It was slightly easier to eat the food this time around now that I knew what to expect.
That didn’t mean that I liked it in any capacity. It still tasted like absolute shit, but it was either this or go hungry.
I guess I could’ve made some fruits or something with magic, but that took a lot of effort and I couldn’t quite make enough to have me feeling full either, I also needed my mana for other things as well like training [Wood Manipulation]. So I had to be careful with how I spent it.
I wasn’t really pushing my mind anymore now that there wasn’t a lot of nature around so it was going to be hard to level [Accelerated Mind] going forward unless I could find some way to mentally press myself outside of combat. Not sure how that would go over though.
I quickly scarfed down the slop and started making my way back to my room, once there I tried to push open the door and slammed into it as it refused to budge.
I frowned pushing on it slightly before I sheepishly remembered I had barred it from the inside with magic.
I glanced behind me to make sure no one had seen my faux pas, which thankfully there was no one. I then pressed my hand against the door and quickly molded away the wood holding the door shut and opened the door, quickly closing it behind me as I entered.
From there I sat down on the floor and went to work.
To start with I dismissed my current arm and slowly began working on reforming another one. Each time I did this I tried to make it a little different, maybe a twist there, and an extra bit of stretch there, reinforcing a specific part that felt a little bit weak.
I tried to find out what worked for making the arm and what didn’t. What would be the most optimal way to make an arm? And well… As I found out, the current design of the human arm was pretty damn good.
Which made sense I guess, there was very little to improve on other than perhaps making it out of material that did all the same stuff but would be more durable. Material such as mana-infused wood is strong enough to get shot by a rifle and stop a bullet.
A couple hours later I had a new arm and a fresh level to represent that.
‘Ping’ [Wood Manipulation] Has leveled 6 > 7
I felt that I was starting to get slightly less exp each time I made an arm. Maybe I should start trying other things rather than just making the same thing each time. Maybe forming my wooden armor repeatedly?
If I tried to make it more intricate or protective I could probably get some good levels out of that, and the skill was a lot more cost-effective than trying to make an arm repeatedly. I was down half my reserves just from making this one arm.
Well, not much I could do about that now. I spent time resting and trying to level my [Rest] skill at the same time. Although as usual, it was just slow going. There had to be something I was missing in regard to this skill. I just needed to figure out what it was.
Once my mana was topped off I got to work on making another apple. As David had said, if I could get a skill for this it would make my life nicer. I wasn’t a particularly big fan of salads and whatnot, but it was infinitely better than everything they were offering here. If I could find a way to make seasonings as well, maybe get some stir-fried veggies going? Oh, man. I was getting hungry just thinking about it.
I made one apple, two apples, five apples, ten apples. In between every other apple I made I had to [Rest] in order to recover mana to keep going, but the process was relatively fast regardless.
‘Ping’ [Rest] Has leveled 3 > 4
Alright, I’d take what I could get then.
I kept making apples, but after number fifty I got tired of them and moved to something else. Oranges. I didn’t particularly care about them myself, but others might. I made my first batch of oranges and stuck them in their own container next to the bunches of apples I had. I had made some basket sort of things I had made out of wood, I had several filled with apples and another starting to fill with oranges.
After filling several baskets with oranges and moving on to bananas I finally got the skill I was looking for.
‘Ping’ General skill [Fruit Production] Has been acquired.
Well… That’s one aspect handled, I’d need to get one for other things like wheat crops, vegetables, and potentially trees and plants as well. Ugh, this was going to be a pain. I rested again having burned through all my mana just as I finished getting the skill, and conveniently got another level for my efforts.
‘Ping’ [Rest] Has leveled from 4 > 5
Was it just that easy? It felt like the more I burned my mana consistently in a row, the more exp I got for resting. Or was it a cumulative amount of exp gained for resting for a certain amount of time with a set duration? If I had millions of mana and had to rest for 12 hours to recover it all would I get more exp the longer I was resting?
That was the only possible explanation I could come to, in which case burning all my mana as quickly as possible and then resting would be the most beneficial way of leveling the skill, it also just meant it was harder to level the skill at lower levels comparatively to higher ones where you had more mana and thus could spend longer resting in between each subsequent mana burn.
Hmmm… Things to consider for sure.
With my mana topped off I stood up and looked around me.
I was surrounded by about 7 baskets. Three for both apples and oranges and then one for bananas. Overall this took me about another three hours, it should be getting to be about time for our shift out in the gorge at this point.
I looked at all of the baskets in my room trying to think of what I wanted to do with them for a moment, before I just shrugged. I’ll just give them to the chef… I never did get her name did I? I’ll ask her when I get over there.
With my mind made up, I manipulated the wood to help me with carrying them, I spawned a barrier underneath the baskets and rested them there. Resting them on the barriers drained my mana, it was particularly cost-effective since the skill wasn’t exactly designed with this kind of process in mind.
Walking down the hallway I made it back into the commons area, lots of people were milling around now that it was starting to get close to the time for us to leave. A lot of them turned to look at me as I walked by with all my baskets of fruits, most of them stepping out of the way to make room for me to pass them on my way.
I glanced around idly, I had a slight nudging to maybe try to say something, to show that I wasn’t the same kind of person as Fist. That thought lasted for about five seconds before I ignored it and kept walking. I had never been a social person to begin with, I was perfectly fine living my life in my little bubble without stepping outside of it.
It was unfortunate that the world seemed designed to never allow for that. I was always just having to do something important that needed me to step outside my comfort zone. It was quite annoying in all honesty.
I made it back to the counter where the small chef was yelling at one of the other cooks, it looked like he had dropped one of the pots full of the gruel they served. As I was approaching the counter I had a quick thought and looped a tendril of wood and connected all the baskets. Then I morphed all the fruits inside the baskets and removed the seeds from them.
It took an obscene amount of mana to do that and I had to quickly put down the baskets before I ran out of mana for my barriers. The sudden movements caught the head chef's attention.
“Back so soon? You don’t quite have enough time to eat something again if you’re still hungry, and even if you did I wouldn’t give it to you. I have other people to feed as well.”
She put her hands on her hips giving me a challenging look.
I shook my head in response, “That’s not why I’m here. I was working on acquiring a particular skill and I don’t necessarily know what to do with the byproducts of the skill so I figured you might.”
I reached down and picked up one of the baskets of apples. I still found it strange that they didn’t have apples here as far as I had seen so far. It was possible they had them in some far-off distant place that didn’t have a lot of influence in these southern countries. The continent was massive, so they just might exist somewhere no one had been yet.
She looked at the fruits with an appraising eye, “What even are these? Some kind of fruit?” She picked one up and looked at it.
“May I?” She asked, giving me a quick glance before biting into it when I gave her a nod.
While she was pondering the apple I picked up the other baskets and set them on the counter between us. When I finished she was taking another bite out of it with a curious expression on her face.
“What is this? I’ve never seen these before let alone tasted one. I’m fairly certain these don’t exist either, if they taste this good and you hadn’t even acquired a skill yet then these would be immensely popular, or at the very least be sitting at the top of the fruit table as a popular ingredient.”
“They’re called Apples. And are they really that good? I mean, they’re alright, there are several different kinds, these are called Red Delicious, I’m pretty sure. They’re personally my favorite, but there are several other kinds that are just as popular where I come from.”
She grunted as she looked at the apple in her hand.
“Alright. So what do you want in return for these then?”
“Honestly, I’m not even sure about that. I just didn’t want them to go to waste in my room and I figured you’d be able to make use of them. Perhaps you could make a business model out of them, there are several pastries and desserts that are made with these fruits individually, perhaps you could figure out how to make some and sell them to people? I’ll supply and then you cut me in for part of the profits?” I said with a slight shrug.
“Although if that’s not something you’re interested in I don’t really have any other ideas. In the meantime, I guess you can just have them for nothing. If you decide on something you can let me know I guess.”
She nodded slowly, “Alright. I’ll see what I can do, no promises though. If you don’t have anything else, then get out of here. I got some ideas I want to try.”
“Oh, just one more thing.”
She turned back with an annoyed look on her face. “What?” She said curtly.
“What’s your name? Or what should I call you?”
She looked at me for a moment before she started laughing.
“I guess I never did introduce myself, did I? My name is Jolene. Pleased to meet you. Now git.”
I raised my hands in mock surrender as I turned around to walk away.
I took a few steps before David appeared before me taking quick steps, and he looked a bit shaken.
“Elf, with me. Now.”
I frowned slightly, “Why? What’s going on?”
“Damn it, now is not the time for questions, follow. Me.” He hissed at me and turned around and started walking away towards the exit of our cavern that leads into the main cavern before the gorge.
He turned around for a moment, “Also, armor up. Go as flashy as possible. You got any abilities that make you look powerful, now is the time to use them.”
I followed behind me, my armor folding up over my body and spreading out. I added a couple of cosmetic changes this time, adding a bit of green to it in the form of leaves as well that rustled softly as I walked behind David, my longer stride easily keeping pace with him.
Sparks and tendrils of lightning surged off my legs and feet and left behind sparks wherever I stepped, causing people to quickly get out of me. The ones not moving fast enough felt a minor shock as they got touched by the little sparks.
We stepped up to the door leading out and David knocked on it with a series of knocks in complicated patterns, with pauses and rhythms. Occasionally he used both hands as well and even kicked the door once.
Eventually, he stopped after a full thirty seconds of pounding the door. The door glowed softly before it opened, standing on the other side was Lurks. She immediately fixed me with a stare that chilled me all the way to my soul.
My steps stuttered slightly, David came to a stop in front of her with me just a step behind him.
“This is him,” David said and then stepped back into the door and closed it behind himself.
What the fuck? David, don't leave me here, DAVID!
He closed the door behind him, oblivious to the screams in the sanctuary of my mind.
I turned back stiffly to look at Lurks. Something about her was completely unnerving and I couldn’t place my finger on it. Maybe it was a combination of things. From the way she moved to the feel of her mana, and the fact that she had a condescending stare as she looked down on me both figuratively and literally. Maybe it was the fact that I could instinctually feel she was much stronger than the average tier four. Something about her caused all of my instincts to scream danger.
Eventually, she spoke,
“Follow,” is all she said to me before turning around and walking away with the sinuous grace of an apex predator.
She led me through the winding paths of the cavern, soldiers marching from place to place, moving weaponry, training against dummies, and sitting at tables relaxing with their friends. A majority of them stopped and turned to look at us as we passed by them adding to the stress already on my mind.
It took us several minutes to walk through the portion of the cavern we were in and eventually we made it to a slope that started taking us up, it winded and turned back on itself frequently as it carried us to the upper levels of the cavern.
With a feeling of dread that coiled around my heart like a vice, I realized where we were headed. We topped a familiar ledge and I saw a singular door. Lurks led me up to the door before knocking on it twice very softly and then stepped back and waited.
After a few short moments, I heard a voice speak from the other side, “Enter.”
The command was spoken softly, but I could feel the weight of the word spoken. As if it were a law of nature on the same level of gravity rather than a simple word, or maybe it was so powerful because it was such a simple word. I had no answers to the question.
Lurks opened the door and ushered me in first. The inside of the room was exceedingly well decorated, but not ostentatious in its design. Along the eastern wall rested mounted trophies of victorious hunts of beasts I had no reference for. Reptilian, canine, feline, avian. All manner of genus hung upon the wall.
On the western side, there was a cabinet, inside it was filled with decorative glasses and various bottles of wines and spirits. In the western corner closest to the door there was an area for resting and relaxing, with two couches arranged in an L-formation around a table at knee height when you were sitting.
A few decorative pieces sat upon the tale in the center all of which sat on top of a fine rug. The flooring switched instantaneously from the dirt, rock floor to a finely polished wooden. I almost stepped onto it without thinking, but I immediately turned off my passive causing me to spark.
I had no interest in finding out what would happen if I burned my footprints into this flooring.
At the farthest end of the room, opposite the door, there was a painting of the man I had seen throw the rock yesterday. It was a life-sized portrait of the man I realized, especially as I had a good frame of reference given that he was seated at a desk in front of said painting.
He had his fingers steepled in front of him on the desk and was observing us as we crossed the room.
[Level 685⁶]
Ah.
I had known he was powerful, but this was a bit absurd. Although, I guess it made sense that someone powerful had to be in charge of this whole operation.
“I’ve brought the one, as requested, Commander Drikith,” Lurks said, speaking with a lot less creep factor and more respectful deference.
Drikith nodded curtly to her, “Thank you, Lurks. You may leave now.”
Lurks narrowed her eyes slightly and opened her mouth to say something, but ended up closing it without a word. She bowed her head slightly before turning around and quietly leaving the room.
Leaving me completely alone in the room with this man.
For a moment we stood there, as he observed me and I observed him. My entire body felt like it was locking up as he combed me over with his eyes, completely taking in every minute detail.
“Interesting.” He said after what seemed like an eternity.
“I have many questions for you, little elf.” His voice was as smooth as warm honey. And it completely coated my mind with its insidious sweetness, robbing me of my thinking capabilities in a way that screamed skill use.
“But first I think we shall start with this.” He reached down and pulled up a long wooden box and rested it on his desk and opened it, revealing my sword. The sword Illesea had given me.
“Where did you get this?” He asked.
I wanted to leave.
It was slightly easier to eat the food this time around now that I knew what to expect.
That didn’t mean that I liked it in any capacity. It still tasted like absolute shit, but it was either this or go hungry.
I guess I could’ve made some fruits or something with magic, but that took a lot of effort and I couldn’t quite make enough to have me feeling full either, I also needed my mana for other things as well like training [Wood Manipulation]. So I had to be careful with how I spent it.
I wasn’t really pushing my mind anymore now that there wasn’t a lot of nature around so it was going to be hard to level [Accelerated Mind] going forward unless I could find some way to mentally press myself outside of combat. Not sure how that would go over though.
I quickly scarfed down the slop and started making my way back to my room, once there I tried to push open the door and slammed into it as it refused to budge.
I frowned pushing on it slightly before I sheepishly remembered I had barred it from the inside with magic.
I glanced behind me to make sure no one had seen my faux pas, which thankfully there was no one. I then pressed my hand against the door and quickly molded away the wood holding the door shut and opened the door, quickly closing it behind me as I entered.
From there I sat down on the floor and went to work.
To start with I dismissed my current arm and slowly began working on reforming another one. Each time I did this I tried to make it a little different, maybe a twist there, and an extra bit of stretch there, reinforcing a specific part that felt a little bit weak.
I tried to find out what worked for making the arm and what didn’t. What would be the most optimal way to make an arm? And well… As I found out, the current design of the human arm was pretty damn good.
Which made sense I guess, there was very little to improve on other than perhaps making it out of material that did all the same stuff but would be more durable. Material such as mana-infused wood is strong enough to get shot by a rifle and stop a bullet.
A couple hours later I had a new arm and a fresh level to represent that.
‘Ping’ [Wood Manipulation] Has leveled 6 > 7
I felt that I was starting to get slightly less exp each time I made an arm. Maybe I should start trying other things rather than just making the same thing each time. Maybe forming my wooden armor repeatedly?
If I tried to make it more intricate or protective I could probably get some good levels out of that, and the skill was a lot more cost-effective than trying to make an arm repeatedly. I was down half my reserves just from making this one arm.
Well, not much I could do about that now. I spent time resting and trying to level my [Rest] skill at the same time. Although as usual, it was just slow going. There had to be something I was missing in regard to this skill. I just needed to figure out what it was.
Once my mana was topped off I got to work on making another apple. As David had said, if I could get a skill for this it would make my life nicer. I wasn’t a particularly big fan of salads and whatnot, but it was infinitely better than everything they were offering here. If I could find a way to make seasonings as well, maybe get some stir-fried veggies going? Oh, man. I was getting hungry just thinking about it.
I made one apple, two apples, five apples, ten apples. In between every other apple I made I had to [Rest] in order to recover mana to keep going, but the process was relatively fast regardless.
‘Ping’ [Rest] Has leveled 3 > 4
Alright, I’d take what I could get then.
I kept making apples, but after number fifty I got tired of them and moved to something else. Oranges. I didn’t particularly care about them myself, but others might. I made my first batch of oranges and stuck them in their own container next to the bunches of apples I had. I had made some basket sort of things I had made out of wood, I had several filled with apples and another starting to fill with oranges.
After filling several baskets with oranges and moving on to bananas I finally got the skill I was looking for.
‘Ping’ General skill [Fruit Production] Has been acquired.
Well… That’s one aspect handled, I’d need to get one for other things like wheat crops, vegetables, and potentially trees and plants as well. Ugh, this was going to be a pain. I rested again having burned through all my mana just as I finished getting the skill, and conveniently got another level for my efforts.
‘Ping’ [Rest] Has leveled from 4 > 5
Was it just that easy? It felt like the more I burned my mana consistently in a row, the more exp I got for resting. Or was it a cumulative amount of exp gained for resting for a certain amount of time with a set duration? If I had millions of mana and had to rest for 12 hours to recover it all would I get more exp the longer I was resting?
That was the only possible explanation I could come to, in which case burning all my mana as quickly as possible and then resting would be the most beneficial way of leveling the skill, it also just meant it was harder to level the skill at lower levels comparatively to higher ones where you had more mana and thus could spend longer resting in between each subsequent mana burn.
Hmmm… Things to consider for sure.
With my mana topped off I stood up and looked around me.
I was surrounded by about 7 baskets. Three for both apples and oranges and then one for bananas. Overall this took me about another three hours, it should be getting to be about time for our shift out in the gorge at this point.
I looked at all of the baskets in my room trying to think of what I wanted to do with them for a moment, before I just shrugged. I’ll just give them to the chef… I never did get her name did I? I’ll ask her when I get over there.
With my mind made up, I manipulated the wood to help me with carrying them, I spawned a barrier underneath the baskets and rested them there. Resting them on the barriers drained my mana, it was particularly cost-effective since the skill wasn’t exactly designed with this kind of process in mind.
Walking down the hallway I made it back into the commons area, lots of people were milling around now that it was starting to get close to the time for us to leave. A lot of them turned to look at me as I walked by with all my baskets of fruits, most of them stepping out of the way to make room for me to pass them on my way.
I glanced around idly, I had a slight nudging to maybe try to say something, to show that I wasn’t the same kind of person as Fist. That thought lasted for about five seconds before I ignored it and kept walking. I had never been a social person to begin with, I was perfectly fine living my life in my little bubble without stepping outside of it.
It was unfortunate that the world seemed designed to never allow for that. I was always just having to do something important that needed me to step outside my comfort zone. It was quite annoying in all honesty.
I made it back to the counter where the small chef was yelling at one of the other cooks, it looked like he had dropped one of the pots full of the gruel they served. As I was approaching the counter I had a quick thought and looped a tendril of wood and connected all the baskets. Then I morphed all the fruits inside the baskets and removed the seeds from them.
It took an obscene amount of mana to do that and I had to quickly put down the baskets before I ran out of mana for my barriers. The sudden movements caught the head chef's attention.
“Back so soon? You don’t quite have enough time to eat something again if you’re still hungry, and even if you did I wouldn’t give it to you. I have other people to feed as well.”
She put her hands on her hips giving me a challenging look.
I shook my head in response, “That’s not why I’m here. I was working on acquiring a particular skill and I don’t necessarily know what to do with the byproducts of the skill so I figured you might.”
I reached down and picked up one of the baskets of apples. I still found it strange that they didn’t have apples here as far as I had seen so far. It was possible they had them in some far-off distant place that didn’t have a lot of influence in these southern countries. The continent was massive, so they just might exist somewhere no one had been yet.
She looked at the fruits with an appraising eye, “What even are these? Some kind of fruit?” She picked one up and looked at it.
“May I?” She asked, giving me a quick glance before biting into it when I gave her a nod.
While she was pondering the apple I picked up the other baskets and set them on the counter between us. When I finished she was taking another bite out of it with a curious expression on her face.
“What is this? I’ve never seen these before let alone tasted one. I’m fairly certain these don’t exist either, if they taste this good and you hadn’t even acquired a skill yet then these would be immensely popular, or at the very least be sitting at the top of the fruit table as a popular ingredient.”
“They’re called Apples. And are they really that good? I mean, they’re alright, there are several different kinds, these are called Red Delicious, I’m pretty sure. They’re personally my favorite, but there are several other kinds that are just as popular where I come from.”
She grunted as she looked at the apple in her hand.
“Alright. So what do you want in return for these then?”
“Honestly, I’m not even sure about that. I just didn’t want them to go to waste in my room and I figured you’d be able to make use of them. Perhaps you could make a business model out of them, there are several pastries and desserts that are made with these fruits individually, perhaps you could figure out how to make some and sell them to people? I’ll supply and then you cut me in for part of the profits?” I said with a slight shrug.
“Although if that’s not something you’re interested in I don’t really have any other ideas. In the meantime, I guess you can just have them for nothing. If you decide on something you can let me know I guess.”
She nodded slowly, “Alright. I’ll see what I can do, no promises though. If you don’t have anything else, then get out of here. I got some ideas I want to try.”
“Oh, just one more thing.”
She turned back with an annoyed look on her face. “What?” She said curtly.
“What’s your name? Or what should I call you?”
She looked at me for a moment before she started laughing.
“I guess I never did introduce myself, did I? My name is Jolene. Pleased to meet you. Now git.”
I raised my hands in mock surrender as I turned around to walk away.
I took a few steps before David appeared before me taking quick steps, and he looked a bit shaken.
“Elf, with me. Now.”
I frowned slightly, “Why? What’s going on?”
“Damn it, now is not the time for questions, follow. Me.” He hissed at me and turned around and started walking away towards the exit of our cavern that leads into the main cavern before the gorge.
He turned around for a moment, “Also, armor up. Go as flashy as possible. You got any abilities that make you look powerful, now is the time to use them.”
I followed behind me, my armor folding up over my body and spreading out. I added a couple of cosmetic changes this time, adding a bit of green to it in the form of leaves as well that rustled softly as I walked behind David, my longer stride easily keeping pace with him.
Sparks and tendrils of lightning surged off my legs and feet and left behind sparks wherever I stepped, causing people to quickly get out of me. The ones not moving fast enough felt a minor shock as they got touched by the little sparks.
We stepped up to the door leading out and David knocked on it with a series of knocks in complicated patterns, with pauses and rhythms. Occasionally he used both hands as well and even kicked the door once.
Eventually, he stopped after a full thirty seconds of pounding the door. The door glowed softly before it opened, standing on the other side was Lurks. She immediately fixed me with a stare that chilled me all the way to my soul.
My steps stuttered slightly, David came to a stop in front of her with me just a step behind him.
“This is him,” David said and then stepped back into the door and closed it behind himself.
What the fuck? David, don't leave me here, DAVID!
He closed the door behind him, oblivious to the screams in the sanctuary of my mind.
I turned back stiffly to look at Lurks. Something about her was completely unnerving and I couldn’t place my finger on it. Maybe it was a combination of things. From the way she moved to the feel of her mana, and the fact that she had a condescending stare as she looked down on me both figuratively and literally. Maybe it was the fact that I could instinctually feel she was much stronger than the average tier four. Something about her caused all of my instincts to scream danger.
Eventually, she spoke,
“Follow,” is all she said to me before turning around and walking away with the sinuous grace of an apex predator.
She led me through the winding paths of the cavern, soldiers marching from place to place, moving weaponry, training against dummies, and sitting at tables relaxing with their friends. A majority of them stopped and turned to look at us as we passed by them adding to the stress already on my mind.
It took us several minutes to walk through the portion of the cavern we were in and eventually we made it to a slope that started taking us up, it winded and turned back on itself frequently as it carried us to the upper levels of the cavern.
With a feeling of dread that coiled around my heart like a vice, I realized where we were headed. We topped a familiar ledge and I saw a singular door. Lurks led me up to the door before knocking on it twice very softly and then stepped back and waited.
After a few short moments, I heard a voice speak from the other side, “Enter.”
The command was spoken softly, but I could feel the weight of the word spoken. As if it were a law of nature on the same level of gravity rather than a simple word, or maybe it was so powerful because it was such a simple word. I had no answers to the question.
Lurks opened the door and ushered me in first. The inside of the room was exceedingly well decorated, but not ostentatious in its design. Along the eastern wall rested mounted trophies of victorious hunts of beasts I had no reference for. Reptilian, canine, feline, avian. All manner of genus hung upon the wall.
On the western side, there was a cabinet, inside it was filled with decorative glasses and various bottles of wines and spirits. In the western corner closest to the door there was an area for resting and relaxing, with two couches arranged in an L-formation around a table at knee height when you were sitting.
A few decorative pieces sat upon the tale in the center all of which sat on top of a fine rug. The flooring switched instantaneously from the dirt, rock floor to a finely polished wooden. I almost stepped onto it without thinking, but I immediately turned off my passive causing me to spark.
I had no interest in finding out what would happen if I burned my footprints into this flooring.
At the farthest end of the room, opposite the door, there was a painting of the man I had seen throw the rock yesterday. It was a life-sized portrait of the man I realized, especially as I had a good frame of reference given that he was seated at a desk in front of said painting.
He had his fingers steepled in front of him on the desk and was observing us as we crossed the room.
[Level 685⁶]
Ah.
I had known he was powerful, but this was a bit absurd. Although, I guess it made sense that someone powerful had to be in charge of this whole operation.
“I’ve brought the one, as requested, Commander Drikith,” Lurks said, speaking with a lot less creep factor and more respectful deference.
Drikith nodded curtly to her, “Thank you, Lurks. You may leave now.”
Lurks narrowed her eyes slightly and opened her mouth to say something, but ended up closing it without a word. She bowed her head slightly before turning around and quietly leaving the room.
Leaving me completely alone in the room with this man.
For a moment we stood there, as he observed me and I observed him. My entire body felt like it was locking up as he combed me over with his eyes, completely taking in every minute detail.
“Interesting.” He said after what seemed like an eternity.
“I have many questions for you, little elf.” His voice was as smooth as warm honey. And it completely coated my mind with its insidious sweetness, robbing me of my thinking capabilities in a way that screamed skill use.
“But first I think we shall start with this.” He reached down and pulled up a long wooden box and rested it on his desk and opened it, revealing my sword. The sword Illesea had given me.
“Where did you get this?” He asked.
I wanted to leave.
