Couple of questions..

[The Rider]

yeah, it is completly random, the first time I played, I never found:
Time Back
Death Star
Demon Slayer
The second time I played: Demon Slayer was in Verona, Time Back- in Verona in the shop where it costs you 200 gold to see the items and Death Star was again in Verona...
In this game (as mage) I got plenty of runes so it wasnt a problem to upgrade neatness and at the end I got around 900 crystals (first level of neatness gives you +2 crystals from 1-3 lvl items, second +4 crystals of 4th lvl items and +6 crystals +2-3 runes from 5th lvl neatness). I bought all items from the shops and converted everything I dont use into crystals and runes. It was very amusing to have all spell to experiment with