Sophie woke up to not one, but two sets of eyes staring down at her – a pair of familiar blue ones and another of hazel. She wondered, wildly, if she had somehow ended up in some sort of harem story – not that she had experience reading those or anything. Ahem.

But then she remembered…The little cakes. The offering. The fire.

“Are you okay?” This, from Acacia.

“You leveled up!” This, of course, from Elowen. “But you scared us! You really must stop doing that.”

Sophie sat up carefully. Her head was killing her. “What happened?” Although she could sort of picture it. They were back in the shrine now, and she was actually on her folding mattress in the back. “Wait, did you carry me?”

Acacia laughed. “Luckily, I have a few tricks up my sleeve.”

“Some people are able to use their mana to increase their physical strength,” Elowen explained.

“Ah…” Sophie said, although she still felt embarrassed about the idea of passing out in the courtyard. “But it worked at least? Right?”

Elowen nodded. “Oh! Yes, it did. It was wonderful!” Her mouth quirked up in a small, pleased smile, but it was gone in a moment, replaced by an annoyed frown. “But, you really need to be more careful! I can’t believe you did that!”

“I know, I know…” Sophie said, only to realize Acacia looked incredibly confused. “Ah, right. You guys can’t actually communicate, can you?”

“Nope!” Acacia agreed. “Not a word. So, did it work? I didn’t even get to find out that much before you went tumbling over on us.”

Sophie felt her face heat again at the image. She must have really scared both of them. “It did,” she explained. “Although I suppose I used a little too much mana. I haven’t worked with fire before.”

Acacia looked surprised at this. “Not at all?”

Sophie shook her head. “Nope. That was the first time. But, on the bright side, it sounds like I leveled up at least.”

Elowen nodded eagerly at this. “You did! Level 4!”

“Really!” Acacia said, sounding impressed. “Were you on the brink of one, then?”

“I think I must have been,” Sophie replied. “I’ve been practicing mana channeling for a few days now –”

“Wait – a few days?” Acacia interrupted. “Practicing what? You don’t mean it’s only been a few days since you last leveled up, right?”

“Ummm…” Sophie trailed off, suddenly unsure. She glanced over to Elowen for help, but the spirit shrugged.

“You are leveling rather quickly,” Elowen unhelpfully supplied.

“Is it that fast?” Sophie asked.

“Oh, yes,” Elowen replied. “Quite impressive, actually.”

Sophie nearly snorted at that. Elowen was rarely ever all that impressed with her mana abilities, but she seemed especially pleased today. Perhaps because of the offering?

“It is completely unheard of,” Acacia cut in. “Leveling usually takes a much longer time than that. In fact, it takes even more time as your levels increase. Although you did just become a priestess, but still… You must be working yourself to exhaustion nearly every day.”

“Guilty as charged,” Sophie admitted, wryly.

“But even if you were…” Acacia trailed off, still looking dumbfounded. “Days?” She shook her head.

Sophie wondered if now was the time to admit that she was only actually a Level 4, and that she also wasn’t even from this reality. The other woman looked so dumbfounded already that Sophie imagined it was probably best to save both of those for another day.

Although Sophie did have the realization that Acacia must not be able to tell her level. She had wondered about that before… She still didn’t quite understand how mana levels were determined, but it seemed like it was different from determining one’s class. Euan from the Crafter’s Guild, the tailor, and the clerk from the administration office all seemed to be able to tell Sophie’s class, for example, but she was pretty sure they couldn’t see her level, otherwise she would imagine people would have had a lot more questions about her…

“Regardless,” Acacia continued, interrupting Sophie’s train of thought. “Training to exhaustion is too dangerous, Sophie. You really need to be more careful.”

Elowen gave her a pointed look, as well, and Sophie shrank under the critical gaze of two angry women. Great. Maybe this was a harem story.

“I’m sorry,” she said, hanging her head. She wished she could promise not to do it again, but she thought it best to skip that all together. This kind of thing was really a theme in her life, and she doubted she’d be able to keep that type of promise, even if she thought she might mean it at the time.

Acacia shook her head again. “Priestesses,” she muttered, as if she had any experience in the matter and Elowen nodded sagely in agreement. “Well, anyway. You’re probably feeling awful right about now.”

Sophie took a moment to think about the condition of her body, then. Her head hurt, she felt quite dizzy, her mouth was dry, and her heart was beating a little too rapidly in her chest. She could almost hear it reverberating in her skull, in fact.

She did, indeed, feel awful. Rather like she had a hangover, but maybe without the nausea. “Ugh,” she replied. “I do. I definitely do.”

“Right,” Acacia said. “Well, we can fix that. Let’s get some food in you.”

“Food?” Sophie asked, skeptically. She was pretty sure she didn’t have much in the way of real food, unless Acacia meant her own heaven-sent baked goods or the little cakes she had brought for Elowen.

“Yes, food,” Acacia replied, rolling her eyes. “Have you really been living off of pastries? There was absolutely nothing to work with here.”

Sophie chuckled weakly. “I’m telling you, I really can’t cook. I had some ingredients, but they were all sacrificed to the terrible soup a few days ago.”

“Well luckily I can,” Acacia teased. “There’s a whole pot of non-terrible soup in the kitchen. At least, it tastes fine to me.”

“What?” Sophie asked, surprised. “But I thought you said you had nothing to work with!”

“You’ve been out for hours,” Acacia complained. “After I got you back here, I couldn’t exactly talk with Elowen. So, I made some tea and hung out for a bit, but when it seemed like you weren’t waking up for a while I decided to go into town and grab one of these –” She pulled out what appeared to be a small bread roll. “And I figured I’d pick some other things up along the way.”

“More bread?” Sophie asked, as Acacia handed the roll over.

“No, silly. It’s a mana loaf.” Acacia replied. “You know, like…” she trailed off, looking embarrassed. “Well, actually, sorry about our cooking lessons. I meant to apologize earlier, but we got a little distracted with the whole –” she waved a hand at the surroundings.

Sophie nodded. Right. The whole burnt offering and then passing out in the courtyard thing.

“Anyway,” Acacia said. “This is what my sister wanted me to make. If you take a little bite of this mana bread, it’ll go a long way in making you feel better.”

Sophie tried a small bite, as instructed. It pretty much tasted exactly like the loaves of bread she had been living off of recently, but she could almost immediately feel energy returning to her – a soothing warmth that boosted her spirits. “This is great!” she said, preparing to pop the whole thing into her mouth.

“Hey, don’t overdo it!” Acacia warned, reaching out as if to physically stop her. “Save some for later. You can make yourself sick if you eat it too quickly.”

Sophie paused, mid-bite. “Why is everything so dangerous?” She frowned down at the offending mana bread.

Acacia laughed. “I don’t know. But it is. And anyway, I tried to keep the soup warm for you.”

Sophie perked up at the mention of more food. She really was starving, the more she thought about it. “I'm sure it's delicious,” she said, practically scrambling off of the folding mattress. She swayed a bit on her feet as she stood and Acacia caught her by the arm.

“Careful,” Acacia warned.

“I'm fine, I'm fine,” Sophie reassured her, but she was glad for the help.

Elowen hovered excitedly around the kitchen as Acacia served Sophie a bowl of soup. It definitely looked far superior to Sophie’s own attempt. It had chunks of some sort of poultry meat and perfectly diced vegetables in it – including the offending potatoes from Sophie’s own disaster of a soup.

“I couldn't help but notice you don't even have a chill box in here,” Acacia said, as she sat down with her own bowl.

Sophie nodded as she took a careful bite of the soup. “That’ll be fixed by tomorrow, actually,” she replied. “Briony hooked me up with one. Also, this soup is amazing.”

“Ah, right. I did send you over to the Crafter’s Guild,” Acacia replied. “So I suppose you got that window fixed, then?”

“Yep, and she gave me a whole list of other things to do. But the chill box was my number one priority.”

“You should do the oven next,” Acacia said with a laugh. “No wonder you can't cook anything. It's definitely a lot easier when you have modern appliances to work with.”

Sophie was sure that was probably right. But, after all, she had lived in many places with many modern appliances for a very long time before coming to this strange fantasyland, and she had never managed to get the hang of cooking there either.

“I suppose,” she said, taking another bite of soup.

Acacia shook her head, laughing again. “Well, at the very least, I can teach you how to make this.” She held up her own spoonful of soup. “Hopefully it’s more palatable than the one you mentioned before.”

Sophie nodded eagerly. “A million times more,” she said in agreement. “Although I don’t know if I could replicate it, even with your expert assistance.”

Acacia all but glared at her. “I don’t think you get it. You will be taking cooking lessons from me. There’s no choice in the matter now. Especially after I saw the state of your pantry.”

Elowen didn’t even bother to stifle her laugh at the comment. It wasn’t fair. It wasn’t like Elowen even needed to eat food, so what did she know?

“I’d be honored,” Sophie managed. “Although I don’t envy you the task…”

Acacia rolled her eyes. “Well, with that – now that I know that you'll live to see the morning, I probably better head back to town before it falls dark,” she said with a sigh. She started picking up her bowl to place in the basin where Sophie washed dishes up.

“Ah, darn. I never finished getting the markers lit,” Sophie said. “Will you have trouble getting back?”

Acacia shook her head. “I don’t think so. It’s not full dark, yet, but I’d take a lantern if you had one, just in case.”

Sophie nodded. “I have a spare,” she said, and made her way back into the little living space next to the kitchen to grab one of the lanterns she had found.

Acacia lit it with the striker that she must have brought in from the courtyard. “Thanks,” she said, setting the striker down on the counter next to the little box of cakes. “So, you really have to light all of those markers by hand?”

“Yep,” Sophie confirmed with a sigh. “And they go all the way into town. I suppose I’ll try to finish them up tomorrow. Since there’s no mana left here, I guess they don’t work any more, unless I channel mana directly into them.”

Acacia frowned. “You better take it easy,” she warned. “But anyway, I had hoped that was just a rumor about the mana here. So there really isn't any? Not at all?”

Sophie shook her head. She couldn’t sense it herself yet, but… “Apparently not. Someone stopped by yesterday to register me as the town's priestess, and they confirmed it as well. It sounds like it’s going to be quite difficult to get it fixed. It’s partially why Elowen’s in the state she's in.”

Sophie gestured to where Elowen was sitting on the counter, pouting now at the mention of her Faded state. She couldn’t exactly participate in the conversation without Sophie acting as a translator for her, and Sophie imagined she must have had a terrible time while Sophie was passed out earlier. The thought made her wince. Maybe she should be a little more careful. If only for Elowen’s sake.

Acacia glanced over the direction that Sophie indicated, towards Elowen but obviously not seeing her. “Right,” she said, softly. “I wish there was something I could do to help…”

“Well, I think I have a lead at the Adventurer’s Guild,” Sophie said. “So I’ll probably check that out tomorrow, as well.”

“Good luck,” Acacia replied. “And do let me know if there’s any way I can lend assistance.”

Sophie nodded and showed Acacia back out to the front of the shrine.

***

After Acacia left, Sophie cleaned up the kitchen a bit and took a few more bites of the mana bread. In fact, compared to when she first woke up, she was starting to feel positively energetic again.

“Should we train more tonight?” she asked Elowen, who was still hovering above the counter in a sitting pose, right next to the little box of cakes. “I think I’m up for testing out channeling into your stone –”

“Of course not,” Elowen said, floating to her feet and crossing her arms. “Don't you understand the meaning of rest?”

Sophie frowned. “But – I mean… I rested. Apparently for several hours according to Acacia. I feel great now.”

“You can't possibly feel great,” Elowen countered. “And even if you do, I forbid it. No more training tonight. None until tomorrow at the very least.”

Sophie supposed that she did level up but she still couldn't help feeling like it wasn't enough, especially not after the conversation with Acacia and thinking more about the shrine. There was so much to do here, and she was so far behind.

What else was there to do around the shrine anyway, other than cleaning or training? Gardening, she supposed – the courtyard was still not in the best shape, since she got distracted by the garden shed the day before. But it was a little too dark to go out there, even with the mana lights in the courtyard. And she probably wasn't brave enough to go out to the little shed in the dark. Not even with a lantern to light her way.

There were books, she supposed. And the letters that she had seen that very first day. All of the things that the former shrine priestess left behind. If she couldn’t train, she might as well go through some of them.

Maybe she could find a hint as to what happened here, or what she could do to fix it.