72 - Book 2: Chapter 9: Breakfast (2)

72 - Book 2: Chapter 9: Breakfast (2)

Noram was looking around anxiously, in a way that felt rather painfully familiar to Vex. It reminded him of himself, but also... "Do you think all this is my fault? Some people are acting weird. I don't know if the mana changes caused it, but..."

"You opened a door," Vex said, shaking his head, and trying not to think about his little brother. He offered Noram an encouraging smile. "We don't even know what that did yet, if it did anything. But maybe you can"

"Porridge!" Anyati announced, the innkeeper bustling over and startling both Vex and Noram; Derivan was as stoic as ever. Two heavy bowls of porridge were slammed onto the table in front of them; it smelled heavenly, and Vex's mouth began watering just from the sight of it. It came with crunchy pieces of fried dough on top and thick slices of meat, sprinkled with just the right portion of greenery

Noram was staring, too, and he looked like he was starving. Vex hesitated, but before he could say anything, Derivan seemed to notice, and spoke up.

"My armor negates the need for food," the armor said. "Would you like my meal instead?"

"I I couldn't do that," Noram said, but he looked like he desperately wanted to. "I mean, are you sure? It's not like I haven't eaten, it's just I'm still hungry, and I don't really know why..."

"I am sure," Derivan said, and nudged the bowl over to Noram. Vex couldn't help but smile slightly at the sight.

It didn't take long for Noram to begin devouring the bowl like he was starving. He took the first bite like he was being cautious of his food, but the next ones came more and more rapidly, until he was practically shoveling porridge into his mouth; Vex took more polite sips of his own meal in comparison.

It was delicious. But he wondered if it meant anything that the food Noram had eaten apparently hadn't been filling.

"Maybe you can show us where the dungeon is," Vex said, continuing his earlier thought as they ate. "It's not very far, is it?"

"It's not," Noram said, pausing for a bit so he could wipe off some of the porridge that had gotten on his nose. "Uh. It's pretty close. It's a small, low-level dungeon. Doesn't usually give much in terms of rewards; we just use it to try to level. Not much success so far, either."

"What level are you?" Vex asked curiously, then blanched a little as he realized the faux pas he'd made. "Um, you don't have to answer that. I was just wondering."

"We're around level twelve," Noram said with a slight shrug. He didn't seem embarrassed about it, or bothered by the question. "We figured we wanted to at least get past ten before applying to the Guild, you know?"

"The Guild doesn't really have a level requirement," Vex said. "You don't have to do that."

"I know," Noram said. He looked down slightly. "We just wanted to prove to ourselves that we could do it, too, you know? The other jobs around here are all farming and taking care of the town, and those are important, but we wanted..."

He trailed off a little bit, looking embarrassed, and dove back into his porridge. Vex exchanged glances with Derivan.

"You do not want glory," Derivan said, cocking his head slightly. "But you want... something more than this town?"

"Yeah, exactly," Noram said. He sighed he'd finished about half of his food, at this point, and was finally starting to slow down. He looked around, as if to check if anyone was listening to them, and then lowered his voice and spoke again. "And Fendal is low on mana crystals, too. They won't admit it, but the supplies from Elyra are dropping. We're going to need more, and we want to try to help farm more."

"Why not just farm at a Nucleus?" Derivan asked.

"It's normally less dangerous than a dungeon," Vex added.

Noram grimaced a little at the question. "There aren't any nearby. We'd have to travel further out, and there've been attacks lately. Monsters and bandits. A low-level dungeon is actually safer."

"The bandits shouldn't be a problem anymore, at least," Vex said, but he frowned a little at the mention of monsters. "When you say monster attacks, do you mean the goblins that have been raiding Fendal?"

"Yes," Noram said, nodding rapidly; he looked like he was holding his breath. Vex couldn't help but chuckle slightly.

"The one we went to was trapped," he said. "We didn't know what we were dealing with at the time. But have you ever heard of runic circles coming to life?"

"They can do that?" Noram asked, his eyes wide. He was a mage himself, so he no doubt was imagining what that meant his hand tightened around his wand, almost like he was getting ready to defend himself.

"They're not supposed to be able to," Vex said with a chuckle. "But they could there. We still don't really know why. The ruins were littered with runic circles, and some of them were designs for new spells but some of them, if you tried to draw them and channel mana into them? You'd be attacked by a living manifestation of mana."

"Whoa," Noram said. Vex blinked, holding back a laugh. When had the lizardkin gotten out a notebook? "How did you beat them?"

"I figured out how they worked," Vex said with a grin. He was genuinely proud of this particular story neither Misa nor Derivan had been able to fend off the circles, since they were largely ephemeral things, creatures of mana that followed them around and blasted spells at them. "They were slightly modified versions of the spells they could cast. There was a sort of runic program attached to it; the circle as a whole resists mana manipulation, but you can still tear apart that attachment point."

"But you said it doesn't work outside the ruins?" Noram asked, still scribbling notes.

"Believe me, I tried," Vex said with a chuckle. "Derivan will remember it."

"He would not stop complaining about it not working," Derivan agreed, but his tone was fond and affectionate. "It was cute."

"It was not!" Vex complained.

"We all agreed," Derivan said whispering conspiratorially to Noram, who nodded seriously and began taking notes

"You're not actually taking notes on that, are you?" Vex asked, groaning.

"Course not," Noram said, laughing. He seemed more comfortable with them, at least he grinned, and flipped the notebook around to show them. It was just a list of notes about the ruins, and a small diagram for what he thought the runic circle might look like.

It was astonishingly accurate, actually.

"I've got notes on what the circles looked like," Vex said, trying to gather himself. "I can share them with you, if you like."

"I would love that!" Noram said. He said it maybe a little too excitedly some of the other tables turned around to look at him, and he blushed and sat back down in his chair. "I mean, I would love that. Thank you."

"He is giving you quite the honor," Derivan said gravely. "To this day, Vex will not show me his notebooks."

Vex squeaked. "I have a good reason for that!" he argued, though he really didn't. He just couldn't let Derivan see his notes.

...Or Misa. Or Sev.

He couldn't let Noram see his notes, now that he thought about it; he'd ask questions about the sketches.

...He could copy the circles out. That would work.

"I am sure," Derivan said, sounding amused, and Vex groaned.