It was the first time Ian had ever been on the administration side of an evaluation. He remembered his own evaluation, but having an opportunity to see his sister do hers was exciting. The chamber designed for the task was a giant room the size of a high school gym located inside of the main Adventurer’s Office building. Unlike a gym, however, the room was pure white with only a single entrance.

  It was an advanced holo-room, one of the few technologies that had been shared by the enlightened worlds to help assist the adventurers of Earth. The administrators watched from a control room, which was a lot less impressive than science fiction always led one to believe. It was a small room with a bunch of displays set up to show a full view of the room from multiple angles. Since the dungeon curator did most of the heavy lifting, there were only a couple of buttons for the administrator to use.

  Ian was watching the display as Ashlyn walked into the evaluation chamber, moving to the designated box on the floor.

  “I’m really excited to see how she does!” Jen whispered from her seat next to him.

  She reached down and pressed the button to start the process.

  They watched Ashlyn jump when three pillars began to rise out of the seamless floor in front of her. They quickly rose to three feet in height before weapons began to rise up from within each.

  Directly in front of her was a compound bow and a quiver of arrows. From the screens above him, Ian saw his sister smirk at the weapon. He knew it was very similar to the one she used to carry for the simulated ‘monster assault’ competitions that were becoming extremely popular in both high school and college athletic programs.

  He was surprised by the other two items that had popped up, though. One pillar held a magical staff with a large black quartz, while the other held a nearly identical staff with a large green quartz.

  “Huh,” Jen said in surprise before looking at Ian. “I never expected her to have two forms of innate magic. That is honestly something I would have expected to hear about when it came to someone who was heavily scouted by colleges for a combat sport. Has she ever had any magic training?”

  “No,” Ian replied as his sister finished strapping on the quiver and picking up the bow. “Neither of us were ever tested for magic affinity growing up, so she probably has no idea. While my parents weren’t poor, my father seemed to shut everything down before it started, and my mother would never go against my father’s wishes, so it never happened. If it wasn’t for my grandparents stepping in, I don’t think Ashlyn would have been allowed to learn and compete in archery.”

  “Huh, with how gifted you and your sister are, it’s still surprising to hear that your father didn’t really support you.”

  Ian snorted. “I think what helped push me was trying to chase my father’s acceptance. Looking back on it, anything that would draw attention away from him was discouraged or directly punished, so it probably just made our relationship worse.

  “Luckily for my sister, my grandfather didn’t care for my father and generally treated him with open disdain. He’s the one who paid for my sister’s equipment and trips—even changing his work schedule to make sure he could take her to every one of her competitions.

  “Meh, it’s a depressing subject,” Ian said before he noticed the change in the room and smiled. “The prompt is almost done. Time for a show.”

  Ian and Jen both moved their entire attention to the far wall. Ashlyn had changed from light stretching to a ready stance. The pillars had retracted into the floor and the room began to morph. They watched as the room became a fairly well-lit cavern with the opening to a normal tunnel on the other side.

  Ashlyn cocked her head towards the cave entrance before looking at the wall right behind her. Ian watched as she began sprinting towards the middle of the room.

  “Smart girl,” Jen murmured.

  A cracking sound could be heard as the wall behind her began to cave inward, letting in a small swarm of giant ants. The workers were only about two feet long, but the soldier ants with them were nearly four feet long with protrusions on their carapaces that made it difficult to get a clean hit with a weapon. The mandibles were also nearly a foot and a half out from their faces and looked sharp enough to rip straight through normal armor.

  “This is going to be interesting,” Jen mused. “Their chitinous carapace can be difficult for an archer to penetrate, and the ridges and knots on the warriors’ exoskeletons make them even hardier, as the arrows tend to hit those instead of making solid contact. Add in the fact they swarm and climb walls…and yeah, they will definitely be a hard opponent for her to handle.”

  Ian could only agree as he watched his sister loose her first arrow. It went straight into the large multifaceted eye of one of the soldier ants, dropping it right in front of the new chasm in the wall.

  Jen whistled appreciatively as Ashlyn’s next three took two soldiers and a worker right next to the first. Ian smiled as he realized she was trying to create a dam to limit the flow of ants. It would have worked if the ants couldn’t climb the walls and walk across the ceiling. Instead of pouring out on the floor, the ants began flooding out of the hole on the top and sides as they began working to enlarge the tunnel.

  As more ants entered the cavern, Ashlyn was forced to move. Instead of a sprint towards the other tunnel, she began to steadily move backward. With practiced, fluid motions, she began her barrage on the incoming ants. Every arrow brought death to the creatures as they attempted to swarm her.

  She wasn’t just picking the closest target. Instead, she would aim for the larger soldier ants that were higher up on the walls. As they fell, their increased weight would break the legs and crack the carapaces of the other, smaller ants they fell on. This allowed her to do more damage with fewer arrows, maximizing her damage output.

  She managed to reach the far wall just as her hand came up empty from her quiver. She reached out and tapped the tunnel entrance. Just as quickly as it began, everything in the cavern froze before slowly evaporating into wispy light particles, starting at the ceiling and traveling to the floor.

  “Damn that’s cool,” Ian muttered as the room returned to its original bright white.

  “That young woman is amazing,” Jen said, the excitement evident as she nearly vibrated in place. “All archers are put up against a swarm scenario and given thirty arrows. Normally, they get a few kills before one of the creatures reaches them. Rarely do they last long enough to get the prompt to escape through the back tunnel, and they usually don’t make it when they do.

  “The evaluation is scored by the number of opponents killed, the number injured, the accuracy of shots fired, how long the person survives, and finally, if they were able to escape. I can honestly say that I have never seen anything like this,” she said as she pulled up the results on the screen.

  “She killed 14 soldiers and 12 workers, which is amazing. More impressive was how she was targeting the soldiers to fall on the others. That shows an amount of insight that most adventurers don’t have until they have been diving for a couple of years. She ended up causing over 20 injuries to other workers doing that. Add in the fact that she survived the entire time and managed to escape the moment she ran out of arrows…she’s incredible.

  “Even with my skills boosting me, I’m not sure I could do as well now.”

  “She’s definitely amazing. She’s even better than I remember her being,” Ian replied. “Which reminds me, I need to learn how to fight with other people. If she is going to be shooting arrows, I need to make sure I’m not blocking her shots.”

  “I’m glad you said something,” Jen said, a smile blossoming across her elven features. “If you are going into the dungeon tomorrow, you should take me along. Now that my group can dive all week long, we aren’t doing anything during the weekends. So, you and I can team up and get some dungeon running in before you leave me too far in the dust.”

  This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.

  “That would be perfect, actually,” Ian said with a nod. “I’ll ask Claire if she can set us up as a temporary party today. I have a skill I am still trying to figure out, and it requires me to be in a party to test it.”

  “Perfect! You should go grab Ashlyn and take her to meet Keeper Withers. Just text me what time we are meeting up tomorrow, and I’ll be there.”

  “Sounds good!” Ian said, waving goodbye as he walked out of the control room.

  Looking around, he saw the other women waiting in the reception area and watching different videos. He spent a few moments watching the women converse with the other adventurers waiting to sell their goods or talk to the receptionists before his sister was led back out to join with the crowd.

  He signaled her over, which caused a commotion when some of the more seasoned adventurers saw him. A few called out a greeting, which he returned with a wave.

  “They really seem excited to see you,” Ashlyn stated as she caught up to him. “Though your body language doesn’t really paint the picture of you being all that pleased about the attention.”

  Ian looked over to see her give him a small smirk. He just shook his head.

  “Having people notice me gives me quite a bit of anxiety, truth be told,” he replied as he led his sister out of the administration building. “There isn’t much I can do about it, though. My circumstances are going to force me into the limelight regardless of my desires, so I might as well just get used to it. Which is one of the reason’s I’m so thankful for Claire’s help.”

  “Claire?”

  “Keeper Withers,” he clarified.

  A look of realization crossed Ashlyn’s face, followed by confusion.

  “Is she your Keeper?” she asked after a moment.

  “Yes, she has taken me on as her only adventurer. She’s actually the one that let me know that you had signed up as an adventurer and even suggested that you could be one of my first party members.”

  He reached out and opened the door before motioning her inside.

  “I understand your confusion, Ashlyn,” he said. “Just hold on a few moments until we are in the office so we can go over it. It will be a lot clearer once everything has been explained.”

  Ashlyn's face openly showed her skepticism as she followed him out of the lobby. He waved at the receptionist, who waved back without stopping him as he walked past the ‘escort required beyond this point’ sign. He looked back and saw his sister looking around like they were about to get stopped.

  “Claire has let everyone know that I have full access to her office at any time,” Ian said, answering Ashlyn’s unasked question. “Now, if I tried to go somewhere I wasn’t supposed to, I can guarantee you they would know instantly. There are more cameras in the hallways and common areas on this campus than there are throughout the rest of the city. I’m also pretty sure she knows we’re almost there.”

  Ian made the final turn and walked up to Claire’s office door. As he raised his hand to knock, the door opened up, and Claire motioned for them to come in.

  “Trainee Spelling,” Claire greeted Ashlyn with a smile. “I am so happy that you agreed to come and speak with me this afternoon. Please take a seat on the sofa across from my desk. I just need a moment for the room to be secured, and then we can talk more comfortably.”

  Ashlyn nodded as she moved to take the designated seat while he followed and sat down next to her. Claire took her seat and pressed a couple of buttons as the light on her desk signaled the room was secure.

  “Alright, there we go,” Claire said, turning towards Ian. “What do we want to cover first?”

  “Eh, I might as well get the important part out of the way. I did promise her more information when she asked earlier.” Ian replied.

  He turned to see Ashlyn looking back and forth between the two of them with a guarded expression.

  Thinking about the best way to go about it, he decided to just get it over with by releasing his concealing skill. As his face became visible, Ashlyn froze.

  “Hey sis, it’s been a while,” he said lamely.

  Ashlyn threw herself at him and wrapped him up in a hug.

  “Ian! Where have you been? Why haven’t you reached out to get in touch with me? People were repeating all these horrible lies, and then you just disappeared! People kept saying that you were probably dead, and it had been so long since I heard from you that I was starting to believe them!”

  She pushed herself away from him to look him over before she suddenly punched him right in the arm.

  “Seriously, Ian, what the fuck? Give me answers!” she said before hugging him one more time and moving back to her side of the sofa.

  Ian began to chuckle. Ashlyn was always going to be Ashlyn, and the thought gave him a warm feeling inside that made his breath catch.

  “It’s a long story,” he said, causing her to give him a ‘don’t make me hurt you’ look. He chuckled and held up his hands, “I was just saying that we are going to be here a bit…”

  *~*~*

  It had taken nearly two hours to go through what had happened to him since the last time they had spoken. He left out Jen and Walter’s identities by glossing over them. Those secrets weren’t his to tell. Luckily, Claire had jumped in at parts, making it easy to skim that information. She also covered a lot of the information the AO was able to discover about the accusations during the course of their investigations. She had even handed her a tablet with all of the documents they had on Ian to show her that the AO truly knew that her brother was innocent.

  “So, you are telling me that you have this much proof that she lied, and you haven’t released it yet?” Ashlyn said, looking up from the tablet. “Ian, if you tell me that you are still in love with her…so help me...”

  “Ha!” Ian exclaimed. “Love is definitely not an emotion I would use to describe my current feelings towards her. However, I haven’t really decided how to handle this yet. Apparently, I have a few options.”

  “He does, indeed,” Claire chimed in. “There are a few legal avenues he can pursue, which could result in a very large payday. However, that would take him out of the dungeon during the legal proceedings—which will take years. Peerless has a stupid amount of money and lawyers, and both of you have seen the lengths they will go to ensure their side of the story is the most well-known.

  “Or he could just release them, which would probably prevent any sort of legal action, but would allow the AO to publicly take action against Peerless. With evaluations done by Vision and validated by the dungeon curator, it would be a huge hit to both Avra’s and Peerless’s reputation. It is impossible for anyone to claim they are fakes, and even the most skeptical people would be forced to take them seriously.”

  Ashlyn was about to say something, but instead just nodded. The dungeon curator wasn’t capable of falsifying things. If it validated information, then everyone knew it to be true. It was the reason most adventurers were so kind and trusting towards each other. Even when different adventurers hated each other, everyone followed the proper decorum because the curator would not tolerate any violations of its rules.

  She sighed before looking over at her brother with a smirk. “About that report from Vision. Are you telling me you decided to shack up for life with the first woman who popped your cherry? Seriously, bro. I thought you knew better. Especially with someone as fake as Beth.”

  “I was young and naive!” Ian exclaimed, laughing while throwing his hands into the air.

  “The word you are looking for is ‘stupid’, Ian,” his sister quipped back. “You aren’t allowed to date any women without getting a green light from me until further notice. Seriously, how can someone so smart be so—”

  “Yeah, yeah.” Ian said. “Anyways, we need to get you signed up for my party, so you aren’t stuck with a group of newbies for the next two years.”

  “Duh,” she replied. “Even if we weren’t siblings, your bonuses are going to make everything so much easier. I’m going to have some issues without a front liner, though, so we are going to need to find another member or two soon.”

  “And we need to get your magic evaluated,” Claire added, motioning to Ashlyn. “I saw that you have two innate magic types, so I am going to be signing you up for a full evaluation later this week. The green quartz is usually a type of nature magic, while the black is either summoning or boosting magic. Either way, they could be invaluable as you develop your fighting style.”

  “Yeah, but I’ll need to spread my stat points out pretty far to do both physical ranged damage and magic. Spreading them out is usually pretty frowned upon,” Ashlyn said, biting her lip while lost in thought.

  Claire snorted and began to giggle. “At the rate Ian is going, he will be in the mid tiers before you are even able to set foot in a dungeon. Gaining 10% of his stats will turn you into a monster, especially if leveling up his skill increases the percentage it provides. We just need to learn more about it.”

  “Oh!” Ian said, cutting in. “I am going to be hitting the dungeon with Glade Runner tomorrow. How do I go about forming a temporary party with her?”

  Claire grabbed her tablet from her desk and typed in a few things before looking back at him, “There you go. I sent her a request to be added as a reserve member of your official party. She can be a reserve member of yours while being a full-time member of her own. If she doesn’t see it before tomorrow, just let me know and I’ll fix it.”

  “Awesome. I’ll text her and get everything set up after we are done here.”

  “I take it Glade Runner is more than just an acquaintance, Ian?” asked Ashlyn.

  Ian nodded before leaning back on the sofa. He took a deep breath before slowly letting it out.

  “Honestly, I owe her a lot. I can’t really expand on it without her permission, but I can say she is a true friend,” Ian replied.

  “Eh, just a friend?” Ashlyn said with an eye waggle. “She’s pretty hot, and it seemed like she was really comfortable around you.”

  Ian snorted, “Shut it, you. I’m pretty sure the single life is where I’m destined to be for the foreseeable future.”

  “It’s not like he has a shortage of admirers,” Claire said. “Zero is the most talked about adventurer right now, and the fanfic sites are going absolutely crazy with creating love stories involving you and every decently well-known female adventurer.”

  “What? For real?” Ian asked, dumbstruck at that idea.

  “My personal favorite says that you hide your identity because you are a foreign prince, and you cast aside your disapproving family to come here to woo the girl of your dreams. Sure, they usually describe a woman who is probably your ex, but I just change the description in my head, so I don’t feel the overwhelming urge to vomit.”

  Ashly giggled, pointing at Claire, “I think you and I are going to be great friends.”

  “I sure hope so,” Claire replied with a smirk, “we are probably going to be together for a very long time. Which brings us back to the paperwork I need you to fill out—”