The Outlands

Tess sighed, stepping back from the stall. Unfortunately, it did not seem this stall in particular had anything that she was particularly looking for. There were a bunch of cores, yes, but none of them were anything…special. There was only a single boss core among them, and it didn’t really suit the needs of her or her attendants.

“I-is there anything else we can do for you?” The woman running the shop asked, shooting a glance at Ava that wasn’t nearly as inconspicuous as she hoped it was.

“No, thank you for your time.” Tess replied. “Best of luck, though!” With that, the group withdrew, and Ava once again cast the perception filter spell.

“So…you were talking about the monsters you could make?” Maven prompted, eyes alight with curiosity.

“Yeah.” Tess said. “Basically, I can design monsters who will work with me, I call them my attendants.” She held out a hand and Silky obediently crawled out, giving a small salute once she had stopped moving. “This is Silky, a Blacker Widow.” Tess explained. “She’s primarily a scout right now, but I’m planning to build her into something of an assassin.”

“A…Blacker Widow.” Maven said. “As in…the boss monster.”

“Yup. I took away the stuff that made her giant and some of her other stuff and instead put a bunch of mobility on her. She keeps the same raw stats, but…well, she was always built around abilities, so they’re not the most impressive around. Then, for the other member of our little team, there’s Isabella.”

She waited for a moment, and Isabella drifted out and gave a brief curtsy. “I am Isabella.” She droned, and then faded back into Tess.

“She’s support. Telekinesis, some area-of-effect status and attacks, as well as intangibility and limited flight mean she’s good at doing just about anything. Not the greatest at killing anything, but a force multiplier all the same.”

“There’s another freelancer’s stall over there.” Ellie interrupted, pointing further down the street. “Shall we get in line?”

“Umm…I don’t want to just stop in the middle of explaining again, but unless Maven has any questions on the specifics of Silky and Isabella, I think everything else we can just talk about normally, right? Like, for the party dynamics type stuff.”

“I…don’t think I have any right now.” Maven said slowly. “I’m curious as to what exactly you’ve got in you right now, but that’s something that can wait until we’re in a better place to talk about this.”

“Alright, I’ll drop the spell and we can get in line, then.” Ava said. “Party dynamic stuff should be fine to talk about.”

A few moments later, they were lined up, and they returned to discussing their party. “So…what’s your…thing?” Ellie asked. “Like, what role do you fill?”

“I’m primarily a sorceress.” Maven explained. “Though if I’m out of Mana, I use a bow. What do you do?”

“Bit of everything.” Ellie said. “Right now, I’m leaning towards playing the tank, though. I got the Aegis Class pretty recently, and I plan to make use of it.”

“You what?!” Alice said. “Do you have any idea how long I’ve wanted that?!”

“If it makes you feel better, it was a gift from the gods.” Ellie said, scratching her cheek sheepishly. “To help me better complement Tess.”

Alice sighed. “I suppose that’s a little better than just random chance giving it to you, but…still. That one’s really nice, so make sure you appreciate it.”

“Don’t worry, I will.” Ellie said. “I want to go all in on the defensive role, so that means using that Class a lot.” She turned back to Maven. “But my stats are perfectly even otherwise, all at max. I’ve got a variety of other Classes, so I can do basically anything in a pinch, but I would prefer tanking.”

Maven nodded. “Good. It’s good to have another person drawing attention. I have a golem that should greatly benefit us in that regard, too.”

“A word on that, if I may.” Ker said. “I had a brief discussion with Alice about this, and I believe it would be for the best if, for now, you didn’t use the golem.”

“Why not?” Maven asked, frowning.

“Encourages bad habits.” Alice replied. “There’s no real analogue at higher levels, not unless you’re someone who specializes in manufacturing golems. Using it to clear traps and draw all the aggro is going to make you lazy, and that really doesn’t work beyond level…forty or fifty, when most golems on the market will start collapsing in a couple of hits. If you want to be serious about this, you’re going to have to learn to do things the normal way.”

“I…understand.” Maven said. “I will defer to your wisdom on this, then.”

“Good.” Amara said. “Make sure you listen to them when they give you advice, they know what they’re talking about. If it conflicts with something your parents or your tutors taught you, forget whatever you used to know. These people are much better equipped to teach you how things work nowadays.”

Jin shrugged. “I’m sure there’s still merit to some of what they’ve taught you, just…take it with a grain of salt. A lot of what is taught to people who are boosting is only relevant if you’re trying to level up quickly in a safe environment. Not quite as useful in the ‘real world’, so to speak.”

“If you’ve ever got a question, just ask.” Alice added. “I’m sure we can tell you why we aren’t doing things the way you’re used to.”

Their conversation was cut short as they reached the front of the line. “What can I do for you?” A smiling man asked. “We’ve been going through some level fifty or sixty dungeons on Ilen and have some good loot for sale!”

Tess nodded. “I’m looking for cores, especially from bosses.” She said. “Do you have any that match that description?”

The man stroked his chin thoughtfully. “A couple.” He said. “They might be kind of out of your price range, though. You…are new to this, right?”

“Yeah. How’d you know?”

“A guess.” He replied, waving a hand. “You looked a little young to be level fifty or sixty, and if you were high enough level to have reversed aging, you wouldn’t need to be buying from me.”

“I see.” Tess said. “Well, don’t worry about that, I’ve been saving up for a while and have more than enough.”

“If you say so.” The man replied dubiously. “Let me fetch what we have, we do have a couple of cores that might be what you’re looking for.” He stepped back for a moment, rummaging through a couple of boxes before taking out two cores and placing them on the counter. “This one,” he said, tapping the one on the left, “is from a Spitfire Phoenix. Particularly nasty dungeon boss, but the core is great for fire magic and recovery magic.”

He tapped the other core. “This one’s from a Mountainous Mole. Annoying to deal with, but not too bad. Only really useful for earth magic, though. We’ll say…seventy five gold for the Spitfire Phoenix core, fifty for the Mountainous Mole core.”

Tess flinched. “If I…bought them both together, would you be willing to accept a platinum?”

The man thought about that for a moment. “I suppose so.” He said.

“Alright, I got this.” Alice replied, stepping up and reaching into her bag.

“No!” Tess said hurriedly. “I mean, I appreciate the gesture, but…well, I want it to feel like something I earned for myself, you know?”

Alice paused. “Are you sure? I really don’t mind.”

“Yeah, I’m sure.” Tess said firmly. “It’s not like I’m using it elsewhere.”

“Alright.” Alice said. “Just keep that in mind for the future.”

Tess turned back to the bewildered man, pulling a platinum out of her pocket. She had, as usual, taken the time to change into her armor once she got home, and she had already transferred most of her bag’s contents to her armor, leaving only a couple of things in there in case, for some reason, she had access to the bag but not the armor.

The man accepted the platinum and handed the cores over. “Anything else?” He asked.

Tess shook her head. “No, thank you. That was most of my savings anyway, so I don’t think I could afford more.” She stepped back, pocketing the cores. “Anyone else want anything?”

No one did, so the group retreated back to the main street. “How did you get that much money?” Maven asked. “People our level don’t usually make enough to afford that much, so I’m curious. Did Guildmaster Los give you some allowance, or…?”

Tess shook her head. “It’s all from me.” She said. “When you’ve got Luck like mine, all those drops add up pretty quick.” That wasn’t to say that it wasn’t a sizeable amount to her; she had only ten or fifteen gold left after that, and knowing that she had bought those cores for what would amount to the price of a pretty decent used car was a little scary.

But she couldn’t transfer that money to Mael in any reasonable manner, and she was content with her current lodgings, so the money was, essentially, just sitting there gathering dust. “Well...I got everything I want that I can afford, does anyone else want anything?”

Ellie shrugged. “Nothing that can’t wait until we order stuff later.”

“Likewise.” Maven agreed.

“In that case, let’s get going.” Jin said. “I was planning to do a couple of dungeon raids today, but…well, plans changed. I think that, if Maven has time, now would be a good time to really hammer out how things are going to work from now on.”

“We have time.” Maven said. “We were planning to spend quite a bit longer shopping. That…is okay, right Grandma?”

Amara nodded. “I see no issue with it. Seems like a good use of your time.”

“Good.” Jin replied. “We’ll make our way to one of the private rooms in the guild, and we can talk more in detail there. For now, continue hashing out the broad strokes of things.”

“I think it’s just me who hasn’t said my place, right?” Tess asked. “I’m like Ellie, capable of doing anything in a pinch, though…that’s for the future. Right now, I’m more suited to close-quarters fighting. If it comes down to it, I can use almost any sort of magic, but if it’s more advanced than intermediate level, I’ll probably need to cause some bleeds to give me secondary source of Mana if I even want to be able to cast it.”

“Ah, may I take that to mean you have the Skill that grants all magic types?” Maven said curiously. “And presumably at a rather high rank at that. If that’s the case, might I ask why you aren’t focusing on becoming a mage?”

“It’s…a little complicated. We’ll get into it more at the guild. Short answer is I don’t have the Mana to make it worthwhile. Not yet, anyway. I’m rather…unique in that regard. But, for now, just know that I’m going to end up being a generalist like Ava, and I’m going to be the one checking for traps, doing most of the scouting, and other odd jobs.”

“Are you sure?” Ellie asked. “That seems like rather a lot to handle. I’m sure I can take over at least some of it.”

“Yeah, I’m sure.” Tess replied. “Scouting and trap checking come as sort of a package deal, and everything else is just super minor. It’s not as bad as it may sound.”

“If you say so.” Ellie said. “Just know that I’m willing to pick up any slack you want any time you want. I’m as well suited to generalizing as you are.”

“In the short run, yes.” Ava said. “In the long run, no. Tess will have much better Skills for it, so I’m trying to get her used to doing it now.”

“How do you know?” Maven asked. “Is there some method to let you pick Skills that I’m not aware of?”

Ava laughed. “No. Tess is…the only exception to that rule. Think about it this way: Luck influences what you get from a Rewards Crystal, right? Higher Luck means better stuff?”

Maven paused. “I seem to recall that, yes.”

“So, for the sake of argument, if your Luck was, let’s say infinite…”

Maven paused again, and after a moment comprehension dawned. “I see. But, still…how do you know what she’s going to get?”

Ava smiled faintly, looking to Amara. “Amara, may I take that to assume she doesn’t know?”

Amara shook her head. “I was leaving it up to you guys if you wanted to tell her.”

Ava nodded. “Well, in that case, since she’s going to be around so much, dancing around the topic will be…frustrating.” She turned back to Maven. “Let’s just say that me and my party are in the same line of work as Tess, and I’m helping her bosses plan for her.”

Maven blinked. “Oh. I…” She trailed off, looking to Amara, then to Ava, and then to Tess and Ellie before shaking her head as if to clear it. “Sorry,” she said, “it just took me a moment to process that. I understand. That makes sense now, thank you.”

The conversation continued like that until they got to the guild, where they began to go over the specifics of what they could do. For Tess, that was roughly the same as it had been before her training with Ava, though she had a few new abilities she had obtained over the course of the aforementioned training:

That was all she had for the moment. She had had less time to devote to freelancing since restarting school, and combining that and the fact that the she wasn’t rushing through the dungeons, the fact that dungeons were actually reasonably long at this level, and that she wasn’t even always in a dungeon when training, she hadn’t even fully finished clearing the one she had been working on.

And, while she couldn’t speak for exactly how much Maven had changed since their encounter, Ellie seemed to have begun to solidify her abilities. She had received a smattering of magical Skills, enough to make her competent, but, for the most part, she seemed to have mostly gained things that pushed her towards physical combat.

Their talking lasted for another couple of hours before Maven had to leave, at which point they said their goodbyes and Tess and Ellie went back to Mael. “I’m going to go absorb these cores and upgrade Silky and Isabella.” Tess said. “So, I’m going to be in my room for a while. I’ll let you know when I’m done, okay?”

Ellie nodded. “Sure thing. I’ll see you in a bit, love you!”

Tess blushed. “Y-yeah. See you in a bit, I love you too.” And so, she set off for her room, steeling herself for what she was about to do. She had yet to modify Silky and Isabella since she had made them, as doing so would require ejecting their cores again and that was not an experience she wished to replicate.

But it wasn’t something she couldn’t bear. She knew that, if she wanted to be stronger, it was something she had to do. So, it was that she sat on her bed, absorbed the cores, and got to reading and working out what exactly she wanted on her attendants.