James felt a little like a creeper as he stood over the pile of sleeping kobolds. They were sleeping in a heap on the enchanted blanket they had recovered yesterday and even with the five of them, there was still a lot of room on the blanket. They really did look like adorably small, if muscular, reptilian children and that wasn’t helping his feeling. He reached his hand out to the one who was acting as the leader of the group and concentrated.

For a short period he simply watched the indistinct and fuzzy dreams play through its head. He was amused to see that the kobold dreamed of being bossed around in his sleep just as he did awake. He could feel how taxing this was on his mana and so he quickly stepped into the kobold’s dream, choosing to appear the same height as the kobold himself. After a few strange short sentences, he traded names with the kobold and withdrew from the dream.

Tikkis, that’s a good name. James thought to himself as he swayed with exhaustion, letting the beads of sweat fall down his brow. The [Dream Walker] skill had been highly intensive to both his concentration and mana pool and it caused his head to feel wooly and dry. He almost tripped as he left the shed where the Kobolds had been sleeping, catching the doorframe to steady himself.

“You ok there?” Came Liam’s call from by the fire. He was sitting on a log while journaling.

“Yeah, just emptied my mana again and… well it’s been a long day.”

“Ooh, nasty. And I feel that. Who’s gonna take the first watch?”

“Ugggh. No watch. If we die we die. I’m at least gonna sleep before I die.”

“I’d agree with you… But.” Liam ended with a mischievous smile.

“But what?” James responded grumpily.

“We’re both gonna level up, right?”

“Yeah, so?”

“I’m fairly certain if either one of us takes even a five-minute nap, all of our mana and energy will be replenished.”

“Oh heck yeah.” James exclaimed with sudden excitement. “I’ll be the first one to try. Wake me up in five.” He said before unceremoniously flopping onto Liams sleeping roll he had laid out near the fire.

Five minutes later Liam woke him up and he felt like he had just had one of the best night's sleep he had in ages. With a promise to wake him in a few hours, James let Liam fall asleep in the truck cab.

“Ok, what's my plan now?” James talked aloud to himself. “We have way better arms and armor than we did before the dungeon so that's not too much of a problem. Oh shoot, I need to check how long till we can use the dungeon again. I need to experiment with my new skills and the extent of my weaving abilities. We need to organize the Kobolds into some type of workforce, we may be able to finish the fort way sooner with them. We need to build some shelters down here to use while the fort is still being worked on. A more dependable toilet solution is a must. Study my skill books and the new spellbook. We’re gonna need a stable source of food really soon. What about learning how to communicate with the kobolds? Liam has already made some progress on that front. I know he’s gonna wanna set up a forge soon to work on all that metal. That will probably be his next profession but I need to figure what my third will be too…” He had been numbering off fingers as he had been adding jobs to his list and only stopped when he had run out of fingers.

“Ok, first off I need a list.”

He had stolen a page from Liam’s journal and written out his list in order of priority.

Water [✓] Food [✓] (for now) Shelter Organize workforce Work on communication Figure out dungeon Practice weaving Study spellbook Study skills Profession? Workout Find more humans? Toilet

He really wished he could start on the shelters right now, but he didn’t have enough wood to work with and he knew it would make too much noise. Ok, what I can work on right now I will. As he thought this, he folded up the page and walked over to the entrance to the dungeon.

WARNING:

[Drake Mines] lie ahead

Lvl. 3 Dungeon

(~1% Evolved)

Dungeon will be inaccessible till evolution process is complete:

10 Days 19 Hours

“Damn.”

That was way longer than he expected. But it was probably a good thing he thought. We will be prepared when we enter the next time. Checking that off his list, he went on to the next matter of practicing weaving.

Using a combination of his skill [Study] and the gut feelings that his skills had given him, he began experimenting with his new weaving skills.

[Uncommon Weave] was simple enough. He now could make a spear with a steel, silver, or even gold spearhead. These materials used a significant amount more of his manna but with his [Mana Bank] skill and his level up, he now had 128 mana points to throw around. A not insignificant number. However, once he started trying to weave weapons with small enchantments on them, he found that he didn’t have nearly enough mana for practicing that. A simple steel spear with a lesser sharpness enchantment took close to thirty points to weave and over three points a minute to maintain. He tried making steel gauntlets with a hardness enchantment, but he was only able to create one before he had to stop.

Exhausted, and sporting another headache, he tried something he had been thinking about since he charged the dungeon key. He took out one of the smooth mana stones they had found in the dungeon and focused on the aura of mana that radiated off of it. Slowly, he felt his mana returning to him. It was a strange sensation, like plunging his head into cool water that only touched his brain. After about five minutes he was topped off again and he could see that the stone was ever so slightly indented where his fingers had been making contact with it.

That’s gonna be useful. He thought while putting the stone back in his pocket, only to pull it right back out again as a thought struck him. Concentrating on the stone, he wove mana stone back into the indents on the stone. After he used his own mana supply to make the stone, he concentrated on attaching the source of the weave’s mana back onto the stone itself using his [Constant Weave] skill.

His head was aching fiercely now but he still smiled in triumph as the stone looked identical to when he first used it, even after releasing his mana’s connection to the weave.

“Ok, so I can make-make mana stones, I think.” He said aloud as he began to draw on the stone’s mana again to replenish what he used. After he topped off his manna again, he wove a tiny pebble of mana stone into existence and attached it to itself as its own source of mana. After releasing his connection to the weave, he waited close to five minutes for the pebble to shrink or to disappear. Much to his excitement, it did neither.

Ok, ok, here’s an idea.

He concentrated on the pebble and used the mana in it to weave an equal amount of mana stone onto the surface of the larger stone. Sweet it retains its mass. Must be an efficient system to not lose a perceivable amount of mass. James had studied law but had always been more interested in the sciences and in this moment he found himself thinking on what he knew of closed systems and conservation of mass and energy as he considered the implications of his discovery. I really can’t make an apples to apples comparison between magic and thermodynamics but they seem to rely on some of the same fundamental principles of logic. I’ll have to give this more thought. Onto the next experiment.

This time he used the mana stone as a core and wove an enchanted spear around the stone, using it as the source of mana. He was able to do it with little difficulty and he found that the spear existed entirely independently of his will or mana. This was a great discovery till he realized he wasn’t able to dispel the spear. He felt he would be able to if he could make contact with the mana stone, but he had wove the shaft of wood over the stone and was forced to use his hatchet to cut through the wood and touch the stone before he could dispel the spear. It was an important discovery and it also excited him to see how little of the stone had been used to form and maintain the spear.

The last experiment he tried was to weave a mana stone bracelet from the mana stone he was holding. He found that it was a simple process and decided to add most of his own manna to the weave before attaching its source to itself and making it permanent. Once done, it appeared to be a thin off-white quartz-like bracelet that laid tight around his wrist. That’s gonna be incredibly important. It’s a source of mana storage that I can use and access at will. If I’m right about this, the manna in this bracelet is probably close to ten times the mana I have now even with my [Mana Bank]. He was taken from his musings by a sound.

*Whoosh*

[Quest Complete!] Daily quest: Lvl. 4 [Class Training] has been completed.

EXP +250 (289 [EXP Boost])

Bonus requirement met: [Concept Discovery]

EXP +500 (625 [EXP Boost])

“Huh, cool.” He said as he checked another box off his list.

It had been long enough, he decided, so he woke up Liam. Liam woke up full of energy and began working on his own list. James was too hyped up and awake after his practice to go back to sleep. So after he told Liam about his weaving discovery and the news about the dungeon, he went into the chest-room and retrieved the spellbook. Sitting down by the fire and adding more wood for fuel, he focused on the book and activated his [Study Skill].

The book was a large tome, large enough to fill up his lap before he opened it. It has a simple leather binding that was covered in tiny intricate glowing magical runes. When he opened the book, he noted the thick but quality parchment that the pages were made of before focusing on the pages themselves. There was no language James could see, instead each page was dedicated to a single runic inscription or, in the case of the latter pages, part of an inscription that the pages after expanded on. Each inscription was made up of many runes. The inscription that filled the first page was only made up of four base runes but they flowed together to create one seamless inscription. On the last page, James saw that the inscription drawn there was made up of easily hundreds of runes, but this too formed a seamless picture.

Something about the runes spoke to their intention. James couldn’t say what it was, but after flipping through the book twice he was certain that all but the first spell were focused on the earth element. He focused on the first spell and did what his [Study] skill seemed to be implying he do and memorized the simple inscription. After less than five minutes it clicked.

*Ting*

A new sound hit his ears and he looked up to see a new kind of box floating before him. It was wispy and a pulsing light blue that seemed to be raining droplets of smoke-like rain down onto the ground below.

New Spell: [Light] was learned.

First spell instructions: Imagine the runic seal in your mind and funnel your mana into its substance.

Well that’s pretty vague. He tried anyway.

Suddenly, a bright ball of pure white light appeared directly in front of his face.

“GAH!” He shouted as the light burnt his eyes.

“You ok?” Liam said, already running over with sword in hand from where he had been working with the leather in the simple barrels.

“Fine! Fine.” James said blinking the white spot out of his eyes. He had already dispelled the light but his eyes were still recovering. “Learned a new spell. Managed to nearly blind myself using it.”

“Ok... You let me know if I can help.” Liam said, putting away his sword and motioning that it was ok to the frightened kobold heads that were sticking out of the door of the shed.

“I’ll be fine. I won’t do it again.” James said as the last of his vision returned.

Liam gave him a worried look, but soon returned to the work he was doing with the leathers. It appeared he was scraping the fat off of them before placing them in the barrels he had refilled with bark and tannin water.

James went back to his study making apologetic gestures to the kobolds who still were watching with curiosity instead of fear. He tried to cast the spell again but this time he pointed to a place some thirty feet distant and focused on the image of the ball of light appearing there. He still closed his eyes before he cast.

When he cautiously opened his eyes, he saw the orb floating where he intended it to be. He concentrated on the orb and willed it to move closer towards him. It didn’t budge. He tried to cast another orb several feet away from the first. The first disappeared. There’s a lot of rules to this I don’t get. He thought as he focused on the next spell.

This inscription, or runic seal as the system had named it, was significantly more complex but was still only made of nine individual runes. To James’ eyes it appeared that the four central runes made up their own image and the five around it embellished the whole. Working off that instinct, he attempted to memorize the central runes first.

*Ting*

New Spell: [Magic Bolt] was learned.

Ohh neat. James thought as a smile filled his face. He had only memorized the four inner runes but it appeared he was right and the whole spell was an embellishment of the central spell [Magic Bolt].

James focused and pointed at the ground near where his [Light] spell was still hovering. He concentrated on the runes and willed his mana into the seal.

*Crack*

The spell had shot out of his finger as fast as any arrow, maybe faster, and had hit exactly where he had been pointing. The bolt was an elongated point of condensed mana that glowed a low blue. Where the bolt had landed, there was a gouge cut out of the stone a finger wide by several long.

“Ok, that’s neat.” James whispered aloud. He pulled up his status screen and let off a few more bolts as he watched his MP. This time he aimed for farther away in the quarry to not cause too much noise. The *Cracks* still echoed back to him as he practiced. It appeared that the spell used up about five manna for every three bolts. A pretty good amount for what he considered to be a powerful ranged attack.

He went back to the book and this time spent the time memorizing the whole spell.

*Ting*

New Spell: [Stone Bolt] was learned.

James grinned a bit like a madman before walking to the far side of the quarry. He pointed at the center of the lake and filled the seal with mana.

*Whump*

The splash cavitated the water and created a localized explosion of pressurized gas and water.

“Wow”

James was shocked by the intensity of the spell. The bolt had been about as long as his arm and twice as thick around. It moved at a speed that made it nearly impossible to watch as it had shot into the small lake.

His grin grew into one of true mania as he sent a handful more bolts into the water. He watched his MP and saw that these bolts took around seventeen MP a shot.

“Worth it.” He panted, tired by the concentration and the mana usage required to fire off spells like that.

He looked around and saw that Liam and Tikkis were standing a distance behind him in the low light of the moonlit night. Liam simply clapped several times before turning back to his work. Tikkis stood there with mouth agape, seemingly waiting for James to do something more. James smiled and shrugged before returning to the fire where he had left the spellbook. Tikkis followed.

As he sat near the fire, he flipped to the next spell. This one was more complex by far. Close to sixty runes wound around each other in complex forms that formed an image that somehow seemed to imply a three dimensional shape. Tikkis looked over his shoulder and made a questioning noise and gesture towards the book. James considered it then decided he had very little to lose.

He flipped to the first page and mimed for Tikkis to come sit next to him. It took him close to a quarter hour but he managed to get Tikkis to copy the runes on the ground till he could do it from memory. Suddenly he saw the kobold react to an image only he could see and he knew he had gotten the message about learning [Light]. He then tried to get the kobold to concentrate on the spell and saw as the kobold created a tiny spark of light in his hand.

The kobold looked surprised and elated as he danced around carrying the tiny spark in his claws. He was off the wall excited but James was just confused. Why is it so small? The kobold was waking up his friends and showing them the light as they threw punches and grumbled at him to leave them alone.

James gestured for Tikkis to come over and considered the problem. He then had Tikkis put his hand on the mana stone bracelet. Immediately the light in his hand grew to the size and brightness that James had been earlier. James hadn’t thought Tikkis could get any more excited. He was wrong.

Tikkis was jumping up and down while letting out little hippy hoots as he looked at the magic in his hands. Once James managed to calm him down, he retrieved another small piece of mana stone from his pack and created a simple stone torq to go around Tikkis’ neck.

He then sat him down and flipped to the next page. It took Tikkis close to half an hour to get this spell. When. He did, James was able to tell by Tikkis’ reaction to the screen he couldn’t see. The small kobold focused and James watched as a long spike of stone slowly grew in his hands. Once the spell had grown to the correct size Tikkis threw it out into the night over the walls of the quarry. Tikkis looked overjoyed but exhausted, so despite his insistence that they study the next spell, James sent him back to bed as he checked another thing off his list and took out his skill books.

Finish leatherworking? No, Liam has that covered. Finish sword proficiency? It’s way faster to train. What about bow? Don’t really need that with the spells now. So physical fitness or just buckle down and start on masonry like I should. Ehh I guess masonry it is.

*Ding*

[Student] +1 EXP (966/1,000)

[Skill Transfer] - [Basic Masonry] (2/500)

*Ding*

[Student] +1 EXP (967/1,000)

[Skill Transfer] - [Basic Masonry] (3/500)

*Ding*

[Student] +1 EXP (968/1,000)

[Skill Transfer] - [Basic Masonry] (4/500)

…

*Ding*

Congratulations! You have reached level 3 [Student].

You have received new skill [Lesser Intellect]

“Wait what?”

Ability: [Lesser Intellect] Improves the users [Intellect] stat by 2 points.

“Wait what?”

Close to two hours after he started, James put down the book when he got to one hundred in his [Basic Masonry] study. He didn’t feel any smarter after his [Intellect] improved but he figured it would be apparent some other way.

He put down the book and walked over to where Liam was setting up the anvil and tools from the chest.

“Hey you good if I catch some sleep before the sun comes up?” He asked Liam.

“Yeah, you’re good. I’m too invested to take any time away from this. I figure I have an idea how to make a furnace but I’ll just repair some of the tools and weapons till I get the first level in blacksmith and the skills will explain the rest.” Liam excitedly replied.

“Sounds like a good idea. For what it’s worth I have a giant book on blacksmithing in the bag in the truck if you need it. It’s pretty extensive so feel free.”

“Will do. Let me try this first then I might see about the book. You gonna sleep in the truck?”

“That’s the plan. Hoping to raise some simple buildings tomorrow so we have a place to sleep and eat. I’ll get you those shelves and boxes tomorrow too. I’m short on wood though so I could use your help in the morning to fell some more trees.”

“Count on me. I got a skill that boosts my energy so I should be fine staying up all day. You go and rest.”

“Will do. Just Liam…”

“Yeah?”

“No matter how excited you are, please don’t start smithing in earnest till the sun’s up.”

“Said the giant magic rock man.”

“Fair.” James said defeated as he returned to the truck and wrapped himself in the woolen blanket.

Groaning, he extracted himself and returned to the frozen outdoors. Stepping down onto the snow with a bare foot he stopped. Why am I not freezing? It’s below freezing and I’ve been walking around with a torn shirt and no shoe all night. I just didn’t think about it due to the excitement but it’s really weird. He reached down and grabbed a handful of somewhat soggy snow. It was cold in his hands but it didn’t hurt him at all. Is this because of my levels or what? Whatever, I’ll just be thankful and worry about it later.

He walked over to the fire and scraped the remains of last night’s soup out of the large pot before making a couple runs to the lake with the bucket to fill it. He piled the coals under the pot and added some kindling to get the fire going again before adding a large amount of rice to the pot. He built up the fire till the water boiled then let it die down to coals. He then placed his wooden shield over the mouth of the pot as a kind of lid before returning to the truck.

By morning, the rice would be a simple porridge and he could add some fried bits of fatty meat to it for flavor before they ate it. It was nice to have the bulk food with the new additions to their camp but tomorrow he would really need to try to find a more consistent source of food for their growing group.

He curled back up into the passenger side of the truck, noting that the interior seemed to be rapidly aging and falling apart, before falling soundly asleep.

The first thing he did in his dream was find the stone circle. Waiting for him in the center of it was his mentor.

“Good to see you’re still alive.” Was all the greeting he got before his mentor wove a club into existence and chased him around the clearing with it.

“WHY” *Whack* “DON’T” *Whack* “YOU” *Whack* “LISTEN TO ME!” *Whack* *Whack* *WHACK*

“Hey! Hey! Stop it!” James was cringing and using his arms to deflect the blows aimed at his head. Nothing really hurt here in his dream, but he could still feel the aching of his pride. “I had a party member and we handled it.”

“You handled it huh? How many times did you or they almost die?” His mentor asked with a raised eyebrow.

“Me? I mean a slime tried to eat my foot, and there were all those spiders, and I stuck my arm down a wyvern’s throat. But I never really got hurt at all!”

“Despite how stupid all that sounds, I’m going to go ahead and ask you how many times your partner almost died.”

James looked more humbled by that. “Really close? I guess three times. Had to patch him up a couple times. It was ugly.”

“Good, it seems you learned something from that. A level one dungeon is safe for a party of five to seven level one adventurers. Level two, five to seven level two adventurers. Do you see how dangerous what you did is?”

“Yes sir. I just… We were both so excited by the thought of the adventure. It wasn’t till I almost died to a trap, oh yeah I forgot to mention that one, that I really realized how much danger I was… WE were in.”

“Did you defeat that fear or is it still defeating you?”

“I think I got it under control. I mean, I’m still terrified of going back into the dungeon. But I will, and next time I’ll be more prepared. We will have more allies and we got a lot of good equipment from the dungeon.”

“Good, don’t let that fear leave you but also don’t let it rule you. So let us talk. I assume you leveled? Level four would be [Mana Pool], [Constant Weave], and [Uncommon Weave] yes?”

“Ok, lots of questions. But before I do anything else I need to know your name.” He raised a hand. “Hello, I am James the Dreamer, Slayer of Dragons.”

The man took his hand. “Hello James, I am Kamalliu Lord of Dreams, King of the East, Builder of Men, Raiser of Cities, and Slayer of All. Nice to meet you.”

Forcing spit past the lump in his throat, James croaked out “Nice to meet you too.” Before disengaging his clammy hand.

“Ok so all… that out of the way. I thought that the skills I got each level weren’t the same as everyone else. I don’t know why, but it seemed that we got skills seemingly based on what we’d done as well as our needs. At least that’s what my partner thinks.”

“He’s right.” Kamalliu responded. “Skills are random, even if they follow the same basic guide and many [Fighters] will get the same or similar skills for example. The exception is for level zero, four, eight, and so on. These are your core skills. Every [Defender] will get [Armored] at level four for example. These are the skills you need to be an effective member of your class. A [Dream Weaver] without [Weave] wouldn’t be much of one. These skills you got at level four are the most important you’ve gotten since [Weave].”

“I think I get that. Is it the same for professions?”

“Similar, but professions have a much higher chance to gain unique or higher leveled skills based off experiences. This can happen with classes, but it is very rare. Have you gotten the chance to see how [Uncommon Weave] and [Constant Weave] work together?”

“Mana stones right?”

“Mana stones indeed. What have you figured out?”

“I can use them as a mana bank to save up unused mana. I can use them as a core to a weapon or other weaves, but if I want to dissipate the weave I have to have the stone exposed. Oh, and I can use the energy from one stone to weave another, thus mould the stone itself into whatever shape I need.”

“Very good.” He said with a large smile. “I wouldn’t expect anything less from my [Student]. I don’t have much more time with you tonight but I will share one last secret with you about mana stones. Just like you or I, they recover mana slowly by condensing the naturally occurring mana out of the environment. But for mana stones, it is a tiny amount. You will see the effects to a greater extent when you use condensed mana of higher quality later. But what that means for you right now, is that if you use enough mana stone as part of a weave it will be self sufficient. It will take a large amount of the stone for any sufficiently complex weave, but for simple things like a wall or a tool you can make something to last.”

James was excited by the prospect and Kamalliu could tell. “It is good to be excited, yes? Practice and experiment and next time we meet you can tell me what you’ve discovered. But for today I will say goodbye.”

James opened his mouth to say… something. He didn’t know what. But by the time it was opened, his mentor was already fading away.

James decided to spend the rest of the time he had in this lucid dream state experimenting with making large mana stone based weaves.

James woke with a jolt as Liam rapped on the window near his head.