Colt immediately equipped his new axe and sunk two of his points into Speed, one into Endurance and the remaining two into Authority. He could not help but grin broadly as he looked at his stats.

[Name: Exile]

[Title: God of the Hearth]

[Race: Local Deity (Human)]

[Tier: 0]

[Level: 3]

[HP: 60/60 (45+15)]

[DP: 10/10 (8+2)]

[Strength: 5]

[Endurance: 12 (9+3)]

[Speed: 6]

[Authority: 10 (8+2)]

The two points of Authority on his new axe also artificially increased his max DP! Colt’s face lit up when he saw the overall effects. He now had two different stats that were essentially in the double digits! Plus, he was now only two stat points away from reaching level 4!

[Authority increase detected… Please choose two of the following spells.]

Colt had a glint in his eyes as he waited for the next notification. He wondered how many other players had figured out how important the Authority stat was.

[(Divine) Minor Sunder: Strike your target with a ranged beam of concentrated Divinity for 40% of target’s health. Requires a higher Authority level than your target. Cost: 5 DP]

[(Divine) Minor Divine Arrow: Fast moving golden arrow. Damage and cost equal to user’s Authority up to 10 Maximum.]

[(Hearth) Raging Hearth: Creates a Divine Fire that radiates a healing aura over 20m. Heals followers/party members for 5 HP per second for 4 seconds. Enemies will suffer from a 20% suppression to all stats within this zone. Cost: 4 DP]

Colt’s eyes sparkled as he read the descriptions. Minor Divine Arrow was nothing new to him by this point, but the other two were far more appealing. Minor Sunder was a gamble, since its damage would depend on the opponent’s health. However, it had a fixed cost was far better than Minor Divine Arrow in Colt’s eyes.

By choosing Minor Sunder, Colt felt much happier knowing that he would have another offensive option. So far he had felt like a meat shield that was only superb at taking damage.

Raging Hearth was another good spell. Although it was another defensive orientated spell it, at least came with a debuff against any opponents. Colt felt as though his character was finally coming into its own. ‘At Tier 1 I should gain more offensive options because of my element. If I had to guess then Earth should be a defensive element. Fire should be an assault type. While Air and Water are probably hybrids.’

Colt nodded as he thought about that. He felt that his analysis made sense based on what he knew from other games. With that, he ignored the Minor Divine Arrow once again and chose the remaining two spells. He felt the usual knowledge of how to activate these spells enter his mind.

With a broad grin, he turned to Jarxos. Now that he had merged his gains, it was time to sell his old equipment. Colt frowned as he felt Jarxos was being stingy. He only gained 2 Gold for his shield and 3 Gold for his old axe. Still, he could not complain since he had nothing else to compare Jarxos’ prices to.

“Come back soon. I’ll sort through these items and put them on display. You never know what you might find.” Jarxos flashed a cocky smile at Colt as he watched the latter leave his store.

There were no nasty surprises waiting for him this time when he left the shop. However, now he had no plans for what to do next. ‘Hm, should I search the city for a place to rest? Or maybe I can find somewhere outside of the walls.’

Colt frowned as he struggled with his decision. Valheim was massive after all and it would take a considerable amount of time to find anything in it. ‘Forget it. I’m better off hunting wolves while looking for a safe place.’ Colt set off for the city gates once again.

Valheim had become slightly lively in this area because of the players coming and going to the wolf fields. Colt eyed them warily as he wondered how many of them might feel the temptation to kill him. However, as far as he knew, nobody had tried anything in the city yet. This made him feel somewhat safe as he moved along the various streets.

‘Hm, I got here faster than before.’ Colt thought as he stared at the giant gates before him. ‘I guess I’ll have to invest in Speed more if I want to do a lot of exploring.’

That seemed like a certainty as he thought about having to track down the other First Flame fragments. He had a suspicious feeling that they might not even be in his subrace’s sphere of influence. It would make far more sense for them to be scattered throughout the entire Human Divine Realm.

“You were at the Temple earlier.” Some man’s rough sounding voice called out to Colt from the side as he passed through the gates. “You seem strong. Why didn’t you reply to our recruitment?”

Colt’s head swivelled to size up the owner of the voice. The man sported a hairstyle that was down to the skin at the sides, while he had pulled the top portion back into a braided ponytail. Strangely enough, his avatar was clean shaven. Usually when gamers went for this kind of style they always had some kind of beard.

“Why would I?” Colt shrugged as he eyed the group from the Temple earlier. “There were no details to judge whether there was anything beneficial to me. Besides, what makes you think I even meet your standards?”

The man chuckled as he looked at Colt. “Oh, you meet the standards, alright. My Divinity tells me you’re level 3. As for the details, well, it wasn’t something that we could just shout out without drawing some unwanted attention. I’m sure you understand what I mean.”

Colt nodded silently as he stared at the group. None of their body languages declared they had any malicious intentions, which made him raise an eyebrow. “So, what do you want with me, then?”

“Ah, let us head somewhere quiet in the city to have a chat about it.” The man grinned as he gestured towards Valheim.