Saintess Summons Skeletons

Sofia was flying next to the skeleton Quetzalcoatlus from Bookie that Cinthia was riding.

“You really need to get a flying skill of your own. What did you even ask as a reward for your bonus task?” Sofia asked, as she flew backwards to be facing Cinthia.

“You weren’t there when I was explaining that?” Cinthia answered, “Well I just asked for skill fusion tickets,” she explained with a wide smile.

“Fusion tickets?” Sofia repeated, “you could have probably even asked for a specialization point, why fusion tickets?”

“Most of my skills have a token cost,” Cinthia explained, adjusting how she sat on her bone saddle, “By fusing them together I can get the same effects for a cheaper cost. It’s a lot better than having more skills I can’t use.”

“Still, that feels underwhelming, how many tickets did you get?”

“They gave me ten!” Cinthia said, trying to give Sofia a thumbs up but quickly changing her mind once her hand left the skeleton’s spine and she started slipping on the saddle.

“Alright I said nothing, ten fusion tickets is a lot. Also you don’t have to worry about falling, I’ll catch you, but even if I didn’t you won’t die from just that.”

Cinthia looked down, the ocean was calm, but it was also thousands of meters below, “I- I’d still rather not fall, if you don’t mind.”

“I used to be like that too, you get over it,” Sofia tried to reassure her, “how’s the viewership today?”

“Nobody’s watching right now. It’s often like that when I just travel, I have a passive that alerts those who want when I’m in danger, though, so if anything happens a few of them will jump on to see what's up and I can actually defend myself,” Cinthia explained, “I bet a lot will be watching when we search for Sorrow’s palace, though.”

“Are you still sure you want to come? I’m not sure there will be anything in it for you.”

“If nothing else I’ll get a lot of donations!” Cinthia answered enthusiastically, “The trial dried me stocks up, I need to hoard a lot before next time. But what about you, you still cannot level up, right?”

“Yeah standard level ups are impossible to get back, it seems, but my scribe’s been working on a replacement leveling method for a while though, I think it will be ready soon. No more regular experience gain for me. On the bright side, this seems to be the only permanent consequence for this entire thing, I can still get new skills thanks to the dagger and the system still handles my old skills’ leveling.”

“I'm surprised you just accept that, it’s not like the disqualification was your fault,” Cinthia continued.

“I wouldn’t be so fine with it if I didn’t have an acceptable replacement for leveling up, but as it is, I don’t really mind. I’ve lived through and seen enough unbelievable things that something like not being able to level up the normal way? That’s barely an inconvenience,” Sofia said with a shrug. “Honestly these last few days I have been more worried about how Remia is doing than how I’m going to get stronger next.”

“I don’t think anyone we know is better suited to take care of a dryad than Alith is,” Cinthia commented, “And I’m sure Bo- Saria will be able to find the missing rings in no time. Unlike me, she can fly, and quite fast too.”

“You’re right. I wonder if she’s faster than me, actually. My maximum flying speed is starting to get quite high. Still nothing compared to a real Dragon though. Erredis’ ‘flying’ is almost like teleportation.”

“Yet she still avoids flying over the Leviathan?”

“Yeah, just like us. Speaking of, remember the dragon-girl from the shop?”

“She was so nice, I still can’t believe she gave me that weapon for free… And that was two days ago, of course I remember,” Cinthia answered, slightly offended, “What about it?”

“Her father lives on an island somewhere around here. Wouldn’t be able to tell you where exactly, though. Not many landmarks in the ocean.”

“You’re about five hundred kilometers too far to the south,” a third voice commented out of nowhere. The surprise almost made Sofia lose control of her wings, but she managed to correct the mistake before anything could happen, carried by her momentum.

The voice came from a familiar tanned man wearing sunglasses, shorts, and an open floral shirt, he lazily walked through the air, effortlessly keeping up with the flying skeleton and Sofia.

Cinthia was quick on the uptake, perhaps helped by a simple [identify] cast, “You would be Lina’s father, then? I am Cinthia, it’s an honor to meet you.”

“Oh, please, my daughter’s friends are my friends,” the man answered as he propped up his glasses on top of his head, revealing his deep green eyes, “Almost didn’t recognize you with the new horns, girl,” he continued, addressing Sofia.

“Hi, Phillip. Did you just happen to be nearby?” Sofia asked.

“Oh, no. Was chillin’ on my small bit of land, but there ain’t much going on around these parts so when someone comes close, I know about it. Wasn’t going to invite myself in your conversation, but since you mentioned me,” he explained with his arms crossed behind his head.

“So you were listening?” Sofia asked with a raised brow.

“Of course. I wanted to stop spying several times, believe it or not, but the conversation was interesting so I kind of just kept listening,” he admitted without shame, “How is Erri doing, by the way? Haven’t heard of her for a hot minute.”

“Erri?” Cinthia repeated.

“Erredis,” Sofia explained, “Same as always, she spends most of her time locked up in her workshop making strange things.”

“Aye, to think she finally came down only to keep doing the same shit somewhere else. Some people never change. Might have to go see her myself if it’s gonna be like that,” Phillip said, shaking his head, “What about you girls, hear you say something about searching for Sorrow’s palace?”

“Yeah, I am Sorrow’s Apostle, after all,” Sofia simply answered.

“You are? Man you don’t look it. Apostles sure’ve changed,” Phillip said before he stopped dead in his tracks.

Sofia noticed and stopped, ordering her skeleton to do the same. She flew back a few hundred meters to Phillip, who was just standing still in the air.

“Is something wrong?” Cinthia was the one to ask.

Phillip blinked a few times. “Is anything not wrong? Why the fuck you carrying so much essence around, are you trying to become Stebron the second?!” he asked Sofia, an incredulous expression on his face.

“Stebron? Oh, isn’t that the name of a planet?” Sofia remembered.

“Never heard of Stebron the god-eater?” he continued.

“No?”

Phillip scratched his head. “Well, at least it must not be that, since you don’t know… Stebron is on of ‘em mighty fucked-in-the-head five-digiters. He’s been gambling with the gods for their essence for thousands of fucking years and nobody knows why. Real mad in the head, I tell you.”

“I see, well, it’s my first time hearing about that, I just need the essence for the racial skills of my new race. Courtesy of Creation himself.”

“The fuck is Clint smoking…”

“Oh, right, speaking of Clint, did you name Lina after Life?” Sofia asked.

“Her birth name is Veliana…” Phillip explained with a sigh, “I told her to stop calling herself Lina but she never listens to me…”

“I see, I thought there might be something like that when I learned that the planet was named Veliadren and I understood it was a draconic name.”

“Of course, after all it was elder Avross who named the planets… Anyway, you might wanna be careful about this. Stebron might actually fuckin’ attack you on sight with all the essence you’re carrying,” Phillip warned.

“Great, now I’ve got some old crazy Dragon to worry about. Just what I needed.”

“This…” Phillip took some time to think, standing there in the middle of the sky. “Where were you girls going?” he finally asked after a long silence.

“Taxes’ shrine in the dwarven isles,” Cinthia answered.

“Getting another essence?” Phillip asked, wide eyed.

“Exact,” Sofia confirmed.

“Erm… Alright. I’ll take you there, since I need to move anyway… I’ll go get Erri and we’ll have a long talk. You won’t need to worry about Stebron after that.”

“Just like that? If it’s that simple maybe she already handled it?” Sofia wondered, “But I will take you up on the faster travel, since you offered, thank you.”

“She clearly hasn’t done shit since there hasn’t been a council in the last three hundred years…” Phillip muttered, “Anyway, with two of us vouching for you even Stebron will keep his distances. You’ll owe me one for this, so try to help my girl with her shop or something, alright? Maybe send her new clients. Can’t believe Erri can still be this irresponsible sometimes…”

“Alright, sure…“ Sofia agreed. The entire thing had kind of come out of nowhere, it was nice to know that a potential future problem would be taken care of, at least.

“Let’s get to it, I’ll get you to the dwarves in seconds,” Phillip finally said before he took some distance and transformed.