Am I glad that we slept in the forest, geez spring gets hot here.

As they were packing up, the moderator gave them the layout for today.

"Alright, you all look..." he looked towards Sarah groggily packing up "awake enough, here's the plan for today. We are almost close to the dungeon outpost, and there we will refill our canteens and fight the dungeon. Simple right?"

"I've been wondering, do you just have a good sense of direction, or os there a landmark nearby?"

"Well Tunner, it's both, as an adventurer getting lost is like a ritual everyone does at least once, also, see that tree over there?" he pointed towards a weird shaped tree that merged with another to form an X. "We always use that to mark this clearing and progress, I'd say we get there in two hours by walking. None of you are to use mana on the way there, you'll thank me later."

"How did I never notice that tree? Looks so obvious."

"Really? That janky looking tree? That was the first thing I noticed."

...

It ended up taking, almost exactly two hours. 

This place is pretty nice actually, for a tiny outpost at least.

There was a log cabin and some flowers right next to it, which, were currently being watered.

"Ah, hello there! You guys must be the new recruits!"

"Yes they are, how are you John?" the moderator extended his hand towards John.

"I'm doing well Samuel, haven't seen you in a bit, how's the wife?"

"Ah' she's well, doing the best she can at her job, as usual. It's taking longer to get new recruits lately, Licentia may be a "beginners town" but we seem to be running out, no matter though, the guilds full as usual."

Sarah turned back to the recruits.

"Yeah, this was my third month applying, not enough people apparently."

Then came the rare word from Marshall. He never seemed to talk much.

"Mmm, probably the war, it's reaching an end point soon though, thank the gods."

Everyone, even Barry just nodded in silence.

...

"Well John seemed nice, how long has he worked here?"

"I'd say ten years or so? He's got a wife that stays with him there, shame ya missed her. They always seemed happy living out here. Wouldn't be me, but good for them."

Sarah seemed a bit surprised. "So they live out here? It would be nice for a vacation, but living here seems a bit rough."

"True, they like it here though. Anyway, we got off track, it's time for the test, all of you got your canteens filled, yes?"

They all nodded their heads.

"Then off we go!"

The dungeon's entrance was captivating. Jackson rarely got the urge to draw. And leveling up art didn't even improve actual artistic skills by much, it was more there for abilities. If he had a sketchpad though, he'd spend hours on it.

The stone arch completly contrasted the dark purple portal within, heading into an abandoned mine down below.

He'd heard stories of dungeons, once a lot of mana gathers, whether or not it's passive or destructive, a dungeon core would manifest and control the area afeected by mana and... 

Wait, spell idea, if it works like I want, It'd be realy useful in the dungeon, but if it's not exact it's not that useful without attack spells. Ok, note it for later.

He Really wanted to learn it now though. Maybe during a break in the dungeon? He hoped he'd have time later.

Single file, starting with the moderator, the filed into the dungeon.

All of a sudden, he felt starnge, and a bit woozy. His sense of balence all wrong all of a sudden, and then it felt like he was kind of... Falling, like that fake sleep fall thing.

Then he was suddenly standing in the dungeon. Somehow he didn't throw up, the others, not so fortunate. Really it was just Sarah, kinda sad.

"That sucked"

Everyone agreed.

"Alright, everyone is in a party right?" no response "Really? That should've been the first thing you did. Um, Sarah, you be Party leader."

A notification popped up. The first one he'd ever saw like this. He'd never been in a party before.

He accepted really quick.

My first ever party, getting a bit teary eyed there.

Parties were a bit special in a few ways. They shared exp between people with a distance limitation, and a few other thing went on that Jackson didn't know of. 

There were a bit of interesting things he did know though. You could look at teammates status and things like that without the Identify skill. Certain skills and abilities only work in parties or out of them as well.

Samuel lit a torch.

"Alright, let the test begin!"

...

"Can you try buffing me? I've never been buffed before and want to get used to it."

"Sure!"

I've never buffed anyone either but i'd rather not say that.

Jackson set his hand on Barry and gave him a simple Bolster Dexterity at as low a burn he could manage. With his new ability Efficient Invigorator that was pretty low, at 1 dexterity per 1 mana a second. Now the spell was finally usable in battle. And he could up the amount of stats with a good bit of breathing room.

"Hey this feels pretty nice! Kinda like I'm full of energy!" 

Jackson slowly drew his hand back and tried maintaining the spell without direct contact. Persistent Casting seemed to help with keeping it active thankfully.

"Alright, you can turn it off now, I think I felt it out."

Jackson had been sweating nervously this whole time. He sighed a breath of relief and turned off the spell. 

There wasn't peace for long though. Five big rats approached them. They were not happy.

It was a flurry of motion, Sarah backed up, readying a spell that looked to be like electricity. Then, Jackson buffed Barry's dexterity putting his mana on a drain of 4 per second, a noticeable buff.

Then he backed up, and drew back an arrow. Sarah was still charging her spell, Marshall, and Tunner were taking on their own rat's Barry already getting the first swipe on his.

Then he steadied his aim on a rat charging to gang up on Tunner.

Focus

He loosed the arrow, hitting the rat in the side staggering it just enough to stop it from hitting Tunner. The little guys were fast.

Jackson was still not the best archer, unable to pull up another arrow in time to properly finish off or at least stun the rat for a good few seconds, the rat got a good bite onto Tunners arm. Thankfully Sarah's spell was ready by now and she shot a bolt of lightning at the rat finishing it off without singeing Tunner. Good aim.

Then she got back to preparing a spell, and Jackson prepared another arrow for the other rat, where did lt it go? 

Oh, it's coming right for me. Wait, it's coming right for me!

He shot the arrow, and missed, the giant rats body to narrow to be hit easily.

He started to draw his sword, but was to late, the rat was already to close.

Oh no.

A slicing sound could be heard.

"Your buffs are very useful, I feel as quick as a kid running from their parents after breaking a vase."

Ohmygodthatwasscary.

"Phew, that was close, thanks."

Jackson turned around to see turner holding his arm and wincing.

"Ah f**k, it got me! Damn this hurts."

Jackson ran over to help.

"Ah, I can heal it! I've gotta clean it first though, and i might not be able to heal it all the way. Uh, you might want to close your mouth, this'll hurt."

Jackson handed him a cloth to put in his mouth and got to it. First he got some alcohol to sanitze the wound and that was the worst part. The skin didn't tear to much because it died before it could make the wound worse so it wasn't to bad, they were very unsanitary teeth though.

He could tell he barely held back a scream. 

As the wound was small, it didn't need stitches, but it was deep, so he started healing it with his full focus to lower costs, and then raised how much it'd heal, it started to drain him pretty quickly. But it was doing good for the wound. He stopped a bit before it was completely healed, having brought him down to 40 mp. And then he dressed the wound and he was done.

"Well that's certainly handy. Thanks Jackson.

"No problem! Make sure to eat though, that spell uses up your food real quick."

"Yeah, I am a bit hungry now that I think of it."

"Then I'd say you earned yourselves a break, great job everyone!"

The moderator stood back for the fight and wouldn't step in unless something bad happend, which hopefully, he wouldn't need too.

"I'm pretty low on mana now, so I definately need a break."

"I'm good on it, I only used my spells once."

"Good, you two, conserve your mana. Everyone needs it."

Jackson took a look at the results from the battle.

Not too many gains, can't say I'm surprised though. Don't think I an try that spell I wanted to, might use to much mana. Maybe I could try and boost mana regen or something.

Meditation is off the table sadly. Hmm, how does mana normally regenerate? We get mana from the food we eat and what we absorb from the air around us. Increasing absorption sounds hard, and I already know Invigoration so I'll give it a try.

First he ate some food. He'd be needing it most likely. He already had something in mind thankfully. Using Increase Metabolism already increases stamina regen, and obviously mana, but it was so tiny it didn't matter. So he focused his mind on getting rid of the stamina regeneration aspect, not entirely of course, he'd starve with a full stomach if he did.

He focused on hiw he wanted to make the spell more efficient at producing mana, putting stamina on the backburner. It took more than a few attempts but spell was simple enough, and he was well past familiar with Increase Metabolism so he got the hang of it a little before the break was up.

Then he used the now finished spell on himself, it required his full attention to cast it, as it threw off the balence of his body a great deal, basically exchanging stamina regn for mana regen. 

Dang I feel... Really sluggish, headaches gone though.

Most spells that interfered with the body in a negative way were really hard to use as the body naturally tried to cleanse the bad effects.

Some spells were easier to use when negatively affecting he body, most debuff spells would in a way, trick the body into helping or ignoring the spell.

Stamina regens the fastest of the three energies sor exchanging it for mana regen really sped it up quick. The spell didn't use too much mana, similar to Increase Metabolism so it paid for itself. And seemed to up his mana regen by a factor of 2.5, similar to a level 15 meditation skill.

In many ways it acted just like meditation, except he had to focus on the spell costantly insted of focusing on nothing. In a way, it was harder than meditation, but easier for him all the same.

Right now his mana regen was at 11, the spell effectively brought it up to 28, rounded up from 27.5 which gave him 1.4 mana a minute, a very noticeable increase.

"Alright everyone, break is over now! Hope your all well and good or else!,

Really? How much mana do I have now?

Jackson let out a sigh, essentially, he learned a really useful spell, but ended up gaining no net mana because what it cost to learn in the first place.

I really need to up my mana capacity. I might get another point in here though. Just need a few more points in magic power for first enhancement. Gotta learn fire magic quick then.

After a bit of walking they got into a few more battles with less giant rats this time, including a few spiders which Jackson hated with a Passion, leveled him up though, everyone else had gotten two or so levels now. Which was disheartening, considering they were way higher leveled than him, but Child of Knowledge had a 25% decrease in experience earned from killing, and another 25% for being a subclass. It still got experience from reading though, so he was fine with it.

After a bit more fights and a lot more walking, they came across a big door.

"Everyone listen up, this is the boss door, you have all done great so far, but you still need to beat this final challenge before this test is over. We will rest here tonight, alternating watch duty before we fight the boss. Any questions? No? Okay good."

Jackson looked at the boss door, it gave him a strange feeling, almost like the one he had to leave the camp behind, except, he felt compelled to go inside. It reminded im of this one thing he'd read about before, "The Call of the Abyss." basically, The Call of the Abyss is what you call the feeling to jump off the edge of a high place, even if you aren't suicidal. If he remembered correctly, some psycologists say the feeling is supposed to let you know you are in control of yourself by willfully making the choice to not jump, or it was just you thinking too much or something, and was more prominent in people with mental illnesses that can cause suicidal thoughts, or not, it was a while ago. It was... Strange, logically, he knew it'd be dumb to go in, but the pull was strangely strong, almost like a spell was cast on him.

He shook his head, trying to make his seemingly faulty brain work.

It feels lot like back at camp...