Preparing for school was fairly easy. All I really needed were clothes and a few essentials like paper and pencils. Knowing that I would grow out of my clothes quickly, I was given two small gold coins to get me through until I was old enough to make some money on my own. It felt like a lot, but I knew that it was only enough for about three or four years of clothing. There was no room for pocket money in that. I'd have to find a way to get some.

The bag I packed weighed about ten pounds since I really didn't have much. Besides the coins, clothes, and essentials, I also packed the monster core when I was sure the coast was clear. I awoke early about a week after my sixth birthday. Breakfast was waiting for me in the kitchen. Mom and Dad looked sad. I couldn't blame them. I'd miss them too.

There was a knock on the door half an hour after I finished breakfast.

"Your wagon is here," Mom said.

"I'll miss you!" I replied.

The three of us hugged. There wasn't a dry eye in the room. I grabbed my bag and started toward the door. Mary was waiting for me there. I bent down and gave her a hug, too.

"Keep Mom and Dad safe for me, ok?"

"Ok!" she said cheerfully.

I opened the door and walked out into the early morning. The wagon was an open-top design with a driver in front. In the back were three other kids that had been picked up as well. I climbed into the back of the wagon and took a seat across from two of them. The third sat at the front facing the rear.

The two I sat across from, a boy and a girl, were dressed in decent clothing. Not rags that might mark them as poor, but also not fine clothes that would mark them as wealthy. They were decidedly middle class like myself. The third kid, a girl, wasn't poor either, but he had clothes that looked a little shabby. Perhaps a farmer's kid.

The wagon trundled off to its next destination.

"Hey," the boy said, grabbing my attention.

"Hmm?"

"I'm Dave, what's your name?"

"James."

"I'm Kiera," the girl next to him added.

"I can't wait to learn to fight!" he exclaimed.

"Fighting's pretty fun," I agreed.

"You already know how?"

"Yeah. Dad's a guard so I've practiced a bit."

"You'll have to spar with me when we can. Show me something cool!"

"Sure. What about you, Keira, what are you looking forward to?"

"Fighting also. But I really want to learn about monsters. They're fascinating!"

"I'm looking forward to learning about magic," I said. "Dad wasn't any good with it so I didn't learn anything."

"My Mom taught me the basics," the girl at the back spoke up. "I'm Alicia, by the way."

"Nice to mee you! That's pretty awesome. Can you help me learn it?"

"I-I guess."

Her face turned red. She seemed like a shy one who got really into our conversation and spoke before her shyness caught up with her.

The four of us chatted for another quarter-hour before we picked up a couple more kids, both boys this time. We scooted closer together to give them room and continue our little group. The wagon spent an hour picking up a total of twelve kids, including the four of us, before it turned in the direction of the adventurer's school that lay near the main entrance of the city.

The school was a complex of eight large buildings. Four of these housed the students while the other four had classrooms and offices. Between them was a wide rectangular courtyard used for leger gatherings, tournaments, and sparring. The wagon stopped near the entrance to one of the buildings--Grace Hall. The driver told us to go inside quickly. We got off the wagon, and, as soon as the last person was clear, the wagon left to get more students.

Grace Hall was a large rectangular building about five stories tall. We entered to see a desk that had 'Welcome' signs hanging from it. An older man sat behind the desk and beckoned us to come closer.

"You name?" he asked the first person to arrive. When she answered, he looked it up in a mall book. "Apartment 3F, room 2. Here's your key. Next!"

When it came to my turn, I ended up in apartment 5A, room 3. I waited for the others to receive their room assignments. Luckily, Alicia and Keira ended up across the hall at 5C, and Dave was in mine, room 2.

We trudged up the four flights of stairs to our rooms. I stuck the key into the door and, with a twist, it opened. The apartment was basic. There was a small storage area for food and a sink with a single counter between that sink and the wall on its left side. There were no ways to cook anything, but at least we could prepare cured foods. The rest of the common room had four doors and two couches facing each other. A large window allowed the morning light to enter. The blinds helped somewhat, but I mostly had an eyeful of sun every time I glanced at the window.

"Those stairs are gonna suck!" Dave complained.

"You may curse them now," I said, "but you gotta remember that you'll be training your endurance for free every day!"

"Wait, you can do that?"

"Sure. You can get strength highed by lifting weights, constitution from overcoming illnesses, intelligence from reading, and a ton I don't know."

"That's awesome! I still think the stairs suck, but at least they can do something good while being annoying."

"I agree."

I opened the door to my room and tossed my bag onto the bed inside. The room had a bed and a desk. The bed was already made, and several pieces of paper sat on the desk. I picked them up and sat on one of the couches in the common room. Dave came out of his room not long after.

"Did you see the paper on your desk?" U asked.

"Yeah, but I can't read that well yet."

"Ok. I'll read them to you."

"Thanks, James."

I read the first page. It had a bunch of rules like a curfew at eight in the evening, quiet time at ten, that sort of thing. The next piece of paper had notes on where to get food, when the cafeterias were open, rules for laundry, writing letters, and many other such things. The final piece of paper was the most important. It laid out the classes available to us and the requirements.

It had everything from elementary archery to tactical theory and everything in between. The paper had a list of suggested classes for incoming students like us. The year was broken into trimesters of four months each. For the first semester, it suggested Reading 1, Writing 1, Archery 1, Swordfighting 1, and Intro to Magic. It also laid out specific conditions for skipping each of the classes.

All except magic were mandatory until the 5th one, then they were optional to the 7th level, which had a note saying it was repeatable. These numbers corresponded to the skill level one higher than you had. So for me, I needed to take: Reading 5, Writing 1, Archery 3, Swordfighting 5, and Intro to Magic. There were boxes to fill in on a separate piece of paper. I took a pencil from my bag and wrote those down in the boxes.

Milestone: Learn to Write

CHA +2

I chuckled and erased the 1 next to Writing and replaced it with a 2. I helped Dave complete his. He was in Reading 2, and the rest were the basics. We would at least share Intro to Magic.

With that accomplished, we folded out class request forms, that needed to be dropped off at the main office, and stuck them in our pockets. The office was near one of the cafeterias, so we'd drop it off when we went to get lunch.

I locked the door to my room and went outside with Dave. We knocked on the door to the girls' apartment, and Alicia answered a minute later.

"Wanna get lunch?" I asked.

"Keira, lunch!"

"Coming!"

It seemed like Alicia had warmed up a lot to us in the couple of hours we'd spent together. The four of us left the building to get lunch and drop off the forms.