Until We Meet Again

After spending a few more hours talking to the kids and Ally, they decided to call it a night and get some rest. Maybe because the four of them knew that they wouldn't have a chance to see each other for at least a day or two, they made sure to spend a little extra time with each other.

After talking to each other for awhile, they all retired to their respective cots and went to bed.

Before Grant went to bed though, he decided to check his stats to see where he stood after entering the Enlightened Tier.

{Status:

Name: Grant Holmes

Level: 25

Race: Human

Path: The Unbound

Title: Unbound

Strength: 172 + 110 | Agility: 223 + 160 | Health: 182 + 100 | Stamina: 209 + 100 | Mana: 419 + 100

Random Rolls: 23

Credits: 1,250

Available Free Stats: 50

Skills:

Unbound Stats (Active: Level N/A)

Jack of All Trades (Passive: Level N/A)

Overclocked Concentration (Passive: Level 5)

Terrorize (Passive: Level 5)

Blind (Equipment Skill: Level Locked)}

Basic Swordsmanship (Passive: Level 5)

Grant was more than satisfied with where he was stat wise. The available stat points seemed almost redundant at the moment because his stats overall were so high but he knew that in the heat of battle, a small difference could mean life or death so he planned on saving them until he absolutely had to use them.

Since he was so exhausted and everyone else was already asleep, he decided to call it a night after briefly browsing through his status page.

In the morning Ally had once again prepared breakfast for everyone. Grant could tell that she stull wasn't full recovered emotionally but she looked much better than she did just a couple of days ago.

After Grant and Ally exchanged their usual morning greetings, Ally woke up the kids and served breakfast to everyone. It had become normal for everyone to rise at the crack of dawn now since so many things had to be done.

Grant used breakfast as the opportunity to expand on what he had already told Richard and Robin. He was sure that they wouldn't be able to reach level 25 before his return but he also wanted to make sure that, if something did happen to him and he was unable to return in a prompt fashion, then they would have the knowledge they needed to make an informed decision on what Path to follow.

After breakfast, Grant loaded his backpack up with stuff that he might need while he was gone and then got prepared to leave.

"I don't want you to go Mr. Carrot! Are you sure you can't just stay with us?"

"I'm sorry Robin, I have no choice. I have to go handle some business and it has to be today. I promise that whenever I am finished dealing with this, I will come back and see you. You better make sure that you stay safe while I'm gone.

And make sure that you keep practicing your bow skills."

"I promise! I will make sure to protect both Richie and Mom! I'm strong after all!"

Robin and Grant both laughed after hearing her say that. By Grant's standards, she was still weak, but in relation to every other survivor they had met she was at the very least twice as strong as they were.

Richard and Grant didn't exchange many words, they just shook hands and gave each other a quick hug. Grant made sure that Richard would always remain vigilant and protect his little sister and mother now that he was the man of the family.

As for Ally, Grant just gave her a smile and a hug and thanked her for everything she had done to help him. Grant also made sure to tell Ally that she should be very proud of her kids because they had grown immensely in the past few days and had done it to protect not just themselves but her as well.

Under the increscent waves goodbye, Grant departed towards the park where Skit told him that his dungeon was located.

Once he was out of sight from the gun shop, Grant unwrapped the bandage on his arm that had been hiding his grotesque wound until last night but was now just a decoration.

Grant had activated his Unbound Stats skill after everyone had gone to bed and pumped every last one of his stats into health to see if it would help in healing his arm and sure enough within a matter of thirty seconds, the wounds had closed and the flesh had healed.

He had found it to be an oddly beautiful sight to watch the human body work at speeds visible to the naked eye. To see how his arm had gone from cuts that were still relatively deep to looking like he had never gotten so much as a paper cut was fascinating.

He had expected a large amount of pain or something to accompany the healing, but all he felt was hungry by the end. He attributed it to the energy that his body needed to use to heal and so he just ate a midnight snack and then felt completely fine.

Grant had also considered using his Random Rolls and Credits last night, but he had waited too long since he was distracted with the company of the other three so he planned on doing it while he was walking today.

He didn't know what awaited him at Skit's dungeon but he wasn't going to walk in there unprepared. And now that he reached level 25 and entered the Enlightened Tier he should have access to items suited for said tier.

So while walking brazenly down the street without a care in the world, Grant first decided to check out the shop interface that would allow him to purchase skills.

{Welcome to The Path's Credit Shop. To view what is available for purchase with Credits, please choose from the list below. Items will be delivered in the same manner as Random Rolls.

List of Goods:

Skills:

- Active

- Passive

Items:

- Weapons

- Armor

- Accessories

Potions:

- Healing

- Mana

- Poison

- Misc.

General Goods:

- Food

- Tools

- Profession Specific

- Misc.}

Grant was surprised by the long list of choices because he had just assumed, based on what Sherlock had told him, that the shop was only for skills. But it looked like he could purchase anything he needed to survive directly from the store. Of course, since credits were limited, it would be extremely foolish to waste them on something like food.

His immediate and most pressing desire were Active Skills. He had no doubt that there were probably passive skills that would benefit him greatly, but he wanted something that could be used as a trump card during a fight.

After opening the skills page of the shop, Grant's vision was absolutely flooded with different options. The fact that his Path allowed him to use any skills from any other Path meant that she shop also displayed skills from all of the other Paths.

Grant figured that he could spend days if not weeks just scrolling through the list of skills, so he tried to narrow it down by type. He did want weapon related skills but since he was capable of using any weapon with sufficient skill then wasting his credits on something like a sword skill wouldn't be a wise choice especially since Wet Noodle was essentially useless at this point when it came to fighting stronger enemies.

After discarding every skill related to weapons, he was still left with a list far beyond the pale. So he once again narrowed it down by cost. Having only 1250 credits wouldn't allow him to purchase some of the stronger Path skills such as Heaven's Fall for Paladins or Raise Undead Dragon for Necromancers which cost tens of thousands each.

After combing through the skills as quickly as he could he came across one skill that caught his attention.

{Skill: Frenzy of Time (Level: 1)

Skill Type: Active

Skill Tier: Epic

Activation: 250 Mana

Duration: 5 seconds

Radius: 10 Feet

Allows the user to manipulate time within a certain radius around themselves. Can either speed up time, slow down time, or freeze time. Will not take effect on enemies that are 25 levels or more above the user.

Cost: 1000 Credits}

Grant zeroed in on Frenzy of Time not just because it seemed to be an exceptionally strong skill for such a cheap price but also because their was something enticing about being able to control time. Every young mans dream was to be able to freeze time.

Grant figured that the high mana cost and the short duration were probably why the skill was so cheap but that didn't matter to him whose stats were so high. Five seconds was basically an eternity for him when he was using his full strength.

He didn't hesitate, and outright purchased the skill. Instantly testing it out around him. At first it was difficult to use since he only had 5 seconds to practice and could only activate it twice before he had to wait for his mana to recover but he could already tell it would be an extremely useful skill.

With a new skill in hand and some testing completed, it was time to roll for new items! And he didn't plan on saving any rolls this time. He was going all or nothing on his luck at the moment.