Gary and I spent the rest of the day in the training yards sparring each other and a few of the other adventurers that seemed to be around our level. I felt like I was fighting myself trying to use the shield effectively while only using one arm for my spear. Some of the training I had done with Gary carried over but a lot of it was completely different. After the day was done I felt less confident in myself compared to before having the shield.
“Don’t beat yourself up, Eli. A few days of training will make a big difference.” Gary tried to reassure me as we walked back to the guildhall to eat dinner.
“I know. I’ll stick with it until it feels more natural and decide from there if I want to continue with it,” I said. At least I had made some progress with draining myself of Essence by casting Thornbolt whenever possible. I did my best to cast it as soon as my Essence had regenerated enough to see if it would push my Spirit up more quickly. I still needed 10 experience more experience for Thornbolt before I would switch focus to Barkskin.
We arrived in the guildhall and I stopped Aaron, Gabrielle, and Zack sitting at a table close to the bar.
“Hey, everyone,” I said as a took a seat at their table with Gary. Aaron nodded back as he ate his stew and Gabrielle smiled.
“Hey! How was training all day on your first day off?” Zack said as he shook his head at me and Gary.
“We went to the market too, it’s not like we trained all day,” I said defensively with a half-smile. “Where did all of you go after the market,” I asked since I and Gary had left before they woke up.
“There’s a beach to the west of the market district that we relaxed at for the afternoon. We also looked around the market for a few hours to see the different prices of things we might need in the future.” Aaron answered my question after a drink of his ale. Our server brought Gary and me some food and ale so I focused on eating. After training and sparring most of the day I was starving, I had noticed my muscles were getting bigger and tougher surprisingly quickly since I had Awakened. I assumed it was the effects of my Vitality and Strength increasing so quickly over the past weeks.
“So how’s the shield, Eli?” Zack asked as he gestured towards the shield leaning against the chair I was sitting on.
“It’s hard, and I feel a lot weaker than before using my spear with one hand,” I complained over my ale. “But, it’s only my first-day training with it. It should get easier tomorrow.”
“You're learning a whole new style of fighting, it’s going to take some time. I picked up a better quality bow today, for most of my funds. Also, some higher quality arrows for those beetles if we see them again.” Aaron responded. I leaned over and studied the new bow. It was a pale grey wood only four feet tall with some metal bandings around each end.
“Looks nice, Aaron,” Gary said. “It’s a lot shorter than your old bow, does it have less draw weight?”
“It’s a much heavier draw than my previous bow, which is what drew me to it. With my strength increasing so much I realized my bow was too weak for me now. It feels more comfortable to pull this back, and it will increase the strength of all of my shots.” Aaron explained cheerfully. He was on his second ale and his normally pale cheeks were bright red.
“Smart choice. I see Zack got a new mace and Gabrielle it looks like you just got new leather armor?” I asked as I was curious what everyone spent their money on.
“Yeah, I don’t ever use a weapon, so I just decided to spend everything I could on my armor. Zack got that mace and a large ashwood tower shield he left by his bunk.” Gabrielle explained since Zack had left for the outhouse.
“Do you think it would be worth it to carry a larger melee weapon than a dagger?” Gary asked with some concern. “At least with a short sword you can defend yourself from a goblin if you ran out of Essence.” I found myself nodding in agreement. Gabrielle used to carry a spear with her but she rarely ran out of Essence during fights anymore so she left it behind to attack more accurately with her skills.
“Maybe, I would have to learn how to use one, though. I guess it would be a good way to train my dexterity, too.” Gabrielle nodded thoughtfully. “I’ll think about it. You're right that I need something to defend myself with if I run out of Essence. Using meteor costs about half of my Essence now, so that does limit me more than when I only had to cast fireballs and wall of flames.” The rest of the night passed pleasantly as we stayed talking at our table and drinking ale until late at night.
The next day I spent the morning training with Gary and another adventurer who fought with a one-handed spear and shield-like I was working on. The adventurer had a lot of pointers that helped me to improve my technique a lot in a few short hours. I left in the afternoon after I seriously thanked the adventurer for helping me out.
“All you owe me is a mug of ale,” he grinned before he turned and walked away to continue training. After training, I went to one of the attendants at the counter of the guildhall and asked what the price was for using the city portals. The attendant let me know portals cost 5 silver each way. The portal from Brightswell to here was only provided because they funded the first portal to an area where you would be able to level at it if necessary. It was both more and less than I had expected so I didn’t find myself too bothered by the price. With that done I waited at one of the tables for Gabrielle who asked me to meet her there in the afternoon.
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“Hey, have you been waiting long?” Gabrielle asked a few minutes later when she walked up to my table. I stood up to join her as she gestured to the door.
“No, I just got here a bit ago,” I replied as we made our way out of the noisy guildhall.
“Great, so I wanted to head to the mage’s guild to see what they offered. I don’t know much information about them.” Gabrielle explained as we walked.
I shrugged, “I don’t know anything about them. I thought most people in the mages guild were nobles or something.” I said honestly.
“Yeah, they might be,” she said. “I just figured with both of us having mage classes it would be worth talking to them.”
“I’m sure they have tons of information that we don’t have. Hopefully, it doesn’t cost a hundred gold to join, or something ridiculous like that.” I laughed somewhat uneasily. It was probably going to be a ridiculous amount. We walked for about forty minutes, almost to the edges of the nobles district before we arrived. There was a large mansion with a large gated compound behind it that was blocked from view. Attached to the front of the large building were two glass doors that opened automatically.
Gabrielle and I both stopped for a second when the doors swung open when we were still a few steps away. I glanced at her for a second before she shrugged and continued through the doors. Inside there was an obvious reception area with an official-looking person upfront.
“Good afternoon, may I ask what you're visiting the Mage’s guild for?” the tall man asked us once we walked up to him at the entrance to the hall.
“Hello, we’re here to see about any information on the mages guild and what it offers to its members,” Gabrielle said to the attendant.
“I see,” he looked us up and down for a moment before he sighed. “Very well, go speak to one of the attendants behind me.” He finished speaking and pointedly ignored our thanks as he focused back on the book he was carrying. I decided to ignore that guy judging us based on our low-quality leather armor.
“Hello, how can I help you today?” the attendant asked once we walked up to her desk.
“Neither of us knows much about what the mages guild does and what they offer their members, could you explain?” I asked the middle-aged lady behind the counter.
“Of course. The mages guild offers a variety of services, including training in enchanting, spell-crafting, and Essence training. More information than that would have to be given after you joined the guild.” she explained shortly. I expected her to give us a lot more information than that, but everything other than training in enchanting seemed to be useful.
“What are the requirements to join the guild?” Gabrielle asked a moment later. I looked at the attendant with interest as I hoped it was something we could save up for easily.
“Level five in a Mage class and five gold coins are required to take the entry test. The test is merely a gauge of your skill in each of the three areas, and is only to see what resources would be available for you once you were a member,” the attendant explained to us with a smile. Five gold was an incredible amount of money, but by the time we were level 5, it might not be too difficult to work on saving that much.
“All right, thank you for your help,” Gabrielle said with a sigh. I nodded to the attendant and we headed out of the mages guild.
“It’s not as bad as I was worried it was going to be,” I said after we got back onto the streets outside. “Not to mention the Essence training probably includes ways to increase our Spirit and Willpower.”
“Yeah, it’s extremely expensive, but we will be able to afford it eventually, I’m sure,” Gabrielle responded. “I’m excited about the spell-crafting that she mentioned. Does that mean I could learn other Spells that aren’t offered from my class?”
“I’m not sure, I didn’t even know that was possible,” I said back. “I guess we’ll find out eventually, once we reach level 5 and save a fortune.”
“Yeah, I guess,” Gabrielle replied. “I’m going to head to the market and see what the prices are for a short sword, then I’ll meet you at the training yards?”
“Sure, I’ll probably spend the rest of the day there. See you later,” I said before we split up to go down different streets. I spent the rest of the day mostly training by myself in the forms that the adventurer I met yesterday had instructed me in. Gabrielle arrived a few hours later and was already sparring with another woman by the time I noticed her arrival.
Thornbolt level 4 reached
A few hours later I finally finished leveling Thornbolt and I switched to working on Barkskin. I decided to stop for the day after leveling and I headed to the bathhouse quickly to wash up before meeting the rest of the team in the guildhall. The next day passed similarly other than the team going to the market together to get another two weeks' worth of higher quality rations for two silver and twenty copper each.
“All right, team,” Gary spoke up after we made it out of the city gates on our way back to the Bloodfields the next day. “I talked to one of the more senior adventurers last night at the guildhall and he explained where we could find monster cores if we’re interested in trying to make a little more this time.”
“Interesting, how much did they pay for F-rank monster cores, anyways?” Gabrielle asked.
“50 Silver for each undamaged core we recover. Monster cores only develop when a monster survives outside of a dungeon for a long time.” Gary continued. “Some of the more experienced adventurers at the Bloodfields don’t even bother clearing out the dungeons. Instead, they search around deeper in the Bloodfields for Awakened monsters to harvest.”
“How do you think those Awakened monsters compare to the dungeon bosses we’ve faced so far?” I asked, interestedly.
“Well, the adventurer I talked to said they mostly hunted the Awakened Hobgoblins that live in villages around 10 miles deep into the Bloodfields,” Gary said.
“Sounds like it could be a good idea. Would we be camping in the Bloodfields, then?” Aaron asked after he heard the distance.
“Yeah, if we want to try hunting for some cores we’re going to have to camp out in the Bloodfields, otherwise we would spend too much time hiking back and forth,” Gary said with a shrug. “Otherwise, we can continue hunting for dungeons near the outskirts again like last time.”
“Let’s give hunting for the Awakened monsters a try first. If it doesn’t work out we can always move back to clearing dungeons,” said Zack after the short discussion. No one had any problems with that so we separated to focus on training as we walked the familiar path to the Bloodfields.
Barkskin Level 6
Barkskin finally leveled up after I cast it on the team at dinner at the edge of the Bloodfields. We had just arrived about an hour before dark so we decided to get an early start tomorrow. Since we planned on hiking ten miles into the Bloodfields before we would start searching for Awakened monsters we were going to leave with the sunrise. I quickly checked my status to confirm that I would need to earn 3200 experience with Barkskin to level it again. I let out a groan at the expected sight and tried to focus on the fact that I leveled it at all as I laid down to sleep.