Logan’s movement was slow, he could feel his body halt its production and supply of adrenaline. A faint headache was forming within his forehead, blood scattered across his clothes, weapons, and face. Using several casts of Clean gave him time to think, alongside the small trek to the, now-dead, gang’s camp.

Instead of the constant dread or sickness he found in the pit of his stomach, Logan felt oddly calm after what he could call his second stealth mission, the first being against the goblins of his first mission. Both the pros and cons of his current state flooded his mind as if trying to make sense of it all. Was his humanity slipping, or was he merely adjusting to the situation he found himself within.

Back on Earth, Logan had no plans of joining any sort of militia or armed forces, not even police work crossed his mind. To go from pushing keys on a board to killing almost every day, the transition was jarring at first, so much so he threw up quite a few times in the beginning. The logical side of his brain was able to win the arguments of his mind, killing those who killed mercilessly or mindlessly was a necessary evil. Though the nagging feeling that whoever was giving him these quests were training him to become a weapon still sat at the back of his mind.

Arriving at the camp, Logan saw Marcus hard at work moving the items to a main pile near the centre. Giving a wave to his ally, Marcus motioned Logan closer.

“All done here, wasn’t much fire left. Seems some of their items got damaged, or were damaged beforehand, so I left those in one of the tents. The bodies I also dragged to the side over there”, he motioned with his hand to the west, “also while you were gone, guess what happened.”

“Your head got filled with knowledge?”

“My- Yes! Was it a blessing from Vokka? Did you get contacted again?”

“Seems so, they granted all three of us a reward.”

“That they did. The words, mannerisms, and knowledge of the Grasp alteration filled my head. I thought it might’ve been because I saw you use it so much, but it was as if it came from elsewhere. Lemme show you”, Marcus spoke as he got closer to Logan and placed his hand on his ally’s shoulder, “Orb of all I call to thee, Pondress heal your children. Heal Grasp.”

Unlike the orbs and swirls of yellow healing lights, Logan’s body was covered in a yellow-white light as his wounds stitched up faster and more complete than ever before. With Grasp increasing the healing by 50% Logan was healed for 26 HP.

“See! Amazing, I can help so much more with this, Logan.”

“And to add to that, I should be able to unlock two further skills for you, if you’d like.”

Marcus’s face lit up even more, if he had a bigger face it would have accommodated his smile better, “Two at once? Vokka certainly is proud of your work. I do not know of any other skills that I would readily want aside from Multitude Healing, so could you just increase that twice?”

“Certainly, we’ll have to talk to other Devouts or find some tomes to find you more skills after this, Multitude Healing will be at its max tier of mastery with this”, Logan replied, placing his ally's two skill points into the skill he requested, it changing from “T3” to “MAX” as it showed the same for Logan’s Essence Absorption.

Giving the usual effect for increasing his skill Marcus continued, “The thought of progressing even further excites me to no end. We’re going to be great adventurers together.”

“While it lasts”, Logan thought to himself.

Having Marcus continue cleaning the camp a bit, Logan moved over to the two bodies that his ally had moved, thankfully they were out of sight. Using Essence Absorption on both, Logan found that both had died during the encounter, either from blood loss or that of further flames.

Collecting all the items together landed the pair with a massive haul, plenty of the armour was left behind due to the weight, but many trinkets were kept thereafter as they were lighter for the value they held. In total there was 567 silver and 820 copper. Marcus accepted his share of 167 silver and 260 copper. Combining his own funds, Logan was looking to be quite rich for having spent barely half a month in this world, holding the equivalent of nine and a half gold.

Alongside the money, Logan was treated to a pristine bastarn eye earring and gave his high-quality one to his ally, Marcus gaining a pristine gobbo-ear necklace to replace his older shoddy variant as well as a pristine wolf fang ring to replace his high-quality. Two new trinkets were revealed to the pair as well, covering the final Attributes that they were missing bonuses to.

The choice was simple to who would get which item, Logan slipped the gold ring on the index finger of his right hand next to his ring of the magi, Marcus putting the wristband on his left wrist. As soon as the wristband was equipped, Marcus was shown to increase his maximum MP by one which he celebrated in his usual giddy way. Utilizing his new Wisdom and uses of Healer’s Caress, he saw the skill now healed 5 HP per use, granting it twice to his ally.

As they continued to shuffle around the items, a new window popped up to Logan, alongside several yellow exclamation marks on specific items.

“You have killed the target of a hunt, this hunter’s quest has the stipulation that pay will not be distributed without the returning of certain items. These are highlighted for you.”

Investigating further, Logan saw that the trinkets and money were all fine, though several items such as tomes and Dena’s weapons were marked as required for the quest. He was more than happy with what he was gathering, so losing those particular items only diluted his high a little. Most of the tomes did not relate to him or his ally, so it was no major loss, the daggers would have been nice as one dealt higher damage and the other reduced the cooldown of Backstab by 30 seconds.

Shifting said items to their own section in the inventory, Logan would be able to hand in the quest when he got to Gauntlet, the hunter’s quest showing up in his journal just like the adventurer’s quests did. As the reward was 2 gold, he didn’t feel like passing it up, nor did he want to get hunted for owning said stolen items. Weirdly there was no more of those smoke pellets that Dena had used in combat.

Moving their attention to the “kaevock” they saw it to be some form of tumbler lock from a door or something, an intricate cylinder with several circle partitions that could be rotated. Using Identification yielded no results, so Logan knew it had an item level of over 14, and holding it within his possession gave no information aside from its name and countless question marks in place of other sections of its description.

“Any clue what that is?” Marcus inquired.

“A kaevock, apparently this was meant to unlock the tomes without a librarian. I can’t seem to figure it out though, seems Dena hadn’t yet either as none of those tomes they had already stolen are unlocked”, Logan replied as he started to rotate parts of the device.

“She said something about a dungeon. Maybe it’s a relic from a different era? I haven’t heard of anything penetrating the locks of books aside from high-level dispelling magic.”

“We could ask at Gauntlet I suppose, but I’m not sure how the general populace would react to such a thing.”

“I’d place a high bet on it getting confiscated by the authorities to then get carted off to the Magi’s Tower Association. They normally deal with these kinds of artefacts.”

“If that’s the case, I really don’t want to show it off. We’ll just hide it for now and handle it later.”

“She must have been close to figuring it out though, the quest made it seem that way. Was Dena going to get lucky or find someone else to use the kaevock?” Logan pondered.

Logan explained the hunter’s quest to Marcus, describing it as a bonus from Vokka for completing the divine request. The Devout was able to piece some information that came his way in Tinte, where hunter’s quests were more suited to hunting down criminals rather than monsters and was mostly headed by the guard. Hunters worked in collaboration with the adventurers since only adventurers could really handle these quests. He likened it to the villager quests that focused on issues within the settlements.

Leaving behind quite the scene, mostly armour, wood, and used tents, the gang’s camp left a looming atmosphere of death. The leftovers would go to any other passersby, or possibly monsters who knew the worth of armour. With the deed done, the pair exited the camp back to the dirt road.

Tallying up the rewards, Logan saw the real worth of these quests in both power and items, the skill points speeding up their progression greatly, especially when he still had no idea how Marcus would gain more. Reaching 32,465 / 36,000 XP, Logan was still a fair distance from level 9, however, Marcus’s reward put him at 9,050 / 10,000 XP, which meant he would be hitting level 5 shortly.

Logan was able to see Celsius within his status, a new window detailing his summonable allies, detailing the fiery friend who had jumped from level 1 to 3 with his bonus. His statistics didn’t jump too high, but it was much better overall from where he started.

“Celsius - Flame Elemental. Level 3. STR 12, AGI 10, CON 12, INT 11, WIS 7, CHA 6: 16/16 HP, 3/3 MP. Skills: Ember Shard, Fiery Body, Damage Reduction 1.

Spell List:

1st: Flame.”

Checking over the new skill known as Ember Shard Logan saw it to be a ranged attack that shot a small ember at a foe within a short distance. It would be invaluable when attacking from a higher position as Celsius was still rather weak when compared to the foes Logan was facing. It was a shame that the information windows surrounding his summons stated that they could not wear trinkets or armour, but Logan couldn’t complain too much about an extra ally.

The ninth day continued on, a far cry simpler and safer than it had started, though as the day moved to evening Marcus brought up a new topic of discussion.

“You know, I’ve travelled a bit as a Devout. Been to Noma, and a fair distance south closer to my hometown.”

“This much different?”

“Certainly more dangerous, at least for myself. I was normally with a larger caravan, hired as a healer or to help identify herbs for parties to gather. But this trip actually feels like I am going be making a difference with it.”

“The whole ‘make the world a better place’ ideal?”

“Maybe not the world, but I would definitely seek to make our gaps to martials minute.”

“Think it’ll be easy? Seems to be a widespread attitude to me.”

“But this is possible. Oracles have changed the world several times over, the MT, the end of wars, from what I could gather an oracle has the power to shape our world in so many ways.”

“It will be a road far longer than this one”, Logan replied, thinking about how long it would really be if he left.

“This is the farthest away from home I’ve ever been, I intend to make many more steps by your side, Logan.”

“Glad to have you there. There isn’t anyone else I’d picture in your place.”

The evening turned to night as the pair conversed, healed, and prepared strategies for Logan’s realization that he could absorb his allies’ spells to use in combat. With Marcus gaining the Grasp alteration, Logan was put off even more of taking his ally’s MP for attacking but it would be a necessity depending on the situation. Celsius would act as a battery for a long time, as he only had the Shot alteration combined with the fact his damage would be abysmal compared to Logan.

Making their own camp, albeit much smaller, the pair went to sleep to recuperate before a final day’s walk to the capital. Without the aid of sleeping magic, their slumber was not accosted by dreams or nightmares, instead, it was only rudely interrupted by the System speaking into Logan’s head that it was time to wake up.

Adding into their morning ritual, Logan had to resummon Celsius due to him dying the previous day. Thankfully with the clasp, Logan only needed to spend a single second-level spell slot, bringing his ally back after a 10-minute summoning ritual. Stretching out his flamy limbs, Celsius let out a yawn.

“Ah! Morning, blade lady get offed while I was gone? She wasn’t fond of a fire lad like myself making signal smoke”, the elemental said without a care in the world.

“Dena is dead, I take it she found you easily with her Dash ability?” Logan inquired.

“Yeah, mean look, mean stab. I didn’t stand a chance, but lucky for me I just hop back in you when I ‘die’. Glad to see you came out on top”, Celsius continued as he looked over his form, “Well look at that, I ranked up during that whole ordeal, I take it you know all that?”

“Yeah, rank 3, more spells for me to borrow from you.”

“Private Battery at your service.”

The Spellthief and fire elemental chuckled with one another, Logan finding it hard to not like the creature as it represented a part of his own personality if a bit hyper-focused on one part. Exchanging information until Marcus awoke, the trio packed up their camp for the last time and started the other new part of their mornings that encompassed two uses of Dimensional Jaunt to cover another five miles.

Even with the distractions, combat, and sightseeing, the party were able to make good time on their journey thanks to the new teleportation magic. As the sun started to set on the horizon, giving the world a lovely orange hue combined with the greenery of the forests. The sight of the capital appeared in view, as well as many people coming and going from a long stone bridge that covered a deep moat surrounding the capital.

Insroumountable grey-brick walls reached so far up that Logan couldn’t even guess at their height, atop which he could make out the blurry images of guards and archers patrolling. At the far end of the bridge, they could see a tall metal portcullis gate that was raised to allow people to come and go as they pleased.

Looking over the villagers, Logan’s Identification spree showed even more classless beings with levels up to 4. As it was the capital, the Spellthief was not surprised to see guards having a minimum of level 5 and going as high as 14 and above. Adventurers could also be spotted, in larger parties of four to eight, with levels ranging from 1 to 9.

As he had hoped, the human’s overabundance was finally lessened with the sight of many more gashriek amongst the populace and even a single saeber. The sabertooth lion-like creature wore metallic plates across its form and spiked knuckle dusters on its four paws. The trio could just barely make out it talking in a gravelly and animalistic tone, using the Ava tongue.

Traversing the stone bridge filled Logan with memories of visiting old ruins back in England, old castles that were damaged through war or the harshness of time. However, this time it was filled with the people of said era, if a bit more fantastical due to the other species and magic floating in the air. As the party approached the opened gates, a guardswoman approached the group, a level 8 Fighter clad in full plate with their visor pushed upwards to reveal brown eyes.

“Hail, sirs. I noticed you still have your elemental summoned, please have that stored whilst within the city walls, it is against the law to have any summons or undead active in Gauntlet”, she instructed calmly without any real sign of animosity.

“Oh darn, no vacation for me in the big city”, Celsius reacted.

“Sorry buddy, rules are rules”, Logan apologised, waving his hand over his elemental for a few seconds. As his arms moved, the flames of Celsius spun around and dissipated into Logan’s hands, retreating to his “soul” as the System referred to. An alert window popped up to confirm that Celsius was dismissed, but could be called out again without using a spell slot but would take 10 minutes to do as normal.

“Thank you, sirs.”

“No problem, would you mind if I asked you for an inn recommendation?”

“Madam Ada’s Respite is a few minutes from the gates, reputable for travellers though often crowded.”

A quick instruction on directions revealed that the inn was pretty much a straight walk forwards with a few turns, easy enough to remember. Thanking the guardswoman, the pair headed past the portcullis gate, smiling as they had finally reached their destination after a long ten days of travel.

“Finally here, we’ve got plenty to do but a good rest will do us good after all that walking. Good job, Marcus.”

“That we have. Vokka and Pondress watch us closely, we’ll make you proud. I will be counting on your lead, Logan”, Marcus replied as he gave a quick prayer to the above.

With a smile to one another, Logan raised his arm to Marcus who returned the motion, bumping the sides of their arms and fists together, the pair had made it to their destination.

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