Although we started traveling a little late, and we take a few days to get into the rhythm of things, we adjust well to being back on the proverbial road. Doubly so since hunting for food is now optional and mostly appreciated simply to ensure we do not get overly bored of eating stew. If there is one word that can appropriately summarize our excursion this time, it would be "convenient".

Everything about our travel now is orders of magnitude more convenient for us compared to the last time we were on the road. Some examples of how and why our experience this time is more comfortable? Well to start with, only needing 2 hours of sleep each night courtesy of those magical bedrolls is a pretty big deal, we have significantly more time in each day than we used to. Yes that extra time it is at night, and when you're in the wild it gets very dark indeed, but I have had night vision all along and now, courtesy of the goggles I made for her, Regina does too.

Regina sold her horse in the last month, it's completely unnecessary because her travel speed is now faster than a horse courtesy of those magical boots. If that is not enough, having someone other than Regina to scout and guide us around powerful creatures or groups, the Ashen Infiltrator, is very convenient for her.

As for me? Having some dedicated crafters that I do not have to continuously resummon is convenient for me. This does remind me that I should make something that can scavenge for medicinal herbs so that she stops having to go out for them in the future. They exist, they just haven't been a priority for me.

Regardless, for most of any given day we will sit on the drivers bench together, chatting and passing time, needing only to take a few hours each day for me to push magic into the potion creations and for her to gather more herbs to make more potions. We do not even need to worry about checking terrain, because I have a schematic I activate once a day that gives me detailed knowledge of the terrain in a 100-kilometer radius around me, and which I then transfer the knowledge of to my clay crafter via telepathy, who puts it onto a map.

Maps are very expensive under normal circumstances and are usually poor quality. This might not make a ton of sense at first glance, but the truth is that there is very little crossover between people who are willing and able to create and sell maps, and people that can execute abilities like my "Know Terrain" spell, and there is significantly less crossover between people that can cast Know Terrain and people that can telepathically communicate that information to a dedicated crafter who is more than happy to create maps 24 hours a day. When we next find ourselves in a city, selling most of these daily maps should makes us a pretty penny.

When everything is said and done, our increase in combat power is lagging behind the increases in comfort and convenience. Though it is worth noting that the single most convenient new feature of travel is a combat improvement. The wooden crossbowmen, who move slowly on their own since they are little more than crossbows with short stubby legs and arms, have completely changed the degree of my combat contribution. Most of the time they stay on top of the carriage, posted along the corners, and they are downright reliable when it comes to driving away or killing nuisances as soon as they are discovered.

When something pops up that is stronger than a mild nuisance, they also significantly increase the amount of missile fire our group puts out. They are not as good as real adventurers would be, but it is like always having a couple trained guards ready to mete out justice on your behalf. With all the semi living objects I've got running around it’s like the classic French tale, “Beauty and the Beast”, but instead of teacups and clocks, I am creating semi sentient weapons of destruction. It is glorious.

To put their contributions into perspective, although Regina outclasses them handily, they are a better shot with their crossbows than I am, so even though they do not hit as hard as Regina, there are 2 of them, they are on guard at all times, and through them I am providing significant contributions to our damage output in battles. Beyond that, the wooden crossbowmen synergize very well with the metal hound, who is rather fast moving, and who serves as a solid skirmisher, slowing down how quickly the actual living creatures would need to engage in melee.

Aside from their rather limited capacity for engaging conversation, which is limited to just a telepathic bond with me and feels somewhat reminiscent of communicating with a particularly advanced Siri, it is like there is an entire team of adventurers out here rather than just a Lizardfolk and a Human hanging out in a carriage.

When the Homonculi get injured I am able to heal them with my repair device imbuement, though I could also fix them with the appropriate skills, i.e. repairing the metal hound is possible via blacksmithing, while repairing the wooden crossbowman would be possible via carpentry. The imbuements are convenient though, and 1 time is usually enough to heal them from the light damage they occasionally take.

Regina and I would move much faster if we left the carriage and the horses and the Homunculi behind. The walking chests for instance, can keep up with a normal human, but not a riding horse. Since they are only as fast as a normal human and we're reliant on horse travel, that means they are usually on top of the carriage, only jumping down and following us when we go to gather herbs or make camp for the night. The Metal Hound and the Ashen Infiltrator can keep up with a riding horse, and the infiltrator ranges ahead making sure we do not come across something too scary, sending me images of potential threats so that we can make course corrections when needed. The metal hound, for the most part, stays as the melee guard for the carriage, generally following behind us until a hostile creature appears and then interposing itself between them and our carriage.

When it comes to speed though? Not even the Metal Hound or the Ashen Infiltrator can keep up with Regina anymore, not since she got those boots, and Regina can no longer keep up with me. We both have magic boots greatly increasing our walking and running speeds, and beyond that I have also incorporated a movement speed increase as a daily buff I give myself from the schematics, with the “Primitive” series spells providing several mostly non-combat buffs that… Are frankly easier to feel than they are to describe. I am more alert, more mindful of the terrain around me, more mindful of the tracks of animals and potential ambushes, and so on, in addition to being able to walk or run faster.

I did test and my increased responsiveness does not seem to translate to being any better at dodging attacks, nor does it improve my accuracy with ranged weaponry or anything else that I can explicitly say is a combat boost aside from being able to move faster. But even if I cannot figure out in exactly which ways or to what degree all of these new spells help, I am completely certain that they do. The speed increase alone would make it worth continuing to cast these once per day spells, but the other buffs just make me more… Aware and reactive, in a way that's difficult to quantify.

Since we do seem to have a lot of free time while we travel now, I start having her attempt to use some of the schematics that I do not find myself needing. For instance, I have her try to use the “Copy Text” schematics, as well as the competent crafting schematics. I also begin to join her to forage for herbs, and generally we try to exchange skill related knowledge. The schematic use in particular, I try to get her accustomed to.

Regina does not succeed at using my schematics. She can't. She is completely incapable of success right now, because she possesses neither appropriate magic nor the required skill. But I still put her through the paces and have her try every day anyhow. Why? Because if she can learn how to Operate Magical Devices, which is a skill so theoretically she should be able to learn it, she should be able to start using schematics as well, and I can see her getting even more value out of those primitive series buffs than I get. The goal therefore is to make sure that the next time she gains a level, the system recognizes that she should get this skill as well.

We spend a lot of time talking, and since we'd reduced the degree of secrecy we maintain most of a year ago, I end up with a fairly clear understanding of her abilities. This is all second hand so there's always a chance she has misinformed me on basically anything here, but even if there are some inaccuracies this should be pretty close.

Name: Regina Class: Ranger Level: 6 Race: Human

Derived Attributes

Defense: 12 Health: 52 Attack: 6

Primary Attributes

Strength: 12 Agility: 19 Toughness: 14 Intelligence: 12 Wisdom: 16 Willpower: 12

Special Qualities:

Versatile, All Weaponry, Medium Armor, Tracking, Disable Traps, Archery, Two Weapon Fighting, Endurance, Assassinate 2

Languages: Common, Draconic

Skills:

Bluff, Climb, Concentration, Tend Animal, Intimidate, Medicine, Stealth, Jump, Dungeoneer, Geography, Nature, Perception, Ride, Survival, Swim, Tumbling, Binding, Determine Intent, Disguise, Land Vehicles, Brewer, Vintner

Talents: Exceptional Reflexes, Enmity, Precision Fire, Skirmisher

Equipped items:

Quicksilver Full Plate Armor, Retractable Quicksilver Buckler Shield, Superior Elven Craft Adamantine/Nyzequil Banded Green-Wood Composite Longbow (Strength 1), Superior Longsword, Banded Bracers of The Archer, Amulet of Fortune, Boots of Travel, Googles of the Cat, Belt of the Acrobat, Flash Step Anklets, Minor Cloak of Safety, 2 Potions of Healing (T2).

Although this wouldn't be part of a base status screen and would have to drill down to get additional information, naturally I'd be curious as to what those talents actually do.

Talent Descriptions:

Exceptional Reflexes: When facing multiple opponents, you can take advantage of more openings.

Enmity: Each time after the first that you hit the same target in a fight, you will do a small amount of additional damage. Additional hits will continue to stack as the fight progresses.

Precision Fire: When using a ranged weapon, friendly fire is far less likely.

Skirmisher: You are particularly adept at fighting while moving and take no penalty for doing so.

Some of the skills I end up finding to be of interest as well. For instance, “binding” turns out to be associated with being able to tie many different types of knots and so on. This skill is the reason Regina is so good with using ropes to do things like tie up enemy captives. Aside from that I will not be explaining why I found this skill to be of interest, but I did ask her to demonstrate a handful of the types of knots I was familiar with, and she had no problems doing so.

Needless to say, I've added Binding to my list of skills to practice now that I know that it is a recognized skill in this world; right along with realizing I should also try and learn what some of those other skills meant, and I should try to figure out how I can practice them. Perception is tied to one of my own Special Qualities after all, and Determine Intent, Disguise, and so on are all potentially useful skills that I am more than happy to learn as skills now that I know they are not class specific special qualities.

If it is a skill, I should be able to learn it during one of my level ups, just as Regina should be eligible to learn how to use schematics. It was through these exchanges that, entirely without initially planning to do so, we began a collaboration to create a book on skills. The focus of that book would be to identify the ones we had, explain what they did, and detail how to learn or teach them.