In a few hours, we arrived at a rather large town. It was surrounded by large stone walls and people were lining up at the gate. From the composition of the people, I saw that only about half were humans, while there were quite a lot of dwarves, some elves and yes beastkin.

“Well this is as far as we can bring ya missy. We have to make a report to the higher ups. Just line up by the gates with the rest, unfortunately I can’t help ya skip the line so ya are on ya’r own from here. Since ya have that Adventurers Guild tattoo, ya should have no problem with identification. I’ll be seein’ ya missy and wish ya luck!” said the dwarf as he made his way towards a separate entrance in the walls.

So now, the moment to make a decision has come… do I go inside the city or do I try to make my home in the wilderness?

Hmmm… It wouldn’t hurt to just check things out right? Right? Just a little... I can leave any time…

Seemingly convincing myself, I get to the back of the line and wait. The wait lasted over an hour, which would have normally been pretty boring. But I used [Hearing Sense] to eavesdrop on conversations and see what I could learn. I know eavesdropping is not a good thing, but I am pretty desperate here!

When I reach the entry booth, sitting there seems to be another dwarf.

“Please present ya’r identification” said the dwarf.

To which I comply and show the identification on my Adventurers Guild tattoo. He then writes down some details, then starts staring at me for some reason.

“May I know the purpose of ya’r visit missy?” he inquires.

...uhmmm...what is the purpose of my visit? Tourism I guess? Since all I want to do is take a peek... Though considering the people standing in line, somehow I have a feeling something like that would sound rather weird...Oh, I know!

“I heard that there is a Blacksmithing Guild in this town and there are selections soon, so I want to join!” I respond.

“Is that so? If it is the Blacksmithing Guild, there is definitely a selection comin’ up the day after tomorrow. Ya can find the guild if ya head down to the center of town, then turn east towards the commercial district. From there, ya can’t miss it” informs the dwarf as he writes something else in his booklet.

Well that would save me the time looking for it, so that’s a plus. As I was about to leave I just remembered something. If the guards are being so helpful why not try to get a bit more info?

“Can I ask if you know a cheap and safe place a person can stay? Also some place where one can gather information?” I inquire.

“Hmmm...if that is what ya want, that would be the Adventurers Guild. As long as ya don’t mind sharin’ a room with a dozen people or so, they have cheap places to stay for adventurers such as ya’rself. Ya can find the adventurers guild in center square.

Similarly, they have a library that adventurers can use, though ya probably knew that being an adventurer and all. So if ya’r lookin’ for more information, try the bookstore which is located at the southern end of the main road” says the dwarf.

Oh yeah! The Adventurers Guild library! I forgot all about that due to it not being accessible to slaves! That is definitely my top priority! I am glad I decided to come here!

“Thanks mister!” I happily exclaim as I head towards the Adventurers Guild.

The town seems to be pretty darn large with traffic heading in all directions. It is larger than all the villages I have seen combined and more! As I head for the Adventurers Guild, I curiously look around and take in as much as I can. From the looks of things, I have seen plenty of beastkin walking around, and none of them seem to be used as slaves. Of course looking at them overall, I see they are worse off financially than the other races, but never the less, better than slavery!

Could this mean that I can finally settle somewhere? And then focus on leveling up in a safe manner? The whole thing feels so surreal to me…

With those thoughts, I make it to the Adventurers Guild.

I open the door, and take a look around. The layout is similar to the previous Adventurers Guild, so I can get straight to business. The first thing I do is head to the quest area and look in the Rank G section for the repeatable herb quest. And as expected, it is there as these herbs are rather common and are used in rather important recipes.

Knowing that, I head for the material selling station while taking out the herbs I stored up in [Item Box]. I stored a total of 15 herbs there, 10 of which I plan on selling, and the other 5 I plan on keeping for experimenting with alchemy when I pick that up. I would have normally stored up a lot more herbs, but not only is my [Item Box] rather small, I had to make room for food. At end of the day, considering I planned to escape eventually, not to mention how poorly we were fed, storing food took precedence.

I make my way to the counter and place the herbs there.

“Lets see what we have here, 2 [Dire Milkweed], 3 [Lavender Ginger Roots], 1 [Vile Nightshade], 2 [Black Lobelia], 2 [Violet River Grass]. That comes out to 32 iron and 50 copper coins. Adding the 10 iron coin bonus for the quest completion, that would be a total of 42 iron and 50 copper coins. Can you please place your guild tattoo on the orb?” said the dogkin at the counter.

Now that I think about it, there have been a lot of dogkin in proportion to other beastkin. Is it because a high [Smell Sense] helps improve survival rate when crossing countries?

I place my tattoo on the orb claiming credit for the quest, then take the money given to me, which by the way I am super excited about because this is the first time I actually get to actually keep my income!

With that out of the way, I head upstairs to find the library.

Like in the previous guild, the library was on the 3rd floor. It seems like this is some sort of standard format or something? I open the door to the library and see a few bookshelves. Frankly speaking, it was pretty underwhelming. Regardless, beggars can’t be choosers.

As I enter the library, I end up being stopped by female elf.

“Hello, you seem to be new around here. I am the librarian Kesha, nice to meet you” said the elf.

“Uhm...yes...my name is Shiro, nice to meet you too” I mutter caught a bit off guard.

“Since you are new around here, let me explain the rules. The library is open from 6 o’clock to 21 o’clock.

Taking books in and out of the library is prohibited.

Eating and drinking in the library is prohibited.

You are required to put down a down-payment of 1 silver which acts as insurance in case any books are damaged. You also have to pay 1 iron every day you plan to use the library, which goes towards the maintenance of the library” Kesha notifies.

What?!?! I have to put down 1 silver just to enter the library? That is so messed up! It is like information is being kept away from me on purpose! Next I’d bet by the time I get the 1 silver the library will mysteriously burn down! Guh! Okay...okay...lets not jinx myself and raise any flags...lets first ask some other information.

“How much does it cost to use the sleeping room in the guild and is it possible to put equipment as down-payment for the library if you don’t have 1 silver?” I inquire.

“The cost to use the beds at the Adventurers Guild is 8 iron. And I apologize, but we can not accept equipment as down-payment” Kesha responded.

Well it didn’t hurt to try at least...anyways, I’ll see what to do about the library a bit later. It is definitely important but I need to think a bit of where I stand.

I have a total of 42 iron and 50 copper coins. A bed costs 8 iron coins, food at stalls cost about 1 iron coin based on what I’ve seen coming here. Though it might be cheaper if I go off main street. Assuming I eat 2-3 times a day, it should be 10 iron coins per day. So as it stands, I can only last 4 days. If I sell the herbs I kept for alchemy, I can probably stretch it to 6 days.

So I have 2 options at this point, I can go adventuring out and collect herbs. With my ability I should be able to collect at least 10 - 15 herbs a day. Of course normally I’d be able to collect more, but this being a larger town makes finding herbs a lot more difficult. Though I don’t exactly know the difficulty of the monsters around this area. But 10 – 15 herbs should be doable. So I should earn around 50 iron coins a day give or take. Subtracting living costs, I should be at 40 iron coins per day assuming weather permits of course.

I can also kill monsters via traps from time to time, gaining levels for my race. Of course all this puts a risk to my life regardless how small it is.

The other option is that I can apply to be a disciple for a profession for 2 years. If I apply for that position, I won’t have to worry about food or shelter. I may also be able to extract information from fellow disciples about this world in casual conversations. I could also make a lot of money selling the things I created. And naturally, I would be able to level my [Creationist] class.

While at this point, I probably still make more from my race class per level vs my [Creationist] class in terms of combat. If I can unlock more attributes, and get to level 10 and unlock more skills, the tides would easily switch in favor of [Creationist]. Especially since I can’t level my racial skills myself.

Both options have their ups and downs...wait..wait...thinking about it logically, can’t I do both?

Lets say I become a disciple in the Blacksmithing Guild. I can get access to metal and make both gear and traps to help level my racial class. Normally, a person who joins the guilds spends their entire time leveling up their trade skill. But to someone like me, that is pointless. I only need to make about 5 or so equipment a day to sell, then I can go look for herbs to collect and monsters to kill! The best of both worlds!

Not to mention, if I get high enough [Blacksmithing] level, I can maybe fix that mithril dagger which from both cost perspective or combat perspective would be worth quite a lot.

It is getting a bit late for today, so I should probably retire for the day. And starting tomorrow I’ll go look to see what herbs are available in this area. Then the day after, I’ll go to the monthly selections for the Blacksmithing Guild.

With my mind made up, I head for the 4th floor which according to the sign is where the beds are. I pay the 8 iron coins and enter the room used for sleeping, which is divided by gender.

In the room I see a bunch of makeshift beds all over the place, and 5 dwarves occupying the beds. Besides them I see lots of bags full of equipment.

After studying the dwarves a little, I move to an isolated corner and take a bed there retiring for the day.