Before I surfaced from my ill-fated jump into Mirror Pond, I took a quick turnaround to the rocks just under the bank. There were lots of jagged crannies here, some filled with moss and trailing algae, others hiding shells. I shoved my paw into the only one it could fit inside and managed to scrape out some sort of clam. Or was it just a rock? My Inventory would hold the answer.
Nasty Rock An ordinary riverbed rock. Slightly resembles a clam, but most people readily know the difference.
Thanks. Yeah. I appreciate it.
With a gasp, I flung both the rock and my head out of the water. Then I swiveled my head around, submarine-wise. Mostly I saw animals, but there to my left, fresh and several times the height of the average animal, was Bayce. I guessed her parasol had turned into that fishing pole she was currently kneeling next to. Bet she thought she was so cool with that transforming pole-umbrella thing…
Not far behind her, I saw something bizarre. Reed was dancing quietly and energetically. Her arms pumped, sending pompom blurs everywhere. Only I was watching her. Thirty seconds ago she was being watched by no one.
I paddled to the shore, relieved that Bayce evidently hadn’t caught me in the act of immediate failure. She was still staring into the water’s surface, and I wondered how much she could actually see. I mean, she didn’t even have on her glasses. Then I decided I’d swing around and get further out. That way, not only could I hide in the trees—to preserve my secrets and not to hide my shame, you understand—I could also surprise a fresher batch of fish, one that I hadn’t totally failed on.
So I walked into the shade, waggled myself a little drier, and prepared my paws. Then—a shadow, darting through the water! Go for it! I shouted to myself.
Splish!
I caught the fish.
Were its scales silver? I had no idea for the first few seconds, since it was wriggling with all its might. It was thick, even muscular, flinging not only water but also stringy algae with every twist of its head and backfin. Saltwater stung my eyes, so I squeezed them shut as I grabbed hard, roar-meowed, and jabbed through the scales with my claws.
Then the fish slowed down. It was just another koi. I say “just,” but the creature was beautiful, with a pattern of orange and gold that reminded me of autumn leaves.
EXP: 62% (1207/1950)
Hey! That Experience yield wasn’t bad for a creature I could defeat without having to use Skills. It had been worth the struggle and the resulting fatigue.
Poof. Into Inventory the fish’s body went, but not without a decent fight.
Watching and pouncing! That was the way to go. Pretty soon I had a rhythm going. Wait, watch, strike. Usually I used my paws alone, but sometimes the fish was bigger and I knew I’d have to add a Swipe to reinforce my attack. Slash remained in my arsenal, pristine and unused. I started feeling superstitious about it. What if that “high chance for critical” mangled the meat? I didn’t wanna risk that, especially when I knew I didn’t have to—the fish here were pretty easy pickings.
Not all the fish were koi. I got plenty of those coveted silver-scaled fish, too. Catfish streaked gray and purple, and tiny sardiney-looking things that must’ve been the same species that’d flown into my mouth earlier…
It was thrilling! Even if the fish weren’t individually strong, it was a workout all the same. And it took more dexterity and movement than you might imagine. Grab the fish wrong and it effortlessly swims free…grab it just right and it can still slip past or jump. And when it somersaults so hard it backslaps you in the jaw, that’s a pretty sad place to be in.
Quite a while passed before I finally took a deep breath and backed away from my perch. My mind and body told me wordlessly that it was time for a break. (Was that part of Wisdom?)
If anyone had asked how I was doing, and if I could’ve said much more than “meow,” I would’ve said “fine.” Yet my chest was heaving, my blood felt hot, and a lingering salt-sting pulsed at the corners of my eyes.
I examined myself physically and Stat-ally:
EXP: 42% (877/2100)
SP 74% (200/270)
Inventory: 5/5
Chora’s Crystal Ring
Debug Blade
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Koi Corpse x5
Nourishing, but won’t heal HP or SP.
Metefry Corpse x9
Nourishing, but won’t heal HP or SP.
Catfish Corpse x8
Nourishing, but won’t heal HP or SP.
Meanwhile, I also had four tiny metefry on the ground by my feet. Still, at least I had just a bit more Inventory space because I’d stashed Heidschi’s letter underneath the rug back at the cabin. Not that that was the best place for it, but, y’know, it was a place.
So that was thirteen metefry, plus five, plus eight. Was that a lot? I had no clue. It felt like a lot.
Especially because I’d just fished right through a Level-Up.
ATK 52
INT 35
DEF 37
WIS 26
SPD 46
Though I kicked myself for not knowing exactly which Stats had gone up in the transition, somehow I thought Wisdom had inched up just a bit extra. If so, good—that was always the one I was most eager to train. Even a Swipe took a lot out of me, and the more my SP could inch just ahead of my Skill needs, the better.
Anyway, yeah. The number of fish was big too. It had to be more than a human could get by fishing with a pole. A net, that’s one thing, but a single line with a single hook and bait? That’s pitiful!
A single line with a single magic spell at the end of it, though…
Oh…ohhh…if Bayce was doing that, suddenly I wasn’t sure if I’d forgive her for it.
I mean, you know me. You know I didn’t even use Skills today…well, not too often. But imagine if that witch lady had charmed her bait, or something, and was enjoying a huge advantage already! Unfair, right?!
Whatever. I’d do my thing and she’d do hers. Then Reed would be the supremely partial-to-both-of-us judge. The best thing I could do was tend to my own business and keep on keeping on.
Aw, no. Now the thought was in my mind and it couldn’t get it out.
I had to see what Bayce was doing.
But this problem (that I’d made up entirely on my own) naturally led to another: How the heck was I supposed to do that?
Uhhhh. First I got a little closer on land. I slinked along the coast, keeping close to the trees. Reed stopped dancing and watched my every step, shadowed though I was. Bayce kept her eyes to the water, seemingly meditative.
As I walked up to the coastline again, I was almost at Reed’s feet. It couldn’t really be avoided, since I wanted to get as close as I could without tipping Bayce off, and Bayce’s attention was probably the only attention that really mattered, contest-wise.
Reed squinted her eyes and quirked her mouth at me, as if to say, “Are you sure about this?” And I gave her a half nod and some lowered eyelids.
Then I spat up the four metefry I couldn’t hold in my Inventory. Those could wait by her feet for now.
I could only imagine the confusion on Reed’s face as I walked on without even pausing.
Then I—deep breath—was facing the water. It was never easy to cannonball in, yet that was what I did every single time. Walking in, though…that sounded nicer in theory, but it meant a whole different kind of unpleasantness. Fast torture versus slow torture.
Putting one foot in front of the other…one leg, one soggy soggy leg, followed by the rest of my poor cold body…I entered. Walking into the pond made it so much harder to work up the courage to open my eyes. Now I felt the salt in full, and the temperature change on my face was even making me nauseous. (Or maybe that was just breakfast catching up with me.)
Brr…urgh…okay. I was in. It curdled my insides, but I had made it.
And there was no time to waste! Cats could only hold so much breath, after all. While I couldn’t see anything in the immediate area besides normal, sandy water-fog, I knew that Bayce’s strategy was probably at work several meters away. Technically, it could be at work anywhere from a meter to a mile further out.
So I set my feet firmly on the underwater surface, to start. Then I backed my back legs up against the most wall-like part of it.
Like a pro swimmer, I folded my legs, folded my whole body up against that wall, and…
Leap!
White light, furious bubbles and an explosive, conspicuous splash Mach-boomed behind me as I streamed through the water.
Amazing! I’d never dreamed of going this fast in a pond—and rather than running at top speed, it felt more like flying, and this was as much like a meteor as I was likely to be in my life. The white magical flares sparking off of me weren’t dulled at all by the water, and that only increased my wanderlust.
My body wasn’t complaining about the damp anymore, but my lungs were, and my throat contracted as tightly as a fist. Didn’t need Wisdom to know that I needed more air.
You’ll live for a few moments longer, Taipha, I told myself. Harder things had been done in the name of survival for millennia! (It’s not like saying that ever helps, yet animals do it subconsciously anyway.)
When the Leap wore off and I touched pond bottom again in a sandy cloud, I saw a dim, ropey, very suspicious shape half a Leap ahead of me. It curved like a fishing line might. Hmm, wonder what that could imply…
In order to get close enough to make out what that silhouette really was, though, I’d either need to sprint my heart out or use another half a Leap. Nobody is running underwater, not even magically, and I had no clue if a half Leap was even possible.
Circumstances left me no choice!!
Half Leap!
Uh, nothing happened that time so Leap! (With-a-great-effort-to-do-it-only-halfway!)
My powers weren’t a faucet—I couldn’t just let a decimal point’s worth trickle out. Nor could I figure out how to diffuse the extra energy. The answer wasn’t “underwater on a second’s worth of breath,” anyway. After the big spring and burst of pure power, I let my hind legs go slack, hoping that would be enough to slow me down. It wasn’t.
Next idea was to aim myself downward. Nope. Too little too late.
I barreled into Bayce’s line, bouncing off with a hard impact.
Actually, I’d hit a fish. No, a cluster of them. Fish after fish was on Bayce’s line—no wonder it’d looked like a string heavy with weirdly shaped banners at a distance.
Other than shifting upon impact after a resounding watery thud, the fish had no reaction to me at all. Just like Bayce up above, they seemed to be in a trance.
Bayce, you little stinker.