Ember looked around her. They were surrounded by trees. "When I asked you to find a place for me to train this was your answer?"

"What? Were you expecting some fancy training grounds? You wanted privacy and here you have it," Justine said, pushing further into the forest.

"Are you sure no one is going to interrupt us?" Ember said, looking at Justine doubtfully.

Justine rolled her eyes. "This is the best I can find on short notice. Plus, I'll keep a lookout or you can see if that fancy map of yours can find something better."

"My map doesn't work like that. I have to have already been to the location."

"And I'm saying that doesn't make sense. People buy maps to find where to go, right? So why would your map be able to find everything except for places."

Ember frowned. She had to admit she also found that strange. "Maybe it needs another level."

Justine blinked. "What? Are you saying your map is a growth ability?"

Ember took a deep breath and she nodded.

Justine whistled. "Damn. You certainly hit the jackpot for abilities."

"Yeah." She turned to Justine. She had thought about things a lot last night. She trusted her family but there were limits on what they could do for her, especially since for them they only saw her as a child. She knew Justine also saw her as a child but even so, she didn't try to get in her way. Right now, she needed someone she could trust and who could help her towards her goal. So, she needed to make a leap of faith. Today, she would make a jump.

"There's something I want to talk to you about."

Justine quirked an eyebrow. "Alright."

She held out her hand and small globes of water, earth, air, and fire appeared above her hand.

Justine gawked. "Wait. Wait! Are you telling me you're a mage? You've got all four elements. Wait! You can also use illusions and that magic map of yours. That's six abilities."

"I can do more than that," Ember said.

"More?" Justine asked like she couldn't comprehend what Ember was saying.

Ember shifted into stealth and right back out.

Justine frowned and then nodded. "Seven then."

"For now."

"For now? What does that even mean?" Justine's face stiffened. "Are you a noble? A secret princess in hiding?"

Ember blinked and then laughed. "No."

She could understand why Justine had come to that conclusion. Only high-ranked nobles and royalty were known for having so many abilities.

"Then I don't get it," Justine said. "How could you have so many abilities?"

"I would like to tell you but you know doing so is pretty dangerous for me," Ember said and met Justine's eyes. "I've decided to trust you but I'm not going to tell you all my secrets, at least, not right away."

Some of the surprise on Justine's face lessened and her voice grew serious. "I get it. You should keep this a secret as long as you can. A commoner with so many abilities and not tied to a noble will cause trouble. And you should definitely try to keep your stealth ability a secret."

"Because of the Rakel," Ember said.

"I forgot you knew about them but yes, them. Unless you want to work for them." Justine's lips tightened. "They'll do their best to have you join them and their methods are brutal."

"I'll be registering soon," Ember said.

Justine looked at her in horror.

Ember shook her head. "Don't worry. They'll only be able to see one of my abilities when I register."

Justine frowned. "How? Nevermind." She shook her head. "That's probably for the best."

"Actually, I have plans in regards to that. I plan to get a sponsorship and state I have the mapping, Illusion, and fire abilities. I'll notify them that my curse keeps the two abilities hidden."

Justine nodded her head but frowned. "It makes sense if you can pull it off but why bother?"

"I'll need it for more freedom."

"Being tied to a noble sounds like the opposite of freedom," Justine pointed out.

"It'll be a temporary arrangement and it'll let me get into places I can't get into as a commoner."

Justine nodded but there was a glint in her eyes. "And you're telling me this, why?"

"I need someone I can trust and who could do things for me when I need them to," Ember said.

"And you picked me."

Ember nodded.

Justine frowned. "Are you thinking this is the path the Akashic Tree was talking about when it gave me my quest?"

Ember shrugged. "I don't know. I haven't gotten a message one way or the other. I just know you're trustworthy and skilled, so I want you on my side."

Justine hesitated. "That's a lot. Things with me aren't exactly as straightforward as you think."

"You mean the Rakels?"

You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author.

Justine stiffened and whipped around to face her.

"What?" Ember said, raising her hands defensively. "You just talked about how they are after anyone with stealth skills by any means necessary. I'm pretty sure you're not an exception."

Justine relaxed a little and nodded. "Right. And you don't exactly have the firepower to go against them."

"Not yet but I will," Ember said firmly.

Justine looked at her in disbelief and then laughed. "You definitely have some guts." Justine ran a hand through her hair. "I'll think about it."

Ember nodded. That was good enough for her. She was hoping Justine would stick with her but she knew being tied to the nobility would be a big concern for her. Ember wanted to promise to protect her but right now she could barely protect herself. She needed to get stronger, which brought her to her current situation.

She needed to unlock her abilities and improve the ones she already had. She had been thinking about the abilities that were still locked. Most of them were tied to the body aspect so they would be unlocked in due time as she strengthened herself. Which meant it was better for her to focus on the abilities tied to the soul and mind. She knew mind abilities worked better as the brain developed but wasn't youth the best time to absorb knowledge? That meant that her mind abilities might not be as hard to unlock as she first thought. And if she could unlock a mind ability maybe she could also unlock the knowledge section of Keeper's Hold.

For now, she called up Keeper and went down the list of abilities she had. Her gaze landed on the two Shade abilities she had besides Soul Torture - Decay and Dominion. She had gotten the two abilities from two Shade-corrupted people. So, if she released them, they wouldn't return since the Shade hadn't tainted those two yet. The corruption she gained from those abilities was not as strong as Soul Torture so she was reluctant to give them up. They were undeniably strong abilities but perhaps it would be better for her to find abilities that were similar or just as strong. She couldn't keep holding on to something that was corrupting her especially since she had to depend on someone doing Cleanse on her.

Her gaze flickered away from the abilities and moved to the one she wanted to focus on unlocking - barrier. Most of her abilities so far were either offensive or utility. She was in desperate need of a defensive ability since the ones she normally would use were physical abilities. In her past life, she mostly used barriers to protect her people since her physical abilities and resistances were enough for her to handle most things people threw at her. Now she would need barriers for herself as much as for her companions.

But how would she unlock it? She looked at the entry for it.

----

Barrier

The ability to produce a field of magic to prevent entry of objects. The barrier can also absorb or reflect damage.

Status: Permanent

Capacity: 100%

Requirements: Soul and Mind. Mind requirements not met.

Access: 1%

---

Ember blinked. Access was at one percent. She looked back at the list and saw that Barrier was grayed out like the other abilities she couldn't use despite it saying that she had one percent of access. Did that mean some of her abilities she actually had access to, just not enough to fully unlock it?

This time she went through each ability and was surprised to discover that several of her abilities had an access level of one to two percent. Though a lot more were still at zero. What really grabbed her attention was that one of her abilities was at 49%.

---

Merge Ability

The ability to merge multiple abilities into a new one.

Status: Permanent

Capacity: 100%

Requirements: Soul and Mind. Requirements not met.

Access: 49%

---

Merge ability wasn't an ability she had used a lot in her past life. It was an incredibly useful ability but using it meant that whatever abilities she merged she would lose and she couldn't be sure that the ability she gained would be worth it. She had used it multiple times with lackluster results. This would have been enough for her to toss it but one time she had used it to combine eagle eye, heat perception, and wolf ears and gained keen senses. Keen Senses had sharpened every sense she had making it far superior to the abilities she had given up and on top of that it took up only one slot. That meant she kept Merge Ability around on the off chance she could make something really good.

She looked once again at the ability requirements and then frowned. It didn't say mind requirements hadn't been met like Barrier, just that the requirements had not been met. What was the requirement she was missing to use it? A thought came to mind. Perhaps she just needed to try merging abilities? She looked at her list.

Would that work if she didn't have the ability unlocked? She looked at the abilities and right away she had an idea of some she could try it on. There were several resistances she had though only two were unlocked. If she could merge them into one it would save her some slots. Still, it was chancy to do it when they were locked and she didn't want to lose her resistances.

I can just do it with Mind and Soul Resistance.

The thought of losing those two resistances made her pause. Mind resistance she should be able to find again but soul resistance was rare. She had gained it in the war with Farru. It had been a fortuitous meeting with a necromancer who had the ability. Of course, she had her map to find someone who had the ability, but being able to get to them to steal it in her current state would be nearly impossible.

She looked at the two abilities. "I'll wait," she said and closed out keeper.

Still, the thought of merging brought her back to Knight Garrick and his lightning. He had said combining water, air, and fire had helped him make lightning. So, it hadn't been a completely different skill but one he had made on his own. Ember had known a person could combine skills hence why she had gained merge ability, but from the way Knight Garrick spoke it seemed that merge ability was not needed to make a new skill.

She frowned. She vaguely recalled Viera and Tafria mentioning it but neither one had been capable of it since their talents lay elsewhere. Ember's frown deepened. It was another gap in her knowledge. In her tyrant life, she spent most of her time collecting abilities and learning to use them. She tried learning magic when she could, but her attention had been split between gaining abilities, learning to use Mally, and fighting. Though she had grown strong there was only so much time she could spend on education when she was busy running Thralen and the Scarlet Fist. Of course, that didn't stop her from collecting books to put into her knowledge section that she promised to read later and never did.

I really need to fix that. But first, let's experiment.

She called up a ball of water, air, and fire and then tried squishing them together. In return, water splashed on her face and singed her fingers. Annoying but she didn't expect to produce lightning on the first try. So, she tried again and again. Each time she was met with failure.

"What are you doing?" Justine asked at one point.

"I'm trying to make lightning," Ember stated, her brow furrowed in concentration as she held up a sphere of water and then slowly slid the flame inside, which immediately doused the flames. "Do I need a different ratio?"

"You're an odd one. I never seen any lightning mage do it that way."

Ember rolled her eyes. "Knight Garrick is a lightning mage. He said you have to combine..."

She paused as a thought occurred to her. Knight Garrick had said that to make lightning the person had to combine water, fire, and air but when he had shown it to her she hadn't seen him combine the three. He had been fast but she didn't think it was a matter of speed. The combining had to have happened before the elements were called.

Did that mean he was combining them within himself? She had never even considered the possibility of doing such a thing before. How did a person combine elements within themselves before releasing them?

Right away, she knew she was missing an important step. She considered her options. She could try figuring it out for herself. She liked the idea but if she was using the abilities within herself it could be dangerous. Maybe if she had her barrier ability, she could negate the risk. The next option was to ask Knight Garrick. He was friendly enough and she didn't think the question would draw too much attention to herself. More importantly, it would be the fastest route.

The thought of gaining lightning without having to use a slot really pushed the issue. She would ask Knight Garrick and if that didn't work, she would put it on hold until she had managed to unlock her barrier ability.

Satisfied, Ember moved on to trying to unlock her barrier. "Justine, do you mind throwing some rocks at me?"