The Ancient adage “you can’t manage what you can’t measure” is fundamentally incorrect.

Hector Mastrantonio, expert Bladesmith

“Almost there,” Johanna said as she jumped on her bed.

The Inn at Malebranche was small, lacking even a common room. For food or drinks, they’d have to cross the street for a small restaurant next door, but that was impractical, so the five travelers had packed themselves into her and Tom’s room.

“That’s Independence State, right?” Petra asked.

“Malebranche is still in Winnebago State but we’ll cross the border on the first day.”

“And you’ll be technically in the clear.”

“If we’d kept going south along the river, we’d have been earlier. The True Missouri was not that far. Although, so far, we haven’t seen any sign of attempts to apprehend us or anything. Save maybe those bandits, which might have been would-be bounty hunters back in the Montana.”

Johanna shrugged and continued.

“Although that requires residence.”

“And as I said, renting some kind of place. I know you farmers, you don’t want to rent or borrow or anything, but renting a place makes sense when you don’t know how your life is going to be,” Petra said. “I did it for years after leaving home.”

“And we probably still have a house in Valetta, unless it got seized or something because we’re criminals, deserters, and traitors to the Marches. But I see the point. Although we don’t have to do it immediately once in Nedalshe.”

“Step one, find a headquarters. Step two, find dependable people. Step three, convince them they can do it.”

Johanna sighed.

“That too. Although I have an idea. Even if we don’t find more Ancient books to convert, we have simple parchments. We can demonstrate using them that we’re not talking our asses off. One might be some exotic Artifact, eight are something different.”

She turned and fished the wrapped bundle. The parchments were made of some kind of thick paper-like squares, and you needed to apply some serious force to roll them, but once you let them go, they unrolled perfectly flat and unbroken. That made them easy to transport. The flat, unrolled, version was a bit awkward to stash in a backpack.

She picked one and then frowned.

“I… distinctly remember this being useable back when we made them?” she said.

“Strength? Yes. Everyone could use it except me and Tom,” Peter said.

“Well… obviously it doesn’t work anymore.”

“Don’t tell me they have a limited shelf life and spoil like milk,” Petra said.

“We never had any for long. All of them were immediately used,” Johanna said, starting to feel panic rising.

Petra grabbed the parchment, and the blue light sprung, converging to the central circle to start rotating.

“Okay. It’s not broken. It’s you.”

“I don’t understand. What’s changed?”

“Something must have.”

Petra handed the paper to Tom. The light started again, prompting a look of surprise.

They all tested it. Only Laura and Johanna couldn’t light the parchment. Tom and Peter both could now.

“That’s… totally bizarre. It’s the reverse of back in Zahl? No, wait, you could do it back then, Petra.”

Johanna picked the next parchment, checking its type – Agility – and circulated it. Once again, she failed to activate it, as did Laura. Both Tom and Petra, who already had been able to use it before still could, but Peter now could as well.

“It’s not an inversion. There’s definitively something very specific, very individual that has changed.”

Authority was also slightly different. Everyone had been able to use it in Zahl, and only Johanna and Laura couldn’t now. Dexterity prompted another weird data point, as Laura could still activate it, while Johanna couldn’t anymore. It looked like every version now had a different set of who could and could not use them.

“Did your Ancient change something?” Petra asked.

“That’s the only thing that might make sense. He said we gave him our choices, and the parchments clearly do some changes – choices – related to Talents,” Johanna speculated.

“New Talents? Might Tom and Peter have become eligible for Strength and Dexterity ones?”

“While me and Laura… we’ve got a new one and we’re not eligible?” Johanna suddenly realized. “No. Laura can use Dexterity. Even if that’s the only one.”

“You said you didn’t always immediately realize when he granted you a new spell.”

She fished another parchment, realizing that it was one of the two Level ones. They’d had ended with six different personal qualities, and two copies of the singular Level version. She handed it to Laura, but it did not light for her either.

“So much for being eligible for a Dexterity talent, then,” she shrugged.

“It’s just an idea, that Level is how you can raise your maximum amount of Talents,” Johanna admitted. “Tom?”

Her husband looked at the inert parchment in his hand and shrugged before dropping it.

“Not working.”

“Yea, it’s something else…” Petra’s voice trailed as she saw the parchment light up in her hand.

“Something has changed for you too,” Peter said.

“I couldn’t before. No one could in Fallen Hill.”

Peter tested himself, confirming that the paper would not react for him before handing it back to Petra.

“You’re the only one among us that has not… given up your choice to the Ancient. He can’t have affected you.”

Johanna looked at the swirling light lines. The effect was slightly fascinating in its eerie strangeness.

“What do I do?” Petra asked.

“I’m not so sure anymore about the effect of Level…”

“Mark used Level twice,” she reminded her.

“Want to try? We do have a spare one.”

“I assume it is not going to give me a new Talent. Just the potential for one.”

Petra looked at the cycling parchment and shrugged, and the paper square started burning without a trace.

“Done.”

Johanna handed her the second Level parchment, which did not light up this time.

“No additional level, just one.”

“It still doesn’t explain how you got one,” Johanna said.

“You’re the expert.”

“Some expert. I just take notes when stuff pops up,” she said, fishing for her notebook. She opened the page where she took notes on the parchment content, trying to figure out what mysteries were involved.

“Want to…”

Johanna raised her head when she heard Petra stop talking and looked. The Earth Shaper was holding one of the parchments leftover… the Authority one.

Inactive.

“What. The. Fuck,” Petra said.

“So, you can no longer activate Perception, Dexterity, Empathy, or Authority, but Agility, and Strength are still available,” Laura summed up.

“They are all linked together somehow, then. If using Level affects the rest,” Petra said, hand tucked under her chin in thought.

Johanna flipped the book to the page where she’d recorded Petra’s gifts and went through the list.

“It looks like you already received Authority. But never Perception nor the rest. Yet you still can get Strength, which you already received.”

“You can get multiples anyway. Mark had Strength twice, am I correct? That’s confusing. Want me to use one of the two, and see how that affects the rest?” Petra asked.

Johanna gave it a thought briefly, before deciding.

“No. We don’t have duplicates, unlike we had with Level. Once you use one, it’s gone, until we can get some books. So let’s think before we use them.”

“And hope your patron remakes some.”

Johanna paused, pencil poised above the page. Then she wrote a single word and a question mark: “accumulation?”

“Elena said sorcerers got slightly better with age.”

“You think it’s linked? It’s been less than two months since Fallen Hill,” Petra countered.

“Yes, but she also said it was like time was compressed when it came to me, to us. As if we were doing in months or weeks what might take years or decades normally.”

“Well, I am not you. Never met that Skeleton of yours, certainly.”

“No, but you travel with us. Maybe there is something that spreads from our connection to the Ancient that also speeds up your… whatever.”

“Interesting idea.”

“One of the things I want to check is if the parchments start activating again. That would confirm we’re slowly – or maybe quickly – gaining something. It’s probably not meaningful, since the Ancient can change us without notice, but you’re the only one who is outside of his reach, and you can’t change without using the parchments.”

“Test subject. Well, if that means I can gain more powers, I’m all for it.”

Johanna looked at the rest, who were all contemplating the puzzle of the parchments. Laura, in particular, seemed to be frowning in contemplation.

“Any better ideas?” Johanna asked.

The Combat Fixer raised her gaze from the Dexterity parchment she’d been contemplating – the only one she could activate.

“Money.”

“We’ve got enough for a while, but how that is…”

“No. It’s like money.”

“What is like the money?”

“The parchments.”

“I don’t get it.”

“Think about it like it is a kind of money. We all get paid, from time to time. Once we have enough in our purses, we can buy things. Petra… Petra didn’t have enough back in Fallen Hill to afford a Level. Then after our trip, she finally had enough. But once she purchased Level… she no longer has enough cash reserves for some of the qualities. She can pick the cheap ones, not the expensive ones.”

“And Tom and I got paid enough we can purchase Strength. And some others?” Peter mused.

“But Laura and I don’t… oh.”

“Yes. The Ancient has our ‘choice’. He’s got the purse strings and can spend the whatever, whenever,” Laura said.

Johanna immediately used the eraser to remove “accumulation” on the notebook, and wrote “currency???”.

Smart, Moore noted.

Seeing Veldhuis use the Level scroll was mildly disappointing. He would have provided it on the same scroll as the skill if needed. He still needed to convey the need for two Dexterity points and an Authority one before Popping Rocks.

But the game of testing who could purchase what had been genius. Johanna’s notes about currencies were on the spot. The experience was currency in this RPG system. The prices might not be fixed, but just knowing about the concept would help tremendously for those that were outside his Authority.

Using the scrolls as a way to teach the system had not occurred to him until now, but once you had enough materials… It was imperfect, maybe too constrained even, but it was a method.

They need that Library of Congress. I have so many basics to show.