“Lady Lisa isn’t here right now,” Mave told them at her doorstep on Sunday. “Come again later.”

“What do you mean she isn’t here?” Ryan asked and shoved a foot in the door before the man could close it.

Micah had the same question, although he might have asked it in a little more polite tone, and after knocking again … might have. But it was Sunday. That meant studying at Lisa’s, even if they had wanted to propose something else. So where was she?

Mave shrugged. “She left with Sir Garen to go to the Guild.”

“When?”

“About an hour ago.”

“Why?”

Another shrug.

“Did she leave a message for us?” Micah threw in, hopeful.

“No.”

“Maybe we’ll find her at the Guild,” he suggested. Ryan looked uncertain, but he nodded. “Can we go get our stuff?”

“... I suppose.”

They changed into their gear and packed their bags. This time, adding a small bottle of middle-grade healing potion to the list that Micah had bought at a shop in the Bazaar yesterday, after he’d convinced Ryan of going into the Tower. It was a deep red color, a tiny bit viscous, and probably only enough for a wound or two, but since it was only meant for emergencies, it would hopefully be enough.

Somehow, buying a potion had hurt Micah’s pride more than he would have thought. But that was ridiculous. Just because he was an [Alchemist] didn’t mean he could make every potion he would ever use. That would be a like a [Musician] only listening to their own music or a [Cook] never eating out. And besides, the potion could save a life in the worst case scenario, so Micah tried to focus on that. It also helped ease the hurt of its cost.

But it did get him thinking—

“Don’t you have armor?”

Ryan didn’t have any real scars that Micah could find and had spent years testing the Tower’s waters. Knowing that did nothing to reassure him.

“Huh? Uh, no,” Ryan answered.

“Why not?”

“Because …“ he trailed off. He didn’t have a reason? “I don’t know. Gardener didn’t give me any when I started out and it just became habit. But trust me, getting bitten has taught me to be more careful than I was before. And the school has to get rid of their mandatory healing potions anyway.”

Micah suddenly remembered that he didn’t like Gardener very much.

“But we never did anything truly dangerous until the Wolves’ Den,” he said. “And my wounds from there were on me.”

And me.

Micah waited a moment before he offered, “I can buy you s—”

“No.” Ryan didn’t even let him finish, so he dropped the topic … for now.

When they had packed everything, they headed off.

Today was the perfect day to go into the Tower, Micah knew, because his parents seemed happy enough after he’d brought home his report card and assumed he was hanging out with friends … which he was. Just not in the city. And apparently, his final grades were better than they had been expecting. His mother credited Ryan for most of that.

Ryan himself had been surprised to hear his parents weren’t stricter, considering their personalities. But weirdly enough, they weren’t. Sometimes, they'd ask him how his grades were coming along, but they didn’t really pressure him into studying. Sadly. Then again, Micah hadn’t pressured himself.

At the Guild, they asked for Garen and Lisa at one of the receptions but the lady there said she would have to check to know and even if she did, she couldn’t hand out information like that … so they went to another reception and tried again.

The third one let slip that they were in a meeting and would be for some time. “Those always go on for ages,” he said. “You would be waiting long into the afternoon just to meet him. Plus, Garen will be grumpy afterward. He always is.”

They did not want to meet Garen, but they didn't bother explaining that. They also did not want to wait for hours for Lisa to show up. If they had known where the meeting was, maybe they could have asked her how long it would be or have bailed her out. But since the receptionists weren’t helping …

“Want to go without her?” Ryan asked.

Micah mulled it over. “Wouldn’t that be kind of mean?”

Ryan shook his head and nudged him with a smile. “She’ll probably be glad to have a Sunday rid of us, don’t you think? Plus, she’s the one who bailed on us.” He must have noticed Micah’s reluctance because he added in a softer tone, “She wouldn’t have wanted to come anyway. There’s a chance we might encounter Shroomish. Those are sort of Myconids. And I bet it was some kind of emergency.”

Micah agreed with that at least, so they bought two day passes and went on their own. This time, with a different location in mind. Ryan almost forgot to take his hand before they stepped through the portal, so Micah did it for him. He led him into a vast expanse of rolling fields.

A stray wind buffeted them the moment they stepped inside, and it carried the scent of forest pines and river. Dirt paths one person wide cut through the grass, as if made from years of traffic. Single trees and small copses dotted the plains, and larger hills rose and fell in the distance. It all went on for miles. A stretching blue sky with billowing clouds framed the floor from above.

He could hear people.

“Welcome to the Fields,” Ryan said, letting go. “The most popular beginner’s floor in Hadica.”

It was crowded.

Well, not crowded. But for the Tower?

On every other hill or three, small groups of people fought against even smaller groups of boars. Most of them had a senior standing off to the side and barking commands. Some had a few teens sitting on the grass and plucking at it as they waited their turn. One— Were they having a picnic?

Micah needed a moment to process that. But basket, blanket, and guy and girl were there. The perfect image of a date.

He immediately looked away.

All in all, Micah could see maybe a dozen people. And that was in just one direction. A hill cut off his sight North, the one next to it was too far away to see clearly, and woods rose far to the North-east.

Ignoring all that for a moment, Micah turned around to check for a portal and found one. It was wide and almost circular, set into a grass-covered mound that was cut off steeply. He inched closer and inspected the grass. But as far as he could see, it was just that: grass. He still got out his alchemy knife and cut out a chunk of it from right next to the portal.

Ryan had a smile in his voice when he spoke, “You tinkerers are all the same, you know?”

“Tinkerers?”

“You know, crafters, hobby scientists; alchemists, smiths, and the likes.”

Micah wouldn’t have put alchemists and smiths under the same roof, and he wouldn’t have branded that roof “Tinkerers,” but he supposed he could follow the steps needed to heat the iron.

He considered the chunk of dirt he was putting into a jar and defended himself, “But it might have some magical properties.”

“No.” Ryan shook his head. “I was giving you a compliment, Micah.”

“Oh. Thanks.”

… Which compliment?

“So can you see any ‘magical properties’ already?”

“Nope.” Micah stuffed his things back in his bag. “It’s just grass; the exact same as outside the Tower.”

“Huh. So do you want to stay here, or ...?”

“Onwards!” Micah called and led the way down a small dirt path.

The Fields were the most popular second floor, he knew, because they made such a good teaching space. Educators could see monsters coming from miles away, everything was peaceful and rather orderly, and the monsters, the Field Boars, were basically training dummies—wild pigs with tiny tusks and tough skin. Which, coincidentally, was exactly why Micah had wanted to come here.

He wanted to brew a Potion of Lesser Toughness … or Least Toughness, however it worked out. And then he wanted to make a Potion of Tough Skin, which had less breadth but more depth in its use. Unfortunately, that one was a little more advanced.

There was also the small problem that Field Boars were actually considered training dummies. They were the unique second-floor monster of Hadica and the second-weakest monsters of all after Lighthouse’s Slimes. Like their counterparts, they didn’t drop crystals. Once in a blue moon, they would drop a half-crystallized monster part—and Lisa had told him Slimes sometimes had items inside of them, so maybe the boars did, too?—but those were considered exceptions.

Instead, Micah had to go further in to find the real enemies of this floor: the Earth Boars. Those had the pattern he needed.

As they headed on, Ryan actually waved to a group they passed and some of them waved back.

“Who are they?” Micah asked.

“No idea. I just recognize their faces.”

Then why had he waved? Back during his first trip into the Tower, Micah had actually dreaded landing in the Fields. Its first monsters didn’t drop any ingredients and it sounded too public to him. He hadn’t wanted to embarrass himself in front of a bunch of strangers.

And he still didn’t. So he led them further and further, past the fields and towards the hill in the distance. At the last stretch, he had no choice but to fight as two small Field Boars rested on its slope like napping gatekeepers.

Micah crouched down and snuck forward. They hadn’t noticed them yet. Maybe he could ambush them?

Ryan just strode past him.

The monsters quickly noticed the intruder and charged, but unfortunately for them, they were called the second-weakest for a reason. They were smaller than regular boars and even most pigs, and always charged in long, straight lines.

While Micah stood up, Ryan just side-stepped the first boar’s charge and brought his sword down, surprisingly cleaving it into two. He then let himself fall sidewards onto the other beast, pinning it to the ground.

The boar huffed in protest, but Micah was paying attention to the rising smoke of the dead first one. Inside of it drifted glittering lights—tiny crystals, which dissolved in seconds. He wondered if there was some way he could preserve those. If he did, what would they be made of?

“A few things you want to know,” Ryan said in his instructor’s voice. Micah frowned. He hadn’t been expecting an impromptu lesson, but he didn’t protest either. He wouldn’t pass up the chance to see Ryan wrestle with a Field Boar.

“See their tusks?” He ran his hands over one. “They’re dull and don’t have a lot of force behind them. The most they’ll do is bruise you or bruise your bones … unless you really mess up. Its bite isn’t much worse than a small pig’s either, which still hurts, but it isn’t life-threatening. Again, unless you really screw up.”

Micah was staring at Ryan, not really listening at all. He knew all that already from Garen and the Beginner’s Guide.

Ryan then pulled an all-too-familiar knife out and used it to nick the beast. It immediately thrashed around a little more, but he just pinned it down with his whole arm this time. His back was straight, his posture relaxed, and he looked like he was in complete control.

Micah envied him.

The wound, a paper cut at most in the boar’s tough skin, bled light.

“All Field Boars are also unmade,” he went on. “You won’t ever find a fully-formed one. The next monster you’ll face in the Fields, further away from the portal mound, is the Earth Boar after all, not fully-made Field ones. And like all other unique second-floor monsters, they also don’t … drop … crystals … Hey, Micah. Are you even listening?” He snapped his fingers at him. “Are you still here?”

“Huh?” He took a step back. “Oh, yeah. I was just thinking about something.”

“What were you thinking about?”

“Nothing.” He shook his head. “Nothing important.”

“You can ask.” Ryan smiled. “If there’s something going on in that head of yours, I’ll want to know. I mean, better you ask now than make a mistake later because you didn’t, right? Because I might forget, too, you know?” He trailed off a little and Micah just knew he was thinking of the Honey Ants.

Micah tried to think of an excuse, but he couldn’t find one and Ryan, strangely enough, looked like he could use a confidence boost. Micah would never have thought that half a year ago. So he admitted, “I was just wondering if I also look that cool wrestling with monsters …”

Probably not, though. Every time Micah had wrestled with a monster, he had almost literally strained every muscle in his body in a desperate struggle to survive, not to mention how he used the next best objects he could find to fight.

He also remembered that time Lisa had joked about how he threw the Sewer Rat away. That hadn’t sounded cool at all.

“Oh,” Ryan said and almost slipped up. He pressed back down on the boar. “You look … cool when wrestling with monsters,” he said slowly and switched tunes. “Yeah, of course you do.”

“...Really?”

“Definitely.”

He was lying. Especially since Micah had never wrestled with a monster in front of him, only the Honey Ant, but he would take it.

“So, do you want to try wrestling with this one, or …?”

“No, it’s fine,” Micah said. “I need Earth Boars anyway. Field Boars are basically just training dummies, right?”

“Right.”

They finished that one off and headed on.

Every Tower had a unique seventh floor, Micah knew. And each one had a mini-version of that with a unique, extremely weak monster that didn’t drop crystals, but sometimes crystalline monster parts. Well, except Ostfeld. Its Tower preferred quality over quantity. But as soon as you headed further in …

Micah and Ryan scaled a grassy hill up to its crest. Below, the slope stretched further down than its twin and led into a basin of head-high grass—shaped like arms now, as they had overgrown—weeds, and bushes.

Ticks, was his first thought. If he waded through that, he would be covered in ticks. And spiderwebs. But of course, this was the Tower. It didn’t have ticks and spiderwebs.

Somehow, the Tower seemed tamer than the wilderness itself. Well, aside from the large boar with an earth-crested hide puffing its charge up towards them.

Micah could hear its grunts from the top and readied his entirely inept dagger.

“Don’t get hit by those,” Ryan warned, as if he had to say it. That thing looked angry and as if it were wearing armor. “Actually, don’t get too close to it at all.”

A moment before the Earth Boar reached him, Ryan slammed a boot into its head, which barely sent it off-course, and Micah dodged back. The beast still swung its head at him in an attempt to scratch him with its tusk. Micah barely bent out of the way and took a few steps back to give Ryan a clear shot, but his blade drew as much light as the knife had from the Field Boar. Its armor was too thick.

It did a lazy loop around and ducked to parry a sword thrust aimed at its eye. It had thick caterpillars of dirt around them, as if it were half-golem.

Micah felt kind of helpless. What was he supposed to do against that with a knife? Hitting its eye was a good idea, but if he stuck his dagger in, it would probably just make it angrier and he would lose the dagger. It had to have a better weak-point.

As it charged up the hill to meet them again, Micah saw that the earth pattern thinned out near its chest, where its legs began.

You can use that. Micah agreed.

The next time it charged and he dodged around, he used an arm to pull himself onto its back and held on for his dear life, because it immediately started running faster and bucking wildly.

Helplessly, Ryan demanded what he was doing from the sidelines, but Micah was a little too preoccupied to answer.

A bump in the ground almost threw him off and he slipped halfway to its side, but Micah found what he was groping for then—a spot that was a little less stony than the rest. He readied his dagger, pulled it back a bit, and plunged it in with the force of the beast’s next step.

It felt like dragging a knife through a wall. The beast finally threw him off and Micah used that same force to pull. The knife slipped back out, but not before it had done its damage. Micah hit the ground and the boar stumbled. They both went tumbling down the hill, the beast’s armor hurting it as much as it protected it otherwise, until he finally came to a halt. It burst into smoke … and Micah laughed.

“What the hell was that?” Ryan asked.

He caught his breath. “A hands-on approach! Did I look cool?”

“...Totally.”

Liar.

“Just ... don’t do it again, alright?”

Micah drudged up the hill with a grin, collected his knife, and groped around until he found the monster’s brown crystal. Unsurprisingly, it was filled with literal earth essence. As in, Micah could have gotten that by digging up a few fistfuls of dirt.

Of course, it had the added benefit of not being dirt, so he could use it more easily in potions. He just didn’t have a pattern for it yet.

Micah glanced at the jungle of weeds and ferns.

… on the other hand, he didn’t want to wade through that to look for the patterns he needed.

To the East, a path led between hills and woods. Maybe they could go there? Boars probably preferred the woods anyway, right? He asked Ryan.

“You still want to get to the Honey Ants, though, right?”

“Yeah.”

They would have to hurry.

The grass became shorter and the ground rougher as they descended. Micah stumbled onto a wider path and glanced between the shaded trees as he followed it, wary of ambushes. But for a while, nothing happened. It was as if they were on a field trip outside the city.

Eventually, Ryan casually asked, “So … do you own glasses?”

“Huh?”

“Glasses? You said you need them?”

“Oh, no. I have [Essence Sight], remember?”

“Except when you don’t,” Ryan countered. “Didn’t you own a pair before you got the Skill?”

“Nope.”

“Huh.”

Micah was about to ask him why, but then they reached … a bridge. Not an actual bridge made of stone. It was a small arced hill. There was a crumbling stone railing on the left-hand side, and a trickling stream from the woods flowed through a pipe underneath into a much larger, circular brick-lined opening in the hill rising to the left of them.

“Is that an entrance to the Sewers?” Micah asked.

Ryan readied his sword. “Yeah. Sometimes, things like to crawl out though.”

Neither of them wanted to enter the Sewers, but they did check both its entrance and the arm-thick tunnel running underneath for treasure. Micah could have sworn he saw something glint in its dark, but it was in the middle of the bridge and they had no way of reaching that far.

He muddied his arms and knees as he stretched, then tried throwing rope, but neither worked. He was easily two meters off from the prize.

“Can we dig in from above?” Micah asked.

“We can, but … with what?” Ryan splayed his arms a little. They didn’t have a shovel.

Micah eyed the stone railing.

“Oh. Do you really want to…?”

Micah did. They stomped their boots against the stone rods until two of them gave—and others clumbled—and used those to break open the dense earth. The thin rods weren’t very good for digging though, so they went into the woods to find wider sticks. Eventually, Micah just switched to digging with his hands.

After about ten minutes, Micah heard grunting and peeked out of the tiny indentation they had made. He wiped sweat from his brow with the back of an otherwise mud-crusted glove and saw an Earth Boar running towards them from the woods.

Ryan picked up his sword. “I’ll handle it,” he said. “Stay safe.”

Screw that. Micah hefted one of the stone rods in both hands and walked up to stand beside him.

Just like last time, Ryan got a good kick in during the beast’s charge, but this time, he immediately followed up with a two-handed thrust into its exposed neck. The blade almost glanced off of the dense earth and only went in a few inches. The beast stumbled along, sadly leaking light, and Micah whacked it on the head with his stone rod.

The rod broke in half.

The whack only seemed to make the boar angrier.

It rushed towards him, and Micah fended it off with his broken weapon while he retreated. Thankfully, Ryan brought his sword down on its neck from the side, like an executioner, and the beast buckled. Another strike into the newly-made wound and it burst into smoke.

Micah caught his breath and gave him a thumbs-up. That almost would have been great teamwork … if they had actually planned ahead or talked about any of it. Well, if Ryan hadn’t been there Micah could have just shoved the stone rod down the beast’s gullet and used the bridge’s ledge.

“What do normal people even use earth crystals for?” he asked as he picked it up. Fire crystals were mostly used for the city’s lamps and stoves. Mages could probably use them to aid in spells, too, or normal people to … heat water? Flesh was good for healing, alchemy, and, of all things, diets. What about earth?

“Masonry,” Ryan said, “and road building. Stuff like that.”

“Really? Why?”

“I … have no idea.”

“Huh. I wonder if I found a newly-made street outside of Westhill, would it glow?”

“We have the time now, we can always just walk around and check,” Ryan offered. Micah planned on holding him to that.

They went back to digging until they hit the familiar dark bricks of the Sewers and pried them out.

Micah had been right. Something had been glimmering in the tunnel underneath the bridge. As soon as the sunlight hit the large crystal, it lit up with a light grey essence of its own. But that essence was distorted, as if he was seeing it through a flowing river.

The stone itself was large and clunky, as if fused from a bunch of oval pebbles together. It seemed more naturally grown than other monster crystal and even looked like it had cracks and small holes in two of its sides. Micah wondered if it was porous.

“I’ve seen those before,” Ryan said. “But I’m, uh, drawing a blank on what it does right now. Can you tell?”

“Another earth crystal?” Micah guessed. “Or maybe stone. It’s different, though. It looks more like … watery pebble essence. Maybe river bed essence?” He looked at Ryan. “I swear there’s water mixed in with the stone in there.”

“Could it have two different essences?”

“Maybe? There’s no reason it shouldn’t be possible, but … it seems more like one to me.”

Maybe it was just the essence of a concept like “riverbed” or something. Micah wondered if it was valuable. It was pretty big as it covered the entire palm of his hand, but did the cracks and holes in it mean it was damaged? Either way, it went into his bag.

They washed up a little, filled the hole back in, and stomped until it was almost flat again, since the Tower might not repair itself anymore. The road still looked a little bumpy and muddy afterward, but they did their best. Maybe the sun would dry it? Micah also collected some chunks of stone from the railing, then.

“It’s good to be respectful,” Ryan mumbled, and he agreed.

As they headed on the path, Micah spotted a cliff-side rising over the woods and wondered if there would be a cave in it. Where there was a cliff, there was a cave, right? Did boars live in caves?

“I want to go there.” He pointed.

Ryan checked and shrugged. “Sure.”

That simple, they headed into the woods. The grass became thinner until it switched entirely to duff. It was a bit chillier, too. Micah heard grunting in the distance and spun around, looking for the boar that was sure to attack them, but there was nothing. Something seemed off to him, though. It made his skin crawl.

Ryan didn't seem to notice. As they stepped into a small clearing, he asked, “But you’ll have to buy glasses eventually, right?“

“Wha—”

Something fell on Micah’s shoulder and bounced off. He flinched and immediately slapped it away, but it had just been a pinecone. He sighed in relief, then glanced up. Why had a pinecone fallen on him?

A larger brown object was falling towards him. It had orange, glowing slits for eyes, wooden teeth, and twigs for limbs. It was also screaming a squeaky battlecry.

Micah took a step back and it plopped to the ground before him. It was the size and shape of a bag of sugar. Guessing by how it had hit the ground, it had to be much lighter. It was also made entirely of gnarled, bark-covered wood.

It righted itself up and stared at him. Then it screamed again with an orange glow in the back of its throat and charged.

Some kind of mini-Treant? Micah wondered.

It clung to his leg and gnawed ineffectively. “It’s kind of cute,” he mumbled.

Ryan cursed and Micah knew something was wrong.

Another brown object fell next to him. And another. And one hit his shoulder and wrapped vine-thin branches around his arm to steady itself. Micah slapped that one away. More and more kept on falling.

“Freaking Saplings,” Ryan called and kicked one away. It sailed over a small hill and disappeared.

“Are they dangerous?” Micah asked. The one from earlier was still gnawing at his chainmesh as if that would do anything, but the sheer numbers falling from the trees all around them … How many of them were there?

“Kill them quickly,” Ryan insisted before one landed on his head and he slapped it away. It had started pulling his hair … and biting? Had it been trying to bite his hair off?

“Oh, well,” Micah said. “You heard the man.“ He leaned down and stabbed the tiny thing in the mouth. It was like stabbing a brittle chunk of firewood: probably not good for his knife, but what else was he supposed to do? The Sapling burst into forest-colored smoke.

He tried stomping another one to death, but it mostly just hurt his foot.

More and more wordless battlecries joined the fray, but for some reason, they all seemed to be focussing on Ryan. One or two attacked Micah here and there. They attacked him by the dozens.

Some of the ones that had missed were climbing up tree trunks and trying again, or just jumping off them halfway to sail in an arc towards him. Others were trying to climb up his legs.

Ryan batted them all aside.

While Micah pressed one Sapling to the ground, he watched him strike falling foe after foe out of the air around him. He spun and kicked, used shield and sword, and none of them could approach him.

It was impressive.

He realized then why they were all focussing on him, too. The orange glow in the Saplings was part heat. Here, in the shaded part of the forest, they must hunt by heat signatures. And in the fighting, Ryan must have let his control on his Skill slip. Either that or he knew the Saplings hunted by temperature and did it ... on ... purpose.

Damnit, Ryan. It was probably the latter.

Half a dozen sharp stings came from Micah’s waist and he winced as he snatched a Sapling off that had bitten him, then pressed it face-first to the ground with his other hand where it could join its kin. He was pretty sure the bite had left splinters, but he didn’t care about that now.

His eyes were stuck on Ryan fighting. He wanted to observe. And learn.

That was until the first Sapling he had pinned started to bristle and swell underneath his hand. Micah didn’t know what why and lifted it up. Its face was bloating, slit-like eyes turning to circles. Then its mouth extended into one large one as well, with wooden teeth like a carved pumpkin.

Micah hurled it away, but it had barely left his hand when it exploded into a shower of shrapnel.

He turned away and shielded his eyes, but things cut him and there was a ringing in his ear. Stinging sensations started flaring up along his face from a dozen different wounds. Everything was shifting like he’d turned in circles for too long. It was making him sick.

“—icah?” Ryan was shouting. “Micah!”

His mind seemed to groan. He did tell me to kill them quickly.

The second Sapling bristled in his other hand and Micah threw it as far as he could. The next clearing over, it exploded as well. Strangely enough, the fragments of that explosion stayed where they landed. The ones stuck in Micah’s skin did, too. Were they all fully-formed?

Micah checked, but the ones Ryan was massacring were bursting into forest-colored smoke. That was a contradiction. Had Micah been unlucky enough to capture two fully-made ones? He doubted it.

But still, they freaking exploded if you didn’t kill them quickly enough? He knew monsters were suicidal, but this…?

“Don’t move!” Ryan shouted over his shoulder. The heat essence around him flared higher than Micah had ever seen it before and he was visibly sweating. The Saplings screamed wordlessly as they charged him. “You’ve got splinters.”

Yes, Micah could feel the splinters. He plopped to the ground and pulled one out that had somehow slipped into his glove. The wound oozed blurry red. Had he somehow turned [Essence Sight] off again? No, he could still see. Maybe he hit his head. He probably hit his head.

Your ear, his mind corrected him.

That would explain the blurry river of purple and orange that was trickling down the tree next to him. Had someone poured a bucket of paint over it?

He heard chittering, saw a hundred legs tapping all along the tree trunk, and got his knife.

Nope. Not paint. A giant freaking centipede.

Seeing those legs, Micah wondered how he had ever thought the Honey Ants’ appetizing.

It stretched its head up to look at Micah and a figure rushed by, blade high, and impaled it to the ground. Ryan had appeared out of nowhere. He stumbled up to the insect after the strike, but hopped back and pulled Micah a few feet through the duff by his good arm. The other was littered with wood. The centipede’s head stretched forward, splitting into two, and feelers reached out towards him. But they couldn’t get close enough. They stopped a few inches away from his face.

Ryan’s wiggling sword was the only thing keeping it off him. The other boy must have known that, because he switched his shield to his other arm and started bashing down on the centipede with its side, apparently trying to split it in half.

Thankfully, it bled light.

Micah snatched a Sapling next to him and tossed it across the clearing, avoiding the massive insect feelers.

The centipede must have realized it couldn’t reach Micah anymore because its head reached around to go for Ryan instead.

Micah shook his head at it. Don’t turn your back on an enemy. He almost laughed, though. He had his back to about a dozen enemies right now. Still, he crawled up to Ryan, plucked a bristling Sapling off his leg, and laid it underneath the centipede. Then he tackled him away with barely any force at all. The other boy seemed too surprised to stop him.

The centipede behind them buckled as the Sapling exploded. Small bits of something showered onto Micah’s back and dissolved into light, but he tried not to think of where they had come from.

Underneath him, Ryan was staring him with wide eyes. No, not at him. At his face. The why could wait.

Micah rolled off him and checked on their enemy. Miraculously, the centipede was still alive, but had been almost torn in half. Its head and a few of its segments lay upside-down on the forest floor, feelers and legs twitching aimlessly. The rest of its body was hanging from a hole high up in the tree, gushing light. They were both connected by a chunky thread of chitin and glowing light.

Micah pulled the sword free and severed that connection with a few quick hacks. The first section burst into smoke then. The others followed like chained firecrackers.

Ryan took his sword from him, Micah by the elbow, and fled. Behind them, two more Saplings exploded.

“Good idea,” Ryan said as he put his shield behind Micah’s head. Debris pattered off of it.

“Why kill them when you can use them?” Micah explained.

Ryan kept on glancing at him as they ran, worry clear in his face, and said, “Uhm, you should know, their crystals explode, too, when they do.”

“Oh. Drat. Thanks for telling me.”

Was there any way he could avoid that? Micah slowed down and groped for Ryan’s backpack. Thankfully, he noticed and stood still. And thankfully, he had his breeze potion in a proper cologne bottle with him. It was almost empty, but it would do.

When Ryan saw it, he glanced at Micah’s face again and almost took it the bottle from him. Softly, he said, “That’s not the healing potion, Micah. Here, let me—”

“It’s the breeze potion,” Micah said and pulled it back. “They hunt by heat.” Then he turned around and marched towards the tiny, screaming mini-Treants that were chasing them. Everything seemed to wobble a little, like someone was weighing the forest left and right. But it was no worse than running through a forest in the first place, so what did he care?

The first Sapling that reached him he sprayed in the face. It halted and seemed confused for a moment before it looked around, saw him, and screamed again. Micah sprayed it one more time, then picked it up, and sprayed it all over. When he sat it back down again, the Sapling plopped to its butt on the ground and looked around a bit, like Sam might, but otherwise did nothing.

“Wow,” Ryan said behind him. “That worked?”

A dozen more were reached them and Micah walked to the next one, repeating himself, “Why kill them when you can use them?”

Ryan stopped him again, though, and took the bottle from his hand. “Good idea, but you need to rest, Micah … and put some pressure on those wounds of yours. Let me handle the others.”

“They’re shallow,” Micah told him confidently, but Ryan was already headed off.

So while he got to work, Micah sat down for a bit. He did feel kind of tired. His head stung from what he assumed were a bunch of splinters, and something was sticking to his right eyelid. Blood?

Huh.

He shrugged off his pack and got out bandages and waterskin, then started cleaning it off. He couldn’t see the splinters and he didn’t want to make things worse, so he stuck to just the eye and then pressed the cloth against his head. Maybe he could head back to the Sewer entrance to get a reflection of himself? Later. He had to wait for Ryan right now.

Eventually, the Sapling next to him attacked him again. Micah immediately saw his mistake. He picked it up, rattled it a little, and set it back down. The breeze potion required motion to work.

Ryan called a few minutes later, “Micah? It’s not working on this one.”

Micah checked and mulled it over.

“Micah?”

Why wouldn’t it work?

“Micah?”

“I’m thinking!”

“Dude, your face is covered in blood. Answer me.”

“It’s fully-formed," Micah said. "The breeze potion works mostly with essence. It must be sensing real heat … I think.”

A few minutes after that, Micah shook the Sapling next to him again and Ryan showed up with eight more in his arms. One of them didn’t have any lights in its eyes and a hole sticking out the back. Micah wondered what kind of potions he could make with its bark.

“Only eight?”

“I ran out of potion,” Ryan explained. “Had to kill the rest.”

He hadn’t even noticed.

Ryan dumped them all down in front of him, glanced at Micah’s face with a grim expression, and shrugged off his bag.

“Is it really that bad?”

Ryan searched for the right words to say or a way to put it nicely before he answered, “You look like you were sprinting. And you tripped. And skidded face-first through a stretch of wooden chips and gravel. You know, the ones they use in playgrounds?”

“Oh.”

It didn’t feel that bad, though. His ear was still ringing a little and he was bleeding, but that was it. He put on his best grin and asked, “Do I look cool?”

Ryan glared at him. “No.” Then he held a waterskin to Micah’s face and said, “Drink.”

“Don’t move,” Ryan repeated ten minutes later as he pulled yet another splinter from his shoulder.

“I’m not moving,” Micah insisted with a grimace.

“You’re trembling.”

“That’s your hand.”

“Oh.”

Thankfully, Micah had turned away and shielded his eyes during the blast, but he still got hit by the brunt of the shrapnel. Finger-long, thin splinters of wood stuck in his shoulder, the lower part of his neck, and the side of his face. They didn’t reach very deep—the force of the blast hadn’t been enough for that—but they hung off his skin. It was uncomfortable. Others had just grazed him. One of them had sliced a long, thin cut into his forehead. That’s where most of the blood came from.

If it had been any worse, Ryan would have had to search his bag to get the middle-grade healing potion out. They didn’t need it—the wounds weren’t bad enough—but Micah was still glad that he had it.

… or at least, they didn’t need it yet. Micah couldn’t go home looking like this. But first, he had to make sure the wounds were clean.

“Stay still,” Ryan mumbled.

“I am still.”

His ear had stopped ringing a little bit ago and he felt mostly back to normal. After just a sip of disgusting healing potion that burned his throat, he’d chugged water. That helped.

He had also made Ryan chug water. It looked like he’d lost a liter of it in sweat just so he could taunt all the Saplings. That had been unnecessary. If he had left Micah his fair share of opponents … Argh. Whatever. Next time, Micah was just going to kill them quickly.

“I’m talking to my hand,” Ryan said.

“Oh.”

Finally, he pulled out the last of the visible splinters and wiped off the blood with a cloth dabbed with a tiny bit of healing potion. At first, Micah had insisted on pulling out the splinters himself, but he couldn’t do that without a mirror, could he? And Ryan had shot down his idea of trekking back to the river. Now, he admitted it felt kind of nice to be cared for. Even if it hurt his pride. Since it was Ryan, Micah could just swallow that.

“Saplings explode if you don’t kill them quickly enough,” he said eventually.

“I gathered as much. So much for cute little mini-Treants.”

Ryan gave him an amused look.

Micah was a little more interested in the how. He fiddled with a tiny crystal shard that a nearby Sapling had dropped. It was filled with a weird mixture of water and wood essences. Maybe tree sap essence? It wasn’t even as big as his thumb.

Then he picked up one of the now-docile Saplings and inspected its eyes and mouth. They glowed orange from heat and they were attracted to the largest heat source in the area, so that was probably a theme ... but how did heat lead to wood exploding? And where had that glow even come from?

“Are they golems?” he asked. Golems had spirits animating them, he knew. What about Treants? “Are Treants golems?”

“Sort of,” Ryan told him. “They’re both classified as Golems, but there are supposed to be differences. For one, Treants animate living beings—trees—and most golems are made of things like rocks, or cloth, or wax ... But I don’t know much more than that. Never really studied them since, y’know …”

“They aren’t beasts.” Micah nodded. “Gotcha.”

He put the Sapling back down and shook another. They would have to kill them sooner or later. They couldn’t use them all as weapons. If they did, they would lose their crystals.

Ryan sighed and leaned back. “Done. I think. Just let me put a loose bandage wrap around it.”

“Yeah, sure,” Micah mumbled. “... thanks.”

He lifted his arm and waited, then put his shirt and armor back on. The extra weight felt both good and bad on the wounds, but Micah couldn't use the middle-grade healing potion yet in case the wounds weren’t clean enough.

After collecting a total of seventeen Sapling crystals, he came upon the one left by the centipede. It was the same orange and purple as its chitin had been, but more diluted, as if most of it were made of murky water. Micah opened up his bag in front of it and swiped it in. He didn’t want to touch it any more than he would have wanted to touch the monster it came from. He was pretty sure it was filled with chitin essence.

Once they’d found everything, they headed further in. Micah’s skin still stung from the scratches, but it was nothing bad, he assured Ryan. Plus, Ryan suspected the Saplings or centipede might have been guarding something valuable.

“Not the centipede,” Micah told him. “It was coiled inside that tree like a worm in an apple.”

"Then the Saplings."

A few minutes further in, they did find a cave at the base of the cliff-side and watched it wearily from behind a tree … after checking to make sure that tree didn’t have any unwelcome guests. The cave was pitch black and they couldn’t know what was inside of it. An Earth Boar? More than one? A tunnel down? Maybe even some monsters from other floors, like Cataracts?

Ryan frowned. “We don’t have a light—”

Micah pressed a Sapling into his hand, looked him in eyes, and said, “Push up [Hot Skin] until it bristles, aim, and throw.”

Ryan grinned and did as he'd said. A moment later, they plastered themselves to the tree trunk and waited for the explosion. They peeked around, but no monster came out.

Micah could have gotten used to using the Saplings as weapons, but he didn’t want to waste their crystals. So in case the potion suddenly wore off, they killed off all but three and used his slingshot to launch one of their crystals into the dark.

Still, nothing came out. Micah couldn’t see anything either.

“Think it’s safe?” he asked

“Safe as cute little mini-Treants.”

“Hrn.”

Micah launched in two more crystals for a little more light before they slowly walked up to the cave. Ryan took the lead again with his shield out, relying mostly on Micah for visual support.

A few steps away from the cave, he chucked in another one … and hit the charging Earth Boar right between its eyes.

Undisturbed, the beast hit Ryan’s shield and shoved him aside with a grunt as it ran past.

Micah spun around and drew back his slingshot out of reflex, realized his mistake, and tossed it aside. He got out his knife and one of the Saplings instead.

The boar charged Ryan again, ramming him with its tusks over and over and circling him like one of those, tiny, angry dogs. Unfortunately, it was a little bit bigger than a tiny angry dog. Ryan was losing ground. His shield was suffering. It rushed past him and nicked his leg with its tusk, drawing blood.

“Ryan, drop the sword!” Micah called.

The other guy glanced at him and threw his blade aside, freeing his hand for the Sapling that followed.

Micah circled around to where his sword laid, picked it up, and shoved it into the boar’s side. It didn’t even pierce it. The boar was bigger than the others and its tusks longer. It had to be fully-formed.

Micah didn’t have time to concentrate and check. But there was a better way to do that.

The Sapling in Ryan’s hand bristled as he heated up his skin, and he tossed it underneath the beast, waited a second, then threw himself away. The Earth Boar was almost lifted off the ground from the explosion and fell to its side, bleeding … light.

“You’ve got to be kidding me!” Micah cried. Not even the larger Earth Boar hiding in a cave was fully-formed?

Dragging Ryan’s sword over, he stabbed it in the gut a few times until the monster burst. Then he shrugged his bag off one shoulder, shook the two Saplings inside absentmindedly, and switched them for a waterskin, bandages, and the middle-grade healing potion he had bought.

“Uh, Micah. Can you not toss my sword in the dirt like a broken stick?”

“Huh?” Micah hadn’t even noticed doing that. “Oh. Sorry.” He picked it up, wiped both sides off his pants, and gave it back. Then he crouched down to get a look at Ryan’s leg.

“What are you doing?” he asked.

“Healing you.”

“Not with the middle-grade potion you aren’t,” he said and held out a hand. “Backpack.”

Micah grumbled but handed him his backpack. A few minutes later, they had wrapped a bandage around Ryan’s leg and Micah waddled around the clearing, collecting their things. At least, the crystal from the cave’s boar was a little larger than the other two he had. But still—

“That was a bust,” he mumbled.

“Not at all,” Ryan said as he walked out of the cave carrying a small chest made of dark wood and a bark-covered lid. “Treasure.”

He said it like an adult might call, “Dinner.” And just like then, Micah rushed to get his hands on the goods. They crowded over the chest on the ground, shoulder to shoulder, as they opened it up.

Inside was a small shield made of bark and an even smaller sack made of what Micah assumed was hemp.

Ryan went for the shield, eyes wide, and Micah couldn’t help but grin as he watched him. This was perfect for him, after all. He seemed to compare it to his other shield. It was a little bit smaller, and … its edge wasn’t as sharp, its front wasn’t as flat. It seemed to be made of twisting roots that were pressed together and covered in thick bark in one direction. A leaf grew off from one of them. Not roots, then. Branches.

Micah didn’t want to say anything, but that seemed like a bad design for a shield.

Ryan must have noticed it himself. His eyes were still wide and his lips betrayed a hint of a smile, but he tested the shield, rapped his knuckles against it, turned it over and inspected every angle. It was sturdy, at least, but it didn’t look like it should be. His smile slowly lessened.

“Is it enchanted?” Micah asked.

“Maybe? I don’t know what it does.”

“Gnarled bark shield,” Micah mused out loud … and quickly drew a blank. He had no idea what it could do either.

“Probably just looks exotic,” Ryan said and put it back. “And only has a weak durability enchantment. A lot of Tower items are like that. If that’s the case, we can still sell it for a decent sum.”

That was disappointing.

The only other item in the chest was the small, hemp-like bag. Micah peeked through the tiny holes in the material and saw it was filled with dark, almost black soil. It was maybe a fifth the size of the large bags his mom made him carry home when she bought them. How much did those hold? Half a liter? So maybe 100ml of black soil? He wondered what it did.

“That’s probably some kind of fertilizer,” Ryan told him. “Or just soil that inherently has [Green Thumb].”

“You don’t think a seed could be in it?”

Childishly, he thought of magic trees with crystal apples that gave you Skills or beanstalks that reached to the clouds.

“Usually plants come in pots or other containers with a bud already peeking out," Ryan told him. "Or you’ll just find a tiny paper bag or a jewelry box filled with seeds. In either case, don’t open it. In case we want to sell it?”

Micah mulled it over while he continued to peek, looking for thin white roots, but then he put it back. “What do you think it’s worth?”

“I’ve never found one before, but I think I’ve heard stories. Maybe a silver penny?”

Micah took a second glance. “Really? For a small sack of soil?”

“Sure. People pay well for high-quality goods.”

Micah thought it over, but in the end. It was only really worth as much as two fully-formed Honey Ants in the Bazaar. Considering how easy it had been to get a hold of those two—relatively speaking; if they had killed the second one instead of kidnapping it, they would have gotten away easily—the sack wasn’t really that valuable, loot-wise. But for soil?

Micah couldn’t see himself paying that much for, well … a bag of dirt. Maybe he was being childish.

He closed the lid and ran his hands over its bark. To him, that was the real treasure. The Salamander chest had been durable and warm to the touch. He wondered if people made things from chests’ wood.

He shook the Saplings, placed them on top, and picked up the chest. Then he headed further into the woods.

“Where are you doing?” Ryan asked, jogging after him.

“We still need to find an Earth Boar, right?”

The other guy took him by the shoulders, spun him back around, then led him back towards the fields and portal.

“Checking up to the cave was fine, but that’s it,” Ryan said. “Half of your face is bleeding as we speak, Micah. There’s no way we’re fighting Earth Boars like that. Plus, we already got some treasure, right?”

“Yeah, but only one pattern that I don’t even have a recipe for.”

“How much did that middle-grade healing potion cost?”

“...a silver penny.”

The pressure on his back eased up for one step, but Ryan quickly caught himself again and pushed on. Micah knew he’d overpaid slightly. He just couldn’t bring himself to haggle like Ryan could. Or Lisa, or Garen, or any reasonable human being. Especially not in a proper shop.

But he felt like the price was an assurance of quality. It'd even had a stamp of verification.

Ryan, at least, was too polite to say anything.

“Well, if we sell the bag for a silver penny, you get … a copper penny …” he mumbled and trailed off. Micah knew what he had wanted to propose—buying ingredients from his shares of the loot—but his argument was falling somewhat flat. “We can still sell the rest once we know whether or not you can use it.”

That was true. They had twenty-two tiny Sapling crystals, three Earth Boars’, and a porous river bed one. They could also sell the chest … which Micah didn’t want to do. It looked cool and he could always use more space to keep things in.

“What about the Honey Ants?” he asked.

Ryan shook his head. “We need to properly clean the wound and get it healed. That comes first. Summer break is here, we can always go back into the Tower again later.”

In the end, Micah didn’t really have a choice. It was kind of annoying to have bandages and blood sticking to half his face and Ryan kept on glancing at him like he might faint at any moment.

“Fine,” he said. “But we’re not going to the infirmary, okay? I’m not signed up.”

“I know that. We’ll go to someone better.”

“Who?”

“My dad.”

“Hold still,” David said with tweezers poised against Micah’s cheek.

“I am still,” Micah insisted for the umpteenth time.

He looked away—the closest he could get to pouting while the man’s long hands forced his head in place—and thought, Annoying father like annoying son.

They were gathered in the Payne kitchen, all four of them. Micah sat on the table, Ryan against the wall as he watched his father pluck out tiny splinters they hadn’t even been able to see in the shaded woods, and Noelle was inspecting their loot.

Apparently, David had a lot of experience with treating wounds but Micah didn't know why. Did security workers in a Westhill inn really see that much action? Micah would have to ask Ed later.

“Do you two want to start a treasure chest collection or something?” Noelle mumbled. She must have noticed the Salamander chest in Ryan’s room. Now, she opened up this one and picked out the purple and orange crystal without knowing what it was. Micah almost winced.

“Don’t,” he warned her.

“Huh?” David paused.

“Mrs. Payne,” he clarified. “That came from a giant centipede.”

She glanced at him, then the crystal, and threw it back into the treasure chest with a shudder.

“No-elle,” David corrected him. “We’re not that old that you need to call us mister and missus.”

They weren’t. But they were Ryan’s parents, soo …

“What even did that to your face?” Noelle said. She had joined a few minutes late, since she had still been at work, but didn’t seem all that surprised by her husband triaging her son’s friend on the kitchen table.

Micah was a little surprised by how long they had been in the Tower. Instead of an hour or two, like he had assumed, they had been inside for four. How? Where had all that time gone?

“Saplings,” Ryan answered and pointed at the dead one lying on the table. “It exploded, but it was my fault. I didn’t warn him expressively enough.”

“Ooh, those are bad,” David said. “I’m sure you did your best, cham—” He coughed and said in a deeper voice, “Son.”

Micah smiled. He hadn’t wanted to call his son “champ” in front of his friend. “He did tell me to kill them quickly,” he clarified. “I just got distracted by his, uhm, fighting style, underestimated the enemy, and messed up.”

David glanced at him but otherwise said nothing.

Noelle began to pluck splinters from his armor and tossed them in the trash.

Lisa still hadn’t been home when they visited her after getting out of the Tower, so Ryan had offered to keep his things in his room instead. If he wanted to?

Micah had seen how annoyed Mave was, like always, and had glimpsed Lisa’s aunt in the distance, so he agreed and they moved the things over. They threw their equipment into the chest and covered it with a spare shirt, then used another to make a makeshift hoodie for Micah so he could walk through Westhill without anyone noticing. They also took a long way around to have the shortest route to Ryan’s house.

Apparently, Ryan’s own bandaged leg wasn’t a problem since people were used to him walking around with small wounds.

“I thought you said you were careful,” Micah had asked him.

“More careful,” Ryan clarified. “And those weren’t always from the Tower. There are some Westgate kids that like to give Lang and us trouble sometimes, so we, uh, give them trouble back.”

Micah had realized in awe, “You’re a delinquent.”

“Am not. Shut up.”

“No. I was giving you a compliment, Ryan.”

Something ripped and Noelle opened up the sack of soil with a knife. She got out a little bit and inspected it.

“Uhm.” Micah didn’t know what to say.

Ryan needed a moment before he even noticed. “Oh, I didn’t want to open that, mom. In case we wanted to sell it?”

“Huh? Are you telling me you didn’t want to offer your poor mother the magical potting soil you found in the magical Tower?”

Ryan blushed and rubbed his neck in embarrassment. “I could buy you four bags of regular potting soil from that?” he offered.

“I can also make fertilizer potions, ma’a—” He coughed and mimicked David’s deeper voice, “Noelle.”

David smiled.

“I’m just joking,” she said. “Sorry for opening it, Rye. But you can always just ask for someone with proofing abilities wherever you sell it.” She brushed off her hands off over the bag again and pointed. “And I’ll take you up on that offer someday, Micah. But not just yet.”

“At least not for six months,” David added.

“Six months?” Micah wondered about something. “Hey, maybe your little brother or sister will share your birthday, Ryan. How cool would that be?”

Ryan’s face said, Not cool at all.

David pulled out another tiny splinter and Micah winced.

“Almost done,” he assured him.

“And this?” his mom asked, holding the shield of gnarled wood in her hands.

Ryan shrugged. “I don’t know what it is.”

“Honey, do you know?”

“Hm?” David glanced over and considered. “Second-floor, you said? Worst-case, it’s just a weirdly shaped shield. Most likely a simple durability enchantment. Best-case, it’s enchanted with Growth.”

Ryan’s eyebrows went up and he seemed to look at the shield as for the first time ... but he still didn't openly smile. Despite having found a literal treasure chest.

Smile, damn you.

“Growth?” Micah asked.

“It’s like a weaker version of Growing Boots,” Ryan explained. “Or maybe not weaker, but different. The shield can grow back if it’s damaged. And there are ways to make it grow into different shapes. However, you literally have to stick it into the ground and water it for that.”

“Oh.”

Micah imagined Ryan standing over a shield sticking halfway out of the ground with a watering can in hand, whistling like a bird, and chuckled.

He also realized what had made his skin crawl in the woods then. Birds. The only sounds in the woods had been the trickling of the stream and the boars grunting in the distance.

“Maybe that’s what the soil is for?” Noelle asked.

“Huh?”

They all three turned to look as she pointed at the bag.

Micah wouldn’t have even have thought of that. Or at least, not so soon.

“Hey, maybe it really is enchanted with Growth!” David said. “You should definitely get them both appraised, Rye.”

“I will, dad.”

“Oh, I know this one,” Noelle said, holding up the cluster of blue-grey crystal. “It’s a filter stone.”

“Excuse me?” Micah asked.

“If you run water through it one way, it’ll purify it and soak up the filth.” She turned it one way and pointed inside. “And if you run it through another way, you can wash out the filth. It can only filter so much, though. The less it has to work, the longer it lasts.”

“Cool.”

“Could be useful for an [Alchemist],” Ryan commented.

“Yeah.” Micah smiled and asked, “By the way, where can you get stuff appraised?”

“Guild,” Ryan and David said in unison. They didn’t even seem to notice.

After all three of the Paynes checked his wounds for any last splinters, and David had cleaned and disinfected them properly, they finally used the middle-grade healing potion to heal his face.

It felt weird ... like someone was tugging his skin back together by force, then holding it fast with clamps or stitches. It felt tight, and apparently, that feeling would last for days. But Micah didn’t mind.

“Half of a day’s trip and half of my best face for this,” he said as he considered the chest full of loot. “What a steal.”

Ryan, at last, chuckled at that.

Then David held him still from behind while Micah treated and forced the rest of the healing potion on his wounded leg. Ryan struggled anyway.

“You two will have to send off your applications soon, right?” David asked as they cleaned up the kitchen.

Ryan rubbed his leg with a scowl. “Yeah.”

Micah nodded in sympathy. His face felt weird, too. He quickly switched over to panic. “How long do we have?”

“You have to hand it in by Sunday,” Noelle said. “You can get the forms at the …” Her voice went up.

“Guild,” Micah guessed.

“Exactly.”

“We’ll need a copy of your report card and a Proof Of paper,” Ryan said.

“Wait, what?” Micah asked. “But then I’ll only have a week to level up again.”

“Uhm,” Ryan looked stumped.

“They take that into consideration,” David said. “You can hand in a newer paper at any time during the examination process. But don’t do it every single time you get a new Skill or level. That looks bad.”

“Oh. Good.” Micah breathed in relief.

“That just leaves the question of where,” Ryan said. “I know a private office in Nistar that doesn’t keep records, only a receipt of your visit. Where we went last time?” He looked at his parents and they nodded. “We could also go to the Guild, but they do keep a record. And that’s just … weird. So do you want to come with?”

“Uhm, Lisa offered to have me proofed during a study session once,” Micah said. “But it would be by her aunt …”

“You want to go to her?”

Micah shrugged. “It’d be free, I assume. And we’re going to her place on Tuesday anyway so I can ask her again. If not, I’ll go with you.”

“You don’t want to wait until last minute,” David told them. “Ask for an appointment and get it done as soon as possible, in case something comes up or goes wrong.”

“Yes, sir,” they both said.

But as they brought up all their things into Ryan’s room, Micah couldn’t help but feel like he should level up before they got themselves proofed. He wanted to make a good first impression on his application after all. So as they organized their stuff, he went back to convincing Ryan of something else.