Chapter 363

Cyrene and Misha are sitting together on the top floor of the central pagoda in the Long Fang Valley Manor, going over the good works they and the Guild members have accomplished over this past week. 

With every Guild member able to call upon sixteen Epic Quality Summons, the entire power scale of the Guild has broken free of what could be considered normal. But between the two of them, and with a lot of help from the others, they have managed to turn that into a positive for the continent. 

“Right now, we have Larkin leading a group of farmers through the Ogre dungeon here in the valley, Kone has gone to Ferdinand’s territory and is helping with a crop growth issue there, but she should be back tonight. Preferably we would have everyone back at a Guild House tonight, because Neffie and Lickity say they have come up with uniforms for the Guild.” Misha smiles, revising her notes. 

“Uniforms? Like costume clothing worn over the armor?” Cyrene asks, and Misha nods. 

“Cloaks and tabards. The cloaks come in a couple of varieties since they grant bonuses, but the tabards are just cloth. Both are black on one half and white on the other. The tailors agreed that would make us easy to identify and the pattern isn’t in use by anyone else.”

“I was hoping for something more Cleric-like for the casters, but making everyone matching robes with good bonuses is a lot to ask, isn’t it?” Cyrene sighs, and Misha pets her scales. 

“The tabards are enough. You will see once everyone is wearing them.” Misha consoles her before looking over their reports again. 

“It looks like the Guild has found seven more Dungeons in the desert around the castle, and they have marked the locations for further endeavors.”

“Why don’t we build shelters over them? That way, they’re easy to find.” Kone suggests, Climbing the stairs to join the two working on the top floor. 

“Stone gazebos like we have back in the Castle? Earth Elementals could do that pretty quickly, and then we could have the Inscription specialists carve protection runes into them to keep them free of sand and desert creatures.” Cyrene agrees, seeing visions of small temples to Cain scattered all over the desert. 

“A place for groups to gather or rest would be a fine thing in the desert. Out of the scorching sun.” Misha agrees, making notes in her to-do binder. 

“That sounds great to me. Standing out in the sun all day is no fun. Speaking of which, I think we took care of the crop problems in the next territory. After the succession battles, they didn’t have any druids or nature Mages left. It sounds like that is a common problem all over the country, so if we can find any that are willing to spend time out helping the farmers of Skyview, it would be a huge benefit to everyone.” Kone suggests. 

Larkin is the next member to return back to the Manor, explaining that he has finished the run of the Ogre dungeon scheduled for the day and all the farmers that went with him are safely back home. Kone escorts him away while Cyrene checks the Guild messages for good news. 

They had one minor incident today; a bandit group attempted to rob Fizzle, one of the female gnomish Warpfire Warlocks. She is fine and managed to get her summons up before she could be immobilized or knocked unconscious, but that does highlight one of the problems with outreach work.

Not everyone is a good person, and having lone transfers off doing missions in dangerous areas is a risk to their members.

Having someone die while out trying to do good work for the Guild would be terrible and undermine everything they are trying to do. 

The decision is to send them in pairs when they are going to be passing through or working in dangerous areas. Though the membership is biased towards younger females, thanks to a particular recruiting Shaman’s love for cute and cuddly things, they have several couples who wouldn’t mind going on adventures together. 

[What does everyone think about having couples or teams go to the more dangerous areas instead of letting people go solo? It should be safer, and for those who prefer time alone, there are still many things to do in cities and other less hazardous regions.] Misha suggests in Guild Chat. 

[That’s not a bad idea. Then we won’t feel pressured to go to different locations all day.] Larkin suggests bringing a round of jokes about him having to clear it with Kone before changing his duty assignments. 

The overall reception is optimistic, though, and just before dinner, the tailors put the stacks of uniforms into the Guild Bank. They made three patterns of the cloak, straight Summon damage, enhanced healing and Summon damage, and increased resistances with Summon damage. 

The bias is deliberate; with every outreach worker having so many summons available, getting the extra damage from the cloak allows them to optimize the rest of their gear for their own class. 

The cloaks are black on the left, white on the right, and the tabards opposite. The effect is very striking and immediately identifiable as a uniform. 

[The Enchanting Group has a brooch to go with the uniforms. It is a new recipe that they hope everyone appreciates.] Cid adds, speaking on behalf of the reclusive jewel Crafters. There are over ten of them, but they are even more rarely seen than even the artists. 

A stack of identical black Octopus shaped pins are added to the bank, and everyone grabs one to add to their outfit. They all add ten points of healing on hit, which will apply when the summons attack as well, and they bind to a transfer on first use, showing the name of their owner when inspected and being unable to be equipped by others. 

[They’re like our identity cards, so nobody can pretend to be us.] Cid explains. 

[Excellent initiative, everyone. Thank you for all the hard work.] Misha adds her congratulations to the crowded chat. 

They have gone through most of the day’s duties, but one item is left at the bottom. Carlos wants to place a building on a vacant property in the slums of the Landis capital, hoping to make a Guild Hospital. His summons can do the job, but he needs approval from a Guild officer to make it a Guild facility. 

Misha doesn’t see a problem with that. They have at least one young Cleric who would prefer healing all day to doing dungeons once the building is done. 

Their Guild roster is only a third full, with the recent addition of Port Nefheim increasing their maximum membership numbers. That isn’t exactly a problem, but more of an opportunity for them to expand. One that Cyrene wishes to capitalize on. 

“We should send out a few friendly people looking for new members. The ones from Beginner Valley that Char raises are perfect, but there are only so many of them available if we’re not going to clear out every unaligned transfer from the valley.

Maybe everyone could keep an eye out while they are on missions? Bring back youth in need for Char to train?” Cyrene suggests. 

Controlling a territory allows them to set quest missions, so Misha makes a bunch up and issues them for the Guild to pick from.

She does this regularly, using it to pay members for spreading the glory of the Darklight Host. But today, she adds an extra mission to the usual list, letting the System fill in the details of their recruitment requirements, along with the reward that it will issue in addition to the token gold coin that the Guild offers. 

[Quest: Find suitable representatives to be trained as Ambassador Members for the Darklight Host under Guild Master Cain.] Quest rewards 1 Gold Coin, plus five skill points for every recruit deemed worthy.

‘Yes, that is what they need.’ Misha decides, then, she reads the system’s bonus reward, which is usually a bit of experience. Getting skill points from any sort of quest is rare, and the reward is unheard of from a repeatable quest. In theory, someone could earn an entire advancement worth of skill points just by finding new members. 

The only question is, how will the System device so is deemed as a “Worthy Recruit”? It will decide before they are admitted and indicate to those on the quest when they have found one. 

That somewhat takes recruiting out of their hands and places it at the will of the system, but if the system decides they are worthy ambassadors, they shouldn’t be bad people. The system has been pretty reliable that way. 

They only have to wait two days until they find the first automatically vetted new member. According to the system, this fifteen year old Gnomish girl who was dropped in Port Nefheim as a stowaway, who didn’t even have a class until Neffie found her and took her in to complete the quest is worthy. 

Currently, she is in Port Nefheim, recovering from weeks of starvation hiding in a merchant ship, but the system interface has now activated for her.

Gnomes are superstitious, believing that fate decides what new experimental devices fail and which ones blow up, so she chose random class selection, letting fortune determine her role in life. 

The System awarded her the class of Crusader, which Neffie finds hilarious since the gnome is even shorter than she is. Still, Brazz is hugely enthusiastic about helping the Guild spread a positive reputation. 

Why she is so devoted after just being rescued becomes apparent when they realize that Neffie had power leveled her to level 50 the very first night while everyone else was sleeping. 

The superstitious gnome believes that Neffie’s help, along with her new class, is a sign that the System has given her a Divine Duty to help the Guild. 

[Send her here to us in Long Fang Valley. We will help her get acclimatized, and she can meet everyone while she gets settled.] Cyrene tells Neffie, who sees the opportunity to come to visit the pregnant Misha and sample different snacks than the ones her cook usually makes. 

“We are off to a good start. One cuddly gnome incoming.” Cyrene giggles to Misha, looking forward to meeting someone new to teach all about The Truth.