Duncan opened the book as the wind was gently blowing over his head and the black hole sun was menacingly looking at him like a pupil of an eye.

“Eclectic sword style” was the name of the book and it was rather thin. There were a lot of illustrations so probably even the illiterate could get some use of it. Duncan was newly literate in Zynnian symbols and he had a reading skill so he breezed through the book even before Shaya woke up.

As a nice surprise his Reading skill leveled up to 5 and the Learn skill gave him a prompt on the last page of the book. He naturally clicked YES and the content solidified in his head permanently.

For a second, he felt similarly to a big drop from on a rollercoaster but he was fine after that. He put away the sword style book and took out ‘The beasts of Zynnia vol.1’. There were a lot of illustrations but not every animal was illustrated. Around a quarter of them are.

The first volume covered the beasts from level 1-10 and Duncan found it a bit tedious to read about different type of rodents most of the time. From rats to squirrels to rabbits to hamsters and so on. Finally, he made it to the last page and again confirmed the prompt.

Since it was a much thicker book and the information was much more abundant, he felt like he was kicked out of an airplane. It lasted longer and the sensation was not entirely pleasant. It even left him with a slight headache.

“Are you finally done?” Duncan heard a familiar voice and looked up.

“Good morning, Shaya. Yeah, I am done,” he replied as he looked at her. Duncan saw two notifications but decided to check them out later.

She smiled at him and asked, “You, wanted to talk with me?”

He looked around and could not see Demira and she continued, “I told her to take a break. I figured you wanted to talk to me alone.”

“I actually wanted to check out the guard tower and then met Demira here,” Duncan said and Shaya’s smile disappeared.

“But since you are here,” Duncan continued, “I can tell you that I talked to Captain Fenris and explained the situation.”

“How did Captain Fenris react,” she inquired and Duncan thought about the talk he had before.

“I would say predictably. He agrees with me to keep things quiet for now,” he responded.

He was not about to explain to her that Fenris thought there is something going on with them.

“Is there anything else you want to tell me?” she asked.

Duncan thought about it and replied, “I might go away for a few days. After that we can go back to the outside through the mine if you or Fenris are available.”

“Go away? Where to?” she asked in shock and by the look on her face regretted it.

“I can’t tell you about that but I will be back as soon as possible,” he replied before getting up.

“Be careful,” Shaya said quietly as Duncan started climbing down the ladder. He looked at her and nodded.

“You too. See you soon,” he replied and waved.

She sighed and then sat down.

“What am I doing?” she mumbled to herself as Duncan was already on the ground.

----------------------------------------

He started walking back to the bar and opened the two missed notifications. The first one was about the Learn skill leveling up. The second informed him Identify finally leveled up.

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“So, you need books or information to level up Identify. Bleeping Wazsh could have told me that,” Duncan sighed and shook his head.

He then shrugged his shoulders and told himself, “Well, what else is new,” as he remembered the antics of his distracted mentor.

He was walking down the Main Street when he remembered Shaya’s smile.

“Argh. That woman must be very proud at how useless I was in the woods,” Duncan said with vitriol before he continued, “and of course she completely forgot how useless she was in the crypt. And that patronizing ‘be careful’. At least I wiped that smile of her face.”

Shaking his head, he came to the bar entering the door like a man on a mission. As he entered Duncan saw Elland talking with Wazsh and Bolgar stuffing himself with some stew.

“Good evening!” Duncan shouted.

Wazsh and Elland greeted back and Bolgar waved his spoon.

“What have you been up to?” Duncan asked.

“Same old,” Elland replied.

“Nothing much,” Wazsh said as he shrugged his shoulders and Bolgar once again waved his spoon since his mouth was still busy.

“Give me what he is having,” Duncan said as he sat down.

“One Midnight deer stew coming up,” Wazsh said as he plopped it in front of him and quickly adding a fresh spoon.

Duncan quickly ate it and excused himself. He had a lot of reading to do.

“Where are you off to now?” Wazsh asked.

“I am going to read some books? Did you know you can raise the Identify skill by reading books?” Duncan replied.

Wazsh frowned before answering, “I think I heard something about that… I am not much of a reader myself so it didn’t register. It’s not like I have a skills manual.”

“Alright. I should not take your words as gospel,” Duncan replied.

“A what?” Wazsh inquired.

“A religious text… It doesn’t matter. You have been plenty helpful. There ae some things I have to find out for myself I guess,” Duncan said before shrugging his shoulders and leaving.

Once in his bed he took out the books and stacked them on the night cupboard. It was just big enough to hold a two-by-two grid of books. Duncan stacked the ones he had not read yet further away from him and laid down.

Picking up vol.2 of the bestiary he activated the reading skill and learn at the end. It took him an hour to do so. Repeating the process until he reached vol.5 gave him another level up in Identify, Reading and Learning.

He would have continued if not for the headache he experienced after each book. They were getting progressively worse and lasted longer.

After the last one ended, he packed it in and went to the bathroom. Duncan cleaned himself up and went to bed.

As Duncan woke up the headache was gone. He took a big breath and checked his time off. It was at a bit more than four and a half hours.

“This should be enough,” he mumbled to himself thinking of his trip to the jewelry shops. He took another book and activated his Reading skill. There were no upgrades in levels but the slight headache and the new knowledge he got were apparent.

Walking from the bathroom downstairs he found Wazsh chopping some vegetables and greeted him.

“What do you do with all the vegetables?” he asked.

“I eat them of course, what else would I do?” Wazsh replied surprised.

“I didn’t see any vegetables in any of your dishes,” Duncan retorted.

Wazsh frowned before asking, “You eat vegetables?”

Duncan looked wide-eyed, “Of course I eat vegetables. What do you mean?”

There was a pause as Wazsh was processing the new data, before he replied, “I remember now that adventurers from your planet ate vegetables too. Sorry I forgot about that. Bolgar doesn’t eat them and Elland does not eat my food so I just assumed.”

“Well, you assumed wrong. And Elland probably doesn’t eat here because it’s just meat and more meat,” Duncan replied.

“So, would you like some vegetables in your dishes?” Wazsh asked.

“I am not a vegetarian but a mix of vegetables and meat would improve the quality of the dishes,” Duncan replied.

“Alright, from now on I will give you the same things I eat,” Wazsh replied.

Duncan nodded before he stated, “Today I am going to leave to my planet for a couple of days.”

“For how long?” Wazsh asked.

“Around 4 hours my time, maybe a bit more,” Duncan replied.

“So around 2 and a half to 3 days, I will prepare some new dishes for us, until then,” Wazsh said and nodded that he understood.

Duncan went back to his room and laid down on his bed. He was about to add another diamond to his transfer slot when he remembered the three rubies. He tried to stick one in however he got a rebound from the attempt.

“Still not big enough,” he said as he sighed.

Then he remembered and gold ring he got from Wazsh’s cellar and tried to stick it in the transfer slot. It went in smoothly. Duncan knew it was worth a lot less than diamonds but he figured gold would be easier to sell.

It was a thick ring and looked much more massive than a typical wedding band. He went back downstairs and asked Wazsh to use his Identify skill on it in case it had any enchantments. Wazsh confirmed it was just a normal ring and Duncan decided it was going to leave with him.

He laid back down on his bed and took a big breath and mentally went through his plan. He was on a tight schedule with the bus transfers if he was going to visit more than one jeweler shop.

“Here we go,” Duncan thought and activated his return.