The walk home was quiet. I think Athena is nervous, or it could be pretty much anything else. As we walked through the garden gate, I broke the silence. "Tesla dropped your stuff off in your room. I figured you could spend the afternoon unpacking, and if you need help moving the furniture around, I can help." Tesla took the opportunity to jump from my shoulder to Athena's, where she rubbed her face on Athena's neck before sitting down.

Athena nodded but stayed silent as we walked into the house. She paused in the doorway. "Your home is huge."

I had forgotten that no one entered the house when we had her family over for dinner. "It is pretty big. The kitchen, dining area, and living space are all together. But that does make it pretty large."

I walked to the doors on the back wall, pointing out Lena and Arterian's rooms, the bathroom, and my bedroom. Athena walked to my door and took a deep breath before opening it and walking in. It was still pretty bare, I didn't spend much time in it, but I kept it as clean as possible.

Athena turned to me in confusion. "Where did you say my stuff was?"

"In your room...?" I was confused too.

Athena held out a hand, ushering me back out the door. I walked to the fourth door opposite my own and opened it to show the only room that was more empty than my own. It was the same size as mine, complete with a desk, two dressers, and the two beds on opposite sides of the room. The only other thing in the room was the neat line of bags Tesla dropped off this morning.

"You can arrange the space however you want, but we have to keep duplicates in the room as credible evidence that Arterian lives in the here as well." I looked around the room before turning to Athena. Her face was completely neutral, and she turned to me too before giving a quick bow.

"Thank you, Jak. I'll unpack for a bit and let you know when I'm done." She moved to the bags and moved them to a bed.

"I'll be in my room getting things ready, let me know if you get hungry or need something." I said as I walked out, clicking the door shut behind me, and headed back to my room.

I pulled out the survival guide Wisham left for me since it seemed to be the most important at the moment. The first chapter contained a list of useful things to take, so I got to work, making sure we were ready to go.

I was mostly done going through what I had already bought and getting spare clothes ready when Tesla interrupted me.

I can't tell if Athena is happy or sad. She is crying, but she is still working and doesn't have a sad expression on her face.

I sat on my bed listening to Tesla's voice in my head.

I don't know if you should come or not.

I decided not to, at least not right away. Also, I wished I could talk to Tesla the same way she could with me. This felt like spying, and I don't want to spy on Athena.

I moved to my desk and pulled out a map to plan the trip, but Tesla kept commenting.

Athena has a lot of clothes.

She doesn't fold her clothes like you do.

She is happy now.

I couldn't focus on the map, so I headed out to the kitchen to make some food. I had skipped lunch, and I wasn't sure if Athena had either. I tuned out the running commentary of Tesla, commenting on the colors of Athena's clothes, and how pretty her bows were.

I decided to make grilled cheese and prepared everything. While the sandwiches were in the pan, Athena came out with Tesla on her shoulder and looked around. I waved her over and got her some water as the grilled cheeses finished.

Tesla was eyeing the stack of grilled cheese. I split them up between us and sat down with the two of them. I took a bite, and so did Tesla and Athena.

This smells good, Jak!

"These are called grilled cheese. Dig in."

We started eating, and both Athena and Tesla enjoyed the gooey sandwiches.

"Thank you," Athena said. "For everything, not just lunch. I wasn't sure what to expect, but I knew you were a good person. The room and the being able to take on these Jobs are exactly what I've always wanted. So, Thank you. Would you like to go over the plans?"

I caught her eyes for a moment before I looked away. "Sure. Come to my room and look at what I've got so far."

We walked back to my room, and I gestured to the collection of gear Tesla left in the corner. Athena sat down next to the mostly organized pile with her tail curled up next to her and started sifting through it.

We had two small tents, the grill I had made by a blacksmith, two pans, various knives, a fire starter kit, a sewing kit, blankets, two small pillows, and a toiletry kit.

"I have a couple of changes of clothes ready too." I gestured to my small stack of clothing on my bed. "But Tesla has me thinking we can take better quality food. Weight and freshness isn't an issue with her storage skill."

"I've got a small bag of clothes I need to finish packing, and I'll be ready. I think we should maybe just prepare some more dense foods instead of packing something more complicated: bread, cheese, that sort of thing." Athena suggested thoughtfully.

"I agree, those grilled cheese sandwiches are easy to make and are quite filling. I'll go pick us up some, and you can finish packing. Is there anything you need?"

Athena's surprise showed in her voice. "Uhh... I-I don't think so?"

"Tesla, are you coming with me, or are you staying with Athena?"

I'll stay!

"Okay, I had an idea, though. Athena, do you know of any cheap dense food that Tesla could eat?"

"There are plenty of grains, nuts, and seeds that are cheap. I could probably pick up a decent amount from Mother on our way out of town. I'd suggest going to Burhke's shop near the coast for food traveling supplies. Father was always talking about him and how he took care of people."

--

We stopped at Athena's parent's house on the way out of town, and we got three large sacks of food for Tesla. Two were nuts, and the other was a grain. We said goodbye to Norrin and Antragus before finally leaving town. Lena and Arterian made us a big breakfast, so we said our goodbyes there with them.

Now that we were on the road, I pulled out the map. The Kingdom of Rune was one of 5 cities on the map. The closest city was 300 miles away by my best guess. Perfect Measurement needs better information than travel time to help give an accurate distance.

I planned to use my perk to help measure how far out these farms were. Athena said it would take us two nights, and we would make it there on the morning of the third day to get to the farm. We were first heading to where the Skulds were sighted.

We'd break for a day before heading to take out the Diomorph. It would take half of a day to get there, but then we could make our way home afterward. Overall it should take us seven days, but we planned for fourteen. Tesla's Storage skill made it much easier to plan for longer trips.

"Stop worrying and planning." Athena said to kick me out of my walking stupor.

I looked up at her, and she smiled prettily before I looked back at the road. "I'm just trying to make sure I didn't forget anything." I defended myself.

"You're also not fun when you drift away inside your head."

We were finally starting to pass people on wagons heading to town. The backs of the wagons were filled with sacks or barrels. Most of the drivers were by themselves, but occasionally kids were riding with a parent.

Now that more people were passing by, Athena dropped back slightly behind me as we walked. "I can't wait until the traffic dies down. I'm ready to run and not get stopped by guards."

"I know we have a long walk ahead of us, so I brought something to help pass the time."

"You'll have to wait until fewer people are around." I said with a slight smile.

Athena stomped a little as she walked, but she quickly stopped and started bouncing along happily, undoubtedly enjoying her time outside the city. Tesla jumped from my shoulders over to Athena's share in the pleasant atmosphere.

The walk through the pleasant weather was great, and once we were 6 miles from town and the farms were fewer and farther between Athena took off at a sprint.

Aaaaaahhhahahaha!

I thought I was decently fast, able to keep up a sprint for a long time, but Athena was faster. She shot off far above my top speed, she made it out of sight and then returned shortly after. No sweat or heaving breaths to be seen from her. "That was insane, you are so much faster than I am!"

So fast!

"It's the Physique skill! Oh, it feels good to run!" She spun in place and kept walking. "How about that surprise now?"

I stuck my hand in the small satchel I kept on me. "You'll have to run some more."

Athena shrugged and took off down the road. It had been mostly flat with some small rolling hills with fields of crops on either side. But ahead, I could see the hills growing larger covered in a sea of trees.

Once she was 100 feet away, I took the small dense leather ball from the bag and used the Cuffs I made from the Skyblades to create a short barrel around the soft sphere and then densely packed in air. She was waiting for me, tapping her feet in impatience.

I raised my arm and the pale blue wind mana that formed the construct followed. I aimed down the road and launched the ball high over her head. She tracked it through the air, and a smile grew on her face. She bolted down the road even farther.

She barely missed it, she was well over 500 feet away, where the ball landed it hit a larger stone on the side of the road and bounced into a small ditch. She grabbed the ball and waited for me to catch up.

"That was awesome!" She applauded me lightly, and I bowed slightly. "How did you do it? I could kind of see your arm shimmer, but I was too far to see it."

I held up both arms and let the sleeves fall back to show the cuffs on each arm. "I wanted to have them on me at all times, and standard weapons weren't going to help me."

I held out my right arm and used my mana to form a glove that moved slowly with my fingers. I made blades from each of my fingers, then changed it to a shield. "I've been working on utility mostly. I made a launcher for the ball that used compressed air to launch it."

"Wisham was right; you're a natural. He really shouldn't have been so vague. I bet you'll get a nice perk to compliment them. Have you checked what skill it falls under?"

"Mana Foci Arts," I said as I looked down, unused to compliments from people.

Can you launch me? I could glide forever!

"Uhhh..."

"What?" Athena asked.

"Tesla wants me to launch her. I'll try it but at low strength at first." Tesla nodded along to my statement, and Athena shrugged shortly after.

Things devolved from there. I ended up launching Tesla into the air over and over. The first time she barely got the webbing between her legs in place to start gliding. She managed to do it though, and Athena ran out to catch her.

It didn't take long for her to really get the hang on long-distance gliding.

Why didn't we ever try this before?!

Tesla was learning how to keep herself in the air for prolonged lengths of time. But as we passed the foot of the mountains, all of a sudden, it wasn't just Tesla in the air. She was being chased by four large birds swooping at her.

I watched her spin, dive, and roll to avoid them as she headed back our way. Athena saw the birds as well, she moved over to me and got herself ready to fight.

"They look like Wailers," I said. "As long as Tesla can lure them in, they should be relatively easy to run off or kill." Wailers were basically nightmares mixed with Canadian Geese, that is if geese had shorter necks and sharp beaks. They were a solid dark gray bordering black, their feathers were missing in sections and made them look ragged. Large red eyes on their heads and red skin on their taloned feet completed the look. The name came from the awful screeching they made that sounded like someone screaming.

They were extremely aggressive and attacked in groups, usually tearing apart prey as they fought over their prize. However, they tended to be weak with the expected soft bones and flammable feathers. The bestiary that Wisham gave me was coming in extremely handy now.

Athena took a position beside me, and Tesla was coming in fast with one of the birds on her tail. I made a solid ring of wind mana using Wind Manipulation and added spikes facing forward. Tesla dove through the middle dodging the needles and landed on my shoulder. The Wailer tried to follow impaling itself on the ring that it was much too large to fit through.

The other three wailers were close behind, but as they neared, Athena jumped swinging her spear and knocked the first one out of the air it smacked into the earth broken but not dead. The second Wailer swooped in at Athena and scraped her left arm, leaving a gash as it flew away.

Throw me at it! Tesla screamed in my head.

I turned and used the same launching mechanism to send Tesla flying into it's back where she turned into a smaller Dervish. She rode the Wailer to the ground, slashing and stabbing as it shrieked.

I turned back and to find the last Wailer coming right at me. Reflexively I put up a shield as it scratched at me. It hovered in place for a second before a blade pierced it from behind splattering the thin barrier with the nightmare bird's blood.

I watched as Athena walked over to the one she knocked out of the sky that was now laying in a mess on the ground constantly screaming. With a flick of her spear she cut its head off.

I stood still for a couple more seconds while the draining adrenaline sapped all of my energy, and the cries of the wailers died out. "Fuck!" I said under my breath as I fell back onto the ground.