As eventful as the day he had just was, Ty still had much more to do. He was most excited to learn about the decree, so he sat down at the desk and turned on the lamp, finally opening "The Decree for Dummies". Eventually, after finishing it, the book could be summarized as so:
'The Decree is a system that takes the children of the Earth and moves them through different realms and allows them to grow stronger. It does this by slowly consuming our planet with monster like beings, beasts, forcing us to raise our strength to fight back. To get started with the Decree, you first must go through Adoubement. This is the term the Decree uses to refer to the trial it makes you pass through to rank up. Doing this for the first time to become a [Serf] will grant you a profession, unique to only you most of the time. There are special cases of members of a clan receiving the same profession for whatever reason, however that is related to the ten great clans, and they will not release such information to the public. The first Adoubement will also grant you one to three unique abilities tied to your specific profession. These abilities will grow alongside you as you go through each subsequent Adoubement. This can come in many forms, such as increasing the effect, unlocking a new effect, or even becoming adaptive to your desires.
You will also gain strength, agility, and will after every rank, although that is a result of the rank, not a result of the Adoubement. Your stats can be trained on their own and will need to be in most cases, so be warned. Every subsequent Adoubement after the first will grant a new ability of that rank, making the total unique abilities you can obtain reach twelve. These will be the foundation of your profession. However, you can also come across ability gems, which give general abilities which can be used by any and all professions, even if some are less useful than others.
Every realm is technically accessible at the [Serf] rank, however it would be unwise to go to those areas, as you would likely die instantly to the environment before even seeing a beast. Each realm is based on a certain rule; however, none have been figured out to this date.
Relics are items received by killing beasts inside any of the ten realms. These relics can be extremely intricate or extremely simple, and rank dictates this to a degree. What is dictated is the power of an artifact. The Relics received from the Degree are much better than those made by humans, another incentive to kill more beasts. Created relics have innate limitations on who can make them, making them a rare but largely useless commodity to anyone other than the forging-based professions. This is because those will normally have abilities that enhance the usage of forged items to a large degree."
These were the main and most important parts of the sections of the book that he read. Professor Seahawk really knows how to fill a lot of space with a whole bunch of nothing, making getting the actually important information in a short time almost impossible. Luckily, Ty loved to read, so he didn't mind Seahawk's… storytelling?
Eventually, he found he was much too tired from his long day to continue reading, so he went to sleep. When he woke up, he went to the communal shower for men and washed off, noting that they had a lot more privacy than he previously thought. After his shower, Ariel had seemed to track him down out of nowhere and surprised him, complaining to him in a pouty voice.
"Hi Ty! Did you sleep well? The beds were kinda hard so now my back is aching~"
"Lords, Ariel don't scare me like that! But yeah, I slept fine. I've been on worse, so this was nice in comparison."
Ariel stared at him in disbelief, and to be fair he wouldn't believe himself if he hadn't had to sleep on the forest floor for a month when he was twelve. That time was actually the most scared he had ever been in his life. Not even that he was sleeping near beasts, but the normal Earth wilderness was more than enough to kill a small twelve-year-old boy.
"Stop looking at me like that weirdo, let's just go to class."
Ty and Ariel made their way to class, although he did regret not going to grab breakfast now, since he was both hungry and tired without caffeine. Eventually though, they made it to their seats, and Cata was already there. Ty greeted her, more so to be polite.
"Good morning, Cata, I hope you slept well."
"Good morning, Ty, and I did, thank you for asking."
Ariel glared at Cata from behind Ty, with him being none the wiser to it since she smiled again once he turned back to her, filling Cata with a sense of unease.
Two weeks passed like this, with Ty growing closer to the two girls. He wanted to get them to talk to each other, but they seemed awkward at best, so he didn't push it. He also started with his physical training, becoming slightly toned. But a new event broke their simple monotony, and an important one at that. Coach Turbo was having them pick out weapons to use.
"ALRIGHT MAGGOTS! TODAY, YOURE GOING TO PICK OUT A WEAPON, AND GO THROUGH WEAPON TRAINING FOR THE NEXT TWO WEEKS! WEAPON CHOICE IS EXTREMELY IMPORTANT, SINCE IT CAN SHAPE THE PROFESSION THAT YOU RECEIVE! ALL OF YOU WILL ENTER A ROOM WITH MANY TYPES OF WEAPONS, AND YOU MAY PICK AS MANY AS YOU LIKE! BE WARNED THAT YOU WILL HAVE TO TRAIN WITH ALL OF THEM THOUGH!"
Immediately, he dashed the dreams of anyone hoping to take as many weapons as possible from the room that they would be going to. Ty had a lot to think about in this case. What weapons should he grab? He was decently sure he would grab a knife due to his skillset, but what if he was bad at using them? And even more importantly, what about range? He could grab disposable throwing knives or reusable ones, each having their own pros and cons. Should he carry a bow? It would be easy to keep one with him if he were wearing light armor. There was a lot to think about, so he put his mind off his own, whispering a question to Ariel."
"Hey Ariel, what do you plan to pick? I have an idea for myself, but what are you good with?"
"Oh uhm… this may be an odd pick, but I plan to get a whip!"
"A whip? Why that of all things?"
"Well, the way I see it is this; They not only have decent range, but they also can be studded or have blades added on to them to make them serrate enemies, not only torturing them, but causing immense blood loss. Sure, they may be heavy, but I'll work hard to be able to carry a high quality one!"
"That's… definitely one way of thinking about it…"
"What do you plan to pick?"
"I was thinking about a knife, but I was worried about range so I wanted to pick up some type of throwing knives or stars to help myself out with that."
"Really, a knife? I thought you would go for something more… Heavy? I guess? You look like an axe type of guy to me, but maybe that's a mistake on my part. Don't worry about range though, if you plan to be a rogue type. Your whole job is to sneak up on people anyways, right?"
"I really don't like the idea of anything like an axe, but you are right about sneaking up on people being my job. I guess I was just paranoid? I'll grab throwing knives just in case though."
Ty then turned to Cata.
"What about you, Cata? What do you plan to pick up?"
"Oh, me? I wanted to pick up a firearm if they had one…"
"Don't those not work on beasts?"
"Those made by forgers do, and Serf rank items are relatively cheap compared to other items, thankfully. I hope to pick up a sniper and a pistol. I want to end fights before they begin, ya know? It'd be nice to sit from afar, kill something, and only get close to collect the materials and the core."
"Oh that sounds pretty cool! I think you would look badass with a sniper, and maybe a cowboy hat too, you would be super awesome looking."
Cata seemed to turn a bit red and turned away, giving Ty a half-hearted thanks.
Eventually, it came time for the class to enter the armory. Not only was it filled to the brim with weapons, but also tons of armor and accessories. Most students seemed to know exactly what they wanted as well. Ariel grabbed a whip, smiling darkly, and Cata had somehow managed to find a sniper and a pistol in this massive room, a huge grin on her face. A boy with long, dirty blonde hair grabbed a sword and shield, a South American boy grabbed a cleaver and started drooling, and- oh wait! He actually recognized this guy. His name was Tarik and he was slightly chubby, lesser so than Cata however. They had been friends back when they went to primary school together, and hopefully he still remembered him.
"Tarik, is that you? It's been so long, man!"
"Who- wait a minute, you're Tyson, aren't you? Man it has been years! What ever happened? Why did you stop coming to school?"
"Oh, that… You remember my stealing problem? Yeah, well the school got fed up."
"Ah man, I TOLD YOU that would happen. You just never learn, do you."
"Clearly not, since I'm technically here for stealing too. It was either this or fifteen years in the slammer, and it's obvious which one anybody would pick."
"True, true. Well I'll talk to you in a bit man, I still have to get my weapon."
"I'll see you later!"
It was really lucky that Ty met someone he actually knew in this Lord-forsaken place. Now, he wouldn't have to so awkward everywhere he went. As a plus, it seemed that Tarik had been there a lot longer than he had, so he could rely on him to explain things that neither he nor Ariel knew about.
But it was enough of that, it was time to find a weapon. There were many to choose from, even just concerning knives. But one stood out to him. It was a long combat knife, with a pouch on the sheath. But before he could grab it, he heard Offshore of all people call his name.