I have removed her respawn mechanic, and the two lines on her leash compelling her to return or for people to fetch her, they were a bit odd. Also now she is enslaved directly by the guild rather than for hire, so she will have more freedom to party up. I have changed [Training link] to [guidance]. I also changed her male name to Brendon.
These changes shouldn't matter in the story up to now though anyway. And here is the next chapter early to help make up for it. Enjoy.
Chapter six
Approaching the temple Evelynn could see that it stood out from the other buildings, it was made with huge dark logs, their bottoms and tops flattened and stacked upon one another. The door frame was two pillars of stone supporting a large slab above the door with a carving of a large tree with the sun behind it.
Francesca was explaining how their temple was dedicated to Gaia, who was associated with nature and earth magics and that most priests or priestess would learn either light or dark magic from their divinity. In Gaia’s case it was light magic of course.
Following Francesca through the door, Evelynn could see that it was a large hall, not unlike many churches or temples often were. All the seating was stacked away to the sides and a large fire burned in a brasier at the far end of the hall.
The fire had no logs though, instead there was a large crystal being held in place, she couldn’t tell what kind of metal it was, but it had a blue tinge to it.
And there were a couple of kids flying! An older lady in similar robes to Francesca was watching them, giving instructions as they flew shakily around the large hall.
They were gliding around the room using a small amount of wind magic to keep themselves afloat, their bushy tails helping to catch the wind. They were a pair of squirrel-kin siblings, a young girl and her older brother.
The priestess told them to stay safe for a minute while she greeted her new guests.
“Hey Rhea, still doing flying lessons?” asked Francesca.
“Hi Fran, just finishing up here they should be tired soon” said Rhea, gesturing at the flying children.
“Ok, I just brought Evelynn here to say hello. She is the new saint you have heard about” replied Francesca.
Rhea turned to Evelynn with a smile and said “hi, I’m Rhea, nice to meet you, Evelynn. I hear you only arrived recently and would like to know more about being a saint?”
“Hi, um yes please,” said Evelynn. “I don’t know what a saint does or what my magic can do, any advice would be amazing.”
“That’s fine, most temples will help the saint with their god given duties. Can you tell me if you have Holy magic?”
“Um…” She looked at her status sheet, unsure if she should say. ‘Well, the temple should help me, right?’ she thought. “I have holy blood magic and Fae healing magic.”
“Hmm, an interesting combo to be sure. But Fae healing magic is quite common among the Fae, it shouldn’t be too hard for you to find some information on. I can give you a book on general Fae magic, which should have some advice for you, but much of it may be irrelevant to a Fae healer.”
Evelynn thanked her for the book and then asked “and my Holy blood magic? I assume that is different?”
Rhea frowned. “It’s certainly harder to gain any information on, most blood magic is either illegal or falsely attributed to darker arts than they really are. All I can tell you is that cleansing magics should come rather naturally to you, and it should be easy for you to stop patients from bleeding out.”
‘Rather vague, but still useful information at least’ thought Evelynn and thanked her again. “Will I be able to test my healing sometime? I don’t mind helping if you need it?”
It was Francesca who spoke up this time. “I think father has a training day for you tomorrow, I’m sure he will test you then” she said.
Rhea nodded along and said “if there was anything else? I assume Francesca said you would need to report here in an emergency?”
“Yup, Francesca was saying earlier.” Evelynn thought for a second, “actually I could probably use some flying lessons myself” she said smiling and flapping her wings a in anticipation.
Both the priestess laughed at that, and Rhea supplied “I think the trick for you is that you don’t have to fly as such. Just put some mana into your wings and you should float, use your wings to move yourself forward.”
Evelynn concentrated, bracing herself for liftoff to more laughter. She felt the mana flow into her wings as she slowly rose from the ground, she felt weightless. It was amazing. She cried out laughing “ahaha look at me! I can fly now!”
She tried putting more mana into her wings, but they wouldn’t take more. Seeing her mana tick down, but immediately tick back up she thought ‘it must be less than my regeneration, this is quite easy really!’
She couldn’t fly much higher though, her feet were barely waist high.
“Not bad for a beginner, you will be able to fly higher with more magic power when you gain more levels or items” explained Rhea. “Now try flapping your wings.”
She did, and started moving slowly through the air, turning came naturally to her when she reached the end of the large hall. She was made for this! ‘It makes sense I guess; both my races use magical flying after all’ she thought.
She cut her magic off and landed heavily beside the two priestess who were smiling at her.
“Haha and to land, you should cut your mana off slowly, not all at once like that” said Rhea, clearly having been waiting for that to happen.
Evelynn thanked her many times while hugging her friend, she was on a high after flying for the first time. “I always wanted to fly!” she said to them.
“Anyway, I should get Eve back to the guild now, we have been out all day and it will be getting late soon. I will see you tomorrow, Rhea?”
“Sure, thing Fran, and nice to meet you Eve” she said with a smile. “You’re welcome here anytime if you have any questions.”
“Thank you again Rhea, and I’ll see you next time” she said with a wave.
They headed out the door to return to the guild, Eve was exceptionally happy with herself, gliding next to her smiling friend on the way back to the guild.
Exiting the temple, she was immediately jarred out of her pleasant mood, as hovering down the stairs she soon hit her maximum height and fell a few feet. But she managed to stay in the air without hitting the ground, it wasn’t so bad.
She decided to walk the rest of the way though.
It made Francesca giggle again though “it sure is funny watching you fly” she said.
Evelynn threw her a fake pout at that.
Arriving back at the guild Francesca said her goodbyes for now, “I will be back for dinner, I usually eat here because I get a good discount” she explained.
“Ok thank you for helping me today” said Evelynn with a hug goodbye, “I’ll see you at dinner then!”
- - - - -
Whew, who knew working at a bar was so hard. Eve had been serving drinks for a couple of hours now and it was hot inside. She had already removed her coat and amulet of warmth. Between the kitchen and the main fire, it was very warm, and she was busy serving people, pouring drinks and taking orders for the kitchen.
The barkeep, Harold, was an ex-adventurer like she had guessed, he had lost his eye and arm during a goblin village raid and a nearby band of roaming orcs thought it was an opportune moment to also raid the goblins, seeing the adventurers fighting them.
He also had a wife about the same age, who worked in the kitchen most of the day. She had chestnut brown hair and a plain dress. She would often make preserved fruits when the bar was quiet to make use of the guild’s large basement.
She learnt a lot about drinks in just a few hours, they would sell a lot of tap beer for customers to drink because its fresh and cool, but a lot of people were stocking up on powdered drinks.
The powdered drinks came in two main varieties, hot or cold. The hot drink being like tea, while the cold was like a cordial. And they came with a variety of small powerups.
Most people bought either dexterity or mana regeneration drinks. The strength drink would be useful in an emergency but was damaging to the body, so most people only had one of those. And the benefits were not huge, but they would replace normal drinks, so it was a great deal all around.
There was one Elven mage who kept drinking the mead though, which gave a stronger mana regeneration buff.
Harold told her that she could help herself to a drink if she wanted to. She was working hard, and it was warm inside after all.
Evelynn decided that she would try a mead.
Listening to a group of human adventurers thrill her with their tales of bravado from their recent expedition to slay a group of Hobgoblins she moved onto her second drink.
By the time Francesca came back for dinner Evelynn was practicing her flying to cheers and laughter of the few remaining patrons. It was quite late now, Francesca usually had dinner after the rush.
“Evelynn!” she shouted, then straightened up and spoke normally, “I am here for dinner now.”
“Hi Francesca!” Evelynn said as she flew over to hug her friend. “Are you hungry? There are heaps of food!”
Francesca frowned at her rose cheeked friend. “Have you been drinking Evelynn?” she asked.
“What, no! I just had a couple of mead’s is all” exclaimed Evelynn.
“Eve, you need to be careful with alcohol” she said with a scowl. “Fairies have a bad history with alcohol, especially sweet ones like mead.”
Evelynn gave her a confused look, “what do you mean a history?”
“Never mind that, just stop drinking now and have dinner with me. Trust me you are going to regret this in the morning.”
“Oh ok… if you say so Francesca” said Evelynn a bit disappointed in having her fun ruined. But her friend was probably looking out for her. “I’ll grab us dinner why don’t you take a seat.”
Returning with two meals, a large one for Francesca and a half plate for herself, they chatted away eating their meals. Francesca had a beer.
She showed Francesca her jewelry again that they had bought, and they compared magical staffs since they were the same and noticed a few minor differences because they were handmade.
Evelynn’s mood was still high, but it was getting late, and they had finished their dinner now. Francesca was about to leave for the night when her father came into the guild.
He walked over and greeted them “Hello Francesca, Eve, how was today, did you get all your shopping done?”
Francesca nodded while Evelynn said “Yup! We got heaps of cool things, thanks for helping so much, ill be able to go adventures now!”
He laughed and said, “that’s the plan, we love to help out new adventurers, it’s a hard occupation to get into after all.”
Francesca grunted at that then said, “it’s late, I should be going soon.”
“Don’t forget to be here in the morning” he said, “I’ll show this one to bed then, goodnight, Francesca.”
Francesca frowned at that, but Evelynn said goodnight to her then stood up and walked off down the hall with her father.
The guild master put his hand around her shoulder, leading her down the hall, she leaned into it hugging him “thanks for all you have done for me” she said, still rosy from her mead. “Anything could have happened to me if I didn’t arrive here.”
“It’s fine” he said “did you have enough dinner? Are you still hungry?”
“Mmm” she replied and hugged him tighter.
Francesca watched as they walked into the room, not until then would she get up to leave for home.
