[62:25:13]

Luke's right corner of vision was ticking as he woke next to the fire. Vaguely, he saw Veronica disappear into a nether portal.

"Finally, time to drink!" She bellowed. Never to be seen again.

She was gone but had done as promised, so what else could Luke say?

Dusting the dirt off himself, Luke saw Sooty waiting next to a pond of water with a smug grin, if beaks could make smug grins. His thirst reminded him to drink water first and ask questions second.

"Seems the feathery lassie sorted your water woes before you woke, lad. Don't get used to that for your own good."

Luke continued to gulp down the water. His thirst had reached an insane level. Soon, after being satisfied, his eyes widened when he saw Sooty take a few sips and then put the rest back into a new feather of hers.

"Ah, the feathery lassie's got herself a new trinket, eh? Most companions can't boast even one, let alone two! Where in the name of all that's unholy did that come from?" Wayfinder wondered out loud.

"Sooty, you got a new item? Where did this water even come from? Never mind, it's not like it matters much. We have water now. That's my Sooty!" Luke started to come off towards the end like a proud parent.

Sooty began to caw boastfully and strut around Luke. He couldn't help but let out a laugh. The spunky crow certainly made his life more enjoyable.

"Laddie, best sort out your spoils from those gruesome battles, then let's plot our next stride. Time's not exactly twiddling its thumbs, you know?"

Reminded of the situation the spectral mark put himself in, Luke pet Sooty for a short moment before taking a look at his interface log. First, he glanced over at Sooty; this crow had gone somewhere and gained another great item when he wasn't looking. Likely when he was sleeping before, he finally looked at the ability she used during the fight against the two living armors.

[Essence Screech II]: Companion lets out a piercing screech in a cone-shaped area in front of them, damaging all enemies hit for 20 damage. Spreads Reaver's debuffs within the area of effect with a 6% chance per affected enemy to activate Reaver's stat steal. Cost: 25 Essence

Cooldown: 15 seconds

Another solid ability to be happy about, with this being added to their team's arsenal, dealing with more than one enemy at a time would be easier now. Having yet another ability to help him steal stats was always welcome. Sooty had also reached level 10, and the two underwent astounding growth. Then again, the pressure of the situation didn't allow for a steady curve.

Luke took a look at the rest of his notices on the Interface. He leveled up again, reaching level nine. Luke managed to steal four additional health points, three agility, and three strength with his abilities and Sooty's help. Of course, no stats were gained from leveling.

After all this time, he had more health points than a level one. It was a start. Luke began to use the two skill points he had. He tried putting it into Infusion yet again but wasn't able to. Luke was about to try to put it into Essence Lance when he noticed a new ability on his log.

Sure enough, he had learned: [Essence Fissure I]

Creates a fissure of raw essence at a targeted area on the ground or sky, causing all enemies within the area to be knocked above the fissure for 1.5 seconds. Deals no damage but interrupts targets within the area. Cost: 40 Essence Cooldown: 60 seconds.

The ability had fixed a sore spot in his range of skills, a hard control. Still, he preferred Essence Lance because it had been the final skill in that critical moment. He tried to upgrade it. As he thought, unfortunately, his two skill points weren't enough. Instead, he took one and placed it into Essence Fissure. The cooldown remained the same, but the knock-up effect increased to 1.75 seconds, reducing the cost to 35 essence—a good trade. Deciding to wait, he kept his other point for now.

He then took a look at the most significant change of all. His bread-and-butter ability, Infusion, had evolved, and the power increase was no joke. His interface showed him the changed details:

[Infusion Tier 1]

Infuse Reaver essence on up to two targets—yourself, an ally, or an owned weapon. Enhances damage and speed by 50% for the next 5 strikes or actions, reducing effectiveness by 10% per strike. Grants 10% resistance based on nearby enemies. Each hit carries a 10% chance of permanently stealing one stat point from an enemy. Infusion lasts until all charges are used. Non-stackable. Cost: 15 Essence per target. Cooldown: 10 seconds

Somehow, his cooldown went up, but that was a small price to pay for all the extra utility this skill now offered. As long as he had enough essence, he no longer had to choose between using the ability on Sooty or himself. Most importantly, it no longer lasted for one strike, and the stat-steal chance increased dramatically. The interface wasn't kidding when it said the ability 'evolved.'

He'd gained three torn pages from completing the rounds. With those three in addition to the two he already owned, Luke found all the torn pages.

[Quest Complete: Found 5/5 Torn pages. Rewarded: 500 experience, completed clue.]

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The completed clue merged with an item he had forgotten about, the Mysterious Rune. The two came together, and the item's description came up without him wanting it to.

[Mysterious Rune]

Follow the direction in which the rune's light dims.

The item dropped into his hand, and he couldn't even put it back in his inventory. At least he had something else to do now: figure out where this rune was trying to lead him. He had several close calls on that stage to complete this thing. It couldn't be a waste of time. Could it? Before he did that, though, Luke took the experience from completing the torn page quest and gave enough for Wayfinder to level. After the consistent funneling of his experience to Wayfinder, he finally showed a new ability for Luke to use.

[Wayfinder]

Level: 5

Quality: Artifact

Stats: None

Devil's Needle: Guides user to what they seek. Sometimes.

Cooldown: 7 Days

Passive - Twilight Vanguard III: +20 to Vision, 10% Accuracy, 10% Chance to Critically Strike

Temporal North: Stores a chosen ability. When activated, instantly resets the cooldown of the stored ability. Chosen ability cannot be swapped until after Temporal North is activated.

Cooldown: 300 seconds

A sentient compass tired from being rudely used as a flail.

"Ah, me gleaming shell's back, it is! Me metal's now tougher than steel, and I reckon the needle's sharper, too. Lassie compasses, I'm your man—so long as this Reaver stays alive." Wayfinder seemed content.

Lastly, Luke took note of the active ability of the Spatial Feather Sooty equipped.

Summarizing his, Wayfinder's, and Sooty's gains, Luke felt like getting out of this tomb might be possible after all. The trio started moving again after a short breakfast of more cooked meat from last night. Luke belatedly decided to store Essence Lance for Temporal North.

The area after the platform had changed in terrain, becoming more like the insides of a dilapidated building than the former rough natural brown stone of before. There was a three-way branch. Only the one on the left still looked like a cave. Unsure of which was best, Luke used the Rune in his hand. Only the one on the far right started to dim the light slightly, so he cautiously descended its depths.

Flickering Torches began to appear in the depths, their light bringing no warmth in the increasingly freezing temperatures of the tomb. Soon, the scent of stale blood entered Luke's sense of smell. White and red frescos adorned the area around the torches. Depicting masses of humans cheering one moment, then fleeing in terror the next. Soon after, the same scene was shown again. Instead, the masses were of beasts and demonic creatures. Central to both was a hooded figure.

The Mysterious Rune was becoming dimmer at a painfully slow rate.

A few runes of indecipherable language started to pepper the walls beside Luke. Sooty would glance at them occasionally, letting out a caw of confusion. Luke also saw them. Still, his warning instincts of hostiles in the area kept him from thinking about them too much. Luke passed by a ninety-degree shift in the hallway he found himself in. And a coven of nine creatures had their back turned to him.

[Blood-starved Vampire]

Level: 9

HP: 131 (Weakened)

Its last fresh meal was weeks ago. Slowly going insane from desire.

Luke didn't waste any time. Instead, he immediately decided to try out his new ability, Essence Fissure. The ground underneath the group of monsters cracked, unaware of being attacked; a few let out confused hiss. Their blood-eyes all concentrated on Luke immediately. Each tried to step forward and attack, only to find they were already up in the air, forced against the top of the Gothic chamber.

The trio didn't waste the opportunity before them. Sooty appeared in front of them, using the natural speed boost of the Quicksilver Feather to pounce on them near-instantly. Knowing they only had less than two seconds, Luke immediately applied Infusion on him and Sooty simultaneously. Luke then cast Essence Bond on the vampire in the group's center. He seamlessly conjured up an Essence Lance and threw it against the ceiling before the vampires. The shards rained down on the six in front, and the slow effect applied to all nine vampires. Sooty followed up with a well-timed Essence Screech, applying the Bond to all vampires.

Noticing all of the vampires were still alive, Luke began to sweat buckets. Sooty used her Reaver Beak on the vampire in front of the group. Still very much alive, she finished the vampire with her Talon strike. With the vampires about to come back down and only one dead despite the combo, Luke showed no hesitation in using Temporal North and resetting the cooldown of Essence Lance. As the eight were about to land, he used Essence Lance against the ground below them, having it shatter against all eight. Luke missed the perfect timing, as his essence needed another second to regenerate enough to fully cast the Essence Lance, barely getting it off in time.

The last move showed promise, with two being slain immediately. And another one was grievously injured. Sooty raked that one in the neck, putting an end to the vampire as the remaining four landed. Listening to Luke's intent over the Reaver Link, Sooty placed an Iron Feather over herself.

"A fresh meal," one said in madness, its own blood coagulating before it.

"Its blood is mine," Another said, nearly at the same time.

"Only enough for one of us." The last one to speak complained.

At that moment, Luke realized having Iron Feather on Sooty was a mistake.

But it was also an opportunity; even with the crow taking two out by herself earlier, they practically didn't seem to know she existed. Their razor focus on the blood bag before them became a weakness. Luke began to run to the nearest torch behind him. Skidding to cover the ninety-degree turn as fast as possible. The vampires, finally able to use their full movement, minus the weakening of Essence Bond, furiously chased after.

Using the Reaver's Link, Luke had Sooty use the special active of the Reaver's Feather. Enabling her next three attacks to be true magic damage. Sooty took full advantage, concentrating two strikes on the nape of the vampire at the back. With no resistance being able to reduce the damage done, the vampire spattered into a blood pool.

Sooty raced ahead of the vampires as best she could, catching up to the start of the pack as they began to pelt blood spikes at Luke. Using Wayfinder as his eyes by having him hang behind his neck on his back instead of the usual on front of his chest, Luke ducked at the right moment.

Unfortunately, that killed most of his momentum. Luke dived, then pushed his hands out, doing a roll forward, coming up in a kneeling position, and pressed his legs as hard as possible to continue sprinting ahead. The maneuver let him avoid the swipes of the closest vampire. He reached out for the torch inches in front of him.

Luke's slow from Essence Lance wore off after six seconds, something he didn't expect.

Without the speed reduction, the vampire's mobility was absurd; one caught up to him immediately. Its fangs were gleaming, and the vampire took a blood-sucking bite onto the arm of Luke. Feeling his blood drain, along with his health, Luke reached out with his other arm, took the torch before him, and jammed it directly into the eye of the vampire. Its mouth loosened, and Luke wrenched his arm out. Two other vampires were about to pierce their claws right through him.

Luke knew there was no need to dodge.

A bird, black as night, appeared in front of Luke, ready to defend her Reaver.