(Gavin)

"And can you split that four ways?" I ask Jesse.

"Of course, Gavin!" He responds. Now that I know this is all just an act by him, I can handle the annoyance a lot better. "Five silver each!"

He reaches under the counter, then hands man four silver coins valued at five silver apiece. After confirming them, I give one to each of my teammates, ignoring Luca's pouting. We all know he was trying to slip away so he could claim the entire reward for himself. I don't think he thought that through, though, because he's currently hiding behind Max, holding onto Max's tail as a way of comforting himself. Jesse still creeps him out.

"Thanks," I tell Jesse. "Have a good day."

"You, too, boys!" Jesse waves, then we leave.

As we reach the door, Luca stops and looks at Jesse.

"Pervert!"

He then hurries out of the Trading Post as Max giggles. Luca definitely did that because Zack wasn't around to call Jesse that. Does he know that Zack does it as part of bantering?

"I'm going to see if I can't get a quality sword commissioned," I tell the team. "With the Candy Ingots, I should be able to. After that, I'm going to work on Mystic Knight a bit. I need to learn a new Skill with it to bring it up to Tier 3, and I can't advance General until I have enough Mana for Warrior's Might."

"I'm going to work on Skills, too," Braden says. "I need one for Warden to advance, then I'll work on Elementalist a bit."

"Max be need raise Skills," Max tells us. "So me be going and hunting! Me do it alone."

"I would rather train alone," Braden tells me. "We can all handle ourselves in the woods, for the most part."

He looks at Luca, then frowns, and I realize that he looked at where Luca was. Luca's gone.

"Max," I say. "Do you know where Luca went."

"He walked off."

I sigh, rubbing my temples. Maybe we should have told Max to keep Luca from leaving. He's smart, but he doesn't always think things through. He knows we don't want Luca off on his own after that, and he doesn't want Luca off on his own after that, but he didn't think about keeping Luca from wandering off.

"Zack probably has people watching us, to make sure we don't get into too much trouble," I say. "Especially if word got back to him about the incident with Su'Numal."

And we all know word will have gotten back to him. Beastborn no doubt saw us hurrying through the City both directions, which means that word will have reached Zack. In fact, I'm pretty sure Max told some of the beastborn we passed about the fight, even if I have no way to actually confirm that.

"Let's go do our stuff," I say, and Braden nods.

Max takes off, and I walk down to the crafting district and locate a quality smithing shop that's probably not too far out of my reach. It's not Jackson's, but I'm no Zack. When he started here, Jackson was the only blacksmith in town, and now… he's Zack. He can do whatever he wants.

When I enter the blacksmith's, I have to wait a minute for the smith, a huge, burly man, to finish what he's working on and dip it in a barrel of what looks like oil. He gives me an appraising look.

"You're the Gavin who's on Zack's team?" He asks.

I nearly ask how he knows my name, then realize that he probably has a higher Overall Level than me, enough of one where I can't see his Level. That means that if he has Appraisal, he's guaranteed to see my name. Plus, there aren't many youth here in Maelnor.

"I am," I answer. "I was hoping I could get a sword made?"

"With the Candy Ingots you earned," he nods. "Zack came by not long ago, said to direct you to Jackson's forge if you showed up. Said to tell you he left something for you there."

What would Zack have left at Jackson's forge? And I'm sure that Zack came by all of the shops and forges, as even with his sight, he probably couldn't be too sure on which one I'd go to.

"Thank you," I tell the smith, then make my way to Jackson's forge.

Inside, there's a woman behind the counter and no one in line. I'm betting he has fewer customers now that he's exclusively working with the top-tier stuff due to the influx of powerful Adventurers here.

"Hello, Gavin," she greets me. "Jackson will make you a sword if you pay five gold, supply the Candy Ingot, and allow him to keep what's leftover. He can color it to whatever style you want."

"Can he make it brown with grey accents?" I ask. "And why did Zack want me to come here? The smith said that Zack said Jackson had something for me?"

"Zack left behind a Primordial Essence for your sword," she tells me, and I feel my eyes widen. That's rare and expensive. Beyond belief. At least, for me. "For a little extra power. He also acquired some Magic Crystals for the sword, to allow it to work with your Blade Skills better."

Even if the sword won't be near anywhere close to Zack's equipment, the addition of Primordial Essence will still make it a lot better than my current gear. I pull out one of the Candy Ingots. This one is pale blue in color, though they come in various colors, just like candy. I also pull out five gold, then hand both to her.

Does this mean that we're getting the powerful equipment that Zack and Nik had mentioned to us in Talorn, then?

"Jackson will drop it off at your house when it's ready," she informs me. "Zack has stuff left for Max as well. It should be a few days before it's ready, he wants to get what he can out of the way before he works on another set of equipment for someone."

"Another set?" I ask.

"Yes," she smiles. "All of the Master Blacksmiths are gathering to work on it as well."

Didn't they forge something for Zack? I've heard rumors of that, but if they have, Zack has kept it a secret. Was it gear for the coming battle? What are they making now?

"Alright," I say. "Thank you, ma'am. Have a good day."

"You as well," she tells me, then I leave.

With that out of the way, I exit Maelnor through the western gate and make my way to the woods. Max probably went straight north, while Braden probably traveled a little west into the woods for his hunting, but from the north gate, where we usually train. Entering the woods this way, I should avoid them a bit, especially since Luca is probably back in the fields south of Maelnor.

I move off the path after a few minutes of walking in the woods, then begin looking for a goblin to fight. As I do, I think about my options for a Tier 3 blade Skill. I only know of three: Lightning Blade, Light Blade, and Dark Blade. There isn't really anything around here that can actually be affected by the latter two, which means they'd Level slowly. As for Lightning Blade, I feel as if I would be stealing some of Braden's thunder if I learned that.

But it's also my best bet for Leveling Mystic Knight, and I need to, to get stronger.

Giving up on picking, I choose Lightning Blade and learn it, focusing the same way I do when learning other blade Skills. It only takes me a few moments to acquire the Skill.

New Skill! Lightning Blade Active Enchant your sword with the power of lightning, sheathing your blade in it for several seconds. Lightning Damage: 15% of your Intellect per Level of this Skill Duration: 20 seconds per Level of this Skill Cost: 250 Mana

A bit pricey in terms of Mana, especially since it's only triple the Intellect power of a same-Level Tier 1 blade Skill, but the facts are, lightning damage can cause both burns and shock if the Intellect is high enough. Light and darkness, as elements, also have extremely specialized circumstances for using, ones which other attacks might not work on at all.

Those are probably the reasons why these attacks cost more, but I'm not entirely sure.

I let the Skill run out as I check my Skills to find out why Mystic Warrior didn't advance into Mystic Knight. It only takes me a moment to figure out the cause – Stun Blade is only Level 2, but it needs to be Level 3 for Mystic Knight Tier 3.

So I need to work on that a little, too.

Moving again, I hunt the forest for a goblin, coming across a duo of them. I should be strong enough to handle them now, even if they're both Level 3.

"Stun Blade," I activate the Skill just as they see me, then I charge forward, my sword clashing against the Goblin Knight's sword.

I strike again, sparring with it and the regular goblin for a moment before I manage to cut the regular goblin, stunning it. With that goblin disabled, I step to the side and stab into its back, killing it as the Goblin Knight strikes at me again. I hold up my arm, allowing the blade to bounce off my vambrace. Raising my sword, I stab at the Goblin Knight, piercing its shoulder. As it freezes up, I stab into its chest, killing it.

With how easily I took out those two, I can definitely go up against a few more goblins, just as long as I don't have to face too many ranged ones. Unless…

Holding up a hand, I aim at a nearby tree, focusing and drawing on my inner power.

"Stone Spike!"

A slender spike of dark brown stone forms in the air in front of my hand, then launches in the direction I'm aiming, hitting the tree. My aim might be a little off, but I can improve that.

No!

I'm such an idiot. I should have tried for that while we were in Talorn. This is how Luca and I could have dealt with the ranged monsters. How he did it remains a mystery still, but I hope he reveals the secret soon, because it's bothering me. Not in a bad way, I'm just really curious how the noncombatant member of our team managed to chase off the goblins. Did he throw rocks at it or something? Or moon it. He's been influenced by Zack too much, so I can see him doing something inappropriate like that, and it scaring off the goblins as a result.

Well, I'll learn eventually. For now, I need to train. I want to gain at least one Level beyond the automatic one I'll get for Mystic Knight. And I think I'll take on Elementalist once Mystic Knight is Level 25, so that I can raise my Mana some more.

Plus, Zack is right. I'm not suited for a Paladin just yet. I might support my teammates, but I don't think I could focus on a buffing style just yet. I might still be a bit too new to have the discipline needed to focus on buffing and healing my allies as I fight. Once I have everything up to Tier 5, then I'll look at if I feel ready to take on Paladin.

For now, though, I should focus on Mystic Knight, so I return to hunting down goblins. With pretty much all of the snow melted, it's easy to travel and see, but that also means there are more directions to keep an eye out from. With the snow, we pretty much just had to stick to the paths made by the monsters, because nothing would really vary from them.

Once the trees finish their budding and grow their leaves, this forest will become a lot more dangerous. Far less sunlight will hit the floor of it, limiting sight somewhat, especially at night. It will be easier for monsters to hide.

A quintet of goblins come into view, and I move behind a bush, watching them. Two Goblin Knights, plus a Level 5 Frost Goblin and two regular goblins. That should be manageable to me, thought the Frost Goblin does give me some pause.

A twig snaps nearby, and I slowly turn my head to look in that direction, hoping that I've not been spotted by whatever it was. A quick, sharp movement can attract more attention than a slow movement, I think. When I finally turn my head enough, I see Braden approaching, holding sticks in his hands. He looks ready to break one, but stops when I see him. Swiftly, he moves over to me and crouches beside me, looking at the goblins.

He must have decided the goblins wouldn't notice the snapping twig and did it to alert me of his presence, so that I would not react in a way which would attract the attention of the goblins.

"Want some help with this?" He whispers.

"No," I whisper back. "I think I can handle this, I'll probably just take a few hits."

"Okay," he whispers.

"I thought you were going to be training further north?"

"I was hunting something that came this way," he tells me. "Then saw you as I was returning up to where I'd been."

"Okay," I respond. "Thanks for the offer. As I said, I should be good."

He nods, then starts to leave.

"Wait," I whisper, and he stops and looks at me. "Just in case, though?"

"I'll watch," he quickly climbs a nearby tree.

"Thanks," I tell him.