An hour later, when I rode Switchblade through the gates of town, I was greeted by a surprise message.

"Congratulations, Lucas! Your alternate experience streams have combined to gain you a level. You are now level 28!"

"Ha!" I jumped off Switchblade, doing 6 somersaults in the air before landing. That move got me some scattered applause from a few nearby people.

For the first time since getting my tier-1 body I was ahead of the minimum curve for advancing to the next stage, and I savored that feeling as I jogged to my castle. Maybe I shouldn't be so surprised, though. I was getting nearly 2 council seats worth of experience, plus 35% of Sam's tavern experience.

He'd texted a few times over the past couple days to keep me up to date. He'd opened a satellite office on the lake to serve the new community there, and it sounded like business was booming. The mushroom-enhanced food offerings were going for insane prices, and I'd arranged to have him pick up another 100 bottles of liquor and 50 more gallons of ketchup from Jeeves.

With hundreds of townsfolk working on the ships, hunting with the zombies, and killing monsters, everyone was leveling up faster than ever. That must equate to a ton of experience for the town, despite the havoc Alpha's attacks were causing.

Jeeves met me at the door with his usual formal greeting. Then informed me he'd completed procuring all of the items on the list I'd gotten from Crystal."

"Perfect. I expected nothing less."

"Thank you, sir. Sythrak filled the order with his usual promptness, although he felt the quality of the requested equipment fell short of your usual tastes. The total came to a mere 12 tier-6 mana crystals."

"Under budget. Can't go wrong with that. You're a good man to have around, Jeeves."

"Thank you, sir. Miss Brianna has moved to her new team and left a message of thanks for your hospitality and the gear I purchased for her on your behalf."

"Good. I hope she's doing well."

"She appears to be in far better shape than before. Lady Ruby and Master Nigel are awaiting your return in the living room."

I hurried back there in time for Nigel to careen into me in full-size lion form. The impact staggered me back and I laughed as I hugged the huge, shaggy lion while he soaked my face with his giant tongue. I should have left my face shielding on.

Ruby chuckled at our antics. "I was going to hug you too, but now you're covered in Nigel slobber."

"Actually, dogs slobber. Lions cleanse."

"Sure. It's good to see you too."

I extricated myself to give Ruby a hug. She kept it brief, then pulled back and pulled a small towel from her inventory. "Here."

Of course, that's when Steve entered behind me and declared, "What? Trying to wipe off lipstick?"

We turned and Ruby asked, "Have you seen me use lipstick?"

Steve shrugged. "You never know. Now that I'm here, this is officially public space again, so watch the PDA."

"As if you can talk, lover boy," Ruby said as she gave him a hug too.

That momentarily silenced him. Then he grinned at me. "Ruby shared the good news. Class! Finally."

"Yeah. About time."

I checked their current status with Identify and grinned. "Looks like Nigel and I weren't the only ones to have a productive last couple days. How'd you get so many levels?"

Ruby had reached level 40 and Steve level 42. They had to be catching up to the highest-level elites.

"Glad you noticed," she said with a proud grin. "We've spent most of the past couple days up at Lake Town."

"I still think Lake Town is the perfect name." Way better than Stepstone or even Midmount Vale.

"Right?" Steve asked. "Especially with that giant fiery dragon monster you took down with your trusty black arrow."

"Lucas does not use arrows," Nigel interjected.

"It's just a reference to an Earth movie," I explained, which didn't help explain anything.

Ruby rolled her eyes. "You guys are both such geeks."

"And you never saw the Lord of the Rings movies, or the Hobbit movies?"

"Well, of course I saw them," she admitted.

Steve prodded, "I can see you getting all misty-eyed watching that dreamboat Thoren Oakenshield singing about missing the lonely mountain."

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"You're incorrigible," she laughed.

"Yup. While Ruby here worked security, hunted with zombie kill squads, and did all the brave heroic things to win her levels I, on the other hand, returned to my blue collar roots," Steve said. "I helped repair ships, mixed drinks in the new tavern up in Lake Town, and even got promoted to shift leader at the head tavern right here in Midmount Vale."

"How'd you manage all that?"

He grinned. "Clones, of course. Got a couple upgrades. When I keep the numbers to 3 or less, they turn totally corporeal and can work with a lot more autonomy. And they each help me earn more experience."

"That's sick," I laughed.

"Cheater," Ruby grumbled.

Steve blew on his knuckles and rubbed them across his chest. "Still experimenting with everything they can do. I've gotten so used to seeing through multiple sets of eyes, I got an ability called Spider's Eye."

"Eew," Ruby grimaced.

"Helps with the headaches."

"So does eating steak," Nigel said before plopping down on the table in a boneless heap like only cats could do, looking like he was about to expire.

It was still barely mid-afternoon. I tossed him a steak then carried him to one of the overstuffed chairs near the fireplace. Ruby and Steve took nearby chairs and Nigel and I regaled them with stories of our 2-day slog up the valley. Then I briefly related my experience against the Ironwood Colossus.

"No way!" Steve exclaimed. "You can breathe and hang out in a pool of lava? What are you?"

"Epic monsters bring epic loot, remember?"

"I'm so glad that worked," Ruby said, eyes wide with wonder. "We never would have found you if you drowned in lava."

Steve shrugged. "Wouldn't find much if most of the monsters on this crazy stage killed you. They'd eat you, bones and all."

When I explained briefly about how I finally defeated the Colossus, they just stared for a moment before Steve slapped his hand on his thigh and laughed. "Let me get this straight? You've been secretly training with mana and runes and stuff with that crazy necromancer and you figured out how to use all that arcane stuff to save your life? Insane!"

"And lucky," Ruby said.

I shrugged, trying to downplay it. "I do have a really high Luck stat."

"You have a luck stat?" they cried together.

Maybe not the best kind of downplaying, so I turned to the tactic that worked every single time: loot sharing.

I pulled out 4 of the large buckets of beautifully crafted gemstones. Each one was made out of a thick, clear plastic, and the room lit up with reflected lights from all the high-quality gems.

"Want a share of the loot?" I asked as I pushed a couple buckets toward each of them. Steve laughed and plunged his hands into one of the buckets, lifting a double handful of huge gems and letting them cascade back down.

"These are beautiful," Ruby breathed, examining the gems more closely and grinning like a little girl on Christmas morning.

"I'm sure one of them will make the perfect home for this." I extracted the Flamewisp Familiar Stone and handed it to her.

"What is it, the heart of your undying passion, condensed into liquid lust?" Steve asked.

"Very funny." I explained, since Ruby did not have Identify.

She exclaimed, "That sounds really cool!"

Steve glanced at Nigel, who was busily munching on his 10th steak. "That was your idea, wasn't it? Didn't want the competition?"

Nigel looked up from his food long enough to say, "If an Eclipse Moth injects maggots into your ear while you sleep, it will burrow into your brain and feed on your life until it matures and crawls out your eye socket."

I stared, then repeated his words. Steve shivered and dropped a piece of cake he'd summoned out of nowhere and had been about to eat. With a grimace, he looked from Nigel to me. "Are you trying to give me nightmares?"

"Maybe use ear plugs," Nigel suggested, then returned to his steak.

"Have you seen Eclipse Moths?" Ruby asked, looking a bit sick.

"No one sees them. They're silent and invisible, but they steal sweaters."

That made me laugh as I translated.

"You're making this all up," Steve accused.

Nigel didn't answer, so Steve turned to me. "Is he always like this?"

"When he's not killing monsters, pretty much."

"We kill a lot of monsters," Nigel agreed.

To get things back on track, I shared the gallons of uncut gemstones and pulled out a few of the more interesting bars of precious metals from the many pallets I'd looted.

"What are these?" Ruby asked.

"I don't know half of them, but Identify gives me a bit of info. They're all valuable. Check this one out." I pulled a shiny white metal bar from my inventory. It glowed with an opalescent sheen.

"Glimmershard. It reflects light beyond the spectrum we can see and can be worked into items that can boost psychic abilities or mental resistance." I needed to give some to Jane. She could order some equipment from a crafter or the system store.

"Cool," Steve said. "How much you got?"

"I'll give you each 5 full pallets of mixed precious metals. I'm going to keep some to donate to the town store for crafters who might be able to use some of it."

Tony would probably be as excited as anyone to get his hands on some of those metals. His fast-crafting iron-man type class was perfect for working rare raw materials into cool weapons or armor.

Then I told them about the ironwood planks, pulled 1 of each out of my inventory, and called out, "Jeeves, can you have these appraised?"

My butler appeared beside me. "Of course, sir."

"Also, can you take all the assorted crafting items and weapons I looted from all the monsters Nigel and I killed over the past couple days and sell it? I created a sort option for items I want sold."

"I shall see it done, sir."

"One more thing. Ask Sythrak to produce a listing of his best heavy weapons. I lost a couple of my strongest hitters. I'm looking for something that can multiply damage or force. My blades are great, but for the toughest monsters and bosses, I need more raw power sometimes."

"Excellent request, sir."

Jeeves disappeared, along with the two ironwood planks. When I checked my inventory, the other items I'd looted were gone too. Jeeves made life really convenient.

"You don't have to share those planks with us, you know," Ruby said as she tossed a gorgeous emerald cut like a disco ball the size of a baseball into the air, sending glittering streamers of light refracting all over the room. "You've given us millions of crystals worth of loot already."

"We're a team, so we share."

"Best team ever," Steve said with a happy grin. "Now tell us about your class."

So I did. We spent half an hour discussing the perks and benefits, spells, and abilities. They were both suitably impressed.

"You know, one thing I saw in a notification as I was selecting this class got me thinking. When we hit the next milestone level and get to make another spell permanent, it'll become part of our core build. That might change our class."

"You don't think our classes are static?" Ruby asked, brows furrowing as she considered the idea.

"Makes sense," Steve said with a shrug. "Gives us tons of flexibility."

"And maybe the chance to end up with a broken build," I cautioned. I couldn't push too much farther without revealing information I shouldn't, but they were my team, so I had to warn them.

"You're probably right," Ruby said. "I'm glad you were paying more attention than I was when I got my class. I was so giddy, I didn't look at the fine print."

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