After completing their daily hunting and training session, Vivi dropped Isabella off at the Institute and brought Saffra back to the manor.
"Well done today," she told her apprentice. "Two levels. You're making good progress. And I can see that your runework is getting cleaner."
Strictly speaking, that might be a lie. Vivi had a phenomenally difficult time telling the difference between even weaker and stronger Titled, much less seeing marginal improvements in a silver-rank teenager. But she could imagine that her statements were true, and more importantly, a teacher was supposed to encourage her student.
As they usually did, though, her words only made Saffra shift in place. She fortunately didn't insist otherwise and mumble something about how she could've done better—a habit Vivi was trying to discourage.
"Thank you, Lady Vivi," the girl said instead. She reached down to her belt and unhooked the Chalice of Withered Plenty. "Should've gotten a level for you too, I think." She lifted the cup and peered inside, studying the liquid for a second before holding the artifact out.
Vivi took the object and looked in it herself. More liquid pooled at the bottom than they had so far gathered at once. "Maybe two levels, honestly," she said.
Her stomach turned at what she needed to do. Most people do a lot worse to get stronger, Vivi, she thought chidingly to herself. Stop being a baby. It's not even actual blood.
Well. It probably isn't.
Not lingering on that disquieting idea, she tipped the cup back and drank. Like each time before, she couldn't suppress the shiver that seized her as thick, iron liquid slid down into her stomach. It wasn't even the uncomfortable taste, her squeamishness fully at fault, but the sheer power held within the small amount of fluid, suffusing every inch of her body.
She might not have a concrete idea how leveling worked, but boosting a level twenty-one-hundred's capabilities even a fraction had to require energy to boggle the mind.
***
Level Up!
You are now a level 2114 [Archmage].
***
She dismissed the screen and waited with anticipation. No skill acquisition appeared, though, and neither did a second level-up to follow the first. Skills did tend to come in intervals of five, ten, twenty-five, and so on, so she couldn't be surprised.
Saffra watched with plain interest, obviously suppressing the question dangling on her lips. She likely found it too rude to ask Vivi outright.
"One level, no skill," Vivi answered.
Saffra's expression sank in disappointment, though she shook her head a second later. "For you, even a level is amazing."
Vivi offered the item back to Saffra—
—and a crack split the air, startling them both. Saffra jerked backward, though Vivi only twitched.
She rotated the Chalice an inch to confirm that it was as she feared: a thin fracture ran down the side.
Saffra's face twisted in horror, and her eyes flicked rapidly between Vivi and the cup of bone.
"Hm," Vivi said. "Actually, that makes a lot of sense."
"W-what? What does? What was that?"
The question was probably rhetorical, seeing how the evidence displayed itself readily, but Vivi turned the cup around and showed the crack to Saffra.
"How?" Saffra asked. "And what does that mean?"
"It means it's not as world-breaking an artifact as I thought," Vivi said, conflicted. Part of her must have subconsciously expected this, because she felt little surprise and only mildly more disappointment. She tipped the artifact side to side, considering. "There's a limited number of uses before it'll fall apart."
Saffra gawked. "And you don't care?"
"Even by the standard of the Codex, the Chalice seemed rather absurd." Vivi held the cup out, and Saffra hesitantly took it. "If we get twenty levels out of it, let alone fifty, it's still arguably the better of the two."
Vivi mulled that claim over. Twenty extra levels, versus the Codex? The book was astoundingly useful. Case in point: her current plans to speak with the Archbishop. Even two hundred more levels wouldn't have somehow lent her the ability to perform healing magic to cure an entire city.
"Twenty? Fifty?" Saffra scrutinized the tiny crack sinking from the cup's rim with an almost baleful suspicion. For whatever reason, she clearly cared more about the item's apparent weakness than Vivi did. "That's it?"
"You probably won't even hit the halfway point to mithril before it breaks," Vivi said. "Though it's impossible to tell. It only just cracked. Who knows how fast it'll go?"
Vivi would've thought she had delivered good news—that the detriment to Saffra's own progress wouldn't last forever—but Saffra glared harder at the cup. Her cat tail swished in plain annoyance.
"Huh," the girl said.
Vivi might not be the most socially insightful person, but she could recognize a discrepancy this obvious. I know she was happy to be 'useful,' but something doesn't line up.
If not for how Isabella had joined them for the leveling session today, Vivi probably wouldn't have made the connection. But understanding hit her so abruptly her eyebrows nearly shot up.
She doesn't want to outpace her friend.
Vivi had no doubt that Saffra's initial reaction—her happiness when she'd learned what the Chalice did, at personal cost—was because she could pay Vivi back. But there were other reasons the girl wanted to slow down her leveling pace too, weren't there?
Saffra sniffed and affixed the item back to her belt. "That's lame," she said. "I thought it was cooler than it was."
Vivi didn't respond. She wasn't sure what to do with the revelation. It was tricky… she still thought Saffra's best path forward was quick progress, a rapid ascent. But the girl didn't want that herself, apparently, and not just because she felt like she would be too inexperienced for her level.
The Chalice would prevent quick growth for a while yet, so Vivi didn't have to decide anything now. She did make a mental note to bring Isabella along on their hunts more often. Assuming Aeris didn't mind.
"So," Saffra said. "What else do we have today?"
Vivi set aside her previous thoughts. "Meeting the Princess."
Saffra tried and failed to hide her dubious expression. "Is that going to end well… like… however it goes?"
"If I play my cards right."
"If she finds out who you are, it's a fight. And if she doesn't, she's still supposed to, what? Interrogate you and find out if you're a dragon? Which she doesn't actually want to do?" Saffra's face scrunched up in confusion. "What do you need to see her for?"
"To help."
"Help," Saffra repeated. "How?"
Vivi's lips almost twitched in amusement. "Let's just say that Rafael might be rubbing off on me, because I have a plan. We know what she wants, and we can use that against her."
***
A part of her had been tempted to [Blink] over to Rafael and lay out her strategy in advance, but at a certain point, she needed to handle her own business. Fleeing to him every time a speed bump appeared felt like too much. Critically important business, yes—that was only practical. But this didn't qualify as that. Not like the post-Prismarche disaster interview had.
She and Saffra materialized in the northern city's town square, and Vivi ferried them over to an empty alleyway near the Adventurer's Guild.
"So I'm just here to watch?" Saffra hedged, clearly uncertain about Vivi's plan—not that Vivi had detailed it to her. Maybe that was why she was so unsure.
Or maybe it's why she has any faith whatsoever, Vivi thought dryly.
"You're here to learn and experience." That was the general reason she brought Saffra along in non-dangerous situations. Levels and even magical know-how were far from everything in an adventuring career. "But also, you're the one who noticed her chain, weren't you? That was a good catch."
"If she's actually wearing it, and I'm not imagining things." Despite her words, Saffra seemed pleased by the acknowledgement.
Vivi inclined her head. They hadn't confirmed the catgirl's observation, though she had little reason not to believe in her apprentice's keen eye. Too many external factors lined up. Princess Embralyne was surely in the mortal lands for greater reasons than simple whimsy. Seeing the dragon's serious side had dispelled the idea that Embralyne was… well, entirely crazy. Just eccentric in her own way, as all Titled were.
Walking through the streets, Vivi saw men and women shuffling about. The soul damage hung over them as a blanket of exhaustion, a general malaise. Cold anger burned as she saw it, and her eyes flicked up to the portal overhead. For the hundredth time, she fought the urge to fly into the void and seek out the man responsible.
They found Embralyne inside the Adventurer's Guild. The first thing Vivi noticed was that the woman was no longer wincing with every movement. Did that mean she had taken the Phoenix Blood Elixir and been cured, or had the dragon recovered naturally? Vivi couldn't discount the second possibility—dragons were obscenely resilient.
Either way, relief washed through her. The woman didn't seem to be facing long-term complications from her defense of Prismarche. Vivi had enough people to worry about healing already.
Embralyne's audience—the collected adventurers—seemed less energetic than in the first instance Vivi had run into the dragon, but still enraptured by her stories. Vivi didn't know what moderate soul damage felt like, but it didn't incapacitate a person. She would be acting faster if the city-wide damage were that serious in the short term.
Also like before, Embralyne became aware of her two visitors when a hush fell across the Guild and eyes drifted—slowly, picking up speed—toward the newcomers at the entryway.
Hate that as much as always, Vivi thought with an inward grimace. She wondered if the people of Prismarche had guessed her identity yet. Surely there were rumors. And how much does Embralyne suspect?
A frown tugged at the dragon's regal features, followed by narrowed eyes. The Princess sniffed and extracted herself from her storytelling audience.
As a group of three, they found a table to speak at, and Vivi threw up her usual privacy spells. Saffra slid into her chair, seeming even more skeptical than before, but trying to blend in. Embralyne didn't pay her much mind.
A white chain flashed, hidden underneath the dragon's gaudy, jewel-encrusted plate armor, and Vivi wondered how she'd missed it the first time. She'd already taken Saffra's observation for granted, but her certainty doubled. Embralyne really had brought along the Fourflame Amulet.
A series of spells to see through Embralyne's armor could confirm the fact absolutely… but Vivi didn't want to do that for a few reasons. She had other ways of knowing without doubt. Through this upcoming conversation, for one.
"I believe I said three days, demon," Princess Embralyne opened.
"My apologies, Lady… Ember." The conspicuous pause after the woman's title had Embralyne squinting further. "I'm busy, and I don't plan on staying in Prismarche for long."
Embralyne took on such a genuinely affronted look that Vivi knew the woman couldn't be faking, no matter the farce surrounding the interaction—that they were both 'in disguise,' and that odds were high that each knew the other's real identity.
"I have business with you, as I've made clear," Embralyne said hotly. "What do you mean you intend to leave?"
"I'll be visiting Bonegulch soon. Tomorrow. I'm not sure how long I'll stay, but it's important. We can continue this conversation there, if you could be so accommodating."
Vivi took smug satisfaction in watching Embralyne's thoughts slam to a halt. It wasn't every day Vivi accomplished the near-herculean feat of 'basic social maneuvering.'
"Bonegulch," Embralyne repeated after a long delay. Her words were flat and punctuated. "And you intend to be there tomorrow?"
"I have means of swift travel."
The dragon's nostrils flared. Those orange pools of lava bore into Vivi with an intensity that almost had her shifting in her seat.
"More than swift, to cross the entirety of the human kingdoms in a day," Embralyne growled at last. "And Bonegulch of all places is… an interesting choice to travel to." Her hand drifted up, like she was reaching for her necklace, but she stopped herself.
Which was confirmation. A thrill went through Vivi, though she knew she was hardly managing any real level of maneuvering, like Rafael performed every day.
"I simply wanted to make you aware of my plans." Vivi stood. "Thank you for your time, Lady Ember."
"I don't believe I dismissed you!"
"My apologies, but I'm leaving." Vivi turned away and was treated to the more-amusing-than-it-should-be experience of hearing a draconic princess scrape her chair backward and sputter incoherently in indignation.
"Demon! Demon, I said stop!"
Saffra followed hurriedly behind, and the two of them left the Adventurer's Guild. Picking up the pace, Vivi swerved into an alleyway—only a second before Princess Embralyne burst out the door in hot pursuit.
But before the woman could barrel around the corner and confront them, a [Greater Warp] grabbed Vivi and her apprentice and ferried them across the world. They appeared in her manor many thousands of miles away. Well outside of the draconic princess's ability to chase, even assuming she knew high-tier spatial magic.
Which she might. Long-range teleportation was difficult, but dragons were masters of magic, even if Embralyne didn't consider herself talented in that field.
Now safe in the privacy of the Vexaria estate, Saffra stared at Vivi in a way that reminded her of when they'd first met.
"I don't think I understand what just happened," the girl finally said. "What was that, Lady Vivi?"
"Everything going according to plan," Vivi told her smugly. "That's what."
Upon the baffled catgirl's expression, she took pity on her apprentice and chose to explain.
…though maybe because a second opinion was always nice, too.
***
Author's Note:
Hi Everyone!
Some news: I'll be releasing Max Level Archmage on Amazon (Kindle Unlimited) on May 4th. If you're interested in reading the edited version, you can preorder on this page: Amazon.com: New Life as a Max Level Archmage eBook : Cadence, Arcane: Kindle Store.
An audiobook will be coming too! I don't get to pick the exact date it releases, but I'll try to time it where it comes out within a week of the ebook.
Thanks for reading!