Chapter 19
“What’s next?” Wes asked.
“It seems the girls are done with their little chat, too. You all ready to go?”
Wes sat thinking if he could use anything else besides eating his meal. It felt like he had been talking the whole time. He quickly grabbed a few things and threw them in his mouth. A type of bread lay on the table as well, so Wes grabbed it and mashed it as small as he could in his hands before throwing it in his pants pocket. Standing up he remembered the one thing that this place did not have for him.
“I can only think of one thing.” Lifting his leg and wiggling his toe. Wes showed that his toes could be seen through the little cracks in his leather shoes.
Nia giggled to herself, “Of course. We don’t provide shoes because everyone on the Path is particular about their footwear.”
Nia reached through the air, and her arm disappeared all the way up to the elbow. Wes did not know if she was messing with him, but she moved her arm in a way that her body moved with it. A moment later, she pulled her arm back through the air. A dark brown boot in her hand. She placed it on the empty space still left on the table and repeated her action a few more times.
When she was done, she held out her hands. The first boot was plain in nature but looked the most durable. The Second and third looked to be a lesser of the first in durability, but they were styled in increasingly intricate patterns. The last was a smaller boot like he had seen Runar wear. This boot's color was black and shiny, and now that he could see the mouth of it. He saw that it went halfway up his ankle. The others went all the way up to his calf.
“Hurry along, Wesley.” Nia pushed.
Wes grabbed the first boot. It fit him the best. The second and third styles were too much for him. And the last did not look very durable compared to the first. With his decision decided he threw off his shoes quickly. Nia caught them before they landed, even though she was on the other side of the room. They suddenly appeared where she grabbed. She looked them over before hurling them through the air over her shoulder. Wes saw them disappear while he went to put on his new boot.
“What are you doing?” Nia asked.
Wes froze with his left foot hovering over the mouth of the boot. “I am putting on the boot to see if it fits.”
“I can see that, but you should go wash your feet and change your socks,” Nia said.
“Why?” Wes asked.
Nia sighed, “When you get a new shoe, don’t ever put your dirty foot into the new shoe. All you will accomplish with that is transferring the sour smell from the old to the new. It will be many years before you..” Nia paused. She smiled and looked at Wesley in such a way that it made him quiver. “I forgot about your new ability. Why don’t you try and use that now.”
Wes’s eyebrows shot up as well in realization. Followed by him rubbing his head. “How do I do that?” Wes asked.
“You never tried using Deposit?” Nia asked.
Wes shook his head. “I didn’t know if it had a fixed cost like most spells. And my current experience was so low yesterday, just like it is now. Plus, I don’t know if it pulls from the Savings the same way as when I level up.”
“And how much Experience do you have now?” Nia asked
Wes offered his status window for Nia.
Name: Wesley of 29744C
Race: Human
Age: 27
Unique abilities: Imperial over Metric, Back in My Day
Abilities: Deposit, Eternal Spark, Cleanse
Skills: N/A
Achievement(s): Bloody Soul, Pragmatic Savant
Trait(s): 3
Current Status: Blessed
Level 2
Savings: 2,508,088
Next Level: 829.44
Level 2 Exp Per Sec: .0048
Current Exp: 11.71
Nia looked over his status. The smile on her face grew as she reached the bottom. “Why don’t you use cleanse now while you are with me. I can’t promise you won’t die, but with me being here with you, your odds of survival go way up.”
“I wasn’t kidding. I don’t know how to activate my abilities.” Wes huffed.
Chuckling, Nia walked him through the process. “In your early days, you have to think about what it is they may do. Let’s hold off on using Deposit right now. I think I know how that will work, but let's use Cleanse first. Think hard about what the word may mean. Visualize it in your mind clearly. Before you activate it, think about what you would like it to do for you.”
Wes nodded along; he followed her instructions. He thought about his dirty feet and how he wanted them to be clean. How he would like them to feel like they did when he just got out of the shower. Wes said the word in his mind.
A flash of bright blue light hummed around him. Covering half the platform in the process. Looking at his foot, he could see it being bathed along with a few spots on his pants and shirt. His hands emitted the glow along his fingertips. His pants pocket, where he stashed the bread, was violently expelling the blue light. He could feel something happening in his pocket, but without seeing, he didn’t know for sure. Moving his vision from his pocket, he looked over to the table and found the table bathed in blue light as well. Little rays were shooting off the table in different areas. His plate and utensil he had used to shovel food into his mouth a few minutes prior looked completely clean.
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Nia yelled, “Wesley!”
Wes snapped out of his trance. The blue light all around him started to die out. When it was completely gone, he finally looked over to Nia. Her face showed deep concern. Her brows furrowed in thought. “What?”
“Look at your Status,” Nia replied.
Name: Wesley of 29744C
Race: Human
Age: 27
Unique abilities: Imperial over Metric, Back in My Day
Abilities: Deposit, Eternal Spark, Cleanse
Skills: N/A
Achievement(s): Bloody Soul, Pragmatic Savant
Trait(s): 3
Current Status: Blessed
Level 2
Savings: 2,506,925
Next Level: 829.44
Level 2 Exp Per Sec: .0048
Current Exp: .0192
In shock, Wes asked aloud. “Did I just use over a thousand Experience on that one ability?”
“1174.71 experience to be precise.”
“That's more than I will make in two days.”
“That’s just shy of what you will make in three days at your current rate,” Nia added.
Wes laughed to himself, “Not such a cheat now am I?”
Nia gathered herself and walked over to Wes, “It is a good thing that I was able to look over your status while you cast. You couldn’t tell how much you were using?”
Wes shook his head.
“That’s concerning, but not the end of the world. We can work with that by having one of the girls monitor your expenditure. That's not to say it will be better by much, but at least you won’t tap yourself dry.” Nia offered encouragement.
Wes looked over his clean hands and clean socks. They had previously been tinged with a color from his old shoes. He pulled off his socks and inspected under his toenails. They were cleaner than he had ever seen them. He looked under his fingernails and found them to be devoid of any debris as well.
This is bad if I have to pull my health, mana, and stamina from experience. I can’t get into any protracted fights. So many questions still left to answer. I can’t use any channeled ability without great concern of killing myself. Good thing I have savings.
“You can feel how much mana you are using, right?” Wes asked
Nia nodded her head, “It’s not the end of the world. We can work around it. That was also your first cast of cleanse. I even used a lot of mana the first time I used Manabolt. As I grew a better understanding of the ability, my mana consumption went down. The real concerning part to me is that it cleans so well. That is something that you usually have to improve with understanding and mana consumption. Next time you use it, try only focusing on the smallest thing you need to clean. I think just thinking broadly will be your enemy with all your spells. And remember, we now know it's a safe bet to assume that all expenditures automatically pull from your savings. That is a key bit of information. There may be exceptions, but in that case, I think it will just fail to activate.”
“You are right. It just feels like I am not suited for active combat.” Wes replied
Nia laughed aloud, “Every boy's dream is to hurl Fireballs. But you are overlooking something. With what we now know, if you reach a high enough level, eventually, no matter what spell it is, you may gain so much experience in a second that you may be able to have Abilities going at all times and still cast all the fireballs you could want. I am more curious how your health will show on you. You can tell when low levels get tired by their appearance. Or in a fight, you are able to see the damage accumulate on them. I am wondering if that is true for you as well, since you have that massive savings account to fall back on. You need to keep it as high as you can, by the way. If it reaches zero, you die, don’t forget.”
Wes nodded along to her words. “That’s what I was just thinking. I am going to use Deposit now.” Wes brought up his status.
Name: Wesley of 29744C
Race: Human
Age: 27
Unique abilities: Imperial over Metric, Back in My Day
Abilities: Deposit, Eternal Spark, Cleanse
Skills: N/A
Achievement(s): Bloody Soul, Pragmatic Savant
Trait(s): 3
Current Status: Blessed
Level 2
Savings: 2,506,925
Next Level: 829.44
Level 2 Exp Per Sec: .0048
Current Exp: 1.0046
Wes focused on his Deposit ability. He watched his experience tick up.
Current Exp: 1.0142
…
Current Exp: 1.0286
Wes said the words in his mind.
Current Exp: .0048
Wes shot his eyes up his status to look at his savings.
Savings: 2,506,926
So it rounded down, that’s nice to know. I wonder if it will round up? It also took my whole pool of experience with it. I will have to play with it more and see if I can deposit a certain amount next time.
Satisfied, he shared his thinking with Nia. She agreed with him that he would need to play around with it in the future.
“This will be huge for you in the future, but it will also be very bad for you in the short term,” Nia said
“Why do you think that?”
“In the future, you will be able to have the largest health pool of anyone that I know of. It can grow so large that it could make you immune to any kind of assassination attempt. But also, it will allow you to go all out and not worry about damage if it is big enough. Like I said, still a lot of unknowns. But even if you never got a defensive ability, which is very unlikely as your levels start piling up. You will still be a monstrous individual to fight, eventually. In the short term, you will lose all your progress to any level and will have to wait that much longer. It is a fixed rate accumulation, and we don’t quite know yet if you will get experience from other things yet like everyone else.” Nia concluded her thoughts.
“Do you think I should prioritize levels or savings?” Wes asked.
“That is hard to say. I suspect that while I am around, you will be more inclined to go for levels and savings after I am gone. But you will have to decide that for yourself. This is your path to walk. Too much advice from me can make you grow overly cautious.” Nia Replied.
Wes made up his mind. “You said that I will get an ability all the way until level 10. So I will go for levels right now. Plus, my Exp rate is still rather low right now.”
“That is as good a decision as any, but I am only guessing that you will. Us normies only get a skill every level until level ten.”
Not allowing the conversation to drag on, Nia waved her arm over Wesley.
Wesley's attire changed. He was now wearing pants with leather patches at the knees and elbows. A small green cloak covered his shoulders now. It went all the way down to just below his knees. Small leather bracers covered his wrists. They appeared to be the same material as his shoes.
“Finish putting on your boots. We have a lot to do.” Nia hurried him.
Wes quickly put on his new boots, feeling the utter stiffness of them. Wes thought.
Perhaps new shoes weren’t the best idea.
