The two tall visitors approached Pico with wide smiles, and she greeted them in turn with a bow. She ushered them over to a semi-private ringed booth at the edge of the new patio and they started to speak with each other animatedly. The mouse that tailed them hung back cautiously, watching the townsfolk celebrate with his brows furrowed.

  "So, I should ask him to come north with me?" Shelby whispered.

  "He may need some convincing to accompany you. I do not think he is predisposed to trust strangers," AIDAN advised.

  Shelby sat down on a bench a couple yards away from the small mouse, and he eyed her warily. She pretended to not be interested in him, looked around at the crowd for a few moments, then spoke in his general direction, "Are you friends with those tall people?"

  His glare quickly turned into a glower. His voice was deeper than she expected given his size, "Who are you to ask?"

  "Just a curious bystander. I haven't seen anyone like them around here."

  "Of course you haven't. The trade roads coming here are completely destroyed."

  Shelby didn't know that, or even that there were trade roads. Was the big road in the middle of the town a trade road? She leaned forward and rested her elbows on her knees, "How did you get here?"

  "We walked," he rolled his eyes and looked away from her, chewing on his lower lip.

  "That must have been a long walk!" Shelby guessed. She had no idea where they had come from, but if people wouldn't come here without a road, then maybe it was something you needed a horse... a fantasy horse… for?

  "Tch," the mouse crossed his arms, "What are you fishing for? You know perfectly well that it was a long walk. Stop needling me."

  Shelby held up her palms, "I'm sorry," and she tried a different angle, this was easily the grumpiest mouse she had met, "I'm not from this region, so I have no idea where you came from or how far away it was."

  The mouse looked her up and down. His eyes were burning with intensity, like he was trying to see right through her. She smiled faintly, but was thinking questions pleadingly to AIDAN the entire time, "This isn't going very well... what should I say?"

  AIDAN rocked slightly on her shoulder, "I am unsure. Ms. Rifu mentioned some areas that could be convincing covers for your story. I will collect information on those regions to better support your claims."

  "Oh! When she was questioning me! What did she say... Haven's College... and... Pharos? Oh, and Marifleur? I like the sound of that one."

  "Pharas. I will display a description of Marifleur for you."

  Shelby carefully scanned the dossier mentally, thankful for the instinctual option. She tapped her chin with her fingertips, "Have you never seen someone from the southern continent before?"

  The mouse's eyes widened subtly, "Liar, there are no Daizi in the southern continent."

  Shelby laughed, "Of course there are! There are Daizi everywhere."

  She didn't know if the people who had made this game had used any stereotypes about rodents, but if they had, then there should at least be mice and rat people all over, right?

  "Your assumption is correct," AIDAN confirmed, "but do feel free to ask me to confirm information in the future before bluffing."

  The mouse seemed to accept that information, even though it looked like he had swallowed a bitter pill. He exhaled forcefully, "So you're a visitor. It's your responsibility to become familiar with the lands you trespass on."

  "How am I supposed to do that?" Shelby asked sweetly, the trap is set.

  "By seeking information about it, obviously!" the mouse grew frustrated, and his volume rose, but he quickly restrained himself.

  Shelby leaned forward towards him, "Isn't that what I'm doing?"

  The mouse gritted his teeth, fighting for a good response, "F-from someone who... from..."

  Shelby pressed her advantage, "You're the first person I've met from outside of this region, aren't you the perfect person to learn from?"

  He wrinkled his nose and turned away from her again, gripping the edge of his small shield with one clenched hand. She leaned back against the bench, "I'm Caramel, by the way."

  His ears twitched. She waited a moment, "What's your name?"

  "It's... Thimble."

  Shelby pinched her lips together to stop herself from saying, "Aww," and spoke to him slowly, "Hello Thimble."

  He shook his head but didn't say anything.

  "So, you were following a trade road, and your friends have a lot of stuff, are you traders?"

  Thimble mumbled, "They are... I'm a, um, mercenary."

  Thimble the mercenary mouse... "Oh, so that's why you have those weapons. You guard those two."

  "No. I mean, yes, I did, but not anymore. I just met them a week ago, and they needed protection to come here."

  "Not anymore, huh? So what are you doing now?"

  "I... don't know. This is an inn, right? I'll stay here until..." He looked towards the inn and shifted on his feet.

  Shelby put out one more feeler, "When are you going to go back north?"

  The mouse's shoulders visibly tensed up, and he looked back at her, "What do you want?"

  "I'm looking for someone to come help me investigate something up there. Could be dangerous!" She grinned.

  He squinted at her for a long moment, then turned back around, "I'll figure something out for myself."

  Did that work or not? Shelby wondered, this mouse sure is stubborn. Maybe he just needs time.

  Shelby stood up and stretched as she wandered away, whispering to AIDAN, "In the meantime, I want to see the projects we unlocked!"

  AIDAN buzzed, "Very well, let us examine the available projects on the map."

  Shelby opened her map and focused on Copperglade Village. The map was more elaborate than it had been before, with little translucent circles around many of the areas within the town. She nodded to one near the Inn and read from a few options:

  There were also a variety of aesthetic projects, including simple things like more planters, different colored glowbell lilies for the inn, and benches for the street. Shelby didn't select any of them, although the three functional projects were tempting. She wondered what kind of food Nisa would make with a garden.

  AIDAN interjected as Shelby scrolled around the map, "If I may suggest an option, the Guild Plaza should have a slot for a 'Touchstone' Project that may benefit you."

  Shelby looked it up:

  That does sound useful, "I don't have a copper coin, or that kind of divinity..."

  "The coin is equivalent to 100 Tin Coins, so we may collect the remaining 62 coins with further work, and the Freedom Divinity may be located nearby or collected through certain contracts."

  "Nothing is ever easy, is it?" Shelby groused, "We're still not level 3 anyways. Maybe that's why Thimble rejected us so harshly..."

  Shelby and AIDAN spent the next hour completing minor contracts. With the town advanced to Stage 2, Shelby was free to focus more on experience granting contracts and those that rewarded coins and divinities. Freedom divinities were among the more common types, along with Trade, so collecting five of them only took a couple of rounds of contracts.

  The contracts were more than enough to get her to level 3 and 4. She hadn't noticed that the meal she had eaten for breakfast was providing an experience boost:

  Shelby had vaguely noticed the Will-o'-Whips gave a large amount of experience, even when split with Plin, and now she knew that a big chunk of it was from the meal bonus. She reminded herself to sit down and eat at Nisa's Inn every chance she got. On top of the levels, she also got used to using Measured Shot against fruit rats and resinlings. The resinlings could be problematic to fight if they survived an arrow strike, because they would return fire using the absorbed arrowhead, but they were otherwise much easier to deal with from afar. Measured Shot increased Shelby's damage by 2 points, and although she struggled to consistently use it, she finally managed to perform three in a row while standing beneath a sap-ridden tree. The slimes really were good practice. Using three in a row transformed the final Measured Shot into a skill called Cutting Shot, according to the skill menu pop up:

  It was a nice bonus for performing three shots in a row, because it dealt an extra 4 damage and sliced through her target. Luckily, she had been shooting at a resinling on the side of a tree when it activated, and the arrow punched right through the slime and continued on for another two dozen yards afterwards. If the slime was on the ground she might not have noticed at all. Shelby wondered if it would go through more than one, so she spent an unwise amount of time looking for two resinlings that were lined up in the branches above her. Sure enough, the Cutting Shot pierced through both of the slimes and continued on. Shelby punched the air when it worked. It probably wouldn't come in handy that often, but how cool!

  While completing quests, Shelby found that [Oak Logs] were a very common resource in the forests around town and managed to collect 32 Common Oak Logs and 12 Quality Oak Logs incidentally while hunting. There were a few Projects she had her eye on that needed them, so she was glad they were so easy to find.

  With a dozen contracts completed and all the necessary materials on hand, Shelby initiated the Touchstone project. A spark descended from out of nowhere and landed in the center of the guild plaza. The stone in a small ring started to glow, but didn't instantly transform like the town had, but rather stones began to slowly shift and elongate one at a time. I guess that's why it needs an hour?

  Shelby also spent 20 Common Oak Logs, 10 Quality Oak Logs, and 5 Nature Essence on a simple wooden wall along the northern edge of the town. It didn't entirely cover the border against the forest, but it promised to protect most of the residential area where the Fruit Rats had attacked earlier. That project was going to take four hours, and Shelby was informed that she could only have two projects in progress at once when she tried to create some benches near the Brushcourser Guild.

  Oh well, I need to figure out my Basic Skill anyways. She had been putting it off after turning in her last three quests, but a quick glance piqued her interest. She hadn't actually gotten to use her Briarknight Basic Skill, but it seemed fun, and the Brushcourser Basic Skills were just as interesting to her:

  Tara chimed in as they read through the options, "Fun skills! I saw someone using Wild Gift in an event a couple hours into the previews. It seems like a cool skill if you want to be flexible but still have a good option for group content and solo stuff. The "Stings" gift is for bosses, and the Hooks is for groups of monsters or hunting solo. I think the idea is that you wait for the 10% chance to go off then switch to Edges for the extra damage."

  Shelby re-read it, it was a little confusing for her, but she thought she got it now, "Ahh, so the skill part is knowing what to choose and switch between. The slow doesn't seem very strong, but I guess every little bit helps."

  "Mmhmm. You don't really kite enemies right now, but you could learn to with this skill."

  "Kite?"

  "Like... lead your enemies around on a string! Like a kite!" Tara enthused.

  Shelby scrunched up her mouth, "That sounds hard."

  "It's not that hard! You'd get used to it. Coda is a great pet for that too, since he can fly."

  "Huh, okay, so that could be a good option."

  "Affine seems so-so to me. Free damage is free damage, but it looks like it's meant for pets that don't attack very often, or maybe for getting the most out of fighting big groups? Maybe it works really well with your piercing attack?" Tara said.

  "Like I would attack an enemy 5 times and then move on to another one, or line them up? I think most of the enemies I fight would already be dead after 5 attacks. Maybe for stronger enemies it would help? All in all, I don't really get it."

  "Me either. Maybe we can skip that one," Tara suggested.

  "Okay, now what about Unleash?" Shelby wondered.

  "Hard to say... it doesn't really tell you what you would be getting. I think it could be really good, but maybe it's totally worthless too."

  AIDAN spoke up, "I would recommend choosing Unleash."

  Shelby looked to the orb on her shoulder, "It's good?"

  "As Ms. Tara says, it can be very useful, but sometimes it can have limited utility. It may be an engaging activity for you to discover what abilities the skill unlocks in companions."

  "Can't you just tell us?" Tara asked.

  "He likes to experience new things with me," Shelby said.

  "He... okay, whatever," Tara said with a sigh, "You wouldn't steer us wrong, would you, Mr. AIDAN?"

  "I aim to protect Shelby to the best of my ability," AIDAN said.

  "Okay, I'm going with Unleash. It does sound fun," Shelby said.

  "You may view Coda's abilities on his Character Sheet," AIDAN said.

  Shelby examined her bat, who was stretched out in a sunbeam.

  "Ooh! A vampire bite!" Shelby cooed, "I really should have named you Edward! It's not too late!"

  She knelt and ruffled the bat's fur as Tara yelled into her microphone, "Don't say that to him! Shelby! That's animal abuse, you monster!"