In his spare time he did end up sitting in with his family for the game. He decided against cooking and asked his mom to do it instead but he hung out in the kitchen with her observing. He'd taken an indirect approach to learning from her. He had a new game waiting for him to learn more but he would have to make that wait. He promised to get to Level 2 today with everyone, as well as introducing King.
Lance had invited everyone to a group chat on his Specter app and they had been chatting throughout the day. It was simple and they all did their best to avoid detailed introductions as far as W.L would currently “allow”. The biggest topic of their conversation was actually centered around Valora. She wanted to hop on her Hard mode re-roll. Clause 5 on the rules allowed her one more attempt, but the class she got would be entirely new. She would also need to play level 1 again, without the group. No one wanted that for her but they all agreed it was best considering it should be something she could handle. Low levels meant easier ways to die but, it was easier to kill. She just needed to disregard rewards and speed through. King, Reilly, Lance and Courage all agreed that they would play the second floor but they would reset their progress when she caught up. This was going to be a good way to test theories. Lance and Courage both had ideas to share they wanted testing on.
After dinner Lance got to watching some videos online about simple cooking methods with a fire pit rotisserie. He was anxious to try it out, it was a method to use his Cook skill over a longer period of time. Most things cooked this way were done with hours, rather than a quick sear in his pan. The techniques were simple and it made it a no-brainer for Lance to bear the burden of the extra weight of bringing the pit roast stakes and firewood. Time passed quickly and it was time to meet up.
Lance stepped into his Tavern through the front door, his entire haul still on the table. Wellyn was nowhere to be seen, and after calling out to him with no response Lance began to gather his things.
“ Oh shit wait I never got that Gacha, and I never checked my notifications!” Lance looked around the room, nothing was out of place, which made him frown; he expected there to be something lying here from his Gacha. He checked his notifications.
2 Tavern quests available
Grax defeated! - Goblin renown increased
2 Shame tier Gacha available
2 Praise tier Gacha available
Level 1 completed 100 experience gained
Level up!
Level 5! Class skill choice available.
Renowned tier Gacha reward available.
“Damn. Alright.” Lance said, sending invites out. He wanted to check out the tavern quests but had to stick to their agenda, to avoid intriguing himself with them. The Gacha were all also very tempting but he didn't want to waste them, or overburden himself further. He desperately wanted to find some sort of bag like Reilly's slime crown. “ A new class skill. You gain experience from beating a level. What's crazy is it's just enough to go from level 1 to level 2. If that becomes a trend, experience gems may hold lower value for a little while. I might need to exploit this. Hmm okay class skills…” Lance looked at the prompt in front of him.
Class skill choices.
- Boil
- Freeze
- Dice
As Lance read the list he fell into thought. None of them had any information on the skill. A choice made after careful consideration.
- Dice <- Class skill chosen.
Lance decided on Dice on one attribute alone. Boiling and freezing something requires more kitchen utensils or appliances. Unsure if the abilities were as straight forward as they seemed, Lance chose the one he believed the simplest to utilize. When he read it his thoughts went in a few directions as far as application, but he was satisfied and felt he made the correct choice.
Dice Lvl 1
Create uniform cuts with precise movements.
Cooldown- 5 seconds or 1 Mana.
Lance decided to test his skill on a bat hide. He wanted to make strips of bat leather anyway so he felt it was the perfect time. He grabbed his cleaver and hide and went upstairs. Once in his training room he placed the hide neatly on the floor and sat crisscross. He didn't want to cut the wooden floor so he folded the hide over on itself then placed his cleaver against its left side. He moved his cleaver from one side to the other slowly and activated his skill. “DICE”
He sliced lengthwise. As he passed through the length of hide, in the wake of his arm movement the latter half of fur began to get cut by after-images of his blade streaking below the initial cut. Once, twice, the Dice skill left halfway cut ribbons below the initial cut. Lance went back the other direction using the skill carefully on cooldown. He continued until the hide was a pile of leather strips. Some of which were trash as they had been cut improperly or into pieces. Lance tried the skill vertically and horizontally across and with faster pace. With the end of his testing he realized that the slower he went the more after images of his cleaver appeared, usually three, but once he got a fourth. The faster he went the closer to start the cuts were but it usually only populated two after images. Lance was happy for this skill to be based on a time cooldown or a mana use. Considering the size of a bat hide, he grew eager to try it on small and large ingredients. He piled the strips of leather in his arms and walked downstairs.
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After placing the strips on the table he grabbed another bat hide and a leather strip. He moved towards his chest of rotting meats. He took a deep breath and opened it ready to grab the rotting remains. Only when he opened the box did he exhale quickly with an outward gasp. Inside the chest was bare, juicy remnants of what was once food pooled In the bottom of the chest. After a moment the pool began to bubble up and fizz and rising in the middle of it was a deep purple slime. The juices and floating bits all sucked inside the slime as its form came together. It depressed and then bound forward bouncing out of the chest, frightening Lance backwards. He dropped the leather reaching for the slime coming at him to catch it, he tripped on his pant leg and rolled his ankle while his pants fell down making him fall into the bench along his table. The slime landed on his lap while Lance was mid yelp. A second later the slime licked his face with a gelatinous tendril . “POP, POP” the slime made noise as two small eyes popped open on its front, and the skin of the creature went from its transparent purple to a full color of deep purple. Lance held it in his hands and looked at it wide eyed, unknowing of what to do. The creature stared back into his eyes and just bubbled from the inside dissolving the bits of remains it withheld.
Just as the stare between Lance and the slime grew to an awkward amount of time the front door to his Tavern creaked open. A second later Wellyn walked in.
He looked much different; his attire went from everyday cloth clothing to a leather suit of armor with bits of chain mail peeking from the crevasses between sections. He had no visible weapons on him but his hair and facial hair had been groomed and styled. He looked at Lance with the slime in his hands sitting on his lap. He raised his brows in surprise.
Lance blushed realizing the circumstance looked wrong. “ Wait wait before you think anything weird this th”
“ Violet, get off of Lance. You know better than ta jump on people.” Wellyn interrupted Lance, a second later Violet bounced off of Lance towards Wellyn, within a few bounces she was in front of him at his feet, he pulled out a potion bottle holding it to Violet. A moment later after some gelatinous suction noises passed, the slime was inside the bottle completely packed tight in the small beaker. Lance had quickly taken the moment to straighten himself up and get up from the table.
“Wellyn where'd you go? You look different, in a good way, how are you?” Lance said, trying to quickly change the subject.
“ Sorry I left in a rush last time, I must’ve left Violet out. She didn't get into anything right?”
“ Ah no, no big deal she just ate the rotting stuff in that box did me a favor really.” Lance said pointing.
“ Hmph I'll talk with her, but as long as nothing valuable was lost. Anyways, I had to speak with my guild master. We have some scholars in our guild and I needed them to once over your note. This note apparently is coded, it doesn't make any sense but we have a translation and are looking into it. I have a couple questions I have to ask. First ya need to tell me everything about how ya got it. Second, I need that Memory jewel. We want to look into it, see what's inside.”
Lance began to tell the tale of the last bit of the first floor and dividing the loot with King. Lance made note to ask King about the insignia, and if it were present amongst anything else. “ … and then we left. I pushed the crate and things in here you saw the rest.”
“ Okay well find out if your friend has anything as well, no offense but I need to hear his account as well. It's important and I just have to get things on record.”
“ On record? What are you a cop? It's just a small alcohol cask. What's the big deal? I'm old enough to drink.” Lance said hoping the world of Wish Legacy had a different standard of drinking age.
Wellyn quickly poked him in the chest. Faster than Lance could even follow his movement, the pressure from the finger on his chest hurt “ Not a cop, but if I was I'd spot that lie a mile away. And it ain't just a cask, it's THE cask. You don't understand yet but the Elven kind are in need of a leader. Their lineage is spread and dying off, soon enough they'll only be mix breeds or a small, very small, circle of pure bloods. They'd maybe last only a thousand more years. Now where's the Memory jewel.”
Lance listened quietly under the pressure of Wellyn's finger. Looking the man up and down in his new attire and haircut. Realizing the small points to his ears. His light tan and freckles hid more to his face than Lance realized. As he looked on he realized Wellyn looked far younger than he thought, even more so now with his neater facial hair. The only hint of age lay in the small crows feet at the corners of his eyes.
“Wellyn are.. are you Elven?”
“ Half, on my mother's side. Dwarf on me fathers. It's why I'm so middle sized. I've a long time ahead of me to sort this out but unlike you, Wisher, I don't have nearly enough. THE. MEMORY. JEWEL. LADD.” He said curtly.
Lance broke eye contact for the first time under his finger. Wellyns eyes grew wide and he put his fingers down.
“ Ya didn't… No No No…. DAMNIT” Wellyn yelled as he stepped away from Lance balling his fists in anger, red flush coming to his cheeks. “ Well what is it! Where? OUT WITH IT!” he exclaimed.
Lance opened his menu and pressed the reward from his notification. A bright green light flashed in the room blinding him and Wellyn briefly. A moment later in front of Lance a long green cloak with a long gash from mid back to its bottom, bloodstained an inch off the tear all the way down. The deep leaf green cloak fell in his hands. Lance pulled it up, the insignia on its back sliced through. Lance barely felt the cloak in his hands, like holding tangible air. Wellyn stepped forward. He quickly snatched the cloak, a tear falling from his eye. His lips pressed hard together, he held it up looking at the insignia. He let out a shallow exhale then gave Lance a hug.
“ I'm sorry fer yelling.” He leaned back. Hands on Lance's shoulders.
“ Listen, let me take this back to my guild n’show them. I'll bring it back. This, this is a High Elven royal guard cape. With the right time sieve we should be able to learn what happened. Here, borrow Violet. She'll make you Slime Soda. Don't feed her trash, she needs a balanced diet or she won't produce.”
Lance grabbed the small vial looking up at the cloak. He wanted to rebuttal but he was lost for words. Wellyn's pleaded with him, his eyes full of emotion, something about them seemed filled with sorrow. Lance nodded and Wellyn did the same, then he turned and left out the door.
Lance fiddled the vial. “ Where the heck was he pouring drinks from? Sigh Well Violet can you make some sodas for the road?” He grabbed the two waterskins he had collected from the checkpoints on level one. He uncorked the bottle and tried to pour out the soda like it was a bottle. Which worked just as intended. He filled the skins with the slime soda.
He began to pack his bag, storing some wood he salvaged from a crate he and King broke, the rotisserie stakes, and the cleaver, which he elected to use specifically for food. It wasn't anything special, just a Shame tier with plus two Attack. He also grabbed the two mana crystals, an intact rope, one they found at the second checkpoint. He did decide to wear his full bat leather armor. Armed with a goblin longsword, his axe, and a booted goblin knife he felt ready. He began to tidy the tavern in wait for the group. Just as he finished cleaning up, Reilly walked in the front. As she entered she smiled brightly and ran over and hugged Lance.