Chapter 27: The Storm Wall

Crimson watched Verity’s outline blur, then fade away leaving just him and Raften.

Raften spoke in a deeper and more serious voice than usual, “I disagree with your choice. Her most likely future before your influence would have landed her dead by her own volition,” he let out a long sigh, “You saved one person inadvertently, and destroyed another’s future. Abel and his group are insanely talented, they’ve got a high growth potential and stable personalities…”

He paused for a second, “The blue Cat-Kin aside, she’s only relatively stable, but they were still party members that would have been able to see the end with you, but without you, they’ll be lucky to gain any levels after 70. As far as your choice, well, Verity is…dangerous. She’s very talented, has a good attitude, and excellent combat sense, but she’s essentially one bad day away from being useless.”

Crimson glared at him; Verity was stronger than that. True, she was still recovering, but losing loved ones was never easy and he personally thought that she was recovering quite quickly after her situation was considered. If something bad happened again, he’d trust her to pick herself back up again.

He opened his mouth to try and retort, only to find he couldn’t say anything.

“Ahh, yeah, sorry about that,” Raften said in his normal light tone, “I can’t summon you here without good cause - you need to be on the verge of death to come here fully, which is just too much work so I decided that this encounter didn’t require a full summon, just a projection; so you can’t talk or interact with anything here.

“Here’s where I give you some prophesies as The God of Possibilities! I’d advise you take your time and get stronger, but try and keep a good pace between [Skills] and [Levels], I can see a future where we’re in dire need of your services, and if you’re under level then there’s going to be big problems for…everyone.

“Keep an eye on that corrupt Priest, Damus. His heart started in a good place, but it’s been been blackening reall~y fast.

“Finally, there’s a nominated request coming your way in a few days, accept it, and leave Verity in Falst while you fulfill it. She needs time away from you. Well, that’s only if you want her to be as strong as you believe she is.”

Raften hummed for a long second in thought, then said, “Oh, one last thing. You should read the children’s book, ‘A Lovely Little Lily Loves the Gods.’ It’ll help answer a question that you have. Bye-bye!”

With those words, Crimson found himself abruptly ejected from the dream, and jerked upright, gasping in bed, sweat dripping down is forehead, and his blanket tangled around his legs.

With annoyance, he jerked the blanket off and threw himself onto his feet to pace back and forth across the room. His head was spinning and he needed to organize the information he’d gained in his head.

First: from last night, he’d learned that there was something wrong with his mana. The fact that it was causing him such severe pain was both confusing and a problem. With a flick, he cast a [Magic Light] with no issues, then double checked his [Blessing] to see that it still hadn’t experienced any changes.

From there, he stopped dead in place and slowly started to fill his body with mana once more. Unlike before, it didn’t fight him at every step, and slowly started to suffuse his flesh, but he started trembling. It wasn’t the violent seizure-like shaking of the previous night, but more similar to the uncontrollable shivers of an extremely bad cold.

From that, he could deduce that there was still a problem, but he couldn’t be sure what that problem was. He clutched his head for a long moment, then realized the only way to answer the question of ‘what happened to him’ would be to find out what mana is. It was a piece of knowledge with an unknown level of difficulty, so he mentally filed it as an eventual goal, but a very important one.

Second piece of information: he was close to learning a few [Skills]. He’d need to learn them before he gained his [Class], so he had a time limit of three weeks or so. [Ul Byrn] might be a bit of a hinderance to the achievement of said goal, but he decided to pursue it for the moment.

Third: Verity had received the [Blessings of Trans’Du’Niir], and was officially - if reluctantly - accepted by Raften. Since he didn’t have access to his [Blessing], he’d had no idea how long it for his [Blessings of Trans’Du’Niir] to fully form, but she would serve as patient zero for him to find out.

Fourth: Raften’s…’prophesies.’ There was pretty much nothing he could do about the first one. It was so vague that he couldn’t guess what kind of pace he was supposed to maintain, which just made him want to hit Raften right on the top of the head with his bokken.

As far as the warning about Damus…he’d been remarkably quiet in the months after being so casually abused by Rhinese. He was hardly ever seen in public and was losing a significant amount of weight. It was honestly pathetic that just a few sly insults were enough to bring him to this point - there was probably something else going on that he was unaware of to bring him as low as he was.

For the next problem, he’d worry about the nominated request when it arrived.

With a long sigh, he rubbed his temples, then went about a truncated version of his morning routine in a rush to get out the door.

Stepping outside, he estimated that it was about four in the morning, several hours before the guild opened, but he had ways in that didn’t require a key.

After slipping through the secret passages and exiting into the guild archive room, he made his way to the library where he thoroughly checked the bookshelves for ‘A Lovely Little Lily Loves the Gods.’ If Raften recommended the book to him, there had to be a good reason…right?

After about two hours of scouring the library he gritted his teeth in annoyance as he check the final shelf. He knew the library top to bottom after having spent a quarter of his waking hours in it, so he knew he hadn’t missed anything, but the book wasn’t there. Well, it wasn’t shocking that a children’s book wasn’t in the Guild Library, but it was the only place he could look at this time of the morning, and he didn’t think it likely for the Astral Library to have a copy, so his search was essentially nothing more than killing time.

Emma would show up to unlock the guild soon, so it would be for the best if he left before then - he didn’t want to answer any uncomfortable questions about how he got in, but just as insurance he unlocked a window on the fourth floor, then slipped in and out of it. By doing so, he ensured that if he was caught and questioned he could claim he got in the guild by climbing through a window, and more importantly remain honest under a [Detect Lie Skill] without revealing the secret passages.

As he slipped down to the ground floor, he stopped on the second floor and pressed an ear to the floor to listen for any movement downstairs. His [PER] was high enough that if there was any movement, he should be able to hear it, but it was possible to overlook something.

After a moment of silence, he slipped down the stairs and placed his little finger into the archive room door frame where the [Mana Lock] was, and opened the passage. His caution paid off as he heard the sound of the front door opening and he swiftly slid into the secret passage and closed the door softly behind himself.

After several moments of deliberation, he decided to start investigating the different book shops in town. A few of them should be opening soon, so it would be best to scope them out. There’s got to be somewhere in town that has the book.

—————

Verity showed up to the guild first thing in the morning, for once she even beat Emma and sat impatiently, waiting for Crimson to show up. After a bit, she heard a familiar voice call out to her, “Verity! What are you doing here this early? Where’s Crimson?”

Verity’s eyes drifted over to a very tired looking Emma walking up to the guild and she responded, “Yeah, I’m looking for him.” She gave the Guild Receptionist a wan smile, “He’s got some questions to answer.”

Emma raised an eyebrow, “It doesn’t sound like you’re going to ask him a friendly question…”

“Maybe it is?” Verity responded contemplatively, “I just learned something about him that he’d hidden from me.”

“Is it a big deal?”

“A little bit, yeah.”

Emma started unlocking the door as she responded after a long moment of silence, “Did he have a good reason to keep it quiet?”

Verity thought about it for a second, “Yeah, I guess so.”

Emma gently poked her in the back of the head, “Well, you trust him, right? Maybe you should wait until he’s ready to tell you himself instead of confronting him about it. It would mean a lot more for him to tell you himself, by his own choice.”

Verity sat quietly, processing the advice. She didn’t even need to thing about it, she trusted him, but was this even a matter of trust? His god - Raften - had technically included them together, and given permission for Crimson to explain things to her, and she was technically owed an explanation.

She wandered into the Guild while considering the problem, and sat at a table to wait. After considering it for a bit, she realized that she’d been puffed up for a confrontation, ready to pick a fight with Crimson to find out what was going on, but she didn’t really have a need to. Knowing him, he’d calmly tell her when she asked; with that realization, she calmed down, and went up to the library to study magic.

—————

Crimson stood in a book shop, carefully inspecting the shelves at 8 in the morning, while the shop keeper behind him was doing the best he could to calm down. Crimson had surprised the shop keeper right as the unfortunate man opened his shop, and gave the man a fright with his sudden appearance. After a quick but thorough inspection, he left after double checking with the owner about the book’s stock.

By 8:15 he was in his next book shop, and by 10 he’d checked all the shops that carried even a single book in town, and was charging through the secret passages to get to the Astral Library. As it was Gratday - this world’s equivalent of Thursday - there shouldn’t be anyone there. Stepping into the library, he surveyed the cylindrical library. Even after a year, he still didn’t know everything about the library, but he did have an excellent understanding of how it was organized.

He charged down to the lowest layer and started looking in all the likeliest places, once those turned up failures, he started looking in even the places with a slight chance. After hours of searching, it became 3pm, and he was forced to accept that it wasn’t in the library.

It was a children’s book, how hard should it be to find?!

Miserably, but swiftly, he made his way back to the guild, wanting to burn off some energy with a delivery request or two. The inside of the guild was packed, it being the afternoon, it was the most popular time for adventurer’s to be in the guild. The stink of body odor mixed with the smells of smoke, alcohol, and oil as the boisterous sounds of conversation bounced off his skull.

After a year working there, Crimson was very well known at the guild, and waved to a bunch of people who greeted him as he made his way to the line where the desk was. They only had Sherry and one other guy working the desk today, so the two lines snaked around the edge of the room, past the staircase, and along the wall. There was no way he’d be able to get a request today.

Restraining his annoyance, he shouldered his way through the part of the line that passed in front of the staircase and made his way to the library. Verity was studying at a desk as he slumped into the seat across from her and slammed his head onto the table, dealing a few points of damage to himself.

He heard Verity set down the book, and silence reigned for a long moment before she said, “Avoiding me?”

“Can’t find what I’m looking for.” He responded with a low voice.

After another pause, she asked, “Raften?”

“A God of Possibilities and Time, he manages my [Blessing] and gave me a task to kill a boss stronger than Lv.100.” He responded without hesitation.

“How’d you meet?”

“He recruited me after I died in another world, gave me this body, and a mission.” Crimson said as bluntly as possible, while inside his guts started to squirm from nerves.

“You’re a Rak’a’niir!” She exclaimed with surprise.

“Yeah, I’m a from another world.” He said while trying to hide the nerves he felt.

She nodded slowly and repeatedly, “Yeah, that makes sense it felt like your knowledge was too…inconsistent for having just lost your memories,” she gave him a big grin, her green eyes twinkling, “I’m glad that’s all cleared up, let’s do our best!”

Immediately, she started reading her book again. At a glance, he could see that it was a copy of [Lesser Healing], the best Healing Spell Crimson knew…but, didn’t she have more questions?

“Aren’t you…going to ask anything else?” He asked slowly.

Verity hummed for a second, then said over the top of the book, “I spoke with Emma, and she had a really good point about trusting you to share your secrets when you feel ready, so I decided to only ask about the things I have a right to know, when you’re ready and are certain that you trust me, feel free to tell me more.”

Crimson quietly bowed his head and whispered, “Thanks.”

He wasn’t really opposed to telling her everything if pressed, but it felt a little like baring his soul, to tell her everything. He wasn’t worried that she would hate him or reject him for being something that he had hid from her, but in regards to who he was before…he didn’t feel ready.

That had been another life, a different ‘him’ and a person he never wanted to be again.

He had been weak willed, lacked dedication to anything, held no passions, and genuinely hated himself. Looking back, he didn’t understand why he’d been that way. His body may not have worked, but he had a perfectly working mind, he had his sight, his hearing, and could talk. He had plenty of tools to better himself, but hadn’t. He’d figuratively spent his life staring out a window, wishing he could open it, but never attempting to.

What had changed about himself? His personality hadn’t been changed by anyone, but…

He tightly closed his eyes, and despite his intense pondering there was no answer. Abruptly, he was brought out of his meditation by Verity after she smacked him in the face with some loose papers.

“Hey! Are you alive? You haven’t moved for five minutes!” She exclaimed with a concerned expression.

“I’m fine,” he said, “do you need something?”

“Yeah, could you explain your process for learning spells to me? I have to rely on the Gods’ assistance to learn.”

He tilted his head for a second then spoke while waving a finger in the air, “My process won’t help you, but here’s a suggestion: when you’re learning magic, what you’re actually doing is engraving the path in your mind. Think of wandering through a maze, learning a Lv1 spell is wandering through the maze until you find the exit. You’re slow and inefficient as you travel through it because you don’t know the process to get to the exit.

“As you redo the maze, a few key points will stick in your mind, and you’ll have a vague idea of where the exit is, but with every pass you get faster and faster as you learn the maze until you know the fastest route through it. All the Gods do is help speed up that process.

“Where the analogy breaks down is that you’re not the one passing through the maze, but your mana is. You use mental images and emotions to tell it where it needs to turn, so if you don’t clearly understand the path it needs to take, you won’t be able to guide it through.

“With that in mind, your goal is to try to make the spell your own, the book teaches you the emotions and images you need to have, but you need to replace those artificial feeling with your own experiences. You can imagine a forest you’ve visited better than a forest that the book shows you. This will help speed up the learning process and slow the decay of the spell.”

Crimson nodded to himself a few times and proudly smiled at Verity, happy that she had asked.

His process was extremely different from his advice -having learned his spells through rote practice and ‘muscle’ memory- but he’d had a lot of experience helping Rhinese. They’d done hours of experimentation to refine the process till they found what works best. It was completely obvious in hindsight, [Skills] worked the same way, as did [Classes] - they had to be embraced and altered to suit the user.

He watched Verity tap her finger on the cover of [Lesser Healing] for a bit, happy that she seemed to value his advice, then his attention snapped back to the book.

Where had she gotten it? The only place he hadn’t thought to check: The Temple. What was the name of the book he’d spent all day looking for? ‘A Little Lily Loves the Gods.’

He bolted out of his seat in an instant and shouted “keep studying” to a surprised Verity as he dashed out the door, jumped down the stairs, completely skipping to the next flight, and ignored the various shouts as he dashed through the crowd and out the door.

Sprinting with as much might as he could manage and not still not run into anyone, he ran to the Temple and stopped right outside it to catch his breath. He quickly cast the spell [Manipulate Water] to throw all the sweat off himself, then compressed it all into a ball that he chucked down a nearby sewer drain.

Once presentable, he walked through the door and went straight to one of the public libraries of the Temple. It had three such libraries and one restricted one. Two of them cost money to utilize, containing spells and other such valuable books, and the third was completely open to the public as a service, usually to help commoners learn how to read and containing books similar to the Adventures’ Guild, ones that provided basic information on specific skills to help commoners learn a trade. More importantly, it also contained religious materials.

It took him less than five minutes of searching to find “A Little Lily Loves The Gods” there was no listed author, but it was a children’s picture book with…to put it kindly, basic drawings. Bluntly, Crimson had seen better child’s drawings.

The text in the nine page book was as follows:

————

A little Lily loves the Gods very much.

She loves the Gods who gave her friends

She loves the Gods who gave Rose the passion of fire

She loves the Gods who gave Lilac the calm of water

She loves the Gods who gave Anemone the cheer of wind

She loves the Gods who gave Diascia the kindness of earth

She loves the Gods who gave Delphnium the energy of lightning

She loves the Gods who gave Gladiolus the helpfulness of metal

She loves the Gods who gave Zinnia the determination of magma

She loves the Gods who gave Orchid the focus of ice

She loves the Gods who gave Her the loyalty of holy

She loves the Gods who gave Hydrangea the choice of profane

She loves the Gods who gave Dahlia the dream of purity

She loves the Gods who gave King Protea the truth of corruption

She loves the Gods who gave Amaryllis the joy of life

She loves the Gods who gave Daffodils the hope of death

She loves the Gods who gave them all the spirit to understand.

She loves the Gods, because they loved her first.

She loves the Gods, because they made her happy.

She loves the Gods, because they help her.

She loves the Gods, and so do her friends.

You should love the Gods too.

————

In addition to the drawings being bad, it was as basic as could be. It was like the author had an encyclopedia of flowers on hand and just randomly chose ones they had liked. It was also just bad for a children’s book, the basic structure of the text would be helpful, but then complicated words and concepts were used, nothing a child would really understand.

However, it did two things well. Firstly was the fact that it tied concepts and feeling to [Affinities]. Second was reducing the intelligence of those who read it, it was really good at that.

All the [Affinities] in the book were arranged in the same order as could be found in his [Blessing], so he turned his attention to the line devoted to [Mana]…or at least tried to. There didn’t seem to be a line for it, unless…

————

“She loves the Gods who gave them all the spirit to understand.”

—————

That line seemed to be it, “Comprehension” seemed like an excellent concept to be associated with [Mana], but ‘spirit?’

Would that refer to a literal spirit? That didn’t seem likely, so it probably referred to spirit in the sense of ‘emotion’ because that’s how most people controlled their mana…or…one other option…it could refer to spiritual energy.

If [Life] was a reference to [Vitality] - the presence of physical energy powering life, and [Death] was a reference to the opposite state - the absence of physical energy, then it would make sense that [Mana] was a form of spiritual energy, and [Void] was the absence of it, but he didn’t have enough information to prove it or refute it.

Pinching his nose, he felt a bit of a headache coming on as his thoughts ran in circles, unable to come to a decisive conclusion, before he decided that [Spiritual Energy] was more likely than any other option he could come up with.

Considering that, it only opens up more questions about why he’d had convulsions the night before. He could find nothing about it that could be explained.

Sighing, he started to trudge back toward the entrance, but before he could make it more than a few steps out of the library, he was stopped by a wolfkin.

A middle aged, but slim male wolfkin, only slightly taller than Crimson, with deeply tanned skin was what greeted his eyes as the man spoke, “Excuse me, are you Crimson?”

Crimson’s eyebrows flicked up in surprise and confusion as he responded, “Yes, can I help you with something?”

Nervously, the man said, “I’m looking for someone to write a prayer for a coming of age ceremony. I look after a young girl,” he shook his head quickly and continued, “I misspoke, a young woman, who will be coming of age soon. It is tradition in our tribe to celebrate a few months in advance and there is none who will truly celebrate with her, as the Chief’s Heir Apparent will be having her coming of age ceremony at the same time.”

He fixed Crimson with a nervous gaze, “So I wanted to get her an amazing prayer she can burn, one that makes her feel special, and allows her to look back fondly on her Niv’beln - her coming of age ceremony for years to come. When I asked a [Priest], he pointed me to you.”

Crimson did his best to hide his surprise, he’d been asked several times to write prayers for others, but he still didn’t understand why he’d been singled out. In their position, he’d definitely ask the actual religious figures, not a sixteen year old kid.

Apologetically, he said, “You should probably ask another one of the [Priests], I know of one named Baylee who does an excellent job with event prayers, I could introduce her to you.”

Crimson started to survey the area to see if he could find her, but was interrupted by the wolfkin, “No, it has to be you. High Priestess Rei told me that you’d refuse and try to get out of it, but that you’re actually really good at writing thoughtful prayer full of praise with writing that looks like art. She said she personally asked you to write some prayers for her!”

Those words were excitedly exclaimed and definitely overheard by nearby people. The piercing and greedy looks were painful to say the least.

Crimson shook his head, “Did she also tell you that I’ve been asked to not write prayers for free? Since I’m not a [Priest], I’m not allowed to do it for free.”

It was the truth, the hope was to encourage people to rely on the [Priests] before him, but with that kind of recommendation from Rei, people would definitely still come to him.

“That’s fine,” the man said, “it’s only obvious that something of higher quality would cost more.”

Assuming it actually was of higher quality.

“Name your price.” He said firmly.

“Give me your name first,” Crimson said.

The man jumped, and flushed from embarrassment, “Nav, my name is Nav.”

Rhymed with ‘have.’

“Okay, Nav, here’s the deal: we’re not going to discuss this here, a lot of people are listening and this kind of thing is private. Let’s see if we can borrow one of the consultation rooms.”

One of the many duties of the [Priests] was offering advice on [Classes] and [Skills], it was similar to the practice of confessionals Crimson remembered from his past life, but the purpose was to counsel people on the paths they wanted to take. All the [Priests] who preformed consultations had sworn before the God of Truth not to reveal what they were told in confidence, and there was a strong punishment associated with breaking that vow, so they were considered trustworthy.

Admittedly, the service was utilized more by the highly religious and commoners, most Adventurers would rather ask a trusted senior for general advice than get a real consultation.

It was also one of the few duties Crimson had gotten out of in the Temple - despite the fact that Rei had tried to get him to do it.

The permission was granted easily, and they sat down in what looked like a windowless conference room. On one wall was a chalk board and on the other, a book case filled with blank paper and writing instruments. There was also a plate hanging from a hook next to the door with a fire enchantment placed upon it, the purpose was to destroy any papers before the people left so they could retain their privacy, but to Crimson, it just felt like a perfect room for a secret meeting.

After a long moment, Crimson spoke, “A coming of age prayer is essentially a prayer for the life to come. It usually includes information that could be of a…private nature, so I will only be able to write about what you’re beginning to tell me. If you want, we can take a more general route, but a lot of people believe that the prayers are less effective the less specific they are.

“Personally, I don’t know if that’s the case, but it does make it easier for the Gods to help you if you are specific. It’s the difference between saying ‘help me’ -which is general and vague- and ‘help me lift this rock’ which is very specific. You have to do a little inferring to figure out what they need help with in the first statement, and have a clear task in the second. So, what’ll it be?”

Nav scratched one of his wolf ears for a long moment, then hesitantly said, “A mix? The young woman I represent and her father are very sickly. Her father doesn’t have much longer to live and her life seems to be following the same pattern as his. Her mother is a very important person who doesn’t have time for either of them and doesn’t seem to care if they live or die.”

He looked at Crimson with desperation in his eyes, “Is that enough information to help you write the prayer?”

Crimson snorted, “No, I need more information, but about other things. Does she have any dreams? Does she want to be something or go somewhere? Does she have someone she wants to marry? The information you’ve given me so far is great, it is probably the most pressing issue, but a coming of age prayer isn’t just about one thing, it encompasses the life of the individual. Give me every detail you’re willing to give up.”

With a loud swallow and a deep breath, Nav nodded and said, “Her name is Rhea, she’s fifteen, and her mother is the chief of my tribe. She’s an adorable girl who loves good food and long naps, but because of her poor health, she has a hard time enjoying either of those things. She…doesn’t seem to have any dreams, but I think she wants to live a long life. She’s completely devoted to her father - he was actually the one who asked me to order this prayer - and hates her mother for abandoning them…or at least I think she does, she’s a little hard to read.

“She doesn’t really have any friends, and she pretends that she doesn’t want any. She’s got a Grey Wolf’s ears and fur pattern, with grey hair and gorgeous blue eyes but I don’t get to see her them too often as she keeps her eyes almost closed. I asked, but she can apparently see just fine even if it looks like she’s sleep walking all the time.”

Nav’s voice became more and more excited as he started throwing out random, almost incoherent details about this girl, ‘Rhea.’ Crimson sat back and listened to it all, mentally retaining useful details and throwing away everything else. The man seemed to really care about this girl, maybe he saw her as something like a daughter.

After a long time, he wound down, then looked at Crimson in embarrassment, “So, uh, is that enough?”

“Plenty, you could have stopped an hour ago, I didn’t really need to know how adorable she was as a baby.” Crimson said dryly as he got up and grabbed a quill and ink from the bookshelf.

After looking around for a bit, he found some fancy blank scrolls used for occasions like this, and grabbed one.

He sat back down once more with his spoils and stared at Nav for a long moment before he started writing, organizing the information in his brain. Then, with quill to paper, he started to write a prayer. He didn’t use an extremely fancy font, rather, he chose one with thin and angular letters, setting every letter on the line at an angle as he tried to represent the girl with the very manner of writing he was using.

Just based on the description, Rhea and he had a lot in common. He’d been a little more fortunate to have two loving parents and they were both in good health, but he knew what it was like to spend his whole life waiting to die.

He first started with her wish for friends, requesting the Gods for her to have reliable and trustworthy people who would love and support her for her friends. He requested a husband for her that would seek to make her happy, and that she might find joy in helping him do the same.

He then wrote of her desire to prove her mother wrong. He didn’t know exactly where the words came from, nor if he understood her feelings right, but his hand moved automatically to write it, and he left it as is.

He followed that by sharing the love she had for her father her gratitude for his love and presence, expressing her wish that he would live a long life, but lamenting her knowledge that he won’t.

Crimson’s quill continued to flow, as he wove together the details he’d gained until the final paragraph, where he wrote of her wish to become strong, and overcome her weaknesses. He wrote her prayer to one day reach Level 100.

After sitting back, he flexed his sore fingers. He’d written a lot, and at no point in the process did he feel he could stop, but the final result was one he could be happy with. Though, he did wonder about some of the things he wrote, because Nav definitely hadn’t told him about any dreams she had.

After a moment of consideration, he noticed that he had an alert from his [Blessing]. At that moment, he had a nervous premonition as he opened his [Blessing].

—————

-All System Administrators have elected to award you a [Title].

-Downloading data…

-Installing…

-Title: [Holy Interpreter] has been applied.

-Note from Administrator Melia: Keep it up!

-Note from Administrator: ROFL!!!! Lolololololol!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

—————

Crimson restrained a heavy sigh, but Nav noticed and asked in concern, “Is there something wrong with it?”

He shook his head, “No, I’ve done my best, and the prayer seems ready, I just remembered something I have to do.”

Punch Raften.

ROFL? For what??? What did the [Title] do? He could guess, but that guess wouldn’t lead to ‘ROFL’ it would lead to him getting Rei’s attention - again!

Crimson waited for the ink to dry, then rolled up the scroll and handed it to Nav with a question, “What can you afford?”

Utilizing a sharp ‘I’m going to strike a bargain face’ Nav responded, “I won’t go any higher than 500 Royals.”

Crimson shrugged, “Okay then, 300 Royals.”

Nav, clearly not paying attention to what had just been said, responded, “Okay, you’ve twisted my arm, I can go up to 650, but no higher!”

Crimson did is best to not show his amusement as he responded, “You’re a tough customer, but I have no choice but to do it for 300 Royals.”

Nav blinked a few times, then grinned happily, “Is that really enough? I was prepared to go up to 800.”

“It’s fine, I already think I’m overcharging you, but you did take several hours of my time, so it’s worth something to me.”

Nav dumped a bunch of Royals from his inventory onto the table and slowly counted out 300. It took him a few minutes, but Crimson walked away happy.

When Crimson got outside, he immediately cursed as he noticed how dark it was. He’d have to be careful going back.

Before they parted, he finally thought to ask Nav a question he should have asked a while ago, “By the way, do you know why Rhea has poor health?”

Nav nodded happily, “Yeah, it’s a bit of an open secret. She has a high [Affinity] for [Void], and an [Antithesis] for [Mana]. Anyway, I’ve got to go, the Adventurer’s Guild said they’d finish processing my request in the morning, and I need to be there bright and early for it!”

Before Crimson could respond to the information bomb Nav just dropped, the wolfkin ran off, seemingly toward Phase 5 where there were some decent Inns.

Crimson’s shock continued, as he found the next morning that the request Nav had given to the Adventurers’ Guild had been for him. Nav was equally surprised by that one as well.