CHAPTER TWO: THE WHITE HORN
----------------------------------------
The smells of musty ale and wood-burning fire hit Blychert’s nose as he entered the White Horn.
It was a modestly sized tavern, boasting a long wooden bar top and a handful of freestanding tables and chairs. The hearth was ablaze, though not overly so, but more importantly it was filling the hall with much needed warmth. There weren’t too many patrons in this evening, less than ten, but Blychert wasn’t complaining.
Before even entertaining the idea of a meal, however, he beelined it across the tavern floor to where the dingy quest board was nailed into the mortar on the far wall. To his disappointment though, there wasn’t a single piece of parchment in sight. The last posting had been over six weeks ago! And it had been a measly requisition for energy crystals. Still, he held out to hope most of the time, and was usually left disappointed.
Figures… Blychert rolled his eyes.
“Well, if it ain’t young Trelen!” A hoarse voice thundered out through the tavern all of a sudden.
Cocking his head towards the bar, Bly smiled at the large man standing behind it, “Evening, mister Ralf.”
Mister Ralf rubbed the end of his red-brown beard momentarily, a slightly confused expression on his face, “A little late for you, ain’t it? Your old lady knows you’re here at this hour?”
“What? Old lady? Oh, about that…” Bly chuckled, scratching the back of his head awkwardly as he realized what the barkeep was asking, “I sort of lost track of the time.”
“Guh… you’re working to get me in trouble again!” The innkeeper accused, picking up a long ladle to point at Bly as he snapped it back and forth in an exaggerated manner, “Now, sit down and let me feed you—send you on your way home before that crazy woman comes storming through my front door again, barking up a tree after your whereabouts and what have you. As if I could possibly have that kind of information!”
“Yes, sir.” Bly agreed cheerily, more than happy to oblige as he took a seat at the end of the bar.
Mister Ralf quickly got to work fixing him a meal thereafter, small talking all the while as he moved about the kitchen area.
“Good haul for you today then?” Ralf asked nonchalantly.
Bly furrowed his brow at the question, and shrugged, “It was okay, er… it’s always okay.”
“Okay…” Ralf dismissed, and grumbled something else under his breath, before adding, “Sixteen years old and already clearing out entire dungeon floors by yourself? I’d say you’re doing a little better than okay.”
“It’s not as difficult as it looks.” Bly laughed, but sobered enough to say, “Anyone could do it, you know.”
“Sure, but you go solo. That kind of effort alone ought to be for anyone with ten or more levels under their belt.” He argued, “You’re what, an eight?”
Blychert felt the hairs on his neck stand tall momentarily.
Thanks to Alyse’s brilliant instruction, his sage terminal formally presented him as Trelen now, not Blychert, a level seven sorcerer hailing from the Kingdom of Loreley. The illusory exploit was supposed to be good enough to bypass most basic Guild detection systems, even some of the more advanced methods too. Besides, it wasn’t like he didn’t already know the Sorcerer class from top to bottom, though he still got nervous when anyone asked him about it. He could lie all he wanted; it was still a lie at the end of the day.
“Seventh level, actually.” Bly said, barely above a murmur.
“Seven?!” Ralf shouted, visibly flabbergasted, and a few of the other tavern patrons turned to glance at them.
Bly flushed, rubbing his forehead anxiously somewhat, as he said, “Keep it down, would you? It’s not that serious.”
“You kids are getting more and more ambitious with your adventuring, that’s for damned sure. We wouldn’t have been caught dead going anywhere near that dungeon when I was your age. We were too busy getting up to no good around here, heh!”
“Er… don’t you have the innkeeper class?” Bly asked confusedly, wondering why miser Ralf would even think of going near the dungeon in the first place.
“Not my point.” Ralf replied with slight frown. He seemed to think for a long moment, before saying, “Remember to enjoy some of your youth, would you? Kelvalder isn’t the kind of place a kid of your talents ought to waste away. I know you’re here training and what not, but you really ought to get out into the wider world, find some friends that share your passions to go adventure with. Find a lovely young lady perhaps—”
“Thanks.” Bly cringed, waiving his hands in protest at the remark, “I think I’ll make do.”
Before mister Ralf could reply, he was momentarily dragged away by another patron yelping for more ale, which gave Bly the chance to settle his nerves.
It wasn’t like he didn’t want any friends, or… other things.
Hell, he missed his own friends all the time. His best friends. There just weren’t many people his age in Kelvalder, or at least any he could really relate to. But even with those he had managed to get along with, getting too close to people was still the surest way for a classless to wind up dead; he’d learned that the hard way once already. The notion of having ‘friends’ seemed completely futile at times, not to mention selfish. Someone was bound to get hurt sooner or later, and he didn’t want to be responsible for that ever again.
Unauthorized usage: this narrative is on Amazon without the author's consent. Report any sightings.
And girls? Where did that nosy barkeep get off saying something as embarrassing as that!
Bly felt his cheeks growing warmer at the thought, and so he shook his head clear, giving the sides of his face a few good slaps just for good measure.
“Suit yourself, kid.” Ralf acquiesced, as he rounded the wall of the kitchen to set a tray of piping-hot stew down in front of Bly, “Now, eat up before I change my mind and kick you to the stoop.”
Blychert’s eyes widened with glee at the savory smell of beef stew. There were carrots, potato chunks, and the distinct aroma of onions that filled his nostrils most delightfully. He immediately grabbed for the hunk of bread, scooped it down into the bowl, and went to work.
Forget the Divine, this was true heaven.
After that, Ralf entertained some of his other patrons for a while, leaving Bly to enjoy his dinner without any more jabs at his social life. Which was fine by him, because he realized about halfway through eating his supper that he smelled horribly of body odor. Taking a spoonful of stew, Bly silently amused himself to the thought that if he brought Alyse food, maybe she’d heat him up some bath water. Though chances were she’d sooner freeze it over for how late he’d stayed out tonight.
Then again, he did have those energy crystals…
Sipping from the tankard of water, Blychert belatedly wiped his face on his sleeve before using his left hand to open his sage terminal. With a small mental gesture, he issued a system command and watched as the entire terminal flickered momentarily. Before long, the entire thing had appropriately reconciled his gains from the day with a clever little concealment exploit, and so he confidently swiped over to his skills page without having to worry about someone getting a glance.
----------------------------------------
[Skills]
> Advanced Spellcasting
> Alteration Magic
> Aura Magic
> Barrier Magic
> Basic Spellcasting
> Creation Magic
> Curse Magic
> Divination Magic
> Elemental Magic
> Illusion Magic
> Intermediate Spellcasting
> Mana Channeling
> Spell Acceleration
> Spell Amplification
> Spell Articulation
> Spell Reinforcement
> Summoning Magic
> Telepathy Magic
----------------------------------------
Bly scrolled down and gestured for his 'Summoning Magic' skill to open.
----------------------------------------
[Summoning Magic]
> Authority Level: I
> Control Level: I
> Accuracy Bonus: 5%
> Damage Bonus: 2%
> Penetration Bonus: 1%
[Known Spells]
> Basic: Summon Swarm
> Intermediate: -
> Advanced: Conjure Weapon
----------------------------------------
His hopes for the ‘Conjure Weapon’ spell were high. It had only been a few short weeks since he’d finally learned how to cast it without breaking focus, but he was already aiming to make it as strong as possible, considering how powerful it was.
Even still, it was proving to be a bit tricky around the edges and more than a little intensive on his mana supply. Knowing that, he really had to be more careful in how he deployed it, or at least try to train it up to the point where he could get the overall mana cost down. His mana pool wasn’t small, per se, but increasing his short-term limits and recovery rate were definitely on the “to-do” list, though that took a lot of training to pull off. Eventually, his mana pool would get to somewhere he liked it. Though unless he learned how to circumnavigate that bottleneck using experience points, such a feat was surely years away.
A higher willpower score would solve some of those issues. He thought ruefully, letting his mind be poisoned by the thought of attributes again, or rather the lack thereof.
It was common knowledge that the classed earned attribute points every five levels. The classless, at least according to Alyse, only earned attribute points through intense training of the specific attribute in question. And while she said it was a slow process, he swore there wasn’t more he could do apart from blowing himself to bits with raw mana to make his magic score go up, or any of his attributes for that matter.
At that moment, his habitual migraine flared, causing Bly to wince.
“Yeah, yeah…” He grumbled, taking a slow and steady breath to calm himself.
He had to remember that his experience points were what made him a special case.
He didn’t have a class, but he still had two exceptionally powerful resources at his disposal: mana and experience. As a classless spellcaster, his mana was the key to system exploitation, since an energy resource was required to fuel the system commands. But experience worked in a similar way, or at least it did once he converted it into mana. The thought hadn’t been lost on him that maybe he could increase his attributes by spending the experience to do so. Though despite his best attempts at it, it was impossible to say for certain. Even Alyse couldn’t seem to work out the right exploits to use for that sort of idea, and she was an expert on the classless craft.
If nothing else, it did make him wonder about the full extent of his transmogrifier ability. Sooner or later, something would have to give in his findings. The last time they’d figured anything out about how his transmogrifier ability worked, he’d damned near collapsed from complete mana depletion. After all, that was the only time Sage, or rather the Raven subsystem, seemed interested in stepping in on his behalf at all. Which was a strange occurrence in and of itself, Alyse had been reluctant to admit it, but there wasn’t really much that could he could do about it.
It was apart of him now, that much was certain.
Whatever the case, he was never going to get stronger with that ability—not at his current pace and not without more information about how it worked, that much was clear.
Blychert sighed and closed his sage terminal.
Life in Kelvalder was too damned slow, and painfully quiet. He guessed that was the entire point when Bartolo brought them here almost a year ago. It had certainly provided a stable place for him to train and to learn about being classless, at least away from the ire of the Guild. Even still, the novelty was wearing off each day, and a small part of him couldn’t help but think about all the plans he and Irvin had crafted; about how they would travel the world as adventurers. He certainly hadn’t forgotten the promise he’d made to himself back then, that he would show the world the kind of person he really was. But after all the time that had passed, he knew that was a lot more difficult to pull off than it seemed at first. And how could it not be? But it wasn’t like he could spend the rest of his days hiding out and grinding away endlessly in the Gleaming Caves. Could he?
Not likely. Bly thought with a grumble, but smiled at the image of what Bartolo and Alyse would have to say about his musings. His master would have a nervous breakdown, surely. She’d simply tell him not to get himself killed… or do, it was his choice in the matter either way.
Yawning, Blychert realized all at once just how tired he was. He was already late getting home, but there was no point delaying the inevitable. And so, with a weary groan, Bly removed himself from the bar, scooped up the food mister Ralf had given him to give to the "old lady" and headed for the door. A couple "goodbyes" and "goodnights" later, and at least one quip from the innkeeper, and Bly was back on the snow-dusted street of Kelvalder, wandering home in the cold, dark of a late summer night.