They didn’t head west. Heading west would mean crossing a large stretch of Kobold territory, they were exhausted, and they wanted the other team to find them. They used the new maps to get to the third floor instead—not over stairs, but a sloped tunnel that led down to a ledge—and went north to put some distance between themselves and the nearest traps.
They left bootprints, only scraped off most of the mud, and left more tracks for the first few bends. Micah even dropped a few shells he’d been collecting as if he had forgotten them.
In the end, the chamber they settled in was one runaway Kobolds might have chosen last time, near a cluster of mineshafts.
It was rather small, there was no water source, two separate tunnels led in different directions, insects were close-by, and he had no doubt there were Kobolds in the walls even if they hadn’t trapped the area yet. But worst of all, it was rockier than other places they had slept.
Micah didn’t mind sleeping on the ground much, or worse, but he didn’t want a small rock to poke him in the back all night, so he spent some time clearing the area first.
“What are we going to say if they do show up?” he asked the others, all of them focused on their own small tasks.
“That we want half,” Kyle grunted and wrenched his boot off, “at least.” He took his one glove off as well and tossed it on his pack.
Micah stared for a second where he swept the ground with an empty sack, then spun around and did the same with glee. Finally, he could take his armor off. His socks stunk but he didn’t care. Better than the unbearable heat.
“I don’t know,” Jason said, “doesn’t asking for more than half seem kind of … rude to anyone else?”
“No?”
“They tried to trick us!” Micah cried in support while trying to tear the mud-dried rags off his knee. Something gave, mud crumbled, and he flung them across the room. “Head’s up!”
“That” —Kyle pointed, then ducked— “and I want more than half. Did you see that mountain of loot?”
“It’s also …” Lea mumbled, looked around as if she hadn’t meant to and when nobody interrupted, spoke up, “It’s also a negotiation thing. You start high and work your way down.”
“So we say we want all of the loot and work our way down to more than half?” Kyle asked.
Micah didn’t know if he was being asinine or genuine. Either was great, because the question stumped her going by the look on her face.
“We work our way down to half,” Jason said.
Ryan joined in, “If they show up.”
“If they show up.”
“They will.” Lisa stepped back into the chamber after coordinating her lizards. “They need us.”
Nobody gave her an awkward look or joke when she said it. Rather, they took it in stride or looked proud, for one reason or another. Confidence in numbers or confidence on its own.
“Yeah but that begs the question,” Micah said and raised his voice over the sound of the rocks he pushed into one corner, “how are we going to divide the loot in half?”
And there they stumbled as they thought it over. Micah wasn’t being contrarian. They had gone over what happened if they allied with another team from their school at length, but from another school? He was genuinely asking. It seemed … messy.
“We could …” Jason started, “do an inventory of what we have before we attack, then divide everything we find beyond that in half?”
“And what about magic items?” Lisa said. “You can’t cut those in two.”
“For the crystals and what can be divided, I mean.”
“For the loot, we could do it team selection style,” Ryan said, “we choose one item, they choose one item. We would have something of an advantage with Lea, Lisa, and Micah on our side.”
Micah didn’t feel like that was true, as he didn’t have as much as Lisa or Lea to offer in terms of items. Yet. “But what if there’s one item left at the end?” he asked. “Or loose crystals?”
He shrugged. “We negotiate.”
That seemed messy. Micah wet a cloth and left them to it. He listened with one ear in case he had something to add, though he doubted it, and tried to think the situation over, but was mostly glad he could finally get somewhat clean. He would have preferred a pool to bathe in like last time, but wiping himself down with a cold cloth would do.
Kyle grinned. “Hey, or we could suggest we do it one team member at a time.”
“And then?”
“Then we’re six and they’re five. A sixth more loot for us.”
“Not if we do it back and forth,” Lisa said. “Then it’s the same but with more wasted time.”
“And can you stop trying to cheat them out of loot, anyway?” Jason accused him. “What happened to honor among climbers?”
“Ha! No? They’re gonna’ try to do the same thing to us. Best we prepare. Negotiation tactics and all.” He jerked his chin at Lea and she seemed to pull back a little as if pulling back from being associated with him.
“Even if that were true, you would want to stoop to their level?” Jason asked. When Kyle opened his mouth to retort, he rushed to add, “I’m not saying not to negotiate, I just mean … Both getting half is the best solution, right?”
“But we’re better than them.”
“How would you know?”
He spread his arms out. “I haven’t seen any proof otherwise?”
Micah had to weave around his arm as he stepped out. He cast [Condense Water] over himself to wash his hair. It was thick and twisted from being compressed under his helmet all day, and he had to mess it up to get rid of the compacted curls.
He immediately felt much lighter, even if it would probably puff into a ball in the humidity. Getting his hair cut was one thing he’d forgotten, but he wanted to save it for dance lessons anyway.
When he stepped back, Jason and Kyle looked like two kids who were ignoring each other on the playground.
“Even if we somehow divide the loot evenly,” Ryan said, “and find a way we can both agree on to divide the magic items fairly, and we all upend our backpacks to …” —he sighed— “ … make sure nobody in the other team, or our team, steals something—”
“Don’t look at me,” Kyle snapped, “I’m not a thief. I’m just saying, we could try to work a … loophole?”
Ryan raised his voice, ignoring him. “We should be aware, the added effort will cost us extra time to get done, maybe even the better part of the day.”
Kyle shut up.
None of them looked happy about that. None of them looked exactly unhappy, either, because the loot would be worth it, but another half a day wasted was just that. They likely would have spent it covering ground after expending resources on something as big as the Kobold camp.
Messy, the thought rung in his mind again and Micah scowled, not because of the situation but the thought itself. So what if it was messy? He tried to shake it off and his head ached as it thought otherwise.
“Dammit,” Lisa broke the stumped silence, “We’re going to have to drag the schools and Guild into this, aren’t we?”
Oh.
Immediately, the headache lessened. That seemed like a good idea, surrendering the issue to the authorities when he couldn’t be one himself.
But Lea’s eyes went wide. “Oh, no. No. You do not want to do that.”
“Why not?”
“Because it will be a hassle and a half, the schools will be unhappy, and the Guild has a negotiation fee for that kind of stuff, and their negotiations have rules of their own.”
Kyle frowned. “Like what?”
“Like, if neither party agrees on who gets an item, the item is forfeit, has to be sold to an impartial third party, and the proceeds are shared. Everyone knows, the only items worth fighting about—”
“Are the good ones,” Lisa finished for her.
“Yeah. And the most immediate impartial third party will be the Guild. It doesn’t pay well. Besides, negotiations aren’t over until the end. So once you disagree on one item, things can turn sour and both parties can go back to disagree on previous items to try and force you to change your mind on the current one. But since most climbers are stubborn to a fault—”
“The negotiations break down,” Lisa said, “everything is sold cheap, and nobody gets nothing but coins.”
Lea frowned when Lisa interrupted her the second time but didn’t say anything. Lisa met her look until she turned away.
“I’m fine with money,” Kyle said. “I do not want to deal with the bureaucrats.”
“Those bureaucrats might help us,” Ryan said, “because of their affiliation with our school? They might waive the middleman fee … or something.”
“You think?”
He shrugged.
Lea looked up with a jerk as if she had regained her train of thought. “But the money will be worth less, if we sell the items, because we’re giving up on the provider’s discount!”
No duh.
“We aren’t going to the Guild,” Lisa said.
Lea scowled. “You were the one who suggested it?”
“We can suggest it to the others first, then treat it as a last resort or consequence for leverage.”
“I actually like the rule you mentioned,” Ryan said, “if neither party can agree, nobody gets the item. It’s a pretty common way of doing things with the assumption that negotiations will be amicable. Which they should be, among climbers.”
Was that another climbing etiquette thing or an extension of it in general? Either way, Micah made notes.
Kyle seemed to do the opposite as he scowled at him.
Lea frowned. “Are you sure?”
“Either way,” Lisa said, “this is pointless if they’re too stubborn to show. Let’s not get our hopes up? We have other things to do.”
That was true. Micah already had a general idea about his chores, so he headed for his pack and left them to it. He glanced from face to face as the others discussed, but caught Ryan wrinkling his nose and fishing around in his backpack for something.
Having stepped out and back in again, he sniffed around, and with all the filthy gear and sacks of freshly-killed monsters laying around, the small chamber stunk already.
Right. With his sleeping space and wash-up out of the way, he put their living space first. The whole point of making camp was to rest. They wouldn’t get much of it if they felt like they were in a stinky sauna all night or that this place was no different from the middle of a tunnel.
Micah went over his options for a moment, felt his mana, and dragged the last dregs up from his toes, then wandered around to cast [Chill] on the area. He manipulated essences by eyes or lungs to spread the effect, filtered and breathed any unwanted ones down one of the tunnels, and poured some breeze potion into a jar he set down between them.
He cracked a crystal like an egg, dropped it inside, and breathed some of the potion up to get it started, then watched the air move and pushed the jar around until he found the perfect spot to let it sit for an artificial airflow, so the chamber wouldn’t be as stuffy.
Kyle wandered over with his ax in hand and some cleaning supplies on his way to guard duty. “What’s that?” he asked.
“An open window.”
His eyebrows went up.
“A small one?” Micah admitted. “Which is slowly closing over the next few hours or so.”
None of this would last long, he knew, but he didn’t care about that. It wasn’t much, but it was better. And more importantly, it would last until he went to sleep. He could refresh it when he took watch.
Kyle felt the air for a moment, grunted, and scratched his arm as he left, leaving the jar alone.
That brought Micah to his next issue: he really didn’t want to itch anymore.
Now that he wore an undershirt and had taken his boots and leg guards off, he could scratch himself. And while he’d thought the satisfaction might help, it did not.
The others had moved on to deliberating whether or not to use the teapot to heat up some soup and calming tea so they wouldn’t have to make a fire, because their three mages apparently couldn’t be bothered to.
“You can do whatever you want,” Lea said while laying out her bedroll, “but I would advise you not to. It makes the difference between ‘used’ and ‘new’.”
Part of him felt like that was snobbish, but he had to admit he preferred the idea of new things over strangers’ hand-me-downs.
He didn’t weigh in, nor did the others really listen, but Lisa summoned a blurry, lithe and wide Salamander that looked like it was decaying into fire and had it wrap itself around the bottles.
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“Isn’t that more expensive?” Jason asked.
“It is. But I’m not holding a flame against those for minutes on end,” she said and lay back against her own pack with an exhausted sigh.
“Can’t you like … make a fire that will burn on its own?”
Another sigh. Different this time. “I could, but I would have to figure out how. I have a Skill that lets me improvise fire constructs.”
“And [Flamewrought Armaments]?”
She made a face. “I prefer [Flamewrought Summoning].”
“Hm.”
Micah wondered why Jason asked at all, but then he added, “Hey, can I borrow one of your mana rings? I want to practice using other people’s mana.”
There was his answer. So he was interested in exploring that side of his calling? [Adventurers] were as broad a Class as [Workers], he knew. They learned anything so long as it helped them sate their need for excitement.
He kind of envied him that. Almost anything he did, it would count as an exploration of his Path.
Lisa forked over a ring with a brief flash of annoyance. He was about to wonder when she glanced up, around, and spotted him.
He quickly looked away, connection made. Jason asked for help with something, Lisa looked annoyed, then turned to him. Had he been such an annoying student that he’d ruined that for her?
Probably.
It was just, she kept on offering to teach people stuff, liked to lecture, correct them, so why … Was it only when they asked that she got annoyed or what?
He’d been about to lift his backpack but rested his knees against the fabric when he had the thought.
Huh. It kind of fit his image of her. If it was true, he suddenly felt like he understood her a little better.
He smiled because that was both great and he had wanted to be more independent anyway, wanted to figure out his Path on his own; it was what had gotten him into the mess that was his head lately in the first place. This could help him not annoy her as much and be a better friend. He just had to wait for her to come to him and be happy with what she offered to teach him instead of … asking follow-up questions like he always did … and really, really liked to do.
Maybe that would be harder than he had thought.
The thing was, Micah preferred asking people over reading books because he didn’t want to study, he wanted to understand! He wanted quick and easy answers and Lisa had tons of those.
Argh! He tried to shove the thoughts aside, told himself he would just have to deal if and when the time came, and scratched his neck on purpose to distract himself.
He yanked his pack up and as before with the rags, he almost tipped over back when [Surging Strength] kicked in. He stumbled a few steps to catch himself and when he looked around to see if anyone had seen, Lisa wasn’t looking anymore. He took it as encouragement.
Micah got his alchemy supplies out, sat in the furthest corner from the soup—not because of the possibility of fire, but because of the others’ dislike of all things alchemy near food despite the cookies and gummies they had been eating all day, or the tea they were making right now—and got to work on a solution with the tools he had on hand.
He could see the puncture wounds and had a few samples of the poison on the tips of collected darts, which helped. How to deal with the poison, though?
Ingredients, ingredients, he mulled it over as he went through sacks, jars, crystals, and more.
If it had been unmade, they wouldn’t have had a problem. Essence tricked the body and faded, so it wasn’t as bad. A bit of healing salve to get rid of the inflammation and done.
The higher level you were, the more Skills you had that gave you resistances, or the higher level you were in a Class which was likely to give you resistances, the less effective poison, and especially unmade poison, was from the start, they had learned in school, which … he felt like should have told him something, given that it was essences, but he wasn’t sure what.
Too many variables: spirit, essence quantities, essence quality, imbalances, natural resistances, and the whole topic of bodily essences that he didn’t know much about yet. He focused on the task at hand.
This poison was physical so their bodies reacted normally. And they could keep on reacting for days, even if the poison was gone, because bodies were stupid like that. That was the problem. It didn’t help that they’d scratched themselves so much.
Micah couldn’t stop the body’s natural reaction—it would be stupid to try—he had nothing to subvert it, and even if he could draw out or counteract the poison itself, that would be a partial solution, as with his salve and the inflammation. It would still help, but …
His eyes settled on a dead Teacup Salamander and a more drastic, more permanent solution. He smiled.
Ryan sat across from him with a sigh. “I’m supposed to tell you, you should be cutting the corpses, and make sure you aren’t ruining our loot by … what are you doing?”
Micah smiled in-between grinding twists but kept his head down. He didn’t want to seem overeager. “Making anti-itching salve,” he said. He needed to improvise additions to his healing salve to bind the poison properly because he couldn’t make one from scratch.
“Oh?”
He sounded almost pleasantly surprised … until he looked around and saw which ingredients Micah was using. Some were obvious to the untrained eye, like the chitin, some less so. Ryan had spent over a year around Micah. He must have picked up on some of the basics.
“Do you want some,” Micah offered before Ryan could decide whether or not to say anything, “after I test it?”
His smile wavered when he realized it was the wrong question to ask. Were you hit?, was what he wanted to ask, but he was afraid of doing that because he didn’t want to annoy him. He should have asked something that would implicitly answer his real question, keeping in mind that Ryan might just deal with any itching without scratching it or complaints, unlike them.
“How are you going to test it?” he asked.
“On myself.”
He said it with an exhausted sigh like he looked forward to it, which he did. Mostly. He didn’t look forward to what might happen if he made a mistake, but he liked to test things on himself. He had access to so many recipes, textbooks, and oversight now, something of his alchemy still had to stay independent.
Ryan shifted. “And should you be doing that?”
He shrugged.
Ryan didn’t say anything else, but he didn’t leave either, so Micah went back to his work.
He considered the powder he was making, the congealed layer of slime on the salve, and wondered just how many Salamander scales he could get away with adding, if at all. He couldn’t bake them—at least, not conveniently here—but maybe he could peel off the choice bits?
A bit of heat to improve the consistency, a bit of the heat-to-sweat conversion to add value to the hot-and-cold sensation? Would that help or exasperate the itch if it strained the skin?
He couldn’t know for sure without testing and— Ugh. It couldn’t be helped. He would have to make two minor batches at first and test them on different wounds.
He leaned forward to grab the peeled skin, got a knife and some pliers, and began to rip the scales off one by one. There were quicker ways of doing it, but those could damage the ingredients and Micah had learned to make the most of what he had.
Ryan still didn’t leave, despite the gore and smell, and Micah realized he hadn’t answered his earlier question. Not even a non-answer, he hadn’t answered at all. It might be weird to repeat it now, though …
He would just offer him the salve when he was done.
“Great job on finding the other team, by the way,” Micah said while he tried to keep the skin as close to him as possible. He had to say something, while he was here.
Ryan reacted. Since he wasn’t looking, he wasn’t quite sure if it was a flinch, sigh, or simply him casually leaning back like he did. Was it because of the comment itself or the smell of his impromptu workstation?
He didn’t know.
He focused on counting scales, wondering how many he could add without screwing things up. Otherwise, he might have to use more of his already-low salve to balance it out again.
“We would’ve been screwed if you hadn’t, running straight into their camp like that.”
“It worked out,” Ryan said, “in the end. You found them, not me. I got lucky.”
Micah shook his head. “I got lucky. I wasn’t looking. You were.”
He lowered his voice and leaned closer. “I didn’t actually know there would be a team here. You know that, right?”
“Yeah, but I think you have a knack for it. You know, trusting your gut and doing the right thing. Like when—”
“You did pretty well yourself,” Ryan interrupted him with a sudden smile, “taking on a true Salamander on your own.”
“I needed a strength potion for that—”
“Still.”
“—and I had help.”
He shook his head. “Thanks for capturing it for me, Micah.”
He tried to sit very still then and not overreact, or smile too much. He put the rest of the skin aside and started washing the scales instead, mumbling, “Thank you. Did it help any?”
“The Salamander?”
“Yeah.”
“Some.”
Micah could see him pressing his thumb into the palm of his other hand, either like he was nervous or remembering a sensation.
“Getting to touch one and feel its scales while meditating in peace was nice,” he said, “even if I worried about my body while I was out.”
His mood was dampened by a stab of guilt. He’d run off instead of watching over him. He shouldn’t have done that, even in his poor mood. Micah was supposed to protect him.
“But you had your scout friends to protect you?”
“Yeah.”
A little less guilt. And the Salamander had been thoroughly restrained and weakened, he reassured himself. That had been his doing.
“Well, another one tomorrow, maybe, or two, after the camp and then for camp, and you might finally further your Path in a way that will make you happy?”
“I furthered my Path a little while ago? I got [Hearth of Salamanders].”
“Yeah, but that’s a variation like my lens—”
“Which took you ages to get. And has been taking you ages for the next one. What’s up with that anyway?”
“Don’t try to change the topic,” Micah teased him. “A warmth aura isn’t exactly useful right now.”
“I’ll remember that, come winter.”
“No!” He leaned forward, as if to take it back. “No, I just meant, something like [Fire Breath]? You’ve always wanted that, right? Maybe you will get it soon, like during summer break?”
Micah didn’t like fire, but both his best friends were pseudo-[Pyromancers]. He could be happy for them.
“Yeah.” Ryan’s response was quiet and more subdued, though he stopped pressing his palm.
Maybe he didn’t want to get his hopes up? He didn’t understand his Path entirely, Micah knew, because the Path itself was new. Which was kind of awesome. And he would be gone often during summer break, to visit his parents and then for scout camp. He might not want to stretch himself too thin?
“We’ll have to get one of those metal nets the others have,” Micah tried to reassure him, “then you can meditate on as many captured Salamanders as you like and it’ll be easy. I promise?”
“Okay.”
Micah toweled the scales off one by one and got his knife to peel the sweat-making layers, but Ryan still didn’t leave or say anything and it had him anxious. It was stupid, he knew. They’d used to hang out like this all the time, alone together, and he wanted things to go back to usual, right?
But something was off. Ryan wasn’t doing anything, and while he had seen Micah practice alchemy tons, it wasn’t like he’d liked to hang out so close to the smells while he did it.
Even their conversation before: it almost felt right but not quite. It was somehow stiff and wrong, all the niceties and teasing he might expect, but from a distance. Closer to how he might talk with Jason or Kyle than Ryan. They were supposed to be on the same page. He was supposed to be able to tell him anything.
Almost anything.
He glanced up and Ryan was looking down with a slight frown, lost in thought. Wait, did … he want to tell him something, maybe?
“You know you can tell me anything, right?” Micah blurted out and immediately regretted it because it was such a lame thing to say. Especially out of the blue like that.
Ryan looked up. Then it was too late. Micah met his eyes until he nodded and said, “Yeah. Yeah, of course.”
He nodded awkwardly, then went back to peeling his scales and waited.
It took a bit. Ryan hesitated when he spoke, which somehow seemed wrong to him, too.
“I … I tried. I mean—”
Micah’s eyes shot up.
Ryan sighed. “I wanted to apologize, Micah.”
He frowned. “Apologize? For what?”
He raised the intensity of his voice a little, but not the volume. “For running off like that.”
“Oh!” Was that what had been bugging him? “You don’t have to. I mean, you said it yourself, it worked out in the end, right?”
Ryan’s expression only sunk deeper, but it didn’t look like it was directed at him. He looked like he was in a bad mood.
“And I’ll know better for the future!” Micah rushed to reassure him. “Like, it will work out better next time. I’ll tell the others where you went and then hurry to catch up, and—”
“Micah,” Ryan interrupted him.
“Yes?”
His voice sounded weary. “You stormed off.”
“Sorry—”
“No. Don’t apologize,” he snapped, “I mean … can’t you at least accept my apology?”
He glanced around—it was hard to meet his eyes—and noticed Lisa and Kyle looking their way, she from the cooking station and he from the entrance, but he didn’t know if they were listening in.
“I … I did?”
“No, you didn’t. You said it was fine and keep on making excuses—”
“Yeah, I said it was fine. That was me accepting the apology.”
“Okay, so you think I had something to apologize for?”
“What? No—”
“See?”
“No, I mean, yes, but …”
Ryan straightened with a self-satisfied look on his face. No smile. “‘Yes, but’,” he echoed him.
Something about the look and the accusation ticked him off because he wasn’t being fair. It was like Ryan had tricked him.
Micah scowled. “So what if you did make a mistake?” So what if Ryan ran off when he had a gut instinct? It had saved his life. And so what if he didn’t talk to him? If Micah were a better friend, he would have known what he would do before he did. That was what being on the same page meant.
“So then say it.”
“No. Why?”
“So you can accept my apology.”
“I can do that either way—”
He began to shake his head.
“I can, I can, I—” he said, but Ryan kept on shaking his head and he still didn’t look happy, and Micah snapped, “You did something wrong, okay?!”
He stopped. The expression vanished. “What?”
What did he do wrong?
Micah faltered and Ryan’s expression faltered with him, so he grasped for something, anything. What he’d felt earlier? “It sucked when you took off without saying anything. To me. It … it felt like you abandoned me— us. And that you wouldn’t even let us know if we asked you why.”
Ryan sagged a little.
“I think … I meant what I said back then. We’re supposed to be a team, you, me, and Lisa, and you haven’t been acting like it lately …?”
And Sam was dead, so there was that. It had been almost half a year and Lisa didn’t look like she would bring it back anytime soon. Was Micah supposed to mourn or not?
“I know,” Ryan repeated, but the corner of his lip twisted up even while the rest of his expression was etched in regret, “and I’m sorry.” Rueful.
“I accept your apology?” Micah mumbled, distracted.
Why was he smiling now when he was calling him out on something that might not have even been a mistake and not earlier, when he’d tried to be a good friend? He didn’t get it.
But Ryan did smile as he leaned closer and somehow, that was more important than any argument he could make.
“I’d promise not to do it again,” he said, “but …“
Micah didn’t get it, but he did feel more comfortable, more like how things had used to be. “How about a warning beforehand, instead?” He smiled.
A nod. “I can do that.”
And that was that. Micah still smiled as he looked back down to his ingredients. Ryan looked like he was about to leave. When he realized it, he rushed to shove the jar of scales at him.
“Oh! And how about you dry these before you leave, as an extended apology?”
He frowned at the jar.
“Like, with a layer of heat mana or something, as if you were baking them?” Micah explained.
“Sure …” Ryan said, voice full of doubt, but did accept it.
Micah blinked and from one moment to the next, he could slowly see a haze extend from his hands and warm the contents.
He knew why he smiled then. Really, he knew why he had smiled before, too. Small assurances, he told himself. Things had gone back to normal for a moment. It could happen again. It was all just in his head, but …
Small assurances, was what he said but really, he wanted so much more and if he had the chance now …?
It was a small question, but it was a much bigger thing to ask. “Ryan,” Micah got his attention.
“Huh?”
He looked at him. “We’re fine, right? You and me?”
Did he hesitate? Scowl? Glance away? No, it had to be his imagination. His fears and exhaustion.
“Yeah,” Ryan said and put on a smile, “Yeah, of course.”