I had been right, most of the items were basically worthless to me. Which isn’t to say worthless in general, there were deceptively plain looking enchanted weapons and armour that would’ve made most Adventurers salivate, but an Inferno Mace of Burning Fury or Shield of the Storm Guard were well beyond me even before all this. And there were the things that didn't really have much utility in the first place. No less than three of the items I hadn’t been able to identify had turned out to be magical music boxes of some variety or another. As much as I like the song, I don’t think I’ll be needing a stirring rendition of the ballad of Thunk the Dungeon Jack on demand anytime soon.

Still there were a few gems among the newly identified doo dads I was pleasantly surprised by.

[ Dungeon Marked Item: Waystone of Innocuous Illusion]

[ Type: Magical Loot ] [ Rarity: Uncommon ]

[ An intricately engraved pyramid which can create an illusion to obscure a small area by mimicking its surroundings. Illusion also obfuscates sounds and scents to a lesser degree. Can operate indefinitely if attuned. ]

The Waystone was practically a portable hidey hole or at the very least a massive upgrade to any hidey holes I set up in. There were also some excellent ambush possibilities. Even if it ended up having a long setup time an Illusory hunting blind was the next best thing to invisibility. This was a must have as far as I was concerned. Even if it was one of the obviously magical items, so was gonna cost me a couple full points.

[ Dungeon Marked Item: Monical of Travelling Vision]

[ Type: Magical Loot ] [ Rarity: Rare ]

[ A silver rimmed crystal eyepiece capable of a limited form of short range scrying. Maximum distance dependent on amount of Mana channeled. ]

As nice as having the ultimate corner mirror would be, I was pretty on the fence about this one. It was somewhat awkward to handle, being something like a full sized looking glass in my paws and while Mana imbued items were generally a bit tougher than they might usually be. I still didn’t think much of the crystal pane’s chances with me. Not to mention my range with it likely wouldn’t be great with my Mana pool being what it was. Might just be best to leave it be for the moment and pick it up if I manage to establish a more permanent base around here at some point. Or maybe grab it now and hand it off to Gig for safekeeping. Yeah, That was a better plan. That was the hard and fast rule of junk shopping afterall, never expect an item to wait for you.

It was tossed in with some miscellaneous jewellery and was only gonna cost a coin worth of gold or so anyway.

[ Dungeon Marked Item: Talisman of Sheltering Aura]

[ Type: Magical Loot ] [ Rarity: Uncommon ]

[ A finely carved wooden token strung on to a woven leather bracelet. When attuned will blunt both physical and magical attacks until the aura destabilizes. Once broken the aura requires several hours to fully reconstitute.]

This one was not unlike my ill fated Ring of Minor Warding except better in pretty much every way possible. The ring mitigated some of the impact of a single magical attack before needing nearly a full day to regain the effect. Honestly not bad considering it was a bargain find at the free traders market back home. This talisman however was like having your own personal pillow fort between you and the first few hits you might take in a fight, whatever kind they happened to be. Talk about a survivability bump. The regeneration rate was excellent as well, you’d have to be having a pretty shit day for it not to be good to go by the start of the next fight. Long story short the thing was going to be my new favourite pendant. The fact I’d be paying just barely more than a silver for it made me want to break out into a ratty dance of celebration. I did manage to contain myself, but only just. It would have taken me at least a year to save up enough for an item with any kind of equivalent potency and versatility.

There was no doubt adventuring was a lucrative profession that put more gold in your hands then most, but one of the first things an adventurer quickly learned was that the means for staying alive to enjoy all that gold were equally expensive.

Saying I was pleased with the finds I would have missed without [Delver’s Insight] would be a ridiculous understatement.

Dinkum had begun to give me strange looks as I hummed and hawed over a string of seemingly random objects. Gig had gotten bored at some point and had wandered over to the corner with the stacks of books where she was rooting around like she was looking for something. Probably a Davey Delver she hadn’t read yet if I was to guess.

I turned my attention back to the items I’d already been able to recognize before I’d gotten distracted by discovering the new facet to my second favourite perk. There were only actually two more that were of immediate interest to me.

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[ Dungeon Marked Item: Anchors of Adherence]

[ Type: Magical Loot ] [ Rarity: common ]

[ A reinforced metal cube that can attach itself to any solid surface as long it has Mana in its reservoir. If attuned it’s effect can be activated and deactivated remotely ]

Anchors of Adherence, which were almost universally referred to by their nickname, Stop Boxes. Very popular utility gear, nearly always sold in sets of four designed to attune as if they were a single item. Simple looking steel cubes with holes drilled through the centre, they operate in a similar fashion as my Entrenched Footing Skill. Running a loop of power down into whatever you place it against, locking it in place strongly enough that you were more likely to break what they were stuck to before the magic itself. They were also extremely Mana efficient. Fully topped up they could operate for days even when not attuned. Basically an unparalleled magical paperweight. Which, believe me, is much much more useful than it might sound. With applications as straightforward as tent pegs or climbing pitons to some of the trickiest trap triggers around.

I had actually built a collapsible spear around a set of them back in my Rogue days. The Spear of Nifty Tricks was one of the most versatile pieces of kit I’d ever come up with. I’d ended up gifting it to a particularly promising young Rogue after I officially chose to dedicate myself fully to the Defender class. I wondered what Silent Jenny was up to these days, she was testing to move up to the B grades last I’d heard of her.

Anyways, I would’ve loved to have been able to pick up a complete set of Stop Boxes. Unfortunately I was only able to find two in Dinkum’s shop. Still, I was very much looking forward to having some to play with again. Undoubtedly worth the points they were gonna cost me.

The last item I planned on picking up was practically a necessity for any working Adventurer.

[ Dungeon Marked Item: Medium Sack of Looting]

[ Type: Magical Loot ] [ Rarity: Common ]

[ A Canvas Sack that creates an isolated expanded space when charged with Mana. The perceived weight and volume of objects placed inside are dramatically reduced. Objects within the expanded space cannot be retrieved while item is active. ]

The Sack of Looting was a truly revolutionary invention when it was introduced some seventy years back. You need to understand even the least extra spatial inventory device that lets you store and retrieve objects at will represents years of labour on the part of a specialized Master Enchanter. Combine that with the fact that they are so ridiculously useful and self-evidently powerful it makes them one of the rarest, most desirable, and sought after types of magic item. As such they are only really available to the upper echelons of the wealthy and elite. No magical storage for us plebs, and that was just the way of it, until that is, one day an Apprentice Enchanter had the most brilliant idea of his life. Which by the by ended up making him ludicrously rich and founded a massively influential dynasty of Enchanters still going strong to this day.

Namely, the Idea was to take the concept of an inventory item and strip it down to absolute bare bones to make a storage item that was merely nice horse expensive rather than manor house expensive. He accomplished that goal by coming up with a design so elegant in its simplicity he had an entire generation of Enchanters kicking themselves for not thinking of it first.

The way I’ve had it explained to me is the extra space inside is like a soap bubble you inflate with Mana. If you can shove a thing past the surface of the bubble it’ll drop into the isolated space. To get the things out again you have to hold the magical equivalent of a valve open to let the Mana bleed away until the space bubble pops and dumps the entire contents of the sack all at once. Collapsing the space takes at least ten minutes and just as long to get it working again. So, it’s a really bad idea to keep anything inside you might want in a hurry.

Sadly something about the magically bullshit equivalent of surface tension acts as a barrier to anything the bubble can’t fully encapsulate. Things are either in the space or they’re not. So, no you can’t cheat by tying a rope onto things you want to be able to pull out or just stick your hand in to grab stuff. Anyway, In the case of the latter I’m told there's something about the Mana in living things that makes them bounce off the space bubble regardless. Which is just a shame, who wouldn’t want to be able to shove their foes into a magic bag afterall.

Nonetheless even with all the restrictions they are utterly invaluable when it comes to hauling away loot and storing bulky stuff like camp gear and the like.

I had a Small Sack of Looting on me when I’d died that I had been filling up with my usual take of goblin swords and daggers, which the Guild sold in bulk lots to ironmongers. It had been able to hold about a decent sized crate worth of the things. A Medium Sack of Looting should be able to hold at least twice as much. I was going to be able to go full pack rat now.

The shop had more than a dozen of them in various sizes. They could've easily been mistaken for mundane pouches as they tended towards very plain and utilitarian designs as to draw as little attention to the costly item as possible, however the little control sigils on the back where you filled and released Mana from were a dead giveaway to their magical nature. Still, they were absurdly cheap even compared to the other magic items in the shop, these Goblins really seemed to underestimate how universally prized Sacks of Looting were.

~~~~~

I was about to take my haul to Dinkum and settle up accounts when Gig waved to get my attention, seeming to have found what she’d been looking for among the stacks of books.

After I’d gotten caught up in sifting the windfall of magic items, the mountain of periodicals that almost filled one entire corner of the shop had mostly slipped my mind. That had been a mistake.

Gig was holding a Skill Manual.