But for a Slime

Joe came back to the conversation quickly, slightly distracted, “Ah… ok… So plane means a planet.”

“Yes. A plane is a planet.”

“Huh… But you do know that planet’s aren’t a plane. They aren’t flat. Planets are round, like a ball.”

“Huh? Oh… right yeah. Of course. Planes are globes.”

“Then… why are they called planes?”

Garnedell shrugged a bit, “I don’t know… they are just called planes.”

Joe’s eyes rose a bit but said nothing about that, changing the topic, “OK. Then, what’s a cradle?”

Garnedell’s eyes rose quite a bit more, surprised, “You do not know a cradle?”

“My people may have had a different name for it.”

“Huh. A Cradle is a cradle from which all life is formed. Only cradles can form life. Cradles also sometimes include all the planes… you call them planets… that surround the cradle, or the whole cycle.”

“OK. Something to do with planets. Still not sure what a cradle is.”

“Uhhh…. The great planet in the middle around which all our planets… planes… go around. The cradle!”

Joe considered a moment then replied, “The sun? It’s not a planet... plane.”

“No. No… Not the sun. The planet in the middle. It is very large. It covers much of the sky. You see it easily, day or night, according to its cycle.”

“Oh. You mean the gas giant?”

Again, Joe felt the pressure form along with the heat wave, increasing quickly, but not as much as had previously, before it exploded outward in a wave which didn’t seem to actually disturb anything physical. So strange. What is happening?

“Oh. Yes… gas giant. Interesting. The cradle is the gas giant or the whole cycle: the gas giant and all planes, planets, around the gas giant.”

“Huh. Good to know… but, what was that just now? The heat wave and pressure wave,” Joe asked a bit distractedly?

“Ah! Probably your polyglot job magic working to make sure you can speak and are understood.”

“That was magic,” Joe asked with some excitement?

“Yes,” Garnedell answered with some amusement.

Garnedell’s amusement brought Joe back to the conversation and he realized, with some embarrassment, that he was showing his ‘country bumpkin’ roots and quickly moved on to the next question that had been bothering him, “Ah… um. Any important things you can tell me about … everything? Pretend I know nothing, cause I really do!”

“Oh, well. There is one thing. Darnua gave a warning,” Garnedell dropped into a quiet murmur.

“Darnua?”

“Priest Darnua? He… helped with your job changes? Back at the village?”

“Oh, right. What did he say?”

“He warned that we should not speak of my curse, or it’s curing. Nor should we speak of ‘many’ jobs, your speed to change so easily… No one should know. Only those you… truly trust.”

Joe nodded slightly before firming up his agreement, “Makes sense, if I want to lay low. But… yeah…”

“He also said you would likely wish to become a priest so as to change jobs easily.”

“Yeah,” Joe brightened excitedly before quickly dropping into a whisper, “Yeah! I really was thinking that!”

“Huh… the priest was wise as always,” Garnedell whispered quietly to himself before returning to the conversation to Joe, “But he warned that the priests would know.”

“They would know?”

“They would know. Only that they would know.”

“Hm… wonder what that means? Anything else?”

“They will see your speed.”

“My speed?”

“That is all I know. ‘They will see your speed.’”

“Hmm… what’s that mean?”

Garnedell said nothing and Joe pondered for a bit before asking another question, “What was he talking about before?”

“To keep silent about your rapid job changes and the ease with which you can choose your jobs.”

“Oh… then… does that mean they will see how quickly I change jobs? My speed… that… yeah… Maybe? If they know means my job? Or something?”

Garnedell said nothing and Joe frowned as he fell into thought some more. After a while of thinking in circles, he turned back to Garnedell.

“Anything else?”

“He said you could speak to him before you become any priest class.”

Huh… some kind of cultural thing then? Or… but… not a warning… more an offer here… but… “Hmm. Is becoming a priest special? Or taboo?”

“No,” Garnedell answered quickly, “But Darnua seemed quite concerned for you. Something important, but he did not explain to me. He only said that the priests would always know.”

“Yeah… already said that, but… then… How do the priest jobs work?”

“Well, I do know that there are tiers of priests. Like, there are basic simple priests, such as monks and clerics. Then there are higher priests such as abbots and bishops. Still higher are cardinals, patriarchs and popes.”

“Ooh… A hierarchy of priests… then… would the… wait. Did he say the priests would know or did he say the popes, or some higher level priest, would know?”

Garnedell stopped at that, taking several moments to think, uncertainty painting his figure, “I’m… not sure, but now that you ask, I think he may have said that the popes would know.”

“Huh… then that might be it. Maybe they can keep track of who is joining their ranks… and popes? There’s more than one?”

“Yes. One for each god or goddess.”

“Oh. Huh… I guess that makes sense. Do you know much about them?”

“I know only a few, such as Baldur, Tyr, and Frigg. I do know there are twenty gods and goddesses. I know one,” and Garnedell dropped to a quiet whisper, “Loki the Rejected, faithless. He is dead and has no church,” Garnedell returned back to a normal volume, “But, truly, no. I know little of the gods, goddesses and the churches. I am no holy man. You must ask the priest Darnua.”

Maybe… I can just join the lower basic ranks… maybe… try to get the easiest / quickest job change then … what? Joe drifted away in his thoughts before quickly returning, realizing he had rudely left Garnedell hanging and jumped back into the conversation.

“That sounds fair enough. I can do that. When did he say he was returning?”

Garnedell shook his head, sighing slightly, “He said it would be a year or two.”

Joe frowned at that, unhappy to hear it, “That’s… not going to work… I’m going to have to do some serious job changes soon, and if it’s important to hide my speed, then… yeah… not going to be able to go to the temple…” Joe trailed off and turned to his thoughts. Gonna be changing two or three times a day… so… I’ll probably need a priest job in another month or so… not gonna be able to hide it much longer so… options? Maybe… do it carefully then… gotta thank that priest when I see him again for the warning… would have just blundered in… so… slow… steady? Carefully? Well… let’s check… Right… I’m not going to be able to wait too long if I wanna keep my swapping… hidden… spread out across… weeks… months? Maybe the other prie… Darnua…

“Do you know where he is? You said he traveled north to a large city. What city was it?”

Garnedell paused to think then shook his head, “He never said. And I know of no city to the north of the village.”

“So… probably far away.”

“At least months of travel, likely, master.”

Joe frowned. Well… that seals it… just… gotta do it carefully then… hmmm… I’ll try to catch up with the priest after he returns in a year or two… not gonna cripple my growth for two years waiting. Joe was already hitting a job in half a day. He was wasting time if he couldn’t swap jobs in the middle of the day to do two a day. He would likely become even faster and Joe really couldn’t accept wasting an entire day on a single job when he could get two or three up in that same time. Nor could he disguise his changes very easily with only twenty temples. It would become… obvious pretty soon.

“Hmm… well. There is nothing much to do for it, then. I’ll take his advice into consideration. Only a fool ignores someone’s help. I’ll listen carefully and see how long I can wait… but…”

Garnedell smiled and nodded his head in thanks, “Thank you. What else do you wish to know, uh… Joe?”

“Hey… no need to say thank you. You’re just telling me what the man said. Why would I need to be thanked for that? I should be thanking you! Anyway, any other important things I should know now?”

Garnedell glanced around the room and leaned closer, whispering a bit more quietly than even before, “Master. You are very strong. Why did you hide what you did about the Legendary Calamities?”

“Uh… OK. Going to need to unpack that a bit. What is a legendary calamity? And when did I meet any?”

“The monsters…sparks… yesterday! They were Legendaries, right?”

“Legendary sparks? What are legendaries, exactly?”

“A ten core monster.”

“Oh, then yeah, why?” Joe replied, pulling out his core pouch, opening it before Garnedell quickly slapped a hand down on it and shook his head.

“Master… that is…”

“Garnedell, serious! Please reduce the ‘master’ stuff, OK?”

“Ah, yes. Sorry … Joe. I will try. But, why do you hide such things? And your strength?”

“I just don’t want to make any waves or be bothered by others. If they don’t know about it, they can’t ask me or bother me about it either! I don’t have to worry about requests, or helping people, or… yeah. Besides, I’m on a bit of a deadline as it is. Maybe after my year is up, I’ll worry about it. Which reminds me, how many days in a year?”

“Ah. Four hundred.”

“Four hundred? Exactly?”

“Yes.”

“Huh… That seems a bit convenient.” But Joe hid a shiver of excited relief. The message said I had one year! I’m guessing it should mean one local year. How could it know about my year? That gives me a bit of leeway. I have quite a bit of time left then, instead of using almost half my time, I’ve still got a good chunk of time left. Joe let his relief be short lived as he returned to Garnedell’s conversation.

“It is!”

Joe shrugged at that point. I guess coincidences do happen? “So, is that why the inn and city seem empty of people yesterday and today? The calamities?”

“Yes. The Dungeon Guardians likely learned of the creation of the Calamity and immediately called for the Dragon’s Spear and prepared to destroy it. They also called for the evacuation of the city to save as many lives as possible. It is lucky that you were here!”

Joe’s head cocked, “How do you mean?”

“The Calamity was a Legendary! Two of them! Likely it would have killed everyone in this city! Even the whole plane! The only sapient who could have killed a Legendary would be Aelthron!”

“Aelthron?”

“The owner of this Cradle.”

“The owner! One person owns this entire gas giant and all the moons!?”

“Moons?”

“Ah… um… another word for planets.”

“Then… yes. The gas giants and all planets are owned by Aelthron.”

“Woah! That’s one rich dude! Think I’ll try to stay under his radar.”

Garnedell said nothing in return, not quite certain how to respond and simply awaited Joe. After a moment, Joe thought of another question and continued his exploration of his new world, “So, those Legendaries could have killed everyone here?”

“Yes, ma… Joe.”

“Whew… sounds bad,” Joe mused. Although they didn’t seem to be that big of a deal? But I think I’ll be a bit more careful with dealing with them, especially since it seems to bring the whole city to red alert. Really want to fly under the radar and finish out the year before I start going nuts! Hmm…. Any other questions? Wait! Levels!

“What can you tell me about levels? Right now, I only know how to level by killing monsters. Is that how the Darnua and Kargallen back in the villaged leveled? They seemed pretty strong, but it seems weird that a priest or a blacksmith would grow by killing monsters.”

“Uh... Joe. I am uncertain of Darnua, but I believe Kargallen grew as a blacksmith as most others have grown. Only the fanatical and thrill seekers pursue growth through killing monsters.”

“So… How did he?”

“Um, well… He likely gained his levels from his age and smithing.”

“Age?”

“Yes. At ones name day, when a boy or girl comes of age and becomes an adult, they are gifted the Coming of Age blessing. This happens when they are fifteen years old and each child gains one level for each year of their life.”

“Huh… cool. So they get automatic level fifteen. That’s it?”

“No. They also grow as they age after, although the growth slows very quickly. I think they gain a level every year until around twenty years of age, then they begin gaining less: one every couple years. As they grow older, they gain less and less, requiring more and more years to gain another single level.”

“Hmm… And it’s free?”

“Yes.”

“And you just automatically get it?”

“Yes.”

“You just wake up on your birthday and you are another level higher?”

“Oh. No. You must receive the blessing of the gift by accepting it.”

Hmm… suspicious. “So you can reject it?”

“Yes. There are some few who do, but… it would be foolish.”

“Are there any negatives… uh… curses from accepting it or rejecting it?”

“No. None that is known.”

Joe considered for a few moments then decided to dig a bit deeper, “Any rumors?”

“What kind of rumors?”

“Rumors about what happens if you accept or reject the coming of age blessing or your birthday blessings?”

“Oh, there are wild speculations.”