The campfire was half-extinguished already and the entire team had dined on steaming crab when Ira finally asked.

“So, what’s that discussion about being enabled for tier four?”

“There are a few zones where some of our team got enabled for tier four zones, but that’s only because one of us missed out on one lair at one point. This is the first zone we are all tier four enabled.”

“I thought tier four was in November?” Alton noted.

“Well, that’s true. But tier four requires some serious advance planning, usually. Even in our case.”

“I thought we were able to get tier four without side Professions? Or am I mistaken?” he said.

“No, you’re not. Due to our special Milestones, we all can bypass a side Profession for one specific tier-four choice each. But for Guss and Jonathan, that’s even better. They have to pick between three different Professions.”

“Wait, what?” they both said.

“Yes. Your starting Potentials and builds give you both a few more choices.”

“Okay. So, what is the problem then?”

“Picks and Plazas. There are forty different tier-four Professions possible, but a tier four Plaza…”

“Has only seven picks? If tier three has eight?”

“You’re correct, Guss. I’ve looked at the reference list, and Rayleche, the only tier-four connection from here has a potential class for you, the Precise Fixer, and a potential class for both Jonathan and Ira, the Calculating Guardian. But nothing for the rest of us in this particular case.”

Alton thought for a bit.

“Meaning we need to plan which tier four zones we want to visit?”

“It’s much better if we unlock the Plazas early. Or we may end up requiring to scramble to unlock them.”

“You mean spending time traipsing everywhere.”

“Mostly. And finding lairs we can use. The Great Line zones we’ve unlocked allow us a good variety of tier fours with a single lair to do, but one question is whether or not we go back to Zilbarn, for example.”

“What’s interesting in Zilbarn?”

“It has one tier-four access to Solid Guardian. Which is the Profession that will probably interest Jonathan the most.”

“Why?” he asked.

“Because it is one Profession that allows you to get Inevitable Sentinel at tier five without a side Profession.”

There was an incredulous exclamation from Ira.

“How is that possible?”

“Because I already picked one side Profession?” Jonathan surmised.

“Partly. You have a quite different build than what’s common since you did not start as a pure defender. So the mix and the extra Adjustment Milestone enables one of the easier Profession choices directly.”

The Calculating Barrier smiled.

“Meaning our team will finally be rebalanced in that regard.”

“Yes. The rest of us will need a side Profession, and unlike other Professionals, we can afford a higher tier rather than a tier two which is usually the case. But you do not unless you want to aim for a different Profession for the fifth tier.”

“It’s all defence skills professions, right? All the Sentinel ones.”

“Yes, of course. All fairly standard. Quick Sentinel is the first with team/defence but it would require a significant side Profession. And the non-Constitution based defensive tier fives are even worse to get.”

“I’ll stick to the safe choice. And will wait for the rest of you to catch up,” he announced.

“Do you have any idea of when tier five will be?” Ira asked, curious.

“Late 1820, I’m guessing. The usual rule of thumb is that each tier takes as long as all of the previous ones. It should still be more or less correct, even for us.”

“That’s still terribly fast. My cousin had just got his tier three early last year and that was after nearly two years as a Professional,” Guss said. “Tier five in two and a half…”

“Adjustment helps, but having unused zones helps a lot,” Jonas stated.

Guss said, “So, it’s now mostly about which Profession I’ll take for tier four?”

“Yes. We could all theoretically decide to pick a different tier four, with the help of a side Profession, but if we want to be in Agni in time, dispersing isn't doing us good. For you, Abiding and Precise Fixer are good, aether-support Professions, but you can opt to get Imposing Fixer, which uses an aether-control sphere and provides some offensive spells.”

“We… don’t have many spells on gear for control, do we?”

“That’s true. I wouldn’t say no to that Firespark flame hand as well, but I can’t pick that at tier four.”

“You just want to turn me into the cook for the team,” Guss joked.

Jonas laughed.

“No, but you should probably consult with Babbage or another build specialist. If you do want to pick Imposing Fixer, then we actually need to go back to the normal British sector, and work out to a new tier three and four, because it’s not on any of our Great Line-connected zones.”

“And that will take time to negotiate even if can be done in a couple of weeks after that,” the Abiding Assistant concluded. “I’ll check that after we’re back and before we head to the trunk.”

Ira raised his hand to stop the whole team as they neared the small clearing with its compound.

A Corrupting Bear

Level 114 ancient

Health: 9361

Mind: 3152

Endurance: 5730

Aether: 4997

“Okay. Let’s back slowly without attracting its attention.”

Unlike the previous bearling guardian, this one looked more lively. But hopefully, it wouldn’t notice half-hidden humans.

Once they were safely out of view of the clearing, they all breathed more easily.

“That’s a pretty big bear.”

“Thanks to the advance warning based on the chest. If we rushed in foolishly expecting an elite again…”

“Lairs have their creatures stay up for months,” Jonas warned.

“So, no easy lair for some time.”

“Not any more. We can do the rest of the bearlings for experience, but we’re not digging up that chest’s content for a while.”

The rainbow light of the Recall dissipated, leaving them in the middle of a large movement. Two loaded carriages were in the middle of the clearing, and multiple Professionals, including a well-equipped one, were grabbing bags to carry across the Great Gilded Gate to the London side.

Jonas checked the sun’s position.

“Still in time for the Faire,” he said. “Although we don’t have much to trade now.”

“Got still most of the quality tier two. I’ll do some shopping to see if I can find some skills,” Laura said.

“Now to report the lair,” Jonas said.

“You’re headed to the Archives too?” Guss asked.

“No, they’re interested in the notes mainly for the next edition of the guides. And they’re not releasing this until this fall. But the British Scouts might be interested.”

“I’m coming,” Ira said.

Jonas repressed a smile. His friend might not be interested in trade or mingling with all the team representatives at the Faire, but talk about the Scouts, and he was all over it.

“Sure. I don’t know if they’re really going to be interested, but who knows, right?”

“Jonas Sims, Solid Aethershaper. Coming to report on a potentially unreported lair, if the Scouts want to keep track of that before it’s published.”

The Professional keeping watch at the British Scouts’ headquarters looked at Jonas quizzically before his eyes widened.

“Oh. Welcome, Aethershaper. Well, that one depends if it’s a focus of our efforts. You’re… tier three? I think?”

“Correct. And it’s a low-level lair on the Great Line. So I’m guessing probably not?”

A voice from the side made him turn his head.

“I thought I’d heard my most vexing Professional somewhere.”

“Cowen! Haven’t seen you in months!”

“Again, I can thank you for this,” the Imposing Knight answered, her smile belying the small rebuke.

“How’s been the forays in the…” Jonas stopped himself.

“Theodore Cropper here is on Agni. Don’t worry. But yea. I have lots of blame for you. Come in,” she replied.

She brought Jonas and Ira in the main room of the Scouts. Jonas noted that the mantlepiece no longer sported any trophy orbs like the last time they came here. Which was something to be expected.

She brought a couple of glasses of some weird blue drink that tasted like lighter port and relaxed.

“The Duke and I hadn’t heard about you or your team since you headed up. Although your boss found some note,” Jonas said as an introduction.

“Yea. We left one after exploring a side zone, a tier four one. Possibly good, I still have no idea. Never been there until then, and we did not have a full Zone Guide collection up in our usual zones.”

“Jack Millard said you’d spotted a British-listed zone.”

“Yes. We actually landed on top of a treehouse. It’s almost invisible from the ground. I’ve included the location, but we couldn’t re-enter the trunk. Damned vines crawled all over the Gate after we exited, making it completely invisible. Couldn’t break them, even after defeating the witch.”

“Witch?”

“Yea. At least it was labelled as such. It was covered in bark, and it bled sap that burned. But the Treebound Witch was the only guardian around, so we got completion. After that, we couldn’t get back in, so we had to Recall, then Fast Travel.”

Jonas laughed and proceeded to explain to Cowen about the immediate completion in the lairs. She blinked a few times while processing his statement, and bent over him, slapping him on the back.

“Hey, what is it with your scouts getting all worked out over that?”

“It’s this zone…”

“Yea. Millard explained.”

“We have only one member of the team not qualified yet for tier six in Biskanta. But all of us are qualified to exit the trunk there. If we just need to kill one lowly veteran or elite, we’re finished with it.”

“Congratulations, I think.”

“Well, the Keep guardian will regenerate in a couple of weeks. We’ll do it after, just to be sure. I don’t want to open the door and have that legendary animated armour look at us crossly.”

“So, you’ve finished your exploration?”

The darker look from Cowen made Jonas stop immediately. She noticed his look and extended her wrist, which both he and Ira checked.

“Lingering Death, two hours still? Whoa,” Ira said.

“Yes. I haven’t died that much in… a decade and a half. At least. The problem is, all those trunk zones are at the maximum of their respective tiers. So all of the tier five is level 675 to 700 Ancients as guardians. Me and my team, we’re good, but not that good. We killed five with some effort, but the last three of the zone… just let’s say I’m hating dessert now.”

“Dessert?”

She contemplated morosely her nearly empty blue glass.

“They’re essentially puddings. Big gigantic cubes of some kind of jelly, except very very nasty since we’re talking about Ancients. And I kept dying to them, even if we ultimately won. So, the team is all tier six ready for the trunk, except me. Getting a lot of good gear is nice, but that’s frustrating.”

“Ouch,” Ira said.

Cowen smiled sadly at him.

“Having your defender be out of commission makes it hard. Waldo checked the next trunk zone just in case, and unsurprisingly, it’s all 950-plus creatures. Maybe they could do it without me, with just damage output, but that’s doubtful. And risking Final Death. Not worth it.”

“So, we have a tier four shortcut?” Jonas asked.

“Actually, Millard dispatched a team there two weeks ago, based on my notes. But if the lair was previously unknown, it might not be the only one.”

“Othary remains the focus.”

“And it’s a tier-four zone. If you need to defeat every lair including the high-level ones, it is only an alternative for mid-tier-five and above. There’s a few of them, but not that many involved in Agni. Jack’s reshuffled the schedules a bit, just in case, but he’s not relying on it.”

“What’s next. I mean for you?” Ira asked.

“For us? Short term, we have a couple of teams and we’re going to tackle the tier three trunk legend. The tier four one will be a bit later… and that blue glowing blob in tier five not for some time. I’m sure Millard will have his tongue lapping the ground when he sees it, but that shit scares me. Anything called something like ‘the Universal Dissolvent’ is not something I want to face. Until next tier.”

“Then we have the usual tier five normal legends as I said before. Although that’s a bit less important if we can bypass them, the equipment is nice if you can get some,” she said, looking pointedly at the two Professionals.

“About that tier three. We’re probably heading to that zone. Our guess is that the experience will be very good if it’s all max level for the tier.”

“It probably is,” she answered.

She proceeded to highlight the various peculiarities of Castikal and its inhabitant.

“Two-legged wolves?”

“Yea. You have legends about those kinds of man-wolf creatures all around Earth, but in that zone, it’s the common deal. Not too hard… but remember what I said about max difficulty guardians.”

“Ancients.”

“Yea. If you see an Ancient… run. And come back to resurrect the fallen, because you’ll have some if you don’t run fast enough.”

Inevitable Sentinel

(tier 5)

Required: 145 CON, 68 STR, 68 DEX

Provides:

+27 health/+13 endurance/+11 mind/+8 aether per level

+1 Milestone/11 levels

Inevitable Sentinel Milestone: +12 CON, +7 STA, +5 WIS, +4 AGI, 5% endurance per STA

Skillset: Personal / Defence