Bon Voyage

Amos took one last look at all of his stats and classes before they were removed.

[ Amos - lvl 78 - Age 22 - Master of Deceit ]

[ Health: 2220 / 2485

Stamina: 780 / 1080

Mana: 1800 / 1800 ]

[ Stats:

Strength

68

Dexterity

98

Endurance

52

Intelligence

78

Perception

112

Charisma

14

]

[ Equipped Class: Master of Deceit 

Type: {Illusion} {Mind Magic} {Trap} ]

[ Completed Classes: 7

Unfinished Classes: 1

Obtained Classes: 87 ]

[ total number of skills: 56 ]

[ total number of perks: 45 ]

Amos closed his eyes for a second and took a deep breath. In that one second, a multitude of feelings went through Amos.

His mind became incredibly groggy, and he suddenly had trouble remembering things. His body felt like the strength and adeptness were drained from him. His body felt much heavier and what little armor and weapons he had on him now felt like they weighed much more. He suddenly felt so tired and numb all over his body. He felt his mana suddenly dissipate until it was nearly nothing. Then his connection to it suddenly disappeared. It wasn't necessarily painful, but all of the feelings were extremely uncomfortable.

Then Amos reopened his eyes and looked at his status again. This time it was far different.

[ Amos - lvl 0 - Age 22 - [ Empty ] ]

[ Health: 100 / 100

Stamina: 100 / 100 ]

[ Stats:

Strength

1

Dexterity

1

Endurance

1

Intelligence

1

Perception

1

Charisma

10

]

[ Equipped Class: [ Empty ]

Type: { None } ]

[ Completed Classes: 0

Unfinished Classes: 0

Obtained Classes: 1 ]

[ total number of skills: 0 ]

[ total number of perks: 0 ]

Even Amos's earliest memories are of having higher stats and more classes than this. It was strange how his stats showed he was as weak as a newborn baby. yet he was a grown man. He wondered how that worked.

The Cardinal then said, "All of your stats should be around that of a newborn baby. You should have all your stats at one except for charisma of course. Additionally, If you had a connection to your mana before then it should have been severed now. Lastly, you should have zero skills, zero perks, and only one class."

Amos opened up the only class he had now.

[ class - Holy Reformation - lvl 0 - (0/100) ]

[ Description: Born anew from the waters of the absolute you gain a new connection to the divine. Due to this reformation, you are capable of better manipulation with holy mana ]

The cardinal saw Amos staring off into space and continued, "I see you are already looking at your only class. Eager aren't you? Anyhow, the class is given to anyone who washes their hands in the water of absolution. It mainly helps with detecting and manipulating holy mana. It is a great way to start down the path of the holy and serve our lord, although Brother Elijah already told me you had other plans, so I assume the class will not be of much value to you."

Amos went from looking at the cardinal to staring at his boney-emaciated-looking fingers.

The cardinal commented, "Let me remind you to be careful. You are now level 0. For example, try pulling out the sword at your side."

Amos gave the cardinal a confused look. He then looked at the paladin by the cardinal's side who merely gave Amos a nod to do it.

Amos then pulled the sword out of its sheath. Except he couldn't. Amos tugged at it and it barely budged. He placed the sheath on the ground to then pulled it directly out. It took every bit of his strength and utilizing every muscle in his body to pull the sword out. And as he did, he nearly dropped it on the ground.

Amos never realized how heavy the sword was. It was a single-handed straight sword made from mithril. Mithril was naturally quite heavy, but when he was around level 75 he hadn't noticed it at all. Yet when it was in its sheath it was a lot less heavy than now.

'There must be a weight reduction enchantment on the sheath. I'll have to get used to my new body.'

Amos slid the sheath over the sword and it was back to being only a nuisance to lift and not a challenge.

The cardinal then said, "It seems you are coming to terms with your new body. That is good. Brother Elijah already told me that you plan to be a sentinel. That is very good. There are never enough sentinels. Although at your level . . . hmmm . . . you'll have to go to a border village most likely."

The cardinal stared at the ceiling for a couple of seconds in pensive thought. He then looked at both Amos and Elijah and said, "Yes I have just come up with a wonderful Idea. I shall give Brother Elijah a holy mission."

Elijah and Amos turned to look at each other in surprise and then turned back to the cardinal and listened intently.

"The mission will be a simple one. Brother Elijah, you are at level 31, correct."

"yes Cardinal," Elijah answered.

"It will be the perfect level for the mission. Your mission will be to go along with the soon-to-be Sentinel. I do not doubt that the only village that he will be able to apply for will be a border village in the south or east. Most border villages will be relatively new and have no church or pastor within them. So when you arrive at this village you will work with him to create a church and oversee the religious operations within said village."

Elijah smiled and answered, "It shall be done."

"Very good," the cardinal turned to look at Amos, "and before I forget, one last warning. Depending on where you go in the city it could be very dangerous for you now that you are level 0. Make sure to take caution."

Amos thanked the cardinal and followed Elijah out of the room. Once they were back in the main cathedral Elijah turned towards Amos with a smile and said, "I guess we'll be working together from now on."

He then turned back forward and said quietly to himself, "my first-ever holy mission."

Amos replied, "Uhh, I would moreso say you will just be babysitting me until I can get back to a reasonable level."

Elijah laughed and said, "True, that will have to be our first order of business. Leveling you up."

Elijah began to walk through the cathedral towards the door while still talking, "I remember you said you still had a lot of money left. depending on how much, we could use it to get you new equipment more suited to your current stats."

Amos hesitated to answer at first. Then with reluctance, he said, "Just about 1 platinum left"

Elijah stopped mid-stride and turned to look at him. His jaw was slack and he had a look of disbelief. He then said, "That's like nobility level of money or like what a factory owner has. I never knew raiding made so much money."

Amos's face had sunken. He didn't like to think about how much money he made off of other's suffering. Amos then said, "It's not like we can ignore the money I have or something."

There was a long silence after that as they continued walking through the cathedral. The conversation had become very awkward so Amos decided to just explain things and say, "The majority of brigands are under level 50 and relatively poor. It is only when they get above level 50 that they begin to do exponentially better as their levels get higher and higher. At that point, nothing much can threaten them and they usually claim territory. "

"Claim territory? What like nobles."

"Kind of, kind of not. It's more like they claim a couple of villages. Then they occasionally demand payment from these territories. Then in return, they kill any brigands that come near the villages and let the sentinel live. This allows the village to continue operating like normal except it's like there is another tax. Of course, only small bands of powerful brigands can do this and towns are too powerful to have them as territories. While Large bands of weak brigands just roam around and attack any village they can to sustain themselves."

"What about large groups of powerful brigands?"

"There is only one large group of powerful brigands. They are called the Crazy 22. All of the members range from level 75 to 110, and they are led by a guy around level 120 called Inferno. Whenever another group of high-level brigands starts to form the kingdom quickly swoops in and snuffs them out. They started doing it after the Crazy 22 was formed and the kingdom couldn't kill Inferno or his group. it's kind of an unspoken rule that as long as you have less than 5 people around then the kingdom won't directly intervene."

"I heard of the Crazy 22, but I never imagined that they had so many high levels."

"Yeah."

Amos didn't want to also mention that the kingdom hired them from time to time to do dirty work.

By now they were outside the front of the cathedral. The sun was still in the middle of the sky which meant it was about noon.

Amos turned to Elijah and said, "My money is back at my apartment Let's go there and decide what to do with it from there."

Elijah nodded and they were on their way.

— 30 minutes later —

Amos and Elijah stepped through the front door of his inn and walked past the bar and up the stairs to the rooms.

The Bartender polished a mug as he watched Amos and Elijah walk together up the stairs toward the rooms. Elijah was still dressed like a priest and Amos still looked like a dirty veteran adventurer.

The bartender mumbled to himself, "It's a crazy world." He then went on to continue polishing the mug.

Amos stopped in front of his room and opened it with the key. He stepped into the room. Amos first noticed how it was much darker than he expected. Normally he never bothered to use a lantern as he could usually see just fine.

''The stats before must have helped me see in the dark, but now I'll need to use a lantern just like anyone else."

So Amos walked over to his little table to the side. It still had all of the alchemy and alcohol distillation he had been doing before. While pushed to the corner of the table was a lantern that came with the room.

When Amos reached over to turn on the lantern he got a good breath of the alchemy and alcohol distillation. Everything became fuzzy and his vision blurred. Then he saw the table approach his face. Although, that was just his perception. The truth was that his face slammed into the table.

As he now lay on the ground his vision blurred until he slowly passed out.

When Amos opened his eyes next he realized he was back out in the hallway lying on the floor and that Elijah was shaking him.

"God, I thought you died for a minute," Elijah said.

Amos rubbed his face as he slowly got up. His face and especially his nose hurt for some reason. Everything started to come back to Amos up until he passed out.

"What in the abyss was that in your room? It took multiple cleansing spells to get rid of the miasma."

Amos scratched the bandages on his chin as he said, "What was in my room? Oh, y-e-a-h I forgot to mention that I started making poisons and did some distillation and fermentation in my room. And I suppose I never bothered to properly seal or contain it."

Amos began to think back to when he started doing it. he never bothered to contain any of it because the fumes never bothered him. It must have been because of his higher endurance. Although now that he thought about it he did have really horrible hangovers whenever he woke up. Maybe the fumes had something to do with it.

Elijah's mouth was agape as he said, "You never sealed it? How did you-. What if-. Ahh never mind. But it's a good thing you never reached the lantern. If the gas was flammable then you would have blown this whole place sky high if you started a spark. I cleansed the miasma with holy mana, but you should still cover your mouth and nose. Well, more than your bandages already are."

And with that, they walked into Amos's room for the second time. Amos smelled around a little. The miasma was gone, but as he walked back over to the table he saw that some of his potions and alcohol had been destroyed in the process. 

Amos looked over to Elijah and said, "You said that you cleansed it. So I should be able to turn on the lantern without killing us both, right?"

"Yeah shouldn't be a problem anymore," Elijah replied.

Amos flipped the lantern on. Amos thought the room would look better with light, but it only made it look worse. It somehow managed to make him look more like a drunkard than before. It had the bare necessities of his armor and weapons, except for all the mugs everywhere.

Amos never noticed how bad it was until now. But at that moment he realized he really had a problem. 

He quickly went around the room picking up the loose mugs and putting them in a corner. As he picked one up he realized it was still half full with beer. As Amos looked down at the amber liquid. He couldn't help but feel the pain in his face and nose rise. All it would take was a swig and the pain would go away.

'I really do have a problem. Even now with a priest here I still want to get drunk. If I want to be better in the future then I can't be a drunkard anymore.'

As Amos placed the mug down with the rest he made a promise to himself. 'From now on no more alcohol. I got to stop, cold turkey if I want to change for the better.'

Elijah stayed quiet most of the time as he simply observed the room. He wanted to say something, but a part of him felt that whatever he said, Amos already knew. So he simply stayed quiet and waited for Amos to go on.

Amos finally turned towards Elijah and said, "Anyway, let's get to what we came here for."

Amos walked over to his bed. He put his hands under it and began to push. Except the bed barely moved at all. Elijah stared at him with a confused face.

'Oh yeah, I forgot.' Amos thought to himself.

He then turned to Elijah and asked. "Uh, think you could give me a hand."

Elijah bent over and got his hands under as well. Then with a collective effort, they pushed the bed over on its side where it made a loud bang on the floor. Normally Amos would be able to push it over on its side easily without making a noise, but now. Not so much.

On the underside of the bed were two bags that were nailed to the wood frame. Elijah pulled them off, put the bed back down, and opened the bags on the bed. One of them barely had anything in it, while the other was almost bursting at the seams.

The only thing in the one bag was a singular platinum coin. It had a particular sheen to it.

The other bag was filled with gold and silver coins. They jangled as they clinked together.

Amos and Elijah then went through the process of counting them all. In total, there was 1 platinum, 11 gold, and 8 silver. Although much less than the 2 platinum's he started with, it was still a huge amount of money.

Amos looked over to Elijah to see him fixated on the money. He bet that priests weren't paid a lot, so this amount of money was mind-boggling to him. Finally, Elijah turned to Amos and said, "I don't even know what we should do with this amount of money. This is the sort of money a noble has. Not someone who's level 0 and a level 31 priest."

Amos sighed and said, "I was hoping you would know a good way to use this money to help us along, but I guess not. Well, that's fine I suppose. I already have a few things that I can already think of."

Amos then put the money back into the bags and placed the bags into a secret pocket within his robe.

Amos then walked over to the corner of the room that held his adventurer equipment. Most of it was useless now because Amos didn't have the strength to properly use it anymore. So Amos placed all of the equipment within his dimensional bag. As Amos placed the last of the equipment in the bag he said, "The first thing we'll have to get is equipment for the both of us. I can't use these armor and weapons anymore so I'll have to sell it and buy new stuff. Then we'll get you some armor and a weapon suited for you."

Elijah replied, "Why do I need a weapon and armor? I'm a priest."

"Because to get to the village we'll have to ride there on horseback. And although the woods are mostly safe around the capital and large cities. It will be anything but safe once we get closer to the frontier. I can guarantee you we will be stopped by a few monsters on the way and maybe a brigand band along the way."

"Alright, that makes sense, what else do you think we will need?"

"Well, I'll have to also buy some magic books more around my level. I only learned magic when I was above level 50 So I don't know any low-level spells. Another thing we will have to buy is supplies for the trip."

Elijah nodded and said, "While we are out getting ready maybe we'll find other things that could be useful."

With that, they walked out the door and got to business. As they walked down the stairs to the first floor the barman looked back over to them.

He had heard loud bangs from above. He mumbled under his breath, "You would think people would be more discreet about that sort of thing."

— 10 minutes later —

Amos and Elijah then went to the markets where they spent the rest of the day. After selling off the majority of his equipment he was back to around 1 platinum and 50 gold.

Although he didn't sell his mithril sword, as he had begun to like the sword since he bought it, and even though he could not use it anymore, he figured he would hold onto it until he could use it again. Plus it didn't take up too much space in his dimensional bag. His higher quality armor on the other hand he sold as it took up too much space and he hadn't grown too fond of it.

From there Amos bought light leather armor for himself as well as a one-handed steel sword. For Elijah, he purchased some chainmail that could go under his robes and a one-handed steel mace. 

After that, they went to a stable where they bought 2 horses for the trip, as well as the food and water they would need.

They haggled an alchemist into some cheap healing potions and lastly, they went to a mages guild library. Now Amos stared at the magic book catalog as he mulled over what magic he should specialize in.

Although he knew many spells before he washed his hands in the waters of absolution, now all the spells felt muddled, confusing, or impossible. So Amos had to restart his magical learning. The book of fire spells he bought earlier was now too difficult to learn so he had to buy some books on beginner spells.

Amos was having trouble deciding on what though. There was almost a call or an allure to going back to illusion spells. although Amos felt divided on it. The only reason he got so good at illusion magic was because of his brigand lifestyle, but then again right now Amos just wanted to amass power as quickly as possible so he could be a better sentinel. It was tearing Amos apart.

Elijah could see how Amos was struggling to decide and whispered to Amos, "I get that you want to leave your past behind and start anew, but currently you are level 0. And we're going to be leaving for a frontier village soon. We will be lucky if you reach level 10 by the time we get there. So if you want my opinion: just pick whatever is the strongest and will help people."

Amos nodded at the advice and chose. Amos chose a beginner book for illusion magic, a small book on sword spells, and a beginner book for alteration magic.

Amos had a feeling that he would be able to relearn illusion magic relatively quickly. The sword spells would help him with offense and fighting. And the alteration spells would help him with protecting himself and others. 

Amos believed it was the best choice he could make.

Even with them all being beginner books they in total cost around 25 gold coins.

Amos then asked Elijah, "Do you want to buy some new magic books."

Elijah explained to Amos, "Actually if I naturally level up and succeed in my mission then the church will send me new books on spells, incantations, and prayers. Thanks for the offer though."

After all the shopping they did that day they were left with about 1 Platinum and 10 gold. it was still a ton of money and neither of them could think of a use for it. So they decided that part of it would go towards building the church in the new village, and the rest could be used to help develop the village as well.

With that, Amos and Elijah separated and went back to their places to prepare and rest for the journey they would start the next day.

— The next morning —

Amos and Elijah reconvened at the stable. They both had all the supplies and things they needed.

Elijah said, "Me and the Cardinal talked with the captain of the city guard. He told me the village we will be going to is named 'Bethel'. It is a frontier village out to the east. It should take us about a month to get there by horseback. Which should be plenty of time to help level you up."

And with that, both Elijah and Amos hopped on their horses and set off. They went through the winding and enormous city until they reached the city gates. Elijah identified himself as a priest which allowed them to get by inspection rather quickly. Their horses plodded along at a moderate rate.

Once they got further from the city Amos turned back to look at it. From this distance, the city was simply beautiful. But Amos had to turn away to focus back on the road they were on. The road they were currently on winded far off into the distant east. At the very horizon of what they could see, they could see the sun gradually rise painting the world pink and orange.

Amos applied pressure to the horse to make it go faster. This surprised Elijah, but he laughed and did the same to catch up. They rode off toward the sunrise to a new life.