Alith followed Sofia inside, immediately her attention turned to the bone statues, “Hey, you're getting better at those,” she complimented. “Who's this one supposed to be, an unfinished product?” she asked while picking up one of them.
“Oh, that's meant to be Ihuarah. See the hole? It's just difficult to capture his appearance, especially from memory.”
“I mean, he is monochromatic, so at least you got that right… The issue is the pose, I think. Ihuarah’s not the kind to stay in a neutral position like this. It's lacking panache if you know what I mean.”
“Well, I, uh… Yeah, you're not wrong. Speaking of which, we still have no news from him. I can see he’s still alive, but that's it.”
“You can always switch places with him, no? That's one way to get news,” Alith suggested.
“What if the timing is inconvenient for him, though?”
“I'm sure he wouldn't mind. But I guess there is no real reason to do it right now. Have you been monitoring his kill feed?”
“No, I have that turned off most of the time, yours too. I just find it distracting.”
Alith nodded, “Yeah, I am the same, though maybe we should stop doing that since it's our only means of long-distance communication.”
“True… Well, let's have a look at what Ihuarah’s been fighting…”
Sofia scrolled through a bunch of notifications. Ihuarah seemed to have been fighting mostly jungle animals for a while, and then it had become a long stretch of killing ‘Ochiarans,’ which both Sofia and Alith had never heard of, with the latest kills in date being against stronger monsters.
‘You have defeated [Damned Ochiaran - lv. 225]’
‘You have defeated [Damned Ochiaran - lv. 245]’
‘You have defeated [Damned Ochiaran - lv. 208]’
‘You have defeated [Turgescent Soul Ochiaran - lv. 259]’
‘You have defeated [Keeper of Limbo - lv. 278]’
Sofia pointed at the last two kills in the list, “These are from four days ago, maybe the boss of whatever dungeon he was exploring? He hasn't been fighting anything since then, it seems.”
“So much fighting, and we can’t even repay our level debt…” Alith complained.
“Debt is whatever honestly. We always stay stuck for a while before the filter anyway, so it's not like it really is slowing us down.”
“Well, yeah, true,” Alith agreed as she sat down on one of Sofia’s bone chairs, “and we’re not getting any more debt for the next filter. By the way, I learned from one of the teachers that we cannot get a specialization point from the third trial.”
“Really? That's kind of a letdown,” Sofia complained as she sat on the opposite chair.
“Yeah, really. As usual, it's hard to get too much information on the trial itself without the censor interfering, but I managed to get some. Wanna hear it, Sof?”
“Of course I want to. Why do you even ask? I don't know about you, but when this school year ends, I'm going straight for the trial.”
This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.
“You say that as if I was not going to go with you… Anyway, here is the information I managed to piece together; first of all, this trial happens entirely ‘in the real world,’ so no fake Magic world, and that's a big deal.”
“So the resources we bring with us actually matter, is what you’re getting at?” Sofia asked.
Alith bent forward, an excited gleam in her eyes, “Yes, but not only that, it also means we get to keep whatever we find on the way!”
“Oh, that's a very good point. Then maybe we should invest in better spatial storage items? I have plenty of space in my ring, but not that much considering all the crap that's in there, and your own ring is rather small, no?”
“It's good enough for now, but it's not huge. I can buy a better one, but I was thinking we should just go and ask the guy who makes them directly, don't you think?”
“So we pay a quick visit to old man TLDR before the trial, noted. It's a good idea anyway since I want to see if he can upgrade Pareth more. Anything else?”
Alith nodded again, “Yeah, and this is where it gets really interesting, both for you and for me, and I'm going to need your help with that. Apparently, you can get some hidden benefits by wagering a divine essence; depending on the God, you get different results.”
“Oh! I’ve got plenty of choices, then, even some… Unusual ones.” If the system even accepts them.
“Yeah, unusual like the thing that came to listen to your public class right?”
“Exactly right, but how do you want me to help with this? I don't think I could give you one of the essences I have even if I wanted to. Do you want to get one from Domination somehow? We might manage to take down the mutated apostles with enough planning…”
Alith frowned, “Didn't you have a quest to return those or something, Sof? I’m not trying to sabotage you here.”
“It was more a request than a formal quest but yeah. If not that then how?”
“Well, you see, I’ve heard from Saria that a certain uncle had resurfaced recently. I was thinking…”
Sofia looked at Alith like she was crazy. “I really don’t think this is a good idea…” she started, and before she could close her mouth, more words came out by themselves. “I, on the other hand, believe this to be a most entertaining proposal!” she continued.
Alith suddenly clutched her head, screaming in pain. She fell off her chair, and Sofia barely managed to catch her before she hit the ground, yelling mentally at Pareth to heal her.
Fuck off Orator! If you do anything to Alith, you can stuff your quest where the sun never shines for all I care!
“Is that all the trust I inspire in you, still? A dagger to my heart, truly,” the Orator said through Sofia’s mouth amidst Alith’s screams. Sofia lost control of her right arm and could only watch herself flick at Alith’s forehead. The short girl’s screams died down as her body limped in Sofia’s arms.
‘The hero : ‘Alith’ has succumbed.’
“Alith!”
“Will you calm down already? Such a needless commotion,” Orator added through Dopple’s voice before being chastised by that same voice, “You dog-ass bastard killed my wearer! I will end yo-”
The world seemed to slow down to a standstill in Sofia’s room. Her emotions in turmoil she could hear a sigh in her own voice. “Always so dramatic. This old one gave the girl exactly what she wanted, did he not? She was the sole cause of these happenings. Now if only you would stop yammering and started working on bringing her back before her soul fades for good. I shall not be held responsible for your failings, Inquisitor’s protegee or not.”
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Sofia’s memory of the last twenty five or so hours were blurry at best. After dragging the lifeless body of Alith near the window, she had been channeling [Maiden Banshee] without a second of rest. People came to knock on her door after a while, surely because of the class she missed, but she did not even notice them. Pareth spent the entire time holding her, while Bookie had summoned itself on his own and Participated in the war effort by summoning skeletons and killing them off to transfer his mana to Sofia through [Heat Death].
Eventually, long after Alith’s corpse had gone cold, the skill worth 100 000 000 of cumulated mana points had resolved without fanfare. In Sofia’s numb arms, Alith slowly opened her eyes, “Sof…? Sorry, I think I passed out…” she mumbled, “It’s… Kind of cold in here, isn’t it…? Hey, why are you crying?”
Sofia looked down at Alith, tears streaming down her face. She let out a choked laugh, a mix of relief and exhaustion. "You passed out? I thought I lost you!" Sofia confessed, her voice shaky. She wiped away her tears, managing a small smile, "You fucking idiot witch.”
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