Ow... my neck was quite sore. 

Some strands of hay were stuck to my clothing and now my clothes had a smell of livestock alongside the alcohol. I looked over at Chloe who had hay stuck all over her hair and was drooling as she slept.

"Ritsu?"

Chloe looked around for me after barely waking up.

"Yeah, I'm here."

Turns out the stables were not a very comfortable sleeping area.

The two of us gradually pulled ourselves up.

"So where are we going now?"

I attached the sword back onto my hip after leaving it beside me while I was sleeping. Chloe pulled some of the hay out of her hair and cleaned it the best she could.

"Um, well we're going to need to get some money. Do you know where we can do that?"

She thought for a little bit.

"We get a job at one of the shops?"

"I mean we could... but I have some personal problems which need to be resolved as soon as possible."

"What type of personal problems?"

"It's a long story but the main thing is that I have to stop Princess Lucia from dying."

"Wait... Princess Lucia?"

"Yeah."

"How is she going to die?"

"It's not that she's specifically gonna die of something... It's more like, I'll be punished if she dies."

"I don't get it."

"It's confusing, but bottom line is, I need to find her as soon as possible."

"Well, if you want to earn money fast, we could always go to the adventurers guild and look for a job that pays well."

Adventurers guild? I've heard of this.

"You have a sword so you must be able to fight decently right?" She continued.

"I mean, I suppose I can fight... but there are also conditions that I must follow."

"Such as what?"

"Like whenever I use an ability, it like disables my arm for a period of time..."

"Oh..."

"It's fine, let's just go over and have a look at the quests we can do," I assured.

We started making our way around the town. Chloe led me towards a big building near the centre of the town. I saw some other people wearing quite sophisticated armour with heaps of equipment. I could hear the clanking of metal from several metres away.

I didn't have any gear aside from this sword...

We made our way inside the building. There was a very large open space with a plethora of tables and chairs. It had a very old design with most of the furniture being made of wood. 

There were many adventurers with various different types of equipment all inside the building. I saw a sign that said 'reception'.

We walked over and spoke to the middle-aged woman dressed in medieval clothing standing on the other side of the counter.

"Um, so we want to take quests to earn money," I said.

"Well to be able to do quests you have to sign up to be an adventurer."

"Ok, I'll do that then."

She pulled out a little form from under the counter.

"So are you currently registered as a soldier or Warrior?"

"Uh, no..."

"Oh, I see. Well in that case you'll have to take a test to give you a rank."

"Alright then..."

Getting a rank? My physical abilities were pretty much the same as a normal human's and my sword has quite substantial side effects...

"Come over here." She signalled for me to follow her.

She led me over to a small testing room. Inside was a big dummy stuffed with hay which was placed about ten metres from an 'x' designated in the ground.

"Wait, so can I use my weapon during this test?"

"You can use it during the combat test but not during the magic or physical test."

This was not good.

 "Ok, so shoot at the doll with magic." The guild woman instructed.

"Um... so here's the thing... I can't use magic, like at all..." 

"It's okay just do what you can, it doesn't matter if you only shoot something weak, it will only increase your score."

"No... like I literally can't use magic."

"It's fine, you don't need to be embarrassed, everyone can use magic, just do what you can."

"No no no, like I physically cannot produce any magic at all from my body."

"Seriously? Like for real?"

"Yeah..."

"But everyone can use magic of some sort."

"Well, it's a long story but basically I can't use any magic."

"I suppose I can't do anything about that then."

She scribbled something down on her notepad.

"Alright next, onto the physical examination."

Oh no... this one wasn't going to be much more fun...

"First press down on this dynamometer." She explained.

She passed me an incredibly dense dynamometer, just the weight of the machine was pulling my arm towards the ground.

I held down as hard as I could and the little arrow only barely moved from the starting position.

"Ok..." She said.

I also did a 100-metre timed run and several other physical tests. The guild woman did not seem very impressed by any of my results.

"Well... I guess I'll give you the  easy  opponent for your combat test then."

"Ok..."

My self-esteem was already crushed to smithereens.

I walked into another examination room. This time there was no other equipment. The only thing in the room was a woman dressed up in full-body covering armour and holding a large wooden sword.

"So this is the new guy." She said.

"Yeah, go easy on him." The guild woman replied.

Stop... don't say something like that, I want at least some dignity left in me after this...

This time I was allowed to use the Universal Sword.

"Alright, begin the combat exam." The guild woman said.

Suddenly, I felt an intense heavy headache.

My heart started beating rapidly and I felt like I was being pushed down by immense pressure.

"Bring it on."

Hold on, why did I say that...

That wasn't me...

It felt like my body was moving by itself, quickly I drew the sword and began running towards my opponent.

"Slow down there buddy you might hurt yourself."

"You better speed up or you'll be hurting soon."

"Heh, you've got big talk f-"

I made my way right in front of her at almost superhuman speeds. Without any hesitation, I swung my sword, smashing into her armour.

"Ah!" She shouted.

She managed to soften the blow a little bit with her footwork but I could tell that she took quite some damage from the attack. My body felt as light as a feather, I felt like I was invincible.

She tried to retaliate by jabbing the sword towards me but I easily sidestepped and weaved past the attack. I swung my sword at her and she just barely managed to parry the attack. Instantly after, I kicked her in the side, sending her crashing into the ground.

She coughed as she tried to get up off the ground.

I felt as if my body was moving on its own.

She managed to kick my ankle, slightly throwing me off balance but I quickly recovered and I was standing directly in front of her. She was still struggling to get up. She shot a gust of air out of her palm but it barely hindered my movement.

I lifted the sword above my head.

"Universal Sword, First form, Uns-"

A blue stream of water began appearing on my sword.

Crap, I was going to kill her.

She looked up at me with pure fear in her eyes.

Stop, stop.

With

Eventually, my breathing slowed and I managed to calm down.

"Sorry." I apologised. 

The woman was still paralysed with fear, sitting strewn on the ground.

"I didn't mean to be so rough."

After a little while, she managed to calm down as well.

What just happened...?

"How are you strong...?" The woman asked me.

"It's a long story."

The guild woman was surprised but not particularly impressed.

She'd probably seen stronger people before.

I was told to leave the examination area. I met up with Chloe again and we took a seat at a table. It was a little hard to hear each other with all the chatter and loud noises in the background. 

For some reason, my arms weren't sore despite using an attack.

"How did it go?" She asked

"It was okay I guess. By the way, do you know magic?"

"I do... but I can only use it when I'm in the deepest depths of despair."

"That's pretty eerie."

"I honestly don't even understand it much myself, although I did hear that magic gets accentuated by the intensity of your emotions."

Interesting.

After a short wait, the guild woman came back with my results. She passed me a little piece of paper. 

[Examination results

Magic - F

Physical - C

Combat - B+

Overall - C]

Honestly, it was pretty decent considering how I did.

"Basically, you can accept quests rank B and below." The guild woman informed me.

"Just out of curiosity what's the highest rank?" I asked.

"It's S rank which is just above A rank." She replied.

Okay.

So basically I'm really weak.

I took my sheet of paper and made my way towards the quest board.