I’d gained a whopping eleven levels from that fight with Wapum. I suppose that made sense, when it was a level-18 player fighting a level-99 mob. I would have been toast if the lava didn’t remove health by percentage, and I would have been toast again if not for Bigger Than I Thought You Were and its upgrade, Knuckle-Cracker.

  I had more of a plan going into the level-up menu this time, and I challenged myself to choose fast, in case I was ever in a position where I needed to level in the field. When Dave saw my eyes darting and my finger flicking, he interrupted me part way.

  “Hey. Take it easy. You only get to make those choices once.”

  “Yeah, well, there are a lot of them, and I should be out farming.”

  He leveled me with such a powerful stare that I could literally feel it slam into me. It even made me look away from the menus.

  I got the sense Dave was looking over a pair of spectacles at me. It was that kind of stare. A do-you-realize-how-stupid-you-sound stare.

  “What?” I said.

  “Remmy, my darling, my treasure,” Dave said flatly. “You are not normally going to be leveling up ten at a time. This is a fluke. Okay, maybe a double fluke between the giant bimbo and the mom dragon, but still. Two flukes. You’ll normally only level once each time.”

  I realized my mouth was open. I closed it. He was right.

  “You’ve been spoiled by your own luck,” Dave concluded. “Don’t get used to this. Keep your hippo-dipping wits about you.”

  “You have hippos?” I said as I turned back to my menu. “What are they, like space hippos or something?”

  “I’m sure they’re only similar to your hippos. The translator is only so accurate. But yeah, they can survive in space. And you don’t want to know what it means to dip them.”

  I kept leveling up.

  I had already chosen a simple stat point for level 19—more Intelligence, since I was currently using that more than Technology. In fact, since I hadn’t really started dismantling stuff yet, I went ahead and threw all my 11 new points into Intelligence. I wanted my spells to hurt a lot more, and I only wanted Technology for the dismantle buffs anyway. I hadn’t even seen a Tech weapon drop yet.

  At level 20, I gained the ability to cast Depth spells, gained a spell slot, and improved a skill. I buffed Knuckle Cracker again, and I would add Pinprick to my roster once the level-up screens came to an end. Every level-up also buffed my health by one point, which didn’t seem like much yet, but would add up.

  Over the course of the next nine level-ups, I increased my health regeneration by 2 per second, upgraded my Luck by one, and got to choose a new World Tree slot.

  Ensure your favorite authors get the support they deserve. Read this novel on Royal Road.

  This one took the most deliberation. I could still go back to the earlier World Tree options I had chosen not to pursue—the ones that increased my health regen from killing enemies or from healing targets. Or, I could keep going down the Name the Blade path, which seemed to relate to equipment.

  This seemed like the smartest move, since stronger and stronger abilities would appear along this branch of the tree, as long as I kept choosing on this same branch. Also, I would be focusing on crafting… eventually. I wasn’t sure where I was supposed to find the time to make stuff, and I was starting to wonder if it was a bad idea.

  No. Stick with it. They wouldn’t have kept the crafting system if it wasn’t meant to be used… and no one else has the Dismantle boost that you have.

  I needed to run with whatever my strong suits were, even if I’d gained those upgrades on accident.

  After the Name the Blade option for the World Tree, there were three more choices:

  Artisan’s Epiphany.

  You gain 1 Luck when dismantling armor and weapons.

  I almost chose this without thinking, but Dave was right. I needed to think this through, so I checked the other two options:

  Lucky Socks.

  Select an armor piece. You may upgrade this piece by sacrificing three of the same type piece (Red Grade). The piece will now gain a Trait shared by all three sacrificed pieces. If there are multiple options, the selected Trait will be chosen randomly.

  A Really Cool Stick.

  Select a weapon. You may upgrade this piece by sacrificing three of the same type piece (Red Grade)…

  The last one was the same as the armor-upgrade option, just with a weapon instead of armor. I frowned at both of the options. They seemed decidedly worse than Artisan’s Epiphany, but something was sticking in my mind. Just like with the Pinprick spell, I couldn’t quite put my finger on it… until I could.

  The NerveGear. My body-suit. It’s an armor piece.

  My NerveGear was essentially permanent. It made me immune to one-third of the magic types in the whole game. I would probably never trade it in for something else… but in Seven Keys, you couldn’t upgrade an item. You could only break items down into their base parts, hope you got lucky on which parts you got, and then build new items from that.

  I would never destroy the NerveGear, not only because it was useful, but also because it came with FATE. But since I could never upgrade it, it would never get better.

  Unless I chose the Lucky Socks option. Really, it was a total no-brainer.

  I selected Lucky Socks, and the menu immediately prompted me to choose an armor piece. I chose the NerveGear, and moved on to the next option.

  “Really? Not the Dismantle buff?” Dave said. “Wouldn’t that improve what kinds of items weapons broke down into?”

  “It would. I might go back to it later,” I said. “But upgrading the NerveGear is better. These two upgrade options are pretty weak this early in the game, but we have the advantage of knowing that we’re never going to get rid of the NerveGear. So this lets us make it better.”

  Dave cocked his head, then bobbed it in his funny little nod. “I get it. Yeah. Because even if we are crafting stuff, we can only really equip other armor types. Your body, leg, and helm slots are all taken up by the NerveGear… so this makes that less of a sacrifice.”

  I hadn’t thought about that, and I hated that he’d made the point. He would be a good partner… if he wouldn’t betray me.

  That anger surfaced again, and I shoved it down. Dave was useful… for now. Keep him. Don’t trust him.

  It was good advice, but I hated it, all the same.