Chapter 96

Lykan

The Other Room

  Lykan stood at what he thought was a near dead end. His new Mental Mapping skill screamed at him that what lay beyond this room, was vast. The only problem was the only connection was a passageway that he had to swim through. He knew the water was harmless, at least mostly harmless. The water was infused with Qi, which caused his body to vibrate and tingle his insides still felt like a mini fire had been burnt where the water he drank had traveled. Even now he could feel the burning sensation slowly dissipating as the tingling pain spread throughout his body. During this time the only thing he could think was, that he wanted more.

  He wanted to stop himself, as he knew Power was just the very topic, he had been scolding himself on. Not just any Power, but Personal Power. The water before him seemed to be an apt metaphor for his life. If he stayed here in the shallow end, he would have powerful Koi fish to interact with, and enough Qi infused water to build up slowly. Yet something deep within his bones told him that he wanted, no, that he needed to go beyond the confines of this room. The room he was in was not small by any imagination. The Koi pond gradually got bigger the closer to the wall he got, until finally it was a good three meters or more of clearance that allowed for clear passage through the mostly clear water into the next room that spoke of vibrantly colored reefs.

  Lykan himself had no clue how such a place existed. He had seen an aquarium that was much smaller than this at the royal Academy in Sidhertha. There at that academy several classes all tended to the different components of the aquarium. The earth mages reinforced the ground to ensure no water spilled or seeped out. The water specialists helped ensure the right concentrations of nutrients were always in the water. Then the nature wielders used their expertise to clear out the dirt and algae from the aquarium at regular intervals. In all the academy was able to host a lake on the back half of the campus that had several exotic and rare creatures that were flown in from all over the world. Thinking back, he saw nothing in that lake that resembled the wonders that he was now seeing.

  The first thing he realized was that everything here had an ultraviolet glow to them. A glow that seemed to be accentuated by the ambient Qi that was both around the creatures and their surroundings. This flow of Qi caused all the creatures present to have a deep purple glow, that caused lights and textures to appear that seemed alien to what he was used to.

  In all he sat there watching the koi fish swim about their structure that had gone on surprisingly well for a long period of time.

  As he watched, he would notice patterns. The most interesting was the way the fish would occasionally go up to the surface and seem to bite down on a spec of bright dirt that fell. After the first time of noticing, Lykan realized the dirt was solidified Qi that had fallen from the ceiling. Then with amazement, Lykan looked up to see glyphs carved into the ceiling that seemed to attract ambient Qi particles to it. Then after some time the Qi particles would gather, get too heavy then fall as one clump to the surface of the water. The water rippling would attract the various fish, who would drop whatever they were doing and go to eat the Qi flakes. It was an odd process, but suddenly Lykan realized there was more to this ecosystem than could be explained easily.

  First this pond wasn’t natural but had somehow been created. If it was created, then by whom? The most obvious answer would be the Titans, but then that brought a whole slew of other questions. First, why? Also, where did they get these different species of plants that grew with the different fish. It was an amazing feat of engineering to be able to create such a structure. Lykan looked to see if there were any signs of tools that had been used to create this structure but found none. It was as if the Titans had carved this very underground lake, and it was a lake, out of nothing.

  While the portion he was currently at was a mere pond, the part that lay beyond seemed vast, far larger than any mere pond could be. Lykan wasn’t quite certain as to the exact measurement of water needed to be considered a lake rather than a pond, but he felt this next room was close to that size. Worse, Lykan wanted to see desperately what lay beyond. He had an instinctive urge to set foot and glance at least once, the beauty of what lay beyond.

  Times like this Lykan realized why he had been chosen to be a Wanderer; he couldn’t sit still, not when the thrill of discovery lay before him. Not when he was so close to learning something new. He watched, and then realized he had no choice but to go. The only problem was, he didn’t want to proceed without a plan. He knew he would likely not be able to come back to this room once he got back. He wasn’t quite certain why, but it was a feeling he had in his gut.

  He also knew that the food he had would go bad when interacting with the water. It was dried field rations, which would balloon up when interacting with the water. He also had no waterproof bag with him, so storing his food was a loss. He could leave the food here, but then thought better of it. There was only a portion and a half of dried bread left anyways. He decided to see one thing.

  Taking the bread from his pocket he broke off a piece and then threw it to the center of the koi fish. Instantly the largest koi fish ran up to the surface and plucked the morsel from the surface, before swallowing the piece greedily. Lykan watched the fish for a moment, seeing if anything would happen to the fish from eating food that was not of its native environment.

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  After a few minutes the fish swam around and rejoined the other fish. Seeing this, Lykan nodded to himself before coming up with a plan of his own. Since his plan was to try to go under the wall and into the other room, he wanted to first see how his body reacted to the water. He waded into the water, going until he was knee deep in the water. Feeling only the slight tingling sensation of Qi infused water brushing against his body Lykan nodded to himself before wading slightly deeper. He moved until he was waist deep and then waited for a second. Then he put his plan into action.

  He began throwing chunks of bread out in front of him. The bread being bread floated at the surface of the water, much as Lykan had hoped it would. The school of koi fish that had been busily trying to avoid Lykan at all costs suddenly were interested. At least they seemed to be interested in the food he was offering.

  Lykan for his part kept his lower body solid, not wanting to draw away attention from the food morsels that he was tearing off and laying about around him. A few were tossed farther away from his body. He used an entire portion on slowly luring the school of koi fish to his current location. The fish were hesitant at first, but then one brave soul got close and grabbed a morsel. Then another quickly followed suit. Slowly more and more went for the furthest pieces until they were within three meters or so.

  Pausing with how to proceed, Lykan waited. Finally, the fish became more brazen with their approach. Going for the pieces that were within arm’s reach of Lykan. These pieces were quickly grabbed before the recipient darted away quickly.

  Steeling himself and his resolve for what he must do, he dropped the entire half portion into the water right in front of him. It was big, too big for the koi to swallow in one bite. The best the koi could do was nibble off pieces. Once the piece remained floating near Lykan’s stomach, Lykan raised up his arms and waited.

  By this time the fish had gone and devoured the free-floating portions of the ration that had floated out from his antics. Until finally it was just the large piece and Lykan that sat in their way of a large meal.

  The fish grew nearby. Lykan could feel a few of the more adventurous fish swimming about his legs, but he paid them no mind. He was after one fish, the large fish that had been the first to eat the falling morsels. The fish that had been the most daring of the group to try new things. That was also the largest of the fish, the one that looked like it would be a bite or two, if he prepared the fish correctly.

  He waited, smaller fish went up and grabbed the morsel from underneath tearing a part of the bread away before fleeing. Seeing the quickest of the fish grab a bite, others came. Most swam under and up, striking the bread from below. This was good, trying to capture those would prove to be problematic as that would be a lot more water to move through. Lykan closed his eyes, not wanting to lose a catch due to optics. Instead, he used his Qi sense to detect the different fish that were swimming around.

  Finally, one of the fish swam under the bread and tried to pull the whole thing away. Lykan momentarily panicked before realizing a second fish had the same reaction, though they wanted to pull the bread a different direction. Realizing his chance Lykan struck with speed and ferocity that he didn’t know he had. Qi infused his arms automatically as he grabbed the fish and pierced them with his fingers. He could tell the strike caused pain to the fish as he felt both begin to wriggle in pain as blood came from the spots where his fingertips landed. Then with deft movements he pulled the fish from the water where they squirmed and wiggled violently, trying to save their lives. The only problem, they were already dead. While they might be able to get away, they would die from the wounds they suffered from the strikes.

  Looking at the bodies of the Qi infused fish, Lykan could see that they had internal injuries that were more severe than what appeared on the bodies. Even though the bodies were slowly bleeding a glowing deep crimson, the internal injuries were far worse. Realizing he had got what he came for, Lykan made his way to the shore, trophies in hand.

  He left the remainder of the bread to the fish. While he didn’t get the large fish, he had his eyes on, he was more than satisfied with catching two fish instead. He felt that was a fair trade, two for the one. This way the large fish could also have more children in the future. Children who would grow up to be as strong if not stronger than their parent.

  With his two fish out of the water, he moved a good deal away from the pond, before he began preparing the two different fish. Pulling his military issued knife from his belt he began carving up the meat. Only once he was done with the prep work did he realize that he had one slight problem, how to create a fire.

  Idly he wondered if there was a training session for how to generate flames. With how adaptive Qi was to the forms of mana he assumed there would be, though it would likely be something he had to do internally, versus externally with mana. Thinking on that concept he tried to create a fire in his hand, but nothing. He then tried to circulate the Qi within his hands violently, but only felt a mild tingling sensation. Finally, he sighed and realized he was stuck with eating without a flame.

  Sighing to himself he remembered stories of how certain fishermen would catch and eat raw fish with rice. Some cultures even considered such food a delicacy. As for Lykan, he realized he didn’t have any to eat and that he had gotten what he was ultimately after, Qi infused meat. So reluctantly he ate the strips of meat that he could from the tiny bones of the two creatures. In all there was less than four full bites, but the amount of Qi he consumed felt like it was on the same level of the two Intermediate hearts he had consumed.

  When he was done eating, he thought about what to do with the innards of the beasts. Realizing he had no bread, he decided to keep the innards as a way of attracting his next meal. Scooping up the innards, he also found two little rocks. At first, he wondered if he had somehow gotten the rocks mixed in by mistake, but then noticed the deep glow of the two stones. Eyes gleaming, he realized these were likely cores from the fish, but that brought about a lot of other questions to his mind. They were small stones, barely larger than small pebbles, but they radiated Qi none-the-less. With that Lykan took the two stones and popped them greedily into his mouth. With the stones now in his mouth, he felt a relaxing wave of Qi get released into his body. This was powerful Qi, though there was not much for him to work with. Instead, he just let the Qi float around his body and slowly fuse into his muscles and bones.

  Satiated by the meal, and with a plan Lykan pulled out the food bag that he had previously used for his rations and seeing no better choice. He placed the remaining fish innards in the satchel. Then decided to enter the pond.

  As he entered the water, a dark red mist appeared from his bag. For a second, he got a bad feeling. With a quick check, he made sure the leather stings were pulled tight and that the innards could not escape. The red mist was just fish blood leaving the package. Satisfied that his method for attracting his next meal was secure. He walked forward, deeper, and deeper into the koi pond. His goal was to walk to the wall and then swim under. As he got close, he began taking in deeper and deeper lungs full of air to prepare his body. He had just let out a breath and was about to take in his final breath needed before going under the wall when he felt a long, massive thread of Qi dart out and wrap itself around his left foot. Then the thread pulled.

  “HUHHH!” Lykan breathed in as quickly as he could, focused more on getting in a breath of air than fighting the monster that clearly had hold of his ankle. Then he ducked low, trying to avoid getting hit by the wall. Before he was being dragged out from the calm waters of the koi pond and into the vast expanse of the other room and the veritable lake of monsters that lay beyond.