finally clear. She headed out of the village.
There was a forest near the village.
Prian Forest.
One of the paths that led to the mines, and home to low-tier monsters. A woman was racing through that wood, springing from branch to branch. Monster-infested or not, spotting her as she slipped between the trees was no easy thing.
"Ah. Found you."
A rabbit with a drill-like horn on its forehead. Horn Rabbit. The same monster she'd taken down just before reaching the village—and this time, the request was to collect those horns.
She crept closer, careful not to let it notice. The creature still hadn't spotted her, quietly cropping at the grass. She drew the bowstring without a sound.
The Stealth skill activated, and the noise vanished into the dark. The Horn Rabbit went on eating.
Not yet. It wasn't time.
The Horn Rabbit turned, and its eyes met hers. A few seconds from the instant those red rabbit eyes found a predator to the instant its body locked up—she did not miss that window.
An arrow armed with silence itself was loosed. That hush, which had swallowed even the whisper of wind, flew at her prey.
—!
The arrow punched clean through the Horn Rabbit's neck. It died without so much as a scream.
"Hah…"
She approached the corpse and dressed it. She stripped the hide, washed the blood in running water, and cut free the all-important horn. Around the time she stowed the butchered Horn Rabbit in her inventory—
Ding!
The system answered.
Proficiency has exceeded a set threshold.
A skill is being generated.