The water of the trial fountain was strange in the way that the water itself did not function like real water. There would be no thirst quenched upon consumption, you didn't need to hold your breath underneath it, and upon stepping out of the fountain, the water would dry itself almost immediately.
It felt like water but it wasn't water— at least not any normal kind of water.
Bo felt a feeling, something he couldn't quite describe, seep into his skin, past his bones and lodged itself in his soul. Books described this feeling as the aura of the fountain, something invisible but still able to be felt.
He closed his eyes and with a single thought, his familiar emblem status appeared in his mind with a new addition.
Badge Weapon
[ Machete ]
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Embers
[ Formless into Form — Access the formless items of living beings and turn them into form. ]
[ Restrictions: Use the souls of beings you've slain to power the ember. ]
[ Soul Power: 106]
Stored Forms
[ Intense Fury: 10g | Iris Faith ]
[ Pain: 32g ]
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[ Equal Growth — You have the ability to grow to the height of any living creature that you can see or that is close by. ]
[ Restriction: You must be able to see the creature or it has to be 100m away from yourself. If you can't see the creature or if it's not in range, you will revert back to your original size. You can't grow any bigger than x5 your height ]
[ Special Challenge Reward: You may choose one of four forms whenever you use this ember. ]
Forms
[ Fire: Your body burns with flames and grants you Increased strength. ]
[ Water: Your body changes to better suit underwater. You gain gills, fins and webbed hands and feet. ]
[ Earth: Your body becomes more dense ]
[ Air: Your body becomes lighter. ]
‘Woah, that's a lot!’ Bo analyzed his emblem status making sure he didn't miss anything, surprised that there was so much. It looked like the special challenge granted some pretty neat rewards, he wondered what Iris and Sera’s looked like.
He stepped out of the fountain and watched Iris and Sera still underneath the water with their eyes closed, probably similarly looking at their own emblem stats. After waiting another minute, they both came out with wide smiles on their faces.
“So what did you all get?” Bo said in a calm tone. It seemed the fountain had some sort of cleansing effect, his mind wasn't as affected by witnessing the dead bodies of the group of four.
They unfortunately didn't have time to worry about them, it was already over, now they needed to focus on their own survival. It was quite a cruel mindset to have but necessary if one wanted to continue adventuring through the Bridge.
“I got a companion creature! I've always wanted one!” Sera beamed and then summoned her new companion. Light particles swirled around the ground in front of Sera before they condensed together and became a large ten foot tall bear. The bear had pink fur and a pair of feathery wings in the same color sprouting from its shoulder blades.
“It's so cute!” Sera ran up to the bear and tried her best to wrap her arms around it in a hug— it was obviously much too large to do that.
“Wow a creature companion!” Bo smiled seeing Sera blissfully embrace the furry beast.
She took a step back and explained. “This is my companion, they're called a Gogol bear. It seems it has abilities related to adaptability.”
She then read out the new addition to her emblem status to them.
[ Gogol Bear — It is a small bear-like creature with colorful pink fur and a friendly face. ]
[ This creature has abilities related to adaptability. It can regulate the temperature of itself and the area around it. It can harden its fur to become as hard as metal. It can create a zone around it where wind can't come through. It can breathe underwater and in high climates. ]
[ Special Reward Challenge: The Gogol bear becomes larger, gains feathery wings, and is able to spew a fire or icy breath. ]
Hearing all the things it could do sounded reassuring. Looks like they wouldn't have to worry about shitty weather as long as Sera was around.
The bear nuzzled Sera back eliciting a giggle out of her, before Sera made Iris and Bo feel how soft the bear's fur was— and it was quite soft.
Then came Iris' turn. “I actually got an artifact that's called the infinite grimoire.”
Support the author by searching for the original publication of this novel.
[ Infinite Book— This book has infinite pages. The book can write anything you say or think about. It can draw whatever you have seen or can picture in your head. You can erase anything you've put down with a thought. You may also search for anything you've written or drawn by asking the book.
[ Special Reward Challenge: The Infinite Book has become the Infinite Grimoire. This grimoire can hover around you. You may turn any potion into a spell which you are able to cast. ]
“This… I got to test it out!” Iris hurriedly summoned her artifact and a thick brown book, easily a foot in length, appeared in her hands. On the cover was Iris’s emblem which Bo hadn’t seen before, it was a golden swirling pattern that headed towards the center.
Iris excitedly opened a page and took the easiest potion to make, the relaxant potion, and then thought about turning it into a spell. The potion is her hand pooffed and disappeared into thin air, and on the page Iris had opened, words and images slowly came into existence.
Once it was on the page, Iris wanted to immediately try using it as a spell. The page then crumbled on itself and turned into a glowing ball that hovered over Iris’s hand. Her eyes looked amazed and she excitedly threw the ball at Bo.
Not expecting it, and not worrying Iris would hurt him, Bo let the ball hit him and immediately felt a relaxing feeling soothe his tired body.
“Did it work!?” Iris questioned with vigor and Bo nodded in return.
“This is amazing!” She hugged her book then asked Bo, “What did you get Bo?”
“Here let me show you.” Bo turned to face Sera’s companion and then activated his new ember making his body immediately grow in height. He grew until he was the same height as the Gogol bear and looked down to see the smaller sized Iris and Sera below him.
“Woah you're so big!” Iris ran over to Bo and felt his leg, seeing his metallic muscles even larger than before.
“There's more. Can you step back? I wanna try something out.” Bo said and Iris followed by taking a few steps back. He turned on his fire form and his body burst into flames that covered his body, they weren't hot to him but seeing Iris take another step back, he could imagine it was hot for others.
Beside the fire, he also felt his own strength magnified. This ember will really come in handy.
He made sure to explain all the details to his comrades after he had shrunk down. Afterwards, they now all knew what each other's new powers were and were even more excited for the future.
Of course seeing people die in front of you made things a little grim, but that wouldn’t dampen their call to adventure, it just now felt a little more real. Especially thinking of all the injuries Iris had taken, hopefully she wasn't permanently scarred after they used a restoration potion on her scars.
That was for the future to decide, first they needed to get out of this cave they found themselves in— and at the end of the cave was a door presumably leading outside. After making their way over to the door, they took one last look behind them before confidently walking straight out of it.
Chaos was what met them right out of the gates.
They spotted Zorn standing around four dead bodies, two of which looked like the group of two who were in the trial with them that they got a brief look at. Beside the dead bodies, ten green eyed crossers stood surrounding Zorn— Rookie Hunters.
“We finally found you murderer!” Mady snarled at him. “We were able to pinpoint exactly who killed are comrades and it was you, you fucking mongrel!”
“Zorn?” Bo said after seeing the situation unfolding around him.
“You know this guy?” Mady snapped at Bo, then recognized them and smiled. “Looks like everyone the boss wants came out at the same time, this makes things easier.”
“Kill him!” She pointed at Zorn. “And take those three as captives!”
The Rookie Hunters obeyed and five of them charged at Bo while the other five, including Mady, went after Zorn.
Looks like they already had a chance to use their new powers.
Sera re-summoned her companion and Bo used his ember to take its size, growing from six feet tall to just over ten feet tall with flames covering his body. They took the vanguard while Iris put her rock blast potions inside her grimoire and turned them into spells which she kept hovering in her hand ready to use when the time was right.
Bo rushed at the group and swung a mighty fist managing to knock one away but the others managed to slip by him and charged the back line. Sera stood watch over Iris and asked the Gogal bear to spew a stream of flaming breath at the group charging them.
Three backed away but one summoned a shield and broke through the flames and swung a sword at Sera who quickly blocked it with her battle ax. Iris then threw out a rock blast spell and battered one of the rookie hunters behind the flames.
Bo turned to help out behind him, but the one he knocked away came flying in from above and kicked him, sending him stumbling. He kept standing and locked eyes with the rookie hunter before the two attacked each other.
The three of them were locked up in battle against the five rookie hunters and they didn't have room to escape. They’d rather try and leave than continue fighting considering the rookie hunters weren’t trying to kill them.
Bo briefly took a look at Zorn and saw him teleporting around the battlefield with his two axes, swinging at the rookie hunters and he had managed to take another out— much to the anger of the rest.
“Everyone to me! Leave those three so we can kill this motherfucker!” Mady yelled out to the rookie hunters battling Bo, Sera and Iris.
The member fighting Bo was distracted for a split second hearing his team leader's call and didn't manage to dodge Bo’s wild swing that nailed him right in the face. The rookie hunter flew through the air and crashed into a tree in the distance, his body going limp.
The rest of the rookie hunters still fighting them disengaged and ran to support Mady but stopped in their tracks seeing their friend limp in the distance.
“What did you do Bo!?” Iris screamed out.
Bo was left stunned. He wasn't trying to kill the rookie hunters, but he wasn't pulling back his swings much considering they were still attempting to capture them. Beside that, his new found ember increased his strength since he was bigger, plus the extra power from the fire form, the power might’ve just killed the rookie hunter.
His body shrunk in response but he was suddenly grabbed and thrown onto a soft back beside Iris. Sera then hopped onto the front of her companion’s back, behind her were both Bo and Iris, before she gave the command to escape.
The rookie hunters ignored Mady’s order and rushed at them again considering they just saw Bo kill their friend. The Gogal bear beated its wings and spewed a breath of fire before it took off running into the forest, not able to fly since there was fog and trees around.
Attacks came their way but they managed to disappear into the forest using the high speed of the bear to outrun the rookie hunters.
‘What did I do?’ Bo’s face was aghast, he had just killed a man. While some would say he had the right to do so considering they were the ones attacking, it still didn't feel great to kill someone for the first time.
Then taking into account the reaction that the rookie hunters had against Zorn who presumably killed some of them, Bo realized he might have just made an enemy for them all.