I didn’t head back to the temple after the meeting with Revayne. Today was the day I was supposed to meet back up with the adventuring party to celebrate, and I figured I would just wait on Ring Three before heading up. Especially since I was meeting Cerea at Gutran’s smithy anyway.

First though, I headed to the bank. On the way, I wondered about what Revayne had asked me. Do you want to be a god?

How was that even a question? Who would truly say no to that? Technically, with the way I was so focused on ranking up and improving myself, I was already on my way. I might not be screaming about Praise the Woven Way or whatever bullshit people loved to believe in, but I was a staunch follower of the Weave in action and decision. I was making full use of it, wasn’t I?

And that was why I hadn’t ended up answering her one way or another. Because she hadn’t asked a simple, clear-cut question of whether I would like to pray to Weave or whatever. Revayne, the perceptive little detective that she was, had asked about what I was doing.

I wanted a home. I wanted to be strong enough to defend myself. I wanted to explore everything I could do with the magic I had discovered in this new world.

None of which were answers to her real question.

Thankfully, she hadn’t pressed me about it and I hadn’t felt like discussing the topic. I had thanked her for revealing the context behind the Woven Way and all that. It made sense why no one really talked about it. In this world, it was a normal, ever-present thing. It would be like explaining why I went to work every day, even if the longer I did it, the more I didn’t want to.

The bank trip took my mind off it. I got lost on my way, ended up bumping into an Ogre stumbling her way into a hospital, got cursed for it, then managed to find my way to the bank.

Where the numbers in my account made me do a double take. I didn’t know if the Adventurer’s Guild had already paid out everything I had earned from the dungeon trip, but seeing an extra digit on my account balance definitely assured me that I had made a very tidy profit.

Satisfied, I left the bank. Now I had to wonder what exactly I was going to do with the money. Find more things to Sacrifice, of course, but I wasn’t sure if the Mage Guild’s trade workshop was going to cut it.

If I really wanted to push back the mana implosion countdown, I needed valuable Sacrifices.

I frowned as I exited the bank. Push back. How long had I been obsessed with pushing back the mana implosion? A while ago, Kostis had mentioned that I would need to go through the mana implosion if I wanted to advance my mana core, or something along those lines, I was pretty sure. To do that, I needed to rank up my Spirit enough to handle it.

Well, now I had another reason to head over to the Mage Guild.

Gutran’s first, though. I didn’t train with him just yet—getting sweaty before an outing was not my style—and I didn’t end up spending that long there anyway. Cerea arrived, brought a pair of gauntlets from Gutran, then hauled me away. The Scalekin grunted out a farewell.

“Did you see the money in your account?” she asked me brightly as we neared the Preservatory.

“Oh yeah, I did!” I said. “It was a lot. Was that everything from selling the stuff we got from the dungeon?”

Cerea grinned at me. “That’s not even the standard amount you’re supposed to be getting, Ross. I’ve handed over everything to the guild already, of course, but the guild itself has only managed to sell off like a third of it all. There’s a lot more coming, friend. And the guild hasn’t even started recovering the rest of the Greater Brillwyrm or paying us for it.”

I whistled low. Alright, with that much money coming in over time, I really had room to splurge on properly valuable Sacrificial offerings.

We went through the Preservatory, getting some friendly waves from the angelic Se-Targa again. They were just as I had seen them before, silver skin glinting in the magical sunlight, feathery wings looking like they were constructed from pure radiance, all the while doing the most mundane things like fishing, sweeping away fallen leaves, hanging out on high branches.

“Do they have this sort of Preservatory at Claderov?” I asked Cerea.

She laughed, but it was more jagged than mirthful. “Our old Senator Primes would piss on the trees and spit into the water before they even dreamed about setting up a Preservatory in Claderov.”

“Yeesh. Why do they hate it that much?”

“They don’t hate Preservatories, specifically. They’re just extremely practical and see anything that isn’t absolutely necessary for survival as superfluous. What they actually hate are people like the Councillor who established the Preservatories on Zairgon. You know, people who think luxuries are still worth experiencing, even when things aren’t exactly easy.”

I was starting to get the sense that Claderov wasn’t as affluent as Zairgon, and most of Zairgon was far from rich in my eyes. Sure, there was Ring Two, but it was much smaller than the lower Rings and no doubt Ring One was even more so.

The gate wasn’t an issue as I was with Cerea. Apparently, it wasn’t supposed to be an issue for me either. Not when I could use my Adventurer’s Guild badge.

The narrative has been illicitly obtained; should you discover it on Amazon, report the violation.

We eventually arrived at a new restaurant on Ring Two. Ugnash’s treat once again. And once again, the owner of the restaurant seemed to know him personally, though their interactions were frosty at best.

“How’d you get this one to give us a free meal?” I asked as the Scalekin owner slowly ambled away.

It was Khagnio who answered once we had a clear shot. “Cheap bastard still doesn’t want to pay for our treats, so he decided to call in another favour. The owner apparently wants Ugnash to keep quiet about the fact that he sold off his wedding ring to pay his gambling debt.”

We all stared at Ugnash.

“Isn’t that… blackmail?” I asked.

The big Rakshasa just glared at Khagnio. “This cheap bastard

is your party’s leader.” He cleared his throat, waiting for the server offering us water to leave before talking again. “And no, I’m not blackmailing anyone. I just offered to return the ring because I haven’t pawned it off yet. In return for some curry and vindaloo.”

The familiar names of the dishes were so out of whack in a world where people ate cave-sheep, I decided against questioning it. It was probably a translation thing from the Universal Language Approximator, essentially approximating the dish names to something I was familiar with from back on Earth.

Turned out the dishes were indeed basically curry and vindaloo. They had delicious veggies and meat, fragrant with herbs, and with a spicy tang to boot. I wasn’t going to forget this restaurant anytime soon.

It was also nice just spending time chatting with the others. The more I talked with them, the more it became clear that they had known each other for a long time, but I never felt like an extra wheel. They were good at wrapping me into discussions, making me feel like I was a part of the group too. Like I was making real friends for a change.

And it wasn’t like we only talked about the fun things such as how Ugnash kept purposefully targeting people who could do him favours when gambling or Khagnio’s occasional run-ins with the black-market in the undercity of Zairgon.

We talked about the Thralls too, about what everyone was experiencing back on Ring Four, about how the cults were trying to make a stand and help everybody, about how the rest of the city didn’t seem to care about it as much. At least, that was how it looked to most people living in Ring Four.

It wasn’t necessarily true. The guards were working on it. With the latest discovery, it was likely the Adventurer’s Guild might get involved. Over time, more and more of Zairgon would sit up and take notice.

But this was a celebration, so we kept it to lighter matters for now.

“Don’t ever go to the Rat-Catcher’s Guild, mageling,” Khagnio was saying around a mouthful of food. Guy had no table manners whatsoever. “They’re a bunch of right bastards.”

I swallowed before I answered. “Really? I’ve been there a couple of times already.”

Khagnio stared at me. “And what did you do there? They just let you walk in?”

“Well, no. I ended up there only because I got lost a couple of times. And I got chased off before I could do anything there. What’s up with them?”

“They are the black-market,” Cerea said after taking a dainty sip of her water. “At least, they’re the side of the black-market that intersects with the Council of Zairgon.”

I blinked. “Wait, the black-market is like an officially supported thing here?”

“No, no, of course not. It’s merely a clever understanding from the Council—well, one of the Councillors, at least—that stamping out such things entirely is a fool’s errand and keeping a distant eye on it through third parties to ensure things don’t go entirely out of hand is a much better solution.”

I supposed I shouldn’t be surprised at all that the Councillors had a hand in the undercity of Zairgon as well. Learning about them was like learning about my new companions. Peeling off more and more layers to discover more depths and expand my understanding.

As we finished our meal, we talked about our plans. Cerea was going to return to Claderov for a while, but she would be back in a few weeks. Ugnash was going to busy himself with gambling—uh, spending his hard-earned money as he saw fit. Khagnio would be going underground.

“It’s his version of going into seclusion so he can train,” Cerea explained in a hissed whisper that carried through the whole table. Khagnio glared at her with slitted eyes. She grinned back.

“Same as Khagnio, actually,” I said when it was my turn. “I want to focus on training for a bit.” I sneered at the Scalekin. “So I can be a mage and not a mageling anymore.”

Khagnio shook his head, his fanged smile still aggressive but not in an unfriendly way anymore.

“I’ll be looking for another job around the time Cerea gets back,” Ugnash said, his chair creaking backwards as he got to his feet. “Keep an eye out for postings.”

We all nodded. Considering how well we had worked together, more or less, I wasn’t averse to more adventures with them at all. Especially not with the kind of rewards I was getting.

“What about the person who didn’t join this time?” I asked. “I forget their name.”

“Sokoryer is retiring from the business entirely, I’m afraid. He’s emigrating to Tenast. Apparently got some family there.”

Cerea nodded. “Good for him, the old coot.”

“You guys should drop by and visit the cult sometime,” I said. “I know Ring Four isn’t uh…” I looked around. “…anything like Ring Two, but we’re all great people there. And now that I’ve got some money, I’m thinking of renovating the Sun Cult temple.”

“Thanks, mageling, but I’ll pass,” Khagnio said, getting up as well. “I haven’t prayed once since I was born and I’m not about to start now.”

I shrugged. “I haven’t actually prayed here either and I’m a legit cultist.”

Khagnio stared. Then hissed out a jerky laugh. “Alright. At least I’ll know where to find you.”

“The way you say it makes me regret my invitation…”

We all laughed at that. With a full stomach and a surprisingly full heart after the meal, I said goodbye to the others as we parted and left homewards.

[ Rank Up!

Your Fervour Attributes has risen by one Rank.

Fervour: Iron IX ]

The notification was a little surprising as I left. Fervour increased every time I did something meaningful for the cult. Was inviting my new buddies over really meaningful enough to get another rank in it? Or was it just what had tipped the Attribute into the next rank, essentially capping off the sum effects of a bunch of other contributions to the cult?

Whatever the case, I wasn’t complaining about a new rank.

I did pass by the Mage Guild on my way back. No getting lost for once. I got lucky. Problem was, I didn’t find Kostis there. I could have tried asking other people or finding other resources, but it wasn’t like I was desperately pressed for time.

So instead, I headed back to the temple and decided to focus more time on using Gravity. Mainly, my new Affix—Field Manipulation. Though, not just that. I combined it with Sacrifice to raise the effect of every single cast and doubled up on training. While I had done it before, I hadn’t done so continuously over a long stretch of time. My intent was to see if it helped raise Spirit.

It didn’t quite work out that way, but I did discover a new facet of Field Manipulation.