“You are such a Vlakas,” Riya sighed, massaging her temples. “I can understand Kedryn not listening to instructions…”
“Hey!” Kedryn cried.
“But I never expected you to try something like straying from instruction,” she said bluntly, ignoring Kedryn’s objections. “Still, it turned out well. I can’t believe it. A unique level mana processing technique at your level. This is simply unprecedented. Just… do me a favor and don’t go making a habit out of taking chances like that in the future?”
Glade readily agreed. He had felt safe enough because the Root and Sprig technique was meant for children. Whomever designed the technique had to know that kids would be prone to making mistakes. Meaning the process was likely harmless if gotten wrong.
“I’m just glad you didn’t tear your mana channels,” Riya said. “It’s been known to happen on occasion with children who are prone to not listening. My house always takes precautions when dealing with overly willful kids.”
Cold sweat began to form on his brow. Torn what now?
“Can you teach us?” Kedryn asked, inching forward. “An 8% increase in mana absorption is far better than the measly 2% from the standard technique.”
“The short answer is that I will try,” Glade said, his mind already going down dark paths as he realized he had made a Kedryn level mistake. “With Riya’s permission and guidance of course.” He hastily added.
“This actually ties very closely to another topic I wanted to bring up,” He continued, pushing forward with some of his primary concerns. “I don’t think we are using our skills to their full potential. More specifically, I don’t know how to use my skills appropriately. If I had actually thought how I could use my Mana Manipulation spell to watch you both using the technique, I could have learned it much faster.”
“What are you suggesting?” Riya asked.
“We need to know more about what each of us can do and see if we can help each other explore their own skills. That last excursion into the caves almost cost us our lives. Eating the food almost gave us mana poisoning. We need to know more about what we can do and then practice those skills until we grow comfortable using them. All before we run out of food or before it spoils. What we don’t know will kill us.”
“We have enough food for at least three more days if we ration,” Riya chimed in. “And I wouldn’t worry about the food spoiling. The Magma Beetle meat has an extremely high mana concentration, which means it will take ages before it spoils.”
“I agree but would add one more caveat. I recommend we teach each other what we can,” Kedryn said, resting his chin in his hand while trying to adopt the look of someone radiating wisdom.
Try was the key word in that sentence. He looked like a child trying to emulate the adults.
“Agreed,” Glade said. He then shared his list of skills and corresponding levels with the others. The list was entirely underwhelming, at least in his own eyes.
“You have Reflection and Telepathy?” Riya said, eyes widening in shock. “Those are incredibly rare skills!”
Kedryn’s reaction was far less subdued.
“This… is… awesome! You are literally becoming a psionicist! That is so OP. I can’t wait to see if you develop telekinetic powers, or even better, taking over people’s minds.”
Both Glade and Riya simply stared at Kedryn, dumbfounded.
“Take over people’s minds?” Riya asked, her voice rising in concern. “You have people on your world who can take over other’s minds?”
“Not people, so much as things. Remind me to tell you about social media some time,” Glade said, knowing full well that his statement wouldn’t calm Riya down much. The look she gave him was worth it. “And no Kedryn, I’m not becoming whatever it is you are talking about. However, I am interested in testing out the skill. I have an idea that might help us avoid slimes in the tunnels.”
Glade turned back to Riya.
“What do you know about reflection?”
“I only know of two of my people that have that specific skill, one of those being my father. From what I have read, those who master reflection can master anything.”
“Sounds like something we should reflect on,” Kedryn said, waggling his eyebrows up down while looking at them expectantly.
Glade gave him a deadpan stare. That was just terrible. Worse even than most dad jokes.
“Yes, I agree that we should learn to reflect,” Riya replied, giving Kedryn the oddest look, like she knew he was being weird but couldn’t see the punchline. How had he been worried earlier about these two getting into trouble? Kedryn was killing off every possible chance he had just by being himself.
“I’ll put that down as something to try teaching the both of you,” Glade said. “What about your skills?”
Kedryn had one or two more skills than he did, but all of them were at least level 2. He had even pushed his Naturist skill to level 5, which seemed impossible until he remembered that Riya had been coaching him.
Kedryn agreed to teach him perception and concealment if he could.
Then they looked to Riya.
“I have a few skills I can teach you,” she said hesitantly. “I’m not technically supposed to teach anyone, let alone others not of my house. Still, I can try. But before that, you should understand a few things about skills.”
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“First, both of you are considered amateurs within your respective skills. There are a total of eight tiers, starting with Amateur. After that are Trainee, Apprentice, Journeyman, Expert, Master, Grand Master, Immortal, and then Divine. As you can imagine, each tier comes with more powerful benefits and far more difficult requirements in order to advance.”
“At the earlier levels you don’t require much in the way of knowledge to gain skill levels. Just the willingness to try new things. Because of that, most skills don’t provide much of a benefit until the Trainee level. That’s when the real learning and benefits begin.”
Kedryn’s hand was already raised, which caused Glade to smirk. There was a massive welt on Kedryn’s forehead from all the pebbles Riya had thrown at him. At least the Kid was finally learning.
“What are the progression levels from tier to tier?” Kedryn asked.
“That is a surprisingly well-informed question,” Riya said, giving the Kid an appraising look.
“Oh, its just standard gaming mechanics,” he replied with an air of narcissistic nonchalance. Glade rolled his eyes.
“Amateur starts at 1 and goes up to level 8, followed by Trainee which starts at 9 and goes to 16. Then Apprentice from 17 to 32. Journeyman begins at 33 and caps out at 48. In case you were wondering, Journeyman is the most prevalent professional rank throughout Veil as I understand it. To achieve that rank is considered a great honor.”
“Any tier after that earns you a title by the Adjudicators. Those who have reached Expert levels, which are levels 49 to 72, are granted the title of Adept for warrior-based skills, Scholar for knowledge-based skills, and Artisan for everything else. This is important because titles do more than grant prestige. They each grant specialized abilities that are tied to their respective skill. For instance, if a hunter who specialized in shooting the bow became an expert and gained the Adept title, he could potentially gain the ability to create his own arrows out of thin air.”
Kedryn’s eyes became as wide as saucers.
“Sounds oddly specific,” Glade responded.
“Ah, yes. It is. My house has one such adept who can pull magical arrows from any shadow around him.”
Oddly, that last statement felt rushed.
“After Expert comes Master, which is skill levels 73 through 96. Their title is simply Master but grants exponentially greater abilities. To be honest, I don’t know what dictates the next three levels. I’m certain there are a few Grand Masters in the world, but I’ve never read of anyone achieving Immortal or Divine levels.”
“Good to know,” Glade replied. To be honest, he had been half listening. Those levels were incredibly far beyond them and he was trying to figure out how to regularly work his skills now.
“The reason why this is so important,” Riya said, looking directly at Glade as if she had known what he was thinking, “is in order to break into the next tier you need someone at least one tier rank above you to agree to put you through a skill trial.”
Glade arched his eyebrow as Kedryn blurted out, “What’s a skill trial?”
Riya flicked a rock at him.
“Neither of you need to worry about that at this stage, seeing as your highest skill level is at 5. However, you will be stuck at level 8 until you find someone willing to help you advance. A skill trial is just what it sounds like. Those of higher rank test the skills of those seeking to advance. The higher the rank, the more difficult the trial. My first trial to rank up in Natural Lore I had to successfully identify 20 common, 10 uncommon, and 5 unique herbs that could be beneficial for my people.”
“That doesn’t sound too bad,” Kedryn said, rubbing his tender forehead.
“You might think, but my trainer had already selected herbs I had never identified before. Which meant I couldn’t get any wrong. This meant I had to rely strictly on my skill to tell me what they were, which is closely tied to how much study you have had in the subject. I failed three times before I finally passed. Each failure I lost a skill level that I had to gain back.”
“My Apprentice trial was even worse. I had to successfully butcher a Warg while identifying everything that could be useful. And I mean everything. Did you know that Warg urine is a key component in a potion of minor metal corrosion? Yeah, that almost cost me the trial.”
Riya visibly shivered at some memory that she likely wanted to forget. Glade could empathize. He had a few of those himself.
“But what about those who don’t have access to someone willing to help them advance?” Glade asked.
“That is why advancing on Veil is such a challenge. Not everyone has access to those with the requisite tier. Those that do usually have to pay a fortune for the opportunity, apprentice for years, or both before those who can grant a trial will even consider helping them.”
Kedryn’s hand was raised, and it honestly looked like he was physically restraining himself from asking a question.
“Yes, Kedryn?” Riya asked.
“Are there such things as skill books or other ways to advance?”
Riya eyed him for a moment before answering.
“How do you know about skill books?”
“From the games I played,” He responded quickly.
“I should have known,” she grumbled. “Yes, there are such things as skill books. They are incredibly expensive and often not worth the paper they’re printed on. I won’t go into the details now seeing as we don’t have any skill books available but suffice it to say it is not wise to skip steps if it can be helped.”
“What about the other ways?” Glade asked.
“The only other way I know of is to enter a Labyrinth of your patron brand. But those are rarer than rare. Even if you know of one, gaining access is all but impossible. Regional powers control access into, and out of, Labyrinths with an iron fist. If you are not in the nation’s employ, have political ties, or incredibly lucky, you will not have access. Even then, the Labyrinths are incredibly dangerous, each tailored to try you in every way possible based on your specific brand.”
There was so much to unpack in that one statement, Glade didn’t even know where to begin.
“Are Labyrinths the same as Dungeons?” Kedryn asked.
“Of course, you already know about Dungeon’s,” Riya sighed, giving up on throwing more pebbles. “No, they are not the same. A Labyrinth is the domain of a patron brand, or more specifically, a holy place to commune with one of the Adjudicators. It is more like a spiritual journey of internal growth that must be faced alone.”
“A Dungeon on the other hand is one of the most frightening monsters on Veil. They are magic incarnate, whose sole desire is to feast upon every living thing that surrounds them. They draw adventurers like flies to dung, offering glory and riches beyond imagination at the expense of their lives. Of course, rulers around the world learned long ago how to manipulate dungeons for their own gain. If Labyrinths are controlled with an iron fist, then Dungeon’s are doubly so.”
Kedryn leapt from his sitting position and whooped loudly in excitement.
“Do you think we’re in a dungeon now?” Kedryn asked.
“May the Overseer protect us if we are,” Riya said, a shiver running through her. “But no, I don’t believe so. The creatures we have faced so far are natural monsters. My Natural Lore skill would have immediately recognized if the creatures were Dungeon born. Also, the cave itself isn’t trying to kill us. That would have been a huge indicator. And third, the creatures would have dissolved after we killed them and left treasure behind.”
“Can we go back to the previous discussion?” Glade asked.
Kedryn looked like he was about to explode with questions, but Glade didn’t care. They had danced around a topic long enough over the past couple of days and he would be damned if he didn’t take advantage of the opportunity.
“You mentioned that Labyrinth’s are tied to brands.”
“Yes, more specifically to your patron brand. Why?” Riya asked.
Glade looked into her amber colored eyes and asked a question he had wanted answers to since their arrival.
“What is a brand?”