Ok no more stops. Straight back to the bat cave was the plan.
On the trip over the mountain we found some more wreckage but nothing more valuable than I had already stored. I did find more Black and Truffles. Enough to make 12 more lesser health potions. Using my botany and analyze skill I looked at the black and gold truffle.
Black and Gold Truffle
Rarity: Extremely Rare
Description: Dark black truffle with golden veins.
Taste: Rich and lightly sweet
Alchemy Ingredient Possible Effects: Restore Health, Add Permanently to Health Pool
Alchemy Preparation: Dried and Powered, Juiced
Cooking Ingredient: Health Regeneration, Add Permanently to Health Pool
Cooking Uses: Shaved Raw, Steamed
Notes: This truffle is found 10-20 cm underground. It is commonly found on the slopes of mountains. It is one of the rare ingredients that can permanently increase the health pool if prepared properly with similar aspect ingredients. Only one such boost can be gained by each person for each ingredient so it is highly suggested to get the highest quality potion or meal to receive the maximum effect.
I grumbled. It had been the first time I had analyzed an ingredient. The info was very useful and detailed but more importantly I learned why I had been the first to discover my potion. Who would make a healing potion when they could permanently increase their health pool? I needed that recipe to increase health pool. I planned to make a dozen lessor potions to distribute to the crew and hold onto the rest of truffles until I had a recipe to increase health pool.
The journey over the mountains was uneventful and we only had to camp one night. I used my ring to be a clone of Celeste. She didn’t freak out. She even tried to get me to kiss her. Being a woman was unsettling. I was attached to Celeste and wanted to but instead cancelled the spell. Celeste said maybe next time I would be more adventurous. I needed to explore being a woman in private before I had confidence with Celeste. I found I could store forms in the ring. I could have up to 5 patterns for the spell and all I needed to do was touch someone. I added myself and Celeste. I added myself so I could shapechange into myself and heal.
I commed the guys to let everyone know when we would get back. We arrived at the cave to find Meranda and her brothers hard at work. Cael arrived an hour later followed a bit later by Red and Vlad. Red and Vlad had bad news. Andrew had found out they were working private dungeons and they had had an argument about it. The story was Andrew had Casey follow them to the smaller dungeon. Andrew presented it to Casey that Vlad and Red were going behind their backs to get loot on their own cutting them out. It turned into a huge mess and Vlad and Red left the group. The big thing that had keyed Andrew into the activities, besides the fact they visited me a lot, was the SYSTEM comm devices I had gotten them. They might have only cost 500 SYSTEM credits but were worth 2000 Ballen credits.
We would have to deal with the fallout. They reported they had gathered enough funds for one engineer robot for Meranda. I waved my hands and summoned four repair engineering bots. Two were humanoid and two were beachball size for work on the hull outside the ship. Hopefully they could all be repaired. Meranda was hoping up and down in excitement. I then gave her two items
Ring of Storing, has a 1 cubic meter space
Glass Eye, +12 Intellect, +6 Engineering Skill, +6 Engineering: Power Systems Skill
She took them reverently. Next up was Vlad. Steel Toe Ring, +12 Speed, +10 Agility.
Then it was Red, Glasses of Medical Evaluation, casts the Medically Assess Condition Spell, cooldown 5 minutes
The two brothers got to each pull two magic items I had planned to sell.
That complete I pulled out the aerther core and Aether collector. Meranda nearly fainted. The I started pulling out all the components I took from engineering. It was a very good trip. Meranda would have to tell me what she couldn’t use and I could sell. We sat at the table and talked about my adventures. I kept my ring of shapechange secret but everything else was talked about. We drank and ate joking and winding down. I pulled out the golden scroll for bludgeoning weapons. It should get 100,000 to 150,000 Ballen credits. Cael had sold his golden cooking scroll for 200,000 Ballen credits. He gave half the money to his parents and rest to his girlfriend who was pregnant. A round of congratulations.
Vlad and Red had 90,000 Ballen credits and gave them to me. I was going to goto Sand Bastion disguised and alone to avoid discovery.
That night I enlarged our room and made a hot tub. It wasn’t quite as fun as the tent hot tub but still it was fun. Celeste kept trying to get me to change into her. We wrestled on the bed, had sex and slept.
Vlad and Red had decided to move into the cave. I was glad to have Red close so I could get some practice on my psionic defenses. They would make a run to the dungeons every day. I helped on the ship with Celeste while waiting for Meranda to assess everything we brought back. The robots needed to be cleaned, my cantrip spell made quick work of this task, and now they just needed new batteries. Cael would get the batteries in town on his next trip. About 60% of the terminals, tubes and other equipment would be useful. The rest could be useful down the line, Meranda didn’t want to sell anything. Meranda gave me a list and three locations in Sand Bastion were I could get the items. The big item was the dual fusion reactor. Each was a cube 2 meters per side. They cost 80,000 each new and 50,000 each used. In her original plan she was just going to get one used reactor since the extra power was mostly good for combat but since this was a wish list she had both on the list.
If you spot this tale on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.
Meranda also showed me a complete redesign of the craft. It involved adding supports through the center of the ship and adding 14 meter wings on both side. The wings would make the ship aerodynamic for atmospheric flight. The wings would also allow moving the missile mounts in each wing and adding heavy gravmetric generators. Gravmetric generators made the ship significantly lighter which allowed thrusters to have a much larger effect on acceleration. The design on her pad had three generators in each wing, reducing the mass by 1800 tons. This reduction would also be usable with the ship movement spell. So the effective ship mass would be 1500 tons when fully loaded, as the wings added 150 tons each. But the generators would need both fusion generators for power. It was a thought and the work would have to be done in an actual ship yard.
In the morning I left with Celeste. When we got close to town I summoned a hollow rock to store the bike inside. I had Celeste disguise herself a little, loose clothes, large brimmed hat, and glasses. I used my memory to morph into Gandolf from the Hobbit films. I changed my clothes as well. We then walked into town from a different direction. We hoped this would throw off Casey. I tested my disguise by seeing Bammi and selling a minor magic item. I asked about soundproofing rooms. She had a few options but the best for me was a spray on clear acrylic matrix that absorbed sound waves in a certain frequency. I purchased 100 canisters and specialized drone robot applicator for 3600 credits. We then went and ordered a shuttle pick up for 12000 credits from Sand Bastion. It would arrive in 4 hours, better than waiting 8 days for the next route. We actually found out there were six people from an adventuring team waiting for the next shuttle. We went and found them in a hotel and they gave us 3000 credits to get a ride, which got another four people getting us another 2000 credits. So we ended up paying just 7000 credits for the trip. It was nice to go straight Sand Bastion, a 45 minute ride.
We talked a little to the adventurers on the flight. They were leaving to pool their funds to go to the Challenge Dungeon outside of Sand Bastion. They explained a Challenge Dungoen had trials inside that allowed adventurers to challenge them. This challenge dungeon had trials for Strength, Agility, Stamina, Constitution, Intellect, Channeling and Speed. Each one had twelve levels. If you successful completed a challenge you got a few coins and +1 to the associated stat. Once you successfully completed a level you couldn’t repeat it, going to the next level. The dungeon also only allowed you to enter it once a year. While inside you could do as many challenges as you wished. Sometimes failing could be deadly as well. The general consensus was you wanted the associated stat to be 10 times the level you were challenging. The group even had complete details for the first five challenges for strength, constitution, agility and speed. The Ballen Empire had control of the dungeon and charged 5000 credits for anyone to enter it. The only downside was the challenges took 3 to 4 hours each. The example they gave was the first strength challenge required the person to move 100 small boulders 100 meters. Each further strength challenge required bigger rocks or obstacles, a timer, and even monsters summoned at intervals. Each challenge was a solo experience, no groups. It sounded interesting and maybe getting the entire team together to hit the Challenge Dungeon in the future to get a few free stat points.
With Celeste I went to the quest giver first.
Quest Completed: Kill the Fear Goblin Chieftain in the Dungeon, Return with the Head as proof. Reward: 5000 experience, +5 free stat points, +2 skill points
We talked to quest giver getting the next quest and learning that the quest giver gave quests to dungeons that had not seen action for a long time. Using the SYSTEM pad I found the location on the other continent, about 400 miles from the bat cave. At least it wasn’t over the mountains.
Kill the Fiery Wyvern, return with the Head as Proof. Reward: 6000 experience, +3 free stat points, one class specific item
I dropped all my points into Stamina and saved my skill points. Our next stop was the store that sold scrolls. Celeste had two free skill slots open. We entered and looked through the scrolls. Celeste pulled two scrolls, Pilot: hover vehicle skill and computers skill. The pilot was obvious, she wanted that bike we had designed and took a generally hover vehicle skill over the hover bike specific skill. The computers skill was for programming and gave her a little ability in maintain and repairing. It was a skill that Meranda was lacking. I really liked Celeste. I was almost level 10 and had a new skill slot coming. I had skill scrolls for intimidation, lightning magic, and seduction in my bag. I pulled the scrolls for metal magic skill, enchantment skill, and runes skill from the shelf. I asked about potion recipes. They were not out in the open and I asked about potions for increasing health pools that used the black and gold truffle. He opened a file cabinet and yes he had two. One added 100 health and the other one added 250 health. I asked for the 250 health one. Then I asked about spells. He gave me a list. I found a cantrip called message. Which sent a message to another persons SYSTEM screen anywhere in the universe. Basically a global text message. I pulled all 3 copies they had. Next I looked for some higher tier spells for me. They didn’t really have a great selection of tier 5 spells. I found a wind blades spell that was a tier 5 air magic spell. They didn’t have any time, space or teleport spells. I found an advanced heal other, a tier 5 spell. I added the wind blades and advanced heal other spell to our pile. With our eleven scrolls on the table I pulled out the golden scroll for bludgeoning weapons skill. We started bartering. In the end we got all our scrolls and 85,000 Ballen credits.
Advanced Heal Other
1
Magic Sphere
Spirit (Tier 5)
Mana Cost
150
Range
Touch
Effect
Heal 300 health
Casting Time
10 seconds
Duration
instant
Leveling Effect
increase health healed
Heal the target
Wind Blades
1
Magic Sphere
Air (Tier 5)
Mana Cost
200
Range
20 meters
Effect
creats 3 wind blades to attack the target
Casting Time
3 seconds
Duration
instant
Leveling Effect
increases the damage slightly
Three blades of wind appear in front of target and slice him
Celeste learned here new skills and took the message cantrip. She would get another slot at level 7 for a cantrip. I learned the message cantrip, wind blades and advanced heal other spell. I immediately upgraded both spells reducing the casting cost of the healing spell by 18 aether and the windblades damage by 31%. I put the rest of the scrolls into my storage.
We left for out next goal getting the dual fusion reactors. It was a Ballen Empire distributor. I had to complete a bunch of paperwork to purchase the fusion reactors. The good news was I got both new for 150,000 credits, saving 10,000 credits. I could pick them up in the morning. We then spent a few hours getting smaller components on Meranda’s list. Total cost 34,400 credits. I found a water recycler for 18,000 credits that had its own power source and could process 50 gallons an hour. It was a 1.5 meter cubic device with an intake and two outports. One was for pure water and the other for the impurities. We were actually short by about 11,000 credits for the water purifier. I also needed 10,000 credits to enter the SYSTEM terminal so we passed on the water purifier for now.
We went to nice hotel and in the room I morphed into myself and we had a good night with dinner delivered to the room. I was to go into the SYSTEM terminal alone in the morning. Celeste would wait outside.