As always the morning brought me clarity.
Jane was certainly a very attractive woman, but so was every other woman and man here.
Once you got to twenty or thirty Charisma you were on par with the most beautiful models on Earth.
[Whisper to Merlin] "Meet at Crooked Hills?"
[Whisper from Merlin] "All good, be there in 60"
[Whisper to Jane] "Are you down to level in Crooked Hills with us? Me and Merlin will be going there now!"
Okay, maybe I wasn't as calm and collected as I thought I was, but I have to give myself a break.
[Whisper from Jane] "See you there"
[Whisper to Jane] "Cool! (:"
Maybe I was a lot down bad, and maybe it sucked.
It was something I went back and forth with over and over again on my walk.
Having more Intelligence made my mental conversations with myself even more diverse.
Entire sections of my mind could talk to entirely different sections.
It was weird to think about, but then again I was thinking about thinking about... yeah, and so on.
Still, I got to the bridge dividing The Meadows and Crooked Hills before the others, so I took out my map and started to draw.
It turns out that with how exponentials and skill levels work, it was simply far more efficient for me to make 100% 100% maps.
After a while of drawing I felt a tap on my shoulder, looking back to see Jane.
It spooked me a little, and I think I showed it a bit too much.
"Oh! Hi!" I say, starting to put away my pen.
"Hello to you as well. I didn't expect you to take cartography as a skill."
"Well, I basically stumbled into it," I say, trailing off.
"Yet you still do it," she says, whistling a bit. "It's cool, you're thinking too hard."
"Well yeah, I do that."
"Couldn't imagine the schizophrenic guy would have a more level head than you," she says, making a bed of flowers under herself and laying on them.
"Well, he's not anymore," I say, taking my pen out again and continuing on the map.
She doesn't respond, just laying there and waiting.
It only took a bit more for Merlin to walk up to us.
"Heyo! Whatchall up to?" he says.
"Nothing, making my map," I say, putting it all in my inventory and standing with the help of a weak mana push.
It was mostly to avoid the balance issues that came with only having one arm, my ability to stand up from seated had taken a small hit that the 7 mana spell filled nicely.
"Who's taking point?" I ask.
"Doesn't matter, we're all casters so no one is better at tanking than the other."
I felt Jane's staff tap my back.
"You do it big guy, you have the best physical shielding."
"Well... okay," I say, blushing again as I start walking over the bridge.
The bridge crossed a gorge that was deeper than the eye could see.
My guess was that if you fell down it, it would take you to a high-level zone, but testing that would be a lot easier once I committed to making a flight spell.
As we crossed, a few options came into sight, all of which we could kill with relative ease, so that's what we did.
With the three of us working together we were able to clear eight packs of enemies.
Jane's magic seemed to focus on making vines and thorns, but I could tell she wanted to use that Ent summoning spell again.
[
[Stats][Magic][Inventory][Skills][Help]
Class: Adventurer 20, Leyline Strategist 12
Strength: 10+10
Body: 10+10
Agility: 9
Dexterity: 6
Intelligence: 88+9
Willpower: 20+1
Charisma: 11+3
Stat points: 0
XP: 278/330
]
[
[Stats][Magic][Inventory][Skills][Help]
Mana: 1455/1455
Spells:
Magic Missile: 6 Mana
Magic Force: 6 Mana
Missile Binding: 12 mana
Mana Fist: 28 Mana
Fireball: 70 Mana
Locate: 50 Mana
Locate (Map): 100 Mana
Inter-layer Teleport: 5000 Mana
Summon: Skinning Knife: 20 Mana
]
[
[Stats][Magic][Inventory][Skills][Help]
Inventory: 11/38
Copper 11x
Silver 41x
High Quality Mapping Parchment 6x
High Quality Pen 1x
Compass 1x
Herbal Tea 9x
Thornberry Stew 8x
Crooked Ham Sandwich 3x
Slowheal Potion 6x
Mana Potion 7x
Wool Cloth 20x
Wool Cloth 20x
Wool Cloth 12x
]
[
[Stats][Magic][Inventory][Skills][Help]
Cartography: 112
Skinning: 100
Cooking: 106
Tailoring: 148
Herb Gathering: 124
Alchemy: 100
Enchanting: 146
]
Right now we were resting in some shade, having a nice picnic of sorts.
I had gotten a few options for new classes but nothing stood out to me.
One was about integrating leylines and map magic together, the other was the ability to use 3D leylines.
The first just wasn't something I was all too interested in at the moment, the second though could already be done just with some extra effort.
Using certain formulas to map the line of mana onto the world I could effectively make a 3D structure with it, but the uses of this were limited at best.
Just as I told Zach, I had something in mind and I was going to wait for it.
[Whisper from Jane] "Stop looking at me so much"
My eyes darted directly to her, looking at her grin a little as she watched me get flustered.
[Whisper to Jane] "I'll do what I want"
Jane laughs a bit, prompting Merlin to give us a weird look.
"What are you two talking about?"
"Nothing, I'm messing with your friend," she says, sipping her tea again.
What does that mean?
"Rough." Merlin laughs, going back to his sandwich.
It took me aback for a second as I went back to eating.
From here on leveling in the Crooked Hills would be more difficult, and we didn't want to go up to the next area before we each got our next classes picked out.
The thing with mobs is that they seemed to get comparatively far more stat points.
Perhaps this was because whatever class they got was always considered a level 10, meaning they got the maximum stat points from every level.
Like how Adventurer gave two stat points, if you changed at level ten it would be three, then four at a total level of twenty. So I was a few stat points down compared to someone who instantly changed.
It was a really complicated way to say the more specialized you are, the worse your stats will be, which in turn means you'll be even farther from mobs.
Still, specialization was worth it in my eyes. To a mage, uniqueness is their bread and butter. If two mages were the same it meant neither were good.
In general, I could think of no reason why a magocracy, or a government ruled by mages, wouldn't just be the gold standard.
Mages were smarter than any other class, and unless we were barbarians who believed in the idea of might making right, mages should rule.
"Let's get to it again," Merlin said after a while, getting up and sending a bolt of magic at the group of lions in the distance.
"Fuck dude, could at least wait for the rest of us," I say, standing with the help of magic before summoning a fireball and sending it at them.
4/2/0 (About 2 weeks)
It had only been a few days before me and Jane hit level twenty in our respective classes.
Merlin hit level ten in his third, moving forward on a very basic telekinetic line.
I told him he should specialize a bit more, figure out a specific niche, but he didn't seem to agree with the idea.
"Listen, I get it, but the more I limit my scope the less I feel like a mage." He put extra emphasis on the "I."
I got it, trying to mind my own business after.
For me, I had been staring at my next class options on my way back, but I knew what I was going to pick.
[Leygate Magister
A guildmaster mage who specializes in bringing the layers together through the power of magic.
Benefits:
+3 Intelligence per level
+2 Willpower per level
+1 Stat point per level
Your mana pool is now calculated as fifty times your intelligence instead of fifteen times
Your help menu on magic now provides information on layer scale magic along with portal magic and Inter-layer Teleport arrays
Unlocks guild system, more information in help menu]
[Guilds
With a guild you are able to unite a large group of people. The amount of people a guild can have in it starts at ten times the level of the guildmaster, and depending on class choices can go higher.
Guilds can assign ranks to their members, have a system controlled storage, and can implement automatic taxes on their members.
Furthermore, Guilds can buy land from the city, allowing them to build in the open world without consequence.
Lastly, guilds have access to a special chat tab, only for the guild. Additionally, whispers between guild members are free.]