But for a Slime

Chapter Seventy Two

Joe woke once again around midnight, waking deeply rested, but also with a frustrated sigh. He stretched and rolled around in the bed for a bit, annoyed to find himself awake in the middle of the night once again. He glanced over to see the boys sleeping soundly in bed then glanced out the window to find the gas giant low on the horizon. He didn't have really much to do, not even the option to really look at his job data because he'd changed his job to Loki cleric last night and now was looking at a job at level zero with no stats, skills, or anything interesting to explore.

Man! I miss the internet and stupid cat videos! Joe sighed again and returned to his status screen before frowning and dismissing it, turning instead to his magic practice. Before he even began, however, the sound of thumping and a low uproar sounded from the floor below. A party in the dining area? This late at night? Joe waited a bit, but the uproar died down and all was quiet once again, but now that he was listening for it, he could hear the steady low murmurs of conversation and multiple people moving. It was so low that unless he really focused on it, he didn't even notice it.

He almost thought about heading downstairs to join the party, but then decided against it as he didn't know the etiquette for parties, let alone feeling comfortable about crashing a party. His mind swirled through ten thousand thoughts and he turned to one that was weighing heavy on his mind. Garnedell's despair and panic yesterday worried him. Garnedell had done well when he'd pushed through to becoming a commoner and while he did well yesterday, seeing him panic at not being able to use his staff had made it clear to Joe that Garnedell wasn't doing well. Garnedell had tried; doing the best he could, but after Joe'd seen his panic in the morning, it was easy for Joe to recognize it buried deep in Garnedell's eyes.

How am I going to help him … he's just going to freak out no matter what… probably the only way is if he gets… ooh… that … yeah… If he could get through faster, that would really settle his nerves, but… what… Joe flipped open his status and opened his available skills to search through his options. He was quite diligent, searching through his skill listing and only found one skill that was really useful. He frowned to see it, not sure what it would do beyond the name and its weak description.