Balamore rubbed his chin thoughtfully, while his cheeks slowly took on a faint, reddish glow of embarrassment. He looked uncomfortably around the circle over the shining obsidian and cleared his raspy throat.
“Yeah… what actually is a guild?” Balamore stammered, blushing agonizingly slowly. “Is it a… kind of hunting community… or what?”
Silarias looked at him intently and then shifted his gaze calmly toward Izamaro. He let out a deep sigh, shook his head slowly, and leaned far forward.
“Mm… no and yes,” Silarias began in a controlled manner, waiting until everyone was listening. “Not every guild is a hunting community… but a hunting community is simply one type of guild.”
Nicola wanted to interject with a strict, academic correction. He was already raising his finger, opening his mouth, but froze halfway through. His eyebrows slowly drew closer together. Wait… yeah… that’s right, sort of… Nicola thought to himself. He closed his mouth again, lowered his finger, and gave Silarias a small, hesitant nod to continue speaking.
Silarias immediately began stumbling over how exactly he was supposed to explain such a complex structure. He thought deeply for a moment, restlessly tapping his fingers on the ice-cold obsidian. The hall fell into a striking buzz of voices. Various members tried to explain it at the same time in a far too difficult, archaic manner, drenched in terms from their medieval origin and non-native regions.
Nicola tried once again to take charge and provide a structured definition, but Silarias cut right through him with a fierce wave of his hand.
“SIMPLE! PONIES AND HORSES!”
Nicola burst out laughing on the spot. “Yeah… indeed, ponies and horses… wait, what?”
Everyone at the long black table turned their heads in unison toward the leader’s seat and stared at Silarias as if he had completely lost his mind.
Silarias remained bone-dry under their gazes, leaned on the armrest, and looked Balamore straight in the eye. “It’s more like… every pony is a horse, but not every horse is a pony.”
The hall fell into a deep, motionless silence. Everyone stared at Balamore and Izamaro, who had plunged deep into thought with frowning eyebrows. Their lips moved soundlessly as they continuously repeated Silarias’s words to themselves.
“Mm…” Balamore finally muttered with a deep breath, as the penny slowly dropped. “So… a guild can be a hunters group… but it isn’t always… it just depends on the kind of group, or the guild itself…”
Nicola nodded, laughing, and pushed his glasses up. “Haha, yeah! Exactly! So now that everyone is on the right track—”
“I think it’s better if everyone introduces themselves one by one,” Silarias cut him off directly, his gaze wandering intently and enthusiastically over the circle. “And that everyone immediately indicates what kind of idea he or she has.”
Silarias pointed with a broad gesture to the left side of the table and stopped at the little girl. “We start to my left… Miki.”
Miki slowly stood up from her chair. She leaned with her trembling little hands on the edge of the black table and looked hesitantly around the circle.
“I… I was introduced at the beginning of our journey as Miki of Oak Haven,” she began with a clear, but fragile child’s voice. “But now… now I am old enough to decide for myself what is true and what isn’t. And honestly… I don’t even know my own last name that well.”
She clenched her small fists, her lips began to tremble, and she stomped her foot hard on the stone floor, while big, hot tears began rolling down her cheeks.
“I only know that my mother is a fire spirit! The strongest… and the sweetest!” she cried out, until her voice broke halfway through. “But… but…”
She sobbed loudly, wiped her wet face with her sleeve, and bravely composed herself.
“Dad came with me to the Ward because the Federation’s army had launched an attack… he went on through an incursion. At the last moment, he had all these weird symbols and little clocks floating over him… and yeah…”
Miki quickly let herself sink back onto her cushion, her chin on her chest, because the memory was simply way too heavy for her.
“I just thought it would be really fun… to do something where we stay together…” she added softly and fragilely at the very end.
Silarias looked intently at the whole group and gave a subtle, urgent look as a signal to stay strong and show no pity. Then he looked at the boy beside her.
“Eh, ehm… Ren, what’s your idea?”
Ren O’Lent stood up. He clenched his jaws together, stared straight ahead, and began speaking with deep concentration.
“My name is Ren O’Lent. I come from a farming village renowned for producing the absolute best farmers… until they were all sacrificed by an occult group for the Corrupted God. And I… I was the only one left behind.”
Ren swallowed heavily, quickly flicked a loose tear from the corner of his eye, and bravely straightened his shoulders.
“It seems beautiful to me to do something that actually makes us stronger. So strong… that these kinds of things can never happen anywhere again.”
Silarias looked at him with a deep, respectful gaze. “Wise… you can be proud. I… we are proud of you, Ren.”
Silarias shifted his index finger along the circle. “Zax, Bonk.”
The two figures looked at each other and calmly stood up. Zax took the floor, while Bonk remained standing rigid and watchful beside him.
“We are Zax and Bonk Bloodhound,” Zax said with a raw, muttered tone. “Our family… yeah, how should you put it… they detest everything to do with the gods. That’s why they actually don’t do much good in the world. But us… we want to be different. Truly.”
Bonk nodded powerfully and looked at everyone one by one.
“We really want to build something where everyone can live together,” Zax continued in a heavy voice. “And where everyone can improve themselves… as it should be.”
Silarias and Nyx looked down at the obsidian for a moment, after which their eyes met. A silent, deep understanding lay between them. They are trying anyway, despite everything their bloodline carries, Silarias thought. For a fraction of a second, Zax and Bonk caught a glimpse of the respect in the leaders’ gazes, a genuine chance to prove themselves.
Silarias’s index finger slid over to the two architects of the hall.
Kaelid instantly panicked completely. “I… I… ehh… I am Kaelid Lithangelos,” he stammered nervously, his hands trembling slightly. “I come from a village on the edge of the Ward… or rather, right on top of a very steep mountain, Lithia. Until my village was attacked by order of the Landlords. I wanted to demand answers from those Landlords, but by the time I arrived… everything was already completely flipped around.”
He dropped his shoulders, sighed deeply, and looked at the black table. “I arrived in the capital of the Ward and everyone was cheering, children were running through the streets… So to prevent something like that from ever happening again, I went into training. On my journey, I came into contact with the Shinto Dojo. There, I tried to perfect my sword skills… but I still have a very long way to go.”
Kaelid looked up at the room, his eyes fierce. “I am looking for something I can pour my soul into. And to become stronger.”
Lila immediately added to his words and held his hand tightly. “I am Lila Aureoflora. The long-lost princess of a kingdom that has been completely destroyed.”
Kaelid was scared out of his mind! His head snapped to the side and he stared at her with eyes as big as saucers. He had absolutely no idea that the girl next to him was a real princess! He looked wildly at Silarias and Nicola for clarification, but the two of them were conspicuously whistling and looking in a completely different direction, acting as if their noses were bleeding.
Lila shrugged gently and continued unfazed. “Honestly, it doesn’t matter that much to me. From what I’ve heard so far, I actually think the exact same as everyone else. So… that, hehe.”
Silarias nodded at her in understanding. “Understandable too. I actually have the exact same… mm.” He held his hand out toward the two noble warriors. “Vulkan, Valeria.”
Vulkan immediately sat bolt upright and took the floor, his voice weighed down by an old regret. “Mm! We are Vulkan and Valeria Hestivo. We come from a noble family that has fought as guardians for the Timekeeper for years. Everything was going well, we were on the verge of becoming guardians ourselves… until our mother became possessed by the Corrupted God. She wanted to free our youngest sister, who had been dead for a long time already…”
The hall became deathly quiet as Vulkan brought up the dark memory.
“We needed money, so we had to steal something… scrolls and a very special box. But the building caught fire and began collapsing. Valeria almost died, so she stored all those scrolls in her brain. The box burned open, causing the anting to fall directly into my hand. It bound immediately, and that’s how I got the kinetic anting.”
He paused for a moment and looked at his sister. “And my sister is now a kind of medium. She summons spirits that serve as bullets, and she fires them with her fan. That fan… comes from our mother. Before she died, when she wasn’t quite fully corrupted yet, she blew herself up to save us. Her very last words were: Mommy always loved you… but I’m not good. You both keep each other, and don’t lose it like I lost everything…”
Vulkan swallowed heavily, his hands clenched into fists. “The door slammed shut and the explosion went off. Our paths only crossed there because Valeria and I weren’t even supposed to be there… Otherwise our mother might have—”
“No,” Valeria cut him off firmly, but with a soft, supportive undertone while looking straight at him. “Don’t lie to yourself, little brother. She was already far gone. Far too gone to ever bring back. If we hadn’t been there, we might have lost our lives too, and we would have lost each other.”
Vulkan fell silent and nodded slowly. He silently conceded she was right and recovered his wild, fiery energy. “Something competitive to become stronger!?”
Silarias stared at Vulkan with wide-open eyes. “Vulkan… man… wait… I really never knew this…”
Nyx immediately bent toward his ear and whispered to him in an urgent, harsh tone: “Do not give pity. Respect.”
Silarias instantly recovered his gaze, looked Vulkan straight in the eyes, and put on a wild grin. “So… COMPETITIVE! Don’t think for a second that I’m shifting back a gear because of this, man! Now I’m going to push even harder!”
Vulkan got instantly completely hyped and slammed his hand hard on the table!
Silarias gestured casually to the two figures next to them. “Jane, Aurelius.”
Jane Benzao shifted somewhat uncomfortably forward. Her beastly tail tucked shyly between her legs. “I am Jane Benzao. My mother is the head tribe leader of our tribe, and my dad is a legend from the Ward…”
Aurelius calmly placed a hand on her shoulder to soothe her and took over the conversation. “And I am Aurelius Kara—”
Miki instantly began glowing intensely with magical energy!
Nyx looked up shocked. “Miki?! What’s wrong?!”
“My father is also named Kara as his second name!” Miki yelled overjoyed and enthusiastic through the hall!
Nyx looked away with a deep frown and began concentrating deeply. Mm… that can’t be, right…? she thought to herself, as the connection tried to form in her head.
Aurelius ignored the interruption with a calm smile and continued his story with a melancholy look. “My mother is a tyrannical woman from a place very far from here… she abandoned me.”
The gaze shifted to Apollo and Beat. Beat began rubbing his wrists nervously and looked at the ground.
“Mm…” Beat grunted softly.
Apollo gave him a friendly pat. He knew how heavy this subject was for his mate. “I’ll start,” Apollo said calmly. “I am Apollo Olympios, from the Olympus family. We are officially Olympians from a place high in the sky. Until our place was destroyed. Our ancestors settled here and over the course of time crossed with humanity. That way we can sit among humans without them noticing.”
Apollo looked with a gaze full of pride at the figure beside him. “And this is Beat… my mate.”
Beat gave him a short nod. Apollo took a deep breath.
“Beat is officially not human like we are. Beat was made. During one of my journeys through the East, I found out that objects can also have a soul. Out of a portion of my own life energy and the remnants of the Titans, I created Beat.”
He looked thoughtfully at the obsidian. “In the beginning I taught him everything, but he kept continuously falling apart…”
To add power to the story, Beat let his arms and torso detach with a dry CLACK for effect and fall onto the table, only to effortlessly click himself back together a second later!
“But…” Apollo continued unfazed, “then he started thinking for himself more and more and making his own choices. We reached the point where he was wise enough to make his own decisions as a full-fledged, independent person.”
The hall fell silent once again. Everyone stared at Beat with their mouths hanging open, impressed by the depth of his existence.
Silarias nodded in full admiration and passed the turn along. “Renuardo, Faustus.”
Renuardo stood up, set his hands wide on the table, and looked around with a proud, confident gaze.
“I am Renuardo FaunusTamre of the Tamer Alliance. My family has been beast masters since the beginning of time. Our very first ancestor even walked side by side with Bansadarius.”
He let a long silence fall to let the weight of that legendary name seep through the hall, and then continued with a tragic undertone.
“Until our kingdom fell… My mother hid me in the Ward back then to protect me. That’s also where my cover name comes from… temporarily, that is.”
He grinned broadly, his eyes sparking with ambition.
“What I hope this guild can be? A place where we tame the wildest powers… and become the most powerful beast hunters in the world!”
Beside him, Faustus leaned back with his arms crossed. There was a mysterious, dark smile on his face.
“I have many names…” Faustus began in a low, calm voice that echoed against the rock walls. “But the official name I bear… is Faustus Morningstar. People know the name as Morstarning… among other names.”
An icy shockwave went through the hall. Multiple members froze and stared at him as if a mythical shadow fell across the table. The silence was razor-sharp and charged with tension.
Faustus laughed softly at the intense reaction, shook his head, and broke the icy atmosphere immediately.
“But don’t forget… I am also just Silarias’s cousin.”
Everyone let out a sigh of relief, after which Faustus fixed his gaze firmly on the leader’s throne.
“I want something… something I can pursue with passion.”
Their gazes then shifted to Nicola and Lyn.
Nicola narrowed his eyes, adjusted his glasses, and took the floor with a heavy, focused voice. “I… ehh… we… I am Nicola VON Etherhart. My family is the Ethercorps. I do my best to do what’s right. I couldn’t save my mother… simply because I knew too little. Now I try to know and understand everything. I died once, my heart stopped beating. But the anting bound itself to my heart and replaced it completely. Ever since, I can use and control Ether.”
Lyn held her chin high with pride and sat up straight. “I am Lyn Luban. My family comes from a blacksmith generation, where sacred techniques were passed down from generation to generation. Now that everyone is nowhere to be found… I am the only one who can carry on this heritage and has to rebuild it.”
She looked around the circle with a warm, genuine gaze. “I really hope that we find something where we can truly build something… together.”
Silarias fell silent at her genuine words. Nyx looked at her and smiled softly. “Beautifully said…”
Silarias wanted to reclaim the floor and pull the meeting to the next point, until Miki and Ren both flew up at the same time and pointed their fingers accusingly at the leader’s throne!
“Mm! And what about you two?!?” the duo shouted in unison through the hall! “YOU HAVE TO TALK TOO!”