Humphrey glanced over to his familiar, who was sitting proudly next to a ratling, dead at his feet. As soon as it saw Humphrey notice it, it transformed into a dog and bounded over for Humphrey to scratch behind its ear. Humphrey walked back to the group through the field, his body drenched in monster blood. The others gave him a wide berth, except for Jason.

“You alright?” Jason asked. He knew Humphrey had killed monsters as part of his training, but he also knew Humphrey was a kind man. Violence didn’t come naturally to him.

Humphrey nodded. His normally friendly smile was macabre on his bloody face.

“That’s what I like about you, Jason,” he said. “You don’t pretend that what we do doesn’t affect us.”

“I don’t think being numb to it all makes you strong,” Jason said. “Strong is accepting the choices you make and owning up to the consequences.”

Like Jason, Humphrey had a dimensional storage space, from which he took a bottle of clear liquid and tipped it over his head. The crystal wash flowed over him, eliminating every trace of blood and filth.

“I’d like to be strong like that,” Humphrey said. “You know, Jason, sometimes it’s like you’re from another world.”

Jason had long ago realised that Danielle had figured him out, not realising she hadn't shared it with Humphrey. He decided to tell his friend all about it when they had the time. For now, they were surrounded by other people. Vincent looked Humphrey over, now clean, the crystal wash rapidly evaporating.

“You got them all,” Vincent said.

“Yes, sir,” Humphrey said.

“Burned a good portion of a farmer’s crop, though.”

“I thought the farmer would rather lose some harvest now than family later,” Humphrey said. “I made a choice.”

“Yes you did,” Vincent said, putting a hand on Humphrey’s shoulder. “Good job.”

55. Rune Tortoise

55

Rune Tortoise

The routine for the field assessment was to stop in a town or village each night. In the morning they would collect monster notices from the adventuring board and set out to deal with them. Vincent took an approach where the would-be adventurers who met his standards were no longer called on for the monster hunts. Starting with Humphrey, the first three days saw four of the seven candidates move from participants to onlookers.

On the third morning, they were delayed in one of the towns Jason had passed through on his original journey to Greenstone. Vincent wasn't willing to turn away the quickly growing crowd of earnest sick people, so the town constable once again turned his office into a makeshift clinic.