‘What is… I just…’ Roge’s thoughts seem to falter as he reads the box over and over, a chill going down his spine as he thinks about who could be communicating with him. ‘What is this?’

  Roge suddenly could feel himself breathing again, the dragon closing his eyes and focused on taking deep, measured breaths. ‘Now I’m officially going insane,’ crosses his mind, another box appearing behind his eyelids not helping with the strategy of calming down.

  ‘I thought you couldn’t read my mind?’ he asked in his head, trying to slow his breathing at the same time to stop hyperventilating.

  Feeling himself calming down at the fact that his mind couldn’t be changed, Roge looked at the new [Status] screen that popped up. He wanted to frown at it or groan, having a particularly nasty thought about ‘child features’.

  ‘What’s with the strike through [Ability Hoard]?’ he asked, pointing the thought to whomever is speaking to him.

  The tale has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

  ‘So isn’t the solution to just have you and me decide what the class is going to do?’ Roge felt like he needed to be included in this decision making, otherwise whatever admin he was speaking to could just take his abilities away.

  ‘That’s… not very helpful,’ Roge complained, flicking the effect screen away with a thought.

  ‘That’s… fair I guess.’

  Roge thought about that for a few moments, knowing that being able to swap skills between people would be a problem as well. ‘So a buff that doesn’t just replicate the effect of the skill could work?’

  ‘So I assume the second [See] effect relates to the code as well?’ Roge asked, wanting to grin at the gems and ingots idea the admin had apparently liked.

  Roge had practically no time to react to that last message, it disappearing as soon as he’d finished reading it. He had other things to worry about, however, his headache coming back full force with the amount of mana it took to pull his hand out of the screen as time started moving again. As the gems dropped to the table, Roge’s head nearly bashed into it too, his breathing labored as he tried to keep however much of his dinner in his stomach.

  Thankfully, the people around him gave him time to compose himself, the dragon looking up to see both Constance and Judson looking at copies of his screens. He couldn’t see them before when they pulled them up, but he assumed his [All Seeing] effect made him more aware of his status. To bolster that assumption, he also saw pink and red screens sitting in front of them as well, though they looked blank to his eyes. ‘Right. The ash stuff or whatever.’

  “That skill…” the lioness muttered, finally looking up at Roge’s face. “While I have seen skills as powerful as this, I’ve never seen one so unique.”

  “Damn right it’s unique! I love working with dragons sometimes,” Judson hollered, smacking Roge’s knee under the table. “Totally worth ten ranks in that skill. Say, you know what those gems do? My [Inspect] isn’t specialized in them, so I can’t see much more than their name.”

  Roge looked down at the pile of gems in front of him, picking one up to take a closer look at it. It looked like one of those fancy cut gems he’d see all the time in video games, though this one was perfectly clear like glass and in the shape of a potion bottle. Skinny neck with a round body and all. Barely an inch in diameter, the small gem looked fairly simple, but shiny to Roge’s eyes.

  “Looks like it’s one rank of your [Glass Bottle Making] skill. Hold on…” he muttered, grabbing the stack and shoving it into his hoard to see if there was a buff for ten of the gems.

  Frowning at the description, and noting the others did as well, it took Roge a moment to figure out what the buff enabled him to do. “Oh! It lets me add my other buff effects to potion bottles. As long as something is considered a part of my ‘hoard’, I can use them on it.” He demonstrated that fact by changing the color of his shirt to more of a mint color, the priests blinking in surprise at the change.

  “But can’t you just… already do that?” the goblin asked, Constance seeming to scroll through the various buffs on Roge’s screen.

  “Only if I add one of the coins to it. This gives me the ability to just use the ash instead, letting me edit objects without adding abilities to it.” Roge jumped up and down at this idea, wanting to find the rest of the crafting related skills so he could edit more objects. He also wanted more modifying buffs like Color and Pigment, hoping he could strengthen or change the objects in other ways too.

  “Okay, I think that’s enough for now,” the priestess cut in, her whiskers wiggling as Roge deflated somewhat. “This meeting wasn’t to brainstorm ideas or delve that far into his class. It’s to reevaluate Mr. Youngston’s probation. I have to cut off the fun at some point.”

  “Speak for yourself. I’m going to try and hire this guy as soon as possible,” Judson muttered, waving to the priestess as she gave him another look.

  “So. From what we’ve seen, and the reports that have been made about Paul, yes it seems like a very powerful class. If you gain access to spells from it, we expect a prompt reporting of it, but otherwise we will stick with once a week meetings to get an update on your [Status]. I don’t see any other need for it, as you seem to be somewhat responsible for the moment.” She gave the dragon a look at that last statement, Roge meeting her eyes and nodding. “So since there is some research to be done on your class, and Mr. Marshall here will want to speak to you about a business opportunity,” she said, waving her paw to the alchemist, “I will take my leave. Please try to be careful with your powers, Mr. Youngston.”

  Roge opened his mouth to reply, shutting it slowly as Constance quickly got up and left the inn in a rush. Only one of the knights followed her out, the one who hadn’t spoken yet standing guard over the goblin, Roge assumed.

  He had a lot to think about now with his class, feeling a bit of frustration flare at the other things in his life it was now piling onto. With the idea now in his head of upgrading his skills, upgrading his [Novice Gardener] class seemed like a no-brainer, focusing it more on magically helping the plants to synergize with his second class better. ‘Even something like Draconic Gardener would be better,’ he mused to himself, finally looking at the nearly vibrating goblin. He wasn’t sure if he had the energy to deal with him at the time, so he’d try and see if they could set up a meeting some other time.