While it had been touch and go for a while, today had been a good day.

Edge would celebrate his victory in the morning. But not just yet. In that moment, his exhaustion caught up with him, leaving black spots dancing before his eyes.

His shoulders sagged as the adrenaline faded away, bringing the pain of his wounds back in full force. It would be a while before he had enough mana to power regeneration, which meant that he would have to tend to his injuries the old-fashioned way.

Edge retrieved his knife and cut the remnants of his shirt into strips, wrapping them around his wounds to stop the bleeding. Then he sat down in the dirt while gasping for air. He was drained dry and utterly spent. But in the end, it wasn’t too bad.

His core’s generation should be enough to heal his impressive collection of cuts and bruises sometime during the night. Until then, he would just have to bear it and try to get some sleep.

He grabbed his pack and crawled between a pair of boulders, dragging his blood-splattered sword behind him. He set his back to the stone, then drank the last of the water in his canteen. As the world outside faded from grey to black, Edge curled into a ball and closed his eyes. He was out like a light less than five minutes later.

He awoke before dawn feeling remarkably refreshed, although he was hungry enough to eat almost anything. But that minor inconvenience didn’t dampen his enthusiasm. The deep cuts across his hands had sewn themselves shut while he slept. He had a quarter tank in his reservoir, since regeneration wasn’t draining it anymore.

His reserves would recover throughout the day, as his mana pores sucked in the magicytes flowing across the plains. He wasn’t sure how long it would take for his tank to refill with his current attributes, but he would know the answer before long.

After making sure that nothing nasty was lurking outside, Edge crawled out of the crevice. He pulled himself up on top of a boulder, where he had a good view of the grasslands below. He scanned his surroundings while stretching out, enjoying a body that was free from pain.

There weren’t even any bruises left from his battle with the nymphs. It was flat out amazing to have healed overnight. To restore in hours what would have taken weeks before. He was grateful for regeneration, along with every other skill he had. This is so cool.

He realized that he was grinning from ear to ear, filled with satisfaction for the present and hope for the future. He was still at the start of his transformative journey, but his rapid recovery was undeniable proof that Edge wasn’t ordinary anymore.

Thanks to Skill-Eater, he had become something more. He knew that he was still wrapping his head around everything that had happened since the moment he’d bound his core. Adapting to his new life one step at a time. He had far more questions than answers right now, but he was eager to start learning more. He couldn’t even imagine how much he would continue to change over the days ahead, although the prospect of finding out had him bouncing with excitement.

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While it was fun to imagine the weeks to come, he turned his attention to the hour at hand. As he waited for it to grow light enough to pick his path, Edge reflected on everything he’d experienced the day before, seeking to learn from his mistakes so that he didn’t repeat them.

He had done his best to survive the onslaught of the living storm, emerging from that gauntlet by the skin of his teeth. While the encounter had been far too close for comfort, he hadn’t made any errors that he could see with the clarity of hindsight.

The battle with the nymphs had been more of a mixed bag. Edge should have realized that he was being driven into an ambush before he was surrounded. He’d failed to consider how suspiciously easy it had been to sense the burrowing creature. Hadn’t noticed that it was driving him toward the boulders. I can’t afford to lose focus just because I’m in danger. I need to keep a level head.

He had been too fixated on reaching favorable terrain to process the clues embedded in the situation. Letting his opponents get the drop on him and set the terms of the battle was a worst-case scenario. One he would avoid at all costs going forward.

On a brighter note, the fight itself had gone well. He had put in a solid performance during the melee that followed, although digesting shadow step at just the right time had been a lucky break by any accounting.

All in all, the melee had been a valuable experience, and Edge wouldn’t get caught by the same trick twice. He’d made a mistake, recovered his footing, then turned the situation around. He’d won in the end and defeated his foes, learning more about his core along the way.

Best of all, picking up entangle was exactly what he needed to round out his skillset. Especially since he’d been able to advance it right away. It was a valuable tool that would help him [Extract] more skills in the days ahead.

He had a long way to go if he wanted to survive on Ord. But he was satisfied with how far he’d come over the last two days. Edge was still overwhelmed and stressed out from his ordeal. But his confidence was beginning to grow.

In addition to picking up more good skills than anyone else at his stage, he was rapidly cycling-up his core. Raising his attributes while racing toward the threshold where Skill-Eater would evolve and grow even more powerful.

On that note, I should see if I have more attribute points to spend.

Edge summoned his Guide and opened his menus, bathed in a soft golden glow that only he could see. He must have been too out of it to notice the messages when he’d finished off his opponents. Because as he had hoped, the battle had been sufficient to cycle-up his core.

You have slain an enemy and gained experience.

You have slain an enemy and gained experience.

I don’t need that popping up each time I score a kill. It’s distracting, redundant, and kind of annoying. Edge opened the customization menu and disabled the enemy defeated notification, changing it to a soft beep instead. He simplified the skill acquisition message, leaving the other settings unchanged.

Then he returned his attention to the good part of the message.

You have accumulated sufficient experience to cycle-up your core. Your new cycle is [5].

You have two attribute points awaiting allocation.

Great. That’s just what I was hoping to see. Now how do I want to spend them?