<~> Chapter 45I woke what I assumed was several hou- bells ter to Torien softly calling my name. Bel was still fast asleep hugging my side with a peaceful look on her face. I decided to let her sleep a bit so I shimmied out from under her.

  I was still a bit groggy but I kinda felt amazing. That rest really refreshed me. I stretched a bit and looked over at Torien. She looked a little worn down too but seemed happy. A bit of a trast to how she looked when I went to sleep.

  "You seem in good spirits this m." I said smiling.

  Torien looked embarrassed at the ent. "Ah, it's just... Talking with my sister st night lightened my mood. Also, I'm sorry about how I was treating Mimi. I guess I didn't realize how I was ag. I was still thinking of her has a monster instead of a thinking person... and I think I was being jealous."

  "Jealous?" That came out of nowhere.

  "Yeah I um... I feel kinda stupid after Mori poi out to me but apparently I get like that sometimes, it's just, it usually happens when I'm being protective of her... I... I think I'm jealous that you're already taking Mimi under your wing, teag her and taking responsibility for her, while I'm still a sve who belongs to someone else. It feels even more dumb because just st night you said you would try to buy us. I promise I'll warm up to Mimi, I was just being dumb. I-I'm sorry..."

  I pulled Torien into a hug, she froze, pletely caught off guard but quickly rexed into it. "It's okay Torien, the situation is plicated for all of us, I would say you should apologize to Mimi but I don't think she would uand at this point anyway." I chuckled.

  When I pulled back Torien had an embarrassed smile on her face. "Thanks for... not being too mad."

  I put my hand on her shoulder, "Thanks for apologizing and expining how you felt. It means a lot to me. It's important that we work this stuff out so we all get along with each other." I looked around, the sun was still down and most of the light was ing from the camp fire. Man was standing over by her tent digging through her pack. "You should probably get some rest. I'm just gonna wake Bel up really quick before I take over for you."

  She nodded and walked back to the fire.

  I crawled bato my tent and found Bel already sitting up rubbing her eyes. "Oh good, you're already up."

  "Mhmm..." Bel replied sleepily.

  "How much of that did you hear?"

  "Mmm, not much. It wasn't as warm so I woke up just now."

  "For someone who grew up on a farm you don't seem like much of a m person."

  Bel looked up at me with the first ever aare I ever saw on her face... it was cute. "I don't usually wake up in the middle of the night after fighting for my life the previous couple days."

  I smiled at her. "Fair enough I guess."

  She wasn't able to keep up her grumpy mood for long because her mouth quickly cracked into a smile. I picked up Mimi on the way out of the tent and Bel and I sat by the fire.

  Torien stretched out before looking over to us. "Alright, my turn to sleep." She gnced over to the tent she shared with her sister. "Looks like Mori couldn't wait any longer." She yawned while walking over to her tent.

  I sat Mimi's sword sheath dowo us as I stared into the fire. It was still quiet out and I don't think I was entirely awake yet so I decided to finally che the notifications I had been putting off.

  [Learned passive skill Double Down][Double Down - Exceptionally Rare Passive Skill]It doesn't take long for those blessed with luck to try their hand at gambling. And after a few good hands they start to push their advantage further. Whenever you take as you perceive as risky you get bonus experience or rewards when you succeed and experience penalties or diminished rewards when you fail.

  This one seemed like a bit of a mixed bag. If I pyed things too safe it wouldn't activate but if I did anything I thought of as risky I would get bohe downside was if I ever messed up I really messed up. But generally, as long as I didn't risk too much, I could get a lot more out of small gambles. Taking a penalty when I already lose seems like it wouldn't be as bad as getting a bonus on top of a win right? Still, I would o be careful that I didn't take unnecessary risks or make high-stakes gambles just for some bonuses. I would o be careful to only take calcuted risks where I could.

  [Learned Luck Magic Spell flip]Create a quarter-palm sized golden . When flipped at a target, call a face, if called correctly do high damage otherwise do nothing. Damage is affected by [Magic Force]. Dire, accuracy, and precision is affected by [Magitrol]. The spell starts at a 50% d increases with luck.

  This spell seems rather useful. It's good to finally have a damaging spell, though it looks to be iionally unreliable. Still pared to no offensive spells it seems like a good option and it scales with luck so it might hit more often than I think. There doesn't seem to be any real indication of how much the ces increase though but I suppose I could test it out ter.

  [Learned Luck Magic Spell Die Nudge]Any situation where you would fail to hit with an attack, spell, or projectile by a small enough amount, you pay mana to do magic damage equivalent to the hit instead. You will be automatically aware when this spell is castable. Mana cost is reduced by [Magitrol].

  This one seems more useful though kind of an odd spell. I wonder if I could iionally miss physical attacks to do magic damage instead. The only thing that really makes it look luck reted is the name. I probably won't know what it feels like when it activates until it happens though.

  [Learned Luck Magic Spell Bckjack]Create two palm sized English pattern pying cards. Kings, Queens, and Jacks, are worth 10 points. Aces are worth 11 points. The cards be thrown to create an are explosion with the magnitude of the face value multiplied by [Magic Force]. Bonus damage applied when drawing a Bckjack, any ace paired with any suit card. The cards be folded to e the explosive effect. Higher lucreases the ce of drawing higher values and Bckjacks. Mana use is a ft amount governed by your [Magic Force].

  Now this spell is iing. The idea of flipping a is a pretty natural game of ce but this offensive spell is actually fashioned after the Bckjack I know from my world. Additionally it mentions English Pattern cards, I never really khat was what standard pying cards were called but it makes sehey would o be identified specifically if they weren't known here. This really begs the question about where this spell es from though. Does it e from my memories about games of ce? Did a previous [World Traveler] introduce this game here? Where do spells e from?

  I decided that, while potentially dangerous, I would activate the spell. It sounded like it would be easy to cel the spell by folding so it shouldn't be a problem right? I felt a tug of magic as the spell activated and materialized two cards in my hand. Despite being called "palm sized" they looked like standard sized pying cards to me, regur in shape, taller on the sides.

  Ace of hearts and six of diamonds, a value of 17. Detly high value, especially for my first ever draw. I stood up and walked over to the log farthest away from the camp aly pced them upside down and jumped back. Fortuhe cards dematerialized as soon as my hahem, not activating just like it suggested from the description. I drew another hand, this time I drew a 5 of spades and a 4 of hearts. I wondered if I would be able to "hit" on this hand a a new card but trying to activate the spell or think about adding a card just didn't do anything.

  As much as I would like to eain myself by drawing hands it actually did take a rather noticeable amount of mana to draw each time. More mana than any of the other spells I have. It said it was governed by [Magic Forbsp;but I'm not sure if that means it could bee too expeo use if I tio put points there. It's probably good that I tried the spell out before allog my points so I properly test it after to see how much it affects it.

  "What are you doing?" Bel called over from the camp fire.

  I folded the hand and again they disappeared. "Oh uh, testing out a new spell?"

  "What's it do?"

  "...Explode?"

  Bel looked at me incredulously. "You cast a spell that was going to explode, in the middle of camp, while half of our party is sleeping?"

  I felt guilty. "Well, the spell clearly gave me a way of deactivating it so I thought I'd give it a try..."

  She sighed heavily and waved me over. I was a little scared by her attitude but I came over and sat back dowo her. She put her hand on my thigh. "Listen, I think it's great to practice your spells when you have down time. I don't even mind keeping watch while you py with them." Her face turned serious as she tinued, "But do not practibat spells in the middle of an occupied camp while half of it is sleeping. You're really smart, I'd wager smarter than me, so I don't feel like I should have to tell you this."

  "Yeah... Sorry... I just got a little overexcited to try it out."

  She sighed. "At least you could dismiss the spell easy enough. How many spells did you get from that st fight?"

  "Five... and a passive skill."

  "F-Five?"

  "Well two of them are light spells, I haven't looked at them yet."

  "Still... I got three so it I guess I shouldn't be pining but five is a lot."

  "Three plus the passive skill were from my css, I got 4 css levels in that one fight. The two other spells are light magic. I probably gained a lot of experience fr to ge my light orb to ultraviolet light while fighting the vampire. I got 3 levels in light magid 2 levels in light manipution during that fight too."

  "Was that the weird colored light ball you were throwing at it? I saw the monster burn from it but I was too busy to think about what it was."

  "Where I e from we have myths about Vampires dying to the sun and burning from ultraviolet light so I thought I would try it. It worked a little but not enough to be worth the effort, at least at this stage."

  "I've never heard of ultraviolet light but trying to make ges to magi bat situations does usually give more system experience."

  "Hmm, iing."

  "Let me see what the light spells I got are."

  [Learned Light Magic Spell Light Beam]Create a movable beam of light from a single point that follow you or be set in pce. Maximum Strength and iy of the light is determined by Magic Force.

  It's almost funny how simple and anticlimactic this spell is. I unlocked a fshlight.

  "I see why most mages might not think this css is worth the effort."

  I cast light beam at a point in front of me into the woods. Illuminating a spot ahead of me just like a fshlight normally would. With a little bit of effort I was able to ge the color using light manipution. I could put more or less energy into the magic to ge the brightness and make the beam rger or smaller giving me a way to "focus" the beam so to speak. The "follow you" part of the spell means I anchor it to a spot retive to myself like my shoulder or I could anchor it to my hand and move it around. It was as literal a transtion of a fshlight using magic as you could get.

  "Light magic is known for its utility and I definitely uand it. Even farmers with limited access to magietimes learned light magic to work at dark or travel at night," Bel said.

  "Yeah," I agreed absentmindedly. I picked a tree off in the distand focused the beam as much as possible then I ged the color as high as I could go until I got essentially a red ser pointer. I then tried to pump more magito it but it just stopped, like trying to forething into too small of a tainer, it just wouldn't let any more in. I tried pointing it at a dead leaf on the ground, nothing. Taking a ce I put my hand in front of it for a sed, no disable heat. I couldn't force it into a higher light spectrum and I couldn't increase its iy any more. A red dot light was the best I could do.

  [Light Manipution has increased from level 3 to level 4]

  Oh, well that's nice I guess. Still, my pns to create deadly heat sers tio be put on hold. I'll probably o get some sort of light magic that create heat. I don't know though, maybe heat falls too muto the fire magic realm for me to reproduce it using magic. I'll have to tio test it.

  "What are y to do now?"

  "Burn things with light magic."

  "...Why would light burn you?"

  "You never had a sunburn before?" I smirked at her.

  "I..." She stared at me bnkly. After a few moments she looked up at the sky, "I never sidered that before." I turned away and checked out my st spell.

  [Learned Light Magic Spell Light Signal]Create a ribbon of light magic you use to write messages with. Strength and iy of the light is determined by [Magic Force]. The size of the message, fine trol over the message's shape, the shape of the ribbon, and mana cost to maintain the message is determined by [Magitrol].

  I used my new spell to write out Beldonna in on, then I wrote it again in English using a calligraphy script.

  "Oh! Is that my hat's so cool!"

  "Yep! This spell lets me write things in the air."

  I stared at the message as I let it fade away and had an iing idea. I straihe signal spell to be purely two-dimensional and then I drew a circle roughly the size of a pte. Ihe circle I put in the runes for creating water and activated it. The light disappeared with the activation but the rune was juring water just as it should. I was so dumbfounded I drained away a good k of mana before I released the rune circle.

  I turo Bel who looked as shocked as I felt. "Oh shit," I said looking at her.

  Saine

  Hello! Writing chapters like these are always fun but a bit harder than they appear. When I first started this story I thought writing a LitRpg would be easy but I have to keep so many notes and reference old chapters so often about the format of how things are written so they are sistent. It's actually signifitly harder than you might think, not a pint, just thought you might be ied. chapter is more system-y things and allog points. I hope you enjoyed reading and see you ime!

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