For the remainder of the night I ended up reading the grimoire, only stopping to join everyone for dinner. “I’ve gleaned some insights into the odd skill book.” I decided it was easiest to describe the book in that way, as I didn’t want the conversation to be caught up on what a grimoire was.

  “You mean the grimoire?” Maria asked almost instantly.

  “Ahem, yes.” I couldn’t help but cough at how quickly she corrected me. “From what it indicates, there’s a possibility skills are learnable without skill books.”

  This was a significant discovery as of right now. It meant in some way, teaching someone else a skill you already learned was possible, but only if you had enough understanding of it. None of us were at that level currently, but the discovery was big enough to shatter the assumptions I had previously held.

  “How can you know that?” Marcus asked bluntly.

  “I don’t know for sure, but there is no easy way to learn the skills listed within, and they don’t show up in my skill list. But there is a slot for the grimoire in my character sheet, and there are instructions on how to train and learn the skills within it.”

  Marcus looked disbelieving. “Are you sure they're skills then?”

  Anna replied, “I read them, they’re definitely skills.”

  “What I’m trying to say, the most important discovery, is that… it’s possible there is no actual limit on how many skills we can have. Maybe the cap we assumed was there only applies to skills that you can learn instantly through a book.” Outside of improving our level and stats, the most important way to increase power was with skills.

  You could only know so many skills outside of those that came innately with your class. If that was now true that you could learn additional ones then the power level you could reach would grow exponentially. Someone with only two skills versus someone with four or five, how could you even compete?

  The conversation went back and forth between skeptics and believers for several minutes till we shelved it.

  “There is a skill I’m going to attempt to learn and I’ll let everyone know how I get on.” This was the easiest way to calm the debate between the skill cap vs no skill cap factions that had formed over dinner.

  Outside of that, there were other matters to cover. “How is Mark doing?” I asked. He had taken quite the blow during the greater demon encounter. It wasn’t fatal, but he still needed recovery time.

  “He is doing okay.” Thomas said, “He can’t get out of bed without major pain right now. There is one positive to all of this though.”

  “What?” I asked.

  “He’s going to learn his class finally.” This really was a weight off my shoulders. Normally I’d have never put up with such prevarication for so long, but Richard was an invaluable tank, and they were brothers. We had never been lacking in any aspect, but it wasn’t wrong to say we could be much stronger if he stepped up.

  “I guess all it took was feeling his own powerlessness,” Richard joked, “I learned that day two or three.” He looked at Anna who nodded back.

  There was Glenn as well, but he was a non-combat class anyway. His Reinforcement ability was already incredible enough. He gave an update at dinner as well, “I managed to reinforce the new walls, but the barrier doesn’t seem to be tangible so I can’t affect it, or at least not yet.”

  This was more good news. It seemed Glenn’s ability had just upped the tier of the fortification by one entire level. The structure didn’t change, but the strength and durability of the material was on a different level.

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  Outside of that there was also the quest turnin. “Did anyone turn in the quest for dispatching the demon camp?”

  “I tried, but the quartermaster wouldn’t interact with me at all today,” Anna replied and I could see from her expression she thought this as peculiar as I did. “I couldn’t figure it out.The only issue I could see that might be relevant was that his HP bar wasn’t a hundred per cent full.”

  “Has anyone been able to interact with him?” I asked. Which returned a resounding ‘no’. My guess was there was maybe a cooldown after the quartermaster participated in battle, but maybe Anna’s observation was right and his HP needed to be full. There were other guesses going around too.

  We put that issue aside and moved on to another pressing one, “How did we get ambushed?” I asked.

  “Were any of you spotted?” Alan looked at Evee, Jessica, and Lucas.

  “As far as I am aware, nothing spotted us,” Jessica answered. Which was good enough for me. She had very sound perception, better than mine with Sixth Sense. That was because hers didn’t just work in danger, there was more to what she could feel as a tracker.

  We talked in circles with no indication of what may have led to the ambush, and it became clear we might never know the cause.

  I wrapped up the meeting as it was growing late. “I just wanted to let everyone know that the next demon wave is in six days. Until then there’s no requirements for anyone to do anything other than rest and recover.” Rest and recover was more than just physical, as all of us only needed a day or so of good rest while in the abode to be at peak physical performance. I was more thinking of the mental, and specifically of Marcus and Rebekah.

  Marcus did a good job of hiding it, but I could tell he had struggled with the loss of Ryan. Rebekah was absolutely heartbroken over Bethany. Her cheeks were constantly swollen and her eyes were a mix of black and red, from a lack of sleep and constant crying.

  No one knew what the next demon wave was going to bring. It could be a few more than five, it could be nearly thirty, we didn’t know. What I did know was that we would probably be okay for this one and maybe the next without new members. But after that… It was up to fate whether other survivors found us.

  Our guess about the quartermaster needing all his HP was proven incurred by the next morning, when he was on full, and yet he still didn’t interact with anyone. There was no way to turn in our quests, but his shop was accessible.

  I had the one remaining skill point and decided that upgrading the quartermaster was probably for the best anyway. Better quests, more items, maybe even skills. It was a no-brainer even without the possibility it would ‘fix’ him. I clicked in the point and then made my way outside.

  It was still a marvel to see the world as it once was. The red hue couldn’t reach us here, and the bleached world I had been living in was far gone now. In fact, the bright sun was a little hard on the eyes these days.

  There was no one around when I made my way to the NPC, and to my surprise he had a question mark above his head. I turned in the quest and received my coins as reward and started to browse.

  There were new quests, specifically kill quests. Not on any specific thing, but generic. Slay demons and slay greater demons. They rewarded reputation and more currency. The raid quest with the guaranteed skill book was still there waiting to be completed. Judging by how tough the greater demon was, I was glad we hadn’t decided to tackle that one yet.

  Besides that, there was also new items in the shop. There were buff potions, specifically made for killing demons. All of a sudden it clicked in my head. The reason we had been ambushed was because of the quartermaster.

  The buffs weren’t anything to scoff at. A full twenty-five percent more damage to demons? Penetration effects for their thick hides? Weakening potions to hinder them? No wonder they wanted him dead.

  The strength just this one NPC gave us was invaluable. His job was to assist us in killing demons, and therefore he was definitely an important target of future skill points. It seemed possible though, that certain actions were gated by his levels. It wasn’t his HP or some inactive status, it was simply that the quartermaster needed to be LV. 2 for quests to be handed in and the potions to appear.

  “I’m looking forward to what else you can give us.” I said to him before walking away. I couldn’t help but look back, the eerie feeling that he might end up responding was always there, and yet he didn’t.

  “Turn in your quests everyone, he’s working again.” I made a quick trip to let everyone know and then met Jessica outside as I walked back to my own abode.

  “You knew?” She asked curiously.

  “Huh, knew what?” I had no idea what she was talking about.

  “To meet the new arrivals?” Her eyes ushered towards the gate, and a moment later there was banging.

  “Please, let us in!” A voice came from outside. The frail voice of a man, surely.

  I looked at her again, “How many new arrivals?” It was quite the commotion outside.

  “Around ten,” she answered.

  I suddenly started to have a headache, “I think something big is happening…”