Chapter 2 Loot?

“What is all this?” Isaac asked once they finally got Jallen’s breastplate off. Pinned to his chest were eight brooches. Each had an onyx gem in the shape of the moon with gold enchantments woven through them. Connected to the back side of the gems were ribbons of various designs. They all had one very obvious thing in common, the gems had shattered.

“Medals of valor.” Lenna said quietly as she picked up the remnants of one of them. The gems’ pieces were held together by what was left of the golden enchantments. “I think I know what their enchantments do, based on what you told me of the fight, but I’m not sure.”

Aria groaned from her place next to Claus with her head barely taking up one of the man’s thighs for use as a pillow. She sat up and rubbed her eyes before glaring at Isaac and Lenna. “Can’t a girl get a nap?” She asked and then saw the body and gear sprawled out in front of them. “Oh?” She asked and sat up a bit straighter. “What is that?” She eyed the equipment. “Wait, is that his armor?”

Isaac nodded. “Yeah, can you do the Identify ritual for these?” He asked and held up one of Jallen’s medals.

She reached out her hand and he tossed one to her. She peered down at it. “I don’t have to.” She replied. “This is an inverted Deflect Death rune.” She said with furrowed brows. “This spell is on the banned list.”

“The banned list?” Isaac asked.

Aria nodded. “Plenty of clerics to righteous deities, paladins of the crown or something justice related, and archmages study the list of banned spells so we know what to look out for and how to counter them. This spell trades another life for your own, though as an inverted enchantment, it trades its life for yours.” She hummed in thought. “It is an ingenious application of a spell that usually can only be cast using a ritual, even then it only lasts for ten minutes without constant power, but with it made as an enchantment set up to use ambient mana to power itself with a range of inches instead of dozens of feet, yes, this is incredible.”

“He had seven more.” Lenna explained. “They are medals for various deeds he did while in the service of the empire.”

Aria looked up from it and met Isaac’s eyes. “You had to kill him eight times?” She asked incredulously.

“Nine.” Isaac corrected her and tossed the amulet he had just taken off of Jallen’s corpse.

“A repeating Death Denial pendant.” She whispered in awe. “Do you know how hard it is to get one of these?” She questioned Isaac.

Isaac shook his head. “No idea.” He replied honestly. “Pretty hard if I had to guess though.”

“This could go for a quarter to half of a million gold at an auction.” Aria explained. “This is a legendary item among legendary items.” She looked between the three other adventurers. “Think about it, a pendant like this would allow you to fill a Bottomless Bag with nothing but blasting jelly, sneak into a castle or a dragon’s lair, then blow all of it to Mount Celestia with the only survivor being you.”

“Has someone actually done something like that?” Isaac questioned. “How does the spell not get overloaded by the destructive force?”

“Death Denial is made to break. The spell takes all of the incoming, well, everything, and disperses it while it disperses itself.” Aria explained. “That is why the spell will only ever work once unlike something like the Amulet of the Hero which is designed to absorb the damage, convert it to stored mana, and then release it as light, but,” Aria scoffed. “no one has actually seen the Amulet of the Hero in use for a century.”

Isaac coughed into his hand. “Yes, a century.” He agreed.

“Wait, you had it with you? You used it?” Aria demanded.

“I just gave it back to Izen actually.” Isaac explained. “Thanks for the magic lesson though, I barely have to ask questions with you, unlike Alexander.” He grumbled.

“Anytime.” Aria replied. “It is kind of my job, you know, as a priestess of a knowledge deity.”

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“Speaking of, what is the difference between things like acolyte, priest, cleric, and pope?” Isaac wondered.

“An acolyte is still in training, they have not been given leave to go and do their own thing. Usually they are assistants to a priest or priestess.” Aria explained and handed the amulet and brooch back to Isaac. “A pope is actually just someone who has reached level twenty. They have free reign over a church’s resources and have to deal with a lot of high level politics. In between that is a priestess, so, me.”

“You are allowed to go off and get yourself into trouble without supervision but you also can’t really use the church’s resources unless it directly affects the church.” Isaac summarized.

Aria scowled at him. “I don’t just go around getting myself into trouble, you know.” She pouted. “Recently I have actually been saving others from trouble.”

Isaac glanced at Claus then back at Aria but decided to hold his tongue. The only reason Claus kept getting hurt was because he was in the basement of the world protecting her. Otherwise he could have been on the surface dealing with normal surface level things. That didn’t mean that everything on the surface was meadows and daisies but the level range of threats outside was much larger. Everything from a rabbit to an ancient dragon found their place under the sun but in general the danger was a lot less condensed.

“What is that?” Aria asked as she stared at some of the runes stitched into Jallen’s under armor. She crawled a few feet over to get a better look. “This is the Regenerate spell.” She explained while tracing one of the lines of the rune with her finger.

“That’s not surprising.” Isaac replied. “I injected him with enough poison to kill all of us dozens of times over, collectively.” He explained. “The man just wouldn’t die.”

“These are still good.” Aria observed. “A little worn out but they could last for another few years. They are always in use though so hiding them under something else isn’t really an option unless you are wearing something twice as potent over top of it.” She looked at the armor that was covered in nothing but runes and patches of filigree between them. “Like, well, like that.” She looked around. “Where are his sword and helmet?”

“Um, about that, I have no idea.” Isaac replied while scratching the back of his head. “Around?”

“Figures.” Aria complained. “Now you don’t have a-”

“No.” Marie cut her off as she appeared a dozen feet away and continued walking towards them. She tossed Isaac the helmet and started pulling the sword out of her Bottomless Bag. “He has the full set because he almost hit me with the helmet.”

Isaac looked at her with some confusion and then he remembered launching the helmet away accidentally. “Oops. Sorry.” He replied.

Marie shrugged. “It scared the hells out of Shy but I saw it coming.” She dropped the legendary sword of the ancient paladin on the stone ground as if it were a sack of copper coins before she reached back into her bag to pull out the shield. “You made me hike for this one.” She accused Isaac as she dropped the legendary shield onto the ground with just as little fanfare.

“Well, uh, thanks.” Isaac replied. “I heard your hunt went well.”

Marie shrugged. “It was fine.” She looked around. “With that settled I should disappear before anyone starts asking questions.” She said and did just that. She vanished with nothing more than a smirk.

“That sounded cooler in your head!” Isaac called after her. The other three gave him odd looks. “I had a pretty good one liner for Fina and Keith before we left and she told me it sounded better in my head.”

Lenna shook her head, Aria rolled her eyes and chuckled, and Claus looked like he was about to start laughing but he reigned it in before he could reopen the wounds Lenna had barely sealed. “We are going to need the ritual for the armor, sword, and shield.” Aria explained.

Lenna shook her head. “Just the sword. I can tell you what enchantments are on the armor and shield. His sword was special.” She explained. “The armor survived Isaac throwing him from the ceiling.” She pointed into the air. “That is all it does.” She looked over at the shield and picked it up gently before she gazed into the inlaid gems that stored mana for the deployable reality shield the size of a wagon. “This is just a better version of what the wizards were using.” She explained. “It powers itself.”

Isaac didn’t want to touch the sword but simply looked at it. “That didn’t try to steal my blood to heal him or anything like that.” He stated. “It flew back to his hand when he threw it at me though.”

Lenna raised an eyebrow. “I thought it was new.” She commented. “Aria, if you would.”

Aria nodded and grunted as she got to her feet. She reached into her pouch and pulled out some of her magical chalk and got to work drawing out the ritual for Identify. The group continued to chat while Aria got finished working. She had just set the sword down in the middle when Edward returned. “How many legendary items did you loot?” He questioned and leaned down to inspect the shield.

“A few.” Isaac replied.

Lenna looked up towards the still standing Guild Master. “Where is Macken?” She asked him.

Edward raised an eyebrow. “Michael is handling him.” He explained. “As long as he doesn’t try anything stupid he’ll be treated well, Michael is a good person.” Edward assured her. Lenna looked like she was about to say something but he continued: “He is in the high security cells under Michael’s office.”

Lenna closed her mouth and nodded. “Thank you.” She replied.

“Your old unitmate, right?” Isaac asked.

Lenna nodded. “Yes. We should go see him, at some point, in a day or two.”

Isaac chuckled. “Alright. After dinner, a bath, and a nap.”

“Isaac, it’s midnight. We had dinner six hours ago.” Lenna replied.

“Second dinner.” Isaac replied confidently.

Lenna shook her head. “After we figure out what enchantments my uncle’s sword has.”

“Most definitely, my curiosity is killing me.” He replied. “Speaking of,” He continued and handed Lenna the amulet Jallen had once worn.

“No.” Lenna replied and pushed his hand back.

“Why not, I can heal from almost anything.” He protested.

Lenna narrowed her eyes on him. “You just told me that Jallen almost killed you in one hit.” She reminded him. “You will have that and you will wear it.” She ordered him. “You make me worry enough that I think I deserve the peace of mind from knowing you at least have that equipped.”

Isaac sighed but put the amulet around his neck. Unlike the Amulet of the Hero there was no fancy symbol depicting what it did for the wearer. It was a simple golden chain with a diamond sandwiched between two golden plates that had platinum engravings on them for the spell. “Fine.” He grumbled. Isaac didn’t want to die but he felt the same way about Lenna that she did about him. He had watched her get dropped by Fable in the arena and it had been a very stark reminder of exactly how mortal she was. He would have felt better if she had it but he did understand her point.

A few minutes later the Identify was completed and what it showed surprised them all. It was also a huge disappointment for Isaac.