Gholob struggled in the feeble body, after only a few days it was already falling apart, incapable of containing his essence much longer. He was in luck though, a frail-looking green creature had wandered within his shell's sensory range.

Gholob pounced on the beast as it tried to wield a crud club to fend him off, 'PATHETIC.' He forced his essence into the new host as it flailed around ineffectually on the ground. Once the transfer was complete he now had full control. He devoured the memories of the creature and learned it was called a goblin.

They had rudimentary intelligence at best. It would serve for now.

He turned to look at the other beast, its husk tainted by his presence and smiled. He gave it a command to go and infect other wildlife. He turned towards the direction of the goblin camp, he had more creatures to corrupt.

***

Jal watched from the alley with a bored expression. Gaspian had sent him to Lionoss to look for the golden-eyed kid and his companions. There was no sign of them along the road, so now he was watching the gate. There were other gates and it was a possibility that the group had already gotten past him but he doubted it. With Gaspian's speed buff he could outrun a horse. Plus he didn't want to traipse around the entire town looking for one kid. Gaspian didn't pay him enough for that.

So he was surprised when he saw the kid entering the town. Three other men were with him and he memorized all three, he was good with faces. He tailed the group at a good distance, making sure to appear as normal as he could. The three older men occasionally glanced his way, causing him to act like he was doing other things.

Those three were wary, definitely city-born.

His skills were up to the task though, years as a thief and cutthroat made him hard to pin down.

The three entered the Guild, Jal stopped a few blocks away and watched from another alley. He saw the group split up and head in separate directions. He chose to follow the kid and the skinny black-haired man. They went into a book shop and Jal grunted his dismay. If they were rich enough to buy skill books it would have been a good haul.

A firm hand wrapped around Jal's chin as a piercing pain entered his back. The vice-like grip kept him from screaming out as the dagger was twisted inside his body. The light faded from his eyes as he was dragged farther into the alley.

Erwin dumped the corpse behind some refuse, wiping his dagger off on the man's clothes. He didn't recognize the man, but they had spotted him following their group since they entered the city. The man had on some old leather armor and two daggers. He had a rough ragged look to him that spoke of a life of hardships and murder. It was easy for Erwin to recognize these signs because he and his friends had the same look. Especially when they lived as street urchins.

The man was too old for that though, so he must be a bandit. The only reason a bandit would be looking for them was if they had a grudge, there being much easier targets than a group of mercenaries. It had to be that damn mage and his crew that they had run into. Nothing else made sense.

Erwin stripped the weapons and any coin from the corpse. The mage would come looking for his missing man but this should buy their group a few days.

***

When Chuck finally made it back up the stairs he spotted the group at a table drinking and talking. Bargo waved, his arm no longer in a sling. The others turned towards him, their conversation ceasing.

"Finally, thought you were going to train all night and let us starve," Erwin said in feigned outrage.

The others chuckled as Erwin smiled, Chuck just rolled his eyes. "I most important to wait for."

The others laughed as Chuck took a seat. A waitress came over at Erwin's beckoning. "Food and another round of drinks."

"Food will be up shortly, I'll bring the drinks over."

Erwin passed her some coin and the woman left to carry out the order.

After a couple of drinks and a large plate of food, Erwin spoke up. "So, I hear you got some more skills, expensive."

Chuck could hear the question in Erwin's tone. He swallowed the bite of food he was chewing on, before answering. "Yes... money come with bag," he said, lowering his head in shame. He should have just come completely clean with the group. Now he waited for Erwin's response.

"Smart move, kid. Always keep a few tricks up your sleeve, you never know when you will need to pull one out and use it. Don't worry about withholding it from us, it was your money anyway."

Chuck relaxed at this news. He had expected the man to be mad, or even worse, disappointed in him. He was relieved to hear the man praise him. Erwin gave him a hearty slap on the back as the group finished eating.

Chuck excused himself to go train some more, the other three just waving him off.

The three watched Chuck head back into the basement to train before they returned to their earlier conversation.

"So what are our options?" Bargo asked.

"Not many I'm afraid. We can't confront the man, if he turns out to be a licensed mage he could claim slander and force us to fight him."

The others grimaced at this news, they had witnessed a mage honor duel in their youth. One of their friends had been stupid enough to try and steal from a robed man, only to be caught by a spell. The affronted mage forced the kid to fight against him to restore his honor. Their friend had stood no chance. One spell had torn his body to pieces, the man laughing as he walked off without a care.

"How long do you think we have, now that his man has been dealt with?" Mellas asked quietly.

"No more than a week. If they found us once they will find us again. We could leave right away towards the larger cities but we need rest."

The other two nodded, they had been pushing hard even before they met Chuck and it was beginning to show. They were still healthy young men but there was a limit.

"Three days then we leave," Erwin decided.

"What about the kid?"

"Let him train, he has enough energy to burn so it shouldn't slow him too much."

Chuck threw out a water blade spell after forming the simple spell in his mind. The range was short, and the speed a bit slow, it acted more like a whip. The crescent of water followed whatever trajectory his arm took as it seemed to flow from the tips of his straightened fingers, producing a thirty-centimeter wide attack.

The water slammed into the wooden dummy, leaving a slight gash. 'Ok, so level one of the skill wasn't very impressive.' Chuck wasn't surprised, it was a common skill after all.

Chuck looked around, the hall had emptied, as everyone either went to eat or off to do other things. Perfect time to test some stuff. He moved away from anything flammable before he cast grease. A large orb of light yellow liquid flew from his palm, splashing against the floor several meters away. The splatter looked more like a cone shape than a circle. He noted that for the future.

Walking over he dipped a finger in the substance, rubbing it between his thumb and forefinger. It was thicker than engine oil but not thick enough to hold its shape. He wiped it off on the floor. He scooped a bit of it onto a piece of broken wood he found. Setting it down away from the rest of the grease, he cast flame lance. The spell barely reached the floor and he had to get closer and cast it again.

A gout of flame licked against the greased up stick for three seconds before it faded. The stick was burning but the grease was just smoldering. It eventually caught fire when the fire from the stick reached it, but it took a bit of time. Chuck's hopeful smile faded to a frown. He had wanted to reproduce one of the most overpowered low-level spell combinations in most games and RPG's he played in his past life. That wasn't going to happen with level one of flame lance.

Earth blade finished while he was experimenting with the grease. He cast it on the dummy to the same effect as the water blade. Chuck was thoroughly unimpressed.

He decided to see if any of his new skills could be combined with mana manipulation. He got the feeling that he could combine a few of them to make a new spell.

Looks like he would finally be able to put the skills other ability to the test.

Chuck decided to combine the blade skills first, he wasn't sure if he lost the skills if he combined them but would rather find out with these nearly useless skills before using it on something he wanted to keep.

It took a bit for him to figure out how to get the skill to activate. He needed to concentrate on what he wanted, then on the names of the spells he wanted to combine. Then through force of will, he had to combine the spell forms together in his mind. When he finally felt a lack of resistance he collapsed in a sweaty panting mess. Combining those simple spells had taken a lot out of him. It had also taken longer than he thought, looking at his skills showed that elemental shield had almost finished in the time it took him to force the skills together.

Chuck decided to see if his old skills were still there. They were, that made him happy, that meant he wouldn't lose skills to try different combinations. He checked out the new skill he created.

Name: Mud Blade

Rarity: Crafted - Common

Level: 0 - 5

Prerequisite: Water Blade level 1, Earth Blade level 1

Damage Type: N/A

Status: Active

Stat: Intuition

Range: 5m

SP to Next level: 100

Description: Why cause physical harm to your opponent when you can embarrass them by flinging mud in their eyes.

Chuck groaned, he wasn't sure what he expected but this was just sad. He still added it to his training queue. Who knows it might come in handy one day.

He was hoping for a better outcome with his next combination. He sat on the floor this time. Entering his menu he selected the two spells he wanted and pushed them together. After what felt like days the spells finally combined. He opened his eyes and flopped on the floor exhausted. His entire body felt like jello and it took him twenty minutes before he was recovered enough to sit up.

Chuck made a mental note to never try using mana manipulation this way unless he was in a safe spot. First, he checked how long he had been at it. Elemental shield had finished training and wind barrier was a good hour and a half in. So, it took over two hours for him to force the spells together. He hated to think how long it would take to do this on higher tier spells. He checked to see if it was worth all the effort or another bust like his first attempt.

Name: Flame Thrower

Rarity: Crafted - Rare

Level: 0 - 3

Prerequisite: Flame Lance level 3, Grease level 1

Damage Type: Fire

Status: Active

Stat: Intuition

Range: 2m

SP to Next level: 1000

Description: Creates a 3 second jet of flaming grease that sticks to anything it hits.

'Now that's more like it,' too bad he couldn't train it right away. He would prioritize flame lance to get this spell trained. Although, it wasn't like he could practice with it here. Chuck picked himself off the ground.

He decided to test out the shield before he called it a night. After a quick three-second cast, a bubble formed around him. It looked a bit like a form-fitted soap bubble. The visual effect faded after about ten seconds but Chuck could still feel the shield in place. He shrugged and decided to head to bed, glad the guys had told him about the rooms on the second floor.

Chuck woke up feeling refreshed. When he checked his skills he realized why. He had slept for ten hours. He didn't have that lethargic feeling you get from oversleeping though so he figured his body needed the rest.

All of his new skills had completed at least one level. Flame lance, water blade, earth blade, and elemental shield were now at level two. Chuck immediately set flame lance level three as the main training skill, moving mana manipulation back to the slower slot once again. After that, he added the rest to the queue.

He headed down for a quick breakfast, followed by training. After talking with the other guys, it was clear that they would be here for a few days. Chuck was free to practice to his heart's content, they said they would come to get him before they planned to leave.

There were people in the training room when he arrived, and the archer woman was back. He decided to see if she would help him test his other barrier. The woman agreed, for a price. Chuck negotiated her down to two silver for five arrows. He wasn't sure why at first. Once he activated the spell and she fired arrows into it he realized why.

The arrows were damaged severely by the winds of the spell. Chuck thanked the woman for her assistance. She only nodded in reply and went back to her training.

Chuck spent the rest of the morning training short sword, interspersed with using minor heal until his mana ran dry. He chose that spell because it didn't have any obvious signs of use. Occasionally he would get a funny look as he just stood there.

Surely some people realized he was using a spell of some sort, not that it mattered.

With his morning routine, he managed a hundred and thirty reps. The healing allowed him to keep going much longer but most of the repeated casts of the spell were wasted as they could no longer offer any more healing. It was fine it helped expand his mana capacity. He was already up to ten casts of minor heal from the five he had started with. The spell was more mana intensive than ice arrow.

Taking a breather he looked at his current skills. Chuck decided to sort them by weapon, utility, defense, and attack skills.

Bladed Weapons: 5-5

Short Sword: 32/150TP to level 2

-------------------------

Enhanced Vision: 2-2

Light Armor: 5-5

Multitasking: 23970/80000SP to level 4

Mana Manipulation: 3485/15000SP to level 3

Minor Heal: 1-1

Sneaking: 5-5

Stealth: 5-5

Tracking: 5-5

----------------------------

Elemental Shield: 2-5

Wind Barrier: 2-5

---------------------------

Earth Blade: 2-5

Flame Lance: 3-3

Flame Thrower: 12/1000SP to level 1

Grease: 1-1

Ice Arrow: 5-5

Mud Blade: 2-5

Water Blade: 3-5

He checked what stats increased. Flame lance only gave an increase in the active time to five seconds and a range increase to one and a half meters. Each of the blade skills ranges went up a meter at each level, nothing else seemed to change. Elemental shield increased from twenty percent absorption to forty percent, so if it kept to that trend it would be able to absorb one hundred percent at level five. Wind barrier only extended its usefulness by another second. Chuck wasn't sure of the usefulness of the spell, the only upside was its short cast time.

He decided to stop for lunch and see if the other guys were around.