Alice thanked the heavens that Olivia was tactful enough to not grab her arm or anything like that as they approached the other three members of their newly-formed team. She was willing to meet and cooperate with what was, functionally, a bunch of strangers, if it got her to tier up. It was worth the uncomfortable feeling in the pit of her stomach, if it avoided being underneath someone else's boot once more.
“Hey! Look who I’ve found!” Olivia greeted the other three while talking in an unnecesarily loud tone of voice.
Alice cringed back as three sets of eyes zeroed-in on her, and she hesitantly waved.
One of them she confirmed to be Julian the moment he spoke, the polite guy she had met at the Main Hall’s reincarnation room and that had run off the moment he got a whiff of anything rune-related.
“Nice to see you again, sorry I left you out to dry the other time. I just really like runes,” Julian said with a sheepish smile as he stepped forward with a hand extended. As Alice returned the greeting and nodded, she scanned his gear.
The armor he wore was little else than a pair of gauntlets and greaves, a helmet, and what she recalled to be a cream-coloured gambeson. Fit for someone expecting melee combat but not focusing on pure defense. The other guy’s armor seemed a lot more geared towards pure defense, with it being a heavy plate, as well as a mail coat she could see beneath the thin steel.
“So!” Started Olivia with a small clap of her hands as she gestured towards her. “This is Alice, our missing team member. Alice, you already know Julian, apparently. This,” she said as she pointed towards the small girl with a bob cut. She was still taller than Alice though. “Is Arwen.”
“Hello,” said the other girl as she gave a small, demure smile, even as her eyes, still like a pond, stayed eerily glued to Alice’s. Alice quickly broke eye contact, never having been comfortable with it in the first place. She didn't like her. That look reminded her of fingers wrapping around—
Alice crushed the thought before it had time to form.
“This walking tin-can here is Noah.” Continued Olivia, oblivious to Alice's bout of distress. “We’ll discuss team dynamics once we get to an empty training field, but he’s the one that wanted to stay back, so you’ll probably end up standing behind him one way or another.”
Noah gave a wave as he inspected a blue and black shield, rasping his gauntleted knuckles against the thick metal, a satisfying sound emitting forth. With a nod, he turned towards the clerk, apparently disinterested in further presentations. Or perhaps he just liked armor that much.
“And me! But I already told you my name. So, we have to finish our purchases here, but then we’ll head out to a field, see if we can come up with something usable, and perhaps do a quick dive into the Blossom. Sounds good?”
Alice didn’t know who had died and appointed Olivia the leader, but she was glad she didn’t have to deal with four other people on a regular basis whilst taking on a leadership position. That’d lead her into an early tomb, she was sure of it.
Better leave the talk-intensive positions to the apparent social butterfly.
Nonetheless, there was something that was bothering her.
“Yeah, I was planning on training a bit for myself. Until I met you, that is. Also, did all of you get tutors too? You seem awfully quick on the uptake.”
“Yes, actually” answered the blonde girl for everyone else. “But as far as I know we're a very small minority. The majority of the people that came with us went the crafters route. Everyone else that took the Delvers route has their own motives to be here.”
Alice nodded before stepping out from the shop. She didn't know why she had expected almost everyone to take up exploring the depths of the world, but that had been what she imagined everyone else had been doing. Apparently not.
Once outside, she adjusted the leather of her blade until it felt comfortable and didn’t get in the way too much. Confirming she still could draw it quickly if needed by doing a half-draw, she noticed how the metal and the sword as a whole felt a whole lot lighter than she expected. Perhaps it was thanks to the Valerita? She regretted not asking the name of the Mercury Edge’s clerk. He seemed rather knowledgeable about metals and weapons. It made sense, given he worked at a shop that sold them.
Perhaps at a later date.
Alice didn’t have to wait long for the others to get out, and as they did, she noticed how most of them now carried new weapons, besides the basic backpack Alice carried herself with what she assumed were the same provisions she had. Thinking about the weight on her back and shoulders reminded her that she had forgotten about asking for a personal space-expanding implement, and she cursed under her breath. Perhaps later.
Taking advantage of the moment of reprieve, she focused her gaze on each and every member of the party, bringing up their identity.
Name: Julian
Tier: [1.1]
Identity: Steeled Runekeeper
Level: [1.1]
Name: Olivia
Tier: [1.1]
Identity: Radiant Bruiser
Level: [1.1]
Name: Arwen
Tier: [1.1]
Identity: Lightning Acolyte
Level: [1.1]
Name: Noah
Tier: [1.1]
Identity: Earthen Firekeeper
Level: [1.1]
It was a bit weird that she could only see their names and not their surnames, but she chalked it up to a default privacy setting.
This narrative has been purloined without the author's approval. Report any appearances on Amazon.
The classes everyone else had looked really interesting, and she couldn’t wait to actually see them in action.
After everyone gathered on the sidewalk, Olivia pulled what Alice assumed was her Delver’s Identification, and intently stared at it. After an uncomfortable second of complete silence broken only by the background noise of the city, the Identification glowed with a soft, golden radiance that was slightly uncomfortable to look at for Alice. It was more of a feeling deep inside her bones, rather than the brightness of the light itself,.
“We’re in luck. There’s a training field free, but the only issue is that it’s near the Blossom, and located in the killzone that separates the city and the forest itself. Does anyone have a problem with that?”
After everyone had shook their head or voiced a ‘no’, Olivia beamed. “Great! Then let’s get going. It’s already,” she looked at the sky as she said that. “Midday, so we better get going. We have daylight to burn.”
Without much fanfare, Alice fell back towards the tail-end of the group, not currently interested in striking conversation with any of them. Noah and Julian seemed to be talking about something as the latter wildly gesticulated with both arms, and if Alice focused, she could almost see patterns within his movements. Probably discussing runes.
Arwen and Olivia were both walking side by side, the former a bit behind the latter. Olivia tried to strike up a conversation from time to time with zero success, until she mentioned going to eat somewhere else with the identification the city had given them. Apparently, Olivia had dug a bit more than any of them, and had looked out for places that served Outworlders. There weren’t many places, but their apparent leader vouched for their quality.
Alice reserved her judgment.
Even then, the dynamic of two small subgroups of people separated from her brought about memories filled with the mental equivalents of sharpened glass shards. She could see the similarities between Olivia and her.
Alice delved deep within her core at the thought, the encompassing agony driving away the budding waves of mental anguish. This was a new world, a new opportunity, things didn't have to go the same way.
It still felt the same.
Alice walked in a daze and behind the group, trying to come to grips with emotions she had been keeping under wraps since she arrived into aethas. Just as they threatened to spill over, a wave of Pain washed them away, and she could once more breathe. The agony was sweet, and the ache in her bones felt like home.
She welcomed it.
It was more or less an hour later that Alice snapped out of it as they found themselves within the confines of a fenced-in area, with no one within the group apparently none the wiser. The training field was little else than barren dirt and some big stones strewn around here and there. Big enough to stand on and hide behind, but little else.
Once there, Olivia once more took the lead. “Now that we’re here, we should discuss a bit what we want to do, and how we want to go on about it. Suggestions?”
Arwen halfway raised her hand, noticed it, and started speaking as she lowered it. “I say that we should explain how our classes work. My goal is to tier up enough to get to retire and live peacefully. I don’t want to squander this new opportunity hunting monsters until one strong enough to gut me without a fight comes along.”
It made sense, at least to Alice. It was the logical path, and the most straightforward way to get a peaceful existence, or it sounded like that. Alice didn't really have an idea about how retirement worked in Aethas, but people had to stop working at some point.
It still pissed off Alice. She spoke next without waiting for anybody.
“My goal,” she spoke as calmly as she could, the prickles of her Ether a soothing presence at the back of her mind. “is to reach the top.”
When all she received were confused looks, she elaborated.
“I want to go as high as possible. I want to see the limits of this world, of my new home. Where can I get, if I tier up enough? What’s the limit? Ten, fifty, a hundred? What’s the apex existence, how did it get there, and how can I climb to those heights myself? What would it take?”
What would she have to kill? A million beasts? Ten? A hundred?
A God?
She couldn’t wait to find out.
Power unending, all of it so none could put a boot on her neck and squeeze until she couldn't move, pressuring just enough to not kill her.
All she had to do was put a boot in everyone else's neck that tried to stop her.
The blank looks acquired a slightly concerned, wary glint to them, and Alice deflated as she schooled her expression into a plastic smile. “But that’s just me and my silly dreams. Really, I just want to explore Aethas and see what marvels it has to offer, and I can’t do that while powerless, that’s all.”
The boys and Olivia nodded in unison, but Arwen kept staring at her for an uncomfortably long amount of time. Unnerved, she touched upon her Ether, the roiling nature of Pain soothing her.
Next came up Julian. “I want to learn runes, and… that’s all, really. That’s all that has my attention at the moment. We’ll see if I get hyperfocused on something else later on.”
Noah nodded. “A noble pursuit. I am working towards discovering the mysteries of this planet, in a geological sense. That different metals and materials can absorb Ether to gain differing properties is fascinating, and deserves to be studied.”
Alice would point at him and call Noah a nerd, if she wasn’t cut of the same cloth. Endless hours of TTRPG sessions filled her mind, and she pushed them back before the people she had played them with came to the forefront of her mind. The adventures lived weren’t tainted, even if those relationships had been cut a long time ago.
Olivia just shrugged. “I just really like punching things,” she said as she banged together her fits, a metallic clang coming from what she now noticed were knuckledusters. A pugilist class, perhaps?
“Now that we know each other a bit better, let’s share what we can do, even if I can kind of guess at how things’ll go. Want to start, Alice?”
The aforementioned straightened up as the group turned to look at her, and she took advantage of the moment to sit into an indentation one of the boulders that littered the field had.
She did mind it, but she started speaking regardless.
“I only have one spell, although I’m looking towards expanding my repertoire. It’s something I can’t use near allies, and the next one would, ideally, be some kind of ensnaring spell of sorts.”
“Why can’t you use it near allies?” Arwen immediately asked, and Alice had a sudden and rather overpowering desire to throw her off a cliff. She held onto it though. Barely.
“Because it’s an indiscriminate area of effect, that’s why.”
Olivia smiled placatingly as she raised both hands, palms upwards. “One spell already? That’s amazing! I only have the skills I woke up with, and that’s it. I can fight regardless of whether I have an actual spell or not though.” She bashed one fist against another, and this time a bust of radiant light spilled forth.
Alice cringed back from the light, its radiance feeling like uncomfortable needle pricks all across her skin.
“I do have one spell!” Julian exclaimed, and he drew a glowing blue rune in the air with a gauntleted hand, its form shimmering and changing in a way that made Alice’s eyes hurt. Julian’s other hand rested upon the handle of a stout axe. He completed the rune, grabbed it with two fingers, and slammed it into his gambeson.
With a start, Alice noticed how it now glowed a very faint blue. Julian smiled toothily, and punched the gambeson as well as he could. It didn’t budge.
“It doesn’t last very long, half an hour at most, but if we know there’s a fight incoming, we can power up with these, and it’ll be a lot safer.”
Alice nodded. With something like that, she’d feel a lot more secure about exploring the Blossom.
Noah left his shield in the ground, and tapped one of the rocks near him. “I have two spells, but they’re incredibly basic. There’s this one,” he said as a thin layer of stone flowed across his armor. It didn’t impede his movement, and he seemed even nimbler than before. “And this one.”
This time, he splayed his hand and pointed the palm towards the sky, a short gout of flame following the gesture soon enough. “That’s all I have. Pretty nifty though, if we need to start a fire for some reason.”
Alice agreed, even if the thought of staying in the Blossom enough to need a campfire made a horrible feeling crawl across her spine.
Lastly, Arwen gestured with her palm facing upwards, as small arcs of electricity jumped between her fingers. “I can do that, but at a distance and bigger. It’s pretty intensive to keep up, and it will hurt if you’re in contact with whatever I’m hitting, so be careful.”
Alice felt a little better upon knowing what everyone within the group could bring to the table. Obviously, everyone had left things out for one reason or another, so she’d have to work with limited information if one of them turned out to be slightly more than insane.
“Could I get some time to see if I can come up with another spell? Then we could set off towards the forest like you said, Olivia. See if we can hunt something weak.”
Olivia nodded, and Alice got to work, her capacity for social interaction completely spent.
Now, how could she make use of those chains hanging up there inside her soul…