Medium Meld (Naruto/Gamer, Male OC)

Chapter Seven - Dreaming of Levels

The plan turned out to be pretty barebones, all things considered, but to make a short story shorter, we would be making our way down to the beach to get on a couple of boats.

We would try to avoid making any noise while we were at it, and we would be moving slowly enough that we wouldn't accidentally injury the King during transit. I would be riding along with the King, in the beat-up looking wagon that Korega and the others had used in their rescue attempt while continuing to work on his Petrification.

Kakeru and I were already situated in the wagon, just waiting for the others to move out. I had managed to level Status Removal up to level six in the meantime and it was now doing six points of damage to the Petrification with every cast, and I had enough mana to charge it up to eighteen points of damage with a triple-cast. My basic mana recovery was just over ten mana per second now, while Meditate boosted that up to twenty-five per second. My maximum mana was sitting at just over seven hundred now, so I was making significantly more progress with each cast.

My recovery wasn't the problem here though, it was the cast time, it took fifty seconds until I could use it again after each cast. It was only an estimation but judging by how much damage I was currently doing to the Petrification and the rough size of 'six' durability I would say that the petrification had at least five-thousand durability? Probably more?

That was roughly three-hundred Status Removals at eighteen points of damage.

That was what, four hours of constant Status Removals at the current damage? It would speed up a great deal after another level or two as well. So I halved it and said it would take two hours until Kakeru was cured. It was a very rough estimate at best, but it would have to do.

I felt the wagon begin to move.

"How are you doing, Kakeru?" I asked cheerfully.

"I breath without issue now," Kakeru said honestly.

"Good to hear," I said simply, "We have a couple of hours left before you're back in fighting shape though, so don't go doing any flips or anything."

Kakeru huffed out a laugh, but my thoughts had taken me elsewhere. Why hadn't I tried to unlock acrobatics or parkour? They were probably passives, right? Dammit.

"Sora-kun, I've just realized that I have yet to thank you," Kakeru said seriously. "You have undoubtedly saved my life."

I think that was the first time he had actually called me by name, aww, I knew he liked me under that Stoney exterior of his.

"Don't worry about it, buddy." I said easily, "I wasn't going to let you bleed out in there."

"Even so," Kakeru said amused, "I owe you a great debt, and should we survive the night I will do my best to see it repaid."

That was the goodwill I was hoping for, I needed a way of getting exp, and sparring with his guards might be a good way to do it.

"How about once this is all over, you get your soldier guys to show me how to fight properly?" I asked hopefully, "I'm going to need to get a lot stronger if there are all these crazy ninja guys running around turning Kakeru's to stone."

"Consider it done," Kakeru said easily, amused at the simple request.

"Thanks," I said happily. "Say Kakeru, where do you think these ninjas came from anyway? The bad ones, not the Konoha ones."

I made sure to clarify just in case.

"They are a group of wandering shinobi mercenaries most likely." Kakeru said thoughtfully, "They carried no village symbol that I recall. Shabadaba has hired many ninjas before at my behest for many reasons over the years, he has always tended to hire those not attached to the larger villages."