Thops

At that moment, Morien entered the church and noticed a bald, bearded middle-aged man sitting not far beneath the statue.

He wore a predominantly black sorcerer's robe and sat on a bench with his head lowered, seemingly lost in thought.

This was...

Morien turned his head toward the distant castle, then looked back at the bald man before him. A name immediately surfaced in his memories.

What a familiar scene.

He suddenly smiled, shifted his mask to the side of his face, walked toward the man, and sat down at the other end of the bench.

Sensing someone sit beside him, the man slowly raised his head and looked at Morien.

He sized Morien up, his gaze sweeping over the markings on his face before finally settling on his eyes.

Suddenly, the man's eyes lit up.

"Are you... a Tarnished?"

he asked with some excitement.

A Tarnished?

He had mistaken Morien for a Tarnished.

Morien touched his face and immediately understood what had happened.

Was it because there was no "Grace" in his eyes?

The Tarnished were a special kind of existence in the Lands Between.

In the Lands Between, people possessed the golden light of Grace in their eyes, a blessing bestowed by the Erdtree.

The Tarnished, meanwhile, were those who had lost that golden light of Grace from their eyes.

The first Tarnished had all been warriors who followed Godfrey into battle. They were rewarded after the founding of the kingdom, then later exiled from the Lands Between and stripped of Grace.

However, that first generation of Tarnished had either died or been wounded, and they were now nearly extinct. In the broader sense, "Tarnished" mostly referred to the descendants of those warriors or others who had lost Grace.

Of course, there was another kind of Tarnished that was even more unusual.

They were beings who had never received the Erdtree's blessing from the very beginning and did not belong to the Erdtree's system.

So, in a sense, Morien could also be considered a kind of Tarnished.

"Mm... I suppose I am." Morien nodded and answered the man's question, his voice appearing directly in the other man's mind.

He had already recognized who the man before him was.

Thops the Bluntstone.

A sorcerer deemed "untalented" by Raya Lucaria Academy.

Upon hearing Morien's voice, Thops's eyes brightened. He did not even care why Morien's voice had appeared directly in his mind.

He asked in a somewhat humble tone.

"Since you're a Tarnished, could you... spare me some Runes?"

"As the saying goes, you can't judge a book by its cover. I once studied at Raya Lucaria Academy, where I learned Glintstone Sorcery."

"As long as you give me ten Runes, I'll teach you Glintstone Sorcery."

Runes were, in a sense, the currency of this world.

And they were likely a currency that would never depreciate.

That was because they were both currency and energy. They were a form of energy derived from the Grace contained within the bodies of the Lands Between's inhabitants.

They could exist as energy within the body, or materialize into golden objects like coins.

Morien listened to his request and nodded slightly.

He did not mind giving this sorcerer some Runes. Though he knew that the spells Thops could teach at this point were mostly mediocre, learning any magic at all would still be an unexpected gain.

But he had no Runes right now...

At that thought, he suddenly remembered something. The refusal that had nearly left his mouth circled around and went unsaid.

The best way to obtain Runes was to kill other creatures.

Even the monsters he had killed before contained Runes within them.

Which meant...

"Wait a moment." He raised a hand, signaling for Thops to wait.

Then he calmed himself and felt the changes in his body.

Aside from the increase in potential brought by Black Flash, his body had indeed undergone considerable changes.

He could sense a golden energy within himself.

This energy seemed to naturally possess the properties of "quantification" and "materialization." With only a little concentration, even a complete novice like him could easily sense exactly how much of it he had.

A total of 3,800 Runes.

The monsters he had killed at the bottom of the cliff.

The two empty-handed ones had each given him 500 Runes, the two holding bells had each given him 800, while the mounted one and its steed had given him 1,000 and 200 Runes respectively.

That made 3,800 Runes in total.

Morien lowered his head and looked at the man before him.

In the game, learning a basic spell normally cost somewhere between 1,000 and 3,000 Runes.

Morien was not sure whether the exchange rate between reality and the game was the same, but at the very least, even the "cheapest" monster he had killed had been worth no less than 200 Runes.

With a smile on his face, Morien gathered golden light in his palm, condensing it into a golden object that resembled a coin.

"Mr. Thops, I want to learn magic from you." He handed the Rune to the man before him.

"Oh, oh, thank you. Thank you so much."

"You're such a good person."

Getting handed a nice-guy card by a middle-aged man was truly tragic.

Thops gratefully accepted the Rune, then suddenly froze.

People of the Lands Between could naturally sense the "weight" of Runes.

The instant the Rune coin reached his hand, he immediately judged its value.

Thops was immediately put in a difficult position.

"One thousand Runes... I'm sorry, I don't have enough to make change."

As he spoke, he tried to return the Rune in his hand to Morien.

But Morien raised a hand and waved it.

"Wait," Morien said. "Besides magic, I'd also like to buy a staff."

"And as you can see, I'm an outsider Tarnished. I have neither a place to live nor food in the Lands Between, so I may need to stay with you for a few days."

Morien activated the Lonely Monster ability.

In Thops's eyes, the sense of familiarity surrounding Morien almost became tangible, washing over him.

This sorcerer, still only third-rate at the moment, could not resist for even a second.

His gaze softened at once, and after hesitating for a few seconds, he accepted all 1,000 Runes.

"That's right. In the Lands Between, you can't use magic without a staff." He nodded. "I still have a few spare Academy Glintstone Staffs, though they're apprentice models. I hope you won't mind."

Morien waved his hand carelessly.

"What does it matter? How could a student use something better than their teacher?"

That made Thops smile.

Then he began introducing himself.

"My name is Thops. I was once a student of the Primeval Current at Raya Lucaria Academy."

As he spoke, he pulled three books from beneath his sorcerer's robe and handed them to Morien with a hint of apology.

"These are the only three spells I have worth showing you. They are Glintstone Pebble, Glintstone Arc, and Starlight."

"Glintstone Pebble releases magical stone shards forward, sending them flying at enemies like sharp stones thrown by hand."

"Glintstone Arc releases a magical arc that spreads broadly to the sides, similar to a warrior's sword wave."

"And lastly, Starlight creates a small floating light to illuminate the surroundings. It's... a fairly decent illumination spell."

"I'm truly sorry. You kindly gave me Runes, yet all I can teach you are such unimpressive spells..."

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