Operation: Benemal

"I decide... I will. I mean, this will be an adventure, right?"
"Quite true, but there will be many dangers along the way. This will not be a play-time and if that is the way you wish to take it, then be gone with you. I do not have time for people of Benemal like you. So simply make the decision. It's not a hard one."
She talked with that accent that was soft and soothing and pronounces one like vone. She replaces r's with ds so very sounds like veddy.
"I suppose I will rise to the challenge. But what am I even to do?"
"Be patient my child. Along this quest you must never be indolent. You will not sleep for many weeks. There will be little food for you to consume. I don't suppose that you were prepared for that, were you?"
"My whole life is made up of hunger."
"Then you will do quite well on this quest my child of Benemal. I do not think that I have made the wrong decision. If I have, this world will be over, so if you don't think you are appropriate for the job, please speak up. NOW!"
I did not say a word.
"Well, then, I'd better tell you what you are to do, musn't I?"
"I guess so."
"Fine then. This quest is all about orbs. There are four orbs. One for each element. Fire, water, air, and earth. You must collect an orb for each element. You will face many dangers trying to get those orbs. For example, I know of the fire orb, to be in a burning fire. It will be hard to get the orb out of the fire. I know there is a way. There is a way for everything, my little child of hope. You may never turn back, for I create portals for you to go in and out of Benemal. Trust me, I will know when the time is right to let you back in. But, until you have four orbs, or you are dead, you will not come back. If you die I will know, but I will never tell you straight out what an answer is. You won't even know where your final portal will be. These are things I know that you can figure out. You must never give up. So I present you with four items. One, a cloak. Two, fishing supplies. Three, this air-catcher. And four, a box of something you will never know what it is, until there is nothing you can do, but open this box. If you ever open it, before needed, I will know, and I will kill you."

Operation: Benemal

After I have started skipping school there's no turning back. You can't march into the classroom and announce that you were "just running a little late". That takes you straight to the headmaster. The headmaster provides you with this glowing orb that you must smash into your element box and all of you collectibles with disappear. That wouldn't really matter except for that fact that there is a due date to have a certain amount of collected items and if you don't meet that requirement, it's off to the headmaster's. You get three trips to the headmaster before you're expelled. Here's one great thing about school in Benemal: They don't take notice if you skip the whole day. It's just being late. But, you can skip as much school as you want, but there is one test day after each 6 weeks of school. If you miss that test, you're expelled. If you fail that test, you're expelled. Pretty much any way you go, you head towards expulsion. The way I do it is skip a day, then I take a walk through the alley to the other side of town, where Xana lives. I ask her all about school, she teaches me things, and so on. But, I do limit myself to one "alley walk" a six weeks. Meaning, I can only miss one "learning before a test. It's kind of a nice system so today I head toward the trail that leads to the woods. When I get to the woods, I walk a little far and then stop. I can hear a soft humming. I peer around trees and even pull up grass. Nothing. Then suddenly, I see something white leaning against a tree. It turns out to be a spirit. Spirits have been gone for a long time. It was the kind of spirit we see in the books we read at school. The town elders banished them from the land because they kept decreasing the population by sending these dangerous quests that mostly people died on. Everyone tells tales of people driven insane by a spirit. I was always curious about them... so I decided to go say hello.
"Hello. I see that you are a spirit. I-- you're not really supposed to be in these woods."
"Neither are you."
"Yes, but it's my choice. I reason carefully."
"So do I."
"Listen, I think it's kind of great and awful that you're here. I mean--"
"Listen child of Benemal. I understand the elders have made these choices to protect you, but I think if they really want to protect everyone, they should let us do this. You see, all those quests have been trying to do the same thing. Slowly, the condition and the point of the quest has been getting worse over the years. This quest trial is our last chance. Will you take this perilous journey?"
"Don't I get to know what this is first?"
"No."
"Then... I decide..."