“You want me to die to test if I can come back? No. No nope no not gonna happen nope never no.” Lillian crossed her arms and glared at the headmaster for a full dozen seconds before realizing who she was glaring at and shrinking back.

Charlie, Angela and Alex looked similarly skeptical, while Aurelia matched the gleam in the headmaster’s eyes, though with a bit less enthusiasm.

Headmaster Geriard looked over the group of students with an eyebrow that almost matched their own skepticism. “Ah, none of you have died before then? I suppose that is not unexpected if this was your first excursion. If you are planning to become bureaucrats or specialists that don’t leave the safety of the cities, that is not too much of a problem, and you may well live long, full lives without it. But given what I remember of your backgrounds that seems unlikely for most of you. If you plan to venture forth and act outside the walls it is something you will inevitably run into eventually. Those who don’t adequately plan for revival usually don’t survive long enough to make much of a difference for anyone but the families and friends they leave behind.”

Fang returned from his exploration of the spicy-smelling knicknacks along the wall to twine between his human’s legs, sensing her agitation and attempting to find the source of it. Something complex about death and new things and ‘science,’ whatever that was. Fang didn’t really understand. Cats didn’t die. And when he did, it wasn’t so bad. Just a lot of floating. Except for the fire face. That wasn’t so fun.

The cat finished circling Lillian’s legs, black fur rubbing off on white cloth as he settled down on top of her feet, tail twitching at the memory and the faint sensation of flames that still remained. Lillian sat back down somewhat awkwardly, doing her best to not disturb his royal meowness now that he’d settled in on her feet. She thought for a moment, and Alex chose that moment to slip back into the conversation.

“I know revival spells are possible, even beyond what Lils can do, but aren’t they absurdly expensive?”

The headmaster waggled his hand back and forth. “Expensive and limited, yes. But going out into the wilderness is profitable and uncommon. Calling adventurous souls back from the afterlife is also easier than most from what I recall of the last time I spoke to a priest on the subject. I’m sure there is a class on the specifics of the adventuring economics if you are interested.” He looked to Aurelia, who shot back a shrug, along with a look that perfectly encapsulated the vanishingly small likelihood of her paying attention to things like ‘classes’ and ‘students’.

“I’m in it actually,” said Alex, “but they haven’t mentioned anything about revival, only healing budgets… And what they estimated wasn’t nearly enough to afford any of the resurrection services I’ve seen.”

Geriard frowned. “I may have a chat with your instructor. Practices have likely changed since my days getting started, but it should be in the syllabus somewhere. It could also be that you were looking at the services targeted at nobility and such city-bound folk. They tend to have different prices and conditions attached.”

“But back to the point,” Lillian said, “I definitely don’t have the money to pay for any kind of resurrection magic if this test went wrong. And what’s the point of it anyway if revival is so common? I know my own revival healing skill is supposed to be valuable, but it’s pretty limited, nothing like what you’re talking about.”

Now that she was sitting, Fang slinked up into her lap, curling up on her thighs rather than the hard combat boots beneath her robes, flicking his tail against her side in a demand for scritches. Which his increasingly well-trained human swiftly provided.

“I wouldn’t call it common,” Geriard corrected. “It is still expensive and exceedingly unpleasant. Revival services should never figure into your plan A. Preferably not a plan B or C either. But it’s an important plan F. Familiar revivals on the other hand are relatively inexpensive and not overly taxing on the soul. Between that and your own specialization, that means any single member of your team could die, be revived, and carry on as if nothing happened!”

The group whose deaths were being discussed universally affixed him with concerned and unimpressed looks. Aside from Fang, who was looking sleepy and unimpressed.

Charlie put words to their collective thought. “I’d much rather not die at all. Not die more frequently.”

Headmaster Geriard sighed and elaborated, “I know this might sound like a bad deal if you haven’t started taking contracts and missions yet, but it really is a very good thing. Unless things have drastically changed since my day, most all mages capable of resurrection are exactly the sorts of specialists I mentioned, never leaving the walls and for the most part sticking to their own temples. That means any death would send the entire group back to the city, if they aren’t wiped out entirely from losing a crucial member in a dangerous situation with no easy retreat. With the cost of resurrection and the likelihood of not getting a payout from the aborted job, that sort of incident was the number one cause of teams retiring early back in my day.”

“Early retirement isn’t the worst thing in the world,” Angela said, “Probably beats dying. Repeatedly.”

“Ah but these adventurers often didn’t retire with full purses and good repute,” The headmaster said, “They retired into craft jobs or manual labor that their skills and stats didn’t properly support. The adventuring life is about balancing risk against reward, and that is probably the best case scenario for failure to maintain that balance. However, there are different types of risk. Lethal traps and assassin-class monsters for example. Rarely a threat to a group as a whole, but often capable of claiming a single life before being dealt with, and a frightening number of them target supports and healers in specific. Many jobs have a high danger rating and corresponding pay specifically due to this risk of a member getting killed. But your group should be able to deal with this sort of danger without nearly as much risk to your success. The cost of a potential resurrection is factored into those jobs, and if you can consistently complete them without needing one, you will quickly earn enough to afford resurrections, which will then allow you to take on even more dangerous jobs.”

“That…” Lillian said, “Doesn’t really sound like a good thing…”

“It is if you want to make a difference or afford an early, true retirement. More danger means better pay or more impact, often both. As for resurrection in this test of your familiar bond, I am confident enough in my assessment that I am more than willing to cover it in the unlikely event that things go catastrophically wrong. While I doubt we’ll be able to replicate this reversed bond, it’s valuable enough information for me to take a small risk in the event the opportunity does arise in the future.” The man’s eyes gleamed at the idea. “If nothing else, getting you acquainted with the concept in order to encourage you to take this line of work seriously would be worth it in itself. Always pays to help out a rising star, and if this works, whatever group you are a part of will certainly qualify. No need to decide immediately though. I’ll need some time to get things in order regardless. At week’s end, after classes finish. We should meet again to discuss the dungeon core anyway. Please make a decision by then.”

The headmaster led a chorus of hesitant nods, and once everyone had joined, he stood. “Then if there’s nothing else, you’ve added enough work to my plate for one day, and Aurelia has added enough headaches for three. Go celebrate your success. You had a very unusual excursion, and you handled it exceptionally well, all told.”

Charlie, Angela, and Alex stood up, but Lillian stayed seated, lightly nudging at the cat in her lap. “Uhm… I would like to, but he’s sort of… He still doesn’t always listen, even when he’s behaving. Come on Chairman Meow, move, it’s time to go.”

Fang stayed where he was, purring as his human petted and nudged his side in different ways. Maybe not the best trained yet, with the mental and physical nudges to vacate his rightful place on her lap, but she was learning. His eyes were drifting closed when a marble floated in front of them. This one wasn’t as big or reflective as the other, but it shone with a soft, warm light that almost reminded Fang of sunlight. He froze, paws shifting under him as he tracked the little orb. Then he pounced, leaping off of Lillian’s lap and bounding off of the chair’s arm before swatting the marble downwards, Unlike the other one, this marble clattered properly off of the floor, and within moments Fang had herded his prey into a corner and pinned it down.

“It seems that this cat of yours is particularly fond of beast cores,” the headmaster said. “I don’t have any fire cores handy, but a light-aligned one should be close enough for him to enjoy. Consider it a small bribe to encourage assisting with my little experiment, and a bit of encouragement and assistance to keep him under control.”

Fang picked the marble up in his jaws, enjoying the slow trickle of sunshine flowing in through his tongue and down towards his core. As Lillian stood up, he trotted back over to her, proudly dropping the marble at her feet, lightly tapping it to set it slowly rolling and headbutting her ankle to encourage her to hunt it. And much to his surprise, his human did! Lillian bent over and plucked the marble from the floor. Not quite proper technique, as she didn’t bat it around to tire it out first, but it was certainly progress! Fang purred with pride as he rubbed against her calves, covering the hem of her robe with black hair and causing her to adopt an awkward gait as she attempted to step around and over him in a hasty retreat from the headmaster’s office, hurrying after her party members and tossing a few apologies and thanks over her shoulder.

Fang would have to work on that. It wouldn’t do for his human to be without at least some feline pride. His pride in his human kept his attention all the way out of the building and across a portion of the quad.

His human tried to pick him up a few times, but Fang wasn’t quite ready for more scritches yet, so he slipped between her inexperienced grabby hands. He didn’t even have to use any sunshine, just his peerless feline agility. Not like with Alice. She was always able to scoop him up when she wanted to, so long as he was within reach. But she gave good scritches and frequent offerings, so he forgave her greed for his presence.

That memory made him slow down, trailing behind the humans as he looked around. The buildings weren’t like any he remembered seeing. Improbably tall and varied, some were made of ivy-covered bricks, some of what seemed like one giant block of stone. A couple even strained his brain as he tried to figure out if they were trees shaped like houses or houses shaped like trees. He didn’t recognize a single one, and the people were strange too. They all looked kind of like humans, but some of them were dressed strange, with metal skin or water flowing around them like clothes.

Even the less strange ones were a bit odd, as everyone had the same robes as his new human minions and the two he’d saved from the mouse in the maze, but in all different colors. Then around them all sorts of things floated, scampered, rolled and scurried. Skulls, mysterious floating marbles, Fang even thought he saw a feather blowing on the wind. And all sorts of animals moved with them. Insects, birds, rodents, one human even sat on top of an enormous gray creature that stood as tall as the distant buildings next to it. But no cats. No dogs either though, so at least that was a plus.

It was full of novel napping spots, sunshine to bathe in, and fluttering prey to hunt, but somehow none of it appealed to Fang at the moment. There was no asphalt, no car noises, no power lines, no other cats that tried to mark every other post in his territory, no children clumsily chasing him with tail-grabbing hands. It was good? But there was so little that was familiar. Fang missed his canned meat offerings, and his cozy spot by the radiator that smelled like him. And maybe Alice too.

Lillian swooped down and picked him up, and this time Fang didn’t resist, nestling himself into her arms and resting his head on her shoulder, taking in the strange sights and wondering which way led home.

Wherever this place of strange buildings and tamed prey was, it must have been far from his home. He should get back to Alice soon. She was probably starving without his hunting. Rats were probably living in her basement without him to scare them off.

But as Lillian used sunshine-infused fingers to scritch the back of his head, and her chest vibrated under him with her hesitant human babbling, he started purring. He should get back soon, but for now, this was pretty good.