The Argo was back on the high seas by the end of the day. The crew's spirits were high.

Trillia sat on the deck, listening to the crew sing a sea shanty. Even the Captain was joining in.

There was still about four months of travel left. So far, she hadn't managed to get herself any combat spells or abilities except enhanced sight.

Layla stood next to a goblin who had a wooden cup in his hand and a spoon, tapping the cup down in tune with the sea shanty. She watched the goblin intently as he expertly set the pace.

You're now under the effects of [Admiral's Admiration]!

Stamina cannot be depleted for the duration of the song.

You are immune to exhaustion for the duration of the song.

Your mana expenditure is doubled.

Perhaps she was imagining it, but it felt as if the Argo picked up considerable speed once the buff had taken effect. Illana tapped on Trillia's shoulder and motioned to the goblin. The elf leaned in and spoke softly, not wanting to interrupt the song. "Pump two hundred mana every five minutes into him, please."

Trillia nodded, pumped the two hundred mana, and moved over to sit next to the goblin. He nodded his thanks and continued to tap.

The song and buff lasted two hours before the little goblin finally got mana sickness. The crew paused to give him a roaring round of applause before they went back to their tasks.

Trillia kept mana sight on at all times now. The crew didn't mind it anymore. It was fascinating to watch mana spiral around the ship.

Sitting on the rail, she watched as a human grabbed the ropes leading up to a sail. Light grey wisps spiraled from his chest, down his arms, and into the rope. The wisps raced up the rope and hit the sails, pushing the Argo a little faster.

Bright golden wisps spiraled around Captain Robert at the helm. Spinning around the wheel gripped within his hands. A dark green glow hummed to life in the belly of the ship and slowly spread into the wood. Anytime a member of the crew brushed a hand or touched the wood in any way, Trillia watched as the ship gave them a little boost to stamina and helped alleviate exhaustion.

She watched sky-blue wisps appear in a sailor's eyes as they scaled the mast into a crow's nest. Her own mana felt dull in comparison.

It was a dull, nearly lifeless flicker compared to the energetic flow of the others.

That evening, Layla and Trillia sat at the table in their room. Trillia had a small cut on her hand.

Layla began to slowly recite her spell and invoke mana to do her bidding. Bright orange wisps sprung from her fingertips and dove toward Trillia's wound. Grabbing the edges of the cut and reaching out to one another. Whenever two sides touched, the wisps of mana became one, and a warm feeling replaced the pain.

They did this several times. Trilla would cut her hand, and Layla would heal it.

Two days later, Trillia tried again to heal Layla's cut. Layla told her to stop sending an intent to heal and instead send an intent to save. A subtle difference, but perhaps an important one.

Layla laid a hand palm up on a blood rag. Using a knife in her other hand to draw a wound across the palm. Trillia took Layla's hand into her own. She stared intently at the severed flesh, leaning in and watching as the blood flowed from the wound. Her mana slowly and begrudgingly dragged itself toward the wound. Faint, barely visible wisps of universal mana attached to each side.

Trillia urged the mana to join up with itself. Hundreds of mana drained every second, and her mana still refused to obey her commands for such subtle application.

After twenty minutes, Trillia sat back in her chair. Sweat beading on her forehead. Layla healed her hand and offered an encouraging smile. "Again tomorrow?"

Trillia frowned and stared at the healed hand. "Give me an hour or two. I want to try something else. If you are ok with that."

Layla nodded, and the two grabbed food. Fish stew.

Trillia was surprised to learn that the crew had created a new game since Layla was around to heal them. They'd stand twenty feet apart and throw a dagger back and forth. Aiming for their opponent's stomach. The wounds were rarely life-threatening. Especially with Layla around. The system still saw the wounds as pretty bad, though. The goal was to snatch the dagger out of the air by the blade itself before it cut you. At first, the Captain was against it. Illana and Trillia urged him to let them try it for a week.

At this point, half of the crew had acquired a skill called [Blade Catcher]. For the purpose of catching thrown weapons, their agility was multiplied by ten at level one. Trillia thought it was a rather extreme skill and wondered how someone might stumble upon it naturally.

This, of course, led other crew members to try and find new ways to get odd skills. Layla didn't mind. She had gotten fifteen levels in her Acolyte class and was rapidly approaching level one hundred. It was Layla's hope she'd be able to evolve from acolyte into cleric when she did.

A few hours later, Trillia was ready. The cook asked if she could practice in the common areas so that other folks could watch. The girls didn't mind, and so they sat at the public table.

"Ok. I want you to heal yourself again. I want to try activating [Mana-Sight] and [Basic Sight Enhancement] at the same time." Layla nodded and went about cutting herself and began to slowly chant her healing ability.

As Trillia activated both sights, she leaned in and watched the wisps. There was something just outside her vision. "Again, please."

Trillia pushed more mana toward her eyes and basic enhancement. Her efforts were mildly rewarded.

General Skill: [Basic Sight Enhancement] Level 4 -> Level 5

She grumbled to herself but stayed focused.

She pushed more mana into the skill and her eyes.

Her vision blurred as she watched the wisps start to flicker in and out of existence.

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Her vision went dark. Trillia no longer saw Layla's flesh and blood in front of her. Instead, she saw a vague outline of the hand. It looked like a muted green river of mana. Bright orange flickered to the surface from time to time. When the hand was freshly cut, the muted green river began to shine bright green. Trillia glanced from the hand toward Layla herself.

Layla herself was glowing the same bright green as the rest of her mana. Trillia saw a thin stream of orange wisps flowing into Layla.

As her eyes followed the thin stream, it became harder and harder to focus. Trillia pushed more mana into her eyes. Just as she caught a glimpse of an ocean of bright orange mana.

Pop.

Trillia fell from her chair, screaming. Her hand covered the now empty-eye socket. She was vaguely aware of other voices and of a stream of notifications. There was simply too much pain to focus.

She screamed and screamed.

The eye itself didn't hurt all that much. But it felt like her blood was on fire. It started from her toes and raced towards the empty eye socket.

She felt a heavy hand on her shoulder, and all the noise went quiet.

Save for her own screaming.

A soothing feeling ran the length of her body. The mana from whoever cast it fighting against her own mana boiling in her veins.

A notification pinged, and the pain vanished.

You have forcibly evolved your body with mana. Mastery Skill: Mana-Warped has evolved into Racial Trait: Mana-Warped.

Species: Orc has been forcibly evolved into Species: Mana-Warped Orc

Mana-Warped Orcs gain 6 Wisdom at every level.

Mana-Warped Orcs gain 1 stat point every level.

For the purposes of skills. You are now considered a Humanoid.

For the purposes of skills. You are now considered a Magical Beast.

For the purposes of skills. You are now considered a Mana-Warped Creature.

You have evolved Species: Orc into a new Species. Your Geas from Ralrouk is considered satisfied.

Racial Skill: Orc Tenacity has been forcibly evolved into Racial Skill: Mana-Rage.

Trillia heard a familiar voice ring out in her head. It was a voice she hadn't heard in years.

"You'll be ok, Trillia. I'll explain some of the new things you are experiencing. You're doing well. I am proud of you." as Dawn's voice faded, more notifications popped up.

Mana-Rage:

When your health reaches 0, instead of dying, you may continue to act and fight as you normally would. All further damage targets your mana directly. Damage taken this way is multiplied by 10 and is not subject to your resistances.

General Skill: Minor Health Regeneration has been forcibly evolved with mana. It has evolved into Racial Skill: Mana-Warped Regeneration.

Mana-Warped Regeneration:

As long as you have mana and are not dead. Your body can suffer no permanent injuries.

WARNING: Trait: Limitless Mana prevents Body Part: Left Hand from regenerating. Source: Divine Rank - Primordial.

You have managed to forcibly peer into the streams of mana known as Aether streams.

Trait Acquired: Aether Sight

Aether Sight:

With a thought, you may peer into the Aether. This allows you to see mana in a more in-depth way. It also allows you to see mana veins and mana channels. Be wary. Other creatures patrol the Aether and may attack your mana directly for trespassing when you activate this trait.

General Skill: Basic Enhanced Sight has been forcibly evolved with mana.

Trait Detectied: Aether Sight.

Trait Detected: Mana-Warped.

Basic Enhanced Sight has evolved into Racial Skill: Mana-Warped Vision.

Mana-Warped Vision:

Mana cannot be used in your presence without your knowledge unless it comes from a creature with a divine rank higher than your own. You may toggle this skill. When it is toggled on, you will not regenerate mana, but your vision will be improved by a % equal to your mana regeneration.

For example, if your mana regeneration per second is 200. Your sight is enhanced by 200%.

Divine Trait Detected: Spawn Seeker.

Spawn Seeker has been forcibly evolved into Divine Trait: Primordial Hunter.

Primordial Hunter:

Primordial Hunter calls to you when you are in the presence of any creature tied to the [Primordials] of Alirast. Such creatures, regardless of power, up to but not including [Primordials], must have a Wisdom score greater than your own or suffer a penalty to skills and resource regeneration equal to the difference.

For example, if your Wisdom is 1,000 and such a creature only has a Wisdom of 500. They suffer a 50% penalty for skills and resource regeneration.

General Skill: Mana-Sight has been forcibly evolved with mana.

Trait Detected: Aether Sight.

Trait Detected: Mana-Warped.

Racial Skill Detected: Mana-Warped Vision.

Trait Detected: Pact-Bound.

Divine Trait Detected: Primordial Hunter.

Mana-Sight has evolved into Minor Divine Skill: Divine Mana-Sight.

Divine Mana-Sight:

If your base Wisdom score is higher than your target's, you are considered to have a Divine Rank equal to that of your pact-bound deity for the purposes of overcoming obfuscation. You may spend mana to learn more about any creature you scan. The greater their obfuscation, the more mana this skill uses.

This skill does not level.

This skill is considered a deific skill, and its use does not grant mortal experience.

Your continued study of mana and its inner workings has granted you a new skill via your class, Mana Conduit.

[Stitch] Level 0 Obtained!

Stitch:

This allows you to use mana to stitch together open wounds.

Class: [Mana Conduit] Level 0 -> Level 5

Trillia kept her eyes shut as the notifications seemed to keep scrolling. She briefly wondered why sight enhancement hadn't given her any levels.

After a moment, Trillia heard Arlyss speak. "Feeling better?"

She managed a faint nod but didn't dare open her eyes. "What did I do?"

"Well. Best I can tell from looking at you. Dumped a few million mana into your body without realizing it. In addition to glimpsing the edge of a deity with your untrained, unshielded, mortal eyes. Looking through your traits, you are thankfully not blind."

Trillia pushed herself to a sitting position, squeezing her right hand as tight as she could. Slowly, she opened one eye.

When no pain flooded through her, she opened the other. Surprised that her eye had already re-grown. "Why can't I ever seem to do stuff the normal way?"

Arlyss sat next to her and gently rubbed her back. "Cause you're too awesome to do things the boring way."

Trillia shot him a half-hearted glare but couldn't help a smirk. "Why am I even allowed to do any of this? How isn't everyone just randomly exploding all the time?"

"Because you have an absurd amount of mana and no survival instinct. Probably due to being an orc and having tenacity. Most creatures aren't willing to risk dying. But the system says you can't die as an orc in an instant."

She opened her mouth to protest but found she had no real counter to what he was saying. "I guess I should be grateful that you were still able to get to me. Is the Argo OK? Everyone on board?"

Arlyss shook his head. "The leviathans are guiding it back to the church. Your...experiments caused a rather fierce mana-storm. The Captain understandably doesn't want to risk sailing through it. He called in a favor with the leviathans to shield the Argo for the next few days while the storm subsides."

Trillia pulled her knees to her chest and buried her face in them. "Fuck."

Arlyss set a plate of food next to her. "Look at it this way, I'm even less worried about you being okay on your own now. Some of the traits and skills you got seem great."

"Do you mind if I stay here for a couple of days? I just. I don't have it in me to deal with anyone or answer questions. Can you let everyone know I'm ok?"

Arlyss nodded, patted her back, and stood to give her some space. She glanced around to see she was in her room at the glass spire. "Thank you, Dawn. For looking out for me. Can you apologize on my behalf to whatever deity I saw and offended? I didn't know what I was doing."

A Greater Deity of Retribution - Ora'Sys would like to establish a telepathic link with you.

Your deity has approved this link.

Do you wish to accept?

Trillia's whole body froze.