Misty steam gently presses against my skin as I walk through the door, warm spots of sunshine lazily moving about on my body through the vapor. I raise a hand to try and wave away the stuff, but it’s like the air itself here is thick and steamy. All I can do is walk, walk, and walk some more through the hallway as something… iffy mounts in my ears.

I smack the side of my head with a frown. “Why does it feel like the pressure’s getting way higher, but we’ve been walking straight this entire time?”

“Magic. Most likely the old woman’s.” Illumisia says from a little further in the mists. “Though it is so insidiously hidden that I doubt your awareness can sense it with your current strength.”

“So, what, are we going down–”

My words fail me as the mist disappears completely, and the sunbeams shine bright and unimpeded through an immaculately clear sky. Clouds stretch out for a hundred feet in every direction from where I’m standing, and behind me is a small patch of much mistier clouds that seems to be… directly on the floor. Which would mean that I just walked straight up for a few minutes.

“Holy…” I murmur as I take in the scenery. “She lives here?”

Columns and pillars support hundreds of vines, knit together to form a platform over the clouds with stones set in paths for us to follow. They lead to small buildings, each with walls of glass and stone columns holding them up. Through the glass I can see a kitchen, a bath, a nearly empty room with padding and a ton of magic woven into the stones, and a few bedrooms. There must be a bathroom somewhere, but from where I stand, I can’t easily see it.

All of the rooms are set in a crescent moon shape around the center–of which I stand at one end of. Plants and clouds billow free, with a miniature sun radiating warmth and light hovering over a pillar that’s so etched with magic runes that I can’t look at it with my awareness active. The end of the strange cloud platform is a sheer drop off, from which the sound of cascading waters emanates.

I walk close to it, careful to keep to the stone pathway through the clearing, and lean on a stone railing that stops me from simply walking off. Thousands of gallons of steaming water thunders down to Palastia far below, falling on one of the highest points of the blurry district that I don’t have enough Mind to see.

“Illumisia, do you remember seeing a waterfall when we first got to Palastia?”

The painted dane trods up next to me and grows until her head is level with mine. “Yes, I did. But seeing as you never asked about it, I thought nothing of it. Taking your questioning tone into consideration, I take it that you did not see it?”

I nod in confirmation. “I thought it would just be censored, not completely hidden. That’s kind of terrifying to think of what the system could do with this new information.”

“If it is any consolation, the deception was not wholly the system’s doing. The old woman’s magic attempted to hide it from view, and the system merely aided her in her efforts” Illumisia licks her lips, then dips her head below the clouds and takes long gulps of near boiling water. With a sigh of content, she lifts her head and shakes the excess off. “These waters are extremely high quality. Your friend looking for ways to grow everdriftwood could use this for irrigation.”

“But ask her first!” Pearl cuts in before I can get a water bottle out. “Magic stuff can turn really deadly if she decides you don’t deserve it.”

“Just like March with everything she makes.” I lower my hand and make a mental note to ask for permission later. “Thanks for the warning. I guess it’s time to see what all those notifications were about, then. Illumisia, can you scope this place out for anything dangerous or… where are you going?”

Illumisia turns back to me and tilts her head to the side. “I am doing exactly what you were too late to ask me to do. If I find anything dangerous enough that I cannot deal with on my own, lie down and prepare for your death, as there is nothing you could do to stop it.”

“Thanks for the help.” I say sincerely, which seems to annoy Illumisia more than if I’d been sarcastic. Which was the intent. “Alright, Pearl, let’s get started. First the notifications, then the rest of the stat coins that I didn’t get to before, and then we’ll try to contact Ursula for more pills. Anything we need to do immediately that I’m forgetting?”

Pearl slides out of her shell and shrugs. “Not that I can think of. Should we try and find the Garza twins while we’re here?”

Gisela and Dora. Somehow, the thought of finding them hadn’t even crossed my mind. It’s definitely worth looking for them, since it doesn't look like I’m on a time limit this time, but it’s not priority one. I’ve seen how weak most people are after their first couple of visits–they won’t be a threat until I’m strong enough not to worry about them.

“I’ll ask Clutter to keep an eye out. He’s more likely to come by them than we are.” I decide as I pull out my Class Card and stare at the thing. “Okay. Get ready for a deluge of information.”

Spell Evolutions Ready: Projectile, Shield.

Skill Evolutions In Progress: High Stakes, Twist Fate.

Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.

New Spell: Horrendous Purification.

New Passive Skill: Halsia Deity.

Current Worth: 1233.

Not as many popups as I was expecting, but I guess that’s because all the actual notifications are condensed into single sentences. I’m not surprised that my spells are ready to evolve, since I’ve spent so much Worth on them, but my skills too? That’s an unexpected surprise. And, to top it all off, apparently the debuff Fleur gave me on the krarig somehow turned into a spell. I ignore the line of text that calls me a god for now, but with how Pearl focuses on it, I can’t for long.

“Those are some nice gains.” I nod to myself, then swipe to my spells and activate Shellbound Aggregate to turn Horrendous Purification coinbound. “Alright, let’s see what this looks like now.”

Coinbound Purification

Evolution Requirements 1/2: Spend 100 Worth on this spell.

Evolution Requirements 2/2: Purify a threat of level 10 or greater for 100 seconds.

Progress: 0/100, 0/100.

Use a Worth coin as a base to begin emitting a field of purifying magic, which prevents the use of mana and removes all other buffs/debuffs from anything that enters the field. If touched to an object before emission, that object can instead be designated to gain the purifying effects. Has weakened effects on more powerful targets.

…

Halsia Deity Effect: If the user so wishes, they can become immune to any individual part of this spell’s effects.

…Halsia Deity effect? I read over the description again just to make sure I’m not hallucinating, and sure enough, that last sentence stays stubbornly in place. It looks like that skill’s going to do something to all my spells, but… wait. Is that what I felt back at the party? The more complex shields, the stronger projectiles–was that all the new skill?

Pearl reads right alongside me, tapping on her knee all the while. “It looks like becoming Fleur’s god actually had some tangible benefits. That’s neat.”

“Don’t say it like that.” I sigh and swipe the window away. “It makes it sound like I only did this because it benefitted me.”

“We all know you didn’t.” Pearl leans back on her hands and kicks her feet over my shoulder in thought. “I wonder if you could get another skill if I made you my god. Or… hm. Maybe spreading my awareness to you is pretty much just that. Do you think you’re my god, Shelby?”

I shake my head and laugh. “Shit, I hope not. I’m still registering the fact that ‘god’ is apparently a system-recognized title. Or… deity, I guess, but that’s just another word for it. Well, might as well check what the actual skill description says now that I can't ignore it.”

A few taps and swipes brings up the skill. I read it over once, then twice, as a frown etches itself onto my face. The description isn’t exactly… descriptive.

Halsia Deity.

You are a god to them.

Their adoration empowers you.

Eventually, you will abandon them.

And then you will be nothing but a footnote in their history.

Pearl sneers at the text like it personally insulted her. “Darn system. If you don’t know what the skill does, you don’t have to be a jerk about it.”

“But it has to know what it does–the description for the effect on purification is right there.” I swipe back to purification to prove my point. “See? How can the system not know what the skill does but still give a description for what happens to the spell?”

“Assumption by negation.” Pearl says easily. “The system knows exactly what a normal coinbound purification does, and it knows what yours does because it’s a modification of what’s already in there. All it knows about this new skill is that it has an effect on your spells, and that it appeared after you became Fleur’s god.”

I don’t have a better explanation, but that doesn’t sound quite right. How would the system even catalog a skill that it never saw before? Did it just sense that I had something new, categorize it as a skill, and write a snarky description to try and tell me off? Because if it did, then that’s almost pathetic. Not threatening like I assume it wanted to come off as.

“Just another thing I need to look into. Throw it on the pile with the rest. Speaking of; let’s see what happened to projectile and shield.”

*Coinbound Shield*

Evolution Requirements: Spend 50 Worth on a single Shield.

Progress: 1203/50

Create a barrier of magical energy using a Worth coin as a base. It shatters when it takes enough damage, ending the spell. Can only be used on coins of value 1-5.

…

Halsia Deity Effect: The shield is broken down into much smaller, crystalline segments that can be given more intricate commands at no additional cost or mental strain.

*Coinbound Projectile*

Evolution Requirement: Create a projectile that lasts for 30 minutes.

Progress: 42/30

Create a whirling mass of destructive magical energy using a Worth coin as a base. Once it runs out of energy, it dissipates. Can only be used with coins of value 1-5.

…

Halsia Deity Effect: Projectiles contain solid, crystalline mass that allows for greater control.

So not much changed, save for the Fleur effect and the fact that they’re ready to evolve. A hundred times over, which means Noland taking over my spells still counted as me casting them. I’m pretty sure I couldn’t see the requirements before, so… what changed? Did I get another Mind stat that I forgot about… oh, right, the dragonjet! I got an extra Mind from that. It must’ve been enough to push me over the edge for the info. Nice.

…Wait, how the hell was I supposed to spend fifty Worth on one shield on my own? Or make a projectile that lasts thirty minutes? That smells like more of the system’s bullshit to me. I’ll have to be careful about the next evolutions if they’re technically impossible, too. Now that the spells are out of the way, I swipe over to my skills and press on High Stakes.

A few simple changes flash before my eyes. But there’s only one that I can focus on–all the others just fade away into the background.

Current Maximum Odds: 2/1.