Chapter Sixteen: Rest, Relaxation? And Relief.

Dragging himself from the pond, Rory emerged completely drenched, his clothes clung to every inch of him. Dragging himself several meters away from the pond's edge, he eventually collapsed flat on his back.

He lay on his back for close to half an hour, his chest heaving for breath, trying to recover from the tough endurance fight and his many wounds.

Everyone else lay next to him as well. None of them were in a better state. Wounds crisscrossed their bodies. Eventually, Rory naturally recovered enough for him to be able to sit up and enter meditation to rapidly recover his resources.

Some time later Rory snapped out of his meditative trance, stretching his arms widely. His body, while not fully recovered, no longer felt like hot knifes pressing into him when he tried to move. Glancing around, everyone else was passed out beside him. They had all been so exhausted and injured, no one had thought to set a lookout.

Peter was by far still the most injured. He whimpered in his sleep, every time he inhaled his shredded back came in contact with the ground. The others seemed to be faring better. Their wounds had started to close and were no longer bleeding.

Rory decided to check the last notification he had received.

Ding - your Dungeon Party has defeated [Dust Wraith] you have killed a being 15 levels or more above you. Additional experience received. Experience earned reduced due to being in a group.

The wraith had been by far the toughest foe he had faced, all of their attacks had been ineffective and if not for Emily’s observation of the wraith losing a small part of its mass every time it got covered in their blood, the wraith would have slowly worn them down and killed them.

Shuddering at the thought and what it might mean if there were more wraiths about, Rory got to his feet and stalked towards Peter.

Crouching and Gentle shaking Peter, Peter groaned in pain before his eyes slowly fluttered open.

“wa? Ergh I hurt so bad,” Peter moaned.

Trying to make his voice as soothing as possible, Rory reassured him, “Peter, your new class gave you the ability to heal. You need to try using it. "

Eyes going wide and cheeks flushing with embarrassment, Peter was quickly overcome with a brilliant white light. Causing Rory to wince in pain and to Cover his eyes against the glare, the light faded as quickly as it came. Uncovering his eyes, Rory observed that Peter looked a lot better, colour had returned to his face and gone was the constant wince of pain he had taken to having, wounds were visibly pulling themselves back together before Rory’s eyes leaving nothing but smooth skin in their place.

Peter’s healing while not instantaneous only took five seconds to have him back to full fitness.

“Wow! I feel great, but that took sixty percent of my mana,” he mumbled.

“sixty percent? What’s your Mana pool?” Rory inquired.

“Ive got 120 points of mana.”

“does your smite skill use mana as well?” seeing Peter nod, Rory continued, “looks like your class is heavily mana dependent. You need to start increasing your mana pool, trust me, its not fun to run out of. mana, you could die.”

Peter visibly gulped at Rory’s declaration. Once he had recovered enough mana to use Holy Reversal again, he quickly cast it on Matthew, who lay next to him.

Once again, the skill left its target fully healed.

“that only used 30 mana that time!”

“It must use more or less dependent on how injured the target is.”

Soon after, both Emily and Alex were fully healed and all three of them lay soundly asleep, having not awoken from Peter's healing.

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Rory’s stomach roared with hunger, making him realise just how long he had gone without anything to eat. Quickly searching through his pouch, he didn’t notice anything convenient to eat as while he had the body of the Tainion Doe he lacked the mean to prepare the carcass or the equipment to properly cook it.

Looking around the cave turned up little of interest, just rough stone on the walls and the floor was devoid of plant life, with the occasional rock scattered here and there.

Rory walked up to the surface of the pond, crouching he then went onto his hands and knees and peered into the pond's depths. however, nothing stood out. Rory stood up in disappointment, just as he went to turn, his head whipped back to the pond's floor. It had been fleeting, but for a moment he could have sworn he saw movement.

Eagerly Rory reached his hand out to the surface of the water, calling upon his power. Lightning raced out of his hand and skimmed across the surface crackling and dancing but not doing anything else. Frowning, Rory plunged his hand into the water and tried again, this time willing the lightning to arc downwards. Again he was disappointed the lightning quickly dispersing across the water harmlessly.

In frustration, Rory cast a static bomb, pouring as much Mana into it as he could manage the skill resisted him at first but eventually something mentally snapped and more mana flooded into the skill. The balloon of energy swelled to twice its normal size, it frantically pulsed and crackled as if at any moment it would destabilise and burst.

Summoning the larger than normal skill caused notifications to ring in Rory's mind, which he ignored for now. Willing the bomb to descend, it quickly broke the surface of the water. Lightning constantly broke off from the ball, dissipating in the water, but thankfully it continued to hold.

Rory watched the ball slowly descend, holding his breath in anticipation. When the static bomb reached the bottom of the pond, it was no bigger than a tennis ball in size. Touching the rough sandy bottom of the pond caused the skill to destabilise and burst, sending lightning streaming along the bottom.

Just as the lightning reached the edge of the pond it caused a disturbance, a tyre sized fish was revealed, previously it had been camouflaged with the sandy bottom however now that Rory’s lightning spread along its body it seized and shook its entire body then going rigid.

The spell's paralysis caused the fish to ascend, rocketing upwards where it breached the surface. As soon as the fish was at the surface, Rory cast analysis and then proceeded to pump lightning into the fish, quickly overcoming it.

Rory quickly swam out to the fish and dragged its body out of the water.

The fish Rory had caught was disturbingly flat, one side was white and smooth with a gaping mouth and the other could have been mistaken for a sandy floor, apart from two milky eyes that now stared lifelessly at Rory it was bumpy and rough and its scaly skin resembled sand more than it did a fish.

Rory brought up the analysis for the fish.

Common cave flounder – lvl 5

Description – Solitary ambush predators, the common cave flounder, are a master of patience, often going days without moving, letting potential prey pass it by waiting for the perfect opportunity to secure its next meal. This creature possesses no special abilities or remarkable skills and relies solely on its advanced camouflage and ambush skills to survive.

Relieved that the skill had not mentioned any poison or other things untoward, Rory placed his hand on the flat stone floor and released jets of fire against it, quickly heating up the stone. Once Rory was satisfied the stone was hot enough, he quickly dragged the flounder over where it started to cook.

Rory’s improvised stone floor hot plate stayed warm for twenty minutes and he had to move the flounder three further times until it was cooked through.

During this time, Everyone was awoken by the smell of cooking fish and crowded eagerly around Rory. Each and everyone of them was just as hungry as Rory, and practically drooled on his shoulder.

Finally cooked, Rory used a shard of metal from Peter's sword to cut the fish into five portions. Everyone gratefully took a piece, the fish rigid enough to be held in their hands and eaten like you would a burger.

A sweetness evaded Rory’s mouth when he bit into the fish, which was flaky and slightly oily. The skin while tough, was easy enough to peel away from the flesh below.

Everyone sat in silence while they munched on the fish, and Rory reviewed the notifications he had received earlier.

Ding – Skill: static bomb has reached level two.

Through the modification of this skill by the user, the size and potency of this skill has increased at an increased cost.

Ding – Skill: Lightning manipulation earned.

You have earned the skill Lightning manipulation. Whether this was helped unfairly thanks to a blessing you might not deserve is irrelevant. Lightning is yours to control, and through brute force, you have learned how to manipulate this element. You will find in future this element is easier to control and manipulate and you are less likely to suffer the effects of paralysis.

Lightning manipulation- lvl 1

While lightning is unpredictable and has a mind of its own, you have started to unravel some of its secrets. Your lightning will gain a limited physical presence and can withstand a small degree of force before shattering. Further levels will unlock new abilities.

Rory was eager to find out what his lightning have a physical presence would mean. Before long, everyone had stripped the fish bare and with weariness continued their journey.