The Golden Wings were a B-rank adventurer team. Though my mother said I could join, she didn't mean immediately-- I still had to pass the adventurer exam.
There are certain skills you need to learn before becoming a good adventurer. Most important of those were Concealment and Detection.
Nearly all monsters can feel the flow of mana. If you don't use Concealment, which allows you to blend in with the flow of mana in the environment, then the monsters will always see you coming. At the least they'll run away from you, but the stronger ones will ambush you instead.
Detection allows you to feel the flow of mana in a similar way to how monsters do it, to a lesser degree. It is incredibly helpful in sensing incoming attacks and finding prey, making it vital to adventurers. Out in the wilderness you can lose everything in an instant, without even knowing who killed you.
Additionally, I had to learn survival skills and had to memorize information on all of the monsters in the area. How to make shelter in a forest, how to start a fire, how to hunt or forage for dinner, how to not die of hypothermia, and how to process and preserve monster materials were drilled into me by my mother. Only then would I be allowed to take an Adventurer's examination and register as an adventurer.
Truly, it was an inconvenient process-- One that gave you too many opportunities to regret your choices.
And so, one day, I was sitting in the forest, practicing my Detection when I noticed someone approaching.
Adult... female?... shit... is it my mother, Martha?
Adam: [Do you miss father often?]
She didn't respond, but I could tell that she smiled slightly when I said that.
Martha: [Do you?]
When I had opened my eyes, she was sitting next to me. Her response confused me --I had expected her to just say yes or give a small anecdote about who my second father was.
Adam: [I didn't spend much time with him, but yes. I wish I had spent more time with him.]
Perhaps I was being too forward. Perhaps I was letting my disguise slip a bit too far. But, a conversation had been long overdue.
Martha: [Yes, he had always been a busy man. Always fighting for something. Always striving for more. And then we almost got killed for it,] she said, with bitterness in her tongue. [Do you know? Do you know what he had been fighting for?]
Adam: [No...]
Truthfully, I had some idea of what he may have been doing, but I never really cared to ask. And it wouldn't have made sense for someone 'my age' to understand, right?
But maybe that too had been some strange form of running away. I certainly could have spent more time with my father if I had wanted to. Instead, I spent my days in isolation...
Martha: [He had been trying to create a more equal society. He had fought to end the horrid practice of slavery and end discrimination towards beast-humans. He hated the wastefulness of nobles and their ceaseless debauchery. He wanted more accountability and less corruption amongst the elites... Yes, he was an ambitious man.]
She had a distant look in her eye. The man she had loved and admired was gone, leaving her with nothing but longing. It was the kind of feeling I thought I would never understand.
Martha: [War is coming, Adam. New Artenia was already unstable, so when the truth of your father's death comes out, there is no going back. I do not know if it will be in two years or ten, but war will come to this land. Will you join me then, to finish your father's work?]
She looked at me seriously, for once. I knew that this was a big moment, but the answer had been obvious from before she even asked the question.
Adam: [Of course I'll help. We can't let things end the way they are now.]
- - - - - - -
A few weeks after that talk, I finally took the adventurer's examination.
All you had to do was hunt a single horned rabbit in the forest. Some trouble came up with the fellow examinees, but I had ended up being overprepared and passed easily.
I registered as Adam with no last name (for obvious reasons). Looking at my card, I saw that I was ranked F. There were 7 ranks adventurers could have, but everyone had to start from F. Adventurers could only do requests up to one rank above their current rank, and to rank up you had to do 10 requests rated higher than your current rank. Apparently, the guild didn't want people killing themselves too easily and cared somewhat about their adventurers.
Adventurers were a dying breed after all... Even with all of the ways the guild helped adventurers, people still died all the time.
The Golden Wings were a B-rank adventurer team, putting them in the top ten highest ranking in town. The way parties worked is that they were rated the same ranking as their highest member. Theoretically, there was nothing stopping F-rankers from joining an S-ranked party-- Not that that would ever happen though.
Funnily enough, Raya was also registered as an adventurer. She did it shortly after arriving in Guileva, but because she worked solo, she was only D-ranked. Still, apparently that had been a high enough rank for her to gloat at me for only being F-ranked. I'm sure if she tried, she could get as high as B-rank.
I guess I can ask if she also wants to join the Golden Wings later.
I walked home, weary, with my new license in hand. I was only on the first step of this long journey, and tired did not even begin to describe my state. It was miraculous that I had forced myself to even get this far. The me of my previous life could never have done this. Did that mean I was doing well?
Thinking... what a pain... I'm so tired...
But now, I can finally stop being a burden to everyone.