I slowly awaken to the feel of the sun’s first rays breaching the canopy. Time to get up and head to town, I start the draining process and think about all the possibilities of today. Not going to lie, I’m a bit excited about getting to go out and do stuff. I’m so giddy I’m about to do a little dance in my pod, I have the room for it now. I hold myself back, need to save my energy for later, and instead patiently wait for the sap to finish draining. Once it’s all gone I quickly scrape the remainder off myself and drop it onto the floor. With a quick shake of my head most of the remainder that’s in my hair flies about and splatters onto the walls of the pod, better there than on me. With all the sap removed I open the pod up and jump down, grabbing my hobo rags and putting them on. After that I do a quick nutrition draw for breakfast then grab my mace and head the direction from which I came in last night.

After a few minutes of walking, I make it back to the road, coming out right next to the big rock. I turn and walk down the road back towards town. It’s a rather uneventful walk up to the fields. Once I hit the part of the road going through the fields, I can see a quite a few people working the fields themselves. None of them seem to be interested in me coming out of the forest so I just walk past and towards town like everything is totally normal. I sneak a peak at one of the workers as I pass by.

Fred (Human, Level 15 Farmer)

Yea, farming classes. There is probably a class for everything in this world, and I suspect they can get fairly specialized depending on the line of work. But around here, nothing but new people. I guess I got lucky I was born literally in the starter zone so to speak.

I continue to make my way into town along the road. Finally, I get close enough to the wall to see that the gate is cracked open. Not fully open, just enough for one or two people to come or go at once. Thank god, I was worried I would have to wait out here like a dumbass all morning. As I make my way up to the gate I notice only one guard is on duty right now. He’s just leaning against his halberd, half asleep as he waves people in and out of the gate. I don’t pay him any mind, casually walking by and through the gate into town.

It's pretty quiet right now, but there is already evidence of people starting to move. Windows are open with women airing out laundry. Kids are leaving their houses and grouping up with their friends in the street, only to run off down some alley to who knows where. Some of the shops are already open, with the rest looking like they are getting ready to open. I suspect that within a half hour the town will be bustling again. All the more reason for me to get to the hunters guild sooner rather than later.

I hurry my way along the street, thankfully it’s only a straight line from the gate to the hunters guild. After a few minutes of power walking, I finally reach the giant wooden building near the center of town. I stop and take a deep breath; I have concerns about being harassed after last night but steel myself and enter anyway. I find my concerns unwarranted as the lower floor of the building is barren as a desert with tables and chairs. There are two groups sitting in corners conversing amongst themselves, other than that it’s only a sprinkling of loners with the occasional unconscious one flopped over a table. None of them are paying me any mind so I walk to a table near the door and sit down to wait.

Over the course of the next hour people start slowly filling the hall. Many of them first turn and go up the stairs to the second floor, only to return a few minutes later and meet up with their groups. Most of the groups seem to be between three and five people, but I’ve seen as many as ten people walk out together. I wonder what kind of activity requires ten people, Another question I can ask Shara when she gets here.

After another minute of waiting, I finally see a pair of familiar faces walk through the door, one of which is now sporting a walking crutch of sorts. I wave my hand to get their attention. Once they see me, they make their way over and sit down on the bench next to me.

“Hey Nina, good to see you. How are you doing?” Alex asks.

“Good, I’m hoping to learn some stuff today. Do we want to start with your leg first? And how much mana should I save for our outing today?” I ask.

“Let’s do his leg first and go ahead and use all your mana. Me and Grant are going to start you off with some herb gathering today. If all goes well, we won’t need to fight.” Shara says.

“You sure? Seems like we are just asking for trouble to not have any mana is reserve. Also should we go upstairs and find a room again?” I say as I bend down to start work on Alex’s leg.

“Where we are going is a pretty safe area so we shouldn’t have any problems. Me and Grant can deal with anything we run into. Grant should be here soon, I’m going to go upstairs and find a post. Don’t worry about a room, not enough people around here right now, just try to be subtle.” Shara says.

This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

With that Shara turns and makes her way upstairs while I start to work on Alex’s leg.

“So, Nina, yesterday you said your parents are dead?” Alex asks.

Oh, I don’t like where this is going, I can always say I don’t want to talk about it. But eventually I’ll need to have at least some semblance of a backstory worked out.

“Yea, I don’t want to talk about it.” I say.

“Oh, sorry. It’s just that Shara lost her parents too, so I know it’s not easy. Hunting is dangerous Nina, a lot of people don’t come back. You could easily do something else, like alchemy, or enchanting. Maybe you could even do your own healing service, although I don’t know if the church would let that stand.” Alex says.

Funny, just the other day he was trying to kill me and calling me all sorts of not so nice names. Funny how he somewhat cares now that I look more like him, some things don’t change even across worlds it seems.

“That last one sounds like a good way to get accused of heresy or whatever and burned at the stake.” I say.

“Burned at the stake? That’s a new one, normally they hang you upside down and peel your skin off starting at your ankles using weights.” Alex says.

I lose my focus for a moment due to the image that generated in my mind. God damn these people are barbarians. I get having some corporal and capital punishments but that’s just brutal. I guess I zoned out for just a little to long because Alex starts calling out to me. I snap out of my long gaze and resume the regeneration work.

“Nina, hey Nina, you alright?” Alex asks.

“Yea, I just wasn’t expecting that. Is that a church only way of execution or?” I ask.

“Yea, if the lord wants you dead you're usually just executed by beheading. The church isn’t supposed to kill people I think, but no one is going to step up and stop them so they get away with brutal executions like that.”

“And the local guard just lets them get away with that?”

“It’s not as simple as telling them to stop, a lot of people follow the church. If the church excommunicates someone they usually try to kill them too. That’s different from shunning mind you. Shunning is temporary I think, excommunication is permanent and comes with a free pass for someone to kill you. You would have to ask Shara, she used to attend church before her parents died so she should know.”

Suddenly I notice the feeling indicating that I’m out of mana. Damn that went fast, still Alex’s leg is looking a lot better. Four to five more sessions should be enough to get him back into working order, what I don’t know is if he will need extra to get back into fighting condition. Hopefully they don’t give me the cold shoulder after I have finished my work. Hmm, maybe I should slow my healing down, the longer it takes for him to get fixed the longer they will work with me. I just need to make it look naturally slow, if they get suspicious that I’m slowing down on purpose they will get prissy and try something stupid. It should be easy enough to say I misjudged the first time and add on two more sessions. Just as I finish my work and sit down next to Alex, I hear a familiar ding echo around my head.

*Ding* You have leveled up!

“All done?” He asks.

“Yea ran out of mana. I got a level on my class too.” I say.

“I can see that, congratulations. What skill are you going to put the points into?”

“No idea, I’m going to wait and see what I need.” I say.

That’s a total lie, last night I slapped all my remaining points into mobile podding because I wanted to get to sleep faster. In hindsight not my smartest move because I need to get blend maxed asap. I don’t know if the extra resistance will ever come into play but I don’t want to find out what will happen if I need it and don’t have it.

General skills:

1. Universal Communication – Level: 1 (Max)

2. Blend – Level: 4(+)

3. Plant Forming – Level: 1(+)

4. Mobile Podding – Level: 3(+)

There, done. Now I just need a few more levels to max it out. Seems I get stat points whenever I level up my race or class, unless my race no longer provides points now that I have a class. Well, guess I can ask that question.

“Hey Alex, do you still get points from your race after you get your class?” I ask

“Hmm, yea you do. But the EXP is shared between race and class depending on which is used in the action that provides EXP.”

“How does the split work exactly, is it evenly distributed or some other method?”

“It’s evenly distributed if both the class and race contributed to the action. Sometimes it’s a blessing as much as a curse.”

I can imagine, if you're trying to level a specific one but actions keep giving EXP between both it could take forever to level up.

Alex seems to see someone he recognizes; he starts waving at a man that just walked in the door. The man has a large build, short cut green hair, and a giant wooden shield on his back. Well, that answers the does my green hair stick out question. The man in question sees Alex waving and walks over.

Grant (Human, Level 29 Warrior)

So this is Grant, got to say the dude has at least two heads on Alex so he absolutely towers over me.

“Hey Alex, so this is Nina who you were talking about last night? Nice to meet you.” Grant says.

“Nice to meet you.” I reply.

“Yea, this is Nina. You and Shara are going to take her out probably herb gathering today.” Alex says.

“Probably herb gathering?” Grant asks with a raised eyebrow.

“Shara is looking at the posts now. Who knows what she will find.” Alex says.

“Actually I found an herb gathering open post and a select post to kill some goblins seen around the southern farmlands.” Shara says.

She somehow snuck down the stairs and made her way over to us without me noticing. Not a surprise given that Grant is taking up literally my entire field of view with his proximity.

“Oh hey Shara, are we ready to go?” Grant asks.

“Yea, lets get going. Alex are you good to get back home on your own?” Shara asks.

“Yea, you guys stay safe.” He says.

“Alright lets go.” Grant says.

And with that we make our way outside and start walking towards the gates.