The next morning, after eating the large breakfast his mother prepared for him, Damion set out to find Ms. Teft. There were several questions he wanted to ask of her. Such as why she did not advise him to make a survival kit, or get armor, and most importantly, what were breaches.
Damion knocked on Ms. Teft’s door, but he did not hear her inside coming to the door. After knocking a second time and receiving no answer, Damion realized she was not home. A quick look at his watch told Damion the most likely place Ms. Teft would be was school.
For the past few years, Ms. Teft had taken charge of his education and training. But technically, she was still the Head Librarian at Damion’s school. With Damion’s schooling over, and since he had gotten his adventurer’s license and gone out on missions, Ms. Teft would no doubt need to return to her normal job. Although the students were out for the end of the year break, many teachers had paperwork they needed to finish for the year and prepare for lessons in the new year, so Damion took a chance that Ms. Teft was at the school.
Sure enough, when Damion arrived at the school library, he found Ms. Teft sitting behind her desk in the library, doing paperwork. When Damion walked in, she looked up and saw him. After giving him an appraising look, she spoke.
“About time you came to visit me. You aren’t starting to think yourself above training now that you have completed a mission have you?”
“Of course not,” Damion answered. “My parents wanted to celebrate my safe return. I’m here now though and I am hoping to get your appraisal of my mission performance.”
“Good. I’m glad to hear you haven’t gotten too full of yourself. So please, fill me in on what happened with your missions.”
Damion began to fill his teacher in on the events of his missions. Ms. Teft listened without comment as Damion recounted his deeds and his reflections on his actions. When he was finished Ms. Teft gave him another appraising look.
“For your first few missions, you faced remarkable challenges and managed to come out unharmed. Even learning from your own mistakes as you progressed.”
“Ethan was a big help,” Damion admitted. “He filled me in on some of the workings of the world I had been too naïve to see. And he gave me a few pointers to help me grow.”
“Oh. What might those pointers be?”
“Having a survival kit for one.”
“A survival kit?” Ms. Teft questioned before she realized what Damion was referring to. “Those are for people that don’t know how to survive in the wilderness.”
“And I do?” Damion laughed.
“I suppose that is true, we only briefly talked about wilderness training. At magic academies, they put all the students through a wilderness training class. And they have to pass the class before the academy allows them to get their adventurer license.”
“So why didn’t I get the same training?”
“I forgot.” Ms. Teft said with a shrug. “It isn’t a subject I taught. The Association doesn’t care if you can survive in the wilderness or not, so it did not come up with them. If someone wants to go and get themselves killed, as long as they can pass their licensing test they’ll let anyone go out on a mission.”
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“What about why you didn’t tell me I should get armor?”
“Well, that is simple. F Rank missions are hardly ever as dangerous as the ones you have been on. Besides, you figured out you needed armor and a survival kit with necessities all on your own.”
“I just bought a basic kit, I figured I would build up to a suitable kit.”
“A cost-effective plan,” Ms. Teft said. “I would recommend a good tent that has enchantments to conceal itself or repel beasts when active. That way if you do need to use it, you can be assured of a good night’s sleep.”
“Anything I should add right away?”
“Rations. Buying a sandwich is all well and good, but field rations are more compact, will last longer and provide you with more nutrients than a sandwich from a grocery store.”
“How much do you think those will cost?” Damion only had a couple of silver coins, hardly enough to go splurging on armor, a tent and rations.
“The type of tent I am recommending, 50 silver to a gold piece. Depending on size and the exact enchantments. Rations are a bit of a different story. You can get a lot of rations cheap, just a few silver for a month’s worth. But those taste like… well you won’t like them. The minimum you should spend on a month of rations should be around 10 silvers. That should get you a decent tasting set of meals.”
“It really is expensive to be an adventurer.”
“As you grow, it gets even more expensive,” Ms. Teft said. “What you have to do is make sure you do plenty of missions, but only those within your ability. Trying to do missions that are above you in Rank will just lead you to an early death. Persistence and saving as you go should let you always afford the artifacts and supplies you need.”
“Why didn’t we hear anything about the beast wave that hit Bufort? In fact, I hardly ever hear about beast waves.”
“Beast waves in White and Green Zones are quite uncommon and usually make headlines everywhere. The last one was the one here, when you were just six years old, so it is not a surprise you don’t remember the news reports.
“Yellow Zones are a different matter. Beast waves there, well... are not common occurrences, but they still happen enough that your mundane news organizations don’t bother to report on them. The Adventurer Association maintains reports on beast waves and dispatches mission requests to qualified adventurers whenever a new one crops up.”
“Really?”
“Of course, you haven’t been on the receiving end of one of those notifications because you are just an F Rank. Once you aren’t so weak that you would only be a liability, you’ll start getting them.”
“Is that so. Thank you for all your help,” Damion said sincerely.
“It is not a problem. In just a few more years you’ll be able to go to a magic academy. When that happens, you’ll have to learn a whole new way of fighting.”
“Really?” Damion was startled by that. He had spent a great deal of time learning to fight with the sword. But the more he thought about it, fighting as a knight would of course be different than fighting as a mage.
“There are a number of different fighting styles for mages. You could follow the spellsword path. Close combat with spells meant for close combat or for buffing your physical condition. Or you could follow the path of an enchanter. Just creating powerful artifacts for others, if you unlock the Spatial magic affinity you could even create spatial artifacts.
“Or maybe you will have a truly rare affinity that you can use to destroy entire cities with a single spell. It all depends on what your magic affinity is.”
Listening to Ms. Teft, Damion realized she was right. If it turned out he had a magic affinity that was suited more to long range magic, fighting up close would be problematic, he would be wasting his potential that way. If only he knew what his affinity was, then he would be able to start adapting his fighting style now.
“Don’t fret over it too much,” Ms. Teft reassured. “Mages often change their styles as they rank up. Once they have access to more advanced magic and the mana to use those spells, it only makes sense to tailor their style to their abilities.”
“So, you are saying I will never stop being a student,” Damion said with a laugh.
“Life is motion. When you stop moving, growing, adapting. Then you will begin to stagnate and die. Never forget that. Even if you one day reach the top of what is known, keep pushing to discover more. Otherwise…”
Damion waited for Ms. Teft to continue, but she appeared to be lost in thought. After a few moments, Damion decided to change the subject and ask what he had been dying to ask.
“What can you tell me about breaches?”