I woke up to the feeling of a rough hand hitting me on the side of my head, followed by a shout from Pierce.

“What the fuck, old man? Haven't you done enough!?”

My heart froze, as much as hearing Pierce actually try to come to my defense warmed it. The man clearly didn't understand how dangerous Snow was. The beast rose from my side, his eyes narrowed dangerously as he looked toward the Tyrant. I saw Snow curl his right hand into a claw. Pierce was surly and rude to me, but he was my friend. He was also much weaker than me now, I'd outleveled him by a lot, I had to protect him.

Without thinking, I threw myself at Pierce, putting myself between him and the ancient beast in human form.

Claws of ice raked across my body and I howled in pain as I slammed my forepaws into my fellow adventurer preparing to shove him away. Protective and Heroic flared the moment my paws touched him. In that split second of contact, I knew I'd made a dreadful mistake. My mind raced, time didn't freeze like it did when Curious had taken me, but the two active Concepts allowed me to process the reason alarm bells were ringing in my head.

I was tier two now, Pierce was still tier one, and the difference was much greater than I had imagined. I had felt it after I ate the mana beast. I had felt how I somehow became more real, more solid, more present in the world. I had thought that it was a mana beast thing, and maybe it was, partly. The moment I touched Pierce I knew it was more universal than that.

The man's comparative weakness wasn't even his only problem. He wasn't wearing his armor, and his clothing was soaked in sweat. I could feel how tense his muscles were. It could have just been his anger, or a reaction to seeing me come flying at him, but it wasn't.

I remembered how the mana had felt like it was being sucked out of me when I was a tier higher than my environment. Pierce was now being subjected to the opposite problem. I knew that my peculiar body made such things worse for me, but that didn't change the fact that the world was pressing in on the human’s weak tier one body.

As soon as I understood that, I understood the danger I had sensed. Pierce's body was already under stress just being in a tier two zone, slamming my paws into him as I was doing could break the man. But it was too late to reconsider.

I was mid-leap, hell, I was already pushing my paws against the man's chest. I couldn't stop myself. Maybe if the System had been active, I could have switched my core and used my mana to turn myself into a stiff breeze. But, though I'd figured out how to switch my core, without the System's assistance I couldn't do it quickly.

I knew there was something I could do, my Concepts were screaming that to me. In desperation, I intentionally gave myself over to them completely.

I wasn't able to follow exactly how I did what I did under their influence, but somehow I sent the energy through Sturdy, Strong, and Enduring. The three Concepts flared strongly, and I sent their power into Pierce as I pushed him away.

He let out a surprised scream as he went flying, I heard him crash into a bush some distance away. I crashed to the ground, landing in an undignified heap. My back burned where Snow's attack had landed, and the cold was sending tendrils into my body.

I writhed on the ground, my claws dug furrows into the earth beneath me. The icy mana kept trying to spread, to infect me, much like death mana often did. It made no headway, Holy resisted it, but it only marginally slowed the spread.

Every time the patch of frost that remained on my back tried to spread, the pain made my vision turn white. For a moment I felt like the pain would take me. I tried to reach for Curious, the Concept had been so useful in the past. With it I might have been able to figure out how to fight off the painful magic. It was unresponsive.

My body was wracked with shivers, I clenched teeth that wanted to chatter from the gnawing cold that was slowly worming its way through my body.

It was shocking, I hadn't felt cold since I incorporated Snow's species into my true form. Then there was the way the pain was hitting me. I hadn't had the Concepts I acquired from the stone tree for very long, but I'd managed to get used to them. Now they were inactive, worse than inactive actually.

The Concepts I had empowered Pierce with were overdrawn to the point that they felt like they were actively sapping the qualities they once endowed me with. I felt fragile, weak, and debilitated by a pain that, on some level I knew I would have ordinarily been able to shrug off.

I wanted to reach out, to switch to my brand new ice mana core. I knew that if I did so, the ice magic would immediately cease to be able to hurt me. But Torill, Pierce and Ivo were nearby, and what I had become when I allowed the fire mana to consume me flashed into my mind.

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I howled in anguish when the guilt I had been prevented from feeling hit me. The pain that had been so all consuming became background noise to the horror of remembering what I had done. I hadn't just killed innocent people, I had consumed them. That I wasn't aware of their existence until I tasted their Concepts didn't matter.

I knew that using my fire mana was dangerous. I knew that losing control was a risk. I had done it anyway to save my own life, and to my great shame, I knew I would have done it even if I had known the cost. I would have liked to be able to tell myself that the danger posed to all of Brightwood by the undead creature getting the crystal figured into it, but it didn't.

Even knowing that death was not the end did not change how I felt. It was my nature. Perhaps I could blame it on Survivor, Angela had been so young when we received that Concept. It was an intrinsic part of my soul now. I could never go quietly, I would fight the end no matter the cost.

Kind, Protective, and even Heroic. For all that I had resisted that particular Concept, they were all things I aspired to be. But Survivor was what I was, there was no fighting that, not in this life. It was a shameful, horrible truth that I uncovered about who I was, and it broke my heart to acknowledge it.

Survivor granted me unmatched resilience, it had given me the ability to run on legs that should not have been able to support me as my entire body was falling apart. It gave me the ability to fight through the worst pain imaginable. But it was selfish, when it came down to it, my survival was the only thing that mattered.

I resolved two things in that time, while assailed by both mental and physical pain. First, I would do better, learn more, and seek control so such mistakes wouldn't happen again. Second, this life would be the only one I lived for a very long time. New soul shards could be made without Survivor, they could have a chance to be the type of person I wanted to be.

While I was coming to those conclusions, my friends had not been idle. A part of my mind was aware of their activities, ready to pull my attention away if needed.

Moments after being thrown, Pierce shot out of the bush he had landed in, full of the rage his class helped him harness. The man was unaware of the Concepts I had empowered him with, though he did know I had done something. The world no longer felt like it was trying to crush him.

His eyes took in my form, covered in frost, writhing on the ground, and howling obvious pain. Torill was standing over me defensively, her hackles raised. She likely had words for Snow, but I didn't hear them.

“Monster!” He yelled, fists clenched in a way that made it apparent that he wished he had his mace with him. He'd had to leave it on the cart with his armor, both had proven too heavy to carry once they had crossed the barrier into tier two territory.

He knew it didn't really matter, he knew the man who had met up with them was a creature far beyond his ability to fight. It was obvious, but Pierce had never been that smart about picking fights. He relied on Ivo for that, and his partner came through for him here.

Ivo's hand landed on Pierce's shoulder. The physical contact wasn't strictly necessary, he could pull the anger away from a distance, but it helped.

“Stop! I sense confusion, regret, and concern. I don't know what he meant to do, but that certainly wasn't the result he was aiming for.”

The great beast clicked his tongue, and sighed in disappointment. He paid no attention to my friends, and looked at me as he spoke in a voice that was soft, but filled with reproach.

“What a foolish cub. What would you have done if I was sending more than a light punishment?”

He grunted, his eyes narrowed as he peered into me, no doubt seeing exactly what I was going through. His voice was thoughtful when he spoke again, this time louder so everyone could hear him, though he was clearly talking to Pierce.

“He'll recover soon enough. He gave much of his strength to you, I think your apparent weakness frightened him.”

Torill, still standing over me, chuffed at him, silent words almost certainly accompanied the noise. He chuckled darkly.

“Yes, I could end the spell, but I don't think I will. It is a good lesson. Perhaps next time he'll make better choices. I suppose that leaping to his friend's defense was commendable, but who is foolish enough to weaken themselves before absorbing a strike? Granted, he is painfully young isn't he?”

“How old do you think he is?” Ivo asked.

“Truthfully? I do not know. It is hard to tell with spirit beasts, harder still with whatever he is. I do know that when he speaks into my mind he feels at once older than you, and naught but a weanling. I would guess that he formed his core within the last year. It is a confusing time for our kind. We do not forget what we were, but a whole new world opens up for us, we have to discover the person we have suddenly become.”

Pierce and Ivo looked back and forth between each other, then at Torill. Pierce whistled, and Ivo elbowed him in the gut.

“Do you think she knew?” Pierce stage whispered.

“What? It's not like he was actually a child. Besides, she is… was? a demihuman. Her people understand beasts better than the best human tamers.”

Torill growled lightly at Ivo. Ivo laughed.

‘Well there you go, she says he's definitely mature enough to make his own decisions in that department. And I'm well aware that he's more than a beast. The insult to my parentage was uncalled for. I can assure you that my parents were married when I was born. You know, Torill sure has changed since she got her new form.”

“Yeah, do you think she'll try to claw my face off if I say she's gotten catty?” Pierce's joke very nearly brought me back to consciousness.

“Funny, but I bet it's the class change. From what I know guardians are serious business in demihuman lands. That the System would shift her from being an adventurer like that? You know how much a class can change your mind. And now she has to deal with politics.”

Ivo's words did what Pierce's joke could not. My mind focused, that was big news.

My eyes snapped open, and I shook the little frost that remained from the waning spell off of my coat.

“Class change!?”