Dante stood before Herald, smiling.

'I guess I'm like a better jehova's witness now? I keep getting people recruited into my ladies service so...' Dante's train of thought was interupted as his wandering eyes meet the bowl that was still floating before the two of them.

"I think this is your's Herald." Dante said as he used telekenisis to push the crimson bowl into Heralds chest.

The second the bowl meet his chest it seemed to phase into him leaving no trace behind.

Herald stood with his arms in the air looking down. Understadably confused by all that had just transpired. Slowly he raised his head to look at Dante.

"I guess im a cleric now. The skills seem very useful." He said as he lowered his arms, slowly relaxing from the initial excitement.

Dante smiled, "So you got the pool but do you have the dagger of sacrifice skill yet? You have the dagger but do you have the skill?" Dante mused for a moment looking upon the dagger in Heralds hand.

Herald's eyes widened as he remembered the dagger in his hand. Looking down as he lifted up his hand he found it was still there but...

'What is this feeling?' Herald thought for a moment as the dagger almost seemed to pulse. The blade began to glow with golden light and then like a crack of lightning, golden veins of energy coursed up his arm. The dagger seemed to fade from existance leaving only the golden veins that raced up his arm. The veins raced up his arm and neck until it reached his eyes. For a moment his eyes burned gold, and in a blink they were normal once more.

"Huh..." He said his eyes unfocusing for a moment before refocusing upon Dante.

Herald smiled as the dagger reappeared in his hand, and in the other appeared that crimson pool of sacrifice.

"May they serve you well. By the way let me run something by you. Can you create an acrane program that basically acts as a soundboard? Maybe it could reproduce things like the, That was Easy, button. The Nope meme. So on, and so on." Dante said curios as to the extend of Herald capabilites for the moment.

Herald chuckled as he dismissed the summoned objects. "Sure, but let's try that when we are back in town. Even with higher intellect it will still take me time to get all the code writen out." he said, using a bit of critical thinking to determine it wasn't the best timing to try it out now.

"Fair enough. By the way so you know you can use that dagger to disable people without hurting them. If its not siphoning health it doesn't hurt people. I know I tested it on myself." Dante said causing Herald to raise an eyebrow.

"O..K? That's good to know." Herald said.

Dante turned to adress the everyone. "Hey guys why don't we adventure together for the day? We will probably go slower but there is a strength to numbers." Dante spoke loud enough for everyone in the two groups to hear him.

He looked to his parents and Califa who simply nodded, fine with the prospect as a temporary arrangement.

James Looked to each of his party members hold a vote.

In the end it was a unanimous decision to tag along for the day.

James stepped forward extending out his hand. "We would be glad to adventure with you and your companions." He said while smiling.

Dante took a step away from Herald to meet James and taking his hand, shaking it. The the blue box arrived.

Party leaders you have chosen to adventure together and as such new information is available to you and your party members! When two or more adventuring parties join forces they become what is called by the system, a legion. Legions are two or more groups of players acting together towards a common goal. As the party leaders would you like to name this Legion?

Dante and James looked to the blue box before them and then each other.

"Should we?" James asked raising an eyebrow. The tone of his voice denoting his amusement.

"Fuck it, why not?" Dante said with a shrug.

After several minutes of group discussion the name chosen came to be...

Congratulations to then new Legion, "Adventures Inc."

Dante was slightly annoyed and mildly amused by the name that had been chosen. It reminded him of both Mystery Inc. from scooby doo, as well as Acquisitions Inc. an awesome D&D group on Youtube.

"How about we check out the lake? Have any of you guys been to the lake?" Dante asked curiously.

Everyone shook their heads except Califa. "I have its very nice. It reminds me of the lake near my house back home." Califa said with a beaming smile.

Nodding Dante addressed the legion once more. "So do you guys want to make a stop by the lake first or just march towards the edge of the zone?" he asked.

"It would be nice to see the lake before we head out." James pitched in.

"I bet the zone gets harder the farther from this town you get." David interjected.

"We can just backtrack if we get in over our heads. Besides we have Dante here. Probably the greatest cleric on the planet right now!" James exclaimed as he turned to face Dante.

Dante's eyes narrowed for a moment. "Yeah that could very well be true. But still I would rather not be raising people from the dead, so, be careful guys." Dante stressed parts of his sentence trying to get his point across. All nodded understanding the meaning behind his words.

After another quick vote it was decided to head to the lake for a few minutes before heading out towards the edge of the Zone.

So it was that Adventure's Inc began their journey to wealth and experience.

With a wave of his hand Dante motioned for James to go on ahead and be the one to lead everyone towards the lake while he stayed towards the back of the group with Herald.

Dante walked besides Herald exchanging idle banter when an idea struck him.

"System store, RGB keyboards." Dante said with a gleam in his eyes. Herald looked at him for a moment.

"What are you doing?" Herald asked, his expression becoming one of curiosity.

"You'll see." Was all that Dante said.

Searching through the many keyboards Dante found one that he felt would suit Herald, his skills, and his new position very well.

Dante produced a blue box of the keyboard for Herald to examine.

The keyboard was a typewriter Style Mechanical Gaming Keyboard with RGB Backlighting. Its angle could be adjusted and thus making it collapsible. Along its bottom was a wrist rest for those long hours of work.

It was an amazing blend of retro, modern, and futuristic all combined into a single item.

"I'm going to assume that you want to buy this for me. I'm grateful but I already have a keyboard." Herald said and as he did so he waved his hand and a holographic keyboard appeared.

"Yeah but how much mana does that take?" Dante asked with a raised eyebrow, eliciting a sigh from Herald.

"10 per minute. It almost cancels out my mana regen." He said with a defeated tone.

"This is a gift. Something to help you with your programming skills. I am helping you for your sake, my own, and for OUR lady." Dante stressed that word.

Herald looking both a bit defeated and yet happy seemed to relent accepting the gift. However, before he purchased the item he realized this would run into the same problem from earlier again.

After a moment he found what he was looking for, a hovering enchantment for 250 small gold. While he was at it he gave it a mana battery with a capacity of 2,000.

With the prices of the enchantment, the battery, and the keyboard itself added together the total price came to 1,251 small gold pieces.

'I am amazed how much money I have, and how much I spend on others. I gave my dad what basically equaled 200 grand!' Dante rubbed his face for a moment thinking about how much money he was really carrying around on him.

After that moment had passed he purchased the item and after retrieving it from his inventory handed it to Herald.

"It's magical so you don't really have to worry about powering it. It has an internal battery you can use for your coding skills. It can also connect to computers like a normal bluetooth keyboard. It requires attunement so you know, and here is the rest of its information." Dante took a breath as he finished that sentence. Handing over the blue box with the items information Herald marveled at the blue box. Then he looked at him, then back to the box and so on.

"How can I..." Herald tried to ask only to be cut off by Dante.

"DON'T DIE!" Was Dante's immediate response startling Herald with the sudden raising of his voice. Realizing he had shouted when he hadn't meant to Dante looked to see the others looking at him for a moment.

Dante continued this time in a lower and calmer voice, "Help OUR lady, and that will help me. Also, I do want that soundboard if you can manage it." Dante made himself clear.

Herald who had been frightened a moment earlier now started laughing. Dante and Herald laughed and chatted for several minutes before they arrived at the surprisingly busy lakeside.

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

They arrived to find dozens of people fishing and swimming all over the sizable lake. He even saw a few pedal powered boats going around, it was rather nice to see. The lake was about half a mile in diameter.

Dante patted Herald on the back as he departed from his side and rejoined James at the front.

"Should we ask some of the people fishing about the fishing tutorial? Maybe we can find out about some interesting skills." Dante spoke to James.

"Not a bad idea. Let's go talk to this guy over here." James said as he motioned towards the middle aged man with a beard, who was wearing a red cap, and sitting in a lawn chair. His pant legs were rolled up and he was bare footed. All the while he held a fishing rod in his hands.

Dante nodded as he turned to everyone. "Ok guys break off and do your own thing for a few minutes while we go chat with some of the people." Dante said much to the joy of several party members, including his parents.

Frank immediately slapped his chestplate causing it to vanish in a flash along with the rest of his armor. This left him in a t-shirt and military black pants. In near perfect sync Dante watched as his parents waved their hands across their faces. When their hands had passed they were both now wearing shades with wide smiles on their faces.

"OK, how did you guys do all that?" Dante asked, wondering where his dad's armor had gone.

Frank spoke up, "I talked it over with your mother and we decided to look into buying inventories like yours. We found a basic inventory in the store would cost us 500 small gold each so we each got one. To our surprise the system gave us something extra when we bought them..." Frank took a breath about to continue but his pause seemed to long for the very excited Laura.

"When we bought them the system gave us another inventory that we share, and it's the size of both our inventories combined!" Laura exclaimed in joy eliciting glances from a dozen people nearby who began walking over.

Dante and James looked to the approaching individuals and then to each other before Dante said, "I think they are looking for you! See you later." Grabbing James by the arm he began moving them towards the still seated man.

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

"Excuse us sir! Can we have a moment of your time?" Dante asked the seated man.

"Whatever you're selling I ain't buying! I already have been converted to one of these new religions. Or rather an old one, and I ain't got enough money to buy your bullshit." The bearded man said with a hearty laugh and a smile as he held up a small coin upon a chain necklace.

Using Eagles sight for a moment to examine the small gold coin he saw the figure of a woman upon the heads side of the coin.

Turning off the skill he asked, "May I have your name good sir and the name of your lady?"

"My name is Jack Russell. Like the Dog. As for the name of "My Lady", her name is Fortuna, an old Roman goddess of fortune." Jack said then kissed the small gold coin and placed it back upon his chest. "Anyway, what brings you here? What are your names?"

"Oh we saw you were fishing and just wondered if you had gone through the fishing tutorial. My name is James and this is Dante." James said before Dante could, causing him to roll his eyes a bit.

"Oh? Why yes I have. It basically, catch X amount of fish. I picked up the fishing skill and by the looks of it..." He said while pointing to his left to a group of four about 100 feet away. One man was knee deep in the lake stabbing into the water with what seemed to be a harpoon. "I think there is a harpoon fishing skill. The fishing skill basically acts like a sort of lure. The higher it is the more likely fish are to come your way. So you see..." Jack paused for a moment as he yanked his fishing rod.

The end of the poll bent back and forth as Jack fought with the fish he had hooked.

"A little help here!" Jack strained as he fought a losing battle against what seemed like a monstrous fish. Dante stepped forward and grabbed the line before beginning to pull it in hand over hand with relative ease. Jack stood for a moment stunned before he began frantically reeling in the slack line, making sure that it didn't tangle as he reeled it in.

A minute later Dante caught a glimpse of the fish that had given Jack such a fight and he laughed.

Dante reached out with his mind and used Telekinesis to pull the giant goldfish from the water. Despite his elevated stats Dante still was not very proficient with Telekinesis and so it was rough going at first to pick up the giant goldfish with Telekinesis.

"Holy Shit! Its the size of a fucking dog!" Jack exclaimed as he watched the fish rise to the surface.

Congratulations! Your skill Telekinesis has leveled up! Lvl. 4!...

"Fuck this thing must weigh 30 pounds!" Dante said, straining to raise the fish. When he found he couldn't raise the fish from the water he settled for walling it into a five by five circle of water.

"Well at least now we know the fish here won't be murdering anyone." Dante said with a smile motioning for Jack to claim his prize.

Jack handed his fishing rod over to James for a moment as he took a few steps forward towards Dante. "Why isn't it leaving?" Jack asked, confused.

"I have a skill called Telekinesis. Moving shit with my mind. It also allows me to build temporary things. Like fences." Dante said with a small bit of pride.

Jack paused for a moment looking at him before saying, "I won't argue with you about that. It ain't the strangest thing i've seen since the system came. Anyway thanks for helping me catch the thing for my quest."

Dante moved aside as Jack stepped into the small fish kennel. "Quest? Did you have a quest to catch this fish?" Dante asked, a bit confused.

"Sure do. Fortuna asked me to and i quote, "Catch a fish of gold." I thought it would be impossible but thought I would try anyway. Now then..." Jack paused as he pulled off his necklace and held onto the fish's spinal fin and pressed the necklace to its forehead. "Fortuna, may you bless this fish of gold." Jack said.

The coin on his necklace began to glow for a moment and they watched as the almost tarnished copper like scales of the Goldfish became immaculate and mirror like golden scales. Jack removed the hook from the fish's mouth and then turned to Dante. "You can let him go now."

Dante raised an eyebrow but did as he asked allowing the telekinetic fence to drop. What surprised him was that the fish didn't immediately bolt. Instead it swam up to Jack's left leg and almost seemed to rub against him much like how a cat would. It did this four times before it swam back to deeper depths.

"Hell Yeah! +5 Luck that makes 30!" Jack suddenly exclaimed as a blue box appeared before him.

Dante waited a moment but none appeared before him.

Jack turned toward Dante smiling. "Thanks to your help not only was I able to finish that quest for +5 luck I also leveled up as a Fisherman. Works well with my lady don't you think?" Jack beamed with joy.

"It does. Anyway, I think we will be going to talk to those guys down there now." Dante said as he extended out his hand to shake Jack's hand.

Jack reached out and shook Dante's hand before saying, "May the blessing of Fortuna carry you through this day."

Dante felt something wash over him before a notice appeared.

+5 Luck till days end...

"Thank you... By the way how many levels have you gained since the system arrived?" Dante asked, honestly curious.

"Four, two levels in Fisherman, and two in Jack of all Trades. Jack of all trades gives small increases to everything and +5 to luck per level. Fisherman gives a bit of Dex, Strength, Con, and Endurance. Hell since the system came my luck has really changed! My luck was 3 when the system arrived and now as you heard it's 30!" Jack said, truly happy with how life had changed for him.

As Dante turned to walk from the lake Jack grabbed his arm and said, "My lady desires to ask you a favor." Dante watched as Jack's eyes became what appeared to be a polished and very reflective gold. The voice that came from his mouth was not the one he had been expecting from lady luck.

It was the voice of an older woman. "Please would you do this old goddess the favor of spreading her name along your travels? I am weakened for the moment so I can only give you so much but I beg you of such fortune." She asked, her voice weak.

Dante thought for a moment before he lifted his palm revealing 10 small gold pieces. "Those not right for my lady, that strike me as needing a change in fortune I shall give your name."

Fortuna smiled through Jack and placed his hands upon Dante's. Much to his surprise he felt that door in the back of his mind open up once more and there in his mind he saw a story not unlike his own.

He saw a heartbroken boy, the lone survivor of a car accident that had killed his parents.

Taken in by his immigrant grandmother who hailed from the lands of Rome. When he was 16 she gave him the necklace she always wore, the same one he wore now.

Soon after she got sick and after a 5 year battle with cancer she died.

Jack mourned for the last of his family was gone but still he held onto that necklace determined to make it in the world. Never forgetting where he came from.

The door closed and once more he heard her weak voice. "You would do well in my service. But I sense that will not come to pass so for your kindness a humble boon."

+1 additional Luck on level ups!...

The golden mirrors that were Jack's eyes returned to their normal brown. Jack pulled back his hands and looking down Dante found his 10 small gold had become 5 necklaces just like the one that Jack wore. With a thought they were stored away in his inventory.

Dante and Jack nodded to one another before stepping out of the lack. Dante used Prestidigitation to dry each of their legs off over the course of a minute.

"One more thing. Do you think your ladies luck equals the luck of all her followers combined or something like that?" Dante asked.

Jack stood for a moment with a hand on his chin. He looked about ready to answer before he stopped for a moment. "She says it's something like that."

Dante smiled as he turned to leave in his freshly dried, and magically cleaned boots.

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

Dante and James walked over to find three asian women in bathing suits laying back on some beach chairs enjoying the warm sunshine. All the while a well built shirtless blond asian man in red trunks was spear fishing in the lake.

Dante called out and waved to them as he and James drew near. They did the same and the spear fisherman stepped out of the water waiting to greet them.

The man that stood before them as they approached looked familiar to Dante but he couldn't quite place it. The spear fisherman had flawless skin, his silky blonde hair pulled back into a ponytail with bangs hanging on the left side of his forehead. The man's eyes were orange which struck Dante as a bit odd, but not really something he thought to worry about.

"Hello there I'm Dante and this is James we saw you spear fishing and were wondering if you had gone through the fishing tutorial." Dante said as he stretched out his hand to shake the man's hand.

The blond man reached out and shook Dante's hand and then James' as he said. "High im Motoyasu." He said causing both James and Dante to freeze.

They looked at each other and then all three of them looked as the three girls began laughing at them.

'Even his voice...' Dante thought before he shook off the shock. "Bullshit! You can't be..." Dante's words were cut off as the man's harpoon glowed for a moment before transforming into a spear. Motoyasu chuckled as he watched their expressions shift through several emotions over the course of a few seconds.

"How?" Dante asked, his voice light and lacking much power.

"I can answer that." Said one of the women sunbathing. The woman in question was thin and about average height. Everything else was also average. Her raven black hair in a bowl cut swayed as she stood and walked over to them.

"Hello my name is Rena Amaku. And yes, Motoyasu isn't this guy's real name." She said as he place a hand on his shoulder

"Hey my name is Motoyasu now! The system recognizes it and everything!" He complained with a pouting face.

"Ok why are you the spitting image of the spear hero from Rising of the Shield hero?" James chimed in having shaken off the immediate shock.

Once more Rena chimed in, "When the system came this guy asked the system if it could change his appearance and it said it could for a price. So he emptied his bank account and converted all his money into gold. Then spent every last copper piece on making himself look like this." Rena motioned to Motoyasu's entire body as she said that.

'Probably even had his dick size adjusted. I wouldn't doubt the system could do it. I bet a lot of people have probably used that.' Dante thought for a moment before he realized something he should have realized sooner. 'I can cure mom's infertility with healing spells like regenerate. That's kind of gross to think about. I'll talk to them later about it.' Dante thought.

"Ok that explains that. You're a fan of the show Rising of the shield hero?" Dante asked really wanting to know what the fuck was going on.

"Yeah. We all are fans of the show. I wanted to be this guy." Motoyasu said as he indicated towards himself.

"As for the rest of us we like the show because we are all pretty similar to the other heros." Rena said as she motioned towards the two others still sitting in their long beach chairs.

In the middle of the three chairs was a shorter asain women with messy shoulder length blonde hair. Her emerald eyes reminiscent of Dante's hazel eyes.

"That's Itsuki Kowasaki, our Bow hero." Rena said to which Itsuki produced a bow from seemingly nowhere. It's appearance is nearly identical to the default form of the bow in the show save one thing.

Dante looked back and forth between the bow and the spear, "There are no gems."

Rena held up a hand, "I'm getting there. Next is Naomi Iwatani. She, unlike the shield hero, has three siblings."

On the chair closest to them laid a woman whose height seemed about the same as Rena's; her hair also raven black was smooth and tied back in a bun. She turned to them revealing her emerald eyes.

"She unfortunately doesn't have even the crappy version of what would be her legendary weapon like the rest of us do." Rena said eliciting a stare from Dante and motioning for her to keep going from Dante.

Picking up on what he wanted Rena twisted her hand in the air like she was twirling a sword and then she was.

The sword of the Sword hero appeared in her hand, though it too was missing its gem.

"You mentioned a crappy version? Does that have to do with the lack of gems? How powerful are these weapons?" Dante asked his questions in rapid fire.

Dante looked over to Motoyasu who was now wearing a white t-shirt and putting on a red open chest jacket.

"When the system came and he changed his appearance we all met up when we arrived and looked up the legendary weapons in the store. We were so hopeful and for a second they weren't there. The system screen fritzed and suddenly they were there. Each of us selected one of the weapons and apparently since we were the first to believe in them we got these limited versions, and each of us got a legendary quest to obtain the real thing. The only one of us left out was Naomi. None of the Legendary weapons in the store chose her like they did us." Rena paused for a moment taking a breath and allowing for other questions to be asked.

Seeing the weapons Dante pulled out his parrying shield. It was identical to the legendary shield's default form. He had bought it for just that reason. The rest of them looked at him in awe as he stared into the gem. The gem almost seemed to shine for a moment, almost encouraging Dante to follow through with his idea.

Dante walked over to Naomi and presented her the parrying shield. "I think you need this more than I do." Dante said. Naomi was stunned to speechlessness.

She had given up on having the legendary shield when she couldn't find it in the store. Even as her friends received their items she lost what little faith she had in the shield. She had been so depressed hiding it behind a smiling mask to make her friends feel better. But could things change now?

Naomi reached out for a moment and after a second of hesitation pulled the shield from Dante's crasp and held it tight to her chest.

Everyone was silent as they looked on, hoping to be proven right.

In that moment that she took the shield, she hoped no, she believed, that she had been chosen to be the shield hero. In that moment she felt faith in the shield and was not disappointed.

Everyone else watched in expectation and hoped for what was to come. Dante looked to Naomi now holding her new shield and for but a moment he saw the glimmer of light come from the large green glass crystal that adorned its face. Naomi's eyes went wide for a moment.

Naomi POV

*PING!*

Naomi heard the notice and after a moment opened her eyes to find a notice waiting for her.

A divine entity wishes to make a contract with you. Will you accept me? Will you be the shield that defends this world from the oncoming threats?

Do you Accept? Y/N?

With joy overflowing in her heart she screamed "Yes!"

The contract has been made...

This item has become the vessel for the Spirit of the Legendary shield!...

This item has become Soulbound to you...

You have leveled up!...

You have obtained the Class: Hero of the Shield!...

You are granted the Legendary Quest: "Become a Hero!"

Naomi shouted out in joy, "Im the shield hero now! I got the quest and everything!" She shouted in her joy as all her friends rushed to congratulate her.

Dante back away and returned to James' side allowing the friends to congratulate her.

"Why did you give it to her? You could have tried to have the shield yourself." James asked confused.

"She needed it more than I did. I could have tried, but i don't think i would have been the right fit. I figured out why the rest of them got it and not her until now."

"Why?"

"They believed with all their hearts. She didn't have enough faith to find what she saught. But it seems it came back to her in the end. Now then...Hey guys!" Dante exclaimed the last part to get the friends attentions. "What the fuck are the limits of those "Limited and crappy" version of the legendary weapons?