While Parin hid, Hakim and Eilin seemed content to read the various books in the library. Vina decided to address the notification windows she had sitting in the background since her fight with Faer.
Skill Level Up: Ambidexterity has reached level 7. You can use your off hand 6% as well as your dominant hand. Skill Level Up: Painting has reached level 11. You can paint 11% faster and your art is worth 11% more. Skill Level Up: Blood Runes has reached level 16. Blood runes can be drawn 75% faster and take 75% less blood to activate or maintain. Skill Level Up: Throwing has reached level 15. Your current throwing distance is 63 feet. You can throw harder and faster. You have gained 750 experience points from leveling skills.
“Why didn’t I get a skill point at 15?” she whispered to herself. She checked her Blood Runes skill and saw the same thing had happened. She had been so busy with her masterpiece, she had missed it.
Hakim responded, “You won’t get another skill point until the skill is level 20. You’ll get a skill point at 30, 40, and 50 as well. After 50, you get a skill point every 25 skill levels.”
Vina looked at him, “Thanks. Sorry. I didn’t know I was talking out loud.”
“It’s okay. You mutter to yourself a lot. I figured I could help you out.” Hakim said, flashing her a smile.
She turned back to her skills and considered what she saw. She was actually fairly disappointed. She had not leveled her skills much at all in her fight against Faer compared to even when she fought in Valanire. While she had fought many creatures there, she noticed some significant difference. “I didn’t have the asharaina title back then”, she thought.
Vina relied extremely heavily on her blood control during her fight with Faer and barely used any of her skills. “I didn’t block anything or use any specific weapon other than throwing knives,” she said to herself as she considered what had happened. Mobility may have saved her life numerous times in the past, but it was a skill that never leveled. Every time she used it, she didn’t get any stronger from it. “If I want to get stronger, I need to keep using skills that gain levels and give experience”, she thought. Keeping that in mind, she pulled up the next set of notifications.
Vina Level Up: You have reached level 13 and have 3 more attribute points to allocate. Your agility has increased by 2, your dexterity has increased by 1, and your mastery has increased by 1. You have gained 10 health and 5 stamina. You have earned two class ability points. You have earned one skill specialization point.
She placed one attribute point into strength bringing it up to 21 and finally achieved the goal of lifting 100% of her body weight. She glanced up at Hakim’s massive health bar and shook her head. “The rest goes into Vitality”, she muttered. The attribute changes took effect on her body and she immediately felt the differences, including a slight boost to the amount of blood in her veins.
She looked at her class abilities next. Given her new decision to focus on trying to use her skills more, Vina was unsure where to apply her ability points. Every class ability she had did not gain her skills. Howeverthey did make her far more powerful when using them. It was a vicious paradox of growth and stagnation. She looked closely at Blood Blades which had been sitting at level one for quite a long time now.
Blood Blades (1/3): Form a bladed weapon of your choice from your blood. The weapon does variable damage based on the type of blade made. Level 1: Small Blades. Next level: Medium blades.
“Maybe if I can make swords... Will it encourage me to use one?” she asked herself. She placed a point into Blood Blades and felt the knowledge flow into her mind. For her final point she decided to continue on her course of having a way of forcing divinity users to face resource bottlenecks and placed a point into Hemophage.
Hemophage (2/3): Your blood can now make Hemophagic cells. Hemophages consume foreign red blood cells via phagocytosis. Phagocytosis reduces stamina recovery by 7.5%. Stacks 10 times. Hemophage is considered an infection.
Lastly, Vina looked at her skills to figure out where to place her specialization point. “When I did running, it made running so much easier. It’s already level 9. I really need to get that to 10 soon though.” She looked through her list before making a choice.
Eilin looked up from her book, “Don’t ever leave a skill one level before you would get a skill point. Do whatever you can to reach the next rank. Letting it languish like that is a really bad habit to get into.”
“You should go on a run today and finish that up”, Hakim suggested.
Vina bobbed her head in agreement, but covered her face in slight embarrassment. She really needed to get this talking to herself thing under control. She tried to focus back on her skill specializations and decided continuing to focus on improving her physical capabilities was the way to go.
Skill specialization: Jumping. Falling damage reduced by 90%.
Vina stared at the prompt in disbelief. “Hey uh.. I just used a skill specialization point, and it says falling damage is reduced by 90%. I just wanted to make sure that it means what I think it means.”
Parin looked at her with a confused expression and Eilin began scribbling furiously again. Hakim spoke first, “I take it, your class has skill specializations.”
Vina nodded her head slowly, “Yes. I get one at every level.”
Hakim raised an eyebrow, “And which skill did you specialize in?”
“I’ve been working on skills that improve my physical capabilities. This time I chose the jumping skill.” Vina said, concerned she might be making bad choices.
Eilin stopped writing, “But…. you have a blood class. Are you able to specialize in any skill?”
Vina shrugged, “I haven’t been told I can’t yet. Every skill I’ve tried to use a specialization point on has worked.”
There was more scribbling and Hakim frowned.
“What’s wrong?” Vina asked.
Eilin and Parin remained silent after Hakim gave them a look. Hakim answered her, “You’re a bundle of mysteries, Vina. Specialization points are typically used to specialize in skills related to your class. These points normally won’t let you specialize in skills unrelated to your class at all. Your title as a traveler should let you learn just about any skill, but I doubt it grants you the ability to specialize in every skill. It is quite strange.”
Vina thought back for a moment, “There was one skill I couldn’t learn. My sister tried to teach me Charge, but no matter what we tried I couldn’t get it. I also can’t learn Rune Carving, my mother’s skill.”
Eilin and Hakim exchanged a knowing glance.
“Stop doing that. What's going on?” Vina asked with her hands held out.
Eilin answered this time, “Records show that as people have grown and changed under Trina’s guidance, they were able to learn new skills over time. The predominant belief is that sometimes the limits we think exist are actually self imposed. You didn’t learn Charge because you didn’t want to.”
“You two think I could learn it now?” Vina asked.
“You’re a Traveler and an Asharaina. We know you can learn it now”, Hakim said.
Vina was about to make an attempt when Eilin spoke up loudly, “Not in my library, please!” When she saw Vina relax she continued speaking, “As for your supposed near invulnerability to defenestration, it’s a strange one. It’s rare to have a normal specialization that allows a person to almost completely ignore a rule of the system. I too would be curious if the definition of ‘falling damage’ includes broken bones or merely health loss. I am also wondering if the benefit would extend to someone else if you are holding them. Care to do some experiments with me?”
Hakim held a hand up, “You can experiment after we have determined if she can find Trina. Speaking of which, I believe the time is up. Vina, would you care to see if you can find Parin by his… what did you call it?”
Eilin looked down at her notes and spoke for her, “Vibrance.”
~~~
Vina quickly found Parin hiding in the large library. He definitely didn’t need a thirty minute head start, and she was rather disappointed he had not gone out into the city to make it more difficult. “I should have expected he would do the safest thing for us,” she thought to herself. But the notification she received confused her. A window popped up that didn’t appear like the others. To her it looked much like something from an old ms-dos screen back in the computer labs back on earth. She momentarily wondered if the system was trying to keep it familiar for her.
System: Vina Esca has learned a new skill: Undocumented.
System: Error 42892. Entity Vina Esca has learned an undocumented skill.
System: Escalating Severity One event to Trina.
System: Waiting…
The message repeated twice more and Vina’s eyes focused back onto the eager faces looking at her. “Uhm… I got a system error. It says I’ve learned an unknown skill. It escalated the event to Trina. It’s waiting for her to respond I think.”
Eilin’s pen immediately went to paper, and Hakim spoke above her scribbles, “Let’s just wait. If Trina responds, it will tell us something. If not…” he shrugged and he didn’t complete his sentence.
“If not, what?” Eilin asked. “System errors are rare, Hakim. If the auto-resolve system activates…” Eilin’s voice also faded. “Oh.”
“What?” Vina asked. “What happens?” She watched as the waiting message continued to appear in the log over and over again.
“It’s rarer than system errors, but sometimes the auto-resolve system would adjust people’s levels or skills.” Eilin said. “I don’t know if it has occurred since The Severing, however. I imagine it requires a unique set of aspects and access to the system itself to achieve it. I’m sure you’ll be fine.” Eilin put on a smile, but Vina's blood shot eyes saw something in it that worried her. Vina’s eyes focused back on the window when new text appeared.
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System: Waiting…
System: Request timed out.
System: Starting auto resolution process.
System: Attempting skill removal…
System: Attempt failed due to multiple existing skill dependencies.
System: Attempting creation of new skill.
System: Enter Skill Name…
Vina swallowed hard when she saw the system tried to take the skill away from her. She thought for a second and then mentally entered the name she thought the skill should have.
System: Blood Tracking
System: Error - Skill name already exists
System: Enter Skill Name…
“What?” she said aloud.
“What?” everyone in the room asked.
“Does the Blood Tracking skill already exist?” Vina asked.
Parin nodded his head, “Yes. Hunters use it to follow their prey after they have shot it.”
Vina shook her head in confusion, “So, I’m not tracking someone by their blood. I’m tracking them by their vibrance. But that seems inconsistent. I see vibrance because of my Blood Sense skill. Why would…” She stopped speaking when the three ellipses at the end of the prompt flashed in her vision. Worried that the command prompt might disappear if she waited too long, she mentally typed in Vibrance Tracking. The screen updated for her once more.
System: Vibrance Tracking
System: Skill Name Accepted.
System: Skill benefits unknown and will not display.
System: Updated Tracking Skills List and Effects. Section 427a. Vibrance Tracking has been added. Others may now learn this skill without error.
New Skill Learned: Vibrance Tracking has reached a level of unknown. The benefits of this skill are undocumented. Vibrance Tracking is a specific approach to Tracking. Vibrance Tracking will replace your Tracking skill.
When Vina’s eyes unfocused from her notification, she saw three very worried faces staring back at her. “I think it’s been resolved.” Their vibrances suddenly switched to being full of hope. She gave them a teasing smile. “Let’s go outside.”
After a quick walk up to the fourth floor and out onto a balcony, Vina took the Aspect of Life from her backpack and held it up to her face. Trina’s blood vibrance was incredibly bright and she had to squint slightly as she tried to focus on it the same way she had with Parin’s. To her surprise it was easier tracking Trina’s vibrance than Parin’s. A thick trail of vibrance, like a cloud, appeared between her and something else in the distance. Vina pointed with her finger. “I think she’s over there. I can see why she said what she did to Shan. Her vibrance is huge and impossible to miss.”
Eilin immediately started frantically scribbling. Hakim pulled a map out of nowhere and held it before himself and Parin. “She’s pointing toward one of the glooms”, Hakim said.
“Yes, but there is a lot of land between us and that. Trina could be anywhere in between and even beyond”, Parin said. “See, the Assemblers are along that line as well.” He drew a finger along the maps and pointed out a colored area. “There’s also two cities before we reach the worst situation.”
Hakim patted Parin on the shoulder, “Your optimism is appreciated, Parin, but we both know the truth. The Darkness has already found Trina. We suspected so for many years.”
Vina, very much not understanding anything, asked, “What is a gloom?”
Hakim answered, “A Gloom is an area of our world where shadows have gathered at an extreme concentration. The landscape has been transformed into something that no longer resembles our own world. Shadow possessed creatures patrol it like soldiers. There are many glooms throughout the world, but this is the closest one to us.”
“And Trina’s likely inside…” Her voice trailed off as she recalled her previous fights with the shadows. “These soldiers, are they six eyed creatures?” Vina asked.
Hakim nodded, “Yes. Creatures and sometimes people like us. When a shadow controls something, it gains additional eyes. Most creatures already have four for unknown reasons.”
“What’s the difference between The Shadow and The Darkness?” Vina asked. “It seems like they are used interchangeably at times, but sometimes it is specific.”
Eilin looked up from her documents and spoke, “Technically, The Darkness is the person or creature that is controlling other people, creatures, or shadows. The shadows are more difficult to define. We all have shadows attached to our bodies. We all know that our shadows are just the absence of light, but to The Darkness they are something else. It seems to work from a different system than we do. If we die near The Darkness, it is apparently able to capture them and force us to serve it.”
“That’s… really horrifying.” Vina said.
Eilin continued, “Even worse, we can’t kill the shadows. We’ve tried, and the best we can do is kill their hosts. The shadows just float out of their bodies and back to The Darkness we think, or maybe to the nearest gloom. It possesses another creature later, and we basically make no progress. Thankfully while disembodied, the shadows are very weak unless in great concentrations. If the concentrations are sufficient enough, they can hurt or even kill a person.”
“Where are all these creatures coming from then? I thought the Adventurer’s guild hunted them regularly, and I know The Watch does as well”, Vina asked.
Hakim pointed at the map, “They’re coming from creature assemblers. They’re difficult to describe, Vina.” He cringed and looked at Parin and Eilin.
Parin shrugged at him, “I think you should just give her the facts.”
Eilin answered, “They’re a mound of flesh with slightly translucent skin. Inside you can see something moving. We haven’t been able to identify exactly what it is. Whatever they are, we can see inside enough to tell that they join pieces of bodies together. The amount of time it takes them to build a creature seems fairly consistent depending on the assembler, but it can vary by location. Some assemblers are extremely aggressive and churn out many low level creatures at a rapid pace. Others take their time and make extremely high level creatures.”
Vina made the same face as Hakim and Eilin continued, “Much like the shadows, we find the assemblers are equally immune to damage. Our weapons simply pass through whatever material they are made from. They are similarly unaffected by aspects. There’s many of these assemblers in the world and more are appearing every week. If you want more information, you’ll likely need to consult The Adventurer’s guild.”
“Why would the adventurer’s guild know more about them?” Vina asked, fascinated.
“Just like The Darkness, the Adventurer’s guild seeks them out and sets up camps around them. I have no idea how many the Adventurer’s guild have secured, but the number is likely quite high. Their members gain experience and skill levels by killing creatures continuously.”
“And The Darkness recruits them as soldiers”, Vina mused. Her company was quiet as she considered what she had learned. It was an arms race between the people of this world and The Darkness. The resource was creatures. “Are one of these secured assemblers near the city or accessible via a portal ring trip?”
“We have secured several by ourselves when they became a threat to the city. They are of a higher level, however and would not like any members of the family to approach them.” Parin said.
Vina nodded her thanks, “Okay. I think it’s time I finally made my map compendium. I’ll take a portal ring trip around the Assemblers that Parin pointed out on the map. At the same time, I can also travel to the edge of the gloom. That should give us confirmation of exactly where Trina is.”
Parin looked at her with some respect, “Why do you want to see an assembler? Do you think you can find a way to destroy one?”
Vina shrugged, “I have no idea. No one else seems to have specialized so heavily into blood and well… apparently vibrance, so I might as well give it a look.”
Eilin perked up, “I agree. I have also noticed how strange it is that Trina seems so willing to foster your growth in blood related skills. Trina’s words are what started the taboo against blood skills. I find it interesting that…” her voice trailed off when she saw Hakim’s gaze. But her eyebrows furrowed and she continued, “I find it interesting that the community on the whole has interpreted Trina’s words as disparaging to Blood skills. Now we are seeing her actions run contrary to that interpretation.” Eilin turned to Hakim, “Lord Hakim, I do hope you remember that my station is responsible first and foremost for spreading knowledge that is available to the general public and secondly for protecting the private knowledge of the Halos Family. Vina, as one of your family members, has access to both sources of knowledge and therefore experiences no restrictions.”
Hakim nodded, but Vina could feel his disapproval in his vibrance.
“Trina was the one responsible for the social rejection of blood related skills and classes? Why wouldn’t you want me to know this?” Vina asked, her heart felt slightly bruised by his deception.
Hakim sighed, “I know from your painting the pain you experience by not being accepted for who you are. I was concerned you may be unwilling to help Trina if you felt she was prejudiced against you.”
“Is she prejudiced against blood users?” Vina asked pointedly.
Hakim gestured to Eilin to answer, clearly trying to remain unbiased. Eilin gave Hakim a side eyed look before answering, “It depends on who you ask. The taboo largely stems from a single phrase in Shan’s books where Trina said, ‘The path of blood will not be nurtured on Palitern’. Shan provided no interpretation as he did not like to influence his reader. Many have interpreted it as an outright prohibition on blood related activities. Other scholars have tried changing the narrative as of late to a more consistent interpretation where Trina is providing commentary on gaining experience through war or combat. She had been consistently against individual growth through violence. Besides, she personally titled an Asharaina of Blood and a masterpiece that teaches blood classes. If that isn’t indicative of support for your kind, Vina, I don’t know what is.”
Vina considered Eilin’s answer. She could see how Trina’s words could be interpreted in either direction and probably in many other ways as well. She knew from Earth just how twisted the words of people could become over time. She spoke to no one in particular, but knew they all needed to hear her words, “I won’t withhold my help from Trina. Soon, regardless of what anyone in this world wants or thinks, blood classes and skills become ubiquitous.”
Vina felt Eilin’s vibrance change from irritation to some blend of emotions she couldn’t quite recognize. Eilin sidled up to Hakim and nudged him with her elbow. “You need to tell her. If you want to keep her as your ally, you need to be honest with her. Especially about that particular topic.”
Vina turned her red eyes on Hakim once again, “What is it?”
Hakim rubbed his neck hesitantly, but he spoke, “Just this morning I learned your sister, Ann, is in the city. She’s here to view your masterpiece.”
Vina felt her heart jump in joy and a smile spread across her face, but Hakim held up a hand to stop her. “If you recall, I mentioned one of the twelve was also in the city. My guard is reporting that they traveled here together. She appears to have been recruited by the Twelve and is now bearing the number of the Eleventh.”
Vina’s joy vanished, “She took Ebba’s number? She joined them? She wouldn’t do that.”
“There’s more, Vina. The man accompanying her is Adir the Titan. He is a near mythical soldier of The Watch. We expected him to be on the front lines in the war against The Darkness. According to our reports, he has been vital in pushing back several different war fronts. The fact that he is here with your sister tells us that she is extremely important. They are trying to keep her safe.”
“Oh”, Vina said, realizing what Hakim was hinting at, “I did this. She has either Trina’s Necklace or the Aspect of Light.”
Eilin immediately started scribbling, but Hakim gestured for her to stop. He reached out a comforting hand and placed it on Vina’s shoulder, “She has the Aspect of Light. You didn’t know this would happen, Vina. You were honoring your mother’s wishes by giving a gift to your sisters. You are a good sister, even if the result has made things more complicated.”
“I need to rescue her”, Vina said, pain evident in her voice.
“We will have our chance. I’ll be inviting both Ann and Adir to the Halos Family Home today for a dinner in their honor that will happen in two days time. Under the Aspects of Peace and Retribution, we can safely discuss our differences.”