Chapter 21: Back to the Familiar

Chapter 21: Back to the Familiar

I mainly relaxed for the rest of the day, spending the remainder of my money on some supplies I felt like I’d need for the trip to Carth tomorrow. It was strange, traveling so much after an entire life of living in a single village. But that was being an adventurer.

I also spent my time practicing Noxious Grasp. For the whole rest of the afternoon and night, I was diligently casting the Spell like I’d always been doing, slowly ticking my Spell XP upward. By the end of the day, Noxious Grasp was at 59/94 Spell XP. After the relatively relaxing afternoon, I lay down and slept soundly through the night.

When I awoke, the first thing I did was check Noxious Grasp’s Spell XP. 79/94! It seemed that the whole ‘practicing while I slept’ thing had become a true habit – one that I liked.

Erani and I agreed to meet in the lobby of the inn this morning, so I went ahead and went there, grabbing a seat and eating some breakfast while I waited for her to arrive. I still felt a bit uncomfortable in populated areas like these. I was used to total solitude in the forest, a single sound meaning trouble’s nearby. Even in my village, there were few places that ever got as busy as most of the areas here in Ordensville. I much preferred socialization when it was of the one-on-one variety. So I kept my head down, avoided eye contact, and ate my stew.

Eventually, Erani walked in, pack on her back and looking ready for travel. She saw me and walked over.

“You ready?” She asked.

“Yep,” I stood and shouldered my own, much smaller, traveler’s pack. I’d prepared pretty lightly – just bringing a change of clothes and some basic rations – but I’d also bought and filled a second and third waterskin, just in case I got lost again. I’d gone through enough dehydration for one lifetime, that was for sure.

Erani had agreed to bring the majority of the equipment, so she had a couple sleeping bags – the trip was slated to be an overnight one – and most of the food rations. Of course, I went ahead and took my share to add to my pack, so that we were at least carrying equal weights, but I was thankful she shouldered the equipment costs. As a Level 9 adventurer, Erani definitely made enough to support herself, and then some.

In my experience, the vast majority of Classers never passed Level 5; most people who got a Class didn’t do so to become adventurers, but rather for a feeling of safety or status, or even just to add a few points to their Strength so they could be a better lumberjack. After a certain point, getting stronger got a lot harder, and most people didn’t have the resolve to fight the stronger and stronger monsters required to get to those higher Levels. So, even though Level 9 was relatively low compared to the Levels of the more famous Classers, that amount of power was still incredibly highly demanded, and I was sure Erani had no struggles finding ways to make money

So, with her funding our trip, we had sleeping bags, tents, and a couple days’ worth of rations. Not exactly living the high life, but much better than what I was used to. Once we had everything, we headed out, exiting the town’s walls and traveling down the road to Carth.

The trip started calmly enough. I felt a bit of anxiety traveling again; I had been outside the walls many times in the past couple days, of course, but I was always within at most an hour’s walk back to the town, and I also knew exactly where it was and how to get back. During this trip, I’d be traveling for two days, with the only surrounding landmark a single path.

Despite that, though, I carried on. I knew I was strong enough to hold my own in a fight now, and we were sticking to roads this time, so I wouldn’t be getting lost. Sticking to the roads had another benefit, too – most monsters avoided manmade structures. That was why we’d gone out, deep into the wilderness back when I was first trying to get the Swordsman Class. The especially strong monsters wouldn’t stick around the areas where they knew Humans were around. After all, even if a monster could get a few easy kills on the Unclassed around there, soon enough a high-Level adventurer would come by to kill it.

I also had Erani for safety, of course – she was much more powerful than me in a fight – but I’d be lying if I said she was what put me at ease. No, I had experience, and I was self-reliant. I could survive, if need be. I promised myself I wouldn’t end up lost and astray again due to putting my fate in the hands of others, no matter how well-meaning they were.

Erani and I glanced across the treeline as we walked. I was searching for suspicious movements from monsters, and I was sure Erani was, too. Sure, they generally avoided the roads, but that didn’t make it impossible for one to stumble by. The trees’ trunks were thicker in this area, with thin needles instead of leaves. The dirt road below us was covered in the droppings, so our boots crunched against them as we walked up and down the various hills in the bath.

While we traveled, I practiced Noxious Grasp, as always.

Erani looked over at me as a puff of fumes escaped my fingers. “How does that not get uncomfortable for you?” She asked. “I can barely handle practicing for the few hours per day that I do.”

I shrugged. “I do it without thinking. Pretty much automatic at this point. I’ve even started casting in my sleep,” I chuckled.

She blinked in surprise at my offhand mention, then laughed in disbelief. “Really? To be honest, that sounds like a nightmare. I’d wake up feeling like shit if I was casting all night long.”

“Yeah, my intensive regimen was definitely pretty awful for the first few days, but I guess I just got used to it. It’s like working out – if you exercise to a point that’s past your limits for long enough, it’ll become your new limit.”

“Well, still. I haven’t really heard of people taking training as seriously as you do, and there’s probably a reason for it. I mean, I’ve read dozens of books on different Spell training methods, and they normally suggest at most four hours per day, and that’s if you’re looking for something really intensive. If people aren’t recommending it, it’s probably for a reason.”

“Relax. Maybe people just haven’t figured out that it’s possible, or maybe it only works for some people. Hells, maybe it just genuinely is that nobody’s willing to. I know I wouldn’t have ever put myself through that if it wasn’t absolutely necessary. It took days of pure casting just to get to the point where it stopped being agonizing, much less to the point it stopped hurting.”

“Right, but, I mean, is it worth it? It’s not like you’re on a time limit or anything, you don’t need to get stronger as quickly as possible.”

“Well, at the time, I did need to get stronger as quickly as possible. I get that it isn’t necessary anymore, but it’s sort of... fun. I like the challenge, trying to optimize my strength and the time it takes to get there. It’s sort of like how you like reading manuals on builds and deliberating on all of the decisions you’ll make in the future. It’s not like one wrong Spell Choice will ruin your life, so objectively, you shouldn’t worry about it. But I’m sure you really do it because you just enjoy thinking about that stuff.”

She listened to me, then nodded. “Yeah, I guess that makes sense. Maybe one day you’ll have to show me how to find the fun in training like that.”

“Yeah. But then a few years passed. Bodies were never found, but you know how many monsters can just eat people whole. So, well, I was left as a kid with nobody to take care of him. House got taken by the lord – he said that there was ‘no way a child could run an estate’ – which left me copperless and homeless. So I picked up a job thanks to the charity of a blacksmith who was willing to hire a kid to help around, and that was pretty much my life until I turned twenty. If they weren’t powerful enough to survive, I knew that I wouldn’t make the same mistake they did. They were in the mid-Levels – I don’t remember exactly, but I do remember my mom, Magda, was excited because she was getting close to twenty – so I knew I’d have to pass that. Have to do things better than they did, and pass those Levels, so I wouldn’t have to worry anymore. And, well, things were pretty financially hard for me after that. A kid’s income – even when the smith was paying me more than he should have for my work – wasn’t much. Adventuring is pretty much the best way to make money, so that part was pretty big, too.”

“Ah, yeah, I get it. I know a lot of people have to resort to adventuring to be able to pay for the necessities.”

“Yeah, that was the main motivation at first. Just get strong enough to pay for everything and not have to worry about dying. But after my recent experiences – getting lost in the forest, getting this new Class – I’ve realized that, really, money doesn’t matter as much. Not to me, at least. It’s power. Even when I saved up enough money to hire two strong adventurers to escort me into the forest, they still failed. Money didn’t save me. But if I was more powerful then, I wouldn’t have had to worry at all. It’s that concept of bettering myself. That every day, I have a slightly lower chance of dying compared to the last. And one day, I won’t have to worry at all. It’s that, well, I just don’t want to settle for mediocrity.”

She nodded. “Not quite the way I think of things, but I understand it. Don’t expect to be some bigshot immediately, though. I kind of made that mistake myself, when I first got my Class. Especially if you’re going to Carth. It’s kind of an adventurer hub. At a Level as low as yours – no offense, of course – you’re gonna look pretty mediocre.”

“I guess I’m just gonna have to try harder, then.”

“I have a feeling that if you try any harder, you’ll kill yourself,” Erani joked.

“Well, truthfully, I’ve already died a couple times now.”

“What? Oh... oh! Gods, I forgot that your Talent activated on death. That must be an interesting experience.”

“Oh? I didn’t realize you changed your mind about believing me.”

“I don’t believe you. But if you’re going to pretend it’s real, I figured I may as well play along.”

I laughed. “Sure.”

“No, seriously! Still ridiculous that you’re keeping up this lie about time travel.”

“Put me under a Truth Stone. I’ll pass it, and then you’ll believe me, right?”

“Oh, you’re getting put under a Truth Stone when you get researched, that’s for sure. But you know those things only test for what you believe, not what’s actually true. So, you can’t just put some random person under a Truth Stone and ask them what’s contained in the thirteenth circle of hell, and then have them guess until the stone deems it to be correct. It’s just some minor Divination magic that reads your mind to see if you genuinely believe what you’re saying.”

I rolled my eyes. “Okay professor. What’s this have to do with what I just said?”

“You might just be hallucinating the time travel, and if you are, the Truth Stone’ll say you’re telling the truth, because you genuinely believe you’re going back in time.”

“If I’m hallucinating it, then how did I get the information on where Akinsoft was?”

“I don’t know, you tell me. Maybe you have a special Talent that Divines you information on something, then makes you think you just went back in time to get it, and tricks you into believing it’s a time travel Talent.”

I shook my head, laughing. “You really don’t want to believe me, huh?”

I went to take another bite of my sandwich. Just as I bit down, however, I saw a flash of movement behind Erani. I leapt up from my seat, but before I could warn her, a white thread shot out of the forest and knocked her down, wrapping her in cobwebs. She struggled against her silky bonds, but they were thick and strong, and she couldn’t escape.

I leapt forward to try and help her, but another strand shot out at me. I ducked below just in time, and looked over to the source of the projectiles. Charging at us were two blue and black spider-like monsters, running on hind legs with their six other clawed appendages flared out, ready to strike. Standing tall with their gangly legs, their arachnoid bodies were close to reaching twice my height.

I recognized these monsters, and I didn’t like what I knew them to be. They were Anacaps, dangerous stalking predators that were native to the forest. They were an evolution that existed between Levels 10 and 15, so I knew they’d be a tough enemy.

Not only that, but this was not a good time to fight. I had food in my hand and unpacked bags at my feet; I was completely unprepared. In fact, the Anacaps had probably planned it that way. The monsters were highly intelligent ambush predators, so they’d likely been tailing us for a while, and had chosen now – when we were distracted – to strike.

I readied myself to fight for my life.