I woke up early the next morning and headed to the common room to wait for Gabrielle to show up so I could get the Gust spell scroll from her. Zack and Gary joined me a few minutes after I arrived and quickly ate before leaving for the training yards behind the building.

“Hey, Eli,” Gabrielle looked depressed as she slumped into the seat beside me. “Good luck…” she pushed the scroll towards me grouchily.

“What’s wrong?” I asked worriedly.

“The Essence formation for Gust is incredibly difficult, there’s no way I’ll be able to learn it any time soon,” she replied with a sigh. “We’re going to have to look for something easier until we improve, I gave up after a few minutes and just practiced forming my Essence into simple shapes for a few hours,” she shrugged. “I think I got a little better, at least.”

“Damn,” I said disappointedly. “Well, maybe we should ask Zarne how she started learning, then.”

“She told me that I wouldn’t be able to learn from a spell scroll for a while, but I didn’t believe her,” Gabrielle replied. “Practicing forming your Essence into simple shapes was what she did when she was just beginning.”

“Well, it is what it is,” I responded slightly disappointedly. “At least we know how to start learning, now.”

“Yeah, you're right,” Gabrielle nodded. “Do you want to practice here or should we head to a training yard?”

“I don’t think training in the common room is a good idea,” I said hurriedly with a wary glance around the room. I didn’t see the hobgoblin from before, but I wasn’t willing to take the chance.

“All right, let me eat and then we can go out back and I’ll explain how I started,” she said. I nodded contentedly and continued reading through the scroll and studying the diagrams while I waited. Aaron showed up a few minutes later and told us he planned on training with a sword at the training yards. Now that we had rings of holding it was easy to quickly switch out our weapons, and he thought it might be worth learning a weapon more suitable for close-quarters if he needed one.

“Good plan, I should spend some more time working with my short sword while we’re here, I guess,” Gabrielle said glumly. I didn’t say anything because I didn’t want to push, but I agreed that they needed to learn how to handle a weapon. There will come a time for all of us when we have no Essence left and still have to fight. A few minutes later Gabrielle and I made our way outside and sat on a bench beside the training yard the rest of my team was using.

“All right, focus on your core,” Gabrielle began, “push a small amount of Essence into the air in front of you and try to form a round ball.” I nodded and easily moved a small amount of Essence through my arm and outside of my right hand. I focused on the floating Essence under my control and willed it to form into a ball. The Essence shifted to a lumpy ball for a moment before I lost control and had to refocus. I continued attempting with a similar amount of success for the next few minutes, and it became painfully clear how helpful it was to have my class teach me my skills.

“It’s so easy with my skills, I don’t understand why this is so much harder,” I complained about a sigh.

Gabrielle glanced at me and nodded, “Yeah, the Essence formation for Meteor is much more complex than Gust and it takes almost no effort to cast. But I’m able to hold my Essence into a ball for longer than last night, just keep trying.”

Although it didn’t cost me much Essence to repeatedly practice shaping my Essence, by midday my head was pounding and I felt more mentally tired than I ever had in my life. I took a break to grab some lunch with the rest of my team and felt slightly better afterward, but I decided to train with my sword for the rest of the day. I focused on running through my sword forms instead of sparring today, and then watched some of the other sparring matches for a while. I felt like I was learning a good amount just from watching some of the much more experienced members of the battalion and I offered to cast my Rockskin before the matches after Zack suggested it. The spars became much more intense with the added safety of Rockskin applied and I thought I earned our team some goodwill from it.

The next morning passed similarly until halfway through breakfast when Gary got called up to chief Duskar’s office by a tall drow elf woman. She introduced herself as Lleldrith and she was the leader of the team we would be leaving with today.

“He probably just doesn’t want to explain the mission to all ten of us in his office, so he’s passing it on to them,” I speculated after Gary nodded to us and headed upstairs with the drow elf.

“Looks like we’ll hit the road early, then. Did you ask Aidor how far the dungeon was?” Aaron asked.

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I shook my head, “No, I didn’t think about asking. Honestly, I wouldn’t even mind having to hike for a while,” I raised my hand and gestured to my ring of holding. “Now that we have these, it’s just an easy walk.”

“Speak for yourselves, not all of us have twenty strength,” Gabrielle shook her head, “I better be getting priority for Earthen Might.” I laughed at her expression; I already planned on casting it on all of us for the hike. The skill was getting fairly close to leveling up and I would be ecstatic if I could advance it before we reached the dungeon. We relaxed at the table once we finished eating and waited for Gary to return since we probably wouldn’t have time to train before we left. A few minutes later he walked down the stairs and headed to our table. The drow elf split off and headed to the training yards, I presumed to grab the rest of her team.

“All right, we’re gonna be meeting the other team outside the gates in a few minutes,” Gary said once we reached our table. “Anyone needs to grab anything?” We were all prepared so we headed directly out of the building and made our way outside of the outpost. Shortly after we got there I saw a team of four drow elves and a hobgoblin heading toward us.

“Hello, I’m Lleldrith of Dusk battalion, I hope our two teams will be able to work together well in the coming days,” she said once she stopped in front of us. “Allow me to introduce my team. I am a Shadowmancer, I specialize in concealment and assassination,” she gestured towards the drow elf man standing beside her.

“Guldrar, Berserker. I usually fight in the front, although I won’t be able to take a blow from the ogres, so I’ll need to be on a flank for this dungeon,” he said. I wondered what skills a Berserker would have idly as I looked to the next drow elf.

“My name is Sornd, and I’m a Scout. I’ll be ranging around our teams before we move anywhere in the dungeon. I’ll be fighting from the back with my short bow,” the lean drow elf stated calmly. That sounded like a useful class, although it was likely weaker than average during a fight.

“Nadal, Cleric of Fystros. I can heal most injuries, and I have an aura to help restore Essence more quickly,” she said. I looked at the drow elf woman interestedly, she was the first healer other than myself that I had met.

“Nalghar, Vanguard Knight,” the hobgoblin grunted. “I’ll be fighting the ogres up front, and I should be able to hold their attention for quite a while.” I was impressed by how well-formed their group was and I tried not to get distracted thinking about what their skills might be as I joined the rest of my team in introducing ourselves now that they had finished.

“Well met, humans of Dusk battalion,” Lleldrith nodded. “The dungeon is a two-day journey from here, and we should be wary of ambushes once we’re a few hours away from the outpost. This dungeon is only large enough for one group at a time so the path is not as often traveled as the rest.” With our introductions done, we turned and started our hike through the mountains.

I walked through my team and cast Earthen Might as many times as I could, then headed towards Nadal to see if she was willing to speak about her skills.

“Hello, I was hoping to learn some more about your healing skill,” I nodded as I fell in alongside her.

“Of course,” she said agreeably, “I was planning on inquiring about which healing skill you had as well. I have two healing abilities, Cure Wound, and Soothing Mist. The first spell heals a wound all at once, although it won’t completely recover a serious injury with one cast. Soothing Mist is a large spell that I can cast over an area, it will continually heal us for five minutes before ending.”

“Soothing Mist sounds very impressive, my healing skill is called Rejuvenation. It slowly heals over a short time, and I have to be touching someone to cast it on them,” I said. I was slightly jealous of her skill, it sounded like what I expected the Restoration specialization would have given me.

“Indeed, it was my first skill to be upgraded after I chose my specialization of Fystros, the god of healing,” she replied with a small smile. “Rejuvenation is a very strong first skill. Although it won’t heal as quickly or as much as Cure Wounds, it can slowly regenerate a lost limb. Cure Wounds will only seal my skin shut, should I lose a hand, or arm.”

“I didn’t know I could do that,” I said with some wonder. “Your specialization was a god? How does that work?”

“A cleric is offered the five most suitable gods for their character for their specializations. Since I chose Fystros, the specializations I unlock next will all be different, as no god will allow me to serve them as well.” Nadal replied helpfully. I grew quiet and walked with her companionably as I thought over what I had learned. Everyone I met since arriving at Ascended Skorv’s territory was so much more knowledgeable than myself or my team, and I felt like I had to constantly push myself to try to catch up.

The rest of the day passed by pleasantly and we made it a good distance from the outpost by nightfall. Sornd took Aaron with him to give him some advice for scouting ahead when he left to clear the area ahead of us. We didn’t run into any monsters, although Aaron told us they saw a few monsters when they were ranging ahead and to the sides of us. After a quick dinner, I started to unpack my bedroll since my watch wouldn’t be until just before the morning. I pulled up my status to check my progress for the past few days of training.

Eli - Lvl 7 Druid

Experience - 7880\20000

Strength-15 (+1)

Dexterity-16 (+1)

Perception-11

Vitality-13

Spirit- 25

Willpower-18 (+1)

Stoneskin - Level 2\10 Upgradeable

Experience - 175\200

Thornbolt - Level 8\20 Upgradeable

Experience - 6910\25600

Rejuvenation - Level 7\10 Upgradeable

Experience - 3420\12800

Snaring Roots - Level 7\10 Upgradeable

Experience - 9110\12800

Earthen Might - Level 4\10 Upgradeable

Experience - 690\800

It looked like the headache from training my Essence shaping was worth it, since I managed to level up my Willpower for the first time in a while. My strength and dexterity also improved from the combination of training and sparring with the other members of the Warband back at the outpost, and Earthen Might would likely level before we entered the dungeon. I was impressed by the competence of the team we were working with and I was much less worried that we would have more casualties, like we had in the past.