“I gotta say, you’re even crazier than I thought,” Kahl exclaimed before clapping Reivyn on the back and guffawing.
After the incident on the beach, Kahl came and found Reivyn walking back to the Adventurer’s Guild. He had heard that a crazy foreigner had swam into the depths, so he came to see if his new friend was alright.
After a brief explanation that Reivyn hadn’t actually dived into the depths but had just looked while underwater, Kahl shook his head and dragged the trio to his favorite establishment. The Shifty Eye wasn’t just a bar. It was a normal restaurant. It was just a regular place for Kahl’s group to go to unwind.
Kahl kept a careful eye on Reivyn as they walked to the restaurant and ordered him a drink after they sat down. Reivyn had already recovered from the ordeal, and he didn’t feel any lingering effects, but he wasn’t going to turn down a free drink.
“So what exactly did you see?” Kahl asked, finally unable to contain his curiosity.
“It was a kraken,” Reivyn replied simply.
Kahl stared at him, not understanding the word. Reivyn gave him an inquisitive look.
“I don’t know what that is, kid,” Kahl said with a chuckle.
“Oh. It was a giant squid. It was way beyond the deep end, well into the Tier 8 border, but its body still went from sea level to beneath where I could see it. It had tentacles that were at least dozens of miles long.”
“Ahh,” Kahl nodded his head in understanding. “So you saw a little guy.”
“A little guy?!” Reivyn sat back in his chair. Kefira just sat with her chin in hands, glancing back and forth between the two. Serilla stood behind her with a stoic expression.
“Sure,” Kahl confirmed. “The true behemoths aren’t large enough to get that close to our Region. I, personally, have never seen any, but we have the accounts from those that didn’t go completely crazy. More than one said they could see beasts hundreds of miles away so large that they looked like they were regular sized creatures.
“If the bottom part of this ‘kraken’ was extending below the view of the seafloor before it dropped off, then it was a lot closer than hundreds of miles away.
“So… did it do anything else? Some other accounts have mentioned getting feelings of intense malice from the gazes of the creatures they’ve seen. It’s probably one of the main reasons for them going crazy.”
“Well, yes, but it was weird,” Reivyn replied.
“Weird, how?”
“It acted like it was going to snatch me up with one of its tentacles - that’s when I freaked out and started rushing back to the shore - but then nothing came of it. Once I was on shore, I felt a mental connection with it, and it laughed at me.”
Kahl stared at Reivyn for a few seconds before he threw his head back and laughed. He slapped the tabletop as he immersed himself in his mirth. After several long seconds of laughing at the top of his lungs, Kahl wiped a tear from his eye before looking back at a nonplussed Reivyn.
“Haha. It was messing with you!” Kahl said. “It was basically flexing on you, like when someone jerks their shoulders with a provocative attitude.. You know what I mean?”
Reivyn thought back to what happened and nodded his head.
“Yeah, I can see what you mean,” he said.
“Haha. I didn’t realize a Tier 8 monster would have a playful side to it,” Kahl said, still chuckling.
“You call that playful?” Reivyn quirked an eyebrow at Kahl.
“Of course. It did it purely to amuse itself. That means those monsters have a certain level of intelligence. I wonder what Tier monsters start having more self-awareness? We only have the example of this one Tier 8 monster. That leaves a huge hole between Tiers 5 through 7.”
“Yeah, but you also pointed out that the other creatures others saw only got a sense of extreme malice,” Reivyn pointed out. “That sounds like typical monster behavior as opposed to what this giant squid did.”
“Maybe there’s just a higher chance that an individual monster can awaken, or whatever, at a higher Tier?” Kahl speculated. “No idea, and it’s not really that big of a deal. Just an idle thought.”
Reivyn stroked his chin in thought before shrugging.
“Eh, we’ll find out one day or we won’t.”
“Cheers to that!” Kahl lifted his mug and clinked it with Reivyn’s. “Take every day as it comes. That’s my motto!”
Reivyn shook his head and smiled. He took a sip of his drink before turning to Kefira.
“What do you think?” He asked.
Kefira didn’t shift from her position of resting her chin in her hands. She just flicked her gaze to meet Reivyn’s as she shrugged.
“I don’t know of any stories from our family elders in the inner Regions mentioning anything about higher chances of sapient monsters,” she said. “It’s either not a significant difference among Tier 5 monsters, or it’s something else.”
“Speaking of,” Reivyn said, “What are your thoughts on making a trip to the Tier 5 outpost your family holds?”
“Of course I have plans to go some day,” Kefira answered. She looked at Reivyn for a couple of seconds. “Wait. Do you mean right when we get back?”
“Well, not right when we get back,” Reivyn said. “Maybe in a few months.”
“Do you think we’re ready for that? You just reached Tier 3.”
Kahl was in the middle of taking a swig when Kefira said that. He immediately jerked forward and sprayed the mouthful of liquid out in astonishment. He stared at Reivyn wide-eyed for a moment.
“You just hit Tier 3?” He asked. His mouth worked, but no sounds came out. He finally got himself under control. “How long ago are we talking? What Level are you?”
“I just hit Level 10 after clearing the Dungeon,” Reivyn answered.
Kahl leaned forward and rubbed his forehead in consternation. He held a hand up to Reivyn to forestall him.
“Give me a minute,” he said. He took several deep breaths before sitting back up, facing Reivyn once more. “So you mean to tell me the kid who’s better at any weapon you could think of than all of the guardians on the island is an actual kid who just reached Tier 3?”
“Well… kind of?” Reivyn answered noncommittally. “I mean, I purposely held off on advancing in Level for a good long time to shore up my foundations. It took a while to reach Transcendence with my weapons Skill and my Tier 1 Affinities.”
Kahl just blankly stared at Reivyn. The two sat facing each other, nothing being said, for an extended period of time.
“I think you broke him,” Kefira finally spoke up, giggling behind her hand.
“‘It took a while,’” Kahl repeated. He shook his head vigorously to clear his thoughts. “Boy, you’re even more of a monster than that supposed kraken you mentioned. ‘It took a while,’ ha! The highest Skilled guardian on the island is low-Tier 5, and his highest Skill is 95.
“What about your dad? I noticed he’s pretty handy with a variety of weapons, too.”
“Last he told me, he was sitting at Level 110 for his weapons Skill,” Reivyn nodded his head. “Just fifteen Levels higher than that other guardian.”
“Fifteen Levels! Ha! Level 100 to 101 is basically another hundred Levels right there. I can’t even imagine what it takes to keep going higher. Just fifteen Levels higher.”
“Well, I’ll grant that reaching Transcendence is its own difficulty, but Leveling the Skill after that doesn’t require that much effort. It’s not like you have to achieve Transcendence for every Level above 101. Do you not know the rules regarding Transcendent Skills?”
“Nope,” Kahl shook his head. “It’s so rare out here, nobody’s bothered to find out unless they actually achieve it, and it’s been a long time since anyone has. Life is pretty peaceful out here.”
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“Pretty peaceful,” Reivyn said. “Yeah, except for the horde of calamities just a couple dozen miles offshore.”
“Nah, they won’t come down to this Region,” Kahl shook his head. “Not enough Mana density for them, for one. Anyway, don’t try to change the subject!”
Reivyn chuckled.
“There’s a bottleneck every fifty Levels after achieving Transcendence,” Reivyn answered. “You have to achieve a new Transcendent ability to go higher, but it can be discovered at any time, unlike the initial ability, which I believe requires a Skill Level of 100.”
“I mean, I guess that’s good to know,” Kahl said, slightly shaking his head. “Your blasé attitude about these topics is… Well, anyway, what’s your Soul Strength?”
Reivyn was taken aback at the sudden question.
“My Soul Strength?” Reivyn asked back.
“Yeah. Is it some sort of secret, or something?” Kahl asked. “I could understand with the amount of talent you’ve shown, but it’s typically not a secret, if that’s what you’re worried about.”
“It’s not a secret, per se,” Reivyn said. “I’ve just never had it tested. I have no idea what my Soul Strength is.” He tilted his head in Kefira’s direction, glancing at her for approval to reveal her information. She gave a subtle nod. “Her Soul Strength is seven.”
Kahl let out a low whistle.
“Well, technically,” Kefira qualified. Reivyn gave her a curious look. Kefira glanced down and back up quickly. Reivyn followed the motion and remembered the amulet she wore around her neck.
Oh yeah, her Soul Strength is halved, Reivyn realized. So her Soul Strength is actually 14! If geniuses have a Soul Strength of three, it really makes sense that her soul is too strong for her body.
Wait, how is she wearing the pearl necklace gear if she already has a necklace on? Did she turn its suppressive effect off? I’ll have to ask her later.
“You guys are insane,” Kahl shook his head. “I’m going to make myself dizzy with all this head shaking I’m doing.”
The three continued their conversation, Serilla a silent spectator, for a bit longer. Kahl’s goal of ensuring Reivyn was fine after the debacle was accomplished, so they didn’t stick around after the one drink.
He clapped Reivyn on the shoulder as he stood up.
“I’m glad to see you’re alright,” he said. “It could have been worse, though it might not have been with your Mental Resistance Skill. That trinket from the Dungeon that provides some protection really only works against the Sirens’ illusions.”
“Thanks for your concern, Kahl,” Reivyn said, also standing up.
Kahl just nodded.
“The drink’s on me, but now I have to get back to my men. I’m still technically on duty even though we’re not on patrol.”
“All right. We’ll catch you later.”
Kahl smiled and walked out of the restaurant. Reivyn sat back down at the table. They were already here and it was close to lunch time. There was no reason to go back to the Adventurer’s Guild to only have to leave again to find something to eat.
Serilla sat down at Kefira’s insistence now that they were alone, and the trio enjoyed a nice lunch.
—
The next day, Reivyn returned to the beach with Kefira and Serilla. He didn’t practice his Stamina control, though. He and Kefira just stayed in the waist-deep water level, and Reivyn kept his head above water.
They did leave the beach a little early to go to the Dungeon so Reivyn could get some practice in. He really didn’t want to take the chance of accidentally looking where he shouldn’t, so they had all agreed to conduct all underwater training and experiments inside the Dungeon.
It didn’t take any extra effort to remember the trigger to freely control his Stamina and use it as a substitute resource. Reivyn simply confirmed he could do it and got a baseline for how long he could extend his breath per Stamina Point expenditure.
It wasn’t exact, but Reivyn found that approximately 5% of his Stamina Pool resulted in a “full breath.” He was satisfied with that information.
They didn’t linger in the Dungeon after that. Kefira and Serilla didn’t have anything to do, and Reivyn needed to contemplate how to come up with a training program for the others. He couldn’t put into words how he felt on the spot. The best he could do is vaguely point them in the right direction, but he wanted to do more than that.
He spent the rest of the evening, aside from eating dinner with Kefira and his father, contemplating how to devise a training regimen for his friends.
—
Reivyn found himself back in the Dungeon the next morning. He had told Refix about his encounter in the ocean, and his father wisely chose not to tempt fate for their breath control training.
“I know I said we didn’t need water to hold our breaths and work on the Breath Control Skill, but it will help with unlocking the Skill,” Refix explained, mainly to Teilon. “We’ll use the Skill during normal training after everyone’s unlocked the Skill, so we’re only going to be in here for as long as that takes.
“Reivyn has discovered and verified the crux of the issue for activating the Hard Mode,” Refix continued. “It’s a bit more complicated than simply unlocking a new Skill, though, and the Breath Control Skill might actually help you all learn the method.”
“What’s the method?” Teilon asked, holding his hand up slightly.
“Stamina can be used as a direct substitute for oxygen,” Reivyn answered. “Directing Stamina to your lungs and burning it will re-energize you with a full breath.”
“Oh, is that all?” Teilon said, rolling his eyes. “Couldn’t be simpler. Just manhandle our Stamina, direct it to our lungs, and burn it. Why didn’t I think of that?”
“Yeah, I’ll admit it’s a bit tricky at first, and I had an advantage in that I had manually activated a Skill before. I’m pretty sure this is a training method leading to that goal, and I had skipped this step entirely. The good thing, though, is that I can help you all figure it out with my experience, and once you get it, it’s super easy to replicate.”
“Alright, enough wasting time,” Refix cut it. “We’re going to unlock the Skill, Level it up during routine training, and then we’ll see about learning to control our Stamina directly. We might be able to piggy-back off of this Skill to help direct our Stamina to the right location if you’re having a hard time with it.
“Ok, everyone in the water.”
Everyone, including Refix, jumped into the water and swam a little ways out.
“So what’s the plan?” Teilon asked.
“It’s simple, really,” Refix answered. “Expel your breath completely, go underwater for as long as you can, surface, take a deep breath, immediately expel it, go back underwater, rinse and repeat until you unlock the Skill.”
“Oh, joy,” Teilon said, sighing. “I can just imagine how exhausting this is going to be, especially later when we’re doing this in the middle of other training.”
“It’s good for you.”
“I know, I know. It just wouldn’t feel right if I didn’t complain at least a little bit.”
Everyone chuckled.
They didn’t waste anymore time, though, and everyone expelled their breath and got to work. It wasn’t too much of a strain on them at first, and Reivyn had already done something similar while working on his Stamina workaround. The first time down, everyone lasted close to ten minutes. Kefira was the only exception as she had the lowest Vitatliy, but she still managed almost nine minutes.
The morning was spent bobbing up and down in the water. They would take a deep breath, expel it, then go underwater. There wasn’t much else to do, and it was a very repetitive form of training.
Slowly, the amount of time they could stay underwater got less and less. By the time Reivyn was surfacing every five minutes, his vision was beginning to go dark around the edges. Even without drowning, he was beginning to experience the side effects.
Reivyn didn’t lose any Health, but his vision slowly got more and more tunnel-vision. His Divine Sense Skill negated the effect for the most part, but even then, if he didn’t pay attention his perception would narrow considerably.
The time limit continued to shrink. Reivyn didn’t pay attention to anyone else’s progress. He was fully focused on the task at hand. His vision got more and more narrow until eventually he felt a pulse centered on his lungs, and his vision once more widened considerably.
The blinking Notification in the corner of his eye caused him to return to the surface to check it out.
New Skill Unlocked!
Tier 3:
Breath Control (0 ->1)
Reivyn nodded his head in satisfaction. He finally looked around to see everyone else’s progress, but he was the only one done with the task. Even Refix hadn’t unlocked the Skill previously, and he was still working at it.
Well, no reason to rest on my laurels, he thought.
He took another breath, expelled it, and rejoined the others in their training.
—
“That sucked!” Teilon gasped as he laid on the floor at the entrance to the Dungeon.
It had taken another couple of hours for everyone to unlock the Skill. Kefira had been the second to succeed. Refix and Vyria had been next, almost unlocking the Skill at the same time. Reivyn assumed his dad and Vyria were around the same talent level. All the other evidence, aside from anything to do with a sword, corroborated the idea.
“I’m really not looking forward to doing this while training,” Teilon said.
Kimberly sat next to him and patted him on the back. She nodded her head in agreement at the statement. She was usually a bit more stoic than Teilon, but she was in full agreement this time.
Everyone had suffered to unlock this Skill. The training method basically amounted to all of them feeling like they were on the edge of losing their breath for several hours, straight. The one deep breath followed immediately by expelling the breath and going back down only prolonged when drowning would kick in. After a couple of cycles, the side effects of drowning, including the sucking feeling in the lungs, persisted.
“Well, you’re in luck,” Refix said. For once, he didn’t chuckle at his student’s complaining. “For one, it took a lot longer than I thought to unlock the Skill, so no more training today.”
“Yes!” Teilon sat up and pumped his fist in the air.
“Or maybe we should,” Refix said skeptically.
“I mean… cough, cough,” Teilon flopped back down on the ground.
Kimberly just rolled her eyes.
“Anyway, the second good thing is that now that you have the Skill Unlocked, the side effects of holding your breath for an extended period of time will lessen. It will take longer to manifest, and the time intervals will extend. It will only get better as you Level up the Skill.”
“Yeah, but then we have to strain the Skill more and more to Level it up further,” Teilon pointed out.
“I never said it was perfect,” Refix shrugged. “Anyway, we’ll meet back up on the beach tomorrow morning. We’ll try and Level the Skill up to ten or so while Reivyn figures out how to teach us how to use our Stamina manually.”
“Wait, you don’t know how to do it?” Reivyn asked. He had always assumed his father already knew how to do it.
“No,” Refix shook his head. “I’ve been fairly traditional with my advancement. By the time it was appropriate for me to start learning the Skill, I had you and the girls. I had other things to concern myself with, so I’m actually a little behind in this aspect.”
“Oh… that actually makes me feel better,” Reivyn said. Refix quirked an eyebrow at him. Reivyn hastily explained himself. “What I mean is, I get to help you figure it out. I feel like I’m getting to pay you back for all the guidance you’ve given me over the years.”
“You know you don’t have to pay me back for any of that.”
“I know. It still makes me feel good, though,” Reivyn smiled.
“Alright, we have time for that later,” Teilon said, hopping to his feet. “I need to catch my breath.”
Reivyn and the others chuckled. Kimberly laced her fingers in Teilons, and the two walked out of the Dungeon. Kefira looked up at Reivyn with a smile and sparkle in her eye. Reivyn smiled back, and the two followed suit, lacing their fingers together, as they exited behind Teilon.