Jessica sighed as she look at her room.

Eian had finished hers a while back and she had instantly gotten in.

It had a couch, chair, table and bed, wholly utilitarian.

She stole the pelt since Alex was working on skinning another, the couch outside was empty so it didn't matter.

It was beginning to smell worse, but it was the closest thing to comfort she could find right now.

'Stupid Alex and his big mouth.' Jessica sighed and looked at her glowing tattoo.

Breathing in deeply she selected spirit.

The world washed away in white.

*****

Jessica stood upon an uplifted segment of the floor and searched around herself.

Six doors stood in all their glory, far more vivid than what the other three described it as.

The fire door danced wildly, the spikes on the ice door looked deadly, the wind door was a tornado of motion, the earth door's jewels were extravagant and the vine door pulsed with life.

The skulls on the door of death were the most intimidating, the eyes felt as if they stared at her soul and they were stuck ever-grinning as if mocking her.

Just the thought of getting close to it gave her chills.

She briefly looked at the other doors, but in the end she agreed to do something, so she would.

Ones word was the currency of the world and if she broke it, the others wouldn't trust her anymore, never mind listen to her.

Wringing her hands together, she bit her lips anxiously and approached the door.

The other doors faded from existence and soon only those maliciously grinning skulls stared at her.

'Is it me or are the eyes glowing....' Jessica backed away slightly, a shock of cold flowed through her.

She stood there a meter away from the skulls, eyeing the sockets for a sign of what she had seen.

Seeing nothing of the sort she closed her eyes and convinced herself it was her nerves.

'Please. If there's someone watching. Please tell me this isn't a mistake.' Jessica opened her eyes.

Chewing on her lip she approached the door, attempting to look only at the knob, which was made of femur bones welded together.

Feeling its texture made her inwardly cringe, it was really bone.

She closed her eyes and pulled at the door.

Seconds later everything exploded in pain.

"UGHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!" Jessica bit her tongue.

Every cell in her body groaned as they begun to ache, then stretch, finally her cells was viciously nailed by burning hot needles all at once.

Her spine arched, she tasted blood and screamed at the top of her lungs.

Her screams echoed throughout cave.

******

An eternity later Jessica recovered, the pain had faded to a bearable degree.

She shuddered, her breathing was erratic, her body felt battered and sore.

She ignored everything that bothered her and brought her knees to her breast.

Someone was talking to her, but she ignored the voice, by closing her eyes and covering her ears.

She just wanted to go home, to lay down on her own bed, see her parents again and forget everything.

Her eyes had watered, nothing was going her way, never.

Was a little happiness so much to ask for?

******

Eian watched on as Alex frantically tended to Jessica.

She had gone completely quiet, shivering in a corner and largely ignoring Alex's questions.

Eian had heard her screams through the stone from the other room.

Shrugging he went back to work, she wouldn't feel the pain ever again, though he did shiver remembering his own experience.

He finished Alex's room a while later, he didn't think Alex was in the mood to use it yet though.

He moved out and begun to work on his own quarters, he would make damn well sure it was the comfiest.

'I guess I'll have to upgrade myself after this too. Hopefully my body stops hurting from using magic soon.' Eian sighed remembering his aches.

He spent quite some time on his room.

As soon as it finished, he lay down as comfortably as he could on a stone couch.

Looking over his tattoo which read Body six, Mind four, and Spirit five.

He lay there for a while hesitant, he had just worked straight for several hours.

Sighing he shrugged, he was no stranger to hard work.

He selected spirit and the world washed away.

*******

He blinked and noticed he was once more in the mountain, Ul stood there at attention, arms crossed.

"Nice te see yer ready fer 'nother skuff. Cheers too, ye managed to pass yer second bottle-neck. I won't be seeing ye as often now." Ul held a broad smile on his face.

"So....What now?" Eian almost cringed.

'This is gonna fucking hurt. This bastards a sadist.' Eian scrunched up his face and grit his jaw.

"Why ye lookin' like that? Ye wanna shit? HAHAHAHAHAHA!" Ul's grating laugh put Eian on edge.

Eian sighed.

"Anyways. I suppose we should start. Times a wastin'. How much time ye got this time?" Ul's face straightened as he got to business.

Ul put his arms behind his back, Sergent style.

"More than three hours...." Another sigh escaped Eian and he rubbed his face.

"Great. I think it's time te start teaching ye how to use weapons. What types have ye used? I'll give ye a few te try and I'll decide what suits ye best." Ul's smile held a promise of pain.

Eian spent some time thinking.

He explained the weapons he had used so far, spears, swords, axes and a lousy mace.

He also explained he used a shield sometimes, but he had lost his one recently.

"Shields good, 'specially since ye aren't made o steel yet." Ul nodded.

"I'll get as hard as steel?" Eian's eyes widened.

"Ye. It'll be a while though, past human racial limit, if ye manage." Ul nodded.

"Then why do even wear armor?" Eian blinked that seemed weird.

"A powerful enough spell can harm me. Dragon fire is 'specially hot. 'Sides certain enchanted weapons can cut through steel like butter, though they are expensive." Ul shrugged.

"How expensive?" A weapon like that completely appealed to him.

"Hmmmm....maybe a hundred gold standards, but maybe even up to a sapphire standard, maybe a lot more maybe a lot less, depends on what world." Ul rubbed his chin, then nodded.

"A what? Where?" Eian scrunched up his face, he had no idea what that was.

"The multi-universal currency is standardized, or standards for short. Ye know cos they have to be up to standard and universally trade-able. Else exchanges would be a hassle, imagine there are almost an infinite amount of worlds." Ul shrugged.

"Okay, and how much is a sapphire standard then?" Eian was losing a bit of track here.

"A hundred gold standards." Ul smirked.

"........And how much is that. That doesn't clarify anything." Eian narrowed his eyes, he saw where this was going.

"A hundred gold standards are a thousand silver standards, or one sapphire standard." Ul's smile broadened, confirming Eian's thoughts.

"That doesn't explain anything. How...Can you translate that to something I can understand?" Eian rolled his eyes.

"Sure, just tell me what ye can buy with a currency ye typically use and I'll try to give a rough estimate. Also it's important to tell me how advanced yer world is. The more advanced it is, the cheaper things usually go for. HA!" Ul let out a short bark of a laugh and clapped.

Eian spent a while detailing American currency.

He gave examples of what he could buy with a dollar, ten, a hundred and even how much a cheap vehicle costs.

Ul told him paper currencies aren't used in the wide universe, because they depend a lot on the country of origin to back up the value.

Standards are precious mineral coins, thus they hold value by themselves, and the bigger standards are standard plates.

Ul told him a silver standard would be somewhere around twenty five American dollars, enough for a nice meal at a respectable restaurant and a beer.

Each coin had an equal mass and were slightly bigger than a quarter, they also held a small hold in the center to be strung, it was an ingenious simple design.

Basically an enchanted sword, that could cut through steel like butter, would cost approximately twenty five thousand dollars, in Eian's world.

Ul was specific that it would only be cheaper in an advanced world, lower tech worlds would inflate the price far more.

Ul told him his world was not an advanced world, they were around a middle world, so the sword could go for a sapphire standard.

Thus if Eian had that much money he could choose: a nice car, or an overpowered sword.

"The standards start with coppers, ten of those make an iron, ten of those make a silver and ten of those make a gold standard. Those are the basic currencies used in everyday life and they are pure to the extreme." Ul nodded.

"But you mentioned a sapphire standard." Eian tilted his head.

"I said basic. BASIC. The higher coins are a tad tricky. A sapphire standard, which I've told you, are worth a hundred gold standards. An emerald standard is worth four sapphire standards.. A ruby standard though, is worth ten sapphire standards. A diamond standard is worth two ruby standards, or twenty sapphire standards. Not all of those are at their highest purity. Each coin of the same type is exactly the same size and quality though." Ul explained.

"Why? Wouldn't purer be better?" Eian thought that made sense.

"Better for what? Coins are used to buy and sell. A sapphire, of extra fine quality, could be worth more than a diamond of the same size. Same with emeralds and rubies. The idea isn't to make them as best as possible, it's to make the coins able to be traded and hold certain monetary values. The sapphires used for example are actually of low value." Ul smirked at him.

Eian tried to process that idea.

"Let me give ye an example. Ye use paper dollars right?" Ul asked.

Eian nodded.

"What would happen if ye only had one paper dollar. How would ye trade with it?" Ul shrugged.

"Um.....by buying stuff?" Eian was losing track.

"What if what ye want is only worth half of that paper dollar?" Ul asked.

"Get two?" Eian thought he had understood though.

"Inconvenient isn't it? Now let's say, ye want something that's worth a million o them paper dollars. Ye gonna carry them all?" Ul motioned with his hands.

"No. That's just asking for someone to steal from you." Eian frowned.

"Not to mention inconvenient. Basically values are assigned to money to facilitate trading. Not to make the most expensive coin out there. The value of the standard coin must reflect the value we assign, always. That's what standardizing is all about." Ul smiled.

Eian spent some time thinking over all that he had heard, it all seemed pretty straight-forward.

He supposed it wasn't different from his world.

"Now enough talk. Let's get to work." Ul's sadistic smile was now present.

Eian gulped.