Reborn as an Adventurer: I Gain a Skill From Every Monster I Eat

Chapter 20: Chapter 20 — An Invitation

The offer came, as most useful things seemed to in Arlen’s experience, almost sideways — not as a formal posting on the board, but as an offhand remark from Cobb over a shared table at the tavern, two bowls of stew and a loaf of bread between them.

"Reya’s putting together an escort for a bigger expedition," Cobb said, tearing off a piece of bread. "Middle forest boundary, some kind of survey work for the guild’s cartography archive. She’s short a body for the support role — someone to handle camp, supplies, that sort of thing, while the Rank D members handle whatever they run into out there."

"Support role," Arlen repeated.

"Not combat. She was specific about that." Cobb shrugged. "But it pays fair, and word is she asked for you by name."

Arlen found Reya at her usual table near the tavern counter later that evening, Dorn and Fennis flanking her as always, and confirmed it was true — a five-day expedition, jointly commissioned by the guild’s cartography archive and a merchant consortium interested in a safer trade route skirting the middle forest’s outer boundary. Reya, Dorn, and Fennis had all been promoted to Rank E within the past month, she explained, but the boundary work called for more than that alone.

"Guild’s bringing in two Rank D specialists for the actual danger end of things," Reya said. "A mage and a scout, both experienced with that terrain specifically. Us three are along for support and to build our own record pushing past what we’re used to — but we needed a fourth pair of hands for camp logistics, and that’s not something I wanted to pull off the Rank D pair. Not their job, and frankly they’re too valuable to waste on cookfires."

"Why me?" Arlen asked, more out of genuine curiosity than false modesty.

"Because you’re careful, and careful’s exactly what I want managing camp logistics while the rest of us are focused elsewhere. You don’t panic — Corwin’s farmstead job made the rounds, in case you’re wondering how I heard about it. And," Reya added, with the faint, sharp smile Arlen was starting to recognize as characteristic of her, "because I still feel a little guilty about the Emberroot patch."

"You gave me half your bundles. We’re square."

"Maybe. I still think this evens it out properly." She slid a small sheet of parchment across the table — terms of the arrangement, written out plainly. "Reward’s 15 silver for the full five days, paid through the guild same as any quest, plus whatever cartography credit the archive assigns for support roles. Not much glory in that last part, but it looks good on a record."

Arlen read the terms carefully, the way he read most things now, and found nothing in them that gave him pause. Fifteen silver for five days of camp work was fair, arguably generous, and the prospect of actually reaching the middle forest boundary — even without engaging any of the danger that lay beyond it — settled into his chest with an eagerness he hadn’t felt since his very first trip past the north trail marker.

"I’ll do it," he said.

"Good. We leave in three days — gives you time to square away gear and supplies." Reya nodded toward the parchment. "Guild quartermaster will issue you a support pack once you register the assignment. Standard kit, plus whatever specific cooking gear you think you’ll actually use. Don’t overpack. We’re not hauling more than we need."

The following three days passed in a blur of careful preparation, Arlen approaching the assignment with the same methodical thoroughness he’d applied to every quest since registering. He visited the guild’s quartermaster — a brisk, no-nonsense woman who issued him a standard support pack (bedroll, waterskins, basic cookware) at no charge against the assignment, along with a small requisition allowance of 2 silver for any additional supplies he judged necessary.

He spent that allowance carefully: a proper cooking pot better suited to feeding six than his own single-serving gear, a small sack of dried provisions to supplement whatever they foraged along the way, a spare set of dry socks that Torv, consulted once more for practical advice, insisted were worth more than people gave them credit for on a multi-day trip.

"Wet feet ruin more expeditions than monsters do," Torv told him, with the flat certainty of a man who’d clearly learned it the hard way at some point. "Pack extras. Thank me later."

He also spent an evening at the guild library reading whatever the cartography archive had on file about the middle forest boundary itself — sparse compared to the detailed notes on the outer trails, which told its own story about how few people had mapped it thoroughly. What little there was described a marked shift in terrain and danger past the boundary line: denser canopy, less predictable wildlife, monster ranks climbing steadily from the outer forest’s Rank 1 baseline toward Rank 3 and 4 territory the further one traveled.

Rank D preferred, for good reason, he noted in his journal, turning the numbers over with the same careful respect he’d learned to give any information about a place he hadn’t personally seen yet. Even Reya’s party is stretching past their usual rank to go out there. I’m not going in far enough to need D-rank strength myself. But it’s good to understand why the boundary demands it of everyone else.

He met the full expedition party on the morning of departure — Reya, Dorn, and Fennis, all freshly Rank E, alongside two additional specialists brought in specifically for the crossing: a soft-spoken Rank D mage named Petra, and a Rank D scout called Yorin, who moved with the same watchful economy Arlen remembered from Kaelis Swiftstep during the wolf pack mobilization. All five of them gear-checked and packed with the same unhurried thoroughness Arlen had observed in Iron Vanguard weeks earlier.

"Ready?" Reya asked, studying Arlen’s own gear with a quick, appraising glance that seemed to approve of what she found.

"Ready," Arlen confirmed.

"Good. Stay close during travel, further back if we run into anything worth staying back from, and don’t wander off the marked route without telling someone first — middle forest boundary’s not somewhere you want to get turned around alone." She said it plainly, not as a warning meant to frighten him, but as simple, practical fact, the same way Torv or Mina or Bram had always delivered their own hard-won knowledge. "Otherwise, welcome aboard. First time past the outer forest?"

"First time," Arlen admitted.

Something in Reya’s expression softened, just slightly, an echo of the same quiet respect Bram had once shown him over a shared bench outside the guild hall. "Good," she said. "Pay attention, then. Most people don’t get to see it properly their first year out. Truth be told, this is further than Dorn, Fennis, and I have gone ourselves. We’re all a little out past our comfort zone this trip."

The party set out from Greyhaven’s western gate as the morning light stretched long and gold across the fields, five days of unfamiliar terrain and half-mapped danger stretching ahead of them, and Arlen fell into step at the rear of the group with his newly issued pack settled comfortably across his shoulders, watching the outer forest’s now-familiar tree line rise up to meet them, and beyond it — for the very first time — the darker, denser shape of something he had never yet had reason enough to see.