Blue and Alex were heading out of Helena's house on Hazelpond. During Hera's recovery, the two of them moved in. Bonnie could also come and share a room, but she had too much work to do in the library, and without access to Helena's laboratory, it was hard for her to do the quests that she got. Helena only said that they would try to get a house near a place closer to a main branch of the guild.
Hera watched her friends leave the house. They were going to spend the day hunting around the city with Runir. He and Alex had gotten closer during the time they were working as mercenaries, and the man was starting to get annoyed by how some people would treat him. Unlike how it was in games, Healer couldn't simply fix any wound. That was something that would only become available later on. Runirs's abilities consisted of removing status effects like poison, increasing the defense of someone for a few seconds, or creating barriers that could reduce the power of an attack. His actual healing abilities were very simple, much like Hera's Mend spell. It would work as first aid, but even with the spell's constant use, the recovery would take a few days, depending on its severity.
Hera wanted to go with them, but her wounds still weren't completely healed. Cameron was still treating her, and according to him, Hera still needed two days to be back in fighting shape. It was to be expected. To let an injury like that heal naturally would take months and leave a permanent scar on her back. Thanks to the guild and Cameron, it would only take a bit over a week for her to be able to hunt again. She was trying to appreciate what everyone had done for her, but staying inside and not being able to train was boring. It gave her too much time with her own thoughts.
She spent most of her days practicing spells. Mostly the mana reinforcement, but she still wasn't quite there. She could cover an entire weapon with the diamond-shaped construct, but every time she tried to close the structure, the energy would break away. Hera asked Helena for some advice, but she only said that Hera should try to understand the spell. Worst-case scenario, she would explain what was going on, but the spell was good practice for the future. She tried it a few more times, and with each attempt, the time needed to cover the weapons reduced. The first time she reached the point where it broke, took Hera ten minutes to make the construct. Now, in two minutes, she was able to cover the weapon as she wanted. The only thing missing was the connection at the edge. During several attempts, she had tried various solutions. Creating a separate bridge and then attaching it to close the gap, placing two strands of mana side by side. Now she wanted to see if there was a way to intertwine the mana, it would break the idea of the overall construct, but she had to try something. Yet when the two pieces of mana touched each other, the entire structure broke apart once more.
"Argh, why does this keep happening?" Hera dropped her chakram on the couch. She looked at her tablet and saw a couple of notifications. One was from Mark. He was about to finish a gift he wanted to give her for getting the silver card and asked if he could come by tomorrow to give it to her. Hera replied that she would be around the house the entire day. She was bothered by not being able to move too much, and walking around the town was complicated due to the number of people on the streets. The second message was from the guild. It was a reminder that her first session with a shrink was scheduled to start in one hour.
There weren't a lot of psychiatrists in the MAZE. Because of that, the guild had set up a few rooms in each branch that worked as large-scale video conferences. A screen on the back of the room would transmit the image from the doctor's office while the patient could stay on the other side. That way, there was no need to employ psychiatrists in every room. Oddly enough, Hera was able to set up an appointment quickly. According to the clerk that helped her with it, not many people would look for the doctors. That seemed insane for Hera. She always had the philosophy that everyone should take care of their mental health. Ignoring that, especially in a place where death was a constant threat, was just plain stupid.
When she talked about the appointment, her friends understood that she needed to speak to someone about what happened, but aside from Bonnie, no one seemed interested in the idea. Still, there wasn't much she could do. Maybe if it helped her enough, they would change their minds.
"Lena, I'm heading to the guild. I'll be back later."
"Don't try to use an ATR. I asked the people there to bar you from renting one," the voice came from the closed basement door.
"I'm not going to. I have the session today," Hera replied.
"Oh, right. I hope it helps."
By the sound of her voice, Hera was sure that Helena was already diving back into her work before even finishing the sentence. The speed at which the mage was able to fall back into high concentration mode was staggering. Hera had to ask if that was an actual skill or just her way of working.
Hera left, heading towards the guild. It didn't take long for her to reach the building, but the crowded streets made her restless. The wound on her back was very delicate right now, and she had no way of protecting the area. She was wearing a leather jacket borrowed from Alex, but still wasn't enough. She wanted to be wearing armor. Using regular clothes inside the MAZE made her feel like she was naked.
She still had time before the session. It would be a good idea to check the voucher. After all, she still had to order and wait for it to be made before actually using it. She talked to the clerk. He explained how to contact the blacksmith. The guild had set up a terminal where she could browse through the crafters' portfolio and look for someone who matched the style and attributes that she wanted. After that, she could send a message directly to the person asking about whatever she wanted. That was available to anyone, and people could order armor there at any moment.
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She headed to the terminal and started browsing. The first thing she noticed was the over five million results, and those were only the crafters that worked with commissions for the guild. People who were starting off or were private contractors weren't on the list. Usually those crafters had specific abilities, or better prices than the ones working for the guild. Not that they were better or worse, it was simply the difference between online shopping and going out to a store. Out of curiosity, she looked at the most expensive armors available. The same person made the top four. They were armors that seemed to come straight out of superhero comic books. They had several moving parts, a guidance system inside it, as well as several defensive and offensive mechanisms. It wouldn't be weird to call them vehicles instead of armors. When she noticed the price, she almost fell back. Just a single one of those armors, without any added capabilities, would cost 10 million platinum. That was 1 trillion gold! Who could have so much money?
Looking at the materials, Hera kind of understood why they were so expensive. Aside from several electronics that had to be custom made by a large company, the ores and substances needed to create the armor all had rare sounding names.
50 Sky dragon emperor's hearts.
80 square meter of skins of eternal mammoths.
10 souls of the ocean.
1 vial of blood of the unspeakable.
The list went on, quoting another 200 different materials. There was also a note saying that each material provided would reduce the cost by the appropriate amount. If someone could provide all the materials, the price would drop to around 50 billion gold. It was still an absurd amount. To top it all off, after buying the armor, the order would be put on a waitlist, and when it was its turn, the production would take another six months.
She stopped looking at something so absurd and changed the filters to match her budget. Aside from the 10 000 gold voucher, she also got 8 500 gold from the wendigo's corpse. It was supposed to be over 15 000, but after checking its condition, they noticed that her poison destroyed parts that could be used for research. Her chakram also made the price lower. As she fought, the blade broke down the mana circulation of places that it hit. That created the necessity of repairing the connections before using the skin and muscle of the beast.
She didn't want to use all her money in a single purchase, but after facing the Carbuncle and the Wendigo, it became clear that she needed to prioritize her armor. Considering she already a fair amount of money saved up, Hera set her budget to 15 000 gold. That should allow her to get an armor strong enough to last a while. She knew that it wouldn't be something that would stay with her for a long time. But unlike a game, when it didn't matter if she saved up for gear at later levels, she couldn't be stingy when talking about her own life. She set up the filter to match her budget and started searching for her new gear.
Scrolling through the options, Hera started to notice some patterns. Every armor had a defense rating, an ability rating, and an overall rating. Among the ones that she could buy, none had an overall rating above D, but a few had C ranked defense. Two things seemed to inflate the prices, the defense rating, and the abilities. Another thing that increased the price was attribute scaling. Armors that could become stronger as the one wearing them grew were a must later on, but now, not all had that option. Buying one with the scaling seemed like a good idea, even if it could be a problem later on. All her statues were at 19, and even someone focusing on a single attribute like Alex only had her agility at 22. In the future, that would be a big issue since her stats would be more balanced. Although she might be able to use armors that scale with multiple attributes, it still wouldn't be enough to cover the difference in stats.
Hera spent almost half an hour looking at the options. They all seemed interesting, but it was hard to decide. She noticed that some armors had a high defense rating and even attribute scaling, but were much cheaper than others. Seeing the options, she understood what happened. Those armors had terrible synergy. One had a skill that would increase the power of spells, but scaled with strength. Another could create a barrier around the user based on its endurance but had charisma scaling. Those felt like armors that someone who had money problems would get since they couldn't afford anything better or fit only people who had less conventional builds. She wondered for a moment why people would make armor like that. It didn't take long for her to remember a conversation with Mark. According to him, when a crafter created something new, the results wouldn't always be what they wanted. Even in those cases, the blueprint would still be saved by the skill.
Hera kept looking for something that fit her, but nothing felt right. She had only twenty minutes before her appointment and was about to give up for now when she saw a different armor among the works of one particular crafter. The gear had scaled with Intelligence and Agility. Its defense rating was D+, and when hit, the armor would let out an energy blast as a counter-attack. She could toggle the skill on and off, and while on, the burst would happen with any impact that crossed a certain threshold. If she had that, the carbuncle wouldn't have made such a large gash on her back. The only thing that bothered Hera about the armor was its design.
The chest and legs were in a single piece. It was tight fitting and had a skirt with a large opening in the middle on both sides. The armor also covered the neck, leaving just a small gap that started just above the collarbone. The arms would go just above the elbow, having some loose on the edges, and there was a pair of armguards that accompanied it. The crafter would also throw in boots to match, but they had no special effects, just like the armguards. The price was only 13 000 gold. She could use it and still have some left. Hera sent a message to the crafter asking about the strength of the energy blast considering her attribute and if he would be able to make the boots or the armguards have some special effect while staying under her budget. She also asked if there was a way to change the color of the armor. In the picture, it was bright gold and blue that would be too easy to spot in the wild.
She left the terminal after sending the message, already heading to her doctor's appointment. While she was in the waiting room, the crafter replied. To Hera, the blast would be as strong as the bounce of a basketball. It wouldn't harm anyone, but it could push them away. He couldn't make the boots or armguards better, but he could make them easier to enchant, which would raise the price by 1 000. Changing the color would also cost between 500 to 750 gold, depending on her choice. He attached a list of colors available and told her that he could have it done in two days and another day to deliver since it was a guild commission. Hera agreed to the terms and would create the order as soon as she returned to the guild. She remembered that she could reach out to Peter to get more funds, but she rather pay herself than to owe that obnoxious man anything.
"Hera Kingsley, please come in," a voice came from the doctor's office.