[center][h3][color=00aeef]Ianthe[/color][/h3][/center]
Names, those were nice. She’d missed the opportunity to offer hers, but she was happy enough to learn the others. Mitra, Avaddon, Blaike, and some Alexandrians too, by their names, Edgar and Luna. The other woman hadn’t introduced herself though, so at least she didn’t feel singled out.

She was apprehensive to hear that Blaike worked with Cid’dan Falreath. She had no idea who Cid’dan Falreath [i]was[/i] until that moment, but the words [i]“Royal Scientist”[/i] sat uncomfortably with her. What was a man who worked in the lap of luxury doing here, trudging amongst the common folk? 

It didn’t seem like she was about to get any answers. Avaddon, loud as he was, had moved forward with the comraderies, and while at first she’d found his boisterous nature somewhat endearing, what he said settled as unpleasantly with her as Blaike’s profession. It wasn’t as though he’d said anything wrong, but it stirred within her a familiar distaste for the lifestyle he lauded. The adventurer’s life. 

[i]“Wandering,”[/i] he called it. It was an appropriate word. An aimless journey, fueled by hope and the lust for excitement, something which had sparked the imaginations of plenty of Argo’s youths. There was nothing wrong with adventuring, of course, it was as skillful and respectable a life as any, but so often she’d heard—as she was hearing now—how easy it was to conflate adventuring with heroism. Ianthe was confident that the warmth Avaddon spoke of was real, but she was not convinced that it came from the joy of helping others. Rather, she’d always believed it was the glory that warmed them, the challenge of a worthy foe and the thrill of conquering it, the fame and recognition, and of course, the coin. 

She respected the Hunters Guild, but the Hunters Guild had never come to Argo. There was no profit in it, no glory. 

Of course, she was one to talk. She’d never stepped foot outside of her hometown before coming here, never thought about the problems facing the world beyond her own borders. Even now, it would have been a bold-faced lie to say she was more concerned with Ferris Wood than being paid for defending it. 

No, Ianthe had decided long ago that heroes weren’t real. Ideas could be heroic, intentions could be heroic, but in this world, people could only be close—the Hunters Guild, fantastical and genuine as it might have been, was the perfect example. 

Proctor Grescott handed out the risk sheets, and she wondered for a moment if any of them were actually going to back down. Who would possibly come this far just to turn tail now? The boy, Edgar, who was quite unassuming compared to the Alexandrian scientist and the man from Fabul, was the first to turn in his sheet. Brave, that one. She hoped he held onto that. 

Finally rising from her seat, bones a bit stiff and nowhere near as rested as she liked, Ianthe scribbled her name in a barely-legible scrawl of someone who had never made a serious commitment to literacy, and handed it back to Grescott. Then she collected her things and made her way to the door alongside Edgar.