Chapter 70: Chapter Seventy

I got the room closest to the big shower. I had given Callie three  days worth of priority on wish granting. The others were annoyed but  Callie was the only one who was strong enough to spar with me for it and  I didn't feel like wasting the charges for the day. Once we got that  settled everyone headed to their rooms and checked on our stuff. I fumed  silently to myself at Zeke when I walked into the room by the bathroom I  wanted and all of my things were in there. He'd given it to me ahead of  time and I hadn't known it, but like hell was I going to admit he'd  gotten me.

The rest of the day was just relaxing and  having dinner (which i made, risotto to be exact) before heading to bed.  The next morning found us all up and eager to face the day, getting  ready for our return to the academy. I cooked breakfast and everyone sat  down to discuss what we would be doing. I sat down and cut into my  pancakes, looking up at the others. "So first off, we should discuss  allocation of funds. Twelve hundred chits, we got extra for the two in  perfect condition that Benny and Jessie took down. I suggest that two  hundred go to them directly rather than being team funds."

I  glanced to Callie, who was in charge, with a question on my face, and  she smiled brightly back at me. "I was going to suggest that myself.  Bonuses for good work are pretty standard, and having a hundred a piece  in walking around money would be good for them. Especially being at H  rank themselves, they can probably get their hands on some nice gear or  materials. Or Jessie could look into rare seeds she could use. Those  vines are useful, but there are all kinds of plants in the universe."

Jessie  looked excited. "You think they might have some? I've been doing  research but Callus has a pretty weak herbalism scene so I kind of  resigned myself to waiting on that kind of thing. Having better seeds to  use would really improve my combat abilities. Not to mention I could  start looking into healing herbs to help level up my first aid Skill.  I'm sure having a proper medic on the team would be useful, but my  Lesser Florakinesis can only merge with first aid if it hits beginner  before my next rank up."

That was definitely something I'd  considered. i didn't know what that combination would make, but I was  pretty sure it would be pretty damn useful to have on the team. Vitality  was nice but it didn't instantly heal you unless yours was insanely  high for your level or the source of the injury was insanely weak. I  looked to Benny. "How about you, planning to buy yourself some new  materials? Or did you want get some fancy clothes to show off for that  pretty elf girl you couldn't stop staring at."

After all  his teasing about Callie it was nice to mess with Benny about his love  life a bit. He flushed bright red but no one else reacted. Benny hadn't  really been subtle about his interest. Jessie stepped in to take the  heat off him as a mercy. She raised a hand excitedly. "Are we going to  ask her about the Fairieland? Because I've always wanted to learn more  about it. It seems so amazing. I can't believe I met an actual elf." She  paused, but couldn't resist a sly look at Benny to pile on. "She was so  pretty too."

He groaned and  dropped his head into his arms in exasperation. I just laughed and  decided to be merciful. "Point is, you two did good work and you deserve  to be rewarded. Clearly Callie agrees, and she's the boss. As for the  other thousand we can invest it in the group. Maybe some enchanting  materials I can use for gear. Or if it's enough maybe investing in a  personal skyride so we don't have to keep using the guild's cars." I  turned to look at Zeke. "Where would we get something like that by the  way? And is a thousand H rank chits enough?"

He  shrugged. "Might be. Depends where you go. Prices vary even among  skyrides of the same rank. Not all care are the same. Some are good for  speed, some are better over long distances, some are defenses, and some  are optimized for massive internal space. I've seen cars with entire  apartments in the back of them, and they usually run a pretty penny, but  you could buy a junker for less than a hundred. I can look into a  dealer nearby that you can check out when you get back, assuming you're  still heading out to the Academy."

I  nodded. It was a toss up whether to bother, but in the end it was still  a benefit. Plus Callie wanted to try getting on the Might rankings. My  own Might was a bit low even with all my Skills to boost it. Though I  could try to fix that. I turned to Callie. "I think we should start your  three days of wishes tomorrow. That would let me get some Might points  today, and I really need to beef mine up a bit." More than just physical  strength, Might controlled the damage output of Skills that interacted with the physical world like my Monk techniques.

She agreed without hesitation. "Of course. I need to think about what Skill  I can trade over too. The food memories are going to stop being  valuable soon, I need to start doing what Benny and Jessie are doing.  Maybe I could trade you memories of my tracking Skill and help you learn  it. There's only so much cooking knowledge you can gain from eating  dishes prepared by master chefs." She blushed a bit. "Also I'm losing  way too many of my favorite meals and it's bumming me out. Like I don't  remember what's missing obviously, but I remember my reaction to the  memories."

I  winced, that was probably smart. Skills could be regained and even  stalling them was worth it if you could get better stats, but actual  memories of experiences were a bit more unique. I made myself a promise  to treat Callie to all the things she traded away again for the first  time. We were working all the kinks out of this, but Skill memories  seemed to be the sweet spot. They actually had a benefit and were a  sacrifice, but not one that couldn't be recovered from like losing  precious memories of experiences.

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She  seemed to sense the direction my thoughts took because she rolled her  eyes, taking my hand. "Don't be an idiot, the food memory thing was my  idea, I just think yours was better with the whole Skill thing anyway. I  imagine we're going to have to actually rank the skills up though if  we're going to keep using them to trade for points. I doubt a Minor  Tracking skill will be enough once we start getting higher up. Even if  the cost for raising points stat wise isn't higher, I'm guessing the  payment starts to go up the higher the stat is." She looked at Zeke for  confirmation.

My  Uncle looked impressed. "Most don't catch that but yes. Points get  harder to obtain as you get higher up, so despite using the same amount  of power for just one, they're worth more. Not that one point makes much  of a difference after a certain point." He looked at me curiously. "You  tried making or trading two yet? With your Impact you should be in the  strike zone, since it can cover part of the cost of other stats if  necessary."

My  eyes widened, I hadn't even considered that. Zeke picked that up too,  from his expression. "Yeah, that innate perception that multiple points  are difficult or impossible is one of the major reasons it's so  expensive. Similar to the whole secrets thing, your powers work on a  conceptual level. Each point past one gets exponentially harder to trade  for in terms of cost. Two should be doable for now, with more coming as  you go. I doubt you'll manage more than five before you get to F rank,  even with the modifier."

Even  two would double my daily point intake though, or output, but I doubted  low level skill memories would be enough to pay for wishes at the scale  Zeke was talking about. Until they could get the resources to actually  pay for them I was pretty sure the one point boosts were the most I  could manage for my friends, at least unless they decided to trade  points from other stats to respec. Two points of Fantasy should be  enough for two points of Might, or at least that made sense to me.

I  finished my pancakes and stood up, dropping my dishes in the  sanitizer."So we head out to the Academy today, and I'll try out my  ability to get two points with one wish. Ten more Might would be a much  bigger advantage than five obviously." I considered possibly spreading  out the wishes over more people to try to lessen the impact of losing so  much though, ten points gone, even if you got them replaced, would  probably be noticeable.

The  others finished eating and we all got ready, suiting up and heading out  to the car. As usual Jessie drove, and the rest of us discussed  possible materials that Benny could get for new gear. My personal vote  was for something Fantasy based. I grinned eagerly at my friend. "The  random nature of inventing would be even more random with that stat, but  it opens up the possibility of even more amazing gear." He seemed  intrigued by the possibility, but Callie shook her head, disagreeing.

Her  face was contemplative, but she seemed pretty certain about her  conclusions. "I'd recommend against that. Not because it couldn't yield  good results, but mostly because the results are too random for the  amount of money we have. If we had the chits to pour into getting a bulk  amount of Fantasy materials and just letting Benny crank out gear until  he got something good I would say go for it, but with our plans to buy a  skyride and you only having a hundred chits to spend on your own I  think it's too big of a gamble."

I  conceded the point. "That's a valid point. It might be an idea with  great potential rewards but ti isn't cost effective. Probably put a pin  in that for later, in the meantime probably Vitality then. If Fantasy is  the most likely to to produce something random, I'd say other than  Might, Vitality is probably the most predictable stat in terms of  outcome. It only does a few things.Granted it's not completely  predictable, it might bring the invention to life like it did for Tock.  But you have a decent shot at some kind of healing or energy boosting  item."

We  spent the next hour or two discussing possible outcomes and different  combinations that might work well, Benny had been researching different  materials to look out for. While inventing couldn't be predicted because  of all the varying factors he could still make an educated guess about  the general direction certain combinations would take, and understanding  materials helped make that more viable.

Finally  though, we arrived at the field outside the Academy, hopping out and  stretching after the long car ride. I took a long deep breath, enjoying  the air. We'd texted the people from Grimmengap on the way so they would  know we were coming today, this was around when we'd talked about  meeting them, but a bit earlier so we wanted to let them know. We'd  arranged a meeting at the crafting hall, since they had to seel their  own materials and we were buying new ones. Looking to the others to  confirm we were ready we all set off in that direction. I had to admit, I  was excited to hear more about the most mysterious faction.

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