Mosh jumped, dodging the latest rock to arrive, and pushed at his mind core, feeling the Psi energy leaving it, but dissipating as it moved away from his body. He needed to get closer, but the feral creatures backed up as he approached. He worried about approaching too close, afraid they would run away if he got too close, and they knew the forest far better than he! He ducked behind a tree, taking a breather, remaining alert for any rocks that may come, but using the cover to try and push his mind energy out. Rocks continued to hit the tree behind which he hid, but the frequency made him think it was just one of them, the other was trying to circle around him. Maybe he could use his Psi energy differently, see if he could use it to find the other mind, rather than just attack with it. He remembered a skill many of the hunters used,
He concentrated, pushing Psi out, quick, powerful bursts rather than the more extended thrush he had tried before. He felt them go out, then fade, but they had travelled further than the longer thrusts. He concentrated on that, making the thrusts shorter, but more powerful. He felt his Psi energy depleting and thought he was achieving something, but was forced to jump back and roll, his body landing on top of a bush, branches digging into his armour, but thankfully not penetrating, as a rock came from the side. He came to his feet, just in time to avoid a rock arriving from the front. He backed off, trying to find cover that would protect him from both sides.
He found it, placing himself between three trees, but his position was far from acceptable. The two ferals could maneuver around him and he would find himself pincered again. They may not be sapient, but they at least seemed to have enough intelligence to plan and use rocks as tools. He needed a breakthrough!
Desperation drove him, he pushed, using every bit of psi energy he had. If he succeeded, he would most likely not be able to use the skill in this battle, but he needed something, anything, to try and see where they were, even if momentarily.
His energy sight skill showed him the small pulse leave, traveling out in an arc in front of him, not all the way round him, his expectation of not being able to see behind him getting in the way of his visualizing a three-hundred-and-sixty-degree pulse. He saw it go out, a wave in front and to the sides. Enough that he could feel multiple tiny little return pulses, as well as two larger ones.
The candidate is being offered the Psi enhancement of
Mosh rejoiced, he finally had a Psi enhancement and would hopefully be able to begin gaining Mind points to advance it. Assuming the two larger return pulses indicated the two ferals, considering they showed an intellect, and thus Mind, greater than the other creatures he had found, he also had a far better idea of where they were. He imbued mana into his feet, activating his
Mosh moved, and he caught a hint of movement to the side. He stopped, trying this hardest to blend into the shadows, and was startled when a system prompt flashed.
Mana stealth skill evolution offered to Mana Camouflage. Tier will advance to 2, Level will be set to 0, Mana consumption will be raised to medium, continuous. Mana consumption will be lowered if further mana channels are opened. Does candidate wish to accept the skill evolution?
Mosh gave his acceptance of the skill evolution and felt the itching of mana as it changed how it clung to him. It moved away from just his feet, to cover the rest of his body. He felt the mana channels in his legs straining to pump the mana around his body and understood why the consumption would be lowered as he opened more channels. More paths directly to where it needed to go, less obstructions and pressure needed. He glanced down to his arm, marveling as it faded into the same colours as the plants around him, but changing slowly. If he really wanted to remain unseen, he would need to move very slowly, but he could not maintain this level of mana expenditure for long and would need to take some chances with how fast he moved and how quickly his camouflage would adjust to his surroundings. He started moving again, towards where he had seen the movement.
Mosh saw the feral, peering into the brush, agitatedly moving its head, its arms swinging back and forth, clearly irritated at having lost sight of him. He stalked closer, his steps muffled by his skill, his body hidden by the shadows and his camouflage. He as about to burst out, move to strike it, when it turned and faced him, snarling and quickly withdrawing a short sword. It charged at Mosh, who set his spear, preparing for its arrival. But the feral knew better that to just charge into a set spear, and stepped to the side as it advanced, forcing Mosh to bring his spear back, using it to parry away the blade that was aimed at his chest.
The two circled each other, and then Mosh’s senses detected a stone coming for him, he dodged it and found the feral’s claws before him. He tried another dodge, but the feral was too close and though the claws missed eviscerating him as the feral had intended, they scored lines across his arms, his armour blocking much of it, but they cut through leaving gashes that bled.
Mosh dropped his spear, not having enough room to attack with it in close quarters, and struck out, pushing his fingers forward even as his claws came out. The move took the feral by surprise, it had not expected claws, and it failed to move fast enough to avoid the blow, and the claws sank into its chest, cutting deep gorges but failing to penetrate beyond its sternum. It gave a shrill cry, stepping back, tyring to escape. Mosh did not relent, he pushed forward, slashing out with his claws, feeling then slice across its faces, and he felt a stream of blood flowing onto him, pumped out from the cut he had made. The feral continued to try and flee, its cries shriller and more panicked, but Mosh pushed on, his fingers striking again, this time the claws stabbing into its throat, almost severing its neck, and it went down in another spray of blood.
Mosh rejoiced, his foe was down! Then realised his error as he felt the approach of another rock but had no time to avoid it. He twisted his head just enough that it impacted on his cheek instead of his eye or the side of his head, and he heard the crunch of bone as pain blossomed and he the world went black as he involuntarily closed his eyes, a reflex that Shiel had tried to train out of him by making him stand still and try not to flinch as she hit him. He had never really succeeded, but as momentarily lost sight of what was happening as he flinched, when he shouldn’t have, he had a far better understanding of the exercise, and he berated himself for not taking it more seriously.
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His sight returned, merely a blink, but it was just in time for him to jerk his head back and prevent another rock from crashing into his face. He sprang forward, darting towards the female feral that was throwing the rocks, feeling skin flap on his face and blood flow. He ignored it, his adrenaline flowing, and felt the blood beginning to harden to hold the skin down as his Blood Bonding healing skill activated. It did nothing for pain, and it was pure adrenaline that allowed him to ignore that!
He continued to charge forward, and the feral got a look of shock as he continued to advance. She turned to run, but it was too late. With his mouth open, a snarl that resembled any angered predator, emanating from it, he pounced forward, his hands coming down in a double swipe, one catching her across her face, cutting deeply into her cheek, cutting across to remove her nose and slice into her eye, causing it to burst and leak its fluids across her face. The other slashed across her bare body, cutting into her stomach, hooking into intestines as he dragged them across, pulling them out as the claws got caught in them.
The feral went down, a look of absolute shock on her face, the pain driving her into unconsciousness. Mosh sank to his knees, pain assailing him as the adrenaline faded. He wanted to cry out, to scream his pain into the sky, but knew that would be foolish, would bring unwanted attention and maybe more foes when he was in no condition to face more.
Govlin prai killed. Body enhancement points earned: 3. Body enhancement points needed to next Tier 12/1000.Mana enhancement points earned: 3 Mana enhancement points needed for next Tier 8/1500. Mind Enhancement points earned. Mind enhancement points needed for next Tier: 3/1000 Evolutionary essence gained: 3, Evolutionary Essence to next Tier 12/100. Evolutionary Potential points gained 3, Evolutionary Potential Points to next tier 12/6600. Evolutions offered: Hardened skin, climbing spurs, Low light vision
Govlin prai killed. Body enhancement points earned: 3. Body enhancement points needed to next Tier 15/1000.Mana enhancement points earned: 3 Mana enhancement points needed for next Tier 11/1500. Mind Enhancement points earned. Mind enhancement points needed for next Tier: 6/1000 Evolutionary essence gained: 3, Evolutionary Essence to next Tier 12/100. Evolutionary Potential points gained 3, Evolutionary Potential Points to next tier 12/6600. Evolutions offered: Hardened skin, climbing spurs, Low light vision
‘Kid, pay attention. Pain is there to warn you, a positive when you might be unaware of an attack, but you need to learn to ignore it when it is just a distraction. Concentrate, ignore the pain, try to absorb from this creature. If you do it right, you should be able to direct some of the body you absorb into healing.’
Mosh heard Midkar speaking and tried to concentrate through the pain. He had never heard of healing through absorption, but then, he had never heard of absorption. He wondered why Shiel had said nothing but that was a question for another time. He placed his hands on the carcass, trying to find its energy, any of its centers.
‘Brat! Concentrate, you are too unfocussed. You need healing. Forget about which energy center you want to find, concentrate on where the Body core should be, just below the sternum. You can worry about other energy types when you are in better condition.’ Midkar’s voice was loud in his mind, clearly shouting, trying to get his attention through the pain.
Mosh understood him, even if he found concentrating hard. He concentrated his energy sight onto her midsection, the embarrassment of looking at what was clearly a naked female torso hitting him now that the distraction of the fight was over. He tried to avoid the fact that it was a naked female body beneath his hands, and the fact that his hands were IN her torso, in the large gap he had sliced into her. Instead, he concentrated on trying to find the energy center he wanted to siphon. He tried to center himself, to enter meditation, but his concentration kept getting broken as pain stabbed through him from his cheek. He tried to ignore it, but his Blood Bonding skill sent waves of pain through at set intervales as the blood hardened and pulled on the skin, trying to bring it back into alignment. He wanted to take it, press it down, but touching it almost made him pass out again. He kept on trying, both to find the energy center and to find his meditative state to let him concentrate better.
Time passed, and the spikes of pain kept on coming, his concentration kept on being disrupted, yet somehow, he eventually found what he was looking, He fund a knot of energy, muddy brown energy that seemed to be coagulating as he watched it through energy sight.
‘Well done kid, you found it! Now you need to try and absorb it before it solidifies. Once it has, you will have no chance to absorb it. Absorbing solidified energy is for Masters of the Absorption, you can forget about it now. Or maybe forever, depending on how capable your species is. Not all can do what the Kin are capable of!’
Mosh tried to ignore the blatant narcissism of Midkar and his seeing of his species as superior to all others. He would advance to the point of absorbing solidified cores in time, and beyond it, even if just to rub it in Midkar’s face that he was not as pathetic as he wanted to imply. He remembered what Midkar had said, that absorption was the reverse of cultivation. He only had the Soul cultivation method, but hopefully he could use the knowledge of that to reverse engineer the process and absorb the energy from the dead feral.
He concentrated, pulling at the energy center, trying to grab hold of its energy, and direct it towards himself. It was dense, losing viscosity as time passed, and he felt it sluggish to respond. He hoped that in the future it would be easier to do it if he tried the absorption sooner after the beast was dead.
He struggled with the energy, feeling the strand slowly coming out, its denseness fighting the connection, the energy slow to flow down the newly created path. But he succeeded, the energy reached his hands, reached the open body channels there, and was sucked in, flowing into his channels, becoming revitalised, spreading up and reaching his Body core.
Absorption skill learned. Tier 0 Level 1. All core energy types may be absorbed.
Mosh felt the energy flowing from the carcass into him, the energy racing down his channels and into his core.
The candidate has physical damage that needs to be healed. Utilise new body energy for healing or to advance Body Tier?
Mosh sent a relieved command to use it for healing, feeling the energy within the feral no longer entering into him, the remaining energy too solidified to move with his nascent skill. He could feel the energy flow through him, some to his arm, a sliver of it, enough to seal and complete the basic healing from Blood Bond. The majority flowed to his face, and he felt the energy flow into the cut, and then a wave of pain hit him. He could feel the two sides of his cheek flowing to each other, pulled closed by the energy, the crude bridge of solidified blood that his healing skill had made a start, but also a cause of even more pain as the solidified blood was absorbed back in, shards of the crystalised blood biting into the open nerves. He managed to not cry out, to keep his eyes open, but he felt pain the like of which he had never felt before. It did not last long, and he felt a huge relief when the pain subsided, though a phantom of it remained as a horrific memory. He ran his fingers along his face, feeling a large, and raw, scar there, one he would surely bear for the rest of his life.