They quickly went through various stories of the gods, passing by statue after statue. Once they got to the last one, Alton couldn’t help but smile at Mother Nature, her human appearance with the grass robe always made him feel more peaceful.

  “Is Mother Nature different?” Roge asked, clearly noticing that the statue was not grouped up with any of the others.

  “Considering her domain is here, on the surface, I’d say so,” Hops replied, the elf seeming more reverential towards the statue. “Her domain is over everything natural. It’s where [Nature Magic] even comes from.”

  “Oh…” the dragon mumbled, his ghostly paw going right through the statue. “I don’t need to… worship her do I?”

  “Of course not, Roge,” Sean rumbled, looking a bit stricken when the dragon didn’t even turn his way. “Worship her or not, your magic will be the same.”

  “Of course, giving her offerings helps,” Alton commented. “Each god gives certain boons when given an offering. I’ve offered many things to Mother Nature and never received anything, unfortunately.”

  “Let’s fix that,” Roge mumbled. Alton immediately felt his form shrink, the two trading places once again as Roge took over his body.

  ~~~

  Roge felt his anger having cooled enough, his eyes locking to Sean before he offered anything. “I know why you did it. But no more lying. Okay?” he asked gently, Sean responding with a grimacing smile.

  “Alright. And I’m sorry, Roge. No more lying.” Roge nodded at that, turning back around to look at the bowl he’d been ignoring below the plaques. It seemed obvious to him that that was where offerings would be put, though he was unsure of what to offer. It took him a few minutes, but in the end, he started off with something simple. Pulling out the required petals and quartz dust in a bottle, he pulled out an ironwood branch, wanting to see what the [Conductor] ability on it would do. Besides, the silver, black, and rust colored branch looked cool to make into a wand, and so he set out to make it. Within a minute, he had the wand, smirking at the information [Inspect] gave him.

  Roge smiled even wider at the information, now knowing that making it out of the ironwood branches would double the amount of healing it could produce. ‘I wonder if the [Strength Boost] blueoak branches make the effect work better and it just doesn’t say…’ Either way, he increased the rank up to nine, knowing a better wand would make a better offering. Once it was done, he placed it down on the offering bowl, no one stopping him, so he assumed he was doing things correctly.

  An instant later, Roge was surprised when the wand disappeared in a flash of light. He looked back at his friends, who all had happy and awed looks on their faces. Once he turned back, he was left with a small green sack sitting in the bowl. He frowned and hesitated to take it, unsure of what it was.

  “That’s your boon, I think,” Sean mumbled, looking confused. “Normally it’s a buff, though…”

  With that reassurance, Roge picked up the green sack, noting it seemed to be made from leaves. He wasn’t sure why he’d be given an item rather than advice or a boon and his friends’ confusion was not helping matters.

  Roge froze as his eyes read the word ‘mana’, his mind churning as he thought over the implications. He’d only been able to do the healing potions due to swapping out abilities with his flowers and taking it from the quartz dust. ‘I might be reading too much into this but… what if I add [Mana] to a flower?’ He placed the sack into his inventory, extracted the ability out of it, and swapped it with the ability in one of his healing flowers.

  “To anyone else, that grin would look scary,” Sean said, snapping Roge out of his thoughts as he turned back to his friends. “What happened? It give you a buff?”

  “It will, once I cultivate it,” Roge answered, his mind spinning with the possibilities. “No, the main thing it did was remind me how I got the healing tulips and potions by giving me the gem dust with the [Mana] ability.”

  Hops’ eyes widened at that, the elf smacking himself on the forehead. “Of course! We just have to find the gems that have the other resource abilities and make flowers from those.”

  “Exactly.” Roge paused as he was about to rush out of the church, making himself take a deep breath and slow down. “After we see about getting Sean that class.”

  “Yes, that’s much more important,” Hops conceded, looking to Sean, who had a mildly embarrassed look. “What god are you looking to align to?”

  “I’m not sure…” the lion said, looking a little conflicted. “I-“

  “If you’re unsure, might I make a suggestion,” a voice called out, Roge frowning at the person interrupting. She was a good bit taller than him, looking like a white/grey skinned elf due to her pointy ears. Her cloak was the main thing Roge’s eyes focused on, though, it being a bright orange with flames painted around the edges. It looked similar to his own coat, which had the music symbols on it.

  “And you are…?” Sean growled out, also looking a bit annoyed at being overheard.

  “Priestess King, of Loyalty, at your service,” she smoothly said, tilting her head forward. “My god has had their eye on you Sean, and I think they might be able to help.”

  “And how exactly can you help?” Roge ground out, moving forwards to shift her attention to himself. He felt a bit defensive at his friend having the attention of a god, a burning feeling simmering in his gut at the idea.

  “By giving him an upgrade to his knight class,” she said, causing Roge to come up short. “Loyalty very much liked your idea of a Paladin, and wanted to give both of you what you want.”

  “But… doesn’t that risk getting a light attack?” Sean asked, though Roge put a claw out to stop him from speaking more.

  “They’ve been spying on us?” Roge growled, the burning feeling getting more and more intense.

  “Spying isn’t the right word. You already unlocked something similar to Loyalty’s power when you upgraded Sean’s class. He obviously would pay attention to someone who’s species aligns very well with our tenants.”

  “Roge? Breathe,” Sean said, coming up beside Roge and placing a paw on his shoulder. He then turned to Priestess King, giving her a narrow eyed look. “And why can’t I just get a healing class from your god?”

  “Because they don’t align with healing,” she responded, which just made everyone else confused. “What they can do is offer their power to give you an attacking skill. Godfire is a lot stronger magic than light, and so it will make your class prioritize that for future attacks. He will then leak some of your light mana into one of your defensive skills, giving it a self-healing aspect. It’s the best of both words, as Loyalty knew right away that the paladin class appealed to you, Sean.” She smiled kindly at that, Roge turning to Sean and giving the lion a frown.

  This tale has been unlawfully obtained from Royal Road. If you discover it on Amazon, kindly report it.

  “It did sound… interesting,” the lion mumbled. “But There’s still that risk, so I can’t have it.”

  “Oh leave him alone Flossie,” another priestess called out, this one having a robe that looked to be made of stone. “Clearly gifting him a healing aspected class would work best, and Generosity is always the best at healing.”

  More and more priests and priestesses joined in on the argument, saying what Sean should choose one way or the other. Roge looked to Sean at that, the lion looking really conflicted between the various options.

  “Sean? Species screen?” Roge asked, Sean frowning for a moment before pulling up the requested screen.

  “I think you should go with Loyalty,” Roge grumbled, everyone quieting and looking to him at that. “You already have buffs to protection classes, and Loyalty would just increase that further. Any other god would most likely make you grow in another direction, which wouldn’t play to your strengths.”

  Sean looked at the screen he’d shown Roge for a minute or two, clearly thinking over the decision. He then suddenly walked over to the Loyalty statue and looked it over. It had a tall, feral looking werewolf as its inspiration, the creature clearly in a defensive position. The priest and priestesses left him alone to contemplate, though some did look like they wanted to interject. Roge just walked up beside him as a show of support, Marge and Hops doing so as well.

  With a nod and firm look, Sean placed a paw onto the plaque of Loyalty, suddenly jerking as golden light spewed forth from the stone. It was so bright that Roge put a claw in front of his face to let his eyes adjust, looking up after a few seconds and freezing in place. He assumed the bands of golden light was the ‘Godfire’ that the priestess had mentioned, but the only thing he could compare it to was the plasma of a lightsaber. It looked just like how the CGI looked in the movies, though this one twisted through the air as Sean’s body absorbed it.

  Looking up at the lion’s face, he was deep in concentration, Roge almost tempted to join in on whatever talks he assumed Sean was having with the god. He didn’t want to intrude, though, so he waited patiently as the energy transfer stopped. Sean stood for several minutes with the godfire shining through his fur, slightly nervous at what could be taking so long. The light soon faded as Sean opened his now molten, golden colored eyes. Several screens also popped up in front of the lion, which Roge shamelessly looked at.

  Rog was about to congratulate Sean when he suddenly felt a pulling sensation in his gut, frowning as he looked down to see nothing happening. A screen then popped up for both of them, Roge frowning at them in confusion.

  “Uh… I didn’t do that…” Roge muttered, looking up at the less confused lion. “What does it even… mean?”

  “I don’t have the ash in my inventory anymore,” Sean stated, understanding showing across his face.

  Roge then noticed the crowd of priests and priestesses hadn’t disbursed, suddenly feeling stage fright creeping in. “Maybe we should discuss this privately…?” Roge muttered, the rest of the party nodding as they made to leave the building.

  ~~~

  It took them a while to leave, the followers of Loyalty especially trying to hound them. While it was common for people to get aligned classes and not be asked to stay at the church, it was apparently bad manners for that person to not then explain what was going on. They finally ditched them at the entrance to the church, the party swiftly moving to a nearby inn to get food.

  “So… is this just an overall good thing?” Roge finally asked, worry pooling in his gut at the idea that he’d permanently bonded himself to the lion without Sean’s consent.

  “It’s actually one of the things Loyalty mentioned,” Sean said, giving Roge a gentle smile. “They foresaw our bond growing stronger due to compatible abilities and the ash. And I accepted that.”

  “Well if you’re sure…” Roge stated tentatively, going quiet when their meal was brought out to them. Roge had felt like ordering a meat heavy meal once again, wondering if not eating vegetables was going to be a problem.

  “Anyway, about the stone dust,” Hops interjected, his smile a bit wide as he referenced a book he was holding. “I think I know which stones to go after for the other resources.”

  “What… exactly are all of them?” Roge asked, looking at his own [Status]. “I mean, I only really know about mana since I have it and all.”

  “Well, there’s one for each attribute.” Hops pulled out another book and flipped through it before finding what he wanted. “Strength has Exhaustion. It works a bit differently than the others, as you want to keep that as low as possible. It recharges based upon constitution. You’ll find that most resources have a counterpart that works off of the recharge rate for it.

  “Next is Flex for dexterity. It’s a useful resource for-“

  “I can handle that,” Marge interjected, earning her a pout from the elf. “Flex is useful when you need a temporary boost to dex. Like if I’m aiming at something, I can use some points to improve my aim. Same with dodging.”

  “So I might get it with my dodge skill?” Roge asked, a shrug all he got in response.

  “Haste also works similarly for agility,” she continued. “I can use it to give myself momentary speed boosts. They don’t last long, so I’m not sure if I can use it for the caravan class I’m going to get, but it’s really helpful in a fight.”

  “Next is Health for constitution,” Hops said, pointing at his book with a smile. “It’s pretty self explanatory, but it essentially determines how tough you are and how much something damages you. You go near zero, and you know you need a heal.

  “Mana, you already know. Inspiration is its counterpart, though not much is known about it since almost no one goes for wisdom classes. What *is* known is that it works similarly to Flex and Haste, though to what is the part that’s missing.”

  “And lastly is Allure,” Sean ground out, Roge snapping his head to the lion when he felt a spark of irritation come to him, similarly to what he got from his trees and fairies. “You use it to convince people, similarly to Flex. It’s especially dangerous with mind and emotion skills, as it can make them stronger.”

  “Okay… so staying away from that…” Roge muttered, feeling unsure if he should say anything about the feeling he got from the lion. Sean gave him a smirk and a nod, which he took to mean the lion could feel his feelings as well. “Is there any way to unlock the resources without a manipulation skill? I think you said it needed that before.”

  “Nope! It always requires one. So we probably need to look into getting you some.” Hops pondered at that, looking through his book and nodding. “Health, Haste, and Exhaustion shouldn’t be too hard. I’m seeing a pretty popular class that unlocks three resources for you, as the class is all about doing that. But we’re going to have to wait for some level ups before that.”

  “So… I should try and level up my bard class?” Roge asked with a smile. “It does give me seven per level up.”

  They spent the next hour or so trying to power level Roge’s bard class, him telling stories and singing songs in between bites. He just hoped he could get enough.