Chapter 90: First Supper

Chapter 90: First Supper

The Lodestar Church - The cynosure of the Lodestar Church is to help people find their path through life, to help direct their journey. The Ordinals, who preach the faith to the common man, never advocate a single direction for the entirety of life. While pilgrimages in one direction are welcome, it is understood and taught that a well-balanced life will have you moving in all directions and rarely a single one. The ultimate test of faith in the Lodestar is to circumnavigate the compass continent, a journey with a constantly changing direction yet a singular purpose. A balanced life is a better life.

Simon the Scribe - Encyclopaedia of Enlightenment.

When we returned Aleera was busy working somewhere with her new tutor, with Grandfather apparently watching from a distance. The majority of her luggage had been moved to the island. We would probably have to build her a further set of rooms to hold it all. That was not everything that Mercurio had brought, though. He had finally arrived with the paints that I had asked for so I was able to colour in some of my earlier pictures.

My sequence of drawings showed my slow exploration of the world around me. Next, I would have to tackle the town. But that would require a fair number of practice drawings to make sure that I didn’t forget anything and that I had the measurements down accurately. While I played with my new paints, Mother and Father set up for dinner. Evidently, we would be having it all together in one of the side rooms off the main hall.

It was here that the idea of our new noble house would meet a new challenge. We only had Des and Sinis to serve our meal. Mother, who had done the cooking, would, if we were putting on the pretence of a noble house, be unable to serve it to us in front of our guest. This meant more work in order to get everything ready while also being presentable at the same time.

Honestly, it would be easier to serve Lady Acacia her meal in her rooms on her own. At least the fish was fresh and exotic having been caught earlier that day from the reef.

The silverware had been pulled out of Grandfather’s chests, places set and we were as ready as we would ever be to welcome our new visitor.

Dong!

At precisely six o’clock the bell rang for the evening meal.

Lady Acacia and my . . . sister descended the stairs. I obviously recognised her but Lady Acaia had clearly spent the early evening braiding Aleera’s hair. It was not just that but both of them were gliding down the stairs. One smoother than the other but it was a noticeable difference from yesterday.

The best bit about being an infant was that an open mouth was not assumed to be a sign of shock and I easily turned it into a wide smile at seeing my sister again. Father and I led the two of them into the dining room that was large enough to comfortably seat the 6 of us without being obscenely large.

Here, Kaius's extended family and Smit’s ambitions to push his sons into different fields and gain a monopoly over the town became most evident. The polished table was a present to him from his brother who was a carpenter, along with the wooden doors that had been opened by Des and Sinis to allow our entrance. Grandpa Smit had probably paid for most of them but got it at cost through his son and my uncle.

Interestingly enough, much like in our first meeting Mother sat at the head of the table while Father sat to her right and Grandfather to her left. I sat next to Father at the table with Aleera opposite. Lady Acacia sat at the other end of the table but it was not a huge table so there were just a few places between Aleera, myself and Lady Acacia.The inaugural upload of this chapter took place via N0v3l-B1n.

“We hope you have had a pleasant afternoon settling yourself in,” Mother opened the conversation.

“It was most refreshing,” Lady Acacia riposted.

I sniggered inside but kept my outward expression calm as if unaware of the hidden context. This would do wonders for my acting ability if I could keep it up.

“Aleera was suitably helpful in overseeing the delivery of your belongings, yes?” She inquired.

“Yes, she was most diligent in ensuring their safe and prompt relocation.” She smiled, “While I have yet to rearrange everything to my satisfaction, she has been most attentive in learning the lessons I have started to teach her. She has made her first stride in her progress this afternoon learning the skill, Glide. I was pleasantly surprised with her broad foundation and thrilled to see her pick up a skill so quickly. I cannot wait to see what she is truly capable of with proper education.”

She positively glowed in her praise of my sister. Glide sounded like a rather pointless skill to start with but there were no bad skills, only bad application, according to Grandfather. I wondered how he would apply the skill. Probably to kill something but then that was how he tended to use the majority of his skills it seemed.

“That’s wonderful, Aleera. Well done,” Father beamed at my sister who grinned back.

“We are happy to hear that you are optimistic about Aleera and her progress,” Mother restrained Father from adding any more.

“Yes, we hope you will enjoy the food just as much,” he said, remembering our guest. He gestured Des and Sinis to bring in the food.

They returned with a wide selection of . . . you guessed it, fish.

Each was carried in still sizzling on stone plates. I had used mana to heat the stones to keep the fish still cooking but not outright burning. Each dish had a different selection of herbs and spices from Wanda’s garden, with a side of vegetables. They carried the dishes to Lady Acacia, offering small slices of each fish before working their way around the table and giving us all a small portion of each option before returning to the kitchen.

I say kitchen but really it was a fairly empty room next door with the bare minimum of utensils required for cooking the meal that had been gathered from our home rather than prepared next door. The wonders of magic allowed Mother to do the majority of the cooking on flat stones that I had heated with my magic.

We were about to tuck into our food when Lady Acacia interrupted us with, “Aleera, remember to switch hands.” We watched as Aleera faintly blushed and switched her knife and fork around. We all looked to Aleera questioningly. But it was Lady Acacia who responded, “We are currently also working on gaining the skill Ambidextrous, a simple enough skill but useful in all manner of situations,” she explained.

I was tempted to copy Aleera and start eating with alternate hands straightaway but thought I would save practising that for later out of the gaze of the new tutor. However, that was not to be the case as she continued with, “I highly recommend that in such a small and intimate setting such as this we all make use of every available opportunity to progress with both skills and stats. While your blossoming wealth might become significant in time, the Silversea family is starting from a distinct disadvantage in comparison to the other noble families of Ponente.”

After listening to the mild criticism of our position, Mother and Grandfather calmly switched over their utensils while Father switched mine and his. Then we started eating.

Vitality: 146 +1

Endurance: 79 +2

Strength: 54 +2

Dexterity: 108 +1

Senses: 138 +1

Mind: 138 +1

Clarity: 118 +1

Magic: 138 +1

Charisma: 40 +1

Luck: 5

Free Points: 40

Skills:

Tier 1: Meditation (LV50) Swimming (LV50) Time Sense (LV50) Running (LV47) Listening (LV37) Breath Control (LV40) Knots (LV38) Stitching (LV37) Humming (LV34) Whistling (LV33) Singing (LV43) Climb (LV32) Trading (LV31) Drumming (LV31) Dodge (LV31) Draw (LV33) Knife (LV30) Sneak (LV26) Acting (LV21) Diving (LV30) English (LV15) Spanish (LV15) Japanese (LV15) Sight (LV15) Scent (LV15) Detect (LV15) Taste (LV15) Throw (LV15) Lie (LV12) German (LV10) Bussola (LV15) Mathematics (LV15) Sailing (LV25) French (LV7) Decoding (LV10) Appeal (LV7) Calligraphy (LV15) Farming (LV16) Insight (LV4) Balance (LV16) Martial Arts (LV2) Cook (LV3) Ambidextrous (LV 1)

Tier 2: Sense Mana (LV40) Quick reflexes (LV40) Eavesdrop (LV30) Memorisation (LV23) Composition (LV23) Recall (LV23) Piano (LV20) Violin (LV20) Trombone (LV20) Saxophone (LV20) Rebec (LV17) Aulos (LV17) Linguistics (LV16) Translation (LV16) Pain Tolerance (LV15) Stealth (LV15) Cornu (LV15) Harp (LV14) Transplant (LV12) Cartography (LV12) Misdirection (LV9) Haggling (LV6) Order (LV6) Knife Arts (LV6) Poison Tolerance (LV1)

Tier 3: Expel Mana (LV40) Mana Manipulation (LV34) Echolocation (LV31) Absorb Mana (LV30) Boil (LV21) Gale (LV18) Ignite (LV16) Freeze (LV11) Bargain (LV11) Melt (LV11) Deception (LV4) Command L (LV4)

Tier 4: Material Manipulation (Lv 20) Mana Drain (Lv 20) Parallel Processing (Lv 20) Stone shaping (Lv 1)

Tier 5: Mind fortress (Lv 18)

Skill experience: 5950

Origin experience: 0

Combat experience: 10000

Craft experience: 5000

Trade experience: 5000

Popular experience: 1000

Exploring experience: 5000

Total Experience gain since last stat check : 32,050

I didn’t find it till the very end of my experience gain. I now got experience for exploring. How awesome was that! Having spent so long attempting to find what was different I mentally reorganised my skills to be in descending order of skill level per tier. Lady Acacia had hinted at a completely different way of thinking about skills and I looked forward to learning it even if it was only learning it second hand through Aleera.

It might get harder and harder to level up but every time I reached a bottleneck the system provided me with another way to gain the experience. I couldn’t wait to go sailing tomorrow. Maybe we could explore a little further.