Alex gave a bit of a nod to that, it made sense to a point but it was definitely something he would look into later. ''So, with those out of the way. Is everyone okay with me coming along? I don't plan to get in the way but to make sure, for the first few encounters I will stay back to see how you all perform. Once I find the synergy of your party, I will fit myself in. If I can do something better instruct me.''
They all gave a nod before Gerald spoke. ''I'd like to leave as soon as possible, when is a good time for you Alex?"
"I can meet you all outside of the dungeon entrance in a minimum of 1 hour, I had already planned to go in for a long amount of time so I have sufficient gear and equipment already."
They all looked between each other before they all nodded. ''Then we'll see you in an hour'' With that Alex gave a nod before leaving directly, only to be stopped by Gerald as he put something in his hand. The moment he did the Guild's sigil appeared above his hand, the sigil changed to a higher rank. Alex noticed and raised a brow. "Rank E?"
"You did spar against me, and even if it wouldn't have killed me it would've injured me heavily. I have the right to raise your rank all the way to C. Consider it just for fun.''
Alex stared a long moment before he sighed, waving his hand as he left, making his way to the armorer. If people knew that he went from rank F to E in only a few days, they might want his head.
As he walked he made his way into the Smith's shop. ''Alex? Just in time, I just finished.'' After a few minutes of speaking, he got into the armor, and it was an upgrade from his old equipment, even if only a little. Once he changed he was patting himself down and stretching, making sure it all fit properly.
''I added a gift since you're a first time customer, self-repairing and self-cleaning. It'd take a while to repair itself but as long as at least a strand of it is left, it will repair itself. The more damage the longer the repair time, a few tears? Few days, down to a strand of leather? Upwards to a month or more. The Self-cleaning is pretty fast though, every few hours, though it will not supplement washing yourself.''
Alex raised a brow. ''Why would I think it would clean me? It's Self Cleaning, meaning it cleans itself.''
The Smith seemed to have flashbacks and just sight heavily, patting Alex's arm. ''Boy, you'd be surprised you know? Not all Adventurers are as smart as you. What I wouldn't give to have my boy be born with half the wit you got.''
Alex chuckled but that brought up a point. Alex seemed overly intelligent for his upbringing, his wisdom, and his ability to apply his knowledge as well as at a whole different level. He had received a modern education so he could be considered a genius in this world, sure. But whereas he considered his ability to adapt, learn, and apply such things higher than some, compared to others here he was far above the normal.
'The quickest way to see what's considered smart in this world is to talk with Maya and pick at her brain with questions, if she's an A rank mage, she has to be at least Tier 3, even 4. Being a mage requires a certain caliber of intellect.' With that train of thought, he began to make his way out of town towards the dungeon entrance.
He arrived an hour on the dot, greeting everyone he stopped seeing Sera stare at him, or more so his hair, breathing heavily and holding an assortment of trinkets and what he assumed to be hair accessories. 'Damn... Was hoping she'd forget about that.' Once he got with them Gerald spoke up.
''New armor? You're even good at keeping up with equipment? Man, you're a monster. You have talent in both Mana and Aura, and you're smart, good looking, what did God forget?" Gerald's face became serious, lowering his voice a bit. ''I don't want to pry, but you don't have a....'' Gerald didn't say it out loud, but the rise of his brows and the slight nod down.
Alex raised a brow before he spoke bluntly. ''Do you want to see it? It's not something I'm ashamed of for sure if that is what you're asking.'' Gerald roared with laughter at that before slapping down onto his shoulder.
"I'm going to enjoy you around.'' With that he turned around and headed into the dungeon, all of them began to follow behind him. Danny stood near Gerald, off to the side as if ready to bolt at any point in time while also being aware of what was going on around them. Maya was in the middle with Alex and Sera taking up the back.
Sera had kept bothering him about starting his hair makeover but he waved her off saying that when they set up camp that night he'd let her go wild. Stepping forward Alex walked a bit behind Maya.
''Maya?" She kept walking but had removed the large hat, showing off her large ears, and now that he was standing behind her he was pretty sure he could see what would be her tail beneath her robes.
"Yes, Alex?"
"This is going to sound strange, maybe even rude. But compared to those you know, and who you have met, do I seem overly Intelegient?''
Maya, without a single ounce of hesitation, spoke. ''I wouldn't say overly, being smart isn't a bad thing, but so far, I can tell you are far above a lot of people I know, with just your ability to think before you act is already ahead of a lot of people, even Gerald has problems with it until he was up to Rank C, but you show it already at rank F.''
She looked behind her a bit to look up at him. She wasn't small, she was only about a full foot shorter than Alex who was technically the second tallest in the group. ''But, with just how you look at things, how you observe, how even when you're just walking, the mana hugs you, shows that your capacity to think is already higher then a lot of the people I know, Mana enjoys beings who are smart, I considered myself to be pretty high along with the Elders from my school, but not even the Head Master has the same level of Mana attracted to her as you do.''
"Do you think apart of it is due to my ability to memorize anything I see even if it's only for a moment?"
When he said that everyone stopped to look at him. Alex looked confused before Gerald just blurted out. ''You can what?"
"I can remember anything I see, as long as I see it.'' When that was said Maya began to rummage in her small pouch before pulling out a book that wouldn't normally fit into it, flipping a few pages she looked at him for a moment before he spoke.
"I'm going to show you a simple rune for enchantment. It's a multi-purpose one so it's not strong when compared to others, it's the same rune used for the enchantments on your armor. It requires little magic, do you think you could memorize the process?"
Alex gave a nod before he spoke. ''Just flash me the page.'' After he said that, the book opened and she showed to him. Giving him a single moment before closing the book. ''Did you remember it?"
Alex summoned his sword. 'This is a good chance to try something as well, now that I have a proper mental image of it, it should be easy.' When he said this he raised his free hand to the blade of his sword. Near the handle he channeled mana to his finger and with a quick hand, he imprinted a mana rune onto the blade. Once he did the sword began to gently glow like a weak lantern.
Maya seeing this, her eyes grew large, they all did but Maya's were like plates. She put her book away and stepped forward. ''Alex, no matter what, never tell anyone else about this.''
Alex raised a brow before he spoke. ''I know the usefulness of it, but is it so rare?''
Gerald barked a laugh before he then became serious. ''I'm a rank A, I'm entitled to Country secrets, and never once have I ever heard of anyone being able to remember a complicated rune after having only seen it once. That ability would be so sought after, wars would rage for it. Countries would sacrifice over half of their population to have someone with that ability. Not only does it allow you to look at all documents of someone, but it also allows you to look at a manual, skill book, or even a Magic book, see it once, then be able to perfectly copy it.''
Alex released a whistle to that, thinking back maybe he should've asked if his whole 'Photographic memory' thing was a good idea. His memory was always good, sure. But now that he had it he noticed a huge difference in use. He could remember a test he took when he was 7 years old, could remember connecting the dots book and remember it dot for dot.
"So, no saying anything about it, and only abuse it to benefit us?" There was a snicker from Sera, even Danny seemed to be amused, Maya's eyes were full of stars, thinking of all the things she could do if she were able to use Alex's ability to help her. But Gerald remained serious.
"I don't think you understand Alex, what's stopping us from knocking you out right now and getting the largest payment of our lives just by turning you in?''
Alex watched him a moment before he shook his head. ''Nothing, I am confident in my ability, but I know in a serious engagement the most I could do is bother you all at best. But if this ability of mine is what gets me killed, then so be it. But even if you could knock me out, there is nothing stopping me from ending my own life.''
Gerald stuttered at that. ''Woah now, hold on. Even if it was just me asking, do you have to be so serious about it? Makes me feel bad.''
Alex chuckled before he spoke. ''I'd rather die before living a life that I couldn't do what I wanted.. I'd rather just end it than have to deal with living a life that isn't for me.''
Danny was the first to nod, strangely enough. They all agreed eventually, and after a few minutes, they had continued on. Alex desummoned his sword earlier when he had shown off the rune, having waited about ten minutes, he summoned it again. As he did he channeled mana through the blade and it began to glow. Sera took noticed of what he was doing and asked.
''What're you doing?''
"I was curious, as you most likely know. My Blessing is summoning weapons and their pairs. I was wondering if I left a rune on one, would it come out normal, or would it retain the rune? Later I plan to break it and see if that once it repairs itself, will the rune also repair itself?''
Sera nodded to that. ''That's pretty smart, it'd take a lot of time out of changing equipment for sure. Maya hates it when we find better equipment or tools since it takes her hours to place all the right enchantments on a single piece.''
Alex without thinking about it reached forward and pat his hand onto Maya's head and rubbed it. ''Well I'm not sure I can do complicated ones that require fine control yet but I'll help her in what I can.' Noticing his hand he looked down to see Maya just kind of wobbling, at first he thought she was angry but he noticed how slow her movements were getting. He just barely rubbed her head and she was already close to passing out while walking?
Once he removed his hand she seemed to get her wits about her again and looked around before looking back to Alex. ''If you can do that every night to help me sleep, I'll do your enchantments for free.'' Sera heard this and gasped.
''YOU'RE WILLING TO GIVE IT TO HIM FOR FR-." Alex caught a hand over Sera's mouth and pulled her back toward him. Pressing his finger to his mouth slowly. He pointed forward to show a corner in the path near the stairs where they were heading. On the first few floors, things were too scared to even approach them due to the energy, but now that they were at about the 8th level, things seemed to care less and less about their life.
Once Sera was shut up she listened out before nodding her head. The rest of them had noticed the quick silence and turned. Seeing the seriousness of it Danny shifted before he was simply gone, the moment he was Alex tried his hardest to sense him in any way, but he couldn't. Only when he attempted to infuse Aura and Mana to his senses did he have a rough estimate of where Danny might be. Soon Danny came back and raised a hand.
Alex read his hands with a raised brow before it clicked, it was code. 'Three creatures, two medium, one small.' That was smart, Alex hadn't even considered doing that yet before Gerald turned slowly, raising a hand he put two fingers and pointed to Alex and Sera, then to Maya. He moved his hand between him and Danny then motioned towards the end of the hallway.
'Protect Maya, we'll go first.' With that, both of them began to move, before they did Danny had reached over and put a hand on Gerald's arm before both of them vanished. Trying again it was a bit easier to notice, but still required a large amount of concentration that he wouldn't be able to keep up while traveling unless he wanted to exhaust himself quickly.
After they left he heard Maya's voice gently in the back of his mind.
~Did you understand what he meant?~
Alex nodded.
~This is my fault, I completely forgot to give you a telepathy earring. How did you notice?~
Alex pointed to his nose.
~You smelt them? Is it apart of the mutation you are as a person?~
Alex nodded again before pointing to Sera, then himself, indicating 1/2
~You think your hearing is about half as good as Sera's?~
Alex gave a nod before tilting his head from side to side.
~You're not sure but that's still pretty good since her hearing is due to a Blessing.~
Hearing that Alex raised a brow before nodding. After a bit, he heard Maya again.
~ They're ready for the attack, it's two Hobgoblin's with light armor and a Goblin Shaman. Gerald wants you to charge down the corridor and make noise, when they start the ambush to get you, Dan is lined up to take out the Shaman, and Gerald a Hobgoblin, do you think you can take the second one? If you need assistance I and Sera will be behind you.~
Alex looked around to notice the side of the cave, too small for him to use his longsword effectively against a creature his size. But he still nodded.
Maya raised a hand before waving off, the moment she did Alex roared. Sprinting forth he made as much noise as he could. Though as he ran his sword and shield changed into two simple daggers, other than their jagged edges nothing was fancy about them. As he saw two creatures about his height but with the muscles of Gerald, and a smaller creature whip around the corner, he watched without seeing why the smaller creature just dropped while one of the larger creatures lost its head.
He aimed himself at the second one and hit the dirt, sliding around the opposite side that was holding what looked to be a broken sword, he stabbed directly into the hip, pulling on it and his dagger he stopped his slid and pulled himself up. Tearing out the dagger in that same momentum he used one dagger to stab his dagger between the Clavicle and collarbone above the shoulder to solidify his stance he brought the other dagger around and back into the pterion at the temple, sinking the dagger into the skull before he wrenched the jagged knife roughly to tear part at the brain. Once he finished this he desummoned the dagger in the skull and summoned it back in a preparing strike but felt the body begin to go limp beneath him. Once he felt that he desummoned both daggers and stepped back to watch the hobgoblin drop.
The moment it did Danny seemed to appear with his hands reaching forward. ''Daggers?" Alex looked confused before he summoned the daggers, they were now clean as if never used. Once he did Danny nicked one before Alex could react and began to expect it, pointing to the jagged sawtooth-like blade he spoke again. ''Why?''
Alex understanding nodded before pointing at it. ''Makes the wound hard to heal, use it properly, and instead of a fine cut, you can also tear a wound open to inflict more damage, cause severe bleeding. Sounds rough, but when using daggers in a confrontation, even if it's just an added effect, bleeding could prove terrible in a fight. People who use daggers aren't made for frontal combat, so instead of focusing on endurance, they should focus on hit and run. Only endurance you should worry about is the ability to keep your stamina and breathing up.''
Danny watched the dagger a long moment before he handed it back. ''Want one.'' As it was handed back they both vanished again. ''I can write up a blueprint for it and hand it to you so you can have it custom ordered. Tonight when we camp let me see your weapons and I'll keep the frame similar to them.'' Danny gave a nod before he moved to the creatures and raised a hand. Dark tendrils seemed to lift from his fingers before he pulled back his hands, suddenly three pouches appeared in his hand. With that, he handed them to Gerald. ''A money snatching technique? What is its limitations?'' He then watched Gerald take them and put them into another bag by just dumping the coins into the other bag, once the previous three bags were empty, the bags just became black smoke. So it made temporary bags as well? That's pretty fucking neat.
''Dead.'' Alex took a moment but realized Danny must've meant they had to be dead for it to work with that he nodded. ''Can you teach it to me later?'' Danny just nodded before he began to take the ears, tongues, the teeth of the hobgoblins, and their mana cores. Once he got them he handed them all to Gerald who put them into a sack.
Gerald spoke up. ''We've been at it for about a day, let move to the next floor and its rest area then set up camp. Get Alex his earring so we don't have a blunder again.'' With that everyone agreed before making their way down the stairs. Once they were they came to a large room with a fountain, no one was around but it looked like people were there recently. Gerald and Sera began to pitch a large tent. Danny was helping Maya begun to get dinner ready. Alex searched into his storage and looked through it until he found a box about two feet wide, about five inches tall. He looked at it a moment before setting it down. Stepping back a bit before the box suddenly shivered before it began to expand, changing shape slowly until it made a double tent, Alex released a breath ''Fancy, starting to think he left more than just simple equipment, I should double-check everything later.'' He pulled out a chair as well and sat on it, relaxing as he stretched.
Safe zones were found on certain floors in dungeons, people used it for rest stops since the fountain offered healing properties even if it was minor, but their real use was to prevent stronger creatures coming up from beneath and causing havoc to the creatures above, also preventing creatures from going down to get eaten. To monsters, it was just a blockade, but to Adventerurs it was a pit stop.
As Alex rested he suddenly noticed he was alone, raising a brow he looked around for everyone before he saw a confused Gerald poke his head out from the tent, seeing Alex sitting next to a simple tent he raised his brow. ''What're you doing out here? Just come inside ours, there's room.''
Alex raised a brow before he packed up his things once more and went inside, the moment he did he just kind of stood there, looking around.
The tent was large on the outside sure, but it was... Many times larger on the inside, it was strange, it felt like he just stepped into a house. Maya seeing this smiled from the couch.
''One of my greatest inventions ever. Once the sigils are lined up properly, it becomes a home! There's a lot of magic mumbo involved, but you can just think of it as a normal house. Your room will be on the second floor, it's nothing fancy since it just has a bed, but you're free to customize it how you see fit.''
Alex just smacked his lips a bit before he said. ''Man, you make my small self-building tent seem kind of cheap.''
Maya hearing this ears twitched. ''Self building?''
Alex nodded. ''Yeah, this will sound weird but my old man found it in a cave, and then gave it to me.''
Maya made grabby hands, which to Alex was adorable, how could he turn that down? So he stepped forward and pulled out the box for her, setting it into her greedy little hands she began to mess with it.
Seeing how she was now engrossed with it he just moved to sit down, the moment he did Sera was behind him, putting her arms around him she pulled him back into the couch before he could get away. It looked like she was hugging him from behind, the dream of all men. But to Alex, she was strangling him.
''You promised.'' Alex pat at her elbow, nodding. Once he did she released him slowly before she pulled out a small box that looked like a hairdresser's kit. ''One question.''
"No, you can not touch any other hair on my body but the hair on my head.'' That got a laugh from Gerald who seemed to be in the kitchen and a wack from Sera.
''No! Do you have a preference of style?!"
Alex with that thought about it, thinking back to his previous life he didn't mind long hair, it looked good on him and he wondered how it'd look on him now, but due to his short hair, he would need to wait for it to grow out. ''I like long hair, not overly long though. But since I have short hair right now I don't really know.''
Sera grinned as she opened her box, an arrangement of brushes, combs, accessories, and other objects were in it. ''Well, leave that to me then.''
She then pulled out what seemed to be an overly fancy brush. ''This brush is magical, it's one of the most useless items we've ever found, but we learned that when you brush your hair with it, it slowly stimulates faster hair growth, it takes a while so I won't be able to much for a few weeks, but you should have long hair within at least a month, once I can do that I'll make your hair real good.''
With that she began to pull at his hair and brush it, the moment she began to brush his hair he felt a strange sensation go through from the top of his spine all the way down to his toes as he leaned back into it.
'Didn't know it felt this good to get my hair brushed by another person... Maybe it's because of my new body's sensitivity?'
While she brushed his hair he took out the dagger, the right-hand one that would've replaced his sword. Channeling mana into it glowed very gently. Seeing this he made his sword appear after desummoning his dagger. Once he channeled mana again the sword glowed as brightly as before.
''So, I can apply a rune to a form, and have it activate strongly on the original holder, while it only gently works on a different form. There might be other limitations.'' He clicked his tongue a bit, the smell in the air was good, whatever they were cooking was better then what he had been eating even at the tavern.
'In my prayers Robert, but it seems your soup might not be that good.'
Maya spoke up. ''I have a question!''
Raising a brow Alex looked over to her, she had set his 'tent' onto the table, now turned with her legs crossed, having her feet pulled in under her legs so she didn't take up any extra room.
''Yeah?'' Alex let the weapon desummon.
''Well, you seem really intelligent, and you seem to have a lot of skill, but seem rather new to your own power, and what it entails? You're also new to magic and Aura as if you never had access to it before?'' Maya tilted her head.
Fuck, those bunny ears were cute but he answered. ''Well, despite how I come off, I did come from a village, we didn't even have currency, we had traded. I didn't experiment with my blessing much because back then it was just, make whatever was useful at the time, an ax, needles, so on so forth. I never had time to sit down and experiment. There was no magic other than the magic from blessings in my village, and the only reason why I tapped into Aura as I have is because of working out and at least training by fighting the beasts around the forest, none of them were ever tiered, just normal creatures that were a bit stronger than others.''
Maya nodded a bit before she spoke. ''Is that why you had planned to come into the dungeon for an extended period of time? To learn, adapt, and see how you can best apply your blessing and knowledge?"
With a nod he pulled out a book, it was titled 'Rune making for the average joe.' "I had planned to spend a half a year down here, or until I felt that I had learned all I can down here.''
Hearing that Sara spoke up faster than Maya. ''Half a year? Even if you had a big enough storage, where would you put the rations?''
''I bought minimal rations, I had bought spices however to learn monster cooking.'' Another book appeared in his hand, the one labeled 'Monster Cooking Manual.'
Sara hearing that gave a nod as she continued to brush his hair, seeming pleased at his dark locks. ''That's a good skill to have, that's the book we learned from and it's served us well, though Danny was always the best cook.''
Alex gave a sniff before speaking. ''Is that who's cooking now?''
Maya spoke up. ''Yeap, it's a special occasion, a new member, a 'Prodigy' recruit. That noted, can you give me your armor? I'm going to strengthen some of the enchantments and add a few minor ones as well. Do you have any ideas you want to be added for yourself?''
Alex was taking off his armor, it was only fastened over his clothing so it was rather easy. ''Is there something that could make me lighter like a sort of word that I say that slows down my decent?''
Maya gave a nod before she pointed to Sera. ''Her boots have one, we have it as a voice-activated one that's simply 'Feather' are you okay with that?"
Alex gave a nod before handing off his equipment to her, once she snatched it away from him she rushed off.
Soon the brushing stopped as Sera put away her little hairdresser box before sitting next to him, pulling out a book. ''This is the first thing I want you to learn, it's a skill me and Danny know to the Advanced level, Gerald and Maya have both made it to starting. Long story short, it increases the 'grip' of your feet and hands, think of a magical magnet for your feet and hands. At start, it just makes it so you can climb easier, but Danny and I can run up a vertical wall for a few meters."
Alex took the book grinning. 'I can be spiderman eventually? Not only does this open a lot of combat momentum and movement, but it's also just plain cool.'
''Technically, you could climb a vertical surface with no handholds for an indefinite amount of time, however, the cost steadily increases the longer you use it, Danny has the highest record for 73 meters of continuous climbing.''
Alex gave a nod before opening the book, taking a look at the first few pages. He flipped through all the way to the 'second' stage of it, seems there were five stages, Danny should be near finishing the 4th stage and moving to the fifth stage soon. After he finished taking the knowledge in he handed it back over.
Sera stared a moment at him before smacking her forehead. ''I forgot of your memory trick, I was so confused as to why you handed it back. What stage did you memorize to?''
"Second, once I finish second I'll ask for it back.''
Saya smiled. ''This makes it much easier, we have a lot of training manuals but it takes time for everyone to learn it, then it needs to be passed around. But if you can just remember it then train without the book it means others can learn it faster.''
Alex laughed before Sera left him on the couch alone. Where he leaned back and relaxed, the could was pretty comfortable. As he sat there the call for dinner was called. Standing he made his way into the 'dining' hall.
Having just tasted the best food of his life, and got to know all of them a bit more with just random things about them. Danny liked sour candy, Sera liked sweet chocolate, Maya preferred darkened unsweetened, which Alex agreed with her. Gerald was less a candy fan, more a brownie kind of guy, any kind of brownie he liked.
Sera preferred forest terrain, Gerald preferred pains, Maya preferred ruins and towers, and Danny, in a rather edgy manor said he liked a place as long as there were shadows he could hide in. Alex himself didn't have a preference, he just enjoyed exploring.
Season wise, all of them preferred a colder climate except Maya, Maya said she much preferred a warmer climate, like around a fireplace snuggled into a thick blanket with tea and a mountain of books. Alex could relate to pretty much all of that.
Alex also learned that technically, since they were a rank A party, they were counted as Nobles, including land, and a manor. Since Alex was now a ''Formal'' member, he was technically counted as a noble as well.
Since he wasn't a higher ranked adventurer however he wasn't a high-ranking one at all, but it did wave certain fees for traveling and certain taxes like bulk orders.
He also learned that they technically had a ''Following'', including a garrison, a town, and many other things. Gerald was the 'Lord' of the area since he was technically the highest ranking due to his leader status.
After some simple chatter, Alex excused himself first and left to his room, not worrying about decorating it he just closed the door. It was rather spacious, after looking around he noticed there was running water, a rather modern bathroom. Thinking about this, Maya must be filthy rich.
'I got lucky to find them in such a place, it will still take me time, but now I'm a ''Prodigy'' rookie with backing and sufficient teachers and resources to get from.'
Deciding to try a bit of the 'Grip' skill he thought to the pages, it was basically a way to use Aura, and Mana respectively, since he was better formed with Aura currently he tried to activate it by focusing a coating of aura to his feet and willing the aura to 'hold' his position. When he did he noticed his feet became solid.
Testing the limits a bit it took a bit of force to be able to move his foot, not a considerable amount but it definitely made a difference. Releasing the aura he walked to the bathroom to wash up and clean himself before he collapsed into the bed. The moment he did it didn't even take seconds before he passed out.