Ryan stepped into the hospital room, seeing four people already in there. Of course there was Modak, who was sitting upright in bed, and right next to him stood Yanna. On the chairs next to the bed were Silvia and Fae, who had also come to visit them together.

  He did the rounds and greeted everyone with a hug, but was quickly met with some curious stares from everyone but Fae. She was the only one that didn't know about Ryan having been invited to see Goria. And it really didn't surprise Ryan that the others were extremely curious about what happened.

  "So? How was it?" Silvia asked, leaning forward until she almost fell out of bed. Ryan scratched the back of his head, trying to hold in a yawn.

  "Fine, but honestly just exhausting as hell," he explained, "But it was enough for me to increase my stamina a bit, so it was pretty worth it."

  "That's it? You just got a few stamina points?" Modak asked, staring at his friend with a raised brow, and Ryan sighed.

  "No, I did get a few more things. Some magic items, hold on," Ryan explained, pulling his bag off his back. Meanwhile, Fae was looking around confused.

  "Uhm... What's going on? Where did Ryan go?" she pointed out, and Silvia looked at her girlfriend with a grin.

  "Oh, not much. He just went to meet Goria. You know, the Great Spirit of Water? Yeah, no big deal," she said smugly.

  Ryan scoffed as he glanced at her, "Why are you acting like it's something you did?"

  Surprised, and confused that everybody else was just believing this clearly unbelievable news, Fae stared at Ryan, "Hold on, what? You... you went to meet with Goria? Seriously? But... you're just, like, a guy, right?"

  "That... I mean... You're not wrong, but the way you said it sounded a bit insulting," Ryan finally pulled the drinking horn out of his bag, "I ended up helping out a spirit at the lake the other day, when everyone just sort of plummeted down and stuff, and Goria invited me afterward. I went through... someone I know, and we got in contact with Goria's acolytes, and they helped me get down there. But I basically had to walk down some stairs for a few hours... I started toward the top of the mountains in the Falls, and had to walk down to some reservoir under oldtown. So, a pretty long way."

  "... Seriously?" Fae asked, looking around the room. Both Modak and Silvia confidently nodded their heads, though Yanna also wasn't perfectly convinced yet. But it seemed as though Ryan had something to at least help the two of them along to believing him a bit more.

  He took a deep breath, and some water flowed out of the horn's opening. It climbed on top of itself, freezing along the way, until it took on the shape of a baseball bat. Then, the ice melted and reshaped itself into the form of a sword, and then a shield, and then a shovel and pickaxe, all within a matter of moments, "This item is called the 'Horn of Shapeless Water'. As you can see, it's pretty sick."

  "Whoa, wait, how does that-" Modak stared at the shaped piece of ice curiously, almost jumping off the bed to take a closer look. But the moment he moved just a bit too fast, he cramped up and pulled his arms down to his ribs, "Ah, fucking-"

  "Take it easy, dude," Ryan said, walking over to the orc to show him the horn more closely, "Basically, I just push my mana inside and think of the shape that I want it to have. The horn sorta does the rest."

  Modak grabbed the horn and took a closer look, running his fingers over all the little grooves. He was basically analysing it, as Ryan continued, "I also got these earrings that are pretty neat. They let me breathe underwater and stuff. It feels a bit weird, like, for the first few moments it kind of feels like you're drowning but then your mind catches up to what's happening and then it's all good."

  "Did you just say it feels like drowning? How do you know what drowning feels like?" Yanna asked with a slight laugh, though she quickly stopped herself and snapped her head toward Silvia, who shook her head with a smile. Silvia mouthed, 'Don't worry' toward her, grinning broadly.

  As she breathed a sigh of relief, Ryan continued, "Well, I don't think that's important right now. The last item is something related to finding cores of other spirits connected to water in some way. I gave it to someone to have it strengthened into something so we can search a larger area."

  As he explained this, Modak and Silvia stared at him confused. He just said that in front of two people who had no idea about the whole 'fragment' business, and Ryan already knew what they were worried about.

  "Guys, don't worry. I decided that I'm not going to keep my own business a secret anymore. I won't say anything that'll put others in danger though," he explained, and as the orc and elf calmed down for a moment, Ryan proceeded to fill Yanna and Fae in on some parts related to his class. Not everything, of course. He basically kept out anything that was directly related to the Aglecards or the people living in hiding in this world. Really, he just stuck to the things that he felt like he should be allowed to talk freely about. Runar might complain, but Ryan didn't care anymore.

  "... Is that what that whole weirdness was about? Like, why that girl yelled at Silvia and I? It seemed like you guys knew something about it, but..." Fae asked, and Ryan quickly nodded.

  "Yup. It sounds like I'm kind of messing up a few things here and there, but in the end, I don't think it matters too much," he said, though he was trying to convince himself with that as well. Runar had told him that whole thing about 'Causality', but it was still pretty tough to accept that Ryan was apparently messing with the fate of everyone he interacted with. Of course, Ryan hadn't said that in specific detail. For example, he didn't explain that Ryan apparently acted completely outside of fate, and just said that he somehow skewed things a bit. Maybe it was lying, but he also didn't want to drag Yanna and Fae into all of this. He already felt guilty that Silvia and Modak were part of this world now.

  Yanna rubbed the bridge of her nose, "Honestly, this is all... a little much to keep track of. So... your class isn't a unique class at all?"

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  "Not really. I mean, only one person with it can exist at a time, so it's kind of unique? But no, I'm not the first one that had this class."

  "And you're supposed to go around and find all these cores scattered around by the last Spirit Keeper?"

  "Mhm," Ryan nodded, "It's going to take a while, but it's what I've got to do. And for that, I've got to get stronger. I'll probably head back into a dungeon soon."

  As he said so, Ryan glanced over toward Modak. The orc flinched at the mention of the word 'dungeon'. For the rest of the conversation, he was quite tense, as if he was waiting for the right opportunity to speak up. Realizing that Modak was clearly too nervous to ask, Ryan did so for him.

  "Yanna, Fae, I've got something to talk about with Modak and Silvia, would you guys mind to step out for a little bit?" he asked, and the two of them were a bit surprised.

  "Huh? Oh, uh..." Yanna looked over at Modak, who slowly nodded his head. Fae also looked at Silvia for approval, and though she seemed a bit confused, not knowing what this was about either, she also asked Fae to leave for a bit.

  "In that case... Fae, want to go grab a bite to eat? The cafeteria is actually pretty good here," Yanna suggested, and with a smile, Fae nodded her head.

  "Sure, let's go."

  And so, the two made their way out of the room, and the moment the door closed, Ryan pulled something else out of his bag. It was the small metal pyramid that was used to create a space for private conversations, and Ryan quickly put it onto the foot end of the hospital bed before activating it.

  The moment that was done, Silvia looked at Ryan, "Okay, what's going on? Why did you just... tell them all of that."

  Ryan smiled at the elf, "Because I decided not to keep secrets like that anymore. But, more importantly..." he looked over at Modak, who seemed to already be trying to find the right words, "Did Modak tell you about his genius idea?"

  "Uhh... No? What's going on?" she asked. Modak took a deep breath and closed his eyes.

  "I told Ryan that I want to go into a dungeon with him. I know that it's stupid, and I know that it's really dangerous, but apparently combat is the best way for an orc to become aware of their own aura, and I-"

  "Me too," Silvia said bluntly, "I also want to come into the dungeon."

  Ryan stared at the elf, taken aback, "Excuse me? Silvia, you're a- you're a production class, you're not made for fighting."

  "So? Then just let me support you from the backlines. If I can see you in actual combat, then I should be able to make better items to help you in combat later on, right?" Silvia pointed out, and Ryan let out a long, deep groan, thinking.

  "... Okay, well... At the very least, it would be useful to bring Silvia for the gift shop items, and if she stays in the back... maybe it would be okay?" Ryan was practically thinking out loud, looking over at Modak, "But actually participating in a fight? I've never seen you even try to swat a fly, man."

  "I know, but... listen, I explained it to you on the phone, right? There's so much stuff going on around us now that we're just involved in, and it's dangerous. And, because of my MRD, my body is perfectly attuned for aura. Things like aura and mana existed since long before the system came about, and there's plenty of mages that act without the system, even if they have less power than Awakened mages, so..."

  "Right, right, I get it..." Ryan closed his eyes for a moment, thinking. Modak was immensely helpful and knew how to handle himself back when the robot with Gaia's fragment went berserk. Really, he ended up saving Ryan's ass big time. He crossed his arms and thought intensely, "Alright, but I'm only taking you under a few very specific conditions."

  Silvia and Modak immediately nodded their heads, and Ryan started, "First, you two have to listen to me. If I tell you to pull back, you pull back. If I tell you to hide, you hide. I'm getting better at team-play now, so I promise you, if I say something, even if you don't know why I'm saying it, I know better, okay?"

  The two quickly agreed, "Second. You're both going to be equipped with decent armour and weapons. Modak, if you're saying that you want to 'realize your aura' or something, I'm guessing you have to fight against enemies directly. So, think deeply about exactly how you want to fight, and then tell me, and we'll have the production crew make you what you need," he started, and then quickly turned to Silvia, "And you, you're going to learn how to handle a mana-powered gun. Again, since you don't have any combat-related skills, you won't be joining combat, but you need to be able to handle yourself. Got it?"

  "Yessir," Modak and Silvia quickly saluted to Ryan, who just let out a long sigh.

  He was a bit worried, looking at them, "Guys, seriously, I'm not kidding. Dungeons are dangerous. Really, really dangerous. I nearly died in my first dungeon. You can only come with me if you're totally, absolutely serious about this."

  "I'm super serious! I've been thinking about what to do to help you out more, since you know, I haven't really been doing a ton despite being your 'aide', and I came up with something great!"

  Silvia pushed her hand into the middle of the air and soon did a motion as if pulling something from a wall. As she did, a piece of paper magically materialized in her hands, and she quickly handed it to Ryan, "Here!"

  Ryan looked at the paper. On it was a drawing of a dove with its wings stretched out, flying over vast clouds.

  "Uh... So what's this?" he asked, since he couldn't feel anything from this drawing. He knew there was something magical going on here, but there was no apparent effect. Silvia grinned broadly, "Just throw it in the air for a moment and see."

  Not sure what to think, Ryan just did as told. As he did, the sheet of paper immediately started folding itself up into the shape of a complex origami dove. It landed on the bed, perching on top of the metal pyramid. It tilted its head left and right, looking at Ryan curiously.

  Immediately, Ryan stared at Silvia, "Wait, you can do this sort of thing?" he asked, and she grinned smugly.

  "Yup! Spent all day observing different birds, and this is the best one so far!" she explained happily, and Ryan smiled lightly as he held his hand forward toward the paper dove. It quickly hopped onto his finger.

  "This is impressive. Do you think I could take the rest of them down to the folks in the hidden village? Just to set free a few 'birds'?" Ryan asked, and Silvia quickly nodded.

  "Sure! They don't last super long, and most of them are pretty clunky, but... it might still be pretty!"

  Ryan looked up from the dove and back to Silvia, "So, what's the point of this? It's cool, but I don't know how helpful it would be."

  Silvia smiled awkwardly, "That's the part I still need to figure out. I'd like to try and let you connect to it like you do to the spirits, so you can control it and maybe see through its eyes or something like that. That way you could do recon or distract enemies and stuff."

  Ryan widened his eyes, "That... would actually be really damn helpful, yeah. You know what, let's give that a shot, maybe try to level up your insight and art skills to level 10, and maybe reach level 10 overall so you could get a new class that could help with that sort of thing," he suggested, and Silvia immediately agreed. In this group, Ryan was the expert in terms of classes, skills, and everything system-related, after all.

  "But won't that take a while? Do we have that time? The White Shadow Society is acting right now right?" Modak pointed out, and Ryan scratched the back of his head.

  "Yeah, but... Runar said I should stay out of all that for now until I'm stronger. He'll take care of the imminent stuff... And though it's really annoying, I do have to admit that I can't really help with stuff at the scale he's working right now," Ryan groaned loudly, looking to the side, "But even if we could, it's not like we can actually go right away anyway."

  Silvia looked at Ryan, tilting her head slightly, "Huh? Why not?"

  Modak smiled wryly, "I mean, my arm and ribs are broken, so it's not like I can fight right now."

  "Ah... yeah, okay, that's fair, I forgot about that."

  Ryan narrowed his eyes, looking at his friends, "I... I know you guys also have a ton going on right now, so you might have forgotten, but you do know that class is starting again on Monday, right?"

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