“Did you level up?” Callum asked the mage as they walked. A man roughly his age, but a few inches shorter and heavier than himself, though signs of malnourishment were starting to appear.

“I did,” he responded. “Twice somehow, even though I didn’t do anything.”

“Don’t worry about that,” he said, confirming that he was level three with Identify. “Did you get a skill selection?”

“Yeah, but I haven’t chosen anything yet.” Callum noticed a far-off look in his eyes as the man summoned his status page.

“What are your options?” Callum did his best to contain the enthusiasm in his voice. There hadn’t been a chance for him to talk to someone else choosing a skill.

“Mana dart, Firebolt, and Barrier. I’m guessing Mana Dart is the one you have?” he asked.

Callum shook his head. “I don’t have any magic skills other than Combat Magic.”

“Combat Magic? What does that do?” He closed the menu and his eyes refocused on Callum.

“I’m not entirely sure yet, but you saw some of it in the dungeon.” Callum hesitated telling him about the class advancement that gave him Combat Magic, not because he didn’t want the mage to know, but because it would invite several more questions. “I think it makes it easier to form mana into something that deals damage, but that’s a working theory.”

The man nodded, deep in thought as he processed that. He had opened his menus again, and Callum had to catch him a couple of times as he stumbled over new roots that were breaking through the sidewalk.

“Okay, I went with Firebolt,” he announced.

“Wait before you do anything,” Callum interjected. When the mage hadn’t started to cast anything, Callum relaxed.

“I wasn’t planning on just randomly throwing fire anywhere. Don’t tell me someone tried to do that.” He stared flatly.

“Yes, some people are a little too trigger happy when its even hinted that magic exists. We can try it when we get back to town.”

Callum resolved to also try and teach the man what was likely Mana Dart as well but decided to wait to do that. His curiosity sated, for the time being, he fell into an easy gait as the party walked back to the town.

He took the time to observe the people and saw that a lot of the tension had eased from when they made their way out to the dungeon. A lot changes when a group of people is put through a life-threatening scenario together.

At the town, the party mingled in with the rest of the group and redistributed weapons. They were getting better armed by the day, but in the back of his mind, Callum knew that as more people were recruited, the demand would increase.

He let the mage relax for a little bit before seeking him out again to test the new spell. When he did find him, the man was ecstatic to get to try it. He also invited Ryan and the other mages to join them hoping that they might be able to learn something.

Before they gathered, he stopped by the obelisk and purchased the mage training grounds. It was something he had planned to use the Power Shard for anyway, and the warrior training ground had too much wood for it to be safe to test anything relating to fire.

He placed it near the preexisting one but kept enough space that nothing the mages did would endanger the wood. Its construction was a much simpler process, as, on one side, a few stones rose from the ground with targets painted on them, and on the other simple wooden platforms rose, only wide enough for one person to stand on. In the center, a stone pedestal formed with a crystal set in the center.

One of the younger mages saw the construction and immediately rushed over, but just before he made it to the edge of the wooden platforms, he slammed into an invisible wall. Callum quickly approached, checking to see if the mage was alright. He was, except for a bruised ego, but what he had run into was more interesting.

When Callum focused on it, there was a thin sheet of mana separating the mage training ground. He pressed his hand against it and felt solid resistance. On the ground, there was a small line in the grass where it had formed. He followed it around until he found where the line was broken, and was able to freely walk inside.

Inside, he felt the density of mana increase. It was an odd sensation, almost like being plunged into an ice bath, but without the discomfort. He approached the crystal in the center and found that it was condensing the mana around him, and drawing in more. The description from the menu had said that it would increase mana regeneration in the area, and this seemed to be the way it accomplished that.

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The other mages filed in shortly after and Callum picked out the one who had been in the dungeon.

“Well, let’s see it,” Callum said, approaching the man.

The man didn’t say anything, but grinned and stood several feet back from one of the stone targets. Everyone else gathered around to watch, some with closed eyes trying to sense the mana around them.

It took roughly ten seconds, by Callum’s count, to gather the mana for the spell. Once he had, a small ball of fire appeared in his hand. The moment it did, he pitched it, like a baseball, at the stone target. Its flight was fast but accurate and left a small black mark on the surface of the rock. The mark cleared up in a moment, but Callum saw a proud look on the man’s face. Now he had something he could fight with.

Callum watched for a few minutes, trying to feel the mana as it flowed through the man. He garnered a few insights into how he could replicate that himself, but moved on. He had a few other things he wanted to accomplish before the day was over.

Since the dungeon run had been a resounding success, he approached the obelisk to see what else he could do with the Power Shards. Most likely, he would end up purchasing the other training ground variants, but it couldn’t hurt to look at what else was available.

He filtered the buildings by what required a Power Shard, and it was like a whole new menu was presented before him. He swore under his breath, cursing both the sheer amount of things that could be purchased and his lack of diligence for not thoroughly searching through to see what he could construct.

The first thing that drew his attention was a beacon. It would cost him fifty gold and a Power Shard, consuming the rest of what he had looted from the dungeon, but it would allow him to attract people to the town. After a moment's hesitation, he purchased the beacon. What ultimately sold him on it was the addendum at the end that said he could control who would be informed of his location.

When he purchased it, he expected to be taken back out to the screen that would allow him to place the building, but nothing happened. He checked his resources and saw that the gold and Power Shard had been deducted, and as he started to grow annoyed, he noticed that it had unlocked a new menu.

Thankfully, it did not come turned on. It took several minutes of tinkering with settings, but when it was ready, he activated it. The way he had configured it, it would only broadcast the location of the town to people within the territory he had already claimed and would exclude enemies. That last part took a lot of work as he had to explicitly define what was an enemy. As far as he could tell, the Vipers were not a registered entity that he could mark as an enemy.

With that done, he set off to find someone to help him catalog what the obelisk could build. It had been three times now that he had found something that he deemed necessary while looking for something else.

He gathered up a pen and paper and found an eager-looking teenager to help him take notes. When Callum had first gone looking for someone the youth had been quick to volunteer, but when handed the pen and paper had looked dejected. Callum realized he needed to find some better way to reward people other than a new house or weapons.

With his helper in tow, Callum went back to the obelisk and started sorting the list every way he could think of, and even some he hadn’t that the teenager supplied.

It was slowly becoming a large list of things that needed to be noted. He found a variety of production buildings that he wanted but would have to at least come after the second upgrade. There was even something called a natural resource deposit that didn’t come with a great explanation. He finally felt satisfied that he had cataloged everything he could want in the near future.

By the time he was done, he saw that the wood in the storage had reached 6,600. With the catalog fresh in his mind, he could think of a lot of things he could do with that much wood, but the wall was more pressing.

The extra wood that was collected would allow him to enclose the training ground plus room for the other three that he planned on building. He called out a warning for people to get closer to the town hall or any other structure, then placed the wooden wall.

Out of the ground rose a wooden palisade wall. Unlike the other things he had built, it was completed in only seconds, the finishing touch being a fifteen-foot-wide gate near the town hall. He walked over and found the gate easy to open and close, with a sliding bar that would lock it closed from the inside. He left the gate open for the moment, as the beacon was likely to attract people.

With his main goal of the day complete, he had time to wait for people to arrive. It didn’t take long, as the first people arrived just thirty minutes after he activated the beacon. The first group was rather small, only five people, but Callum was happy to have them.

As they approached, each group marveled at what he had managed to build in such a short time. He had to explain how it was possible, and that seemed to excite some, but scare others.

Over the next few hours, he talked with more people than he could count, repeating similar phrases every time. He didn’t mind, though. He had decided on ‘strength in numbers’ and would stick to it. By the end of the day, he was short only five people for the next town upgrade.

The sun was setting, but he still had not seen Eliza. Neither that day nor the day before. He decided to at least wait around until it was truly night before shutting the gate. He had a feeling that she could scale it if she wanted to, but he still felt he owed her the courtesy of waiting.

Just as the sun was about to set and would close the gate. He saw a flicker of something in the distance, his hand going to his sword. He watched for a moment, straining his eyes to see anything in the twilight.

A moment later, Eliza stepped out of the shadows in front of him. Her clothes were torn and bloodied. Her skin looked like it had been cut to shreds, and an arm was cocked at an unhealthy angel.

“I’m sorry. I messed up,” she said, before collapsing into him.