Chapter 26:

The last trial started off simple enough. While Mia and myself were small, we were also stronger than most people our age or thereabouts, and stronger than most adults without classes. While my strength was only Wood 2, as opposed to Mias’ and Boones’ Wood 5 effective strength, my tail and claws gave me strange advantages to an Athletic challenge. Honestly, the one that had the most trouble was Boone. His paws and body shape didn't lend themselves well to climbing walls, ropes or balance beams, and more often than not, I had to gently coil my tail around him, while he used his telekinesis to lighten his body weight, and I was forced to carry him like luggage while I kept my own hands free to assist my own struggles.

I had remembered that I hadn't upgraded Boones’ ability, but while he was upset that I hadn't told him, when I explained when it had happened, he accepted that we had had a lot going on at the time and not much opportunity to deal with upgrades until now. He elected to wait to select an upgrade until we had a better idea of what each choice meant, but before we used another crystal or stone. Ability upgrades worked very differently to Attribute upgrades, after all, and Boone simply had no idea what he would get. It was a big decision. That likely meant, however, that we’d be waiting till right before I would gain my last constellation and form my class. Right before we would fight the Chimera that this temple was originally named for.

So, putting off that decision, we had gotten back to crossing what was effectively the magical version of an assault course - and it had started well. Between the three of us we had leapt across slanted platforms, climbed steep climbing walls, slid down ropes - that one strangely easier for me with the Armour covering my palms than for Mia, whose bare skin was chafed terribly by the rough rope - and balanced across narrow beams over dark pits. That all went well. The problems started when skeletons started shooting at us from concealed positions.

I was just creating another climbing wall, claws dug into the lip and hauling both myself and Boone over the edge, when sharp edged projectiles started to rain down on us. Boone was luckily on watch for just this kind of trap - or any trap in general as there was little that he could do while being carried in my tail coils. He yipped in sudden fright and threw up a blue tinted telekinetic shield, the arrows suddenly impacting with the sound of fracturing glass.

Even with his new strength, the shield began to collapse after ten or so heavy impacts against it, and I was forced to scamper across the new platform and throw myself into some low cover, possibly placed there for just this purpose. Boone hunkered down next to me, and Mia slid in beside him. While she was a lot faster than me, she was also stronger, and had elected to follow me in case I fell.

“Where are the archers? Did anyone see them?” I asked the other two. Mia shook her head while catching her breath from the scramble, but Boone gestured with his muzzle at some of the structural columns holding up a nearby platform that was higher than us - and one we’d probably need to proceed to if we were to move forward. “I think those columns are actually towers. There's thin little slit windows all the way up, and they're firing from there. Skeletons, like in the first trial.

Remembering the Archers who had nearly ended Boone and me on the dash to the riverbank, I grimaced, before fetching out a stone and double charging it with both Foxfire and the propulsion enchantment in my catapult. When the barrage paused for a second, I popped up, aimed down my arm, and fired a stone at one of the offending slits. It exploded against the stone, but it was close enough to send a shower of stone chips inside and paused the retaliation from that window. Unfortunately, I caught return fire from the other firing position, and had to duck quickly back down. An arrow impacted my shoulder, but the Hide of the Hunter protected me from getting run through. Hurt like getting kicked by a mule, but thankfully didn't penetrate the enchanted hide.

“Okay, I'm open to ideas. How do we get past this?” I looked at Mia and Boone, and saw a worried expression on Boones’ face - his telekinetically thrown rocks were about as accurate as mine, and with the constant return fire, he’d be more vulnerable than either Mia or myself in our armours. However, when I looked at Mia, she had a thoughtful look on her face.

I nudged her in the side with an elbow, and she snapped out of whatever tunnel she was thinking herself into. “What have you got, Mimi?”

She looked at me, and then her eyes flickered side to side as though reading something from her soul card. “Boone, how transparent can you make your shields?”

The fox thought about it, and replied that they could be made nearly transparent, if with a blue tinge. “And how shadowed do those windows look?” I flicked my eyes over the low wall we were cowering behind and saw that the firing slits had a lot of flickering shadows that moved as the skeletons behind shifted around beyond them. Though I was quickly forced to duck back as arrows clipped the lip of stone and covered me in bits of displaced stone. I passed the information on and Mia grinned, if looking a tiny bit unsure of her own idea.

“Boone, would you throw up your most transparent shield please?” Mia asked very politely. When Boone did so, throwing up a blue tinted but otherwise see through window of Force, Mia popped up, flinched as several arrows chipped against the shield, and then reached out with one hand, going pale as she did so. Suddenly, I heard the tearing rumble of stone coming apart, and practically jumped up to see not just the offending skeletons in one firing slit, but a good chunk of the stone as well be pushed out into open space by large, ferociously sharp looking axe blades of shadow and red darkness. Mias’ grin turned predatory and ferocious before she turned to the other slit, repeating the attack with another boom of displaced stone. Her face went as pale as her hair and she woozily sank back to her seated position behind the wall.

“What did you do!?” I asked, flabbergasted by the display of power. Mia was breathing deep and her pale skin had gone translucent. It looked like whatever power she had used had used up most of her reserves.

“Shaped Shadows, with Shards of Midnight. It's what I got at level 5 Body. The Abilities stack, but both at once without an unlocked or upgraded Mind Attribute, that…took a lot out of me.” I honestly couldn't believe the changes in Mia from the scared child she had been forced to return to being in the Trial of Courage. It was so good to have my competent, smart big sister back. Even better that she was treating me like a peer, and not an unknown or a freak. It had terrified me for years that my family would abandon me if they knew I was different. Mia was gasping for breath by the time she finished speaking, however, and I worried she wouldn't be able to go on. When I showed my concern, though, she waved me off and heaved herself to her feet. “I don't think I should do that again for a while but I'm fine. We’ll think of something else.” I turned round to give Boone a concerned look about my sister, only to find he had grabbed several blocks of masonry stone and hefted them into an orbit around him telekinetically. He grinned at me and let his tongue loll. We would, apparently, find a way indeed.

When Mia had eventually recovered, we took a series of floating stepping stones to the next small platform, crossed a balance beam above a long drop to spikes below, and slid down a zip-line, resorting to using our belts to not burn through our hands - the last two with me holding Boone in my tail again, which he eventually complained about, saying he felt like hand luggage.

Then we came to a corridor full of swinging axe blades. It was a classic fantasy trap from the books I used to read in my last life - an enclosed corridor, with slots in the walls spaced several feet apart, and a huge scything blade swinging back and forth between all of them. I instantly hated it, mainly because I had the lowest reactions of the three of us, so I sat down and tried to work out the timings of the blades, as they were all different.

“What are you doing, Arcadia?” Boone asked me, sitting down by my side. “Do you need a break? You have been carrying me a lot, I would not doubt that is tiring.”

“No, buddy, I'm counting the seconds between the blades so we can get to the other side. Know the timing and we’ll know when to dodge.” The fox tilted his head at me, looked at the blades, and followed their motions for a second.

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“Why not just turn them off?” He asked, and I looked at him with a raised eyebrow. The answer was obvious, but I didn't want to be the butt of his boasting, for I was certain now that that is where I was.

“No, I haven't tried that yet. Did you want to give it a go?” The fox grinned at me, and then looked at the blades, concentrated for a moment, and his body lit up with the telltale blue fire of his abilities. For a second, nothing happened, and then the blades came to a stop and retreated into the walls. I looked at the gloating fox, happily wagging his tail, and I mock-frowned at him, then got to my feet, patted him on the head, and followed him and Mia through the passage. On the other side was a chain handle extending from a skull set in the wall. It must have been a reset or stop button, that when pulled paused the mechanism; Boone grinned again.

“Okay, how did you know that was there? You can't have seen one of these before. I haven't seen one of these before and we were born into this world on the same day!” The fox chuckled and scrambled ahead, skittering and scratching his way up an inclining ramp to the next area. He turned back to us, grinned back down at me, and raised his head to look superior

“Not telling!” I was about to throw something in his direction, when a spear burst through my best friends’ chest.

“NO!” I screamed the word as I started running, leaping with claws spreading as I raced as fast as I could to get to my friend, my brother, the other half of my soul. Mia was faster. She raced past me in a lightning blur.The skeleton champion that had stabbed Boone picked him up like a kebab and threw him off of the blade at us, before Mia surged past and the cacophony of sharpened shadows on steel echoed through the space. I didn't hear it, not really. Boone was bleeding and barely moving, and there was a hole in my heart. Boone had never been badly injured when I had been nearby. I fell to my knees by him and pulled his head into my lap, checking the massive wound in his body. His blood was azure flame and it was leaking all over, soaking into my trousers and staining the hem of my cloak. “Hold on Buddy, I have the Healing bottle right here.”

I ripped the basic healing potion from my inventory and tried to pour some down my friends’ throat, but he could barely swallow. The little that got into him managed to stem the bleeding, but the hole in him was right the way through both sides of his chest. His organs were most likely pulped and his ribs shattered.

I didn't have the knowledge or the Ability to help him.

“I could feel the mechanisms…in the walls.” He grinned, and I sobbed a laugh, begging him not to talk. I couldn’t think what to do.

He was a glass cannon, had been since he had torn his core open when I was five - his power had always gone up, but his health bar had always been tiny. Apparently so much so that a single blow from a Wood 7 champion had been almost enough to see him off completely. I had always hoped he be more durable as he grew.

Wait…durability. I scrambled to bring up my Soul Card and searched through the available options. There it was. A hail-Mary:

[WARNING!!] Inborn Talent: Soul Companion has reached the 1st Threshold. Ability has met the requirements for Evolution. An Evolution Path must be selected. Soul Companion Ability must be evolved before it can Level further.

* Strength

* Versatility

* Durability

I didn't have time to ask for his input - he needed to live. I grabbed on to the Durability option and forced the essence to move in that direction. Boone began to cough, and choke, and glow differently as the upgrade took place. Ability upgrades were very different to Attribute upgrades. Rather than an ability moving in a set pattern, getting stronger as it went, Ability Upgrades were randomised, and could be anything - but they always followed one of a few paths. Durability powers were always to do with health, healing, or survival.

Boone had been created for me as a companion that would be with me for a very long time. He was created by a Goddess of reforging the broken. He was practically a demi-god, if a mortal one. There was no way a durability evolution wouldn't be strong for him. Still, for probably only the second time in this life, I prayed to my ‘Patron’ Kintsuji. I begged her to intercede, to help. I think with Boone under my hands completely run through from one side to the other, I would have promised anything, sold anything, done anything to make him well again.

You have selected to upgrade Soul Companion Inborn Talent along a Durability pathway. Generating Ability Upgrade along randomized parameters…

Ability Created: [Skin to Skin].

Soul companion. Level: Wood 5 (0/11)

* You have been graced with a spiritual adviser to your new world. Boone acts as a companion to help you train, a connection to your patron deity, and as a motivational aid in becoming the best you can be.

* Your soul companion, Boone, has unlocked a pseudo-class, the Telekineticist. Unlike a full class, this ability more closely mimics the magical abilities of Monsters, and is more limited in scope, but will act as a supporting ability user to you moving forward.

* With each level moving forward, your soul companion will gain in size and mental strength, though his ability to go ignored will be less and less reliable.

* Level 5 Upgrade. Durability: Skin to skin. As long as you maintain a physical contact with your Soul Companion and remain alive, your Companion will regenerate slowly from anything below mortal wounds. You may choose to sacrifice your own health to speed this process with a conversion ratio of 2:1.

I could have laughed, jumped for joy, celebrated in a thousand ways, but as Mia returned from the next platform with several broken skulls in her hands and a bloody tear along her cheek, all I could do was sob fat, heavy tears that dropped down onto my friends’ neck. He had passed out from the upgrade, but I could feel the new connection. I could feel something close to essence, or how my life energy felt in my body, flowing from my hands into Boone, and I knew if I remained like this, he would eventually get better. I could practically feel Kintsuji grinning. Another breaking, another reforging. Making me ever further into her perfect project.

But I didn't care, not right now. Boone was breathing and all was good in the world. I didn't know how we were going to move or continue - but my friend would live. “Arcadia, what's happening? Is Boone going to be alright?” Mia asked, carefully running a hand through a patch of no bloody fur.

“He will, as long as I can keep contact with him. I evolved his ability in a way I think his Mother would approve of. I can heal him as long as we are touching - but it's very slow. So now we’re sort of stuck here. I don't know what to do - I don't know how to move him and still be useful.”

“Wait here, I might have an idea.” Mia said, and I nodded, but it wasn't like I could do anything else - I needed to stay in contact with my friend, and I wouldn't have left him while he was unconscious anyway.

It took a few minutes, but Mia came back carrying a length of crimson fabric that had been roughly torn along the top edge. “How does the Ability work? Do you have to touch him with your hands? Is it a channelled Ability?”

“No…the Ability just says I need to make physical contact with him.”

“Okay, ‘Cadia I have an idea. One of the Champions had a cloak. I'm going to remove your cloak for a minute - hold on.” she did as she said, undoing the clasp and allowing the Hide of the Hunter to fall from my shoulders. Then she carefully slit my shirt all the way up my back, practically cutting it in two.

Next, she laid out the cloak next to Boone and helped me lay him on it. Finally, with a brief moment of non contact in which Boone whined in pain in his sleep, she helped me tie the fox to my bare back, with his body pressed to mine and his lolling head on my shoulder. “Does the Ability still work?” It did - I could feel the strange energy still trickling through me and into him, and I could have cried. Careful not to jostle him while Mia tied the bundle as tightly as she could to my torso - which given her Wood 5 Body Attribute, was very tight - I hugged her and cried into her shoulder. I saved Mia, She saved me. Boone saved both of us. I didn't want the world to work any different than having the three of us backing each other from now until the end of time.

“Always, Anytime, ‘Cadia. Now, let's get that armour back on you and keep going. You try to stay at range, and I'll cut anything that tries to hurt you two into pieces.” The look on her face was something I hadn't seen before - hadn't seen ever. She meant it, with her whole heart. She was nine and she was willing to kill for her family. I felt my heart go slightly cold at what was being done to my sister, as much as it was being done to me. These Abilities were changing us - it's something I had known for a while since being in here. My parents grew to reflect their Abilities. My Mother was fiery and passionate, my Father a taciturn warrior who planned far into the future. My Papa a genius with Runes with endless curiosity. Me? I was a beast under it all - that simmering rage felt so alien yet so familiar; so comfortable. And it was going to turn my sister into a killer.

The revelation was broken when she smiled and rubbed Boones' ears on my shoulder, and she was back to being my big sister again. Together, the pair of us stood, and together we continued on the path of the last Trial, but in the back of my mind I was now thinking: what comes next?