104 Chapter 104 Happy Birthday (1/2)
With the three blizzards they encountered, it took a solid month to arrive at their destination. Joseph didn't have a chance to cast them, but the AMCC crunched through SEEK EARTH, SHAPE EARTH, EARTH TO STONE, CREATE EARTH, SEEK PLANT, IDENTIFY PLANT and was partly through HEAL PLANT when they arrived. He felt a little bad for Derek. He only had a few more spells, before he would surpa.s.s him in number of EARTH spells. Without a supernatural talent like Selena, n.o.body would be able to stay ahead of him after his gift from Enacra.
When they finally arrived at the valley, it was already December 9th. Everyone was grateful to stop. Joseph headed to the kitchens, to see what the stores were at. Fortunately, it didn't seem that the ground here had been frozen by the icy fog, so plenty of wild plants were still alive, just dormant. It meant the entire north wasn't sterilized.
At the kitchens, it was very busy. Apparently, his dad had a similar idea, as another slave of his was currently doing the same thing. The slave must have gotten here faster because of the longer legs. Several wagons of food were getting old, so Joseph cast PURIFY FOOD to remove any bad spots and started thinking of recipes. Stu was there within a few minutes of Stella and his arrival.
Between the 3 of them, it only took about 20 minutes to decide the menu for the week, using up the food that would spoil first. The slave went to report that they settled the issue. Stu turned to him.
”Master Joseph, where did you learn all these recipes?”
Joseph started to laugh.
”Stu sit down.”
Sitting across from him, Joseph grabbed his hand, and dragged him to the magical realm. Stu was obviously confused, to arrive in his magical realm.
”How do you know so many of the runes. I have heard of this place but…do you know all of the runes, Master Joseph?”
Joseph laughed again, ”Not yet. This way.”
He took him to FOOD. Joseph's gingerbread body was quickly remade, but today he went for whipped icing in his hair for a different hairdo. Stu took a few moments to be anything but a blob.
”Listen, Stu. You can work on your body later. Learn the sound of the realm. It will teach you.”
Joseph roared out FOOD with all his might, back to the realm, and dozens of recipes came flowing into his mind. Stu was stunned. Joseph didn't know why exactly, but FOOD was a kind rune. It made sense that friends and family gathered around food. It had a kind of grandma wanting you to have plenty to eat feel.
Pulling them back, he found he was tired. Dragging others was always more effort. Stu was still dazed in his chair as Stella brought pen and paper. They hadn't been gone long, but already the other chefs had most of the pots full and simmering. Joseph quickly wrote down all the new recipes he had just learned. Many incorporated the ingredients that would expire first. If FIRE was nice to him because he was Selena's friend, then FOOD seemed to just generally be kind to everyone. It didn't let him shortcut learning FOOD magics, but it was very generous with the recipes.
A week after they arrived, everyone had finally settled down and figured out their places in the valley. There was enough food to last until April. Joseph was determined to finish PURIFY WATER and HEAL PLANT. He was already half way finished with PLANT GROWTH. After that was CREATE PLANT, which would let him literally create living plants, in a barren field. After experiencing the damage from the icy fog, he thought those would be good spells to learn.
On top of finally getting to focus on his magic again, he intended to keep up with his sword training and dancing with Stella, that had kind of fallen to the wayside in the chaos of the last several months.
(YOU HAVE COMPLETED 300 HOURS OF SWORD TRAINING AND DANCING.)
(YOU HAVE BEEN GRANTED DOUBLE JOINTED.)
(+5 TO SKILLS THAT REQUIRE FLEXIBILITY.)
(YOU CAN Pa.s.s THROUGH OPENINGS THE SIZE OF YOUR HEAD.)
(YOU HAVE COMPLETED 600 HOURS OF EXERCISE.)
(YOU HAVE BEEN GRANTED VERY FIT.)
(STAMINA DUE TO PHYSICAL EXERTION IS LOST AT HALF THE NORMAL RATE AND RECOVERS AT TWICE THE NORMAL RATE.)
Joseph realized there were higher levels that the system hadn't told him about. It made him wonder what else he could earn if he tried, but his father summoned him before he could do more than wonder.
William had set up his office of operations in a large cave along the edge of the valley. When Joseph and Stella arrived, he dismissed everyone else in the cave.
”Joseph, I finally have time to have a real talk with you. Sit down. We can talk freely here. Catch me up on everything that happened since I left you. I have heard much of it from Selena, but you obviously can't tell her everything.”
Joseph paused to think. He knew that he needed to keep it short, and at the same time thorough.
”Dad, how much do you understand about magic?”
”Very little. I only studied the smallest amount of it in order to look for tell-tale signs in slaves and prepare defenses from n.o.bles.”
”Alright, I'll omit all the theories. I am likely the most learned mage in this realm with the possible exception of any remaining dragons. That's why the others have started referring to me as the child of prophecy.”
”How many runes did you learn in these ruins to the north?”
”Nine that weren't in the kingdom's doc.u.ments. But in order to truly exceed human potential in magic, I need to learn the META rune. It is the rune that governs how other runes interact. Every time I advance in META, the system will allow me to increase my magery, but the only copies of it are in the royal elven library, or the wastelands.”
”We'll worry about the elves when we get there. It will be difficult for me to get you into the Elven kingdom.”
”I also learned GATE.”