"An excellent plan." Breakfast!

As usual, the food is tasty.

The boisterousness of the hall ramps up as other adventurers also stop in for early lunches. They slept in a bit after the night(s) they had, apparently. Actually, there is maybe a bit more activity today than on the previous two days?

Sky blushes about it a little but happily cuddles into Coventina's side as she eats.

"Um," she says, "I still have one skill point left over. I wasn't sure what to spend it on, so I guess I'll save it?"

"Sure," he says agreeably. "Might be handy to have one free if we run into a situation where some skill you could get would be long-term viable and short-term critical."

Nod nod.

Nom nom.

Nuzzle.

"We could take the day off, or spend it shopping or something," Coventina suggest. "I want to get at least a coin pouch that has that marker rune sewn in, I think I saw some things like that for sale. Maybe get you some better gear, too."

"Yes, that sounds like a good idea. Although I also feel that I should be maximizing the amount of free time that I spend doing assorted physical exercise and cheating with your help to avoid being exhausted by it."

"I think you're overestimating the returns you can get on that relative to just earning more stat points, but I'm definitely not going to stop you."

"If I wasn't going to be using that time to earn stat points anyway then it's effectively free stat points! Efficiency!"

Okay, that gets a giggle.

"Of course."

Presently, they finish breakfast. Coventina doesn't have anything particular in mind to buy, besides the runemarked pouch, so once they've got one of those she and Sky can just follow Laurent around for the rest of it.

But what if Laurent doesn't have anything particular in mind to buy either? Well, a change of clothes would be a nice start. And then... well, what other equipment upgrades are in budget?

A change of clothes, another sword at least as good as the one he already has, and a few more pieces of armor enchanted to self-repair overnight are all within budget if they shop around for the best prices!

Around noon, there is suddenly a loud sound, like an air raid klaxon echoing through the whole city. And then Luna's voice, "Attention all adventurers. Your presence is required for a mandatory quest. All adventurers, please report to the south gate for the cabbage harvest."

This message repeats twice before the klaxon falls silent.

Adventurers of all stripes, a mix of excited, annoyed, and worried, stream southward through the streets.

"...I'm sorry, the what?"

But he follows the crowd nonetheless.

"Don't look at me. I have no idea."

She sticks to his side, though.

"Oh, um, they do this every year, I think," Sky offers. "I think the wild alraunes up in the hills have some kind of migration and re-planting this time of year and that produces a lot of weak plant-based monsters as a side effect? They're not all actually literally cabbages I don't think but they do tend to be edible or have a lot of edible by-product, so the guild likes to collect as much as possible."

"That makes sense. Good thing we have better gear now! Although I wish I'd known ahead of time, I would have spent more time getting familiar with my new repertoire. I'm not even entirely sure I know how to... use spells..."

"Generic effort plus incantation. The implanted 'muscle' memory will be triggered by the skill name automatically if you want something to happen when you say it out loud. You can get a feel for a spell with repeated castings and make it more a natural part of you, but if you say it out loud with intent that's always guaranteed to work. It's a very user-friendly system."

"That's very handy, thank you!" he says, conscious of the double meaning between thanking her for the tip and thanking her for the design feature.

They arrive at the gate. Dozens of adventurers make for a colorful crowd as they fan out without any real sense of organization, just filling the available space on the path and on the grass. Other parties stick together mostly, but no one appears to be in charge.

Laurent and his party end up adjacent to this tall, graceful mage in an embroidered purple bodysuit that hugs her willow-y figure, with a fancy mage cloak draped around her shoulders. She holds a black crystalline wand with a white flower tip in each hand, and watches the horizon with interest.

Good aesthetics. He approves.

"Hello," he says. "I just gained my first couple of levels today and I have an untested tactic involving filling a 25-yard radius with persistent lightning using an elemental persistence area effect and a lightning dash; I thought it would be polite to warn you ahead of time. I don't know that I'm going to use it but if I were you I would prefer to know the possibility loomed nearby."

"Oh, you're referring to Genesic Echo and Fulmindash right? Are you a Druid? No wait, Fulmindash is a Monk skill but that would mean you're classless! You should definitely use the synergy that sounds fascinating. You picked something that cool as your first skills?"

This mage girl is now completely ignoring the the small avalanche of green that has just appeared on the horizon.

"It seemed like the thing to do! I also took a couple points of Bladework so I could stop trying to reinvent swordsmanship from first principles."

"Mobility, terrain control, and martial competence," the girl agrees, nodding sagely. "Clever of you to put that together with so few points! Did you know, I've read about classless adventurers who become enamored with many unrelated spells and end up redundant no matter what party they're in. You wouldn't think that would be common but it is! I'm happy to meet someone who's doing it right!"

"Efficiency!" he says brightly. "Speaking of which, we should probably prepare for the approaching hordes."