Chương 58: Chapter Fifty-Five - Revelations

"It's beautiful," I said. Gunther shifted a little, the compliment making his deathly pale skin flush just a tiny bit.

"It is adequate," he said. The painting was fairly simple, with a stone wall illuminated by torchlight behind both myself and Amaryllis. It reminded me just a little of American Gothic, but Amaryllis was the only one scowling, her sharp eyes looking at me sideways and there was just a hint of humor in her gaze, probably a trick of Gunther's brushstrokes that made her eyes pinch at the corners. Standing to Amaryllis' left was a Broccoli Bunch that I hardly recognized.

Sure, that was my smile, the one I always wore when taking a picture with a friend. And I had my trusty spade over my shoulder and my bandoleer on and my spear held up by my side. But something had changed. There was a lot of happiness there, but also... guilt.

"It's really nice," I repeated. I hated lying.

"You can take it with you, if you want. I merely needed the practice," Gunther said.

"We couldn't," I said.

"Nonsense, it cost me nothing to make," Gunther insisted.

"No, I mean, we literally can't. It's too big to carry through the swamps. It'll get all mushy," I said. Amaryllis poked the painting and it poofed away.

"There. Done. Favour's paid, painting is in storage, sun is still shining. We should go."

"Amaryllis!" I said.

"That was rude. Gunther's a friend."

"No, no, she is correct. Rude, but correct. If you intend to reach Green Hold by nightfall then it would be best if you left now. A direct route west-southwest will have you intersecting the road leading into the town in... oh, six, seven hours at a fast jog?" That was a lot of jogging.

"Um, but that would mean just... leaving, like that." Gunther's smile was a little wry, but it was still genuine.

"Yes. But no worries, I'm certain we'll meet again someday. Else I suppose I'll read of your exploits in some book of myths and tales." Amaryllis snorted.

"Hardly," she said before eyeing Gunther.

"You weren't all that bad, for a necromancer."

"And you're passably tolerable, for a harpy," Gunther replied just as easily.

"Aww, you're getting along," I said. Amaryllis huffed and walked past me.

"I'll be waiting outside." I watched her go for a moment before turning back to Gunther.

"It really was nice to meet you-- and Throat Ripper," I said. I walked over to the big bony lump. The doggy was laying on his side and looked asleep... or maybe just more dead, though one of his eyes started to glow when I started patting his side.

"Thanks for your help earlier," I said. He replied with a thump-a-thump of his tail so I gave him some extra pats.

"Be safe, and may the world watch over your journey," Gunther said. I smiled.

"And may it, um, watch over you as well?" I said. He laughed.

"Ask your friend about proper greetings, I'm sure she can talk your ears off about it. Good luck, Broccoli Bunch. We'll see each other again, I'm certain." I found Amaryllis eyeing a skeletal harpy, her head tilted to the side as she stared at the only bird-like skeleton in the area. I looked at its thin-boned arms and the way its legs connected to a strange pair of thin hips, then I eyed Amaryllis who was, by then, glaring at me.

"Stop staring at me like I'm some sort of chicken," she said.

"Um, but aren't you just a little bit chicken?" I gestured at her white hair and feathers. Amaryllis squawked and stomped off and out of the fort so fast I had to jog to keep up.

"A chicken! She calls a member of the purebred Albatross family a bloody chicken? Why world? Why did you saddle me with this idiot?" Amaryllis asked the skies.

"Is being called a chicken an insult?" I asked. It was a strange way to start our voyage back, but Amaryllis' loud and gesture-filled rant about the inferiority of the Chicken clan and how they did little more than scratch at the dirt all day and eat grubs, was entertaining at least. Apparently humans weren't the only ones that didn't like insects in their lunch. Most harpies were on the same page. With Orange pouncing ahead of us to scout, we moved down the same path we had that morning.

Amaryllis' rant only stopped when we recrossed the bridge. Nothing happened though, and soon we were walking along at a good clip towards Green Hold. Amaryllis went dull-eyed for a moment, then scowled at the air.

"I'm going to be hitting my class evolution soon. I'll need a second class in abeyance if I want to keep progressing."

"What's that mean?" I asked.

"It means that... if you decide to remain my partner in the guild, which if you have any wisdom in that thick human skull of yours you will, we'll have to make a detour to a suitable dungeon to pick up a second class." So, second classes were a thing for real then.

"And what's a class evolution?" Amaryllis stopped walking so suddenly that I took three steps before noticing. I lowered my spear and started to prepare some cleaning magic.

"How do you not know that?" she asked. She was eyeing me like I was a bunny and she was a hungry bird of prey.

"Everyone knows about it, even peasants. Especially peasants since it's what keeps them that way."

"Is it that big a deal?" I asked.

"It's the only way to level past ten. Without guards and warriors in the second tier and beyond civilization would collapse in a week."

"Wait, you can't level past ten without an evolution thing?" I asked. I was beginning to worry. What if they were really expensive?

"Broccoli," Amaryllis said.

"Where are you from? How did you survive with such an abysmal education?"

"Ah," I said as I hesitated. I didn't want to share too much. No, that wasn't it. I was afraid to share too much because that knowledge might shove a wedge between Amaryllis and I. But now my lack of knowledge was doing the same thing.

"It's a long story?" I tried. If you spot this story on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.

"It's a long walk."

"Right." There went that excuse. I decided that I might as well bite the bullet.

"Do you know what a riftwalker is?"

"Yes... no," she declared. Suddenly she was eyeing me up and down as if I had started dancing a naked jig.

"You are not... oh but that would explain a lot."

"So you know what a riftwalker is? Gunther knew, somehow. He was very mysterious about it, but he didn't seem to think it was a bad thing."

"The only person for whom it's bad is me. If some of the professors back home learned that I was with a riftwalker and didn't question her thoroughly they would clip my wings and fling me off the highest tower in Farseeing." Amaryllis slapped her talons over her face.

"That explains why you're so wildly incompetent at everything."

"Ah," I said. Amaryllis went on.

"Your complete cluelessness about magic. Your ignorance about the local cultures. And to think I thought that you were merely struck in the head."

"That's rude, I think," I said.

"You must be from some incomprehensibly backwards world where the young are coddled and protected," Amaryllis said.

"Hey! Canada's not... too backwards. We have the internet in some places," I defended. Amaryllis made a high-pitched trilling noise, one that I had never heard from her before.

"Well, now I'm slightly less disappointed that we've become... friends." She had been disappointed?

"You are?"

"Oh yes. The last Riftwalker that I learned about was an unassuming man of little talent and worth, or so every test suggested," she said.

"That doesn't inspire much confidence," I said.

"He went on to be a professor of the Snowland's greatest academy and pioneered the creation of the gravitic engine that airships use today. That was some hundred-odd years ago."

"Oh," I said. Now the glint in Amaryllis' eyes looked kind of scary.

"Well, don't expect anything like that from me," I said.

"I think I already did the thing this world wanted. But we can still be friends anyway." Amaryllis deflated a little.

"Truly?" I nodded.

"Well, regardless, you're still a trove of possibly interesting, if mundane, facts."

"I'll tell you about my world if you help me learn about the magic you use here," I said.

"Deal!" Amaryllis said. She puffed out her chest, and when she began walking again it was with something of a strut. She really did remind me of a chicken.

"With me at the helm of your education you'll have caught up to the world's standard in no time."

"Awesome!" I said with a laugh as I jogged to keep up.

"So, what's a class evolution?" She waved a hand dismissively through the air.

"A class evolves when it hits its tenth level. This is universal across all classes that I'm aware of. At that point, the world gifts you with some choices on how you guide your future development. Some require certain actions to be taken beforehand, others are more common and are available to everyone. Most classes have the default option to continue with the same class."

"Okay?" I said.

"So... level ten lets you evolve your class. Got it. I've met a lot of Grenoil who are Fencers, is that because they all evolve into that?"

"No. There's a dungeon in Deepmarsh, the capital, that gives anyone that clears it the Fencer class. It's a low-level dungeon, purposefully kept that way so that younger grenoil can obtain the class. For a lesser gold you can be escorted to the boss and someone will beat it near to death for you," Amaryllis said.

"By participating in the fight you can replace your main class with Fencer, which is what quite a few grenoil set out to do. It's a well-documented class with some clear and easy progressions." I couldn't keep the smile off my face as I listened. These were the kinds of things I wanted to know for a while now.

"So, back to the evolution thing. Can a Fencer become a Sword Dancer?" Amaryllis nodded slowly, as if uncertain.

"I think that's one of the class evolutions from Fencer, but with a focus on two blades?"

"That sounds right. I met a grenoil from the exploration guild that had two swords and that class," I said.

"So when I get to level ten I'll get to pick from a bunch of classes?"

"It depends on your accomplishments, but essentially, yes. There are some progressions that are very well documented. Fire and Thunder Mages for example. There's another evolution at level twenty, and every ten levels after that."

"Brilliant. I can't wait to find out what my class will evolve into," I said.

"Probably something suitably droll. Your class sounds like something a peasant might obtain from cleaning the lavatory."

"You can get classes from cleaning lavatories?" I asked.

"I thought you needed to fight a dungeon boss." Amaryllis sighed.

"No. Your first class is always a gift of the world. And it's usually awful. That's why I switched to Thunder Mage about a year ago."

"What were you before?" I asked.

"That doesn't matter," she said with a lofty wave of her hand.

"As of right now, I'm level nine, which means my evolution approaches. Once it's done I'll be bottlenecked until I unlock a second class and can start levelling both it and my primary class again. The next bottleneck will be at level twenty for the primary and ten for the secondary class."

"Okay?" I said as I tried to imagine it. Maybe it was like those glass jars in chemistry class, then the first one filled up the excess would pour through a spout to the second and so on. Or maybe not.

"I just need to find a suitable dungeon to tackle and I'll be set for a while. We can even share a secondary class, if you want to come along."

"That sounds like a lot of fun!" I said. I wasn't too sure where my friendship with Amaryllis stood, but I was hoping for the best.