Chapter 38. Janica’s Mad/Crazy/Genius Plan

Janica looked at me, stunned. She tilted her head to the side.

Dread laughed, not taking her eyes off of the rivets she was pounding. She stopped, then looked at me. “Wait, you’re serious?”

Janica flew up to me, inspecting my face from up close. She looked into each eye, squinting suspiciously. “I think he’s serious. Warren, is this all to impress a girl?”

“No it’s… You two are impossible,” I said.

“Uh huh,” Dread said.

“Look, Warren, I’ve done much crazier things to impress a girl, myself,” Janica said. “But at least I was willing to admit why I was acting crazy. You don’t seem to be willing to be honest with yourself. And that’s a problem. If Henry was your real concern, you wouldn’t care that Arthur got down there first.”

“Okay,” I said. “I realized I’m responsible for Henry getting taken. I want to get my group back together. I can’t do that without getting myself powerful.”

Dread nodded silently. “And how do you expect to pull this off?” Dread said. “Arthur has enough people to fill three teams. They’re going to blast their way to the bottom.”

“I expect them to lose members,” I said. “Every time somebody dies, their current Job resets to one. Most of those people are fighting in their most advanced Job. Dying will be a huge setback. And I doubt they have any healers.”

Janica looked at Dread and shrugged, accepting the argument.

“Plus,” I said. “I have Janica on my team.”

“No offense to Janica,” Dread said. “But she can’t swing a sword. You’re going to have to fight every group of monsters by yourself.”

I smiled. “Not anymore. We leveled up our connection. Janica can fight now. Together, we could be the only group in the dungeon with a master fighter and a caster.”

A huge, proud grin grew over Janica’s face. She flexed her biceps.

“The question is…” I began. “Did our leveled-up-connection allow you to start telling me more information? Because I’m going to need to get strong. That means advanced Jobs, special Skills, synergistic Loadouts. I need to become a powerhouse.”

Janica smiled, confirming my suspicion.

“The big question though,” I started, “is if I’ll be able to use mana inside the dungeon. Because if I can’t, I need to start training as a fighter.”

Janica nodded. “I’m pretty sure you will be. We put two power cores into the Dungeon Seed. But there’s no way to tell for sure until we get in there.”

“Do we take the risk?” I asked. “If we prepare me to use magic and then there’s no mana, I’ll fall behind.”

“I say we do it,” Janica said. “If we show up and you can’t use magic, then we’ll start training you to use your staff. That will be our backup plan.”

I agreed, then looked at Dread. “I’m also going to need gear that complements my Job. Caster stats, mana regeneration, tons of health and spell power. Really whatever Janica thinks I need to dominate this dungeon with her.”

Janica grabbed a pencil from Dread’s workbench and flew to the wall. She scribbled everywhere, drew arrows, crossed things out. She wrote a list of ingredients and a flow chart. She drew a picture of us, side by side, armored and equipped. She circled a word in the center of her brainstorm: Elementalist.

“Okay,” Janica started, standing in front of her… mind map? Brainstorm? Vision board? I didn’t know what to call it. I’ve always thought that there was a thin line between genius and crazy. Janica seemed to be a little on the side of crazy. Really, it was too early to tell.

“So we only have a few hours before the dungeon opens,” Janica said. And when it opens, we need to be fighting inside, because that’s the only place where your mana is going to regenerate. Hopefully. However… Since my level is tied to your level, we need to level you up as much as possible. You’re only Level seven right now, so I’m Level seven. Pretty pathetic. I don’t even have access to half of my skills.” She began zipping around, pointing at different parts of her plan. “But before we get to fighting, we need to work on your gear… it’s terrible. How many Shark Skins and Sinew do you have?

“Umm.. fourteen Shark skins and twenty-four Shark Sinew.”

Janica looked at Dread. “Is that enough to make a set?”

Dread counted on her fingers. “Yep,” she said. “Plenty. With a few skins left over.”

“Good,” Janica said. “Cause we’re gonna need some extra cash.”

“But Warren isn’t going to get access to every pattern he needs at 100 Expertise. He’ll get one of them at 100. Another at 115. Another at 130, and so on.”

“What’s your Leatherworking Expertise at?” Janica asked.

“Ninety,” I said.

“Okay, so if he makes three pieces, he can get the three-set bonus. That’s not bad to start. Then we can add more pieces to the set when he gets that skill higher. Crafting those pieces is on the to-do list today. It can’t wait.”

I hated asking, but if time was this important… “Should Dread make them for me so that I can go grind levels with you?”

“Nope,” Dread said. “When you create a set, you have the option to make it Soulbound. That means you can’t trade it. But you get better stats than you would if you were selling it.”

“Oh,” I said. “That’s a cool mechanic.”

“How much Enchanting Thread do you have?”

“Maybe half a spool? I used up about half of it making that shoulder piece for Cassandra.”

They both stared at me.

“What?” I said.

“You gave away half a spool of Enchanting Thread to Rowan’s sister,” Dread said. “Pretty nice gift…” she said the words in a way that suggested I was up to something.

“What are you trying to say?” I asked.

“I think you know what she’s trying to say,” Janica said.

“Whatever,” I said, shaking my head. “How do we get more Enchanting Thread? Can’t we just buy it off the Auction House?”

“Do you have 100 Silver to spare per spool?” Dread asked.

I tried to keep my mouth from dropping open.

“Still feel good about that gift? Does your frugal self have any regrets?”

I scratched the front of my head. “Can we get it somewhere?”

“Well, Enchanters can make it.” Janica said. “But only by breaking down Uncommon items. We’re going to need a lot of it. Like seven spools. Maybe more. Let’s put that on the backburner.”

Dread showed me how to prepare the Shark skins. They were not only tougher than the Medium Leather to clean, but also very flexible. We prepared the Sinew by cleaning it with a knife, stretching it, and braiding it by turning it back on itself and twisting it until it was more like thin shark-rope.

You received Medium-Quality Sharkskin x 14.

You received Medium-Quality Shark Thread x 24.

Your Leatherworking Expertise improved from 90 to 128.

Congratulations, you discovered the pattern for Tribal Leather Buckler.

Unauthorized duplication: this tale has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

I felt grateful that I got a point from every skin and thread that I prepared. Probably because the materials were Uncommon. Dread had told me that points would be more difficult to get after level 100.

“I got a pattern!” I hollered.

“What’d you get?” Dread asked.

“Tribal Leather Buckler.”

“Oh that’s a good one,” Dread said. “It’s a 145 Expertise pattern. That means we can get you a bigger bonus today.”

I pumped a fist. “Wait, do I want to use a buckler? Doesn’t that mean I can’t use my staff?”

Janica smiled. “Yes, you’re going to use a shield and a scepter.”

“A scepter? Where am I going to get one of those?”

“You know that legendary hilt you got?”

I pulled it up for the first time. Somehow, in all the chaos of the last day I had forgotten about it.

Legendary Hilt

‎ Item Class: Quest Item

‎ Item Quality: Legendary

‎ Combine this legendary item with 10 shards of Edreru and an Edreru Core to form a legendary weapon of your choosing.

“Whoa,” I said.

“Whoa is right,” Janica said, pointing to a little spot on her board. “We can collect shards from bosses inside of the dungeon.”

“And the Core?” I asked.

“I’m not sure yet,” she said. “The dungeon was just created, and I don’t know all of its secrets. We’ll need to find clues within.”

“We’d better get to crafting,” I said.

“First,” Dread said, “we’re going to need something extra. How much money do you have?”

I eyed her.

“Warren,” Dread said with a threatening tone.

I sighed. “I have 314 Silver.”

“Give 100 to Janica. She needs to buy something for you.”

I handed over the coins begrudgingly. I had given almost everything I had to Sofia. The few Silver I had meant everything to me. Safety. Security. Rent.

Dread and Janica talked quietly and Janica sped off down the street.

“Come on,” Dread said. “Let’s make some armor.”

I pulled the tome of novice patterns down from the shelf, and found two new recipes that I hadn’t been able to understand before.

Congratulations, you discovered the pattern for Tribal Leather Bracers.

‎ Congratulations, you discovered the pattern for Tribal Leather Boots.

Each of the patterns was similar to the ones I had learned earlier, but with stylistic differences. The Tribal pieces were cut at different angles that the non-tribal pieces. Instead of rectangular pieces, the tops of the bracers and boots almost looked like they had wings. I didn’t know what stat bonuses these items would provide yet. According to Dread, the type of materials used and the quality mattered. In theory, I could make these patterns with regular Leather, Shark Skin or any other type of materials that I had.

Dread oversaw my work, helping me cut cleaner lines into the Shark leather. We used the beveler to make edges that were more round. We poked thicker holes for the Sinew. These small details mattered. We made the first bracer together, boiling it in Ectoplasm-water and tailoring it to my exact size. When we finished the bracer, a unique prompt popped up:

Congratulations, you created Sharkskin Tribal Bracer.

Would you like to bind this item to yourself?: Yes/No

The game provided me with details when I chose “yes”.

Sharkskin Tribal Bracer

Item Class: Set Armor

Item Quality: Medium

Armor: 2% Damage reduction

+2 Constitution

+2 Wisdom

+2 Intelligence

+5% Shadow Resistance

Set Bonus: None

Soulbound

This was one of two bracers. Which meant that I’d get these stats twice. Incredible. I showed it to Dread.

She smiled. “Not bad. Leather Tribal Bracers give Wisdom and Intelligence, which means you’re getting Constitution for free by using Shark Skin. Next time, see if you get it up to High Quality.”

Over the next couple of hours I made another bracer and a pair of boots. The buckler was a whole other process. Apparently, a good leather buckler needed a centerpiece. Generally, these were made of steel or some other kind of hard material.

“Janica, what’d you find for us?” Dread asked.

Janica flew over. She had returned from her errand sometime in the middle of my focused work time. She handed something to Dread.

“Okay, this will work,” she said. “Bring your shield pieces over, Warren.”

She put a thick, copper soup bowl down in front of her. She grabbed a hammer and started flattening the rim of the bowl.

I put my hands over my ears, the clang-clang of the hammer deafening.

Janica looked at me and raised an eyebrow. She rolled her eyes.

Whatever. She could lose her hearing if she wanted to.

Dread finally paused when the edges of the bowl were about an inch wide all around. Then she took out a special awl and started pounding holes around the rim. She handed it to me. “If this were made of iron or a rare metal, you’d get more armor out of it, but it’ll do for now.”

Looking at the pattern in my book, I connected the copper piece to the Shark Leather pieces I had cut, binding them with rivets. We hardened and treated the leather and added a strap to the back. I laid out every piece that I had made for myself. Two bracers, a pair of boots, both pauldrons, and a buckler. I was still missing a bunch of armor. I had no chest piece. No leg, shoulder or head protection. Which felt strange. Gear seemed hard to come by in IO, which made my chosen profession all the more valuable.

Congratulations, your Expertise in Leatherworking increased from 128 to 140.

I was getting three Leatherworking Expertise with every Sharkskin Tribal piece that I made. This was consistent with earlier gains. With my Expertise now over 130, I could get the next pattern in the book and make another piece. However, I couldn’t wait. I needed to see myself all geared up. My first armor set. Once I put the buckler on my left wrist, I looked at the details and gawked.

“Holy hell… Janica, are you seeing this set bonus?”