Chapter 44:

My question sparked some serious discussion.

"I know we should," Astrid said with a giddy smile on her face, "...but I don't know if I'll be able to focus properly."

"I want to fight," Bjorn roared, holding up his spear over his head. In his other hand, he drew out the ax he had gotten as a sidearm. It was more of a hatchet, but he shook it. "My blood is high!"

I looked at him like he was a bit of a crazy person, but that was just Bjorn. Jonas shrugged.

"I think we might as well push on. Even if we get one more room, that's more loot, more money, more coin to spend," he said with a knowing wink.

Helga spoke up quietly, "I agree with Astrid. I don't think we'll be at our best."

Everyone looked at me. I wanted to go on. I was on a roll, but at the same time, I was exhausted. As good as most of my stats were, and with magic boosting my abilities, I was able to push this far. Still, I was starting to feel the limits of my smaller constitution. Perhaps I had managed to push it high enough that I actually increased it, but still. I blinked, playing up the act a little bit, and put a hand to my head.

"Well, I'm pretty beat, guys. We can keep going, but I'm going to need some of you to pick up the slack," I said with a smile.

"Oh, you're on," Jonas groaned, and Bjorn just chuffed while Astrid and Helga rolled their eyes.

"I think we should probably leave. We have a lot of loot, and I think we could all do with a gear upgrade. Next time we run this, we'll get through it without much of a problem. We'll be better prepared and can get even further," I reasoned.

Bjorn and Jonas both seemed to capitulate at that, and we took the option of leaving the dungeon early. The challenge portal winked out beneath us as we emerged, smiles on our faces, long since used to the disorientation of entering and leaving the challenge. A few people waiting in line gave us polite claps, and I noticed a little symbol appeared as we left, indicating that we had just passed the minimum for the month. And with our exuberance, it was obvious that it was the first time.

We waited in line, chatting about what we wanted to do with the extra loot. Bjorn was thinking about upgrading his spear, and I was planning on maybe picking up another spell—maybe a weapon conjuration spell so I didn't have to worry about upgrading weapons in the future. I could just focus on that or some sort of heavy-impact spell if I could afford it. Now, I had almost 1000 coins, so I should be able to get some of the second-tier spells rather than just the low-level ones I had gotten at first.

We traded all our loot for money, and then, as we were walking out. We paused just outside the entrance, a little off to the side, so we weren't blocking anyone's way.

"I think tomorrow we should take a break," I said. "We managed to make it for the month, which is amazing, but we've been going nonstop. Why don't we do something else? No training, just fun. Or you can go see your other friends," I offered with a shrug. "Just something else."

Everyone seemed amenable to the idea.

"Why don't we go back to the arena where we first met?" Bjorn suggested. "See some fights. I haven't even had a chance to really dig into that too much since we've been running the challenge nonstop."

I wasn't against that. It sounded like there was a possibility of making coins there. Astrid and Helga seemed ambivalent but willing to go along.

"Why don't we do that in the evening?" I said. "Sometime around dinner, and then we can have the day to ourselves."

That decided, and we all went our separate ways. I went, had food, and then went to bed early, getting a full night's sleep for the first time in weeks.

***

When I woke up, I jumped out of bed, thinking I needed to run to training, but I slowed my racing heart, got dressed, enjoyed a leisurely breakfast, and then made my way over to my favorite spell store. Phil greeted me with a cheery wave.

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"You're back! How did the Healing Touch and Quick Step treat you?"

I smiled and gave him a thumbs-up. "Perfect. Got me far enough to make some more coin," I said, hefting my bag.

"Good, good. As always, we aim to please," Phil said. "Watching you move, you're doing pretty good at integrating them into your style, I see," he said, watching my feet.

"How can you tell that by just looking at the way I walk?" I asked.

He tapped the side of his temple. "Trade secret. But I'm very good at matching customers to what they need."

I nodded. "It's coming along nicely. Still, a lot of kinks to work out."

He bobbed his head in agreement. "Of course, of course. You seem to have modified them slightly based on your movement. You're getting in people's faces more than what the Quick Step spell is designed for. It's impressive for you to make it so versatile."

I shrugged. "Well, I did spend some time working on them as I was adapting them for myself. Okay, well, what do you have in mind? Do you have any arcane spells available?"

"Of course," Phil said, pulling out a list and pushing it over to me. It was a list only six long, with prices next to them. I winced as I read through them. Absolute Destruction sounded awesome, but costing over 100,000 coins, even with a discount, was way out of my budget. Mana Intrusion also sounded very effective, but the cost of 50,000 coins was still far too expensive for my blood. The only one that was potentially possible was Arcane Punch, and it was discounted. The original 5000 coins had been slashed through and replaced with 1200 coins next to it.

I looked at Arcane Punch. "Can you tell me more about this one?" I said, tapping the cheapest option.

Phil nodded. "Yeah. Picked up that spell decades ago, and no one really wants it because, well, anyone who's good enough at close-quarters combat to use that sort of spell likely has a lot more coin and access to better spells. And anyone who is looking for something in this budget and can use arcane…well, that's pretty rare."

"So you're saying it's kind of a weak, cheap spell for its type, but not many people who could use it. Those who can could also afford a much better one?" I asked.

He nodded.

"Okay. What about weapon conjuration spells?" I asked, keeping that in the back of my mind.

"Well, got lots of those," he said and put some more lists down. "The issue is they're all really mana-hungry. Even maintaining one for a while takes a bit of mana, but the cheaper you go, the more mana you need. There's a bit of an efficiency curve."

I looked through the list and considered picking up one of the cheaper dagger ones. I didn't have a good way of quantifying how much mana I was using. There were things about that in the books I had read, but nothing direct. So I asked, "How do you quantify mana? It doesn't seem to have an easy-to-define number."

"That's because there's really not," Phil replied. "You can test for it, and there are various measurement systems, but not one that has completely won out yet. The general guideline is just to give an impression of how mana-hungry it is—low to high. All that's very customizable to the person, though. But there are trade-offs. Usually, the amount of mana and recovery is governed by the focus stat."

I nodded. My focus stat wasn't extremely high yet, but some levels in my class would fix that. I looked through the spells, but nothing really stood out to me. So I went back to the Arcane Punch.

"How low can you go for this?" I asked.

Phil looked at the parchment. "Well, this discount was from a year ago. I suppose I can give it to you for 800 coins—the family and friends discount."

I frowned. "Could you do 750?"

Phil shook his head. "Sorry. I wish I could."

I sighed. "Hmm. I'm not sure I really need to improve my weapons, but none of these really speak to me," I said, gesturing at the weapon conjuration spells. "My magic is nowhere near mature enough to rely on it."

"Yeah. I wouldn't recommend you get one of these. I think either a defensive spell or some sort of attack like this is actually a pretty good deal if you can use arcane mana," he said, tapping the entry for Arcane Punch.

I grumbled and pulled out my wallet, grabbing a handful of coins.

"I'll take it," I said and counted out some of the higher denominations, nearly emptying my total fund pool. Phil bagged up the book for me and passed it over.

"Come again," he said with a cheery wave as I exited the shop, significantly poorer than when I had entered.