And I’ll absolutely take that.

In the days since he’d first gained the skill, he hadn’t found himself with nearly as much potential to train it as he had on that first day. As easy as it was for him to go and throw his money around to practice, his time was filled with trying to help Sachel awaken her skill, working on tools for the coming tower, and completing more crystals to hold the structure of the summoning spell. That left comparatively few times to work on it.

At least not in a completely ethical way.

His solution had been to train at the clinics where Sachel was practicing her magic, subtly linking his minds with the healers and patients around, not building theirs up to the level he knew he could, but instead only adding a strand or two on, giving them a boost to their thinking power that was handy without being disorienting like it would be if he just kept piling things on. As it stood, nobody even realized he’d done it, with the few who were conscious of the change at all attributing it to a sudden bit of clarity.

But I still hate this. This is definitely not the peak way of using my time.

Sure, he was practicing both mental symbiosis and deep connection, and he was making sure to materialize grains of all sorts of materials in his pocket as well for the job experience, but he wanted to be at his forge or working on the summoning spell, not out treating himself as a battery when that was all he could do.

There’s no reward without risk. Besides, maybe that will be just the kick you need for talking that succubus into being your head priestess. What was her name again? Valaria?

Myriad said evasively.

What, did she convert away from you already?

Then is she not good with your other believers?

Then is she bad at connect or something?

Then literally what is the hold-up?

Ben closed his eyes and let out a deep sigh, pinching the bridge of his nose as a few of the patients in the clinic looked at him.

Okay, I’ll freaking work on this too then. I’m ninety percent sure that as long as I really can force Sachel over the edge I can swing things so that she’ll accept if you ask. Just gotta modify the plans a little.

Anything if it means having one more person to keep me from having to be a responsible apostle.

“I did it!” Sachel yelled out, breaking through the conversation as she jumped up, radiant in her joy. “I leveled up my life magic!”

Only took a week huh? Thank god.

“Congrats,” He told her as Thera conveyed her own before going back to healing those around her. “Looks like we’ve finished the easy part.”

“...So what comes next?”

She didn’t like thinking of that as if it had been easy. Between the constant work, the circlet that made that one week feel like two and a half, and the constant, strange sensation of having her soul overfilled with mana it had all around been pretty terrible, but she knew that her dream would never be simple to fulfill.

The entire time she’d worked she hadn’t been told what would come after and her mind could only fill with the thoughts of whatever training would be forced on her for both her earth and water magics, as well as what else might come next for life. From the bit she’d seen of Ben’s life along with her talks with Myriad, she knew he was a hard worker, maybe too much so, and a part of her thought he was planning on working her to the point that she might awaken the skill by the time the next wave rolled around, leaving her completely unprepared for his actual thoughts.

“Well, since you’re done this we’ll be challenging the life tower in a couple days, just long enough for you, Thera, and Sonya to get all of your stuff in order. We’ll really only be gone for at most a week so look forward to it.”

“Um, you aren’t being serious right now, are you?”

“Of course I am, I’m always serious.”

“Ben, this is why Myriad says you’re insane! I’m a level seven life mage as of today! Do you even have life magic?”

“No, but that’s really just a minor detail.”

“This feels like a pretty major detail actually!”

“Sachel, I’m not going to lie to you and say this is going to be safe, and admittedly I have a couple reasons to think this is worthwhile beyond just helping you, but I want to give you the chance to come because I believe this is an excellent opportunity to achieve your dream. Not to put too fine of a point on it, but we could all be dead in a couple years. I don’t know the timescale you think you might be able to awaken your magics on, but I feel like you weren’t acting in a way that would get you to your goal in that time.”

She chewed on what he said, still hesitating but thinking it all over nonetheless. She knew that there was a very clear time limit they were on, should she risk her life for the chance of achieving her dream or just be happy with the time she had, even if it meant never getting there?

“I mean, even if we get to the top and I get my ninth level of life magic, there’s no guarantee I’ll be able to awaken it from there.”

“If we get to the top then I have a way I think could awaken your skill. I put it at fifty-fifty odds.”

Myriad told him privately.

Sure I can. Either it works or it doesn’t, sounds pretty fifty-fifty to me. Besides, I put way too much work into memorizing the biological structure of a freaking seed to let this fail.

Sachel heard none of that exchange, being too enraptured by what he said. She trusted her apostle, if he thought the odds were that good then she believed he had a reason to, and that did help tip the scales for her. Risking her life when she wouldn’t get the payoff she wanted was one thing, but risking it for a coinflip…

It felt insane, but she’d already felt she’d invested too much to back out, just like Ben had hoped.

“Okay, you say we have a couple days?”

“Absolutely,” He grinned. “Don’t worry, this is absolutely going to be terrible, but there’s a chance it won’t be too terrible.”

“I have no clue how I’m going to explain this to Ralia,” Was the last thing she muttered before Thera forced her back to work. Even if she got her level, she was still in the clinic so there were still people to help for whatever bit of practice she could get before she would really need to test the bit of skill she had.