Nate wandered downstairs. Sleep had come quickly and unfortunately lasted just as long. While he could get by on just a few hours of rest for one night, multiple nights in a row would still wear him down. He’d need to go to bed at a reasonable hour tonight.

  When he woke, Britt had already been gone. Her scent had lingered in his bed though, and she’d left him a little note telling him she had returned to the University. Combat classes were continuing for the handful of students still staying at the University despite the war; mostly merchant’s kids from what he had seen. If anything, it made the whole feel of the University less stressful. Without the noble cliques and the constant maneuvering they seemed to engage in, the remaining students could focus on learning. He just wished that he was staying as well.

  He had come far in his journey and the things he had learned in his subjects had helped guide his development. Understanding how intent played a part in his Skills and their development, the revelations about the nature of soul, demonic and celestial energies had all improved his abilities. Changing his Embodiment might have been a pipe dream if he hadn’t learned about its importance and how Achievements and Skills could factor into it. There were some lingering questions on that particular topic, of course. Just because they taught something at the University didn’t mean they were correct, or perhaps it would be better to say, entirely correct. Kiri’s Embodiment was what made him question whether the University Professors understood the entire picture. The Reborn Embodiment had clear ties to Kiri’s Achievements. Entering the Spirit Realm and returning was a form of rebirth. Her loss of a Class Core and regaining a new one could also be seen as a form of rebirth. Yet none of her Skills took on that nature which stood in stark contrast to his own.

  Meanwhile, his Skills were almost all ‘Conceptual’ in nature. Some of his achievements could be considered similar, but then, they were more closely tied to the idea of creation, at least from his view. Then his most powerful achievements were all about wandering and, to a certain extent, space – visiting different universes and realms. The dichotomy made him wonder if there was more to it, or if his own attempts to change his Embodiment just required more work because he had high-tier Achievements in the mix. At the end of the day, he didn’t know. But, with his next experiment, he hoped to find out.

  Kiri was sitting at her desk going through a small pile of paperwork. His sister flashed a smile at him as he stepped into the room.

  “Had a good night?” she asked with a knowing smirk. “Jacque didn’t complain, but the look on his face said he could hear everything. Even from the basement. Might want to put some sound dampening runes on the walls.”

  Nate grinned, used to the teasing by now. It was Kiri’s way of showing she cared.

  “I’ll look into it. So, the apprentices. That’s today, right?” he asked.

  Kiri nodded, shuffling the paper into a neat pile before putting most of it into a drawer on her desk, the lock clicking into place as she closed it. The enchantment on it was a simplistic one, and Nate suspected he could do better, but he only had so much time in the day and he was one man. Two if you counted Jacque, but the ex-Professor had his own quotas to meet for the Rare and below runecrafted equipment they were selling. That was where the apprentices should come in, assuming everything went according to plan.

  “So, let's talk about the kids, I mean, the apprentices, before they get here” answered Kiri.

  “They’ve come by for a couple of hours each day for the past few days. Cutter’s been escorting them and Jacque spends the time going over some basics with them. I don’t fully get it, but mostly just practising their drawing to see how well they do and gauging their aptitudes. We’re holding off on Luc dragging them off to some Dungeons to get Achievements until we’re sure they’re a good fit.”

  “What are they like?” Nate asked. He could understand that she was focused on whether they would be able to do the work, but personally, he cared more about if they would get along. He knew a thing or two about growing up in a tough situation and while some kids managed to escape the cycle of poverty, many more were dragged under by it.

  Kiri’s smile turned softer as she replied, “They seem like good kids, Nate. Cutter chose well. They work hard, and according to Jacque, take criticism well.”

  “If we take them on, they’re going to live here, right?”

  Kiri nodded, “We’ll need to set up some living space for them. They can share a room, but honestly, I’m not sure we should dig out another basement. I was going to set them up in the storage room with some bunk beds or something until we managed to expand. I’m looking into buying the lot next to us.”

  “It’s better than their current situation,” Kiri added. “They’re orphans. They sleep wherever they can.”

  Nate didn’t ask how Cutter had known. Maybe he hadn’t, and the old sailor just saw an opportunity to get a few kids off the street. But, it still pulled at Nate’s heart strings.

  The conversation turned to other matters and Kiri gave him the rundown on how the business was performing so far. The answer was, they were doing incredibly well. Since Nate was stealing their mana supplies and they owned the building, their only costs were what they paid Jacque and the materials, most of which were low tier, and finally a small amount of mana purchased from the government. She explained that she was purchasing from multiple suppliers to conceal the fact that what they were producing was often a higher tier than what they were buying. It helped that a large proportion of what they were selling was intended to go to Asmuisil, which had a far more limited ability to look into their suppliers. On the other hand, if anyone looked too deeply, they would quickly see that the amount of materials purchased exceeded what they were selling to the Etruan branch of the Adventurer’s Guild. But that would only happen if anyone looked into their finances.

  Taxes in Etrua were unusual. The Capital didn’t functionally have a taxation system. Why would they, when they were the ones selling the mana. Their tax was already taken by hoarding the majority of the mana. The little that didn’t go towards their Dungeons was stored and sold to the merchants and nobility. On top of that, it sounded like any mana sent towards the Dungeons of the Nobility came at a standard cost in processed mana. Since that was how the Royals collected their tax, there was only a small amount of oversight on businesses. As long as they didn’t sell far more in Etrua than their mana purchases accounted for, then no one would ever be the wiser. Basically, Nate had accepted that he was committing theft and possibly fraud. If they got caught, they would need to run, and fast. But he didn’t feel bad about what he was doing. Stealing from a government who was stealing from their populace seemed a no-brainer. But he also wasn’t a hero, taking from the rich to give to the needy. Maybe he would though, when he was capable of competing with the Royals in truth.

  It was another thirty minutes before Cutter arrived and Nate watched the door as the five individuals entered. One too many, and unless his eyes were deceiving him, one more than was apparent. Nate noted that neither Kiri nor Cutter reacted to their unseen guest. As for the three kids huddled around Cutter, he guessed their ages ranged from around seven to ten. The Class Core didn’t unlock until usually after eleven, but Kiri had told him stories of kids taking as long as fourteen. The trigger was unknown, but since the Class Core’s connection to soul energy allowed The System to read their minds, he wondered if their development and maturity was a factor. That begged the question of why The System would care. Whatever its reasons were, they were irrelevant to him. What was relevant was how much time that meant these kids had to develop.

  The narrative has been taken without permission. Report any sightings.

  “This be Nate. Say hello, lads,” said Cutter in his gruff voice, the man's eyes shining in the slightly dimmer room.

  “Hello,” they all greeted him, the youngest saying it softer than the rest. A child used to hiding then.

  “Nice to meet you all,” Nate replied, smiling at them in the hope of making them more comfortable. He didn’t have much experience with kids. “What are your names?”

  “Kio,” said the oldest. He was dark-haired and dark-eyed. He could’ve been Null’s younger brother. He had the build of a swordsman, if that swordsman was malnourished.

  “Laure,” resolutely stated the kid in the middle, blond-haired and blue-eyed with tanned skin and a wider build. An oddity in Etrua, both in appearance and build.

  “Callum,” whispered the youngest. The presumed seven-year old was whip thin, with a messy mop of black hair that partially hid his green eyes. Unlike the other two, Callum seemed slightly less malnourished. Good at stealing, perhaps, wondered Nate.

  Nate chose to ignore the fifth individual who remained hidden, leaning against one of the walls. They hadn’t made any moves yet and seemed nonchalant. The area around them buzzed faintly in his senses and he had a pretty good idea who it was, but he wouldn’t call them out till after he handled the kids' testing.

  Pulling out three sheafs of paper from nowhere, he ignored the kid’s gasps, only noting that the youngest hadn’t made a peep, despite his eyes widening. Very used to hiding then.

  “I’ve drawn a symbol on each of these. I want you to see how well you can copy it for me,” he stated, placing them on Kiri’s cleaned-off desk along with pencils.

  “Will you send us away if we fail?” asked Kio.

  Nate shook his head. Perhaps he should – better apprentices with more aptitude would obviously be better in the long-run, but having seen the kids now, he knew he was too soft to kick them out if they weren’t as talented. They would just have to work harder, or be relegated to simpler work. Maybe they wouldn’t reach as high, but he had the means to uplift them, at least as far as the lesser nobility. Uncommon tier was a certainty, Rare a possibility and Epic a distant hope, if they possessed the aptitude.

  Nate watched as each child attempted to draw the rune he had created. It was incredibly simplistic, but it was also his only original creation: the Initiate-tier Fire Sigil he created in his first Dungeon. The rune used three overlapping shapes to draw in mana. A circle, with a square inside and then an octagon inside of the square. The Fire Sigil then lay in the centre of the rune. It was of the lowest quality, but what he was mostly interested in is how well they drew the lines and their attention to detail. He was also sensing their mana reserves while he watched. Unsurprisingly, they were almost empty. Given the barren nature of the Slums, it was no surprise. Even now they were slowly drinking up a small amount of the ambient mana within the building.

  Kio managed it the quickest, but also the sloppiest. He seemed to have trouble with curved lines and his Sigil was unlikely to even activate. Jacque would need to get him to slow down. Laure, on the other hand, clearly had a talent for drawing. His lines were clean and except for a few minor issues of size and scale, he had created an almost perfect replica. Callum’s work was in between the other children, but had taken the longest. He was young, though and still learning fine motor control. Nate could work with that. Whispering his thoughts to Kiri, his sister stood up from her desk.

  “Alright. Nate is satisfied with your attempts. We’ll need to discuss details and living arrangements, as well as the contracts. Cutter, are you happy to come along and make sure we’re not taking advantage of the kids?” asked Kiri.

  “Lass, ya gettin’ them off the streets an’ giving em work. That’s better than they coulda hoped for. But fine, ain’ got nothing better to do. Last chance ya lot. There’s tha door. Ya in or ya out?” Cutter grumped, locking glowing eyes with each of the kids.

  Only Callum glanced at the door, but even he didn’t choose to leave.

  Nate waited as Kiri took Cutter and the kids, apprentices now he supposed, down to see Jacque. They would finalise the details and Kiri would make sure it was all organised, which meant he was finally free to deal with their unseen guest.

  “What can I do for you, Avery?” he asked, glancing at the wall where she hid herself.

  “So, it’s not sound based, then,” answered the Guild Platinum in a deep masculine voice, appearing a moment later. Similar to the last time, they had the appearance of a man. This time she looked like a fat and balding merchant, perspiring in the heat of the Capital.

  “Was that what the buzzing around you was? Were you trying to prevent sounds from bouncing off of you?” he countered.

  “I told you last time, I’ll figure out how you’re seeing me on my own. Just a matter of time.”

  “I am surprised Cutter couldn’t see you,” Nate commented.

  “I’m particularly proud of that little deception.”

  “Is that why you’re putting on this facade?” he asked, waving in the direction of the corpulent visage. “I know you’re a woman.”

  Avery’s form shifted into a tall willowy woman with red hair and green eyes, “Is this better?”

  Conceptual Insight hummed at the use of Light, Illusion and Sound. Avery was still changing her voice, he realised. It had been expected she would when she was masquerading as a man, but even shifting to a woman she hid her true voice. The Platinum was apparently careful to the extreme. A level of paranoia he could appreciate, given what she supposedly did for work.

  Nate shrugged, “Can’t say I care much how you make yourself look. Was just curious.”

  Avery tilted her head, “So, you don’t recognise her. Very interesting.”

  Nate raised an eyebrow questioningly.

  “This is Duchess Charlotte Desmarais. You didn’t react. So you’ve never met her.”

  “I thought we explained that in the Guild Tribunal?” replied Nate, mildly annoyed.

  “Trust, but verify,” answered Avery, still seeming relaxed about the entire exchange.

  “Alright. That makes sense. Now that you’ve verified, was there anything else you wanted, Avery?”

  “Just to let you know, my informants tell me that there are no signs of the Dungeon Cores that were captured along the border with Asmuisil. None in Asmuisil or Etrua. Dungeon Cores don’t just disappear, Nathaniel. Someone is up to no good. So if you intend to follow through with your foolish plan to follow Allais’s daughter to the front, be wary of everyone. Things are not as they appear.”

  “I would’ve been careful anyway,” he answered with a frown. “But, thank you.”

  “Just looking out for a fellow upstanding Guild member. A word of advice. If you’re going to trust any of the Prefects, make sure it’s Porter.”

  Nate’s eyes narrowed at the statement.

  “Raoult doesn’t have a spine to speak of and Allais is a greedy bitch that would sell us out for a grain of sand's worth of power,” responded Avery, her body changing again to that of a young man with red hair and cruel eyes. Fabien Lussier.

  He flinched and Avery shifted back to the fat-looking merchant.

  “The reminder is clear?” the Platinum asked, voice deep once more.

  Nate just nodded, gritting his teeth. Even after Avery had left, he continued to stew. It had been months, but he still wasn’t completely over his kidnapping and torture. The memory of it hurt less and less, but the fear was still rooted deep within him. He wanted to be angry with Avery. She was clearly manipulating him, but were her reasons for doing so detrimental? The Platinum had stopped by to give him information he didn’t have and a warning to look out for what was to come. Where had the Dungeon Cores that had triggered this war gone, and what was Prefect Allais up to? He doubted he would find out soon. They would be leaving in the next couple of days with the Guild contingent headed for Princess Morgane’s ‘Bright’ Army. He would need to keep his wits about him and his paranoia close. The last thing he wanted was to be dragged into another incident with the Nobility. Deep down, he knew his hopes were futile. Power called to power and he would soon be too powerful for them to ignore. Shaking his head, he headed upstairs. Preparation was key, so that when the castle of cards finally collapsed, he had to be ready for whoever swept them aside. And when you didn’t know what to prepare for, it was best to prepare for anything.

  Discord Channel

  Patreon with up to 20 chapters ahead of RoyalRoad.