An Unbound Soul

There was a knock at my door. "Yo, Peter. You in?"

I knew that voice, but I couldn't place it... Female, and happy-go-lucky. Pretty sure it wasn't anyone I'd met today. Was it someone from the last time we were here? "Yup, I'm here," I answered, heading for the door.

I opened it and immediately recognised the woman on the other side. It wasn't anyone I'd seen on our last visit, or for a number of years prior.

Freya, Human, Earth Mage (?/?)

Seems like she'd maxed out [Fire Mage] at some point over the last few years and switched to earth. Together they made up the lava complex affinity, which must be her goal. "Hey Freya. Long time no see."

She didn't respond, just standing there staring. I waved a hand in front of her face. "Hello?"

She blinked back to reality. "Wow. You're adorable."

"That's really not the intent of this outfit, you know."

"Ah, sorry, I didn't mean... Never mind, you can't blame me that you're tiny and cute. Everything gets cuter when it's smaller, don't you know? Anyway, the rest of the party is down in the bar if you want to join us."

"Wait, your party is the one I'm joining? Aren't you a bit high level for me?"

"Probably, but it's not like you're going to be a proper party member. I think we're supposed to be escorts of some sort. You bash stuff, we step in if you screw up. And it's only for the next week, anyway."

I followed behind Freya, trying to ignore the fact that she was also wearing... no, wait, actually she wasn't. "You're using a different style armour to most of the light armour wearers I've seen."

She sighed unhappily. "Yeah, we don't have any enchanters here who can stack more than two enchants. Durability is vital if you don't want to have to replace it once a week, and ever since I once lost my eyebrows after using [Fireball] at too short range, I've wanted fire resistance. That doesn't leave any space for a comfort enchantment. It's a real pain; it's so much harder to get on and off than the normal style, not to mention all the maintenance it needs."

So kinky armour wasn't completely universal then.

We arrived back at the bar, where the rest of the party was sitting around a table playing a board game I'd not seen before. Robin had advanced from [Ranger] to [Silent Sniper] but no-one else had changed class. On the other hand, all were out of my [Appraisal] range, so they must have been pretty close. I should be able to view the level of anyone with a combined level of thirty-six or below, which meant Noah and Jared were either within three levels of a class change or had taken a second rank two class.

Robin was very much wearing the kinky style of armour, with an additional leather sheath to cover her tail. Her helmet was currently off, resting on the table, and was a slightly different shape, with cute little bumps on top to accommodate her ears. How the hell did I not notice all this when I dealt with them, with any delvers, before? I'd run into plenty of instances of culture shock during my time in this world, but I had to admit that this was one I did not see coming.

Xander greeted me, looking mildly concerned. "Are you okay there? You're looking a bit red."

Mind out of the gutter! Now! "I'm fine. Nice to meet you all again. What game is this? I've not seen it before."

"Oh yeah, this whole board game thing was your fault, wasn't it?" accused Jared.

"Umm, maybe? Depends what you mean by 'fault'?"

"You pointed out that since games of strategy can boost mental stats, the delvers' guild should keep a collection of them for training purposes," answered Noah. "I have to admit, it was a good idea."

It sounded like selling my chess set expanded into something unexpected. Looking over to where Noah pointed, I saw the bar had now acquired a games shelf, stacked with boards and bags of pieces of various types. Cool. I'd have to work my way through them to boost my own stats, too. Assuming I was able to concentrate; I was currently feeling more like I was sitting in a fetish club than the guild bar. I should probably get the business out of the way so I could leave if needed.

"Do you mind sharing the plan for tomorrow? Anything I need to do to prepare?"

"You seem to be fully equipped already, so not really," answered Xander. "We'll meet in here at dawn and head to the dungeon. We'll stick to the top floor until you learn what to expect, then move down one by one as I deem appropriate. If I don't give permission, you're not to go lower. We'll stay in the dungeon for five hours. If anything unexpected happens, we'll leave immediately. If you see anything that looks out of place, say so immediately. We'll repeat every day for a week. Our job is to give you a crash course in dungeon survival; at the moment, your abilities far outstrip your experience, and we need to correct that before you can join a lower level party. Once we're done here, I want to see you in the training arena to see exactly what your abilities are like."

I nodded. That was perfectly sensible; he was the expert, not me, so I was willing to follow his instructions. On the downside, that meant I was stuck with them until we'd been to the arena, so I tried to focus on the game instead. It was a game called Inequality, played on a hexagonal board with three players, but each player used a different team of pieces, each with different numbers and rules. One game consisted of three rounds, and each round the board was rotated, leaving each player in control of a different team of pieces. One player had to win two rounds to win the game. Because each team required completely different strategies, flexibility in thinking was required to win the full game. It was no good being talented at controlling one single team. There wasn't enough time for me to join in the game that evening, but I did manage to memorise enough of the rules to be able to play the next time. As far as deep strategy games for boosting intelligence went, this one did indeed look very promising.

In the end, Jared was the victor, with Xander managing to take one round and Noah, the final player, not winning any. They packed up, politely returned the board and bag of pieces to the games shelf, and we proceeded to the arena. For my second time today, I ended up standing in the middle.

"Umm, shouldn't I be using a training weapon? I doubt I can hurt you, but wouldn't it be safer?"

Xander was standing opposite me. Unlike the rest of us, he wore heavy armour, and given his rank and class, I expected I could beat on him all day without hurting him. He hadn't drawn his sword, and his shield was still strapped to his back.

"No, I want to see how you will fight tomorrow. Show me without holding back."

Fine, lighten staff, [Far Step] behind him, swing, boost the weight of staff to full. Xander spun around and caught it. My staff stopped dead, not pushing him back a millimetre. My hands went numb; it felt like I had punched a brick wall, and I almost lost my grip on my weapon. Well, damn...

"You can do better than that. Again!"

He let go and I took my distance. I only had the mana to go all out once, but it looked like I needed to be serious here if I wanted to actually achieve anything. I felt the veins of magic expanding under my armour as I activated my buffs, adding in my time affinity magic too. With fifty seconds before the shortest duration spells started to run out, I stepped back in and swung. I saw an expression of surprise and he didn't catch my staff this time, but deflected it with his arm guards. I launched ten, then twenty blows without being able to land a single one. Varying the weight of my staff made no difference. With my fifty seconds almost up and determined to at least land one blow, I used [Far Reach] to project my staff through his guard. The tiny distance travelled meant I had no difficulty in projecting a nearly full force blow and caught him square in the chest. Once again, he didn't budge a millimetre.

ding

Skill [Weapon Proficiency: Staff] advanced to level 10

Skill [Far Reach] advanced to level 11

Heh, landing a blow was totally worth it for the skill gains, however ineffectual it was at actually causing damage. Alas, my speed boosts were out now and I was down to twenty mana. I could refresh them, but that would leave me very low on mana and only fifty seconds more of full boosts. I'd rather save my mana to refresh [Dexterity], which would run out long before my higher level [Strength], so that I could continue for another minute and a half.

I stepped back in and begun swinging again, my movements now a little more fluid from the level up but slightly slower without my manipulation of time. Xander looked surprised again before switching to a frown, but continued blocking every one of my attempts to attack without any use of a weapon of his own. Attempts at [Far Step] were immediately seen through, Xander turning to face my new location before my skill had even completed. [Far Reach] was mildly more successful, not because he couldn't see through it, but because phasing my weapon through his guard wasn't exactly easy to respond to. I didn't manage to hit him, but I did at least force him to evade a couple of times.

ding

Skill [Dexterity] advanced to level 2

With my buffs coming to an end, I backed away. My mana was dry and there was no point continuing any further. I smiled at the irony; my position was completely reversed from earlier in the day. This time I was the one facing an insurmountable wall. Despite all the warnings about how even a weak monster was dangerous if it caught you by surprise, I got the impression that I could whale on this guy in his sleep as much as I liked and he wouldn't even wake up.

"Giving up?"

"My buffs are about to wear off and I don't have the mana to recast."

He nodded. "Very sensible. Don't wait until they run out completely before disengaging. So... your skill with your staff isn't at all bad for a mage. You have the weapon proficiency at a high level, I assume?"

"Yes, it hit ten in the middle of that fight."

"Oh? Lucky you. Unfortunately, while you have that skill at a high level, your buffs only lasted a minute or two. With a duration that short, you risk them running out in the middle of an engagement."

"I have [Strength] at level three and [Dexterity] reached two in the middle of that fight. I have a trait that means they should reach four quickly enough."

"Good. Four minutes will be sufficient for most encounters. Now, although the guild master has told us about the orc attack, he hasn't informed us why you're attracting such attention. Since you were openly using both time and space affinity spells in that fight, I can see that you're special in some way. My guess would be a unique trait, but I won't require you to tell me the details unless it will impact our ability to fight in the dungeon."

Oh, crap. I wanted to give it my best shot, so I used all of my spells without thinking. These weren't kids from my village, or my parents with little knowledge of magic, or even the inexperienced brats from earlier. These were real professionals. Of course they'd recognise my spells. A glance over at the rest of the team showed that Freya once again had the dangerous glint in her eye from the first time she met me...

"Yes, I can use both space and time affinities. It's the same trait that's responsible for my adult intelligence. It also grants me a high level of soul magic resistance. There are no effects that would impact you."

Uhoh... Freya's eye sparkles were getting worse. I could see she was busting to say something and was desperately trying to hold herself back until Xander was done.

"Interesting. But despite that, I advise you to refrain from using your rank one time spells in the future. The mana efficiency is simply too poor compared to the rank two spells you have available. On the other hand, you've built up your space magic into a vital part of your fighting style. I've never seen anyone use [Far Reach] in quite the same way. You can consider me impressed."

I looked at him with some mild disbelief. Impressed? He'd just fended me off bare handed for over two minutes without breaking a sweat, barely even needing to take a step.

"Yes, impressed. You look surprised, but you landed a blow on me despite my efforts to stop you and the massive level difference. That said, your biggest weakness is going to be mana. Even if you restrict yourself to your rank two spells only, from what I just saw, your mana will only last for two encounters. Because you use your staff as a weapon, it hasn't been enchanted for mana reduction. This may be an odd suggestion for a mage, but I suggest you try to fight completely without magic. Save your mana for unexpected situations, when you find yourself outnumbered and outmanoeuvred. Hopefully, we'll be able to remove that restriction with some training; I want you up in the bar every night working your way through their stockpile of strategy games. If you ever earn enough gold to buy higher end equipment, you might want to look at jewellery enchanted with mana efficiency effects."

Sheesh, how much did he learn about me from that one fight? But again, he made sense. In the dungeon, encounters could happen one right after another. It wasn't going to patiently wait for me to regenerate mana after each fight.

"Right, that's enough you two!" burst out Freya, unable to hold herself back any longer. "Peter, why did you not tell me about your impossible affinities when I visited you before?"

"Oh? I used both time and space magic against you when we were sparring three years ago, though. It isn't my fault if you didn't notice."

She blinked. "You what?"

"You mistook [Minor Speed] for [Minor Dexterity]."

I watched her mouth open and close in disbelief. Unlike Xander, I hadn't used [Minor Slow] on her, which would have been far more noticeable. The whole world speeding up around you was more obvious than just me speeding up on my own. Having finally processed what I'd said, she crumpled to the floor in defeat. "Right in front of my face, and I missed it."

"Okay, that's enough. Jared, you come and spar. Practice staves only, and no magic for either of you."

I spent the next chunk of the evening sparring with Jared, not being allowed to stop. Even when my stamina ran dry, Jared used [Rejuvenation] to restore it. His physical stats were obviously greater than mine, but my weapon proficiency was higher and I was still able to hold my own. Eventually, Xander seemed to deem my performance acceptable and let us stop. I flopped to the ground, panting. Forget everything I thought about him being a great leader. He was a damn slave driver!

ding

Endurance increased by 1

"Okay, that's enough for today. Tomorrow we'll be escorting Peter into the dungeon. Given his performance just now, I don't foresee any problems, but that's no excuse to let your guards down. We'll meet back up in the bar area tomorrow dawn."

Everyone drifted off, Freya giving me a long glare before she left. I needed a few minutes of meditation before I could climb back to my feet and head back to my room. I stripped off my armour and the reason for the spacious bathroom immediately became apparent; after all that exertion, I'd sweated buckets. How had I not noticed until now? I had some serious cleaning up to do before bed. I wished again that Adele had given me washing and maintenance instructions instead of fawning so much; how was I supposed to dry my armour, even if I did manage to scrub the inside? Was it even possible to turn it inside out?

Contrary to my expectations, the inside wasn't even damp. In fact, it showed no signs at all of having been worn all day. Did the comfort enchantment do this, too? Wow, that was handy indeed, and it was no wonder Freya was complaining about the extra maintenance hers needed. I washed myself, since unlike the armour I unfortunately was in no way enchanted to be self-cleaning, and collapsed into bed. Tomorrow I'd be stepping into a dungeon for the first time, a thought sufficiently scary to blow any other considerations out of my head completely, and I drifted off into a nervous sleep.