Joe watched the three head up to the stairs then waved a waiter over and asked for three meals for the apprentices before looking to Kukurnal to see if he wished anything as well. Kukurnal nodded in thanks and also ordered a meal.
After Kukurnal finished ordering, he turned back to Joe and Joe asked, “So. How can I help you? What do you want to talk about today?”
“Well, I… well. Is everything OK? Things seem to be a bit … different today?”
“Oh. It was bad. Kilniara was gutted by a goblin. It was pretty bad. But it turned out OK. We were lucky. We were able to find a healer quickly, so she’s fine now. Which reminds me, which are better for healing, priests or healers? And where could we find one to join our group, if possible?”
Kukurnal’s eyebrows climbed through his hairline, “You want a priest or healer to go with you into the dungeons?”
“Definitely. It would be incredibly useful.”
“Hmm,’ Kukurnal replied noncommittally, thinking carefully before reply, “How would you compensate them?”
“Well, if I have to, then I would pay, of course, but I would rather not and just want a healer who is an adventurer or dungeoneer who’d be willing to plumb the depths with us.”
“I do not think many would be willing to go with you. It’s incredibly dangerous and it would likely lead to their death.”
“How? A group would much more likely survive if they came along than not.”
“True, but a healer or priest has almost no ability to attack or defend themselves.”
“Yes, but that’s where we come in. They would hide behind us and heal us as we need. Otherwise, they just sit back and enjoy without much effort.”
“I understand, but there is little benefit for them and only high chance of death. And priests will only offer much for curses, not much else. I do not believe there are many dungeons with diseases.”
Joe frowned a bit, grimacing, “Ah... then a healer would be best... but... no one would be willing to go?”
“I am sure you could find some, but any priests would be very unlikely to go, unless they are… unwanted and have no temple. In which case, they are not someone you would likely wish to rely on.”
“So then priests are a no go. How about healers?”
Kukurnal frowned, slight confusion evident as he silently mouthed ‘no go’ under his breath but then replied, “Healers seem better for what you desire. And they would be more likely to join you, but are much rarer than priests and often in the employ of clans. The best priests and most healers are in the employ of the clans.”
Joe grimaced, frowning, “So no chance?”
Kukurnal sighed, “No. There is a chance.”
“How?”
“I will show you tomorrow. Stop by my temple tomorrow. I will take you to a place where you might find a healer who would be willing to work with you.”
Joe nodded his head, happy for the option then realized it wasn’t a good idea. Can’t have Zilnek’s criminal status come out. Maybe later after we get him changed to another job? “Thanks, Kukurnal. I’ll definitely take a look, but I’m going to take my time. We’ll come by to see where the place is but I’m going to talk to the other three and make sure we choose someone who is good to join us.”
Kukurnal nodded enthusiastically, “That would be quite wise, Master Joe.”
Joe smiled and nodded, “So what is the difference between a priest and a healer?”
“Hmm… for healing, not much. The healer is focused on healing the physical. A priest might be able to do the same, but often takes longer and is truly focused on the spirit and mind. I have not met a priest who can heal the physical. Only in story and rumors have I heard such. The physical is a minor part of their capabilities. Healing itself is a minor part of a faithful's work.”
“Hmm… so if we are looking purely for healing, a healer would be better.”
“Likely, yes. But if you also want some form of purifying, then priests are better.”
“Purifying? Like curing poison or other things?”
“Yes. Such things as poison, although there are many others.”
“Hmm… Interesting,” Joe fell into a bit of silence, his questions done and relief of safety and rest bringing about his collapse into exhaustion.
“May I ask more of your knowledge, Master Joe?”
“Certainly!”
Kukurnal smiled and scooted forward, excited and launched into a rapid fire of questions, most of what they had discussed before but with greater clarifications or deeper explorations of the subject. The conversation continued on for another good twenty minutes when the other three finally came back down, dressed warmly with wet hair straggling down their heads. Joe smiled and waved to them before turning to Kukurnal.
“I believe I’ll bathe now. I’ll return soon, but I really want to clean off. I’ll be right back.”
“Thank you for answering my questions so readily.”
Joe smiled and nodded without a reply but turned to Garnedell, “Mind if you order supper for me? Yours should be out soon. Order mine after I head up? I want a warm meal when I come back.”
Garnedell nodded quickly and Joe rose, heading up to the room. He found the room humid and warm, but the water a bit tepid and frowned. He took the hot pot of water and found it just too hot, but seeing the bucket of lukewarm used bathwater, he found himself a bit repulsed and resigned to an unsatisfying bath. He dumped as much of the bathwater out as possible, putting it into another empty bucket then emptied all the hot water into the tub to warm it as much as possible.
Scrunching up in the tub proved as uncomfortable as always, legs bent up, what felt like, right up under his chin, and he began scrubbing himself clean quickly, cleaning himself thoroughly before sinking as much as possible into the water to rest a bit.
He let himself rest for a few moments then flipped open his status, wanting to see what he had gained. His skills proved both simultaneously interesting and disappointing. He gained a skill called criminal guidance, which seemed to be similar to job guidance. It was a skill that allowed him to ask questions about jobs. He assumed that, unlike Theorist’s job guidance skill, his citizen guidance skill and criminal guidance skill only applied to those specific jobs; citizen and criminal jobs respectively. He had used job guidance before, but wasn’t sure how useful criminal guidance would be, let alone any other job guidance. He took a moment then considered, before shrugging. Might as well try!
Joe semi-whispered under his breath, “Criminal guidance. How can I help Zilnek free himself from his thief job and allow him to choose another job?”
Joe waited for a few moments then dropped his mouth a bit, shocked by what he got. It was significantly more verbose than anything he’d ever gotten before. His excitement climbed as he read, then he sighed, disappointed to find that what he learned still proved to be pointless.
There are three options for freeing a criminal from their system imposed criminal job.
1)
The criminal’s immediate noble or any nobility above the criminal’s noble in authority may absolve the criminal of his or her crimes.
2)
A priest can change a criminal’s job. With the absolution of the criminal’s noble, this can be done without any consequence. If a priest attempts to change a criminal’s job without the nobility’s approval, a priest will become corrupted.
3)
A criminal may be absolved through some great deed or work. In so doing, he or she may gain a new or unique job, removing him from criminal status.
Ooh… now that was pretty cool. Lots of interesting pieces of information there. Hmm, “Criminal guidance. Can the one wronged absolve the criminal?”
The immediate no came as no surprise to Joe, and he sighed, letting his mind worry at the problem in thought but let it percolate before trying again, “Can a corrupted priest change a criminal’s job without consequence?”
A corrupted priest is capable of changing a criminal’s job without consequence.
Joe’s mind wandered some more, but couldn’t think of much more, then another idea popped into his mind, “Criminal guidance. What are the consequences of a criminal job for the criminal?”
Criminal Jobs have no consequence within the system itself.
Purely socio-political consequences then. The system just let’s people know what you did. The society, government, and authorities decide how to punish you, then… Hmm. Joe’s mind considered and decided that his plan might work. It was time to try to unlock the priest job and see if he couldn’t get the job skill of changing jobs. He would then be able to change jobs, but if did it without having his job changing skill leveled up to use at any time, he might lose the skill when his priest job was changed to a corrupted priest job, which would likely start at level one like Zilnek’s thief… Wait… wait! Joe’s mind whirled, mind playing with thoughts. If I have my priest job equipped and then change a criminal’s job, my priest job will be corrupted. If it’s a guess, I’ll just be forcibly changed to another job, like Zilnek’s thief job. And likely at level one again. I won’t be able to change jobs again and I’ll have to level it up again. Not too big of a deal, but what about… if I get the priest job, level up my skill to one so I can use it any time if I’ve got a char skill equipped… maybe use my double learning temporarily, still need to be able to speak.
Hmm… so… job change skill, but then I change my job to… commoner or something. Change Zilnek’s criminal job… can’t really corrupt my commoner job! Ha! Will I still get the corrupt priest job, but since I’m not a priest… will it forcibly change me or not? Or will I still be a commoner… Or maybe… the corrupted priest replaces normal priest… that would be … troublesome. Hmm…
Joe’s mind wandered for a bit, interested at the ramifications but was leaning pretty hard towards doing that. As long as he didn’t have priest equipped, then he didn’t see how he could become a corrupted priest… Exploits! Yeah!
Joe grinned and then looked back at skills and found another under criminal theorist; something call predict job. He fiddled with it a bit then grinned, realizing it actually gave him a rudimentary understanding of the possible jobs that appeared under the criminal job trees.
He took a few minutes playing with it before becoming pretty disappointed with it. He really could only predict jobs from any jobs he currently had, which, since he wasn’t a criminal, proved ultimately meaningless. His criminal guidance skill actually proved useful and was able to give some explanation into the skills usage, and then he realized that all the guidance skills for each major branch of jobs would be able to tell him about how the skills worked for each of the jobs. He grinned, excited, but still grumped about the fact that predicting a job only worked for those exploring that line of jobs. He couldn’t use it on behalf of Zilnek at all.
Joe sighed and let his mind wander over his new skills listing, then frowned a bit as he realized that his predict job was his highest level skill he’d gained. He counted out the numbers, and quickly realized that, if his display was correct, he’d managed to get criminal theorist to level thirty just that day.
Joe actually gasped slightly and scrambled to look at his current job listing, then gaped. Well… I … really? Level thirty in a single day?! How?!
Status
Blessings
Current Job
Available Jobs
Current Skills
Available Skills
Log
Joe McConnell
Status
The narrative has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.
Physical Resistances
Magical Resistances
HP
30.00
Physical:
MP
60.00
Piercing
0.00
Attack
30.00
Crushing
0.00
Defense
30.00
Slashing
0.00
Magic
60.00
Magic Defense
60.00
Strength
30.00
Dexterity
30.00
Agility
30.00
Criminal Theorist
30
Speed
30.00
Endurance
30.00
IQ
480.00
Wisdom
600.00
Learning
3000.00
Luck
0.00