Marc and Fray had been training for hours before they called it. Both of them had high resilience, meaning any accidental hit and exhaustion would be reduced. Marc could confidently say he would no longer be baseball-batting his way through deer. Who knew there was more to using an axe than simply swinging as hard as he could?

  More than that, though, Marc knew he was close to a level-up. He pulled up his tablet. He knew that others seemingly couldn’t see or touch the tablets, so was careful when summoning them.

  NAME: Marcus H. Green

  RACE: Outsider

  CLASS: Wanderer

  LEVEL: 9/50 (96%)

  ECHELON: 1

  HEALTH: Moderate

  ABILITIES:

  RSL - 30

  Resilience. How able you are to resist and recover from adverse change.

  FCS - 24

  Focus. How able you are to concentrate and exert yourself mentally.

  MGT - 21 (+8)

  Might. How able you are to affect the world around you.

  FNS - 14

  Finesse. How able you are to perform tasks quickly or skillfully.

  LCK - 6

  Luck. How much the gods like you.

  He’d still not gained a single point of luck, and that description hadn’t really given him a lot of confidence. He was just beginning to feel like a reasonably athletic person with his might and finesse, not to mention how pain was starting to dull from his resilience. Hopefully he could ask someone in the know what a normal amount of luck was.

  “Or,” he thought, “I could just never meet a god. I think I vote for that.”

  Summoning the Boons tablet, he was far more pleased. He’d made progress with a number of them, though his Outsider boons didn’t seem to grow like the others. With Spectator Effect, they also gained new flavor text.

  BOONS

  WANDERER BOONS

  SIGHTSEEKER - 43%

  All Wanderers are called to the discovery of something new.

  Current effect: [4] / [87%]

  Next Potency loss [22 days]

  SURVIVALIST - 78%

  The bare elements are gentle toward the wanderer, whose place is the road.

  ESTRANGE - 06%

  To wander is to leave, whether by choice or force.

  OUTSIDER BOONS

  POLYGLOT

  An innate replacement boon for all outsiders. Imperfect, but understandable.

  AETHEREAL RESISTANCE

  Allows prolonged and frequent travel through the aethereal media used for teleportation..

  SPECTATOR EFFECT

  A Unique boon provided to Farlanders familiar with Computer Role Playing Games.

  Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

  HISTORIA BOONS: 0/2/6

  

  Marc stared at the bottom of the tablet. Unlike Lloyd or even Jacky, he had no clue as to what his next echelon class might be. He was a bit worried about it. Unless he could find something that fit him it wasn’t impossible that he would end up with a class utterly unsuited to his role in the party. Or worse, a class that simply didn’t agree with him.

  Fray looked at him before speaking, her voice bringing him back to the present, “You look like you’re thinking real hard.”

  “Oh, it’s about what Historia I should get.”

  “Thinking of your next class already?”

  “Can’t, really. Wanderer class. I’d like to plan it out, but theres no information on it.” If there was more information on things he might be having a very different experience. He’d probably have a plan for all his echelons already.

  She thought for a moment. “Well, what’s your goal with adventuring?”

  It was Marc’s turn. He’d really just been dragged from place to place by people who knew better. Thinking on it, him coming to the training room was the first time he’d chosen what to do since. . .

  Since he left the cave. Even then, it was more a matter of getting away from the noise. Thinking back, even before he’d woken up in the cave, he’d just been living life on autopilot.

  Shaking himself out of it, he promised himself that he would address those thoughts later. He refocused on what Fray had actually asked him. He needed to think of himself as a game character with a role, not a person.

  Marc was tough. His resilience was definitely above what basically anyone would expect for his level. He was basically made to be a tank, and Estrange only reinforced that. Armor would help, but he could buy that. What he needed was a way to either keep his enemies focused on him, or control their movement. Jacky could handle the latter part, though redundancy wouldn’t hurt either. If he worked on the former, she could then heal him instead and get the same result.

  “Is there any way to make monsters focus on me?”

  “Only the really dumb ones, and its risky with the Flood coming up. Don’t want a Dire Bear staring you down when there are better options.”

  “What about a way to control their movement?”

  “You looking to get into magic?”

  Thinking for a moment, Marc responded, “No. Or, not yet at least. I don’t really. . . know how magic works.”

  “That’s fine. I barely do and I cast spells.” Fray sat and thought for a second. “Can you wait until after the flood is over?”

  “I don’t see why not, why?”

  “Lots of fresh Historia afterwards. Much cheaper, and bigger selection. They don’t reappear later though. Barry probably knows why.”

  Marc nodded, and the two said goodbye. Once more, Marc had the choice to do what he wanted. “Twice in one day” he muttered to himself.

  He went back to the archive. He chose to learn about magic.

  The Elf watched from the stands as the Glorifiers clashed. This was one of her favorite haunts, and she was well known to the others who frequented. Not as a thief, but as another patron of the bloodsport. With money shifting hands so often though, there were bound to be a few that went missing, though rarely enough to matter.

  “You stand out here, you know,” a voice from behind her came. She turned, and had to stifle a dry laugh at his statement.

  Sharoaa were not a common sight in the Sage Lands. Neither were robes glowing with magical runes or dragonscale boots. A person with any one of those obvious traits would stand out, and he had all three. If anyone got a good look at the catlike humanoid, they’d immediately recognize something was going on, and the full-face mask completed the ensemble of oddity. “Then again”, the Elf though, “they’d need to be allowed to see him first”.

  With a flick of the Sharoaa’s tail, the roar of the crowd and arena went dull. A magical veil appeared around the two, and they were in privacy. He removed his mask, but the Elf still couldn’t quite make out his face or features. She once more came face to face with her low level, trying to tell if his eyes were amber, green, or even red.

  “That gives us privacy. What do you have for me?” Quick and to the point. The Elf appreciated that.

  “The Flood’s approaching, and you know what that means?” she asked.

  “That upstanding Classed people like us should be out killing monsters and gaining levels. Well, you should at least.” A slight dig at her, but not one she hadn’t heard before. Still, she clenched her fist before forcing herself to relax. “There are a lot of things I could be doing during the flood. Why should i listen to your idea?”

  “Because you’re a rogue, like me,” She replied. It was true, the Sharoaa was originally a Rogue. His unimpressed stare somehow made it through the stealth magic, so she continued, “and I know that this plan would get us more experience than killing monsters ever could in that time.”

  “A Heist? That’s it? You better have more than that.”

  “Oh you bet I do. See, the local thieves guild has an alliance with the Dryad Queen since its her daughter running the place.” The Sharoaa’s head tilted, and she could almost make out a small scar on his face. “That includes no robbing adventurer’s stuff during floods. I’ve been around fo the last three, and every time, they leave everything undefended.”

  “Everything?”

  “All of it. Slayers, Alchemists, even the Temple.”

  “What of the Canopy Ward?” The home of the Dryad Queen herself. Normally it was off limits to all who didn’t have an invitation, and only the nobles had said invitations.

  “They need guards on the outer walls. The only person to worry about would be-” He cut her off.

  “The Queen herself. . .” She could see a dangerous grin on his face now. “So, what’s in it for you, other than levels and money?”

  “What, are the levels and money not enough?”

  “People don’t betray their guild for those things.” He was right, of course, but she couldn’t admit to it right away. “So, go on.”

  “I’m close to 40. Levels, not years,” She corrected. 40 years to an elf was less than ten for a human, “And with this, im sure I’ll get to 50. I just need some Historia and, well, one thing from you.”

  The Sharoaa looked her over, and nodded. The stealth magic disappeared from his face. His eyes were an almost purple color, there were no scars across his face, and his nose was a completely different shape than she could make out. “You want me to Sponsor you. Deal.”

  She shook his hand.

  What should the name of the book be?