Zalia spent the next three weeks mostly training, going on small hunts by herself or standing guard. She didn't go on any more contracts during the time as her team wasn't given any and didn't take any. The first few days, she got her last abilities in the Herbalist class to Iron, ranking the class itself up.
Congratulations! Flora identification has reached Tin 20.
Congratulations! Flora identification has reached Iron 1.
Flora identification will not increase in level until all classes have reached Iron.
Flora identification - spell - targeted
Tin - Poison, cure or food, you'll know. You may identify whether targeted flora is poisonous, helpful, nutritious or all of the above.
Iron - You may now identify what elements different flora contain.
Congratulations! Stasis has reached Tin 20.
Congratulations! Stasis has reached Iron 1.
Stasis - spell - targeted
Tin - Can put a small amount of herbs into stasis.
Iron - Herbs in stasis may now be put into a spatial storage.
Congratulations! Herbalist class has reached Tin 20.
Congratulations! Herbalist class has reached Iron 1.
For reaching the next rank, linked attributes of the Herbalist class have increased significantly. Increase all other classes to Iron to progress further.
The new Flora identification ability allowed her to identify what elements were in herbs, something quite useful. She had gotten the sense of what they contained already from her herbal magic passive but now she could see it defined in the small text box that came with Aura observation. She checked out all all her stored herbs with the new effect.
Snow-leaf - Iron - Use in a ritual to add an element of Ice.
Bitterbalm - Iron - Use in a ritual to add an element of Curse
Dodge-vine - Tin - Use in a ritual to add an element of Protection.
Manifest - Tin - Use in a ritual to add an element of Physical manifestation.
She had no Frozen Heart or Flame-root left but would like to see what kind of element they would contain. The next level of her stasis ability allowed her to put herbs into their own little spatial storage that was kept.. somewhere.
She couldn't identify where the herbs went but could feel they were there and how much there was of each. There was room enough to store quite a lot of each of her Iron ranked herbs, she only kept Tin ones in the short term to sell in the city. She found that herbs she was using preparation on she could store, otherwise needing to be touching them. It was the same for summoning them, she could bring them back into her hand or as a part of using Preparation. This meant she could harvest, cut up and store herbs magically all without touching them, putting them into a timeless space to be used at a later time. The synergy of the abilities was quite satisfying to use.
The significant increase to her vitality and resilience attributes that came with the rank up from Tin to Iron for her Herbalist class was quite something to feel. She could physically feel the increase in health and toughness. It was almost as if the density of her body changed, being harder to cut into and requiring more damage to destroy.
Across the three weeks, she spent a lot of time in the forests near the city and managed to net about sixty silver daily from selling herbs, retaining a good stock of the Iron ones. This meant by the end of the three weeks she had amassed twelve gold and sixty silver, along with the extra three gold from the Morning’s shade bringing her to a total of sixteen gold, ten silver and ninety copper, including the fifty silver and ninety copper she still had from before. She also continued her mobility and sword training across the weeks, gaining six levels in mobility and five in sword proficiency raising them to fourteen and thirteen respectively. The speed at which her sword proficiency progressed had slowed quite significantly after her initial learning curve but plateaued out a bit once she got more comfortable. She was now pretty good with basic sword work, nothing compared to someone like Tristan still but on a good track to getting there. She wanted to change up what weapon she used though, the short sword not feeling quite right to her. Another type of sword would fit her better; she just hadn’t figured out what she wanted. She had her mind on something lighter and used in a more graceful way than the thicker short sword she used now.
Through her weeks, Survivalist and Hunter’s sight also ranked up to Iron, only requiring one and two levels respectively.
Congratulations! Hunter’s sight has gained two levels reaching Tin 20.
Congratulations! Hunter’s sight has reached Iron 1.
Hunter’s sight will not gain further levels until all classes have reached Iron.
Hunter's Sight - passive - body enhancement
Tin - The hunter tracks their prey. You can track creatures easier. When tracking you learn very basic information such as number of legs, number of creatures and general size of creatures.
Iron - You now learn how long ago a creature left tracks and may apply a Hunter’s mark if tracking it for more than an hour.
Congratulations! Survivalist and associated skills have reached Tin 20.
Congratulations! Survivalist and associated skills reached Iron 1.
Survivalist will not gain further levels until all classes have reached Iron.
Survivalist - passive - body enhancement
Tin - The body of a hunter shall not fail easily. Gain the heat resistance and cold resistance passive skills. They level alongside this ability. You are able to survive with less nutrition.
Iron - Gain the stealth and trapper passive skills. These also level alongside this ability. You require less sleep.
Heat resistance - passive
Tin - You take reduced damage from high temperatures and heat related magics.
Iron - You may manipulate Fire and heat to a minor degree.
Cold resistance - passive
Tin - You take reduced damage from low temperatures and cold related magics.
Iron - You may manipulate Ice and snow to a minor degree.
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Stealth - passive
Tin - Normal vision and sight based skills and abilities have a harder time seeing you.
Iron - Other senses are also inhibited and you blend with your surroundings.
Trapper - passive
Tin - Your traps are magically hidden from sight.
Iron - Your traps are magically enhanced.
Hunter’s sight gaining an ability that specifically affected how she could use another confirmed one of her theories about the skills and the further effects she was gaining. It seemed like the new abilities were forming themselves based on her preferences for using her existing skills. Preparation interacting with Stasis the way it did had formed the theory for her but this confirmed it.
The effects Survivalist gave her were a complete game changer. It not only gave her two extra passives in the form of the Stealth and Trapper passives but also brought her heat and cold resistance to Iron with it. The minor manipulation skill wasn't super useful but she thought it might level with the skills to become better. They were very fun to use however and she often found herself playing with the fire of her campfire, making it into shapes and flowing it around her body.
The stealth passive allowed her to sneak up on creatures a lot easier and she could immediately see how changes to her form and coloring matched to her surroundings, making her much harder to see. The trapper passive was very interesting and she tested it with some of her spikes. When she placed the small spikes they were magically hidden within piles of leaves or roots, whatever fitted where she placed it. When a creature stepped on the spike it extended like it was shot from the ground, impaling the foot of the unwary victim.
The last part of the skill was the reduced sleep, which she also immediately noticed as she woke up earlier than she usually would have the next morning. If she didn't have to sleep as the skill progressed further she would have a lot more time on her hands. At this point she only needed to eat a small meal once every two days due to the Tin rank effect already.
She also gained a single level each in Low light vision and Escape, two levels in Aura observation, Nature’s wrath and Protection of the wilds. This brought her Druid class to Tin eighteen and her Hunter class to Tin twelve.
The final thing she had done during the three weeks was get her armour enchanted with the simple self repair and self cleaning functions. It was done by an enchanter she found in the town for a gold coin.
At the end of the three weeks she was found by her group at the entrance as she came back to the keep to do her guard duty for the day.
“Zalia,” Ember greeted.
“Ember,” she replied.
“Hey Zalia! How are you? How have things been?” Zen said, moving in to give her a hug.
“Good,” she replied, taking a step away from the bear hug.
“Zalia, back to civilization once again I see,” Lady Indis said.
“Unfortunately, is there a reason you are ambushing me with social niceties?” she asked.
“We’ve been given a contract,” Ember said.
“Ah, let’s go see what it is then,” she replied.
They made their way to the same room they had met in. It was just a standard meeting room for any team that wanted to use it, Zalia had found out. During the three weeks she had been out and about, Zalia hadn’t really seen any of the others from her team apart from the occasional meeting in the halls or about the keep. She had spent most of the time sleeping out in the wild only coming back for her daily guard duty.
When they entered, the Hidden was sitting in a chair casually leaning back, looking relaxed. Zalia gave him a nod as she entered, getting one in return.
“Alright, what have you got for us?” She asked as she sat down, ignoring any pleasantries. Indis gave her a look for the apparent breach of conduct but she didn't care.
“We have had reports coming from all over the lands about Elementals raising trouble. That in addition to the war currently happening all across the eastern borders of Endaria has caused quite a stress across the martial forces of the kingdom. While we aren’t an extension of the kingdom's military we are a big martial force all the same. As such the kingdom has decided to pay us to take care of some of the elemental nuisances around the lands and the Morning’s shade has accepted. We do this to protect the people of the lands rather than to assist the kingdom's plots and will be doing some investigating of our own. Elementals acting in this way are usually in response to something and we plan to find out. Obviously none of this can leave this room,” the Hidden explained.
There was some silence in the room before Zalia spoke up,
“Where are you sending us?” she asked.
“You and two other Iron rank groups will be going into a large abandoned mine a few days south of here. They had some issues as of a couple of months back to do with different elementals attacking the miners and it has been abandoned since. It was a part of the deal with the kingdom that we be allowed to choose where we send people and this was one of the first noticed awakenings of elementals that we know of. It's been getting worse these past weeks and it's time something was done about it,” he replied.
“I did hear of this mine being abandoned, it was a great blow to house Darial,” Lady Indis said.
Zalia zoned out for a minute as Indis went on to explain the economic difficulties the house had after the mines abandonment and what the resulting impacts to the economy at large were.
“When do we leave?” Zalia eventually asked, interrupting Indis.
“You and the other teams are to meet up in the marshalling yard on the east side of the keep grounds,” the Hidden replied, smiling at her impatience.
“Excellent, if that’s all I’d like to go do my guard duty so I can leave the city again,” Zalia said.
Indis just rolled her eyes at Zalia but Ember actually gave her a smile, Zen seemed to be deep in thought.
“Actually, it isn’t. If I may have a word with you in private?” the Hidden asked.
“Sure,” she said.
Indis seemed to get the message and prodded Zen, leading him and Ember out of the room.
“I wanted to talk to you about that bow,” the man said when the others had left.
“What about it?” Zalia asked, a little worried.
“I knew its owner,” he replied.
“You knew Juniper?” She asked, a little surprised.
“Yes, I did. We were close, once,” he replied, smiling a little sadly.
“I was once the familiar of the man who first wielded it, Zayes,” he continued.
“Wait what? You’re a familiar? What does that even mean?” Zalia asked, now quite confused.
“Yes, I am in fact not human. I am a shade, once non-sentient but brought to sentience when Zayes formed a bond with me. I found you because I sensed that bow and the essence of my old friend upon it. I believe Juniper gave it to you for that very reason, she must have known there was something special about you,” he replied.
Zalia was silent for a moment, thinking about what the shade had told her.
“Who was he, this Zayes?” she asked.
“The founder of this organisation. The name, the Morning’s shade is in part reference to how I met the man. His death was in part, my fault. I will not go over the details but I believe the bow now is in good hands and would leave it with you, not that it's my right to take it but it's how I feel all the same. There isn't anything special about the bow other than its status as an heirloom item but it does mean a great deal to me and some of the older members of our group,” he answered.
The explanation the shade had given her did connect a few dots for Zalia, explaining some oddities she had noticed in Juniper's actions and how easily she had been let into the order.
“Why tell me all this?” Zalia asked the shade.
“Because I believe you are a good person, despite your dislike of dealing with others. I thought you should know the history of the weapon you use,” he said, simply.
“Thank you, I do appreciate that. You aren’t all that intolerable,” Zalia said, smiling.
“I am the most tolerable I will have you know,” the shade responded adopting an exaggerated aghast expression.
“Of course. Am I allowed to know your name now oh mysterious shade?” She asked.
“Nope,” he replied.
“Ugh, I take it back, you’re completely intolerable,” she said.
“How dare you!” he replied in mock anger.
Zalia chuckled quietly,
“I’ll see you around, Shade,” Zalia said as she stood up, grabbing her bag.
“See you around Zalia,” he replied.
The shade had a slightly sad expression on his face as she left the room, making her way to the guard station she had taken for the day.