by Ivan Kal
Morgan put his hand on the hearthstone and a screen popped out in front of his eyes.
Skyreach hearthstone — Hall of Myths Hold LVL 1 — Tier 1 Guild
Below he could see two bars, all reading 0% from 100%: one for the level, another for the Tier. He didn’t know what the difference was, but it wasn’t all that important right then. Below that he could see the upgrade screen, with additional structures, walls, and many other add-ons available. They didn’t have the energy to build any of them. Morgan blinked and dismissed the screen before turning to the others and telling them what he had seen. They each tried for themselves, and saw the same thing, but they didn’t have the options to use anything. Only Morgan, as the Guild Master, seemed capable of actually picking the add-ons to build. They turned from the hearthstone and explored further.
Behind the hearthstone was a wall that separated the hall from the rest of the building. There was a small doorway on the right side with curtains covering it. They moved through it and entered a small corridor that went from one side of the building to the other. To the left were the stairs that led to the loft, and in front of them were two doors, one leading to the kitchen and the other to the baths.
Morgan took a deep breath. “All right, people.” He turned to look at the others. “We have a lot of work to do, so let’s go through every room, and the other buildings, and see what we are missing. We need a list. Tomorrow we will start for Terbon.”
They split off and started exploring. Ves stayed with him, and once the others were out of the hearing range she leaned in close and whispered in his ear. “So, want to pick a bedroom?”
They picked the largest bedroom, what looked like to be the master bedroom. Morgan figured that it was okay; he was the Guild Master and, well, there were two of them. Vestella had made it clear that they were going to be living together, and it wasn’t like he was against that.
They were lying on the bed, cuddled up to each other, and Morgan was looking at the beams above him, thinking. If there was one thing that he hated more than anything in the world, it was traitors. He still couldn’t believe that that villain had tricked them and left them to die. He hated people like her, those who used others without a care, those to whom lives of others were worth nothing. His step-father had been like that, a monster who used and abused his mother and him. He lied, and took from them what he wanted, confident in his belief that he was untouchable. Until Morgan put a knife in him.
Emily was the same, and she would pay the same. Not just because of what she had done to them, but because Morgan knew that they were not the first.
He reached out with his hand in the air and closed a fist, imagining crushing Emily in his palm.
“What are you thinking about?” Ves asked.
“Nothing,” Morgan said.
Ves raised up on her elbows and looked at him with a raised eyebrow. “You looked like you were thinking about something intense.”
Morgan thought about lying, but he figured he shouldn’t lie to her. “I was thinking about her.”
Ves narrowed her eyes, but there was no confusion on her face. She knew exactly who he meant. “Are you sure that it is such a good idea to focus so much on her? You are becoming obsessed.”
“She left us to die.”
“Are you really planning on starting a war with Glitter Force?”
“Pff,” Morgan said. “Of course not. War is an inefficient way of getting revenge. No, we will grow, get strong… And then I will slowly dismantle her Guild. If she goes to another, we will follow. Buy up their territory, put pressure on their allies, crush them slowly. And then, when they are on their last breath, I will look her in the eyes and laugh.”
Ves chuckled. “You might even manage to do that.”
“Of course I will.”
They lay there for a while before Ves sat up. “Morgan, I need to tell you something.”
“Shoot,” Morgan said.
She turned to face him, and then pointed at her scar, the one that ran from below her navel up to her ribs. “I got this scar when I was sixteen years old. Vallsorim and I tried to ascend then. We were young, and stupid. We went into the wilderness and stumbled into a goblin ambush. We managed to escape with our lives, but…I was hurt. We couldn’t get back to our village, not with me being so hurt, so Vall went to find help. He was lucky enough that he stumbled on a small adventurers’ group, and they had a healer with them. He brought them back to me, and the man healed me. But he wasn’t a high-level healer, so he couldn’t fix everything.” She grew quiet then. Morgan realized that she was struggling with this, so he didn’t push.
“I… I can’t have children, Morgan,” she said finally.
“Oh,” Morgan said. He hadn’t even thought about that; hadn’t ever thought about having children. And once he had come into this world, well…
“I wanted to tell you before, but I was scared. And I completely understand if you don’t want to have me as an amri now, I just…” A single tear flowed over her cheek.
“No, Ves. It’s all right, I don’t care about that. I want you,” Morgan said quickly, reaching out to her.
“Really?” she whispered.
“Of course—I mean, I never really thought about having kids. And, well, if we ever really want to have them, we can always adopt, I guess.”
She threw herself at him and burrowed her head in his neck. Morgan ran his hand through her hair, calming her.
“Or we could get a domri?” she asked quietly. Damn it, why can’t I handle tears?
“Sure, whatever you want,” Morgan said. The hell is a domri? Not that it matters; if she wants it, I will get it for her.
Ves nodded weakly and hugged him tightly.
Sometime later they had gathered back in what they were now calling the Grand Hall. Rann was sleeping next to the hearthstone, and the four of them were sitting at the table. They had some lumber in the storage room, and had started a fire in the fireplace, and were eating some of the food that they had left over from before they started the dungeon.
They had made an extensive list for what they needed. They had no food in the kitchen’s pantry, and while the bedrooms had beds—good ones, as Ves and Morgan could attest to—and some bare essentials, they needed more. Ves had taken the role of their treasurer, saying something about leading their household, and she had assured him that they had enough funds from the chest they had recovered to buy everything that they needed and still have more than half left. Vall had looked in the forge, and while it had all the equipment he expected a forge would need, none of them knew how to use one. So Morgan had assigned Vall with recruitment—they were going to try and find a smith, and a few other people for a few other positions.
“I don’t know about accepting non-ascended,” Vall said when Morgan had brought it up.
“Why not?” Morgan asked.
“They can’t join the Guild unless they are ascended, and if they aren’t in then they can betray us.”
“The other Guild don’t hire non-ascended?”
“They do, in a manner of speaking. Mostly for resource gathering and such. They don’t have them in any really important positions, and certainly not in the Guild Hold itself.”
“Wait, are there any rules for killing non-ascended?”
“No,” Lucius said. “That is one of the reasons why most ascended look down on the non-ascended. It has created some problems in the past. Closer to the Tower, the non-ascended are basically slaves.”
“What kind of rules are those?”
“The rules are the rules,” Vall said.
Morgan shook his head, thinking about how best to populate their Guild Hold. A thought occurred to him. “Wait, so the ascended who work in the Guild Holds, they don’t go out and hunt monsters?”
“No, the Guild provides them with ascension crystals to survive, and they serve the Guild. Most are usually those who want to stop or couldn’t handle the hunting. They are rarely high levels.”
“All r
ight, then, we will look for people who are willing to ascend. I assume that a level-one ascended can join the Guild?”
“Yes, but in order for anyone to ascend they will need to learn a class,” Vall said.
“It might be good for Lucius and you to teach them the Soldier class.”
“Why?” Vall asked, and Lucius’s eyebrow quirked up.
“It is an overall warrior class, and even if they don’t want to go and level, they could be useful as soldiers in case of an attack on the Guild. I don’t want to teach them something like Hunting or Enchanting, not at the start at least, and even then maybe just for a few of them, so that we might have some hunters and such.”
Lucius and Vall nodded. “That makes sense,” Vall said.
“Good, then you two will be in charge of finding non-ascended who are willing to join the Guild. Get them to the hold and then train them enough to ascend. I assume that they don’t really need to kill a monster, just eat a crystal?”
Vall nodded.
“We will need to go out and hunt some monsters, get enough ascension crystals for us and the others,” Morgan said. The ascension crystals that they’d had been spent to create the hold, along with the manticore heart that Morgan had. They had just disappeared from their inventories. Now they were basically living on borrowed time. Thankfully all of them had more than a month of life left. “Wait, how long will it take for the dungeon to respawn?”
Lucius answered him. “A day, two at the most.”
“Good, any people that want to ascend and are willing to fight should be taken through the dungeon both for the leveling and to gather loot. You and Vall can do that once we find enough people. Without the manticore boss, of course.”
They nodded their heads.
“Now, Terbon is the closest settlement, correct?”
“Yes,” Ves said.
“And it is ruled by a non-ascended mayor or something like that?”
“That is correct,” Ves answered.
“Well, then, our first order of business is to bring the town under our rule,” Morgan said.
“And how are we going to do that, exactly?” Vall asked.
“Easy—we will offer protection from monsters, allowing them to expand their farms beyond the sight of their walls. In return they will give us a portion of their produce, maybe pay a tax. We’ll see what kind of a deal we can strike with their rulers.”
“There are a lot of monsters out there in the wilderness,” Lucius said.
“We will start small, with one town. We clear all the monsters around them, and by then I hope that we have some more ascended recruits which we will then send on patrols. After, as we grow, we expand,” Morgan said.
Vall was looking at him strangely, and then he spoke. “You really know how to do this.”
Morgan grinned at him. “Doubted me, didn’t ya?”
“Well, it’s not hard to doubt you. I mean half the time I wonder if you are sane or not.”
“Hah, don’t worry. I wonder the same thing.”
Somehow that didn’t seem to have reassured Vall.
“Now, we have another thing to deal with,” Morgan said and nodded at Lucius.
The Roman pulled out a chest that they found in the dungeon.
“Are we going to take a chance?” Ves asked, referring to the class stones.
“No, I am hoping that my Inspect skill is high enough now to tell which class they are,” Morgan answered.
Lucius opened the chest and Morgan looked at the stones and used his skill. Suddenly his eyes widened as a screen jumped in front of his eyes.
CLASS
REQUIREMENT
Blade Dancer
Knight/Rogue—Soldier (Discipline, Domination)
Outrider
Soldier/Archer—Scout (Discipline, Domination)
Arcane Ranger
Hunter/Archer—Enchanter/ Wizard
(Discipline, Domination)
Juggernaut
Soldier—Knight
(Domination)
Spellguard
Mage/Wizard—Knight (Discipline)
Eldritch Knight
Mage/Enchanter—Knight
(Discipline, Domination)
Morgan relayed what he had seen to the group. The ability stones were paired with the class stones, two each. They discussed the classes. They still didn’t know what the classes did, but they were all upgrade classes, which meant that they should be more powerful. They could tell a bit about each class based on what requirements they had and their names.
Not everyone could use every stone. Some had a single class that was required and several options for the second. Others had stricter and others looser requirements. Lucius could use only the Blade Dancer skill, since he was a Soldier/Rogue, and the Soldier class was required, while the second could be either the Knight or Rogue, and any alignment. Vallsorim could use either the Blade Dancer or the Juggernaut, since he had the Domination alignment. Ves could use either the Spellguard or Eldritch Knight with her Knight/Mage class and Discipline alignment. Morgan, on the other hand, could use only the Arcane Ranger, and the Outrider was the only one that would be useless for any of them.
He knew that the class would change depending on which class and alignment you already had. There were a lot of possibilities. But still, he was interested in the Arcane Ranger class.
“We could wait,” Ves offered. “We don’t need to upgrade our classes right now.”
“It would make us far more powerful,” Vall added.
“I vote for us to use them,” Morgan said. He knew that there were more upgrades later on; he didn’t really know much about them, but still. And the more he thought about it, the more he liked the name of Arcane Ranger.
“Me too,” Lucius said.
“Well, I do like the sound of Juggernaut. And I had been planning on going for an offensive two-handed build, which this looks like it is. It is even only reserved for Domination alignments; clearly, it is suited for offense,” Vall said.
Lucius picked up the Blade Dancer stone. It was fortunate that Vallsorim hadn’t been interested in that one. “That means that I get this one. I had planned on finding a Duelist teacher once I had joined a Guild, but this sounds like something in the same vein.”
Ves looked at the two stones available to her. “I had planned on going down a more defensive route, and both of these seem like they are that. I just don’t know which one to choose.”
“Take the Eldritch Knight,” Morgan suggested.
Ves raised an eyebrow. “You know something about it?”
“Nope, it just sounds cooler.” Morgan grinned.
Ves shook her head, but she did take the Eldritch Knight stone.
Finally, Morgan reached out and took the Arcane Ranger stone. He swallowed it and felt a warmth spread through his body, and then he reached out and took the two ability stones and swallowed those as well. The others followed suit.
A window popped up in front of his face.
CONGRATULATIONS! YOU HAVE SUCCESSFULLY UPGRADED YOUR CLASS! YOU ARE NOW AN ARCANE RANGER!
Morgan noticed that on his character screen he no longer saw his Hunter/Enchanter classes, but instead saw only the Arcane Ranger class. His old skills and abilities didn’t change, but he did get a bonus to his stats and some new skills and an ability, plus another two abilities from the stones.
His new skill was Energy Manipulation I: Allows the user to manipulate his or her own energy and shape it into various forms (efficiency and skill increases with rank and intellect). Morgan raised an eyebrow at that.
The second one was Arcane Mark I: User can mark up to two targets with his or her energy at up to 30 paces. A release of energy will home in at these targets for up to ten seconds after they have been marked (range and duration increases with rank and will).
Well, that is useful as all hell. Morgan hoped that Energy Manipulation meant what he thought it meant. If he had to go based on his new abilities, then he most certainly was corr
ect. He had gained one ability from his new class, Energy Arrow I: User manipulates his or her energy to create an arrow of whichever alignment he possesses, which can be fired like a regular arrow, dealing magical damage (damage increases with intellect and rank, cost decreases with will and rank).
Hell yeah! The two abilities that he had gotten from his stones were even more impressive. Rain of Arrows I: User fires an arrow into the sky which detonates and sends a rain of smaller arrows to the ground—requires Energy Manipulation (damage increases with intellect and rank, cost decreases with will and rank).
And the other one was Exploding Arrow I: user can charge a regular arrow to explode and deal alignment damage (damage increases with intellect and rank, cost decreases with will and rank).
Seeing the type of abilities and skills that he had received, Morgan figured that the requirements of the Enchanting or Wizard class probably had something to do with manipulation of energy. Both the Enchanting and Wizard classes required an ascendant to have a greater control over their inner energy. As far as he knew the Mage class relied on contracts with spirits and elementals, so it made sense for one of the other two to be a requirement. Morgan took a look at his screens—his attributes had gotten a nice bonus as well.
STRENGTH
13
AGILITY
(22+1) 23
CONSTITUTION
15
INTELLECT
(17+2) 19
WILL
(20+1) 21
