The way back was monopolized by my mumbling, cursing myself for my lousy memory. The reason for my foul mood was simple; once more, I was overweight. I had totally forgotten about the dimensional storage skill.

My mood was dispelled as I reached the village. The moonlight fell into the wide, open space, and then refracted on the crystal formations, bathing the whole village into a silvery, blue, soft light. Golden lights trembled from within the windows on the tree houses far above me, resembling fireflies hidden in a canopy. From one big house near the entrance to the village, soft music accompanied a soothing voice who was singing a slow ballad. Almost mesmerized, following the voice as a guide, I climbed up and entered the inn.

The inside was much simpler. Small, round, wooden tables took most of the space, with a small raised area where an elf was singing a ballad accompanied by another one playing something like a lute. Oil lamps kept the whole place illuminated in a soft, yellow light, and another elf was standing behind a wooden counter, serving wine to a few patrons that lined that area. Most of the tables were empty by this time. Keros was nowhere to be found, probably long now asleep.

Fishing in my pocket I realized the second major problem. I only had four coppers...

I approached the innkeeper looking dejected already. Today it had been quite a tiring day with all the hunting, the walking around, and the bosses, I would hate to have to sleep in the cold soil below.

"Hello."

He gave me a good look before he shrugged.

"Evening to you as well. Now, out with it. Your face tells me that there's something you want."

"Do you accept meat as payment?"

"...Normally, no. But scratch my back, and I'll scratch yours. And since you've helped us already, I suppose I can make an exception. "

Selling the sixty-six pieces netted me three gold and three silvers. I WAS RICH! And more importantly, no longer overweight, since most of my encumbrance was from the raw weight of the meat. I happily spend two silvers for a room and dinner, ate a herbal scented roasted pig, and dropped to bed like lead.

By the time I actually woke up and contacted Keros, they were already on their way towards Grinea to grab the rewards of the chain quest they completed yesterday evening. Seeing as the round trip was almost five hours, that gave me plenty of time to do some serious work.

According to the guards, dimensional magic was the providence of the gods, and indeed, my problems were finally answered by a gray-robed elf in a tree church. All for the minimal price of nine silvers.

You've gained the skill Dimensional storage Lv1.

You can put non-soulbound items in a safe place in another dimension. Time will be suspended in there. Costs 1 maximum mana/ inventory slot, +1 maximum mana/2Kg. Higher levels allow better mana to storage conversion and allow more maximum slots. Current: 5 maximum inventory slots.

FINALLY! I thanked the priest from the bottom of my heart, disregarding the confused face he was making while I was jumping and shouting from joy.

I sold the excess hides and ultimately decided that I had to sacrifice the boar tusks as well to the altar of capitalism. Gold. So much gold flowed into my pouch, over twelve gold pieces lined my pockets, and as easy as they appeared, they were gone again, as I picked up the full recipe set for the composite armor. I also took the opportunity to ask how you can use soul-infusion on leatherworking. It seemed that you could only use larger monster stones and you had to mix them in during the tanning process.

You learned the Leatherworking Talent Soul-infused leather

Looking at the plans and the remaining materials, I calculated that if I had sold everything I would have gained close to 20 gold. Enough to actually buy a slick armor like the one Keros used...

Maybe leatherworking wasn't useful in the end if you never actually sold gear and just used it for yourself... Whatever.

As I tanned and thinned the leather, preparing it for the composite armor, I summoned Knight-kun. Unfortunately, I only had one large monster crystal, the hobgoblin one, so I could only soul-infuse the chest piece's leather. Now, it was time to actually try something that one of my conversations with the steel elemental in the forest yesterday had inspired me.

"So, Knight-kun, you said that similarly to how you stretch and thin your lance, you actually have control over the shape, right?"

"Sir, yes Sir!"

"Can you then stretch your arms and weave the strands like a loose mesh?"

"...I think so, Sir. Why?"

"See those layers of leather? I would normally put lumps of iron in-between them, and then secure them all together with iron studs."

"Pff, iron is weak Sir, I'm so much better!" He replied as he puffed his chest forward.

"Exactly! So, can you weave a steel mesh instead, securing the leather layers together? "

Knight-kun gave me a good look like he was measuring me, and then he started elongating his arms and weaving them. He started from the chest area, creating a tightly woven mesh, which switched to a more loose one as he moved towards the areas that needed some mobility. As he was weaving, the steel thread kept piercing through the two leather layers, alternating between them, securing them and shaping them as he did so. From time to time he would look at me, measure me with his eyes, and adjust the shape accordingly. As time passed, and more and more of his body was actually invested in the armor, he kept growing smaller.

By the end of the process, all that was left was a palm sized elemental. I carefully picked the miniature Knight-kun on my hand and raised him to my eye level.

"I hope that's adequate Sir" He shouted, with a very high-pitched voice, as he saluted me last time before the tiny amount of material crumbled lifeless in my hand.

You have Created a Leatherworking recipe: Mesh leather armor.

The threaded metal is not as sturdy as the lumps of metal in Composite armor, but Mesh leather armor is much lighter and allows higher mobility.

You have learned a Leatherworking Talent, Personalize Armor.

Using measurements, you can create leather armors that fit a person exactly, enhancing their performance.

I bowed my head slightly towards the tiny lump of steel on my hand and immediately rushed to the blacksmith to buy some more, enough to thread the rest armor pieces and still have enough steel afterwards to summon Knight-kun, blowing another gold piece and a half. The elemental went out of his way to even put solid strips of steel on the arm and shin guards, as well a ring of metal, like an inlaid circlet, on the helm. To finalize my work, I used magic ink to permanently inscribe P.Def runes on it.

Wearing my new set, and holding my enchanted dagger, I finally felt geared enough for the first time ever.

Unfortunately, since my old armor was soulbound, I simply broke it down to base materials for a tiny more skill xp. And with that, leatherworking was done.

Since there was still a ton of time left, it was finally the moment to experiment with infused elementals. I ended up spending two hours just to find a few more recipes. Apart from some obvious ones, finding the right base material proved to be much harder, and quite more enjoyable, than anticipated.

I used the rest of the time to actually craft soul-infused ones from those I thought they were the most useful. Those were the quicksand one, which was simply water and earth elementals on a mudball; Napalm, which produced a sticky flame that wouldn't extinguish, and was created by using fire and water elementals on a small vial containing oil; High explosives, producing a great blast of fire in a big area, solving my aoe problems by infusing air and fire on the material that took me the most time to find, a tiny piece of coal inside a glass tube; and finally, my trusted Air darts.

I made five of each of those, as well as five soul-infused burst daggers, and enough materials for ten deathtraps, albeit without using crystals on those since each one would take four of them and I wanted to keep my last eight for emergency infused summonings.

By the time I was done crafting five hours have passed already, but at least I've gained quite a bit of xp, just a bit higher than three thousand.

Looking satisfied at my character screen and my improved skills, there was only one thing that really didn't sit right with me. Due to me continuously raising intelligence and wisdom, my magic attack rivaled my physical one, even when using such an awesome, purely physical, dagger. But on the other hand, I really didn't want to turn to staff or wand for a weapon.

Inspired by Keros' bow skill, I thought that it would be awesome if I, too, gained a magic based dagger skill. This would combine the best of the two worlds, my stats, and a decent weapon.

Looking over my magic based skills, there was obviously Elementalism, Nature magic, Curse, and Elemental playground.

The illusion one was instantly discarded. Elementalism also seemed kinda redundant since, according to the druid, inscription, later on, would allow me to put elemental effects on the runes. That left Nature magic and Curse.

Combining Dagger mastery Lv10 and Nature magic Lv1 will result in Nature magic combining into a new skill. Accept? Y/N

So... Dagger mastery will remain and instead Nature magic will change. Apart from this being not what I wanted, I would also like to keep Nature magic as is, for a future combination I had in my mind.

No.

Combining Dagger mastery Lv10 with Curse Lv1 will merge both skills into a new skill. Accept? Y/N

Damn... I actually liked curse for its potential against bosses. The hatred talent that instantly gave you rage also seemed to pair well with it... Whatever.

Yes.

Dagger mastery Lv10 and Curse Lv1 have successfully merged into the skill Dread blade Lv8

Dread blade

Evil intentions seep through your cursed strikes. Combining lethal martial prowess and hatred, Dread blade dagger techniques automatically consume Rage, if available, for extra, detrimental effects.

Dagger mastery talents have been adjusted to Dread blade talents Old New Stab: +10% damage, +30% armor piercing. Costs 20 stamina. 3sec CD Cursed strike: +30% armor piercing. Consume an additional 10 Rage to afflict an accuracy debuff. Costs 20 stamina. 3sec CD Backstab: +100% Damage, +100% armor piercing, requires stealth. Costs 40 stamina. 0 sec CD Mark target: +100% armor piercing, increases Rage generation of all strikes against the target, requires stealth, costs 40 stamina. 0 sec CD Quick slash: Additional attack during a dagger attack. Costs 20 stamina. 0 sec CD Malice: Dagger attacks cause additional Magic damage by consuming Rage. Costs 5 rage per strike. Toggle. Retreating strike: +50% damage, +30% armor piercing, tumble backwards 5m. Costs 20 stamina. 10sec CD Vanishing strike: +30% armor piercing, tumble backwards 5m. Consume an additional 30 Rage to momentarily confuse your target's senses, causing him to lose you. Costs 20 stamina. 20 sec CD Execute: +(50+X)% Damage, +100% armor piercing. X is equal to target's missing health %. Costs: 40 stamina. 10sec CD

Sentence: Consume Mark to cause target 20% of total damage suffered while Marked as Magic damage. Range 10m. Costs 50 rage. 10sec CD

(Currently unavailable, requires Skill Level 10)

That... turned out better than expected!

Keros messaged me that they'll be arriving in the village in about half an hour, which gave me just enough time to try and practice my new toys with the help of a not-so-lucky tree just outside the village.

As I'd expected, from the tooltips, it seemed my original burst damage had taken quite a blow. Especially the removal of the massive backstab bonus was quite severe. But on the flip side, Mark did give plenty of rage, and it seemed like that would apply to everyone hitting the target, not just me. And rage, either indirectly through skills, or even directly, through percentage bonuses, added to damage the higher you got. Plus, it was kinda necessary for allowing me to chain my skills. From what I could tell watching my bar, the original 2 per second and 5 per hit, rage was amplified to 2 per second and 10 per hit, which basically meant that the rest of people would get a big boost, while I could use Malice without a care in the world.

Vanishing strike, if I understood what it did, since the poor tree wasn't really conducive to this aspect of the test, would be awesome to allow me to enter stealth again, but unlike Retreating strike, it had quite a bit longer cooldown. Malice, on the other hand, was awesome. For starters, it was much more fluid compared to the double strike, secondly, the fact that I didn't have to waste another 20 stamina for each hit, basically meant that my sustained damage was quite higher. I had a feeling that it would suck if I had procs, but who cares. Similarly, I couldn't really tell if the accuracy debuff of cursed strikes was better than the slight damage boost of stab and the additional damage those 10 rage points represented.

Lastly, Sentence sounded like it would be the actual big boost to my damage, at least compared to execute, which was basically another backstab or slightly higher than that. Plus, it was finally a ranged skill, AND it seemed to feed on all damage suffered, so elementals, or the occasional party member, should actually amplify that quite a bit. Sadly, that meant I would have to grind my teeth for two more skill levels to get it.

All in all, it seemed like a decent upgrade. Lower burst but higher sustain, would help with either elementals or party members, and more importantly, it also dealt some magic damage that I assume was based on my Magic attack as I hoped. The only thing was that Rogue armor mastery's stamina bonus, now seemed superfluous, so that kinda locked my next combination.

I continued to shadow box, trying to get the feel on the new moves that the skills twisted my body and form, until Keros, finally, messaged me that they had arrived at the village. It was quite easy to find his extravagant figure waiting at the edge of the village. He was accompanied by a slightly shorter companion who was equally flamboyant.

The woman next to him was wearing some sort of white harem pants which, due to her tight, knee high, laced, black boots, sagged at her knees and, alongside a deep red sash wrapped tightly around her slim waist, made her look like a female corsair right out of a movie. Above the sash her fit, white, buttoned shirt with a wide, open collar had the top buttons popped open drawing one's eyes towards her small bosom. And what I originally saw as weirdly-red, thin, vines embroidered on the shirt, were actually super-thin, stylized, flames. She had a bit darker complexion, almost, but not quite, tanned, which somehow simultaneously contradicted and fit her vivid, dark red with golden highlights, shoulder length, slightly curled, hair. Two bright green eyes completed the fully exotic image of the, currently laughing, human female.

An engraved staff, slightly taller than her, that started thin, and ended as thick as my arms and finished on a beautiful fist sized red crystal, completed her appearance.

I approached the duo waving my hand.

"Sup."

"Greetings brother! We finally managed to meet up! How did my brethren here in the village treated you?" He over-enthusiastically started moving his hands as he was talking, trying to somehow embrace the whole village. On the other hand, the woman's smile had disappeared, replaced by a sharp gaze like she was judging me.

"Hello."

"Oh, yes! Brother this is Spitha. She may be only a human, but she shows equal zeal to cleanse the forest as any one of us! Spitha, this is Qualexis."

She raised her hand to stop the elf as she frowned.

"For starters, do not, even for an instant, assume that I'm like the kid here. As long as something gives good xp and skills and gold, I'm in. Secondly, kid, I can read. His name is right there on the party screen, as is mine."

"Also, Keros, I told you to call me Alex."

Raising her eyebrow, she looked towards me. "Keros?"

"I'm not calling him his actual nick, since he's ok with that, it works for both of us."

"Meh, I simply call him kid..."

"I'm not a kid! I'm a nature's guardian! Even the elder said so after we cleared the goblin warlord!"

"Yeah, yeah. Speaking of that..."

I reached in my inventory to pull the twenty-odd crystals that were his share of the boss fight, and I noticed that I barely had two gold pieces remaining. About as much as his actual share from the daggers were...

Easy come, easy go, I guess. Adding quickly all the money that had passed through my hands, it was just shy of twenty gold pieces in the span of one and a half day. And now, giving the last gold to Keros, I was left with two silvers and four coppers. A vast fortune lost in a day...

"Here," I said as I handed the gold and the crystals. "That's your share." Let's not mention the actual monster stone from the hobgoblin that now resided in my leather chest...

Since I knew that the elf was reliable, and I've just gotten my hands on some skills that could work well in a party, the next part was only natural.

"So, what are you guys going to do now? You mind if I join you?"

"Absolutely brother! You're alwa..."

"What's your current quests?"

"I don't have any. We can always go fight some monsters." Meh, quests are bothersome.

"You don't have quests??? Why?!" She somehow seemed genuinely surprised.

"I don't usually get them, I just farm stuff I guess?" Wait, was it that weird that I didn't have any?

"..." There was some form of pity in her eyes as she looked at me. "That's weird and completely inefficient. You can grab quests everywhere by speaking to the npcs afterall..."

"...I see." I knew I was missing something when I saw those weirdly high levels on the forums!

"You simply can't level without quests, and they are easy to get as well." And then she turned towards Keros, "Kid, go find us some quests."

"Why me again?! And I've told you not to call me that! At least call me like brother does, or at least Nature's guardian!"

"Tell you what. If you find us an awesome quest chain, I'll stop calling you a kid."

"Deal!" And like that, he simply turned and started running.

I shot a sideways glance towards Spitha as Keros moved away.

"If 'quests are easy to get' why don't you go to find some and sent Keros instead?"

"...NPCs are annoying. At least the kid has fun talking to them." She replied turning her own gaze away from mine.

"I thought so..."

"Hey! At least I'm not a leech like you."

"What?! I'm not a leech! I even properly gave him our shared spoils that I could have easily pocketed!"

She crossed her arms below her chest as she looked me straight in the eyes.

"That's the sole reason I agreed to let you in the party in the first place. But if I see you only leeching, you're out."

"You seem pretty determined that I'll just be leeching."

"Obviously! Why else would you party with us with your crappy level."

"How do you even know my level?"

"Oh god... You're also a noob? Soulsight, soulsight! At my current level, I can see your average strength from this close. It's even easy to train, just keep swapping weapons and looking at your status."

Oh... she was one of those people.

"...Pass. By the way, what's your level actually?"

"Fourteen, and the kid is twelve."

Damn... she was right. With my level 8 it would be almost like I was leeching from someone with nearly double my level.

"...I see. I can at least try to support you two. Speaking of which, you're a spellcaster, right?"

Suddenly there were sparks shining in her eyes.

"Obviously! Finally, a game where fire magic is also top dps! Unlike earth which is more defensive, air which is more about mobility, and water which is more supportive and flexible, fire magic is just pure damage!"

She was giggling like a teenage girl talking about her first love.

"Let me guess, you always play fire mages?"

"What? No! There are a ton of games where I am forced to play stupid things like archers because they do more damage. But this time I get to play what I like the most as well!"

"So, ranged dps?"

"Duh! The best way to farm xp, blast them before they reach you. Not that a slow-poke like a stealthy dagger user that wastes most of his time to even get to his prey would understand."

Hey! Stop spreading your superiority aura over me! Daggers are awesome!

We kept talking like that for a little less than half an hour. She was actually a fountain of knowledge regarding some mechanics, knowledge gained by continuously browsing the forums for any little parcel of information. From just this short talk there were two apparent obsessions, fire damage and being on the top. The fact that the whole time the conversation lasted she kept swapping her staff with a wand was slightly disconcerting though.

Keros approached with a hasty pace and a frown on his face.

"What's wrong?"

"You didn't find a quest?"

Our voices greeted him.

"That's not it! There's trouble... I was speaking with the Druids about the lizardmen. It seems that it's weird that the came so close to the village after all. Like something chased them away from their habitat. Naturally, I promised to investigate."

"So? What's the problem? That sounds like a quest alright." Spitha interjected.

"The problem is that as I was leaving, I chatted with a guard. He told me that his son hasn't returned from when he went to the lizardmen to scout and begged me to search for him."

"So, double quest. Still not seeing any problem."

"I've promised the druid that I would report about what chased the lizardmen out by nightfall. And the guard told me that through a magic item he knows his son is still alive but injured! We can't search the whole lizardmen area for him and still investigate what lies beyond them before nightfall!"

"Wait... BOTH QUESTS ARE TIMED?! Crap!"

"And I don't know which to do! The druid gave me that time limit due to his foresight skill, implying that something bad may happen if we don't act quickly. The guard's son, on the other hand, may die till tomorrow! "

So, it was like that, eh... The answer was obvious.

"We should help the guard."

"Brother! I knew you had a big heart!"

"No... He's just the closest so we don't have to run far away..."

"Cut the crap both of you. We obviously need to go to the druid quest."

"Spitha... I knew you'll come around and start liking the village!"

"What the fuck are you talking about? Obviously whatever chased the damned lizards is higher level and more xp. Plus, it may lead to a chain quest!"

"I still say the closest. "

"You don't get to vote leecher. We go to the furthest."

"As expected from my trusted allies! You agree to push ourselves and aim for both!"

Oh god... We're screwed.