Soon, we were standing in front of the cave that held my best gear. I could have gone in and grabbed my weapons immediately, but before doing that, I turned to her. "I need you to promise me something."
She gestured for me to continue. "Go ahead."
"I need you to swear that you'll keep what I'm about to reveal to you a secret. It's a matter of life and death," I said. For a moment, she looked affronted, like I had just asked her to deface a monument to her religion. It clicked. "Except Maria, of course," I added. "I know you two come as a package deal. I won't ask you to keep secrets from her."
I would have if it had any chance of working, but it was a moot point.
She lost her tenseness. "Better," she said. "But, I won't make any promises in her place."
"As long as you help me convince her to keep it a secret," I bargained. I wasn't entirely sure if it working, but I wasn't under any delusion. The moment I decided to help Eleanor openly, I knew that they would pay more attention to my actions.
It was inevitable. Previously, no matter how much potential I had offered, I didn't represent an actual threat. What I had displayed while helping Eleanor proved that I was able to fight on the same stage as them. It meant attention, which would eventually lead to the reveal of my secrets.
Voluntarily revealing them looked much better.
"Let's see what makes you so tense," she said even as I swiped the rocks from the entrance and revealed the safe house to her. There were several notable items, but at the center of the room stood my armor, placed on a mannequin, and next to it, stood my three weapons.
"Looks pretty, but hardly a big reveal," she commented even as I walked toward the stand. "I was kind of suspicious that you're holding back a new alloy based on the number of shells you collected without the assistance of your new guild, but mentioning killing a dungeon boss pretty much settled it. You need to be able to ignore the corrosion completely to actually spend that much time on the fourth floor."
"Fifth floor, actually," I corrected, which made her look at me with a sudden shock, which made me believe that it was a big deal. Admittedly, considering the difference between the fourth and fifth floors, it was certainly a big deal, but I seemed to guess that just by the mention of the fifth floor.
I needed to learn what was common knowledge and what was not.
"Well, I'm sure this will answer some of your questions," I said as I threw her the sword, hilt first. She caught the sword, almost absent-minded, but the moment she swung the sword absentmindedly, she froze like she had been struck by thunder.
"Impossible," she gasped as she let Health cover the sword, which stretched significantly. "I … just…"
I smirked even as I realized the best way of getting rid of her. "Why don't you go out and test it for a moment and meanwhile, I can change."
She didn't even deign to answer my question even as she stepped out. I changed into the other armor, grabbed my hammer and spear, and went out. On my waist, I still had the sword I used publicly, which wasn't as good as the one I had given to Eleanor.
I wasn't stupid enough to try and get back the sword from Eleanor … at least, not before I forged one of her own that fit her style even better. I shrugged. I still had my hammer and spear, which was already more useful against the upcoming battle.
The hammer in particular. I could hardly wait until I smashed their faces and —
I paused, my own smug satisfaction made me do a double-take. I was thinking about killing people. It was a deep, solemn event. But, I was treating it as a challenge to be cleared, almost like an exciting problem.
I wondered if it had something to do with the fact that they were determined to ambush us, or if was I simply getting too used to violence because I had spent my days in violence. Yes, it was against mindless monsters, but it was clearly making me more callous to death.
"Maybe I'm the crazy one for actually trying to treat life as something sacred," I muttered as I continued to put on my armor. After all, people had been doing their best to treat life as a currency — and not a particularly valuable one — as they tried to climb the ladder of power, both the system and the social kind.
However, the moment I finished putting on armor, I abandoned those thoughts. Not permanently, but there were better ways to handle a potential ambush. Regardless of my own feelings — or lack thereof — the ones that ambushed us needed to be dealt with.
I was afraid of what they would do next.
I replenished my throwing spears, and left the hideout. Outside, Eleanor was practicing her skill attacks, her face contorted in a familiar excitement while the life aura around her sword was thicker than I had ever seen. "Let me guess, you have earned a few skill points."
"Try a lot instead. I have gained six points. It's absurd," she responded even as we started to run back. "Is this how you managed to improve that much in such a short time? I can see why you want to keep this a secret."
"Yes, I don't think a lot of city lords would appreciate the prospect of lower classes getting stronger," I said.
"But they would love to have those swords," she commented, looking confused.
"Enough to keep me a guest forever," I responded. "Before I make any kind of decision, I want to be strong enough."
"Then, why did you come here in the first place and play along," she said. "Aren't there better ways to access a dungeon."
"Well..." I said, realizing that she misunderstood the timeline of my development. I wanted to let her continue believing in that. Not due to any practical reason, but solely because I was ashamed. But, even the harmless lies had a way of coming out, and the last thing I needed was for her to believe my presence to be some kind of conspiracy.
So, as we traveled back, I gave her an abridged version of my story, up until their recruitment. It didn't take long, as it was hardly a riveting story. "Really?" she said, chuckling in amusement. "The genius professor wasted three years of his life doing nothing but sending applications."
I shrugged. As much as I wanted to defend myself about the impact of the peace field and how it potentially impacted people who lived in towns, I held back. Not because I wanted to keep it a secret, but because that particular topic needed far more time than we currently had to properly explain. "I have to admit it was not my finest moment, but it worked out. Without your help, I doubt I could improve my combat skills in such a short time," I said. I wasn't sure if it was entirely true, but being generous with credit was almost always a better choice.
"Yes, you owe me," Eleanor said, her smile widening. "Wait until Maria learned I managed to help you more than those silly experiments."
"I wouldn't go that far. After all, it was her experiments that allowed me to unlock Essence. Without her, I couldn't use Mana ..." I continued, only to stop when I noticed Eleanor had stopped, and was falling behind me.
"Y-you can use mana," she gasped in shock.
There, I realized that I had yet to mention that fact. "Well, yes," I said even as I raised the sword, and let the mana gather around the edge, which turned mana into something actually visible rather than something that could be sensed through Essence.
"How?" she repeated. "The only way to unlock new stats is to upgrade class skills, and the skill stones that allow it are nearly impossible to find," she said.
"Maybe, but it doesn't exclude upgrading the skill directly," I said. She looked at me blankly. "I'm sure upgrading the rarity of the skills through practice is not a secret."
"Well, no," she said. "But, it only upgrades to the rarer variant of the same skill."
"Not always," I replied, remembering my own experience with Meditation, which upgraded to Cleansing meditation. "And, sometimes, achieving something incredible, like creating a mana-infused metal alloy can actually upgrade the skill to a rarer variant."
She gasped. "T-that's a game changer."
"Believe me, I'm aware. Why do you think I'm keeping all those secrets? People kill for much less." I didn't have any concerns about revealing that to Eleanor, as paradoxically, it would help her to keep my secret even better.
Ironically, the bigger the secret, the harder it is to sell. My ability to forge weapons that even Eleanor couldn't access from the market was a secret she could have sold for a king's ransom.
The potential to upgrade production classes … was the kind of secret the buyer would have killed everyone just to prevent any accidents.
Hopefully, Eleanor was smart enough to realize that as well.
She stood silent for a while, her expression shifting. "We will talk about it later," she finally declared. "We have a battle to win."
"Don't worry, we will," I said, feeling excited at the prospect. The information I managed to glean from both of them allowed me to improve significantly. I was enthusiastic about what a true collaboration could bring.
But first, we had a battle to win.