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

Chapter 40: Chapter 40 — Calling for Help

Arlen was still confined to the guild’s medical wing, ribs healing well enough that Aria promised he’d be back on his feet within days, when the Guild Master came to see him — a visit he understood, immediately, to be unusual, given that in all his months registered with the guild, he’d never once seen Garrick Ironheart appear anywhere outside his own top-floor office.

He was a broad-shouldered man, older than Arlen had pictured, gray threading heavily through hair that had probably once been dark, his face carved with the kind of deep, weathered lines that came from decades spent doing difficult, dangerous work rather than simple age alone. He didn’t announce himself with any particular ceremony, simply pulled a stool up beside Arlen’s cot and settled onto it with unhurried, deliberate ease.

”You’re the one who got close to it,” Garrick said. Not a question.

”I am.” Arlen found himself sitting up a little straighter despite his healing ribs protesting the movement, some instinct recognizing, without needing to be told, that this man’s calm carried a different kind of weight than anyone else’s had these past few days.

”Lyra’s given me your account already. Word for word, twice over — she’s thorough that way.” Garrick studied him with the same patient, unhurried attention Bram had once shown him on a guild-hall bench years ago, though considerably sharper underneath it. ”I want to hear it from you directly regardless. People remember details differently, telling it a second time. Sometimes the differences matter.”

Arlen recounted it again, more steadily this time, the memory settling into something he could describe without quite reliving it as sharply as he had with Lyra days earlier. Garrick listened without interruption, his expression giving away little beyond careful, focused attention, and when Arlen finished, the older man sat quiet for a long moment before speaking again.

”A word,” Garrick said finally. ”Not a roar. You’re certain.”

”As certain as I can be. I don’t have anything to compare it to.”

”Neither does anyone else, from what I’ve gathered.” Garrick’s jaw tightened slightly, the first real crack in his otherwise composed exterior. ”I’ve led this guild for eleven years. Before that, I spent twenty more adventuring across three regions considerably less settled than the Ashen Frontier. I’ve faced things in that time most people in this city would have nightmares over just hearing described.” He met Arlen’s eyes directly. ”I’ve never encountered anything that spoke. Not once.”

Arlen felt a chill settle deeper into his chest, hearing that admission from a man whose entire presence radiated the kind of quiet, unshakeable competence Iron Vanguard had only hinted at.

”What does that mean?” he asked.

”It means this is beyond what the Ashen Frontier can handle alone,” Garrick said plainly. ”I’ve already sent word to the regional capital, and to two neighboring guild branches with greater resources than ours. A proper response to something like this needs specialists we simply don’t have here — people who’ve documented threats at this scale before, if such documentation exists anywhere at all.”

”How long will that take?”

”Days, at best. Longer, more likely.” Garrick’s expression didn’t soften, though something in his voice carried a rough, honest sympathy. ”I won’t lie to you, Arlen. This isn’t a problem I can solve by throwing more Rank D adventurers at it. Whatever’s out there operates on a level closer to what the capital’s specialists handle, not what a frontier guild like ours is built for.”

Arlen absorbed that, turning it over with the same careful attention he gave everything now, though the implications sat heavier than most things he’d had to process these past months. ”The Ashen Frontier’s never needed help from outside before, has it?”

”Not in my time as Guild Master. Not in the records before me, either, as far as I’m aware.” Garrick’s gaze turned briefly toward the small window near Arlen’s cot, the city’s rooftops visible beyond it, deceptively calm in the afternoon light. ”This region’s always managed its own threats. That’s part of why people build lives here — the sense that whatever danger exists, it’s danger we understand, danger we can handle ourselves. This changes that.”

”People are scared,” Arlen said, remembering Sil’s words from the previous evening.

”They should be, a little. Fear, properly directed, keeps people cautious rather than reckless.” Garrick rose from the stool, his considerable presence somehow both reassuring and unsettling at once. ”I don’t intend to let that fear curdle into panic, if I can help it. But I won’t insult anyone by pretending this is a small matter, either.”

He paused at the edge of Arlen’s cot, studying him a moment longer with the same unhurried, evaluating patience he’d shown throughout the conversation. ”Lyra tells me you have some unusual talent. Recovery, mostly, from what she’s described.”

Arlen felt the familiar tension rise, though facing Garrick’s steady, direct gaze made the usual deflection feel considerably harder to summon convincingly. ”Something like that. Still figuring out the full shape of it.”

”Mm.” Garrick didn’t press further, though something in his expression suggested he’d noted the deflection for exactly what it was, filing it away rather than pursuing it immediately. ”Whatever it is, it kept you and Ilvera both alive against something that should have killed you outright. That’s worth something, regardless of what label eventually fits it.” He turned to leave, then paused once more at the doorway. ”Rest properly. Whatever’s coming next, once the reinforcements arrive, I suspect this region will need every capable person it has, however unusual their capabilities turn out to be.”

He left without further ceremony, and Arlen sat alone afterward in the quiet of the medical wing, turning over the weight of everything the Guild Master had just told him — the request for outside help, the frank admission that even a man of Garrick’s evident experience had never encountered anything like the creature from Millbrook, the unmistakable sense that the sheltered, self-contained world of the Ashen Frontier had just been forced open onto something considerably larger than it had ever needed to face before.

I’ve spent my whole life imagining what lay beyond these walls, he thought, staring up at the ceiling, the ache in his ribs a dull, persistent reminder of exactly how real that wider world had suddenly become. I never imagined the wider world might reach back in first, before I was ready to reach out toward it.

He thought of Garrick’s calm, weathered face, the honest uncertainty beneath his composed authority, and found himself, despite everything, oddly reassured by it — not because the Guild Master had offered any easy answers, but because his honesty felt more trustworthy than false comfort would have.

Days, at best, Arlen thought, turning the timeline over with the same careful attention he gave most information now. Longer, more likely. Whatever’s coming to help us, it isn’t here yet. And whatever’s out there in the forest, it isn’t finished either.

He closed his eyes, exhaustion finally outweighing the restless turning of his thoughts, and let sleep take him, though even in the quiet safety of the guild’s medical wing, some part of him remained braced, waiting, for whatever came next.