Kilniara hopped excitedly, “OK! I’m ready!”
“Ha! You have a long way to go, but you have improved a lot, and I think you will soon be able to handle a goblin alone. Nice work!”
“Thank you! Thank you so much, Master!”
“Master?”
Kilniara ducked her head, but her smile did not disappear, “Right now, you are my master, teaching me well. But you are now done teaching, yes?”
“Hmm… yeah, basically.”
“Then, now, I can call you Joe.”
Joe cocked his head at that and smiled. Huh… interesting compromise. He considered a bit before nodding, “Maybe… mind if you could try teacher then? Instead of master?”
“Teacher?”
“A person who trains or teaches another.”
“Another name for master?”
“One a bit more… acceptable to me”
“Thank you, Teacher!”
Joe smiled, relieved, slightly uncomfortable with her calling him that, but for completely different reasons, ones which were much less discomforting. “Yeah. That … that sounds much better to me, even if it is a still a bit uncomfortable for me.”
Kilniara smiled and shook her head, “You are strange, Mas… Teacher.”
Joe shrugged, “I’m fine with that. Being like everyone else means I’ll be the same as everyone, making the same choices and mistakes so I will end up in the same place.”
“That is… an interesting way to live life”
“Well. It isn’t one guaranteeing success. You still have to be very careful and wise with the choices you make. You could also make a lot of mistakes because you end up trail blazing.”
“Trail blazing?”
“Uh. That means to go somewhere or do something before any other person has done it.”
“Oh.”
“And since you’re the first, you probably could make a lot of mistakes or even hurt or kill yourself.”
Kilniara nodded, “Ah… that makes sense. But do you not think that it is unwise to listen to your elders or ignore their teachings?”
“Oh. I don’t ignore their teachings. That would be foolish. But it is possible to explore, safely, within the constraints of what the great people before you have found. If what they have found makes sense to me, or is something that is easily proved, then I accept it well enough. But if there is something that seems unusual or incomprehensible, then I am willing to explore it or try to find an answer that makes more sense.”
Kilniara said nothing as they walked further through the streets, soon approaching the inn before she finally replied, “You are much braver than I.”
“I don’t know if that is very brave, but… thank you,” Joe replied while glancing at her with a smile.
Kilniara looked up at Joe, seeing him looking at her with a smile and failed to stifle a gasped chuckle, “Or maybe you are just arrogant?”
Joe smirked and shrugged, “I’m sure it might look like arrogance but it's standard practice amongst my people. And, I would say, it gets a lot of us in trouble, heh.”
“I would say so!” Kilniara exclaimed a bit firmly, seeming more shocked than impressed.
Joe said nothing in reply and simply shrugged his shoulders, choosing to push the door to the inn open for her, allowing her in first, “After you, my lady.”
Kilniara froze at this, staring at him in shock, trembling slightly even a fear seemed to wash over her face in waves, “I’m not a lady!”
Joe looked up quickly, shocked by her vehement reply to finally notice the fear that was there, “What’s wrong? Why… what’s going on?”
Kilniara calmed after she heard Joe’s reply and quickly shook her head, heading in while whispering to the side quickly, “Later. This is not the place.”
Joe frowned in a bit of confusion, but followed her advice, knowing the fear was genuine and deciding to act in caution, waiting till she was ready to reply.
When they made it into the common room Kilniara quickly brightened and called out quietly to her brother and Garnedell, but Joe could hear the underlying stress in her voice. What was… it must be really bad if she’s acting like this, but what on earth is it?
Joe plastered on his own fake smile and walked up to the table where Garnedel and Zilnek sat as well.
“Kukurnal hasn’t showed up yet?”
“No, Joe,” Garnedell replied quickly.
“No problem. I’ll come back down as quickly as possible. Kilniara, do you want to bathe first or should I go first?”
“You can go first, Joe.”
Joe replied while nodding his head in gratitude, “Thanks. Could we talk real quick first? Then you can come back down to hang with your brother.”
Kilniara nodded her head and waved goodbye to the other two before heading up to their room. Joe smiled at the two boys and turned to leave as well.
“I’ll come back as fast as possible. I don’t want you to have to deal with Kukurnal without me, OK?”
“Yes, Joe,” Garnedell replied solemnly.
“Thank you, Master,” Zilnek called back with cheer.
Joe nodded and skipped up the stairs quickly, not wanting to leave Kilniara alone too long. Don’t want her to freak out, and don’t want her to think she has to ‘prepare’ for something that’s not going to happen!
Joe made it back up to the room relatively quickly to see Kilniara sitting nervously on his bed. She leapt to her feet when he came in and quickly spoke.
“I’m ready, uh… please just…”
Joe quickly shook his head, calming her, “Relax, Kilinara. I just wanted to know why you reacted the way you did at the door way.”
“Oh!” Kilniara exclaimed a bit before her nervousness was quickly replaced by a fearful reticence that confused Joe. She took a bit to finally calm herself before speaking, “I am not clan, Master.”
“Teacher, please.”
“Ah, yes. Teacher.”
“And I’m not teaching right now. You are teaching me, so please teach me well, Teacher.”
Kilniara jumped at that, eyes wide and a bit of shock shining through her posture, “Master, I’m not…”
Joe interrupted her with a cocked head and eyebrow and a firm look.
Kilniara quickly stopped and started again, “Teacher!
“Thank you,” Joe replied gratefully.
“Kilniara smiled then started again, “I am… I’m just not clan. Only clan are noble.”
“Ah… so is it considered impolite to call another noble who is not?”
“Not truly impolite, but clan do not… they guard their honor jealously.”
“Ah… that kind of thing,” Joe frowned, discontented, “Petty small minded people unable to find meaning in their deeds but demand respect for no reason of worth but that they are born with a specific name.”
Kilniara’s eye’s rose at that and her face quickly paled, shock and fear so evident that Joe had no problem reading her as she leapt forward and waved her hands to suppress his speech, “Shhh! Shhh! Do not say such things!”
Joe stopped with his last sentence, not wishing to push things but shook his head, “Well, thank you for explaining. I will be cautious of that in the future.” Joe took a deep sigh and turned away, “Right, I understand now. Go ahead and enjoy a meal. I’ll take my bath now and then let you know when I’m done so you can take yours, OK?”
Kilniara quickly nodded, her fear still evident but the paleness receding. Huh… weird that she blushes and pales basically the same as a human, despite being cold blooded. Can cold blooded creatures control blood flow like that? I’m not sure…
Joe jerked his head to Kilniara as they both stepped out of the door as he heard her speak, “Huh? I’m sorry. Lost in my thoughts.”
“Ah… I was asking why you are going to the common room. I thought you wished to bathe?”
“Ah… yeah… I do. Just need to ask the inn keeper or waitress to send up some water.”
“Oh. Then I will ask for you, Mas… Te… Joe.”
Joe smiled at Kilniara’s efforts and chuckled, “Thank you. And thank you for trying to call me my name. It means a lot to me.”
Kilniara ducked her head at that and backed away before jogging down the steps quickly. Joe let his smile linger as he watched her go before shaking his head and heading back into his room. His mind went back to consider Kilniara’s unusually similar physique and physical responses, his mind worrying over the idea but was interrupted with a young waiter slipping into the room carrying two heavy buckets of water. His swarthy and thick barreled torso almost as thick as he was tall but only half Joe’s height immediately had Joe thinking he was looking at a typical fantasy dwarf. He could only smile hugely, excited to meet a fantasy race. Well, not literally twice the width to his height… it just looks weird to see such a short humanoid with a chest bigger than mine! Really exaggerates his girth!
Joe tried to strike up a conversation, but the youth was recalcitrant and unwilling to interact and soon escaped after the water was appropriately distributed and heated, thumping from room. Huh… same characteristics as a dwarf as well? Few words, gruff, and blunt? Just… how can they be…
Joe felt his busy thoughts flee him as he settled into the water, the hot water soaking his skin and quickly occupying his mind with blissful thoughtless relaxation. He let himself soak a bit, but then quickly cleansed himself before once again leaning back to soak, letting the warmth massage tired muscles.
Joe let himself enjoy the warmth for a good twenty minutes before he sighed and decided he needed to look at the daily gains. He looked at his new skills for the job, and found them to be basically the same, although, like the Education Theorist, this one also had a strange garbled skill at level twenty as well. Well, these jobs have useful stats but are really boring and useless for skills. Even the guidance jobs and predict jobs don’t help much!
Joe sighed and went through some questions using crafter guidance to understand a bit more about crafters, but didn’t find much that was useful. I just don’t know what good questions to ask! Joe sighed and gave up after a bit, finding that the only really useful information he’d gotten was that the education line had a lot of mind based stats and learning, while the others didn’t seem to show any really strong bonus to any specific stat. Citizen Theorist said nothing about what citizens actually did or gave as a bonus to a person. Likewise Party and Criminal Theorist didn’t have any specific significant stat gains. The only thing that seemed to be a slight hint was that party jobs helped parties, which was one of the most useless hints he’d ever gotten and after he’d thought about it a bit, it made complete sense as education and crafter jobs would help with being a teacher or a crafter, so an utterly useless realization.
Having found nothing useful with any hints about stat gains, just about the only useful thing he seemed to be able to get with any significance, he dropped looking at his skills and checked his blessings and titles quickly, but found nothing new. Sighing, he then looked at his available jobs to identify his next job to level before he glanced over his current stats for Crafter Theorist, finding it identical to all the other jobs in the theorist line so far. Grimacing at the monotony, although grateful for the big boost to the mental stats, Joe sighed and escaped his bath, dressing quickly to head down the stairs to the common room.
He found Kukurnal already there, but the three seemed a bit more relaxed. Maybe he just got there? Not bothering them yet? Joe sidled up to the table and settled into his seat, calling for his meal while he found a comfortable position.
“Hey Kukurnal, good to see you.”
“Hello, Joe! Are you ready for another wonderful evening of learning?”
“Of course. Kilniara? If you want to bathe, you can head up now. Boys, if you don’t want to stick around, you can head out, too.”
Garnedell and Zilnek seemed quite relieved to take Joe’s offer and disappeared, fleeing from the table although Joe called out to them before they disappeared, “Let Kilniara bathe first! And, you will go with us tomorrow, so you will sleep at an appropriate time tonight, right?”
Both Garnedell and Zilnek quickly agreed and disappeared from the inn. Joe smiled at them then returned to focus on Kukurnal, the evening fleeing swiftly into the night as the two got into heavy discussions on a variety of topics. Garnedell and Zilnek returned sometime in the debates, offering their greetings to Joe before slipping upstairs and Joe took that as an excuse to head to bed as well, bidding Kukurnal goodnight. As always, Kukurnal wasn’t happy to cut their conversation short but soon repaired his mood and stood to allow Joe a polite farewell.
Joe returned to the room to find all three excitedly in conversation with one another, but Joe, exhausted by then, found himself drifting to sleep on his bed, his clothes still on and still on top of the covers.
Status
Blessings
Current Job
Available Jobs
Current Skills
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Available Skills
Log
Joe McConnell
Status
Physical Resistances
Magical Resistances
HP
31.00
Physical:
MP
62.00
Piercing
0.00
Attack
31.00
Crushing
0.00
Defense
31.00
Slashing
0.00
Magic
62.00
Magic Defense
62.00
Strength
31.00
Dexterity
31.00
Agility
31.00
Crafter Theorist
31
Speed
31.00
Endurance
31.00
IQ
496.00
Wisdom
620.00
Learning
3100.00
Luck
0.00