What was it that made a wizard?

No, not a mage, someone who could simply use magic, that wasn't all that special in their universe of weird game mechanics and magic.

No, specifically, what made a wizard?

That was the question Rory was pondering, deep in contemplation with yet another wise founder.

Heh.

"I'm telling you, a wizard needs a wand," Zoey argued, flailing her hands around as if waving a wand.

"Bullocks," Rory shot back. "Wands are overrated and childish."

"No, they aren't, they're cool and portable."

"And what do you know about the subject?"

"I went to the Harry Potter Park at Universal."

"Rich bitch, weren't you?" Rory snickered.

"What, you going to tell me you were some poor street cleaner, making ten cents an hour as a child?"

"What, was I born in 1950?" Rory rolled his eyes at Zoey. "No, I was not some down on my luck rough and tumble childhood, I just never got to go to any places like that, unlike some people."

"Well, we've got all the magic in the world around us now," Zoey countered as she pointed at Jinn happily floating around in his magma whirlpool.

"Not the point, and to get back to the main argument, wands are dumb."

"They are not."

"They definitely are."

"So what do you think makes a wizard?"

"A staff," Rory said as if it were obvious.

"What, like you want to be Gandalf? Going to grow out a long bushy beard?"

"I've occasionally had a long bushy beard; they tend to light on fire," Rory said with a sigh. "Anyway, no. Plus, there is a distinct advantage staves have over wands."

"And that is?"

A large metal pole appeared in his hand, and Rory smacked Zoey over the head with it, his fellow founder not even flinching.

"What was that for?"

"Making my point. With a staff, you can use it as a weapon in a pinch."

"…."

"What was that?" Rory leaned in, having heard the faintest of grumbles from Zoey.

"I said that I guess you have a point."

"Hah, my win!" Rory said proudly. "Alright, thanks, you can leave now."

"Excuse me?" Zoey said, sounding flabbergasted.

"I've got stuff to work on, and you're just going to pester me."

Zoey frowned at Rory before finally sighing, flipping him the bird as she left to go do… whatever it was she had in mind.

Maybe exploring the higher regions? Between the retrofitting on her armor, and the fact that she actually has solid armor, she should realistically be able to explore the higher regions with far less danger than I could.

They had agreed to avoid exploring the deep chambers of the volcano unless they were together; the fact that it had been essentially gatekept by a mid-tier-seven monster could signal potentially even more mid-tier-seven monsters deeper inside the massive volcano.

Well, neither here nor there for the time being.

Rory's primary focus was his staff. He'd gotten sidetracked in the pointless debate he'd found himself in with Zoey about what really made a wizard, a debate that had only occurred due to a passing comment of his about what it was he was looking to work on next.

As for what Rory felt like he would need for the staff itself, there were three main areas he believed would be necessary. First was the use of a Pearlescent Core, the 'heart' of the staff. Second was an experimental idea he'd had; he would carve into the staff and install small tubing that he would fill with a solution of dissolved pneuma crystals, a matter of alchemic chemistry. Lastly, there were good old inscriptions to be carved throughout the staff.

Ignoring more basic skills, such as simple carving, that is.

Technically, the pearlescent score and even the pneuma crystal solution were likely overkill, but Rory felt that it was now his reputation to go overboard rather than not.

Reputation with whom? Well, with himself, obviously. Whose opinion mattered more to him than his own?

Having chased away all noisy distractions, only Jinn was quiet enough to be allowed to stay –and the fact that the elemental didn't really have anywhere else to go– Rory got to work, having already laid out the plans within his Mind Palace. Carving the bone with his trusty knife wasn't too difficult; it wouldn't be until he started working with materials beyond rare that he would struggle once more. The nice thing about making a staff was that, unlike a sword or an axe or even a mace, staves were fundamentally simple weapons, poles for all intents and purposes.

Would he add some flourish? Sure, but that was far less demanding than forging metal into chain links for chainmail, for example.

The body of the staff was simple, consisting of a straight pole that very slightly grooved inward toward the center before flaring out toward the end, a detail so slight that it was only noticeable on longer inspections. That itself took no more than an hour to work on. The head was, subjectively speaking, far more difficult as he hollowed it, allowing a socket large enough for a core to be placed. Taking some time to add some flair, Rory even went as far as to carve out the holding area for the core, leaving it so that it looked almost like branches or ribs that would be holding the core once it had been created and added. Looking at the butt of the staff, Rory considered sharpening it to a point before shaking his head, instead intending to cap it off with a hard metal cap shaped almost like a golf club head so that it might be better used for blunt force striking, if need be, without also making the entire weapon unwieldy.

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Taking in the work-in-progress staff, Rory sighed, relieved that this part of the process was straightforward work that someone of his caliber could knock out in a single evening.

The hard part would be the pearlescent core, the pneuma fluid –name a work in progress like so many other concepts of his– and the final inscription work, as he had a specific plan for that which would be much more taxing than just slapping on some runes.

Work. Lots and lots of work.

While time passed for Rory as he set out on side quest after side quest in preparing his staff, collecting monster cores and working on not exploding them, testing the perfect method for melting pneuma crystals as he desired, so on and so forth, others spent their time being useful.

Or that was what Zoey told herself as she tramped around the mountain.

"The gall he has at times," Zoey muttered. It had been nearly three months since he'd started to work on his staff, and every time Zoey dropped into their base, he was off muttering something she couldn't make heads or tails of.

But then, she couldn't really make heads or tails of most of what he talked about, amounting to little more than gibberish to her half the time.

Now, was she being fair? No, and Zoey was well aware of that fact. It just reminded her of her father, who would lecture for what felt like hours on time, about the importance of their family and blah blah blah, there was a reason she had run away from home.

It was part of the reason she went out of her way to annoy the man, a petty tit for tat.

All of that was to say, she wasn't actually irritated or annoyed with her fellow founder. The fact that she had her current wonderful armor prevented that. It even slowly repaired itself, and the more extreme the volcanic environment became, the faster it repaired. It was a long shot from her old days of scrounging by with whatever armor she managed to obtain from delve rewards.

Speaking of which.

She was currently on an island that looked like an inverted Christmas tree, a rather strange appearance for a floating island, but then that was what one had to come to expect living in a fantasy universe. Zoey had slowly made her way to the very bottom-most point of the strange island, scrambling and climbing down rigid cliff faces and sheer walls until, at the bottom, she found what looked like a swirling vortex of orange haze.

Bingo.

She had mentioned to Rory not long ago –or what felt like not long ago, months at this point could pass in what felt like days– that delves came into two forms, physical delves which were, well, physically present in their reality, and then their superior cousins, the, uh…. Uh…

Alright, she hadn't thought up a more interesting name for the non-physical delves even after how many years she'd been on Aelia for.

Either way, the non-physical delves, which usually were entered through things like strange doorways, chasms, or, in this case, swirling orange portals, generally gave much better rewards than the much more boring delves.

Or, usually at least. Ignoring Colossal Delves.

Colossal delves were the mutant sibling of physical delves, delves that extended for many floors. She had never experienced one herself, but apparently, Rory had mentioned encountering a delve that was projected to have around twenty floors, of which he had only cleared two of the twenty.

Oh, what I would give to check that out.

Her innate desire to explore all but slavered at the mouth at the thought of such an expansive delve, but it wasn't in the cards any time soon.

Alright, Zoey, keep it in your pants.

Sighing, she returned her attention to the present. Her descent down the odd island had only exposed her to low-tier-seven monsters, leading her to believe that the delve in front of her was roughly the same scale of difficulty. Even if it maxed out at a mid-tier-seven, unless it was a proper 'boss' monster such as the ape her and Rory had fought, she felt like she could come out on top. It helped that over her shoulder she had a bag of goodies slung, filled with small gems, a few brews, and even a backup weapon in the form of a small sword –apparently called a gladius– to aid in her adventure.

The joys of knowing a guy.

Mentally preparing herself, Zoey stepped forward, falling into the orange vortex, only to find herself inside what appeared to be some crags, orange fog hanging from her knees down.

Gas of some sort?

Doing something most would consider stupid, Zoey dropped to the floor as if she were about to do a push-up, inhaling deeply from her nose.

Ooo, tingles. Yeah, definitely some sort of case… Not acid, more like fire, in gas form. Weird.

Only her immense durability investment allowed her to essentially ignore the worst of the fire gases effect. Now, if she remained where she was, huffing the fiery gas for an extended period, that would be a different story, but then Zoey had no such intention as she hopped back to her feet.

Hmm, I wonder if I should have invited Eia.

Admittedly, she and the serpent had gotten off on a bad foot-

Bad foot? Bad scale? What would you say when one of the parties involved doesn't have feet?

-but unlike her fellow founder, who was a bit of an eccentric hermit, even if he himself didn't realize it, Eia liked exploring the world and not staying cramped inside for weeks and even months at a time.

Well, it's a little too late now.

She hadn't really thought of inviting Eia until she'd dropped low to the ground, the act spurring her random neural connections to thinking of the serpent, and thus it wasn't as if she could amend that now, but she would try to remember in the future.

I'm still not used to working with others.

Oh sure, technically she'd had some experience around others since her arrival on Aelia when she'd been given responsibility over some younglings, but as soon as they seemed as if they could care for themselves, she had fled.

I'm not much for being in charge, after all.

It was also why she had no problems working with Mr. Architect, as she had no thoughts of grandeur, of being the supreme power or whatever. Once he had come across as personable enough and willing to work with her, she was more than happy to play a bit of second fiddle to whatever his machinations were; she was just the Vanguard, not a damn Architect after all.

Oh, Aelia would throw a bitch fit if she heard me say that out loud.

She got gear, she wasn't in charge, and she even had someone to banter with. All was good as far as Zoey was concerned.

Nodding to herself, she began to explore the crags of the delve, dodging around rockfall traps or terrain made of what looked like shale that crumbled the moment she pressed too much weight on it. She'd seen these sorts of traps and the likes enough times that she was an expert at avoiding them. There was even a rolling boulder that chased after her through the crags for a period.

After nearly two hours of dodging traps and other 'challenges' thrown her way, Zoey finally paused, standing in front of something new for once.

"A door."

There wasn't any other way to describe what was blocking her path through the current crag she was traversing. It was clearly a door through a naturally formed stone barrier, two stone slabs with clear grooves and handles to push open and step through.

"A trap, a puzzle, a fake-out treasure room, or a tough monster," Zoey mused as she examined the door. She wasn't a true expert at trap spotting and disabling; she'd gained experience through the school of hard knocks to recognize the signs, and from what she could see, the door was untouched by traps.

Still.

Bracing herself with her shield, a medium-sized slab of red colored metal that weighed a metric fuck ton, Zoey pushed against the door, opening it.

It was fortunate she had braced herself behind her shield when she did, as the moment she pushed the heavy doors open, she felt the familiar sensation of objects slamming into her shield with a measured pace.

Thump. Thump. Thump. Thump.

For nearly twenty seconds, things slammed against her shield, sounding strangely… doughy, before the noise stopped. Lowering her shield, Zoey was able to take in the new area for the first time.

The first thing she noticed was the pile of oversized mosquitoes lying dead on the ground in front of her, around fifty of them, each the size of her hand. They had slammed so hard into her shield that the weaker of the two opposing forces had crumpled.

And shockingly, her shield made of +1 Promethium was not weaker than the bodies of large mosquitoes.

Aside from the oversized insects, the room itself looked like a fusion between a Japanese theatre, something she knew of only because of her father, and a Greco-style amphitheater.

Except, entirely made of orange glass with black stained bamboo.

Odd, but not unappealing.

Slowly creeping into the room, even insane amounts of durability didn't take away from the benefit of caution. Zoey waited for something to happen.

When nothing popped out to eat her face, she finally gave up on slowly padding through, instead walking directly past the rows of seats and clambering onto the raised stage at the center of the room. At the very center, there was what appeared to be a miniature tea house, a scaled model where she might watch a kabuki show, and most shocking of all was how quaint and truthfully rather cute it was.

Gently investigating, she flipped back what looked like a curtain on the small model, only to flinch as a small doll was sitting within, wearing a full kabuki costume. More unnerving was that, rather than a head, there was an opening like a pitcher plant, with two cat-like eyes staring up from the bottom of the pitcher plant opening within the small doll.

"Freaky."

Hearing a sound from behind her, Zoey slowly turned around, watching as a panel on the stage floor moved, a thing rising out from the void within.

It was, of course, a life-size version of the creepy kabuki-costume-wearing pitcher plant monster.

"Tough monster it is," Zoey sighed, preparing herself.

Well, I can't say I'm surprised.

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