The stone walls of the Academy dormitory were cold, but to Aleric, they represented isolation enough to balance out his books. He sat on the floor of his rooms, moonlight tracing a sharp line across his pale face. His cheeks seemed to carry a parchment hue, his hands shaking with an uncontrolled rhythmic motion.
While he wasn't fully vacant, he was also not far removed from a physiological state of crisis. His own internal audit revealed his own internal reserves were tapping on the knees at 35%. To an unaware person, this could be perceived as a comfortable condition, a straightforward case of exhaustion—Aleric knew the biological considerations of mn energy loss far too intimately.
A human body is like a frail ledger, Aleric observed in his shallow, regulated breath, "Dropping below 40% is equivalent to hemorrhaging an enormous volume of blood." "The body immediately mortgages its own strength to preserve the currents." "The skin becomes pale, the muscles go flaccid, and the heartbeat fails as the inner pressures drop." "A man foolish enough to go below 10% doesn't simply stop being able to cast spells—he stops existing altogether." His very center implodes into a vacuum, dying in an instant."
He closed his eyes and began the slow, rhythmic process of replenishment. He drew the thin, ambient energy of the city into his core, watching with a clinical eye as his internal ledger climbed back toward his baseline. It was a tedious process, taking hours of patient focus before the hollow, cold sensation in his chest was finally replaced by the familiar hum of power.
I'm being taken out at 40% critical too quickly, Aleric thought, regaining a little of the color in his face as the energy levels stabilized. I passed into this zone of danger yesterday. If there was another in the pack, I would have entered the 10% kill zone. I'm a bottleneck in my effectiveness. I need a place where no one is looking, a remote territory away from the city, where I can aim to burn out in a controlled fashion. I need a space where I can force my body into a zone of burnout, stretching my channels up to 40% as a simple scratch. I shall never live my life at such a perilously thin margin.
The next morning, Aleric went to the adventuring guild. The mood among those within the stone hall was vastly different from what he was used to. The loud shouting of mercenaries was replaced with a subdued murmur of reverence as he walked among them. No longer was he merely "the Auditor." No longer was he just another member among many. He was a living legend, one who lived after an event that was meant to kill a dozen men.
He was escorted into the back—the appraisal hall. It was a vast, refrigerated stone chamber that smelled of cold iron and the ozone of fading magic. There, his haul had been laid out with surgical precision. The butchers had already been at work; the mountain of carcasses had been reduced to a meticulously organized inventory of parts.
His head clerk stood before it with an ink-stained scroll in his hand. "Master Auditor," his voice lacked his usual bureaucratic zest, "the appraisal is done. We have set them apart."
Aleric strolled along the aisles of butchered drake pieces. Magma-colored scales were neatly heaped in shining piles, jagged horns of mana-conductive material resting on velvet cloths.
"Dost thou wish to keep any of these?" the clerk inquired. "A smith could make B-Rank armor with these. The horns could be sold for a fortune by themselves."
Aleric looked over them carefully. He did not want any of the heavy armor or the trophies. "Sell the scales, horns, and the cores," Aleric said firmly. "No magic for a commoner like me to access before the change in its raw, physical form."
He stopped, though, before a long table filled with dense, dark-red muscle—heart-meat of the Cinder-Drakes.
"I shall take the meat," Aleric commanded.
The clerk looked surprised by his statement. "The meat, sir? Most hunters sell their meat in low-tier markets."
"It is a dense energy resource," Aleric said in answer. "If I need it in a wilderness, I require a supply that can sustain the body and cores simultaneously, so it is logical, a survival tool."
The clerk bowed properly and motioned for the laborers in attendance. Once the meat was properly packed in heavy crates lined with salt deposits, Aleric stepped forward and raised his hands in contact with the wooden surface of the crates – a faint but nearly invisible transfer of energy from his palms as he marked the object with his designation. Suddenly with a sharp crack of fingers, the space around him rippled out in an instant invisible darkness.
The clerk then took Aleric to a private table. Lying upon the wood was a bulging leather pouch and a shiny insignia made of blue steel.
"The mission payment itself, Master Auditor," the clerk said, sliding the items toward him. He opened the pouch to reveal the dense, yellow gleam of gold coins. "The initial contract fee was set for a D-Rank extermination, but because of the Guild's failure to monitor it, we have added a significant compensation directly into this pouch. In truth, it was a catastrophic error on our part that we sent thee into a B-Rank nest unknowingly. We hope this extra gold settles the grievance."
Aleric hefted the weight of the gold. It was a sizeable amount, enough to fill the pouch full. "And the sale of the parts?"
"The accountants are preparing the gold for the scales and cores as we speak," the clerk replied. "Given the volume, it shall take a moment to finalize the transfer."
The clerk then nodded to the badge, made of blue steel, as his hand shook. "Also, an order of forced promotion was given by the Guild Master. Ordinarily, it isn't easy if you want to go up in ranks at C Ranks. But that doesn't matter in your case. You're forced to B Rank."
The clerk stared at this badge with a look of utter disbelief. "In my long service, I've never beheld any man rise to such heights of ranks as quickly as thou. In a blink of an eye, thou leapt past years of worth. Thou art a phenomenon. Thou art the first I've ever laid eyes upon who rose straight from the lowest tiers into the upper tiers!"
Aleric picked up the badge, its cold material catching the predatory glint in his eyes. Now he had clearance to get better information from restricted libraries.
"The account is settled," said Aleric, "See to it that the intelligence for the next one is more accurate. I don't like surprises in my ledger accounts."
He turned, walked out, calculating the coordinates of the upcoming training in his mind. He received the gold, the prestige, the rations, but he needed the strength.