Lumel blinked at his suggestion, staring at him like she hadn’t quite heard him correctly.

  “You… You’re actually inviting me to come with you? Even after I abandoned you back in the library?”

  “Like I said, it all ended up working out in the end,” Vin shrugged. “You don’t have to by any means, but I thought I’d at least put the offer on the table.”

  Lumel continued to stare at him, seeming to give the offer some serious thought. After a long stretch of silence however, she slowly shook her head.

  “I really appreciate the offer Vin, I honestly do… But even if you’re fine with the way I reacted in that situation, I’m not. I think I showed myself that I have a lot of growing I need to do before I decide I’m ready to work with others again like that. If I were to panic again and someone did end up getting hurt because of me… I’d never be able to live with myself.”

  “I understand,” Vin said, giving her a reassuring smile. “I probably should have checked in with the others before I spoke for them anyway. Though if you’re not coming with us, what are you going to do?”

  “I think…” Lumel paused, looking all around them at the giant empty room they were standing in. “…I think I’ll take a break from adventuring for a bit. Maybe stay here for a while. Study these strange rooms and corridors for a change, rather than just using them for travel. I am a Dimensional Mage after all. It should be an excellent opportunity to level up my class.”

  “Won’t you need supplies? Food? Water? Stuff like that?” Vin asked, peering at the thin mage.

  Rolling her eyes, Lumel raised a hand. With a flash of purple, she was suddenly holding a bundle of dried meats. “Vin, I’m a Dimensional Mage that used to live in a palace. I’m carrying an entire storeroom of supplies with me.”

  “Sorry, it’s easy to forget,” Vin chuckled sheepishly, wondering just what else she was carrying in her own personal dimension. “Still though, I doubt it’s healthy to stay isolated down here for all that long. Maybe pop your head out every now and again and get some personal interaction?”

  “Or, you could just stop by whenever you get the chance and say hi,” she countered, smiling at him. “It’s nice to be able to speak with someone face to face, and the few times I tried doing such a thing with the other races it did not go well.”

  “Well, what are friends for?” He grinned, thankful that his focus was high enough to keep his queasiness down as he looked at her skin-free face. Clearly his efforts were appreciated, as Vin received quite the unexpected notification out of the blue.

  New Title Unlocked! Common Ally (Minor). Reward: Gain an innate understanding of other races.

  “What?!” He couldn’t help himself from exclaiming, his eyes bulging as they read his newest title.

  “What’s wrong?” Lumel asked, her own smile faltering as she peered at him. “You know you don’t actually have to stop by all that often....”

  “No, it’s not that,” Vin said, waving away her concern and giving her an apologetic grin. “Sorry, I was just caught off guard. The System just awarded me a title.”

  “A title?!” Lumel repeated, clearly just as surprised as he was. “Which one?!”

  “Common Ally,” Vin said, only realizing after the fact that the pulmon might take offense at learning she was no doubt part of the reason why he’d gained it. Thankfully, Lumel didn’t seem embarrassed in the slightest. Instead, she practically jumped up and down as he revealed it.

  “Ohh, that’s a good one!” She grinned, clearly excited by the news. “Especially for a place like Edregon!”

  “Care to enlighten me?” Vin chuckled. Seeing the pulmon that had been bawling only a few minutes ago look so energetic and full of life was a nice change.

  “It’s a title that’s extremely rare, but it was listed in our records,” she explained, pausing to think carefully. “If I recall correctly, it’s awarded for forming bonds between different sentient races. I think the requirement is ten different ones?”

  “So you just have to befriend ten different races?” Vin asked, surprised by how easy that sounded. Lumel must have picked up on his tone, because she shook her head.

  “No, it’s more complicated than that… Befriending them isn’t enough or even the requirement, you need to form some sort of mutually beneficial bond between you and them. A bond that involves something important for the other party. And for the record, obviously this title used to be a lot harder to obtain than it would be here on Edregon. Even so, forming so many bonds can’t be easy.”

  No kidding… Vin scrunched up his face, doing his best to count out the different races he’d interacted with.

  Elf and Petian are the obvious ones, followed by what, ghost or golem? Assuming the System is counting Alka as one of those, that makes three right there. Lumel obviously counts as one seeing as I just got the title while talking to her, so that’s four… I suppose either helping Nohral explore the dungeon or bringing back news of the dead brothers must have counted for the dwarves, which makes five… The One That Paints in Red makes six, and Madam Trebella makes seven… Oh, duh, Erik is a dryad, that makes eight…

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  “Does your own race count?” Vin asked, struggling to come up with the last two.

  “Yes, as long as you form the bond,” Lumel nodded.

  Okay, humans would be number nine then, be it the Earthers or the members of Sakis…

  “Do uh, do sentient animals count?” Vin asked, scratching his head as he tried to figure out what on Earth the tenth race was.

  “I… I don’t know,” Lumel frowned, giving him a strange look. “Do you have a bond to a sentient animal?”

  “I certainly hope so.”

  Yet as much as Vin loved Reginald, he thought it strange that the System would include the rat, seeing as most rats were not sentient. But if it wasn’t Reginald, it could only be one of three people.

  It definitely isn’t that insane lizardman. Which means it's somehow either Forpurt or Drintus, Vin decided, thinking back to the capillan they’d met on their travels and the minotaur they’d encountered in the library. Forpurt was friendly, but we didn’t really bond with him or anything like that. Drintus did seem to love battle… Did fighting for our lives together inadvertently form some sort of bond between us? I have the title, so unless I’m forgetting something, it must have.

  “Yeah, I guess that makes ten,” he muttered, rereading his newest title one more time. Innate understanding of other races, huh?

  Glancing at the pulmon still watching him cautiously, Vin tried focusing on learning more about the strange race of undersea people. To his surprise, he suddenly just… knew a few key things about them.

  Similar to how purchasing a new skill shoved a bunch of previously unknown information into his head, focusing on his title with the intention of learning about pulmons did the same, albeit to a far lesser degree.

  For one, Vin suddenly understood just how dangerous being out of the water was for these people. He got the sense from his title that without whatever passives or spells Lumel had active, her translucent skin would dry up in mere minutes, and the lack of water would eventually cause their entire bodies to seize up and go into shock, quickly leading to death.

  He also now knew that despite their lack of gills, her people were somehow able to breathe underwater through their skin of all things. He didn’t have the faintest idea how such a thing was possible, but he wasn’t about to second guess the strange nature of his new title.

  “Your new title telling you anything interesting?” Lumel asked hesitantly, pulling her cloak a bit more tightly around herself. Only then did Vin realize he’d been staring quite intensely at Lumel’s body for the last minute, and he mentally kicked himself.

  “Sorry! Just wasn’t expecting all that new information,” he chuckled. “You breathe through your skin?”

  “Only while we’re underwater. Up here we breathe the same as you,” she confirmed, her face still slightly flushed from his deep scrutiny. The fact that the pulmon’s blushing just looked like clumps of blood vessels grouping up together sent another wave of queasiness through Vin’s stomach, and he cleared his throat, glancing away. Trying to come up with a way to change the topic, he immediately asked the first thought that popped into his mind.

  “Could you teach me dimensional magic?”

  “What?” Lumel blinked, looking like he’d caught her off guard. “Where did that come from?”

  “I mean, ever since I watched you first teleport yourself I’ve wanted to learn dimensional magic,” Vin shrugged, being completely honest. “I love magic, and I want to learn as much of it as I can.”

  “I mean… I suppose I could show you the very basics,” Lumel said, watching him carefully. “But you have to understand. Dimensional magic isn’t quite like most other magics... It’s far more dangerous. Do you want to guess what a backlash looks like if you mess up putting together the runic structure for Dimensional Shift?”

  “Ah…” Vin muttered, imagining accidently teleporting a chunk out of his own body while struggling with the spell. “Point taken. Maybe I will stick with the basics for now then.”

  “Probably for the best,” Lumel giggled. “I’m planning to be down here in this strange extradimensional space for at least the next few weeks, or possibly even longer depending on how much I can learn from this place. Point being, there’s no need to rush your way through this.”

  Holding up a glowing purple finger, she began sketching out a shining runic formation in the air. “Unlike many affinities, all dimensional magic stems from a single spell instead of two. You learn this, and you’re firmly on your way to becoming a proper dimensional mage.”

  “Sense Dimensions,” she said, finishing up the formation with a flick of her finger. “Naturally, as you’ve seen my own Dimensional Pocket spell already, we do have our own method for creating small, personalized dimensions. But that comes after gaining the ability to sense them.”

  “Makes sense,” Vin muttered, quickly committing the runic formation to memory with his Iron Mind passive. There was a chance he’d be able to learn the spell from Scule’s magic bag eventually, but that was a lesser artifact, and he’d barely managed to pull off learning Create Water from a minor one at this point. Getting the dimensional spell formation handed to him like this was a fantastic gift.

  Almost too fantastic in fact.

  “I feel bad I don’t have anything to give you in exchange for this,” Vin admitted, frowning at the Dimensional Mage. “I mean, I could give you one of my own spells. But I have a feeling you wouldn’t be interested.”

  “Yeah, I’m quite content with my dimensional magic. As for paying me back, that’s rather simple. I told you, I just want you to stop by and say ‘hi’ every now and again. Maybe after you learn that spell you can come back and I’ll help you with the next one?”

  “I don’t think you have to worry on that front,” Vin chuckled, already wondering when he’d be able to return for his next dimensional spell. Thoughts of making his staff and pouch vanish into thin air like Lumel did with her belongings made him almost giddy with excitement. Hopefully, learning to store other things in another dimension wasn’t nearly as tricky as moving oneself across dimensions.

  “I should probably head back and let the people waiting for me know I’m still alive,” Vin admitted, scratching his head sheepishly. In all honesty, he’d completely forgotten about the dwarves for a while there. As much as he wanted to keep exploring this strange place or try popping up into different fragments, he didn’t want to keep them or his friends waiting. “Is there anything you’d like me to bring you the next time I stop by?”

  “I could use a bit more cooking oil, if you happen to stumble upon any in your travels,” Lumel said, biting her lip. “Maybe another blanket or two as well? If it’s not too much trouble I mean.”

  “Oil and blankets, got it,” Vin said, pulling out his journal and making a quick grocery list on a free page. Storing it back in his pack, he smiled at Lumel one last time. “I’ve definitely got a lot on my plate at the moment, but I promise I’ll try and come back before too long. Do you mind if I bring the others with me?”

  He thought he caught the flicker of a frown on the pulmon’s face before she smiled, shaking her head. “Not at all! The more the merrier!”

  Saying goodbye to his latest and strangest looking friend, Vin quickly made his way back toward the dwarf fragment, only just now realizing how much time he’d spent wandering about down here.

  Hopefully Shia had managed to find Scule and Reginald by now.

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