The next day Dryth was still anxious about not being able to get licensed, but it wasn't dominating his every waking moment or threatening to drive him into a panic attack, mostly thanks to Sindri. Having his irrepressible friend at his side was a balm all on its own and having said friend be able to literally feel whenever Dryth was starting to spiral into a swirl of negative thoughts helped him either distract from or reason against the negativity whenever it was appropriate.

  Having Ewan as a pillar of stability was his other relief from the fraught nightmare that was his situation, Just having somewhere to live and knowing he'd be able to eat tomorrow mitigated his problems in a big way. Dryth had never been homeless or truly destitute, but he'd grown up in a massive family that wasn't too far away from poverty at any moment. Eating more than one every day had been a glorious thing to him when he'd first been sent of to boarding school and he wanted to keep that option going for the remainder of his life.

  "When I saw my twist on my Soul Card I thought I would have an issue getting contracts, I didn't think it would literally prevent me from getting licensed." He complained under his breath as he hurried toward their next lesson with Sindri once again wrapped around his neck. They were headed to a room Dryth hadn't been in before, which was also serving as an impromptu test of whether or not he'd gotten the tricks to navigating Ewan's magical home down, and they were already late.

  "It hasn't, remember? Ewan just has to yell at people about how stupid they are and then it'll be fixed."

  One issue with muttering under one's breath is that people close enough to hear it, say a feathered serpent who's head was right by your mouth, could hear everything you said even when you meant it to be just to yourself.

  "I know, I know. I was bitching about the Association's stupid rules more than anything." He almost missed the turn he was supposed to take and had to swing himself around a corner at speed. "The more I learn about them the more I agree with Ewan, they suck."

  "How much of that feeling is driven by your current negative situation with them?" Sindri asked in a neutral voice. Something about it sounded like he was quoting something he'd heard.

  Dryth shot him some side eye. "Are you trying to therapist me?"

  "Maybe? That felt like a question my mom would ask and I thought it was appropriate."

  "I'm sure some of my feelings are exacerbated by how annoyed I am right now," Dryth replied after chuckling, "But limiting what people learn because of fear, trying to pressure and propagandize mages into living their lives a certain way, and getting in having rules and regulations for every single thing in existence in order to ensure that it's controlled and neat and tidy are all things I'm against. Even if Treegold was pushing the boundaries of what the Association normally does, the fact that those boundaries weren't in a much different spot makes me unhappy." He stopped in front of the thick metal door Ewan had described a breakfast. "This should be it."

  "What do you think we're learning today? Ewan was being all cryptic this morning" Sindri grumped.

  "No idea. I've given up on guessing since there's so much we don't know." He pushed open the door, which was much heavier than he'd expected, and revealed the room behind. There were three stone walls jutting out that divided part of the room into lanes, with targets at the end of each. Off to the other side was a humanoid figure made of a dark metal with no facial features standing upright while perfectly still with a large amount of open space around them.

  Ewan was sitting in a chair with the front two legs lifted off the ground, watching the door. "Ah!" He let the chair fall into place and used the momentum to help himself stand, "There you are. Did you have any difficulty making it here?"

  "Nope!" Sindri called out before Dryth could think of a good excuse. "Dryth was getting all mopey about the licensing again so I started telling him some funny stories and we got distracted. Sorry!"

  "Sorry," Dryth sighed without making eye contact.

  "Don't fret too much about it." Ewan waved the apology away. "It isn't like you're a regular truant or don't have respect for my time or anything like that, you've had a bad shock that's upturned your plans for your life and now you're dealing with it." He blew a raspberry. "This minuscule event isn't even a drop compared to the bucket of times I've done similar things."

  "Still, I'm sorry." Dryth insisted. "I shouldn't have lost track of time like that and I'll make sure it doesn't happen again."

  "Well I certainly appreciate that, thank you. Oh, and I accept your apology. Well then students, welcome to the basic combat training room!" He indicated the area they were in with both hands. "We'll be starting more lessons than not in here for the next while, while we wait for the responses from my contacts in those various places I mentioned yesterday."

  "Why are we going to have lessons in here?" Dryth asked cautiously as he looked around.

  "Because I'm going to be teaching you basic combat, of course." Ewan answered as if that were obvious, "It's a fools bet to assume that anyone, let alone a mage, will never see any kind of fighting in their life and I thinks it's vital to ensure that you and Sindri know how to best handle yourselves if you do end up in danger. Plus," He added, a bit begrudgingly, "All of the potential jobs I know of that you can get without an Association license involve fighting, so it's best to get you prepared now."

  "What?" Dryth whipped his head away from where he'd been inspecting the dark metal figure. "What kind of jobs are we talking about? I didn't think to ask the specifics yesterday."

  "We're going to be fighting? Alright!" Sindri cheered.

  "I don't want to fight anybody, or anything!" Dryth protested to his partner.

  "What?" Sindri pushed his head up against Dryth's cheek. "But we're going to go adventuring, and all adventures have some kind of enemy in the way to be overcome!"

  "Yes well, I didn't bring up what specifically I was speaking about yesterday because, well I haven't know you that long Dryth but I can tell you're not that interested in fighting." Ewan pressed his lips into a thin line. "I didn't want to make things seem worse by making it look like the only options you had were ones you didn't like." He shrugged one shoulder. "They aren't, not forever, but they probably are in the short term."

  "What kind of jobs are they?"

  "There are three methods of becoming employed, or to be more specific of making money, as a mage that don't require an Association license here in the kingdom. The first," He counted as he raised one finger, "Would to be to join the military. I don't recommend it for a number of reasons, but it is an option." He held up a second figure, "Next is to become a merchant, specifically a free trader. That requires some basic tests be passed that are separate from the Association's test for licensing, but they aren't very hard for anyone that can read, write, and do basic math. Many contractors go this path at some point in their lives, whether temporarily or permanently, because we're likely to have lots of excess cards on hand. For you personally that path is still possible, but I don't know how viable it is since you're unlikely to have a wide range of possible contracts, making your ability to acquire certain cards unlikely and making you fairly one dimensional in what you can stock."

  This story has been unlawfully obtained without the author's consent. Report any appearances on Amazon.

  "Why are Contractors more likely to have excess cards? I don't remember that from any lessons with you or at the school."

  "Oh, because unlike manifesting cards there's nothing limiting you from getting more than one copy of a card through your contract. It's rare, especially since you can only get one at a time, but it happens. There was a time where I was contracted to a fire elemental that loved throwing fireballs around. I had four copies of that card from them by the time our contract ended, and since you can't put more than one copy of a card in your deck..." He shrugged. "Some Contractors set themselves up as permanent merchants selling specific cards. They make contracts with people that have in-demand cards and then pay them somehow to use that card as much as possible. They can become quite affluent that way."

  "Huh." Dryth reached up to scratch along Sindri's feathered mane while he thought about that. "That's pretty ingenious of them. Too bad I probably won't be able to do that."

  "Why not? I can get good cards that people will want!"

  "Sure, but are you willing to stay in once place all the time just using those cards over and over so I can get copies that we'll sell to people?"

  Sindri reared back. "No, that sounds horrible! It'd be so boring!"

  "Exactly. How does being a Contractor-merchant involve fighting though?"

  "They get targeted by thieves, robbers, bandits, and kidnappers constantly, especially the ones with access to really powerful cards. The wealthy ones can just hire guards, but you would be just starting out and you'd need to be able to defend yourself."

  "Oh."

  "Indeed." Ewan held up a third finger, "Third, final, and my personal recommendation is to become an adventurer."

  "That sounds perfect!"

  "Yes, I thought you'd say that." Ewan said with a smile for Sindri. "Technically here in the kingdom they aren't referred to as adventurers they're called bounty hunters, because instead of independent adventurer's guilds organizing jobs or quests for adventurers to take on for pay it's handled here in the kingdom by a government agency called the Bounty Agency. They track, collate, and validate all official and private bounties for the acquisition of resources, slaying of monsters, capture of criminals, and all other such tasks that aren't being handles by companies, the military, local or national guard forces, or other official groups that would normally take care of such things."

  Sindri's eyes glittered brighter and brighter like twinkling gemstones or polished silver bars as his excitement grew with each word Ewan uttered. "Woooooow."

  Dryth decided to ignore his partner's excitement, which was a bad omen, his own growing trepidation, which was based on said omen, and instead focused on a disconnect he was feeling. "That honestly feels out of place. Everything I've been learning about our government seems to be focused on limited personal or individual power and focusing it to grow the kingdom's power as a whole. The Association wants to limit or control mages so they're organized, systematic, and don't cause trouble just for one immediate example. I get the kingdom not wanting private guilds of adventurers running about fighting monsters or tracking down criminals, why have a Bounty Agency at all, why not just send more funding to the guard forces and the military?"

  Ewan nodded slowly in acknowledgment to Dryth. "Well spotted. Most with access to the information needed to see it take much longer to realize that the kingdom is like that."

  "How many people have it shoved in their face?"

  "Ha! Good point. The answer to your question is simple. The kingdom can't go without a bounty office or some other alternative, adventurers, or bounty hunters or whatever one wishes to call them. are a requirement for a society in this world. Without them civilization will fall apart."

  That snapped Sindri out of his daydream and he asked the same question Dryth was about to. "Why?"

  "Because humans, and every other member of what is commonly referred to as 'The Races of Man', require a kind stability that is not natural to our plane in order to have civilizations flourish. Monsters are a constant problem everywhere and they are a threat to buildings, individuals, groups of people, livestock, fields, and so many other things we need to keep a city or a town in existence. There will always be criminals and because any criminal has as much a chance as you or I to become suddenly much more powerful or threatening than many people can deal with they become and issue on the same level as monsters at times. There are valuable reagents and materials that exist in the world, but many of them exist in dangerous places that your average man or woman can't survive in, let alone harvest the material and return with it. And many of those things the rich and powerful want cannot be artificially procured or have their habitat or location artificially made safer. Some are the product or part of things that are dangerous in and of themselves." He gestured around himself in a grand motion, as if showing off the world in it's entirety in this one moment. "The world is dangerous, and civilization needs people to both deal with and brave that danger in order to keep going."

  "Why can't we increase the kingdom's power itself though? Wouldn't more and more powerful soldiers and guards be able to take the place of adventurers?"

  "No, for three main reasons. Cost, effectiveness, and because decks aren't made equal. Armies and guards must be paid, obviously, and keeping a large enough army to be everywhere there is or could be a problem would bankrupt the kingdom in a year or less, let alone keeping them fed, housed, trained, equipping them in proper gear, and everything else you need to make a fighting force stay effective. Following that, armies and guards just aren't the solution for some problems. There are monsters, mages, Blademasters and other red Soul Card Classes, and even some individuals with green Soul Cards that can destroy cities or wipe out armies by their lonesomes. What good would sending more and more fodder to die to them? In many cases single powerful elites or small groups of elites are much better than whole armies."

  "That in turn circles around to cost," Ewan continued, cutting off Dryth as he opened his mouth to ask a question. "The government of course does its best to train elites, but doing so is expensive by itself and the elites the kingdom creates are often for singular purposes that they're either weaker or useless outside of. Royal guards that will ensure the royal family will survive anything aren't that impactful if a rogue mage is burning down warehouses or if a giant monster is eating a keep, especially since those royal guards are never going to leave the royal families side in order to hunt down monsters or bandits ravaging a village in the sticks. You know who will for a promise of sufficient payment? Adventurers." He stopped and glanced at Dryth. "You had a question?"

  "You already answered it."

  "Wonderful! Finally, we reach my final point, that being not all decks are created equal. This brushes up against the concept of effectiveness but really focuses down on individual power. Effectiveness as a concept and reason for adventurers is really about matching the task that needs to be completed to whoever can do it most effectively, which is often not an army or guards from any one city or even the kingdom itself. Also, didn't mention this before, but even if the kingdom could afford massive armies and contingents of guards and jailers and such, there just aren't enough people to fill all those slots and also do the other necessary things like grow food."

  "But back to decks! When I say that decks are not made equal I am referring to sheer power." He leaned in close and clenched his fist. "As I said, there are mages, warriors, and more out there that can destroy cities. They exist, but there aren't many of them, making the counter or deterrent to many of them to be members of that same small group. Many nations have one or two people that are that powerful, and they're almost always on defense, protecting their homes. But what if one of them is evil? Who is there to go out and slay the mad wizard in his tower who threatens the city, or the nation? Who will save us from this terror!?" He raised his hand into the air as if beseeching some unknown, distant deity. Or like he was copying an actor, which was more likely.

  "Is it adventurers?"

  "It is adventurers!" Ewan declared loudly. "Single, unbound, unfettered beings capable of solving problems, ending threats, and saving the day are necessary to the continuation of civilization, because there are always threats that will end it all!"

  "Awesome!" Sindri shouted with glee, rising up into the air with only one loop of his body around Dryth's neck anchoring him down as he beat his wings madly. "That sounds awesome!"

  "How much of that was just fluff to get Sindri excited about it to put another lever on me to get me to do what you want?" Dryth asked blandly at low volume under the cover of the wind Sindri was whipping up and his partner's own rampant daydreams that had just sprouted.

  "More than you'd thank me for but so much less than you would probably like there to be." Ewan told him. "It's not like you'll be jumping headfirst into those kinds of stakes, but they do exist and they do pop up significantly more than anyone is happy with. Outside of the idiots who believe in doomsday prophecies or are the ones making the stakes so dire, of course."

  A sensation swept through Dryth that felt like a memory he couldn't quite remember mixed with someone speaking to him but he couldn't quite make it out that was still somehow invoking feelings in his chest. "I... I have a bad feeling about this all of a sudden."

  "I can't imagine why."

  "We're going to go on adventures!"