Fifth Member Part 2

Several days later.

[Alright, I'll store this batch with the other ones you gave me the other day.]

The fairy said while taking fifteen intermediate health potions from my alchemy station in the magic hall.

Ever since the addition of the lobby's second floor, master had summoned thirty more people through the first floor summoning chamber.

Our number had gone over 60 now, almost twice our size ever since the lobby's renovation.

Master had even expanded the lodging's second floor up to fifty bedrooms in anticipation of the added people.

Of course, only those permitted were allowed to live up there.

But master's decision to expand was a right call.

Several people had been helping out in the equipment workshop. They had also begun training under the craftsmen to become novice crafters.

These crafter apprentices had been invited to live on the second floor.

A couple of able cooks had also gone to the kitchen to help Pauline and the others. They too had been chosen to be second floor's residents.

Also, for the past couple of days, Tarran had been organizing the gathering activities in the Weekday Dungeons.

Given how I told him we could not keep burdening the cooks and craftsmen with gathering duties, he had been actively setting up parties to enter the Weekday Dungeons.

Thanks to the arrival of the newcomers, the boy managed to recruit a handful of skilled farmers, hunters, and miners as gatherers.

Upon my recommendation, master decided to group these people up to be sent to the Weekday Dungeons routinely.

Well, I only recommended them to be in a party together. It was master who decided to make them frequent the Weekday Dungeons after realizing their set of skills.

Accompanied with few inter-changeable combatants from the makeshift parties as escorts, we now had three gatherer parties which actively entered the Weekday Dungeons and gathered materials.

Others in the lobby volunteered to enter the Weekday Dungeons as well, but those three gatherer parties were the ones master frequently sent to provide steady flow of supplies to the storage.

It was thanks to their efforts that I was able to have enough ingredients to create another fifteen intermediate health potions. In fact, I still had more to work with.

On another note, the three gatherer parties were also able to obtain quite a handful of elemental stones from the huge monsters in the Weekday Dungeons.

I also had been referring the huge monsters as the Weekday Dungeon guardians or the elemental stone guardians.

Anyway, master immediately used the elemental stones to create more basic promotion stones.

We should be able to promote three 1-star heroes with the amount of promotion stones currently in the storage.

Due to their excellent work in the Weekday Dungeons, the gatherers, and some combatant escorts who helped gathering the elemental stones, had been allowed to live on the second floor of the lodging.

Also, during the three parties' trips to the dungeon for the past few days, we discovered all three Weekday Dungeons were only available all at once for three days only.

Today, we could only access the Isralta Mine.

There was no window asking us if we wanted to go to the Kendert Forest or Sinmiel Plateau whenever we approached the shining mirror in the middle of the mirrored chamber.

It was probably similar to when the Weekday Dungeon first opened and we could only go to the plateau at the time.

It was likely the schedule between the dungeons was being rotated.

Thankfully, Tarran and the others had gathered enough health potion ingredients from the other two inaccessible dungeons until they could be available again.

And since they could only enter the mine, I had informed Tarran to gather as much Replay Stone as they could.

Gerrits and I had told the miners how to locate such stone in the mine. There were many others in the lobby who could benefit from watching the recording of the fifth floor.

Now that we had established a routine schedule and designated personnel for the Weekday Dungeons, master began sending makeshift parties to the trials once more.

Since yesterday, master had been sending random parties of the lobby's first floor residents to the first till the fourth floor of the tower. The ones who did not work as a gatherer, crafter, or cooks and had not been invited to the second floor, of course.

As what master had done previously, master was trying to see which of the first floor residents, both the old and the newcomers, had the most potential in combat.

I was certain master was doing these sorties to discover who could fill the last spot in Party 1.

With that agenda in mind, after completing my research quota for the day, I stepped out of the magic hall and went to the second floor training ground where my comrades were at.

As I arrived, I found them to be deep in some discussion.

"What are you guys talking about?"

I asked them.

"We were just going through the things that happened in the fifth floor."

Shanny said.

"Trudy managed to notice something interesting. You'll want to hear this."

Jonah told me.

"Oh really? Do tell."

"Well, it's about Gerson's death."

Trudy said.

"What about his death?"

"I just found it odd how those goblins managed to overwhelm him like that. As if he was not strong enough to fight them back."

I nodded to her observation.

"I thought the same too. I've seen him fought in the lower floors. He could definitely kill those goblins easily. But somehow he could not at that time."

"Exactly. Which was why I asked Jonah and Shanny whether fear has something to do with his death."

I raised my eyebrows upon the term.

"Fear? You think the reason he lost to those goblins was because he was afraid?"

"You probably never experienced it because you're so strong and brave, Serafina. But I remembered when I first entered the trial, I suddenly felt weaker whenever I was starting to panic. It actually happened every time I felt afraid in the trial, even if it was just for a moment."

Trudy stated.

Now that was an interesting observation.

"You think fear can weaken you in the trial?"

"At first I thought it was just me. But I was more certain after seeing Gerson's death. I mean, panic could disorient you. But Gerson also lost at least half his strength in the fifth floor."

Jonah, Shanny, and I were too busy engaged in battle during the fifth floor trial.

Although we were there, we were too occupied dealing with the situation at hand.

We were not able to observe our environment very precisely, such as the happening around Gerson's death.

Trudy, however, was able to completely observe everything that happened in the fifth floor thanks to the Replay Stone.

Given she had nothing to do but watch us, she managed to capture the small detail that we overlooked during our time there.

"This is definitely a useful discovery. Now we know fear is a significant factor in the trial."

I told my comrades.

"I suppose that's why my 'Composure' skill is meant to resist fear. Turns out it also protects me from a physical side-effect, not just my mind."

Jonah said.

"Unless we want someone to die like Gerson, our fifth member can't get scared so easily in battle. Though it's never a good idea to have a scaredy-cat as your ally.

Shanny stated. She went on.

"After all, you could also say Cecily died because she panicked in battle and lost focus on her opponent."

"On that note, have you guys found anyone suitable from the first floor?"

I asked them.

Jonah, Shanny, and Trudy shared a glance with each other.

"Well, there are some candidates."

Jonah said, unconvincingly.

We all went to the second floor square which overlooked the training ground on the lobby's first floor. There, we could see dozens of people training.

The gatherer parties' combatant escorts were allowed to train on the second floor training ground after master invited them to live on the lodging's second floor.

But they remained to train on the first floor since some of their companions were still training there and that the place was more familiar. Though I bet it was more because they did not want to get beaten up by those in Party 1 in duel.

"There are a few 2-stars that were recently summoned. I heard some of them were mercenaries before coming here. Experienced in fighting. But I'm not sure if they'll work well with us, given what happened to Cecily and that she was a 2-star as well."

Jonah told me.

"I also spotted some hard-working ones among the 1-stars. They could get stronger if we push them hard enough. But, Gerson was also strong. So I'm not sure how they'll react to bad situation."

Shanny said.

"Many of them are actually promising. They just needed proper guidance."

Trudy commented.

What she said gave me a spark of an idea.

"If the first floor training ground had an instructor, we could probably discover some talent fast."

The three of them stared at me confusedly.

"Instructor? Like a teacher?"

"Yes. A combat instructor who could teach them how to fight. Remember, most of the newcomers weren't fighters to begin with. Had they have someone to teach them, they could probably become as strong as you guys immediately. Or at least better than they could become training by themselves."

I told them.

"Are you suggesting one of us should become their instructor?"

Trudy asked.

"Of course not. Being an instructor is a full-time position. So does being in Party 1."

I stared at the rift of space-time below us. I continued.

"We spend most of our time preparing to climb the tower. We could barely make up a party as it is. There's no way I'm letting any of you to drop out of the group to become an instructor."

They all immediately understood what I was saying that they did not pursue the subject.

"But now we're back to our current problem: Who will be our fifth member?"

Jonah asked.

"Should we gather up the candidates and have a fight with them? Once we find someone that stood out, Serafina can recommend them to master."

Shanny proposed.

I nodded to her suggestion.

"That would be wise. Let's go down to the first floor and announ--"

Shingg!!!

Suddenly, the summoning chamber on the lobby's second floor shined bright like the sun.

The sight of this happening brought a smile to my face.

I turned to my comrades.

"Never mind those candidates on the first floor. I believe our fifth member has just arrived."