The mood inside the wagon was by no means conducive to conversation and so the wagon rolled on in silence throughout the morning. By lunch I had however managed to gather enough courage to ask a question I should most definitely have asked much earlier.

“So, I have been wondering about this for a while.” I hesitantly glanced at the wagon driver. “The stuff we have been talking about has been umm, a bit sensitive right?” I asked while sending a meaningful look at the balding wagon driver.

““Haha!”” Gilana and Franz just looked at me for a second then burst out laughing and Kiyara gave me a look as if I was daft.

“You ask that now?” Gilana kept laughing. It might be at my expense but that was fine, at least this meant that some of the 'doom and gloom' dissipated. “Brian here is a guild driver. So, he won’t even remember who he was driving after we pay him.” Gilana said, still laughing a bit.

“Wow, that sounds terrible.” I admitted aghast. “How does that even work?”

“He has signed a magical contract that makes it so that he is unable to remember things like: who his clients were, what reasons they had to travel and what they were discussing.” Gilana said with a disappointed look as Kiyara rose from her lap and sat down opposite her.

“Why would anyone sign that?” I was horrified just imagining having someone play with my memories.

“Why not ask?” Gilana said before she turned to the driver and shouted. “Hey, Brian?”

“Yeah?” The driver asked without taking his eyes off the road.

“Why did you decide to work for The Guild?”

“What?” Brian answered in a voice that made it sound like that, was the dumbest question he had heard. “Well, I mean... There are countless reasons.” He said looking back for a moment with a troubled look. “First of all, I did it because it is safer. In this line of work you’d normally have to pay a lot of money to have enough protection to be able to safely travel anywhere. But The Guild never sends anyone, anywhere The Guild doesn’t believe they can handle. Secondly I am provided with both horses and a wagon, something I would have been unable to afford myself. Also it pays well and I don’t have to worry about anyone threatening me or torturing me for information about my clients. As I don’t have it.” He shrugged and chuckled lightly. “Not that anyone would try that with a Guild employee.”

“There you have it.” Gilana said with a smile. I still found it a disturbing thought to have someone tampering with my memories. “But then again, I don’t really know what this world is like.” I recalled the witch and thought about the story I had been told this morning. So for the first time, I really understood that there were horrors in this world beyond my wildest imagination.

When it was time for lunch, we could just make out the fields of Embry and we came to a stop. I jumped out and was glad to be able to stretch my legs. As I was stretching Gilana gave me a comforting clap in the back and spoke with a disturbing amount of sympathy.

“Well, good luck.” She walked off and I froze with a sudden sense of impending doom.

“Just because we have potions doesn’t mean that you should use them.” Kiyara said and walked off. Leaving me just standing there, utterly confused and more than a little alarmed.

“Well, I hope you are ready, boy!” Franz said with a wide, wide grin.

“Ready for what?” I asked confused and scared the almost manic grin on Franz’s lips. Franz pulled out a wooden practise sword and long stick.

“For your combat practice of course!” Franz pushed me over to an open field by the road. “Can’t have you dying just because you don’t know how to use that fancy sword of yours.” He stopped me a fair distance away from the road and took a step back. His wide smile was plainly visible through the visor. “We will start with your stance, then we will proceed with footwork and finally I will show you how to swing that thing.” What happened after that was very, very tortuous.

“Well, that was worse than I’d hoped but better than I’d feared. From now on, I will have you repeat your footwork training along with one hundred PROPER swings every morning and evening. At lunch we will start sparring from tomorrow onwards. Now get some food out of your storage so we can have something to eat.” Franz said while tapping the murder weapon (also known as a stick) on his armoured shoulder.

“…I-I… thought… that… the… girls were… going to cook... the wolf’s meat?” I said panting and groaning on the ground. Franz was a damned menace with that stick. Every time I would mess up a step or swing incorrectly he would ‘gently’ correct my mistake with the stick, saying things like ‘pain is the best teacher’.

In the beginning the strikes had been light, only stinging a bit painfully. But as time went on even the light strikes started hurting, what was worse however, was that every time I made the same mistake Franz would hit me just a little bit harder. You might not think of that as a big deal but, I have never held a sword in my life, and I have never even done any martial arts so things like ‘stepping in hard but not too hard’ and ‘feel the flow of the strike’ was all but impossible.

“I will give you some advice.” Franz said very seriously as he pulled me to my feet. “Do not ever eat what those two cook. There is not enough beer in the world to wash away the taste.” Franz shuddered with what I hope, was exaggeration. Turns out, it was not.

After those two ‘experiences’ I gently sat my battered and tired body down on the non padded bench of the wagon. I groaned when my bruised backend took my weight. The others chuckled a bit at my pain but I ended up ignoring them in favour of checking out my stats. There were far more changes than I had been expecting.

Name: Victor Lynth, lvl 2* Human.

Class: None

HP: 100/100

E: 23/94

MP: 146/146

Will: 252/252

Attributes: Str: 8, Agi: 9, Dex:10, Vit:10, End:9, Int:13, Wis: 11, Cha:9.

Skills:

Special: Interface, Skill point system, True familiar (Simon), Sixthsense, Telekinesis

Passive: Mind palace 1, Mind 2, Mana perception 2*,

Active: Storage 3, Soul weapon 8, Dimensional magic 3,

Resistances*: Magic resistance 3, Charm resistance 1, Curse resistance 1, Pain mitigation 1,

Boons: Esper

Skill points: 9*

“Not at all ominous.” I felt cold sweat run down my back as I looked at my stats and did something rather stupid. I checked my log.

00.1.3 20:12,24: You have been affected by: Unknown magic.

00.1.3 20:12,25: You have been affected by: Unknown magic.

00.1.3 20:12,27: You have been affected by: Unknown magic.

00.1.3 20:12,29: You have been affected by: Unknown curse.

00.1.3 20:12,31: You have been affected by: Unknown magic.

00.1.3 20:12,38: You have been affected by: Unknown magic.

…….

And on it went. I felt more than a little sick by it, but at least I had a few ‘You have resisted Unknown magic/curse’ when I scrolled down. There were also four instances of ‘You have resisted Unknown charm’ which was fortunate. “I would have probably not made it out of there if I had failed to resist the charm.” I shivered at that thought.

“So, um…” I looked at the others and winced when the wagon began rolling once more. “In that forest… I was um, affected by, how do I explain this?” I was not sure how to broach being hit by at least 150 debuffs. “Do they call it debuffs in this world?” I mused but was promptly pulled back to the conversation at hand.

“Curses? Magic? Disease, poisons, charms, madness?” Kiyara asked with an unamused look.

“Ehee… I mean…” I stammered. “How do you respond to that?”

“Did any of it stick?” Gilana asked with worry in her voice. When my lack of comprehension became apparent to her, she added. “Do you still feel the effects?”

“I mean… I resisted a handful of them… but I don’t feel any different?” I looked over my arms but winced. “ Besides the brussing I guess.” I added gingerly rubbing my sore arms.

“You resisted a handful of them?” Kiyara asked sceptically. “How do you know that? And wait, how many were you hit by?” She looked at me suspiciously.

“Well, um… a lot, over a hundred magical effects and maybe a quarter of that in curses…” The others just looked at me like some kind of alien. “But no poison, diseases or madness. There were also four charms, but I somehow resisted them.” I tried to sound positive, but I swallowed hard when the other's eyes turned sharp.

“I think that it might be time you tell us everything.” Gilana said.

“What?!” Kiyara said, outraged. “We would have to take him then!” She half shouted.

“Take me?!” I asked distressed, that sounded all kinds of bad.

“We would end up doing that anyway.” Gilana said with a snort. “It is not like we could just leave him anyway.” Gilana looked mischievously at Kiyara. “Besides, even you don’t mind his company. And don’t even try to argue, I know you well enough sweetie.” As if to prove her point Gilana moved over to Kiyara’s side, wrapped her arm around her waist and pulled her close.

“Why are you even making a fuss about this?” Franz asked then. “I have already started training the boy. There is simply no way I’m allowing him to run away before I’m satisfied with his skill.”

For my part, I just sat there feeling even more like air than usual as the other three talked to each other like I wasn’t even there. I would probably have been more hurt by it, had I not been rather used to this kind of treatment. It had been like that all my life, people around me just didn’t pay much attention to me. If there were a lot of people around I just sort of faded into the background. Most of the time, it wasn’t even due to malice, although sometimes it was. Mostly, people just found me forgettable and boring. It didn’t help that my views and ideas never really stood out and my appearance was for better or worse, average. Even here, I only stood out due to my height.

“Whatever.” Kiyara said, looking away. That ended the discussion and Gilana turned to me with a wide smile.

“There you have it.” She reached out her hand. “As the leader of Fortuitous, I welcome you to the party!”

“I-I… um… okey.” I said taking her hand, feeling that threading rather thin ice here. Which to be fair, was my experience with Savani so far.

“Wonderful!” Franz said and his smile instantly made me doubt my decision. “Now I will be able to train you properly.”

“Wait?! W-what do you mean ‘properly’? Was that just harassment before?!” I asked, a bit more hysterical than I would like to admit.

“Of course not.” Franz responded with a snort. “But if you are staying with us, I can focus on the long term! I won’t just have to just beat a little swordcraft into you. I can work on your foundation!” Franz rubbed his steel clad hands together and started talking to himself. I might have felt some existential dread at this moment, but maybe that was just remnants of the lunch. I was however about to politely refuse, with the proper excuses, that I was not a warrior but a mage. But, a gentle hand on my shoulder stopped me.

“Give it up.” Gilana said with both pity and sympathy in her voice as she shook her head.

“!!!” I felt almost as terrified as when I had seen the witch for the first time by the implications. Okay, that’s an exaggeration but I was afraid for my well being.

“Enough of that. Now spit it out.” Kiyara said, sounding utterly exasperated as she glowered at the dwarf who had disappeared into his own world. “Tell us everything.” She said and stared at me intently. Gilana moved back to her favorite spot next to Kiyara, and Franz sat back down after having started pacing in the cramped wagon.

I took out a water skin from my storage, drank a bit to get rid of the dryness that had formed in my throat and after taking a few deep breaths I told them. I told them about all my skills, even my interface and skill point system. It was a curious thing to see their faces go from accepting to mildly surprised to disbelief and finally outrage.

“Franz.” Kiyara said with a very cold voice.

“Yes Kiyara?” Franz responded, his flat voice made me nervous .

“Mind if I ‘aid’ you in training little Goldie over here? I feel like I really, really must hit him a few times.”

“Ehee?” I uttered dumbly, more than a little taken aback by the anger directed at me.

“That sounds acceptable.” Franz said, tapping a finger on the chin of his visor, it made a metallic ringing sort of sound. “Now that I think about it, we have a good number of lesser potions. I feel like it could be a good idea to ‘pick up the pace’.”

“C-could we not?” I asked, looking to Gilana for support. Gilana for her part was looking very conflicted. She had been silently listening for the entire time and was by far the calmest in the group. Suddenly she seemed to make up her mind and turned to Brian, the wagon driver.

“Brian, change of plans.” She waited for Brian to pay attention before she spoke once more. “We will go straight through Embry and head to Yallow. It might be a bit rough on the horses but we should make it before night fall, correct?”

“No problem.” Brian said confidently and the wagon picked up some more speed. The other two stopped glaring at me and turned to look at Gilana with obvious surprise, Gilana for her part was sporting a vicious grin.

“I think you two are ignoring one important part.” She pointed at me. “He is level 2.” Her smile widened and I was sure nothing good would come out of this. “Special skills grow with the user, so at level two they are unlikely to be of much use. Well Simon and Interface are the obvious exceptions.” I looked at her confused. I mean I felt that all of my special skills except maybe Telekinesis were very useful, but why would Simon be a standout. “Interface is truly an amazing skill, so much so that I really want to find a skill scroll of Appraisal and have Goldie learn it.” At this the others nodded.

“If it works like similar skills, that would mean that we could learn exact values for stats.” Franz said smiling. “That’d be far more useful than: Physique: High Primary Strength.” Franz smiled happily thinking about it. “Just imagine what I could do if I didn’t have to ‘feel’ what was missing in a student but could accurately see it.” He let out a happy smile. “We MUST find him one such scroll! Or at the very least a skill book he can study.”

“Agreed, Kiyara?” Gilana said looking at the elf that still looked unhappy with me. But, after a few moments she nodded with a sigh. “Good that’s settled then, we will use Fortuitous funds to have Goldie learn Appraisal.”

“Okay…” I said just to not feel left out. “Um… by the way, why do you consider Simon to be such a standout?” Did Gilana know something about familiars perhaps?

“Something that cute can’t be anything but useful, no?” She asked straight-faced. I just sat there, silent and dumbfounded, and I was not alone. “Well back on topic, since Morgan is at such a low level, we will be able to raise his level with ease. And with the absurd amount of special skills he has, we can expect excellent results from doing so.” She wore a rather predatory grin at this point.

I laughed nervously and then frowned a bit. “No one is going to comment on the Simon part? We are just going to gloss over that part?” I thought wryly. “But levelling up hu? I wonder how that really works here, also.” I looked at the others. “I don’t know if this is something that is okay to ask, but what levels are you?”

“Yeah… you shouldn’t ask that.” Gilana answered. “But since we are now in a party…” She looked over at the other two. “I am level 67, my current class is War maiden.” She said with a grin.

“Level 87, Weapon master.” Franz said proudly.

“…” Kiyara sighed unhappily. “I am a Level 77 ‘Seeker’.” She glared at Kiyara as she said her class.

“Oh come on sweetie…” Gilana said unhappily. “You can’t seriously be mad about that still?” She tried to wrap her arms around Kiyara but the elf glared at her. “… I just didn’t want you to keep going down the path of thieving…” Gilana said unhappily, and to comfort herself she began to cling to me while sticking out her tongue at Kiyara.

“I liked thieving.” Kiyara said with a twitching eyebrow.

“And that’s why you are a slave.” Franz said with a snort and Kiyara growled at him.

“You’re a slave?” I asked Kiyara, surprised.

“What?” Kiyara asked incredulously. “Do you think this is just some kind of fancy decoration?” She fiddled with the silver collar around her neck. When I stuttered she looked at me with astonishment. “Don’t you have slaves in your world?”

“I-I mean we probably do?...” I answered uncertainly. “But, slavery is illegal in my world… but I guess that is a rather recent thing now that I think about it.” I felt a bit conflicted as I thought about it. “Many of the great civilizations of my world were built on slavery, so I guess it shouldn’t surprise me.”

“It always surprised me how much humans forget in a few hundred years.” Kiyara said with a snort. “Glad to see that humans are the same everywhere.” She sounded more than a little smug about it, and Gilana, who was claiming my arm as an emotional support pillow, gave Kiyara a hurt look which the elf ignored.

“Anyway, we are getting off topic again.” Franz’s voice interrupted the lovers’ antics. “We are getting into the fields of Embry.” The others looked around at the fields that must have been some kind of food crop that I did not recognize. “So let’s leave the more ‘sensitive’ topic until we are out on the other side?” He then grinned at me. “So instead, how about you tell me how to make the holy water instead?” Franz asked gleefully. There was not a lot I could tell him but I described what I remembered.

“So…” I said, a bit hesitant to speak of something I knew so little about. “If I remember correctly…” I thought for a few moments then spoke. “What you do is that you take a drink with high alcohol content and then you boil off the alcohol…” I trailed off, trying to remember the process better. “By the way…” I looked at Gilana who was resting her head in Kiyara’s lap. I had no idea when or how that had happened. “I can’t have been lost in thought that long, can I?” I shook myself. “Is this um, ‘safe’ to talk about?”

“Sure it is.” Gilana said smiling. Her vibrant green eyes locked on Kiyara who was pointedly ignoring her. “I’m just going to hope that she is actually listening…”

“Anyway you boil the alcohol in a pressure vessel or something, then collect the alcohol leaving the water behind. Then you repeat the process until the remaining alcohol has reached the desirable level.” I gestured to the shampoo bottle Franz was holding. “Until you make something like that…” A thought struck me at that time. “Doesn’t alcohol act as a solvent? Are my plastic shampoo bottles going to be okay?” Franz kept barraging me with questions that I mostly did not know the answer of until we eventually made it out of the dreary town of Embry.

Embry was a rather odd place in my opinion. There were simply too many ‘apartment’ buildings for a medieval world. “Then again, it was like that in most of the lower city in Elianor as well, if I recall.” We only passed through and at a brisk pace (for a wagon in a crowded town) so I didn’t get much feel for the place. But according to the other we really needed to keep a high pace if we wanted to make it to Yallow before nightfall. Which was very important to the three, and I would have to agree. “I sure as hell don’t want to see anymore nightmare fuel.”