Beneath the Dragoneye Moons Book 5

by Selkie Myth

Dedication

This story is dedicated to my wonderful wife, Lauren, without whom this wouldn't be possible. Her endless love and support keeps me going.

Thank you.

This story is also dedicated to my beautiful daughter Flora, whose smiles light up my every day.

Thank you.

I would also like to acknowledge my beta readers, who put up with my endless typos, fix my mistakes, and help guide the story, so it can be the best story possible.

Thank you.

Lastly, I'd like to thank all the other supportive authors and writing communities, and all the kind words they have.
Thank you.

Chapter 196 - Journey to the center of Pallos I

I sat against the wall, exhausted, out of mana, as the dwarves argued.

"We need to go after Toke." Glifir was insisting. "It hasn’t been that long."

"We have no idea what’s out there. Toke is strong. Whatever happened to her, we need to take this slow and careful, not just blindly rush in." Ned argued back.

"I’m with Ned." Drin said, eyeing the flickering torch uneasily. "We’ve lost all of our supplies. Following up with Toke could easily get us wiped out."

"We should find Toke. Our chances are better with her. Plus, if any of you vanished, you’d want the rest of us to come find you, right?" Fik punctuated almost every word with a stab of his finger.

Round and round they argued, making no progress, getting steadily louder. Without Lule to take charge, they were lost. There was no solid chain of command, no second to step up.

I slumped against the wall. I missed Lule. She was a solid, kind presence. She kept me safe, even to the bitter end. She was the first person I’d had die in front of me in a long time, without divine intervention or White Dove interfering. A cruel reminder that some things were beyond me, that I was still a small leaf to be blown around in the wind.

I knew what I needed to do. I’d literally been trained for this, to step up and take charge when needed. The idea had been for me to do this with Ranger teams, who were already primed to take orders from a Sentinel, but this wouldn’t be too different.

However, I just wanted a bit of a break. Lule’s death and Toke’s disappearance weighed on my mind. [Center of the Universe] was purely anti-pain, and without the emotional stability, I just wanted to grieve for just five minutes. Enough to regenerate my arm, and catch a breather after the battle above.

The entire mine shook and rumbled, dust and rocks falling from the ceiling, as some powerful blow or another shook the very earth we were under. A reminder that the clash of the titans was continuing above, and that we were only tentatively safe here.

It did shut the remaining dwarves up, and we spent a moment just hearing the steady drip-drip of water falling from the ceiling, the rainwater from Etalix’s storm seeping in, and seeing a narrow circle of light from the torch. Some other sounds reached us, but it was hard to make out what they were. The mine was all sorts of weird when it came to sound. Some noises vanished, while others hit surfaces just right, bouncing them further than any noise had any right to go. An occasional click echoed through the mine, like a hammer delicately tapping.

Something the size of one of the walls - which, given that this mine was dug out by the dwarves, wasn’t much of an accomplishment - seemed to move in the dark. I mentally cursed.

Not even a minute of rest. Not counting the time spent checking my stats and talking.

Out of habit, I glanced at my mana, then did a double-take.

I’d regenerated how much?!

Cripes.

I regenerated my arm with a thought, only putting forth a minor effort to improve the efficiency. Sure, the inefficiency caused almost all of my mana to vanish, but I wasn’t going to lollygag about when we were under attack.

"To arms!" I yelled, thanking past me a billion times for properly going through the drills and learning how to use weapons.

While I was still trying to regenerate enough mana, I threw out a minor [Shine] all around me, eating into my regeneration, but at least showing us what we were dealing with.

My sense of size had been right. It was the size, and roughly the shape, of a wall, a dark brown, almost black surface to better blend in with the tunnels. The light shining on it gave it depth though, and it was semi-translucent.

A slime. The biggest damn slime I’d ever seen, the first one out of the dead zone, but it was a slime nonetheless.

I used my new and improved [Long-Range Identify] from like a meter away on the slime.

[Deep-Dwelling Slime]. Roughly level 370 or so.

Given the size and the level, I had serious doubts that my last dregs of mana would be enough to burn through it, and blow up the core holding the slime together. Instead, I used it on [Sunrise], figuring a clear head and a surge of energy would be more valuable for the upcoming battle.

The presence of an enemy united the dwarves like nothing else would. Weapons were drawn, and I was happy to see that everyone had one - although Glifir’s were made out of Ice. Lines connected from Ned to everyone else, including me.

The slime lurched forward, and I danced back a hair, making sure to keep some distance between us. I stabbed out with my short sword, mentally cursing my lack of a spear and how damn close I needed to be to use my short sword, only for it to barely sink into the slime. In a moment, my sword was bounced out with such force that it rebounded out of my hand, deeper into the dark.

I cursed my low strength, and made a mental note that I needed to re-examine my fighting style and physical training when I got back to Remus.

I scooted back as Drin and Fik engaged, with Glifir pacing back and forth behind them, looking for some sort of opening.

He was using knives made out of Ice, and if anything, they were worse for dealing with the slime than my short sword was. The slime also encompassed the entire tunnel, leaving no room for Glifir to flank it. I’m honestly not sure what the roguish dwarf would even be able to DO to a giant slime. Like. They didn’t exactly have vulnerable bits to stab in the back or anything.

Didn’t stop him from throwing a few knives made out of ice, but they barely penetrated before stopping and melting away or clattering uselessly onto the stone floor. That melting rate was far too fast to be heat, and implied a deadly, acidic end to anyone caught by the slime.

"Crush the core!" I yelled.

Look, it was on the obvious side of things, but sometimes the obvious needed to be said.

What was extra-hard was slimes, generally, were fairly impervious to physical attacks. We’d lost both of our mage heavy-hitters, and I was straight up out of mana.

Although, I was regenerating it at a crazy pace. I threw a 500-mana needle-thin beam of Radiance at the slime, only for it to practically vanish as it hit. I think the slime collapsed around it, but what I was shooting was narrow compared to the sheer bulk of the slime. In other words - it was doing damage, but there was just too much slime for it to matter.

The rest of the dwarves were shouting and yelling, mostly war cries at the blocky menace.

"Anyone have Arcanite?" I called out, loud but calm. "I might be able to hit the core if I get Arcanite."

Nobody answered. I hadn’t seen anyone using it so far, and I wasn’t too surprised.

Drin yelled as he bashed his shield, charged to stun, at the slime, who recoiled slightly from the shock. Then it surged forward, trying to smother and overwhelm Drin. Fik slapped him on the side, and Drin flew back, further than he had any right to, as Fik also jumped back.

Which reminded me. Fik was a spell-axe, with strong Gravity abilities to supplement his physical work.

"Fik!" I yelled at him. "Can you kill the core?"

He made a grasping motion in the air, then shook his head.

"No! I’m not strong enough!" He shouted back.

"Retreat!" I ordered. "We can’t kill it!"

The second weakness of slimes - just walking away. We couldn’t kill it, but slimes weren’t known for their terrifying speed. Just their resilience. If I had a full bar of mana, I’d feel comfortable trying to kill the slime. I was fairly confident in my abilities to boot.

Hang on - my bar had almost doubled recently. With only half a bar of mana, I felt like I could kill the slime.

"It’s foolish to retreat! No slime can stand against the might of the Nolgordians!" Ned yelled.

I whirled on him, but Fik beat me to the punch. Backing off, keeping a wary eye on the slime, he explained his logic to an outraged Ned.

"Healer Ned. Listen to Healer Elaine. She’s correct, there’s no benefit to fighting the slime here and now. I’d like to retire one day, and not become slime food. We’re going."

Ned stomped off with us, not stupid enough to let the slime eat him to prove a point.

We retreated down the tunnels, the walls occasionally shaking. There were collapsed passages here and there, most of the cave-ins fresh, some of them ancient. Passages went up, passages went down, and I was wildly lost before long.

It was asking too much that the dwarves would’ve dug this out in a logical, sensible fashion. Instead the mines twisted and turned, looping back on themselves endlessly, chasing their precious metals.

Eventually I saw a collapsed side-shaft, where the collapse was a moderate distance in. A pool of water was off to the side, water running down a wall to feed it.

Perfect for my purposes.

"In here." I called out, turning and walking in. Forcing the dwarves to follow me, or leave me behind.

Something of their old mission remained, and I was basically the only light source. They followed me into the dead-end. I briefly considered using one of my gems, Sealing’s shield, but decided against it. I was probably going to need it later, and he was dead. It was a momento of sorts, an irreplaceable skill.

I did throw up [Mantle] across the entrance once everyone was in. The skill still didn’t take any mana to activate. It only used mana when it was hit, and only when it was overloaded or I was out of mana would it break.

"Why here?" Drin asked after an awkward moment, as I folded my arms together.

"We’re beat. We need to regroup and reassess, and it’s not happening out there." I said. "We need a safe place to evaluate. Now. What did you all manage to get down here?"

"Why should we-" Ned started to say, but I cut him off.

I was so done with Ned.

"You’re listening to me because I’ve been trained for this. I’ve lived this. And the four of you, no offense, were spending more time standing around arguing, than getting anything done."

"We needed to figure out the best course of action!" Glifir protested.

I actually let him finish his sentence because he hadn’t been a jerk.

"Making a bad decision is better than no decision at all." I countered back. "I literally have been trained to do this." I was repeating myself, but it bore repeating.

I glanced at the wall, seeing that it was still good. I took a seat, and beckoned everyone else to as well.

I evaluated Ned briefly. We started off on the wrong foot, and things had just gotten worse. The stuff that needed to get done, needed to get done though.

Ugh. Let’s try something simple.

"Healer Ned the 92nd." I politely said, giving him a seated half-bow. "I recall that you have a food purification skill?"

I got all sorts of looks from my sudden shift in tone. Ned stiffly nodded. I gestured at the pool of water next to me.

"In order to survive, we’re going to need air, water, mana, defense, shelter and food. In that order. Air is taken care of, and is out of our hands if it fails. Water is here and now, and we should make use of it while we can. We’re all regenerating mana for defense, and shelter is both everywhere and impossible, depending on how we look at it. Food is last, and while regenerating mana is hungry work, it’ll be days to weeks before anyone starves to death."

I got some looks at that last part. I mentally shook my head.

It’s like they’d never taken a long, hard look at what exactly can kill them, and how long it took. I had to remind myself that I was with a team from the wall, which wasn’t exactly the dwarf A-team, nor was Lule here, nor did they get the same type of training that Rangers got.

They were competent in their role, but they didn’t have the all-rounder experience.

I stared at Ned from my seated position, and slowly everyone else turned to look at him.

I got a look from him that promised this wasn’t over yet, but he walked over to the pool, knelt down and touched it, purifying the water.

I didn’t mention that it was entirely unneeded, since I could simply cure any problems that tainted water had. However, I didn’t want to drink dirt or shit anymore than the next gal.

"Right. Once some basics are secured, I plan on going after Toke. Fik was correct. We don’t leave people behind." I said. "If any of you ended up in a cave-in, would you want us to leave you, or dig you out?"

There was muttered agreement at that.

"Scout Glifir. Can you get us back to where we initially fell?" I put our scout on the spot. We hadn’t gone particularly far, slimes needing no great speed to escape, but it’d be difficult for me to reverse engineer the path. I could try walking backwards with [Pristine Memories], but yeah. Slow and obnoxious.

Glifir grinned at me.

"Sure!" He said, and instead of saying anything more, conjured up Mist in a convoluted shape.

I studied it for a moment, seeing a main long wiggling part, and lots of little nubs attached to it before it clicked.

"That’s a map." I said stupidly.

"Of course it’s a map! We’re here." Glifir pointed to one spot on the map. "And we fell here." He pointed to the opposite side.

Great skill for a scout!

I beamed at him.

"This is great! Getting lost will be hard with this map."

There was no way I was going to curse it by saying "getting lost will be impossible with this map" or any such nonsense like that.

"Right. Let’s drink up, recover our mana, then head back. Any objections?" I asked.

Ned and Drin shot me unhappy looks, but Glifir and Fik were nodding.

Good.

I changed my stat sheet to have mana done per second, since the numbers were otherwise getting high.

[Name: Elaine]

[Race: Human]

[Age: 19]

[Mana: 5261/239290]

[Mana Regen: 60.1 (+42.5)]

Stats

[Free Stats: 101]

[Strength: 274]

[Dexterity: 497]

[Vitality: 3376]

[Speed: 3376]

[Mana: 23929]

[Mana Regeneration: 23929 (+15314.56)]

[Magic Power: 9997 (+149955)]

[Magic Control: 9997 (+149955)]

[Class 1: [The Dawn Sentinel - Celestial: Lv 355]]

[Celestial Affinity: 355]

[Cosmic Presence: 269]

[Solar Infusion: 140]

[Center of the Universe: 355]

[Dance with the Heavens: 355]

[Wheel of Sun and Moon: 311]

[Mantle of the Stars: 315]

[Sunrise: 128]

[Class 2: [Ranger-Mage - Radiance: Lv 256]+]

[Radiance Affinity: 256]

[Radiance Resistance: 256]

[Radiance Conjuration: 256]

[Shine: 188]

[Sun-Kissed: 256]

[Blaze: 256]

[Talaria: 256]

[Nova: 256]

[Class 3: Locked]

General Skills

[Long-Range Identify: 355]

[Pristine Memories: 205]

[Pretty: 154]

[Bullet Time: 269]

[Oath of Elaine to Lyra: 300]

[Sentinel's Superiority: 355]

[Persistent Casting: 255]

[Learning: 340]

Chapter 197 - Journey to the center of Pallos II

We decided to spend some time - like an hour or so - resting up, everyone else topping their mana up and getting long, deep drinks out of the pool Ned purified.

We were still processing what happened, Lule’s death and Toke’s disappearance. Everyone was handling it in their own way. The dwarves were chatting a bunch about what had just happened.

"No. There’s no way the Sierra Obelisk fell." Fik gasped in disbelief as Glifir mentioned the dwarves’ tower falling.

"It’s true! When the stars were coming down, I saw it collapse."

"But it was in the middle of the city!" Ned cried out.

I glanced over. He was crying unashamedly,

"We also lost Lule, if that Elaine is to be believed."

There was some venom in his voice, but it wasn’t directed at me. Just, grief turning into anger.

"Peace Ned. Did it look like she had any mana when she came down? Her story is believable. She would have no reason to lie to us." Fik pointed out.

Ned just muttered unhappily into his beard, but seemed to accept it.

"No, what’s terrible is we don’t have her head. We can’t bury her properly." Fik said.

"Aye. Even if we manage to get back out, we’ll need to be all sorts of lucky to bury her under a sapling." Drin added, stroking his beard.

That was interesting. I didn’t know they buried dwarves under trees. An interesting take on reincarnation, and who knows? Maybe the great cycle of samsara recognized their actions, and put the soul of the departed into the tree for their next life.

Glifir snorted.

"If we manage to get out, we need to help the survivors. Everything was burning, and I doubt there’s anything larger than three stories standing. Every hand is needed for the living."

Some more nods of agreement, and more tears. I couldn’t blame them. If I’d seen the devastation that’d just been unleashed rained down on Remus, I’d be a tearful mess to boot. If I was stuck underground after such an event, knowing that I could heal thousands, but was unable to?

Yikes. I was starting to get an idea of just how shitty they must all be feeling. Everything just - gone. Their whole lives upended.

I was staying out of the conversation. I had nothing to add, nothing to say, no way to comfort them at the loss of everything they knew and loved. I was a stranger.

Instead, I was thoroughly cussing out Hunting. That Void-brained, goblin-faced, grouchy son of a slime had fucked me over so hard.

"Hey Hunting, can I get some time to Class up?" I’d asked him, but nooooooooooooo. No time for Sentinel Dawn to get a large power spike. Nope!

I pulled grumpy faces as I re-imagined the conversation.

"Classing up? Nope. I angry grouch. You follow me."

Ugh. In his defense, leaving quickly was probably needed to get the Formorians before they were able to grow and scatter, and it did let him check out the Queen’s bodies before they were eaten. And let me save the angel.

Still. I was pissed that I was sitting on my 256 class-up for my Radiance class, and was in completely the wrong place to do it.

My thoughts were rudely interrupted as everyone started to float - blasted Hebai must’ve reversed Gravity again - a reminder that while there were slimes down here that we could fight and run and generally contend with, there were still Guardians and a dragon fighting out there, and attacks had destroyed entire mountains. We were at the mercy of fate, praying that Lun’Kat wouldn’t try to body slam Galeru, who was coiled right above us.

The miles of rock would do nothing to stop her.

Heck, even without smashing the mountain, a strong enough attack could shake the entire mine, causing rocks to fall and everyone to die.

We were all more than a little unsettled at that, and it seemed to be time to leave. I checked my mana, noting that it was getting close to full, even as my stomach rumbled from the sheer hunger generating that much mana took.

Blah. I was going to need to move up food the priority list. So many things to juggle.

Speaking of juggling, I needed to do a check on what we had, and what we could do.

"Did anyone manage to grab any supplies on the way down?" I asked. I picked a moment where the silence and the grieving seemed to have gone on for some time, judging the moment to be breaking, but not intruding on, their grief.

It was a judgement call though, and for all I knew I’d flubbed it.

"The yaks had almost everything." Fik noted with a frown. "No idea what happened to them."

"I’ve got some snacks! Keep them on me for when I’m scouting all day and don’t have time to grab a bite. Do you need one?" Glifir mentioned, offering me a ration bar.

I could eat a whole yak, but I declined. Partly for the appearance of being the selfless leader, mostly because I knew I’d need it later. There was no sense in eating food now when we’d had a solid dinner, what, 6, 7 hours ago?

Given that the world had basically ended in that timeframe, it felt much longer.

"No thanks, we should save them for now. Unless Ned, you need a bite?" I asked him. Healing was hungry work - I knew it all too well - and Ned was probably feeling similar hunger pangs.

"I’m good for now, thanks." He said, as he forced himself to tear his eyes away from Glifir’s snack.

I also took a chance to drink, noting that the "puddle" was quite a bit deeper than a little trickle of water coming in would account for. Something to keep in mind.

While I waited for my mana to finish regenerating, I made a mediocre permanent image for [Dance with the Heavens] and [Persistent Casting], having lost the last one when I was falling down the mine shaft. It wasn’t great, but if we hit a pocket of bad air or something, I wouldn’t slowly fall asleep and die without noticing or being able to heal myself.

That’d be a humiliating way to go. "Here lies Elaine. Died from poison gas while full on mana."

I quickly checked over the condition of the rest of the dwarves. Drin was helpfully regrowing bits and pieces of his armor, and I’d eventually ask for some replacement pieces myself once everyone else was fully outfitted. I was down most of my pieces, but they belonged to the front-liners first, and not to the healer in the back.

"Right. Let’s head back. Glifir lead, then Fik, Ned, myself, and Drin in the rear. Let’s go!" I ordered.

"Hang on." Drin protested. "Fik and I should swap spots."

I eyed him for a second. I didn’t want to argue, nor did I want to get undermined. I quickly weighed my options, painfully reminded that Leadership had been one of my least favorite classes.

And I didn’t even have the Chain of Command. Namely, the chain I could beat people with when they didn’t follow my command - or at least that’s how Quintis referred to it. I was operating off of sheer force of will and momentum, because the leader is the person everyone thinks is the leader. No belief, no buy-in, no leader.

I didn’t have to be the leader, but any of the dwarves would get us all killed from what I’d seen. I liked staying alive, and I liked having more people able to keep watch while I slept.

Drin was the only pure fighter we had. Like Maximus, he had a class dedicated to fighting and to slowly working on armor - in his case, he could flat-out regrow his armor and other people’s armor, as well as wield Lightning stunning skills. When a fight came, he was in the front, and I’d seen what he could do to hellhounds. It was frankly unfair.

Fik was our other melee fighter, but he was a spell-axe. Instead of everything being physical, he was half-physical, half-magic, like Bluebeard - eerrr, Sentinel Hunting. Instead of Void magic, though, he had Gravity magic, which let him do all sorts of nonsense with moving stuff around.

In theory. I hadn’t seen giant applications in practice yet.

… I suppose, worse-case, I’d just team up with Fik or something and try to work my way out of the mine with just the two of us. Something to keep in the back of my head. My Oath only required me to wrangle suicidal idiots if they were actively injured.

However, end of the day, the two of them were almost interchangeable. Drin wanted to be swapped? Sure, they filled the same role of "be in front of everyone else."

"Fine. Fik, Drin, swap. Glifir, let’s go. We spent long enough getting ready, I want to try and get Toke." I said.

I didn’t say the part where I thought the odds of her being alive were slim, especially after all this time. Sure, it’d only been about an hour, but that was an eternity in monster-filled mines.

I kept [Shine] going, at a slightly stronger rate now that I wasn’t trying to get every drop of mana again.

"Slime!" Glifir yelled as he rounded a corner, and the rest of the dwarves tensed.

I kept walking forward, past Ned and Drin, and peeked around the corner.

Massive slime, stretching from wall to wall and floor to ceiling, chunks of dirt and metal floating in the gelatinous ooze. I quickly looked over it, but I wasn’t able to tell the slime’s core from the other chunks floating in it.

I fired a beam of Radiance at one promising looking chunk, slightly surprised at how large the beam ended up being. I focused, properly narrowing it down, and reminding myself that I’d increased my magic power and magic control by almost 50% in the last three hours or so.

However, I wasn’t going to be so lucky as to just hit the slime’s core in one go, not with how high level it was and with my luck.

The beam did pierce the slime and hit a floating bit of debris that I’d hoped was the core, but the only thing that happened was the slime slumped a bit as it filled in the part of its body that I’d vaporized.

I narrowed my eyes.

Fine then. We’re doing this the hard way.

I fired a few more quick Radiance beams, only to whiff on all of them before swapping gears. I used a cone of Radiance to hollow out a small hole in the slime, then followed it up with a [Nova].

It was hard to tell when it worked, but I swear [Sentinel’s Superiority] guided my timing, as the glowing ball made it right into the slime as the mass of it collapsed onto the [Nova], making the explosion extra-devastating inside the slime.

Chunks flew everywhere, and the slime seemed to quiver with rage. It inflated, then decompressed, shooting high-speed slime chunks and bits of unrefined ore at us.

I flared [Mantle of the Stars], and did a little heel-clicking jump and dance - purely mentally - as it FINALLY STOPPED AN ATTACK STONE-COLD.

I dropped the [Mantle] and used the same combo again, and again, working my way through the center of the slime. I had some slim hopes that I could slice it in half, but no such luck.

I was succeeding at reducing its bulk dramatically though, as not only did my Radiance beams utterly annihilate parts of the slime, but once [Nova] exploded inside the slime, it tore off large chunks, which landed on the floor, walls, ceiling, everywhere, wobbling like jello once it was separated from the slime’s core.

Mmmmm jello.

I was so hungry. I was regretting passing up on Glifir’s snacks. I’d ask him later.

I didn’t have infinite mana, and I wasn’t going to leave myself at zero again. When I had less than half of my mana left - "only" 100k, an obscene amount by anyone else’s standards - I stepped back, looking at the much-reduced slime.

It was now a chest-high cube-shaped slime. We were all short to boot, it’d be more like waist-high on Artemis.

"Drin. Fik. All you. Glifir. Check that nothing’s coming up on us." I ordered.

I didn’t say anything to Ned. As much as we were like oil and water, he would heal everyone, and I’d already pushed him somewhat.

"Watch the floor! It’s slippery!" Glifir reminded everyone, as he seemed to rapid-step past the slime, Mist rising from his footsteps.

Drin and Fik stepped up, and now that the slime wasn’t large enough to simply engulf and consume us all, it was easier. We stayed aware that the slime could still have some nasty tricks up its sleeve - which it did, trying to spray Drin with caustic goo when he got close - but Fik just redirected the spray elsewhere. Then a zap from Drin, a few cleaves from the pair, and the slime collapsed.

[*ding!* Your Party has slain a [Deep-Dwelling Slime (Ooze - 378)]]

[*ding!* [Shine] leveled up! 188 -> 189]

"Good work!" I said.

Drin was grinning.

"Aye. This is the way to do it! No more running from oversized sewer-cleaners!" Drin happily said.

I was eyeing the glops of slime that littered the hallway of this mine tunnel.

The only thing I could think was "chocolate pudding."

"Healer Ned?" I asked politely.

"What?" He semi-grumped back. Neatly handling the slime seemed to have won me a few brownie points.

"Can you try purifying a slime chunk? We should check if they’re edible." I said, with the straightest face I could manage.

He huffed, then got a sly grin as he pointed at a chunk.

"Try that one."

I’d bet money that he hadn’t purified it, but I wasn’t going to call him on it.

Welp. I was screwed either way.

I went over to the chunk, and tried to grab a handful, only for it to liquify more than before and ooze between my fingers, falling back to the ground.

I cupped my hands, and scooped up a chunk. I brought it to my face and tried to slurp it.

Bleargh. Wet dirt. Not mud - wet dirt.

It was terrible.

I managed to somehow keep a poker face, then "enthusiastically" drank the rest.

"Wow! You should try some!" I called out.

Not technically lying.

I was impressed. With how bad it was.

And he should try some.

Looking at me doubtfully, Ned tried a handful as well. A flash of disgust went over his face, before a broad grin and a wink my way.

"Glifir! Fik! Drin! You’ve gotta try this!" Ned called out to the rest of the dwarves.

Thinking about it - we were doing a lot of yelling. And sound was traveling through the mines.

Well, hopefully someone would hear us and come help.

Poor, trusting Glifir promptly tried some, but he gave up the game, retching at just how terrible it was. No matter how Ned and I tried to coax Fik and Drin, they wouldn’t try it - and Fik cut it short.

"We need to find Toke."

That sobered us up, and got us moving again, following Glifir. He’d point us to the next spot we needed to go to, then run as fast as he could, peeking down all the little side passages, expanding his map of the mine. I never knew when it’d come in handy.

Without additional hassle we made it back to where we’d fallen down the ventilation shaft. The only thing of note was another large scale shudder as something hit the earth hard enough for us to feel it. We also heard the sound of a collapsing shaft somewhere in the mountain. Drin verbalized a prayer of thanks that we survived.

It was a good thing I hadn’t tried to find the way back - all the shaking and rattling had shifted things enough that I no longer recognized them, and I would’ve walked right past this spot.

Glifir went to one knee as he started looking around, pinching dirt and rubbing it. Practically sniffing a spot or two.

I thought he might be playing it up for appearance sake, but if he got it done, he got it done.

"This way." He eventually said, pointing down one of the side-shafts, and we were off.

"How was she? Could you tell?" Drin asked.

Glifir hesitated a moment, then nodded.

"Being dragged." He said. "By several things with two feet."

Oh curses. My mental estimation of Toke just got revised to "possibly alive", which made me feel bad slightly goofing off with the slime food earlier.

Speaking of the slime food, we needed to do an after-action analysis on the fight we just had..

"Glifir, keep leading us. Everyone else. We’re going to do an after-action analysis on the fight we just had." I called out.

"Why?" Ned asked.

"So next time we kill it faster, and work better as a team." I retorted back.

"We’re completely helpless without Elaine." Fik noted. "None of us could touch it without her magic.

Drin gave me an over-the-shoulder look at that.

"You didn’t mention you were a mage." He said.

I gave him a dumbfounded look.

"You didn’t see me killing hellhounds last fight?" I asked after a moment.

He scratched his nose.

"Well, errr...." He said awkwardly.

I rubbed my eyes.

"This. This right here. This is why we do after-action analysis." I said, to Drin’s bashful nod and Fik’s curt agreement.

"Should’ve lured it around the corner!" Glifir yelled. "Given ourselves more room to work with!"

I smiled. This was exactly the type of analysis needed, and it was good to see someone getting into it.

"We should have an escape route ready if Elaine’s out of mana again." Drin pointed out.

"Should figure out how small the slime needs to be before we can physically kill it." Fik observed.

"Yeah, but we don’t have the time for proper experimenting, do we?" I countered.

"I felt useless most of the fight." Fik grumbled back.

"Then keep your eyes on a swivel so nothing sneaks up on us!" Glifir retorted.

"He’s got a point. There’s got to be more down here. A lot more." I observed.

"How do you figure?" Glifir asked, while Ned just muttered unhappily into his beard.

"Nothing exists alone. If there are slimes, they need to eat something. Whatever grabbed Toke also needs to eat, which means there’s at least something smaller in here."

I paused a moment, letting them digest that.

"There’s no way we’re going to be lucky enough that there’s nothing that eats them."

There was muttered agreement at that, and a strong "Aye!" from Drin.

I did some personal reflection on everything myself.

My physical stats had completely changed around. My strength had gone down, and my speed had increased.

I made a mental note that I needed to re-do my physical exercises as well. My strength and speed had wildly changed around, and I was faster, and didn’t hit as hard. A long reevaluation of my style was needed. Then again, my strength was falling further and further behind, especially when compared to the monsters I was up against, and I needed to consider that perhaps the time where I could use weapons for anything other than intimidation and creatures far, far below my level was coming to an end.

I was half in thought, half looking around when I heard a sharp twang come from ahead.

Chapter 198 - Journey to the center of Pallos III

There was a sharp twang, and a blur in front of me.

A sickening thwack occurred, and a weak cough from Glifir, a spray of blood.

"Glifir!" I shouted as I ran forward, Fik looking on stupidly while a connection formed between Ned and Glifir. Drin ran forward with me, and we arrived at the same time.

The light in Glifir’s eye was fading as he coughed weakly, hands moving slowly up, then slumping back down. There was a broad axe, almost as long as Glifir was wide, embedded horizontally in his chest, nearly bisecting him.

I grabbed him, flowing [Dance with the Heavens] through him, imagining blood and bone, muscle and sinew restitching together, and started to pull Glifir off the axe trap. Drin arrived a moment later, and together, with a strong yank and accompanying sickening squelch, we managed to get the axe out of his chest, my healing restoring his ruined chest as the axe left.

I suppose Ned’s healing was also helping, but between an unknown efficiency factor in what I was doing, and an unknown ratio of human to dwarf healing, I had no idea how much was me, and how much was Ned. It didn’t really matter in the end.

With an open mouth and glassy eyes, Glifir patted his chest.

"I’m… alive. I’m alive. I’m alive!" Glifir shouted, without a care in the world for who or what could hear us.

"Yeah, you’re alive!" I cheerfully told him. Wasn’t the first time I’d handled someone being slightly off after I’d yanked them away from certain death.

[*Ding!* [Oath of Elaine to Lyra] leveled up! 300 -> 301]

Being a healer was awesome!

"This had to be made by someone with skills." Fik said, and I half-jumped, having completely missed him moving up closer. "See, look, the whole thing’s made out of stone. There’s no way to get tension in it, not without there being a skill involved."

I looked at the trap, but "How to build traps while stuck a mile underground" hadn’t been one of my Ranger Academy courses. I was inclined to believe Fik, it wasn’t like he constantly made bold claims out of nowhere.

"Whatever took Toke is smart." Drin said, to Ned’s eyeroll.

"A goblin could’ve made that trap. It’s not exactly elaborate." Ned crossed his arms as he told us.

"Footprints are too big to be goblins though." Glifir pointed out.

[*Ding!* [Learning] leveled up! 340 -> 341]

I had no idea where these levels were coming from, but I wasn’t going to complain or look too hard at it. Maybe I was on the edge for some of them?

"All this talk is great, but we should keep going. Glifir, how are you on spotting traps?" I asked him.

An awkward look passed his face.

"Umm. I can make traps no problem. I’ve never needed to spot them though. I should be fine though." Glifir said, awkwardly scratching his head.

I gave it a moment’s thought, then shook my head.

"I should be in the lead. As long as I have mana, I’m hard to kill. When we get to an intersection or something, you tell us where to go. That should give you a bit more time to scout the side passages, and make sure nothing’s sneaking up on us."

"But I can’t let you take the lead!" Glifir protested.

Ooooh, that got my hackles right up.

"Can’t? Can’t!?" I yelled at him, channeling some of my "Drill Sergeant Sentinel with Ranger Trainees" experience. "Which way?" I demanded, fire and venom in my voice.

‘Can’t let me’ my ass.

Glifir exchanged looks with Drin, but said nothing. I narrowed my eyes, and stomped off in the direction we had been going, leaving the rest of the dwarves to catch up.

I spent a moment reflecting on the axe that had nearly chopped Glifir in half. My strength wasn’t exactly my strong suit, and I needed to be able to deal with weapons embedded that deeply in other people.

Or did I?

My train of thought was interrupted as I reached the next branching intersection, where I stopped and waited. I wasn’t entirely enraged to the point where I’d do terminally stupid stuff, like randomly pick paths when I couldn’t follow the trail.

"Which way?" I demanded of Glifir when he caught up with the rest of the dwarves.

He quickly looked down both paths, checking arcane stuff that only a [Tracker] could see, before pointing down one.

"This one but-"

I ignored him as I swept by, making sure there was enough of a lead between me and the remaining dwarves, just in case there was a problem.

I went back to reflecting on my axe problem. On one hand, I had basically nothing for massive weapons embedded into people. On the other, that was a fairly niche problem, given that people with oversized weapons replacing their respiratory tract tended to have short lifespans.

Two hallways later, my musings were interrupted by coarse webs firing out of the walls, fired too fast for me to react without [Bullet Time].

Which never activated, given that the trap was entirely non-lethal. It just wrapped me up in sticky webbing, and hoisted me feet-first into the air.

The rest of the dwarves turned the corner, and Glifir rushed over, concerned, while Fik and Drin lost their shit laughing at me. Ned just smirked.

I grinned back, as the blood rushed to my head.

"Mind giving me a hand here? I’m a little tied up." I said, punny inspiration striking.

Fik groaned and mocked an arrow striking him, while Drin teased back.

"I should add spider webbing to my arsenal, for when zapping uppity healers doesn’t work."

I stuck my tongue out at him as Glifir cut me down, carefully making sure I didn’t hit my head on the way down. The spider webbing idea of Drin’s was a good one though.

I probably could’ve burned the spiderweb away, but why spend the mana? I was using lots in rapid succession, and I was already ravenous. No need to blow mana needlessly, not when I had a team to do the same for me.

I stood back up, picking off the strands of spider silk and trying to shake them off my hands as each one was a persistent bastard, who refused to leave.

Glifir and Fik gave me a hand.

"You know." I said conversationally. "This probably means we can add spiders to the list of creatures down here."

Fik looked at the strand he had in his hands, and furiously wiped them on the side of the shaft.

He didn’t help too much with the rest of the clean up.

The next blasted hallway had a sharp rock on a stick swing at me like a club. [Bullet Time] activated, and I threw up [Mantle] as I danced backwards. [Mantle] managed to hold the trap for a second before breaking - but that was more than enough time. I was long gone, and grinned as the trap vibrated in an impotent manner.

I couldn’t resist sticking my tongue out at it before the rest of the dwarves caught up and managed to see it. I had this trap thing down!

I hadn’t seen enough traps to fully flesh out the theory, but there was a chance that they were hunting traps. The axe trap had been kinda overkill, but other two traps seemed to be sized-up versions of game and hunting traps I had some basic knowledge of. Food wasn’t exactly dropping from the sky here, and whoever was down here needed to eat.

The halls continued to rumble, with all of us being pressed into the ground twice, and launched into the ceiling once. "Aggravating" didn’t start to cover it, although I was glad it was Hebai’s Gravity attacks that were being obnoxious, and not one of Yurok’s attacks filling the halls with poisoned gas or something.

Up and down, left and right, corkscrews and ramps, we traveled through the mines. If there was an architect, some grand overseer seeing the planning of how the mines were excavated, they were quite mad.

No, more likely that it was just some sort of free for all, with each dwarf having done their own thing.

Three hallways later, and I sprung another trap. [Bullet Time] activated as a hidden stone axe, comically large, sliced towards my neck. I threw up a [Mantle of the Stars] in front of me, starting to grin as it stopped the trap stone cold.

Only to feel the bite of a second axe from behind sink into my neck, slicing through my spinal column, paralyzing and crippling my body. It continued, in slow motion, at high speed, cutting through my carotid arteries, my windpipe, and the rest of my neck, as I desperately tried to heal and reattach my head to the rest of my body. I wanted to frantically claw at it, to scream the fear out. I couldn’t move, I couldn’t scream. I could only be aware of the steadily slicing axe killing me. I was crippled, and my vocal cords had been cut in half.

The axe was too large, and continued to interfere, even as my new enhancement from classing up and improving [Dance with the Heavens] to get rid of foreign objects started to chew through the material.

Then I was flying, up towards the ceiling, spinning in such a way that I could see a headless body, dressed in a mismatch of Sentinel gear, collapse to the ground, blood spurting out in great gouts as my heart continued to pump, having never gotten the message that the head was gone.

My healing kicked in, and with a shudder and a tiny pop, I regrew my entire body in a single go. There was no slow, gradual regrowing, just matter instantaneously being recreated. A small shiver went through me, as hundreds of thousands of nerves reconnected in a single moment, flooding my mind with foreign, yet familiar, sensations.

Physics got slightly confused at this, as my head was going in one direction, then suddenly a bunch of extra mass was added on, but contrived to cause as much annoyance as possible. I slammed into the ceiling, cracking my head against the hard stone, then fell back to the floor with an ungainly splat.

I mentally cursed as my face landed in blood, and the rest of my body crashed into the hard, unyielding stone. My old body continued to exsanguinate, baptizing the new one in hot spurts of life’s most vital substance. Being on my stomach was super uncomfortable, and I rolled over, getting blood in my hair, panting as I stared at the ceiling.

That had been way too close.

[*Ding!* Congratulations! [The Dawn Sentinel] has leveled up to level 355->357! +3 Dexterity, +24 Speed, +24 Vitality, +170 Mana, +170 Mana Regen, +48 Magic power, +48 Magic Control from your Class per level! +1 Free Stat for being Human per level! +1 Mana, +1 Mana Regen from your Element per level!]

[*Ding!* [Celestial Affinity] leveled up! 355 -> 357]

[*Ding!* [Center of the Universe] leveled up! 355 -> 357]

[*Ding!* [Dance with the Heavens] leveled up! 355 -> 357]

[*Ding!* [Sentinel's Superiority] leveled up! 355 -> 357]

[*Ding!* [Long-Range Identify] leveled up! 355 -> 357]

I checked my mana, only to see I still had tens of thousands of points left, having burned through some 80k points of mana for that particular stunt. I could totally improve that with a better image, and getting a good image back into my [Persistent Casting] was now high on my to-do list.

Also.

I’d survived being decapitated!

Down in the rapidly expanding pool of blood, I couldn’t help myself. I lifted my hands above my head, deeper into the pool, and yelled.

"I did it! I survived a beheading! Headless Elaine - total victory! Woohooooooooo!" I howled my victory into the air, down the hallways as loudly as I could, kicking my feet in excitement.

As long as I had mana, I was going to be super hard to kill. I already knew that, but now I knew it.

Voices came to me.

"Whoa, whoa, WHOA! That did NOT just happen!" Fik yelled.

"That happened. That really happened. Pinch me, this has got to be the most elaborate dream I’ve ever had. Between the dragon, and the battle, and everything burning down, and now Elaine surviving that? Dream. Only explanation." Drin muttered to himself, like a man possessed.

I didn’t see who hit him, but I heard the smack.

"Argh! Son of a goat-fucker, that hurt!" Drin cried out. "This is the worst dream ever. I even get hurt in it."

Another smacking noise.

"I didn’t ask you to keep going!"

"We should check that she’s ok." Glifir said, which brought the pitter-patter of dwarf feet running on stone to my ears.

"Elaine? Elaine!" The dwarves were calling out, and four concerned faces popped up around me.

I lazily waved a hand above me in confirmation that I could hear them.

"I’m ok. Just need a moment." I lazily said, continuing to just stare somewhat vacantly at the ceiling.

After a moment I blinked, groaned and rolled over, getting back up, naked as the day I was born. I looked at my old body, and at myself.

"This is going to take a few minutes." I said, grabbing and dragging my old body back. I started to strip it, feeling more than a little uncomfortable with the process. Not only did it feel like I was robbing the dead, but it was my body. Well most of my body, without the head and all.

Robbing the dead took on strange flavors when it was my own dead body I was robbing. Just. Extra-squick.

I let a cold pragmatism take over, along with a desire not to trapeze along down the cold mines completely naked, as I continued to undress my unmoving body.

Never really knew my back looked like that.

Bonus - all my clothes, gear, everything was now soaked in blood. Yaaaay me.

The dwarves continued to be utterly incredulous in the background. A real peanut gallery.

"Her whole body. One instant." Ned was muttering to himself, like a man possessed. He wasn’t the only one.

I finished stripping the body and realized I was missing something.

My pendant. The one from mom.

I dropped to my knees, before starting to search through the pool of blood, trying to find it. It had been around my neck, and given my old neck’s current inability to hold anything, it wouldn’t surprise me if it had fallen off.

"Whatcha looking for?" Glifir asked me, peering over my shoulder, poking me a bit as if to check that, yes, I was real and he wasn’t hallucinating.

"A pendant. From my mom. It’s good luck." I said, smarting up a bit, and making my fingers into rakes, running them through the ever-expanding pool.

A bloody, tear-dropped shape emerged from the pool, and floated over.

"This it?" Fik asked.

I didn’t need to see him to know he was grinning, his great bushy beard split.

I found some running water and gave the stone a quick rinse, my pendant emerging from it.

"Yes!" I said, throwing my arms around him.

Or tried to anyways. I was rudely halted mid-air as Fik jumped back, laughing.

"Now now, none of that. Get clean and clothed first." He said, pointing at my pile of gear.

I flushed. Yeah, I wouldn’t want to be hugged by the naked bloody mostly-stranger either.

There was something to be said for giving the clothes a quick rinse in one of the water puddles, but we were also going to drink from them at some point. Also, we’d spent enough time here. There was enough urgency to finding Toke that said "don’t spend 15 minutes washing clothes." I did quickly dip and wring them, to get the worst of it out.

Although, waiting 15 minutes would get me enough mana to survive a second decapitation. I was starting to become a real powerhouse - while I had mana.

I started to put on the blood-soaked clothes, wincing as the freezing-cold blood was pressed against my flesh. I had regrets about rinsing them quickly.

Tunic: 8/10.

Tunic drenched in cold blood: 1/10.

It didn’t even get me a [Pretty] level!

Still, as I finished getting my clothes and armor back on, I couldn’t help but think:

This totally gave new meaning to "Axe body spray."

[Name: Elaine]

[Race: Human]

[Age: 19]

[Mana: 32584/242710]

[Mana Regen: 219805 (+155334.4)]

Stats

[Free Stats: 103]

[Strength: 273]

[Dexterity: 503]

[Vitality: 3424]

[Speed: 3424]

[Mana: 24271]

[Mana Regeneration: 24271 (+15533.44)]

[Magic Power: 10081 (+151719.05)]

[Magic Control: 10081 (+151719.05)]

[Class 1: [The Dawn Sentinel - Celestial: Lv 357]]

[Celestial Affinity: 357]

[Cosmic Presence: 269]

[Solar Infusion: 140]

[Center of the Universe: 357]

[Dance with the Heavens: 357]

[Wheel of Sun and Moon: 311]

[Mantle of the Stars: 315]

[Sunrise: 128]

[Class 2: [Ranger-Mage - Radiance: Lv 256]+]

[Radiance Affinity: 256]

[Radiance Resistance: 256]

[Radiance Conjuration: 256]

[Shine: 189]

[Sun-Kissed: 256]

[Blaze: 256]

[Talaria: 256]

[Nova: 256]

[Class 3: Locked]

General Skills

[Long-Range Identify: 357]

[Pristine Memories: 205]

[Pretty: 154]

[Bullet Time: 269]

[Oath of Elaine to Lyra: 301]

[Sentinel's Superiority: 357]

[Persistent Casting: 255]

[Learning: 341]

Chapter 199- Journey to the center of Pallos IV

I took a moment to reorient myself in the mines. We’d come from that direction, and were going in that other direction. Right.

I glanced at my stripped, headless former body. It felt all sorts of wrong to just leave it. On a deep, fundamental level it was like leaving the dead unburied. On a more practical note, it could attract predators, and put them on their trail.

Put them on my trail, and they’d know exactly how tasty I was.

"Anyone got ideas for how to handle…" I gestured to what I was trying hard to not think of as "my body."

There was no way in hell that I’d consider eating my own body. I wasn’t Ponticus from Perinthus, who happily ate his own fingers. That was fifty levels of NOPE NOPE NOPE.

Never-ever NOPE.

I’d seriously consider violating [Oath] if any of the dwarves suggested it.

Burning lethal holes in a body - my body - was easy mode, especially now that it was no longer System-enhanced.

Shouldn’t be System-enhanced. It’d be all sorts of weird and creepy if the System still considered it part of me, and I’d be faced with some really uncomfortable questions.

It was a different matter entirely to try and burn away the WHOLE body though. Cooking, yes. Vaporizing, no.

There was some awkward silence, and dozens of glances exchanged. For as chatty as the dwarves were when I’d initially been decapitated, they were lost for words when it came to the practicality of cleaning up. Everything rumbled, some rocks and dust falling from the ceiling. The sanguine pool had ripples going through it, and a tiny wave. That seemed to break the silence, and Ned spoke up.

"You just regenerated. Your entire body. In one go." He said, with a strange, halting flow.

I was half-annoyed that the topic wasn’t being addressed, half smug-pleased. Especially because it was Ned, who’d been a huge pain. Well, I’d shown him up before, and now I’d irrefutably shown him up forever more.

I decided to let smug-pleased win, and preened a bit.

"Yup! All in a day’s work! Only took about a third of my mana pool to do so." I said, immensely enjoying dropping the bombshell on them.

After that particular revelation, I had no fear of flies, not with four flycatchers out and about. I gave them a few minutes of stunned silence, before realizing my usual trick of closing mouths with a finger on the chin wouldn’t work here.

Their beards were too big and bushy.

Finally, Fik broke the silence.

"I could try to build a small cairn, but I don’t have enough mana to do it in one go. You might be able to regrow your entire body in a second, but, uh, I don’t quite have that much mana." Fik said, somewhat stupidly.

That seemed odd to me, even as a Spell-axe, even with a lower tier class, he should have enough. Then again - a cairn sounded like a LOT of mana, and we didn’t exactly have much to spare.

I decided to interpret his answer as "it’d be a bad idea to use that much mana" not "I magically can’t."

I made a decision, the only one I could.

"Right, let’s move on." I said, briefly looking at the blood, thinking about jumping over it, but figuring that the ceiling was too low for a proper jump. Seeing no other option, I walked through the kiddie-sized pool of blood, hearing the slosh-slosh of blood around my ankles.

I heard some minor arguing behind me, and I glanced over my shoulder to see what was going on.

"Come on Fik! It’ll only take a minute." Drin implored Fik.

I paused on the other side, curious what would only take a minute.

"Elaine made it through just fine!" Fik protested back.

"Yeah, but I don’t want to be wringing blood out of my socks. No offense." Drin said, glancing at me, catching my eye.

"Work work work." Fik muttered, as he gestured.

I quietly cursed to myself as I saw Fik carefully putting some stepping stones down.

Right, that totally would’ve been an option. Not sure why Fik had delayed crossing himself if he didn’t want to put rocks down, but eh. I wasn’t going to try to delve into his mind.

It took a few minutes for Glifir to pick up the trail again, and I hesitated. My mana was regenerating at a good clip, but I didn’t have enough to repeat that stunt.

However, time was ticking, and as Glifir picked the trail back up, I confidently led the way. The amount of mana I needed to use to heal myself was directly related to how much mass I needed to restore and the quality of my image. If I just healed my torso, and left stubs for my arms and legs - "scarred over" - I’d be fine.

Probably.

I was willing to risk probably.

Behind me, the dwarves were furiously whispering, and over all the other chittering, clicking, dripping, and new banging noises, I heard some of their conversation.

"She really just…"

The rest trailed off, but I could imagine the gestures.

"Yeah, she did."

"Ned, could you do that?"

Dead silence.

"No." He reluctantly admitted. "Not even close."

I refrained from pumping my fist. I’d wanted to prove who the better healer was, and, well.

Superiority shown. Dominance established. Not only that, but he’d been asked twice. And said it twice.

I just needed him to do it a third time. There was something special, something magical, about Ned being forced to confirm I was the best three times.

"She didn’t even take a break, think she can do it again?"

"No. That’d be insane."

"I totally can do it again!" I yelled over my shoulder.

I couldn’t help it. I strutted down the latest hallway, only for the cruel gods in the sky above to remind me that I was a puny mortal.

The passage we were in shook, like a god had descended to Pallos, picked up the planet, and shook it like a snowglobe. I bounced off of walls and ceilings and floors, with no idea which one was which. Bones broke only to be immediately reformed, and an eternity, seconds, later, it stopped.

I got up and shook my head. I then turned around, and sprinted to where the dwarves were, cursing that I’d made [Wheel of Sun and Moon] depend on being able to see the sky. Totally useless down here.

I glanced at my mana to see that… I had more mana than when I’d checked after the decapitation. My regeneration was simply insane, but I was starving. Needed to find some food soon. Should ask Glifir for a snack real soon.

I got to the dwarves, only to see them groaning and picking themselves up off the ground, Ned looking like he’d salvaged some of his wounded pride.

"We’re all good here." He told me.

I glanced at the dwarves getting up, and shrugged.

"Right then!" I said, only to hear the steadily increasing roar of water.

"Brace!" Drin yelled, grabbing onto me and Glifir. Fik and Ned grabbed onto each other, and I managed to link hands with Glifir as a small wave of water rounded the corner, and kinda pathetically crashed into us. I’d happily jumped into bigger waves in Remus, when I’d had some downtime.

I eyed the receding water, flowing around us, and slowly put the pieces together.

Mines. A complex interlocking system, of shafts going gods-knows-where and collapsed passages goddesses-knows-where. Water flowing down and filling up where it can, only for a massive jolt to shake everything loose. Something had broken a water reservoir, and it’d come crashing down, only for the speed and momentum to rapidly bleed out as it needed to turn corners and fill endlessly branching tunnels with water.

"Any chance of getting tracks out of this?" I hopelessly asked Glifir. I figured it was worth checking.

I got an "Are you stupid?" look back.

"With all due respect, no." Glifir said. "However, we can keep following the direction, and hope."

"Your snacks are still dry, right?" I asked, failing to keep the longing and desire out of my voice.

We weren’t running anymore, or even jogging. No, wading through water, as it made [Shine] dance and reflect in crazy ways across the hallways, was the order of the day. It was currently waist-high, but that wasn’t saying much on me. It was also draining fairly rapidly, to gods-knows-where.

A hallway and a killed slime later, I eyed a collapsed rockfall trap, grateful that whatever force had shaked us to the bone had also shaken the traps loose. Made our job easier.

I wasn’t going to assume they’d all been sprung, but I was going to boldly assume that water was not part of a trap, and that it would probably hinder whatever traps would go off.

I could imagine a trap that was faster in water than in air. I couldn’t imagine whoever was setting these traps would anticipate all the tunnels getting half-flooded and having the traps that were laid ready to be faster under water than above.

I climbed up the pile of rocks, and half-crawled along them, the ceiling pressing above, to get to the other side. Of course, as soon as I landed and cursed the intractable mud that the dust and the water inevitably made all over me, I was called.

"Hey! Over here!" Glifir yelled.

"Do you need me?" I called back, hoping the answer was no.

"You should really see this!" Drin added in. Welp, back up and over I go. At least I was out of the water for some time.

A hop, a skip, and a jump later, and I was staring at a pillar of ice. While we couldn’t see the ends, it was clear that it continued far on up above us - and well on down below.

Fik let out a low whistle.

"I don’t want to see whatever creature can make that." He told us.

I looked at him like he was an idiot.

"We probably did?" I said in a tone that tried, but failed, to not be patronizing.

He had the good grace to look embarrassed.

"That was cold." Glifir said, giving me a grin. Fik and Ned joined each other in groaning at the bad pun.

Still. I didn’t think I’d seen whatever used Ice - so the Guardian must be firing them from such a distance, that the System didn’t even give a presence notification. I’m not sure how I felt about that.

I crawled back over the rocks, and froze.

"Halt!" I yelled, and madly scrambled back over the pile.

"Drin! Shield! Fik! Get our other side! Glifir! Ned! Center!" I barked out orders. "Watch the walls!"

I don’t know if it was my tone, how long they’d been letting me be in charge, or the decapitation stunt - but they all snapped into position.

"What are we watching for?" Drin asked, eyes nervously darting around.

"I’m not entirely sure." I replied. "But when I went over initially, it was just a tunnel. Now it’s an intersection, and something just made a new crossing tunnel, perfectly smooth and steeply angled. I don’t know what’s worse - if it was digging deeper, or something from deep below trying to escape."

I’d had enough making dumb assumptions. I was now assuming that under our feet were beasts and monsters of all levels, and creatures as strong as the guardians we’d seen were resting below our feet, willing to burst out if we dug too deeply.

I wanted out.

"Nothing that can move that much rock that easily is low level." Ned said, to nods of agreement.

"Heck, even if it doesn’t want to eat us, just trying to go through us like it goes through stone would be more than enough." Glifir nervously added.

"Unless it’s a skill to eat stone." I said, which had a few shoulders stupidly relax some of their tension.

After a few minutes of us ready for the walls to explode and a rock-eating monster of some sort to menace us, and nothing of the sort happening, we relaxed.

"Well. Better safe than sorry." Ned said, to general nodding all around.

My legs were freezing. The mines started off cold, it was winter, the water was cold, and the pillar of ice was probably chilling everything even more. As long as I was moving, I didn’t notice it too much, but standing still was doing me no favors.

We climbed back over the wall, and water was backfilling here as well. We all paused in solemn contemplation as a face-down body floated along the current towards us. Ned waded over and flipped the body over, revealing a blue-faced dwarf, who was very dead.

Marks of violence were all over his body, his metal armor dented and broken in a dozen places, with a large gash in his chest indicating likely the fatal injury.

"Those aren’t monster marks." I said, pointing out the obvious.

"Orcs." Fik spat, which had me glaring at him.

"Oi!" I shouted at him.

"What!? Orcs suck!" He grouched back.

"We all need to stand in the water you just spat in! That’s gross!" I complained back at him.

I was ignoring the fact that I’d created pools of blood for everyone else to wade through.

"Orcs are the worst. Brutal savages, who love nothing more than to plunder and raid." Drin said, spitting into the water.

Honestly. No manners among any of the dwarves.

"We keep beating them back, but they’re like cockroaches. They’re impossible to exterminate, and when there’s one, there’s a dozen more. No true dwarf can stand their presence. They’re a stupid, savage lot." Glifir added.

Ned just spat three times. I assumed that was once for the rest of us.

"I have a woodchip mural of our champion slaying dozens of orcs in my home." Ned said, swelling with pride.

Ah. That might’ve been the ugly-as-sin creature on Briga’s desk, the one I couldn’t figure out. For all the "we hate them", they sure made a lot of artwork of the people.

At the same time, the dwarves seemed to be spewing a lot of standard "anti-other" propaganda. I’d heard "Uncivilized savages, good only for extermination" before, and it wasn’t exactly in a positive context - or a correct one.

"I bet the traps were made by them." Fik said with disdain.

I’d need to make my own judgement, but anyone with the ingenuity to create the wide variety of traps and snares I’d seen was getting some high marks from me. They were leagues above goblins, and goblins already had enough sentience to give my [Oath] problems. I’d want to chat with an orc if I could, just to get the other side of the story.

"It’d be just like those brutes to not fight honorably." He continued. Fortunately, not spitting this time.

No. Noooooooooooooooooo.

The dwarves had notions of "honor" and "fair play" in fights.

Nooooooooooooo.

We were totally doomed.

Chapter 200 - Journey to the center of Pallos V

In spite of the new lows I associated my dwarven companions with, we carried on. What else was there to do?

I kept wandering through hallways, picking intersections at random, while the dwarves tried to keep up enough to stay within the radius of my [Shine], no other light making it down here.

Which is why when I saw dim flickering flames, I instinctively held my hand up in a fist, Ranger hand-speak for "halt" as I extinguished my [Shine].

"What did you do that for?" Ned complained as he waded up next to me, the sloshing of the other three dwarves giving away their position.

Of course, my instinctive use of Ranger-hand speak meant nothing to the dwarves, although I glared at him in the dark. Not that he could see me.

"Shhh!" I said, futility pointing at the flickering light, cursing the inexperience and inability of these supposedly high-level dwarves.

Sure, they fought decently well, but the moment they were outside their "normal lane", they did dumb shit all over the place. Like talk loudly when I’d just tried to get us into stealth mode.

"Lights over there." Drin hissed to Ned.

Ok, fine, maybe it was just Ned that was a dumbass.

"Glifir, can you check it out? Quietly?" I whispered to him.

"I’m not Glifir, I’m Fik." Fik replied, barely moving his mouth.

Whoops. Wrong hairy dwarf ear when I’d just turned off the lights.

"Glifir!" I whispered into the right hairy ear. "Can you check out that light?" I said, pointing.

"Yeah, but not without them seeing me." He said.

I weighed my options, as I saw the light start to rapidly brighten.

"Retreat! On me. We want as much distance as possible." I said, calling it out a bit louder. Whoever they were might hear us, but that was the price we paid for good communication.

At this point, it wasn’t like they didn’t know we were here. My [Shine] was just as obvious to them, as their torchlight was to us. I also heard some low voices, coming from a throat I’d never heard before. Not exactly an encouraging start.

We waded backwards through the knee-deep water, fortunately draining. We made it to the end of the tunnel, where it branched again, and waited.

I took a kneeling position, the water sloshing around me, but the rest of the dwarves stayed standing, weapons in hand, shields out in front. Drin had managed to re-armor almost everyone, although Ned still lacked a few pieces, and I hadn’t gotten anything yet. Our fearless frontliners, Drin and Fik, stepped forward, shoulder to shoulder. I could see Drin’s shield starting to crackle with Lightning, and Fik was getting some pebbles ready. Glifir was conjuring up Ice knives and letting them float in the water next to him, preparing to throw them.

Being in the tunnels was cramping his style. Hard to sneak around people and fade into Mist when there was nowhere to fade to.

"Wait for my command." I whispered to them, seeing four heads slowly nod back.

We spent a terse moment waiting, as the torchlight grew brighter and brighter. My stomach gurgled, trumpeting our presence and location, and complaining that it’d never been fed. Then they stepped round the corner.

They were four brutish hulks, humanoid, with dark red skin and sharp tusks sticking up from their lower jaws. The tunnels were just a hair too short for them, and they needed to bend their heads to be able to move comfortably around.

Even then, I saw the third one bump his head on the irregular ceiling.

Probably the mentioned orcs.

The only defining features I saw was the one in the lead carried a long stone quarterstaff, and the one that’d bumped his head had a flame on his shoulder, following like a faithful dog.

Right. Wood might be valuable down here, and skills were infinitely preferable as a light source.

With a roar, the dwarves next to me exploded forward, bellowing warcries. I mentally facepalmed at them completely and totally ignoring the "wait for my orders" part, and rolled with the new situation

All the yelling made hiding in the dark completely useless, and killed any advantage of surprise we might’ve gotten. With deep, guttural noises, sounding like barks, the orcs carefully retreated back down the hall.

Not before I was able to get a [Long-Range Identify] off.

Two [Warrior]s, two [Mage]s. Levels 350 to 400.

"Back! Back!" I yelled, only to be completely ignored. I sighed.

I threw up a [Mantle of the Stars] at the edge of my range, just barely managing to catch Fik and Drin.

Fik halted at the barrier, but Drin tried to plow through it. Fortunately for me, he wasn’t able to get a lot of speed, thanks to the water slowing him down, but it did take a chunk of mana.

A chunk of mana that I didn’t have to spare.

The orcs vanished back around the corner, and the flickering flame they were using was either extinguished or concealed. I let a light [Shine] come off of me, so we could see, and not have to suffer in absolute darkness.

"Fall back! Follow me!" I yelled, not caring that the orcs could hear me.

"But we need to-" Drin started to protest.

I cut him off before he could get going.

"You need to follow my orders." I said, my tone brokering no argument. "They know the area. We don’t. We didn’t even know if they were hostile to begin with! After seeing you lot try to murder them though, they are now." I said, glaring at them.

"I expected you to shoot them or something! You’re a mage, right?" Fik complained to me.

I glared at him, but didn’t want to reveal [Oath], and how it limited me to self-defense and protecting patients.

I needed the orcs to attack first. Given the lack of attachment I had with the dwarves, I’d be hard-pressed to justify them as patients that needed defending, not until they started to get injured.

Then I could fire at will.

But again, I wasn’t going to start shouting it from the rooftops.

"We didn’t know they were hostile." I repeated myself, emphasizing every word with a fist smacked into my open palm.

Drin started to protest, as a funny smell reached me. I sniffed, trying to identify it.

[Bullet Time] activated, as a massive, flaming glow came from around the corner.

"DOWN!" I tried to yell as I put up [Mantle] as a wall, while trying to dive into the water.

The words felt like they were taking an eternity to leave my mouth. The flames would reach us before I’d finished talking.

[Bullet Time] was giving me way too much time to reflect.

Once upon a time, I’d grabbed Fire as my element for my [Mage] class. Maximus and I had many long chats about Fire, and how it wasn’t a particularly good element for a mage.

Not until it was paired with another element.

With that being said, I was seeing exactly what Fire paired with a second element could do. In this case, their mage had filled the tunnels with Spore, Miasma, or something else, then lit the fuse.

Causing the roaring explosion heading towards us.

It was extra-nasty in the tunnels, since the explosion was well-contained and well-directed towards us, instead of being more dispersed.

The last thought I had before the explosion ripped through my shield and washed over us was that the orcs seemed well-prepared for fighting in tunnels.

Then with a mighty boom, the explosion and pressure wave washed over us, churning and splashing water, pressure making my teeth rattle so hard I bit part of my tongue off, flesh cooking and searing in the heat.

My skin blistered under the heat, only for my body to immediately reabsorb it as I healed through the damage. Water swirled, picking me up for the ride, twisting and turning me so much that I no longer knew which way was up.

Then it was over, gravity reminded me which way was down, and I was once more unceremoniously dumped on the floor, where I flipped myself up as water rained down around me. One of Glifir’s knives inserted itself into my shoulder, and I wrenched it out with a curse.

His bloody prep ended up turning itself against us. However, in his defense, I would’ve never imagined things going like this, so I wasn’t going to hold it against him. A good reminder that no plan survives contact with the enemy.

"Trying to blow me up" firmly put them into "self-defense" territory though, and I was weapons-free.

The rest of the dwarves were picking themselves up off the ground, a bleeding gash on Drin slowly closing at the same time Fik’s arm with too many elbows was getting righted.

Ok, fine, Ned was at least solid at being able to keep his teammates up.

We were regrouping as the orcs charged around the corner, looking annoyingly healthy and hale for the stunt they’d just pulled on us. The warrior with the quarterstaff charged at us, while the second one reached his arms out, one hand on either wall. I wasn’t sure what he was up to, but I didn’t want to find out.

Our frontline charged in tandem, and I was forced to flare [Mantle] to stop a high speed rock - one of Artemis’s favorite tricks, and clearly it was good enough to cross species - from braining me. A second shot headed my way, and I continued to play "whack-a-mole" with fired rocks, keeping Ned and Glifir safe.

The occasional shot headed towards Fik, but when it got too close it either curved away from him, or got redirected to the charging orc with a quarterstaff, where the stone seemed to just glue itself to him.

Fights where multiple people could manipulate the same object, from [Earth Manipulation] to [Gravity Manipulation] to whatever the orc was using, got weird fast. Basically, whoever was closest to the object usually had the best "grip" on it, but then stuff like magic power and magic control came into effect and -

This was not the time.

I probably could’ve erected a full shield, but that would’ve cut the three backliners out from the fight, and we weren’t going to leave Drin and Fik by themselves, 2v4. That would be all sorts of dumb.

Glifir started throwing knives, but dwarvish arms came nowhere close to the speed and volume a mage could produce. He was totally out of his element here, but was undeniably helping.

I made a bright cone of [Shine], aiming at the orc’s eyes. I then rapidly cycled it between bright and dim, and tied it off with [Persistent Casting]. A flashing strobe made vision hell, strong utility. Blinding people was one of my favorite tricks.

I tried to move, so they couldn’t just shoot rocks at where I’d have been, only to feel a strong yank on my feet. I looked down, and swore.

Whatever mage was throwing rocks had more tricks, and stone hands had come up from the ground, grabbing my legs, preventing me from moving. I pulled, but I wasn’t nearly strong enough to rip my leg out from the trap.

"Glifir! I’m trapped!" I yelled, hoping that he’d be able to get me out of this mess.

I wasn’t going to stand there helplessly. At the same time that I was calling for help, I threw a [Nova] their way. I was too far to try and brain the mages with Radiance, but I figured [Nova] would keep them on their toes.

I then fired a beam of Radiance at the charging warrior’s head, who roared at me. His mouth was full of broken teeth, with bits of rotting meat stuck between them. He continued to twirl his quarterstaff one-handed, as the other hand reached up and grabbed the ceiling, grabbing a chunk of stone that became a stone helmet as he slammed it onto his head.

I wasn’t going to lie. I was a bit intimidated by that. My angle was now all sorts of shit, as Fik and Drin were in the way of lower shots.

At the same time - I think I got his eye. Which would be a huge win in my book. I was a fan of blinding my opponents.

The second warrior orc had been holding onto the walls, but as [Nova] approached at high speeds, he started to slam his fists together, muscles bulging as he seemed to physically pull the stone out of the wall, creating a shield.

He wasn’t quite fast enough, and the [Nova] impacted on him, exploding in blinding Radiance. However, he’d pulled the stone "doors" closed enough that between them and his body, the mages behind him were safe. Didn’t stop him from becoming "extra-crispy". He’d need to see a healer after this, or spend a week recovering.

Naturally, I tried to finish him off. I sent a second one their way, only for him to finish "closing the door" so to speak.

[Nova] exploded harmlessly against the stone - but they were no longer shooting at us.

The different types of shields struck again! His shield was slow, and it took time to make - but once it was up, he didn’t need to spend another point of mana on the shield. In contrast, my shields were instant, but everything they blocked took mana.

I could use the skill again, and I fired a third [Nova] down towards their backline, trying to keep them pinned. If we couldn’t win a 5 versus 1, I dunno what we’d do.

Then Fik, Drin, and the quarterstaff orc all charged into each other.

The orc was bigger, taller and meaner. He had no shield, but was charging with a quarterstaff held like a polearm. I was dubious about the weapon of choice, given that the tunnels and his size didn’t exactly give him a range of motion to use it without hitting the walls - until he swung it in a vicious side-swipe.

Given that his hands were scraping the walls of the tunnel, I was surprised that his staff didn’t bounce off the walls, or break. No, the stone staff melded with the stone walls, and with bulging, straining muscles, the orc finished his swing, his weapon having gone through the stone.

No, not quite through.

Instead of a quarterstaff on the other end, a weapon that could generously be described as a warhammer emerged from the other side. More accurately, it was a big stick with a giant rock on the end of it, a chunk of the wall missing where his skills had "grabbed" it from. It swung into Fik at a speed that made me widen my eyes and redouble my struggles against the stone hands that were holding me fast. They were slowly tightening, which I didn’t like.

I might be able to scrape the little pieces of Fik off the ground fast enough to heal him, but that relied on me being able to get to him.

I was forced to duck as the wall of the tunnel turned into a spike, trying to impale my head. I rarely fought creatures with real intelligence actively trying to kill me and my party, and I was pleasantly reminded that healers were perpetually on the ‘kill them first’ list. It wasn’t helping that the enemy mage knew where I was, by virtue of having grabbed onto my legs.

The hammer connected, but instead of Fik being turned into paste, he was simply launched to the side and crashed into the tunnel wall. The landing looked rough, but he was still groaning and moving, with minimal blood loss, and a lot less dwarf-paste than I was expecting.

I threw another [Nova] back at the mages in the back, trying to keep them pinned behind the shield. Not that it seemed to be doing much, not with the enemy Earth mage knowing exactly where I was and throwing blind attacks at me. Glifir had seen what I was doing, and kept throwing the occasional knife in that direction.

Then, it was Drin’s moment to shine. The orc’s crushing swing had left him open, and Drin made full use of it, a flash of Lightning on his feet as he suddenly sped up and smashed his shield into the orc’s stomach, making the orc stiffen up and freeze entirely.

Not one to waste a chance, I threw a lance of Radiance through the orc’s right shoulder. It wasn’t a lethal blow, but trying to swing that absurd hammer would be much harder with only one functional arm. Glifir got a knife between the orc’s ribs, and Drin opened up a vicious cut along the orc’s gut.

Glifir reached me at that, and started working on pulling me out.

Then the orc was back in action, but hurt. He couldn’t bring nearly his full strength to bear, not with an arm out of commission and his guts starting to spill out. He dropped his warhammer and punched Drin with his left hand, causing him to go to one knee - and hit the orc again with his shield.

Glifir took one hand off of me, and flicked another knife at the orc, managing to somehow curve the knife up and under the crude stone helmet. I don’t know what it hit, but there was a good amount of blood streaming from the bottom of the helmet.

I threw another [Nova] at the orc’s shield that protected their backline.

Only half-powered though. I was running dangerously low on mana, having never gotten a solid rest, and Radiance wasn’t exactly going to do a ton of damage to stone. I just wanted to keep them pinned. Since none of the orcs could see me anymore, I changed [Shine] to a safer "lamp" mode, so we could see without me throwing blinding rays around.

The orc crashed to the ground, and while there hadn’t been a notification yet, he was clearly out of the fight. It was only a matter of time now, and ugh. There was a chance I might need to save him.

Either way, his current threat was neutralized, and it was time to deal with the rest of the orcs, and get freed from the stone hands still gripping my legs.

"Drin! Need a hand here!" I yelled, as Glifir tried to give me an extra inch or two of height.

I shielded a spike growing out of the ceiling, trying to impale me head to toe, delighted that my shield was strong enough to stop the spike. Ha!

Only to discover that the rest of his team hadn’t been idle behind the shield as a second large explosion ripped through the hallway.

Chapter 201 - Journey to the center of Pallos VI

The light of the explosion washed over us as I watched the expanding flames.

I was low on mana. I’d been in non-stop marathon mode, and fighting was expensive. Sure, I had more mana - but I could also blow through mana a lot faster. I just didn’t have the reserves to handle another explosion, then handle the rest of the blasted fight.

No, it was time to start pulling out my gems. Powerful, one-time use skills that we Sentinels all swapped and traded with each other, rounding out our kit to bail ourselves out of difficult or tricky situations.

Like being out of mana, deep underground, watching a roaring explosion heading towards me and the other dwarves. Just another typical Sentinel mission. My stomach roared in protest, reminding me that I was technically starving. My brand-new body had no food in it at all when it was conjured up.

I was totally going to acquire Glifir’s snacks after this, one way or another.

With deep regret over losing one of the last mementos I owned of Sealing, I blew the gem with his skill. Brilliant walls snapped around us, cutting off the flames from the fuel. I threw up a second [Mantle] behind it, just to be safe, but the barrier held against the explosion, incandescent flames against a shimmering barrier of light, with stars layered against the whole image.

Sealing, still saving lives from beyond the grave.

[*ding!* Your party has slain a [Stone Berserker] (Mountain - 370)/[Mountain Mauler] (Mountain - 316)]

Fik had taken the moment to finish off the orc, the notification indicating that he was fully gone.

"Grab the body! We’re out of here!" I yelled, as I started to retreat, only to be rudely reminded that I was trapped.

"Actually, Drin! Help me out here!" I shouted.

"On it!" Drin yelled, as Fik started to haul the orc’s body down the tunnel.

Drin grabbed one arm, and Glifir grabbed another. I opened my mouth in a silent howl as they yanked, and I felt bones breaking. Bless [Center of the Universe]. I was still stuck though.

"Do you mind?" Drin asked, hefting his axe.

Ah fiddlesticks. Not this again.

"Do it." I said through gritted teeth.

Four sharp hacks later, and I was free, regrowing my feet once again. I didn’t even have the tattered remains of my sandals left, and even if I found sunlight I wouldn’t be able to use [Talaria]. Blast it all.

We all got to the other side of the barrier, and I did a quick headcount. We were all here, and Drin and Fik were working together on the orc’s body.

"Great! We’re off!" I said.

I dropped Sealing’s barrier - it was a cube in the end, and had also sealed off our escape - and started to jog at a good clip, not too fast where if I took two turns quickly they’d lose me, but not too slow that we’d get caught up in the next explosion. The more distance we could put between us and the orcs, the better.

We could kill them if we got the drop on them, and we had full mana. We had neither right now, and not only did the orcs have a home field advantage, but it was blindingly obvious that all their classes, skills, and fighting style revolved around being in the tunnels. It gave them too much of an advantage.

I don’t know how long we ran for, but we’d gone a considerable distance before I halted us in a dead end.

First things first.

"Is anyone still injured from that fight?" I asked. Heads reluctantly shook. My stomach awkwardly growled in the silence.

"Does anyone know or see of a threat to us right now?" I said, looking around in a large, exaggerated motion.

"Nope."

"Nothing."

"Clear."

Ned didn’t say anything, just folded his arms over each other.

Confirming with my own eyes that we seemed safe enough - barring monsters bursting through the ceiling, which was a distinct possibility - I threw up [Mantle] across the entrance to the dead-end, and took a seat, so fast it was like I was falling.

Important things first.

"Glifir?" I asked him with a pleading voice, giving him my best puppy-dog eyes. No idea if they had puppies or anything, but it was kind of a universal gesture.

My hope was rewarded as he rolled his eyes with a knowing smile, and handed me one of his snacks. I tore into it like a woman who hadn’t seen food in weeks.

Hunger was THE BEST spice. The hard, tasteless rations became positively divine.

"Come, sit." I said, not quite keeping a slight tremor out of my voice. Life and death fights were a pain, and the crash of adrenaline was never fun.

"What about-" Glifir asked, before shutting up. I raised an eyebrow at him.

"What about….?" I asked, encouraging him to finish his sentence. The amazing snack-hander-out could do no wrong in my books.

"Toke." He reluctantly finished.

"She’s probably dead." Drin muttered unhappily into his beard, taking a seat. "Orcs don’t take prisoners, they take rations."

"Disgusting practice." Fik made his displeasure well-known.

However, at Fik’s words, slow nods went around the room. It seemed like we were recognizing that Toke was dead. I’d need to grieve for her - and Lule - when I got a moment. I’d done so a bit earlier, but I hadn’t finished processing the grief. I was just shoving it away in a corner to process, to move.

"Right. We’re taking a break here." I announced. "We’re going to rest up, before tackling the rest of the mine. Our current goal is to escape. Does anyone disagree?"

Furious nodding met my proclamation of our goal being to escape. Bit surprised it was nodding, but hey, different cultures and all that. I’m glad we were on the same page, and nobody had ideas of trying to hunt the orcs down to the bitter end.

"Oh, Healer Elaine, what was that barrier there at the end?" Ned asked me, shuffling over towards me a bit. "Is it related to how you were able to heal yourself from being beheaded? That looked like Brilliance. Did you get a third class and reset your first? Is that how you’re so strong? That would explain the decapitation thing..." He trailed off, stroking his beard thoughtfully.

I gave him a blank look, before laughing.

"No, if I’d managed to hit 512 before I was 20, that’d be one heck of an achievement!" I continued to chuckle at the idea. "No, just good classes."

"What I want to know." Drin said, stroking his beard thoughtfully. "Is why your Radiance beam didn’t go right through the orc’s head. You claimed to have what, 114,000 magic power? More now? You healed your entire body in one move, which supports that claim, but then you shouldn’t have had trouble with the orc."

I felt some heat rise up my neck.

"Caught." I said, the edges of my [Oath] going to be revealed. "I’ve got a skill that improves my healing power and control."

"But the barrier?" Glifir interrupted. "How did you have that?"

I didn’t want to tell them or show them, but, well. More cats outta the bag. Just hoped they wouldn’t try to murder me in my sleep - not that they’d shown any inclination for that so far, but you never knew. Starving, trapped in the mines, I wasn’t one of them. I was Other", and it was a lot easier to kill, butcher, and eat an Other than to resort to cannibalism. Especially when she was pesky and kept giving orders.

I’d hope that keeping them all alive counted for something.

I tapped my right vambrace, the only one I had left. I’d lost the left one to Lun’Kat’s flames.

"Gemstones. Sentinels are equipped with a wide variety of gemstones, with the most powerful utility skills we can reasonably find and purchase. That skill was-"

I found my voice wavering, sadness crashing through the little hole in my mental defenses left by the crashing adrenaline. I powered through.

"-from a good friend of mine, who died recently." I said, not stopping a few hot tears from falling.

Sealing. There one day, then in a moment, a flash, he was away with the strike team, and never came back.

Another day.

"Got more of those?" Fik asked, greed in his voice.

I shook my head.

"Just the one. My role isn’t a combat one, I just have a few tricks for self-defense."

"Hang on, I-" Ned was interrupted by Fik, and honestly, I was more inclined to listen to Fik and answer him.

"Like what?" He asked, eagerly crowding around and looking at my bracer like it’d give them magic abilities.

I mentally smiled. Wood-obsessed as they were, everyone liked shiny gems.

"I’ve got a few invisibility gems, which are usually great." I said, waving my hands at the rocky walls surrounding us. "Like Glifir’s discovered though, they’re not nearly as good when there’s nowhere to vanish to. Speaking of, we should talk about that fight."

I feel like a prayer had been answered somewhere. I’d somehow redirected a conversation well. A diplomatic win had somehow occurred.

"Stopping our charge was a mistake." Drin immediately called out. "We should’ve taken them from the start."

There were nods of agreement around.

"Help me out. Why? We weren’t on the same page, which led to us kinda stumbling over each other."

"Orcs are vile and cruel, and must be fought wherever they’re found." Ned said, practically sniffing, seemingly sidetracked from his question.

The dwarves were so frustrating. I could scream and rip my hair out. I was seriously considering just taking my chances on my own. It was only out of a sense of obligation, guilt that Lule had died for me, along with the belief that, as a whole, they helped my chances more than hindered me, that kept me around.

Ned - I disliked him strongly. But he was a competent healer, if incredibly obnoxious. He’d patched me up without a moment’s hesitation after I’d fallen, and was out of mana, and constantly had heals up on everyone else. Ranged heals. It let me focus primarily on the fighting, and not need to run around slapping healing into people.

Drin was a strong front-liner. He was too aggressive, but his ability to stun people was no joke. I had my doubts on how well it’d work, before I saw how effortlessly he took apart the orc. It wasn’t like he stunned them briefly, and that was it. No. He could chain his stuns, in a way that almost permanently crippled a foe, all while he took them apart with his axe.

That, and he was regrowing everyone’s armor. Stupidly unfair, but I made a mental note to ask for some anyway. Now that we were no longer in a rush, I wasn’t taking a risk.

Also, I was a dumbass. I should’ve asked him for a set while we were moving around.

That thought made me reevaluate myself.

I hadn’t quite given them a fair chance, or a solid shake. I’d been paranoid, then slightly put off by them, and I’d just retreated into my own mind and books that I’d been given. I should’ve been socializing with them, making friends. Instead, I’d been stand-offish. Arrogant. Practically putting my nose in the air as high as Ned’s. I’d assumed I was better than them, just as much as Ned had assumed he was better than me.

I was no great actor. There was no way they hadn’t picked up on it.

Fik was solid. He was supportive, and had amazing tricks with his Gravity magic, along with being a stout warrior. A classic spellblade, and was vocally supportive of the decisions I was making. Possibly to keep the harmony, but hey. I liked it.

Then there was Glifir. He was completely out of his element, and I couldn’t blame him much for it. It was just like when I tried to stab the slime, except I had the ability to fall back on my other weapons. He was trying to fall back to his plan B, but it was only so-so.

At the same time, he seemed to genuinely enjoy being around me, and was nothing but helpful. His mapping abilities were priceless, and if I had to only have one dwarf with me, I’d pick Glifir every time.

Which had me circling back round to the idea that I genuinely might be better off on my own. Each time the dwarves pulled a dumbass stunt like the one in the fight against the orcs risked my life, and while I’d heal a patient, there was nothing about preventing suicidally dumb idiots from jumping off a cliff.

My only obligation was to patch them up after they hit the ground.

I wasn’t going to let the dwarves tie me to a boulder, and throw it off the edge.

I realized some time had passed, with everyone looking at me.

"Ok, sure, but why charge? Why not retreat, and wait in ambush? Catch them around a corner, while they didn’t know about us?" I asked. "Help me understand, so we can work better as a team."

Drin held up his hand.

"Healer Elaine the 94th." He said, and I was instantly giving him my full focus and attention. We’d lowered how formal we were being, given the situation, so the full, formal title grabbed my notice.

Maybe that’s why they did it?

"None of us at the wall are, um…" He said, trailing off awkwardly and tugging at his beard. He looked around, and saw that nobody was going to help him. He sighed.

"None of us at the wall are really there because we want to be." He said. "It’s a punishment detail, of sorts. Screw up. Go to the wall. The one out of the way where nobody is nearby and nothing happens for years. Serve however many years of punishment there. Come back."

I said nothing, waiting for him to continue. "Sorry we’re all fuck-ups that got sent to a shit detail" wasn’t exactly endearing to me. Nor did it excuse their behavior.

Drin’s beard went through some awkward twitches here and there, as he worked something out internally.

"We’re just, well, not trying to screw this up. If people knew we’d run from a fight, our reputations would get even worse. Might even get years added to our time at the wall. If they knew we’d ran from orcs, of all things, we’d be lucky if they just threw us out." Drin said. "Win though? Kill a team of orcs in combat? We’d be back home so fast, we wouldn’t even be able to plant a tree to mark our passage. So it influenced me somewhat, ok? Baseline, it’s a matter of honor for us. Tradition."

I had a lot of thoughts of where, exactly, those could be stuffed. I kept my cool. Drin continued.

"Hearing your questions, you’re right. I’m under a lot of stress. I screwed up. We screwed up. It’s hard though, when your teammates are dying, and flames have wrapped your country. I don’t even know if my family is alive."

There was a lot of muttering at the last one. Glifir patted Drin on the shoulder, who patted his hand back.

"Yeah, that’s terrible." I said, sympathizing. My thoughts strayed to my family, especially my dad, who might get caught up in the civil war that was brewing. I didn’t want to try and one-up them though, so I kept it to myself.

"Hey, look. Let’s just try to survive, and get out of here, ok?" I said, swinging my arms out to half-hug Drin and Fik, who were sitting next to me. "I imagine getting a diplomat out of a tight pinch is worth a bunch of honor, right?"

There were some confused looks at that, and I plastered a cheery smile on.

"Look, you’ve told me what you need. You know what I want. To get back home alive. Tell you all what. We get out of here, and I’ll make sure you get assigned somewhere nicer. I’ll tell ’em it’s a favor for me, for saving my life a dozen times over. Heck, I’ll even make sure you’re able to plant some trees along the way." I had no idea what the last bit was about, but I was now resolved to find out.

That got them happy, and I mentally celebrated. I’d finally stopped treating them like automatons, and more like people. I’d spent some time figuring out what they wanted, not just needed besides basic food and drink. I’d worked out how to align our goals together.

I was still so hungry though.

That’s what the orc body was for.

Chapter 202 - Journey to the center of Pallos VII

Hilariously, for all their cursing of orcs as uncivilized barbarians, the dwarves didn’t utter a single word of objection to roasting and eating the orc. From how they savagely tore into the orc, they were a lot less squeamish about eating intelligent foes than I was.

I had to ruthlessly murder the part of me that was screaming about eating a formerly intelligent humanoid. Glifir’s snacks were good, but hunger and survival instincts teamed up to utterly shred the moralistic part of me that was saying "no, don’t do it!"

In the end, my first bite of a creature that had formerly been intelligent and thinking was ravenous and drooling. I took great big bites of an arm that I’d drilled Radiance through, and thoroughly enjoyed it.

Fortunately, it tasted nothing like pork.

We’d agreed to eat, then plan our next moves, and I took a moment to check my level-ups, noting that everyone had gained quite a few levels. Glifir was on the low end at 9, while Ned was on the high end with 26. Between Lun’Kat and the fight, I wasn’t surprised.

[*Ding!* Congratulations! [The Dawn Sentinel] has leveled up to level 357->358! +3 Dexterity, +24 Speed, +24 Vitality, +170 Mana, +170 Mana Regen, +48 Magic power, +48 Magic Control from your Class per level! +1 Free Stat for being Human per level! +1 Mana, +1 Mana Regen from your Element per level!]

[*Ding!* [Celestial Affinity] leveled up! 357 -> 358]

[*Ding!* [Center of the Universe] leveled up! 357 -> 358]

[*Ding!* [Dance with the Heavens] leveled up! 357 -> 358]

[*Ding!* [Sentinel's Superiority] leveled up! 357 -> 358]

[*Ding!* [Long-Range Identify] leveled up! 357 -> 358]

[*Ding!* [Mantle of the Stars] leveled up! 315 -> 318]

[*Ding!* [Shine] leveled up! 189 -> 191]

I chewed on the humerus thoughtfully, which must’ve triggered a bout of insanity or something, as I briefly debated classing up. That sheer stupidity of that idea caused me to laugh out loud, which had all the dwarves looking at me like I was mad.

Yeah, no, not going to try classing up in a place where everything was trying to kill me, ceiling included. I did trust the dwarves to look after me, and I cursed my earlier paranoia.

What was done was done. I did note that I needed to work on [Sunrise], and make a habit out of using it in fights, if nothing else than to get more levels in it.

The rest of the meal was in relative silence, as we were all too busy chowing down to have a proper talk.

We ate the entire orc - I have no idea how honestly, it was some sort of miracle - except for the head and entrails, which we kinda, maybe buried, as was Tradition.

And good hygiene practice. Which really was how a lot of traditions started. "Hey, eating pig makes you sick, let’s not eat pig."

"Right, let’s start with a map. Glifir?" I asked him, and he generated a sprawling map of where we’d been so far.

He’d been a busy bee the entire time I’d been face-tanking traps. In and out of side passages, the extent of his work was laid in front of us. He somehow managed to clearly mark dead-ends by having the Mist map terminate abruptly, and unexplored passages trailed off, indicating they still had potential. I hadn’t quite realized how far we’d gone, and I doubted I would be able to find my way back in a timely fashion, not without his map.

Also - these had been some busy, busy dwarves. Then again, we’d seen that other, non-dwarf creatures seemed to be making tunnels, and the Guardians were busy rearranging things, so who could tell.

Speaking of the Guardians, it’d been ages since the tunnels last shook. We were all hoping that it was over, but not a single one of us was willing to say it out loud.

"Right, we’re here." Glifir said, pointing to a spot on the map I wouldn’t have guessed as our current location. "And we dropped down here." He said, pointing to a spot on the map that was lower than our current location.

"The way I see it, we’ve got a few options, and a few non-options." Glifir said. "We’re deep underground. Option 1 - keep going up ramps, and try to break through to the surface."

I was nodding at that, along with everyone but Fik.

"Option 2. We go back to the shaft where we fell, and try to work our way back up."

That had Fik nodding furiously.

"For the less-obvious choices." Glifir said, and I was all ears.

"Option 3. Try to trace the orcs back to their base, and exit however they get out." He said.

"Won’t work." Drin interrupted, twirling his beard. "Traditionally, they live deep in the mountain. They don’t have an exit, this is their home."

"Doesn’t mean they don’t know an exit." Ned pointed out.

"Yeah, but-" Fik started to argue, and I cut him off.

"Let’s discuss all this if we think the five of us can pull off what, apparently, generations of Khazad dwarves couldn’t." I said, with a dry tone.

"We’re so much better than they are." Fik muttered with an angry tug of his beard, but dropped the argument.

"Thank you. Option 4, we stay here and wait for rescue." Glifir said.

There was a pause, before we all started laughing at the joke. Drin let out a huge belly laugh, while Fik cackled like a witch. Ned chortled, while I fell over laughing, struggling to get enough air in my lungs. Even Glifir let out some weak chuckles.

"Wait for rescue." HA!

"Ok, ok, moving on." He said, only for my renewed howls of laughter to interrupt him.

I felt bad, but I couldn’t help it.

All good things - like a solid joke - must come to an end though.

"Right, option 5 - we try going deep. Real deep. Into the Below levels." He said.

"Aren’t those just rumors?" Ned asked.

"Too many rumors of them, too consistent. They’re probably real." Glifir said.

"But if they’re just rumors…." I "asked", letting my question trail off.

Glifir shrugged.

"There’s a reason I listed the option after ‘Stay still’." he said. "The rumors all agree that vast and powerful creatures live there, certain death, yada yada, you get the idea."

"That’s all I’ve got for ideas. Thoughts?" He asked.

"Build a small base, fortress, whatever, here. Keep it defended, set traps for food, explore to expand the scope of what we can see until we’ve got more information to select the best plan." Drin said.

I stared at him.

"Oooh! What if we based it near the shaft we fell down? I can work on getting us out that way, while Glifir scouts, and Elaine, Ned, and you rotate between holding down the fort and hunting for food!" Fik excitedly told Drin.

"Yeah, that would work!"

The two of them were building up a huge amount of energy towards their plan. Heck, I was getting excited!

Which I needed to not do. I needed to step back, and evaluate things dispassionately.

"Checking a few basic things, sorry." I said. "Do we have any ability to go through rocks?"

The dwarves all looked at each other like I was an idiot.

"No, not really." Ned said.

"I mean, we can get through some collapsed passages, depending on how bad it is." Fik pointed out. "My Gravity magic is good for that sort of stuff."

"We have no idea what’ll collapse if we clear out rocks though." Ned said.

I reluctantly nodded my agreement with him. I wasn’t going to mention my [Wall Buster] gem. I didn’t even know if it’d work, and explosively removing a rock blockage?

Rocks fall, I die.

"We could end up bringing the whole thing down on us. Let’s save that idea if we know there’s an exit on the other side of a rockfall, but otherwise not try to get through rocks. Agreed?"

Everyone but Glifir agreed, who grumbled about "exploring" and "a complete map" under his breath but otherwise let it be.

"Nobody’s mentioned them, but are there Khazad dwarves down here?"

"The ground defilers are probably somewhere, yeah." Fik grumped out.

"Bloody useless lot." Ned said, somewhat agreeing with Fik.

"Only a few steps above orcs really." Drin added in.

"We had dinner with one! Remember?" I said protesting Drin’s assessment.

"Ok, fine, quite a few steps above orcs. Still, wouldn’t want my daughter coming home with one." Drin amended his statement.

It was technically better, but not by much.

"And!" He said, getting worked up and mad. "I remember that tree-rotted Khazad dwarf talking about trying to evict Lun’Kat from her lair! I bet that’s why she went on a rampage!" He said, fury, hurt, and anger in his voice.

"Yeah!" Fik agreed, flavored by rage.

This was going to go downhill fast if I didn’t butt in.

"Would they help us?" I asked. Not my most tactful question, but I wanted them to refocus.

In a way that was like pulling teeth, like he’d rather a limb get amputated, Ned answered.

"...Yes."

"And they’d probably have food, and know an exit?" I asked again.

".... probably." Glifir added in.

Geez, don’t all trip over yourselves with enthusiasm.

"Ok, help me out here. You’ve got relatives that’ll get you food, shelter, and an exit, and won’t murder us on sight. What’s there not to love about that?"

"They’re Khazad dwarves though!" Drin half-protested. "We don’t need their help."

I pointed the humerus I was gnawing on at him.

"I just ate an orc I needed to kill in mortal combat earlier today. I’d really like not to do it again."

"She’s got a point, you know." Ned pointed out, seemingly less annoyed than his usual state of being. "We’re all dwarves down here. Link up with the Khazads, and get news of what’s happened above. The dragon is pro-"

It pained me to interrupt Ned when he was agreeing with me, but I had to.

"Shhh!" I said, cutting through the rest of what he was going to say. "They can hear you when you call their name."

Ned opened his mouth at me, saw something in my face, and closed it.

Welp, topic of conversation massively deflected. Might as well go all the way.

"Where I’m from, we have a vampire. A progenitor, from what you all call the first generation." I said, smiling at their reaction. "He witnessed the devastation 'they' can unleash first-hand, and he believes that 'they' hear you when you say their name."

I was getting some skeptical looks, and Glifir had some waterworks starting, but I plowed on.

"Now, I’m not sure of how true that is, but after what we’ve seen, who wants to risk it?" I asked.

Dead silence.

"Let’s not say Her name, or what she is then?" I suggested, getting a reluctant nod out of Fik. The rest of the dwarves didn’t disagree though.

However, I’d just rudely reminded them that everything they knew and loved was probably gone, and I felt obligated to provide a distraction and direction.

"The way I see it, from what we’ve been saying, there are two real options. First, we try to go up, towards the surface, and hope we bump into some Khazad dwarves while we’re at it. The second option, we go back to where we fell down, and make a little fort while Fik works on getting us out. Waiting here, or trying to take the fight to the orcs, or going super deep, aren’t really options. Are we all in agreement?"

"Well, with option 2-" Drin started to say, and I held my hand up.

"Obviously, whatever one we pick we’ll need to hammer out the details on." I said. "Right, let’s discuss pros and cons, then vote on what we’ll do."

A lively discussion ensued, and the lines, and the pros and cons, were quickly established.

Drin and Fik favored option 2, going back to the shaft and trying to work our way out. The pros of the plans were a defensible location, a known area, and a known exit. The cons of the plan were getting out would be difficult - Fik thought he could do it, but couldn’t guarantee it - the fact that orcs were roaming the area, which would probably get us into a fight, then more and more as word got around that we were there. Food had already proven to be scarce in the location, even before the roaming slimes were factored in.

Which left Glifir and Ned on option 1, going up and seeing if we could find an exit ourselves, or meet other dwarves. The exit would be much easier to use, if we could find it. We’d be more likely to find a food source, and potentially pivot to Drin’s fortress plan. Friendly dwarves could give us news and help.

It also became clear that from how they were debating the issue - it was far too civil to call it arguing - that the points being made were aimed at me. Not only had I been accepted as the nominal leader, but I was the tie breaking vote.

Which was interesting, it implied that the dwarven government - errr, probably former government, after Lun’Kat was done with them - had some democratic features, and were pervasive enough that the average dwarf thought about voting.

Anyways, to me, the answer was easy.

"We should go with option 1." I said. "Movement is life. We can build an OK fort, like Drin wants, but if - when - the orcs discover us, we’re sitting ducks. We don’t have anyone with an Earth or Mountain element - sorry Fik, Gravity doesn’t count here - and if they know where we are, it becomes easy to surround and pin us down. Fik’s also not entirely sure he can get us out of the shaft, so we might just spend days or even weeks, only to find out we’re right where we started, but possibly weaker, and hungrier."

I shook my head.

"Against a superior force, we never want to directly engage. We’d want to hit, run, and whittle them away, and barring that, retreat to get reinforcements. Stillness is death."

The only time I’d gotten a chance to practice my "one against many" tactics was when the pirates had tried to ambush me on the trip back from Deva. Now, I was operating on the proper scale of my team versus their team, but our objective wasn't to kill the orcs, it was to escape.

"Does anyone have strong objections to going with option 1?" I asked, getting shaking heads in response - although Drin’s was reluctant. I hadn’t called a vote, because there was no need to. It was clear how things would shake out.

[*Ding!* Congratulations! [The Dawn Sentinel] has leveled up to level 358->359! +3 Dexterity, +24 Speed, +24 Vitality, +170 Mana, +170 Mana Regen, +48 Magic power, +48 Magic Control from your Class per level! +1 Free Stat for being Human per level! +1 Mana, +1 Mana Regen from your Element per level!]

[*Ding!* [Celestial Affinity] leveled up! 358 -> 359]

[*Ding!* [Center of the Universe] leveled up! 358 -> 359]

[*Ding!* [Dance with the Heavens] leveled up! 358 -> 359]

[*Ding!* [Sentinel's Superiority] leveled up! 358 -> 359]

[*Ding!* [Long-Range Identify] leveled up! 358 -> 359]

That was a pleasant surprise. I suppose "organize foreign soldiers and have them recognize your leadership, while fighting impossible odds" counted as Sentinel-y activity. I was still primarily a healer, but I could now get levels from doing some non-healer activities.

Nice. It hammered home what Night was telling me about Sentinel classes being broad, and getting lots of experience for it. Being out of the dead zone was helping.

"Right then. Let’s take a break to sleep, then move out when we wake up." I said, moving over to the pool of water and getting a drink.

There were general nods of agreement at that, and the dwarves started to try to find ways of making themselves comfortable.

Me? Ha. I’d literally slept like a baby in worse conditions during the Hell Months at Ranger Academy. In a tunnel, with only rocks as a pillow? Nightmares were my only concern.

"Sleeping time! How do we want to do this? If we have lights, we can see problems, but might attract problems. No lights, and we’ll be entirely, totally blind, but we’ll be able to see problems coming from a million miles away from their own light source. Thoughts?" I asked everyone.

"Bright lights." Fik said immediately.

"No lights!" Drin countered.

"Very, very dim lights - enough for us to see, but not enough for others to see us." Ned said.

Ned’s made the most sense.

"Super dim lights, enough that someone can go to the bathroom in the night, not enough where anyone can see us." I said. "Let me know when you’re all settled in, and I’ll dim the lights. Watch schedule - one person per watch. Drin, Ned, myself, then Fik. Glifir gets tonight off, he’s been running around more than the rest of us. Since we’ve got no method of time keeping, just go as long as you’d like for a shift." I said.

I’d taken the late-middle shift, which was usually considered the worst.

The joys of leadership.

[Name: Elaine]

[Race: Human]

[Age: 19]

[Mana: 246130/246130]

[Mana Regen: 223123 (+157523.2)]

Stats

[Free Stats: 105]

[Strength: 273]

[Dexterity: 509]

[Vitality: 3472]

[Speed: 3472]

[Mana: 24613]

[Mana Regeneration: 24613 (+15752.32)]

[Magic Power: 10165 (+152983.25)]

[Magic Control: 10165 (+152983.25)]

[Class 1: [The Dawn Sentinel - Celestial: Lv 359]]

[Celestial Affinity: 359]

[Cosmic Presence: 269]

[Solar Infusion: 140]

[Center of the Universe: 359]

[Dance with the Heavens: 359]

[Wheel of Sun and Moon: 311]

[Mantle of the Stars: 318]

[Sunrise: 128]

[Class 2: [Ranger-Mage - Radiance: Lv 256]+]

[Radiance Affinity: 256]

[Radiance Resistance: 256]

[Radiance Conjuration: 256]

[Shine: 191]

[Sun-Kissed: 256]

[Blaze: 256]

[Talaria: 256]

[Nova: 256]

[Class 3: Locked]

General Skills

[Long-Range Identify: 359]

[Pristine Memories: 205]

[Pretty: 154]

[Bullet Time: 269]

[Oath of Elaine to Lyra: 301]

[Sentinel's Superiority: 359]

[Persistent Casting: 255]

[Learning: 341]

Chapter 203 - Journey to the center of Pallos VIII

For once, I slept somewhat decently. The sheer terror that had been coursing through me for the past few hours led to a spectacular crash once I felt like I could sleep, and I didn’t mind the rocky pillows. Or the rocky mattress. Or…

Either way, after tying off [Mantle of the Stars] with [Persistent Casting] to make sure we had something of a shield against, say, invisible gas attacks in the night, I was out like a light.

Ned woke me up for my turn on watch, and I woke up with the biggest crick in my neck. I stretched it out, noting that I was full up on mana, and my shields hadn’t gone down.

"Hey, Healer Elaine." Ned whispered to me as I got up. "Mind letting the shield down for a minute? The orc’s trying one last attack."

It took me a moment to process what he was saying, and I grinned. My grin rapidly vanished as my own stomach turned over, the orc indeed having one last fight in him.

"Yeah sure." I whispered back, trying to be quiet enough so nobody else would hear. "Go for it."

I dropped the shield, and noted with a raised eyebrow that Ned summoned a little ball of light for himself.

That - argh! He’d been asking me to keep doing the lights, but he’d been perfectly capable of helping out this entire time!

I put the shield back up after he passed through, and noticed the light fading as he wandered down a tunnel.

And fading.

Cripes. Just how bad did he think this was going to be?

His light eventually settled on a dim glow, then after a while started to flicker rapidly. It went out entirely at one point, and after a few seconds, I started to get up, somewhat concerned about him. I’d just taken a few steps to the shield, when the light went back on.

Well, I wasn’t going to disturb Ned when he was having that much trouble.

After another minute or so, the light came back, brighter and brighter, and Ned stiffly walked around the corner, back to where we were. His legs were like boards, and he had a glassy, thousand-yard stare on his face.

"Ned? Ned, you ok?" I asked him, dropping the shield.

He slowly turned towards me, and gave me a single, stiff nod.

I would’ve loved to stay and chat, but my stomach was rebelling against me as well. The meat had been purified and cooked, so it seemed that fundamentally orcs were as disagreeable in death as in life.

And yes, I could see exactly why Ned had gotten such a distance, and had taken so long.

While orcs were staying on the menu - I wasn’t going to starve myself - they were now ending up near the bottom of said menu.

I spent the rest of my shift getting a moderately good [Persistent Casting] of [Dance with the Heavens] arranged, and thanked my lucky stars that I could run more than three skills at once with [Persistent Casting]. I decided to make my casting this time be for anyone "on-touch". It would be a problem if a hostile orc managed to start grappling with me, but at the same time it meant I could just touch anyone on the team, and instantly heal them with a strong image behind it.

I had the brief image of me trying to play catch with a dwarf’s head - I touch it, they live, I miss, they die.

I shook my head clear of that picture, and kept working on my image. When I thought it was good enough, I swapped shifts and went back to sleep.

The morning - well, the time when we all finished waking up, being fully rested - rolled around soon enough, and Drin had finally finished making armor for everyone.

"Here you go!" He said, handing me over replacement parts for my gear. "I tried to mimic what you had, but I had nothing for your shin guards."

Indeed, instead of the stout armor the dwarves used, Drin had tried to grow me a set of armor that was more like my own. My left vambrace was an exact mirror of my right, although he hadn’t quite gotten the helmet or shin guards done right. They were a little blockier than I was used to, a little thicker, but I wasn’t going to let that get in my way.

"Thank you Drin!" I said, happily hugging him.

"Drin." Ned said, nodding along.

I gave him a weird look, but Glifir interrupted. I started getting my replacement armor on.

"I think we’re all ready to go! I’ve got an initial pathway planned out." He said, pulling up the map. "Right, we’re here." He said, pointing to a spot. "And I noticed an upramp here, which I think is our best shot at going up. Any objections?"

I waited to see everyone else shake their heads before shaking my own. It was too easy as the leader to set the tone, and have people not speak up as a result.

"Right, let’s get moving. I’ll take point again, Ned’s in the middle, Fik and Drin with Ned, and Glifir, you’ll be running around, scouting around us. I plan on moving slowly, to give you enough time to check side passages. If you need something, yell at me, and I’ll walk back to you. Sound good?"

"Yup!"

"Aye!"

"Yes!"

"...Yes?" Ned asked.

"Ned, is there a problem?" I asked, looking at him.

He gave me a vacant look.

"No?" He answered, somewhat hesitantly.

"Right! Let’s go then!" I said, only to stop.

Good leaders asked for directions when they were completely lost.

"Err, Glifir, what way am I going again?" I asked.

"Left, then down the third passage on your right." He said.

… I think the moving plan might need some revisions.

"Ned, is everything alright?" Fik asked Ned as I started to head down the passage.

"... Yes, I am ok." Ned said after a moment. "Just feel weird."

I wanted to offer some words to Ned, but what would I say? "Yeah Ned, you’re acting super weird?" He was finally starting to be nicer, and he was probably ok. Being a healer meant he could fix most physical problems on his own. I’d probably insult him terribly if I offered to heal him instead.

I’d try to discreetly heal him next time I brushed near. But if he said he wasn’t feeling great, and that he was ok? Eh, not much I could do with that.

He did decide to show off his light skill though, so what I was mentally calling the "reinforcement team" had their own source of light.

We started to wander through the hallways, and the number of traps sharply decreased. We hit a few dead ends, needed to reverse course a few times as Glifir noted different directions seemed to lead more up than others.

There was a disturbing lack of monsters. Glifir noted the occasional slime here and there, but were generally not in our way, nor chasing after us.

We didn’t see a point in trying to kill them. They weren’t food.

Speaking of…

"Food!" Drin yelled, and I heard a stomping foot echo through the hallways. I doubled back, only to see him pick up a bug off the floor and examine it.

"Want it?" Drin said, offering it to me with a smirk.

I was no wilting daisy. I’d eaten worse before.

Thank all the gods and goddesses - ok, and I suppose Night - for making Ranger Academy.

"Sure!" I said, happily grabbing the bug out of his hand before he could retract his offer. Down the hatch it went!

Wasn’t great, but it was food. Gave me terrible heartburn.

The look on his face was great though.

"Nobody ever takes me up on eating bugs." He sulked and kicked the dirt.

I stuck my tongue out at him.

"Tough luck!" I said.

"Do humans regularly eat bugs?" Fik asked me.

"Nah, but Rangers all need to as part of our training. Makes us think about it and remember they exist."

A lightbulb went off, in super slow motion.

"Drin… how many bugs have you seen down here?" I asked him.

"Hmmm? That was the - oh! I see what you’re saying!" Drin said, getting all excited.

"What’s she saying?" Ned asked curiously.

"I haven’t seen bugs until now. Now I’m seeing them! That must mean we’re getting closer!" Drin excitedly told us.

"Yay bugs!" I said, throwing my hands up in the air.

"Yay bugs." Ned echoed.

"Let’s get out of here!" Fik said.

Glifir wandered over, and had clearly heard the conversation.

"I do think we’re near an exit, look." He said, generating the map with his Mist. It was getting fairly large, with all sorts of twists and turns.

"See this portion here?" He pointed out, near the edge of the "explored map" as I liked to think of it. It looked vaguely like a hump coming out of the rest of it. "I think we’re actually in one of the mountains right now, back above ground. There should be an exit somewhere."

I looked at it. If I squinted just right, I could maybe see the mountain shape.

I kept studying the map as the dwarves got cheerful.

"That’s a lot of cave-ins." I said, noting how many paths Glifir had tried that ended up with cave-ins.

"Hey, yeah, Elaine’s right." Fik said, studying the map.

Glifir shrugged.

"What do you want me to say? They’re all cave-ins, I promise, you can check."

"We should!" Drin said. "What if the Khazads collapsed the entrances behind them, and freedom’s just a few rocks away?"

We looked at each other, then at Glifir.

"What?"

"Bring us to the nearest cave-in that looks promising!" Drin said.

"Yeah!" Ned added in.

Glifir looked down at the map, and grinned.

"Let’s get out of here!" He said.

We ran to the cave-in, heedless of potential traps. We hadn’t seen one in ages, and my theory of them being orc-generated and only around their territory was reinforced.

We got to a cave-in, and slowed down. The issues were still present. We still had a lot of rock to move. We still didn’t know if shifting the rocks would bring the whole thing down on us. None of us had any skills relating to this sort of work, with Fik’s Gravity magic being the only thing close.

The lure of freedom and escape called to us, and with barely a word, we unanimously decided to risk it.

Drin, Glifir, and Fik were all at least half-physical Classers, and one of the benefits of physical classers was the flexibility. They didn’t need a [Move Rocks] skill to get through rocks, they could just physically pick them up and move them.

Or, as I got out of their way and watched, I thought one of the benefits to being a pure magic Classer was I got out of chores like these.

Ned walked up to the rocks with everyone else.

"Can I help?" He said, getting strange looks from the rest of us.

"Nah, you’re fine, there’s not enough room for four." Fik said.

"Oh ok." Ned said, coming back and finding a seat near me.

I gave him a look.

"You sure you’re ok…?" I asked him, subtly brushing his shoulder and blasting a full-powered [Dance with the Heavens] through him. My mana dropped a few dozen points, but I wasn’t quite sure if there was damage I’d just healed, or if there was a tiny scrape from all the tunnel wandering that I’d just healed, with an inefficiency penalty from Ned being a dwarf.

Ned and I sat back as Glifir and co started to haul the rocks out of the cave-in.

I shifted from foot to foot, my eyes drilling holes in the back of their heads. I couldn’t wait. I wanted to get out. I needed to get out from this stone tomb we’d found ourselves in. I needed to breathe fresh air, to feel sunlight on my face again. I’d been keeping it together, because breaking down did me no good, but I hated being down here, trapped.

So I was staring, hoping that through sheer force of will I could make them move faster, that I could see a crack of daylight that much sooner.

I tapped the three dwarves, and hit them with [Sunrise] every time one passed, invigorating them and filling them with energy. No slowing down with me on watch! Full energy, get the rocks out of the way! I made sure [Shine] was nice and bright, and occasionally I was asked to move so they’d get better light.

Not nearly enough attention was paid to the ceiling, and the possibility of rocks falling and killing everyone though.

Yet, far too soon, they stopped.

"What’s wrong?" I asked, stepping up.

Fik was tracing along the stone with his fingers.

"See this?" He asked, and we all leaned in.

"What am I seeing?" Glifir asked.

"There’s no seam. Even though these are two different types of rocks." Fik said.

I looked at the rocks. One seemed to be completely different from the other one, but I knew somewhere between jack and shit about rocks. For all I knew this was normal.

"Ok?" I asked, not getting it.

"No, the whole thing." Fik said, tracing his finger quickly along the seam, all the way up to the ceiling, down around the wall, and back to the floor. "This is all one rock."

I groaned.

"Someone deliberately sealed this off." I said, stating the obvious.

"Yes. Bad." Ned said. "We need to find a way out."

Ned was rapidly moving from weird to "what is wrong with you?" but like, what could I do about it? Keep my distance, and sleep with one eye open just in case he was in the middle of cracking or going insane, and going to murder us all in our sleep.

Ned was totally getting the "full night’s sleep" whenever we took a long rest next, just so somebody was also awake. I was also totally going to sleep in my [Mantle], while also using it as a shield. Benefit of a higher-level skill - I could make my shield even bigger, even more complicated.

Everyone confirmed for themselves that the passage was indeed completely sealed, and everyone made an effort to break through.

I considered using my [Wall Buster] gem here. This was almost the textbook situation for it. Trapped inside, only a thin layer between me and freedom? The temptation was so strong I nearly went for it, damn all the rocks that would fall all around me once I’d done it. I might be able to get a small space between the falling rocks to survive in, and the dwarves might be able to dig me out before I died in some other way.

However… it wasn’t quite urgent enough, or our situation dire enough, for me to risk it. I did make a mental note that if we got desperate, if we were on the brink of death, it might be worth it.

I banished the thought of letting another dwarf take the risk. No. I was the toughest, the most likely to survive. I wouldn’t sacrifice someone else to clear the way for the rest of us. Not unless things got worse.

The rest of the dwarves had their own methods that they wanted to try.

I personally stayed well away from Drin when he tried ramming his way through. Something about the idea of rocks falling on me in a mine spoke to me on a deep, primal level, and I wanted nothing to do with his nonsense.

I personally tried to laser through for about half a second, before declaring it futile.

"Right, it seems like this passage is plugged. Do we want to try to clear another passage, or keep wandering until we find an exit or the Khazad dwarves?" I asked.

"Try another one." Drin said, practically frothing at the mouth that he hadn’t been strong enough to practically move an entire mountain.

"If one’s plugged, someone did it." Fik reasoned out loud. "We’d need to clear each blocked passage, and only then hope we found one someone missed. Who knows, maybe we’ll get lucky."

"We should find more people." Ned said.

"And food." Glifir added.

That sealed it for me.

"Look, we’re not finding any food here, and digging out boulders is heavy, hungry work. I can’t imagine any reason why someone would seal the exits of the tunnel. However, we gotta work with what we have, which is sealed tunnels. Glifir, any chance you’ve found vents to the outside?"

He nodded. "Yeah, I’ve seen a few, but with no Toke, we can’t widen them at all."

I mentally cursed, as I’d forgotten that part.

"Right, we’re going to keep looking." I said, and we were off, through the mines.

It was dull, tedious traveling. At one point I tripped a crude trap, where three stone spears tried to skewer me. We reversed directions at that point, figuring that we’d reached the edge of orc territory.

Several "days" passed, with only the occasional insect for food. Drin was getting real popular as he found them, and shared them out. We even forced him to turn over a rare bug he didn’t have in his collection for nourishment.

I think he found a second one, and didn’t tell anyone. I wasn’t going to force the issue though.

Ned kept acting weird, and I decided that he needed more sleep.

Finally, after endless tunnels, and only Glifir’s reassurance that, yes, we were exploring new parts of the mine - he had his great big fancy map to prove it, and I think he was secretly thrilled about being able to make such a large map - I sprung a new trap.

Four sets of metal wires, each at a different height, whipped towards me, powerful enough to activate [Bullet Time]. I threw up my shield, protecting myself, and the highest wire completely missed me. It wrapped itself in complicated loops, tightening to an impossible-to-unravel knot.

I did not want to be in the middle of that wire as it became a knot.

The remaining three wrapped around my shield, and started to squeeze in. They weren’t strong enough to break my shield, but they were strong enough to drain my mana at a good rate.

"Help!" I yelled, the reinforcement team hurrying along.

Alas, the last wire was too low, and I’d summoned my shield too close to me for me to be able to just drop to the floor, and let the wires finish their business above me.

I looked at my mana. Still dropping, but I’d be fine. Just to make sure, I finally blew my [Summon Knife] gem. I carefully unraveled part of [Mantle], letting my hands out with the knife, and started to saw on the wires.

It was a bit of a silly gem at times, but I appreciated it all the more in situations like this where I absolutely needed something sharp. No idea if it’d work, metal against metal and all that, but I wasn’t going to risk it.

Everyone else came around the corner, and with some effort, managed to break the metal wires.

"Thanks everyone, that was close!" I said, meaning it.

That trap had the potential to kill me. If it didn’t cut through me, if it instead just bound and strangled me? I wouldn’t be able to break free with my measly strength, and I’d totally die. I needed to reconsider how I did this whole "trap-finding" business. Some traps had the potential to kill me, regardless of my shields or healing prowess.

"Ah, it’s what we’re here for. I’m pretty sure one of us would’ve died to those traps without you around." Drin said, patting my shoulder fondly.

I cracked a grin at him.

"Do you know what this means?" I asked, bending down and picking up some of the wire.

"What?" He asked, seemingly more to entertain me than actually wondering.

"Evidence of someone new!"

Chapter 204 - Journey to the center of Pallos IX

"Elaine’s right." Glifir said, eyeing up the remains of the trap. "This isn’t the orc’s crude work, may they die and never grow back."

"Agreed."

"Yup."

"What do we want to do? Keep going, or wait here for someone to come round and check on the trap?" I asked.

"Let’s keep going." Glifir said, pulling out his map and spinning it around, seeing where we were now.

"Onwards. Sooner we find the Khazads, the sooner I can get a good meal." Drin said.

"Let’s go!" Ned encouraged.

"I see no strong benefit to staying." Fik added in.

I eyed the dwarves, the sentiment obvious. I weighed the options, and took a deep breath.

"We’re going to stay." I finally said, to the obvious dismay of the rest of the dwarves.

This was it. The moment of truth. Did they trust my leadership, or was I about to have a mutiny on my hands?

I got a bunch of quizzical looks, and I figured I’d explain myself. Not like we were doing anything else.

"That trap almost got me. The orcs had crude traps of stone, while the dwarves are, at first glance, using much more elaborate traps."

"You survived being beheaded." Drin pointed out. "You can survive almost anything."

"What!?" Ned asked, and we looked at him again.

The distraction was both unwelcome, and well-timed.

"Ned…" I asked slowly, with a calm voice like I was dealing with a scared cat. "Do you not remember me surviving a beheading trap?"

He looked thoughtful for a moment, then nodded.

I glanced at everyone else, who were also looking concerned.

"Fik. With me. Glifir, Drin, hang out here." I said, in a dangerous tone that suggested challenging me on this would be a shit idea.

Fik and I walked back quite a bit, and I threw a [Long-Range Identify] over my shoulder, mainly checking on Ned.

Still returned as a [Healer], right in the level range I’d expect it to.

"Something is very wrong with Ned." I said in a low voice, not even asking it as a question.

"Agreed." Fik nodded, stroking his beard. "He’s been acting most unusual."

"Problem is, I have no idea what to do about it." I said. "I can do...what?"

"Have you tried healing him?"

"Yeah, I lost a few points of mana, but that was it." I said.

"Remind me about your healing." Fik asked.

"Panacea against - ah, it doesn’t do magical herbs, or similar effects." I said, remembering the dwarven ale.

"Maybe he’s eaten something weird?" Fik suggested, seizing on that.

"That could explain it…" I said, thinking about his symptoms. It didn’t match any drug I knew, but I was keeping an open mind. The dwarven drugs to get you drunk had done all manner of wonky nonsense to my body, that could only be explained by magic.

Or lots and lots of different drugs.

Then again, we’d all been eating the same stuff. Anything impacting Ned would’ve hit all of us.

Except -

I snapped my fingers.

"Insects. Drin’s been feeding us all sorts of bugs. Let me grab him for a chat."

Fik shrugged.

"Sure, why not."

"Well, either way, don’t talk to Ned about it." I said.

I went to chat with Drin privately.

"Warrior Drin." I said.

"Healer Elaine." He replied back.

"Ned’s all sorts of weird. Any chance it was an insect you gave him?" I asked.

He frowned.

"Possible? Yes. Likely? Not at all. I believe I’ve recognized nearly everything I’ve grabbed. There aren’t too many different bugs that live here, and it’d need to look exactly like a bug I already know, while also causing that… problem… when eaten. And I would’ve needed to have never heard about it."

He grunted.

"It’s a good idea, but no. I doubt it."

We walked back together, and I grabbed Glifir for a private chat.

I went over the same things Fik and I talked about, and he had another idea.

"Are, like, parasitic mushrooms a thing?" He asked. "Whatever’s wrong with him has been going on for a while, and maybe he keeps getting a dose of whatever’s wrong?"

I shrugged.

"They could be. Just about anything seems possible with magic."

"How do we ask him?" Glifir said.

"Erm. We just ask him to strip and check him over?" I proposed.

I got a side-eye at that, then a sigh.

"Yeah sure. Talk with Drin first." He said.

A quick talk with Drin - again! - and we were all on the same page.

"Hey Ned, can we check you for mushroom spores or something?" I asked him.

"Sure!" He said, stripping out of his gear. We looked over him, seeing nothing of concern.

"Huh. I would’ve put money on that being it." Glifir said.

I frowned, not knowing what to do.

"Glifir, how’s the local map looking?" I asked him.

"Eh, so-so. I’d like to explore a bit more. If we can find a large intersection, the odds of someone finding us go up." He said.

I thought about that briefly.

"Alright. Need me to check for traps?" I asked, given that we were in the trap zone.

"Nah, I’ll be fine." Glifir said, waving me off.

That seemed unusually out of character for him, given how careful he’d been so far. Was everyone just slowly going insane down here?

I watched with no small amount of trepidation as he carefully worked through the hallways, Misty steps behind him indicating some sort of skill. He made it to an intersection without any problems, and called us over.

We headed over in a single-file line, with me taking up the rear position, right behind Ned.

About halfway down the hallway, there was a deadly whirring noise, and a pained cry from Ned.

"Arghhhhhhhhh!" He yelled, as his arms fell off. "Crusty eggshells that hurt!" He screamed out, looking down at his severed arms.

"Ned!" Drin cried out, hurrying back to him.

"Are you ok?" Fik yelled, moving back to support Ned.

"Yeah, yeah, give me a moment." Ned said, making a motion with the stubs of his arms like he was trying to wave them off, and failing because he had no arms.

I started to hurry forward, only to see Ned start to regenerate his arms.

My eyes narrowed. My grip tightened on my knife.

"Drin. Fik. Back off." I said, lowering myself a hair into a fighting crouch, good for moving quickly.

"But he’s-" Drin tried to protest.

"Now." I snarled at him, practically growling.

The image of a tiny kitten pretending to be a tiger flashed through my head, and I banished such intrusive thoughts.

"What’s wrong?" Glifir asked, having caught back up.

"Ned’s healing is wrong." I said, staring at his slowly regrowing arms.

"It’s wrong? How?" Fik demanded.

"Ned said he had over 4000 power, during the dragon’s attack. Before he got almost thirty levels. That healing rate isn’t 4000 power worth of healing." I said, watching Ned like a hawk, slowly backing away to get more distance.

"That’s… kinda weak." Fik said lamely. Drin was reluctantly nodding along.

"Oh come on! I’m a healer! I know this stuff!" I protested.

"Yeah, but you’re only, like, what, 20 years old? That’s not a lot of experience, even if your race grows up fast." Drin pointed out.

"Yeah, how do you know how fast I heal?" Ned smugly pointed out.

[Oath] boosting my healing knowledge by an absurd percentage, along with a decade of experience. I didn’t say that though. I was still hesitating over the efficiency problem.

Ugh. I couldn’t even attack Ned and prove my point once and for all. I didn’t believe that he was an active, current threat to me.

I mean, not only was I [Oath]-bound, but like, stone-cold murdering someone to prove a point wasn’t what I wanted to do.

Although - shit, he could just have a horrible efficient rate. That would slow him way down.

Fuck. The words were already out of my mouth. I felt that nervous pit in my stomach, the one that occurs when I really, really screw up.

"Glifir?" I said.

"Ummmm. Let’s keep waiting and seeing? It’s a bit weird, but I dunno this healer stuff." He said.

"You never did like me." Ned pointed out.

The pit in my stomach, the dreadful feeling of having really screwed up, was deepening.

Thankfully, the heavy stomping of metal boots on stone started to faintly echo down the hallway. We exchanged rapid looks, promising that this wasn’t over yet.

"Fik. Can you be the boss? If they’re dwarves, they’ll probably react better to another dwarf than a beardless unknown." I said.

Fik looked startled at the trust, and I mentally cursed.

I’d never established a chain of command after me. I’d been too used to Kallisto managing it, and I’d forgotten that minor detail.

Because honestly, in the situation I was in, the only way I wasn’t in charge was if I was dead.

Still, Fik stepped up, and it was with mounting tension that we listened to the boots coming closer. I made sure to keep one eye on Ned, and one eye on the escape route I knew was clear.

"Maybe call out to them?" Glifir suggested.

"HO! Cousins!" Fik called out, his voice echoing through the hallways. "We’re over here!"

There was a pause in the stepping noises, then the sound of rapidly marching boots headed our way. I primed my [Mantle] to be ready if anything happened.

"How did you get here!?" An angry dwarf encased in metal grouched at us, hefting a large, two-handed battle axe. "You’re supposed to be in Velduar! Wandering out like this could kill you!"

We exchanged excited and awkward glances with each other.

Fik stared at me, a desperate look in his eye. The look of someone who wanted someone else to take over.

Fik was not natural leader material. I gave him a slight nod of encouragement.

"Um. We came in from somewhere else." Fik said, having found some spine.

"What!?" The dwarf exclaimed. "It’s all supposed to be sealed up! You must tell us where there’s a leak."

Glifir butted in at this point, generating the entire map of where we’d been.

"We’re here." He said, pointing to a spot. "And we came down an old air shaft that we widened over here." He said, pointing to a now-familiar spot.

The Khazad dwarf eyed the map, looked at Glifir, and sighed.

"Fine. I need to get you to one of our [Strategists], they’ll figure out how to close it. Come on, let’s head to Velduar."

"Um. What about the traps?" I asked.

"Dwarves don’t trigger them." He said, before doing a double-take at me.

"Wait, how did you know about the traps?" He asked suspiciously.

I was mentally screaming.

Ned had triggered one!

"She’s a human."

"A human?"

"Yeah, from the dead zone."

One of the other metal clad dwarves peered at me, like I was some exotic bird or another.

"Is she safe?" He asked.

"What happened to her beard?"

"Can you really live in the dead zone?"

The dwarves poked and prodded, questions coming so fast that I couldn’t even respond to them. At least I got some distance from Ned.

"Oi! You lot!" The Khazad commander yelled. "Give her space! We’re near the edge of our patrol, let’s talk when we’re deeper in. Don’t want any orcs sneaking in."

He muttered and seemed to adjust something.

"There! That should fix the traps for us on the way back." He said, and scanned us one last time, before slapping his forehead.

One of the guards nudged the battle axe dude.

"Healers!" He whispered, with the urgent tone I knew to interpret as "casualties ahead."

"Cousins! Right! You do things differently." He said, turning towards us.

"Healer. Healer. You both grace us with your presence, and I wish to invite you to break bread and share salt with us."

I glared murder at Ned, who just smiled back in the most innocent way. Whatever was going on with Ned - he still had healing skills.

I wanted to tell these guards about my concerns with Ned, but - getting to somewhere safe, with food, was a high priority for me right now. I was all too aware that I could totally die down here, and getting myself safe was higher up on my priority list, than taking Ned down with me.

Ooooh, when we got back, I was going to tell everyone about Ned. Maybe I’d use my human bigshot status, and talk with someone important about the issue.

However, I was no longer the boss. Ranting and raving about the issue to the new dwarves, when the dwarves that actually trusted me and knew Ned hadn’t been convinced? They’d just lock me up in the looney bin, if they even allowed me in at all, and my credibility would get torpedoed before I could talk with someone important enough, alone, and convince them of my story.

We made our way through the tunnels, which quickly morphed into sensible, reasonable, well-lit and arranged hallways. The dwarves spent some time idly chatting, talking about the trip, about the attack. Everything I’d said about not saying the D-word clearly went out of everyone’s head, as the Khazad dwarves freely talked about her, then my team did after a moment’s hesitation.

It… was totally possible that Night, and as an extension, myself, were wrong about saying a dragon’s name got their attention. Or if it did - it didn’t matter. The dwarves were happily calling to her, and…

Well, I suppose she had just annihilated all visible dwarven civilization, from the sound of it.

A series of bright lights were in the final hallway, with a well-manned barricade at the end. The battle axe dwarf looked like he’d been poleaxed.

"Ah, erm, right." He said, nervously stroking his beard. "I forgot this part, ah. This is awkward." He said.

I glared at Fik so hard, he must’ve felt my eyes boring into the back of his head. He finally got the hint.

"What’s awkward?" He asked.

The patrol leader waved his question off.

"I’ll let the commander explain it. She’ll want to talk with that scout of yours, and the two healers.

He gestured, and two of his minions stepped up.

"See that they’re settled in somewhere nice after they’re debriefed." He glanced at us, remembering what we’d said about eating bugs in the conversation back. "Get them a hot meal or six." He added on.

"Patrol coming through!" He announced, stopping.

"Stand by for a patrol!" One of the guards yelled.

"Relax, it’s fine." Battleaxe dwarf - I really should learn his name - said.

A number of lights flashed, and Inscriptions lit up. Some frowning and muttering occurred.

"She says she’s a human." He said. "From the dead zone."

A barrage of questions was fired my way, and I swear I was going back to Remus, if nothing else than to dodge all these annoying questions that I kept getting asked. Let someone else be the tip of the spear, and I’ll come back to visit once I’m no longer the pale beardless wonder.

I mean, I’d still be beardless, but I’d no longer be the new, exotic specimen.

"Right, you three, with me." He said, leading us through the well-manned barricade. I saw a number of [Warriors], a few [Rangers], and a couple of [Mages], all pushing or over level 400. Only took me one [Long-Ranged Identify] to get them all! They took this defense seriously. Layer after layer of defenses, crossbows, Inscriptions, and more, all jam-packed into this narrow hallway.

I decided to keep my mouth shut on the obvious question of "What if they dig below you?", assuming there was a good answer to that - like "we already have defenses down there."

This did not look like a new conflict.

We made it through the blockade.

We exited to a marvelous city, carved into the heart of the mountain.

It was like they took an entire mountain, and carved out the entire heart of it. A few soaring pillars suggested that engineering, not magic, was holding up the ceiling, and the buildings were primarily built out of stone in a rough, block, Brutalist manner.

That’s not to say the seven-story apartment building in front of me was any the less impressive for it. No, the buildings either built out of the rock - or possibly, carved out of the rock as they built this city, were large feats of engineering prowess.

It was also clear, looking around, that buildings had been built in several stages, so to speak. The underlying build and architecture - and I suspected the rooms inside as well - were blocky and practical, and then there were the decorations.

Finely crafted metal filigree adorned every building, although most decorations ended abruptly around two stories up. Still, glowing moss and lichen of every color - some even slowly shifting through colors - adorned the buildings from that point up, basking the city in a multi-colored glow.

And, from what I could tell, it was a real, proper city. Buildings of various heights stretched back, each one "painted" in different multi-colored moss, creating a blinding display of lights. Dwarves hurried along crowded roads, where vendors were shouting their wares. We were in an isolated zone, a military area near the chokepoint into the rest of the mines, but we could still see the rest of the sprawling city.

The "inside" of the mountain seemed to be coated in a soft white moss, bathing the entire thing in an odd light. Hot red glows were scattered around the city, evidence of powerful forges working their craft, creating a strange, scattered lighting throughout the entire city.

[*ding!* [Cosmic Presence] has leveled up! 269 -> 270]

This beat the crap out of the tunnels!

Chapter 205 - Journey to the center of Pallos X

Glifir, myself, and whatever Ned was - heck, at this point I wasn’t even sure it was Ned anymore - were rapidly led to another tall, blocky building. The glowing lichen was a pulsing red, making it visible from a distance, and the doors were extra-large. A constant flow of dwarves, armed and armored to the beard in well-used and clearly loved metal gear, marched in and out of the doors.

I kept a wary eye on Ned the entire time, and I don’t think it went unnoticed by our escorts that I walked in odd ways to avoid being too close to him. Fortunately, they didn’t comment.

We made it inside, and while this was obviously some sort of military establishment, the Khazads had ideas on beauty in all things. Metal arches flowed along the walls, from floor to ceiling, with artistic "splashes" of flowing metal reminding me of water. The pillars were of subtle shades of different metals, and if this is how they treated utilitarian buildings, I couldn’t wait to see their idea of artistry!

Which gave me a sad pang as I thought about the dwarves I’d been traveling with. I’d seen the Sierra Obelisk, but what other art had they made? What objects of wonder and beauty had been casually razed by Lun’Kat’s rampage? How many years, centuries, of careful, painstaking work had just gone up in flames?

How many precious books were up in flames, unreadable forevermore?

My quest for a solid library that I could hole myself up in would have to wait some more.

I’d been trying not to think too hard of the literal millions, if not tens or hundreds of millions of lives that had been extinguished. The thought of it, the idea, was too painful, and I needed to be operational. I needed to be able to keep moving.

Here though? I was starting to feel the wear of constantly being on guard, of constant paranoia and alertness. I was feeling myself starting to relax a hair.

In spite of knowing I shouldn’t, that Ned was near and possibly dangerous.

It was all relative. Down in the mines proper, there were monsters lurking around every corner, every step could be a trap, and orcs were out for our blood. Which made Velduar like a siren song. No deadly traps. No orcs.

Just Ned.

His presence was enough to keep me on my toes, although he wasn’t making any threatening moves. On one hand, I was cursing my [Oath], on the other, I wouldn’t actually do anything to him.

Still, my hostility didn’t go unnoticed by our hosts, although they weren’t saying anything. They were giving us the look that the guards gave to drunks that were arguing though. The "Please don’t fight, we don’t want to step in and break everyone’s skull."

We made it to a desk, and the truth of the world was laid bare.

Everyone had paperwork.

"Urik. You’re back from patrol early." A gruff dwarf behind the desk said.

"Found this lot wandering around the edges of the patrol area." Battleaxe dwarf - now I had a name, Urik - said, indicating to us.

I awkwardly waved hi, noting we were still basically in a lobby as people were hustling and bustling around.

"Two of them are healers!" The administrative dwarf said, practically leaping out of her chair in excitement. "You should’ve started with that!" She said, berating Urik with a nasty tone of voice.

Urik opened his mouth, probably to protest that he’d only gotten a few words out and was getting there, but with a resigned look, closed his mouth. I knew the gesture well.

"Thoren. THOREN!" Admin-dwarf yelled, and a single dwarf, encased in metal like a can of tuna, hustled over and saluted.

"Thoren. We’ve got two healers here. Your squad is now on protection detail, along with Urik’s squad. I’m sending them to Commander Glora now." She ordered Thoren, glancing back down to her paperwork like there never was a question if he’d obey her or not.

Admins. Might not be in the chain of command, but they yelled and everyone else was jumping around.

"Right then! Follow me." Thoren said.

I glanced at Urik, but he seemed to be naturally falling in to follow Thoren, which made me think Thoren outranked him. There was probably an obvious way to tell, but for all I knew it was how their beard was braided, or the exact alloy of the armor they were wearing.

In my defense, I’d spent no time with the Khazad dwarves, and knew nothing about them. I actually had an excuse!

"What’s up with us getting an escort?" I whispered to Glifir, figuring he might know something about the dwarves.

"I don’t know. This is weird." He said, looking around like a tourist.

"Still making a map?" I teased, trying not to show how tense and on edge I was.

He shook his head.

"It’d be terrible form for me to make a map of their barracks." He said.

"Yeah, we’d hang you for spying!" Thoren cheerfully told us, and it took me a moment to realize he was dead serious.

That dampened the mood as we climbed tightly spiraling well-worn stone staircases. I insisted on walking behind Ned… although maybe my paranoia was going a bit too far. I seriously doubted he’d try anything while surrounded by guards.

I managed to come to the conclusion that I was probably hurting my case, not helping it, as we arrived before some incredibly ornate doors, just one of a number in the hallway on this floor. There were some serious administrative chops going on here. Whoever had made them were masters of their craft, details spiraling smaller and smaller to the point where I was only seeing the smallest of them with the extra perception granted to me by my vitality - which made me think there were details even smaller that I was missing.

Four guards flanked the doorway, and unlike the wood guards - heck, unlike the average guard I saw in Remus, my dad included - they were looking keen-eyed and on-point, ready to be moving and fighting at a moment’s notice.

Guard duty was boring, and guard duty in town, in a military building, on what was one of the higher floors? The one token guard to act as a gatekeeper should be falling asleep on his feet, not four guards on high alert.

Thoren stopped a distance from the guards, and saluted.

"Is Tin Commander Glora in?" He asked.

One of the guards popped his head in, and had a quick word with whoever was inside. He exited, shaking his head.

"Tin Commander Glora is occupied. She says to see Silver Commander Korun instead."

Thoren saluted back, and we were off again, to another door, another set of four guards.

"Bronze Commander Thoren with Steel Commander Urik here to see Silver Commander Korun!" He shouted out, having a completely different reaction.

Cripes that was loud.

I was tempted to tell him off, and to use his "indoor" voice.

Oh no. Oh no oh no.

I was becoming my mother!

I wanted to do something silly, to prove that no, I was still a kid, but this wasn’t the time or the place for it, which was even worse!

I should just lean into it and get a nice wooden spoon.

The difference in greeting made me think that Korun was Glora’s boss or something.

Also, silver was over tin was over bronze was over steel? Confusion was going to be the name of the game here. It probably made perfect sense to the metal-obsessed dwarves, but I was totally lost.

I shook my head and refocused.

One of the guards poked their head inside, and seemingly satisfied at what he found, popped back out.

"He’ll just be a minute." He said.

I exchanged an awkward look with Glifir, and shrugged. Not much to do but wait here.

So we waited, occasionally having our whole group shuffle around in the little "left-right" dance as other groups of armed dwarves marched by.

One dwarf couldn’t stop staring at us - specifically, his eyes rapidly flickered between Ned and myself - as he marched by in his team, with us pressed against the stone wall to get out of their way.

"What are you looking at!?" The leader screamed at him.

"Gold-Comman-" He started to say, only to get interrupted.

"I don’t care! Eyes! Front!"

Well, good to know that we were going to be a spectacle.

I wasn’t the most patient of gals, so me getting bored to the stage of tapping my feet wasn’t exactly unusual. With that being said, we ended up waiting an uncomfortably long time, to the point where one of the guards peeked in again to make sure that Korun was still there.

"Enter!" A voice cracked out from the room, and half of us jumped at it. We quickly filed in, only to realize that maybe seven of us could fit, not the twenty-seven of us that was my team and the escorts.

"What is this mess! Why are there so many of you! Commanders only! Get! Shoo!" The same voice yelled, and I was brought along back in a tide of steel as half the dwarves tried to exit at the same time some were trying to get back in.

We eventually managed to sort ourselves out, and Glifir, Ned, myself, and the two dwarf commanders were in the room with Silver Commander Korun.

"Right." He grumped, shuffling paperwork on his desk and grumbling into his beard. "I had said commanders only, but I suppose they’re here for a reason. What can I do for - Why didn’t you say you had healers?!" He screamed at Thoren, jumping up onto his desk, kicking paperwork everywhere. "You know how hard pressed we are for them! Or wait. These aren’t new healers are they? Someone who’s switched their class over?" He peered at us a moment, then shook his head.

"Of course they’re not. Too high level. That one’s a Nolgardian to boot. I thought we’d seen all the Nolgardians. But what’s with this one?" He asked leaning forward to peer at me from an uncomfortably close distance. "Mismatch of metal and wooden armor, healer-tagged, and beardless? What crime did you commit for that, and why haven’t I heard of a beardless healer? We might’ve offered you a pardon, depending. Which means you’re new here. How?" He asked, finally pausing in his barrage of words to let someone else get a word in edgewise.

I glanced at Thoren and Urik, only to see them studiously keeping their eyes on the wall ahead of them, not looking at us at all. I mentally cursed them.

"Hi! I’m Elaine, a human from Remus, which is in the dead zone." I said, starting a little speech. I briefly considered trying to explain that I was also Sentinel Dawn, but that would go down one heck a rabbit hole.

"Not a criminal." I added in, figuring I’d get that out of the way. "Human women just don’t grow beards."

I was getting strange looks - what do you mean human women don’t grow beards? - and decided to get back onto the main crux of the story.

"One of my teammates and I made first contact with the Nolgardians here, and I was on my way to the capital when the, um,"

I paused what I was saying, and flapped my arms like giant wings, while mimicking breathing fire.

"Yeah, when that attacked." I said.

"The dragon?" Korun said, looking at me like I was a crazy person.

I shushed him.

"Shhhhhhh! Don’t say its name! It’ll hear you!"

He opened his mouth, exchanged bemused glances with the other commanders, and closed it. He looked at me thoughtfully.

"Two weeks ago I would’ve called you nuts, and thrown you out the gates. Today? After seeing what’s happened? I think I just might be looking silly the next time we discuss this…her." He turned around, and made some markings on a piece of paper pinned to the wall behind him.

"What happened to the rest of your team?" He asked. "Are they downstairs?"

"Oh, no, my teammate Hunting went back to tell everyone else that you were here. You’re as new to us as we are to you. Plus, the border patrol didn’t like him very much. Something about him being a Void mage."

He grunted.

"Yeah, good thing they didn’t let him in. That’ll end in tears one day, and a city turned to rubble. Right. Healer, healer, what are you here for?" He barked at Glifir, pointing at him with a finger.

Glifir jumped at that, and Urik smoothly stepped in.

"They came from outside our perimeter, and breached their way into the old mines to escape the, um, "

To my endless amusement, Urik started flapping his arms as well. I could see a bright red blush spread up his cheeks, over his beard.

"Anyways! He’s made a map, and can point us to where they broke in, so we can hole it up."

Korun grumbled, and started sorting through his papers, flinging them everywhere. He was basically making it snow, and it was a wonder he got anything done with that organizational system.

Glifir just generated his map out of Mist, making it large, and pointed to the spot.

"It’s here we fell down." He said, pointing to the spot deep within the mines."

"How’d you manage that?" Korun asked, studying the map - namely, just how deep and surrounded by other tunnels it was.

"Widened an air shaft." Glifir said.

Korun grunted, as he kept shuffling through papers.

"Good trick that. Going to be a huge pain for us to fix." He said, pulling out a paper, nodding at it, then scribbling furiously on it with an oversized quill.

The paper was hovering in the air, which was making me think there was a skill of some sort. [Invisible Clipboard] or [Everything is a Surface] or something.

There was so much cool magic in the world! I wanted to sit and talk with him, and learn all his skills!

Heck, forget that, I wanted to know everyone’s skills.

"Right, anything else from you?" He said, pointing his quill at Glifir, who shook his head.

"Right, out you go." He said, pointing to the door.

"Um, go where?" He asked.

Korun rolled his eyes.

"To where the rest of the Nolgardians are! Someone will be there to debrief you. Now shoo! Get!" He said, menacing Glifir with his quill, who vanished in short order.

Not that his directions were exactly illuminating. I hoped Glifir would be ok, and they wouldn’t, like, think he was spying on them or something.

One of the guards could probably give him a hand.

Korun kept standing on top of his desk as Glifir left the room, creasing the paper with his great big boots.

"Now, the two of you." He said, sighing and plopping himself back in his chair. "Both are true, proper healers, yeah? Got all the tricks?"

Ned nodded.

"Not sure what all the tricks are, but if it’s a mundane injury I can fix it." I said.

Korun grunted at me.

"Good enough. Right, we have a problem." He said, and I mentally rolled my eyes. There was always a problem.

What now? Healers were on strike? Deadly magical plague? All the healers had gotten locked outside when Lun’Kat attacked?

"We’re in a state of war with the orcs. I dunno how much you know about warfare, but healers are a high-priority target. They’re soft. Easy to kill. Kill the healers, and attacks become deadlier. Killing is no longer mandatory, but crippling works even better. After all, a cripplied warrior needs to be looked after, taken care of, fed, housed. However, when a healer’s around? A crippled warrior is back in the fight the next day."

I nodded. I’d gotten similar lessons from Artemis and Maximus, about how in fights against other people, I’d be targeted first. Heck, I’d seen it in the fight against the orcs earlier, where their earth mage’s attacks had almost all targeted me. Ned had gotten lucky by being further back than I was, but ‘kill the healer’ seemed to be semi-universal among intelligent beings.

Yay me.

"Anyways, the orcs have been targeting healers, along with other targets of opportunity. They usually fail, but every success is a devastating loss for us."

"Why would anyone ever leave town?" Ned asked, seemingly perplexed by the idea that anyone would want to. "It’s full of food."

"Contrary to what you Nolgardians think, we’re not idiots." Korun said, giving Ned the evil eye. "We’re trying to keep the healers safe. However, orcs do occasionally manage to slip into Velduar, and when they do, they try to burn our food, undermine the supports holding the cavern up, assassinate our healers, and hit whatever else they think is critical that’s unguarded. Two weeks ago, they managed to sabotage our sewage system. Shit was literally flowing through the streets. At least they can’t burn down our buildings."

Oh. Yes. I hadn’t considered that, but combine the ability to become mostly invisible with just about anything else? Yeah…

It was like what I had done to the pirates, on a large scale. I was willing to bet that the dwarves had their own commando teams deep in orc territory, performing the same tasks. All was fair in love and war!

I’d let my [Shine] lapse, since there were actual lights here, but nope. It was not to be. I set a moderately powerful [Shine], strong enough to chew through mirages, weak enough that I still had a modest amount of mana regen.

I got a Look.

"Anti-Mirage skill." I said.

He gave me a curt nod.

"Glad to see you’ve got your head on your shoulders! Anyways, while the two of you are here, we need you patching people up. You’ll also be assigned two teams of guards, and secured quarters. Some orc tries to come after you, just run, don’t try to fight them. We believe there are three teams of orc Sabotaugers currently running rampant through Velduar, and most, if not all, of the members have their third class. Now, I won’t lie to you. We’ll do our best to keep you alive, but they managed to drop a building on one of our most senior healers last week. We’ll do our best, but no promises."

Ned was frowning.

"Is it possible to forgo the escort?" He asked, and even Thoren and Urik turned to give him a stupefied look.

"No." Korun said, without a moment’s hesitation. "We need you too badly to risk it. Healer Elaine. May I speak with healer Ned privately?" He asked.

I nodded and stepped out of the room.

Waiting… waiting… waiting…

Wonder what they were talking about in there.

Ned came storming out, an angry frown on his face. Urik was hurrying along behind him, and he and his team vanished after Ned.

"Healer Elaine. If I may speak to you?" Korun said, and I entered to see Thoren and Korun in the room.

"Hi. Thank you for your patience. Believe me, I wish you were currently patching people up, reforging their body like a smith fixes a broken sword, but there are a few things I’d like to get from you before you begin. I’d like to know your magic power, control, mana regeneration, classes, and skills." He said, having a fresh sheet of paper ready.

I blinked, and looked at Thoren, who nodded encouragingly at me.

"With respect - heck no." I said, crossing my arm and cursing the lack of sunlight outside.

"Explain yourself." Korun said, in a less friendly though not hostile tone.

"I’m not just Healer Elaine. I’m also Sentinel Dawn, a member of the Ranger organization in Remus. I was scouting our frontlines, because, politely, I’m one of the best humanity has to offer. I’m not telling a foreign military all of my tricks and secrets. I’m delighted to heal people - just point me to them - but if you think I’m letting you know what I can do? Not happening." I said.

Korun tapped his quill against his desk.

"I need a rough idea of what you’re capable of, to manage estimates and juggle healers and their locations and assignments." he said.

That was fair enough. Administrative work was hard enough even when people weren’t deliberately withholding information.

Speaking of - I needed to tell him about Ned, and my suspicions around him. I’d been mulling over it, and I was starting to see the shape of the problem.

Still. He didn’t need to know the full extent of my healing.

I grinned to myself. I’d give him the toned-down version.

"I can rip and tear through patients as fast as you can give them to me, without rest." I grinned. "Just point the way!"

Chapter 206 - Journey to the center of Pallos XI

"Excellent!" Korun said, scribbling furiously on his paper. "Now, the way we do things is we’ve got the healer in a secured room, and we’ll bring you one patient at a time. You heal them, we move onto the next one."

I frowned at that.

"Something wrong?" He said, picking up on my frown.

"Yeah… that’s pretty slow." I said. "Like, I’ve done these types of events before. Last time I needed to have people brought to me I was half the level, and it was disease, not injury I was tackling."

"And disease takes less to heal than injuries, right?" Korun said, flipping to another set of notes. "At least, that’s what my other healers are saying. Is the same true for humans?" He asked.

"Yup!" I cheerfully confirmed, seeing no harm in the knowledge, as he scribbled furiously on another piece of paper.

"Right. I’m going to strongly caution you against healing like that, since being able to heal 36 people a day for thirty days is a lot better than you healing 216 people once then getting wacked by the orcs, but I’ll allow it this time." Korun reasoned.

My eyes narrowed at ‘allow it this time’, but before I could properly dissect the statement, Korun had to go and make a mess.

"Ahha!" He said, jumping onto his desk again, renewing the paperwork snowfall. Seriously, how did he get anything done? His organization was terrible.

"We can have some secondary teams waiting nearby, see if we can lure the orcs out of hiding with you! Sure, it’d suck if you died, but if we can get one of the Saboteur teams in the process, it’ll totally be worth it. Guard. GUARD!" He yelled, one of the outside guards peeking in.

"Yeah boss?"

"Get me the Lead Commander, the Gold Commander, and the Adamantium Commander. Got a job for them."
"Um. Sure boss. What do I say when they tell me to rust off, because they’re hunting the orcs?" The guard nervously swallowed.

"THAT THIS IS AN ORC HUNTING OPERATION!" Korun screamed at him, like the poor guard was the one defying orders, and not the one stuck between a rock and a hard place.

Said poor guard vanished, and Korun dropped to his seat again.

I’m not sure how I felt at how little regard he seemed to show for the potential of me dying, but eh. Can’t have it all.

"Anyways. We have some nice accommodations for you, and I’m going to see if I can get that blasted rabbit to up the security on your rooms. I am right in thinking you have nowhere to stay?" He asked, peering at me like I might have somehow acquired lodging in the fifteen steps needed to get here.

"Um, no." I said. "Something that you arrange sounds nice. I’d like to stick with the dwarves I came with if possible."

Free lodging? Sure, I’d take it.

"Good, good. I’ll look into having some of them bunk with you. Perhaps that Ned, you’re both healers, we can secure both of you for the price of one."

Wait. No. Not like that. Before I could say anything, Korun plowed onwards.

"Now, you’re the frontline scout for you humans. Are you interested in meeting the Council of Elders, or no?" He asked me, carefully neutral.

Oh gods no. Politics again.

You know what? Fuck politics. Fuck trying to be nice and polite. Just fuck everything about this mission. I was totally done, and wanted nothing more than to go home and soak in a nice bath.

"Nope! No interest in the slightest." I said, ignoring Thoren’s incredulous look.

I probably should’ve agreed to meet, but at this point, I’d call "making it home" a big win.

More scribbling.

"Right then. They’ll eventually find out about you, and will probably insist on meeting later, but I won’t send an urgent message saying you should meet."

More writing. Poor dude. I hope he had a class for all this. Some of his displayed skills suggested that he had some skills relating to admin work.

I checked quickly. [Warrior]. Around level 450 or so.

Ouch. Hope his second class was an administrative one. Then again, he probably got promoted once his second class was past 256, which meant no chance of a reset or side-grade. Downside to the way the System worked, but then again, someone didn’t need an [Administrator] class to be a good administrator. They just wouldn’t get magical assistance for it.

"Right! I think that’s it. If there’s nothing else, Thoren can guide you to one of the infirmaries." He said, focusing back on his papers.

This was my chance.

"Actually, there is one more thing." I said, with my most serious ‘there is a Problem’ tone of voice. "Healer Ned."

"What about him?" Korun said.

"While down in the mines, he, well, changed. He went from being an ass, to being confused, stilted, then forgetting basic things that happened. I also believe that he set off one of the traps you laid down - you know, the ones that trigger on non-dwarves? Lastly, his healing rate doesn’t match his claimed healing abilities."

Korun frowned at me.

"Most of those aren’t quite problems. Healers - heck, everyone - lie about their abilities constantly. And he wouldn’t be the first Nolgardian to have mentally broken or snapped after the attack. That happens. The trap thing concerns my beard, although, were you near him at the time?" Korun asked.

"Yeah… I was right behind him…" I admitted, knowing how it’d look.

Korun nodded.

"That could do it then. But just to be safe, when he gets a moment break, we’ll do another scan. Ask him politely to walk through an area we’ve set to detect non-dwarves, and get one of our healers to check on him. Happy?" He asked.

"Any chance I could not bunk with him?" I asked, hoping to get some minor win. They weren’t taking my complaints seriously, and it was going to end in tears. I just wanted to make sure they weren’t "boo hoo poor Elaine, we should’ve listened."

"If it makes you happy, sure." He said, finding yet another piece of paper in his endless piles and crossing something off.

I felt like Korun wasn’t taking this as seriously as he should be - he hadn’t seen it the way I had, didn’t know the things I knew. He was just hearing a single verbal report from an unknown species, that was unverifiable and the concern didn’t seem to be shared by others.

I suppose a "Let’s double-check you are a dwarf" would have to be good enough. I mean, practically speaking, could they do anything else?

"Alright." I said, nodding. "Thank you."

Ned was no longer my responsibility. I’d kept my team safe, we were now in a new place, and I’d given them a warning about him. What they did with that information was their responsibility. Only way I’d be stepping back in is if he needed medical attention.

Otherwise? I was washing my hands of the whole thing.

"Great! Thoren, if you’d do the honors?" Korun said, dismissing us.

Thoren and I left Korun’s office, to meet the rest of Thoren’s team outside. My stomach half-gurgled, reminding me that I’d been eating nothing but insects for the last week.

"Any chance we can stop for some food on the way over?" I asked.

Thoren hesitated a moment as we started to climb down the stairs, the dwarves keeping me in the middle of their formation.

"We could, but would you be able to eat something on the go? I don’t know why Korun took so long."

I shrugged. Potato, potato, as long as they had potatoes I was good.

"Yeah, sure. I’ve been eating insects for the past week or more - hard to tell time down here! I’m ravenous, I could eat a whole orc again."

Thoren gave me a somewhat skeptical look.
Ok, fine, so a whole orc was like three times my size.

"Really?" He asked.

"Yup, really. Got a Spatial stomach just for storing stuff." I said with a totally straight face, then cracking into a laugh.

"Nah, Radiance as you saw - are seeing now - but I am hungry."

[Shine] was permanently on. Low-level not to wreck anyone’s eyesight, but hopefully powerful enough to mess with illusions.

He finally got the hint, and as we exited the dwarves military-administrative-I-don’t-even-know building, had a quick word with one of his minions, who hurried off to find food.

We moved through the streets, and I was more than a little embarrassed.

"Move! Out of the way! Healer coming through! Yeah, you, out of the way!"

One of Thoren’s minions shoved someone out of the way, and I could just flat-out die of embarrassment. I didn’t want this treatment at all.

I didn’t need to worry about orc commandos, the dwarves would make me kill myself in shame.

I should totally live in the infirmary for like, a week, then get out of here.

We made it in, and infirmaries were the same the world around. The only notable part was the apparent multi-floor nature of the building - a gentle ramp led upwards - and that all the dwarves seemed to be military, with bundles of armor next to each bed, and a quick scan showed everyone [Identify]ing as a combat class, with only a few exceptions.

I rolled my shoulders as I felt a huge grin creep onto my face. This was it! This is what I was made for! Good, wholesome healing.

Thoren was running interference with the dwarves who were running the show, but "we brought a healer to go nuts" greased a lot of hinges.

"Right, any reason not to get started?" I asked Thoren, who shrugged at me.

"I dunno, you’re the healer."

Welp, nothing for it. What was nice with this many people in one spot - [Cosmic Presence] should be going nuts. It-

[*ding!* [Cosmic Presence] has leveled up! 270 -> 271]

Yeah, like that. I’d just leveled it earlier today to boot! Probably should’ve told Korun about the skill, but at the same time, it wasn’t like they could move people in here from other buildings, and my aura was ginormous. Big enough to cover this building, while I was in it.

The nice part with [Cosmic Presence] was with this many people here, I was preemptively healing everyone in my radius. My radius was large, and it did take a short amount of time with each person, which had the net effect that once I got going, each person would take less mana than normal to heal, given the amount of work [Cosmic Presence] had done before I’d made it.

I got to the first patient, and after a cursory look I tapped his foot and healed him up, noticing that the mana I lost was rapidly being restored. I probably could just burn my way through this entire building, like I claimed.

I was excited. I turned off notifications, I wanted to see them all at once when I was done.

Second patient was missing an arm. No problem, it was only around a few thousand mana to restore it with all six fingers, and I started to pick up speed.

What was interesting with the two patients I’d seen, was it looked like a Water healer, or a Water-aligned healer, had already seen to them. Cuts were closed, with that uniform fleshy look that I associated with magic healing, but the "help your body along" variety, not the "restore body parts" type.

Third patient had gotten peppered with rocks, or something, and his chest was a mess. They’d gotten the stones out, but he had torn muscles and broken bones everywhere. Nothing super major, but enough low-level damage to take someone out of a fight, and keep them out of the fight. I touched, and my eyes widened.

"60,000 mana!" I exclaimed, looking at the dwarf, and glancing back at my mana bar. "Wow! Glad I made it!"

Hang on. Being beheaded took almost that much mana, and the dwarf, while in bad shape, hadn’t been a decapitated head lying on a bed. Also, 60,000 mana for one dwarf? I was going to need to eat crow at this rate.

Then again, saving this many people from Black Crow kinda was eating crow in a sense.

"Um. Wow. Thanks, I guess?" He said, sitting up and flexing his arms.

"Hang on." He said, looking at his right arm. "What happened to my arm!?" He said in a panic.

"I healed it?" I asked, checking over his arm, touching him again. No feedback, no problems. "It seems good. Skin, muscle, blood, bone, what’s wrong?"

"Bone! That’s what’s wrong!" He yelled in anguish. "It cost me 12,000 Drul to get enchanted metal to replace the bones in my arm!" He said, practically sobbing.

"Errrr…. Oops?" I said.

"Didn’t anyone ever - oh hi" The dwarf had started to work up a real rage, yelling and screaming, before Thoren and the rest of his escort stepped in.

They didn’t say anything. They didn’t need to. They all had their weapons drawn, and they loomed over the poor dwarf, who decided that shutting up was the better part of valor.

It was kinda impressive, how people as short as I was could loom so well. I’d need to take notes.

"Is this a common thing?" I asked Thoren.

"What part?" He asked back, somewhat confused.

"The metal in his arm!" I said.

"Oh yeah. All sorts of dwarves do it. Metal arm, steel ribs, built-in knuckles, iron hands. Heck, I replaced my leg bones to run faster. Dwarves do it for all sorts of reasons to boot! Those that worship the god of the forge believe it brings them closer to him, others do it so they can fight better, or want a hand that’s immune to fire, or run faster, or just look good. I know one dwarf wi"
I gave him a Look.

"And with all that metal in them, how, exactly, do they get any healing?" I demanded.

Some confused looks and mutterings went around, and a runner was sent. It would be too much for me to expect meatheads to know how medicine worked. I barely knew how meatheading worked!

"So what did the metal in your arm do?" I asked the dwarf who I’d inadvertently screwed.

"It was unbreakable. Had enchantments to make me stronger and faster. Had an [Earth Shot] enchantment mimic on it. Plus it kept me warm. And some other enchanter rust that I ignored. Now it’s gone. All gone." He said, morosely looking at his arm.

"Erm. I’m very sorry. I haven’t healed here before." I said.

I needed a solution to this problem.

Hang on, while I was thinking, I could make myself useful.

I was about to ask for everyone with metal in their arm to raise their hand, before reconsidering. That was, to me, the abnormal, but there weren’t just metal-in-random-places dwarves and normal dwarves. There were also dwarves that were asleep, that might’ve lost their hearing, or just plain weren’t paying attention.

"Oi! Can anyone without metal implants raise their hand!" I yelled, only getting a few hands nearby up in response.

This was going to take ages.

"Thoren. Can you get a pair of the guards to wander around, and get people to raise their hands? I’m going to be moving at a good clip." I explained.

"It is running the escort a bit thin…" He hedged.

I rolled my eyes at him.

"They’re going to be a short distance away. It’ll be fine."

I spent a moment thinking, then realized I had more.

"Plus, I’m the healer. I’m the boss here. Work with me."

Thoren frowned, but then turned and pointed to two of the guards, who started shouting on their way down the infirmary.

I decided to show them up, and wherever they went, I was right behind them, high-fiving every raised hand, instantly healing people back up.

"No metal? Good! High five, you’re back in it, go!" I said, slapping the hand of another dwarf before moving onto the next. I heard him behind me.

"Ha! You spent the last ten years giving me rust about your oh-so-wonderful iron knuckles! Well, who’s laughing now!" He said, teasing another friend of his in a good mannered way as he started to get his gear on, chuckling that he was finally free.

Food arrived around this time, and I switched from high-fives to high-elbows, as I tried to keep a container of some sort of mushroom soup stable with one hand, and eat with the other.

I’d murder the bloody dwarves for making a game out of high-elbowing me and seeing if they could get me to spill a bit, but they were having too much fun with it. Way too high-energy for sick and injured patients. There was probably someone with an [Energize Patients] skill in the building.

Or wait, it’d probably be a Metal class or, hmmm. Mirror. Yeah, probably Mirror. [See how energetic I am!] or something like that.

Either way, I was getting most of the food in me, and only a little on me, and orcish commandos weren’t bursting through the ceiling, skills blazing.

A few of the dwarves were sadder cases though. They listlessly lifted their hands for healing, and once I healed them, they just dropped their hands back to the side.

Lifeless.

Their bodies were whole, but their minds were broken, damaged in a way I couldn’t repair. I was just thankful that none of them thought I was a threat, or started shooting skills at me.

I’d blazed through most of the floor when the minion sent to find out how metal was normally handled came back with another dwarf in tow.

"This is healer Elaine. She has questions about healing around Metallic Enrichments." Minion-dwarf introduced us.

"Walk with me." I said, handing my leftover bowl to a guard, and continuing to walk and heal. I did like my crowd of guards/helpers making my life easy.

"What do you need to know?" The dwarf asked me.

"Well, how healing usually works with the Metallic Enrichments." I said, finger-touching another dwarf and healing his amputated legs in a flash.

"Well, the healer usually starts healing, and when they’re done healing, they stop." She said, acting confused. "Most Enrichments resist healing, so it’s not a problem."

I half-stumbled at that, but caught myself and continued on.

"Ah, see, I’ve got a bit of a problem. When I heal someone, I automatically flush out all foreign materials." I said.

"You didn’t notice anything was wrong when he seemed healed, but it was taking ages?" The helper asked me.

I shook my head as I kept walking, the guards rattling after me.

"Did the entire thing in one flash. 60,000 mana down the drain. The anti-healing probably explained why it took so much mana though." I said, thinking about it.

What was strange was I swore I’d arranged my skills so that I could flush stuff out of the body like that - in my torso and head only! The fact that I could do it on large foreign objects in arms was puzzling me a hair right here and now. I was sure once I spent a few minutes thinking about it properly, it’d come to me.

"That’s impossible." She scuffed at me. "You’d need-"

"I have over 100,000 magic power and control and the mana to match." I said, cutting her off and enjoying a little smile to myself. I was underselling myself, but only telling the truth, and, well, those basic numbers were already out in the wild so to speak.

One of the downsides to metal armor? Clumsily hitting each other with it made quite a nasty noise.

I smiled to myself as the worst orchestra percussion symphony ever went into full swing behind me.

Chapter 207 - Journey to the center of Pallos XII

Making people trip when they heard my magic power and control wasn’t going to get old anytime soon.

However, I was faced with the most ridiculous, absurd problem I’d ever heard of.

I had too much power. I was healing out metal augmentations that the dwarves had installed in themselves. And it wasn’t like they had a standard set they all used! Oh no, everyone had something different from the sound of it.

I continued to walk through the tent, hitting up dwarves that were raising their hands while I thought about the problem.

Let’s take the dwarf with the metal bones. How would I heal that?

Well, the problem wasn’t "How do I heal it" now, was it? It was "How do I not heal it?"

Which led me back to briefly reflecting on my [Oath]. I’d sworn to heal everyone, yes. However, if someone had, say, prosthetic legs, and they were happy with said legs, regardless of performance?

Well, then there’d be no problem. If there was no problem, then I didn’t need to heal it. The patient’s wishes would triumph in those circumstances, unlike Perinthus and the plague, where the greater good came into play.

I tapped another dwarf, fixing a nasty broken jaw, punctuating the thought.

Ok. So, ideally, I’d like to save their augmentations. My healing right now just smashed right through what was present, and replaced their metal with bone, "healing" them back up.

I stopped moving for a moment and facepalmed.

"Everything ok?" Thoren asked.

"Yeah, yeah, I’m fine, just realized something dumb." I said, getting moving again.

I was healing them… because of my [Persistent Casting]. The answer was now somewhat obvious. I needed to turn my [Persistent Casting] heal off again, then on each dwarf, figure out what metal they had, then make sure I healed around it. I’d be playing it kind of close, but that’s what my massive control was for.

At the same time, my [Persistent Casting] was arguably what saved me from decapitation, and there were the orc commandos running around. Apparently, I was a high-value target, and as I considered how I would lead a team of Rangers to demolish an entire city, I had to reluctantly admit to myself that I’d aim for the healers. Perhaps not first, but they’d be on my list, and I’d kill one if I saw an isolated or weakly guarded one.

Thank all the goddesses I had [Oath] and would never - could never - make that decision.

I’d reached the end of this floor, and was staring kinda dumbly at the stone wall.

"Healer Elaine? Are you alright?" Thoren asked me.

I gave him the murder glare for breaking me out of my concentration.

"Hang on. I’m thinking." I grumped at him.

Goddesses, I hated being broken out of my focus. It was so damn hard to get back there. Right, where was I? Prosthetics, healing around metal, careful control, ahha! That’s right.

I could also focus, and "limit" how much I was healing in any one go, which should give the anti-healing properties a chance to work. Or, um, not work, as the case may be.

Right. Now that I had something of an idea, I needed to know more about how the metal implants worked. Take the bone augmentation for example. The whole human body was connected, and interconnected, again and again and again. The dwarvish body was likely to be fairly similar in many aspects. After all, the gods seem to have plagiarized everything, and while I wouldn’t dare guess how a phoenix’s biology worked, with it being made of fire and all that, I was willing to assume that dwarves were similar to humans.

Said bone-replacement needed many things. Like, obviously the dwarves' muscles still worked. That meant tendons were connecting the muscle to the bone-replacement. The other bones had to be connected, which meant the ligaments were in place. It was technically possible that the fenestrated and sinusoidal capillaries - the little blood vessels feeding the bone - were in place, but I had serious doubts about that. That would be extremely high-tier work, and while possible, the dwarves seemed fairly obsessed with metal, and less so with biology.

I should write out a copy of the Medical Manuscripts for them. It’d-

No.

Focus.

Right, if I didn’t think the blood vessels were directly connected with the metal - like, metal poisoning was potentially in the works even more so if it was - then that also meant it was likely that the bone marrow didn’t have a replacement either.

"Healer Elaine! I’m so glad you’re safe!" Urik called out, barging through the guards, trailing his own escort.

"WHAT NOW!?" I practically snarled at him. I WAS BUSY DAMNIT!

He barely batted an eye at my ferocity, being actually somewhat experienced and shit, and I cursed to myself.

Oi! System! Give me an [Intimidation] skill or something! [Scary]! I needed a skill for this!

[*ding!* You’ve unlocked the General Skill [Savage puppy]! Would you like to replace a skill for it?]

No! I was not an angry puppy! Give me a real skill!

[*ding!* You’ve unlocked the General Skill [Kitty Has Claws]! Would you like to replace a skill for it?]

I briefly considered cursing the System out, but I was near a class evolution. There were wildly varying theories on how smart the System was, and how it responded to people’s actions. The fact that I could wish really hard for a skill and get offered something was proof of that. I didn’t want to piss the System off, and get subpar classes, if not shitty ones.

With that being said, being "cute" and "adorable" was kinda grinding my gears here. It was clear from people’s reaction, and the System’s offered skills, that people weren’t taking my angry grumpings seriously. If only I was a beefy six foot tall physical classer, that could intimidate people with a single look. Or had one as an escort who could practically read my mind.

ANYWAYS. Back on task. Urik was talking.

"... no idea what happened!" He said. I continued giving him a vacant, half-snarling look, as my brain worked overtime.

[Pristine Memories], bail me out here.

"Healer Ned just vanished! We’re afraid the orcs got him, but we have no idea what happened!"

Ah right. There we go.

"Ok, fine. How does that impact me here, now, and was it worth interrupting me?" I said, grumbly as hell that I’d gotten interrupted twice as I was trying to figure out how to keep people alive.

Seriously, all these delays were not good for the dwarves.

Urik was slightly taken aback by that.

"Well, you two were traveling together, I thought you’d care." He said.

Ooof. Right. That was kind of a bad look, to be like "My buddy vanished, probably dead? Don’t care."

"Something was wrong with Ned in the first place, like I told your boss, I was assuming he’d try to kill me at some point. How’s Glifir, Drin, and Fik doing?" I asked, to blank looks.

I rolled my eyes.

"The Nolgardian dwarves I was with." I clarified.

"Oh! Still being debriefed. Probably getting fed, then we’ll find a place for them." Urik said after a moment’s hesitation.

I didn’t quite buy that, but I was busy.

"Right. Anything else I need to know before I can get back to working on how to heal the people here?" I asked, irritation obvious in my voice.

"Hi, yes, can we come through?" A pair of dwarves with a stretcher asked, from way back behind the crowd. They both [Identify]ed as [Laborer], around level 110 or so. Young.

Wait, the crowd?

I blinked and looked around again. Thoren had all eleven of his minions back with him, all armored up, weapons at a relaxed ready. Then there was Urik, and his eleven minions, and the aisle in the infirmary wasn’t exactly large.

Three’s a crowd, and we were twenty-five people.

Oh no, don’t tell me they were going to try and "keep me safe" by permanently following me around, were they?

Nooooooo. They totally were.

"Yeah, sure, come on through!" I said, shuffling myself out of the way.

Thoren and Urik shared an indecipherable look, but we all slowly shuffled out of their way as they made it to one of the dwarves that hadn’t gotten healed yet.

"Mage Toick, you’re up!" One of the stretcher-carriers, carefully moving the dwarf over to the stretcher. My money was on some sort of skill.

I ruthlessly crushed the idea of speculating on their classes and their system of healing and medicine before I got sidetracked by more stuff!

However, the stretcher dwarves, and moving patients presumably to a healer, reminded me that they were thinking of using me as bait, since I was being high profile and stuff.

I mentally snorted. If I was leading a team of Rangers, there’s no way I’d ever hit the ridiculously well-guarded target. That was asking for trouble. No, I’d pick off a target somewhere else where there were fewer guards. Snipe the VIP when everyone was relaxed in public.

Which meant eventually the pendulum would swing, the orcs would hit somewhere else, and when the guards all scurried off over to where the distraction was, then they’d hit me hard.

I should get out of town before then.

Although…

If I saw a well-guarded target, and I had, say, Artemis and a hiding spot, I might be tempted to have Artemis unload on the target, then bail to a new hiding spot.

I nodded to myself.

Right. Heal here, see how many dwarves and how much backlog I could clear out, then casually walk out, hopefully before my presence even registered on the orc commando’s radar. It wasn’t like people were talking with them, it was all observation.

… Unless, of course, they used a Mirage skill to disguise themselves as dwarves. But I had a weak [Shine] going to dispel that. Argh!

Anyways.

Focus.

I needed to work on healing, which meant I needed to finish working out the medical puzzle I’d been presented with.

Where was I?

Bones. Ligaments. Tendons. Capillaries.

Bone marrow!

I’d need to check, but I’d be surprised if there was a bone-marrow replacement, especially since it needed the capillaries to make it all work.

Also, there was no way they properly made bones be a store of calcium.

Actually, there was an easy way to check those parts!

"Hey, question on metal implants - err, Metallic Enrichments." I asked Thoren, looking over at Urik and making it clear I wanted his input as well.

"I don’t know much about them, besides the obvious." Thoren said. "I can’t even guess at some of the technical aspects."

I waved him off.

"Does anyone have a full skeleton of metal? That’s been replaced, and not, like, someone’s skill to have a [Metal Skeleton] or something?"

I felt pleased with myself that I caught the possibility of a skill before being given bad info.

"Nah. The damn smiths won’t work on you if you’ve got both arms, legs, and your ribcage replaced." A dwarf that was sitting up and watching us interrupted. "I would know, they refused to give me any more and started muttering arcane mad-smith nonsense."

I looked at Thoren, who nodded slowly. Urik jumped in.

"Yeah, he’s right. I’ve heard the same thing."

Ok, that implied that it wasn’t replacing biological functions. I was dead curious what the dwarf had done to himself, and why he wanted so much blasted metal in him. It had to hurt, and it had to be constricting his breathing. The chest was flexible for a reason!

Unless they made it flexible. Magic was totally awesome like that! I was tempted to stick around and see just how much I could learn, how much I could get taught. I didn’t think I’d be able to use any of it… I just wanted to satiate my curiosity.

Right, fine. I needed to go in, heal a bunch, and avoid wherever there was metal. A long, complex puzzle boiled down to such a simple solution didn’t quite sit right with me, especially considering any other damage they might have nearby, that I might miss as a result of my healing method.

I wasn’t totally thrilled with that, until another piece of the puzzle clicked into place.

I could hang around for a bit after, and let [Cosmic Presence] finish the job!

"Ok, I’m going to need to focus for a skill of mine." I said. "This is one of the skills that keeps me alive, and I need to be absolutely uninterrupted while I get it set up." I explained to Urik and Thoren.

"Is this the best place for it?" Thoren asked me.

I looked around. Crowded infirmary.

I shrugged, and sat down on one of the beds I’d made vacant.

"Sure, why not?" I said, dismissing my [Persistent Casting] of [Dance with the Heavens].

I then re-did it, speedy mode, for just myself. That way if I brushed up against a dwarf, I wouldn’t accidentally purge their metal implants. Honestly, it was a miracle it hadn’t happened yet.

Still, I had to balance a good image for myself, with getting to the wounded and injured. I spent enough time to almost entirely refill my mana bar - it’d never recovered from the first dwarf I’d "overhealed" - and considered it "good enough for now".

So many things to do, and not nearly enough time.

"Right. I think I can heal dwarves with metal implants, and not ruin them." I said. "However, I’d like to look at a few, up-close and personal, to see exactly how it’s all connecting together."

"Um. Do you mean to slice me open?" The dwarf who’d spoken up asked, looking somewhat nervous.

"I mean, yeah, I’m going to have to." I said, thinking out loud. "If not you, then someone else. I need to take a look at how the tendons and ligaments are attached to heal them properly. I don’t have what I need to see capillaries or anything that small, but I’ve gotten a good guess on them." I said.

"Who’s got an anti-pain skill, and would like to be first?" I said, looking at a few unwilling test subjects enthusiastic volunteers.

"Errr, why don’t you go ask one of the other healers…" The sitting-up dwarf said, nervously looking around at us eyeing him like a pack of wolves eyes a lamb. "They probably know! Please don’t slice me open like one of those mad smiths!"

The last part came out frantically, and I sighed. Didn’t he need to be sliced open to replace his arm in the first place?

Wait. Right. Magic.

I had no interest in being a smith, but I was getting crazy curious about their process and their work.

"Fine, fine. Anyone? Any big, tough dwarf ok with me slicing them open to see how they work, so I can get healing? Any dwarf with a beard big enough?" I asked.

Nobody.

I started to walk down the aisle, my overly large escort leading the way and following behind in an overly complex single-file line.

This was absurd.

"Any dwarf. Annyyyy one at all willing to help me out." I called out in a sing-song voice.

"I’ll help." One dwarf wheezed then coughed, ugly bandages all over the remains of his face. No guesses why he was wheezing, that was ugly.

"Great! Anyone have a sharp knife? You do have an anti-pain skill right? Where do you have metal in your body, I just need to take a quick look. Shouldn’t take me more time than eating lunch!" I said, happily accepting a sharp knife a member of my escort handed to me.

"Uh, wait." He said, wheezing some more. "Nobody ever said," He was really struggling with that breathing. "Anything about slicing into me!" The poor dwarf got the last part out all in a rush.

"Awww, fine." I said, pouting a bit. I just wanted to help them! Was that so hard?

"Anyone? Anyone care to test their metal mettle?" I called out.

"I’m Forrous Metal-Hand the 38th!" One small dwarf with a big voice roared out. "I’ve never backed down from a challenge, and I won’t back down now!"

"Excellent!" I said, a maniacal gleam entering my eye as briskly strode over to his bed. "Where are your implants, and do you have an anti-pain skill?" I asked.

He looked down at his hand, and my brain caught up with my ears.

‘Metal-hand.’ Derp.

"Great! Anything else?" I asked him.

"Aye. Entire arm, shoulder, and half my ribs." He said.

"Most excellent!" I said.

I was totally getting a [Mad Healer] or [Overly Enthusiastic Vivisector] in my next Celestial class up.

"Numb to pain?" I asked him, and got a nod back, followed by a startled look.

"Wait, are you sure you’re a healer? Aren’t anti-pain skills standard?"

"I mean, yeah, but I wasn’t using mine, so I dropped it." I said. "Now, hold still, this knife is a bit on the large side and I need to see small things."

"Fine." He said.

I took his arm, and flipped it wrist-side up. I was actually quite pleased with Forrous Metal-Hand. It looked like he was trying to get half his body metal, and not only did he have a bunch of bones replaced, but it looked like there was a sheet of metal over his chest.

A terrible idea, but I’d get to see how that connected as well.

I carefully looked at where the tendons in his wrist were, lined the knife up just right, and pressed down.

Nothing happened. My knife bounced off his firm flesh, not even leaving a mark.

"Now what?" I complained.

Chapter 208 - Journey to the center of Pallos XIII

Forrous and I were staring awkwardly at the knife pressed against his wrist, that just wasn’t cutting.

I tapped the knife experimentally against his arm a few times, sharp-side down.

"Just how tough are you?" I asked.

Forrous puffed his chest out.

"Tougher than your little knife!"

"Yeah, yeah, real helpful." I said, as I leaned on the knife, seeing if I could pierce his skin in any way.

"Look, can you turn off your defensive skills? Please?" I asked.

I got a Look, like I was a moron or something.

"They are off."

I was tempted to throw up my hands in frustration, but I was too aware of the knife I was holding onto.

Curse my low strength, and his high vitality. This was absurd. It was making it all too obvious that blades might not be in my future at all, apart from a small knife to help me out.

Then again, in all the years since I’d lost the skill, this was the first time I missed [Surgeon’s Scalpel]. One of the minor downsides of only having one healer class - I had all the main tricks down, but some of the more esoteric side-pieces were missing.

It didn’t bug me. I could heal, and keep people alive no problem. This was to make life easier for the dwarves, and not blow up their valuables. In a pinch, I could just heal them the normal way.

I briefly considered using my Radiance to help me out. It’d slice through the dwarf’s arm, with fewer problems.

However, Radiance had its own set of problems. Namely, the whole burning and searing part would burn and sear the delicate little parts of the body that I wanted to see in the first place!

"Anyone got a skill to help me out?" I called back to my way-too-large escort. "Sharpening skills, anything?"

A few dwarves started to step forward, which kinda made sense. Most of them probably had something metal-related, and making your blades sharp was a basic warrior skill.

After some internal shuffling and glances, one minion was selected to help me out.

"Right! You can make things sharp?" I confirmed.

"Aye! And I’ve got some Erosion skills, to weaken things I hit." He confirmed.

"Perfect! What do you need?" I asked.

Minion shrugged, and touched my knife and Forrous’s arm.

"All set!" He said.

Well, that was easy. I suppose I made my healing look just as simple.

"Can anyone make blood vanish, so I can see what’s going on?" I asked the dwarves. "Could be Water to wash it away or manipulate it, Wind to keep it clear, Dark to remove it, really, I’m not fussy."

Twenty-four dwarves, each with at least two classes, and having at least 24 skills each. I got my new volunteer to give me a hand.

"Darkness mage, high control." She said, not saying a word more.

Didn’t really need to!

What I was basically doing was an exploratory surgery, to see just what the heck was going on. Not too different from a surgeon doing the same thing.

Technically, I should wash my hands, especially after touching loads of injured patients. I didn’t want a repeat of Lyra, but at the same time, I was going to heal him after, and I believed my [Cosmic Presence] aura would kill any infection in the cradle. Plus, he was going to get a healthy dose of healing after.

I carefully sliced into Forrous’s arm, noting that I was piercing the skin. My dexterity wasn’t too high, compared to my level, but at baseline I had steady hands, and the 500 extra points helped me keep them steady as I slowly sliced into Forrous’s arm, blood pooling and welling up, only to be whisked away by my helper.

I kept slicing, making sure to avoid the tendons, until I hit the metal bones. I then smoothly sliced down the arm, keeping clear of anything important, like veins or ligaments.

It wasn’t easy. Human anatomy wasn’t quite the same as dwarven anatomy, and there were just enough minor differences to keep throwing me for a loop. I was nothing if not adaptable though, and worked around them.

I did accidentally hit the radial artery - or what would be the radial on a human - at one point, but a tiny burst of focused "Heal this one injury only" and a little touch fixed that problem. Some of the medium-sized parts of the circulatory system I had no choice but to slice through, carefully sealing them after me so I wasn’t going to end up swimming in blood.

[Oath] didn’t bother me. I was - and it was - familiar with the concept of surgery, and minor mistakes. I fixed the little mistake, and it was, globally, part of making him better. I couldn’t deliberately cause harm, and I needed a damn good reason to do this operation - but because both were checked off, the operation was kosher, and little mistakes weren’t punished.

I couldn’t imagine if little mistakes were punished. Bump into someone on the street? Lose a level. That’d be impossible.

I probably would be punished harshly if I went "Lots of injured people that are horribly complicated to heal? Nah, I don’t think I’ll bother."

Then again, it wasn’t in my nature to do that, so it was fine.

Plus, I’m sure Forrous preferred his blood inside him, no matter how gruff he might seem.

I then put my knife down carefully, reached in with both hands, and peeled his forearm apart, to get a better look at what was going on. I used my hands to keep it open, and prevent it from snapping back shut, although I could feel the strain on them. I made a mental note to pass it off, and soon.

I heard a retching noise or two, but ignored them. I did check on Forrous though.

"You good?" I asked, noticing that he looked distinctly green.

Muscles tense in his neck, he gave me a tiny, curt nod.

Ahh yes. The "I’m trying real hard to keep my lunch down" look. Still, I had consent, so I was going to take a peek under the hood! Err - arm.

I started off by looking at the wrist, and all the delicate little bones there. Whoever had designed the hand hadn’t wanted to deal with the wrist, so it was still all fleshy.

I peered in, looking closely. The tendons made it all the way to the metal hand replacement, where they seemed to be "grabbed and pinched" by tiny, delicate metal protrusions. They were a little covered up though, by a bit of flesh and blood and general ick. Still, I could see some tiny, densely-packed inscriptions keeping the whole thing running.

I considered asking my assistant to clear off the material around the tendon-to-hand connection, but I figured the risk of her not knowing anatomy well enough, and accidentally deleting part of the tendon was too high of a risk.

I went to the bones - errr, metal implants - next, nodding in approval as I saw not one, but two metal rods in his arm. The smiths had decided to try and imitate life, and not just stick one bone in the arm and call it a day.

Except, they seemed to think bone didn’t do much more than just provide support and structure for the body. Blah. Bones did so much more than that.

I was totally going to get them a copy of the Medical Manuscripts. So many things to do, and I felt like the clock was ticking fast, and pressure was on.

Ligaments and tendons were both "pinched" by little grabbing "claws" coming out of the metal bones. I continued to poke around, seeing how the connections all worked, how the whole thing was put together.

I felt my hands getting tired keeping his arm open, and there was one last connection being blocked that I couldn’t see.

"Should I be awake for this?" He asked with a nervous chuckle.

"Well, no. But while you are, here, hold your arm open. There’s one last thing I can’t quite seem to..."

Finally, I’d seen enough.

"Right. Forrous. Do you mind if I try healing a few little things while I’m in here, just to test things out."

"I, uh, don’t like the sound of ‘test things out.’" He said.

I looked at him, waiting.

"Well?" I asked. "I didn’t hear a no."

Forrous had a pained look on his face. I internally chuckled. His brash claim of ‘I never turn down a challenge!’ was now being tested as "Let me take a quick look" turned into [Mad Doctor] Elaine would like to perform EXPERIMENTS! Hold still, this will only hurt for a second.

"Yeah, sure." He said, with gritted teeth and closed his eyes.

I carefully focused on healing just his tendon, seeing almost nothing happen.

Heck, I couldn’t even see my mana bar move, it was recharging at such a fast rate.

At the same time, metal didn’t start to suddenly vanish, the tendon didn’t snap, nor did huge amounts of my mana go poof. So, healing parts that were connected, and just connected, were fine. There wasn’t anything super special going on.

I tried a few more things, and finally I was satisfied that I knew how to heal Forrous, and other dwarves with the same "improvements".

"Right, I’ve got it now." I said. "You can close your arm."

He let go, and his flesh practically sprang back together. I touched it, and I focused on what I’d done and sliced apart, along with managing the inflammatory response. I also focused on his primary injuries, and made sure that everything metal he’d mentioned was explicitly excluded. Then I sent a thin, tiny trickle of mana into my [Dance with the Heavens] skill, watching my mana slowly tick away - no wait, I was regenerating just as fast as I was using mana - as his flesh re-knit in front of my eyes.

"I’m healed." He said stupidly.

"Yup! Implants are all intact to boot! Not only that, but now I’ve worked out how to heal everyone with implants thanks to you." I said, giving him a reassuring pat on the shoulder. "Should be good for some bragging rights, eh? Thanks for volunteering!"

He grinned.

"Aye! Nobody will ever be able to top holding my own arm open for the healer to poke around!"

I made sure my surgery scalpel was returned back to the dwarf who owned it, who gave me a side-eye at it having been used that way.

It was marathon time! Part 2!

"Thoren. Urik." I said, getting my escort’s attention.

"Aye?" They asked in unison.

"I need two dwarves to be ‘frontrunners’ so to speak, and get a solid idea of what metal each dwarf has, and what their injuries are. This is already going to take me ages, I don’t need to be delayed waiting to hear everyone’s life story."

Thoren nodded, and had a quick word with three of his minions, pointing them to the right spot.

"Need a bite?" Urik asked, and I nodded.

"Please."

Healing was stupid hungry work.

We were unfortunately in the middle of the room, so I couldn’t just do a clean sweep. Step by step, person by careful person, I made my way through the remaining patients.

Blasted dwarves and orcs couldn’t leave well enough alone, and new patients slowly trickled in. Still, I wasn’t alone here. The other healers, while not visible, were felt by the teams of stretcher bearers coming down, grabbing someone, then bringing them up the stairs.

There was a bit of a twist. Some patients had gone deaf, an explosion or something else having mangled their hearing so badly they couldn’t hear what was being asked of them. Usually, I’d hit them with some carefully aimed healing at their ears, then move on while one of the asker-dwarves got their full story. I’d then swing by after my next patient to heal them, to not waste time collecting information.

Once in a while a dwarf was catching a nap, or trying to sleep off their injuries. Some appreciated being woken up for a quick heal, others were grumpy, three woke up swinging, assuming they were under attack.

Made me all the more thankful for my helpers, and it was a good reminder. I was approaching territory where people’s specializations were shining. The physically-inclined dwarves could hit hard and fast, to the point where I’d be in danger.

If I was low on mana.

Either way, I didn’t want to be wrestling dwarves and digging axes out of my spine, and I was happy to let someone else do it.

We worked our way down the room, then back down the other way, the room slowly but steadily emptying out.

I then hit my first new snag.

I stared at the dwarf’s completely mangled arm. He’d broken his arm badly, and his prosthetics were bursting out of his fleshy arm, forming a right angle like a nightmare of a compound fracture.

"Um." I said, looking at his arm. The dwarf chuckled.

"Smith that sold it to me called it unbreakable. I’d have a pair o’ angry words for him, if it hadn’t saved my life in the process."

"Yeah, that’s… something." I said, eyeing it up, and thinking fast.

I was no smith. Heck, if it was raw iron, I doubted I could fix it, forget whatever complicated things were going on, forget whatever runes had been broken here that also needed fixing.

I will admit when I do not know how to heal a patient.

This totally fell into that category.

Partially.

"You’ve got two options here." I said, eyeing the arm. "First is, I heal you, but you’d lose the fanciness going on in your arm. Second, I give you a little top-up, fix what I can, and leave you to someone who can fix this mess. Errr. I assume there’s someone that can fix this…?" I said, realizing that it might not be fixable.

He waved me off.

"Ironarm here just saved my life. This will sound a mite mad, but I’m attached to the bugger now. It’d feel like some betrayal to get rid of her. Nah, you’re cleaning up everyone nicely, which means I’ll jump the list for another healer soon enough. There’s a few that work with smiths for exactly these types of problems."

Reasonable. Patient had declined treatment, and had a plan for getting proper attention in the future. Patient clearly knew the risks, and was willing to forgo treatment.

It was one of those situations again, where I’d offered help, and once declined, I allowed them their bodily autonomy.

"Right! Best of luck! Want an energy pick-me-up?" I offered.

He shook his head.

"Got a skill for it. As long as my feet are touching the ground, I’m good."

I pointedly stared at his feet, up in bed.

"Yeah, yeah, you’re real funny. Shoo!" He said, making a shooing motion with his good hand.

On and on I went, smiling to myself as [Sunrise] kept me going, and my mana stayed high. Only a handful of dwarves refused treatment, most looking for a smith-healer, and a few didn’t seem to trust my beardless nature, instead wanting to wait for a "real healer, made of proper steel". No idea what that was about, but I got the gist.

I was only slightly offended. I mostly didn’t care. I’d been getting shit for my gender in Remus for so long, that getting shit for something else entirely out of my control by a few xenophobic dwarves practically slid right off. Or was it beardless-phobia? There seemed to be something about dwarves and a lack of beards.

Whatever. I had too much other shit to do.

On and on we went, food coming, people going, massive crowds of escorts and grumpy stretcher-bearers trying to get through us.

Still. The passage of time, and my efforts, paid off.

"Wow." Thoren said, as we looked at the practically emptied infirmary. His mouth open, he hesitated, then closed it again. Open… and closed.

"Well, I thought you were good at boasting, but I’ve gotta eat rust." Urik said, looking at the nearly-empty infirmary. "Feel like tackling upstairs?"

Chapter 209 - Journey to the center of Pallos XIV

I looked at the nearly-empty infirmary. The only people left were those who had refused treatment - even then I saw two of them taken away on stretchers, to be seen by a specialist - those too broken in the mind to keep going, those who we hadn’t been able to rouse and check on.

And those who had died before I got to them. They were rare, having been stabilized by front-line medics before getting here, but they were imperfect. Things occasionally slipped through. Usually minor… but not always.

"One last sweep." I said. "I’m going to heal anyone who’s slept right through all this. It suggests that, metal or no, there’s something wrong with them that needs to be addressed."

I thought about it a moment more.

"I’ll try to avoid healing their bones. No promises if they have an artificial organ or an iron ass or something, but at the end of the day, their health is more important than their augmentations."

We started to move back through the infirmary, at a much higher clip. I mentally checked on my Arcanite reserves.

About half full. They’d been slowly recharging, and I mentally cursed to myself. If I’d been keeping careful, careful track of how much mana was in the Arcanite, I could’ve marked time better.

The train of thought got derailed as I reached the first patient. One of Urik’s minions was shaking his shoulder, but there was no response.

I looked over the dwarf, the only visible injury a nasty cave-in on the skull. My money was on a head injury of some sort. I mean, I didn’t need a degree in medicine or special skills to make that guess.

I shrugged, touched the dwarf, and focused on healing everything that wasn’t bone. More mana than I would expect vanished, but not so much that I thought I’d killed an implant or something. Just a few thousand, which was more than I’d expect for no major injuries.

Yet, the dwarf kept sleeping. I glanced at Thoren, who just shrugged at the confused look on my face.

"You’re the healer, not me."

I shrugged. I’d treated the unknown dwarf to the best of my abilities, and made a note to myself - don’t get hit hard in the head. Like, I’d treated head trauma a bunch, but this was hinting at some types and forms of brain damage being Bad News.

I thought about the problem as I continued treating the remaining patients. There was, as far as I could tell, no mind magic of any sort on Pallos. The closest things were mental buffs to myself, like my own [Center of the Universe], and the occasional "positive" aura, like the calm aura I used to have, or the happiness aura.

Imagine if there was any type of mental magic? Merchants would be all over it so fast, fleecing people and forcing them to empty their pockets.

It would get much darker from there. It wasn’t a path I wanted to explore.

The Guardian’s fight against the dragon had nothing that I could see that resembled mind shenanigans.

At the same time, that wasn’t conclusive proof that there was no mind magic, just strong evidence that it wasn’t around.

The dwarf’s head injury - and others - being unable to be easily fixed might be an extension of the no mind magic. For example, if his frontal lobe was destroyed, his entire personality could change. Would restoring the frontal lobe back to its prior configuration be mind magic?

What if he liked his new personality?

There was a dizzying array of questions and possibilities, and I reiterated my conclusion:

Don’t take bad headshots. Hopefully if I did, I’d automatically heal myself back up before anything new "settled in" so to speak.

That, and I better hope I had my [Persistent Casting] going. If it wasn’t up, a headshot could easily kill me, even if I had all my mana. Be an awkward way to go.

I healed the last few people, then turned to Urik and Thoren.

"You mentioned upstairs?" I asked.

Urik nodded, and without a word led the way to the gentle ramp near the entrance.

We followed a pair of stretcher-carriers up the stairs. They were jamming the way, and I didn’t feel like trying to slip past them, not when my entire escort would as well.

Gods, they were awkward.

We made it up the ramp, and it was totally different up here. Instead of rows of beds, there was a long hallway full of doors, about half of which had one, or in some cases, two guards. Three doors had four guards, all of who looked on high alert.

"What’s up here?" I asked Thoren. "Is this where the healers are?"

He nodded.

"Doors with four guards are healers - the rest of their escort is inside, the theory being that the orcs won’t use the hallways to attack. The rest are various high level fighters, commanders, and the rest who rate their own private room."
Even as I watched a pair of stretcher-dwarves be let into one room, another pair left a second room and hustled down the hallway.

Inefficient, until I considered mana regeneration rates, safety, and comfort. Not everyone was, well, me.

I strode to the first room, and opened the door.

"Intruder!" The dwarf inside yelled, as all hell broke loose.

The dwarf was obviously a mage, and a high, high level one to boot. Flickering beams of Radiance met my eyes, trying to blind me, screw with my vision, and burn through my skull. Only once the beams were boiling my eyeballs did [Bullet Time] kick in, letting me see - barely - everything else that was coming at me. Like a damn bursting, a bunch of clear liquid fell from the ceiling, at the same time a roiling cloud of colorless droplets came hurtling at me, and numerous rocks came flying at me. The mage in question vanished behind a solid wall of burning Radiance, which might be a shield, or just a way to hide her location.

Everything but the kitchen sink.

Which were just the attacks I saw. I was able to see somewhat through the Radiance trying to blind me - although, damn that was annoying, especially with the strobing - and my eyeballs were healing just as fast as they were seared off, bless my [Radiance Resistance] and healing.

I threw up a [Mantle] as I tried to leap backwards, only for the rest of my escort to throw up more shields than I could quickly count, as Thoren and Urik started yelling.

"Hold! Hold! By the Clans HOLD!" Thoren yelled. I missed what Urik was shouting, because Thoren was louder.

Shields were breaking almost as fast as we could put them up, but after a moment the Classer inside the room seemed to realize that, no, this was not an assassination attempt on her life.

Screams of pain and agony caught my ear, and I saw three dwarves rolling on the ground, most clutching their faces.

I squatted down, patting two with [Dance with the Heavens], using a shit image of just "heal them", and I kicked the third one. I winced as two of them had implants and chunked over half my mana to heal. Bad images were extra costly with those damn implants. It made it extra-clear why they weren’t usually an issue.

They’d probably curse me out later, but for now, I’d made sure their lives were saved. I’m not sure what hit them, but my bet was the clear liquid wasn’t water.

Thoren and Urik went into the room, and started to give the Classer a piece of their mind, each one yelling over the other. The exact words were lost to me - and probably whoever was in there - but the tone, and the message, wasn’t.

I just got myself up slowly and dusted myself off. That had been too close. A reminder that anytime, anywhere, someone could have enough power and will to just end me. Even someone on my own side.

It’d taken the combined efforts of nearly two full squads of guards on top of my healing to just keep me alive. Then again, I could see why the dwarf had a VIP room. She was incredibly powerful, an unparalleled [War Mage] who could unleash her entire arsenal in a second or two.

I glanced up at the door, noting the holes the acid had sprayed out of. She’d even set up traps ahead of time.

Idiot. She could’ve killed one of the other healers, or some other innocent - like she almost had.

Then again, with my experience, given the chance to set traps I might well do so too.

There was no winning. The world was a dangerous place, where threats lurked around every bush, every tree, every boulder, and, as it turned out, every hospital door.

"You’re clear!" Urik called back to me. I stomped in, noted the war-mage’s injuries, and slapped her full of healing.

I might’ve also deliberately blown out her augmentations, and replaced them with normal skin and bone. I was in a little bit of a pissy mood, having been almost murdered by the very patient I was trying to heal.

I stormed back out before I could get her thanks, an apology, or worse - a realization of what I’d done to her augmentations. I was pretty low on mana now, but with only a few rooms left, and the other healers, and my natural regeneration rates, I figured I’d be fine.

Anyone as high level as she was, who rated an entire VIP room all to herself, and was dressed in armor as fancy and shiny as she was in would be able to get a new set. That was my own, personal justification.

The next few rooms we carefully knocked on, and sent a guard ahead to announce me. No repeats, although we did end up spending a good amount of time waiting around, where the three dwarves I’d saved took it upon themselves to profusely thank me.

Turned out, I needed to thank them as well. Two of them had Mirror skills that let them take the hit for me, while the third one had been standing next to me, and ate a faceful of acid.

Blocking me from taking said same faceful of acid. Not that I hadn’t been hit at all, but there was a difference between a full face of high-level acid, and just the side-spray.

We got through most of the rooms in good order, dodging stretchers who shot part-grateful "thanks for reducing our workload", part annoyed "You’re in the way and reducing the number of levels I get" looks at us.

Water off my back.

No, the only significant snag was with one of the guards.

"Can’t let you in." He said, stubbornly guarding the door like he could fight all of us and win.

In a sense, he probably could. If we attacked him, or tried to physically remove him, he’d just need to scream bloody murder for everyone else to come down on us like a sack of iron ingots, and we’d totally be in the wrong.

Some of the dwarves we’d healed were hanging around, just watching us work.

"Why not?" I asked curiously.

"You ain’t one of the healers." He said.

"You [Identify]’d me?" I asked incredulously.

"Nope." He said, staring past me to the wall on the other side of the hallway.

"Why not?"

"Don’t have the skill."

"How do you tell what people are?"

"[Examine]."

"Well, did you [Examine] me?"

"Yup."

Silence as he stared at the wall.

"And?" I prompted.

"You ain’t one of the healers." He repeated. "Can’t let you in."

"Could I get whoever’s inside to confirm that he or she doesn’t want me healing them?" I asked.

"Nope." He said stubbornly. "Can’t let you in."

"Can you let me in?" Thoren asked. "Bronze Commander Thoren."

The guard looked nervous, but to his credit, held firm.

"Nope. Only the healers." He said.

I shared an incredulous look with Thoren, who shrugged in a "I’m so glad I’m not the healer and this isn’t my mess." way. His job was to keep me safe, and I’d talked him into giving a bit more help. It was clear that he was leaving me on my own for this.

This left me with an interesting problem, which I pondered as I went to the next room.

Patients who refused treatment were fine in my book. They didn’t want my help? They didn’t get it. No skin off my back.

People who were attacking my patients? Also fair game.

Someone peacefully denying access to a patient?

Record scratch.

I couldn’t abandon them, the patient hadn’t explicitly denied or refused treatment. I couldn’t go through the blockage, it wasn’t defending myself or my patient. Heck, they probably thought they were doing what was best for the patient!

No, the only solution I could think of was to wait. Wait until the patient was healed, dead, I was allowed in, or another healer was allowed in.

Hmmmm.

I continued that line of thought as I healed more people.

I didn’t exactly need permission to heal. If I could somehow sneak into the room, I could heal whoever was there. Then again, with the hair-trigger state everyone was in, that would be a smart move, but not a wise move.

I knew [Oath] had some problems, and could potentially put me in bad situations. Inadvertently, I seem to have stumbled upon one of the problems.

Well, while I was hanging out waiting for him to be available to be healed, there was nothing stopping me from trying to hit up everyone else. Just as long as I wasn’t abandoning him.

The situation fortunately resolved itself, as the VIP’s got treated quickly, and I was clearing out enough people to jump whoever was being guarded to the front of the "to be healed" line. The stretcher crew made it to the VIP’s room, was let in, and taken back out without a fuss.

I wanted to roll my eyes at the whole thing, but the problem was over. I’d just need to keep it in mind as a potential "Oath-trap", and just another way someone could exploit me if they knew about my [Oath].

The rest of the floor was over in a whirl.

"By Wulfric’s great grey beard." Urik swore, after I went back downstairs and re-cleared out the new patients who’d arrived since I got started. "I’ve never seen anything like that."

"I want to give you my - our - deepest thanks, healer Elaine." Thoren said. "You’ve saved countless lives, and we’re indebted to you."
I waved him off.

"All in a day’s work. Now. This looked like a military hospital. I imagine the civilian ones are about as poorly off? No, wait, worse. They would’ve been hit, and people pulled towards this one." I guessed, my voice only being described as "tired-cheerful."

Like, 8 parts tired, with 2 parts forced-cheer. I bolstered myself with [Sunrise], but still. I was flagging.

"Yes, but…" Urik hedged.

"But what?" I asked.

"You don’t need to…"

"Appreciate it! I do! Same drive that brought me here, that had me clearing people out, is also why I’m heading over to… wherever it is… and working my literal magic there. Ha. Magic. So much fun." I said.

… I was tired. I don’t know how long I’d been awake, but I’d been traveling through the mines, nearly murdered three times over, had a massive marathon session, and was only still on two feet by the grace of [Sunrise].

"Sure you don’t want to go to the quarters we’ve prepared for you? Meet up with your friends?" Thoren confirmed.

I shook my head.

Thoren and Urik had a quick huddle with a few of the other guards, while one brought me something.

Mmmm. Fresh chicken on a stick. How did they also have chickens here? I guess chickens were good at surviving, and universally tasty.

Or maybe it wasn’t chicken? Some exotic dinosaur that tasted just like it?

"Alright lass, it’s your call. Onto the next place." Thoren said, taking the lead.

We rattled our way down the street. The only thing of note was a "chicken-on-a-stick" vendor, with VERY fresh chicken - I watched him behead a chicken live, before instantly dressing it with some sort of skill and sticking it over the fire. A beast tamer of some sort, surrounded by a bunch of small, fuzzy animals that looked like large fuzzy balls of fur, with little snouts pointing out. They lept and snuffled over him in the most adorable way. I kinda wanted one.

They [Identify]ed as [Sniffler], and Urik noticed my interest as we hurried along.

"Snifflers. Can train ’em to smell metals of all sorts, but gotta be careful. If you teach them to find gold and iron, they’ll lead you to both, and you’ll never know which one it is until you get there."

Sounded like a dwarf’s best friend, and was perhaps the cause of the twisting tunnels? Snifflers finding the closest metal?

We made it to the civilian, er, "hospital", which wasn’t saying much. There just wasn’t the same large-scale organization like there was in the military. Still, injured people were injured people, no matter how many strange looks and curses over my lack of a beard I got.

These dwarves had serious problems with people who didn’t have a beard, and it was only thanks to my escort tirelessly explaining that, no, I wasn’t a beardless dwarf, I was a strange newfangled thing called a human, that anything got done at all.

"Right. Next?" I called to Thoren hopefully after the last patient was done, hoping he’d decipher my meaning.

Thoren and Urik shared a conspiratorial look.

"Ah, we’ve got just the place for you!" He said. "Follow me!"

"Oh good. You’re so nice. Thank you." I said, blathering on a bit in my sleep-deprived, [Sunrise]-boosted state.

[Sunrise] was just pure energy after all. It didn’t remove tiredness, it just acted like a strong cup of 8-shot espresso, and it wasn’t possible to live on pure espresso with no sleep all the time. The piper wanted paying, and I’d happily pay him with interest. Eventually.

Once I was done healing.

We arrived at another building, arranged a little differently. It was a little narrower, and unlike the previous one and two story infirmaries, this was a good six stories.

I squinted at it suspiciously.

"This is our next spot?" I asked.

"Yup!" Urik confirmed, way too fast.

I narrowed my eyes, then shrugged. Screw it.

"Right! Lead the way!" I said, giggling a bit as my escort took ages to file into the building.

I looked around the - lobby? - as Urik had a quick word with some bored-looking dwarf in half military gear. Some light armor, a small weapon. No shield, helmet, etc. Words were exchanged, a key was acquired.

"This way." Urik said, leading up tromping up the stairs.

"We skipped the ground floor. And the second floor." I said, pieces of the puzzle coming together. "Hang on, this isn’t a hospital, this is-"

"Where you’re going to GET SOME DARN SLEEP." Thoren yelled at me, finger poking into my chest aggressively. "You’ve been at this for a day and a half, you’ve run us all ragged, and you’re almost entirely incoherent. You blew out six implants, with barely more than an ‘oops’! You need to sleep, we need to sleep. Now look, here’s your room. Enchanted for you. We’ve got a few luxuries in here, and we can get you more if you’d like. It’ll be guarded. Defended. This building is for important visitors. You’re safe. Get. Some. Sleep." He said, punctuating every word with a poke of his finger.

"If you really need to, we can keep going." Urik said. "We’re not going to force you to stop."

Thoren’s words sunk in. I looked at my escort - really looked at them. There were huge baggy raccoon eyes under most of their eyes, and the three dwarves that had taken a beating from that one [War-Mage] still had their armor in tatters. One of my guards tried to stifle a yawn, and failed.

It was contagious. I yawned as well.

I peeked into the apartment door Urik was holding open. It had nice carpeting. A sofa. An extra large, stuffed chair.

I let myself get lured in a bit, checking out the bedroom. A huge four-poster bed, with enough layers of thick sheets that I could get myself lost in.

It was cold. The bed was warm.

I was tired. So very, very tired.

The bed called to me.

Hypothetical patients, somewhere, called to me.

The bed won.

I’d check my level ups and start considering how to class up tomorrow.

Chapter 210 - Journey to the center of Pallos XV

I woke up, buried in great fuzzy sheets, my head on a massive fluffy pillow.

So warm. So cozy.

I turned over, snuggled deeper into the bed, and let myself go back to sleep.

I woke up slowly, wrapped in warm blankets. First time in months and months and literal months I’d woken up sleeping somewhere nice. No rickety airboat, no monster horde, no soldier’s bedroll, no half-underground pit, no wooden lean-to, no rocky tunnels.

I was ignoring the spartan, but nice digs that Nolgardian dwarves had, both at their border wall, and at the town I’d visited. I’d spent enough weeks down in the mines to feel like I’d earned it.

Dreamland was nice and all, but reality wanted to drag me back, kicking and screaming. I cracked my eyes open, saw that for whatever gods-forsaken reason that the dwarvish escort saw fit to have four blasted dwarves in the room with me, and closed my eyes again.

Whatever. It was like I was sleeping in a barracks again or something.

The downside to this not being the barracks is my I-don’t-know-how-filthy clothes and armor just spent a night sleeping in here, and the sheets were ruined.

Oh well.

I decided to check all of my level up notifications from the comfort of my bed. I’d need to leave eventually, but I wanted to delay as much as possible.

[*Ding!* Congratulations! [The Dawn Sentinel] has leveled up to level 359->365! +3 Dexterity, +24 Speed, +24 Vitality, +170 Mana, +170 Mana Regen, +48 Magic power, +48 Magic Control from your Class per level! +1 Free Stat for being Human per level! +1 Mana, +1 Mana Regen from your Element per level!]

[*Ding!* [Celestial Affinity] leveled up! 359->365]

[*Ding!* [Center of the Universe] leveled up! 359->365]

[*Ding!* [Dance with the Heavens] leveled up! 359->365]

[*Ding!* [Sentinel's Superiority] leveled up! 359->365]

[*Ding!* [Long-Range Identify] leveled up! 359->365]

[*Ding!* [Mantle of the Stars] leveled up! 359->365]

[*Ding!* [Persistent Casting] leveled up! 256->259]

[*Ding!* [Learning] leveled up! 341->350]

[*Ding!* [Learning] has upgraded to [Passionate Learning]]

Passionate Learning: You have a deep and abiding love for learning in all forms. You are intrinsically motivated to seek out knowledge in all its forms, from written to oral, and when that doesn’t suffice, you slice people open and get it directly. You’ve broken into libraries, listened to oral lectures, got trained by Rangers, attended the harshest training humans on Pallos could think of, but were you satisfied? Of course not. You traveled to distant lands and met other races, just so you could read their por - err - books. You don’t quit when stymied, no, instead, you pick up a knife and slice people open to get answers. Improved learning speed. +1.25% increased experience gain per level.

[*Ding!* [Passionate Learning] leveled up! 350->354]

[*Ding!* [Oath of Elaine to Lyra] leveled up! 301->308]

[*Ding!* [Bullet Time] leveled up! 269->283]

Holy. I needed to get all-out attacked by powerful mages twice my level more often. That was a lot of levels for one [Mantle].

Actually - that had some disturbing implications I needed to work out, once I was done with the rest of my levels.

[*Ding!* [Pristine Memories] leveled up! 205->206]

I’m not actually sure what leveling this skill up did for me. My memories were perfect now, and I could recall what I wanted. The description also didn’t mention a big change per level.

I guess not every skill improved over time. It was still worth leveling it up, just for it impacting the quality of my classes. It could also evolve later on, to something a little more impactful.

[*Ding!* [Cosmic Presence] leveled up! 270->285]

The skill was aggravating to level at times, with events like yesterday being one of the only ways to level up. Still, I had no doubt that I saved a large amount of mana in total, and I did look forward to seeing it used in a more active setting at some point.

From a leveling perspective. Anything that gave it "real" experience was a disaster. It was an annoying contradiction in being a healer - I didn’t want people to get hurt, but I couldn’t improve without large numbers of injuries. Which occasionally had perverse whispers in my ear, hoping for some disaster or another.

Blasted intrusive thoughts.

Maybe I should check out the triage tents, where the Water healers were patching people up before sending them over to the Light healers?

[*Ding!* [Sunrise] leveled up! 128->132]

I was leveling this skill up one level at a time. It really drove home for me how important sticking with and evolving skills, not resetting them, was. Sure, I had a bunch of stats I could throw at a skill to make it go faster, but it was obnoxious, no matter how I sliced it. I was glad I’d been able to build my own skills for [The Dawn Sentinel], which should serve me well for the next, like 200+ years, but it was good to remember for my [Ranger-Mage] class that I needed to weigh a high-level mediocre skill against a low-level powerful skill. Sure, the powerful skill was better in the long run, but the mediocre skill would keep me alive long enough to get there.

Also, [Sunrise] was doing a lot more work than [Solar Infusion] was. My plan had originally been to drop [Sunrise] in favor of the Immortality skill - whenever it decided to show up, hopefully before I or anyone I knew died of old age - but more and more it was looking like [Solar Infusion] might bite the dust.

I’d gotten one good use out of it. In months, and in multiple conflicts. There just wasn’t the time to hit someone with it. It had seemed like a great idea when I was building my own class - preemptive, persistent healing? Wooo! - but in practice, it was coming up short.

Well, that was it for the levels. I emerged a bit from my fortress of fluff, peering around the room. One of the dwarves noticed I was awake.

"Welcome back to the land of the living!" She said, with all the relief of a boring job getting more interesting. "Thought you were made of metal, with how long you kept going, then how long you slept for. Plus, we weren’t quite sure how long homans slept for. Water barrel’s right over there, and some fresh clothes are over here. We found you some nice shoes as well, having noticed you missing yours and all. Thoren almost forgot to get you some." She said, with a pained look on her face as she shook her head at her boss’s idiocy.

"Thank you." I said, starting to emerge from the thousand layers of woolly goodness. Now that I’d slept in a real bed, I could feel the layers of accumulated grime and filth. A bath was next on the agenda. I must’ve healed someone up with some sort of connection, right?

"It’s human, by the way, not homan." I gently corrected her. In the game of telephone, screwing up a new species name wasn’t too hard to do.

"You were a bit, ah, focused two days ago, but I wanted to say - thank you." One of the other dwarves spoke up. "You helped 30 members of my clan get back on their feet." She said.

"31 here!" The third one called out.

"It’s not a competition. Is anyone going to keep watching the door?" The fourth one grumped.

The other three looked at each other.

"No, not really." The first one said. "The rest of the squad’s in the other room. Plus, it seems like the orcs have moved on. Mid-level administrators. So hot right now." She said, miming fanning herself.

"Raeg!" The fourth one shouted out, in a scandalized way. "That’s totally inappropriate!"

I’d finished getting out of bed, and was busy having a drink or three of water from a barrel, using a ladle.

"Wait wait, don’t tell me. Burned alive?" I asked.

"Thrown into molten metal. Orcs probably thought it was ironic or something." Raeg corrected me.

"Right, well, I’m awake and up now." I rubbed the last bit of sleep out of my eyes, luxuriating in not needing to instantly be up and at ‘em with [Sunrise].

I poked my head out of the room, and facepalmed.

Luxurious, well-guarded living quarters for one VIP, and a guard or two.

Not enough room for twelve! The wonderful space I "had to myself" had a dwarf every meter. It was like an overly packed party, with more metal and swords and less booze.

Then again, Artemis thought the best parties had lots of knives.

"Thoren. Thoren!" I said, waving down the gruff commander of the guard. I noticed Urik wasn’t around, and either they were changing shifts, or, like I’d guessed, they’d been moved somewhere else.

The recent attack on the administrators suggested the second one.

"Healer Elaine. What can we do for you?" He said.

"Well, in order, I’d like to get some food, a bath, and chat with my friends that I came here with." I said. "If possible, I’d like to get some tools to maintain my armor, and someone who can clean up my outfit."

"I’ll see what I can do. You saved literally hundreds of lives yesterday, I don’t think there’ll be any problems." Thoren said, and a whirlwind of delicious activity occurred.

I ended up doing some serious thinking when I was soaking in a bath - privately.

The [War-Mage] who’d almost killed me was well over level 550, and had three whole classes supporting her. Her twitchy barrage the moment I’d entered the room spoke of a lifetime of hard battles and difficult training. She was, quite frankly, several cuts above Drin, Fik and the rest, and was probably as experienced as a senior Ranger. With the levels, and stats, of a Sentinel behind her.

And she’d been in the hospital.

Granted, she had been in the VIP section, implying that she was one of the stronger dwarves, but that established where the power ceiling seemed to lie, roughly. There were possibly a few higher level dwarves running around - their rare, high level classers, like we had Sentinels - mostly because I couldn’t believe I’d somehow stumbled upon the highest level classer the dwarves had. Especially considering that she hadn’t been seen first. She was just getting special treatment. A Sentinel would get seen first, then the leaders of Ranger teams. Only a second like Artemis would be left to "wait a minute" while higher-priority people were taken care of.

That was making a number of large assumptions and leaps in logic, that the dwarves treated people like humans did, but I literally had no other frames of reference to work off of.

Which led me back to the orcs. From what I’d seen and heard, there was a genuine war between the two sides. Which implied that one side couldn’t just steamroll over the other. Now, I’d been hearing all about how the dwarves were better, were winning, blah blah blah, they loved their propaganda as much as anyone else did.

However. Slaying the orcs hadn’t been an extermination mission. The dwarves didn’t just move in, and the orcs died. No, they fought back. It was a war. There were orc commandos in the city right now, wreaking havoc. The dwarves obviously couldn’t find them and kill them. Which implied that the orcs were able to dodge level 550, level 600+ dwarves. Which suggested they were around the same level.

The orcs were smart, and found a new way to throw wrenches into the operation of the city. The leaders obviously seemed to have some protection, the grunts were relatively worthless, but the people in the middle that kept things organized and moving around?

Well. I imagine more than a few pieces of government would work more smoothly without the presence of middle-management, but more would grind to a halt, and most would eventually buckle and fall apart.

Especially if they just randomly filled the middle manager roles with people that had no experience. Ooooh, that could go very wrong. Be worse than no manager.

Either way. I was getting distracted. I was in a nice, warm metal tub of a bath, so I could get distracted, but onto the main point.

The orc commandos probably had three classes each, and were in teams.

Two full teams of guards barely managed one single burst from one mage.

If they came after me?

I was so dead!

It’d be like if Hunting, Destruction, Ocean, and Night all decided to ambush me to kill me at the same time. There wouldn’t be a fight, just an execution. Sure, the guards would help - they demonstrated they could hold off one classer, and I hadn’t seen their counter - but none of that helped if they went for a long-range attack of some sort.

Well. I’d like to think it’d take multiple attacks to kill me, and that I’d be able to heal through a single attack. Maybe two or three. Four if they were bad.

Did not want to test that at all.

Which made me wonder why, in all these mountains, there wasn’t a major concern over someone like Destruction bringing the whole place down. I couldn’t imagine his build was that novel, and defenses of some flavor were probably in place.

Or everyone was just winging it. Given what had been mentioned about spies, and how I’d explicitly called myself a high-ranking member of the human’s military, I wasn’t going to go around asking about the city’s defenses. That just seemed like a poor life choice, and a quick way to whatever they used as gallows around here.

Either way, I needed to get out of town before the orc commandos got wind of a powerful healer undoing their fellow orc’s hard work, and decided to remove my piece from the board. For the rest of the dwarves, this place was home, this was their war. Me? I was just passing through, and the more I heard, the more appealing making myself scarce sounded. I didn’t want to be just another number in someone else’s war.

I’d do what I could for people for a few days to rest up, then get the hell out of dodge. In a perfect world, I’d get a team to escort me back home, but hell, I’d settle for a map, or even just a "Go that way."

I wanted to go home.

I wanted to hug mom and dad.

I wanted to see Artemis and Julius again, and get all the gossip.

Kallisto and his wife and kid.

Albina, and her baby.

Autumn, and her never-ending supply of mangos.

Heck, I even wanted to hear Night pontificate all night.

I wanted to go home.

Homesickness was attacking with great force. It might eventually go away, but for now, making it home seemed like the best course of action.

Time to plan out how that was going to happen.

Right, gameplan.

Get fed, rested, and re-equipped. Maybe I could ask some of my guards if they’d be willing to refill my Aquamarine gem with a Gale skill, or my Quartz gem with another strong barrier, or some other Brilliance skill. I also had an Amethyst gem, for a metal skill. Given that their culture seemed to revolve around the stuff, I felt like I could get a seriously powerful skill for myself.

See if I could negotiate a guard, map, whatever.

Leave. Preferably in one piece, before the orcs got wind of me.

Honestly, it didn’t need to be complicated. I mentally gave myself two, three days tops to get my relaxing and healing done and out of the way, before I left town.

I’d love to class up here and now, but I figured getting out of Dodge was more important, with the way the scales were currently balanced. Granted, it wouldn’t take much to shift the scales - like finding out the orc commandos had been killed or driven off - but right now, leaving before classing up won by a tiny hair.

I rolled a loosening shoulder in the warm water. Was I sure I couldn’t stay a week?

The vision of the dwarf’s massive attack came back to mind, and I imagined trying to survive Night.

Two days. I’d gathered that I’d actually spent almost a day and a half on my mad healing spree, and almost as long sleeping it all off.

Now that I had a goal, and a deadline, luxuriating in the bath no longer seemed like a good idea. I was going to spend a solid week in the bath once I got back home though. I did wish I could spend enough time to fully recharge my Arcanite, but it’d be like, half full, by the time I was ready to leave, which would give me enough of an edge, even if I was immediately attacked.

With a plan in mind, I met with Drin, Fik, and Glifir for a quiet dinner, made un-quiet by my overly large escort. The meal was peaceful, eaten at a little ‘outdoor’ eatery with glowing brown moss on the building, and they were settling in alright. Where they were living was better described as "hastily erected cheap and cramped apartment blocks for the Nolgardian refugees", rather than anything as close to as nice as what I’d gotten.

"You’re being treated the way any healer should be traditionally treated." Was Fik’s take on the matter, to general nodding and agreement. I even caught one of the guards listening in and nodding her agreement.

In short, the rest of the dwarves were as happy as they could be, given the situation. Sure, they’d been debriefed for a few hours, and the accommodations weren’t exactly what they hoped for, but it was far, far better than it could be. They were all trying to find news of friends and family - Drin’s best friend hadn’t made it, and Fik had found a distant cousin.

I did get lured to a few smaller healing spots, which were mostly a few larger clans who had their own miniature hospital, and injuries that, either due to skill or an assassinated healer, hadn’t been treated yet. Which led me to wandering down to the triage section, and helping out a bit.

Which honestly ended up as me doing a lot of waiting around with everyone else. Most casualties occurred in the mines or in fights, and while most companies had a healer attached, it usually was not a dedicated one, just someone with a few "patching up" skills who'd stabilize the wounded until they could make it back.

Still, a few casualties trickled in. One of the healer dwarves was drinking copious amounts of water, which I asked about.

"Got a skill. Lets me recover mana by drinking water. I took it as a young dwarf, and I skimped on mana regeneration, in favor of stronger stats elsewhere. Problem is now… I’m stuck." He explained between mugs of water.

That was fairly interesting, and led me to thinking about [Sun-Kissed]. If I got out of here, would it be worth skimping on my regeneration a bit, because the skill was improving things?

Either way, I loved learning about new magic! So cool. I didn’t quite feel an affinity for water, but it was strong stuff.

MAGIC!

I played tourist, seeing the magnificent dwarven city, before finally getting an appointment with Silver Command Korun again, with Thoren.

"Hey Korun!" I said, cheerfully greeting him.

"Healer, err," He shuffled through some papers, before finding the right one. "Elaine! Yes! Thank you for your help. We estimate you helped…" He said, before shuffling some more papers around. Poor dude needed a memory skill.

He found the piece of paper he was looking for, and his eyebrows shot into his hair.

"... a lot of dwarves."

He checked something on the paper, then flipped back to my paper.

"In two days?!?" He practically screamed. "Healer Elaine, oh most wonderful healer, anything you want, anything you need, just say the word and I’ll make it so. Also, I’m getting Urik back to guarding you. He should’ve mentioned how many people you’d healed."

"He tried to. I was there." Thoren said.

Korun just gave Thoren the "Did you really correct me?" death-glare, which Thoren just repressed a smile at.

"Why thank you Korun!" I said, applying my best honeyed words. "I’m hoping to get home soon, and I was hoping, well, could you maybe spare a few people to help me out? A map that has the dead zone on it would be great as well, along with some supplies."

Korun nodded.

"Let me see what I can do. Come back tomorrow, at..."

He cleared off all the papers from his desk, only for me to see that the surface of the desk looked like - was - a giant schedule. One with a dozen different colors on the column he dragged his finger down.

"After the last meal." He reluctantly said, his finger tapping the bottom of his schedule.

Great!

I got clean clothes, and another nice tour of the city the next day. Thoren and the guards strenuously objected to me setting up an obvious "free healing" booth in a market, and I had to reluctantly agree with them. It would put too large a target on my back, for too small of a benefit. Most people getting drive-by healing were fixing minor injuries. Didn’t stop me from healing whoever I did see though, which was the norm for me. Walking around the city was good for [Cosmic Presence], although I didn’t seem to be leveling it.

I also took the chance in the afternoon to re-do my [Persistent Casting], making my self auto-healing have an excellent image to work with. Which in turn, would mean I was more efficient, and it’d be that much harder to kill me.

I still didn’t make it auto-heal others though, since I didn’t want to brush someone on the street and make them lose an expensive implant. I wasn’t sure about the current conversion, but they sounded expensive.

That "evening" I found myself back in Korun’s office, after a wonderfully large dinner that Urik paid for again. I’m sure he had a budget of "keep the healer happy", but eh. I was going to be nice and polite to anyone paying for my food.

"Healer Elaine!" Korun said. "I have excellent news for you!"

"Oh?" I asked, excited.

"Yes! It took some wrangling, but I talked with my boss, who ended up, if you would believe it, talking with three of the clan leaders from the council of elders! We’ll be happy to give you a full escort home, as soon as this conflict’s over."

Good news, good news, good news - wait, what!?

I took a deep, calming, centering breath. I wanted to fly off the handle, but I needed information, and flying off the handle here and now could be a poor life choice. In more ways than one.

"That’s great!" I said, not quite managing to suppress the tightening in my throat, strangling my words a bit. "How long do we think that’ll be?"

Korun flapped his hand.

"Not too long! Should only be 20, 30 years max. We’ll make sure you’ve got every luxury available here in Velduar, you’ll want for nothing! Same deal the rabbit’s got, honestly."

"I see. If I’m willing to leave a bit earlier, and strike off on my own?" I asked, fearing the worst.

Korun got an awkward look on his face.

"Healer Elaine… we need you. We need you badly. The clan leaders, once they saw how many people you healed in two days, ordered us to keep you here, happy, and healing by any means. The three H’s Clan Leader Hakkar called them. Was quite pleased with himself. I really, honestly, think you’ll be happy here while we sort out this little mess. Think of all the levels! You got a few just from the few days you’ve been here already. Please don’t make my job hard." Korun said, getting near begging at the end.

Healer Elaine was totally dead and gone at this point. It was time to be Sentinel Dawn, with all that entailed.

"Naturally, I won’t make your job hard!" I said, carefully not lying. His job wouldn’t be hard once I was gone, after all, and until then? I was going to be the perfect model of someone happy and content, so they didn’t think of yanking my chain too tight. It’d give me time and room to prepare, and heck, if I asked nicely, they’d give me half the resources to escape themselves!

After my first escape - not that there’d be a second, but hey, I had to plan and prepare just in case - it’d be almost impossible for me to, say, ask for a week’s worth of travel rations and a waterskin.

Which led me to another point. Korun wanted to keep me happy, and from the sound of it, I was the golden girl right now. That’d fade with time, so if I wanted to cash in golden girl status, I needed to do it now, especially when asking for a largish favor.

"Hey Korun, my second class is ready to upgrade. Could I possibly get a few extra guards keeping watch over me while I handle that quickly? It’d improve my healing capabilities." I said, tapping my fingertips together nervously, under the level of his desk and eyesight.

It’d also improve my survival capabilities, and hopefully my flight. I didn’t think flying, or anti-flying, would be high on the dwarves skill list.

Hopefully they wouldn’t think me a flight risk.

Flying underground was super hard mode after all.

"Sure! Of course! Thank you, Healer Elaine, for being so understanding. Let me see what I can scrounge up for you. It might be a few days, is that ok?"

"Totally!" I said, shoulders slumping as they relaxed, unable to keep the relief from my voice.

Yes, I was understanding of Korun and the situation.

I understood that he was totally swamped, busy with a thousand things, and as a result not looking too closely into why I’d want to class up now, right after our conversation.

I understood I was a prisoner, a sweet bird in a golden cage.

Chapter 211 - Radiance Class-up I

I looked around one last time at the preparations made. Korun was as good as his word, and had gotten me some solid defenses for my class-up. Given that I was likely on some orc commando’s hitlist, and would be completely unable to defend myself, I appreciated it.

I wasn’t going to speedrun the class up, but I wasn’t going to spend a lot of time reading either.

I had a barrel of water, and some dried snacks and jerky for when I got up. I was in a safe room, with Thoren and Urik’s squads on guard duty, along with a few high level dwarven Classers, including the VIP that almost killed me.

"Sorry again." She said, as I was settling down. "Really thought you were there to finish me off. Name’s Hakka."

I waved my hand at her.

"It’s fine, we all lived."

"And you’ll continue to live if I have anything to say about it!" She said, her beard somehow looking ferocious and protective.

Thinking about it. All the dwarves had their beard, even in the infirmary. There had to be quite a few people with beard-skills floating around. Heck, given how they prized their beard, "free beard restoration service" was probably in the soldier’s contract somewhere.

Either way, I was wasting time. I closed my eyes, and fell into the world of my soul.

"Librarian!" I called, giving her a hug.

"Elaine." She said, returning it, touching her forehead to mine.

We spent a moment looking at each other, then breaking out into a fit of giggles.

"You look great!" I said, taking a look at her.

Full Sentinel gear, fancy red cape that blew in the non-existent wind included.

"Thanks! You’re looking good yourself!" She called back.

I checked what I was wearing.

Huh. Interesting.

"Right. Chop chop, we’re on a tight schedule here." I said, breaking free and striding briskly towards the stairs. Librarian hurried after me.

I knew by now that she could modify things on the fly.

"Ok, first question, did I unlock building my own class again?" I asked, chewing on my lower lip slightly.

Please please please...

Librarian just shook her head.

"Drat. Any idea what I need to do to unlock it?" I asked her.

She shrugged.

"I get some information, I don’t get others. Plus, without even having the option, I’m not told that it exists. Only because we remember it happening do we know it’s an option."

Long story short, no.

Well, that meant I could go look at other books. My plan had been, if I was able to build my own class, I’d just go there directly and start cracking.

"Right, fine then. I’m loving being a Radiance mage, it’s doing what I want in a class." I said as we started climbing. "I’m looking to stay in the same element, and generally improve my power for getting out of here. I need to still have strong self-defense, and I can’t imagine not needing flight." I said, then considered what I’d said.

"Unless, of course, there’s a way to turn me into a Radiance beam and move that way." I said, thinking of Galeru and the fight with Lun’Kat. She’d turned herself into a bolt of Lightning to get to the fight quickly, and I wasn’t going to lie, that sounded like a totally sweet ability.

My heart wanted to be able to fly more than zip around as a beam, but turning into a ray of light sounded much more powerful. Then when escaping came into the mix? Being a prisoner for 30 years, which given how estimates worked really meant more like 60?

Yeah, no. I was getting out earlier, even if I had to replace "flying" with "turning into a totally badass ray."

"Nope! Sorry." Librarian cheerfully crushed my dreams. "I’m not even sure what books would get you on that path."

"You could see what was going on with [World Traveler] way back when." I pointed out.

"Yeah, because you had access to the class. Which meant I could see information about it." Librarian countered.

"Fine, fine. Let’s keep the side-grades to a minimum, but show me the powerful ones." I said. "As long as I can defend myself with it, and it gives solid stats, I’m going to consider it.

It broke my flying-loving heart more than a bit to say that, but I wanted out. And while my plan was to escape outside and fly away, plans D onward included escaping down into the mines, where flying wasn’t exactly super useful.

We continued up the stairs. The second level. The third level. Finally, we arrived at the fourth level, where I got to see what the library looked like this time.

It was a cushy reading room, a chair bigger than I was in front of a roaring fire, a nice throw rug, all wrapped in tasteful mahogany and impossible lighting.

Normally, I’d scream bloody murder about a flammable rug in front of a fire, but hey! This place wasn’t real, so it didn’t matter.

"Sit! Let me bring you the choices." Librarian said, and I sat down, only for the chair to be like the comfiest mimic ever, as it tried to absorb me into its fluffy depths.

Instead of walking over to the tasteful bookcase, Librarian just held up her hand, and a book popped into existence.

[Acolyte of Asura - Radiance] You have witnessed the unbridled might and fury of Guardian Asura, the Destroyer. You have marveled at her grace, beauty, and majesty. Her Radiance magic is second to only one other, and pierces through all illusions, as she gallops through the heavens on golden hooves. Take this class, and become a loyal follower of Asura to gain a fraction of her power. +10 Free Stats, +10 Strength, +10 Dexterity, +10 Speed, +10 Vitality, +128 Mana, +256 Mana Regen, +128 Magic Power, +256 Magic Control per level.

I looked at Librarian with love in my eyes.

"You know me so well." I said. She just winked back.

I cracked the book open, and started speed-reading.

There were two major flaws with the class, and they were linked. The first was, it used the method of casting that Asura used - writing out magical mandalas, circles, inscriptions - it wasn’t quite clear - then having those cast spells. Strong. Versatile. Time-consuming. Problem was, I had no idea how to do that. The second part was the skills. I’d need a whole suite of new skills to be able to cast like Asura did.

Except… I saw no knowledge portions.

"How would I be able to use this?" I asked Librarian. She leaned over my shoulder to check what exactly I was talking about.

"Ah, erm, right. You’d need to learn from someone. Asura would be the best teacher, but looking at it sideways, doesn’t it seem like they’re just like how Inscriptions work?" Librarian asked.

"We have no idea how to make Inscriptions."

"We could get some of the dwarves to teach us." Librarian said. "With [Passionate Learning] we’d pick it up quickly, and that’d give us time to bide until a good chance to break free came up."

I wanted to argue it more, mention that we had only seen standard Inscriptions so far, not anything special like Asura did, along with a whole host of other arguments - but I figured I’d move on, see what the other choices were.

"Ok, is there anything that wouldn’t make the shortlist?" I asked Librarian, who quirked an eyebrow at me, teleporting a new book to her hands.

[Disaster Diplomat]

I didn’t bother reading it, I just gave Librarian a glare. She giggled at her prank.

"Ok, ok, fine, any books I asked for that wouldn’t make it?"

She shook her head.

"Your requirements basically shortlisted them all already."

I was somewhat pressed for time. I wanted to explore all the cool side-grades, and see what I’d properly earned for myself. Heck, forget that, I wanted to go skipping through the library, reading every single book there was.

Blasted staying alive, interfering with good reading time.

"Right. What are my top choices?" I asked, figuring I should just cut to the chase in an efficient manner.

Boo efficiency.

I already had [Acolyte of Asura - Radiance] shown to me. Librarian showed me the rest of the "shortlist".

[Sentinel-Adept - Radiance] Sentinel Dawn. You have proved yourself to be not just a Ranger, not just one of the best Rangers, but a full-blown Sentinel in your own right. You are a living legend, a myth in the marketplace. You are the last line of defense that Remus has against threats, internal and external, and here you make your mark. You are Sentinel Dawn, promoted on your healing prowess, yet with powerful magics are at your beck and call. Magics that are powerful enough, that you shouldn’t be called mage - but adept instead. Take this class, and continue to defend Remus. +32 Speed, +32 Vitality, +120 Mana, +120 Mana Regen, +64 Magic Power, +64 Magic Control per level.

[Butterfly Mystic - Radiance] All that is gold does not glitter, not all those who wander are lost. You flit around from place to place like a little butterfly, sipping the sweet nectar of knowledge wherever you go. Visit a town? See the library, see what delicious fruits are on offer. You found a job that takes you all over the place, letting you visit and learn all about the great world around you. Remus wasn’t enough to contain you, you had to venture even further, in pursuit of new knowledge. You’ve seen guardians, attended academies, and when stymied in your pursuit of knowledge, you picked up a knife and sliced someone open to learn more about how they work. Take this class, and keep fluttering about and learning new things, and new magics! +8 Strength, +8 Dexterity, +70 Speed, +70 Vitality, +70 Mana, +70 Mana Regen, +70 Magic Power, +70 Magic Control per level.

[Radiant Slayer of the Endless Formorian Swarm - Radiance] You, and the rest of the Sentinels, exterminated four of the mighty Formorian Queens, along with hundreds of their Royal Guards, and thousands, tens of thousands, of their lesser spawn. Outnumbered and outleveled, you stood firm with the rest of the Sentinels, as you executed a daring, desperate plan to bring them all down, and kill them. Take this class, and continue to kill Formorians. +100 Free Stats, +50 Strength, +50 Dexterity, +100 Speed, +100 Vitality, +300 Mana, +300 Mana Regen, +300 Magic Power, +300 Magic Control per level.

[The Rising Dawn - Radiance] You are the sun rising over the darkest of nights, eternal in your quest to heal everyone in need and protect those under your care. You cannot be stopped or pinned down by others, traveling the world and meeting new species. Where you go, the Dawn arrives, shining light and hope into those you see. Yet while the dawn is normally a fleeting moment of time, you have spent weeks on end endlessly serving as the literal and metaphorical light of humanity. You never stop while there are those who need help, cannot be cut short of your task, and all who see you may forever rejoice. Take this class to truly become the Rising Dawn, a beacon of hope for people everywhere as they look up to you boldly marching forward in your quest to help others. +80 Mana, +130 Mana Regen, +85 Magic Power, +85 Magic Control per level.

[Dragonforged Star - Radiance] Forged in dragonfire and tempered in celestial, your life shines ever brighter. The fires that end civilizations wash over you and you come out ever stronger. Take this class, may your light never cease and your fire never fade. +20 Free Stats, +100 Vitality, +60 Mana, +60 Mana Regen, +70 Magic Power, +20 Magic Control per level.

[Radiant Immolator - Radiance] You’ve found dozens of inventive ways to fight people and monsters with your Radiance magic, from using blinding light, narrow beams, [Nova]’s, cones, eye lasers, balls from your mouth, and many, many more inventive techniques. Take this class, and lean into your destructive impulses. +40 Mana, +40 Mana Regeneration, +160 Magic Power, +160 Magic Control per level.

[Draconic Prophet - Radiance] You have warned others of the dangers of dragons, and the fools failed to listen to your dire warnings, and paid the ultimate price. With the ability to wipe out an entire civilization in a single night, even when opposed by Gaia’s chosen champions, dragons are the ultimate force of destruction. Go forth with this class, and illuminate the masses of their might and power, so all might cower before them. +50 Free Stats, +160 Strength, +160 Dexterity, +160 Speed, +160 Vitality, +50 Mana, +50 Mana Regen, +50 Magic Power, +50 Magic Control per level.

[Light of Truth - Radiance] You have seen Lun’Kat’s great secret, and the mystery behind the Dragoneye Moons has been revealed to you. You playfully dueled with humanity's best illusionist, and have seen peak illusionists in Lun’Kat and Guardian Galeru. You’ve tried to break illusions where you go, and light the path for others to follow you. Take this class, and see through all illusions, peel them back for the whole world to see the truth. +48 Free Stats, +8 Dexterity, +64 Speed, +160 Mana, +160 Mana Regen, +160 Magic Power, +160 Magic Control per level.

[Exotic Chef - Radiance] Seared, Sizzled, and Scalded, you’ve prepped dozens of exotic dishes on the road using your Radiance magic. We get it, you like cooked food from all around the world. Take this class, and stop awkwardly cooking with conjured Radiance, and properly grill yourself a steak or two. +4 Dexterity, +8 Vitality, +16 Magic Control per level

I gave Librarian a look.

"Seriously? Two prank classes? We’re in a rush here."

She winked and laughed, entirely unrepentant.

"Relax a hair! It’ll make your decision easier."

[Pirate Hunter - Radiance] Those poor pirates are the lifeblood of Remus! Without them ignoring the letter of the law, and indiscriminately enslaving the people of Remus, the fresh supply of slaves gets cut off. How could you? Trying to destroy an entire industry.

Well, if you must visit economic destruction on Remus, hop on board! We’ve got pirates to hunt! +150 Free Stats per level.

This was a boatload of classes. I immediately made some cuts, just for the sake of my own sanity.

[Pirate Hunter] and [Exotic Chef] bit the dust. They were simply too weak, not with the other options I had left.

Similarly, [Dragonforged Star] sounded totally cool, but it wasn’t doing anything the other classes weren’t, and with the dragon in the name, well, I was feeling reasonably skittish about them.

[Draconic Prophet] was eliminated as well. It looked like it wanted me to be a physical classer, and was basically a side-grade. A legit option, especially as I’d both gain a ton of levels from my stored experience, and I could discreetly level it in town, but even though a boatload of physical stats would help escape, I felt like doubling down on being a mage was the right call.

The part about Gaia’s chosen champions was interesting, but I had no time to delve into it.

What would I even do with the information?

That left me with [Light of Truth], [Radiant Immolator], [The Rising Dawn], [Radiant Slayer of the Endless Formorian Swarm], [Butterfly Mystic], [Sentinel-Adept], and I suppose I should keep [Acolyte of Asura] in the picture. It gave enough stats that a gigantic boost could be worth considering, especially if I weighed the risks and possibilities of learning how to cast that way from some of the dwarves here.

It would also be a permanent reminder of Origen, some validation from beyond the grave that his ways and methods.

Granted, if I went down that route, I’d either try to escape early, and be missing a modest chunk of skills, as [Acolyte of Asura] overwrote them, which seemed suboptimal. Or I spent a bunch of time at risk of getting whacked by the commandos.

Blah. Why couldn’t I be in a more normal prison?

[Light of Truth] had quite a lot going for it. I wasn’t thrilled with the move away from some of my more combat and self-defense oriented aspects - I’d lose [Nova] and [Blaze] entirely in favor of anti-illusion skills. I’d keep [Radiance Conjuration], so I wouldn’t be helpless, but my firepower would dramatically decrease.

Offset, of course, by the increased stats.

"Can I test what my abilities would do if I lost [Blaze], but gained the stats from leveling up with the stored experience?" I asked Librarian.

She shook her head.

"Sorry. No horseplay in the library. You’d need to take the class first and give it a whirl."

"Rotten mangos." I cursed. So much for testing. I’d have to jump in blind, and see what I got.

There was also the future to consider. I was still [The Dawn Sentinel]. I got into scraps regularly. Replacing my combat class with a more focused anti-illusion class would strip me of a lot of defenses. Like, if I was in a Ranger squad, that’d be one thing. I’d know my place in a team, I’d know if we needed more firepower or not, and I’d know that once the round was over, I’d be shuffled into a team that could take advantage of my abilities, and cover my weaknesses.

Sadly, right now all I could count on was myself.

…. Fuck, I should’ve asked Korun if they had a thunderbird egg or something else cool down here. Goddesses curse it all!

I guess it wasn’t too late to ask.

[Radiant Slayer of the Endless Formorian Swarm] was the ultimate in "Power today." My stats would skyrocket to unbelievable heights, all while improving my combat skills.

The problem was, what about tomorrow? The class revolved around killing Formorians, and, well, we were hopefully out of those. I’d shoot up 50, 60, maybe even 100 levels, bask in an absurd number of stats, then… they’d stay there.

I could only reset a class when it was ready for an evolution, and there wasn’t one at level 512. Given the pattern, I’d make a guess that the next evolution was at 1024, but maybe I should’ve asked the dwarves first before I went under.

Too late now.

I was leaning towards "no" on the class, but I wasn’t far enough along to decide that for sure. However, the sheer number of Formorians I killed, into this class, was probably worth a solid chunk.

Blah. The more I thought about it, the more I didn’t think my life was in such immediate dire straits as to make my second class take, like, centuries to level up far enough before I could reset it. If I was unlucky, it’d take over a thousand years.

I wasn’t even 20. The thought of something taking that long just boggled the mind. That assumed constant, active use to boot.

[Sentinel-Adept] was the obvious choice. Easy experience. A stat distribution like I’d done for [The Dawn Sentinel]. Upgraded skills.

Simple. Easy.

Boring.

Reading the book was exactly what I thought it’d be. Stay at the capital. Check on missions daily. Train new Rangers. Go on missions. Stop my aging, watch generations of Rangers and Sentinels come and go. Slowly drift into a myth and a legend in my own right, given my longevity, combined with my flashiness.

No, not like that.

Still.

Boring.

Granted, this was my entire life, and not just "what’s cool and interesting", but at the same time, being here in my soul was time for some serious introspection. Librarian was wearing Sentinel gear. I clearly saw myself as a Sentinel.

But was that all I was? Sentinel Dawn? Doubled up Sentinel class? Just another perpetual guardian of Remus, along with Night?

It kinda locked me into a one-dimensional being. I was more than just Sentinel Dawn. I was also healer Elaine, daughter Elaine, friend, teacher, and mentor Elaine. Plus, I’d just learned about the great big wide world around me, and doubling up on Sentinel basically meant I’d need to go home and stay there for centuries. I’d get another chance once I evolved [Sentinel-Adept], but like. That’d take extra-long, being in the dead zone.

Hmmmm. That wasn’t quite correct, now was it? I got serious Sentinel experience for meeting with the dwarves, for crossing over into their land. Obviously, more than just missions and staying at the capital was what a Sentinel did, and it wasn’t quite fair for me to pigeonhole the class - and my job - that way.

Taking a class that was also my job did have significant benefits, in that I’d be leveling it daily.

Still, it brought the question up - if I had the chance, if there was perfect equality and peace in the world, would I still sign up to be a Sentinel?

The answer was "Maybe", which was interesting on several different levels.

I wanted to go home - but I also wanted to see all the cool stuff the world had to offer. Asura had shown me some magic, heck, all the Guardians had shown off cool skills. I wanted to see and know more, like what [Passionate Learning] had to say about me.

Right. [Sentinel-Adept] was the safety class. The benchmark. If I didn’t find anything better than it, I was going to take it. It was the natural evolution of [Ranger-Mage], but I wanted to see if I could pull off something better.

[The Rising Dawn] felt like the natural next selection, Sentinel, Dawn, etc. It seemed like a different evolution of [Ranger-Mage], leaning more into "Dawn" than "Sentinel". I read it over carefully.

What was interesting, was that it rewarded (rewarding?) me for getting into marathon situations, along with swooping in to save the day. Seriously, there was a whole segment detailing that if I showed up with shining lights, I’d get more experience for it. This class was almost "Heroic savior" combined with "Get into marathons." Plagues and other disasters would be my jam, echoing the "It’s kinda like [Sentinel-Adept]" without actually being tied to being a Sentinel. I’d get more experience, say, saving the dwarves, but I wouldn’t get as much experience when I attended boring meetings, for example.

Not that those were worth much experience.

There was also a solid "endurance" portion to it. [Sun-Kissed] would evolve to grant me energy and mana, which would let me free up a slot in [The Dawn Sentinel] for [The Stars Never Fade] once I got the skill. That hadn’t been the plan, but I was a flexible gal. I’d also get ramping experience the longer I was in a marathon situation, like, for example, fighting the Formorians endlessly.

[The Rising Dawn] class felt like it rhymed with [Sentinel-Adept], without being it. It was a natural evolution, without being a safe, boring choice. At the same time, it gave me options on my "safety zone" so to speak. An endurance and saving the day class, over a "doing my job" class.

Two classes left! I arbitrarily picked [Butterfly Mystic] to check out next.

The class was based around experience, knowledge, and learning. Lots of experience. Learned something new? Experience. Did something new? Experience. Went somewhere new? Good amounts of experience. Learned new magic? Solid amounts of experience. Not like the tons of experience [Sentinel-Adept] or [The Rising Dawn] would get for a mission, but it wasn’t like it was bad experience. Fighting, and generally casting, was still good experience to boot.

It was almost like the System liked high-stakes situations.

It was something of an all-rounder, and for some reason, I was reminded of Artemis’s [Wandering Mage] class. I don’t think it was getting a ton of experience these days, not with her stuck at her school, but who knew, maybe she took the students on field trips or something.

Back on topic. While the class didn’t have large experience gains for giant, flashy actions, it had solid accumulation for doing lots of different things, and I had to admit - I was never staying still. I was always doing something new, and I doubted that would be changing anytime soon.

I’d fairly often been offered main class evolutions based off of my general skills, from [Emergency Medic] way back when, to various [Pretty] classes along the way. I realized this was another one of those classes, based off of the [Passionate Learning] skill I’d just picked up.

While the class didn’t offer amazing experience for particular actions, it did have another reward, one that I only noticed after reading through the book a few times and asking Librarian.

"What’s up with all the skills?" I asked, having read that the "me" in the story used, by my counting, the 23rd spell in the story. I’d only started counting when I noticed the number seemed high to boot.

"Well, the class picks up new skills fairly easily. If you see an active Radiance skill being used, and you can figure out roughly how it works? If you want, the System will offer a weaker version of the skill for [Butterfly Mystic], depending on how much you understand. It’s part of being a [Butterfly Mystic]."

"Ah, that would explain why book-me used [Elegant Radiance Nails] a few chapters after raiding the archmage's not-so-abandoned tower, and seeing him use [Giga Laser Claws]. No chance I can use it for general skills or anything like that?" I asked.

Librarian shrugged.

"General skills are already easy to pick up. You’ve got [Passionate Learning] that boosts that even further. [Butterfly Mystic] wouldn’t make a difference anyways."

"Right… is this unique to the class or something?" I asked, tapping the cover of the book.

"Nope! Everyone’s skills are improveable and upgradeable. However, the threshold on improvements and upgrades is fairly high. Like when you went skydiving through the Formorian anti-air assault, that got you offered the pinpoint defense skill as a reward."

I nodded.

"How’s this different than what every other class has coming naturally to it?" I asked, skimming through the pages and trying to find the answer.

"It lowers the threshold quite a bit, and makes everything easier to learn. For example, maybe you could’ve picked the anti-missile skill up in an intense training session with Artemis throwing rocks at you, instead of needing to dive out of an airship into hundreds of thousands of Formorians to get offered the skill. Maybe [Rapidash] would’ve upgraded to a Fire flying skill, instead of needing to wait for an evolution." Librarian said. "Heck, how we kept using [Light] to read in a narrow cone in the dark is how we evolved it to [Flashlight]!"

"Basically, faster skill improvements, and faster new skills, but it’s not something super special and unique to the class." I said, summarizing what Librarian was saying.

"Right. But don’t discount being able to upgrade skills that quickly. Imagine if you’d gotten a Fire flying skill, instead of spending a year and a half jumping into the air to try and get it." Librarian said. "Improved skills will also persist through future upgrades, although if things are improved, they’re going to be kinda locked in for us."

Complicated class. Lots to think about, and it wasn’t quite clear if all the added complexity came with extra power.

Last up was [Radiant Immolator]. It wasn’t some horribly complex class like [Butterfly Mystic]. It didn’t take a long discussion with Librarian to figure the ins and outs of it. There was beauty in it’s sheer simplicity. It did exactly what was on the tin. It was the "Go forth and kill things" class. Fantastic firepower, a focus on making things dead, and keeping myself alive. There were no fancy tricks to it. No special ways of getting experience. No strange quirks.

No. Just boatloads of experience for killing things, and all the tools to get it done. I wouldn’t lose [Shine], [Sun-kissed], or [Talaria], and their upgrades would be tilted towards better ways to kill things, or protect myself.

In many ways, it was what I fundamentally needed from the class. I needed to be able to protect myself in a hostile and violent world, and most of my experience I’d gotten over the years was from killing things before they killed me. I loved flying, I liked not having to worry if what I was seeing was real or an illusion.

Those were luxuries.

Pallos wasn’t a civilized place, for all I was in a giant city in the heart of a mountain. The law of the jungle held sway here, and just as I was empowered by the System, so were the monsters.

This was the no-frills, no-fuss, defend myself class. The inherent conflict with [Oath] didn’t matter, given how often I was in a fight for my life.

So many choices, and none that stood out in a negative way, asking to be cut.

I settled in, and got to work.

Chapter 212.1 - Radiance Class-up II

Seven classes to choose from. Seven strong options.

I suppose, in many ways, that it was better than the alternative, of having no good classes available. Or only one OK class, that I was forced to pick.

No, options were good, even if I was going to end up with a serious case of decision paralysis.

"What’s the worst-case scenario on picking a class?" I mused out-loud, hoping Librarian would help me out with some analysis.

"That it’s weak, and you hate everything about it, what it means, what it represents, and what you need to do with it." Librarian promptly answered. "The worst-case isn’t a bad class, the worst-case is a class that actively harms you."

"Like my fear about the [Prophet of Papillion] class."

"Exactly! The other worse-case scenario is picking a class that actively draws hostility to you." Librarian pointed out.

I spent a moment thinking about that.

"Like the class Hesoid had. The plague-generating one." I said.

Librarian nodded.

"Right. Here, they seem to hate Void mages with a passion." She observed, letting me work out the rest of it.

I quickly thought about what Void was. Dark and Dark, and I had Celestial already.

"Do I have a level 8 Void mage to reset to?" I asked Librarian.

She shook her head.

"No, just a level 8 Darkness mage. Should be easy enough to get a Void mage offered at 32. Probably be weak, but doable."

I thought about that for a brief moment before shaking my head and discarding the idea entirely.

"No, let’s stick with the current offerings." I said. "They’re all solid, and none of them actively harm me." I mused out loud. "It’s a question of balancing the present against the future."

"Right. Now, what’s the argument for the classes with the more powerful stats now?" Librarian asked.

"Escaping, freedom, survival." I said, rapidly listing the three points off.

"Are we in a cage, with an execution scheduled for next week? Are we chained to other slaves, about to be auctioned off? If the dwarves are as good as their word, and we stick around 30 years, able to explore and enjoy this city, what harm have we come to?" Librarian asked, and I winced.

She had a bit of a point. It could be so much worse. I was a favored bird in a golden cage, not a slave forced to mine lead, or worse. I had guards, and not only was nearly my every need taken care of, but they went above and beyond to provide any luxury I wanted. The biggest concern was my friends and family dying in an accident before I could make it back.

That, and my violent distaste for anything resembling shackles or chains that I hadn’t chosen for myself.

"Let’s look at classes with a balance for the future and the present then?" Librarian asked with an amused smile.

I gave her a smile as warm as the cozy fire in front of us.

"Thank you Librarian. Really. I don’t know what I’d do without you. Probably get lost wandering all the options."

She chuckled.

"Yeah, I think that’s why the System has guides. Could you imagine otherwise?"

I thought about my first class up, and the thousands, if not tens of thousands of classes I was offered, along with all the questions I’d had.

"Disaster." I said.

"Yup! Complete disaster." Librarian agreed.

Focus. I thought to myself. Librarian was me, and I was her, and I could imagine the wild tangents we could get on if I allowed it.

"So, in conclusion, since we’re not at immediate, dire risk of dying or worse, we don’t need to hyper-focus on a strong class here and now." I reasoned out. "Need to balance the future with the present."

Librarian gave a curt nod.

"And the far future." She pointed out. "Not just 10 years from now, but 100 years. 1000 years."

With a small amount of reluctance, I cut [Radiant Slayer of the Endless Formorian Swarm]. If I was going to be executed in the morning, currently a slave of some vile [Slave Owner], or in some worse situation, I’d probably take the class, just for the raw, immediate boost of power. I wasn’t though, which left me with [Light of Truth], [Radiant Immolator], [The Rising Dawn], [Butterfly Mystic], [Sentinel-Adept], and [Acolyte of Asura].

I was eyeing up [Light of Truth] next. It was on the shortlist due to the extra stats, and I did like how it was similar to [Light of Hope], my early Light healing class. However, it was in the running due to the "escape" potential, with the extra stats boosting my combat capabilities enough to help me escape.

Which brought it in direct comparison, interestingly enough, with [Radiant Immolator]. I wasn’t quite sure how I felt about the class yet, if I was taking it or not, but for my purposes, it was a fair comparison.

On skills: [Radiant Immolator] was far better for fighting and escaping. Everything it had was combat-focused. Heck, even the flying skill was combat-focused! [Light of Truth] had objectively worse skills for "fight out and escape", although it had a slightly better flying skill.

On the stats: [Radiant Immolator] was +40 Mana, +40 Mana Regeneration, +160 Magic Power, +160 Magic Control per level. That was strongly tilted towards "Just do damage". [Light of Truth] had +48 Free Stats, +8 Dexterity, +64 Speed, +160 Mana, +160 Mana Regen, +160 Magic Power, +160 Magic Control per level.

They were tied on the Magic Power and Magic Control per level, which translated to "The skills would be just as strong as each other."

Assuming the same level gain, I’d be just as powerful from a raw "How much damage does my new [Nova] skill do?" perspective… before the fact that [Radiant Immolator] would get a better [Nova] skill than [Light of Truth] came into play.

Then, long-term, while I didn’t enjoy killing and fighting, I did have my Radiance mage class for my own self-defense.

In [Light of Truth]’s defense, added mana and regeneration was strong for fights. However, it was a small stone on the heavily-tilted scales.

In conclusion - [Radiant Immolator] was better than [Light of Truth] in every way but one I could easily measure right now, which meant I could cut it with a clear conscience.

That also gave me some potential avenues for exploration and comparison. I’d tackle that in just a moment.

[Acolyte of Asura] was objectively the "best" class of the lot, if I could use it. It met all my requirements, it was powerful, it worked short-term, long-term, and opened up a whole new world of spellcasting to me.

"Right. Pros and cons of [Acolyte of Asura]." I asked Librarian. "How does this go horribly wrong for me, and what needs to happen for this to go right, and what are the chances of both?" I asked her.

"Wrong - a bunch of skills get replaced when you take the class. You don’t figure out how to cast properly, and you essentially cripple the class for years, if not decades before you work it out. All while the class is effectively disabled, you also wouldn’t be leveling it."

"I’d still have [Radiance Conjuration]. Deadly beams - my main attack and defense - would still be available, while enjoying improved stats." I pointed out.

"Sure, but no [Blaze] weakens it, no [Nova] lowers how much damage you can burst out, no [Talaria] means you’re stuck on the ground." Librarian said, ticking the points off her fingers.

"Right, fine, how hard do you think it’d be to work out casting magic? Clearly, Asura figured it out, and others must’ve also worked it out. We can’t be the first. Plus!" I said, getting excited. "I saw Asura using dozens and dozens of spells while fighting Lun’Kat. I have [Pristine Memories], I can recreate it!" I said, working myself up.

I jumped up, and walked to another part of the room.

"Chair! Table! Pen! Paper!" I clipped out to Librarian, having all of them appear in front of me. I sat down at the desk and focused, ignoring the barely-repressed mirth behind me.

"Ok, the first one." I said, putting the pen on the paper, focusing and trying to remember what I’d seen.

… part of it had been behind Asura. I had a lot of pieces, but not the full puzzle. That was fine. There’d been more.

"... Second one." I said.

It’d been at a fairly steep angle, not letting me get a good view.

"THIRD ONE!" I groused.

It’d been at a good angle, and unobscured, but I couldn’t remember all the details. Not due to a lack of memory, but because it’d just been too Goddess-cursed far away to see it all in the first place.

Librarian’s chuckles became full-on gales of laughter.

"I saw someone operate on a man once! I’m sure I can operate on a baby!" She said, wiping some tears of laughter from her eyes. "Come on. Asura was casting the most complex, the most powerful magic possible, the culmination of all her knowledge and experience. We don’t even know the fundamentals behind it all, let alone have the power and control to cast the same spells Asura was casting. For all we know, each one is entirely unique, with no fundamental bits."

I grumbled to myself, idly drawing circles with my pen.

"Fine. I can’t learn from Asura’s casting." I grumbled. "I can use it for reference later on, but I won’t figure out the fundamentals. Maybe if I had a team of researchers and a few decades we could work it all out, but…"

"But yeah, we’d need to find someone else to learn from." Librarian said. "Which makes this the high-risk, high-reward option."

"Odds that the dwarves have someone to learn from, and odds that they’d teach me?" I asked Librarian.

"Pulling a number out of my ass… 20% that they have someone. We haven’t seen hide or hair of anyone casting like they do, and we have seen a few clans now. 95% chance that they’d teach us though, they like you and want to keep you happy. Only if it’s some giant secret, or someone as important as you are would they say no. Keep in mind though, this probably isn’t something that can get picked up overnight. It’d probably take years of study."

"So, a 19% chance pulling numbers out of your rear end that things work out." I grouched.

"Yeah, and spend years working on it. But that’s if we want to learn stuff now. We can always learn it later." Librarian pointed out.

I put [Acolyte of Asura] off to the side. I’d re-evaluate it against whatever other class I picked out of the remaining four. It wasn’t the winner, but it wasn’t getting cut either. It’d be easier to argue for and against the merits against a single class.

That left the four light green classes left. [Radiant Immolator], [The Rising Dawn], [Butterfly Mystic], and [Sentinel-Adept]. They were all fairly close to each other, and I basically needed to have a little tournament to decide the winner.

Actually - that was a pretty good idea. I could have two classes go head to head, decide which one I liked more, then repeat with the winners.

I looked at [Sentinel-Adept] vs [The Rising Dawn] and sighed. Nope, it wouldn’t be that easy to decide.

Time to do this methodically.

Stats and skills first.

[Radiant Immolator] had 400 points of stats, and all of them were Magic stats. The total wasn’t as high as some of the other classes, but the distribution was in a good place.

[The Rising Dawn] had 380 points worth of stats, and again all of them were magic. The distribution supported long, continuous casting sessions, which I approved of. The raw total wasn’t as high as [Radiant Immolator], but the distribution on each was skewed towards what each class wanted to do.

[Butterfly Mystic] was crushing it with stats. 436 points in total, but the distribution was suboptimal. Only 280 of them were in magic stats, with the remaining 156 being in physical stats. They were slanted towards "Keep me alive and balanced", and there was something to be said for the tyranny of sheer stats. The distribution could be quite a lot better though, I was less than thrilled with where I’d end up.

It was easily the most complicated analysis. It seemed to support traveling, moving around, lasting in harsher conditions, which only [Sentinel-Adept] seemed to hint at.

At the same time, I was basically complaining that I’d be tougher and faster, and that my strength would start rising again.

When all the stats were magical, it was easy to compare them. [Radiant Immolator] had more stats than [The Rising Dawn], no question about it. I wasn’t quite going to go into the analysis of Mana+Regen VS Control+Power, beyond the fact that both were distributed the way the class wanted. [Butterfly Mystic] brought up the question "What’s a physical stat worth?"

I’d finish up that line of thinking in a minute.

[Sentinel-Adept] had 432 stats total, with 368 of them being magical. They were arranged almost the exact same way I’d arranged [The Dawn Sentinel], which I found nice.

Right. I had the stats and their distribution, and quite frankly it was a crapshoot. All of them had stats to support what the class wanted to do. None of them were bad, but [Sentinel-Adept] was the clear winner. I hesitated to call [Butterfly Mystic]’s distribution bad, because speed and vitality were important. It just felt weird that I’d be getting so much of them, and it made it a bit of an outlier.

Ok, stats, at the end of the day, were a bit of a crapshoot. I wasn’t getting anything from them. Nothing was jumping out at me as a "Cut me!" or "Pick me!"

Next up, flying skills!

Chapter 212.2 - Radiance Class-up II

[Sentinel-Adept] had it easiest. [Talaria] would keep the same name, but lose all restrictions. I didn’t need sandals or sunlight anymore, and I’d be able to fly on a whim. I could stand, make tight turns that I couldn’t before, and more. A straight up, simple evolution. I’d be faster and more nimble.

[Radiant Immolator] also evolved [Talaria]. It kept the restrictions, but in exchange, I got a point-defense system in place. While flying, the new and improved Skill would shoot down projectiles fired at me, at a significantly discounted mana price. Instead of 100 mana, I’d use 60 mana on an equivalently powerful attack, and the discount would grow as the skill got stronger. Heck, a few chapters had me flying a hair off the ground at all times, always having my defenses on. Between that, and [Bullet Time] plus [Mantle], I ended up fairly hard to hit… from small things.

It didn’t do anything about someone dropping a mountain on my head, and if it tried to zap something big and metal, I just ended up with superheated metal in my body. That was before someone cut my legs off flying. Sure, I could regrow them - but I wouldn’t have sandals on my feet anymore, which would lead to a long drop.

As my power and control grew, so would the strength and precision of my point defenses. It tied neatly together like that.

[The Rising Dawn] had angel wings! Glowing, bright wings of soft light. I had to imagine that my interactions with the angel had rewarded me with them. They were restricted to daylight - and they promised to punch a hole through whatever clothes I was wearing - but it came with a significant speed boost. Which was totally in-line with the "Show up dramatically at the right moment to save the day" theme that the class had going on.

[Butterfly Mystic] had technically restricted flight, but practically unrestricted flight. It was only a bit faster than [Talaria] was - a strong jogging speed, instead of a brisk walk. I’d get, surprise surprise, butterfly wings, which was the restriction. If there wasn’t room to move them, I wouldn’t be able to fly. Which was interesting - [The Rising Dawn] didn’t mention a similar restriction. The "learning" part showed up again. The more I looked at butterflies, birds, and at other flying magic, the better my flight would be. Not just from a "The skill improves" way, but just sheer learning about different flight methods would let me use them.

Hang on - it used my jogging speed for the baseline rate. Which meant it tied to my speed, so as my speed improved, my speed would improve. Heh. Classes distributing stats as they needed strikes again!

I’d improve by finding different types of butterflies as well. Birds would also work, but butterflies were best. Some flew at incredible heights, so high up that I suspected going that high would trigger the wrath of whatever Sky had tried to warn me about once upon a time. Others were fast, and I could improve the speed of the skill.

Lots of small improvements was the name of the game. It arguably started off worse than the other flying skills, but could get better.

Shame I was freaking underground right now! Birds and butterflies weren’t famous for making lairs deep inside mountains.

Either way - the flight skill’s differentiation wasn’t going to get me what I wanted or needed. I couldn’t find a way to cut a class, or have one stand out from the rest.

I was undeterred. I was going to keep working at it. I was going to find an answer.

I started analyzing the rest of the skills, and how everything was put together, but it was an exercise in frustration.

All of the classes had skills that supported what they were, and how they wanted to evolve. All of the classes were good.

I was pacing in front of the fire as I finished the last skill analysis, the last comparison. I threw myself into the chair, letting myself sink into it.

"I need help." I told Librarian. "I’m struggling to decide here."

"Yeah, it’s tough." She agreed. "Let’s look at it from another direction."

"I’m game. Anything." I said.

"First off, with everything we’ve seen - are any of them wrong?" She asked. "Will we regret being [Sentinel-Adept] instead of [The Rising Dawn]?"

"No." I said, starting to see where she was getting at.

"Worse-case, we can flip a coin three times, then compare it against Acolyte." She said. "Let fate decide what we want, and we’ll be ok with it."

I slowly nodded.

"Better to make a choice, than no choice." I said. She shook her head.

"No, listen. None of them are bad. We’ll be happy with any of the four. They are all us, they’re all some aspect of who we are." She said. "You are a Butterfly Mystic. You are The Rising Dawn. You are a Sentinel-Adept. Lastly, you are a Radiant Immolator. That’s all you. The question is - which one do you want to be?"

I blinked, processing. That was an excellent point.

I was all of those. The question was, which aspect did I want to focus on? Did I want to focus on grand heroics? Learning magic? Blowing things up? Or just, the "plain and simple" Sentinel?

[Sentinel-Adept] got cut as I was mulling it over. I’d even initially hinted at it when I saw the class. I wanted to be more than just "another Sentinel." I wanted to be more than just a one-dimensional being.

By similar reasoning, I cut [Radiant Immolator]. I had no problems blasting monsters to pieces, nor did I hesitate to fight other people.

I didn’t like doing it though. I didn’t want to have to kill monsters and fight people. It was out of necessity, not love. Demand, not desire.

The other classes would also help me stay alive.

That left two classes, before I needed to compare it against [Acolyte of Asura]. [The Rising Dawn] versus [Butterfly Mystic].

I boiled it down, and down, and down some more, and found that, fundamentally, it became a simple question.

Did I see myself as - or did I want to be - Supergirl? Or was I the quiet person tucked away in the corner of a library, reading books and learning more about the world?

On one hand, I loved the idea of heroics. I loved being the center of attention, of swooping in and saving the day. Sure, I didn’t like the escort I had - but something fluttered in my heart when I was seen and recognized as Sentinel Dawn, the heroine, the savior. I enjoyed walking into an infirmary, and healing every single soul in there. I even liked the look on the adventurer’s faces, after I single-handedly killed nearly every single pirate on the ship. I undeniably liked the attention and accolades from being heroic.

On the other hand, I was currently curled up in a fluffy chair in a library with a book. My soul hadn’t changed, there was no lying about who or what I was.

… At the same time, calling it a "Sit in the library and read" class was horribly wrong. It was a "Get out of the library and learn stuff hands-on" class. It was a "Slice people open to discover how they tick" class. It was a "Go poke unicorns 10x your level and ask them for tips" class.

It was a "Join a team of Rangers and have them train you" class.

I’d learned more in a month of being with the Rangers than I’d learned in years in Aquiliea. I’d gotten more out of a single talk with Night than a whole book.

Between "fantastic heroics" and "poking people to learn things", which one did I like more?

It was tough.

"Got any ideas?" I asked Librarian.

"[Pristine Memories] and [Passionate Learning] both support and help [Butterfly Mystic]." She said. "It’s not a lot, all things considered, but…" She trailed off, shrugging, knowing that I’d get the rest of the message.

She was right, it wasn’t much. It was just a single feather on the scales.

A single feather, from a newly hatched chick’s downy fuzz, but when the scales were well-calibrated and perfectly even, it was enough to tip them a hair.

"So it’s [Butterfly Mystic] then." I said, a bit surprised. I wouldn’t have guessed it would come out on top.

I took [Acolyte of Asura] out, ready for the last round. Was [Butterfly Mystic] better than it? Which class did I want more? Fancy spellcasting? Or more standard fare?

Did I think I could pull off what was needed to make [Acolyte of Asura] work? Could I learn how to make cool magic spells like Asura did?

Librarian coughed softly.

"Yes?" I asked her, somehow not annoyed that she’d interrupted my musings.

"Well… [Butterfly Mystic] lets you pick up new magics as you see them, right?" She asked, when we both knew the answer.

"Right… oh. OH!" I said, the pieces clicking together. "If I ever meet someone who can teach me how to cast like this, I can get the fundamental skill from them!!" I said, jumping out of my chair.

I deflated.

"Hang on. [Acolyte of Asura] needed a bunch of skills to work. There’s not one fundamental skill."

"Let’s talk about this." Librarian said. "I’ll advocate against the class, you advocate for it. Let’s see what arguments we can hammer out, and what conclusions we come to.

"[Acolyte of Asura] is an advanced class, with a huge amount of power behind it. It has twice the stats of [Butterfly Mystic]. It’s like comparing your [The Dawn Sentinel] to your [Light of Hope] class. Yeah, one’s got much better skills, and can do a lot more. However, your interest in casting like this is fledgeling. New. What if you hate it? What if you can’t use it well in a fight? Is it worth changing everything we do for it?" She asked. "However, with [Butterfly Mystic] we get to dip our toes into it gently if we find a teacher. We’d need a teacher anyways. Sure, it’s not half as good, but it gives us options to improve and evolve, depending on what we find."

"Sure, but the sheer power of the class suggests I’m going to almost double my stats." I pointed out. "There’s something to be said for becoming almost twice as strong."

I thought about it more.

"In addition, if I can figure this out, I’ll be another frontrunner. Another ‘human first’."

"You assume." Librarian said. "Plus, then your focus is going to be split in half. You’re already stretched thin, teaching Autumn, teaching Rangers, teaching at Artemis’s school, healing people. Now you’re going to add a whole new field of study, one that you don’t even know if you’ll learn?"

"I’m going to be immortal. What’s a few extra projects running around? Plus, then I’ll have ways of leveling up both classes, instead of [Ranger-Mage] stalling out every time I’m in town."

"But we’re not comparing against [Ranger-Mage]. We’re comparing against [Butterfly Mystic]. Which also levels peacefully."

"It requires new experiences, which won’t be found in a town that we’ve lived in for centuries!"

"I think a direct comparison is bad." I said, not liking being on the losing end of the argument. "[Acolyte of Asura] is the better class. I think the better question is - what’s my risk tolerance? How much of a gamble am I willing to make?" I said.

"I think the better question is, how many decades is it going to be until we find a way to use the class well? And assume we make it back home - how is crippling your class for the foreseeable future going to go over with Night and the rest of the Sentinels?" Librarian analyzed, starting to pace in front of me.

I pursed my lips at that. Shit. I’d been so focused on the short term and the long term that I completely forgot the medium term.

"On one hand, not great." I admitted. My missions had rarely been ‘just heal things.’ "On the other? I’d have a ton of stats to throw at any problem. Which would also strengthen [The Dawn Sentinel]. Bit of a wash."

Librarian shrugged. "End of the day, it’s risk tolerance. Do you want to gamble?"

I did like gambling - a bit. In moderation. When I could tilt the table a bit towards me. Like when I gambled with the other Sentinels, and played them to make me win a hand. When I bet I could drink people under the table, knowing that I could cure myself of alcohol.

Then - I walked away from the table. I took the small win I knew I could get, and I walked away when the outcome was uncertain. I’d utterly missed my "sure" gamble with the dwarves and their ale, and been punished for it. Not even my "sure-thing" gambles always paid off.

I gambled - on small things. I gambled - for fun, with small amounts of pocket change. Well, large for other people, but I was relatively wealthy.

I didn’t take all my money to a high stakes game. I didn’t bet everything I had.

I didn’t take large gambles. Not since I ran away from home, and even that felt more like it was "do or die", rather than a risk.

An unnecessary risk, since I had a powerful, perfectly viable option right in front of me.

"Right. [Butterfly Mystic] it is!" I said, picking up the book.

Ha! Back to the bug theme. I’d started off as [Firebug], and it seemed that I couldn’t quite escape it.

Now that the choice was made, I briefly let myself indulge in secondary aspects, enjoying the class. I liked the name. I thought it was super pretty. Plus, who would believe me?

"Yes, my ‘firing lasers all over the place’ class? [Butterfly Mystic]."

I spent a few more minutes cooing over my choice, reading through the book again.

I hesitated. I didn’t want to go. I didn’t want to leave. Librarian gently took my hand, and gently pulled on it.

"Elaine. You’ve made your choice. It’s time." She said, leading me down the stairs.

"But I don’t want to leave you!" I cried out. "I don’t know how long it’ll be before I see you again."

Librarian smiled sadly at me.

"I know. But remember - I’ll always be here, inside you." She said, touching my heart with a single elegant finger. "I am you, and you are me. I’m not gone - just more apart of you, so close you can only hear me whisper."

We made it to the checkout desk, and I gave her a great big crushing hug, her Sentinel armor somehow not hurting or getting in the way. Soulspace rules. I tried to linger, to stay, to be with her some more. To be with her, with me.

"I don’t want to go." I cried into Librarian’s arms. "I don’t want to leave you. To not see you for decades, if not longer."

Librarian entertained me, and we spent an immortal moment together. A moment that was but an instant, an entire lifetime, and would need to last me decades or centuries.

But all things must come to an end, and with great reluctance, fingers trailing slowly behind as I tried to elongate this one last moment, I eventually had to let go. All good things must come to an end, and with my skills, this would not be the end.

"See you soon." I whispered.

I woke up to a flood of notifications.

Chapter 213.1 - Shiny New Skills! I

I woke up to dozens and dozens of notifications. Even compressed, I had a good number to wade through.

Also, my skin and flesh seemed to be crawling. It was disconcerting, but my [Persistent Casting] was still on, and my mana was…

Wow. That was a lot of mana.

It was also totally full!

The crawling sensation stopped, and I made a note to check on what the heck that was later.

Weirdly, I didn’t feel super hungry or thirsty. I suppose it’d hit me in a moment.

[*ding!* Congratulations! [Ranger Mage] has upgraded into [Butterfly Mystic]!]

[*ding!* Congratulations! [Butterfly Mystic] has leveled up to level 256->306! +8 Strength, +8 Dexterity, +70 Speed, +70 Vitality, +70 Mana, +70 Mana Regen, +70 Magic power, +70 Magic Control from your Class per level! +1 Free Stat for being Human per level! +1 Strength, +1 Mana Regen from your Element per level!]

What! Bullshit! Only 50 levels!? I’d been in the Formorian fight! I’d actively contributed the entire way! And then, after that capped me out, I’d…

… done almost nothing with the class. I fought some hellhounds, fired a few potshots at a chupacabra, briefly flashed [Shine] in the dragon fight, fought a slime and did some lasering against orcs. I wasn’t even sure if they were all worth enough experience to get a level, although the combined efforts were probably worth one level.

Then again, I’d done a bunch of new things! I met an angel… ok, that was probably more healing class. I encountered the dwarves, and while my Sentinel class got some levels out of that, some of the knowledge had to count!

Then again, I was arguing that leisurely reading books should be worth multiple levels at 300+, for a class that wasn’t dedicated to reading. My argument felt thin even to myself.

So it was all the Formorian War, which I’d started at, what, roughly level 215?

… maybe I shouldn’t whine about almost 100 levels in less than six months. It felt like an eternity, but that was the time left, not the time behind.

[*ding!* Congratulations! [Shine] has been upgraded to [Lantern]!]

Lantern: The lantern, held high to guide others. The luminous fairy, fluttering inside the lantern, exuding golden rays light. The firebug, lighting the world up with her lantern. The moth, drawn to the flame. You are all these and more. You hold the lantern aloft, guiding your fellows through the dark, stripping away the lies and the falsehoods of darkness, revealing the world as it is to all around you. Destroy illusions around you. Minor sense for illusions. Improved illusion removal efficiency per level.

While it seemed to be mostly the same skill, I wondered what ‘minor sense for illusions’ meant? Would I get a system notification about nearby illusions? Or would it be more subtle?

The part about "I was a fairy trapped in a lantern" was more than a bit concerning, and caused a deep pit of worry to form in my stomach. I really, really hoped it didn’t come back to bite me. I was hoping it was just metaphorical, that it was describing me lighting up the dwarfs’ area, and their city was the lantern I was "trapped" inside.

Given that the skill had upgraded, I was going to assume the anti-illusion properties were even stronger than before. Radiance was already a natural counter to Mirage and all illusions, and improved efficiency basically meant that I’d be using a tiny fraction of the same mana to destroy an illusion. For example, if Magic spent 10,000 mana on an illusion, it might only take me 800 mana to destroy it.

I had no idea what the actual numbers were - I was guessing, especially since the skill didn’t tell me numbers - but I knew the ratio was brutal against illusions. Only the most powerful Mirage-makers could last more than a second against [Lantern].

That’s what they get for trying to trick the world. There were no good uses for illusions, in my opinion.

I was conveniently ignoring entertainment. And a whole host of other, potentially legitimate uses.

Somewhere, I swear I felt Librarian giggle.

Naturally, [Lantern] would still be good for plain old lighting things up as well.

[*ding!* Congratulations! [Sun-Kissed] has been upgraded to [Nectar]!]

Nectar: Nectar is the sweet sugar of the natural world, essential for every butterfly. The mighty mango tree generates the sweetest nectar of them all. But [Butterfly Mystics] don’t need nectar, they need mana! .2% increased mana regeneration per level.

That was almost the same as [Sun-Kissed], with one crucial difference.

It came from me, not from the sun! I was freed from the tyranny of the sky! No longer did I need to be outdoors to enjoy the skill.

Putting it another way - I almost doubled my mana regeneration stat!

However… it no longer mentioned free mana regeneration. Did that mean I now needed to chow down extra to compensate? With it almost doubling my mana regeneration…

I needed to look into a [Bottomless Pit] skill. Or maybe some sort of [Gourmet] third class.

[*ding!* Congratulations! [Blaze] has been upgraded to [Sun’s Heart]!]

Sun’s Heart: Your inner fire only grows larger, stronger. Hotter. More powerful. A sun has formed in your heart, pulsing energy burning through you with every beat. Your fire and passion can’t be contained, and will explode out with every skill you cast. Increased heat, damage, and effective mana per level when casting offensive spells and generating heat. Costs 32,768 mana regen.

Welp, there went…

Roughly 9 mana per second.

In other words -

Almost a rounding error worth of mana.

Holy shit.

[*ding!* Congratulations! [Talaria] and [Pretty] have been merged into [Scintillating Ascent]!]

Scintillating Ascent: Take wing with the prettiest pair of wings on Pallos! With every flap of your iridescent, scintillating wings, you will soar through the boundless sky, see what the whole world has to offer you. The flight speed is tied to your speed stat. .4% reduced mana usage per level. 1% increased maneuverability per level. Tiny prettiness metamorphosis per level.

The skill didn’t mention upgrading, but that’s because it was tied to the class, not the skill.

ALSO!

THE MOTHERFUCKING SYSTEM TOOK MY [PRETTY] SKILL!

I worked my ass off for that skill! It was mine, damnit! I didn’t want it absorbed into [Scintillating Ascent]!

I was going to grab the System by its throat, and shake it until my [Pretty] skill came back out again.

I took a moment to blow out some annoyed air, making it all too obvious I was back. I got some looks, but I was too busy being annoyed.

Then again, people taking some time to process everything new was normal. Especially the higher tier upgrades took longer, since there was just so much more information to process.

Fine. The System had taken my [Pretty] skill, but it was merged into [Scintillating Ascent]. It wasn’t gone, simply transformed… like a butterfly.

Like it seemed to be saying would happen to me.

Wait. The little crawling sensation when I woke up - did my skill just make me prettier? Not just my own self-perception, and helping me be pretty, but did it just morph me a hair closer to my own ideal?

Wait.

WAIT.

It was now a Class Skill, not a General Skill! That meant [Sentinel’s Superiority] now applied! Free 25% boost to my new [Pretty] skill!

And, with my free general skill slot, I could just take [Pretty] again! DOUBLE PRETTY TIME!

… Fine, System, I forgive you.

I had a feeling I was going to be making a lot of butterfly jokes in the future.

[*ding!* Congratulations! [Nova] has been upgraded to [Supernova]!]

Supernova: The silent roar of the biggest stars in the universe exploding in one final cataclysmic event. Even larger exploding stars. Increased size, damage, speed, and control per level.

That was the shortest, lamest description of a skill ever. However, control? That seemed to imply that I could bend my [Supernova]’s now - which was one of the only things I’d lost when I’d ditched [Radiance Manipulation]. Something to test, as soon as I could.

Although, I’d need a good testing ground. [Nova] had already been fairly large, and this was promising to be even larger.

Right! Cool new skills! [Butterfly Mystic] away! Let’s see what the levels had to say about things!

[*ding!* [Radiance Affinity] has leveled up! 256->306]

[*ding!* [Radiance Resistance] has leveled up! 256->306]

[*ding!* [Radiance Conjuration] has leveled up! 256->306]

[*ding!* [Nectar] has leveled up! 256->301]

[*ding!* [Sun’s Heart] has leveled up! 256->306]

[*ding!* [Scintillating Ascent] has leveled up! 256->281]

[*ding!* [Supernova] has leveled up! 256->306]

LEVELS! It was pretty clear which skills I’d extensively used in the fight against the Formorians, and which skills hadn’t been used as much.

Also, I had a free general slot now! On one hand, I wanted to rush off and grab some cool new skill to fill it. Like [Extra Pretty]. On the other, I was keeping an eye out for a companion, and the open slot was perfect for that.

And like some deformed monstrosity, on the third hand, an open general skill could totally be used for escaping. Something like [Sneaking].

Heck, [Escaping] might be a skill!

I could always combine option two and option three. Grab [Sneaking] for now, replace it later.

Or another skill.

Speaking of other skills, I was being offered a boatload.

[*ding!* You’ve unlocked the Class Skill [Float Like A Butterfly, Sting Like A Bee]! Would you like to replace a Class Skill with Float Like A Butterfly, Sting Like A Bee?]

Float Like A Butterfly, Sting Like A Bee: Butterflies are fragile things, carefully flitting through the world from flower to flower. Cruel creatures love nothing more than to throw rocks at the vision of beauty, crushing the innocent butterflies. However, you aren’t an ordinary butterfly, no, you’re a [Butterfly Mystic]. Show the rock-throwers that you’re not so easily taken down. Personal defense system. Automatically shoots down projectiles heading your way. Increased range, number of Radiance beams per level.

Point defense system strikes again! Third time might be the charm, since it could help me escape. No flying requirement either!

No flying skill integration though.

[*ding!* You’ve unlocked the Class Skill [Pollination]! Would you like to replace a Class Skill with Pollination?]

Pollination: As you fly about from flower to flower, drinking the sweet nectar of knowledge, you impart knowledge yourself. You cross-pollinate ideas and information, and you never know when you’ll sow the seeds of inspiration with those who are teaching you. Teaching skill. 0.4% per level increased experience gain for yourself and others when teaching them new knowledge. 0.5% increased ease of skill acquisition for yourself and others when teaching.

Yeowch. This was a solid skill. I’d want to try and grab it again once I was back in Remus.

Then again, was weakening my self-defense worth it? I’d need to think hard about it… another day.

[*ding!* You’ve unlocked the Class Skill [Eyes of the Mystic Butterfly]! Would you like to replace a Class Skill with Eyes of the Mystic Butterfly?]

Eyes of the Mystic Butterfly: Eyes in your head, eyes in your wings, now get eyes in the back of your head! So to speak. Butterfly wings have eyes, and with the Eyes of the Mystic Butterfly, you can see through them! Improved processing, clarity, and scope per level.

This was interesting. I’d almost literally get eyes in the back of my head. Full-scope vision? Sounded cool! Sadly, I’d need my wings out to make the best of it.

[*ding!* You’ve unlocked the Class Skill [Egg Laying]! Would you like to replace a -

NOPE NOPE NOPE HARD PASS ON ANYTHING CALLED EGG-LAYING.

[*ding!* You’ve unlocked the Class Skill [Signal Flare]! Would you like to replace a Class Skill with Signal Flare?]

Signal Flare: You constantly find yourself in peril and needing to ask for help. This skill is an unmistakable cry for help and attention, that you urgently need assistance at your location. Increased size, speed, pierce, visibility, and loudness per level.

I’d take the skill if I was on a Ranger team still. I wasn’t though - I was the reinforcements. Here, I was already surrounded by guards. Elsewhere, I was a solo operative. I just couldn’t see good use out of the skill.

At least it was better than egg laying.

[*ding!* You’ve unlocked the Class Skill [Sun Scales]! Would you like to replace a Class Skill with Sun Scales?]

Sun Scales: While in flight, you may choose to loose a dusting of sun scales during the day which will cause all those touched to become burned, and ignite wildfires.

Um. If I didn’t have [Oath] and wanted to utterly burn some place to the ground, maybe I’d consider it. As-is? Nope.

[*ding!* You’ve unlocked the Class Skill [Migration]! Would you like to replace a Class Skill with Migration?]

Migration: Butterflies fly far, and you’ll need to fly further than most! Dramatically reduced cost, increased energy, stamina, and flight speed after flying more than an hour continuously. Effects increase per level.

The skill was strong, and was a serious contender for getting into my skill line-up. Problem was, what to replace with a brand new level 1 skill? My Vitality was pretty good, and I already knew I had infinite flight time from [Talaria] before it got upgraded. [Sunrise] had me set in the energy field, so really all it did was a slowly ramping flight speed once I’d been flying for an hour. If I’d already been flying for an hour though, I was home free, so to speak.

[Lantern] was a candidate for getting cut for it though. I’d need to do some more thinking.

[*ding!* You’ve unlocked the Class Skill [Monarch Butterfly]! Would you like to replace a Class Skill with Monarch Butterfly?]

Monarch Butterfly: The ruler of butterflies, the queen of insects, all flock to be sheltered beneath the monarch’s wings. Increasing ability to attract insects. More exotic insects and numbers will follow per level.

… Why? Just, why? I get that moths and other insects were attracted to flames, but why would the System offer me such a skill? Hard pass on more bugs biting me, which might bring me down some [Swarm Queen] route or other such nonsense.

[*ding!* You’ve unlocked the Class Skill [A Single Flap of a Butterfly’s Wings]! Would you like to replace a Class Skill with A Single Flap of a Butterfly’s Wings?]

A Single Flap of a Butterfly’s Wings: Chaos.

Ok, with a skill description like that, no way in the seven hells was I taking the skill.

[*ding!* You’ve unlocked the Class Skill [Cooking]! Would you like to replace a Class Skill with Cooking?]

Cooking: Food is best eaten cooked, as you well know from frying dozens, hundreds of animals with your Radiance magic. Sometimes you burn ‘em, sometimes you undercook them. Well, no more! Perfectly cook your dinner every time! Increased cooking speed per level.

That was somewhat appealing, I wasn't going to lie.

Still. Any new skill I got would get reset, put back to level 1. Given the ease that I could unlock skills now, I decided to shelve the decision and thinking for later. Like [Eyes of the Mystic Butterfly], or [Migration]. They all seemed like upgrades to [Scintillating Ascent], and I’d rather spend my time and effort upgrading the skill to manually merge them in, rather than get supplemental support skills.

Like. It’d be easier to merge the skills if I took them all, and focused on merging them, but I only had so many skill slots. I’d need to ditch a bunch of skills to make it work, then re-train them from scratch.

I’d keep thinking about the choice. For now, I was going to keep my skills, and focus on them.

I took a look at my status.

[Name: Elaine]

[Race: Human]

[Age: 19]

[Mana: 291390/291390]

[Mana Regen: 229092 (+219647.225)]

Stats

[Free Stats: 161]

[Strength: 670]

[Dexterity: 871]

[Vitality: 7116]

[Speed: 7116]

[Mana: 29139]

[Mana Regeneration: 29189 (+21964.7225)]

[Magic Power: 13479 (+207576.6)]

[Magic Control: 13479 (+207576.6)]

[Class 1: [The Dawn Sentinel - Celestial: Lv 365]]

[Celestial Affinity: 365]

[Cosmic Presence: 285]

[Solar Infusion: 110]

[Center of the Universe: 365]

[Dance of the Heavens: 365]

[Wheel of Sun and Moon: 311]

[Mantle of the Stars: 365]

[Sunrise: 132]

[Class 2: [Butterfly Mystic - Radiance: Lv 306]]

[Radiance Affinity: 306]

[Radiance Resistance: 306]

[Radiance Conjuration: 306]

[Lantern: 188]

[Nectar: 301]

[Sun's Heart: 306]

[Scintillating Ascent: 281]

[Supernova: 306]

[Class 3: Locked]

General Skills

[Long-Range Identify: 365]

[Pristine Memories: 206]

[: ]

[Bullet Time: 283]

[Oath of Elaine to Lyra: 308]

[Sentinel's Superiority: 365]

[Persistent Casting: 259]

[Passionate Learning: 354]

Chapter 213.2 - Shiny New Skills! I

Awwww yes. I looked over the stats, and saw that they were Good. My vitality and speed being almost half my magic power and control wasn’t exactly what I’d expected to have happened when I started out, but here I was.

I mentally felt a hair of regret towards how I’d acted towards Polyphemus back in Aquiliea. He had told me that physical stats were important for everyone, and I’d blissfully ignored him with all the certainty of a young teenager. Well, look at me now, valuing physical stats.

Well, my first check through my stats and new skills was done! Time to put them to the test!

Also, the VIP who’d almost fried me had Radiance magic. Time to try some sweet talking, to see if I could get her to show me some tricks!

Speaking of -

"That was fast." She said, "Everything go ok in there?"

I blinked owlishly at her.

"Um, yeah." I said. "How long was I down?"

She shrugged.

"Didn’t even get to play three hands." She said, gesturing to a table full of playing cards they’d set up.

"Hakka! You’re not leaving this hand!" Thoren said. "Just because healer Elaine is awake early, doesn’t get you out of this! Come on, show!" He said.

A heated round began behind me, as crushing disappointment washed over me. Only a few minutes? All that time spent checking classes, and only a few minutes!? Leaving Librarian early, skipping reading, a few minutes!??!?!?!?

Between that and the loss of my [Pretty] skill, I was going to murder the System. Dissect it into many little pieces.

I took a great big calming breath. Throwing a hissy fit over a loss of reading time, over cutting my farewell with Librarian short wouldn’t do me any good. I’d gotten a good class, good stats, it was time to experiment with them, then plot my breakout.

"Eight Pickaxe!" Hakka said, triumphantly throwing her hand down, and reaching for the pot.

"What a shame." Thoren said, voice full of disappointment, Hakka making gloating noises. "What a shame that I have THREE GOLD!" He said, cackling as he revealed his hand. "Get your paws off that Krul! It’s all mine!"

Hakka made a disgusted noise.

"Why do I even let you fleece me on these games?" She asked.

"Cause you have too much fun and too much money." Urik said.

"Yeah, yeah." Hakka said. "Thank you Elaine, for sparing my poor wallet. If there’s nothing else, I’ve got some training to do." She said, standing up and putting her helmet back on.

This was my chance!

"Hey Hakka!" I called out. "You’re a Radiance mage, right?"

"Yup. You’re also one. I would’ve killed you if you didn’t have the resistance skill, healer or not." She informed me, with the matter-of-fact voice like telling me the moons had eyes. "Also, you probably know this, but being a two-classer right now, and with healing one of them? Oof. A level 100 Mirror-anything combat will destroy you."

I wanted to defend myself, and point out my physical stats, but in a stroke of genius decided that shutting up was probably the right move.

No, wait.

Agreeing with her was the right move.

"You’re totally right." I said. "Could you show me some Radiance magic that you use?" I asked, figuring I might as well be direct about it.

It was a very personal thing I was asking, but I hoped to get a favorable response. Nothing ventured, nothing gained.

She shrugged.

"Why not. You finishing up so fast saved me a day here, and half my purse. I still feel bad over nearly killing ya when you were just trying to help. Just one question" She asked, giving me an evil eye for some reason.

I gulped. Had she figured out that I was planning on escaping?

"Why’d you ask now, and not earlier? Totally could’ve helped your class up!" She said, cracking a grin.

I refrained from groaning. I’d been totally pranked. She wasn’t wrong though.

Well, she was going to give me a bunch of her secrets. I figured my class’s ability to learn wouldn’t be too bad to let loose.

Plus, it could make the dwarves see me as having added incentive to stick around! If they thought I was happy here, and had tons to learn and do, they wouldn’t look as closely at me. It’d make it easier to make a break for it.

"Well, I was pretty happy with what I had." I explained. "However, I got a class that rewards learning, and will upgrade skills easily if I see them used. Figured I could try it out now." I said.

I was so lucky that Hakka was a Radiance mage.

Then again, city full of high-level dwarves? A thriving military? Even if I didn’t have a weak connection with Hakka already, I could ask Korun nicely and he’d arrange something.

I should totally ask Night - no, wait, Julius - during the next Ranger Convocation to meet with any Rangers who used Radiance magic. Radiance mages were as rare as any other mage. With 44 elements and two classes to fill, the odds of any one person having a particular element was low, but in a group the odds were good that at least one person had it.

"Right, follow me!" Hakka said, and I followed her to a training room, located in another building.

Half of my overly excessive escort followed along. Thoren and his crew came along, while Urik went with his minions on some other detail.

A number of Thoren’s guards squared off to lightly spar, or get some practice in themselves. If the orcs tried to hit me here, well, they were all in the same room, already geared up and ready - if not actively using - skills.

"Right." Hakka said as we made it to a large sparse stone room, with a number of dummies scattered around the room. They were all crude representations of orcs, carved out of stone. "Are you a fighting mage, or a utility mage?" She asked.

I blinked at the question, having never heard of those classifications.

"Um. I’m not sure." I said. "I’ve got a few combat skills, and a few utility skills."

Hakka grunted.

"Sounds like a utility mage." She grunted with distaste. "I can’t be much help with those. I’m allllll fighting." She said, turning towards the orcs.

"Right. I’m not great at this teaching thing. Lemme show you a few of my tricks, one Radiance mage to another." She said. "I’m based around the glow of the flames from the forge."

She lifted a hand up, glowing Radiance around her fingers.

"For super close up." She said, slashing through a statue. I noticed that it slowly started to rebuild itself.

Nifty. I didn’t think claws were the direction I wanted to go though. Also, what was with claw skills recently? This was like the third time they’d come up.

She presented her claws for me to study. I took a close look at them, trying to figure out how the skill worked.

[Butterfly Mystic] was about learning new things after all. Even though I didn’t want the skill.

Hang on - I should try to learn the skill though, and see what happened. Get some practice.

It looked like her fingers - her entire hand actually - was coated in Radiance, and it seemed to form sharp, feral points. It was possible that the skill was helping reinforce her hand, so she could actually claw her way through things, letting the destructive aspects and nature of Radiance take full hold.

The skill was probably TERRIBLE without the before-mentioned [Radiance Resistance]. I wasn’t touching it, and I could feel the waves of heat coming off of them.

[*ding!* You’ve unlocked the Class skill [Ladybug Antenna]! Would you like to replace a skill with it?]

Heck no.

At the same time - that was easy. The class hadn’t been kidding when it said new skills would be easy to pick up. I wish I could tell if I’d gotten experience for my class from this. Everything I’d read suggested yes. Still, no way of telling until that magical ding showed up.

I nodded.

"Right, I think I’ve got an idea of that one."

"Slightly further range." She said, taking a great big breath, then bellowing golden flames out of her mouth.

Just like a - a - a street performer.

The statue melted. I didn’t want to think about how hot that was.

She glanced at me, and I shook my head. I knew how that sort of skill worked - heck, I’d been offered a variant on it once - I could probably recreate it myself, later.

"Actually, why don’t you show me what you’ve got?" She said, stepping back.

I was a bit nervous. I was on the spot, with a new skill that sounded grand. I didn’t want to screw up and-

Wait.

I was dumb.

Thoren and co. were hanging back, out of the way. Not in the line of fire.

Hakka had [Radiance Resistance]. Probably at a much, much higher level than mine. Heck, it could almost be [Radiance Immunity] if the skill evolved like that!

I’d never heard of anyone having the skill, but then again, all this traveling was opening my eyes. All sorts of things I’d never imagined were popping up.

I aimed for a cluster of orc statues, further down in the room. I didn’t point, or gesture, I just let the skill happen.

[Supernova].

The skill exploded out of me, a lazily spinning large sphere of deceptively powerful destruction. Seriously, the ball was bigger than I was. It wasn’t a single uniform gold, no, it was spotchy and spotted, all types of yellow, just like a real star would be.

It sped down the range, far faster than [Nova] ever had. I found the mental handle that was the skill, just like my old [Manipulation] skill, and curved it into the group of statues I was aiming for. I was only able to keep track of the speeding ball thanks to my dramatically improved vitality. The ball landed, exploding with a ferocious boom as it hit the cluster of statues. Masonry rained down on us.

I was feeling pleased as punch with the new and extra-large [Supernova].

"That was terrible." Hakka said.

I didn’t protest. I wanted to know what the super-high level Radiance mage had to say.

"It’s flashy, yes. It’s powerful, sure. Heck, I’ll even concede that maybe you’re not constantly fighting in tunnels, so the inability to use it down there due to its size isn’t as large of a consideration. Ask yourself this though. How much of the ball ends up applying to your target? How often are your enemies going to neatly group themselves up, and not have a shielding skill?"

I frowned at that. The first point seemed to be the strongest.

I used all my power on every attack I had. I reviewed my [Pristine Memories] of fights I’d used [Nova] in.

The Formorians had been A-Grade [Nova] bait. They were also dumb as bricks, and came in a gigantic horde. [Nova] was the skill to use.

In fights against other stuff?

The slime was the only one I could think of where [Nova] had lived up to its full potential. I’d needed to literally carve out a hole in the slime, shove [Nova] into it, and let it explode.

Yeah. I could see Hakka’s point.

"Watch." She said, pointing to another group. "If you must attack like that at range, I recommend beams."

I tended to be a "Stick the beam on the person and keep it on until it burned through something." Hakka wasn’t.

She rapidly flickered tiny, pinpoint bursts all over the place, hitting eyes, throat, knees, elbows, shoulders, hips, stomachs - every spot on a body that could be fatal or crippling.

It had the added effect of doing what I tended to do with [Shine] - now [Lantern] - in that the rapidly changing light was blinding.

Which made me think about my own tactics. [Lantern] flashing was still strong - but the light was probably secondary to the lasers just lighting the whole place up and keeping them lit up. I should run some tests.

Also - I looked carefully, again only seeing it thanks to my improved vitality - Hakka was using a lot of beams at once.

Ahhh. She was combining her [Radiance Conjuration] with a straight up "beam people to death skill." That was pretty darn useful, and arguably better than [Nova].

[*ding!* You’ve unlocked the Class skill [Beam people to death]! Would you like to replace a skill with it?]

The funny thing about unlocking new skills was they lingered for a bit. Usually around half a day, to give me enough time to figure out if I wanted it or not. I held off on it for now. Unlike the other skills I’d been offered, this was an honest, high-powered straight-combat skill.

"Beams are amazing." I agreed with her, considering changing how I used them to mimic her ways, even if I didn’t take the skill.

She nodded.

"Now, if you must hit your target from all angles, do it like this." Hakka said, then mimed a great overhand blow with her hand.

Must be a restriction on the skill that made it more powerful.

A glowing hammer appeared in her hands, and seemed to hit an invisible anvil. A great spray of sparks shot off, the thousands of shimmering shards zipping over to the target, winding around each other, almost impossible to follow or track. The tiny points hit the statue from every angle, a cascading devastation on the poor rock.

"Now, there’s a solid multi-directional skill." Hakka said with obvious pride. "Nothing short of a full-body shield stops it, it hits from all directions at the same time, it’s small enough to sneak through small gaps, it’s maneuverable enough to go around corners."

I was eyeing all the slowly rebuilding statues.

Hakka had gone easy on me when she thought I was an intruder. Acid, rocks, and lasers to the eyes had been a weak opening salvo, while she wasn’t quite sure if I was actually an intruder or not. I had wondered why I’d only seen like 8 skills, and not 25.

Still. She made a ton of neat points about [Supernova], and her better skill.

"Right, last skill…" Hakka trailed off, awkwardly scratching her nose.

"Well. It’s a full aura attack. It just hurts everyone around me." She said. "Not a ton of damage to any one person, great for swarms. It’s new though, and my control over it?" She said, waggling her hand.

"Let’s talk about it another day." She said, and I agreed.

Time for hard mode.

"Willing to work with me a bit to improve my skill?" I asked, not waiting for an answer. I summoned a dozen tiny [Supernova]’s at once, firing them off towards another target. I tried furiously to control all of them, rapidly flickering my attention and control from ball to ball, getting about half of them to hit the target from different angles at what only the most generous referee would call "at the same time."

"Mmm. Close. Watch again." Hakka said, getting into it. She lifted her hand up again, a glowing hammer appearing as she smashed down again, thousands of tiny sparks erupting off.

We traded back and forth a dozen times, as I slowly got better and better at conjuring up and controlling a dozen, then fifteen, then eighteen, tiny little [Supernova]’s.

It was hard. I don’t think the skill - one GIANT FIREBALL - exactly wanted to become dozens of tiny little sparks. It was more than a bit of a stretch, and normally I’d need, oh, a year and a half of effort at Ranger Academy while being taught by another teacher to pull something like this off.

Then again, it wasn’t quite as large of a leap as [Rapidash] to [Talaria], which I’d managed.

Another try. 13 hit.

Another try. 15 hit.

Another try. 9 hit.

Another try. 14 hit

Another try. 16 hit

Another try. 12 hit

Another try. 19 hit

Another try. 21 hit.

Finally - after long enough that we took a break for food twice, and Thoren and his guards got replaced by Urik - the notification popped up.

Two notifications popped up.

[*ding!* Would you like to change [Supernova] to [Kaleidoscope]? Warning: Some levels will be lost.]

Kaleidoscope: A thousand fluttering butterflies made out of radiant light form a kaleidoscope. Now unleash them, and let them dance and weave their way over to your target! Increased number of butterflies, increased acceleration, damage, control, and range per level.

I hit yes.

[Error! Kaleidoscope had dropped from 306 to 265]

Ouch. At the same time, it was quite a different skill. Also, acceleration, not speed, was interesting.

And! Learning new magic was rewarded in more ways than one!

[*ding!* Congratulations! [Butterfly Mystic] has leveled up to level 306->307! +8 Strength, +8 Dexterity, +70 Speed, +70 Vitality, +70 Mana, +70 Mana Regen, +70 Magic power, +70 Magic Control from your Class per level! +1 Free Stat for being Human per level! +1 Strength, +1 Mana Regen from your Element per level!]

[*ding!* [Radiance Affinity] has leveled up! 306->307]

[*ding!* [Radiance Resistance] has leveled up! 306->307]

[*ding!* [Radiance Conjuration] has leveled up! 306->307]

[*ding!* [Sun’s Heart] has leveled up! 306->307]

[*ding!* [Passionate Learning] has leveled up! 354->355]

Woo! New magic, new skills, and more levels!

"Thank you Hakka! I got it!" I said.

I was starting to think that maybe I could spend a week or two, practicing and picking up more magic. Just a little more wouldn’t hurt, and it was, by my reckoning, the middle of winter right now. Not the best time to be alone in the wilderness.

I’d need to do some thinking about it…

"Good iron!" She said, celebrating my success. "Now show me!"

Chapter 214 - Shiny New Skills! II

I focused on [Kaleidoscope], casting the skill for a few seconds. First a few, then a dozen little motes of golden light sprang into existence around me, dancing around each other, growing ever-more the longer I cast. A close look at one of the motes revealed that it was a tiny little butterfly, playfully fluttering with others of its kind.

The skill name was somewhat literal. Kaleidoscope. A group of butterflies.

Unfortunately for me, I’d been casting the skill, and when I tried to move the butterflies to hit one of the regenerating statues, I found that my control of the entire swarm was terrible. Only when I stopped them all, then controlled them in groups did I regain fine control over their movements.

Naturally, it was roughly the same number that I could summon in a single second, that I could control well all at once.

Instead of launching them all at once, I launched them in waves, roughly sending the same amount per second that I had managed to conjure.

They flocked to the statue in droves, flying around until they found an unclaimed spot, then landing and exploding.

The combined effect was something like almost a hundred little stars twinkling and exploding.

I was kinda expecting them to do something else, but, well, it was a [Supernova] upgrade. Parts of the old skill were showing themselves, just like how [Talaria] was still foot-based after [Rapidash], which was originally from [Running].

Hakka whistled.

"That’s more like it!" She yelled, patting my back with such force that I was nearly bowled over. "See how the entire attack lands, and not just part of it? See how you hit from multiple sides at once? Now, try sending the attacks in waves to land all at the same time, and practice controlling how they move."

She thought for a moment, then nodded to herself.

"And with that bit of advice, my debt to you is cleared."

She turned on her heel, and was gone so fast I swear she must’ve used a movement skill.

"Thank you?" I said to the empty air beside me, my hair whipping in the wind she’d kicked up.

Nobody had ever mentioned anything about a debt to me. I might’ve asked for something else, if I knew Hakka felt she owed me.

Then again - maybe that’s why she didn’t talk a bunch about it. It had been a little weird that she was willing to help me class up…

Oh well. [Kaleidoscope] was totally awesome! I’d need to find some way of saying thank-you again.

Maybe a nice book. Yeah, everyone liked a good book. Only question was, should I write her the Medical Manuscripts, or a book of Earth stories?

Or maybe I should recreate one of the Nolgardian dwarves literary masterpieces?

Hmmmm. I didnt know Hakka well enough to know if she’d appreciate some of the more, ah, tasteful books I’d read.

I wouldn’t get her one of those.

Ugh. That reminded me. I wanted to write at least one copy of the Medical Manuscripts before I left. Maybe even an updated version with the implants and prosthetics. So much to do!

My only time limit was "not get noticed and murdered by orcs."

I shook my head. Working out a full to-do list, and finalizing my escape plans, should be done after I finished testing out my new skills.

[Lantern] seemed to be exactly like [Shine]. Nothing special, nothing different, just a hair less mana needed for the same brightness. I honestly felt a little robbed. Maybe I needed to find some people to help expand it. A little glowing light that followed me around sounded nice.

That, or my mana regeneration was screwing with my numbers and calculations. Either way, the brightest it could go was much brighter, but that might’ve just been due to my dramatically increased Magic Power.

Time to try some things!

I first held up my hand, pretending I was holding a lantern. I couldn’t really see a way to make the light start shining at a point below my hand - it just didn’t work that way - so I shone it directly from my hand instead.

Same skill. There was no difference in brightness, intensity, control, mana use - anything. Miming holding a lantern was doing nothing, although if I wasn’t careful the skill would evolve to make me always do that. Sure, it’d give great benefits for it, but I didn’t want that.

The skill mentioned a firefly as well as a lantern, and while I had no way of generating light away from me, fireflies did generate light internally.

So I did what any sane, reasonable person in my dwarvish shoes would do. I lit my butt up. I made it shine.

I put it through a whole set of paces. Nothing.

Tried shaking it like a firefly.

Only thing I got were looks from the dwarves thinking I’d totally lost it.

I stopped butt-[Lantern]ing before the System decided to "upgrade" me.

The three baseline Mage skills had no change, and needed no practicing. [Radiance Conjuration], [Radiance Resistance], and [Radiance Affinity] didn’t need any practicing. I doubted I could upgrade to [Radiance Authority] in any plausible timetable. I was going to work on the lightshow business a bit - if flashing lights wasn’t doing anything because of all the lasers and lights I was putting out, I might as well save my mana in a fight.

[Nectar] and [Sun’s Heart] were both passives, which left just one skill left to practice with.

[Scintillating Ascent].

With a flicker of thought, a pair of dazzling wings erupted from my back, the wingspan longer than my outstretched arms. Most Radiance skills stayed within a narrow band of burning golden light, with only small variations - like my short-lived [Supernova] had all sorts of different golden colors. My [Radiance Conjuration] made golden beams, and [Lantern] made a soft yellow glow.

All that to say - [Scintillating Ascent] hadn’t absorbed [Pretty] for nothing. I had dazzling, bright multi-colored wings, and both the sun theme and my other class being Celestial was vaguely represented, as the blues and reds and yellows and purples and all sorts of other vibrant colors seemed to be burning - burning like stars. Little twinkles of light hinted at galaxies hidden in my wings, "eyes" like stars, and an experimental flap of the wings shed little motes of stardust, like a butterfly, shimmering for a flash of time in the light.

I took a few more flaps of my wings, practicing and getting used to them, a butterfly emerging from her chrysalis, hardening her wings for the trials ahead.

I bent my knees and jumped, leaping up into the air as my wings caught, lazily flapping as I ascended to the top of the training room. I practiced twisting and turning, and found that I could even hover, or go backwards if I needed to.

No light needed! This [Butterfly Mystic] no longer needed the sweet rays of light for all her tricks!

Between the class skill’s discount, and my regeneration, it was trivially easy to permanently stay in the air. Heck, I’d gotten "forever flying" back when the skill was [Talaria].

Experiment time!

I flapped my way to the wall, and got close enough that the next flap of my wings would hit the wall. The wing hit, and crumpled, which threw me off balance, swinging me down to hit the wall. I didn’t stop there, being in the air, and kept falling. I tried to reassert my wings, only for them to hit the wall again. Finally, I pushed off the wall, getting myself enough space to use my wings properly.

Right. Flying in tunnels was probably off the table, and I needed to be careful when flying near objects. In conclusion - my flight was almost entirely unrestricted, and could evolve to be better in almost every respect. The only consideration I had were my wings. I needed enough room to flap them.

I should also see what happens when they’re attacked. Obviously, if they got hit, I wouldn’t get hurt, but would it take mana to reform the damaged parts? How badly would my flight get ruined?

I landed near Thoren, who was trying to keep an eye on myself, on the rest of the guards who’d mostly paired off to do their own practicing, and the rest of the place in case the orcs decided here and now was the time to attack.

I didn’t blame the guards for getting some of their own practice in. Guard duty was boring, and the odds of me being hit here were slim. They’d been on duty long enough that the novelty was wearing off, and with no threats, it was hard to stay constantly vigilant.

Heck, I’d totally be slacking off after like, 20 minutes of guard duty.

"Thoren!" I said, landing next to him.

"Elaine." He said, eyeing up my wings. "Can’t say those are terribly practical, but they sure look nice."

I opened my mouth, then closed it.

Right. They lived almost entirely underground. Wings, from his experience, were terribly impractical. Given that was his attitude about it, I had to imagine fliers and anti-flying tactics were probably rare among the Khazad dwarves, which redoubled my resolve to escape by just flying away. Once I got high enough, I was free and clear.

"Eh, I like them." I said, hiding my true thoughts on the "flying escape" matter. "Can you hit them a few times, let me find out what happens when they’re attacked?" I asked.

He shrugged.

"Sure. What do you need me to do?" He asked.

I turned around, flying just an inch off the ground.

"Hit the wings without hitting me." I told him.

I heard the whistling of an axe behind me, and tensed. There was no good reason for it, but I still somehow expected the blade to sink into my back. Not that I expected treachery out of Thoren, just too much time spent around people trying to kill me.

Still, I resisted the temptation to shield and shoot back, instead watching my mana. I lost a few points - maybe - but that was it. I didn’t get any feedback from the attack, nor was my flight interrupted in any way.

"What happened?" I asked Thoren. "I don’t have eyes in the back of my head."

Yet.

"Blade went right through ‘em." He said. "They just reformed like nothing happened. Also, my axe is now hot." He said. I could practically feel his eyes narrow at me. "You better not burn my axe."

"Alright, I’ll make sure not to." I told him, understanding that the session was over. "Thank you for your help. How much time do we have left here?"

"About another half-candle mark." Thoren said. "A squad’s got the place reserved after. I can try to tell them to rust off if you’d like?"

Good old Thoren. Trying to make sure I was happy at every turn. I did appreciate the treatment I was getting, although that changed little about my resolve to leave.

"No, I’m getting the hang of my new skills." I shook my head. "Just want to try out a few more things."

Thoren shrugged.

"Suit yourself."

Which I did!

I summoned a single [Kaleidoscope] butterfly - bit of an oxymoron - and had it hover next to me. I summoned a second one, and had it fly around my head in a lazy, meandering circle. I wanted to know how long they lasted, and if traveling reduced the time.

I then summoned a third one, trying out some new stuff.

"Go over there." I verbalized.

Nada.

Oook. They didn’t listen, or couldn’t hear. Good thing my embarrassment module had been turned off, and I didn’t care if the dwarves thought I was nuttier than a squirrel.

Still, I never used verbal commands in the first place.

Follow me. I thought, taking a step forward… and having the butterfly flying around my head promptly collide with my hair, fizzling out of existence.

Welp. So much for that.

The butterfly mote could follow me, and I experimented with a wide variety of other commands. Unfortunately, nothing more complicated than "Go over there, and don’t hit other stuff" was possible, and the only non "traveling" command was "explode".

Nice to know that I could preemptively detonate them.

The "hovering" mote lasted only a minute, which was a bit of a shame. At the same time - it meant that I could, with practice, get an entire minute’s worth of casting to land all at the same time.

Translation: I could get my entire mana pool to blow as a single attack, effectively giving myself a mini-[Channel] skill like Destruction’s for one attack.

Then, of course, I’d be entirely out of mana, but it was worth keeping in mind.

"Time!" Thoren called out, before I could get to my last set of experiments.

I shrugged to myself. I’d work on figuring out the right timing for waves of butterflies to all land at the same time another day.

We left, and a runner found us, looking relieved. She had a quick word with Thoren, who looked at me.

"Been something of a fight." He said. "Up for some healing work?"

"Of course!" I eagerly responded, without a shred of guile in my words. "Point the way! Let’s gooo!"

I had no problems "earning my keep" so to speak.

No matter how I was a caged bird - err, butterfly - in a golden cage, that didn’t mean I wasn’t going to sing my sweet song.

Or flash my pretty wings. I dunno, this "butterfly in a cage" metaphor was breaking down fast. I should stick with birds.

Given my wings, and the lovely golden color that threaded through it, along with Papillion’s initial thoughts - I was totally a Golden Crow in a golden cage.

Either way, I wasn’t going to hold it against the poor schmucks caught in the line of fire. A few lines of my [Oath] came to mind.

I will never see a patient as anything other than another creature in pain.

I will not discriminate who I heal based on class, sex, race, what gods they pray to, nor by any other means.

The discrimination clause was an interesting one. As I’d grown, as my worldview and knowledge expanded, I’d been led to the conclusion that I did have to discriminate somewhat. Two people hurt, and enough mana to save one? Obviously, I’d need to discriminate in some way, by sheer virtue of picking someone. Maybe I’d pick the younger person. Maybe I’d pick the woman. Heck, maybe I’d pick the blonde over the brunette.

Either way, when push came to shove, I was occasionally forced to make choices, which naturally was discrimination. I wasn’t punished for "true" impossibility though.

That wasn’t the type of discrimination [Oath] was meant to cover though. It was meant to cover situations like "I don’t like what city you’re from, so I won’t heal you." or "I dislike what god you pray to, so I’m going to skip you."

Also included? "I don’t like what your bosses are doing." - Outside of an obvious self-defense aspect.

However, none of this applied here. Healing away!

At the same time, I wasn’t feeling forced by [Oath] in the slightest. No, [Oath] or not, I would heal them. [Oath] had settled into my bones, the very fabric of my being. It was simply the way I thought, simply who I was, by sheer virtue of choices made again and again. I wasn’t controlled by it or any such nonsense, it was simply who I was. It was a pure expression of my thoughts and feelings, my ethics and beliefs.

Which raised an interesting question about restriction skills. I’d talked with Night about it some, but he was unsure as well.

Was I only able to take my [Oath] because it was fundamentally who I was? Or was my personality shaped by it, molding me into the confines of my own choices?

Night wasn’t sure. He thought it was the first one, which explained why some people could take some restriction skills, but not others.

In other words, I happily trotted off to the infirmary to work my literal magic.

I’d gotten there early, and patients were still being stabilized and triaged at the "intake" building, which was elsewhere.

"Hey Thoren, I think we should move to the triage section." I told him.

He looked at the mostly-empty room, and me standing at the door tapping people as they came in.

"Sure. You’re the healer."

Like a carp fighting up a waterfall, I walked against the tide of incoming patients, healing them as I came across them until I’d "fought" my way to the triage building.

Ahh. Predictable chaos. A great place for [Cosmic Presence]. I couldn’t swing an iron ingot without hitting a screaming dwarf who was trying as hard as they could to die, blood and gore made the floor a slip and slide, and harried-looking healers and assistants were being run ragged.

In other words, my element.

Chapter 215 - The Golden Cage I

Ten days later, I was sitting with Drin, Fik, Glifir, and Urik, enjoying a nice meal all together. I’d just come back from a long session with a scribe, where I’d sped-read the entire Medical Manuscripts from memory to him. It had still taken ages, I was ravenous, but it was done and getting distributed. No idea if anyone would take me up on it, but I’d tried to dodge prejudice by signing it just "Elaine" again.

Then again, that wasn’t a very dwarfy name. Ah well, at least I was being consistent.

Chicken and other meat was incredibly cheap right now, which told me there’d been a wholesale slaughter of farm animals… the better to stretch winter rations out, and an acknowledgement that all the farmland on the surface had gotten burned to the ground. The harvests had all been in and secured in the granaries when Lun’Kat attacked, so in that respect they were predicted to survive the winter without too many problems. There were a number of underground farms as well, supplying the city, but some of their leadership had a cautious approach to the situation. The lack of any established surface farms, and orc commandos trying to burn what stores they had, had the dwarven leadership order a cull.

Long story short: Chicken was delicious.

I’d gotten my checklist together of what I needed to get out, and what I wanted to get out.

Needed:

Warm clothes.

An exit.

A way to store water.

My Sentinel Badge.

Mom’s pendant.

The last two a neutral observer might declare as "wants", but no. I wasn’t leaving without them.

Wanted:

For it to no longer be winter. Fik had told me all about just how crazy the snow got in the mountains. According to him, there was over 9 feet/3 meters worth of snow regularly. Drin had objected, saying that it was usually even more. Either way, two, three Elaine’s worth of snow was too much. It’d been hitting the start of winter as we were arriving, and there was much spirited discussion if the "big storms" had hit yet or not.

Fuckers. They could’ve told me that I’d be trapped in a boatload of snow after going to the capital before sending me off that way. Either way, I was expecting to need to handle heavy snowfall, and I honestly didn’t know how to survive in the wilderness when snow was involved. Water was less of a concern, but that was the extent of my knowledge. Remus was nice and toasty, and snow was occasionally seen in the deep south - rare enough that it was part of the Advanced Wilderness Survival course, which I hadn’t taken.

Food.

A map.

Armor, weapons.

A guide, or someone to watch my back.

A survival kit. Tent, flint and steel, rope, canvas, etc. This would let me create rudimentary alarm systems, and let me get some sleep

A backpack.

My utility gems, recharged with skills.

Time to practice all my skills. I’d gotten more practice in, but [Kaleidoscope] was tricky. Specifically, getting all of the butterflies to land at once, from every angle. I’d almost gotten the hang of it, then on level up they’d improved slightly - which had been enough to throw off all my timings, because leveling up improved acceleration, not speed. Sure, I could’ve used a lower acceleration to get everything timed and landing right, but I had standards. Top acceleration or bust.

Sure, the want list was a lot, but I was realistic about it. Every edge would help.

Slightly less realistically:

The dwarves’ blessing to leave.

All their magical knowledge, to evolve my skills, sate my curiosity, and advance my class peacefully. This tied into the snow… if I could safely wait for spring, and get a few more levels under my belt, I absolutely would.

A dozen more levels of [The Dawn Sentinel]. After the novelty of dwarves and prosthetics wore off, my leveling rate had decreased somewhat.

A unicorn. Now that I knew they existed? Oooh, I wanted a pretty pony all for myself. I’d totally call her Sunshine. Maybe Sunny. Sylver? Sparkles?

Ok, sure, a Thunderbird egg was more realistic, and was on my "to-acquire" checklist. Still had no idea how big their eggs were. Running away with something bigger than I was would be a challenging preposition.

I’d been able to subtly get a number of the items, mostly in the name of comfort. I’d been given a thick set of clothing, after casually mentioning that I was from a warm, warm climate, and that it was pretty cold underground - totally true.

A water skin was easy. I hadn’t even needed to ask!

I still had no idea on the exits, besides where I’d come in. Given that it had a dozen guards, anti-Mirage measures, traps, and general security against invaders? Yeah. It wasn’t high on my list, but it was literally the only exit I knew.

I didn’t consider it an option, not without a change in situation. It existed, but trying to exit that way was arguably worse than just staying put.

I wanted to ask about touring the farms, and seeing the grand entrance to the city from the surface. Both should have a way of getting out. My constant touring of the city had established that I liked to wander around and see things, and I’d been asking to see different things, so when I asked to see the exits, it’d seem totally natural. Just another thing [Tourist] Elaine wanted to see!

I had a backpack, although I couldn’t think of a good way to ask for new armor and weapons.

I had no way of getting a survival kit, short of stealing one. Immediately trying to break in to steal supplies right after I’d broken free seemed to be a poor life choice. I was going to keep my eye out for opportunities, but I didn’t have my hopes up high.

Food I’d half-secured. That was to say, I’d convinced Urik to stockpile snacks for me, given how much I ate when I was healing. To keep up the deception though, I had to keep eating them while I was on a healing spree, so the amount I had kept fluctuating.

I’d make sure I got a good meal before making my break.

Assuming I got to plan the right moment, and didn’t just seize the chance when I saw it. I should start carrying all my stuff with me, just in case I spot a good opportunity.

Map and a guide? I was working on that right now.

"It’s bad, but it’s not awful." Drin was saying. "The Khazads opened all their doors to us, and tens of thousands managed to flee to safety."

Urik interjected some good-natured… grumbling? Poking? Trying to establish what they’d paid, to make them grateful?

"Kazaragoth half-burned down as a result." He mentioned.

Ouch. If looks could kill? Read the room, Urik. Even I wouldn’t put my foot in my mouth that badly.

Heck, I was shooting him a foul look.

Fik saved the day. Or Urik, as the case may be.

"Free housing, free food, and cheap loans to get back on our feet." He said. "Along with an aggressive hiring program. Speaking of, I’m probably going to sign up." Fik said, with an apologetic look to Drin.

"Never thought you’d be the one to volunteer for more work." He jabbed back. "Also… I asked. They laughed me out of the room when I tried to sign up." He groused. "Just because my armor skills are wood-based."

Ooof. Yeah, I could see why they wouldn’t want Drin. Still, he was a… ok, not particularly strong warrior. Still, if he was guarding a door, that freed up someone else to go fight.

My understanding was that the Khazad army had taken a huge hit when it tried to attack Lun’Kat. It wasn’t exactly public knowledge, but "Great big army goes off to try to evict the dragon", "The orcs beat us to it - damn them for kicking Lun’Kat and making her eradicate our cousins!", "Only a few survivors of the great big army, after an epic battle against the orcs." combined with "Ignore all the domestic problems, we must throw every resource at killing the orcs!" told a story. Not a particularly flattering one to boot.

Propaganda. Lies. Drumming up martial fervor to cover for leadership’s blunders. The same story, told again and again throughout time. The story didn’t change, only the actors.

Still.

Not my problem.

I got to the crux of the question, and the real reason I wanted to have lunch with everyone.

"Glifir, how are you doing?" I asked.

He shrugged.

"It doesn’t seem like anyone I know is here, but I asked around. My family would be in Karacon. I’m trying to save up enough money to go there."

CHANCE!

"Why do you need money? Why can’t you just walk?" I asked him.

"Entrance tolls and movement fees." He explained, turning to Urik. "You’ve been more than generous, taking us all in, but do you know why there are those fees? I never got a clear explanation."

Urik leaned back, going into "teacher mode".

"Well, the tunnels are unsafe. After the attack, a large number of them have collapsed, and we’re digging some back out, while trying to find alternate routes. If we just let everyone wander around, they would. Then most of you would get lost and die, feeding whatever’s living down there, making them stronger. Then the survivors would whine at us that we let you all die, and that we should do something."

We all pulled a face at just how bloody accurate that comment was. Of course people would go and do dumb stuff, and of course once they died everyone would complain to the government about it, entirely forgetting that they’d saved their lives, and seamlessly, with no problems, gave them a new lease on life, a new living.

In Remus they would’ve just let them starve until they fell into enough debt to sell into slavery.

"The entry fee is tied to that. You’d all be running around trying to find your families. We totally respect that, but we need to slow everything down. We’re already strained here, and everyone would head towards Thel Doruhl given the chance, since that was next to your capital. Thel Doruhl is a small town, and is barely managing as-is. If everyone ran there?"

Urik shrugged.

"No way the town doesn’t starve and collapse. Just makes everything worse."

"The grump could’ve told me all that, instead of telling me to take a hike." Glifir grumbled into his beard, viciously skewering another bite of chicken on his knife.

Damn. That didn’t sound promising. I doubted I could lure Glifir out on adventure, on traveling to Remus, when he was trying to save up enough money to see his family.

"Hi, yes, come with me. It’ll take ages, and I don’t have Krul, and it’ll delay you seeing your family a ton, and possibly ruin your chances of rebuilding your life, but pleaseeeeee?"

I did not see that ending well. Glifir as a guide was out, and I didn’t want to overplay my hand by asking to see his map.

I looked at the road.

"Speaking of moving around, how do kids and dwarves with low physical stats get around?" I asked.

The higher average level exacerbated the difference in stats, which meant some powerhouses careened down the street at high speed. It was risking life and limb to step out alone, without good enough stats - or armor.

I had enough speed that I felt confident about risking myself on the roads, although I didn’t see a white zone or any other "safe" travel lanes for kids and low-leveled mages and the like.

While most people had eyes, and didn’t run into each other, my plan for escape involved going invisible. Being invisible was a great way for someone else to run into me by accident, and ruin my plans. Hence my investigations.

"Tunnels!" Urik happily told me. Then he turned sour. "Well, when things are normal. Most kids stay in their clan’s compounds, and will use tunnels to get around to other compounds to play. Orcs hit a traveling group of kids though, killed them all. Nobody will use them now."

I shuddered in sympathy, while pulling my lips back in an involuntary feral grimace. I was somewhat shielded, both metaphorically and literally. I hadn’t been around long enough, nor was I in contact with the average dwarf enough to know what the "real" state of things was. All I saw were the sick and injured, and after the initial wave of healing a few people that I suspected got hurt in the aftershocks of Lun’Kat’s epic battle with the guardians, I hadn’t seen much.

Healers didn’t get called for dead bodies.

Going after military targets I understood. Going after kids? That was a whole new low.

I needed to take a deep breath. I felt my blood boiling, surging up, demanding that I leave the table and hunt down the kid killers right now. Fuck the orcs, and fuck anyone who deliberately targeted kids.

The only thing keeping my butt firmly planted in the strangely comfortable stone seat was the knowledge that I was just too weak. I’d get murdered.

However, unused tunnels sounded like a good way to move around.

We were making small talk, a bite of food coming to my mouth, when things got a little strange. A hush descended upon the world. Drin and Fik paused, forks halfway to their mouth, while Glifir was leaning forward, his animated telling of a joke stopped.

No, not stopped.

Slowed way down.

Fuck.

[Bullet Time].

It had taken a moment for it to click. Still gave me enough time to wrap the table with [Mantle of the Stars], shimmering specks of light surrounding us.

Nobody had time to do anything else. The shield was instantly broken as something went through it, and at seemingly the same moment my back was violated. Fortunately, for once, this was going at seemingly normal speed, in spite of [Bullet Time], which spoke to the velocities involved. Something exploded into my torso from my spine, and instead of just going through me like a normal projectile, split into dozens of corkscrewing missiles, turning my chest into a bloody mess. Geysers of highly pressurized blood sprayed out of me whenever a stone left, my rapid healing tracing behind the damage, forcing the blood and organ slurry out.

I clenched my teeth in pain, as [Center of the Universe] anti-pain mitigation got mildly overwhelmed.

The attack was more than enough to kill almost any healer, as the stones made sure to keep ricocheting about to keep destroying vital organs, overwhelming most healing.

I wasn’t any healer.

I felt the last stone erupt from my neck, my skin flawlessly healing behind it, only to get dog-piled by all of my guards, who were yelling and shouting, one of them tackling me to the ground, the rest throwing up shields and generally making a fuss. A crack echoed across the buildings, the sound of the attack finally catching up.

It didn’t stop at one dwarf physically intervening, throwing themselves between me and my attackers. More of the dwarves physically leapt on top of me

I tried to heal everyone touching me, but I was at serious risk of suffocation from the dwarves tackling me, throwing their bodies over me to stop another attack.

"Help." I tried to gasp out, but couldn’t. The crushing weight of the rest of the dwarves, and my lack of significant strength, was doing me in. I tried to struggle, but I was being pressed, compressed, suffocated.

I was going to get killed by my own well-meaning escort, who couldn’t even hear me or feel my feeble struggles. I started to flash [Lantern], in a bid to let them know I was here, and I was dying.

Shooting Radiance through them wouldn’t help. They’d just turn into dead weight.

Soon enough though, the dwarves were reshuffling themselves, orders being yelled so fast and so loudly I couldn’t keep up. Then I was picked up, tossed about like a sack of potatoes, and we were off. I wrapped myself back up in [Mantle], just for the extra security. It took me a moment to orient myself, but when I did, I saw a silver lining to the whole situation

I was totally going to use this as an excuse to ask for armor and a weapon. Dwarven-forged!

I looked back at the scene of the assasination attempt, and noticed that my former escort looked fine. However, I saw something terrible.

They weren’t bringing the food!

I wasn’t done eating!

Chapter 216 - The Golden Cage II

I was unceremoniously dumped in a safe room, plopped onto the floor like a bag of grain. With about as much care as throwing one of those around to boot. The rest of my blood-smeared escort rushed in, throwing up barriers against every surface, layering them on top of each other.

"Thisar! Befak! I want stone, water, stone! Gaimo! Khit! Layer your barriers after." Urik was barking orders out, the guards securing the room in a well-practiced manner. I started to crawl to my knees to get up, but the guards had other plans.

"Jump in 2, 1, JUMP!" One of the guards yelled. I was rudely yanked off the floor, and everyone made a little hop as layers of stone and water appeared on the ground. We landed, and I was dumped back on the floor.

All this happened at a speed that’d be blinding to most experienced soldiers from Remus, as everyone made full use of their speed stat, along with any other buffs and skills they had.

Getting constantly dropped on the floor was getting obnoxious. I was betting that they practiced with bags of grain as the "VIP", and just kept the same ideas. Well-drilled, but hadn’t done this much in practice.

Then again, if the VIP was banged up but alive? They’d done their jobs.

I felt it was overkill, but hey. The orcs had just demonstrated that they could, and would, snipe me with lethal force.

If [Mantle] hadn’t been instantaneous, I never would’ve gotten a shield in place. At the same time, the attack was obviously powerful enough that it punched right through my shield. Given the level of the orc commandos, it wouldn’t surprise me if my shield did jack shit.

It didn’t look like I was going to get thrown around anytime soon, so I picked myself back up off the ground.

Mmm. Thinking about the attack - it had spat out stone shards every which way, turning me into a one-woman gore-and-stone firework. I should check if anyone needed healing.

I glanced at my own mana. I’d lost roughly 38k mana on the attack. Lethal for many healers, but I wasn’t the average healer.

Actually. If Ned was a typical example, he might have survived it with a strong knowledge of anatomy. Keep the circulatory system healed and running, maintain blood pressure to the head, and the rest would’ve taken too long to finish killing him. If his image was almost perfectly efficient, at 4k magic power, it would’ve taken seven seconds for him to heal back from that.

Yeah, a perfect image, cool head, and combat-honed reflexes could’ve saved him. Then again, I could count the number of healers I knew who had combat reflexes on one hand. We were a rare breed, since our healing lowered our ability to fight, and not many people wanted to be in the front anyways. Even a fraction of hesitation would be enough for the attack to be lethal against a normal healer. Not having [Bullet Time] or [Persistent Casting] would’ve killed me.

Like. For Ned to survive the attack, he’d need an instant, perfect image of the circulatory system, know that it was exactly what was needed to be fixed and maintained for him to buy more time, then properly rebuild his organs in the correct order to maintain homeostasis. From what I’d seen, the dwarves just flat-out didn’t have that knowledge.

Yeah, I was mentally revising my estimate. That was a lethal attack, even for healers like Ned - and much more powerful healers to boot.

I shook my head and brought myself back to the present, the here and now.

"Healing! Everyone ok? Any injuries?" I called out, yelling in the tiny room to try and get myself heard over the din. A few guards glanced at me, then Urik pushed himself forward.

"Elaine! You’re alive." He said, patting my sides with his hands, seemingly checking that, yes, I was there, alive, and in one piece. A bit over-familiar though.

"Yes." I stated the obvious. "Look, that attack went everywhere. Can I check that everyone’s ok?" I said.

Urik took a look around the room, seeing the frantic motions had come to an end before nodding.

"Injuries! Anyone injured see Elaine!" He bellowed into the tiny air-tight room.

A bunch of shuffling around later, and three guards with moderate holes in their arms and legs got patched up.

"What happens now?" I asked Urik, as we seemingly were just hanging out in this sealed and shielded room. Staying put felt wrong. Movement was life. I was getting weird looks again.

"We stay here while other teams try to track down the orcs." Urik said. "They’ll give us an all-clear, or if we’ve been in long enough, we leave ourselves. Generally don’t like doing the last one, but it’s my call how flexible I want to be."

Seemed like a reasonable, if aggravating, policy. Urik was studiously keeping his eyes on my face, which prompted me to look down.

Of all the - fuck.

I’d been wearing my much-abused laminar vest over the dwarf clothing I’d been given, as an added layer of protection. It also held almost all of my Arcanite. The rest of my gear was a mismatched set of Sentinel gear that’d survived - like my right vambrace, having my utility gems.

Anyways. The orc commando’s attack had completely and utterly ruined my chestpiece beyond reasonable repair. Rather, "repairing" it would look like "Welp, time to melt it all down and rebuild it", it was in that many pieces.

Worst of all, I didn’t think either [Mantle] or the armor had particularly helped. They just made a mess.

I gingerly pinched a bloody piece of my armor that was hanging on by a thread. I plucked it off, and held it in front of Urik.

"Think I can get a new set of armor? Please?" I asked him.

He eyed the swaying piece of metal in my fingers.

"Aye, I think we can swing that. Can’t think Korun or Glora will say no. Unless it’s too expensive. You’ve been coming in nicely under budget so far though."

Once some of the initial tension had left the guards, a few of them relaxed, and started to mill about. We could only stay in "THEY’RE TRYING TO KILL US!" mode for so long.

"That was amazing." One of the wider guards said, clasping my shoulder in his hand. "I’ve seen the end result of that skill before. Still keeps me up at night."

He forcefully patted my shoulder a few more times, checking that, yes, I was still there, alive, and whole.

"This is going to be worse than sniffler crap to clean off." A well-sprayed dwarf was complaining.

"You think you’ve got it bad?" I bantered back, peeling off another barely-hanging on piece of former shirt, and waving it in her face.

She looked at me.

"Heck yes! You’re just going to throw that away. I’ve got hours of washing ahead of me!"

That got a few chuckles - myself included - and helped break the tension. Soon we were chatting, with Urik half looking like he wanted to tear his beard out at how lax we were all becoming, and half looking like he wanted to join in himself.

I didn’t mind that the guards, charged with protecting my life, were cracking jokes and slacking off on the job. The orcs had taken their shot and, well, technically hit, and I needed a breather for just how damn close I’d come to dying just then.

My shield and armor had been worthless. Only my strong self-casting on [Dance with the Heavens] had kept me alive.

I was fast. Between my stats and [Bullet Time], I had near-instantaneous reflexes. That attack, the corkscrewing bouncing around inside of me, had almost done me in. A normal healer wouldn’t have had the magic power to keep up with the damage being inflicted. A healer used to peace, or at least clean tents and not the life and death fights I kept finding myself in, wouldn’t have had the skills to be constantly self-healing. There just wouldn’t have been a point. The stones would’ve destroyed enough of my circulatory system to drop my blood pressure to zero, which generally resulted in passing out.

At which point, it wouldn’t matter what my stats were, if I wasn’t awake enough to use them. A nasty, clever trick.

Ah well! I was alive, they’d failed, and hopefully their logic would be "too tough a target, hit something softer."

HA! Like I had that type of luck.

No, with my luck I was now top of their hit list, and they were going to try again.

Actually - I should check. There wasn’t anything else to do.

"Urik. Hey Urik!" I called out, waving my hand to catch his attention.

"Yes?" He asked, shoving his way through the guards.

"That didn’t seem to be a whole building that collapsed on my head." I observed, stating the obvious.

He gave me a curt nod.

"Looks like an attack of opportunity to me. One shot from a distance? They were trying to pick you off." Urik analyzed.

"Think they’ll be back?" I asked him.

He shrugged.

"I’ve got no idea."

Waiting in the stuffy room was a chore and a half, but eventually we were told it was all-clear. Urik and some other important-looking dwarves got together for a conversation in hushed, serious tones, before he strode back over to me.

"Right. Our [Intelligence Analyst]s think they’ll try again. Do you mind bunkering down in your apartment while this blows over?"

I shook my head.

"Not at all."

My cage was getting smaller, but I didn’t care. A cage was a cage, and the size of the cage didn’t matter to me. There was good reason to shrink on me. Heck, I might’ve suggested hunkering down in my apartment myself!

However, it also dramatically moved up my timeline in a way I found entirely unappealing. The orc commandos had been putting pressure on me to move. I’d previously been hoping to skate by before I managed to catch their attention, but I’d pushed it too far. I’d been moving too slowly, too cautiously, and nearly paid the ultimate price.

Escape time was now, nevermind missing part of my needs list. I was going to seize this moment to grab the dwarves by their thick beards, and shake them until loot came out.

"However, can I meet with Korun quickly?" I asked. "I’ve got a request or two, that I think will make me safer."

"Aye. Let’s go!" Urik ordered, and I was shuffled off through a series of tight tunnels that I hadn’t seen before. They were making me claustrophobic - and giving me ideas.

At the same time, I had a massive barrier to escape. The entire city was on the lookout for hidden, high-level classers. I wanted to be hidden, and I would be relying on gems to pull it off my escape.

We made it to Korun’s office, where the dwarf was busy turning himself into a snowman - errr, paper-dwarf.

"Elaine!" He said, nimbly leaping over his desk, paper flurrying predictably in his wake.

"I’m so glad you’re ok! Um. Mostly. Here, just…" He said, grabbing my arms, picking me up, and moving me over a hair before putting me down again.

I glanced at the floor.

Well, I guess the papers here were slightly less important, and I could drip some blood on them. I wasn’t bleeding, but my clothes had gotten saturated.

"I apologize again for our lacking security. Your safety is our…"

Korun went back to the desk, and shuffled some papers around, his mouth moving silently as he counted.

"45th priority!"

Well then. At least he was honest about it.

"Fear not! We’re going to up your security by…"

More papers. This one needed a lot of papers and cross-checking, along with a whole new document.

"One team! I’ll reassign Thoren and his squad to help you."

Urik coughed awkwardly.

"With all due respect, commander, Thoren’s already assigned to Elaine’s guard duty."

"Oh." Korun looked nonplussed at the revelation, checking another piece of paper. He scribbled something out, and wrote in a new note.

"We need to up security in here. Darn orcs are changing my notes." He said.

We all managed to keep a straight face at that one.

"I have a few thoughts for improving my security." I was tempted to move around a bit, to see if dripping blood all over Korun’s office would motivate him to say yes just to get me out - but it might backfire. If I was any good at social stuff I’d know the right answer. For now, I wasn’t going to be rude.

"Speak. I’ll try to make it happen." Korun said, sitting back down at his deck and reorganizing his papers in a futile fight against his own search system of "throw them all everywhere".

"New armor." I said. "I have a preference for light-"

Korun held up his hand.

"I’ll get you in touch with the right smith. You can tell him the details."

"I want it to be a rush job." I emphasized. "I almost died just now, and that was against the best armor humanity had to offer. I can imagine how bad it would be if I was entirely unarmed."

Ahhh. Telling only the truth, and still twisting it. Yes, this was the best armor humanity had. Yes, I could imagine how bad it’d be.

The exact same. The attack had gone through the armor like paper. Heck, a few shards had even tried to embed themselves into my back. It’d been worse than useless, it’d turned into pure shrapnel.

"I also have three gemstones that need skills." I tapped my vambrace, where they lived. "A strong Metal, Brilliance, and Gravity skill."

Korun glanced at Urik.

"Can your squad handle that?" He asked.

Urik nodded.

"We’ve got all three. I think. Can never remember if she’s got Mantle or Metal though."

"Excellent. Anything else?" Korun said. We shook our heads.

"Dismissed."

It took the worst three days of my life for my armor to get made - and that was it being a top-priority rush-order. Something about bureaucracy, and acquiring suitable materials.

I wanted to complain, especially because my request to get books got lost somewhere in the shuffle. It wasn’t denied, but it wasn’t a priority, and I bet it was on a piece of paper stuck in a crack in Korun’s office.

End result - I was bored out of my skull for two of the three days. I’d gotten into another healing session, which had pushed [The Dawn Sentinel] up.

However, word finally came that my armor was ready, and for some reason Korun wanted to meet me again in his office.

Given that I was living with 12 other dwarves in a one person luxury suite, I had no privacy, and no chance to even think about escaping. Hence, upon hearing that we were going for an outing, I made sure I had everything ready. Fortune favors the prepared after all.

I bundled myself up in my warm clothes, which didn’t get a second eye batted at. Nor was pinning my Sentinel badge to my clothing, sliding on my one remaining vambrace, or grabbing the water bottle.

I always wore the pendant mom got me for System Day, all the way back then. She’d said it was lucky, and while I was slightly skeptical of the notion, I was alive, high level, and relatively happy and healthy. I wasn’t going to jinx it.

I’d been able to get the guards to donate skills for my gems, and someone had rustled up a quarter of their clan’s Moonstones that I charged with [Dance with the Heavens]. Mutual back-scratching for the win!

I had [Reversal] replacing [Feather Fall], allowing me to briefly change the direction gravity pulled on someone. It wasn’t super strong, since the gemstone for [Feather Fall] hadn’t been that large to begin with. [Repair Armor] replaced my [Summon Knife] skill, and one of the dwarves swore by [Brilliant Barricade], which shot bars of Brilliance across a narrow gap, not letting anyone through.

I did get a half-raised eyebrow from one of the guards when I grabbed my backpack full of snacks.

"What?" I asked her. "If we end up in the safehouse again, I want some snacks. It’s boring in there!"

She laughed, and patted my back with enough force to explode the air out of my lungs.

"Ain’t that the truth!" She crowed.

"I brought extra just for you." I winked.

That was almost the sum total of all my possessions.

We left to meet Korun, a vision of escape percolating in my mind.

Chapter 217 - The first escape attempt! I

We made our way to the great big administrative building, and filed inside. Thoren stopped to have a brief word with the administrator on the first floor, and came back to us, shaking his head.

"Gotta go to another building." He grumped, twirling part of his beard around his finger.

Welp. About face, march. We stomped on over to another building, which I recognized as one of the training grounds.

Nice! Korun was making it easy for me! I could get my new gear, and immediately try it out. It’d be much easier to convince Thoren that I was still safe in the place I was, than to get him to try to get to a new building.

My heart plummeted into my shoes when I got into the training room. The orc statues had been moved to the side, and the walls were lined with dwarves, their weapons out and looking mean. Korun was on a makeshift stone stage, along with a number of other grumpy, important-looking dwarves.

I knew that Korun was important, but seeing all the other important-looking dwarves defer to him hammered the point home. Glifir, Drin, and Fik were all in the center of the room, the spotlight of attention on them.

"Healer Elaine. Good. Please join the rest in the center." Korun’s words were nice, but his tone was restrained fury, making it entirely clear that he was giving orders, not asking.

Without a shred of hesitation, I walked to the middle of the room, my "Sentinel Dawn" game face on. I had my gems. Worse-case, I’d blind everyone with [Lantern], throw out a wave of [Kaleidoscope], then blow a hole through the floor with [Wall Buster]. Assuming it worked on floors, I’d never tried. I’d escape to the lower level, leaving a second wave of [Kaleidoscope] to slow pursuers down, hide with [Invisibility with Eyeholes], and take it from there.

Heck, I even had a free skill slot. My plan so far had been to grab whatever skill I thought would help, and that was still the plan.

I made it to the center of the room, looking at Korun with fearless eyes.

I didn’t think I was untouchable - but politically and socially, I was a peeled mango. Difficult to get ahold of. Not impossible, but I wasn’t going to get in trouble for anything short of the most major crimes.

"There have been a string of murders." Korun announced, getting right into it. Grips tightened on weapons, and the sound of shuffling armor echoed around the room as the guards - execution squad? - leaned forward.

"They were traced to an Ooze-Mirror Changeling, who ate the victim, then used one of its skills to copy the look, skills, and [Examine] tag of the victim, to find a new one." He announced.

I didn’t quite see what this had to do with us, so I started to relax. Just a bit. The number of armed and angry guards still had me on edge.

"We traced the Changeling’s path back to you four. You brought it in under the guise of one ‘Healer Ned’, and we need to examine you." Korun announced.

It was dumb.

I shouldn’t say it.

Not when surrounded by lots of angry dwarves with twitchy fingers.

Unfortunately, the filter between my brain and my mouth didn’t always work, and I’d never been accused of making the right social calls. Especially when everything lined up so nicely.

"I told you so!" I shouted out.

Naturally, all the hostility in the room was directed at me, with Korun’s eyes threatening murder.

Fortunately for me, he was a relatively reasonable dwarf, and murdering the golden healer for showing him up in public wasn’t on his to-do list. Still. I fully expected my book request to get firmly rejected at this point.

I’d never been accused of being socially graceful.

Korun cleared his throat, bringing the attention back to him.

"As I was saying. The Changeling we killed was an amateur, and we need to examine the rest of you to make sure you are what you claim to be. Please do not resist. We have healers on-hand."

With that, Korun snapped his fingers, the rest of the dwarves came a little closer, and the room went white.

A deafening BANG went through the whole room as a bolt of lightning, thicker than my thighs, went through me, causing me to involuntarily jerk around as the Lightning played havoc with my nervous system. My healing chased the lightning, restoring my organs just as quickly as they got fried.

In less than a heartbeat - granted, a longer heartbeat than usual, given that it’d been half-stalled out by the electrical testing - it was over.

I looked to the side. Glifir and Fik were literally smoking, but Drin was standing there, all sorts of annoyed, beard going haywire all over the place. He’d taken the shock, but not nearly as badly as the other two. I knelt down to heal Glifir and Fik - the Khazadian dwarves had a healer rushing in, but I was closer - and gave Drin a quizzical look.

"What?" He shrugged. "You think I play with Lightning without having a resistance skill for it?"

"Right. They’re clear!" One of the important-looking dwarves announced. She was the only one on the stage without a frazzled beard.

A bunch of the important dwarves started shouting out orders.

"Bronze Team! On me!"

"Aluminum Team! On me!"

"Platinum Team! Move out!"

Squads formed up and dispersed, leaving just Thoren’s squad, and two more that I assumed were assigned to Korun, or possibly just deciding to use the training room.

"Thank you for your understanding." Korun said, as one of the squads did the obvious thing I hadn’t thought about - they helped my former traveling companions up. "I hope you understand that we needed to do that."

Drin gave a curt nod.

"Aye. Don’t like it." He said, voice filled with hostility. He did a smart military turn of his heels, and walked right out of the room, forcing everyone else to follow after him. Glifir and Fik were muttering curses under their breath, and the guards were looking a smidge guilty over the whole thing.

"Healer Elaine. One more thing, if you’d please?" Korun said, tone having thrown itself in reverse from "hostile and annoyed" to "fuuuuuuuuuuuck I probably pissed off the VIP that I was told to keep happy under any circumstances something fierce."

I swallowed the fresh anger and annoyance that was hot in my throat, practically burning me. It helped that I was already displeased with the Khazad dwarves - putting it mildly - which meant I didn’t need to go on some rollercoaster of betrayed emotions. Still, my wind whirled furiously as I tried to think of what concessions I could leverage out of this, what items on my escape list I could politely ask Korun to get me.

Books were back on the menu, for example.

"Commander Korun." I politely - with a minor coughing fit, getting the smoky "crispy lung dust" crap out of my lungs. I couldn’t quite remember his metal-name title, and I wasn’t feeling generous enough to check on it with [Pristine Memories].

"Walk with me. I would like to once again apologize for that unpleasantness." He said, clasping his hands behind his back and starting to walk. I followed along.

"Some additional background. The Changeling was following what we believed to be a standard pattern for their kind. Assume the identity of a child. Wait. Hit the parents. Move on." He said, and the pieces clicked for me.

Artemis. Waaaaaaaaay back when I first met her. She thought I was a Changeling, in the middle of the "murder and assimilate" routine. I had some basic facts wrong, and in Artemis-land, where "breaking a twig" was met with "rocks and lightning", the fact that I was still alive was practically a miracle.

The problem of "What do I do the next time I suspect a Changeling" was still up in the air, and Korun was still talking.

"Needless to say, we could not permit that to continue. I tried to argue with the Council of Elders that you’d demonstrated your usefulness, and that you’d bled red for us just a few days ago, and that even if you were a Changeling, you were too useful to get rid of. They were out for blood, and testing you instead of summarily executing all of you was the best I’d been able to manage. One of the Elder’s great-great-grandchildren got killed."

I nodded. There was a lot to unpack there. Korun had some minor pull with what sounded like all the hotshots running the place? They’d considered executing me?

Operation Escape was going into effect today.

"Anyways! If there’s anything I can do, just say it." Korun said, as we arrived at another door. "Here we are." He said, opening it.

A work of art met my eyes.

"Those blasted rabbits claim to be the best at everything. The best [Carpenters]. The best [Poets]. The best [Songwriters]. The best [Mages], [Artisans], [Warriors], [Archers], [Rangers], and everything else. Maybe they’re right." Korun reluctantly admitted. "But when it comes to shaping and working metal? Bah. We’re better." He said, a hint of communal pride of the Khazadian dwarves entering his voice.

The suit of armor was like a blend of what I imagined a [Knight] would wear, crossed with my Sentinel gear. The only thing "missing" was a spot where my right vambrace would go, with a perfect mirror on the left-hand side.

Shame it wasn’t filled with Sunstones, but I couldn’t have it all.

I took a hesitant step towards it, my hand moving as if to caress the arms, stopping just short. I didn’t want to get oily grease stains on this absolute vision.

"Go on." Korun encouraged me. "Try it on."

It took some help to get it all on - the straps were all in different places, and there was this fancy little latch that I was entirely unfamiliar with - but before long, I’d managed to get into the suit of armor, which I swore expanded in the right places and contracted in others to perfectly hug my body through the warm clothes I was wearing.

The chest was thick but flexible, stout without making me wider. I had my full range of motion still, and smooth armor around my shoulder and armpits slid around perfectly, preventing any gaps from showing up. The Arcanite from my old set was re-done into this one, but sadly Korun hadn’t seen fit to up my supplies.

I hadn’t asked. I should’ve.

The metal flowed like water along my arms, perfectly encasing them, ending in metal gauntlets. The metal was whisper-thin on my fingers, making it hard to tell that I was wearing them, and not interfering at all with my fine dexterity.

It was nice that I no longer had my biceps exposed to the air. While not a vital target, Legion doctrine held that they didn’t need specific armor, and that doctrine flowed to the Rangers, and the Sentinels as a result. Having them covered felt weird, but I was sure I’d get used to it.

I was used to a leather skort, with strips of metal hammered onto it to protect my legs. While the dwarves had kept the same design, they’d replaced the leather with metal, the skort reaching past my knees. Tall knee-high boots protected my shins and feet, carefully articulated to allow my full, flexible range of motion.

The helmet was open-faced, with a secondary "soft" metal that carefully wrapped around and protected my neck. It was in the dwarven style, with my requests and crude drawings of how my helmet looked seemingly entirely ignored.

"Sorry about the helmet. Smith said your design was, and I quote ‘Stupid and will get her killed.’, and insisted on doing his own thing."

I looked at the open-faced part.

"Did he remember I don’t have a beard?" I asked Korun.

He coughed awkwardly.

"Yes… but said that you were good stuff, and you’d grow yours back in eventually."

I rolled my eyes at that. Some people thought they knew better, and in some respects, the smith was probably right. He probably knew helmets and protection better than I did.

In others, it created blind spots. Like "Human women don’t grow beards" just went in one ear and out the other.

The suit itself was a work of art. The [Smith] was something of an artisan though. In delicate silver, melded and meshed with the armor itself, smooth to the touch but easy on the eyes, were flowery whorls and artistic flourishes. The endlessly spiraling patterns that I saw the dwarves liked to use in their buildings were repeated in the armor, and I believed I could spend hours upon hours tracing their intricate patterns.

Still. It didn’t make up for Korun lightning-bolting me not thirty minutes ago. At the same time, I wasn’t going to show my displeasure.

"Thank you Korun! It’s wonderful." I gushed, entirely honest about it. I started doing some stretches with it, and decided.

Now was the time.

"Mind if I stay here and practice with it?" I asked Korun. "I don’t want to trip over myself when something bad happens."

"Of course!" Korun said, all smiles that I seemed to be happy. "I’ll let Thoren know. You’re right that you’ll need the practice. The armor’s got a number of passive enchantments in it, all centered around durability. Smith didn’t think you knew how to connect to active enchantments. Since all you need the armor for is staying alive long enough for someone else to cover you."

I closed my eyes at that, resisting the urge to massage the bridge of my nose. It was good armor. Made by a master. Completely free.

"Thank you again Korun. I can’t tell you how grateful I am for this."

We made some more small talk, heading back to the main training room, where Korun made his excuses and left me with just Thoren and his group. We spread around the room, the guards breaking up into pairs or just squaring off against some training dummies. I idly made a few [Kaleidoscope] butterflies playing around my head, watching them as I did some serious last-second thinking.

I wasn’t going to ask anyone to show me cool skills, in an attempt to squeeze an extra level out of [Butterfly Mystic]. No time.

Right. First things first. Free stats.

Stats

[Free Stats: 164]

[Strength: 678]

[Dexterity: 883]

[Vitality: 7234]

[Speed: 7234]

My Magic stats were absurd. Putting free stats into them wouldn’t make a single lick of difference. No, physical stats was where I’d get any sort of use.

One number sprang out at me after a few moment’s thought, and I felt like the world’s biggest moron for not noticing it.

My dexterity was unbalanced.

I had enough dexterity to properly control 7064 speed. I had 7234 speed. I hadn’t noticed, because it wasn’t like I went off a cliff the instant I was unbalanced, nor had I been pushing my speed hard enough to notice it.

My strength was now somewhat noticeable, but when push came to shove, I didn’t think I’d be rolling any boulders out of the way. I was planning on being somewhat sneaky, and dexterity would help with that and not twisting my foot at a bad moment.

I put all 164 points into dexterity.

Onto my free general skill slot.

This was the time and place. The only question was - [Sneaking] or [Sprinting]?

After a brief thought, I went with [Sneaking]. If I was in a mad, all-out dash, I was already doomed. No, being sneaky was the name of the game here. [Invisibility with Eyeholes], combined with [Scintillating Ascent] would -

My mental gears came to a screeching halt.

MY THRICE-CURSED WINGS WERE MADE OUT OF RADIANCE!

I didn’t have the spare gems to test it - not with how valuable each of the three [Invisibility with Eyeholes] skills were - but I’d bet my last coin that my wings would not only stick out of the shroud of invisibility, but because they were made out of Radiance, they’d utterly shred the illusion to pieces.

Fine. Flying out was off the table. Well, flying while invisible.

Plus, it’d make me the BIGGEST target. Nobody flew in the city, not even with all the neat buildings and relatively large spaces carved into the mountain. It just wasn’t done, and I knew people here had the levels and stats to support it.

It did irk me to get a general skill that I’d owned once upon a time. That was a real bummer.

I "hid" behind one of the orc statues, and focused on sneaking to hide behind the next one.

[*ding!* Congratulations! You’ve unlocked the General Skill [Sneaking]! Would you like to take the skill? Y/N]

Honestly, basic skills from the System were almost too easy.

I mentally willed myself to take the skill, and it slotted neatly into the skill slot. I then did a little bit of sneaking around, watching the initial levels skyrocket, thanks to [Passionate Learning] and the stress I was having over escaping.

There was an added benefit to moving like this. The armor I had was entirely new to me, and I needed to move with it

[*ding!* [Sneaking] has leveled up! 1-> 11]

However, time was rapidly ticking away, and I didn’t want most of the guards to be ready and waiting for me to finish up when I made my move. Then they’d be ready to try and catch me - or, as they probably thought about it, "move to protect me."

I could believe that the average guard here genuinely believed I wanted to be here, and would genuinely think she was protecting me as she tried to catch up and keep me safe.

Time was ticking. Last up was my exit plan.

I didn’t know where the main exit was. From snippets I’d overheard, it was on the far side of the city, and "closed". Rumors were mixed if it was closed because of Lun’Kat’s attack, the orcs - I had no idea what that logic was all about - or because it was straight out winter, and the snow was piled so deep against the doors that the dwarves didn’t bother opening it.

Either way, option A was to try and cross a busy, crowded city, while invisible, hoping nobody bumped into me, find the mysterious exit, and figure out how to open the doors.

Option B was to head back towards the mines and tunnels. The dwarves would scream bloody murder at me calling it "mines" - apparently, there were multiple distinct layers of said mines, with only one of them being proper "Mines."

I didn’t care about the minute details of tunnel-boring. They were mines.

I had a plan to enter said mines, but no plan on exiting. Vaguely, I had thoughts about seeking out another dwarven city, saying hi, being let in, not letting them know how good of a healer I was, then walking out through their front door. It wasn’t the best of plans, but it was a plan. Alternatively, I could try to reverse-engineer where we’d dropped into the mines, then fly out with [Scintillating Ascent]. The drop was tight, but I should have enough room.

I walked over to Thoren.

"Hey!" I called out.

"Elaine. Do you need a sparring partner for something?" I can ask someone if you’d like." Thoren said. "Or would you like to look at my skills?"

It was a fair question, given that I’d bugged half the guards for help with [Butterfly Mystic]. One thing I’d failed to consider when getting the class - asking people to see their skills, the general privacy most people kept about their skills and classes, and my utter lack of social skills was a bad mix.

Focus.

I shook my head.

"No, just letting you know I’m going to be trying some blinding skills out. Don’t want anyone to be taken by surprise." I said.

Thoren gave a bit of an unhappy look.

"That does throw a bit of a wrench into everyone else’s training." He said.

"Yeah, but…" I gave him my best harmless kitten eyes. "You all get time off to practice stuff. I don’t."

Thoren made a noise of assent, stroking his beard.

"Yes, right, that is unfortunate. Right then, go ahead."

I mentally - and since I could, physically - pumped my fist. I walked over to a corner - near the door - and started flashing my lights as brightly as I could.

I wasn’t using [Lantern], not wanting to risk some residual remains from a specifically anti-illusion skill for what I had planned, but I did push the brightness from my [Radiance Conjuration] to the max, while keeping the burning part minimal, as I started flashing the skill rapidly, making myself into a blinding strobe light as I walked to the door.

I checked that the door was indeed open and unlocked.

I put my hand on the doorknob, and took a deep breath, my heart pounding in anticipation.

Then I flashed my Radiance for the last time, blew my [Invisibility with Eyeholes] gem, threw open the door, and I was off!

Chapter 218 - The first escape attempt!! II

I sprinted down the hallway, legs pumping as I took great big breaths of air. I made it seven steps before I heard a confused cry behind me.

A dwarf rounded the corner, just walking along. Ignoring the cries from the training room - as everyone did. The problem was, he was standing more or less in the middle of the hallway. If he had seen me, even if I was just walking normally, we’d just swerve around each other, no harm, no foul. Just two people passing in the halls, like normal.

But I was invisible. He couldn’t see me. Well, except my eyes, but I was gambling that he wouldn’t notice them, or if he did, he’d be confused, or assume it was some dwarf.

There were benefits to being dwarf-height over orc-height.

I kept running towards him, not pausing for a moment as my mind whirled.

[*ding!* [Sne-

I disabled notifications. I didn’t need the distraction, and since this was nearly life or death for me, and I was doing some uber sneaking with the invisibility gems?

I was anticipating a good number of levels.

Still, I needed to get around him, and the noises from the training room were rapidly coming closer.

I took a risk. This wouldn’t be the last risk, nor the biggest one I needed to take. Plus, I had no other real option. As I approached the dwarf walking down the hallway, I threw myself flat against the wall, sucked my stomach in as I shuffled past him, then the moment I was clear, put my feet down again and kept running.

Ok, sucking my stomach in was kinda pointless with the full suit of armor, but it was the idea that mattered to me. The thought and feeling that I was doing something to help. Imagine if I did nothing and got caught?

No, I was doing everything I could, throwing every piece of my arsenal at the problem.

[Sneaking] was terribly low-level, but even with its low level it was helping a hair, guiding my legs to step just a little softer on the floor. It helped me know how to navigate with my new armor, making sure it didn’t bang and clang against itself. It wasn’t much, but it helped reduce the noise I was making. I’d like to think I was quiet as a mouse, but even if I wasn’t, [Sneaking] stopped me from accidentally stomping around like an elephant, or tripping and falling like a bunch of pots and pans.

The dwarf passed, unaware how close he’d come to an invisible human.

Past the dwarf, up a staircase, and I exploded out of the door, into the city proper.

Well. While technically the city, I was still in the middle of the military compound.

The military compound, full of measures designed to detect high-level orcs sneaking around invisibility, nevermind plucky healers bent on escaping.

I needed to move, and move now. Right now, only Thoren and his team were looking for me. The moment they got to talk with Korun, or anyone else in charge?

The entire base would be looking for me.

I had a tiny, narrow window to escape in, before the jaws closed around me. I wasn’t good enough to avoid an entire army.

I wasn’t going for the main exit to the outside. I didn’t think I could cross an entire crowded city, to find an exit in an unknown location, with unknown guards and security. No, as much as I hated it, I needed to try the mines.

I started running, sprinting, pushing my new speed to the max as I ran towards the great wall at the edge of the compound that marked where the city ended, and the tunnels and mines were located.

I had to come to a screeching halt, cursing my bad luck, as a whole company of dwarves came marching past, blocking the road off.

Thoren and the rest of the guards boiled out of the training building like angry wasps, shouting about orc Sabotaugeurs kidnapping me.

"Attack! Attack! We’re under attack! Orcs!" Thoren yelled.

The worst part of that cry was that Thoren and the rest probably believed it. I’d given no indication that I wanted to escape before now, and "orc attack" was probably what they jumped to as a conclusion.

Either way, my lead was vanishing.

"Company! Halt! Break into squads, find those orcs!" The commander of the column of dwarves yelled.

Which got the company of dwarves marching right in front of me to halt, then explode into action, neatly splitting up into teams of six and running about. I had to throw myself flat against a wall as multiple teams ran past me.

One dwarf was running with one arm ram-rod out for whatever reason, coming right at me. With a curse, I dropped to the floor and wedged myself in the corner where the wall met floor, just to try and stay undetected.

Yet, I felt somewhat trapped here, out in the open as the dwarves hurried about. I "shuffled" down in my invisibility skill, to stop my eyeballs from "peeping" out. It made me entirely invisibile, but the trade-off was that I couldn’t see anything.

I could still hear though, and it brought to mind a terrifying thought. Bats could locate things via echolocation, and there had to be skills to detect people by their breathing.

Heck, I could even imagine that echolocation was extra-worthwhile in the tunnels and mines, effectively letting them see around corners. I could use my [Muffle] gem to stop people hearing my breathing, but that would make me even more obvious to echolocation.

Fuck. Why didn’t I think of this before? I might’ve timed my escape differently.

I shook the thought off. "Ifs", "could’ve’s", "what-ifs" and the rest were pointless. I had to play with the hand I’d been dealt.

Staying still was pointless. They’d find me, catch me, throw me in chains and only let me out to heal. My gems and toys would be removed, and I’d be trapped for decades.

No.

I had to move. Movement was life.

I have no shame in admitting that I crawled. I crawled for life. I crawled for freedom. Who cares that it was on my hands and knees? It was getting me there. Although, the fact that my armor was new did me no favors. My metal skirt was dragging on the ground, making soft scraping noises. I just had to hope they sounded enough like metal boots on the ground that their noise would be lost in the din.

Also, after the initial burst of activity, there were "only" two patrols a street, instead of an endless horde. My heart lifting, I found a timing between two patrols, and neatly slipped myself in between them, keeping them at an equal distance. Invisibility didn’t mean they couldn’t bump into me after all.

They made a turn down a street I didn’t want, but there was another patrol coming down the street I did want. I decided to stick with my current working system, and trade-off into another street when I got a moment.

I slunk down the streets, invisible, forced to keep moving by the patrols almost literally breathing down my neck. How they hadn’t found me, I didn’t know.

Then, glimpsed through an alley filled with detritus, I saw my destination. The entrance back to the mines. I kept going, then briefly slid into a doorway to let the latest patrol pass, before running back and squeezing into the alley.

There was all manner of crap here. Discarded trash, loose barrels, coils of rope, and piles of crates. Why it was all shoved here, I’ll never know. Just another alley filled with junk that would be dealt with "later".

I climbed up onto a crate, and cursed as the blasted thing was rotted, and I fell through, making an unholy clatter.

I pulled a face.

Mushrooms. I’d landed in a pile of half-forgotten mushrooms, which did what all food did when forgotten about in an alley.

Now I stunk, and there was a cry from a patrol as they headed my way. Worse, while I was invisible, I was leaving a neat Elaine-shaped imprint in the mushrooms, making it blindingly obvious that someone invisible was there.

I heaved myself out of the crate, and tried to hide behind a barrel. It wasn’t a great hiding place, but at this point I was furiously praying to the gods and goddesses - I wasn’t picky, I cycled through all the ones I knew - to help me out, to grant me a miracle and help me hide.

Bastards took some of my mana, clearly hearing my prayer, but didn’t do a thing. Why did I even bother?

Dwarvish patrols showed up at either side of the alley, trapping me in. I tried to stifle the tears that were welling up, the sadness overtaking me.

I wasn’t done yet.

As much as it looked like I was doomed, as helpless as it looked, I wasn’t captured yet. I wasn’t in chains, I wasn’t out of mana.

I could hear my heart pounding in my ears as the dwarves got closer, pointing at the broken crate I’d just climbed out of.

Freeze? Or fly? What was better? My fight or flight instinct was hammering at me, screaming at me that I needed to do something.

I froze.

The dwarves poked at the crate, speaking quickly to each other. Arguing.

"They were here!" One yelled.

"Obvious! Tell me something new!" The squad leader snapped back. Tensions were high. Weapons were drawn.

"Probably traveling the roofs. One missed a jump? Probably went back up." Another said, in a loud but not shouting tone, pointing to the roofs then the crate.

"Makes sense. Hit the roofs, see if we can find the direction they went." The squad leader ordered, obviously relieved to help in a way that didn’t directly tangle with the non-existent orcs.

Heck, I wouldn’t want to take on a squad of commandos with twice my total level either.

"Take that building!" The squad leader behind me yelled to the squad across from me.

"Aye!" They saluted, and the two patrols vanished, one into each building.

They’d… just left?

I hadn’t been caught?

I sent a quick prayer of thanks to whatever god or goddesses had just overseen me, and I made a break for the entrance of the mines, sneaky-running across the open stone, the various shades of lichen throwing crazy colors all over the place.

Here was my last obstacle. No matter how bad things were, the insane amount of security on the entrance to the mines hadn’t faltered. They were literally packed shoulder to shoulder, had anti-Mirage lights sweeping the area, dozens of traps littered the place, and I couldn’t even guess what else they had going on there.

It seemed entirely impassable to me. I’d made my break for it not knowing how to pass this hurdle, I’d gone this way in spite of it, kicking the problem down the road, and well - now I was here. Now the problem was staring me in the face, and it demanded a solution now.

I refrained from tapping my foot. No bets that one of the guards had crazy high vitality, and would hear it, and wonder "why am I hearing tapping noise coming from an empty spot?"

As I waited, the guards parted, and I inhaled, preparing to sprint through. I’d let the illusion get stripped, and I’d just try to tank the traps as they sprang out at me. I was able to heal just about anything, and the traps were designed to keep people out, not in. So, like, if there was a crazy rolling boulder trap or something, I’d be running in the right direction as I ran away from it.

Of course, the guards weren’t parting for no reason, and I had to stuff my fist in my mouth to stop myself screaming in frustration and anger.

Injured. Wounded. Not a whole company, just a squad limping back home. Two dwarves were being carried by the other four, a standard dwarf-squad of six. They turned and hugged the wall, making their way over to the triage building. It was close enough for a team to get to quickly, but far away enough to preserve some of the kill-zone around the mine entrance.

Fuck my [Oath] sideways seven different ways - I couldn’t just abandon them. I had to heal them.

And there was no light down here to blast them with [Wheel of Sun and Moon]. No, I needed to physically touch the dwarves.

I started running towards them, all sneakiness gone as I leaned forward into an all-out sprint. They were moving at a good pace, but they weren’t sprinting, instead choosing to not jostle their squad mates.

I mean, technically, I could ignore them, and take the [Oath] penalty. I suspected it’d be more severe than the last time I turned my back on someone who needed help, and me screaming in crippling agony in the middle of the military compound wasn’t exactly a winning move in my escape plan.

I ran and ran, thanking my inadvertent choice to take a class that was heavy on speed. A desperate plan crystallized in my mind, one potential way that I might be able to escape. It was silly. I had no idea if it would work or not. But it was do or be captured right now. I had no other choice, but to gamble, and gamble hard.

I hated gambling with so much on the line. Unlike my classing up though, I had no choice here. There was no safe option.

I caught up with the dwarves, then overtook them a hair.

I then turned on my heels, executing the plan.

Like a whirling dervish, arms outstretched, I slapped one of the injured dwarves full of healing, then spun, dodging the carriers while I hit the second one. Both of them had those blasted implants, and my mana got horribly chunked.

But they were alive. Hale and whole.

I could see my feet, as I’d gotten too close to the dwarves, and it was one insult too many to the skill. [Invisibility with Eyeholes] dropped, and I was in full view of everyone.

The dwarves made surprised noises, but I was wearing obviously dwarven-forged gear, while being dwarf-height. It had benefits, like them assuming I was some criminal beardless dwarf - AKA a weirdo, and not an orc that they should be trying to kill.

I took the moment of distraction to run back towards the entrance of the mine, reaching out with one hand to touch the smooth stone beside me, the other focusing on [Wall Buster], trying to trigger the gem.

Magic was weird. I could remove flesh with [Dance with the Heavens], but only if it was to heal it. I couldn’t just remove flesh. Similarly, I could only restore an arm if someone had been born with it. If someone was born without an arm? My healing wouldn’t do anything, in spite of me knowing exactly what would need to happen to fix it.

[Talaria] used to only work in sunlight. Nevermind that moonlight was simply a reflection of the sun’s light off the moons - that didn’t count. That was, according to magic, moonlight, and my old [Moonlight] skill had worked off of that.

I was counting on "magical logic" to bail me out here. [Wall Buster] was designed for blowing up walls. Not blasting holes in stones.

As I ran towards the entrance to the mine, hand trailing on the wall, hearing a cry of alarm come up from behind me - cursed ungrateful dwarves, giving me away after saving two of them - I was focusing on casting [Wall Buster], the skill constantly failing to activate as there were no "walls" present.

Guards started to run at me from all directions. From the squad behind me, yelling about catching "the strange invisible beardless thing", to the tunnel security trying to capture the "obviously running away from security, must be up to no good", to various patrols that were summoned by the commotion, I was surrounded.

The net was closing in.

I threw up my [Mantle], creating a small teardrop against the rushing dwarves, stopping skills from coming in. A few long-range skills headed my way, but I was throwing off all manner of "harmless" cues. The skills were weak, capture-only skills, and my [Mantle] was strong enough to deflect them.

Then the [Wall Buster] skill "took", blowing a hole in the wall. An L-shaped intersection met my eyes, beckoning me into the mines.

Good enough for me.

I sprinted in, throwing up [Brilliant Barricade] behind me, lighting my way with [Lantern].

Then, in an action that caused me no small amount of consternation, I left a trail of [Kaleidoscope] butterflies behind me, tiny motes of light hovering in my path. I pounded down the neatly carved stone tunnels, throwing [Mantle] on my back like a cape.

The [Kaleidoscope] butterflies were a massive risk. On one hand, they were an offensive skill, designed to explode and slow down my pursuers.

On the other?

They gave a neat sign pointing out my trail. There was no hiding, dodging, or hoping they’d get lost - I was pointing them exactly to me, leaving a nice trail of breadcrumbs.

Worst of all - they easily could become an [Oath] violation.

If - and only if - they harmed someone, it was me deliberately causing harm to another. Sure, if the people actively pursuing me got hit, it might - just might - be self-defense. It was stretching it quite a lot, given that while they were in pursuit, they weren’t actively engaged with me. It was possible that it’d hit them, and not count against me. However, I wasn’t sure of that. I believed I had a few toes over the line.

But the patrols that the dwarves had in here?

People coming back from battle or recon?

There was no justifying harming them. If someone ran into a butterfly and it exploded? There was no excuse. It was an [Oath] violation, and I knew it.

I was counting on the short lifespan of the butterflies - about a minute - the fact that they just hovered with the commands I gave them, and the healthy paranoia anyone at the levels I was dealing with would have. Who would willingly run into an unknown skill dropped by someone being chased?

In short, I was bluffing. I had to hope that nobody decided to just power through the skill, knowing my level and how much it wouldn’t hurt a high-level classer like Hakka.

Actually, Hakka would be the perfect dwarf to run into one of those butterflies. It wouldn’t hurt her at all, not with her resistance skill. No harm, no foul.

I rounded corners at full speed, sprinting, gasping, panting for air. I didn’t care where I was going, nor did I try to track it - I just wanted out. Out of the tunnels, away from the dwarves.

I knew I was near the surface, and I also knew the dwarves had tried to seal all the exits. No way did they miss one so close to their home, and it’d be all too easy to find myself in a dead end.

No, whenever possible, I went down, down, deeper.

I wanted to go invisible again, to try and hide from the dwarves. I had two more [Invisibility with Eyeholes] gems left.

Problem was lighting.

I was a Radiance mage, and my ways of making light were [Lantern] and [Radiance Conjuration] primarily. Now, it was possible to shine the skills out of my eyes to light the area up so I could see - but "Hey, what are those floating beams of light hovering in the middle of the hallway?" was a dead giveaway. That was before Radiance ate away and broke Mirages.

In short, it’d do nothing but waste a gem. One of my more powerful gems to boot.

A gem, that was one of my last mementos of Magic.

I kept running through the hallways, triggering traps the whole way.

I was in another corridor, when I simply felt my [Mantle] break. I twisted as I flung myself forward, to see what had happened.

I couldn’t see anything weird or out of place. Just smoothly-cut stone walls all around me.

Feeling more than a bit foolish, I got back up and kept running, reasserting my [Mantle]. I dunno what happened, but it had clearly done something.

If nothing else, it slowed me down, and I saw lights flickering in from multiple tunnels, converging on me. I scrambled to my feet and kept running.

I was running so hard that I couldn’t quite make the turn, instead slamming into a wall and half-bouncing off of it to make my turn into a long corridor. I was praying that the dwarves would all follow from behind, and none would wrap around, and flank me from the other way. An entire corridor of the floor fell away, a deadly-looking purple-colored liquid underneath the pitfall trap.

[Scintillating Ascent] made the trap a joke, as I simply flew over it. I stopped dropping [Kaleidoscope].

Three more tunnels, two more down ramps, and I saw a shift in the stone. From smooth and polished, back to rough, it was like the construction crews had said "here’s the line, let’s not do anything beyond this."

Then, with a breath of relief, with my heart soaring into the… well, not the sky, I was underground, but high - I was past the tunnels, past the dwarf’s claimed defensive area.

I took a moment to slow down and pump my fist victoriously, before continuing on at a light jog.

Only for the wall to open up, with a few huge tridents erupting from the wall.

[Bullet Time] activated, and I threw up my shield, delaying the spikes for a fraction of a moment. It was enough for me to twist out of the way of almost all of them - all but one.

It slammed through me, bouncing my helmeted head off the wall, pinning me to the cold, hard stone like a butterfly on a board.

I was small, and the spikes were meant for larger game - orcs, primarily. Each of the spikes was large, and spaced far apart, which is why I was lucky that only one was through my chest. There were a few more prongs of the trident that scraped the armor on my arms, and pinned my arms next to me - but they weren’t actively keeping me trapped. Just immobile.

Fluttering helplessly against the wall.

Footsteps approaching.

Panicking now would be the end of me. I spent a brief moment calming myself, letting myself think.

I turned off my [Lantern], not making it any easier for the dwarves to find me. I just needed to use "The hip bone is connected to the ouch bone" to know where I had problems.

I tried to take a breath, only to feel it aborted against my will, which helped me diagnose the problem.

Barbed spike through my right lung.

However, after the pirate attack, after being able to build my own class, I’d been worried about something similar happening to me. I focused on my healing with [Dance with the Heavens] - which was already autocasting, but I figured focusing on the "remove materials" part of it would help.

While I was mostly immune to pain thanks to [Center of the Universe], I could still feel it, I knew it was there. A total lack of pain was almost worse than an overactive pain sense, since I couldn’t know when something was wrong. Either way, the "my chest is hurting" sense started to slowly decrease as I focused.

"Oh empty Arcanite." I swore as I realized something. When I was done healing myself, the spike would still be "pushing" me into the wall, so to speak. I had one chance, right now, to fix that.

With a scream, I pushed myself forward on the prong, driving myself forward, feeling the pain flare up again, hearing my backpack tear.

Not the snacks!

I then waited, nervously feeling rivulets of sweat running down my back as I heard the dwarves running, coming closer and closer. They’d find me any second now, and I needed to be free before then.

My sense of pain fading as [Dance with the Heavens] slowly "ate" the metal pinning me to the wall, I wriggled experimentally, seeing what motion I had available. I turned [Lantern] back on, figuring the dwarves knew where I was, and that I needed to work out my escape.

The dwarves rounded the corner, seeing me in the trap right as I was freed, healed out. The end of the spike still sticking out of my back, I nimbly darted through the rest of the trident-trap, turning round to flip the dwarves the bird as they ran up to the trap and started to push their stout bodies through it.

Ha! Being tiny had its advantages!

My glee was cut off as one of the dwarves fired something sticky at me. With pure reflexes I managed to throw up [Mantle], stopping the attack, avoiding capture.

Unlike that time with the mud mage.

I turned and fled down, down, deeper into the endless mines.

Chapter 219 - Alone in the Dark I

I ran.

I ran with everything I had, sprinting, running, uncaring about the dangers and threats, directions and diversions, nothing else - just running.

Fleeing the golden chains and shackles behind me, running from the dwarves. I’d take the terrors of the deep, the chilly unknown, bad food and terrible water, if it came with freedom.

If it came with being able to see my family again.

So I ran. Endlessly, unceasingly, fueling myself with [Sunrise] every time I felt my energy starting to flag, grabbing a drink of water when I was thirsty, chowing down on snacks from my bloody backpack. Every time I thought to stop, to slow down, I heard echoing footsteps, forcing me to pick up the pace again, redouble my efforts to avoid capture.

Now and then I stepped up into the air, taking flight with [Scintillating Ascent]. I didn’t know how I was being tracked, if at all, but I figured I’d make pursuit a bit harder if I flew a bit.

I was encouraged by the fact that whenever I landed, I didn’t hear any echoing footsteps. However, inevitably, as soon as I started running, they’d start back up a few seconds later in hot pursuit.

Without Ranger Academy, there’s no way I’d be eating food that had my dried blood on it. With the training, I didn’t even bat an eyelash at it. Nor did I mind the number of floating things in the water I was drinking, located in small pools here and there.

What did disturb me was when I found another body in an extra-large pool - practically a small lake of water - with large chunks bitten out of it, only needing three toothmarks to entirely bisect the body. My mind mechanically analyzed that whatever did this either had a very large mouth - or was gigantic.

Either way, my sleep-deprived brain decided to avoid large bodies of water underground.

I don’t know how long I kept running, doubling back when slimes approached, dodging down side tunnels the moment a weird noise met my ears.

I just knew I needed to get away and get down.

Exhaustion crept at me, started to eat at me. I fought it off with [Sunrise], and healed my aching muscles with [Dance with the Heavens]. I’d theorized I could go a long time, run endlessly - it was being put to the test.

I don’t know how long I ran for. I do know that exhaustion kept creeping back, only to be beaten away by [Sunrise], just for it to rear its ugly head and snap back, harder each time.

[Sunrise] wasn’t a sleep substitute. It was simply energy. I’d need to eventually sleep.

Eventually.

For now, I just kept running, running, deeper and deeper, just chanting and repeating a few thoughts endlessly in my head.

Need to escape.

Movement is life.

Go deep.

Need to escape.

Movement is life.

Go deep.

Other thoughts slowly faded, becoming garbled insanity as fatigue and exhaustion warped my thoughts, causing the bad idea fairy to masquerade as the good idea fairy.

Go for a nice swim. Cooling, fresh water, makes the trail hard to follow.

I’ve gone deep enough. I should level out, and consider going higher.

Bounce on the slime! Could use a bit of fun and distraction. Look how it wobbles. Wibble-wobble.

This is probably far enough. I should stop, and rest.

Good ideas? Bad ideas?

I was fairly certain most were bad ideas, but I was so tired. The dwarves were relentless in their pursuit, metal boots on stone always echoing from around the corner. I just knew I’d come up with my core ideas, the ones I was holding onto with every bit of mental strength, when I was awake and alert. I’d just follow them, until I made it to a safe place.

I don’t know how long I ran for. The only rough comparison I had was Ranger Academy.

I had thousands of stats more now than I did then.

I had never been so tired, my limbs dragging so hard, my mind as cloudy and as foggy as I was now.

It was at least a week solid that I ran, the part of me whispering, screaming to stop, ignored by the rest of my brain, which just held onto and kept following the core ideas I’d established.

Maybe it was two weeks?

Surely, I couldn’t have run for three solid weeks…?

At that thought, I slowed, ducking into a narrow dead-end passage. I tried to whip my foggy brain, begging for sleep, into shape, keeping a half-ear on the footsteps.

There was no way I’d run for three weeks straight. I wasn’t that fit?

Although, [Sunrise] and [Dance with the Heavens] could keep me going forever.

There was no way to mark the passage of time.

My Arcanite was totally full.

I had no snacks.

I’d quickly paused to answer nature’s call how many times again?

Fuck.

I really could’ve gone three weeks straight. No wonder I was feeling all sorts of loopy.

Also, now that I was thinking about it - no way had I been chased for three weeks solid. I looked down at my feet.

At my new boots.

My new, never-worn-before boots.

My metal boots - something I’d never worn before.

I stamped experimentally, hearing a footstep echo back a few seconds later.

I was a complete moron! I’d been scared of my own footsteps! I was never going to stop beating myself up over that.

I looked around the place I’d found myself.

Cozy. Secure. One entrance. No water.

I hadn’t forgotten all my tricks, and I decided that here and now was the time to blow my [Tripwire Alarm] utility skill. I’d figure out how to protect myself while I slept another time.

I used the skill on the entrance, killed my own [Lantern], had enough presence of mind to wrap myself in [Mantle], and was out like the light.

I woke up in near-total darkness, not quite feeling rested. I assumed it was because of the massive back-to-back chain marathon I’d just run. I wanted to stretch, but the faint glimmering of hundreds of tiny stars reminded me that I was wrapped in my [Mantle]. I put a brief eye on my status, and any lingering sleepiness or brain fog vanished as I saw that I only had half my mana left… and it was steadily ticking down.

I instantly jumped to the one conclusion I’d been paranoid about for years, one of the downsides of my shield skill. With constant, weak pressure on my shield, it’d protect me, at the cost of mana. Keep it up long enough without me noticing, and I could get entirely drained of mana, vulnerable to whatever monster of the week wanted to gobble me up whole.

Slowly, carefully, I used [Lantern] to brighten my surroundings, letting a faint trickle of light see what the problem was. I felt my heart race, stifling a scream as the full horror of what my problem was came to light.

Spiders. Spiders as big as my head were everywhere. Eight pale legs attached to a hairy body, blind white eyes seeing nothing, they didn’t seem particularly interested in me, or wanting to devour me.

No, they were just filling up this particular cave, and standing on my shield seemed to be a side-effect. I checked their level.

[Deep-Dwelling Cave Spider].

Oh fuck me sideways, they were all above level 350. More like 370.

Still, I hadn’t seen hide or hair of them before, but I froze as one of them made a strange clicking sound.

The same clicking sound I’d heard when we first fell into the mines, the same pervasive, omnipresent clicking that joined the dripping, the clanging, the echoing footsteps, squelching slimes and far-off roars.

Either way, the spiders had to go. I was going to fight fire with fire, and bugs with bugs. Or something like that.

Slowly, carefully, I opened a small hole in my [Mantle], and let a trickle of [Kaleidoscope] butterflies loose. I carefully controlled them to hover near the spiders, burning my mana at high speed as I prepared a devastating alpha strike.

When I’d filled the room with butterflies, when my mana was too low to justify continuing, I made my move.

I hated doing it, but exploding my butterflies on top of my shield like this would simply break my shield, draining me of mana in the process.

I dropped my shield at the same moment I detonated the butterflies, the combined explosion of hundreds of the tiny things in such cramped quarters magnifying the explosion.

I was mostly immune to my own Radiance skills. I wasn’t immune to the side effects, like the overpressurized blast trying to tear my body apart. Fortunately for me, my new dwarf-forged armor helped both with the blast, and with the spiders trying - and failing - to crawl on me, and my smooth armor.

A good number of the spiders flat-out died in the explosion, while more fled in panic, screeching in pain. Only a few seemed to realize I was the cause, or were just lashing out at anything that moved. Either way, sonic waves assaulted my ears as some of the crawling spiders on me tried to bite through my armor.

My armor mostly held, dents and chips joining the neat puncture in the middle of my chest. I played whack-a-spider with Radiance beams and [Kaleidoscope] butterflies as fast as I could to peel the last of them off.

Thank goodness for my armor. It’d stopped me getting hurt, and more importantly, stopped me from feeling the hairy spiders crawling on my skin. Nooooooo thank you.

Then, not three breaths from when I’d first started, it was over. I was alone in a cave, miles underground, with the carcasses of two dozen dead spiders, panting and heaving. The charred spider scents was tingly in my nose.

Why did it have to be spiders?

Not seeing anything better to do, I sat right back down, and overcoming a hair of initial revulsion, I grabbed a spider and started to cook it.

Completely, totally, ridiculously overcook it. I wanted to taste charcoal, not spider.

I checked over my notifications, hoping for sweet, sweet distraction from what I was putting in my mouth.

Sustenance. Nutrition.

[*Ding!* Congratulations! [The Dawn Sentinel] has leveled up to level 367->369! +3 Dexterity, +24 Speed, +24 Vitality, +170 Mana, +170 Mana Regen, +48 Magic power, +48 Magic Control from your Class per level! +1 Free Stat for being Human per level! +1 Mana, +1 Mana Regen from your Element per level!]

[*Ding!* [Celestial Affinity] leveled up! 367->369]

[*Ding!* [Center of the Universe] leveled up! 367->369]

[*Ding!* [Dance with the Heavens] leveled up! 367->369]

[*Ding!* [Sentinel's Superiority] leveled up! 367->369]

[*Ding!* [Long-Range Identify] leveled up! 367->368]

[*Ding!* [Mantle of the Stars] leveled up! 367->369]

[*Ding!* [Persistent Casting] leveled up! 259->265]

[*Ding!* [Cosmic Presence] leveled up! 285->286]

[*Ding!* [Sunrise] leveled up! 132->166]

That was probably the weeks of running and using the skill, and less so the fight. Constant use, combined with high-pressure? Recipe for sweet, sweet levels.

[*ding!* Congratulations! [Butterfly Mystic] has leveled up to level 307->309! +8 Strength, +8 Dexterity, +70 Speed, +70 Vitality, +70 Mana, +70 Mana Regen, +70 Magic power, +70 Magic Control from your Class per level! +1 Free Stat for being Human per level! +1 Strength, +1 Mana Regen from your Element per level!]

I ignored all my capped [Butterfly Mystic] skills re-capping. I should consider doing that with [The Dawn Sentinel] as well.

[*Ding!* [Nectar] leveled up! 301->303]

[*Ding!* [Scintillating Ascent] leveled up! 281->284]

[*Ding!* [Kaleidoscope] leveled up! 265->269]

[*Ding!* [Sneaking] leveled up! 11->140]

Well. That was one way to power-level a new skill. Use it to run for my life for weeks straight. Artemis would be proud.

[*Ding!* You have slain a [Deep Dwelling Cave Spider (Sound, 368)]//[Deep Dwelling Cave Spider (Dark, 350)]]

That was interesting, and rare. Monsters, even if they were caster monsters, generally only had one turbo-charged class. These spiders seemed to have two elements at their disposal. Sound probably helped them navigate, and I was guessing the Dark both helped them hide, and tear through whatever landed in their grasp.

Although… where were the webs? Did the spiders, like, sing webs? Or did they just make them naturally, or were they one of the spiders that didn’t use webs?

I wasn’t sure about that. I had never been interested in spiders.

[*Ding!* [Oath of Elaine to Lyra] leveled up! 308->315]

I guess potentially sacrificing my freedom, and making the call to value others over my own well-being had rewards. I don’t think I’d ever gotten so many [Oath] levels for a single person. The bandit camp when I was an idiot teenager jumping into the line of fire of Rangers potentially qualified, but it was hard to tell on an individual basis.

Still, it all worked out in the end.

I looked around, and mentally amended that.

It will have worked out once I was no longer at risk of this place becoming my tomb.

I continued to mechanically eat ...don’t think about it… as I reviewed my memories of my fleeing, trying to replay it in fast-forward mode, trying to work out where I was.

[*Ding!* [Pristine Memories] leveled up! 206->207]

I shook my head in frustration.

It wasn’t that my skill was failing me. It was that I wasn’t able to follow and build a mental map of nearly three weeks of running, jumping, doubling back, going down ramps, dodging monsters, and finally ending up here. It was just too much ground covered.

However, reviewing my memories, there were distinctly different types of tunnels. The most obvious was the dwarves neatly carved and polished stone corridors, obviously with an intelligent hand behind them. Then it became cruder, carved out of stone, but still mined and dug out by hands and skills of intelligent creatures - likely the dwarves. Then a layer that seemed to be mostly natural cracks, the rocks and cave settling in such a way to permit movement and motion. A natural cave system.

Then the last layer, where it changed again. Becoming sleek, like something melted through it, or hot things constantly flowed. I hadn’t gotten far into this level before I’d stopped.

Putting the pieces together, I paled.

Odds were good that somehow, I was in a volcano, exploring the magmatic chambers. Toast, when the next eruption occurred.

I shivered at the thought, which seemed to produce a contradiction.

Shivering? It was cold down here, not hot! A point for it being a dormant volcano.

Right. At this stage, going up seemed to be the right call.

I left my little cave that I’d inadvertently shared with the spiders, noting that it was carved out of normal stone, while the tunnel was the melted or heated stone from before.

Wait.

Spiders?

In a volcano?

Ok, I knew this was Pallos, and judging things by my old logic had bitten me in the ass more than once. I could believe volcano-spiders. I was doubting volcano-spiders without a Lava element.

Which left… monsters. Like whatever had tunneled right next to us when I was with Drin, Fik, and the rest, looking for Toke.

On that note - while he annoyed me to no end, and drove me nuts, I was a little sad at Ned’s - the real Ned’s - passing. Upon reflection, I think the Changeling got him that night when I was on watch. To think - that could’ve been me. I shuddered at how close a call that was.

Reflecting on the fight, I noticed one more thing.

The spiders had been entirely silent when they walked around, only clicking to each other to communicate. Given the absence of light, and how blind they were, it sent the hairs on my neck crawling.

Something could be sneaking up behind me right now, and I wouldn’t know it until their jaws were closing around my head.

With that lovely thought, I flared [Lantern], and started moving.

Upwards.

Towards light, air, the sky, home, my friends and family.

Towards freedom.

[Name: Elaine]

[Race: Human]

[Age: 19]

[Mana: 300330/300330]

[Mana Regen: 237088 (+227901.45)]

Stats

[Free Stats: 4]

[Strength: 672]

[Dexterity: 1067]

[Vitality: 7422]

[Speed: 7422]

[Mana: 30033]

[Mana Regeneration: 30086 (+22790.145)]

[Magic Power: 13831 (+217838.25)]

[Magic Control: 13831 (+217838.25)]

[Class 1: [The Dawn Sentinel - Celestial: Lv 369]]

[Celestial Affinity: 369]

[Cosmic Presence: 286]

[Solar Infusion: 110]

[Center of the Universe: 369]

[Dance with the Heavens: 369]

[Wheel of Sun and Moon: 311]

[Mantle of the Stars: 369]

[Sunrise: 166]

[Class 2: [Butterfly Mystic - Radiance: Lv 309]]

[Radiance Affinity: 309]

[Radiance Resistance: 309]

[Radiance Conjuration: 309]

[Lantern: 188]

[Nectar: 303]

[Sun's Heart: 309]

[Scintillating Ascent: 284]

[Kaleidoscope: 269]

[Class 3: Locked]

General Skills

[Long-Range Identify: 368]

[Pristine Memories: 206]

[Sneaking: 140]

[Bullet Time: 283]

[Oath of Elaine to Lyra: 315]

[Sentinel's Superiority: 369]

[Persistent Casting: 265]

[Passionate Learning: 355]

Chapter 220 - Alone in the Dark II

I wandered through the hallways, lighting them up as brightly as I reasonably could with [Lantern]. The rocks were glossy, and did a bit of reflecting, doing some trippy bending. Nothing I couldn’t handle - it was more neat than anything. I remember the dwarves mentioning something about the "Below levels", and I was hoping I wasn’t there.

Light was tricky. On one hand, I needed light. On the other, it potentially gave away my position to monsters… or drove them away, since they spent their entire lives down here without a single ray of sunshine.

That’s what I was telling myself.

I tried to trace my steps back, to climb back out of what I was calling the "melted levels", but failed. The tunnels had shifted around me, and finding my way back was just as hard as finding my way forward.

I’d occasionally hear voices echoing down the corridors. People talking. Monsters with a clever lure.

I avoided them. Early on, I’d tried to approach them, but after three near-misses in a row, I now avoided them. They were either orcs, who I couldn’t talk with and seemed fairly aggressive, monsters that mimicked speech, or dwarves, who had tried to capture me. It was possible, likely even, that they were dwarves from somewhere else - but seeing a strange creature down here, they might shoot first, and ask questions later, given the tension and state of war they were in.

Plus, like, I was inclined to think everything I bumped into down here was hostile. I couldn’t blame them for thinking the same.

Most Rangers I knew would also be inclined to shoot unknowns in hostile territory.

I did try to follow the sound of their voices at times, but the sound played tricks on me as often as it led me to a narrow crack where the noise came through.

I wandered for hours.

I’d grab water from the ever-present pools of water, the soft drip-drip a constant background noise to the rest of the noises from the mines. I was getting used to the noises in the tunnels, the different clicks, plinks, plonks, and clangs music to my ears. I knew when they were right, when everything was orderly and normal, and I could tell when there was something new, something close.

I discovered that the spiders did, somehow, know when I was around, and would scuttle over to me when I rested or slept. However, as long as I was in [Mantle], they’d only crowd around, seemingly confused by the barrier. They also wouldn’t come if I slept with the lights on, avoiding the light.

In other words - easy, disgusting food when I needed it.

I wandered for days.

While there were monsters down here, they were rare. Light didn’t make it down this far, which meant plants didn’t easily grow. The foundation of any ecosystem just didn’t exist, which made the entire area food-scarce. Clearly, the spiders and some other monsters were finding something to eat, but I could go hours without seeing another creature.

Days.

I did find some dead orcs at one point. Their arms were like skeletons, flesh pulled taut against bone, while their collarbones jutted out. I could count their ribs without even trying, and whatever monster had killed them had only bothered to eat their organs. It looked like they were in the middle of starving to death when they encountered some monster that took advantage of their weakened state.

Or more likely, they’d tried to bring down a monster for food, and failed because they were starving.

What did that say for the rest of orcish society? Were these just two orcs who had gotten lost, or were the orcs as a civilization being starved to death? The Khazardian dwarves tactic of sealing up every exit to the outside took on an ominous tone, and it forced me to re-think and re-evaluate the war that was going on between the two.

I suspected there was more to it than met the eye.

Either way, I was out of it for now, and I had no intention of getting back into it.

At the same time, I wanted to avoid their fate. Bone marrow was nutritious after all.

I wandered for weeks. Months?

Most monsters didn’t want to tangle with whatever I was. I smelled of metal, with burning light at my fingertips. An unknown, an oddity, down this far. Most predators hunted for their lunch, with a strange unknown not being the top choice to hunt down.

Not unless they were desperate, or starving.

With that being said, the most memorable encounters were with the ones who weren’t most. I’d barely escaped alive from those encounters, and it was only a matter of time before I fucked up hard enough to die.

Heck. I wouldn’t even need to screw up. It was possible to make no wrong moves, and still get eaten. That was life.

I locked eyes with some sort of beetle, large enough to mostly fill a tunnel itself. It was high level - over 700 - and clearly knew I was there.

But it was a monster, having never encountered whatever-I-was before. For all it knew, I was over level 1000. A lack of [Identify] gave it pause. I was strange, weird, and not aggressive. I wasn’t acting like food, and I wasn’t acting like a predator.

I didn’t turn my back on it and run. No, watching it, heart in my throat, I slowly slid into a crack in the wall, praying that there were no tiny spiders that would crawl into my long, matted hair.

I threw my [Mantle] across the crack. It wouldn’t stop the beetle trying to eat me, but it made me just a hair harder to detect. Skills, for example, couldn’t easily penetrate my [Mantle], which included detection skills.

The beetle lumbered off, and I breathed a sigh of relief. It wasn’t the first level 500+ monster I’d bumped into down here, and wouldn’t be the last. I was a believer in the Below Levels now, having seen the occasional monster come up.

I wandered through another tunnel, idly checking my status.

[Name: Elaine]

[Race: Human]

[Age: 20]

[Mana: 327390/327390]

[Mana Regen: 260367 (+273193.2)]

Stats

[Free Stats: 34]

[Strength: 862]

[Dexterity: 1250]

[Vitality: 9246]

[Speed: 9246]

[Mana: 32739]

[Mana Regeneration: 32816 (+27319.32)]

[Magic Power: 15553 (+244959.75)]

[Magic Control: 15553 (+244959.75)]

[Class 1: [The Dawn Sentinel - Celestial: Lv 375]]

[Celestial Affinity: 375]

[Cosmic Presence: 286]

[Solar Infusion: 110]

[Center of the Universe: 375]

[Dance with the Heavens: 375]

[Wheel of Sun and Moon: 311]

[Mantle of the Stars: 375]

[Sunrise: 198]

[Class 2: [Butterfly Mystic - Radiance: Lv 333]]

[Radiance Affinity: 333]

[Radiance Resistance: 333]

[Radiance Conjuration: 333]

[Lantern: 261]

[Nectar: 333]

[Sun's Heart: 333]

[Scintillating Ascent: 287]

[Kaleidoscope: 333]

[Class 3: Locked]

General Skills

[Long-Range Identify: 368]

[Pristine Memories: 210]

[Sneaking: 211]

[Bullet Time: 299]

[Oath of Elaine to Lyra: 315]

[Sentinel's Superiority: 375]

[Persistent Casting: 290]

[Passionate Learning: 358]

My status helpfully told me just how horribly lost I’d gotten myself. It was clearly summer - at least! - above ground, and I’d passed by a birthday, all while stuck down below here.

Did mom and dad celebrate without me? Did they throw a "Our little girl’s 20!" party? Did they put out a nice meal, hoping against hope that I’d pull off a miracle, and manage to drop in just in time?

Or was it a sad day, mom crying in my room, fearing, believing that she’d never see her baby girl again? Did dad believe I’d fallen victim to some horrible fate? Did he bug Night, checking once a week if I’d been found, if he’d heard any word of me?

I had to get out of here.

My musings were interrupted by a new sound, a wet squelching noise, unfamiliar to me. It was the most vile noise I’d ever heard, nothing excluded. A wet sack of excrement being slapped to the floor, a stomach filled with rotted meat being dragged. The mere sound of movement was enough to skeeve me out.

I wanted nothing to do with it.

I turned back, away from the noise, hitting a long corridor I’d passed by earlier. I turned the corner and froze.

At the other end of the corridor was a monstrosity. Like a fat slug worming its way through the tunnel, the pale grey fleshy thing scrunched up, then slowly slid forward, mucus, ooze, and deadly acid sliming its body. It had a number of reaching, grasping tentacles, waving in the air, patting all around the tunnel.

As I watched it, it scrunched up and slowly pushed itself forward, a maggot burrowing into flesh. The sound though?

It didn’t come from the monster. No, in perfect time with its movement, it echoed from deeper in the mines. Anything trying to flee from the monster based on sound would find itself turned around, running back to its grasp.

In front of the monster, which I hadn’t noticed until now due to the sheer grotesqueness of said slug, was a giant mole-like creature.

I said giant, but that was relative. It came maybe waist-high to me.

It had sweat pouring off of it, and it was panting as it struggled to put one foot in front of the next. I watched with hypnotic horror as it struggled to take a step, then limbs trembling, tried to slowly take another step.

The limb landed, but failed to hold its weight, the giant-mole-thing collapsing to the ground, glassy-eyed and panting with exhaustion. The big nope-sack slowly crawled forward, tentacles feeling over the giant mole who tried to push them off, but didn’t have the heart or the energy to do so.

It seemed resigned to its fate, as the horror slowly reeled it in, enveloping it in its flesh.

Not even bothering to kill it before starting to eat and digest it.

In my pity, I sent a single [Kaleidoscope] butterfly to the mole, landing it deep inside its mouth, frozen in a silent scream. I detonated it, getting a kill notification, putting the poor beast out of its misery.

The giant leech-like thing waved its tentacles around wildly, but I was far out of reach. I continued to watch in fascinated horror as it calmed down, and kept oozing forward.

Even as I watched, some of my tasty spider-chow frantically bailed from one of the numerous small cracks that they could impossibly fit into, the sound-based creatures running from the noise.

Directly into its flesh.

Getting glued on, oozed over as their frantic, high-pitched spider screams tried to warn their fellows of danger.

Some heeded it. Some recognized that something was wrong, and their "run away from the spiders yelling pain" was greater than their "run away from the noise of the monster" instinct.

Others weren’t so fortunate, and the monster feasted.

[Inevitable Shluggoth] [Long-Range Identify] brought back, and I had no idea where to even begin trying to classify something yellow.

I promptly activated [Scintillating Ascent], and let myself slowly drift away, not making a sound.

I thought I’d been seeing creatures from the Below Levels.

No.

Now it was obvious that I’d been encountering the dregs, the rejects, the creatures that lurked at the edges of it. The Inevitable Shluggoth was the first creature that I could believe was a true denizen of the Below Levels, and I was no longer under any illusions.

It was one of the weaker members, to be so far out from the levels, to be so far alone.

I turned on my heel, and forced myself to walk into the sound of the monster, feeling myself get all sorts of jittery as I turned blind corners into the sound of impending death.

I rounded one corner, just to see a spider on the wall.

I didn’t quite scream, that instinct had been thoroughly beaten out of me, but I did unleash everything I had on it. It rapidly became too crispy to eat.

My heart was going a million miles an hour, and I couldn’t even wipe my sweaty palms against anything. Blasted armor was in the way.

I picked up the pace, moving at what was normally an unwise speed, around corners, looking to get higher up. Away from the Shluggoth.

Finally, after a few solid hours - or so I thought - of running, I slowed. I found a spot to rest, grabbed some water, and started munching on a spider-snack.

I had a somewhat relaxing meal of spider-and-water, along with something I caught along the way. Dunno what it was, but it was a tasty variation to my diet. I was starting to get concerned about scurvy, since my healing, for whatever reason, couldn’t fix a poor diet. Normally, I’d have developed scurvy ages ago, but I was guessing vitality was giving me a hand? I had fantastic Earth knowledge of medicine. I was clueless when it came to the interaction of stats - specifically vitality - on medicine.

That, or some of the classic signs - joint pain, bruises, bleeding gums, and the like - were instantly healed away as soon as they occurred.

Either way, I had a bit of a relaxing break. Not every moment was running, hiding, and fighting. I’d wear myself ragged if I tried to. No, I needed a bit of relaxation time here and there, even though there was practically nothing to do.

I finished my R&amp;R time, and I was starting to settle in for a few hours of sleep when I heard the unmistakable noise of the Shluggoth. I blew a raspberry as I got up, invigorating myself with [Sunrise]. Off I go!

I took a sharp turn, then mostly went straight, getting myself out of the Shluggoth’s path. I settled down again, and was drifting off to sleep when I heard the sickening splattering noise again, as the Shluggoth wormed its way through the tunnels.

I huffed in annoyance. The sound misdirection it was running made it hard to tell which direction, exactly, I needed to go.

Still. I picked a direction, and used [Scintillating Ascent] to drift through the tunnels, not allowing my feet to touch the ground, minimizing my light usage. I wasn’t going to give any vibrations or the like to give away my position.

I went for about an hour this time, tiredness and my increased speed making me feel like I could take a shortcut. I finally found a resting spot to take a quick catnap, and my eyes were shutting, sleep was closing in, when I heard a noise.

The Shluggoth.

My eyes flew open, and I made it to one of the hallways, slowly walking as I considered.

The Shluggoth seemed to be chasing me. Normally, with its speed, I wouldn’t be concerned. However, its level, and what happened to that giant mole was still fresh in my mind.

It clicked when I considered its full name.

The Inevitable Shluggoth.

If I had any coins and anyone to bet with, I’d say it hunted by wearing its prey down to the point of exhaustion, then slowly eating it, or trapping its prey in a dead-end, then leisurely grabbing and eating its prey.

Now, it seemed to be targeting me.

I discarded the idea of it giving up chasing me. It was an endurance hunter, and my only hope was to get so far from it that it lost track of me, or I ended up somewhere it couldn’t go.

There might be a better decision, but I was going to make this one. I sprinted off, tearing around corners at inadvisable speeds, occasionally needing to flare [Scintillating Ascent] to make hairpin reversals as I turned the corner into another high-level monster - or just to float over one of the larger bodies of water.

There were things in the water. Things I’d never seen, just seen the edges of. It was why I avoided large bodies of water till now.

I didn’t feel I had a choice.

I ran, sprinted, and flew my way through the tunnels, furiously eating my spider snacks as quickly as I could to help fuel my gigantic mana usage - and to lighten my load!

Chest heaving, I stopped in a place I’d never been to before - not that that was hard to do. No, more importantly, the tunnels looked a little different, which was practically a miracle in and of itself.

While the old tunnels looked like they’d been melted and reformed, by lava - or, as I was thinking, by monsters like the Inevitable Shluggoth and its oozing, acidic skin, melting and reforming rock behind it - I was at the start of a new section, that looked blackened and charred, somehow burning rocks.

My mind immediately sprang to the dwarven forges. The huge constructs belched flames, and I could easily imagine them venting ‘waste’ into the tunnels. Sure, I was on the wrong end of them, but it was a promising start. If they somehow belched flame into the corridor while I was here, I was mostly confident that I could protect myself against flaming waste, between my shield, my healing, and the non-lethal nature of the "attack."

Sure, it could be super-hot, and I might find myself in a bad spot, but the low risk, compared to the threat behind me, seemed to be an acceptable trade-off.

I noticed as I started to go in that there was a fine layer of ash on the ground. The ash started to grow thicker and heavier the deeper I went, encouraging me. The ash seemed mostly undisturbed, which to me suggested that the forges were not in active use.

My foot hit something in the deep ash, and I knelt down, dusting away the ash. Some twisted, melted metal emerged, bolstering my confidence. If metal could be blasted out, if it needed tunnels this large, maybe, just maybe, the vent of the forge was large enough that I could flat-out squeeze in, instead of banging on the outside.

Sure, it’d be awkward. "Hi, I’m a human sneaking in the backdoor from the forges. I’m covered in soot and haven’t had a bath in weeks. Mind letting me in?"

It was somewhat risky, but I figured I could shout from a distance, check where I was, and see if I could negotiate passage. I felt like this was a lot more doable than trying to yell at armed patrols in the mines, who were more inclined to shoot first and ask questions later. My thinking was that smiths would be more inclined to be chatty, and have a nice conversation.

If nothing else, smiths were less lethal than [Warrior]s and [Mage]s of the same level.

My big fear was a closed forge vent, where I couldn’t get in, and the forge on the other side was too big for anyone to hear me pounding on it. That’d have to be one heck of a giant forge, but hey. Dwarves, skills, big architecture. Giant forges would be totally in-line. I figured smiths had a bunch of points in vitality, which would make hearing me easier.

I kept going down the charred tunnel, before reaching an incredibly obvious-looking intersection. The rocks were cracked and charred in this part of the tunnel, and the ash was fairly deep. At the same time, one portion of the wall suddenly, abruptly, looked exactly like a normal tunnel.

Yeah. Sure. This one moderate portion of the tunnel JUST SO HAPPENED to be completely untouched by whatever terrible flames regularly went through here.

I also got to see what my [Lantern] skill meant by "minor illusion detection." Looking at the wall, I felt a tiny, subtle itch in the back of my mind. I might not have noticed it without already being on the lookout for illusions, but now that I was thinking about it?

Yeah, totally obvious. This was an illusion if I’d ever seen one. It was like the creator made a perfect illusion for how the stone had been once upon a time, but didn’t consider what it’d be like after a ton of flames went through.

I pressed my hand up against the Mirage wall, frowning as it felt exactly like solid stone. It didn’t let me pass through it, which was weird. I didn’t think illusions could become solid - and when I’d talked with Magic about it, he’d confirmed something similar to me.

I focused [Lantern] on the wall, briefly turning it to moderate-power. I didn’t want to blow my mana.

[*Ding!* [Lantern] leveled up! 261->262]

Aww yes, that’s what I was talking about.

[*Ding!* [Lantern] leveled up! 262->263]

More levels!

[*Ding!* [Lantern] leveled up! 264->265]

I made a split-second decision to maximize how much power I was putting in. This experience was insane! I wanted to milk it for all it was worth.

[*Ding!* [Lantern] leveled up! 265->266]

[*Ding!* [Lantern] leveled up! 266->267]

[*Ding!* [Lantern] leveled up! 267->268]

[*Ding!* [Lantern] leveled up! 268->269]

Wow, this was crazy. The illusion was holding as well, the Inscriptions had to be crazy good!

[*Ding!* [Lantern] leveled up! 269->270]

Or fueled by a ton of Arcanite.

[*Ding!* [Lantern] leveled up! 270->271]

I hope it wasn’t fueled by a ton of Arcanite. There might legit be more mana fueling it than I could counter.

[*Ding!* [Lantern] leveled up! 271->272]

Even considering that I’d forced the illusion to spend hundreds or thousands of points of mana for every point I spent breaking it.

[*Ding!* [Lantern] leveled up! 272->273]

Oh, but the experience was so good.

[*Ding!* [Lantern] leveled up! 273->274]

Maybe I’d ask them if I could train my skills here a bit?

[*Ding!* [Lantern] leveled up! 274->275]

They might not be too happy if it cost them a ton of Arcanite though.

[*Ding!* [Lantern] leveled up! 275->276]

Even if it recharged.

[*Ding!* [Lantern] leveled up! 276->277]

Unless there was a master Mirage classer on the other side.

[*Ding!* [Lantern] leveled up! 277->278]

They might be ok with me training skills with them.

[*Ding!* [Lantern] leveled up! 278->279]

I can’t imagine how high of a level they must have for [Lantern] to struggle so much with their illusion.

[*Ding!* [Lantern] leveled up! 279->280]

Hang on.

[*Ding!* [Lantern] leveled up! 280->281]

Master Mirage classer?

[*Ding!* [Lantern] leveled up! 281->282]

Underground?

[*Ding!* [Lantern] leveled up! 282->283]

Fiery remains of ash and metal?

[*Ding!* [Lantern] leveled up! 283->284]

[*Ding!* [Lantern] leveled up! 284->285]

...

[*Ding!* [Lantern] leveled up! 332->333]

[*Ding!* Congratulations! [The Dawn Sentinel] has leveled up to level 375->377! +3 Dexterity, +24 Speed, +24 Vitality, +170 Mana, +170 Mana Regen, +48 Magic power, +48 Magic Control from your Class per level! +1 Free Stat for being Human per level! +1 Mana, +1 Mana Regen from your Element per level!]

[*ding!* Congratulations! [Butterfly Mystic] has leveled up to level 333->338! +8 Strength, +8 Dexterity, +70 Speed, +70 Vitality, +70 Mana, +70 Mana Regen, +70 Magic power, +70 Magic Control from your Class per level! +1 Free Stat for being Human per level! +1 Strength, +1 Mana Regen from your Element per level!]

[*Ding!* [Passionate Learning] leveled up! 358->360]

[*Ding!* [Sneaking] leveled up! 211->215]

The rest of my notifications were compressed, capped skills re-capping.

My heart dropped, grabbing my stomach as both plunged into my toes. At the speed of thought, just a hair too late, I turned off [Lantern].

It was too late.

The Mirage had broken, a sloppy, slap-dash job taking nearly all my remaining mana to break.

But it had broken, and I could see behind it, revealing the horrific truth.

I started sweating and trembling, considered fleeing, taking my chances with the [Inevitable Shluggoth]. My odds would be a million times better than what laid in front of me.

I stifled a laugh of despair, one that would surely be my last.

Through the hole in the wall, briefly narrowing into a crack, I stared into the lair of Lun’Kat.

I stared at Lun’Kat, The Stygian Deceiver, sleeping deep in her lair.

And she was hurt.

Chapter 221 - Beneath the Dragon’s Eyes I

I froze in indecision, staring at the dragon, deep in her lair, hearing the creeping sound of the Shluggoth slow right down as [Bullet Time] activated.

I blinked, realizing that I could see in spite of all my skills being turned off. I’d gotten used to the complete and totally pitch black darkness when I’d turned off the lights, the total blindness that came with the absolute absence of light. Lun’Kat’s lair had soft lighting coming from a dozen different directions.

I tried to swallow around the mango-sized lump in my throat.

Behind me was death. Slow, creeping, dissolved alive death.

In front of me was death. Violent, burning, possibly crunching death. Or clawed, or whipped by her tail, or crushed, or magicked, or… the possibilities were honestly endless.

I’ll just call it swift, screaming death and leave it at that.

To the side was a continuation of the tunnel, an escape route. It’d be a great escape route, continuing my cat-and-mouse game with the Inevitable Shluggoth.

If it wasn’t for my [Oath].

I’d sworn to heal everyone. I’d sworn to not discriminate, to not see injured people as anything other than a creature in pain that needed help.

There wasn’t a shred of doubt in my mind that Lun’Kat, for all the violent tendencies I’d seen out of her, was incredibly intelligent.

There wasn’t a shred of doubt that she was badly injured, and in need of medical attention.

What gave me a moment’s hesitation, what had my feet frozen to the ground, amidst the ashes of the dwarves who’d tried to evict her, was her retaliation.

When the dwarves had tried to evict her, she hadn’t just killed the countless dwarves who’d bothered her in her own lair. No, she’d made an example of an entire country, burning and razing it to the ground. A reminder that she was not to be trifled with, and the penalty for doing so.

The distinction that she’d killed the innocent wood-based Nolgardian dwarves, and not the guilty metal-loving Khazadians, was either lost on her, or she didn’t care.

If I tried to leave, the penalty from [Oath] would cripple me, leaving me screaming on the floor. Either Lun’Kat would wake up and end my miserable screams interrupting her nap, or she’d sleep through it until the Shluggoth caught up to me and ate my unresisting body.

Behind me lay certain death.

To the side lay certain death.

In front of me lay extremely likely death, along with potentially getting a large number of humans killed in the process.

Once I’d spent some time I didn’t have thinking, the choice was obvious. I was too young to die, too attached to life. I’d designed an immortality skill for myself, for crying out loud. I was going to literally walk into the dragon’s lair just to have a small chance at living.

I immediately blew one of my two remaining [Invisibility with Eyeholes] gems, as well as [Tracks-be-gone] and [Muffle]. If there ever was a time to use every last tool in my arsenal, it was now.

I took a step forward, my legs seemingly dragging in water as [Bullet Time] was helpfully speeding my perception of time up to ludicrous extents, at the price that I got to watch everything I did in slow-motion.

Usually incredibly helpful. Right now? Yaaaaay.

[*ding!* [Oath of Elaine to Lyra] has leveled up! 315 -> 316]

I jumped at the notification, thanking every god and goddess in the great heavens above that I’d already activated [Muffle] before I’d rattled and clanked my armor against the stone. I disabled all my notifications, figuring that seeing them wouldn’t help, and them going off at the wrong moment could kill me.

Heck, for all I knew Lun’Kat would be able to hear them!

Invisibility for sight. Muffle for sound. Tracks to remove the last little bits of evidence. No smell, no footprints in the lair, nothing. I briefly considered that Lun’Kat could detect magic - she had noticed my [Identify] during the fight - but I was super dead either way. Might as well take my chances.

Night was going to totally kill me when I got back. The idea of meeting up with my family, then going into hiding was briefly considered, then filed away in the I AM SNEAKING INTO A DRAGON’S LAIR, DO NOT DISTURB section of my brain.

However, as I was walking into her lair, specifically as I was squeezing through the crack to get in, a brilliant thought popped into my head.

Lun’Kat had to have her own exit to the surface!

My poor heart was already going at high speed, and the added excitement was almost too much for it. The thought of an exit, of freedom, of being able to feel the sun on my face and wind in my hair almost caused me to make a mistake.

[Bullet Time] was making the world seem like it was slow enough that I could catch myself.

I finished entering Lun’Kat’s lair. I took a look around, repressing the urge to whistle.

What did an immortal dragon, the apex of the world, do in her spare time?

Well, according to the dwarves, according to what I saw in front of me, the answer was: Collect stuff.

Like the world’s richest, maddest [Collector of all Things], Lun’Kat had collections and series of everything in well-organized sections all throughout her lair.

First was the lair itself. It seemed dramatically larger on the inside than what was suggested as I was peeking in. Heck, given that four steps away there was a corridor leading back the way I’d come from, which should have overlapped the tunnel I’d come from but didn’t, suggested that powerful Spatial magic was at play. I was unsure if Lun’Kat was the origin of said magic, or if she’d found a spatially compressed cave to take over and claim for herself. Crystals of all sort were scattered through the cave, a number of them glowing. I recognized some as Arcanite, and glowing inscriptions were centered on each one, sprawling outwards and connecting with the rest of them.

One of the glowing crystals was near where I exited, and I was able to get a good look at it. A tiny winged figure was trapped, frozen inside the crystal, mouth twisted in a terrified scream. She had delicate features, with delicate clear wings, and she was the reason the crystal was glowing, Lun’Kat using nothing but one of the most dangerous creatures in existence to light her home.

She’d trapped a fairy, to use as a wall lamp.

Somehow, in spite of my invisibility, of using every trick I had to remove every trace of my passage, in spite of being in solid crystal, the fairy’s tortured eyes followed my every movement, begging for release that I could not grant.

That was only the beginning.

An angel was bound to the ceiling, hung like a chandelier. Cloth wrappings acted like chains, binding her, making it impossible for her to move. Her sword was wrapped tight in her hand, trapped and captured, impossible to let go.

She still glowed with divine light, still had the occasional spark of divine fire ignite and sputter out. Nothing but the most expensive, deadly, premium lights for Lun’Kat.

I briefly eyed her, wondering if I was about to get trapped again. I practically breathed a sigh of relief when I saw she was entirely unhurt, and didn’t need medical attention.

[Oath]-trap number seven: Injured angel hanging from the ceiling. I didn’t expect it to be a common occurrence.

Murals stretched along the cave, primarily depicting Lun’Kat in various poses and figures of what I assumed must be draconic prowess. Occasionally, a second white dragon would join her in these pictures, a long, sinuous creature, with no wings, and long flowing whiskers. A few of the murals depicted Lun’Kat and the other dragon closely entwined with each other. Each mural was carefully lit by prisoners from another realm, with a few being lit by large glowing pillars. I squinted at one, only to realize it was Arcanite, as large as The Heart from the middle of Remus’s capital, and she had dozens of them casually scattered about as mood lighting.

Below that was the ground level, and just looking at it sent greedy pangs through my body. Autumn would’ve had an aneurysm seeing the place, and I could understand why the dwarves’ greed overcame their common sense. Just the main chamber alone would set me up for my eternal life - me, and my thousand closest friends would never want for a single thing for all eternity.

A huge pit dominated the center, loaded with furs, wool, cotton, and soft things of every type. It took a moment of looking at it with a puzzled look on my face for it to click.

It was her bed. Made comfortable with the furs of thousands of the most luxurious pelts Lun’Kat could find.

Which inevitably drew my eye to Lun’Kat, sleeping on what looked like a pile of metal and gems and other valuables, casually heaped together. I instantly dubbed the pile "Mt. Loot", for the obvious reasons. Even as I watched, she shifted in her sleep, sending a cascade of ores and unrefined crystals cascading down.

I opened my mouth in a silent scream, sure that my end was here.

Ba-dum. My last heartbeat.

Ba-dum. My last heartbeat.

Ba-dum. My la-ok, she wasn’t waking up and murdering me dead.

I narrowed my eyes at her comfortable bed, and her significantly less comfortable sleeping spot, before noticing a streak of dark-red on some of the metal she was on.

She didn’t want to bleed all over her nice bed.

Seriously?!

Was I really dealing with a dragon, and not some pampered princess?

Then again, if my claws were gigantic, and my furs tiny, I might not want to ruin a few dozen of them in one go.

I continued to look around the room, seeing collections of all sorts, literal thousands of years of Lun’Kat going forth and collecting, of her finding hobbies to entertain herself through life.

The art and the murals had been the most obvious, the highest up. I suspected most of what she had wasn’t in her main lair, a dozen side-passages on each side of the main room leading off to other collections. There was one passage directly across from me, and I could faintly see densely-packed dinosaur and monster heads, each one mounted on a plaque.

Gigantic cauldrons filled with all sorts of colored liquids, some still sparking, were neatly stacked on shelves in one part of the room. The next spot held thousands of gems, neatly sorted and organized by gem type, cut, color, and size. A number of them glowed, indicating that they held skills.

Next to that were metals of all types, each one forged into stacks of equal-sized ingots. They were stacked next to each other in color-gradient order, and some more common metals were significantly larger than some rarer metals.

Even as I watched, one of the piles arced lightning, while another one shimmered through the colors of the rainbow. A third was almost impossible to see, hiding in darkness, while a fourth was nearly transparent.

They weren’t mere metals. They were a vast hoard of magic metals. With the amount Lun’Kat had here, I could believe she was a significant factor in them being rare.

A dragon-size bookshelf tempted me, weathered scrolls as thick as I was tall stacked on top of each other. They were behind glass, and I had a feeling that this was only the "rare and valuable" collection, and that a full library waited in one of the passageways off the main lair. Terrible, terrible ideas were running through my head.

Surely, one scroll wouldn’t be missed? Right…?

Right next to her bed, in a seeming place of honor, were a number of knick-knacks I couldn’t quite see the point of. A rock. A broken eggshell. Half a bone. A melted helmet. A pair of dragon-sized boots. What dragon needed boots? A half-dozen scales, only one that looked like hers. A half-shredded giant stuffed toy, stitched like a dragon. It was well-loved, and missing an eye. A crudely carved statue, covered in clawmarks from an unskilled craftsman, depicting Lun’Kat and two small dragons. A few other pieces that didn’t look particularly valuable.

The only thing I could think of was they were each imbued with powerful magic - or were mementos, tokens of emotional significance. Memories of loved ones. Her kids, making her a mother’s century present.

There was an egg collection. Looking at it, I realized it wasn’t just eggs, and I would’ve felt a surge of avarice if I didn’t already have liquid greed running through my body. They were arranged in tiers on the floor, with the lowest tiers being large, but mundane-looking eggs against the wall. Then more fantastical eggs caught my eye. One medium-sized one had sparks coming off it, while another’s shell seemed to be made out of shifting sand. A third one I literally couldn’t keep my eyes on - it hurt just to look at it - while a fourth one had a slow, lazy trickle of smoke coming off of it. Some had bumps all over the place, while at least three were cubes.

Some needed some special containment. One was in a clearly-defined magical containment field, with a second being in an aquarium. Dozens more were around, each more fantastical than the next.

In front of the collection, clearly in a place of pride, were nine… well, calling them eggs was a bit of a stretch, not all were.

The first egg was waist-high on me, and so thin I could see the long jaw, sharp teeth, and closed eyes of the dinosaur inside. The juvenile status, the haze from the shell not being transparent, and the twisted contortion to stay inside the egg meant I couldn’t tell which dinosaur, exactly, it was. Not that my dinosaur knowledge outside of Remus was that good in the first place.

Next to it was a sapling. In a pot. A potted plant somehow had made the list of "most valuable eggs", and yeah. I didn’t know what to make of that.

A clutch of small chicken-sized red eggs with golden lines snaking through them like cracks was next to the sapling. It was one of the only sets of eggs that had multiples, instead of one big egg.

Next to that was a sight that made my eyes sparkle, and the urge to go squeeeeee was overwhelming. I bit down on my tongue to stop myself.

Next to the eggs, frozen in stasis, one hoof up, was the most adorable white pony! Eyeing it a little closer, noticing the silver mane and golden hooves, it had clicked, and was the reason for my completely over-the-top reaction.

No, not a pony. It was the most adorable baby unicorn! Oh my god oh my god I wanted it! It was frozen here, being used as decoration. It should be free! Out in the world, running wild… with me on its back.

It better be alive. It better be alive! Ooooh, I’d…

The blasphemous thought of what I’d do to whoever hurt the baby unicorn, and who, exactly, that was, was like a bucket of ice cold water over me.

Right. Dragon’s lair. Sleep-deprivation was getting to me, causing me to be distracted, make bad mistakes.

I checked on the unicorn’s level, and just got back a white [Foal]. Interesting - the System considered it intelligent. Otherwise it would’ve come back as [Unicorn], instead of the child equivalent.

In the center, in the place of glory, the only one on a pedestal, was what looked like a perfectly round portal to the night sky. It seemed to be panning through the stars and galaxies, a burning star here, a constellation there. The glittering night sky and a wheeling spiral galaxy. Dozens of Celestial images slowly showed on the shell. The only hint it was an egg, and not a portal to space, was its location among all the other eggs.

Moving my head around, I noticed it was perfectly spherical. What manner of fantastical creature could hatch from this? Also. It was totally Celestial, and that seemed to be exactly me!

A leathery, rainbow-colored egg was next, knee-high on me. Green lightning occasionally sparked up from it, only for it to crash against a cage made out of magic, briefly flaring into visibility as it stopped the lightning.

An aquarium held a pair of eggs. One was a standard-looking monstrous egg, with swirling stripes in dark blue against the dark green egg. The second was a whole cluster of tiny eggs, each the size of my thumbnail. Tiny tentacles were all over the place, visible through the dark exterior.

Lastly, there was a small, fist-sized white, leathery egg, with what looked like a second egg merged into it. It was like Lun’Kat had taken two eggs, chopped one in half, and glued it onto the second one.

I started to carefully walk towards Lun’Kat, cursing as I was going in slow-motion thanks to [Bullet Time]. Gave me plenty of time to keep looking around.

A grand suit of draconic armor had its own stand, the night-black fierce-looking armor covered in dizzying arrays of glowing red runes. A number of weapons were behind it, each scaled up for a dragon to use. A large glaive seemed to be a favored weapon

I did not want to think what would’ve happened if Lun’Kat had decided to arm herself before going on her berserk rampage across the dwarven lands. Would the guardians have even been able to beat her back?

Thinking about that led me to look at Lun’Kat herself. Large, scabbed-over wounds crossed her body, some of them still slowly leaking pus. Her left wing was tattered and broken, awkwardly laid out instead of neatly folded back like her other wing. She was missing a claw from her right foreleg, and coal-black streaks of lightning scars were visible against her night time scales. A long scar was covering her eye, and a chunk of her snout was missing. A few bloody teeth were scattered around Mt. Loot.

I couldn’t see behind her to see what other injuries she had, but what I saw was significant.

As I continued walking towards Lun’Kat, I got to see inside the side-passages, the chambers full of secrets and loot that didn’t quite make the cut to the main lair.

Three whole chambers seemed to be zoos, animals frozen in stasis within carefully built and maintained habitats. Tigers and lions, triceratops and brontosaurus, heck, there was even a rat and an otter, frozen in playful poses!

The number of stasis fields scattered around Lun’Kat’s lair had me deeply concerned. I could easily screw up, put my foot down in the wrong place, and BOOM! I’d be frozen in one of the stasis fields, completely unaware of the world around me. Heck, assuming Lun’Kat kept me, and didn’t burn me or something, I could be in stasis for dozens of years.

Hundreds of years.

Tens of thousands of years.

I’d be trapped until she got bored of me, or somehow, by some miracle, someone unfroze me. Heck, for all I knew I’d turn into some sort of trading figurine!

"Yeah, I’ve got one human, which is worth at least four goblins."

I hoped I was worth more than four goblins.

The chamber next to the rare scroll collection did indeed lead to a dragon-sized library, with endless shelves filled to the ceiling with scrolls, books, clay tablets, and all other manner of methods to record text.

I almost took a detour to investigate.

Surely, Lun’Kat would have some duplicated books that she wouldn’t mind lending out?

A room with a garden, all manner of exotic plants and herbs being grown.

A room that I could only think was a giant fridge, carcasses of animals hung all over, cool air blowing out. Refrigeration by magic. I’d tried to give the idea to Origen, and it hadn’t quite worked out. It was refreshing to see someone else had properly figured it out!

I almost expected to see a kitchen, before remembering that dragons had their own built-in stove.

One room was filled with altars, and sculpted statues of various dragon deities were on each one. A religious dragon? That was new.

Another room was filled with trees, fruit heavy on the limbs. More than a few were broken on the ground, having ripened until breaking point. I did stop here for a moment in indecision, having spotted the most elusive of prey hidden behind a dozen other trees, the bright colors unmistakable for anything else - mango. I took a step towards the side-passage, hunger, months of eating the denizens of the tunnels, and plain old desire mixing with sleep deprivation distracting me enough for a moment that I took a wrong step.

Good common sense reasserted itself quickly enough, and I was back on the move towards Lun’Kat. As I got closer to her, a few more things revealed themselves. What I had to guess was a portal, a massive pitch-black void surrounded by the densest, most complicated Inscriptions I could ever imagine. They were written in at least 24 different colors, layered and overlapping with one another.

Another major item, which had me rubbing my eyes and cursing Lun’Kat’s deceiving ways, and her love of illusions, was an honest-to-god Victorian-era ghost pirate ship. The entire cave and situation was surreal, and if it wasn’t for my healing prowess I’d assume I’d been caught in some illusion or hallucination gas. The ghost pirate ship, that seemed to have a thriving jungle ecosystem on deck, poking through the cannon holes instead of cannons?

Yeah, that had me pinching myself. Either Lun’Kat had an overly active imagination, or the Flying Dutchman-cross-jungle was a real thing.

How peculiar. How odd. Maybe that’s why it was here?

They were just a fraction of the wonders, a small slice of the marvels I saw. Dragon-sized baths, both water and lava, mystical fountains that sang music, wonders large and small were dotted around the cave, glimpsed through dragon-sized side passages. Literal millennia of collected wealth.

Still, as I was on final approach to Lun’Kat, two more things caught my eye, causing me to have a sharp intake of breath as I gazed upon her majestic, sleeping, injured form.

An exit. Freedom to the skies above. In it lay an opportunity, as Lun’Kat was sleeping roughly underneath it.

And the greatest of prizes, the most priceless treasure I could believe existed on Pallos - a clutch of dragon eggs, protectively nestled in her grasp.

Chapter 222 - Beneath the Dragon’s Eyes II

I looked up, and up, and up at Lun’Kat. Part of why I’d been able to see her from the mines was due to whatever spatial shenanigans were going on here.

The much larger part was she was bloody huge! Her claws could skewer me, and I’m pretty sure if she tried to eat me I’d go down the hatch mostly-whole. Maybe crushed by her tongue a bit.

Now that I was so close to her as well, my old, entirely reasonable fears awoke once more. The lizard part of my brain was screaming "ABANDON SHIP! ABANDON SHIP! ALL HANDS ABANDON SHIP!" and was generally making itself into a grade-A nuisance. Heck, even as I tried to inch a little closer, I was trembling furiously.

I hadn’t planned on trying to climb Mt. Loot to get next to Lun’Kat, in large part due to Mt. Loot’s inherent instability, but the fact that I could barely keep myself going, that I’d regularly just stop and pause, trying to wrestle my emotions back under control, reinforced that decision.

Flying was totally out of the question. It’d break my invisibility, and then I’d be touching her. I didn’t believe I could touch Lun’Kat and get away with it. Not in the slightest.

This would be so much easier if I just accepted that I was a dead woman walking, and said acceptance would, ironically, make it easier for me to survive. White Dove seemed like a much gentler way to go, in the end.

I just lacked the proper mindset. It was Black Crow or bust for me. I would fight to my last breath, I would rage against the dying of the light.

Which wasn’t helping right now! Calm and collected would see me through this, not raging against my inevitable fate!

I took another breath.

How was this any different than jumping into a fire? How was this different from charging the Nothasaurus with the Rangers? Both led to death. Both I wasn’t terribly likely to walk away from.

This was just another fire. Just another monster that could casually end me with a thought. When had I gotten so soft?

The lies I was telling myself worked.

I faced my fears. I acknowledged them. I recognized they were valid, and I let them flow through me. I embraced them.

I was still terrified, but I was no longer trying to hold my fear back. It weighed heavily on my limbs, but unrestrained, it didn’t make me tremble. It was no longer an albatross around my neck. It was a simple reminder that what I was doing was dangerous, and to take utmost care in how I dealt with Lun’Kat. It helped sharpen my senses, focus my entire being on the problem in front of me. My attention wouldn’t be broken by distractions, I was hyper-focused on Lun’Kat.

Onto the patient herself. I’d viewed her injuries, and while extensive, I believed my [Dance with the Heavens] could handle the problem.

At a massive penalty, but still. It wasn’t outside the realm of possibility.

I cursed that I’d decided not to take the "heals monsters" aspect to [Cosmic Presence]. If I thought [Cosmic Presence] could do the job for me, I’d literally just hide somewhere in the cave, out of easy sight, and spend my time praying to any god or goddess that could hide me.

NOPE. I wasn’t nearly that lucky. I had to do this the hard way. The only thing I thought might keep me alive was the exit.

Namely, Lun’Kat, being a dragon, had a modest exit located at the top of her lair. It made it a little harder for someone to just wander in, although I had to wonder how she handled dumb sheep falling in or something.

Wasn’t important.

What was important was that the exit looked up at the sky.

It was currently night time, and I circled around Lun’Kat, until I was roughly between her and the exit, the hole in the ceiling. Then, I waited, each second stretched into intolerable lengths by [Bullet Time] stretching my perception.

Lun’Kat currently wasn’t in danger of dying. As long as my actions were aimed towards healing her, as long as I didn’t abandon her and continued to put effort forth to heal her, I was within the bounds of my [Oath]. That meant, for example, that I could wait to heal with with [Wheel of Sun and Moon], instead of flying up to touch Lun’Kat directly. I firmly believed, no matter how successfully I was sneaking around in her lair, that if I touched Lun’Kat, she’d notice, and kill the intruder that was laying hands on her while she slept, injured.

Eventually - minutes, hours, I don’t know my sense of time was totally off - the event I was waiting for occurred. The moons rose, shining through the entrance to Lun’Kat’s lair. I slowly watched their light creep through her cave as they performed their own dance across the sky, and finally the light touched the edges of Lun’Kat.

This was the moment I’d been waiting for. For a short, brief moment the light of the moons was both touching Lun’Kat, and low enough on Mt. Loot that I was still in it.

It was time for [Wheel of Sun and Moon] to come out and play, after being stuck underground for months.

I worked quickly. While I was behind Lun’Kat, the scars and burns that lightning bolts had inflicted upon her were a full-body experience. Lichtenberg figures usually faded quickly, but there was magic at work here, and I could believe they had burned channels through her body.

Without a detailed look at them, without knowing Lun’Kat’s anatomy well, I could only make educated guesses how she worked, and what, exactly, was going on with her injuries. Still, every little bit of efficiency was needed, and having formed what I thought was the best image I could in the time I had, I unleashed my [Dance with the Heavens], focusing on clearing out those injuries.

To my dismay, only a modest patch of the scars vanished with roughly 290,000 points of my mana. A heartbeat later, and the circle of healed lightning scars expanded a small amount, as my remaining 50,000 and change mana vanished down her metaphorical throat.

As long as it didn’t become her literal throat, I’d be fine.

I was eating a moderate distance penalty between myself and Lun’Kat, but the real killer was my piss-poor knowledge of draconic anatomy combined with my healing not being at all attuned towards dragons. My inability to properly know and understand her injuries wasn’t helping, and Lun’Kat was enormous. All of these penalties multiplicatively stacked with each other. Heck, it was practically a miracle that my skills were taking hold and having any sort of impact in the first place!

I’d also been taking a quick peek at my new and improved level while looking at my status, and even as I watched it was going up.

My non-existent tombstone would read: "Here lies Elaine. Highest-leveled human healer, her record breaking stayed unknown."

I quickly looked around me, seeing the pillars of glowing Arcanite. I spent a bit of time thinking about it, hesitated, then figured should head over anyways, and do my thinking along the way. I started walking towards the nearest one, which happened to be near the egg collection.

I had all the time in the world to think as I was speeding over to the Arcanite, and no matter what I decided to do, I wasn’t staying near Lun’Kat.

Grabbing mana from Lun’Kat’s Arcanite was arguably suicidal. Squinting at it, looking at it sideways, it was stealing from a dragon. A crime worthy of the death penalty, from all my knowledge on the subject. Other capital crimes I’d committed, according to dragon-lore: Breaking and entering, trespassing, seeing Lun’Kat injured, seeing Lun’Kat’s treasures, and the biggest sin of them all, seeing Lun’Kat’s intimate paintings.

I’d realized, after all, that was what the picture of her and the other dragon closely entwined were.

At the same time, it sped the process up significantly. Instead of waiting for all my mana to regenerate, I could get another bout of healing in, which multiplied the speed I was working at by a significant factor. If, say, Lun’Kat woke up once a week to chow down regardless of how hurt she was, I did not want to be in the cave when that happened.

By the time I reached the Arcanite pillar, my mind was made up. I was in for a coin, I might as well be in for a rod. I’d nick a little bit of mana from the dragon, because it was just going right back into the dragon herself. I was already super dead if I was noticed, and Lun’Kat’s collections indicated a keen, intelligent mind. I could only bank on her deciding "well, maybe I’m short a bit of mana that’ll recharge in a minute, but all that mana went back to healing me, so it’s ok."

… Yeah. HA. Like I’d be that lucky. Probably more like "You disgusting selkie how dare you violate my lair and put your grubby paws on my stuff. Dragons just naturally shed their injuries away, don’t you know?"

Then fire, brief screaming, and back into the cycle of Samsara I’d go.

I touched the pillar, and tried to pull the mana into me. It came, but only with great reluctance, like I was pulling teeth. It did not want to leave, and my thinking was Lun’Kat had somehow super-attuned the Arcanite to herself. It was a shame the pillar wasn’t in the light touching Lun’Kat, otherwise this would be a breeze.

I hoped she wouldn’t detect my transgressions. If she’d demonstrated having an Arcanite element, I’d be a lot more worried.

I snuck back over to Lun’Kat, noticing with concern that the moons hadn’t stopped for me and my musings on the subject, and had continued their endless march across the sky. The window where the moonlight was both on Lun’Kat, and low enough to the ground for me to be in it was small to begin with, and while I had high speed to zip around with, it didn’t mean I was going to be full-out sprinting with Lun’Kat here. Good way to knock something over. I was still [Sneaking] around.

When I finally turned my notifications back on, I was going to get some insane [Sneaking] levels. Rather, I was getting [Sneaking] levels, and everything else, passively, in the background. It’s why my mana pool was steadily increasing in size, along with the amount of magic I could use in a moment.

I was still invisible, and I had some thinking to do about how and why the gem was still running. Either way, I reached my hand up, nicking the last bit of moonlight that I could, and focused again on healing her lightning-based scars. Another modest patch of them healed, and a full-body ripple went through Lun’Kat’s body.

I froze in terror, eyes unblinkingly watching her every movement.

She shifted around, stretching out like a languid cat. My heart was racing as she curled back up into a sleeping ball, moving at what I’d consider normal speed.

Forget the fact that I was under the effects of [Bullet Time], and every motion I made took an eternity to complete. Lun’Kat just casually moved at such high speeds that it didn’t seem to matter.

Or rather, I could only half-follow her casual actions thanks to [Bullet Time].

I stood there frozen for I-don’t-know how many minutes, then finally my mind un-blanked enough for me to sprint-sneak away. Yet, even as I took my first step, Lun’Kat moved again, causing me to freeze - and nearly topple over, as I was still trying to take a sneak-sprint step.

It didn’t seem like she’d noticed me. No, she simply scratched her side like a cat, scales flaking off the area I’d healed. Then she settled back down, and I resumed my sneaking away.

I was flat-out of mana, and the moon was no longer in position. I couldn’t do anything more for her. Ok, that wasn’t quite true. I could absolutely fly up to Lun’Kat, touch her nose, and try to heal her that way. It’d be an extremely short healing session, as there was no way in my mind that Lun’Kat wouldn’t be woken up by me touching her. It’d be like a spider crawling across my face while I slept. Absolutely wake me up.

No, [Oath] demanded that I helped. It didn’t require that I perform suicidal measures to try and restore her faster. A slow and steady healing method - as long as it was reasonable - was fine. Leaving her be for now, waiting for the sun to rise for another session, was good enough.

Which didn’t mean I could leave the lair, but I’d be damned if I stayed right next to her. If I was in something that vaguely pretended to be a hiding spot, and Lun’Kat, I dunno, had a bad dream and briefly opened her eyes, or went raiding for a midnight snack, I might be out of the way enough for her to not notice, and survive.

I felt my stomach rumble in a way that would’ve gotten me killed without [Muffle]. Which brought me back to [Muffle], [Invisibility with Eyeholes], and [Tracks-be-gone].

From everything I could tell and knew, they operated off of "how hard" they were working. If I activated [Muffle] then started banging pots and pans, the skill would work hard, then break. There was only so much mana in the gemstone in the first place.

To contrast, if I activated [Muffle] then was as quiet as a mouse, the skill could last hours, days, if not longer. Hence my focus on physically sneaking around, and not just striding in, trusting the gems to keep me safe.

In short: It helped smooth over little wrinkles and flaws, and the less noise I made, the less Lun’Kat looked at my invisible form, the better.

Also, I was starving, and exhausted. I’d been getting chased by the Inevitable Shluggoth before coming here, and it seemed like even that monster had more sense than I did, and wasn’t poking the dragon in her lair. Out of the frying pan, into the maw of the dragon. [Nectar] wasn’t helping, as the boosted regeneration was making me hungry, faster.

I had quite a few choices where to hide. I had a place in mind to sneak towards though. Tip-toeing through Lun’Kat’s lair, I rounded a corner into one of the side passages, not clearly visible from the main lair. More importantly, not visible from Lun’Kat’s perch on Mt. Loot.

The "Orchard room". With dozens of fruiting trees of every type, in neatly arranged dragon-sized rows - the better for Lun’Kat to peruse the current offerings. There were fruits I hadn’t seen since Earth, and a few that I’d seen since being reincarnated here on Pallos. Apples and oranges, bananas and pineapples joined the avocados and cherries, the apricots and coconuts.

There were things in the chamber. A few tightly twisting spirals of cloud and wind went from tree to tree, bush to bush. On occasion one would release a careful trickle of water, properly watering the plants.

I didn’t want to use [Long-Range Identify], not when Lun’Kat had already demonstrated that she could sense it. However, between the mini-twisters, and a few other things roaming the room, I had a weak guess what they were.

I’d never seen or even heard of them before, but I bet they were elementals. Creatures of pure elements, not having any sort of biology or anything, somehow a living, thinking being with no flesh or blood.

I couldn’t even think how I’d fight one. How did one cut through water? Even if it had no skills of its own, even if it lacked a System, it could simply engulf and drown whoever it wanted to. And there was no way they lacked a System to boot, although I’d bet every last coin I had that they were granted System-access.

Above the Storm elementals was a Fire, Light, Radiance, Verdant, or some other elemental, acting as a miniature sun. Some mud or ground elementals slowly lumbered down the paths, occasionally patting trees. Lun’Kat groundskeepers.

A bodacious verdant-green woman, wearing nothing but some leaves and vines, with a crown of flowers in her hair, was ambling through the rows of the orchard with a resigned look. At each tree, she look a look at it, touched a branch or ate a fresh leaf, nodded to herself and moved on.

My best bet was she was examining them for disease or something, and I tried to hide, to make sure I wasn’t near her line of sight. Just a short time - an eternity later - she reached the largest tree, and vanished into it.

Was that a dryad?! Did Lun’Kat keep an Immortal protector of trees as a gardener!?

Her actions drew my attention to the walls of the place, painted a bright blue with some white clouds to mimic the outdoors. That, or it was an illusion - I had a hard time telling, but with Lun’Kat, I could never be sure.

Bushes of berries lined the walls, invisible from the outside. Strawberries, blueberries, and blackberries were only the start of the vast cornucopia that Lun’Kat was growing.

Naturally, no bounty would be complete without the goddess of all fruits, the ambrosia, divine perfection in fleshy form. I spotted it past a dozen trees, the bright color of its fruity goodness instantly drawing my eye.

Mango.

I didn’t let my gluttony get the better of me, as much as I wanted to. I reached for the forbidden fruit, reasoning to myself that, like the Arcanite, I needed to be able to keep going to heal Lun’Kat.

My hand on it, greed in my eyes, I was halfway through twisting it off when I froze, despair crashing through me.

Mangos were the most perfect fruit. Included in their perfection was handy ammo with every fruit, great for braining annoying Rangers. Sure, I’d never managed to hit Julius - he was too fast - but everyone else was fair game. Sadly, the pits meant less edible nectar, but hey! They were still fun.

However, I had to do something with said pits. My mouth, my teeth, for all my vitality and strength, probably couldn’t just bite through a mango pit. I couldn’t discard it - leaving evidence behind? With my saliva on it? Nooooooo. If Lun’Kat didn’t find it, the dryad would. My only hope would be to bury it in one of the dirt elementals, but maybe they’d take it as an attack.

I could try to burn it, but it’d smell, and I imagine a dragon - especially one with a lava bath - had anti-fire precautions, along with a good nose for flames and burning things. She clearly wasn’t in a terribly deep slumber, and I was already taking huge risks here.

I could try to bury the pit, but that was nearly as many problems. I could keep the pit with me, but then [Tracks-be-gone] would be working overtime to keep me alive. It’d break much faster if it needed to preserve a rotting mango pit.

Time to let go. I thought to myself.

My treacherous hand wouldn’t release the mango, half-twisted and ready to be popped off. With effort, I forced myself away from the mango, looking at the sub-par offerings before me.

With a sigh, I forced myself to find other fare. Strawberries, so sweet they felt like the sun kissing my lips with every bite. Blueberries, exploding with flavor on my tongue. Apples, crunchy and filling. The elementals didn’t seem all that bright, but I made sure to perform my filching when none were near, or seemed to be looking at me.

They all paled before the glory of the almighty MANGO that I knew could be mine. My sweet, delicious mango. Oh, how I missed you so.

I was totally going to grab one when I left. Lun’Kat surely wouldn’t begrudge me a single fruit, would she? They grew back after all. The mana in the Arcanite restored itself over time, and fruits grew back. Nothing that would be missed over time.

Either way, I was totally exhausted. I’d think about this more after a good night’s sleep. There literally wasn’t anything else to do, besides wait for the sun to come up, and for me to perform another round of healing on Lun’Kat.

Sleeping inside the garden with the elementals seemed like a mediocre idea. I snuck out to check out a few more chambers. Each one had elemental helpers though, and I gave up after three, figuring that the garden was one of the least-likely places for the meat-eating Lun’Kat to visit, and the thick and wild growth of the bushes and trees could do more to conceal me than the straight, well-laid out and organized chambers from the other rooms.

Still, to be safe, I found some thick blueberry bushes in the most isolated corner I could find, and scuttled under them. I instinctively wrapped myself in [Mantle], before realizing - it was past my invisibility skill!

Terror coursing through my veins, I dropped the skill, not daring to breathe. Had Lun’Kat noticed? Had one of the elementals seen? Would the dryad sound the alarm? Was there some glint of light that had gone off my skill?

Hang on.

I’d used a few healing skills already. What was done was done.

Still, I spent ages staring at the thin branches and ripe berries before I’d calmed down enough. I eventually closed my eyes, and was out like a light.

Chapter 223 - Beneath the Dragon’s Eyes III

I woke up after a nice, long sleep, and had the urge to do a nice, big stretch and yawn.

I remembered where, exactly, I was, and immediately clamped down on that instinct. I looked down to where I should be, only to see dirt, some leaves that had fallen on me while I slept, and a few crushed berries.

I was still invisible - but in my carelessness, I’d left some traces behind. Crushed berries didn’t come out of nowhere, and now I was going to be leaking blue goo, which [Tracks-be-gone] was going to have to work overtime on, reducing the skill’s useful life.

Heck, thinking about it - traipsing through the garden with barely a care in the world was making [Tracks-be-gone] work extra-hard. A footstep on stone was erased in an instant, practically no mana used. Dirt footsteps?

Dirt impressions on the ground where I’d been sleeping?

Oops didn’t begin to cover it.

I checked that the coast was clear, that no elementals were near and like, looking at me, then I scuttled out from the bushes, carefully not touching any of the branches. I wasn’t fully successful, as not being able to see myself at all didn’t help with the finer points of moving around without touching anything. Still, minimal harm was done. Even as I winced after breaking a "branch" of the blueberry bush, I watched it knit and repair itself, the skill working hard.

I’d need to seriously consider a full stealth class for my 3rd class. Being properly stealthy was invaluable, although my current combination of sneakery was using three different elements at once. Mirage, Sound, and Wood.

Thoughts for another day.

However, thoughts for today - I had [Sneaking]. I was willing to bet I’d been offered an upgraded version, even if I couldn’t see the notification yet. I was going to try something crazy.

I was going to see if I could accept a skill that I hadn’t seen the notification of. After all, I’d technically gotten the new skill - I just hadn’t seen the notification.

I willed myself to accept the upgraded [Sneaking] skill - making sure I tried to get whatever one was best for the current situation - and took a quick peek at my status.

[Avoiding The Dragon's Eyes] met my eye, and I pumped my fist. Eking out little bits of survival, here and there!

I didn’t think anything else could easily be upgraded, but I’d take what I could get.

My level was doing good things to boot! Amazing experience here. My [Oath] was also skyrocketing, everything multiplying with each other in the most satisfying way.

I chewed my lips before coming to a decision. I’d been wearing [Tracks-be-gone] for a while now, and the more time I spent in the orchard the worse it’d be. I was going to be here quite a long time to boot, Lun’Kat’s injuries were extensive, and my healing wasn’t doing much. I took my well-abused backpack, slung it in front of me, and started looting, only hitting up trees and bushes in a direct line between where I’d gone to sleep, and the exit to the orchard.

Apples made up the bottom layer, followed by oranges and bananas - all fruits that I could eat whole, that wouldn’t leave evidence that [Tracks-be-gone] would need to erase. I wasn’t looking forward to eating the peels, but push was meeting shove and survival was paramount. I sprinkled the top with some softer berries. The entire time I tried to walk softly, to step in areas with harder, more packed dirt. Needing to dodge the occasional elemental was just the cherry on top. Fortunately for me, the dryad wasn’t around right now.

With one last look of longing at the stand of mango trees, and the forbidden, uneaten fruit, I left the orchard, vowing that I’d get some sort of repayment from Lun’Kat for her effectively denying me gastrointestinal bliss.

I made my way back to the main lair, where the sun was streaming in from the hole in the ceiling. The sun lit up the floor, slowly moving towards Lun’Kat.

Thinking about it - I hadn’t tried it before, but could [Wheel of Sun and Moon] work on indirect sunlight?

I snuck closer to Lun’Kat, and tried to activate the skill, focusing on healing her snout. I had no such luck.

I looked at the sun, slowly creeping across the floor. I refrained from sighing.

Being able to work on Lun’Kat twice per day was going to make this take forever, and dramatically increased the risk that she’d wake up, I’d get caught, roast Elaine, yada yada yada.

Of course, if I went and directly touched her, the same thing would happen. Dragon wakes up, Elaine-on-a-claw, Elaine-in-the-maw, and then I’d see what the afterlife normally looked like. Noooo thank you. If I was that suicidal, I would’ve let the Shluggoth eat me. I was here because I wanted to live.

No. I was going to do this the slow way. It was [Oath]-approved. She was being actively treated, she was getting better. I was here, and doing what I deemed reasonable to leave both patient and doctor alive and well in the end.

While I couldn’t directly heal Lun’Kat right now, there were other things I could do. I slowly, carefully circled her, noting every injury I could see. Every cracked scale, every bent horn. The lightning scars and broken wing, the nasty cuts and missing claws.

For each injury, I catalogued it, then started to make a medical plan. How would I treat it? What was wrong with Lun’Kat? What would be needed to fix it? Each injury, each plan of action, I knew I’d be able to easily retrieve with [Pristine Memories].

I was maybe a quarter of the way through the process when the sun started to reach Lun’Kat. I stopped my diagnosis, and got into position.

Lun’Kat had shifted around somewhat, and her tail was now lower on Mt. Loot. It was enough for the sun to reach her sooner, which allowed me to heal her sooner.

I grabbed the first set of injuries I wanted to handle, and with my pre-made image, immediately blew through all my mana healing it. Without a moment’s hesitation, I sprinted - as softly as I could - over to the Arcanite pillar I’d used last night. I still believed that my [Scintillating Ascent] wings, being made out of Radiance, would destroy my invisibility and strip one of the tiny bits of protection I had. Sure, given Lun’Kat’s incredibly high level, it was probably more like a paper sign saying "Nobody is here", but I never knew. Every little bit helped.

Then again, there was an argument for blowing my invisibility, and using my wings to fly. I’d be quieter, and faster, which would get me out of here sooner. At the same time, if Lun’Kat stirred, she might notice me as a result, especially with the great big glowing wings, saying "INTRUDER HERE!" Lun’Kat was probably the greatest illusionist in the world, and might be able to detect my weak invisibility that I had going for me.

I didn’t know which decision was correct, but I made it, and I was going to stick with it until new information changed my mind.

Knowing the little "trick" to it, how the Arcanite "resisted" and needed a little "twist", I was able to pull mana faster this time, before running back over to Lun’Kat.

A combination of the sun moving slightly differently across the sky, my pre-planning and determination, and Lun’Kat’s tail being lower on Mt. Loot all in all meant that I got fifteen healing sessions in this time, instead of the two I got in last night.

Lun’Kat shifted three times while I was healing her. I didn’t let it bother me - she’d either see me, or she wouldn’t. I was dead if she saw me, and alive if she didn’t. I had achieved a state of serenity about it.

I didn’t draw mana from the pillar while she was moving though. Too risky. She might be able to feel me "tugging" on it, and wake all the way up.

Either way, fifteen rounds of healing later, and the sun’s light was too high for me to reach without flying. It was nicely on Lun’Kat though, and I started to hear dragon-sized purrs come from her as she bathed in the sun.

First she acted like a princess, now like a cat. It was hard to reconcile her with the living incarnation of terror and destruction I’d seen devastating the countryside.

Now that I was done healing, I wanted to make myself scarce. Which meant the main lair was out of the question. I’d love to see what she’d done with her herb and flower gardens, but the dirt problem was rearing its ugly head again. That, and I couldn’t possibly justify going there - it would solely be for my own curiosity. It didn’t help Lun’Kat at all.

No, sadly, tragically, if I wanted to help Lun’Kat I’d need to visit her absolutely massive library. Woe is me. I wanted to see if I could find some books on dragon anatomy, to study them and see if I could improve my healing speed.

I practically skipped to the library, staying all-too-aware that being too loud could break [Muffle], and that I was still deep in the lair of a dragon. I did throw the occasional [Sunrise] at myself, figuring that I should seize the moment to eke out every last level possible.

Still! A chance to legitimately look through a dragon’s hoard of knowledge! I was so happy I could sing!

Naturally, I’d memorized exactly which side-entrance had the books. I approached it, and slowed to a stop.

Did Lun’Kat guard her knowledge as fiercely as everything else? Were there wards and security on the books? Enchantments to stop bookworms from eating everything? Elementals dusting, and patrolling around?

Little spells to slap butterflies trying to eat the books, who wanted nothing more than to snack on some delicious knowledge?

I hesitated, looking around.

Inscriptions covered large amounts of Lun’Kat’s lair. Whatever they were doing, they hadn’t detected a pest like me yet. The doorway to the library looked just like every other side-passage in Lun’Kat’s lair. There wasn’t a layer of special Inscriptions or anything.

Was getting a chance to see Lun’Kat’s library worth the risk of getting caught and eaten? Couldn’t be riskier than covertly trying to heal A DRAGON!

I had to stifle a laugh, biting down on my lower lip.

HA! Of course it was worth the risk!

I gleefully entered the library, looking up in awe. It was like a normal library, except everything was scaled up to be dragon-sized. The shelves, hallways, scrolls and books were all of a size for Lun’Kat to easily read - which meant they were nearly twice my size, and reinforced to boot. The world’s slowest ball of dust rolled through the hallways, a small, compressed cleaner, the winds being more like a puff of air.

Grabbing the most powerful elemental around wasn’t always the right call it seemed.

I had full confidence that I could pull a fairy, or a little mouse, and slowly turn the extra-extra large pages using my full body, one at a time, and read the words inside, drink the tasty nectar of knowledge, all while dodging the questionably alert sentinels.

I was being careful. I didn’t want to touch anything, not until I’d found what I was looking for. I was an unattended kid in a candy shop, told to only grab one bag of licorice. It wasn’t what I wanted to do, but it’s what I should do.

Yet, even as I scanned the titles of the books on the lowest level, two things jumped out at me.

The first was the symbols were completely unrecognizable. I knew how to read, but this was written with an entirely different alphabet. It might be the same language - unlikely - but I was screwed either way if I didn’t know the alphabet.

The second was the Inscriptions I’d be concerned about. They were written around the edges of every bookshelf, layers of some type of protection near the book. Lun’Kat had placed the protections practically on top of the books, instead of securing the entire library.

The third, naturally, were any elementals or other guardians Lun’Kat might have around.

Still. I was undaunted, and had nothing better to do. Then again, given the chance to browse a dragon’s library, I don’t think I’d ever have something better to do.

The titles on the books remained disappointing, and occasionally there’d be a stack of scrolls on the lower shelf. I tried to see inside of them, to check if they were worth risking the security system or not - for all I knew the ‘security’ was really just anti-bug, anti-decay Inscriptions - but they were either dark, or written in the same unknown language.

Up and down the aisles I went, searching for books that I could read. I’d take anything at this point, even if it wasn’t dragon anatomy!

Although, I really should be focusing on dragon anatomy. It was a little harder to justify why I was here, if it wasn’t to help Lun’Kat.

Then again - if I was going to die screaming if I was caught either way, why not read a few things to pass the time?

Row after row, book after book, and I was starting to despair that I’d find anything written in a language I knew. From what I’d gathered, I spoke a language I was calling "Creation" - the language all living things who’d been created on Pallos had dumped into their head. As Night had said, he’d been given a full language when created, and it was the reason the dwarves and I shared a tongue.

I would’ve expected the dragons to also have been born with the language, and assuming Lun’Kat’s moons weren’t hereditary, she’d been around almost as long as Night had. Yet, none of her books were in the language. The only thing I could think of, was that dragons had decided that they didn’t want to speak the same language as everyone else, and invented their own. Or maybe Lun’Kat wrote all her books in a cipher, that only she could understand.

Either way, as I hit the wall in the library, marking the end of the shelves - I had nothing to read.

Head low, bitterly cursing Lun’Kat out, I headed back to the main lair. No mangoes. No books. No fun way to pass the time. All this risk, and for what? A few measly levels?

I glanced at the open skylight on my way out. Moons were up, and I had some time before they made it to Lun’Kat. I continued circling her, diagnosing the last few injuries I could see, and coming up with a plan of treatment for each of them.

When the moonlight hit Lun’Kat again, I was ready. I managed to get five full sessions in, before the angle became bad.

I wandered over to the library, chowing down on my fruits and berries I’d liberated from her garden, finding a little side-corridor that didn’t seem to have elemental cleaners to sleep in. I cursed Lun’Kat as I drifted off to sleep, surrounded by a massive bounty of books that I couldn’t read.

The next three days went mostly the same. Wake up, check on Lun’Kat. Do a large set of injuries when the sun shone on her, do two smaller sets in the night when the moons peeked in. Explore the lair in-depth. I wasn’t going to get anything out of this, maybe I could make an illicit map, and sell it to someone? A map of her lair had to be worth something.

As I ran back and forth, from Lun’Kat to the pillar filled with Arcanite, I couldn’t help but notice the egg collection that she had there. From the large dinosaur egg, to the spherical Celestial egg, an egg near the middle I was sure was a Thunderbird egg, to the aquariums, rainbow eggs, red-gold, malformed, and oh, so many different eggs and creatures!

I wanted one. I’d been wanting a Thunderbird egg for ages, hunting and searching for one. Heck, part of why I’d followed Hunting was to try and get one. Now, there was one in front of me.

Ah, but was that the best choice? It was a "unique" egg, so to speak, an individual egg marked in the collection. It vanishing would be as clear of a sign as any that I’d been around, and taken fair payment.

No, what was a little more attractive were the clutches of eggs. When there were dozens of eggs as a single "collection", each one identical to the ones next to it? A single missing egg might not be noticed for years or decades. I’d be long gone by then.

There was a clutch of stone eggs, impossibly still viable. Plain-looking eggs, spotted, striped, eggs made out of wood, eggs that reflected the world around them. Eggs as blue as the sky, as hot as a volcano. Tiny little caviar in aquariums.

There were no large eggs in clusters. There wasn’t a point.

Sometimes, when I was bored between healing sessions, I reviewed the eggs in my mind, looking over them. Wondering.

I was looking for a companion, and, well, it was like I’d been offered a one-stop-shop for options. If I was told that literally every egg in creation was present, I’d believe whoever told me that.

Then, of course, there were Lun’Kat’s eggs. Clutched protectively in her grasp, Lun’Kat was always on top of them. Protecting them with her lair, her security, and even her physical body. Arguably the most powerful eggs in creation.

I did more than just lust over eggs. I did more than just daydream about riding the unicorn over hills and meadows. I spent significant time in the library, hedging my bets against Lun’Kat cracking an eye open and looking around. I used [Sunrise] now and then, grinding the level in a high-danger situation.

I did find a section with books written in Creation. They were my size, and high up on a shelf, behind solid glass. Quite a few more books, scrolls, steles, and tablets were in that section, and in my sheer boredom I looked at them, comparing the letters to each other.

There were at least a half-dozen different languages present, of which I only spoke one. Still, I didn’t have much else to do besides look at the books. Lun’Kat was getting more and more energetic and restless with each healing session, and I was resigned to my fate at this point. I didn’t like it, but it was inevitable.

The sun rose on what I hoped was the last day. Almost all of Lun’Kat’s injuries had been healed. The only thing left was her broken wing. Setting the bone was going to take huge amounts of mana, and was probably going to hurt as the bones shifted around. It was the first time in years I’d been wanting to use my old anti-pain skill, and I was mildly regretting ditching it.

Then again, it had been the right choice at the time. Just - not having it right now might be the death of me, which sucked.

Pain meant waking up, and I could only hope at this stage, with the number of injuries I’d healed, with the number of scars removed, tissue sewn together, and claws restored that Lun’Kat would recognize what I’d done, and show mercy upon me.

I got into position as the sun hit. With the way Lun’Kat was curled up, her injured wing was away from me, as far away as possible. With a quirk of magic, that didn’t matter - all that mattered was how close the nearest body part was to me.

I’d been saving the wing for last. Whether Lun’Kat had partially set it herself, or if it had only been slightly broken in the first place was irrelevant. Either way, I didn’t think the bone would require large amounts of effort, but the tattered wings needed fixing.

I’d never studied a book on bat anatomy, and what I vaguely remembered was forming the basis of my image. I wasn’t expecting efficiency here. Just blood, muscle, scales, wings needed to be whole and hale. I did fix the broken bones first though, which only took a session and a half, the dragon blessedly not stirring through it. Lun’Kat - or rather, the flow of time and natural healing - had already fixed some of it.

The wings only took two more sessions, and like a proud painter, I took a moment to admire my work, my masterpiece of healing.

I frowned.

No, I wasn’t quite done, now was I? I’d fixed everything external, but for all I knew there were internal injuries, and Lun’Kat could be sick for all I knew. How was I just thinking of this now? I was a better healer than that. I was a dumbass.

I made a quick plan and review as I went to get another round of mana. I wanted to hit all the unlikely things first, before working on properly fixing her internals.

I decided to hit diseases first. Bacteria purge, I lost a few thousand mana. Basically nothing, considering the scales I was working on. She’d been almost entirely healthy. Virus? A hair short of ten thousand. Again, nice and easy. Prions didn’t cause my mana to flicker at all, and fungus was in the low hundreds. All numbers that were close to insignificant.

Poison though? Yikes.

Blew through a full heal, and part of a second one. Lun’Kat immediately settled down further, and a deep, rhythmic rumbling emanated from her.

She was purring. The poison must’ve been doing a number on her.

I grabbed another set of mana, and started working on her internals. My images were terrible. I imagined healthy organs of all sorts, then tried to twist the image to be dragon-shaped organs, with a rough approximation of what they should look like. I then applied the "heal" concept to them, instead of having more specific fixes in mind.

I’d never appreciated until now just how hard it was for regular healers. They needed to try and heal without a good image all the time. It helped explain why I was so many cuts above other healers. Forgetting stats for a moment, I could heal three, four, ten people with the same mana they needed to heal one person.

Well, the shoe was on the other foot, and I was more determined than ever to spread my Medical Manuscripts around.

I finished the sixth round of healing Lun’Kat, noticing that finally, I hadn’t used all my mana. I smiled to myself as I lazily jogged over to the pillar of Arcanite, planning on topping myself up before I took flight, and got out of here. The lair was entirely silent. Dreams of freedom, of flying through the sky were dancing through my head, as I felt a powerful rumble behind me.

Hang on. Silent? Lun’Kat wasn’t purring anymore?

I froze, hearing Lun’Kat get up, Mt. Loot shifting and turning as she moved.

Why?! Why now?! Why couldn’t she snooze for a few more minutes!?

A flash of heat erupted behind me, and I closed my eyes, making peace with my fiery demise. However, flames didn’t wash over me. Instead, I heard soft padding, and rapidly rising heat heralded another blast of dragonfire, and ripping, tearing, and swallowing noises followed. Lun’Kat was raiding the fridge after a long nap.

I took the opportunity to slip behind the pillar of Arcanite, hoping that I’d be hidden from casual view if Lun’Kat could see through my [Invisibility with Eyeholes] gem. Heck, I blew the second one just in case. It was no time to be frugal.

I stared at the eggs in front of me, tempting me. The ones in the front of the collection were within arm’s reach. I’d just need to reach out to grab one.

I used all my willpower to keep my hands to myself, to refrain.

Still, some soft padding later, a few big gulps of water, more soft padding, and the purring noises started back up.

I peeked around the corner. Lun’Kat had migrated to her bed, her real overly furred, extra-luxurious bed, and settled down for what looked to be a "good" sleep. She hadn’t noticed that she’d been healed. She probably just thought she’d slept off whatever injuries she had at long last, and was getting some more sleep in.

Or maybe she did notice, and assumed someone she knew had done it. I dunno what was going through her mind. I didn’t particularly care, I just wanted to get out.

My eyes wandered around the lair, immediately noticing a change. Her eggs, three perfect dragon’s eggs, were now in a brazier, flames merrily playing around them.

I licked my lips. I wanted one of those eggs. I could see it now. [Dragonrider] Elaine. From the looks of it, dragons were immortal to boot. I wouldn’t need to worry about my companion aging and dying on me, like Night’s had.

I clapped my head with both hands.

Stealing a dragon’s egg was moronic. Catastrophically, absolutely, obscenely retarded. There weren’t enough words to describe how much of a bad idea it was. Lun’Kat would probably stop at nothing to get her babies back. I wouldn’t mess with a bear protecting her cubs, I’d imagine Lun’Kat would be worse than a momma bear.

Still, my greedy little heart wanted something. I’d been denied books, written in another language or locked behind glass. I’d been denied mangoes, with too much evidence left behind after I ate one. I’d gotten nothing but heartache and grief, and blown tons of expensive gems. I’d lost my last mementos of Magic. I’d done what would be incredibly expensive healing for anyone else. I could’ve charged a king’s ransom for what I’d done, and Lun’Kat could easily pay it.

I totally deserved a little something for my healing. I wasn’t about to go rummaging about Lun’Kat’s lair, but, well. She hadn’t noticed the mana I’d used to heal her, or the food I’d needed to eat to keep healing her, or the library I’d checked through to see if I could improve my healing speed on her. An egg as repayment was just part of healing. Healers needed mana, food, knowledge - and pay.

Her entire egg collection was right in front of me. I didn’t spend a lot of time thinking and ruminating over what to grab. The little red eggs, with golden cracks running through them were in the front, in a place of honor. They had to be extremely valuable to make it ahead of everything else, to be in the top nine eggs. They were also a clutch, which meant one or two eggs vanishing might not be noticed for quite a long time, if ever. The original owners might not be looking for them, if they knew a dragon had them.

I impulsively reached out and grabbed one of the eggs, almost dropping it in surprise.

It was hot.

I activated [Scintillating Ascent], and quietly, quickly, made myself scarce.

Besides, there was one last dumb reason I’d picked this egg in particular.

Red was totally my color.

Chapter 224 - Flying Free

I exploded out of Lun’Kat’s lair, immediately tumbling and falling to the "ground" as my wings shattered against her protective illusion. I tumbled and rolled on the hard rocks, not a shred of evidence that it was a massive illusion instead of natural rock present. I stabilized into a roll, then as my feet got under me I kicked up and re-launched myself with [Scintillating Ascent], into the blue sky.

Soaring in the air, feeling the wind in my hair, and the sun on my face for the first time in months. No longer was I trapped in the mines! No longer was I a prisoner in the dwarven city! No more playing doctor to a genocidal dragon!

Free!

I was free!

Free to fly in the sky! My eyes burned and forced themselves into a hard squint as I saw full sunlight for the first time in months. I continued to fly away from Lun’Kat’s lair, flapping at full speed, pale skin crisping in the summer sunlight for the first time in ages. I felt little shivers go through my body as [Scintillating Ascent] rapidly leveled up, the minor ‘transformation’ aspect to it working its literal magic on my body.

Ok, mostly free. I looked down at the precious egg I’d nabbed from the dragon’s lair. It was a deep, fiery red, with bright golden lines crossing over it. It was warm, almost burning to the touch. One more flap, and [Bullet Time] broke, time resuming its normal march.

Thinking back on it - shit. How was I supposed to hatch this egg? Did I need to keep it warm? Lun’Kat stuck her eggs in a firepit while she napped, should I do the same?

At the same time, the egg hadn’t been in a fire in her lair - but she clearly had some sort of stasis field, freezing things in place. Like the unicorn foal. I had no idea what that meant for hatching said egg though. Had it ruined things? Or was the stasis a proper stasis?

Argh! This was hard. I guess I was going to try and match the temperature the egg gave off with my Radiance. It would stop it from losing heat too fast, and was hopefully where the egg needed or wanted to be. I would be so pissed if I got the egg of some fantastical creature, then ruined it by being totally clueless how this worked. I wanted to get a companion out of this, not a hardboiled egg.

I wonder what would be inside though? Given the place of honor in Lun’Kat’s collection, given that it was next to a unicorn of all creatures, it had to be something good. My greedy little heart wanted it to be a red dragon, a heist Lun’Kat had pulled against one of her own.

I carefully adjusted the temperature my hands were giving out to the egg, and once I’d worked it out, I tied it off with [Persistent Casting].

Which reminded me - I needed to check on my new levels! I should’ve gotten a TON!

I turned my notifications back on.

[*Ding!* Congratulations! [The Dawn Sentinel] has leveled up to level 377->418! +3 Dexterity, +24 Speed, +24 Vitality, +170 Mana, +170 Mana Regen, +48 Magic power, +48 Magic Control from your Class per level! +1 Free Stat for being Human per level! +1 Mana, +1 Mana Regen from your Element per level!]

LEVELS! A ton of levels for a single healing event! Sure, I’d imagine that healing a dragon would be worth more than that, but maybe "healing a potentially Remus-ending threat" got me dinged on the "Sentinel" aspect of the job.

[*ding!* Congratulations! [Butterfly Mystic] has leveled up to level 338->345! +8 Strength, +8 Dexterity, +70 Speed, +70 Vitality, +70 Mana, +70 Mana Regen, +70 Magic power, +70 Magic Control from your Class per level! +1 Free Stat for being Human per level! +1 Strength, +1 Mana Regen from your Element per level!]

Booo. Not a lot of levels. Then again, the only Radiance magic I’d used was flying away, and trying to acquire some dragon knowledge.

I continued to suppress my capped skills notifications. They just weren’t that interesting. No, what was significantly more interesting were the rest of my levels.

No [Cosmic Presence] levels made me sad. If only I’d permitted creatures in the aura when I was building the skill, it probably would’ve capped. Along with getting me out that much faster. Prolonged time multiplying Lun’Kat’s natural healing? Yes please!

[*ding!* [Wheel of Sun and Moon] has leveled up! 311 -> 395!]

No surprise there! I’d been using it a TON.

[*ding!* [Sunrise] has leveled up! 198 -> 344!]

Grinding [Sunrise] when I’d been bored between healing sessions paid off!

[*ding!* [Scintillating Ascent] has leveled up! 287 -> 312!]

All that from one escape flight? Nice!

[*ding!* [Scintillating Ascent] has leveled up! 312 -> 313!]

Oh shit. That was a good reminder that I wasn’t clear yet, and I was still in Lun’Kat’s territory.

I focused a bit more on my speed and flying, upping the pace a bit.

[*ding!* [Long-Range Identify] has leveled up! 368 -> 370!]

[*ding!* [Pristine Memories] has leveled up! 210 -> 215!]

Comparing books and runes in my head worked out! I should try remembering Lun’Kat’s lair, and drawing it. That might be good for some more levels.

[*ding!* [Sneaking] has leveled up! 211 -> 270!]

[*ding!* [Avoiding The Dragon’s Eyes] has leveled up! 270 ->341!]

Avoiding the Dragon’s Eyes: The mighty dragon is the most powerful creature on Pallos, and their hoards are famous for being places of amazing treasure. In order to survive sneaking through their home, you’ll need to Avoid the Dragon’s Eyes. Improved and increased sneaking abilities per level when trying to avoid a dragon’s notice, and when a dragon is looking for you.

Well. I can’t say I was disappointed by it - I’m certain the skill helped keep me alive - but now the skill was almost entirely dead. I didn’t plan on avoiding too many more dragons. It was going to suck losing the skill, and replacing it with something else.

Ok, sure, there was a slim chance that Lun’Kat could actually see through the gigantic eyes she painted over the moon, in which case the skill was top-tier. And I did have something to hide from her.

I glanced down at the egg I was holding.

Totally worth it. I now, potentially, maybe had a companion, and an open skill slot. The two were practically made for each other.

A bit strange that the skill didn’t cap though.

[*ding!* [Bullet Time] has leveled up! 299 ->418!]

Living under the effects of [Bullet Time] for a week would do that I guess.

[*ding!* [Oath of Elaine to Lyra] has leveled up! 316 ->375!]

Jackpot! Willingly walking to my death to heal a deadly monster paid off in spades! My numbers were going to be insane! I couldn’t wait to check them.

[*ding!* [Persistent Casting] has leveled up! 290 ->291!]

Meh. I’ll take it.

Cripes, how jaded was I? Getting levels far higher than the vast majority of the Remus population, and my reaction was "meh." Going out to explore the wider world had done a number on my worldview.

[*ding!* [Passionate Learning] has leveled up! 358 ->376!]

Rummaging through Lun’Kat’s stuff, being curious and trying to learn everything I could got rewarded!

I had no doubt that [Passionate Learning]’s massive experience boost helped with everything. Heck, if I didn’t have the skill, I’d be at what, half my current level? Give or take?

Probably not quite that bad, but I couldn’t deny that it was useful, and one of the key cornerstones to my success. I had to let other people know. Specifically Artemis. Her school was the perfect place for that kind of stuff! If her students got famous for being high-level, that’d help her out.

[*ding!* [Sentinel’s Superiority] has leveled up! 377 ->395!]

[*ding!* For reaching level 400, you’ve unlocked the Class Skill [The Stars Never Fade]. Would you like to take this skill? Y/N]

The Stars Never Fade: You burn as brightly as the twinkling stars in the heavens above. Like the eternal sky, so too will you be eternal, turning back the wheel of time on yourself and those you choose. You have fought disease, injury, plague, war, and all other manner of death. Now fight the good fight against the implacable enemy who takes all - Time. Immortality skill. Reverts age back to a chosen time. Minimum age of 8. Decreased cooldown per level, increased age target control per level.

OH FUCK ME! YES! Yes, I want this skill!

Nothing happened, and I felt my heart plunge into my toes. I slowed my flight, just hovering there as creeping dread came over me.

Oh shit. What if I was too late? Skills only lasted so long once they were offered. What if it was too late? What if I’d lost my chance at being immortal, just because I had my notifications off? What if-

No wait, I was an idiot. I needed to tell the system what skill to replace.

Wait, shoot, what did I want to remove. Um. [Dance with the Heavens] was out, I probably needed [Celestial Affinity], um, um, um. Wait, yeah, there we go. That was the skill to remove.

I focused on getting the skill, and losing [Solar Infusion] for it.

My heart paused for a terrifying moment, the fear of missing my one shot at Immortality rising.

Although - maybe I could ask Night nicely if he’d make me a vampire? Sure, there were a ton of downsides, but I could totally pull off the hot vampire look.

[*ding!* You’ve acquired the skill [The Stars Never Fade]]

YES! Old age was defeated! All I needed to do was get home before anyone I knew or loved died of old age, and I’d be set.

Or died in a war. Like the civil war that had probably already started, but I was told to stay out of it. I needed to do some serious thinking soon about where I needed to go next, and what to do next.

I was tempted to try the skill on myself, but a few things gave me momentary pause.

First, I was pretty happy with my age. 20 was a fine number, heck, 30, 40 were also pretty good numbers. I might start considering at, like, 50 or 60, depending on what my vitality did to my aging, but either way I was already at the lower end of what I was happy with.

Which brought me to the second point. "increased age target control per level" implied that I couldn’t quite exactly control how young I became. I’d die of embarrassment if I ended up at, like 10 years old again. Being reincarnated already kinda sucked in some respects. When I was a kid, I got treated like a kid, and I had felt myself mentally slide back into a kid’s mentality. A combination of how I was treated, and the hardware I was working with.

Puberty sucked. I’d already done it twice. I wasn’t risking doing it a third time.

Lastly, there was the conversation I’d had with Night, way back when. He’d mentioned that all Immortal races were cursed by White Dove. I wasn’t sure if winding back time on myself would count as Immortality - after all, I could still die of old age, and plain old violence - but the skill did mention Immortality. Playing around with a skill, just for White Dove to visit me again and curse me, didn’t seem great. Especially if I got some ridiculous, over-the-top curse like "dirt now melts me like lava" or "Can’t cross running water", or "must forever dance" or "get turned into a newt" or some other ridiculous curse.

No, the skill was going to stay at level 1 for now. I took a look at my status.

[Name: Elaine]

[Race: Human]

[Age: 20]

[Mana: 409320/409320]

[Mana Regen: 338381 (+353806.125)]

Stats

[Free Stats: 89]

[Strength: 942]

[Dexterity: 1462]

[Vitality: 11118]

[Speed: 11118]

[Mana: 40932]

[Mana Regeneration: 41021 (+35380.6125)]

[Magic Power: 18094 (+339262.5)]

[Magic Control: 18094 (+339262.5)]

[Class 1: [The Dawn Sentinel - Celestial: Lv 418]]

[Celestial Affinity: 418]

[Cosmic Presence: 286]

[The Stars Never Fade: 1]

[Center of the Universe: 418]

[Dance with the Heavens: 418]

[Wheel of Sun and Moon: 418]

[Mantle of the Stars: 418]

[Sunrise: 344]

[Class 2: [Butterfly Mystic - Radiance: Lv 345]]

[Radiance Affinity: 345]

[Radiance Resistance: 345]

[Radiance Conjuration: 345]

[Lantern: 345]

[Nectar: 345]

[Sun's Heart: 345]

[Scintillating Ascent: 313]

[Kaleidoscope: 345]

[Class 3: Locked]

General Skills

[Long-Range Identify: 370]

[Pristine Memories: 215]

[Avoiding The Dragon's Eyes: 341]

[Bullet Time: 418]

[Oath of Elaine to Lyra: 375]

[Sentinel's Superiority: 395]

[Persistent Casting: 290]

[Passionate Learning: 376]

Heck yeah! Skills all over the place! Levels for days! A mountain of stats! No wonder Night and the other Sentinels were so damn strong, if this is what they were dealing with. No wonder I could only have kept up because of my [Oath].

My speed and dexterity were still properly in-line, but it was going to get unbalanced soon enough. At this point, my free stats weren’t going to make or break anything, and I planned on just holding them in reserve until something went wrong.

I realized I was still hovering, and went back to flying. I wasn’t quite sure what direction I was going, but it was away from Lun’Kat’s lair, which was good enough for me.

On the other hand - I was literally complaining that I had too many stats. Back when I was being promoted to Sentinel, 10,000 points in a stat was considered "pretty darn good." Now my tertiary stats - speed and vitality - were both over that number. My mana was over 40k, my regeneration was over 70k and nobody would believe my magic power and magic control when healing at this point.

Looking at the stats made me wonder just how much mana regeneration Destruction had. A good amount of his build was based around it, and he probably had some dedicated skills to it, like my [Nectar]. [The Swirling Storm Inside] or something.

Focus. Here and now.

I was feeling a hair lost, both in a metaphorical sense, and in a literal one. Like. Where was I!?

I looked around, really taking in the sights. I was currently flying down a mountain covered in a verdant forest. It wasn’t a jungle, or redwoods, or anything fancy - just plain, simple forest. A lovely stream, with dreams and ambitions of becoming a mighty river, was fed by melting snow from higher up in the mountains and meandered through the woods.

In other words - I had no idea where I was. Traveling with the dwarves, then jumping into the mines, visiting the city, traveling through the Below Levels, then Lun’Kat’s lair having some sort of spatial oddness to it all conspired together to make me completely and totally lost. The only key I had to my location, the only little bits of knowledge I held onto, was that Remus was somewhere warm, and near the ocean. In other words, northwards was a good direction to head.

Apart from that? East or west were equally valid directions to try and head. I think east was a bit of a better guess, given that the Formorian frontlines had been on the western front of Remus, and we’d gone somewhat south to the dwarven mountain range. Orienting myself to the sun, I was now heading west again, down away from the mountains, away from Lun’Kat’s lair. A vast open savanna, with rolling hills and swaying prairie grass opened up in front of me, past the forest. Ferns were interspersed with the grass, with the occasional scraggly tree, creating an odd look. It seemed like some skills were in play. Or maybe that was naturally here. In the far distance, I could just about see a few isolated mountains, standing proudly alone.They were unnatural, but then again, given that Pallos was created, and not shaped and formed, I could easily believe the gods had plunked a mountain down in the middle of nowhere. That, or a high-level Classer decided to make their mark on the world, and erected a mountain in the middle of nowhere.

I could distantly see dinosaurs roaming about the plain, some in groups, some alone. Their visibility at such a distance implied they were on the larger side of things.

I continued to fly down the mountain, while I tried to get my bearings on what to do next.

First, immediate needs. I needed to secure food and water, and given my time in Lun’Kat’s lair, my strong urge to leave no traces of myself behind, and the extremely fiber-rich diet I’d been on the past week, I was massively constipated.

Fortunately, woods were my jam. It wasn’t a bamboo forest, but they were the primary wilderness survival biome that we’d been trained on. I made it most of the way down the mountain, before spotting some brightly colored berries near the stream. Seemed to be the perfect place to take a break.

Thirty minutes later, and I was feeling lighter, unburdened, and a lot more at peace with the world, and myself. An old, grizzled mountain sheep, rugged and coated in scars, emerged from the bushes, looked at me, then walked right past me to the stream to get a drink, close enough to reach out and touch.

Well. When life delivered a tasty lunch right to my feet, I wasn’t going to say no. Sorry Billy, eat or be eaten.

I packed my stuff back up, the sheep continuing to ignore me as it drank from the stream, then started to nibble at the bush. I flew up, and aimed a tight beam of Radiance right at its head. A quick mercy killing, aiming to end it before it even knew it was under attack.

The beam hit, and instead of burning through and the goat collapsing like I expected, the Radiance just hit its fur and stopped, impotently frying the dirt on its fur.

Well, shit.

The whole world seemed to slow as [Bullet Time] activated, then it seemed like the entire mountain came alive. Rocks by the hundreds barraged up at me, leaving no room to dodge, while a massive stone ram seemed to lift itself out of the ground, looking exactly the same as the goat I’d tried to make my lunch. Only ten times the size.

I wasn’t exactly taking this lying down, but I wasn’t in a position to do much more than levitate myself up, shielding my head and precious egg with my body, arms, and [Mantle] as I flapped away at full speed. Some of the rocks dented my armor, while others shredded right through it like it didn’t exist, exploding out the other side with a scream of tortured metal.

The worst were the goldilocks rocks. The ones with enough power to break through my armor, but not enough to drill through my vitality-enhanced body, and back out the other end.

Those rocks rattled around inside me, making my healing harder as [Dance with the Heavens] slowly wore them away. However, the sheer volume of incoming rocks was far greater than the speed I could heal them away, regardless of my speed.

Then, for a brief moment, the thundering hailstorm of rocks on armor paused. I had just enough time for my eyes to start to widen before the sheep golem rammed into me, half-pulverizing me on its forehead as it launched itself - and me - deeper into the sky.

My mana dropped, then stabilized as I healed myself back. At this point no more attacks were occurring - I was simply being carried along by the momentum of the rock. I did everything I could to protect the precious egg I had. I used my own healing to handle the rest of the damage.

I swear, if the fucking sheep wrecked my precious egg right as I got it, I would end it. My entire life’s mission would be to kill that one sheep, by hook or by crook. I’d kill it, eat it, dance on it’s grave, then get [Necromancer] as my 3rd class just so I could reanimate it to DO IT AGAIN.

Things calmed down a hair, and I reactivated [Scintillating Ascent], and jumped off the now-inert sheep-shaped stone, flaring my wings to see where I’d gone.

The mountain I’d been ejected out of was now somewhat in the distance, but I could vaguely see the depression where the sheep had ripped up huge chunks of the earth to shoot at me.

"Bloody caster monsters." I muttered to myself, ignoring the fact that I was entirely in the situation because I hadn’t properly identified the sheep before going for the kill. I’d think after months of encountering beetles over level 500, and giant slugs that could kill even Night, that I would’ve learned my lesson about old sheep living near a dragon’s lair.

Nope! I’d let my greed and my desire to return to normalcy overcome my common good sense. I wasn’t going to have that happen again.

However, the involuntary flight assist wasn't terrible. It did let me scout two types of dinosaurs that roamed the plains.

First were the large dinosaurs I’d seen while I was still in the mountain. They were funny-looking sauropods, in the same family as the brontosaurus. However, they had an incredibly short neck, and their body was round, almost like an over-inflated balloon. They waddled in groups through the plains, hoovering up vegetation. They did not look like the smartest dinosaurs around, having a vacant look in their eye. I’d bet the sheep that just gave me a run for my money, and told me in no uncertain terms to sod off, would demolish most of these dinosaurs.

I’d wondered about predators, but there was an apex predator’s lair within eyeshot. These seemed to be easy prey for a dragon - slow, waddling, right outside her lair, and enough food to last a week or two, even at her size. Checking them out, I got back that they were Brachytrachelopan, and if that wasn’t a mouthful and a half, I didn’t know what was. I decided to call them brachys, because that was just easier. Their levels varied, from level 40 juveniles, to level 250 to 300 adults.

I suppose there wasn’t much of a difference between eating a level 100 dinosaur, and a level 3000 dinosaur. They had the same quantity of meat either way. The lower-level dinosaurs were less likely to have a nasty counterattack though.

It was easy to imagine Lun’Kat descending, completely invisible, to seize one of the brachy’s without the rest knowing.

See my recent humbling experience with the sheep.

Smaller boring dinosaurs scurried around them, avoiding the large dinosaur’s footsteps, nibbling on ferns left behind. They were herbivores, and again - boring. Waist-high, two arms, two legs, a tail, a neck and a head. Checking [Identify] brought me back Anchisaurus, and with their low levels, I had ideas for my dinner.

A couple of predators stalked through the herds. The dinosaurs gave them a bit of distance, and they didn’t seem particularly aggressive. Just looking if any animal was too sick or injured to put up a fight.

They looked like derpy t-rexes. Their arms were short and stubby to the point where they practically vanished into their body, and they were significantly smaller than a t-rex to boot. Like, less than two meters tall at the shoulder. Arthur was bigger than they were. Little bumps coated their back, up their neck and onto their head. Aucasauruses.

The one downside to this place was there was nowhere for me to easily camp. I considered taking a break on one of the brachy’s backs - it was certainly large enough for it - but decided not to in the end.

I used the sun to orient myself, and started flying north. Metal from my ruined armor kept digging into deeply uncomfortable spots, and I looked down to assess how bad the damage was.

My armor was half-ruined. Now was the time to use the [Mend Armor] gem I’d been given, and I happily blew it, watching with a smile as the armor bent and twisted back into shape, some metal being conjured up to fill the largest holes.

The smile vanished from my face as I noticed a problem.

My Sentinel badge was missing. It had inscriptions to stay attached, but "sticking to armor" didn’t do much when entire panels had gotten blown apart.

I looked at where I was, hovering in the middle of the plains.

I looked at where I’d been blasted from.

Fuck me. This search was going to take me ages.

Chapter 225 - Free Butterfly

I cursed up a storm at discovering my missing Sentinel badge. I descended back down to the ground, to where I’d landed. I carefully examined the ground beneath me.

I wasn’t lucky enough for my badge to have fallen where I landed, oh no.

[*ding!* You’ve unlocked the General Skill [Lost and Found]! Would you like to replace a skill with it? Y/N]

[Lost and Found], my old friend! More useful when I had more stuff to worry about. Still, I had something lost I needed to find, and while I didn’t quite have a spare general skill slot, [Avoiding the Dragon’s Eyes] was close enough to dead to consider it.

I flew up into the air, to get a grasp of how large of a task was in front of me.

It was about a kilometer from where I was to the base of the mountain I’d been thrown off of. I needed to find something gold and reflective that was about the size of my hand, that could be in a wide path from where the stone sheep had landed - like half a kilometer behind me - to where on the mountain I’d been thrown from.

Shit.

I’d need every bit of help I could get.

Plus, I was totally going to replace [Avoiding the Dragon’s Eyes] with a companion skill, hopefully soon. Why not do it now? I could even swap between skills for some time, grab whatever I needed that would help.

I took the skill, ditching [Avoiding the Dragon’s Eyes]. Losing the skill sucked - I doubled over and hurled, carpet-vomit-bombing the dinosaurs below, who didn’t seem to care.

At level 1, [Lost and Found] wasn’t doing much for me, but as I leveled it up, hopefully it’d help.

The remains and the outline of the sheep’s attack wouldn’t last terribly long, not with all the dinosaurs roaming the savanna. Which was another confounder - if a dinosaur stepped on the badge, it could drive it deep into the dirt, making it almost impossible to find.

Still, it wasn’t an impossible task.

I flew around the area, keeping a weather eye out, while burning markers with Radiance, outlining the huge field where I believed my badge could be. I then flew along it slowly, keeping my eyes open while burning a grid pattern into the ground.

It took me four passes to get everything set. The brachys gave me a hard time, being too large to give a fuck about the small flying burning thing hovering around. The other dinosaurs thankfully scattered when my rays showed up.

I got the entire field scoured and marked, a classic grid search pattern.

I then flew over to the square I’d arbitrarily marked as "A1", and got to work.

Seven weeks. It took seven bloody weeks to find my Sentinel badge again. More than once I’d considered leaving it behind, and going "whoops, my bad" when I finally made it back to Remus. Especially with Lun’Kat’s lair nearby. It had probably been foolish to stick around, but, well, there was a whole herd of animals here, an entire ecosystem.

But no. It meant too much to me. It was too important for me to just leave behind, not when it was merely lost, and not utterly destroyed or something. I found it one night as I was bathing the unchecked squares in [Lantern]. I finally got lucky, and saw a shiny reflection from the ground. I swooped down, picking it up, and thanking all the deities that Lun’Kat hadn’t left her lair.

More likely, she’d left while invisible, not wanting to announce the presence of her home to the world. Or she’d traveled through her portal, or she had some other way of getting out.

I kept the egg nestled under one arm the entire time, pouring heat into it. It was practically second nature at this point, helped with [Persistent Casting]. Sure, I was basically down an arm, but it wasn’t like I had the weapons to use the arm. Just made camping a little awkward.

Speaking of, I’d set up on top of one of the brachys. It had some element - Arcanite or Gemstones was my bet - which made crystals grow out of its hide. It made a nice place for me to nestle in and rest at night, with the crystals both stopping me from rolling off, and stopping anything extra-big from hitting me. I feasted on leftover dinosaur - the small ones were tasty! - then had a nice, long rest before the travels ahead of me.

The next morning, with my badge found and re-attached, it was time to go. I’d already decided that I was heading north. I’d hopefully hit the ocean, unless the weather and terrain got too tropical. Then I’d head east. It’d be arrogant to assume the ocean spanned the entire world. For all I knew, the continent looked like an L or something.

Unless I found some reason not to return to Remus. It was complicated, but right now I couldn’t think of a single other thing to do besides return home.

I had a large breakfast, eating most of my leftover dinosaur. It was easier to fly with it in my stomach after all. I packed the remains in my bag, then launched myself up. I used the sun to orient myself northish, and started flying.

Flying! Flying never got old. It never got boring. It had everything I’d loved about running, without being constrained by the ground. I was free to soar, to twirl and glide. I could flutter, flit, and flap my way across the sky! Nothing could hold me back, nothing could restrain me! The sun in my face, the wind in my hair, flying was glorious. I angled my wings to catch a breeze, launching me high up into the sky, where I then dove down, swooping towards the ground at a dizzying speed, only to catch myself on the air and fly right back up!

Flying! The only things better than flying were mangoes and books, but I didn’t have either of those. Plus, none of them had the long-term staying power that flying did.

I could almost literally fly forever to boot! Between my insane regeneration, and [Sunrise], I could go a loooooooooong time. Not that I was planning to. Not again.

My top speed wasn’t anything impressive, but it did remind me that my skill was upgradeable, mostly by studying butterflies and birds.

I almost facepalmed as I realized I’d potentially missed a chance to study a dragon flying. What sort of stupidly powerful upgrades would that have granted me?

Then again, in order to do that I would’ve needed to risk myself even further, which wasn’t quite what I wanted.

Where did my all-too-reasonable fear of dragons go? I watched Lun’Kat destroy a country with more-or-less a single skill, and here I was thinking about studying how she flew to improve my own abilities.

I tried to shake my head, mentally reset myself. Familiarity bred contempt, and I’d spent too long in Lun’Kat’s lair, sneaking around her sleeping form. I’d seen her up close and personal, I’d seen her pictures, her treasured mementos. She wasn’t an unknown, terrifying monster in my mind.

She should be! My lack of fear, my lack of respect towards her and her capabilities would get me killed SO FAST.

I looked around for birds. A murder of crows was nesting in some of the scraggly trees, while a few hawks soared on thermals. I spotted a sneaky dimorphodon poking its head out, keeping an eye on the savanna I was flying over.

I tried to chase some of the hawks, to shake them and make them give up their secrets, but they wanted nothing to do with the giant glowing lunatic butterfly.

Wise birds.

Still didn’t stop me from pausing and observing them for some time. I wasn’t quite sure, but it seemed like my wings got a little lighter, and the next time I hit a warm updraft of air, it felt like I was going up a bit faster. That I could hover in place a tad longer. I hadn’t calculated all the numbers, I had no way of timing and recording stuff, so I couldn’t say for sure that it was the case.

No levels in [Scintillating Ascent]

I figured one animal was good enough for the day, and I found a place to camp for the night. Not having any camping gear kinda sucked.

The next day the cycle resumed, and I figured I could take enough time every day to study one bird or another. I was in no rush, and I might see animals I wouldn’t see again for some time.

I wanted to see the aerial acrobatics of crows next, and that was one heck of a mistake. They were fairly content to hang out in their trees, and when I rustled it, trying to get them to do something?

Yeah, they figured I was attacking them, and mobbed the crap out of me. I could’ve lasered them all to death, but that felt like an extra-dick move, so instead I just fled, crows pecking at my shield the entire way.

I didn’t even notice an improvement in my flying, but maybe it’d done something subtle. Probably not though - the skill did mention ‘studying’, which I hadn’t done at all.

Ah well. Onwards.

I spent a day stalking a dragonfly, trying to get my wings to mimic its crazy buzzing. At the end of it, I was fairly certain I’d upgraded my skill a bit, but I wasn’t quite sure how. I resolved to put myself through a full set of paces, to see exactly what I had, and then repeat the exercises whenever I studied an animal, to see if I’d managed to improve things.

Even then, I was only one person, without Sky to provide feedback. I was probably missing moves.

I let myself get distracted, and studied a second animal as I found a butterfly for the first time! I must’ve spent three hours stalking and watching the butterfly, blowing an Anchisaurus that got a little too curious into a dozen well-roasted pieces.

The butterfly was sadly common, with no special traits, and I didn’t get anything from it. I did get a lovely meal though, and chasing the butterfly around was just plain fun. It felt like being a kid again, no worries, no fears, no monsters lurking around the corner. No crushing presence of rock and stone threatening to bury me alive. Just good clean fun.

Alone.

In the wilderness.

Hundreds to thousands of miles from home.

The thought was like a bucket of cold water.

A few days later, and as the sun was setting over a forest I now found myself over, I spotted familiar tendrils of wispy black smoke. Someone had a campfire going! I figured I’d fly over and see if I could say hi. The odds that we spoke the same language were low, but I could always try body language, and the old standby - pointing and charades. All language shared a similar root, which would help, and I’d hopefully pick up any new languages quickly with [Passionate Learning].

The trick was to not get totally blasted into oblivion by whoever was there. I wouldn’t blame people for being twitchy, not with the sheer volume of monsters that regularly roamed. I lit myself up with [Lantern] - not too bright, I didn’t want to look like a sun was landing, AKA an attack, just making sure I was bright enough to be seen coming from a distance.

I followed the smoke, and saw a group of three people in a comfortable campsite around a fire. They had three large huts, simple and made out of dark stone, beautifully carved chairs, even a small table with a spread of food. A couple of large barrels had fires burning under them, with all manner of copper tubes weaving between them. There wasn’t a wagon or anything else like that I could see. A large wolf was playing tug-of-war with the woman, while a strange white rope was coiled on a rock.

Of course, there were the people themselves. Two men, one woman. They were beautiful - there was no other word for it. They were otherworldly divine, the Platonic ideal of what bodies should be and faces should look like. The woman was in light leathers, one man was in totally impractical robes, and the second man was in casual clothing.

The two men had looked up at the approaching light, while the woman was busy playing tug-of-war with the wolf.

Two more features caught my eye as I got closer.

First, they all had horns. Impractical-robe dude had short stubby little horns, like a goat. Tug-of-war woman had a majestic set, like an ibex, huge and curling back, while the casual clothing dude had horns that curled back around his ears, like a bighorn sheep.

Speaking of ears, they also caught my attention. They were long and slender, and I could feel excitement welling up inside of me as I saw them, a few casual comments about "pointy horns" dropped by the dwarves suddenly clicking into place.

Elves!

Chapter 226 - A campfire meeting

I hovered above the elves, not really quite sure how to greet them, or what I should do next. They looked up at me, and I figured I’d start with a standard greeting.

"Hi!" I called out, giving them a wave, diminishing my Radiance. They could see me after all.

The elves glanced at each other, even the woman playing tug-of-war with her wolf paused. The white "rope" on the rock got up, flapped over to the casually dressed elf, and wrapped itself around his arm.

"Greetings." The fancily-dressed one called out, with a strange, clipped accent. "Who - and what - are you?" He asked, voice filled with curiosity. There was no hostility, no concern, no worries.

Progress! Greetings!

"Heya! My name’s Elaine. I’m a human, from Remus. Who are you?" I asked, hovering above the absolute visions of perfection. I didn’t want to get too close until I knew them a bit better. I ID’d them quickly.

[Warrior] - The ginger-haired woman with the massive horns. She looked as strong as a bull to boot!

[Mage] - The impractical robes and short horned blond. Why was I not surprised?

[Ranger] - The casually dressed dude with the bighorn sheep horns emerging from pitch black hair.

The mage was a little behind the other two, but all three were massively powerful. Not quite as strong as Hakka had been, but stronger than any human I’d seen. It was hard to pin their level exactly, but they had all three of their classes.

The Ranger seemed to make a decision.

"Yo! My name’s Aegion, I’m the Ranger here! We’re all elves from the Tympestshard Council! Come on down and have a drink!"

His accent was also strangely clipped, and the other two elves turned on him, fiercely whispering in rapid, quiet words among the three of them.

Given their seeming reluctance, combined with their high levels, I wasn’t going to poke too much. I did fly a bit lower though.

Finally, they seemed to reach a decision.

"Heya! Come join us!" The woman called out. "Always fun to meet fellow adventurers, no matter where they’re from!"

Oh no. Oh no oh no OH NO. They were adventurers! Scum of the earth! Source of all villainy!

They were also incredibly hot elves, and something smelled amazing. Who was I to say no?

I landed, continuing to clutch my egg protectively, and being a Sentinel was totally awesome.

[*Ding!* Congratulations! [The Dawn Sentinel] has leveled up to level 418->419! +3 Dexterity, +24 Speed, +24 Vitality, +170 Mana, +170 Mana Regen, +48 Magic power, +48 Magic Control from your Class per level! +1 Free Stat for being Human per level! +1 Mana, +1 Mana Regen from your Element per level!]

Huzzah! I focused on what I was doing.

A round of introductions started.

"I’m Awarthril!" The tall woman said, extending her hand for me to shake. She was a head and a half taller than me, and was even better-looking up close. Like, WOW. My definition of "beauty" was entirely redefined as I kept my eyes studiously locked on her ever-changing eyes. Blue, hazel, green, purple, red, grey - her eyes shifted through every color, some natural, some less so. The classic mark of a Mirage Classer. I took her hand, and felt her move it up and down. Her grip was gentle, her movements slow, but there wasn’t a single shred of doubt that she had my hand in its entirety, and that none of the movements I was making were making a shred of difference in what she was doing. She was strong.

"This here is Kiyaya!" She said, affectionately rubbing on the massive wolf’s head, who came up to me.

I hadn’t appreciated just how stupidly large Kiyaya was when I was in the air. He was literally eye-level with me, with a jaw big enough to stick my entire head in, with teeth sharp enough and muscles strong enough to then casually rip my head off.

He gave me the great big goofy tongue-lolling look that dogs did so well, then gave my face a sloppy lick. It was incredibly ticklish, and caused me to laugh.

"Can I pet him?" I asked, getting a nod and a hidden smile back. I started to scratch Kiyaya, in the same way I used to pet Moonmoon back at Ranger Academy. She thumped her foot happily - which was a little scary, given her claws and the size.

"Awww, who’s the best little wolf?" I cooed over her. "Yes it’s you!"

Kiyaya gave me another lick at that, and I glimpsed Awarthril’s approving smile.

"Anyways, I’m a Mirage-Ooze-Mantle Warrior." She explained. I’d never heard of that combination before. Heck, I hadn’t heard anyone theorize it either. Mirage? Ooze? Ok, Mantle I could see.

"How does that work?" I asked, curious.

She glanced at Aegion, who grinned back.

"One mug!" He called out.

"A quarter of a mug." Awarthril countered.

"Half a mug and two candies." Aegion replied back, so fast it must’ve been prepared.

"Half a mug and one candy." Awarthril said with an eyeroll.

"Deal!"

I was totally lost, but the elves weren’t. They cleared a space for Aegion to stand in the middle of. As he passed me, he whispered.

"I would’ve settled for Awarthril to drink half a mug, but she never negotiates the candies well."

I was so lost.

His snake bailed from his arm, and went to quietly raid the snack table while everyone was occupied. Smart snake.

Hang on - the snake had wings. What was it?

I used [Long-Range Identify], only to get back [Couatl]. Interesting! I kept a half-eye on the table.

The elves prep was done though.

"Here!" She called out. "This is how it works. Watch carefully!" She said.

The third elf and Kiyaya vanished, and Awarthril flickered off to the side. My head started to itch in that way it did in the presence of illusions, when I had a faint inkling they were at work. Chains sprang from the ground around Aegion, wrapping around his legs and arms, while puddles of goo appeared at his feet.

To his credit, he - and his snake - tried to fight back. He leapt and tumbled, acrobatically avoiding the chains - but the ooze was building up on him, stretching from the ground to his body, slowing him down. Eventually, he slowed down enough that the chains caught him, wrapping him up entirely.

The entire thing happened in dead silence.

"You got me!" He called out good-naturedly.

The illusion dropped, and Kiyaya appeared behind Aegion as Awarthril’s location changed back. The 3rd elf and the couatl appeared at the table, still chowing down.

"See? See! It’s amazing." Awarthril said, with the supreme confidence of someone who knew exactly how good it was.

However, I hadn’t been watching just Aegion. There was something else I’d noticed.

"Totally cool!" I said, meaning it. That was one heck of a skill set - being able to fake her own location, hide her teammates, then bind and chain down attackers? It was a ton of crowd control, and her stats - and identification - revealed that she was a warrior, with a lot more tricks up her sleeve. Like casting the famous "punch" spell.

"There was one thing I noticed." I said with a grin.

"What’s that?" Awarthril said, still preening, missing my tone of voice.

"While you hid your friend and the couatl well, and hid what was in their hands, you didn’t hide the food vanishing off the table."

Awarthril looked like she’d been poleaxed, while Aegion roared with laughter. The last elf just chuckled as he peeled an apple by twirling his finger around it, using some magic I couldn’t quite see.

"You - but - bleargh!" Awarthril threw her hands up in the air. "How did you notice that of all things?!"

I let a faint Radiance glow come from me while I winked.

"Let me introduce myself! Elaine, human, Celestial Healer and Radiance Mage! I’ve got some explicitly anti-mirage skills, and I’ve been dealing with some high-level illusions recently."

Which was putting it mildly.

"Arglebarglebargle." Awarthril made a noise. "Of course you’re a Radiance mage and a healer. Like the total opposite of me."

I cocked my head. "Oh?" I asked.

Before she could answer, the last elf smoothly slid up to me, offering his hand.

"Serondes. Charmed to meet you." His voice was like music, a crystal wind chime in the wind. I took his hand, locking eyes with him. His eyes burned and boiled like a mighty volcano was trapped behind them, and I felt heat rising to my cheeks as I took his hand.

Why did my treacherous heart have to go a-THUMP?

"I’m, a, utterly charmed to meet you as well." I said, getting a smile as dazzling as the break of day from him.

Serondes. What a pretty name.

"What Awarthril means, is that your skill set is almost entirely antagonistic to hers. You are a healer, graceful and powerful. No injury can stand in your path, no disease can survive your beauty. Yet, Awarthril is all about preventing injury to her team - like me - in the first place. Illusions to hide herself and her friends, chains and muck to stop enemies from reaching me and harming me in the first place. She considers any injury to her team a personal failing. Naturally, your Radiance could destroy her illusions, if powerful enough." He explained, as I hung onto every word.

Awarthril punched him in the arm to a resounding crack of breaking bones.

"Shattered crystals WHY!?" Serondes screamed, holding his arm.

"Because you talk too much. You didn’t need to flirt with Elaine by telling her everything about me, hmmm? Plus, she’s a healer. She can fix you up. Remember last week? The spiders? The raptors? The acorns!? And what about -"

"Ok, ok! I get it!" Serondes yelled back, gripping his arm. "Elaine’s a great healer. Of course she wouldn’t mind helping me." He "asked" with a brilliant smile, but it wasn’t a question. Just a statement that the world would move to, that it was inconceivable that I’d do anything other than heal him.

I mean, he wasn’t wrong.

"Of course!" I said. "Let me take a look at your arm."

Sure, I could just smack him full of healing - I had the power, control, and mana for it - but I wanted to get the chance to study elvish anatomy. It’d help with future healing, in case anything got tight.

That’s what I was telling myself. It had nothing to do with me wanting to see just how - oh my.

Serondes, instead of rolling up his sleeve, just dropped the entire top half of his robe, revealing his rugged abs, his perfect pectorals leading up to lean arms, muscled just so.

Why couldn’t I have been born an elf? Immortal perfection from the start?

Aegion gently coughed, and I jumped, flushing. What was I, a teenager with a crush?

… damnit, given my age and social experiences, yes. I was rapidly developing a crush on all three of the elves. Or wait, was it a crush or just envy? Did I want them, or did I want to be them?

I mentally shook my head.

"Right. Do you have any implants in your body? Anything that might be destroyed by healing back to your natural state?" I asked, quickly studying the break. Broken humerus, clean break, simple stuff.

He shook his head. "I keep talismans in the crate, but nothing inside." He said.

I poked him, focusing on the healing. My mana flickered a hair, and I let out a whistle.

"Wow! You’re efficient!" I said.

"Of course! I’m an elf." He said, like it was the most natural thing ever for elves to be perfectly efficient when being healed.

"For services wonderfully rendered, a gift." He said, Sand swirling in front of him. A blast of heat and light heralded Lava, and then he started to sing. Tonal singing, like a chorus of angels. The Lava faded, revealing a glass rose that was twisting and growing under his melodious voice.

"For me?" I gasped at the fine glass artwork that was presented to me. At his nod, I used my free hand to take it.

"Serondes. Lava, Sand, Sound mage, glass-maker extraordinaire." He bowed, giving me a good view of his rippling muscles, before clothes suddenly popped into existence on him.

"Leave the poor girl alone, she’s going to have a fit with all your prancing about." Awarthril scolded him.

"Yeah! Plus, now she’s got no spare hands!" Aegion said, barging over with four mugs in his hands, his couatl on his shoulders. While Awarthril was what an old master of marble would’ve carved, and Serondes was smoldering, Aegion was cute. Sure, he was perfection made flesh, but under all that was a burning intensity, confidence in every inch of his tightly-wound muscles. I couldn’t help but imagine what his hands would feel like.

"Name’s Aegion! Might’ve mentioned that already. The Ranger in this group. This here’s Cordamo. Best little couatl you’ll ever see! Careful of his poison. Right! I’m Gale, Lightning, Spore, long range, so on and so forth. All that stuff’s boring. What I do is I’m a brewmaster! I -"

"Regularly poison me, because you have no classes or skills in it." Serondes interrupted. "Elaine, I don’t think you’ll like what he has to offer."

I looked at the egg tucked under one arm, and the rose in the other. I shuffled the glass rose into my egg-holding arm, to free up space.

"Ah, I’ll give it a shot." I said, accepting a mug. Awarthril reluctantly accepted a half-full mug, while Serondes rolled his eyes and took a full mug.

"Right! Bottoms up!" Aegion said. "To our new friend, Elaine!"

Awarthril and I both started drinking, while Serondes and Aegion looked on.

Oh my gods. This stuff was foul. It was as bad as the elves looked good. Thick sludge with unusual lumps in it. I forced myself to swallow a mouthful, but couldn’t do a second.

"Gluuuuuurbg! Yuck." Awarthril made a disgusted retching noise. "This is somehow your worst attempt ever. How do you make it worse every time?"

Aegion took a small sip and pulled a face at his drink.

Aegion and Serondes promptly turned their mugs upside down, pouring the contents out onto the grass. It sizzled slightly.

I remembered that Awarthril had agreed to "pay" for the demonstration by drinking a half-mug. I wasn’t bound by the same rules, and if the person who made the drink was pouring it out?

I dumped my mug.

Awarthril finished her mug, and threw it into the woods. It went through a tree, and I lost it after that.

"Get better at your damn drinks!" She screamed at Aegion. "There’s no way I’m trying one of your new ‘candies’ after that!"

She started ranting about Aegion’s concoctions, and all the different ways they’d been utterly terrible, and how this was somehow a new low.

I was in total agreement. Aegion’s brewing. Highly suspect didn’t start to cover it.

I shot Serondes a grateful look, for trying to spare me from the misery of Aegion’s hobby.

"I’m curious, what are you three doing here?" I asked, changing the subject.

After all- what were they doing here?

Chapter 227 - Shimagu

"Why we’re here?" Awarthril repeated, tapping her lips thoughtfully. "Well, we’ve all got our own reasons, but one word’s enough to explain it. Shimagu." She said, looking at me expectantly.

I blinked, tilting my head. Was that supposed to mean something?

"Do you not have Shimagu where you’re from?" Aegion asked.

"No, I’ve never heard of them before." I said, wondering if this was the name of some creature I was familiar with, but simply didn’t know the word for.

"Ooof, you should know about them. If you don’t, you’re a ripe target." Awarthril said.

"Let me tell you all about them!" Serondes jumped in with his musical voice.

Wait, right, Sound element that he sang with. Of course he’d have an amazing voice. He settled down into a ‘teaching’ pose, and began lecturing, covering everything from the basics up.

"Shimagu are body snatchers. They’re made out of ooze, and all have the element. While they can’t take over the brain, or use the host’s skills, they’re more than capable of seizing complete control over a body. Warriors, and large, powerful monsters are a favorite target of theirs, while mages are practically useless, and healers are actively avoided. Warriors, Laborers, and other physically-inclined classes tend to have powerful passives, focusing on the body. Shimagu are able to use those buffs when they take over a host, since they are innate, intrinsic. Rangers and some Artisans are considered mid-tier targets, while mages, like myself, are terrible targets, because the host’s skills are unusable."

He paused for a moment, letting me absorb that. Short version - they got the body, not the skills. Which also meant…

"Can the person being hijacked get free? Or is it like, getting taken over kills the host? Can the host communicate at all, or do anything?"

I was thinking about Ned, and the changeling that had taken over. I was wondering if they were the same thing? It didn’t sound like it.

"Good questions! I’m the perfect person to ask. Yes, they can get freed, although it’s rare. The Shimagu needs to voluntarily give up control, or a healer needs to be involved. It’s part of why they’re so nasty to deal with. It’s the same person, the same "shell", which makes analytical skills almost worthless. Any Shimagu that wants to take over someone intelligent has skills to drain mana and cripple regeneration, which will often double as buff skills to improve the body they’re in. It makes them stronger than they look, since there are often two sets of skills and abilities improving a single body. Now, technically, the host can still use skills, but it’ll only last as long as they still have mana. No mana, no skills, no communication or fighting back." Serondes explained.

"It’s why they don’t like healers or mages." Aegion jumped in with that appealing intensity, and Serondes glared at him for the interruption. "Healers and Mages usually have skills that can hit at the Shimagu - if they’re willing to throw, say, a spike of lava through their body - and have mana pools large enough that they don’t drain quickly. Gives them plenty of time to fight back, or just self-destruct, instead of being taken over. Also, since the bodies aren’t buffed, and they have low physical stats? They could take over a warrior a quarter of the level, and have a better host."

Ha! I wasn’t a target for bodyjacking! For once, I was at the bottom of the priority list! Not that it mattered, I was still leaning towards "go home", because what else was I going to do? Join the elves on their crusade? Fat chance they’d want me.

"Yeah, they tend to kill healers they find. They count as a parasite, and every healer worth their salt can handle parasites." Awarthril happily added in, flicking her hair in a way that was oh-so-appealing. It didn’t stop her comment from bursting my bubble. "It’s why we knew you were fine, and not a Shimagu trying to infiltrate us. Healers are able to, more or less, instantly kill a Shimagu they find, usually at a range. It’s horribly unfair to them. Hence them getting rid of most healers. Except for a few sympathizers, who’ve joined them willingly."

Awarthril’s tone of voice made it entirely clear what she thought of people willing "joining" the Shimagu. It also implied other people willingly joined them, giving them access to mages - and healers! - if the Shimagu weren’t mages themselves. I was curious - I wanted to know more, like could a Shimagu survive without a body? It also started a train of thought - if I got caught by Shimagu, would it be worth bluffing a surrender to save my life? Could I escape later? Could - but before my questions could come out, Serondes started talking again.

"By the way, what were you doing here? I’d love to know your story." Serondes asked, staring at me with his fantastic eyes.

"Well, it all started about a year ago, when I got some bad news…" I started off.

I kept it simple. Formorians, big fight, victory. That was a hit - "Almost as good as an elf!" Aegion had commented.

Exploring the new lands, meeting the dwarves, getting caught up in the fight between the dragon and the guardians.

"Why are you acting like that?" Aegion asked as I tried to mime the dragon, causing a flush to crawl up my cheeks at the rebuke.

"Because I’ve heard they hear their name when they’re called." I mumbled to the ground.

Awarthril snorted.

"That’s ridiculous. Pretend it’s true for a moment. How many people are constantly saying their name? How many conversations are they hearing? To them it’d just be a non-stop stream of ‘dragon, dragon, dragon’ in their ears."

I visibly winced at that.

"Drive anyone nuts. If they came out and tried to wreck stuff anytime their name was said, they’d all be dead or the world would be a flaming wreck."

Uh - that was a really good point. I still wasn’t sure what was right, or who was correct over the whole thing.

"Candy?" Aegion randomly asked, tossing me something that looked like a lollipop with no stick. I eyed it, remembering the drink.

"Sure, I guess." I held it in my hands, figuring that the longer I talked, the longer I could stall on trying Aegion’s newest thing.

"Anyways, from there we fell into the mines, although one of the dwarves didn’t make it…"

I continued to regale my tale, from being trapped down in the mine, fighting the orcs, meeting the Khazad dwarves, implants, gentle imprisonment, and escape.

I glanced down at the egg I was holding. I skipped Lun’Kat’s lair, just telling them that I’d found it while escaping the Inevitable Shluggoth from the Below Levels.

"You have no idea what’s inside the egg?" Awarthril asked, and I shook my head.

"Mind if I take a look?" Serondes asked, offering up a hand.

With a small degree of reluctance, I handed the egg over, the three elves huddling around it with me, poking and prodding at it.

"I have no idea." Aegion said after a minute.

"I don’t recognize it either." Awarthril said a few minutes of poking, prodding, and picking it up later. "I know all the medium and high-quality eggs though. I’m sorry Elaine, I think you might have a bit of a dud here."

Serondes remained fascinated.

"Well, there’s a chance that we could discover something entirely new." He said. "Elaine did mention that she’d found it deep underground, in an area that seemed volcanic. A burning crimson egg, found deep in a dormant volcano? Even if it’s low tier, no Lava creature is weak. Elaine, I would be delighted to help you hatch the egg, and see what emerges."

Serondes might be somewhat biased with his element, and his conclusion was based on faulty data - I hadn’t found it in a volcanic tunnel, I’d found it in a dragon’s lair. I also bristled at Awarthril’s assertion that she knew ALL the high-quality eggs. Something in the place of honor in a dragon’s lair?

It did support my theory a bit that I’d maybe gotten a red dragon’s egg. Or maybe a gold dragon’s egg. I had no idea what dragons were like here! Maybe red scales, with gold trimming between the scales, kinda like the egg? That’d look so cool.

Either way, I’d be shocked if elves knew what a dragon’s egg looked like. Then again, they looked somewhat normal, so…

I was getting horribly distracted and off-topic.

"That’s be wonderful!" I said, taking the egg back. "What do you suggest? I’ve just been trying to keep it warm for now."

Aegion interrupted.

"That’s all very good and all, but could we hear the end of your tale? How did you escape from the Below Levels? How’d you end up here?"

"Learning how to properly look after an egg isn’t fast or easy." Awarthril mentioned. "Might as well finish your story."

Making stuff up was hard. I just skipped over it.

"Well, I finally managed to find tunnels that led up, and I got out." I said. "Nothing too exciting. I figured I’d head north, then east, trying to find my way back home. It’s in the dead zone, do you know where that is?" I asked.

I got a frown back.

"Not sure where the ‘dead zone’ is, but that doesn’t sound pleasant. We might know it under a different name, what’s it like?" Aegion asked.

"Well, it feels all sorts of bad when you’re in it, but I didn’t notice until I’d left. It’s also an area of reduced experience gain, or so the dwarves claimed." I awkwardly explained. "No idea what causes it."

The elves looked at each other.

"Sounds like the Low Experience Zone." Serondes said. "We know where that is, yeah. We’re even vaguely, sort of heading that way. Come with us for a time."

"Serondes. Can I talk with you?" Awarthril said, in that oh-too-sweet tone I knew too well.

Even when angry her voice was simply magical.

The three elves retreated slightly, and the most bizarre argument I’d ever seen erupted. They were animated, hands being thrown all over the place and mouths twisted in yells, but the whole thing occurred in complete silence, as Kiyaya came over, begging for scratches.

I happily obliged.

"Who’s a good girl?" I asked as I scratched her stomach with my one free hand. With her size, giving her a good scratch was a full-body experience. "Oh yes you are!" I said, to her happy wriggling on the ground.

I needed to figure out a better way to carry this egg around. Being permanently down one hand hadn’t been too hard when I was just flying, but I wasn’t always flying.

Cordamo glided over on his pale wings, and as he got closer I realized he wasn’t just white - he was more like an albino. He landed next to me, and cautiously nuzzled my left arm.

I wasn’t much for snakes. I just flat-out didn’t like them. Something deep and primal inside of me recoiled, yelled that I should keep a distance from the danger-noodle. Sure, I was a powerful healer, but that was a bit too abstract of a concept for my lizard brain to handle.

However, deadly snake - couatl - or not, if it wanted to attack, it would. A bit of distance wouldn’t help.

I steeled myself, then when that didn’t work great, I adamantiumed myself. That worked, and I tentatively stopped scratching Kiyaya to stroke Cordamo’s head. Cat-like, he worked himself under my hand, getting it to rub just the right spots.

Then he poked his nose forward, tapping the egg I was holding under one arm with his nose twice. A question.

"You want the egg?" I asked. Cordamo was smarter than he looked - not hard - and nodded his head twice, opening his jaw wide.

"You want to eat it?" I asked, more than a bit skeptical. He nodded furiously, wings flapping in excitement.

"Heck no!" I said, pulling the egg in closer. "My egg."

My indignation overcame my fear somewhat, and I lightly booped him. Not enough to do anything, just let my displeasure known.

[*ding!* You’ve unlocked the General Skill [Egg Incubation]! Would you like to replace a general skill with it? Y/N]

Egg Incubation: You defend your egg as aggressively as a velociraptor, and sit on it as cluelessly as a chicken. Serious intervention is required. Please take this skill, and help the young one out of her shell. Increased egg incubation knowledge per level.

On one hand, I wanted to keep [Lost and Found] in case I misplaced the egg. On the other, [Egg Incubation] seemed like a great skill for hatching the egg. There was a benefit to having a skill specifically for what I wanted, and this whole egg hatching business was going to be hard enough as-is. I had no idea what I was doing.

Also, did the System just leak that it was a girl!? I wanted to do a fun gender reveal party, preferably without burning down thousands of acres of woodland.

Alright magic, work for me! I took the skill. I shifted how I was holding the egg slightly, adjusting my grip slightly as the skill took hold, nudging me a hair.

[*ding!* [Egg Incubation] leveled up! 1->2]

Having just had the experience with [Lost and Found], I turned off my notifications for that one skill, to not get spammed horribly. I’d keep leveling up, keep improving, but I didn’t need to know every single detail of the low level skill slowly increasing.

"Hey Elaine! Mind if we ask you a few questions?" Awarthril asked, making me jump a hair. I hadn’t seen or heard her approach.

"No, not at all, shoot!" I asked.

"Well, first of all, are you interested in traveling with us for a time?"

"I mean, if you’re heading in the direction of home, yeah, sure I am!" I said, dreams of spending more time with the lovely woman dancing through my head.

"Ok, what are your class qualities? And how many stat points do you have, before and after buffs?" She asked. I could see Serondes and Aegion listening in, but not crowding me. Between Kiyaya, Cordamo, and Awarthril, I appreciated it.

However, judging someone by class quality and stats was a novel way of looking at it. I’d never been asked that before. I suppose it was a solid way of gauging someone’s strength, especially with how little level was starting to matter as I continued on my journey.

Like take Ned. I’d been the same level as him, yet totally blew him out of the water stat-wise. It wasn’t even close. I guess the elves were wise to that, and asked the right questions.

"Dark green and light green on my classes." I said. "I got to build my own class on the dark green one, and the light green one seemed awfully close to dark green with the stats it gave."

The elves’s eyes flickered to Serondes, and Aegion slid in closer.

"Dark green? That’s amazing! Doing a reset cycle before you get your third class is suboptimal, but it sounds like you pulled it off! You go!" He said, offering me a high-five which I took.

"Thanks! What do you mean by reset cycle though?" I asked.

Serondes joined in, and I was the center of attention. I could only hope that all the elves made me the center of attention fo-

Focus.

I’d been around incredibly good-looking people all the time in Remus, with appearance skills being popular, but I’d never been so distracted in my life. Elves were just unfair. They were all super nice to boot.

"Reset cycles refers to getting all three classes up to level 768, or in some cases 1024, then resetting the classes one at a time back to level 8, and starting over again from there. The increased stats from the other classes greatly improves the offered classes when resetting, which often results in a jump in class quality. Then, once the reset class has been maxed out again at 768 or 1024, the process can be repeated with the next class, then the third. Once all three classes have gone through this process, we call it a single cycle." Serondes helpfully explained.

"We’re all on our initial cycle." Awarthril explained. "It’s why we’re out hunting Shimagu. The local minotaurs asked the Tympestshard Council for help, and they let us, and a few other ambitious elves know about the problem."

She shrugged.

"Not everyone goes out to improve the world. However, there aren’t too many ways to get enough experience to leap up forward like this. Kiyaya needs all the levels she can get, isn’t that right?" She said the last part to her wolf, who nuzzled up to her.

Ok, a ton to unpack there. Reset cycles? I suppose if a species had unlimited time, they’d figure out the best way to get all the levels - or, thinking about it, the more important thing, all the stats. Plus it let them play around with different elements, see what clicked, see what resonated with them. Heck, someone could completely switch over from a Warrior to a Mage! Sure, it’d take them ages, but the elves were immortal. They had all the time in the world to pull it off.

Also -

"Why level 768?" I asked. It didn’t make sense from what I knew of the leveling structure.

"There’s a class-up there." Serondes explained.

Oookay. I had no reason to disbelieve him, it just sounded weird.

"Well, I’m on what you’d call the initial cycle." I said.

Awarthril blinked at that.

"That’s incredibly good! Good job! You might only need to do 18 cycles total to get the highest quality class with that head start!" She enthused, then got slightly downcast.

"Not that you’re likely to live long enough to do eighteen cycles."

I opened my mouth, hesitated, and Aegion cut in.

"It's excellent for your initial cycle! I wish I’d managed to hit dark green on my first 256." Aegion added in.

"Not to be a downer, but she did mention she grew up in the Low Experience Zone." Serondes chimed in. "It’s impressive, don’t get me wrong, but that played a hard-to-replicate part. I’d guess more like 24 or 25 cycles total. I’ve got two yellows and a light green for my first cycle."

"Still impressive. You’ve got what, about 200k stat points total?" Aegion said, running a finger down Cordamo’s spine, who’d flown back up to join him.

I checked my stats, wincing a bit.

"No, more like 140k" I said, quickly tallying them up.

"Low dark green. Class levels are probably a bit out of balance to boot." Serondes analyzed.

These elves were smart, on top of being well-educated, knowledgeable, and everything else. Cripes it was unfair.

"Well," I teased, "That’s all pre-buffs. I am a healer, after all, so I’m a bit better there."

Time to bring out the big guns. If this didn’t impress them, I was going to dig a hole, crawl into it, and die from a bad case of "massive inferiority complex."

"I have roughly 360k each of magic power and control when I’m healing."

I dropped that bombshell with a triumphant smile, which only grew wider as I got exactly the reaction I was hoping for.

Stunned amazement.

Chapter 228 - Biohazard

The fact that I’d given the oh-too-perfect elves a moment’s pause at my numbers was deeply satisfying. Serondes was the first to recover.

"Has to be a restriction skill, and narrow in scope." He thoughtfully tapped his lips. "Mind sharing?"

"Eh. The full details I’d like to keep to myself, but yeah, it’s when I heal."

"You sure you can’t tell us? I’ll brew you up a drink!" Aegion tried to ‘tempt’ me.

"Are you trying to bribe her or threaten her?" Serondes snorted.

That got a weak chuckle out of me and Awarthril, even Kiyaya gave a little barking laugh.

"We should sit down." Awarthril said. "It’s cozier."

We sat down around the table - how did they get this while camping? - and I eyed the spread.

Cheese, dates, grapes, fruits, breads and sandwiches, a jug of wine, fine glasses to drink out of - courtesy of Serondes, I was sure - and more were spread out on the table. I’d been to parties with worse food, and these elves were casually camping out in the middle of nowhere.

"Cordamo!" Aegion yelled as we were sitting down, and the snake, faster than I could process, practically snapped into his hand, curving like a bow.

Actually - the couatl was the bow, as a shimmering light extended from his head to the tip of his tail. Aegion summoned a large, nasty-looking arrow, and aimed the bow straight up. Barely spending a moment to aim, he loosed the arrow, Lightning crackling as sparks flew away from him.

"Show-off." Awarthril commented, grabbing a nice cheese. "Three medium Arcanite says it lands on your barrels again."

Aegion squinted up into the sky where his arrow had gone.

"I’ll take it." He said, hurrying over to his barrels, brewing his noxious drinks.

"So Elaine! What are your total stats after the buffs?" Serondes asked.

"Hmm? Oh. Uhm." I did some quick math, adding my [Oath]-boosted stats to my total, and throwing in [Nectar] to boot.

"Around 850,000." I said, tallying them all up. I hadn’t quite realized just how high they were getting. I’d break a million stats soonish.

And to think, when I’d unlocked the difference between 16 stats and 24 stats was gigantic.

"That’s frankly amazing." Serondes gave me his full attention, and I preened a bit under his gaze.

"No kidding." Awarthril agreed. "Sorry about all the yelling earlier. Serondes here," She made a little jerking motion, which I recognized as her kicking him under the table - and his pained yelp attested to it connecting. "Occasionally forgets that we’re a team, and need to discuss things together. Still. Tell you what. We could use you, if nothing else than to make Shimagu nervous, and reveal themselves. Only Shimagu with wills forged out of the hardest crystal will see a healer who can kill them by accident, and keep their cover."

Awarthril gave me an encouraging gesture as she spoke, and I grabbed a tasty little cucumber sandwich. Real food! Tasty, tasty bread! I hadn’t had anything more complicated than roast monster, supplemented by the occasional random fruit or berry in months! And here the elves were, casually having a whole feast laid out while they camped. Good stuff! I had to figure out how to make this my reality when I was back in Remus, doing Sentinel stuff.

The taste and the flavor exploded in my mouth, reviving long-dead tastebuds and neural pathways. My tongue almost had a seizure, it tasted so good and fresh.

Also, her little gesture sent me into an absolute tizzy. She likes me! She cares! NO! I’m reading way too much into this!

I refocused.

"Aren’t you worried about a Shimagu taking one of you over?" I asked what I thought was the obvious question.

Serondes gave me an almost affronted look. Awarthril just looked confused. Aegion actually responded.

"Um, no? Why would we be? There’s no way they’d try to take one of us over."

That seemed like an entirely foolish oversight, but I wasn’t about to start arguing or digging deeper into it. However, my image of the perfect elves had broken. They had a serious hubris problem.

I looked around the campsite. They were completely out in the open, no measures taken to hide or conceal their campsite’s presence. They honestly seemed to believe that nothing was going to attack them.

With an almighty thud, a pterodactyl landed in the campsite, half-landing in the fire, one wing knocking over one of Aegion’s barrels. The foul smell emanating from the spilled barrel almost put me off my lunch.

Then again, I’d been dealing with spiders and other creatures of the Below Levels for months, and real food? I had no issue powering through the smell.

"Ha! Pay up! It landed on your barrels!" Awarthril crowed out in triumph.

"No way! It totally landed in the firepit! One wing hitting one barrel doesn’t count!"

Both of them turned to Serondes, who sighed at being the tiebreaker.

"It didn’t land in the barrels." He said. "It clearly landed somewhere else. Awarthril, it’s quite a stretch to imagine its landing spot was the barrels, in spite of a wing landing on it. As such, I must rule in Aegion’s favor."

With good grace in defeat, Awarthril handed over some Arcanite to Aegion. He didn’t revel in his victory or rub it in, just pocketed the gems with a smile.

Serondes gave a sharp, long whistle, rapidly changing the pitch by small amounts in a musical rendition. As he whistled, the carcass of the pterodactyl started to fall apart into pieces, breaking up into choice cuts. Without a single motion, simply a thought, each piece of meat was pushed up and wrapped by Lava emerging from below it, slowly cooking the remains.

It took me a moment to fully process what had happened. Not because the actions were strange, but due to the sheer skill involved.

Aegion had, somehow, spotted a high-flying pterodactyl. He’d made a snap-shot at it, perfectly timing it with his skills and abilities to not only hit the bird, but also overcome any defenses or evasive maneuvers it would make. Not only that, but he’d accurately managed to predict how and where it’d land at the end of its trip, neatly delivering dinner into our campfire.

Literally. The only way it would’ve been more perfect is if it could just stay there, and end up fully cooked.

The level of skill and prowess was mind-boggling. I decided to recenter myself with more mundane activities - and possibly work on [Butterfly Mystic].

"Hey Serondes!" I called out. "Mind sharing how you cook things? I’m often cooking with my Radiance magic, I’m curious how you do things."

He looked pleased to be asked.

"Well, it’s not terribly difficult. See, for each slice I estimate how thick it is, then I estimate the temperature and the time needed to cook the slice how I’d like. Then, I…"

I listened, enraptured as Serondes explained how he cooked things. It wasn’t anything special, but I liked the sound of his voice, and I was curious if I’d learn anything. Plus, [Passionate Learning] might get a level. Although, that was fairly ambitious, considering how high the level was. It wasn’t that easy to raise a level 300+ skill, no matter how many multipliers I had going.

Like a well-oiled machine, Aegion walked from cooking slab of meat to slab, shaking a mix of spices onto the pterodactyl steaks. Serondes, his musical voice never pausing, opened up the Lava cookery to each one, just in time for the spices to hit.

Sadly, I didn’t get a level out of [Butterfly Mystic]. That would’ve been too easy.

"Right! Let me clear this all off. Thanks for dinner Aegion!" Awarthril said, busily bussing things off the table. They didn’t have a wagon or anything, where were they putting it all?

I watched Awathril put a full plate directly into a crate… then some bread, and a jar of jam. She reached in, and grabbed plates and silverware, seemingly grabbing from the same spot she’d dropped the other food in. An idea sparked.

"Is that a dimensional crate?" I interrupted Serondes to ask, with no small amount of awe. I ignored the frown he shot my way. Dimensional rings were one of the first things I’d hoped to see in Pallos, and I’d had no luck whatsoever.

"Hmmm? This?" Awarthril asked. I nodded furiously.

"Oh, it’s just a Spatial Box. It’s not a particularly good one, just a 60:1 compression ratio." She said, giving the box a light kick. I had no doubt that she could utterly pulverize the box if she wanted to, Spatial magic or not. "We couldn’t afford a better box with a 200:1 or an epic one with a 4000:1 ratio, so we’re stuck with this piece of junk. Why, do you have something better on you?"

My jaw must’ve been catching flies, because Aegion tossed something real tasty inside.

"He shoots! He scores! The Titanderby champion returns!" He crowed, throwing his hands up in the air, doing a little running dance around one of the Lava-slabs.

I instinctively bit down on what he’d tossed, the candy bursting in a sweet explosion of flavor. I started munching on it full-speed.

"This… is really good?" I said, puzzlement in my voice. How were his drinks so bad, and his candies so nice?

Aegion acted wounded, dramatically clutching his curly horns with one hand, and the other placed over his heart like a Shakespearean actor.

"Oh ye of little faith! Of you who don’t believe in my beautiful delicacies! No words could wound me more!"

"Oh lay off her." Awarthril said. "You practically poisoned her the first time you gave her anything, it’s a miracle she didn’t run away."

Aegion went back to working his dubious magic on the barbeque we had going, as Awarthril turned back to me.

"How do we keep getting interrupted?" She asked rhetorically. "Now, about that storage item…?" She asked, with all the hope of someone with too much stuff, and not enough space.

I shook my head.

"I don’t have one. Heck, until today I didn’t know they existed!"

Awarthril’s face fell, and she shrugged philosophically.

"Ah well, it happens."

Of course, I should’ve known. With how Lun’Kat’s lair warped space, and was much larger on the inside than the outside, it should’ve been obvious that storage items, like the Spatial Box, were possible. Humanity just hadn’t figured it out, or, more likely, didn’t have nearly the levels needed to work such a magic.

Awarthril’s forehead creased in worry.

"But where’s the rest of your stuff?" She asked, looking me up and down like I was hiding a whole wagon under my armored skirt, or the egg I was holding would unfold into a tent.

I shrugged.

"Lost some here, lost some there, this is literally everything I have."

Awarthril gasped.

"No. No no no no NO! We simply can’t have that." She said, grabbing my hand and pulling me along with her irresistible strength. "Since you don’t have your stuff, and I apologize for this if I’m wrong, can I take it to mean you haven’t had a good bath in some time, and your, ah, current odor is not your natural one?"

My wha-

Oh.

Please Papillion, Thanatos, White Dove, really, anyone, I’m ready now. Please let me just die of embarrassment. The hot elves think I stink. Send me a lightning bolt from the sky. Have the ground open up and eat me. This is a great time for a precise meteor strike exactly where I’m standing.

To be fair, after a few months in the tunnels, running, bleeding, sweating, and more, I wasn’t surprised that I was more than a bit ripe, especially since the armor had gone on and hadn’t come off the entire time. The only time I wasn’t shedding a stench was in Lun’Kat’s lair… except who knew when the [Tracks-be-gone] skill had ended? I’d assumed it was still running, but for obvious reasons I hadn’t tested it. Had I left a distinct scent all over her stuff? Was she going to sniff me out to kill me and retrieve part of her egg collection?

Was I going to get sniffed out and killed for leaving a stinky mess in her lair?

Thinking about it, they were the same level of badness - dead.

Or - had she known the entire time!?

I focused back on where Awarthril was pulling me. Serondes was coming along, Awarthril having grabbed his arm with her other hand, leading us to a small pond.

"Right, Serondes, one hot tub please." She glanced at me quickly. "With walls."

"My talents are more than just for making baths." He muttered, as Lava started to rise around the pond and cool, hardening into rock. More Lava went under the pool, heating it up.

"Yes." Said Awarthril sweetly. "Your talents are also great for cooking."

Serondes opened his mouth to keep protesting, saw that I was hanging onto every word the two of them said, and closed his mouth.

"Should be all set now!" He said. "Elaine, just remember who made the bath." He said, throwing me a roguish wink, spinning around with a twirl of his robes, and stalking off back to his barbeque.

Awarthril put a hand on her hip, wagging a finger at his retreating back.

"Ooooh, one of these days…" She said, leaving the thought unsaid. She turned back to me.

"Come on, let’s go." She herded me into the lovely, pool-turned-hot tub, like a mother hen watching over her charges.

"Right! Let’s get that armor off, and get you a nice soak. Months without a bath? You must be dying in there, you poor thing."

Awarthril managed to say all that without a shred of condescension, just pure mothering concern. She fussed over me as I put the egg down in a safe, warm spot, [Egg Incubation] helping slightly with placement and such, and started to strip the armor off.

I was fortunate that I’d delayed on using my [Mend Armor] for so long, even though that meant I’d spent time with broken armor, with a nice big puncture wound through the middle. Otherwise, all the clasps would’ve been dented, broken, or otherwise unusable to the point where I would’ve needed to be cut out of my armor. Which would make this whole embarrassing experience even more humiliating.

Still, I managed to peel my first gauntlet off, and then the stench hit me. I had to hand it to them, the dwarves knew their craft. At the same time, blood, sweat, random bits of spider and other crap had slowly, over time, infiltrated my armor, mixed with my tunic, and rotted. The smell made me retch, and even Awarthril wasn’t immune.

"Aggalgalglaglag. By the unchanging council that is foul."

We looked at the slime slowly dropping off my wrist, a few sturdy threads of clothing trying in vain to keep it all together.

I sighed, then immediately regretted it as more noxious air entered my lungs.

"Ugh. Oh. Ugh." Awarthril said, throwing dignity to the wind and pinching her nose. "I never thought I’d dislike my enhanced sense of smell. Elaine darling, I’m sorry for this, but…"

I didn’t even have time to blink before finding myself stripped naked and dunked under the water. Awarthril was fast. Benefits of being a physical classer, and a strong reminder just how out-classed I was.

"Stay there! I’m going to get you some soap!" She called out, vanishing around the bend.

Well.

While I wasn’t a huge fan of my bodily autonomy being violated like that, but I was in a bath.

A hot bath.

At long last.

I let myself settle down, the warm water loosening my muscles, then started to scrub.

I had a feeling I was going to be at this for a while.

Chapter 229 - Barbeque

I spent an excessively long time in the hot bath Serondes had made. I’d like to say it was because I was relaxing, enjoying my first hot soak since the dwarves.

No. I was mortified by the fact that I’d stunk so badly that the elves almost literally threw me in. I was determined to clean out every single last bit of dirt, grime, and grease. Also, my nails had gotten super-long, and had started to curl against the end of the gauntlets. I just hadn’t noticed at all, but they were curled, yellow, cracked, and nasty.

My hair was in terrible shape to boot. The only reason the entire thing wasn’t one huge mat was the uber helmet-hair I was now sporting. The ends had needed trimming, and I swear I would’ve lost levels in [Pretty] if I’d still had the skill. In theory, it wasn’t possible. I was convinced that I would’ve caused such an affront to the skill that the System would’ve been like "whoa, wait, no, can’t have any of that."

As I was scrubbing unidentifiable sludge off my body, Awarthril was running about with a piece of string.

"Left arm up!" She called out, and I instinctively obeyed her, feeling my hair blow around as she moved faster than I could see. I felt numerous tingles along my arm follow behind her motion.

"Mmm, I see, I see…" She said, vanishing again in a flurry. I’d get back to washing, and of course as I was cleaning somewhere awkward she’d show back up again.

"Stand!" She called out, in a nice, but firm tone. I stood on the hard igneous rocks, not quite sure what she wanted. She was being so helpful though, that I wasn’t going to say no.

"Right, arms out." She said, with the professional tone of a nurse getting her patient all set.

I snapped my arms out, feeling a light, ticklish breeze over my torso and belly as her string whipped around it, far faster than I could see. A shiver went up my back, following a few seconds after the string.

"Ok, I’m done. You have a nice long soak now." Awarthril said, vanishing again.

The gust of wind behind her led credence to the idea that she’d moved with her super-elf speed, and hadn’t dropped an invisibility illusion.

I went back to scrubbing, thinking about it. Awarthril was the most straightforward illusionist I’d ever encountered. No tricks, no deceit, just plain and simple.

Well. As "plain and simple" as any elf got.

The water was starting to turn an ugly color, the relative size of the pond versus the dirt I had on me in an unfavorable ratio.

I was still musing on Awarthril when I spotted Kiyaya, roughly at the same time she spotted me.

And the bath.

"No! No no no AHHHHHH!" I yelled, as Kiyaya took a running leap into the pond, acting like a one-wolf depth-charge.

I came back up spluttering, only to see Kiyaya happily frolicking in the water, splashing about like a puppy. I blew some hair out of my face, chuckled, and kept digging dirt out from under my freshly-trimmed nails.

About fifteen minutes of intense scrubbing later, Kiyaya got out of the water, with the dreaded little shakes all dogs do when wet.

I was a bit smarter this time, and dove under the water right as she shook herself, throwing wet dog water all over the place.

I rolled my eyes as I kept scrubbing, eventually moving onto my armor, which Awarthril had helpfully left by the pond.

I honestly didn’t know how to properly maintain plate armor like what the dwarves had gotten me. I did know some basics, like "clean out the sludge" and "get the dirt out of the joints" and the like. Fortunately for me, the [Mend Armor] gem had fixed most of the worst issues, like corrosion. Granted, given that a chunk of the armor was now made out on conjured material, it was living on borrowed time. It would only have a few years left of being useful, but at the rate I went through armor?

Yeahhhhhhhhhhhh. I suspected I’d be back in Sentinel gear in no time. If nothing else, I wanted to look the part. People knew what Rangers, and Sentinels looked like. Showing up in weird armor?

They’d mistake me for an adventurer. I couldn’t have that happen!

I idly touched mom’s pendant. The leather cord it was on had somewhat held, but I’d need to look into restringing it soon, along with washing it.

"Hey Elaine!" Aegion called from behind one of the hardened walls of Lava that Serondes had raised.

"Yeah?" I called back.

"Do humans have a nudity taboo or anything, or can I come in?"

Did I want the incredibly hot elf to stare at my naked body?

Noooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo. I mean, yes, but nooooooo. I was feeling self-conscious around the elves already. I didn’t think my ego could handle Aegion’s critical look. From what little I’d seen, he’d good-naturedly point out a few flaws I had, then tell me exactly how I could fix them.

The elves were absolutely wonderful, and I was going to develop an inferiority complex being around them.

"Um. We don’t, but I’d rather not. The water’s mostly sludge at this point anyways!" I finally squeaked out, giving a poor excuse, the other part of my brain imagining Aegion in the bath with me.

I’m pretty sure all the steam was from the bath, and not from my ears.

"Alright! Well, you’ve got some new clothes out here. They should all fit, I just tailored some of Awarthril’s old clothes for you."

I couldn’t help myself. I quietly broke down crying, trying to half-submerge myself in the water so they wouldn’t hear me.

Alas, trying to keep sound hidden from incredibly high level Classers with extra-large ears right next to you was a losing game. Awarthril moseyed over with Kiyaya in tow, plate with pterodactyl steak in one hand, fork with a second steak on it in the other. She was gnawing around the edges, twirling it around as she chowed down. I put my hands over my face, not wanting her to see me crying, as futile of a gesture as that was.

"Are you ok?" She asked, taking a comfortable seat on the ground near where I was crying in the bath. I weakly nodded my head, unable to stem the fat tears welling up.

"What’s wrong? You can tell me." Awarthril’s voice was soothing and comforting.

"You’re all just so nice!" I blubbered out. "Everyone and everything for the last YEAR has been trying to kill me, eat me, imprison me, or worse, then you all come along and you’re just so nice and wonderful and caring and just too good for me." I had snot running down my nose, and I was totally in ugly-crying territory. It’d been too long since I’d been treated with basic kindness. Too long a paranoid captive, too long trapped in the dark mines, too long fighting Formorians, just - too long since I’d last had a hug.

I needed a hug.

"D’awwww. No, it’s ok. Come here. It’s all ok." Awarthril said, awkwardly cradling my head while I cried into her lap. "You just looked like you needed a break. Come on, it’s all ok now. I’ll get you fed and warm, you’ll have a good night’s sleep and everything will be ok."

I sniffed again, rubbing my snotty nose against my arm then just dunking it back in the pond.

"You’ll be ok. I promise. Why don’t you finish up, and join us for a hot steak? Serondes has really outdone himself this time! Come on, a hot meal’s just what you need."

"And you’re sure about the clothes?" I asked her.

"Oh those? I hope you’re not too offended, I’ve been looking for an excuse to get rid of them for ages. I hated the cut, but Mistcloth’s too nice to just throw out. This does me a favor! Really!" She explained. "Guilt-free storage cleanout. Ok, I’ll leave you be. Come join us in a minute!"

Awarthril left, and with a great slobbery kiss Kiyaya licked me and padded after her companion. I finished washing up, then took a look at the clothing Awarthril provided.

First off, wearing hand-me-downs was nothing new for me. Most of the clothes I’d ended up in as a kid had been hand-me-downs that mom’s friends gave to her as their last kid outgrew them, and many of my old clothes ended back in circulation that way, or got re-stitched into newer, larger clothes for me. That part wasn’t weird.

A practical stranger’s former undergarments becoming mine? As an adult? A little weird.

It was totally different from anything I’d ever seen. There was a dark, navy blue sort of "bodysuit", that went from my ankles to my wrists, but for whatever reason stopped at my chest instead of going to my neck, showing off a bit of cleavage. I could see why Awarthril didn’t like the cut. The edges were rimmed with gold, which made a nice effect.

There was a second layer on top of that. A white, partially sheer half-cape wrapped around my neck, and went down to my elbows, all rimmed with gold again. I had something like a long shirt, made out of the same material, with long slits in it for easy walking, while the whole thing was cinched with a "belt" made out of the same material, ending with a diamond-shaped "buckle".

The stuff was soft and wonderful, and it practically hugged me. The contrast to what I’d been wearing before helped with the magical, otherworldly feeling it gave. I walked experimentally around the pond, trying out how my clothes felt.

They were weird. I had no doubt there was some magic at work. On one hand, I felt clothed. I could feel the cloth against my skin, the fabric shift and move as I walked. I was obviously clothed.

On the other hand, I felt naked. The feedback was almost non-existent, and as I walked and moved, the split skirt, which should’ve hampered my movements somewhat, didn’t. The bodysuit part, which should’ve restricted my movements just a hair, instead allowed me a full range of flexibility. I tried all sorts of exercises to see if I could get the feeling or sensation of the clothes restricting me, or feeling taut against me. I stretched, bent, puffed my chest out, did a cartwheel - nothing.

I was brewing a headache trying to reconcile the two feelings together. Still, having gotten the hang of it, I put on some too-thin slippers - super cozy, and as easy to walk in as sandals. I grabbed the egg, re-warmed it, and walked back out.

If Awarthril had told me one of the two men was daintily eating his pterodactyl steak with a knife and fork, carefully taking small bites and savoring the flavor, and the other one had a spinning carousel of meat in front of him, only taking the choicest bites out of each one as it passed by his mouth, I would’ve pegged Serondes for dainty, and Aegion for savage.

Turns out, Serondes was a hair picky, and only wanted a few of the best bites from the food he’d cooked, waste and silverware be damned. Aegion, on the other hand, wanted to savor every last bite, no doubt in search of the perfect flavor to throw into his next poisoning attempt.

"Elaine! You look great!" Aegion cheerfully waved me over to the table, where I started to copy his manners.

"I knew you’d look good in that!" Serondes snapped his head forward, tearing out a chunk of prime rib.

A glowing smile lit my face up.

"Thanks!" I gracefully accepted the compliments, digging into the feast, asking a burning question.

"What does Mistcloth do? It seems somewhat magical."

Serondes casually answered between bites. "It’s a low-tier magical cloth. When it comes to normal activities, it’s solid. When it comes to anything that can harm or rip it, it becomes insubstantial. Watch me!"

So saying, he shot a precise bolt of Lava at me. I had enough reflexes to start to dodge, but not entirely.

Good thing he wasn’t aiming for me, just for the part of my half-cape he could snipe. The Lava bolt reached it, and cleanly went through, the half-cape barely even fluttering.

I examined the path the shot took, seeing that my clothing was entirely untouched.

"This is good stuff!" I said, poking at the cape. It felt springy and real enough.

Hang on - if it couldn’t be damaged?

"How’d you tailor it?" I asked Aegion, who just got a smug look on his face.

"I’m just that good."

We exchanged some small talk, before Awarthril got down to business.

"I believe our talk about you coming along for a bit has been interrupted a few times now." Awarthril opened up the conversation, then proved she was just as distractible as I was by darting over to Serondes.

"How many times have I told you? Honestly, wipe your face." She said, grabbing a napkin and wiping the corner of his mouth, too fast for him to escape the physical classer’s speed.

Awarthril. Team mom.

"Right! You’d be a great fit for giving us a hand. You don’t even need to fight or anything, from the story you told us you’ve done more than enough of that. No, we just need a high level healer hanging around, maybe going around and helping ‘heal’ everyone. Don’t even need to heal anyone we come across if you don’t want to! The simple declaration should be enough to panic any Shimagu, and that’s what we need to flush them out. Otherwise, they’d just lie low when we pass through, and we’re frankly not strong enough to assault their cities. In exchange, we’ll help you get back to your home after doing this for a few…"

Awarthril trailed off, realizing something.

"How long do humans live anyways?" She asked me. "You’re not Immortal, we’d know about humans otherwise. But like, you live at least 500 years, right?"

"Wellllllllllllllll…. About that…." I prepared myself for an awkward conversation.

"Humans aren’t that long lived. Close to 70, 80 before vitality kicks in." I explained to Aegion’s wincing. I left out the significantly lower lifespan from everyone poisoning themselves with mercury, lead, and other fun substances.

I figured that an entire thriving race of Immortals were probably the safest people to reveal my closely-held secret to, and get a gauge of their reaction. That, and I wanted to impress them somewhat.

"With that being said, I might be slightly Immortal."

Chapter 230 - On Immortality

There were a few moments where I got to feel smug at their surprise.

"You seized Immortality?" Serondes eventually asked.

"Seize immortality?" I asked, completely unfamiliar with the phrase.

"Attained it with a skill." Aegion clarified.

"Seized is the better word." Serondes muttered.

"Attained is accurate!"

"So is seized!"

Awarthril thumped both of them on the head, ending the argument.

"You two are as bad as each other! Knock it off!" She turned to me.

"Elaine! That’s wonderful!" She leaned in closer. "What’d you get as your curse?"

"Awarthril! I would never ask something like that!" Serondes waved his fork at her. "Her curse is intensely private, not to be shared with anyone she doesn’t utterly trust."

"Oh, knock it off." Aegion swatted at the air near Serondes. "From the sound of it, she grew up in an area with no Immortals, she doesn’t know any of the terminology, we need to help her out as much as we can."

"I’m not cursed yet." I told them.

"Awww, shucks. Sounds like it isn’t an Immortality skill then." Awarthril cut a steak in half, shoved the entire thing in her mouth, and ate it in like three bites. That was a valid method of eating when she had a billion physical stats, but wow.

"Eh, I haven’t activated it yet. I was concerned about White Dove and getting cursed, since we don’t have a lot of immortals."

Serondes and Awarthril each picked up something different from that statement, and started talking over each other.

Aegion took the chance to shove a mug of some sort of golden-colored liquid into my hands, raising his own in a universal "cheers" gesture. I instinctively took a sip, flavor and taste having a whole parade at how good it tasted. Why couldn’t everything he made be like this? I narrowed my eyes at him. Or was this some of the "old, good stash", broken out on special occasions, and not one of his brews?

I was leaning towards "not one of his" until further evidence changed my mind.

Serondes won out, on the basis of having Sound skills.

"Hang on, you know almost nothing about Immortals, but you know about White Dove’s curse ahead of time? Most people who seize Immortality are taken by surprise." He said, while Awarthril glared murder at him. To her credit, she gracefully backed down, letting me answer Serondes’s question - but from the look on her face, the way she was hunched forward on the table, not eating, said the moment I was done, she’d pounce with her own question.

"Oh, we’ve got some vampires hanging around where I live. I talked with a few of them, they told me how it worked for them." I said, giving the short, short version.

"Vampires!" Aegion happily slapped the table with one free hand, slamming his mug down to the table. "We’ve got some records of them in the List of Immortals, but we thought they’d gone extinct! Good to hear they’re still alive and kicking. Be a shame to lose another Natural Immortal race."

"Forget all that." Awarthril said, still staring at me. "You said you haven’t activated it yet. Are you telling me that you’ve got an active Immortality skill, not a passive one?"

"Uh, yeah. It rewinds the clock on the body, or in other words, makes someone young again."

That was my understanding of the skill, having built it myself, and from the description given.

The penny dropped for the other two elves.

"Hang on, can you use it on others?" Aegion asked.

I opened my mouth to answer, but Serondes interrupted.

"Elaine, listen to me. No, seriously, listen. I know I said keep your curse quiet, but more importantly, if you can use it on others, don’t tell anyone. Being able to make others Immortal is one of the most sought-after skills, period. Take Awarthril here. She’s bonded with Kiyaya,"

The two in question affectionately nuzzled each other.

"But Kiyaya has a limited lifespan. The bond’s extending it, but Awarthril isn’t expecting her to live more than 200 years."

"Pblrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrp! I’m expecting her to live forever!" Awarthril interrupted with heat and fire in her voice.

Serondes graciously nodded a compassionate concession, and kept going.

"You’re going for a companion yourself, you should have some idea of the depth of the bond involved. Now, Awarthril’s come along with us to try and get enough levels for Kiyaya to gain her own Immortality skill."

Awathril threw a fork at Serondes. It wasn’t particularly fast, not with the supersonic throws I knew she was capable of, and he easily dodged it. He did get brained as she pulled on the thin strand of sticky goo attached to the fork, boomeranging it back, making him faceplant into the table.

Either way, message sent and received. Serondes kept talking as he rubbed his head, glaring at Awarthril.

"Now, she finds someone who can grant Immortality, or heck, like you were saying, turn back the clock. What would she do to convince you to help her and Kiyaya?"

"Uh. Ask nicely?" I hazarded, channeling a bit of Brawling and playing the naive human.

No, the implications Serondes was talking about were all too clear. Even if Awarthril was totally moral, and I helped her out willingly, desperation one day might drive her to some extreme or another. Someone with a higher level and fewer scruples might want an Immortality granting healer around, to keep all their favorite toys alive forever.

And since this was Immortality that was being discussed here, forever was forever.

"Ok, no, I get it." I raised my hands defensively as Aegion started to open his mouth. "What makes Immortality skills different from, like, the best carpentry skills ever? Why doesn’t that inspire greed?" I asked. "Surely this can’t be the only madly desired skill."

"Time." Awarthril grimly answered. "Or replaceability, depending how you look at it. You want Folen to make you one of his legendary talismans? You can afford to wait until your name is next on the list. You need a sword of adamantium? Offer a new life to a hundred orphans, and train them all in the art of smithing, until one master rises to the top, and can craft the sword for you. However, you fall in love with a mortal? You find a lifelong connection with a companion who’s only got 300 short years on the planet? Nothing can replace them. The only solution is to get them to a high enough level, and get lucky that the System offers an Immortality skill - or find someone who can grant it. Conventional wisdom says to not fall in love with mortals, or bind with creatures with low lifespans, but… sometimes life just happens." She affectionately petted Kiyaya, fighting back a tear.

"Oh."

I put on my thinking cap.

I didn’t have much more to say. I’d wanted the Immortality skill, burned with desire for it. I’d crafted and shaped my class to accommodate the skill, all without thinking about long-term implications and knock-off effects.

With that being said, would I have problems in Remus?

Unlikely. Night, and other vampires could grant Immortality, and yet they didn’t seem to have big problems. Being somewhat secretive and hiding could help, along with being the biggest, baddest fish in the small pond called Remus, but there was something more to it than that. The elves knew about vampires, but I hadn’t heard of secret midnight raids to kidnap them. Given that, to my understanding, they could grant Immortality, I was missing some piece of the puzzle.

I mean… Aegion had just mentioned that the elves suspected the vampires had gone extinct, which might be why there were no daring… midday? raids.

Come to think of it, Night had never offered to turn me into one, nor were there legions of ex-Sentinels-turned-vampires running around. At least, not that I knew of. There had to be something else going on, but I didn’t think this was the time for it.

Also, I’d seen stasis fields from Lun’Kat. Didn’t they imply other ways of keeping people around forever? Oh, right - they’d freeze the person, and it wasn’t much better than creating a statue of the person, but it did extend the timeframe… although given that it was one of the most powerful dragons in the world making the stasis fields, it might be out of the reach of all but the highest leveled elves.

I challenged one of my assumptions. I hoped Lun’Kat was one of the most powerful dragons. I dreaded to think what it’d be like otherwise. The fact that one of her elements was Mirage implied she wasn’t that combat-focused as…

Focus.

"Elaine. If you can help Kiyaya, will you do it? Please?" She asked, as the wolf in question nuzzled my hand, licking me plaintively. "I’ll owe you a favor, even if you just try."

Well, nothing for it. I had no reason to say no, and this would be good practice.

I focused on the skill, "stretching" it like a new muscle. I tried to channel it into Kiyaya, but there was no purchase. No feeling of activation. It was like I was trying to heal a rock.

"I’m sorry. I don’t think my skill works on wolves." I said, feeling my heart stabbed as Awathril’s face fell. The skill had no ‘purchase’, no feedback.

She put on a brave face.

"Well, nothing for it. I’d be more than happy to work with you to level you up, get the skill stronger, and evolve it so it can help with non-humans!"

Always the eternal optimist.

"That might be a bit hard - I put the bare minimum in to get the skill, it was expensive."

"What do you mean?" Aegion asked.

"I had the chance to build my own class! It was a ton of fun, but incredibly stressful."

I’d mentioned that earlier, but it’d gotten lost in the discussion about my class qualities and stat totals.

The elves and their companions all looked at Serondes, who gave a smug smile.

"I managed to get that for my Lava class! Had a whole range of volcanoes, and a jar of lava to pour. Got some nifty skills out of it. How about you?"

Interesting. It didn’t quite seem to be as rare as I thought.

"Stars and constellations I had to ignite with starlight." I said.

"Elaine, it sounds like you’ve had a most fascinating journey. I’d love to know more about you. Tell me about yourself." Serondes gave me a look, like I was the only person in the world.

I know I’d given the short version of my story, heck, earlier today, but now they wanted more.

"Well, things started in earnest when I was eight, and unlocked my System. See, I had my good friend, Lyra, who…"

I gave them a somewhat abridged version of events, from the events that caused me to swear my [Oath], without going into details of exactly what was in it, to running away from home, bandits, Rangers, monsters, classing up, kidnapping, more monsters, plagues, the capital, Ranger Academy - the short version - becoming a Sentinel, keeping all the Sentinel secrets. An overview of my missions, from plagues to pirates, earthquakes to rebellions. Then the Formorians, and, well, they’d heard it from there.

It was pretty late by the time I’d finished, and Serondes had scattered torches around the campsite, igneous rock topped by shifting Lava.

I was helping as well, with my own little glow, but I was feeling more than a bit regretful right now that I’d taken Radiance over Lava. It was just so versatile!

I had to remind myself that it was significantly more expensive to pull off the same tricks, and Radiance had a different bag of tricks. Like, Radiance light was cheap. Lava-light? Had to keep dumping large amounts of mana into the Lava to keep it hot, and it kept radiating the heat out, while also not being all that bright, relatively speaking.

Aegion was contently sipping another mug of mystery beer, a contently sloshed look on his face.

"Good story, good story." He gestured towards my mug I’d been nursing, carefully rationing every sip. It was good stuff, worth savoring and letting the feeling flow over me with each mouthful.

"I’m totally convinced now. Elaine dear, you need to spend some time with us, to learn what it means to be Immortal, and how it’s going to change things for you. Plus, we need to get your level way up. That Night fellow sounds like he’s got his heart in the right place, but is muddling through it himself. I’m sure he’d do his best to help you, but, well…"

She trailed off, not wanting to finish her sentence, and disparage someone close to me. I could roughly fill in the blank.

"But he’s not an elf."

Still, I did appreciate them wanting to raise my level, even if it was for selfish reasons. I wasn’t going to say no, any help in this hostile world was worth it.

"One early trick, for example, are companions! You’re going to be living a long, fruitful life, probably with a bunch of cycles to get your classes and their quality high enough. Companions are great for that! They help protect you when you’ve just reset, and you’ve lost a lot of strength. Jumping from your first cycle to your second is rough. A lot of Immortals do something silly, thinking they have their old strength, that they’re as fast as they used to be."

Awarthril shook her head sadly, but not with the knowing of having lost someone close to her to the described mistake.

"Plus, companions are great!" Aegion jumped in, affectionately feeding Cordamo carefully-sized chunks. The poor snake was bloated as hell, having been ‘affectionately fed’ for the past few hours while I was telling my story, but the little glutton was still forcing his mouth open for the next bite. "People will come and go your entire life, no matter how much you might think otherwise. A companion though? They’ll keep you grounded, centered, sane. One friend who’ll never leave you, who you’ll never drift apart from over the centuries."

"Right now, we’re all the best of friends." Serondes chimed in, to everyone’s - companions included - agreeing nods. "A thousand years from now? I might be cashing in some favors Awarthril owes me once in a while, and every decade or so inviting Aegion to lunch. A companion? Friendship for your eternal life, the one constant in an ever-changing world."

Awarthril shot him a foul look at that.

"It’s pretty late. We should turn in for the night." Awarthril yawned and stretched.

"I’m happy to take a watch if needed! I don’t mind helping. I’m used to it." I volunteered.

"Watch?" Aegion asked, as confused as could be. "Why would we set a watch?"

Um. What?!

"Er, if something attacks us in the night, or tries to sneak in, or something? Whoever’s awake can alert everyone else?" I looked around, seeing looks of confusion.

"But nothing’s going to attack us." Serondes pointed out, like it was the most obvious thing in the world.

"Don’t worry about it Elaine! We’ll be fine. Just go get a good night’s sleep." Awarthril said.

"I’ll fix you up a little space. Come with me." Serondes got up from the table, beckoning me to follow. With a flicker of thought, he raised walls, expertly catching a bedroll tossed by Aegion over to us. Sand and Lava mixed together as he hummed, a beautiful and haunting melody. Soon, a cozy little sleeping space, complete with small windows, big enough to let in some light but not let anyone see inside, emerged, with us in it.

It would be cozy even before Serondes was here, and as it was, I ended up pressed against him, my mind whirling in all sorts of different and interesting ways. I shifted to make sure my egg stayed safe.

"One last thing before I go." He musically half-whispered in my ear, not needing to be any louder for me to hear. "Match the egg’s temperature, then exceed it by a small amount. If you’d like, I can make a Lava box to keep it warm at night."

The soft breaths on my ear was causing a flushing to go up my neck, and I mentally reasserted myself.

"Thank you." I whispered back. "I’ve got a skill for it."

"Tell me if you need any help during the night." He walked out of the small sleeping hut he’d made.

I did need something - I retrieved my armor, and spent some time making sure it was all dry, doing some serious thinking. First things first though, I adjusted the heat output from my Radiance magic to the egg I was holding, then once I’d gotten it just right, according to both Serondes’s instructions and [Egg Incubation], I tied it off with [Persistent Casting] and forgot about it.

First off - all the elves were stupidly good looking and interesting. However, my experience with Jaclyn, remembering how that turned out, was a good reminder not to rush into things. Heck, the elves either didn’t notice the effect they had on me, or just assumed it was totally natural.

I wanted to curse the gods out for making elves so damn perfect. If I’d known, I would’ve begged Papillion to be an elf, not a human. It was so unfair, I could cry.

I let the feeling pass. Crying and being upset over it wouldn’t change the past, it wouldn’t change who I was.

With that being said, I figured I could indulge in the inadvertent crush I’d developed on all three of them for a single night, then ruthlessly crush it - pun intended - and properly mentally reset myself, so I wasn’t totally bedazzled by all three of them, so I didn’t hang onto their every word and watch every motion, hoping they’d glance at me and smile.

Hormones were so annoying!

At the same time, they could be a ton of fun. The trick was going to be in control of my feelings, and not let them rule me, along with not making any dumb decisions.

And hey, once I’d sorted out my crush feelings and gotten my head screwed back on straight, maybe I’d pursue one of them. None of the dates I’d gone on in Remus had been any good, and I was starting to despair of finding someone, anyone, who could relate to me in a respectful way, who I found interesting and wasn’t old enough to be my father.

Ok, maybe technically the elves were that old, but they seemed to be around my maturity level. Either way, we were on a similar playing field, so to speak. They didn’t have a bunch of kids running around, we were all Immortals, in short, they didn’t trigger any of my squick "ewww no" factors.

Awarthril’s mothering of everyone was getting close though. Wasn’t there yet.

Right. Plan was set - indulge in crush tonight, then kill it, and look at the elves with a fresh set of eyes. I wrapped myself up with [Mantle], then started fantasizing about the elves. Only question was - who?

Serondes, with his musical voice?

Cute Aegion?

Awarthril, with her caring nature and ginger hair, which I’d never seen in Remus?

No, wait - All three.

At the same time.

I practically exploded in delight at the thought.

Chapter 231 - Elvish Adventures! I

I woke up, briefly panicked and confused at the stone surface above me, almost closing in on me. Was I back in the mines?! Was Lun’Kat’s lair, escape and freedom just a fever dream, my overactive imagination tantalizingly dangling freedom in front of me, pulling the wool over my eyes to the cruel reality that I was still trapped deep in the mines?

No.

The egg was still in my grasp, and the light was streaming in through the windows Serondes made last night. The fact that he could casually make windows, when Remus didn’t even have glass, still blew my mind.

[Egg Incubation] was telling me that I was holding the egg wrong, and I shifted and shuffled about some to get it all right, along with upping the temperature. Up. And up. And up. It got to the point where I double-checked my mana, making sure that I was at a sustainable number. It wasn’t going down, so my regeneration was still outstripping my casting. Everything right in egg-land, I dismissed [Mantle], got up, and left to get breakfast.

I quickly checked my [Egg Incubation] level. 35.

I was having a stupidly hard time evaluating how good that leveling rate was. On one hand, I expected quick levels from new skills these days. I had [Passionate Learning], and all my recently acquired skills had shot up quickly. Also, no more dead zone.

At the same time, all of them had been under high stress situations. Normally, it’d take a year or so for a skill to level up to 30, but that was assuming I wasn’t constantly using it, and I wasn’t, like, singing for my life. The fact that I was already level 35 was quite the jump… although my old logic of "what was my leveling rate" was all based on living in the dead zone. Or, as the elves called it, the low experience area.

I’d been in no danger working on this egg. I had a strong multiplier, but that didn’t explain it. There was a gap in the experience I was getting. I was getting more than I expected.

The only thing that I could think of was the tier of the egg. Something interesting was inside. I’d have to keep working on it, and pray my skill was good enough.

Wait - maybe Serondes had [Teaching]? Or some uber elf-bullshit equivalent that was increasing my experience gain. For all I knew, elves all had [I’m an Elf!] and it was all the general skills rolled into one.

As I left the little hut, intending to go wash up - and oh, what a luxury that was! Being able to wash up in the morning! - a sudden wave of "well, DUH" inspiration hit me.

I was leveling [Egg Incubation]. By definition, that meant whatever was inside was still alive!

Captain Obvious, reporting for duty!

I finished getting out, seeing Aegion having breakfast, his forearms rippling in the-

No. Bad Elaine. No more crushes! I scolded myself, acknowledging the feeling of attraction, then letting it go. I shook my head.

Right. I was back on track. Even though I’d been visiting those arms in my dreams last -

BAD ELAINE!

"Morning!" Aegion waved to me. "Breakfast?" He asked, gesturing to some nice flat bread on the table.

"In a minute, just want to wash up first!" I briskly walked over to where the pond was, still covered by the Lava walls.

Only to half walk-in on Serondes and Awarthril, who’d had the same idea to wash up.

My poor eyes. My poor "no more crush" conviction. I didn’t know if I wanted to take the chance to feast on the sight, or walk away. Either way, my face was doing its best beet impression.

It wasn’t like I hadn’t seen naked people all the time in Remus, usually around the public baths. The elves were a whole different kettle of fish.

Or pond of fish, as it may be.

My self-discipline took over, and I walked away, back to the table. I knew they’d seen me, but they hadn’t called out or anything. Bless them.

"I think I’ll wash up after breakfast." I couldn’t keep the embarrassed heat out of my voice, to Aegion’s knowing grin.

"Sounds good. Drink to wash it all down?" He asked, passing me a cup.

"Thank you." I took a sip, spinning my head so I didn’t spray the entire breakfast spread with my spit.

"Oh dear gods." I wailed. "How can something be so terrible!?"

His drinks seemed to be a coinflip of good or bad. I’m not sure spinning the wheel was worth it.

"Ah, another bust. Drat." He took a tiny sip, shuddered, then poured out his own suspiciously-full cup.

"Too much salt."

"Do you ever drink your own stuff?" I dumped my own cup out as I asked. Hey, Aegion was doing it, it was clearly acceptable. Also, I wasn’t counting ‘taking a small sip’ as drinking his own stuff, and Aegion clearly realized that.

"Only when I can’t find anyone else to drink it for me!" He poured something else into his cup, taking a tentative sip. A smile, and he downed the rest.

Revenge. Revenge was best served cold, but I’d take luke-warm. A plan was brewing in my mind, sweet vengeance plotted out.

However, the key to revenge was to not say anything. Screaming about how "vengeance would be mine!" and "you’ll pay for this!" was a great way to get nothing done, look like a complete idiot, and worse - it would let my target know that I was maging for them.

No, silence was the name of the game. Secrecy. Aegion wouldn’t know I was mad until my revenge was complete! Although, I could lay some of the groundwork for my revenge, AND poke some fun at him, all at once.

"Well, better me than someone who can’t neutralize poisons." I hid the little smile on my face in a mouthful of bread.

Aegion gave me a look, like he wasn’t sure if I was poking fun at him, or entirely serious. Serondes and Awarthril came back, and I took the chance to pop off for a quick morning rinse, my ears burning at the memory of walking in on them.

No crush. I reminded myself, banishing the thoughts from my head.

We finished the morning up, then it was time to pack up. It was practically a game.

"Ready!" Awarthril yelled, standing next to the crate. Utter mayhem followed her sentence.

Serondes was at the table, grabbing and flinging plates, cups, silverware, food - everything - at her, as fast as he could. Meanwhile, Aegion had unplugged and corked up his various barrels of experimentation, and was throwing them wholesale at Awarthril.

Neither of them could move nearly as quickly as the physical [Warrior]. Moving so quickly she was just a blur, she expertly grabbed each item out of the air, and neatly placed it into the Spatial Box.

Kiyaya ran around the campsite, grabbing the occasional large item that was lying around and tossing it to Awarthril. Cordamo patrolled the skies above, spotting forgotten items here and there, then swooping down to grab them - or anything too delicate for Kiyaya to grab with her huge jaws - and adding them to the maelstrom of flying camping supplies.

He was giving the entire place a bird’s - snake’s? Couatl’s. - eye view from above.

In under a minute, the entire site was cleaned. I let out a low whistle, as Serondes went around to the Lava-huts he’d made, crumbling them into a pile of sand. Environmentally responsible.

"A full team of professional Rangers, doing this every day, couldn’t get a campsite cleaned and ready to go this fast." I paid them the highest compliment I could imagine.

"Well, yeah." Awarthril replied, hefting the box easily up onto one shoulder. "They can only do so much without a Dimensional Box. Are we ready to go?"

I looked around, noticing in the chaos my armor had gotten packed up.

"I’m all set!" I shuffled a little closer to Awarthril, not sure what was next. I was suspecting it would be like when I was on a Sentinel mission, where I’d pack up in the morning, throw everything in my bag, then start hiking to the next spot.

"Set!"

"Ready."

Sticky goop erupted from Awarthril, slapping onto all of our chests. It completely wrapped around my chest, effectively putting me into a harness of sorts, with the other end connected to Awarthril. I was a bit concerned - this wasn’t terribly nice - but Aegion and Serondes had gotten the same treatment, and they seemed to consider it perfectly normal.

I must’ve had a confused look on my face.

"[Rubbery Rope]." Awarthril explained. "Lets me yank you out of danger if needed, moving you faster than you could move yourself. What’s your vitality, so I don’t accidentally snap your neck?"

I kinda shrugged at that, the hardening ooze - it was nothing like rubber, in spite of the skill name - restricting my movement somewhat.

"Perks of being a healer. I can bounce back from almost anything, including a broken neck."

I quickly flashed through the medicine, making a snap call.

"In fact, it’d probably be better for me to cleanly avoid whatever’s coming for me, and fix the damage from being jerked around, than take a partial hit."

Awarthril frowned at that.

"I’d rather you got out of the way without being hurt either way. Come on, what’s your vitality?"

Blah.

"11,000ish."

No reaction at all. Extra blah! Then again, they already knew my overall stats, so them being surprised would be surprising.

"Ok! We’re off!" Awarthril said, started to leisurely walk northwards. The rest of us followed along, like a trail of ducklings.

"Where are we headed to?" I asked, a little surprised at the pace. I knew we could all travel much faster than this. We were walking at a kid’s pace, not the superhuman jog, or run, that I knew we could all do - and probably maintain until nightfall.

"North! Your Poor Experience Zone is to the north and east, and we’ve gotten reports of Shimagu to the north and very slightly west of here. I figure we’ll head north, smash a Shimagu or two, using you to flush them out easily, then turn around and get you home before anything happens to your friends and family. Then, hey, who knows, maybe you’ll want to travel with us some more! Shimagu are a menace to everyone, and you’d be helping out your own countrymen by stopping their spread before they come too close to you."

That sounded like a totally reasonable plan.

"Plus, we can teach you everything you need to know about being an Immortal, and give you a hand with your egg. I know you don’t have a lot of experience with it, and could use all the help you can get."

Serondes jumped in here, walking by my side.

"I know that the early days of raising something that just hatched can be difficult! Most everything that hatches is weak and vulnerable in the early days, and quite a few creatures bond to the first thing they see."

Aegion butted in.

"Something worth knowing about Immortals, is as a rule, they treat Mortals and Immortals differently. If another Immortal has a problem with a Mortal, well, the usual answer is to just ignore them. They’ll die out soon enough, as long as they don’t do something stupid like attack you."

I felt there was a lot more being unsaid there.

Serondes tapped in, and Aegion gracefully let him say his piece.

"Even with all the prep, something can go wrong. I had perfectly prepared for the baby pegasus that I raised. However, it turned out to be a rare variant, and we never properly bonded as a result."

There was a very unlady-like snort from Awarthril, but the whole thing sounded terrible, and I didn’t want to dig deeper into a sore spot.

"The tree over there is a Bomboa tree. They’re rare, but they hold a bunch of water. Their fruit is OK, but nothing at all like what we can grow back home." Awarthril pointed to a stout tree.

"Now, another thing about Immortals is the importance of favors. Not every Immortal is rich, contrary to the stories, and we do have good use for normal coin. However, a favor can be priceless. You never know where someone will end up in life, and a favor gained today can be worth the world in a few thousand years, when the person who owes you has thousands of levels, and rare and fantastical skills."

He gave a slow nod at me, and it clicked - Awarthril said she’d owe me a favor. Heck, if someone helped me out, then asked me to turn the clock back on their kid or something? Yeah, I’d totally do it. I couldn’t be the only one with rare skills, and given a few hundreds years for Awarthril to mature her skills? Good chance she could give me a solid helping hand down the line.

Yeah, I could see why favors were such a good currency. And speaking of rare skills, it sounded like my Immortality skill could be worth a ton. Which made me wonder - why didn’t elves aim for similar skills?

I internally cringed as I realized I’d missed almost all of Awarthril’s little botany lesson, and tried to consult my [Pristine Memories] for what’d been said - except Serondes was now talking about pet homes! I decided to listen to him, instead of eternally playing catch-up.

The elves took turns telling me things, teaching me, expecting that I could follow three disparate conversations that had nothing to do with each other at the same time. Because of course I could follow three conversations, and soak up all the knowledge they were teaching me.

Awarthril’s attitude was just a touch grating. She believed that she knew better than me - better than the rest of us - and that it was her elfesse oblige to correct, educate, and protect the rest of us.

It was tempered by the fact that she was utterly correct. I didn’t know any of this stuff. I hadn’t thought about cycles, how to improve my own stats and class quality when time wasn’t an issue. I hadn’t realized how valuable favors were, or how importantly they were treated. I’d tried to do long-term thinking, but I hadn’t known that mortals tended to build resentment towards Immortals in their midst - even family members. Helped explain why Night was so low-profile though, and some of this he could’ve told me.

I also didn’t know the local flora and fauna, which Awarthril was cheerfully correcting.

While juggling three conversations, watching where I was going - Awarthril cutting a path through the tall grass and ferns made it much easier than usual - I also tried to do some self-reflection, practically groaning as the answer came to me.

I’d properly smothered the crush in its cradle, but now instead of wanting to have fun times with Awarthril, I wanted to be her. At my core, in my little heart, I was intensely envious of the elves. I wanted what they had. I wanted to be them, to be able to walk through life with an easy gait, to have been raised in the most wonderful environment. Instead, I was a muddy human, and from the sound of the other species Aegion was telling me about, humans were closer to the bottom of the elvenoid food chain, than the top. By his reckoning, it went goblins -> gnomes -> humans, then a dizzying array of other species. Even then, there was a weird rock-paper-scissors going on in his estimation.

"See, goblins are arguably better than gnomes, due to their increased size and savagery. It gives them a proper leg up in a straight fight. Gnomes, however, are possibly better than humans, given their mastery of magic. Smart little buggers, I’ll give them that. They can enchant anything, and since it’s tiny? Well, they can usually work in more enchantments than most other crafters. At the same time, there’s no doubt that humans are better than goblins. Your sheer size and physical advantage makes being a human much better than a goblin. The fact that you only get one stat point per level hurts, but at least it’s a free point, which is the best. Still, there are arachne, cyclops, demons, dullahans, giants -"

Serondes smacked him. What was interesting was Aegion could’ve easily dodged. He didn’t, for some reason - perhaps sheer politeness?

"Ah fuck your horns hurt!" Serondes waved his hands in the classic ‘smarting’ move.

Nope. Not politeness.

"Elaine’s a human! She can’t help it! Don’t be a jerk." Serondes swapped back to telling Aegion off.

I decided then and there that, if I did decide to pursue one of the elves, it would totally be Serondes.

"Ooof, right. I never thought of it that way." Aegion gave me a little half-wave. "Sorry about that. I’m sure there are plenty of benefits to being a human. Like, uh…"

"Quit while you’re ahead." Awarthril amusedly shot back.

I saw a moment to ask a few questions that I had rattling around.

"Out of curiosity, why don’t elves get an Immortality-granting skill? Like Awarthril, wouldn’t it be easier for you to get the skill yourself, versus leveling up hoping Kiyaya will get something? Or if nothing else, why hasn’t anyone gotten the skill, and, like, sell access to it or something? And why are we strolling like this? It’s nice, but…"

"In a rush?" Awarthril’s amusement laced her voice.

I opened my mouth, but she continued on.

"I’m choosing to focus on leveling myself and Kiyaya, because I’m not close to a reset. I don’t have a free class slot, and elves, well…"

Awarthril seemed to struggle to say the next part, her mouth opening and closing a few times as she started to say whatever it was, failing, and trying again.

"Elves, and other Natural Immortals, almost never get Immortality skills. It just doesn’t happen. We believe the System recognizes us as Immortal, and just doesn’t offer the skill. Why would it? We already have Immortality. It makes Immortality-granting skills virtually impossible outside of companion bonds. As for someone selling the skill? They do - for a ludicrous sum that all of us together could only pool a tiny fraction of what they want. They can afford to charge usurious prices, and they do."

She shrugged and quickly changed the subject, not wanting to dwell on a potential failing. Evidence that lowly humans, 3rd from the bottom according to Aegion’s list, could do something better than the almighty elf.

"We’re all Immortals here. We have unlimited time. There’s no real need to rush about, here and there, zipping through the world. Nah. Slow down, smell the flowers. See the trees, listen to the wind. There’s a great big beautiful world out there, and we’ll get our heads lost in the clouds. We rag on mortals quite a bit, but it’s easy to forget the world as Immortals. They never do."

Aegion stage-whispered, ruining Awarthril’s beautiful speech.

"Her mom told her that unless it was an emergency, she had to walk slowly. Something about being a flighty mess as a kid."

Awarthril launched herself at Aegion with a scream of embarrassment, and a scene I was all-too-familiar with from traveling with the Rangers emerged.

A brawl.

I couldn’t help but chuckle.

Chapter 232 – Elvish Adventures! II

I yelled as the [Rubbery Rope] that attached me to Awarthril got yanked on, snapping me forward into the brawl. There was no [Bullet Time] activation, but I did throw a shield around the egg, curling around it protectively. There was no way I was going to let this get hurt.

"Oi!" Awarthril’s fury was clear in her voice, as she stood up. "No bystanders! Elaine’s fragile, and she’s got an even more delicate egg with her!"

Ouch. 11000 vitality. Fragile. Right to the heart.

Aegion dusted himself off. He opened his mouth a few times, just to close it, frustration written on his face. Finally, he stalked off, and that seemed to be the end of it.

"Food for a baby companion can be tricky, especially if you don’t know what it is ahead of time." Serondes broke up the awkwardness by continuing another one of his lessons. "I would have fruits, berries, ferns, leaves, meat, bones, and organs - liver and brains are a favorite - on-hand, and I’d consider getting some more esoteric things, like good dirt, prepared just in case. You did mention you found the egg deep underground, and it’s not impossible for it to be some sort of worm-like creature."

I thought about a large Lava-worm hatching out of the egg, and I shuddered. Noooooo thank you. I’d probably raise it well, get it to adulthood, then let it be free. Companions and bonding was a voluntary choice, after all. I doubt I could even get the skill to trigger if I was baseline, fundamentally revolted by the form of the creature.

"Ok, what do I do once the baby hatches?" I was starting to get a little freaked out. This was a lot of prep work, and a lot of responsibility. I’d been dreaming of having a companion, but heck, I hadn’t even looked after a pet! This was going to be like a pet on steroids, dozens of times as complicated. In my mind, the egg would hatch, I’d feed it some of my dinner, and we’d live happily ever after. Reality was asserting itself, and it wasn’t painting a pretty picture.

Still, I’d committed to this, and I wasn’t going to back down now, no matter how much I was screaming internally.

"Feed it slowly. Remember, it’s a baby. Being a baby is hard. It doesn’t know how to eat. It doesn’t know how to drink. It won’t know how to walk, fly, or swim. It’s a baby. Its only way of talking is to scream, and it's your job to be patient and understanding." Awarthril was scratching Kiyaya behind the ears as she lectured.

"It might try to bite too much, choke on a rock, jump off a cliff, climb into a fire, swim in a raging river, or pick a fight with something much bigger than it is, depending on what, exactly, it is." Awarthril launched a stick with a weird ripple that immediately vanished, and Kiyaya got my hair swirling around me as she blasted off after the stick. Cordamo hissed his disapproval, then re-curled himself in Aegion’s horns, enjoying the sun.

"It’s your job to protect the baby, keep it safe. Normally, it’d have its parents around to help, but…"

I got a half-dirty look. I internally winced as I remembered they thought I’d snatched the egg from a nest, not liberated it from a dragon. There was quite a difference between separating the egg from its mother, and removing it from a mad - errr - perfectly normal and sane collector.

"I understand." I said seriously.

"About cycles - oh hang on." Cordamo had perked up, launching himself from Aegion’s head and gliding over to something in the ferns. Aegion started to briskly walk over there, talking away from me, his voice fading as he got further and further away.

"If possible, delay getting your third class as long as you can. The more stats you’ve got in your other classes, the more achievements you rack up while you’ve got the [Adult] class, the better your 3rd class is at the start, which has the potential to knock off a full cycle. We…"

At this point, he was too far away for me to hear anymore. Serondes rolled his eyes.

"Awarthril and Aegion held off as long as they could, but getting a third class is just too exciting."

With that sort of bait tantalizing placed in front of me, I couldn’t help but ask Serondes as Kiyaya finished playing fetch, returning the stick to Awarthril.

"What about you?"

"I perfectly timed, and optimized, getting my 3rd class." He said smugly, clearly pleased with himself.

Awarthril threw a stick right at Serondes’s head, but slowly enough that he could duck, looking gleeful that he’d dodged.

Right until Kiyaya bowled him over in her attempt to follow the shortest path to the stick.

You’d think Serondes would learn by now. There was no dodging Awarthril’s love taps.

"This is exactly what I needed to make the perfect, most sublime beer ever!" Aegion crowed, holding an uprooted plant that was ugly as sin.

No way was I going to drink anything that came from that.

Still, I couldn’t help but chuckle at the antics of the elves as we kept walking along.

"Elaine! Elaine! You’ve gotta try this mudweed with Longfern!" Aegion hustled over to me, pressing the questionable-looking plant along with one of the many ferns we were walking through into my hands.

I gave him a doubtful look, as he nodded vigorously at me. Reluctantly, being a good sport, I put them both in my mouth, and started to chew.

The fern tasted like miserable, stringy lettuce while the mudweed tasted as good as it sounded. However, where the two were mixing in my mouth, something magical was happening. The flavors were merging and evolving into something entirely new, something tasty and delicious.

I chewed furiously, giving Aegion a double thumbs up, who looked pleased as punch with himself.

===

"What’s the deal with Void mages?" I asked.

We were breaking for lunch, and while the elves were nice, and everything they were telling me was useful, important information, I was so sick of hearing them talk, and following three conversations at once. [Pristine Memories] and [Passionate Learning] had both leveled in a single morning, and I could feel my brain cooking.

I was learned out. I didn’t have the endurance to keep going, not at non-stop high-speed triple lessons at once. If this is how elves were normally taught, well then.

"Well, it was tricky." Aegion started to explain, yanking one barrel after another out of the Spatial Box. "Every 50 to 100 years or so, a city somewhere in the world would randomly explode, a gigantic fireball consuming the entire city and everything around it for miles. This was of great concern to us, so dozens of teams of our best and brightest went out to investigate. I don’t know how they did it, but they pinned down that the explosions were due to Void Mages. They then recruited 6,000 mortals, made them all get Void Mage classes, and…"

He mimed a huge explosion with his hands.

I shuddered at how callously Aegion talked about signing up thousands of mortals to their doom. Seeing my distress, Awarthril put a hand on my shoulder.

"They all knew what they were getting into." She softly, kindly said. "Everyone was worried and concerned about the problem, and now that we’ve narrowed it down, it can be prevented. Every time a Void mage exploded, tens of thousands to hundreds of thousands of people died."

I didn’t want to think about it anymore. I had some doubts that many people voluntarily signed up for the experiment, and there were serious ethical questions around it. Did they have them all grouped up, which meant they all died when the time came? Did they hunt down the surviving Void mages if they were scattered around, to prevent more damage? Looking at this too closely would become problematic, for no good reason. Time to change the subject - radically.

I generally kept the world traveling stuff quiet, because there was no reason to talk about it. Like, it was mostly a "Look at me I’m so special" thing, but it wasn’t something I’d earned. It’d just happened to me. I’d rather be treated for what I’d done, and my skills and abilities, than judged on some grand random cosmic error. There were some parallels here between that, and how people in Remus treated women terribly just because of what they were, but I couldn’t quite work it out.

Not that it mattered.

However, listening to the elves natter non-stop? I was ready to do almost anything not-rude to stop listening to them. I was vaguely aware that while there was no mind magic in Pallos, and they didn’t seem to be using a skill like [Charm] or anything, I was rapidly becoming comfortable around them. A combination of their easy manner, their acceptance, me being absolutely starved for any sort of positive interaction, and, quite probably, the fact that they were elves and had crazy natural charisma put them in the "fast friends" category. It felt like I’d known them for years, not two days.

I was perhaps too comfortable, too relaxed, but I wasn’t quite able to let it go. The paranoid, screaming part of me that had been in control the entire time I was in the mines, that said to trust nobody and run back to Remus as fast as I could, I locked away in a box and threw away the key. I wasn’t going to wander through life like that. I’d get burned again in the future, but it was a better way to live.

We’d stopped for lunch, and had been making all sorts of small talk, while Aegion tended to his barrels. A brief lull in the conversation, and I saw my moment.

"Did you know there are other realms?" I casually asked, figuring I’d at least test the water a bit.

"Oh yeah. Lirillen rips the veil, and grabs some random creature every hundred years or so." Awarthril casually bit down into her sandwich, barely even registering the question.

My mind did a mental record scratch. Who!? Did what!?

I’d long ago accepted my new home, my new family, my new parents. I was content, barely giving a thought to my old life. I suspect Papillion’s swiss-cheesing had more than a little to do with it, but being raised in a kind, loving household was better than years of therapy for the issue.

However, hearing that someone had what sounded a bit like a [World Traveler] class? Rather, a [Dimensional Gater]? I was interested. Could I pop by Earth? Could I let my old parents know I was ok? Could I talk to my old friends and family?

Would I still have System access?

Would I be able to get back?

I doubted I could re-integrate back into Earth’s society. Too much of me was here. Heck, even my internal reflection in my soul - how Librarian dressed - was from Pallos. I didn’t even think in English anymore. I -

"Troodon got your tongue?" Serondes teased, interrupting my runaway train of thought. I noticed my mouth had been hanging open, and I snapped it shut.

I shook all that out of my head. They mentioned someone who brought things over, not made gates. And once every hundred years? Too risky. No, I’d leave it be for now. I did want to talk with her at some point… but I was Immortal, and so was she. Probably. If she was an elf. Which it sounded like.

"Yes, sorry." I said, finally making it back. With how casually they were treating Lirillen, I felt like I could come clean without too much grief. "I kinda got smacked through worlds."

Their reaction was lackluster.

"Ahhhh, that explains the hole in your story!" Aegion said, bringing over a new set of mugs, filled with his newest questionable brew. An opportunity for revenge was starting to present itself.

"Hole?" I asked, accepting the mug.

"Yeah, I noticed that as well. Elaine, healers are offered better skills depending on their knowledge. It makes healing an interesting, but somewhat awkward path to follow, since the proper way to become a healer is to spend years at level 8 or level 32, studying as much knowledge as possible. It lets them get the proper powerful skills to be a healer. Most don’t have the patience for it, at least not while they’re young. Quite a few elves do eventually go down that route one cycle or another, but many find healing boring or tedious, and don’t stick with it. However, you never talked about any education, or stalling, and even mentioned that you were denied education." Serondes also accepted a mug. He was going to be collateral damage in my revenge plan, but my vengeance would be enacted regardless.

I took a sip, and forced myself to swallow the vile brew, mechanically widening my eyes. That was surprise, right? This acting thing was hard.

"This is good!" I tried to infuse my voice with as much cheer as I could, not quite knowing how successful I was being.

However, like the poor innocent lamb to the slaughter, Serondes - and Awarthril - raised their mugs up. Like a convicted criminal being led to the gallows, Aegion did the same.

Three nearly identical sprays of Aegion’s "beer" followed a moment later, and I fell over cackling.

"Ooooh, I’m going to get you for this!" Awarthril started to walk menacingly towards me.

"Why me! Aegion’s the one with the shit beer!" I complained. "I just made sure he got a taste of his own stuff!"

She paused, then turned on Aegion.

"You know, she’s got a point. Get over here!" She called out diving at him again. Cordamo bailed out of his horns, and the brawl was on again - this time with the tether removed.

"So. I’d like to know, how’d you end up here?" Serondes asked, finding a seat next to me. I shuffled just a tiny hair closer, my heart rate skyrocketing at my move.

What if he didn’t like that? What if he disliked me? What if-

BAD CRUSH GO AWAY.

"I have no idea." I told him. "According to Papillion, I was found floating in the void. My soul had somehow gotten lost, and he offered me a choice. Reincarnation in Pallos, losing a chunk of my memories, or thrown back into Samsara. I didn’t want to die, and being reincarnated with some of my memories seemed like a better deal than dying ‘for real.’ The rest was a natural extension of that."

"Where’d you come from?"

"A place called Earth."

"What can you tell me about it?"

Aegion and Awarthril had paused mid-brawl, Awarthril on top of Aegion, hand raised to punch, while he was pulling her hair. Both had stopped in the pose to better listen to me.

"Well, quite a lot. We prized knowledge and information there, and a lot of it was kept as I got moved over. Some was removed, but, well…"

I started talking about Earth.

And talking.

And talking.

And talking.

And talking.

And eating dinner.

And talking.

And…

"I think we should stop here for the night." Awarthril got up and stretched, and with a start I realized that the sun was already low on the horizon, and piece by piece, a full campsite had been established where we’d broken for lunch.

"Not the best traveling day." Serondes observed.

"Seemed pretty good to me!" Aegion cheerfully was drinking something, which I suspected was the "good beer", and not his experiments. Somehow, he seemed to get all the joys of drinking just from sipping his beer, and none of the downsides. I couldn’t tell if it was related to his class, if he had skills along those lines, or if it was just more elvish nonsense.

I saw my chance.

"Why don’t we split the day in half? You all have so many wonderful things to tell me, and I have so many stories I’d like to sing. Morning you teach me, afternoon I give you all some more stories. What do you say?"

I kept quiet that the mornings were slow and lazy, and the afternoons considerably longer, and that I was getting the better end of the deal.

Or rather…

We were all winning. The elves got more Earth Tales time, and I got as much valuable education as I could stand.

"Yeah, that sounds good." Awarthril had leaned back, and was starting to study the stars as they came out.

"I think we should swap days." Aegion proposed. "One day each. It makes a fair rotation."

"Listening to you talk for an entire day?" Serondes made a horrified face. "I’d rather jump in the ocean and let a kraken eat me."

"What! I’m not that bad. Elaine, tell Serondes I’m not that bad." Aegion protested.

"Lovely stars." I scooted over to Awarthril, sipping on a mug of something amazing. It was like hot chocolate with whipped cream on steroids.

"Aren’t they?" Awarthril’s amusement at me completely ignoring Aegion was made clear.

Serondes sidled up next to me.

"You see those seven stars there? They make the Crystal Crown." He pointed to the stars, roughly tracing his hand in the constellation.

"Oh? Humans call those three that are part of it, and the other eight there The Spear." I traced one back.

We spent some time showing each other constellations, while Aegion and Awarthril started to play some sort of game. I was tempted to call it cards, but it was so much more involved than that, requiring levels of superhuman - heck, even superelven - skill that I couldn’t even follow, let alone hope to match enough to participate in.

Finally, I worked up my courage somewhat, and my decision. I was horribly inexperienced with the whole dating thing, and that wouldn’t change if I never put myself out there. Why not give it something of a try? Why not try pursuing Serondes, and just… seeing where it went? If it was a bust, it was a bust. If it went well, great!

"Hey Serondes?" I asked, heart racing a million miles an hour as I shifted my egg around, and leaned my head on his shoulder.

"Yeah?"

"Can you show me magic? My class grows and evolves by seeing skills and understanding them, and my skills rapidly improve. You’re not a Radiance mage, but I figure I can try to learn something. Would you show me your magic?"

He glanced at me, and I shamelessly batted my eyes at him. He just chuckled.

"Sure. First, tell me about your skills." His voice was oh-so-musical.

I listed my [Butterfly Mystic] skills off, watching his face frown.

"Mmmmm. I see why you need to improve your skills. Additionally, your [Lantern] skill is far below mediocre. Radiance naturally kills illusions in the first place. I can’t imagine a situation where you’d need it, versus simply blasting through the illusion with conjuration. Why, I believe you’d be able to blast Awarthril’s illusions apart with little effort!"

I kept my silence about Lun’Kat, and her incredible illusionary prowess, and thought about what he was saying.

He had a point. Apart from Lun’Kat’s illusions, I was able to pierce most normally. The illusion "sense" was nice, but it wasn’t worth an entire skill slot. Plus, if I was fighting something that much more powerful than I was, I was dead anyways. Might as well get a more useful skill.

"What do you suggest I try to get to replace it?" I asked.

"Oh, I know of hundreds, thousands of better skills." He said. "I know your class should have an easy time merging skills though, so you should ditch [Lantern], then slowly grab new skills, then focus on merging them into your current skills, improving them and freeing the skill slot up again. Then repeat, finding more skills and merging them, until you find the absolute perfect skill to fill the slot."

"That’s brilliant." I meant every word I said. I should’ve thought of it myself, but I hadn’t. Cycling through skills, then merging them in? Perfect. When that was mentioned, being willing to drop [Lantern] was an even better idea.

"What’s an idea you have?" I asked.

"Well, you’ve got [Sun’s Heart], which is a solid heat and damage boost. However, you can probably get it to ‘aspect’ further, giving all of your skills additional minor abilities. Let’s see… Radiance is off of Fire, which has destruction as a concept. It should be possible to improve [Sun’s Heart] to simply make all your skills more destructive on top of everything else."

I spent hours listening to his musical voice, learning, improving, and throwing looks at Serondes - some of which I imagined were reciprocated.

It was a good night.

Chapter 233 - Centaurs

We spent the next two weeks slowly heading north, the days starting to become just a bit shorter. We were making alright time, although stopping halfway through the day felt all sorts of weird.

It was perfectly normal to my elvish traveling companions, and, well, when in the company of elves, do as the elves.

It was a day like any other as we walked north, the three elves chatting away, helping me learn all sorts of things.

"Over there, we can see some vultures circling… hang on." Awarthril pointed out some tiny flecks in the sky. I gave her my best "Are you shitting me?" look. Just because she was a physical classer, with probably over 100k vitality, possibly some skills to boot, didn’t mean we could all see that far!

"Let’s check it out." Aegion turned and started walking that way. Of course he could see that far, he was a blasted snipe-archer. He could probably shoot them down from that far away. With his eyes closed.

With nothing better to do, we all turned slightly and started heading towards the vultures, most of the conversation dying out as we focused on the task. We did pick up the pace though, slowly going faster and faster until I felt forced to take flight with [Scintillating Ascent], my wings in all their glorious colors snapping open and letting me soar and glide, pulled along by Awarthril’s [Rubbery Rope].

Flying never got old. I’d have to seriously consider if I wanted to keep my wings if I ever got offered the "Turn into Radiance and zip around" skill. It also suggested that I wouldn’t "cycle" my [Butterfly Mystic] class - I didn’t want to lose flight, and I suspected my efforts improving skills wasn’t easily replicated. Plus, it had eaten my [Pretty] skill.

Heck, for that matter, I was unlikely to cycle my first class either. I couldn’t risk losing my Immortality skill and just dying of old age because I did something dumb. No, the only class that had a shot at me cycling it was my 3rd one. Even then, I might just stall out getting it as long as possible to give it the best start I could, and take it from there.

Serondes took flight a few minutes later, Awarthril towing the two of us behind her. Aegion kept pace with her, a combination of having Gale and Lightning as his elements, archers being physically inclined, and Awarthril stopping herself at Aegion’s max speed.

Or… was it Aegion stopping himself at Awarthril’s top speed?

In about a quarter of an hour - Awarthril’s eyesight was ludicrous - we were near where the vultures were circling. A centaur - I couldn’t think of anything else that was half-man, half-horse. He looked like something out of myth, scraggly brown hair turning into a combination mane/backfur, leading into spotted fur along the horsey parts. If I had been a horsey girl once upon a time, I might’ve been able to guess what type of horse he seemed to be half-of. He was badly hurt, walking in a little three-legged gait, keeping all his weight off the fourth one. His left arm abruptly ended at his elbow, and as he panted and heaved, blood continued to trickle out of a dozen different injuries, some looking like nasty punctures, others like long strips had been taken out of him. A few creatures were stalking him through the plains, not going for the kill, but just waiting for the inevitable to occur. They spent more time snapping and snarling at each other, than trying to bring him down.

It was a miracle of tenacity, the predators being willing to wait until he dropped, avoiding a life and death fight, and significant amounts of System help, that he was still alive and on his feet.

The elves, taking only a minute to drink in the scene, sprang into action. Cordamo snapped into Aegion’s hand, and with a crack of thunder, a number of arrows blurred away. Awarthril dropped the Spatial Box, disconnected Serondes and Aegion from her [Rubbery Rope], and ran towards the centaur… pulling me along with her. I tumbled at the sudden acceleration, getting a quick look behind me before straightening myself. Serondes was busy erecting walls, while taking items out of the Spatial Box at the same time. Kiyaya ran next to Awathril, effortlessly keeping up.

Guess we were camping here.

I re-oriented myself, just in time to see Awarthril reaching the centaur. I pulsed [Dance with the Heavens] through [Wheel of Sun and Moon], flash-healing the centaur, fully restoring him to perfect health. Well, minus the dirt, the exhaustion, the dehydration, the starvation, the dried blood, then… ok, fine, pretty good not-about-to-die health. The image was terrible, but I had the mana to spare.

Also, up close, it was clear that the centaur was big. Like, his horse-half wasn’t scaled down to a nice human-sized proportion, no, the human half got scaled up to horse-size. Horses, as it turned out, could get stupidly large. I remembered that horses were measured according to their shoulder, and I’d need to stretch my hand above my head in order to touch the point on his body where the shoulder was measured. I couldn’t quite walk under him without touching, but I’d be able to limbo without too much effort.

I wasn’t a horsey girl - but I did remember that Shire horses were the biggest horse of them all. Just one of those little fun facts.

The centaur took one look at us, one look behind him - seeing the monsters dead or fleeing under Aegion’s assault - and collapsed.

"Well… that’s not the usual response." I quipped.

We got the centaur back to the camp - mostly Awarthril picking him up somewhat awkwardly, but with no effort, and carrying him over - and started to settle in. Aegion was busy with a knife and some wood, hands blurring as shavings flew all over the place, while Kiyaya retrieved monsters for Serondes to cook.

"Lion-steaks. Nice." I saw one of the animals dragged in. Kiyaya gave me an affronted look, and moved the lion over to the side in a pile, making it abundantly clear that it was her lion.

"I’ve never had them before." Awarthril confessed, throwing Kiyaya a look that said ‘be nice, and share with everyone’. "We don’t casually hunt apex predators. Only when they become a problem or threaten someone do we step in."

I cocked an eyebrow at her and gestured towards the world, as Serondes started his whistling.

"Really? The lion is an apex predator?"

"Close enough." Serondes paused for a moment to answer, before continuing his tune. Awarthril got a blanket out.

"Elaine, would you be a dear and find water?" She asked, handing me a large bucket.

Well, might as well make myself useful. I took flight, noticing that Awarthril was making a heap of blankets, then putting the centaur on them, throwing one last blanket over the whole mess, doing her best to make him comfortable.

Water wasn’t exactly easy to find. We tried to camp near a watering hole most days, but we didn’t quite have the same luck today, not with us haring off to follow the vultures. I flew in steadily-widening circles, feeling the occasional thermal shoot me up into the sky, letting me lazily glide down, or dive to pick up speed.

Sure, I had more than enough mana to cover flying, almost no matter how I ran it. It was just pure fun, bliss in the air.

I eventually found some water, filled up the bucket, mentally marked the spot, and headed back. Flying was less fun when carrying a bucket of water, watching it slosh out now and then. I made it back to the campsite, which was now fully arranged. Landing near the table, I put the bucket down, then walked over to where the centaur was sleeping.

"How is he?" I murmured, trying to be quiet enough to not wake him up.

"Exhausted, poor thing." Awarthril was looking at him with a critical eye, while Kiyaya protectively stood over him, her head slowly turning from side to side, scanning for threats.

Aegion was busy with a knife and wood, while Serondes wasn’t around. Drat.

I debated using [Sunrise] on him, giving him a quick shot of energy. It’d chase away a lot of the exhaustion, but would probably wake him up, and he needed his sleep. I was with a team right now though.

"I’ve got an energy skill, but I think he needs to sleep. We don’t need to talk with him immediately, do we?" I asked.

Awarthril tsked at me.

"No, no, let him sleep."

I eyed the bucket, I eyed the camp, I mentally thought about our water reserves.

Well, I should make myself useful.

"Got any more buckets?"

===

Centaur dude finally woke up late at night, while we were all softly talking around the fire. Serondes was slow-cooking the monsters Aegion had sniped earlier, occasionally picking up and flipping them over with a mage’s hand made out of Sand.

Versatile stuff. I’d never given the element much credit, but Serondes was a master of flexibility with it.

We were sitting in a circle, and I was mindlessly telling a story I’d told uncountable number of times before - Arthur’s favorite, The Iliad. I was more focused on Serondes’s expression, his rapt attention on me. His little smile at the funny parts, his frown at the sad. Awarthril was idling stitching something large together - although I thought Aegion was the one with the tailor skills? - and Aegion himself was continuing to carve lots of arrow shafts. Serondes continued to show off by having a number of mage hands plucking feathers, and attaching them to the arrow shafts.

I wanted a [Mage Hand] skill. I was strongly considering trying to get that as my "final new skill" once I’d finished a nice round of upgrades on my [Butterfly Mystic] skills.

That was if Radiance could even do that sort of thing. Nothing about Radiance suggested physicality, which was both part of its strength, and its weakness. I might have to shelve it until my 3rd class.

Still, I started and stopped the story at the centaur making some noise, while the elves smoothly turned to look at him.

"Hey, you’re awake!" Aegion exclaimed, staying seated. "How are you feeling?"

"Oh, probably awful." Awarthril didn’t bother staying seated, instead going over to make a fuss over the centaur. "He almost died, and the vultures were quite literally circling him, ready to pounce at any moment. Frankly, it’s a miracle you’re alive." She said, circling around the poor centaur who was twisting his body, trying to track her. I could see his eyes blinking in the sleepy "what the fuck is going on, am I still sleeping?!" way.

Thinking about it, he probably just used an entire lifetime’s worth of luck.

I walked over, and halted near him.

"Here, let me use a skill on you." I extended my hand, pointing at him with one finger.

He said something, and I didn’t understand a word of what he said. Sounded like an entirely different language.

Awarthril and Aegion looked at Serondes.

"Their language changes as fast as they run, and he’s not from any of the main tribes I know." Serondes shrugged.

Aegion walked over with a variety of foods that he quickly whipped onto a large wooden plate - finger food, bread, some of the meat Serondes had cooked, vegetables, a knife, a fork - basically a bit of everything, a feast with a tiny option for any diet.

It didn’t stop Awarthril from slapping the mug out of his hand.

"We’re trying to make him better, not poison him to death!" She scolded Aegion, while the poor centaur was looking on in confusion. I seized the moment to lean over, touching him and blasting him with [Sunrise].

Aegion shoved the platter in his hands, while Serondes used another mage hand to bring over a freshly-dunked mug of water. Awarthril tsked, and grabbed her hairbrush out of the endless crate of goodstuff, then started brushing the centaur. The poor dude - he was very obviously a dude - half-jumped at the intrusion. Awarthril continued to brush, leaning in with expert strokes to get rid of all the dirt, dried blood, and other debris.

Mostly on his sides though - dude was huge, even by gracefully tall elf standards.

"Awarthril." She said, pointing to herself.

"Aegion."

"Serondes."

"Elaine."

We all pointed to ourselves in turn, and the centaur figured it out.

"Tyriss." He said with a great, booming voice, with an accent like rolling, thundering hooves, then said something else after that.

I didn’t quite catch what it was, but annoyingly, the elves seemed to immediately figure it out. Extra-annoyingly, there seemed to be an immediate consensus among them that they’d all learn his language, instead of trying to teach him their language. It made sense - with the three of them working at it, they could help and reinforce each other, and they were all, well, frustratingly geniuses at it.

I had [Pristine Memories] and [Passionate Learning], and yet, the elves instantly outstripped me in learning this new tongue. Heck, they’d even riff off of each other.

I grumpily sat down at the table, chin in my hands, idly grabbing a bite of food here, a sip of water there, and pouted in their general direction as they mastered an entire language in the space of two hours, while I figured out how to say "hello" and "my name is Elaine." I think.

And when I said the elves mastered the language. I meant mastered.

"No, look, this is clearly something venomous he’s talking about, not poisonous. See how the vy sound changes between the two? That’s clearly indicating the difference between the two." Serondes exasperatedly explained to Aegion.

"Potato, Tomato. You were completely wrong on ‘lake’ versus ‘pond’." Aegion retorted back.

Serondes looked affronted.

"It was poorly explained!"

Awarthril yelled at them in the new language they’d learned, and they immediately switched back to bickering in the new tongue. There was a language barrier, but the tone and the body language made it clear what was going on.

Tyriss was clearly becoming more relaxed and comfortable as the elves picked up his language, and he got a good meal inside of him. Warmth, food, drink, and companionship worked wonders - I would know, having been on the receiving end of the elven generosity not too long ago.

Awarthril had a sort of blanket for him, neatly embroidered and looking warm and cozy as anything. Aegion’s endless whittling ended up with him giving the centaur a bow, and a quiver full of arrows. Tyriss looked grateful, babbling his thanks.

I was feeling left out of the entire thing, and after some time I decided to chat a bit with Serondes on the side.

"How did Aegion know that he used a bow? Not all Rangers are archers." I asked.

"Ah, I forget how little you know at times." Serondes sat down next to me, as I shuffled in a bit closer. For warmth, of course.

I scowled at him.

"Yeah, I’m not an all-knowing elf. Come on. The Low Experience Zone drives everyone away, we’ve had Formorians at our gate for centuries, of course I don’t know this stuff."

Serondes shifted a hair, helping press our arms together a bit better, which naturally had my heart going wild and all sorts of interesting thoughts going through my head. The last week or so of doing magic together every night had been slowly bringing us closer - or at least, that’s how I saw it. For all I knew, Serondes just saw this as normal, or assumed it was some sort of human custom that he was entertaining.

Ugh. Why did this stuff have to be so hard?

He turned and looked at me, locking eyes with me.

"Centaurs are famous for their archery. They almost never stick around for a pitched battle, instead choosing to volley arrows and skills into attackers, then using their natural System-granted speed and god-granted bodies to outrun their pursuers, constantly whittling them down. Creature for creature, in their given terrain, they will beat any elvenoid race... except for elves."

I hadn’t blinked once during his entire lecture, drinking in the sight of his eyes… and I noticed he hadn’t looked away either, not even as Awarthril smacked Aegion for doing something or another dumb. My poor heart was steadily increasing in pace.

"Why don’t they rule the world?" I asked, fully expecting the answer to be "Because elves." Still, anything to keep the conversation going, to keep Serondes looking at me while he was that close. Plus, it was boring being boxed out of the talk due to the language barrier.

"The entire world isn’t a flat, open grassland." Serondes replied with an amused twist of his mouth, turning and looking at more of the background yelling that was going on. Something about Aegion and his barrels.

Oh shoot. Did that just sink things? Did he think I was some sort of idiot?

Why did these damn hormones have the driver’s seat!?! I needed a skill to kill all my hormones and make me more normal.

Serondes kept me company for a bit, sometimes seeming to flirt, sometimes not - hard to tell, especially with my skewed perspective - while Awarthril and Aegion kept chatting with the centaur. Finally, they all joined us at the table, Aegion breaking out more of his drinks, pouring some for each of us.

"Long story short." Awarthril said, gracefully accepting hers. "Tyriss’s entire herd was wiped out by a hydra of all things. We’re going to swing by and see if we can do something about it. A hydra that’s gotten a taste for elvenoids isn’t something we should let run free."

We all watched with rapt attention as Tyriss said something, the elves all nodding. He then gratefully held the mug up, and took a great big drink.

He got like three swallows in before realizing just how foul it was, and I properly foresaw the spray of disgust coming. I shielded everything, stopping the foul liquid from contaminating our stuff and clothes - well, everything except Aegion. He totally deserved it.

Practically as one, like we’d rehearsed it, the elves and I turned our mugs over.

Chapter 234 - Traveling through the plains

We got up in the morning, and after stocking up on water, set off at a good pace. None of this lazily walking around until noon, no. We had a job, a mission, and I was frankly a little surprised that the elves were so willing to go out of their way to help out on this.

To my embarrassment, I realized about halfway through the day that I was the anchor, the slowpoke. I was running, pushing a sprint, the Mistcloth clothing making the impossible - running in what was basically a dress - possible, yet everyone else seemed to be going at an easy loping jog, Awarthril and Tyriss looking like they were practically walking.

Stats were weird. The benefits of being a physical classer were making themselves manifest once again.

Either way, I felt bad about being the slow link, and I pushed myself until my lungs burned, using [Sunrise] in moderate amounts to keep myself going. It was a cruel reminder that between my time in Lun’Kat’s lair, the weeks spent searching for my Sentinel badge, and the relaxed time I’d been spending with the elves, that I’d done almost no cardio, or other exercise.

In short, somehow, far away from home, I’d managed to go soft. Possibly a bit flabby, with how much I’d been eating and sitting around with the elves. I resolved that once we were back on the road after this little detour, that I’d get back in the habit of some daily exercise, regardless of how nice it was to laze about.

I had my pride, and we didn’t need to get to the hydra quickly. It wasn’t like it was in the middle of eating a town or anything. We were on, from what I gathered, a mission of revenge.

At the same time, I knew pride came before the fall; and it was good to occasionally swallow mine for the benefit of the team. Letting myself get humbled now and then, here and there, kept me grounded and didn’t let my head swell up to absurd sizes.

"I’m slowing everyone down." I panted out. Just because I could heal myself, and had near-unlimited energy, it didn’t stop my lungs from burning. It’d take a little more cardio to get me back into good enough shape where it didn’t happen anymore.

I would totally cheat with healing, and it’d take me like three days, not three months. Still, I had to suffer during those three days.

"Should I fly up, and have Awarthril just pull me along?" I gasped out the second part.

"We can slow down if you’d like." Awarthril offered kindly. Tyriss looked at her, hanging onto her every word.

I wasn’t great at social stuff, but being in the same boat, I recognized the look. He was crushing on Awarthril hard. I was glad to know the elves had that effect on more than just me.

"No, the point is to speed everyone up, not slow us down." I said, feeling winded. Running and talking wasn’t my strong suite, as much as I loved running.

Awarthril nodded, throwing a stick for Kiyaya to have fun with. Kiyaya was bounding about, seemingly out for play, while Cordamo was out foraging, grabbing the, errr, tasty plants for Aegion. For each plant Cordamo would fly back with it, he’d leisurely examine it - while jogging - grunt approval, then effortlessly make the shot, dropping the plant into the Spatial Box.

Hells, it was probably landing in exactly the right place in the box to boot. That one I couldn’t attribute to elf bullshittery - that was just raw stats on display.

Flying was better, although my understanding and brief experimenting with it showed that I was faster running than flying, at least on the open plains we were moving through. It helped that everyone was running in front of me, trampling down the grass and ferns, making it as easy as could be to run.

Speaking of - a nice dress with metal boots was one heck of a weird running combo. I didn’t have anything else, and I desperately wanted a backpack full of gear again, as opposed to my floppy, full of half-rotting dino-grease practically-empty bag. Honestly, at this stage, I might be better off burning it, it was that gross. The elves were nice enough to stick my armor in their Spatial Box, but even with their help my hands were full - gold-cracked red egg in one hand, and that lovely glass rose Serondes made me in the other.

I missed having basics, like a knife. [Radiance Conjuration] helped mitigate most problems, and it hadn’t been a concern down in the mines. Now though? Now I felt like a burden; and I looked like an idiot who just walked into the wilderness armed with nothing but gumption and a smile.

I was seriously considering a strong physical mage element for my 3rd class. Earth was a solid contender, although being able to easily make and manipulate stuff was making Sand, of all things, highly attractive. I suppose other elements could do similar things - Wood, focusing on plants and vines, Ice, focusing on snow. Water - although it’d get stuff wet, Metal, focusing on a liquid metal.

Lava was cool - but not. It’d probably burn anything I tried to mage hand, although the sheer building versatility was nice. I could probably build with anything solid though. The reason Rangers didn’t was sheer power and mana. It was expensive, and without reserves - like the wagon’s mana - mages couldn’t easily summon or move enough stone to make it work.

Thoughts for another day. I wanted my 3rd class to do everything!

Heck, I wanted all my classes to do everything. Just, with my other classes, it was easier to accept what they were, and the direction I was taking them. The last class? Endless possibilities, made real by the System.

Normally I’d tell myself to focus, and get on track, but I was running. There was nothing else to do, besides pant and curse the fact that Mistcloth gave no support at all.

Running hurt. Bless vitality for making it hurt less.

Well, I suppose I could listen in on the conversations everyone else was having. I couldn’t really participate, because every word would be punctuated by gasping and wheezing, while Tyriss and Awarthril seemed to be out for a light stroll, happily chatting with Aegion and Serondes.

We ate on the run, although we did pause to drink now and then. I had a sneaking suspicion that Awarthril was stopping for water a little more frequently than was strictly needed, for my benefit, but I was keeping my mouth shut.

Well, not really shut so much as open and panting, but same difference.

We ran late into the night, only stopping when the moons were high, throwing a spotlight onto us. Serondes made a quick camp, electing to go for one large dome that covered all of us, instead of the smaller individual huts we’d been doing before.

I groaned as I saw Aegion taking out his barrels, but Serondes was the one who said something.

"Really? You can’t leave them be for one day?" He asked.

"They need tender loving care! Otherwise they’ll go bad!" Aegion protested, hooking up another barrel.

I couldn’t leave that lying down.

"Wait. They’re not bad right now?" I quipped, getting some sign language back. The elves used their pinky, not their middle finger, and held their hand at an angle. Same general shape, same idea. They did have five fingers though. Awarthril just laughed, and after translating for Tyriss, he chuckled as well, shooting his own rapid-fire insult into the fray, clearly trying to impress Awarthril.

Aegion half-stormed off in a huff, but couldn’t quite get anywhere, given that he still needed to sort out his on-the-road brewery. Cordamo did hiss menacingly at us all. Tyriss looked nervous, while I took a step back. I wasn’t messing with a high-level danger noodle, especially when nature had gotten hit over the head and gave it WINGS. Serondes just good-naturedly half-heartedly swiped at the couatl, while Awarthril just shook her head at our antics.

We ate a quick dinner, then I seized the moment.

"Hey Serondes - more magic tutoring?" I approached him after the food, seeing if I could finagle some time with him.

He paused a moment, thinking.

"Not tonight, sorry. I need to rest. You need to rest as well." He patted the ground near him, and I took it as an invitation to set up next to him.

Oooh, he liked me! He wanted me to sleep next to him! Or wait, was he just being friendly? Was I reading too much into this? This whole thing was -

He gestured to Awarthril, and patted the other side of him. I gave him the stink eye, which he should’ve noticed, but either didn’t, or pretended not to.

I was a bit miffed that he invited Awarthril over, who chained into Aegion and Tyriss. The moderately sized hardened Lava-hut had room for all of us, but we all ended up on the same side, settling in nicely. Kiyaya laid down at our feet, creating a nice footwarmer for us all, while I made sure the egg - I should start coming up with names, or have a nickname for it or something - was properly resting against me, [Persistent Casting] and [Egg Incubation] working in tandem.

I wanted to go to sleep, but between my healing and [Sunrise], I was able to stave off the effects of having run all day long. Instead, I started at the ceiling of the hut as everyone went to sleep, my heart pounding in my ears as I was aware of just how close Serondes was to me, his chest moving, his…

Damnit, I’d gone and gotten a crush again. But, like, I kinda signed up for this one, and thrown myself into it.

What I should do was talk with him, like a normal, capable, functional adult. I should see what he wanted in a relationship, what his wants, needs, and expectations were, see if it was compatible with mine, then ask him if he wanted to date. It should be that simple and easy - well, it was - I just lacked the emotional something or another to, like, actually do it.

ARGH! This romance stuff was complicated! I didn’t even know what I wanted!

Sentinel Dawn. Crippling weakness: Romance. And social stuff. Thinking about it, one was an offshoot of the other.

With a huff, I turned myself over, and after minutes - hours? - of staring at the back of my eyelids, I finally fell asleep.

It took four days of running mixed with angst to make it to the swamp. I eyed Tyriss with newfound respect. From what I’d gathered, he’d made it all the way to us, from this swamp where they’d tried to fight the hydra. It was one heck of an impressive feat… until I remembered we’d been traveling at my pace the entire time, and not the centaur’s significantly faster gallop.

Tyriss said something, and I managed to catch the gist of it, having picked up a few words from all the chatting.

"What now?"

Awarthril responded in fluent centaurese, and I entirely missed it. I didn’t miss her going invisible, and while the grass looked entirely undisturbed, the blast of wind as she sped off was unmistakable.

I shook my head. What would Magic have to say about her sloppy techniques? I swear, she was only going invisible because it seemed to be the right thing to do, not that she needed to be invisible. More elvish nonsense.

Serondes gestured, and we all backed away from the swamp. Rapid-fire words were exchanged with Tyriss, which turned into a heated argument. Serondes was waving his hands around, while Tyriss stomped his hooves.

Finally, they seemed to reach some sort of compromise, and Lava started to flow from Serondes, coating a modest patch of grassland, smoothing and flattening it. Forming a foundation. Then walls, twice as thick as I was tall, started to rise up. They only made it about half as tall as I was, when they stopped rising up.

Serondes moved around to the back, and quickly made a smaller - but still significantly sized - lean-to. It was Tyriss-sized, and the centaur moved over, and said something, signifying his approval.

Guess he wasn’t staying with us in the large construction of Serondes’s?

A clear, but narrow, zig-zagging entrance was present and built in, and Aegion immediately walked into the entrance, only to jump back with a yelp.

"Why’d you leave it so hot!?" He did the classic ‘hotfoot’ dance, glaring murder at Serondes.

I rolled my eyes at that, and Tyriss who’d wandered back over, in spite of not speaking the language, got the idea, whinnying a laugh.

Serondes answered, his tone indicating what, exactly, he thought of Aegion’s question.

"Lava, as you might have noticed, is hot. Things take time to cool, like your dinner coming out of a fire."

Aegion threw the same pinky one-fingered salute Serondes’s way.

"Why the low walls?" I studied the structure, not quite seeing the point.

"Ran out of mana." Serondes replied. At my concerned look he corrected.

"Ran out of spare mana. Plus, the entire thing is too hot right now. Any more, and it’ll start melting and collapsing."

Made sense. Worst part was Serondes being out of spare mana, he couldn’t keep showing me magic tricks, well, not without eating into his mana that was needed to keep building the…

Well, usually I’d call it the campground, or the resting place. No, from how large the foundation Serondes had laid, to how he was circling it, muttering with his hand over his eyes, looking at a steep angle up into the sky?

He was building an entire fortress.

Generally, in Remus, it was considered poor practice to build anything out of conjured material. The natural decay rate of conjured stone made it impractical for anything lasting more than a few months. Sure, it might still be standing, but unknown structural problems would start cropping up. It’d take constant maintenance to keep upright, and it was considered far cheaper to simply pull real stone out of the ground, or quarry it, and use that. At Ranger Academy we’d studied a couple of famous examples of buildings that had collapsed horribly, and been told "don’t do it." We’d never been given the exact details, but then again, we’d been in training to become Rangers, not engineers.

It was compounded by most people not having the mana pool or regeneration to just erect a fortress in a reasonable period of time.

The current situation completely overturned that logic. Serondes had the mana, the time, and we didn’t need it to last that long. I hoped. I should check on that.

"Hey Serondes, is this just for the hydra fight, or is there more to it?" I caught up with him as he made it back around one circle.

"Just for the hydra. We shouldn’t have any trouble with it, but it gives us a place to hold and defend if needed."

He glanced at Tyriss.

"I personally doubt that the hydra would be so foolish to engage with a fortification like this, not when it was smart enough to avoid being baited by the centaurs, however, it’ll keep our gear and you safe."

Hang on.

"I should come along!" I protested.

Serondes gave a long-suffering sigh.

"Why don’t you and Awarthril discuss it?" He started to raise another level of the fort, while I grumpily stalked off.

Leaving me behind, bah. We’ll see what they had to say about that!

Chapter 235 - The Hydra I

After about an hour of working on the Fortress of Hydra Death, Serondes’s Sizzle Shack, or Castle Why-Does-The-Swamp-Smell-So-Bad - the name was a work in progress - it had cooled enough that Aegion and I could get in. The entrance was a bit too narrow for Tyriss to comfortably enter, and he was looking more than a bit nervous at the entire thing.

I mean, I would be nervous as well, if the people helping me out were building a fort that explicitly didn’t let me inside.

"Hey Serondes! Why the narrow entrance that Tyriss can’t enter?" I asked him, noting that Serondes had built Tyriss a special little lean-to for his own, clearly indicating that he wasn’t joining us. It didn’t seem nice to poor Tyriss.

"Simple. Anything large enough to permit Tyriss entry, would likely allow a head of the hydra to enter, which would entirely defeat the purpose." I thought about Tyriss, and how he was so damn big that I could almost walk under him. I looked at the narrow passageway that was slightly wider on the bottom than the top, probably a minor concession to Kiyaya crawling in, and getting our Spatial Box in and out. I thought about how stupidly large the passage would need to be to accommodate Tyriss, and how it’d lose the zig-zagging property.

I reluctantly, to myself, admitted that Serondes was right.

He gestured, numerous thick spikes erupting out of the ground. I eyed them, thinking about what myths and legends had to say about hydras, and while the spikes were thick, they didn’t seem large enough to properly stop something the size and weight of what we were dealing with.

Then again, maybe they were purely a deterrent? A hydra-be-gone?

Either way, I wasn’t an engineer, nor was I an overly talented elf that could somehow do everything. What did I know about this stuff? It was possible that Serondes had some sort of skill that was backing up the construction, making the spikes deceptively powerful. Or he was next-leveling the hydra, and preparing something that the hydra would think was strong enough to be a problem, without having the needed power.

I dunno.

Either way, I kept my mouth shut and entered the building, violating hundreds of safety regulations.

Serondes had arranged a few rooms here and there. One was obviously a dining room, we each had our own little room - no doors, of course, Lava wasn’t that busted as an element - a communal gathering area, and some storage rooms. I had no doubt that we’d end up getting doors somehow though.

Oh, and a considerate room for Aegion’s moonshine. I suspected it was more to keep it out of our hair, than out of any desire to be nice to him.

Aegion and I got working on unpacking all the gear, and making the place cozy. To his credit, he was making sure everyone else’s stuff was unpacked and settled in before tending to his latest attempt at seeing if he could overcome our vitality, and poison us all to death.

Aegion focused on unpacking, while I ended up arranging the fortress to specs. I’d never been much of a homemaker, and now I was suddenly finding myself more or less in charge of getting a fortress arranged. Literally single-handedly.

What had my life come to? Also, I needed to figure out a sling or something for the egg. Being permanently down a hand was no good.

Every now and then, a roiling wave of heat would wash over us, Serondes expanding the fortress in some new and inventive way. There were no stairs to the top of the walls, but they’d either come later, or everyone had the ability to make it up there on their own. Well, everyone except Tyriss, but he wasn’t inside the fort. Like, I could fly up there, Awarthril could probably just flat-out jump that high, the entire castle was made out of Serondes’s element, and Aegion?

I wasn’t sure, but if he told me that Cordamo could lift him up that high, I’d believe him. Stats and skills, especially at the level the elves were at, made seemingly ridiculous ideas and feats commonplace. Heck, Aegion might have the strength to just leap up the wall, or the dexterity to use the tiny cracks in the rock to climb up the side!

Either way, we finished up, and I was lounging in the living room, open to the sky above, without anything better to do.

"Water. I should get some water." I sighed and hauled myself up, as Aegion emerged from his brewery, evil-looking green gases following behind him.

"Hey Aegion! Got a spare barrel? Figured I should stock up if we’re going to be here for a while."

He looked thoughtful at the idea, eyes rapidly flickering as he inventoried his stuff.

Wait.

Don’t tell me he’d hijacked the team’s water barrel for his own brewing?

I could totally see him doing that.

I could also see the elves blithely assuming they’d always be set on water, and just not bothering to have significant reserves.

"I’ve got a few spare, yeah, good idea Elaine." He walked over, plopping himself down on a large pillow.

"Alternatively, I know you’ve been trying to aspect your Radiance magic with more destructive elements, right?"

I nodded. I had no idea when he’d picked that up, but for all I knew he’d heard everything we’d ever said. Or Serondes had told him. Or… there were a lot of options really. It didn’t matter.

"Well, Lightning is somewhat destructive, and Cordamo is an expert at other types of destroying. Figure we could try and give you a hand. Grabbing a specific skill is never easy."

Well, between chores, and learning magic, the chores went right out the window.

"I’m all ears!" I flicked my fingers, letting the soft Radiance glow emanate.

"Right. All elements have concepts behind them." Aegion started to lecture, retreading some familiar ground. "Water is flexible and flowing, while Earth is hard and rigid. Easy to be flexible with Water, while Earth being flexible is difficult, for example."

I nodded. Maximus had lectured on similar principles in the past, although there was a lot more hemming and hawing and "not entirely sures".

"Destruction is a concept that’s primarily in Dark, and secondary in Fire. Now, just because a concept is in the base element, doesn’t always mean it ends up in the final combined element. A good example of this would be Light to Sound, where the illumination aspects of Light don’t carry over."

I thought about that for a bit.

"Let me guess - Sand lacks rigidity?" I asked, going back to his prior example.

"Exactly! Now, new aspects and concepts show up all the time in advanced elements, and the list is frankly exhaustingly long, and probably incomplete. Poison, for example, might have destruction as a concept, given that the element revolves around, well, poison. It might not, it could just be an effect. We’re not sure."

He shrugged, as Cordamo, the poison couatl himself, curled around his horns, flickering his tongue at me and sunning his wings.

"Either way, seeing things get destroyed should help."

I gave him a Look, with a twist of the corner of my mouth.

"Where’s your latest concoction? Might as well put it to good use! Destroying it with Radiance is a much better look than letting it destroy my sense of taste!"

Aegion swatted me for my insolence. Undeterred, I stuck my tongue out at him, and grabbed a barrel he deemed "safe enough", and went to get some water.

The swamp looked like an easy place to get water, and an utterly terrible idea. Instead, I flew around a bit, finally finding a nearly hidden stream. The entire time, I was meditating on the idea of destruction, because, well, I wasn’t about to start lighting the grasslands on fire.

What did it mean to destroy something? Well, that was fairly subjective. It meant it had fallen apart, or wasn’t working anymore, right?

As I watched the water barrel fill up, I came to a conclusion:

There was no way I was getting a "destruction" skill on meditation alone, even with [Butterfly Mystic]’s help in getting new skills. I needed to get out there, and blow stuff up.

Hopefully it’d be fairly easy to merge with [Sun’s Heart], and then I could get a NEW skill, and work on merging that!

As difficult as this new skill was to get, I did like how I was freeing up a skill slot, then abusing the heck out of it to improve all my other skills. I could try to directly improve the other skills as well, and maybe that was more efficient… although, if I managed to earn an upgrade for a skill, wouldn’t it be more likely that I was directly offered the upgrade, instead of getting a skill for it?

Getting the skill felt like a solid half-step in the process of upgrading a skill.

Still, I wasn’t quite getting what the elves meant by "aspecting with destruction", which was doing me no favors. I strained and heaved the full barrel of water over one shoulder.

Legs wobbling, I leaned down to pick the egg back up - I only dropped it for a second! - rewarmed it, then took flight with [Scintillating Ascent], heading back to the fortress, awkwardly balancing the half-full barrel with one hand, using my knees as extra support, flying in a weird squat.

I needed a sling, badly.

I doubt I could’ve carried the barrel back on my own, but I just needed to keep it somewhat stable, and let my poor flight skill handle the rest. I should study hawks or eagles or other large fliers that carried things. It would help the skill.

Well, I was in for a long, long stretch with minimal class ups or skill changes. Might as well make the most of it, especially if [Butterfly Mystic] didn’t have the fancy skill evolutions in its next tier.

I made it back, only to see a completed Castle Evil Overlord. Seriously, made out of dark, hardened Lava, nasty spikes in every direction, and an artistic Lava flow acting as a moat? Only thing the Castle was missing were some banners and Totally Evil guards patrolling. Oh, and the screams of the damned.

Either way, I landed, and Awarthril and Kiyaya were back!

"Thanks Elaine! That’s super helpful." She gave me one of her radiant smiles, which had me feeling all warm and fuzzy inside.

"Right. Now that we’re all here, I want to tell you about what I found, and what the plan’s going to be." She said, changing gears into a serious mode that I knew so well. Reminded me of Julius.

"Where’s Tyriss?" I asked. He wasn’t hard to miss, and this was the "no centaurs allowed" fortress. I mean, he was probably outside, but I meant more in the "why isn’t he part of the planning?"

Aegion shrugged.

"Probably off to find another herd. He’s done his part, leading us here, and he knows we’ll kill the hydra. He might hang around a bit just to get confirmation that we’ve succeeded, but he’s not going to be part of the fighting."

That was a lot of confidence in people he’d barely met. I guess elves did have that sort of reputation, and they’d helped him re-gear up before sending him off. Just like they’d helped me.

It did imply that the moment the elves stopped finding me useful or entertaining, they’d just leave me behind. Then again, I believed I was both useful and entertaining, and they had said they’d help me get home. I suppose Tyriss had asked for help with the hydra, and the elves were helping out.

"The hydra." Awarthril said, getting back on track. "It’s in the swamp, level 700 or so. Seven heads, and it was able to detect me through my invisibility." Awarthril frowned at that, seeming to take personal affront to the hydra detecting her.

Personally, I thought it was because of her smell - clean, pristine, and vaguely of flowers, which was totally out of place in a swamp - and I considered keeping my mouth shut. At the same time, it was needed information.

"Awarthril, politely…" I said, hesitating a bit.

"Yes Elaine?" Awathril made sure I could say my bit.

"You smell." I bluntly told her, and at her affronted look I backpeddeled.

"Not in a bad way! In a good way! You smell great!" Well shit I was putting my foot in my mouth. "But it’s not how the swamp smells, and the hydra might’ve noticed the slight change, of a beautiful flora scent instead of rotting decay."

Awarthril’s face had a mix of affronted, offended, and thoughtful. She gave me a curt nod.

"Thank you." She said, and moved on.

"There are numerous deep ponds in the area, and the tree cover gets somewhat thick. I didn’t engage, but hydras almost universally have Verdant as their primary element, with two more coming along. Given it’s living in a swamp, and from what Tyriss has told us, I’d guess Decay, Miasma, or some of the Water-related elements." Awarthril finished her summary. "Ideas?"

I had six different plans of attack ready by the time she finished her summary, Ranger Academy and the endless lessons and training on fighting monsters coming in handy. However, I kept my mouth shut for now. I didn’t know my team’s full capabilities, and I wasn’t the leader here. Heck, I was a hanger-on, and unlike the dwarves, the elves were competent. As well as having their leader.

I’d be happy to contribute and refine ideas.

Aegion spoke up first.

"I’m almost useless here." He freely admitted. "Whatever support you can think of me doing, I’ll be happy to perform."

I tilted my head in confusion, but the elves were in serious-face mode, not inclined to explain things to me. I’d ask later.

"Most of this fight is going to come down to my Lava." Serondes said. "Only thing we’ve got that can stop a hydra’s head from regenerating."

Ok, that I needed to correct.

"Uh - " I slapped a hand over my mouth as I realized I was about to say something monumentally stupid, given that I’d never seen or studied a Pallos hydra. They might not follow the same rules, and I should absolutely, 100% make sure my knowledge properly aligned with what they did. I’d been burned too many times relying on Earth knowledge, assuming that it worked the same way in Pallos.

"Yes Elaine?" Awarthril gently, implacably, removed my hand from my mouth. "If you’ve got something to add, please, we’re all ears."

I eyed their long, pointy ears, and with superhuman effort, kept a lid on the jokes.

"Hydras regrow their heads. Wouldn’t Radiance be able to stop that?" I asked.

Awarthril frowned.

"Ok, technically, yes. Radiance can sear a hydra stump and prevent regeneration, along with most of the Fire-aligned elements, and weirdly, Acid. However, even if we were bringing you on this fight, your range is too short. You’d be right in the middle of their heads, I’m not convinced you have enough power to properly sear the head shut, and you’d break my Mirages."

I bought the part about me not having enough power to properly sear a hydra’s neck shut. Awarthril knew roughly how much magic power I was working with, and had seen the hydra. The part about my relatively short range I could also accept. I had no idea how long the hydra’s heads were.

I was skeptical, but willing to accept Awarthril not wanting her Mirages broken. She had a style, and I wasn’t going to gimp it.

Staying out of the fight though? As much as I wanted to, I didn’t agree.

"Look, I’ve spent my entire adult life, and half my childhood being the healer in a fight. You saw my armor. Any injury you take, I can immediately heal. Any poison that’s used, heck, any poisonous plants we pass, we can entirely ignore. Heck, if someone makes a mistake and is bitten in half, I can heal that. Nothing short of an instantly lethal blow will kill one of you."

"But we’re not going to die anyways?" Aegion asked, seeming confused at the idea.

I facepalmed at the sheer arrogance in the words.

"You wanted to get me leveled up right? How am I suppose to level enough to improve my [The Stars Never Fade] if I never get into fights, if I never take risks?" I asked, trying a different track. Awarthril was looking hopping mad at that, and I mentally berated myself. Kiyaya’s lifespan was her sore spot, and I’d just poked at it hard.

"Look, if Elaine wants to tag along, we should let her. She’s got a flying skill, she can be with me in the air." Serondes suggested.

Cordamo landed on my hair, wrapping his tail around my neck as I went very, very still. He let out a long hiss at Aegion, who seemed to understand. He rolled his eyes.

"Cordamo’s fine with you coming along, provided that you’re his new sun spot. The lazy git doesn’t want to do his own flying."

I leaned back, only to have a medium-sized heart attack as Cordamo popped into full view, hissing something at me and nodding towards my egg.

It was Aegion’s turn to facepalm.

"No, you can’t have the egg! Leave Elaine alone! That’s hers!"

More hissing.

"No, it’s not ‘fair payment!’"

"How about I drink a full mug of your swi - err - sweet drink as well?" I tried to shamelessly bribe Aegion, almost punting the entire thing as I nearly called his drinks "swill".

He shrugged.

"Alright, I’m fine with it."

Awarthril’s face had thunderclouds going across it. Kiyaya nuzzled her, and she glanced down, pursing her lips.

"Is your general healing able to handle animals? Specifically, dire wolves?" She idly scratched behind Kiyaya’s ears.

"Yes, at a steep but manageable penalty." I replied, seeing where this was going.

Awarthril continued to frown, then sighed, letting the tension out of her shoulders.

"Right. Fine. I don’t like it, but I see when I’m outnumbered. Right, what’s the range on your healing?"

I told her, along with the caveat that I needed sunlight or moonlight to make it work.

"Right. Here’s how I see it." Awarthril blurred, stone chips flew, and there was a miraculously detailed and well-measured map carved into the floor of the fortress. I’d bet my teeth that it was accurately to-scale to boot.

She told us the plan.

I applied my critical eye towards it, but I had to reluctantly admit it was good, and I couldn’t think of a way to improve on it.

"Right, let’s check our gear, get a good night’s sleep, then move out first thing in the morning." Awarthril said, clapping her hands together, indicating that the meeting was over.

[Name: Elaine]

[Race: Human]

[Age: 20]

[Mana: 411,030/411,030]

[Mana Regen: 340,040 (+355,281)]

Stats

[Free Stats: 90]

[Strength: 942]

[Dexterity: 1,465]

[Vitality: 11,142]

[Speed: 11,142]

[Mana: 41,103]

[Mana Regeneration: 41,192 (+35,528.1)]

[Magic Power: 18,136 (+340,050)]

[Magic Control: 18,136 (+340,050)]

[Class 1: [The Dawn Sentinel - Celestial: Lv 419]]

[Celestial Affinity: 419]

[Cosmic Presence: 286]

[The Stars Never Fade: 1]

[Center of the Universe: 419]

[Dance with the Heavens: 419]

[Wheel of Sun and Moon: 419]

[Mantle of the Stars: 419]

[Sunrise: 344]

[Class 2: [Butterfly Mystic - Radiance: Lv 345]]

[Radiance Affinity: 345]

[Radiance Resistance: 345]

[Radiance Conjuration: 345]

[Lantern: 345]

[Nectar: 345]

[Sun's Heart: 345]

[Scintillating Ascent: 313]

[Kaleidoscope: 345]

[Class 3: Locked]

General Skills

[Long-Range Identify: 370]

[Pristine Memories: 217]

[Egg Incubation: 42]

[Bullet Time: 419]

[Oath of Elaine to Lyra: 375]

[Sentinel's Superiority: 395]

[Persistent Casting: 291]

[Passionate Learning: 377]

Chapter 236 - The Hydra II

I’d gotten over "fight the next day" nerves years ago, and I slept decently considering the nightmares and the circumstances.

Aegion’s brew wasn’t quite as bad as usual, but drinking a full mug had taken its toll. I’d carefully nursed it while telling a story - Hercules had seemed rather appropriate - but I’d needed almost an hour for the aftertaste to fade enough for me to get some sleep.

I did not like sleeping under stone. Not anymore. I was totally going to get myself a new villa when I got home, made entirely out of wood. Maybe I’d see if Serondes would be willing to make me a glass ceiling or something? Or I could just sleep under the sky.

The thought of Serondes and home quickly led in an awkward direction, and I axed the entire line of thinking, instead cursing that my nightmares had come back.

I didn’t spend long cursing my luck though. I got up, and immediately started to move, preparing myself for the battle ahead.

Hilariously, mages and healers took more time to gear up and get ready than warriors and rangers at the levels I was dealing with, which was part of why I got up early, a nightmare acting as my alarm. Warriors had more gear to put on, but correspondingly more speed. I was no slouch in the speed department, but I was outstripped and outclassed, and Awarthril had already seemed reluctant to have me come along on this mission. I didn’t want to give them any excuse to leave me behind.

Mistweave off, dwarven armor on. Awkwardly, given that I’d only put it on once - then promptly stayed in it for months - I wasn’t 100% sure how it was all put together. Julius’s lesson from long ago echoed back - better to be slow and get it done right, than fast and sloppy and get someone killed.

Which had me working on latches and clasps, the armor both incredibly obvious, and overly complicated at the same time.

[Pristine Memories] was useful, letting me recall the memory of Korun helping me into the armor with perfect clarity, along with months of seeing which strap and buckle went where.

It took time, but the first light of dawn was brightening up the sky as I emerged from my room into the airy inner section, Serondes having made the choice to leave the fortress open-air for whatever reason. The rest of the elves were still in their rooms, and I allowed myself a little, tight smile of victory.

There were still ways I could get small edges over the immaculate creations. I grabbed a light breakfast, my stomach starting to clench with nerves.

I’d be fifty types of stupid if I didn’t get nervous before a big fight I knew was coming, against a creature, once again, twice my level. And without my major destructive gems to boot! I’d been able to take down a Formorian Royal Guard with a full complement of my gems, and right now I was acutely feeling their absence.

However, I had a new problem I needed to figure out. What was I going to do with my egg? I wasn’t bringing it to the fight, but I didn’t want it to stick around cooling off. Maybe I should build a fire, and stick it in? My biggest concern with that was the fire might be too cold.

As I pondered my options over some delicious meat of dubious provenance - I swear, there wasn’t a single skill one of the three elves wasn’t an expert at - Serondes, then Aegion and Awarthril emerged from their rooms.

"Morning!" Serondes cheerfully greeted me, heading over to the Spatial Box. He started pulling out pieces of armor.

A light bronze, bordering on silver, the armor was beautiful in its functionality and grace, each piece flowing and elegant. However, I eyed their armor, and I looked at mine.

The dwarves had been bragging when they claimed they were better at shaping metal than elves were, and the jury was still out on that claim. However, from what I’d gathered, Serondes and the other elves weren’t exactly the best elves in the world, the cream of the crop. They were, from my understanding of elven society that they’d imparted so far, relatively low-tier. That’s why Serondes had agreed to come - he wanted the levels to boost his social ranking.

"Morning!" I cheerfully called back, chomping down on another bite. It was so delicious. I chewed, savoring the taste, then my jaw dropped open as Serondes started to strip.

My eyes traced every line of his arm, his perfect abs, his chiseled thighs, his forearms.

So delicious.

A finger gently but firmly closed my mouth, as Awarthril blocked my view with an amused look on her face. She wiped some drool off my face, snapping me out of it. A hot rush crept up my neck and onto my cheeks.

"Good morning Elaine!" She cheerfully winked at me. "Sleep well?"

I was still somewhat star-struck, and could only mutely nod my head, stabbing another bite to eat.

"That’s great! Here, I recommend having this for breakfast. Or a snack. Whichever!" She said, handing me something wrapped in leaves I didn’t recognize. I slowly unraveled it.

"What is it?"

"Ilan bread!" She unwrapped and started chewing on her own. "Fantastic stuff. Gives a slight boost to all your stats, makes you heal faster, makes you more resistant to poisons and toxins, improves your effective skill level by one, and some people claim you learn skills faster!"

She paused on the last one and shrugged.

"I personally don’t think so, but you can never tell. Sadly, the bread isn’t as good as the fruit is, but the stuff’s tricky to preserve fresh. Anyways, eat up! I hope we won’t need you, but any little extra edge you can get to not get hurt is a boon."

She leaned in real close, her lips almost kissing my ear.

With a near breathless whisper, so quiet I could barely hear it in spite of my stats and proximity, Awarthril whispered into my ear.

"Serondes is interested, but you have to make the first move."

Blushing, I grabbed my egg from my lap, and fled back to my room.

I slammed the door shut - the elves had managed to rustle up doors of all things! - realizing I still had the Ilan bread.

Well, might as well. It wasn’t Aegion’s invention, although I was somewhat wary of it. It sounded a lot like a potion, and those were uniformly terrible in Remus. Also, Awarthril hadn’t said anything about the taste, and in my experience, that was because it’d be terrible.

I took a tentative nibble, and thought I’d died and gone to heaven. It tasted like everything. Well, every fruit and vegetable ever. But not in the terrible way eating everything at once would! No, it had the bright notes of blueberries, the smoothness of bananas, the freshness of cucumbers, the tingly sensation of pineapples, and best of all, the sweetness of mangos. That, and a million other sensations went through me, electrifying me.

I couldn’t control myself. I wolfed down the rest of it, eager to get more. I felt strength flooding through my body, and I checked my stats, seeing that they’d all improved roughly 2%

Which was absurd.

In Remus, humanity had figured out how to make Strength, Speed, and Dexterity potions. The easy physical stats. Vitality was being worked on.

It was believed to be impossible to improve any of the magical stats. How would an increase in mana pool even work? No, the experts were trying to make mana potions - at least according to the Ranger Trainee I’d nicknamed ‘Alchemist’ - as a substitute for Arcanite.

And the elves just casually had something utterly absurd lying around like it was no big deal, able to just hand me a slice like it was nothing.

I checked over my gear. Armor. Gems. Arcanite.

No weapons, which sucked, but at this point they’d just slow me down. A hydra wasn’t going to get intimidated by me waving a spear at it.

No, my big problem was my egg. What was I going to do with it during the fight? I wasn’t going to carry it, that was for sure.

Another nice side-effect of the bread - all my embarrassment was gone, and the lingering effects of sleep had been entirely chased away. Sure, I could’ve used [Sunrise], but this was nice.

I figured hanging out in my room would just make the awkwardness worse, and I left, getting a double eyeful of Awarthril and Aegion.

PAPILLION! Why! Why didn’t you tell me this was an option! If you changed your mind, making me a human instead of a golden crow, why didn’t you tell me I could be an elf! I want to be an elf! Mulligan! MULLIGAN! I want a do-over! I’ve changed my mind! Give me that easy perfection!

Aegion caught me staring and winked, but kept on getting dressed as normal. I had no idea what I’d do otherwise. I did appreciate him not making it weird, or doing anything strange.

They were both sadly at the tail end of getting dressed, and I was soon freed. The images were forever burned into my mind.

"Elaine! I was thinking about you!" Serondes came up to me, finishing the last bite of his Ilan bread. He was fully dressed in his silvery-bronze armor, each part elegantly flowing into the next. It’d look right at home in some fancy art gallery, never mind it being a lethal instrument. Numerous small, thin pieces of paper were attached to his armor, only stuck on one end. They were white, with dense red scribbles all over them. The previously mentioned talismans?

"Oh?" I asked, dying to know what, exactly, he was thinking about me.

"Yeah! Your egg! I have the solution for it." He opened his hand expectantly.

I was the trusting sort, and handed it over.

A pillar of Lava slowly emerged between us, forming a blazingly hot pedestal that he put the egg on.

"Right! Let me know how hot it needs to be." Serondes said, and I put my hand right next to the egg, letting [Egg Incubation] work its magic.

"Hotter. Hotter. Hotter. Keep going. Warmer. There we go!" I pulled my hand back, blowing on it furiously. I had to have healed some damage, and Serdones had one eyebrow going high into his hairline.

"Well then. Certainly a Lava creature!" He stepped back, more hot Lava forming around the egg, lowering it somewhat.

I hadn’t quite realized how hot I’d been keeping the egg, nor just how good my Radiance magic was - both at generating heat, and keeping me safe from it.

After changing the pedestal to a more nest-like structure, Serondes stepped back satisfied.

"My skill should keep it warm long enough for us to get back, and then some." He nodded approval at his work.

Awarthril’s works in my mind, I decided to say fuck it.

"Can you keep people warm?" I gave him what I thought was a coy look. Or something. I wasn’t great with this flirting stuff, all my prior romantic attempts ending in flames. Once, quite literally.

"Ahem. If we’re done flirting, are there any last second preparations you need to make?" Aegion strode over.

No longer in casual clothes, his armor fit elegantly. A slightly curved sword was at his waist, and a teardrop shaped kite shield was on his back, a large quiver of arrows on his waist, opposite the sword. He was holding onto a crystal longbow, which defied everything I knew about bows and agreed with everything I knew about magic. He had two more quivers of arrows slung over one shoulder. From what I knew about long-term archery fighting, he’d be putting those down near him. A couple of talismans were stuck on him, but not nearly as many as Serondes had.

I shook my head, as Serondes went and grabbed his own set of sword, shield, bow, and arrows. I cocked an eyebrow at that. I was curious what he was planning to do with it.

"All ready?" Awarthril asked, her gear trading a bow and arrow for an oversize crystalline fauchard which she wielded without a shred of effort. It had a long pole, almost twice as tall as I was, and a shaft as wide as my arm, which Awarthril gripped with ease. At the top was a thick curling blade, the entire thing giving off an imposing air, screaming "Big game hunting." Awarthril had her talismans in neat patterns, somehow making them look like a fashion statement, rather than the powerful magic I was sure they had to be.

There was no doubt that the hydra fit into the category.

"Ready!" I pumped my fist, while Serondes confirmed in a more restrained manner.

"All set!" Aegion didn’t look at us, instead grabbing a bag out of the Spatial Box. Awarthril rolled her eyes, and grabbed three more bags.

"Preparations complete." Serondes started to conjure Lava around him, hardening the top half into a platform, while the bottom half remained molten, hovering just a hair above the ground. Some chairs and railings sprang to life, and he beckoned me on. I stepped on, only to get bowled over by Kiyaya leaping on.

"Bad girl." Awarthril said, not able to keep the laughter out of her voice. I chuckled as I got up - it was funny. True to his word, Cordamo landed on my head, wrapping himself around my helmet. I got some annoyed hissing that I interpreted as "You said I could stay in your hair! What’s with the helmet!", totally forgetting I’d said no such thing.

Of course, he could just be trying to bribe, beg, blackmail, plead, threaten, or generally extort me for more food. The couatl was a glutton and a half.

I watched Aegion leap to the top of Castle Elaine - a much better name than anything else I’d come up with - with a howl of wind at his back, then start stretching as Serondes’s Howling Platform lifted off with the five of us on it. We slowly cleared the walls of Castle Elaine, then started to pick up speed, Aegion waving at us from the walls.

We flew over the swamp, Awarthril leaning over the railing with her hand over her eyes, looking around, while Kiyaya tried to pace in the small area. She had a few talismans stuck to her, and the big difference was that these ones were already glowing.

Well, I’d been assuming. This seemed to be a good point to fix my knowledge, one way or another.

"Talismans, right?" I asked, gesturing at the inked paper. Awathril nodded.

"Handy things. We can grab, mix, and match what we need for a situation with them. Sure, they’re one-time use, but they’re easy enough to make."

"Can you teach me?" I asked Awarthril, but I was shooting eyes at Serondes, the all-knowing mage, hoping he’d answer.

"I have no idea how." Awarthril answered, and Serondes seemed to completely miss the question.

Drat. Outta luck.

The walls of Castle Elaine rapidly vanished as we went deeper, Serondes starting to zig-zag the platform in a classic search pattern.

"Go that way a bit more, that’s roughly the direction I was going last time." Awarthril pointed, Serondes continuing to drive.

A thought came to mind.

"I know Aegion’s on ranged support, but, uh, how can he help?" I said, the castle having totally vanished from view.

Serondes got a smug look on his face.

"Hold your hand up in a circle." He said, and I put my hand up in an OK-sign. Cordamo and Kiyaya were both looking at me, and a few moments later I stumbled as a blast of air went through my hands, forcing my fingers apart. A deafening crack of thunder punctuated the entire thing, making my ears ring for a moment before my healing kicked back in.

"Show off." Awarthril signed something quickly in Cordamo’s direction, then turned back to scanning the swamp as she explained what happened to me.

"Every companion bond is different, as unique as the people involved." Her head was still moving back and forth, scanning the swamp. "In Aegion’s case - hang on, Serondes, turn us left then shoot forward, I recognize that weird moss pattern on the rock - anyways, in Aegion’s case, he and Cordamo can see through each other’s eyes. His skills already allow for impossibly long shots, and Cordamo acts as a spotter, making him the longest-ranged archer at our level. You saw how accurate he is to boot."

Yeah, I had. We were, what, a few miles away by the time he’d demonstrated his stunt? And he managed to thread a high-powered arrow through the tiny hole my hand made?

I was so glad he was on my team, and not gunning for me. How was I supposed to survive a Classer like that trying to kill me?

"There it is! Pole!" Awarthril yelled, Serondes making a pillar of rapidly-cooling Lava in the middle of the platform. Awarthril barely waited, throwing out her [Rubber Rope], connecting herself to the pillar.

Then she leapt off the skyship, bungee-jumping down to the swamp below.

Chapter 237 - The Hydra III

I rushed over to the edge of the platform, making sure I stayed away from Awarthril’s [Rubbery Rope]. Serondes joined me as Kiyaya padded over, all of us half-leaning over to get a better view of what was going on. Cordamo stretched himself over my head, acting as eyes for Aegion, stationed way back over at our base.

I saw the seven-headed hydra before I saw Awarthril. I used [Long-Range Identify] and was horrified as it came back [Healer]. The hydra was intelligent!? And a healer?! The red was darker than the elves to boot.

Ok, the healer tag wasn’t terribly surprising, not with the famous head-regrowing property. With seven heads, seven brains (or was it eight?), it wasn’t too much of a surprise that it was smart, but I was having a sudden crisis of conscience. I’d never hunted a healer before, and I didn’t quite want to start now. Fortunately for me, I’d been asked - told, really - to stay out of the fight, and I was just on-hand to heal.

I spent the few moments left in Awarthril’s fall to keep studying the hydra.

Two heads were above the treeline of the miserable trees surviving in the swamp, while the rest were low down, weaving and investigating, seemingly trying to sniff out any tasty morsels that tried to hide instead of fleeing from its presence. One head snapped out to grab a terrified otter that tried to run away, while two more were quite literally splitting an alligator between them. From how shredded the alligator was, it was clear they’d found it some time ago, and were busy savoring their meal.

Well. I think it was an alligator. There were so many sub-types of crocodiles it was hard to tell, especially after they were dead and the System wasn’t granting anymore help.

It didn’t seem to be hunting, just moving from place to place, the food it was grabbing a target of opportunity. Its body was large, the shoulder reaching up three-quarters of the way up the trees, and its tail was as long as its necks. The scales were a matted, splotchy dark-green with black and grey smears, which would let it camouflage almost perfectly with the environment it found itself in.

The level of savagery it was exhibiting, and a reminder that Tyriss’s entire herd, all his friends and family, had been wiped out by the hydra, helped dampen my reluctance to participate in the hunt. It was just another monster. Monster-sized, monster-shaped, and with a keen, intelligent mind. I’d hunted monsters with human minds and human bodies before, with no issue painting the target on Hesoid.

Then again, I was only getting one side of the story, and it was far too late now for me to be worrying or thinking about it. I refocused.

Awarthril was a silver bullet, dropping quickly, sleekly, and silently. I felt heat rising up to my right, and saw that Serondes had conjured up four head-sized ball of incredibly hot, rapidly expanding Lava. Even as I watched, it doubled in volume, and started to spin.

I was so glad I was on the friendly side of whatever that attack was.

He had his bow in one hand, nocking an arrow with the other. I kinda wanted to facepalm.

Duh. Right. Mages didn’t need their hands, and Ranger training had us learning how to use a spear and shield, for our own defense and to take a place in a shield-wall if we needed to. For whatever reason, it’d never occurred to me to learn archery, and use that instead.

Then again, at a range my magic was more than enough, and up-close a bow and arrow was worse than useless. Still, I was curious if Serondes had any archery skills, or was relying on pure talent and stats.

Probably the second one. Blasted unfair elves.

I saw some leaves blow around violently in a straight line as Awarthril was about to land - Aegion taking a ranging shot? We were crazy far away from the base, and honestly I had trouble believing that anyone could make shots like this, System or no. It was hard to deny the evidence before me.

Awarthril landed, and all hell broke loose, [Bullet Time] deciding that, nah, I wasn’t in any danger up here, and could try to watch things in a blurry, high-speed way.

At the same time, the lack of danger let me spend all my attention observing.

Kiyaya began to howl, a low, deep song that thrummed in my bones. Another wolf joined, then another, until a full pack was howling.

Oh my gods. Kiyaya was a sub-woofer.

Well - until Kiyaya was imitating a full pack howling, magic and the System enabling her to play a full orchestra - errr, pack - at once.

I felt strength and energy coursing through me, so much that I started to rub my arms in an attempt to deal with the itching, and bouncing my leg. My armor made my rubbing futile, but in spite of the incredible desire to scratch, I maintained discipline and didn’t take off my gear.

I was stronger. Faster. Probably tougher and more agile. Kiyaya was providing widespread buffs to all of us, Sound being a great element for that sort of thing.

Speaking of sound, to Awarthril’s credit, she hadn’t yelled or screamed warcries at the hydra as she was falling. Her landing was graceful, but there was only so much muffling she could do as she dropped like a bullet into a swamp, the splash catching the attention of one of the hydra’s heads. She charged forward as the hydra’s head snapped towards her, trying to grab an easy meal.

Awarthril’s fauchard flashed, but the hydra didn’t flinch. The blade landed, and went right through the hydra’s head, at the same time the hydra ate Awarthril whole.

A new Awarthril peeled off from the head, a belated look of "no, I dodged, really." The hydra brought its head back, ready to snap again.

Awarthril and her illusions.

A crackling boom heralded one of Aegion’s arrows finding its mark in the hydra’s legs, followed by rolling thunder behind it as the sound caught up with the arrow. The arrow shattered along with the leg, the hydra briefly staggering under the loss of one of its supports.

Then the hydra’s regeneration kicked in, the leg snapping right back into place, and the hydra turned to Awarthril, putting its full angry focus on her, right as Serondes’s attack landed.

Serondes had waited for the battle to be engaged, and for his Lava-balls to become sufficiently large. Then, abusing his height advantage, he spun off dozens, hundreds of tiny little Lava pellets at the Hydra in a narrow cone, the four orbs providing overlapping fields of fire. Not all of them would land - but most would, and there wasn’t an easy place to dodge to. He supplemented his attacks with "rapid fire" arrows, each one tipped with a speck of Lava before he fired it.

He was getting hundreds of Lava pellets for every arrow he shot out though. Not exactly an impressive archery showing. Still, it was better than what I was doing, which was standing around doing nothing.

The Lava pellets landed, a thousand tiny bullets impacting with a sizzle, pitting the hydra’s back. The injuries stayed open though, the Lava burning and searing, stopping healing from where they landed.

Or if it was healing, it was at such a slow pace that I couldn’t see what was happening.

The hydra went into a berserk fury, six of the heads slamming one after another into Awarthril at high speed, snapping so fast and with such coordination that I couldn’t follow it at all. The last one reared up, keeping a wary eye on us. Awarthril’s illusion, of course, neatly "dodged" them all. When two of the heads slammed down at the same time, a pair of collars got conjured around the two necks, linked together by chains. It didn’t slow the hydra down, but it would restrain its range of motion.

Serondes took the chance to fire off a thick crescent of Lava, aiming to decapitate the hydra in a single blow. The hydra effortlessly dodged, but had to pause in its relentless assault against Awarthril to do so.

One of Serondes’s Lava bullets hit something critical, and the hydra roared with pain, all seven heads letting out a high-pitched painful, keening wail. It didn’t drown out Kiyaya’s incessant howling.

Between Kiyaya’s howling, Awarthril’s chains and being impossible to hit, the hydra had enough. It whipped around, its tail cracking like a bullwhip as it cleared the area, and charged off through the swamp, trampling trees and going far faster than the terrain suggested it could go.

A randomly demolished tree, along with the [Rubbery Rope] pointing that way, suggested that the hydra’s "sweep" had hit Awarthril, and sent her flying through the swamp.

"Bah." Serondes looked like he’d just eaten surprise lemons.

"Should we chase after it?" I asked the obvious question. Serondes hesitated.

"I want to see what Awarthril wants to do. No idea how bad that hit was."

Kiyaya stopped her howling, instead making concerned whining noises, nuzzling at the rope that was Awarthril’s lifeline - and way back up.

The [Rubbery Rope] went slack, and Awarthril dropped her invisibility a moment later, looking no worse for having been sent flying. Even her armor, somehow, in spite of having gone through an entire swamp, looked pristine, not a hint of dirt or muddy water to be seen.

That was just good enchantments though. Unless it was an illusion. I flickered my healing a moment, my mana flickering a few points. A couple of seconds later, I was back to full mana.

I’d need to subtly throw some dirt on Aegion or Serondes and test it out.

"Dagleblagleflagle. I hate being thrown through trees. Also, Serondes, what are you doing!? Follow it, let’s go go GO!" She cried out, pointing in the direction the hydra was fleeing.

Not that it was exactly subtle about the whole thing.

Serondes just rolled his eyes. We’d been waiting for Awarthril to figure out our next move. After how she’d berated him for taking unilateral action when we first met, I’d think she’d be a bit more understanding.

The entire Lava platform smoothly accelerated after the hydra, and Aegion’s arrows regularly punctuated the chase, blowing apart the hydra’s knees, only for them to be immediately restored.

Powerful healing was such bullshit. I needed to take notes.

The hydra did figure out what was going on with the arrows, and changed its pacing somewhat, to a strange, loping gait. It was slower, but Aegion’s arrows didn’t bother it in the slightest anymore. It only slowed down the hydra’s regeneration, and my critical eye judged the healing needed to be relatively light on the mana.

Four of the heads turned to look at us, and hissed. One of the heads went as high as it could go, and started to spray a fine mist directly up. One shot green globs at us, while the last two started to make a large green ball of something in its mouth, working in tandem, channeling it to be larger and larger.

It reminded me of Serondes’s preparations for an attack, and I did not like it one bit. I threw up [Mantle] to shield us.

"Go! Keep flying!" Awarthril shouted, seeing my shield.

I saw some shots of Lava erupt from underneath the flying platform we were on, intercepting the green mid-sized shots from the hydra. [Mantle] managed to cleanly plow through the fine spray being thrown up, although I wasn’t sure what we were going to do about the larger attack the hydra was preparing.

The hydra launched the ball - now nearly as large as it was - straight up, on a path to intercept us.

"I can’t shield that!" I yelled, preemptively flaring my healing around me. It was going to get nasty when that hit.

"Hold on!" Serondes yelled, abruptly pulling the platform back.

I was flung forward by the sudden deceleration, Cordamo hissing in displeasure as Awarthril snaked an arm out to grab me and stop me from falling off.

Not that I would’ve fallen off. Safety railing and all that.

"Hold your breath!" Awarthril yelled as Serondes said something, the ball bursting on top of us.

Then it was all darkness, chaos and slime as the world tumbled around me.

===

After an eternity - seconds - of being tumble-dried in Serondes’s encased Lava platform, sticky Ooze filling every crack, the dome of the "ball" we’d been encased in cracked open, the Ooze vanishing a moment later.

Cordamo relaxed, his futile stranglehold on my armored neck looseningrelaxing. It took me a moment to work out what had happened, while Awarthril and Serondes bickered in the background.

Serondes had quickly, with expert precision, closed off the top of the skyship, shielding us from the gigantic glob of I-didn’t-want-to-know that the hydra had spat at us. At the same time, Awarthril filled the entire container with Ooze, which absorbed all the impacts, and kept us all perfectly safe.

Something in all that had destabilized the platform, and it’d come tumbling down, in the gentlest, lightest way, courtesy of Awarthril’s Ooze. There wasn’t a single bruise, and her de-conjuring the Ooze had cleanly removed all of it. The softest chaotic landing ever.

I briefly checked in on Serondes’s and Awarthril’s argument.

"If you hadn’t thrown me off-balance, we would’ve been fine!" Serondes was coldly, but furiously rebuking Awarthril, having a tight leash on his emotions but letting her know how he felt.

"Oh come off it! We would’ve been rattled around like coins in a beggar’s bowl! We had no light, and it would’ve been too easy to accidentally slice Elaine and Cordamo! We’re all fine, we can keep chasing!"

"Yeah, but-"

I tuned them back out. Nothing interesting going on there.

Kiyaya came over and gave me a half-nuzzle, and gave Cordamo a lick before trotting over to Awarthril and sitting down next to her. She absent-mindedly reached over and started scratching her behind the ears with her free hand.

Which left her not-free hand, still holding the fauchard, to start gesticulating as she argued with Serondes, the crystalline blade flashing everywhere.

The argument quickly ended.

"Elaine, are you ok?" Awarthril said, patting my armor all over like she could divine broken bones by touch alone.

Totally ignoring that I was a healer.

I guess it was just an affectionate gesture? A way to show she was concerned? Pure habit?

Didn’t matter.

"Yup! Totally fine. Honestly, the Ooze was a greater danger than anything else." I said, Awarthril looking unhappy at that, while Serondes looked triumphant.

Sadly, it was true. Broken, battered, bitten in half? Easy. Ooze taking up all the air? Tricky.

Awarthril put on a fake-bright smile, and I felt bad. My comment had cut deeply.

"Right! Let’s get back to chasing that hydra!"

Chapter 238 - The Hydra IV

We took a short break while Serondes and Awarthril restored their mana. The hydra would get a chance to heal up, but the first round was already something of a bust. Either Serondes’s Lava pellets would keep the wound open, or they wouldn’t. That, and none of them were particularly deep.

Awarthril was missing a few talismans, a couple of them looking like they got ripped, and a few looking like they’d been in a fire.

Serondes re-made the platform, this time with a large glass pane in the middle.

"To better protect ourselves." He explained, which made sense. His range of control on his Lava was big enough that he could just use the bottom of the platform to fire his Lava bullets, while still being able to see, and giving us a hair more protection. The hydra had demonstrated that it could hit us when we were flying, after all.

We got back on, and started tracking its trail through the swamp.

"I might have to fight this on the ground." Serondes frowned as he paced on the ship, seemingly paying no attention to where we were going. Awarthril acted as a lookout and navigator, while I felt like a kid, hanging on as the parents ran errands.

Of course, that meant I could play with Kiyaya, who was taking full advantage of my idleness to get some serious good-girl scratches in.

Serondes let out a string of curses as the trail ended at the edge of a lake, the hydra having gone underwater.

"FlsklegrablegrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrAH!" Awarthril… well, cursed would imply there were actual words I could understand. As far as I could tell, it was just a noise of frustration.

Or some super-secret elf language she was swearing in. I was going to start taking notes, and seeing if I could decipher it. Could also be wolf-speak.

"I’m going to land us." Serondes didn’t wait for a reply, navigating the Lava ship to the edge - away from the tracks - and landing. Awarthril, holding onto her fauchard, and Kiyaya hopped off before the platform had even stopped moving, taking a look at the tracks.

I’m not sure what they were looking for - it seemed real obvious to me that the tracks went directly into the lake - but they were seeing something there.

Probably. That, or trying to look all-knowing and wise in front of the little human.

We touched down, and Serondes went over to check on the tracks, while I hung back. I didn’t have [Tracking], [Woodsmanship], or any other such skills, and I’d only ever been barely passable at the natural skill. I was more likely to muddy the waters - quite literally - than contribute anything.

The world slowed down as the water bulged, [Bullet Time] deciding that, yes, now was the time to try and save my life. The mud-coated hydra’s heads erupted from the water, right as I jumped up, soaring into the sky with [Scintillating Ascent], Cordamo wrapped tightly around my helmet.

Three of the heads went for Kiyaya, Awarthril, and Serondes, while two more opened their mouths, noxious-colored gases flooding out. One head went on "lookout", scanning around, while the last one locked onto me. Chains dangling from two of the heads showed that not only was it the same hydra, but it’d bitten through the chains Awarthril had tried to shackle it with.

"Fucking moldy mangoooooooooooos!!" I swore as I tried to fly back as fast as I could. My initial distance saved me, as the hydra couldn’t directly try to bite me. Instead, it fired more of those nasty green bolts my way.

Cordamo launched himself off of my head, and a strong wind started to blow behind us, as the couatl used his Gale magic to speed us up, and slow the hydra’s spit.

Then the traitor zoomed off, leaving me behind, creating a white streak that reminded me of a thrown javelin.

As the spit traveled towards me, as I twisted to minimize the impact, I got to watch the heads attacking the other elves. Awarthril, in a stunning display of physical prowess, swept her fauchard in such a way that the shaft knocked Kiyaya back. The front of the blade saved Serondes, as it sliced in a way to make the hydra’s smile extra-wide, cutting through the muscles it would’ve needed to bite him in half. The hydra reared back, a strange gurgling scream coming from the head.

I had no idea if it would have succeeded, given the Lava rapidly forming around him, but the save was good anyways, a single motion of her weapon getting two of her teammates out of harm’s way.

I’d managed to twist myself out of the way of some of the goop the hydra was spitting, and aligned myself to take hits feet-first, presenting a small profile. Still, I wasn’t able to dodge everything, and I threw a [Mantle of the Stars] up at my feet. The attack chewed through my shield - of course, but at least I’d stopped some of it - and latched onto my armored boots.

There was no sound, just my boots, feet, and lower leg just vanishing in a moment of agonizing pain. Blasted acid attacks. It took half a moment, but my legs popped back in, my healing spending a tenth of a second fighting with the acid before it won out.

One of Aegion’s arrows came thundering in, blowing up in one of the gas-spewing hydra’s eyes. It screeched in pain, waving around, but continued to slowly flood the field with it’s colorful miasma.

I would’ve loved to keep watching the battle between the elves and the hydra, but the one head after me wasn’t about to let me go, not when it sensed weakness. I was slow, for the level of the battle occurring. I was weak. It looked like I was an easy target, and while the main hydra body was busy with the elves, this one head had it out for me.

That, and Awarthril had her illusions going full-force.

It didn’t do the "great big acid ball" attack, nor the fine spray of mist. Neither would work, and this hydra was proving itself cunning and clever. It had retreated to its habitat, it had coated itself in mud to shield itself from the Lava bullets, and it had laid in ambush, after making obvious markings.

I took a few more hits, but nothing too bad. The attacks might’ve been able to kill me, if I took an unshielded hit on my head. As it was, each attack briefly chewed through some flesh, then my healing took over.

I was as bullshit as the hydra was. Which honestly had me somewhat concerned for this fight. I wasn’t looking forward to a detailed, up-close guide on "how to kill powerful healers."

I was still flying away as Serondes grabbed me by the arm, jerking me and towing me like a stuffed toy.

"I apologize for the rough treatment." He gruffly said, as he caught up to where Cordamo was hovering.

"No worries." I rolled my shoulder, getting the "almost ripped out of its socket" kinks worked out. Serondes started to make a full Lava platform to stand on, versus his prior little "Lava boots" he’d been using to fly.

I just hovered next to him. He was the heavy-hitter for the fight, he’d need all the mana he could get. Me standing on the platform was a noticeable drain on his mana, and this fight was looking like it’d be a long one. He’d need every bit, and it didn’t cost me much to fly next to him. The difference between using a skill with a cost buy-off, versus needing to do the entire lifting.

I looked down, seeing the progression of the fight. The hydra was now fully emerged from the lake, entirely coated in mud armor. From what I could tell, it wasn’t a skill or anything, just sheer beastial cunning.

The entire area was flooded with two colors of gas, while most of the hydra's heads darted in and out, snapping and snarling at dozens of shapes flickering through the gaseous mist.

One of the hydra’s now nine heads was keeping a wary eye on us, but step by step it was going forward, driving Awarthril and Kiyaya back.

Or were they luring it fully out of the lake?

I’d eat my hat if the hydra wasn’t using Miasma.

A clear line pierced through the Miasma, Aegion’s arrow hitting with a sharp thunderclap. It gave us a brief glimpse of Awarthril - or at least, the illusion she was using. Chains snapped into existence, locking heads together, while sticky Ooze was stymied by clever mud, simply peeling away layers of the hydra’s armor instead of slowing it down.

One of the hydra’s heads was on chain-snapping duty, but right before the mist closed back up I saw a chain connecting the base of its head to another one, positioned in an awkward angle for the snapper-head to deal with.

Then the mists closed back up, and I was left with a frowning Serondes, who had Cordamo on his shoulder. He spent a few moments - an eternity of howling wolves and flashing blades, down where Awarthril was fighting for her life - before sighing.

"Cordamo." He extended his arm, the couatl seemingly understanding what he wanted. He wrapped himself around Serondes’s arm, head near his hand.

Serondes summoned a tiny little sand twister, dancing about in his hand. Cordamo started a fine spray of clear liquid from his mouth, the poison mixing with the swirling sand.

Slowly, carefully, Serondes and Cordamo built up a sand twister, filled with deadly poison. I eyed the creation warily. The sand was swirling at incredible speeds, promising to strip and abrade anything it came into contact with - at which point, Cordamo’s poison would easily enter the scraped wounds.

Then, of course, the poison would do what poison did best.

At the same time this was happening, Lava walls were slowly rising around Awarthril and the hydra, Serondes attempting to trap and contain the hydra, so it couldn’t run away again.

I was torn, my eyes flickering between the steadily growing calamity in a palm, and the fight below. The gas was getting steadily thicker, making it harder for me to see. The steadily flashing blades, darting figures, and haunting howling made it clear that Kiyaya and Awarthril were still fighting, and fighting well.

I wanted to dive down and see if they needed healing - all that gas couldn’t be good for them. At the same time, they might not be injured, and diving in would just force Awarthril to protect me. Being on-hand, ready to heal at a moment’s notice, was good enough.

Leaving was out of the question.

Chains flailed through the air, steadily increasing in number as Awarthril summoned them and the hydra broke them. Still, the number was increasing, and one particularly corroded chain let me see something clever Awarthril was doing - she was simply reconnecting the chains at this point, saving her mana for the slogfest she was in.

Aegion’s arrows stopped, the poor visibility making missing just as likely as hitting the hydra, Awarthril, or Kiyaya.

After almost twenty minutes of channeling and building the twister, of raising the Lava walls to a height and thickness that might be enough to contain the multiple tons of hydra, Serondes threw the sand twister forward, following closely behind it.

He kept manipulating it as it reached the fight pit, where it then exploded into a quarter-sized, full-force sandstorm, whipping and howling in the pit he’d built. It easily grabbed the deadly Miasma gases the hydra was spewing out, creating a swirling sandy maelstrom of death.

I was more than a bit concerned for Awarthril and Kiyaya, trapped inside the storm with all the other nonsense that was going on. Serondes’s storm didn’t discriminate - or at least, I assumed it didn’t - and while Awarthril was well-armored, Kiyaya wasn’t.

Although, I could totally see Awarthril trying to Ooze up Kiyaya to shield her. Problem was, the storm was effectively abrading and sanding everything down. Skin, flesh, armor, mud, ooze, fur - nothing was safe.

I imagined being inside would be like having a high-powered sandblaster over my entire body. Add in the stinging, Poison, and Miasma?

Eeesh.

The fight continued to rage, out of sight, for an unknown length of time. It might’ve been short, it could’ve been long - I just knew I was "pacing", flying back and forth, concerned for my friends inside. Feeling useless. I couldn’t fly into the storm, and any Radiance attacks - if I could even see where I needed to shoot - would just get intercepted and ruined by the swirling sand.

Serondes just watched the whole thing with a frown, his eyebrows creased in worry. The walls shook and shuddered when the hydra threw itself against it, or Kiyaya got thrown into them. It was impossible to tell what was going on. Finally, Awarthril’s oversized crystal weapon flashed for the last time, a javelin throw at Serondes. At the same time, Kiyaya’s howling changed, from the deep, teeth-rattling noise to a more mellow and pained sound.

Serondes dropped the sandstorm, and we both moved in. Sheets of colored sand fell around us like a waterfall, as Serondes’s magic was no longer holding it up. It was as beautiful as it was deadly, sand dyed all the colors of the rainbow by Poison, blood, Miasma, and more.

The shape of the hydra started to emerge, coated in a thick layer of sand. It was up to a whooping thirteen heads, Awarthril having been forced repeatedly to cut a head off to keep herself - or Kiyaya - alive.

The fighters themselves emerged from the sand, coughing and wheezing. I rushed over, pushing my flight to the max. I threw out my [Dance with the Heavens] at full-blast, using [Wheel of Sun and Moon] to get the healing to them a bit faster. The image was terrible - "Heal, and cure Poison plus Miasma" - but it got the job done, as my mana lost a small percent twice in a row, the second drop being larger than the first. Still, all in all I lost less than 14k mana. My mana pool was absurd, and for patching up two people, who weren’t even missing arms or anything? Easy.

I never got a good look at their condition, and the sandblasting they’d gone through had removed most traces of gore. Poor Kiyaya had been entirely stripped of fur though, and I’d never seen such a sorry-looking wolf. She looked down at herself, then back up at Awarthril and plaintively whined, pawing at her nose.

Awarthril was bent over panting with exhaustion, coughing and hacking Sand out of her lungs. Kiyaya also made some retching and coughing noises, like she was a cat trying to get rid of a hairball and not a wolf as large as I was getting rid of all the crap she’d breathed in.

Whoof.

Cordamo took the chance to throw a hissing laugh her way.

Everything shook, the last of the sand falling off the hydra, and I realized - it wasn’t dead! With thousands of bleeding wounds all over, Awarthril had chained and Oozed and chained and generally stacked bindings on the hydra to the point where it could no longer move, dozens upon dozens of chains restricting its movement, sticky black tar trailing from the walls and the ground to all over the hydra, purple goop sealing each mouth shut.

"Finish." Awarthril panted out, then just sort of waved her hand at the hydra, almost falling over as a result.

Like an idiot, like the Oathbound healer I was, I opened my mouth to protest. I didn’t quite think this fell under what I needed to do - after all, we had just been in a fight for our lives against it - but it was intelligent, and clearly beaten.

The Sentinel, the Ranger, heck, the human in me said "kill it!" It was a threat, actively hunting intelligent creatures, and incredibly powerful. It’d just cause more harm, and 95% of me was in agreement in that direction.

The last 5% was a filthy traitor, who hated seeing intelligent creatures die. Especially healer-tagged creatures. It was all too easy to see the same justifications that led to the hydra hunt, to see the same tactics applied to the hydra, applied to me.

As I said. It was dumb. It didn’t stop the thought.

Cordamo seemed to have a similar thought, as he flew between us and the hydra, flaring his wings protectively and hissing at us.

"Don’t kill the hydra?" I asked, already being somewhat vaguely inclined towards that direction.

Cordamo hissed an affirmative, bobbing his head up and down.

"Why ever not?" Serondes’s insult at the suggestion was clear. Heck, I was feeling slightly insulted about it.

Cordamo had something complicated to say, as he started pantomiming… something. His tail went across his neck, which then comically fell to the side, then popped back up, then his mouth opened and closed a bunch.

As a fellow foodie, I got it. I groaned and put my face in my hands.

"He’s saying to keep the hydra alive, and chop off its heads for an unlimited supply of hydra-steaks."

Cordamo hissed and shook his head at the last part. I rolled my eyes.

"Sorry. Hydra barbeque."

He looked much happier at the correct interpretation of his desires. I just groaned, and stuck my face back into my hands.

Sparing the hydra was a dumb idea of mine, but by every metric, Cordamo’s was dumber.

Serondes looked horrified at the suggestion, while Awarthril just looked exhausted. A crackling arrow a few moments later made Aegion’s thoughts on the matter all too clear.

Thank goodness for Serondes. Instead of dithering, or arguing, he instantly summoned a wave of crescent Lava blades, each one neatly and mercifully cutting off one of the hydra’s heads.

[*ding!* Your Party has slain a [Sneaky-Swamp Hydra] (Verdant, Lv 734) // [Muriatic Sharpshooter] (Acid, Lv 694) // [Roiling Gas of the Swamp] (Miasma, Lv 211)]

Chapter 239 - Afterparty

"Let’s head back." Serondes suggested, as Awarthril still looked exhausted. I realized I was a dumbass, and hit her with [Sunrise]. Still wasn’t used to using the skill with a group of people, even though I’d had it for a year.

She perked right up at that, going from "barely standing on her feet" to "I could run three marathons" in an instant. I loved magic.

"Thanks Elaine! Yeah, we should head back." Awarthril belayed her own words as she headed towards the hydra. Serondes started to make another platform, and Kiyaya padded over to where Serondes was, still looking like the funniest thing I’d ever seen.

Shaved wolf. Honestly, when I forgot about how it’d happened, it was hilarious.

Now that the fight was over, I was all too aware of the fact that everything from the waist down had been dissolved off, and I was prancing around half naked, and it was the wrong half to boot.

Ah well. There was nothing I could do about it besides own it.

With a few expert twirls of her weapon, Awarthril took the hydra apart. She whistled sharply, and Kiyaya came bounding over.

"Hey Serondes! Make it a big one!" She called out, dragging a large chunk with Kiyaya.

Serondes muttered darkly about "being more than a gloried [Ferryelf]." and "absurd mana costs." Knowing how expensive flying was, and seeing the mass of hydra and Lava that needed to be moved?

Yeah, he had a slight point. I’d be impressed if he could pull it off.

A sky barge formed, as I stood around feeling somewhat extraneous. The elves had been mostly right - I hadn’t been needed. My healing wasn’t the difference between a win or a loss, between life and death, and while Kiyaya and Awarthril had been in terrible shape at the end of the fight, they hadn’t been on the edge of death. Sure, they might’ve been stuck in bed for a week or two, but I’d done practically nothing. At least, nothing that required my presence right here in the fight.

I watched Awarthril take a look at the hydra, then slice a deep gouge into its flesh, parting the walls and crawling into the body. I pulled a face at that, and went back to thinking of the elves.

I’d thought them arrogant, and somewhat naive for doing stuff like not setting a watch, and happily hunting a much stronger monster in its territory. However, the elves had proven they were almost as good as they thought they were, and I was privately, quietly, eating some crow.

With a triumphant cry, a blood-stained gore-splattered Awarthril emerged from inside the hydra, clutching a large, fleshy mass, five times the size of a head. Awarthril was carrying it like the severed head of an enemy, and it clicked - it was the hydra’s heart. She brought it up to her face, and with several large motions, took a bite out of it, barely chewing before swallowing. She then offered the heart to Kiyaya, who took a delicate nibble.

Given that Kiyaya was as tall as I was?

That "delicate nibble" was more than half the remaining heart. It drove home the point that she could rip my head off in a single move if she was so inclined, and I didn’t believe I could heal that.

Awarthril tossed the remaining heart to Serondes, blood flying off of it in a twirl as it spun through the air. Serondes turned to catch it, but Cordamo intercepted the throw, unhinging his jaw and somehow swallowing the rest.

Serondes glared murder at Cordamo, who unrepentedly smacked his long, snaky tongue against his nose, hissing a laugh at him.

"I am sure I will find a way to even the score." Serondes promised, turning back to the barge. Cordamo looked a little worried about that, and flew over to rest in my hair.

Well. Ok then. Eating the hearts of their enemies. Not what I was expecting out of the elegant elves. I hope there were no more surprises, like "sacrifice a traveler during a double full moon" or anything like that. I was a little too handy and easy to grab…

Still, fresh, hot meat right out of a monster? Had it during Ranger Academy, 6/10, a bit of searing dramatically improved it.

I went over to the lake, mostly to stay out of the way, partially to clean my legs. I had armor from the waist-up, and a strong wake-up call that I shouldn’t bother with it against foes that were much more powerful than I was.

Then again, if I’d gotten caught in the sandstorm, I would’ve loved to have the armor.

"All set!" Awarthril called out, and I headed over, sand caking to my legs in the classic "wet feet sandy beach" way.

We all boarded the Lava-barge, loaded with tasty hydra cuts, and started to make our way back to Aegion and the Fort-De-La-Victoire.

We took back off, and I had some burning questions.

"What’s it like where you grew up?" I asked them, while looking at Serondes specifically. He’d gotten my life story - what was his?

Awarthril gave me a knowing smile and a wink while Serondes was looking at me.

"Well, I grew up on the outskirts of the Tympestshard Council. I had three brothers and sisters - all older - and we had a few hundred acres of forest for our family. Early on, my parents taught me how to…"

I was enthralled with him, hanging onto every word he spoke.

Serondes kept telling me his life story, not even pausing as we needed to land at one point. He threw some grumpy looks at Awarthril, but said nothing. Possibly as a concession to just how hard she had just worked in the last fight - she’d done the vast majority of the work. If she wanted to celebrate a bit, and have a massive barbeque, nobody was going to rain on her parade.

During a lull in the conversation, I figured I’d check my level up notifications.

[*ding!* Congratulations! [The Dawn Sentinel] has leveled up to level 419->420! +3 Dexterity, +24 Speed, +24 Vitality, +170 Mana, +170 Mana Regen, +48 Magic power, +48 Magic Control from your Class per level! +1 Free Stat for being Human per level! +1 Mana, +1 Mana Regen from your Element per level!]

My capped skills stayed capped - [Mantle], [Dance], [Wheel], etc - but that was it. I suppose the only thing I’d done was run away from the hydra, heal my legs getting dissolved a few times, and fixed up Kiyaya and Awarthril at the end of the fight. I hadn’t exactly strained myself, and I suspected the only reason I’d gotten a level was the sheer difference between the hydra and myself.

[*ding!* You’ve unlocked [Solar Flare]! Would you like to replace a skill with [Solar Flare]?]

Solar Flare: The sun erupts with destructive power, obliterating all those who stand in its way, and those too unlucky to be near. With this skill, all your [Butterfly Mystic] skills and abilities are more destructive. Increased destructiveness and effectiveness per level. -66,666 Mana Regen.

Ok, wow. That was a stupid amount of mana regeneration, and the text of the skill was ominous, to say the least. Still, it was what I’d been looking for. It would dramatically improve my Radiance abilities, and let me punch up significantly. I’d felt I was falling behind for some time, that my mage abilities were becoming weaker and weaker compared to my healing abilities.

Well, this was a good step in the right direction. Bonus - both [Solar Flare] and [Sun’s Heart] seemed to be Sun-related, which was encouraging. It made me think that I could merge the two skills together down the line, which [Butterfly Mystic] was good at. Then I’d get a new skill slot, a new skill, and the cycle would repeat.

Stats were only a small part of the power and survival equation. Training and skills were significant.

"Excuse me." I got up and walked to the railing. [Lantern] was level 345, and I was not looking forward to what would happen once I lost the skill.

"Everything ok?" Awarthril’s concern was clear.

I nodded.

"I’ll be fine." I said, positioning myself for a technicolor yawn.

I breathed in, and slowly let my breath out. I took a deep breath in, and with some will, swapped [Lantern] for [Solar Flare].

The dizziness and nausea hit me like a tidal wave, my lunch rebelling and going back up the pipe. I tossed my cookies over the edge, collapsing as the world spun around me. I felt hands grab me, keep me stable. Another hand grabbed my hair, pulling it back as I kept sick uping off the edge of the Lava barge.

"I don’t know what’s wrong with her." I heard Serondes saying.

"She’s not an elf. She probably swapped skills, and is suffering."

"Oof. Glad that’s not me."

Fucking.

Elves.

Finally, as I heaved and heaved and nothing but bile came up, the world stopped spinning. I became aware of Serondes and Awarthril holding onto me, keeping me safe and secure. My heart went out to both of them, to the kindness and care they’d shown.

"Thanks." I got back up.

Serondes waved his hand.

"Don’t worry about it."

I did brush my legs off, cooking the sand dry with my Radiance.

We arrived back at Fort Why-Did-We-Make-This-So-Big, landing outside of it where Aegion had already dug out large firepits, crossing them with branches and small trees. Serondes landed the barge near the pits, then Aegion and Awarthril got to work. I slipped into the castle, retrieving my egg, and changing back into good clothes, AKA my only other set of clothing, the Mist weave. No more half-naked armor-bare legs combo. It was a crime against fashion. Serondes had been as good as his word, and [Egg Incubation] reported that it only needed to be warmed up a bit more. I promptly grabbed it and started dumping heat into it, clutching it protectively. Feeling beautiful and elegant, I swept my way back to the firepits.

Serondes had made himself a chair to lounge in while he had a few mage hands contributing to the preparation of the hydra meat. Grabbing a chunk, carrying it over to him where he whistled it to pieces using his Sound magic, then placing it onto the firepit, where his Lava was busy cooking things.

Of all the magic I’d ever seen, I’d never seen an instant-cook skill. I should totally try to find a Radiance chef with an instant-cook skill. It would probably be good for [Butterfly Mystic].

Kiyaya practically fell asleep in the fire, exhaustion laying her low. Her nose twitched furiously as she smelled the delicious cooking wafting her way. I figured I’d see if I could hit her with [Sunrise] when we were done.

Cordamo had a little spice shaker in his tail, and he flew back and forth, lightly dusting our dinner.

"Anything I can do to help?" I asked Serondes.

He looked at me, and my blasted stomach did a flip-flop that was entirely unrelated to the upcoming dinner.

"Can you pack up the table and chairs into the crate, then ask Awarthril to get them out here?" He asked, all while his magics kept working without pause. Impressive multi-tasking.

I headed over to the oversized cooled Lava walls, and slipped back into the main fort area. Trying to juggle the table and chairs while holding the egg was tricky. Lots of one-handed dragging occurred. I managed to pack up the chairs and the table into the Spatial Box, having figured out the trick of how to put them in just the right spot. I figured I’d try to bring it out myself, instead of bugging Awarthril. She’d had a tough day.

Keeping the egg in one hand, I grabbed the lip of the box and heaved, trying to drag it. I might as well have tried to haul the wall, for all the good that did me.

I put my hand on my hip and glared at the Box, my mind churning.

I snapped my fingers, and said to no one in particular "I’ve got it!" as I worked out the problem.

Spatial Box. Nothing about weight loss or reduction. It had a what, 60:1 ratio? So it was as heavy as 60ish crates together. I looked at my strength stat.

Yeeeeeeeeeeah I wasn’t moving that anytime soon. There was a reason Serondes had suggested I ask Awarthril for help.

"Hey Awarthril?" I approached her, seeing that she was now lying down a wide variety of fruits and vegetables onto the oversized grills, letting them soak up the fat dripping off the meat.

"Yes?"

"Can you move the crate out? I’ve packed it up."

"Of course!" Awarthril blasted off, two gusts of wind heralding her leaving and coming back.

"Now, can you take out and lay the table please?" She placed the crate in front of me.

I did a quick count.

"Six? I don’t think Tyriss is joining us." Hadn’t seen hide nor hoof of him since he’d left. Sure, there was always a chance he’d double back, but that’d be one heck of a coincidence.

"Let’s do seven. What if someone finds us, like you did? It’d only be polite to have a seat ready for them."

Seven it was!

I reached into the crate, feeling around for the table and chairs. Taking stuff out was harder than putting it in, but after a few false starts, I got the hang of it and started pulling out the needed pieces.

I finished up just in time, Aegion slicing off and plating a few rare steaks. Awarthril and Serondes had moved onto making some drying racks for the hydra, to better preserve it for the road. I was a little wary of how well it’d work and how long we’d be here - drying that much meat would take forever - then Serondes used his Sand magic, wringing all the moisture out of the meat.

That… would work.

Aegion wandered into the fort, jumping onto the walls with one of his barrels.

"Don’t you dare!" I yelled at him, certain he could hear me from here. "Break out the good stuff! This isn’t the meal to be poisoning all of us and ruining the taste!"

Aegion jumped down from the wall, somehow keeping the open barrel perfectly stable as he landed.

"Relax! This is the good stuff! Come on, I’m not that mean." He walked the barrel over to the table, sounding hurt. He grabbed a few mugs off the table, dipping them in one at a time to fill them up. He took a great big drink, then handed me mine.

I took a sip.

It was terrible.

I whirled my head so I wouldn’t hit the table, then sprayed it all over the ground, spitting a few times to get the taste out of my mouth.

"Fine. You got me. You win." I said, dumping my mug right as Aegion dumped his. "Now, can we please have the good stuff?"

Aegion good-naturedly chuckled at his prank as he wandered over to the Box, reaching in and hauling out a silver embossed barrel with a tap on the end. As he poured out drinks for everyone - using fresh mugs, bless him - Serondes, Awarthril, and the companions joined us at the table.

"We feast!" Aegion called out as we all sat down. "To Awarthril, heroine of this trip! The unstoppable vanguard! The untouchable warrior! The one who chains and binds!"

The three elves moved to click their mugs together, and I hastily joined in. Awarthril took the next part.

"To Serondes, doing everything! The killer! The flier! The storm!" Awarthril toasted Serondes, and we all clicked our mugs together.

Serondes was up next, and I figured out how this went.

"To Kiyaya, voice of doom! She rips! She tears! Her howls echo throughout the world!"

We clicked our mugs as Kiyaya trotted over to one of the roasts, grabbing an obscene amount and dragging it back. She had a few mouthfuls, then started to "talk" in the doggish way, nuzzling Cordamo.

Awarthril was the only one who understood what she was saying, but she wasn’t translating. After a few warbling wolf-isms, Kiyaya stopped, and we all clicked our mugs together.

Cordamo flew over to me, and started hissing loudly, thumping his tail on my shoulder and blowing my hair around with his wings. He had quite a few things to say, out of which Aegion roared with laughter at one.

"Says you’re a comfortable resting spot."

I rolled my eyes as I clinked my mugs with everyone else. "Comfortable resting spot" indeed. I hadn’t contributed that much else to the fight.

It was my turn, and it seemed like things had come full circle.

"To Aegion Longshot! Sniper extraordinaire! Brewer most awful! Something else should go here!" I finished, not having a good third thing to say. The elves laughed though, as we crashed our mugs together for the last time, the three elves throwing their drinks back.

In for a penny, in for a pound, and I joined them, praying that the stuff wasn’t as potent as the dwarven ale that had laid me low.

I did not want to make an embarrassed drunken mess of myself in front of any of the elves. Especially Serondes. Noooo.

The drink was smooth and rich, hitting all the right spots and sending a pleasant, non-inebriating buzz through my body.

"To the hydra! No more will you harm another soul! Well fought, and we are thankful for your presence gracing our table!" Awarthril used her empty mug to toast the parts of the hydra still cooking, and with that -

We tucked in.

Aegion was back to his small bites, while Serondes made a brief showing of eating properly. All that went out the window after the first round of hydra had been eaten, and he went back to the "grabbing a bite out of the choice pieces" method. Honestly, I found it a bit wasteful, but there was like 600 pounds of hydra and six stomachs. I wasn’t eating a hundred pounds of hydra.

Awarthril practically inhaled her food. She spent more time walking back and forth to the barbeque, piling her plate up, than sitting down and eating. I’m pretty sure the only reason she stuck around at the table, and didn’t, like, just start ripping the food off the pit into her mouth directly was it was the polite thing to do.

I was still stuck being one-handed, and I just leaned into it. Spear food with fork, take entire steak to mouth, munch around the fork as I worked my way down to the bone. Then the next one, grease getting all over my face and dribbling down my chin.

We didn’t talk much - we were too busy chowing down. The silence of good food, that was hard-fought for.

The sun set as we were eating. I had a good seat, and it didn’t get in my eyes. It did get into Aegion’s eyes though, and I suppressed a laugh.

"That was good." Awarthril said, her stomach bulging alarmingly. I didn’t know it was physically possible to eat that much, but she’d done it.

I’d eaten my fair share, including some fruits that I didn’t recognize but were otherwise tasty. I wasn’t ravenous like Awarthril had been, given that I’d barely used any magic. I did feel like I needed to be rolled out of here with a barrel though.

"Yes." I agreed, not feeling like saying much more. I cleaned my face with a napkin, degreasifying myself.

Food good.

"I’ma turn in." Aegion got up, somehow steady in spite of drinking way too much of the good stuff. More blasted elf nonsense.

He picked up Cordamo, who’d gone entirely comatose from overeating, and smoothly walked over to Castle Too-Much-Effort.

Awarthril flopped into the grass, vanishing in the untamed wilds, and Kiyaya nuzzled up next to her. Serondes got a blanket out from the Spatial Box, and draped it over the two of them. Loud snoring echoed shortly after.

Flopping down sounded nice, and I did just that, looking up at the stars while the embers glowed red. Serondes joined me, lying down next to me and looking at the stars.

"The stars are almost as lovely in the sky as they are in your eyes." Serondes outrageously flattered me. I mentally rolled my eyes at the over-the-top compliment, but it didn’t stop me from being secretly pleased deep inside.

I was still riding high off of the fight, the party, our success - everything. I thought back to what Awarthril had said - wow, was it really this morning?? - and decided, fuck it. Who’d want to date someone who couldn’t even talk to them properly? Serondes had just given me the best opening ever.

"Well, your eyes are like the hydras!" I cheerfully flirted back.

"I sure hope you don’t mean my eyes are dead and lifeless." Serondes drily replied.

Wait.

Shit.

No.

"Buh, no!" I verbally backpedaled. "Like, your eyes are all shiny and Lava-y, and there’s lots of bubbly holes, and it kinda looks like a ton of eyes, like the hydra has - had - not that it matters - a ton of eyes. Pretty! Cute! I promise!"

Serondes chuckled at my blathering - hopefully amused. Undeterred, I plowed on. My stomach was twisting, my palms were sweaty, and I’d rather sneak through Lun’Kat’s lair again than open myself up like this.

But I’d never get anywhere in life on "what-if’s" and "maybe he’ll talk to me first."

I could try to be somewhat subtle though.

"What are elf - and really, Immortal - relationships like? I can’t imagine they’re the same as mortal relationships."

To the best of my knowledge, Night was a monk. If it wasn’t for Jaclyn, I’d wonder if vampires even…

Wait.

She wasn’t a good example. For all I know she was just trying to get some tasty healer bites in.

Serondes chuckled.

"You have no idea how true that is. Even among different mortal cultures, they all do different things. Some mate for life. Some just for offspring. The dragonlings have no real concept of a "relationship", just good sex partners. As for Immortals? We all differ, as varied as the Immortal races."

Yes, yes, that was very nice, but…

"What about elves?" I said, rolling over on the grass, onto my elbows, to see him better. "Do you have, like, an arranged marriage? Some fiancee waiting for you back home?"

I hadn’t heard one in his story, but then again, he hadn’t been able to give the whole story. Immortals had long, rich lives.

He smiled at me.

"Most Immortals follow the same pattern, although there are exceptions. Mortals who seize Immortality form the majority of these exceptions. Elves have it figured out though. After a period of getting to know each other, they make a commitment, a period of time to be devoted to each other. 100 years is considered short, 2000 is considered long. At the end, there’s an understanding that they will separate for some time, before deciding what to do next."

He shrugged.

"That’s for the ones who want a short - or long - commitment. Others are free spirits, content to enjoy life."

That answered the question, but didn’t answer the question!!!

I swear, he knew what I wanted and was enjoying tormenting me.

"Are you devoted to anyone?" I asked, mentally thinking about him and Awarthril. They had been bathing together at one point… but I hadn’t seen other interactions between them that suggested they were a couple.

But.

Naked.

Together.

Alone.

The formula was there.

He shook his head.

"I knew I’d be going out, and quite frankly, we’re all young. We wanted to see the world first, before thinking of such a thing."

Ok. Seemed to be available. Seemed to be interested. We were already on the topic.

Nothing for it. Time to be bold! Time to be Healer Elaine at her very best!

We were already close.

I reshuffled myself so I was supported by my knees, the omnipresent egg in one hand. I leaned over, grabbing his short pointy horn with one hand, and kissed him.

His arms wrapped around me, as he pulled me in and kissed me back.

[Name: Elaine]

[Race: Human]

[Age: 20]

[Mana: 412740/412740]

[Mana Regen: 275034 (+356755.875)]

Stats

[Free Stats: 91]

[Strength: 941]

[Dexterity: 1468]

[Vitality: 11166]

[Speed: 11166]

[Mana: 41274]

[Mana Regeneration: 41363 (+35675.5875)]

[Magic Power: 18178 (+340837.5)]

[Magic Control: 18178 (+340837.5)]

[Class 1: [The Dawn Sentinel - Celestial: Lv 420]]

[Celestial Affinity: 420]

[Cosmic Presence: 286]

[The Stars Never Fade: 1]

[Center of the Universe: 420]

[Dance with the Heavens: 420]

[Wheel of Sun and Moon: 420]

[Mantle of the Stars: 420]

[Sunrise: 344]

[Class 2: [Butterfly Mystic - Radiance: Lv 345]]

[Radiance Affinity: 345]

[Radiance Resistance: 345]

[Radiance Conjuration: 345]

[Solar Flare: 1]

[Nectar: 345]

[Sun's Heart: 345]

[Scintillating Ascent: 313]

[Kaleidoscope: 345]

[Class 3: Locked]

General Skills

[Long-Range Identify: 370]

[Pristine Memories: 217]

[Egg Incubation: 44]

[Bullet Time: 420]

[Oath of Elaine to Lyra: 375]

[Sentinel's Superiority: 395]

[Persistent Casting: 291]

[Passionate Learning: 377]

Chapter 240 - Minor Interlude - Rostellio.

Rostellio was bound, beaten, but not broken. He was hung up, the mighty angel, the agent of the God of Light captured and imprisoned.

He was a toy. Displayed, as a warning, a threat, a statement of power. Used, in an ironic twist he was sure was deliberate, as a chandelier, in the lair of Lun’Kat.

Oh, she hadn’t been the one who’d captured and bound him. No, that had been Alendras, who seemed to have a hobby of capturing angels that descended, spitting in the face of the gods.

Daring them to come after him.

And they dared.

"Lun’Kat! I’ve come for you!" An old dullahan roared, dropping from the entrance to the lair to land on the floor. An advantage of angels was they understood every language, perceiving the intent behind the words moreso than the words themselves.

Rostellio had Vision, an aspect leftover from his mortal life, before he became an angel in the service of Raito. It let him see.

It let him see both Lun’Kat lazily lounging in her bed, and an illusionary Lun’Kat bursting forth with a roar of flames. She continued to laze about as her illusions fought the dullahan, forcing the fight into a special chamber she had just for the purpose of fighting pompous, weak, foolish challengers.

They didn’t have a chance. It didn’t stop Lun’Kat from toying with her food, from deriving pleasure and entertainment from the perverse game of cat and mouse that she played with suicidal intruders.

The [Paladin] fought bravely. Fought valiantly. He was in service to Raito as well, and Rostellio knew the truth. He was at the end of his life. He’d asked for one last mission, one last service he could perform for Raito before his death. For his death.

Raito sent him here, to remind Rostellio that he’d not forgotten about him. The god knew where his angel was, and wanted to help.

Raito wasn’t able to directly free Rostellio. Not without an expenditure of power too great, without needing to directly fight Lun’Kat in her own lair. It was a fight not even a Tier 2 god, the god of Light himself, wanted to take.

Alendras’s bindings were thorough, and he’d had millenia of experience capturing angels and luring gods into epic confrontations. The gods had eventually learned when, and how, they could interfere without the blowback.

There were reasons the gods didn’t want to expend too much of their power. Rostellio wasn’t in the know, but they always looked upwards, looked out, when discussing it.

Still, Rostellio’s Vision let him watch the entire fight, let him examine the illusions. Lun’Kat had over 40 different layers of illusions, so when one broke another one was there and ready, able to give false hope that the [Paladin] was getting somewhere. She even allowed "herself" to take injuries, making the poor dullahan think he was getting somewhere.

That he had a chance.

A week they "fought", the occasional mirthful chuckle coming from Lun’Kat as she cruelly crushed his hopes again and again, letting one badly-injured illusion "break", only to show a fresh, hale, and healthy "Lun’Kat" behind it.

Then she got bored, and with a thought, a massive eruption of dragonfire ended the fight in an instant, vaporizing the dullahan and all traces and evidence that he’d ever existed. Something she’d been able to do from the start, but where was the fun in that?

Where was the break in the monotony?

No, the dullahan had provided her with a week of entertainment, soon to be forgotten.

Rostellio could do nothing but weep quietly at his fellow devotee’s loss. Maybe one day he’d find the man as an angel, and be able to give him his thanks.

Thanks for the hope he’d given him.

Thanks for the message he’d received - he was not forgotten. He was not abandoned.

Rostellio’s Vision meant, even if he wanted to, he wasn’t able to close his eyes to the horrors and tragedies he was forced to bear witness to. Some were cruel, like the nameless [Paladin]. Others?

Well. Lun’Kat’s mate had come to visit, entering from the magic portal that linked their two domains together. There’d be a new clutch of eggs, more terrible dragons to wreak havoc on the world.

Lun’Kat would vanish for a time, occasionally coming back with some trinket or another, to be carefully placed in her ever-growing collection, to be never looked at again. She’d occasionally redecorate, rearranging where everything went, old treasures dusted off to be seen again, ancient triumphs revisited.

Apart from the main entrance and exit to her lair, where Lun’Kat regularly flew in and out of, she had a half-dozen other ways in. Rostellio’s Vision let him see all of them. There was the shimmering mirror-portal, linked to her mate’s lair. There was a crack, leading to the Below Levels. A small Spatial leak twisted and distorted space, nothing having ever gone or come through it. Rostellio would’ve thought it unknown to Lun’Kat, had it not been given its own chamber and protections. Another portal led to the ocean, creating a pool that Lun’Kat could bathe in if she wanted to, some sea life occasionally managed to work its way through now and then. A fishman had once challenged her, to the same toying results as the rest. More, scattered about, some natural cracks in the gigantic recesses of her lair, other just straight portals to different places.

She hadn’t reshuffled things in some time, nesting protectively over her eggs. She was still protecting them when dozens - no, hundreds - of dwarves burst into her chambers, taking the entrance from the Below Levels.

Lun’Kat reared back, as the dwarves started firing off thousands of skills indiscriminately, items in her collection breaking and smashing.

Lun’Kat knew when to play with her food, and when to bring down the unholy wrath of a dragon. A single blast of Pyronox-aspected dragonflame, and nearly the entire army was wiped out.

She made some unhappy, keening noises as she shifted through some part of her broken collection, fixing them and putting them right. Rostellio had been hanging out long enough that he could get some idea of her mood, could read her somewhat. She started off mad, and as she cleaned up, slowly became furious.

Then wrathful.

Placing her eggs in a dozen protective wards, hidden by innumerable illusions, she turned invisible - to mortal eyes, not angelic ones - and flew out of the lair in a rage.

Rostellio couldn’t see that far, but he could feel it. Even with the distances involved, the skill and power of those involved shook the earth. He watched a cauldron slowly teeter, praying to Raito that it wouldn’t fall. That she wouldn’t become madder, and take it out on him.

He screamed more than the fairies did, and so, was more entertaining.

She came back after a night and a day of furious battle, flying awkwardly as a wing was broken, deep cuts marred her entire body, and every exhalation tainted with wisps of poison. Every drop of her blood sizzled and burned the ground where it landed, and she protectively grabbed her eggs, curled up into a pile of old conquests, and fell into a deep, healing sleep.

Rostellio wanted to rage and curse. He wanted to tell Raito that now was the time. He needed to tell Raito that this was his chance, his way to strike down Lun’Kat, and free Rostellio once and for all.

The connection had been severed ages ago, when Rostellio had been first captured.

Lun’Kat had been slowly healing, when a new intruder showed up. This one was laughable, coming in from the Below Levels again. She had layered all sorts of spells that she surely thought were good on her, to hide and protect her.

Ha!

The [Thief] was terrible. Not only did her invisibility skill have massive holes in it, but she wasn’t even taking care with the air she displaced! Her every movement caused subtle currents to flow through the air, practically screaming "SOMEONE IS HERE!" She didn’t occlude sound, instead being a sink for it, which was almost worse than no anti-sound skills. Her footsteps sent tiny tremors through the floor. Her heat still radiated off of her.

She spent minutes knocking on the flimsy "look at me" illusion, practically ringing the doorbell repeatedly before managing to "break in".

All in all, it was amateur hour as the [Thief] slowly crept into the lair, then started sneaking around like all thieves would.

Rostellio didn’t like thieves much. He did try to flare some angelfire at her, to give her a warning, but the restraints were too much.

She deserves her fate. He settled back, not about to shed tears for this latest idiot.

Lun’Kat was sadly back in a good mood. She was going to torment this [Thief], slowly let her do… whatever… and pile on the pain. Oh, it was a slow, cruel process, playing with her food in a different way. Of course, the big reveal, the hope crushing, would only occur at the end.

As she crossed the lair, her eyes kept wandering, greedily drinking up all the treasures she could see. Rostellio wondered what she’d go for first. The scrolls that could teach teleportation to even a novice? The potion that granted Immortality? The mystical metals, each with strange and unusual properties? Something else?

No, the [Thief] was petty and small-minded, going for the gold, silver, weapons and armor that Lun’Kat was currently sleeping on. The worst items in the lot, that only a fool would go for.

And she… just stood there. Looking up at Lun’Kat. Barely moving, studying her. Then something happened, something changed that Rostellio only caught because of Vision.

She was healing Lun’Kat!

If Rostellio could’ve moved, if he’d been drinking, he would’ve done a spit take.

It wasn’t a gigantic heal out of legends, no, merely a small, modest fix. Rostellio wanted to kick and scream, to rage against the unfairness of it all. Instead of a slayer, instead of Raito being able to seize the moment and free him, some idiot was fixing Lun’Kat up! Didn’t she know how dangerous dragons were?! Why would she do such a thing!?

She practically stomped over to the pillars, trying to grab some mana. After a brief moment of Lun’Kat keeping a tight lock on it, she relented, allowing the trespasser to take some mana.

The [Healer-Thief] stomped back to Lun’Kat, healing her again, and again. Then the moons were out of sight, and Rostellio let a cruel smile play over his face as he saw Lun’Kat deliberately shift, terrifying the poor thief.

She was still playing with her food. Still a cat, with a mouse in her eyes.

Rostellio wanted to bash his head against a rock as he saw the [Healer-Thief] enter the fruit grove, merrily thinking herself clever as she "avoided" everything in there. Nevermind that everything could sense her, that elementals rarely used sight to see. She was so naive, so out of her depth, so ignorant in the ways of the world that she somehow thought she was succeeding! She thought the elementals didn’t note her passing, that a dryad somehow didn’t know every leaf and fruit present in her grove.

Rostellio didn’t know what was worse. That she was healing Lun’Kat, or that she was so terribly ignorant of the world.

Lun’Kat kept playing with her newest toy, this one vaguely different from others. One thing she did do was move her tail, putting it in a position where the healer would be able to use her skills for a longer timeframe, speeding up her healing process. If that’s what the healer wanted to keep doing. Rostellio was convinced that was part of why she gave intruders a chance - maybe one would surprise and entertain her, longer than most.

The… Rostellio was forced to admit, [Healer] - continued to behave oddly. She circled around the lair between healing sessions, just looking at things. Never touching. Spending an hour staring longingly at some of the fruit trees. Wandering the library, like she was hunting for some scroll of forbidden knowledge.

Also, what sort of hare-brained idiot could only heal under sunlight and moonlight? And how horribly unbalanced were her stats that she could blow through her entire mana pool in two seconds? Honestly, that was just a bad build. Rostellio wanted to be freed, so if nothing else he could descend to whatever mudhole this healer had crawled out of and properly educate them. Balanced stats! It was all about balanced stats! Not this "ooh look at me I can heal for two seconds and that’s it" nonsense that this healer was running around with. By level 600 or thereabouts, you’d think this healer would’ve figured it out.

Rostellio couldn’t see levels, but he had Vision of how much mana was being thrown around, and what their physical stats were by how they moved, and so could effectively estimate where someone landed level-wise as a result. Give or take a half-dozen levels and class quality.

Yet, it was effective. Rostellio had to privately admit - not that he had anyone to share his thoughts with - that having so much power, when there was nigh-infinite mana surrounding her - was more effective than any other build for the specific task of healing Lun’Kat. What demented god had she prayed to, to get this [Cleric] sent to her in her time of need? Who even had such a creature faithful to them, able to find her lair?

The [Thief] grew bolder the longer she stayed, sleeping in the lair like it was her own, perusing through the aisles of the library like she owned it. The whole time she was careful not to touch anything besides the fruits, some water, and the Arcanite. Lun’Kat tolerated it, playing with her in a different way. Letting her get comfortable, before the big reveal, before the hammer drop.

Before she’d cast the poor healer into the depths of despair. Rostellio felt his emotions changing, starting to pity her. She thought she was getting out of this alive. She didn’t realize that she was being allowed to get her hopes up, so that Lun’Kat could dash them all the harder.

Finally, one of the last healing sessions occurred, Lun’Kat wrinkling her nose in pain as the bones snapped into place. However, she kept the facade up, Rostellio only noting what happened due to long involuntary familiarity with his jailor.

Another session, and Vision showed that everything was perfectly healthy with Lun’Kat, that she’d been entirely restored.

Then, Lun’Kat started to play. She moved twice - once was her illusionary body, wandering around, the other was her real one. The real one safely stashed her eggs inside her nest, as she curled up protectively on them. No risk would ever be taken with them.

The fake placed illusionary eggs in a brazier, lighting it with fire. She then made a big show of eating and drinking, before going to sleep, enjoying the terrified look on the healer’s face, as she thought her doom had come.

Idiot. She was just being played with. Lun’Kat was letting her feel some fear, only to take it away, which would make crushing it in a moment all the sweeter.

Lun’Kat’s illusion overlapped with the real thing, going to a "sound sleep", the better to see what the healer did next, with no supervision.

The healer seemed to recognize that it was time to leave. The lure of money, of wealth, was too much for her to resist, and she reached out, grabbing an item from Lun’Kat’s possession.

That… was an interesting pick, not that it’d matter. The [Thief] had glorious wings of Radiant light erupt from her back, as she flew away at top speed, trying to escape Lun’Kat’s wrath.

It would be impossible. Lun’Kat was going to let her get some distance, then smack her down. The further she allowed her to get, the harder the smack, the worse the metaphorical and literal fall.

She went further… and further… and further…

Rostellio looked down, at Lun’Kat, who had one eye open, narrowed slightly, tracking the escaping healer. She glanced at her collection, and saw that it was almost entirely still intact. The healer had gotten lucky, and stolen something that Lun’Kat had nearly a dozen of.

The dragon let out a snort of flames from her nose, then closed her eyes.

Rostellio could’ve been knocked over by one of his feathers, if he’d had any range of motion. The only thing he could think of was Lun’Kat considered it a "fair trade", which according to anyone but her, was anything terribly unbalanced in her favor.

Still.

She let her go?!