As Wyatt activated the sacellum, the world dimmed and everything went quiet.

He looked around, but he was now in a blurry dark void, the only things present himself and the sacellum.

A message appeared.

You have 4 ⦗Essence Orbs⦘

How many would you like to consume?

It still isn’t going to tell me what it does? I should have asked the others first.

But he had expected a message, not to be shrouded in blurry darkness.

Is this how Patrick is level 2? He and Camila were standing near it arguing when I got here…

He tried out his Analyzer skill.

Sacellum

Consume various items to increase your power

No option to use an Essence Orb for more information.

He mentally instructed the sacellum to consume one orb. All the ones he had left were level 1, so it didn’t matter which it used.

The shrine glowed and the orb floated out from his belt, absorbing into the shrine.

⦗Essence Orb⦘ consumed

A bolt of lightning shot out through the darkness and struck him.

You have been empowered

He frowned. He didn’t feel any different.

He tried to check his status, but found he couldn’t.

The moment he wondered how to get out of whatever this was, the blur fell away and he found himself standing in front of the shrine, Kevin shouting something about getting them killed at him.

No time passed? Or was he yelling at me the whole time and I just couldn’t hear it? I couldn’t see them, but maybe they could still see me.

Ignoring Kevin, he looked at the group, settling on Brandon. “Do you know what giving it orbs does?”

“The sacellum? You give it orbs and it levels you up.”

“That’s how he’s level two,” Camila grunted with a gesture at Patrick. She seemed really pissed at him.

So you level up with Essence Orbs, but they’re also used to fuel Analyzer. I wonder if that’s the only kind it can use. If so, then I’d basically be spending experience points, giving up leveling up to identify things. That seems like a bad tradeoff in most cases. And what’s the difference between a sacellum and delubrum? Do they give different things? Is one better than the other?

“Did anyone beside Patrick level up?” Wyatt asked.

Tyler raised his hand.

“How many orbs did it take?”

“One.”

“What level was it?”

“Uh, three, I think.”

Wyatt turned back to the shrine. Kevin tried to push him out of the way, but he was immovable.

Right, I’m still running energy into my rune shield and it’s increasing my mass.

He didn’t even notice anymore.

Can only one person use the shrine at a time?

Ignoring Kevin’s struggles, he reactivated the shrine.

The world dimmed and blurred around him, and he used two of the remaining Essence Orbs he had, leaving him with only one.

The result was the same as the first time, but when he’d used up the third, he did feel different.

Sacellum is diminished

Must recharge

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Oh. Maybe that’s why Kevin was upset.

He backed out and checked his stats.

Wyatt Willaby Johnson

Level: 1

Stats:

• Nervous System: 13

• Immune System: 9

• Hard Tissue: 11

• Soft Tissue: 11

• Energy: 6

Skills:

• [Debuffer]

• [Analyzer]

• Empty

He’d leveled up, but other than that, all his stats were the same. But he felt stronger somehow.

Is that just placebo, or am I actually stronger in some way that’s not represented by my stats?

“You drained it again!” Kevin shouted at him.

Patrick laughed for some reason.

“You don’t look like you have orbs,” Wyatt said to Kevin.

He threw up his hands, then winced at the strain this put on his injured foot. “That’s not the point! It keeps them away when it’s charged.”

Wyatt frowned, thinking.

What would it keep away?

“Monsters?” he finally asked, only to realize Kevin was no longer standing in front of him.

This being sucked to another world—or wherever this is—has really hampered my burgeoning social skills.

And he’d been doing so well. He was pretty sure most people thought he was normal.

I’m level one, so, there’s that.

It actually was quite exciting.

Okay, my stats haven’t changed, so what has?

Wyatt paid attention to the Energy running into his shield and titan skin. If it took any less from having leveled up, he couldn’t tell. The rate it drained him felt the same. Same for how fast it was regenerating.

Not my stats, not my Energy, skills seem separate… So what’s the benefit of leveling up? Maybe I’ll need fewer stacks to fully affect a monster with Debuffer now? Better resistances? That would kind of make sense.

He suddenly remembered the level 10 skill ball item he had and retrieved it from his belt.

He used Analyzer on it.

Skill Balls

Level: 10

An item capable of storing skills.

Use ⦗Essence Orb⦘ for more information

Storing skills? As in my own?

This time when he ran Energy into it, it worked and a message appeared.

So I was too low level when I tried to use it before? A ten-level gap. Maybe that’s the limit?

He read the message.

Choose skill to embed

He frowned, and picked Debuffer.

Nothing happened.

He tried focusing more narrowly on Disgorge.

The skill suddenly activated with the ball as the target, draining some of his Energy.

⦗Skill Balls⦘ charged

Balls charged: |Disgorge| × 1

Balls remaining: 9

There’s ten of them? It looks like there’s only one. Weird.

I can imbue skills into them. How is that beneficial? It felt like it took the same amount of Energy as it normally did, so that wouldn’t be a benefit.

Unless…

He waited, seeing if his Energy would regenerate.

After a minute it had. He checked the charges on the skill balls. Still one charge.

He tried another Disgorge.

⦗Skill Balls⦘ charged

Balls charged: |Disgorge| × 2

Balls remaining: 8

That felt like it used the same amount of Energy. Could I discharge it at once, adding two stacks to something for the price of two single stacks?

He looked around at the group, but quickly dismissed the idea of testing it on any of them.

There’d be monsters soon enough.

The group were all huddled together around Emma, listening as she explained what happened to them after they’d died.

Stowing the skill ball away for now, he approached Tyler, who was listening with rapt attention.

“Did your stats increase when you leveled up?” he asked him.

Emma stopped her explanation, and everyone turned to look at him.

I really need to work on how loud I talk.

It was something he’d always struggled with. When he was little, he’d spoken so quietly no one could ever hear him. Now he had the opposite problem.

Tyler blinked, looking at Wyatt. “Huh? Oh, nah, it’s separate Bro.”

“Maybe don’t drain it next time,” Kevin grumbled.

Wyatt put on a half-smile. It may not work on Kevin, but he was in a bad mood today, even before this. “Yeah, my bad. So it protects you?”

Tyler shrugged. “No? The monsters won’t go near the shrine, but I wouldn’t say it protects us.” He held up a bandaged arm. “They can still hit you from a distance.”

Brandon nodded. “Not sure if it’s ranged attacks or only skills.”

“I feel stronger,” Wyatt said. “But my stats are all the same even though I’m level one. The only other thing I can think of would be resistances.”

“Oh yeah,” Brandon agreed. “Essence Orbs let you level up, but you need Augment Orbs for stats. I’m not positive, but I think resistances are exactly what leveling up boosts. Like, to attacks from skills. It doesn’t make your skin tougher or anything, not to normal attacks. But the ratapua have this skill where they shoot out spikes, and the level 1s didn’t pierce Patrick’s skin after he leveled up, but they did Tyler’s, even though Tyler has a higher Soft Tissue stat and the spike hit Patrick in the face instead of the arm.” He motioned at Tyler’s bandaged arm.

“Ratapua? I don’t recognize the name,” Wyatt said, looking questioningly at his professor.

Professor Dave shook his head. “It’s not from any myth I’m aware of.”

The high-school teacher, David, agreed with Dave for once.

“It means something like spike rat,” Camila said. “And it’s not from any myth. Not an Aztec or Mayan one.”

“They’re different in other ways, too,” Brandon went on. “One was level seventeen at first, but then it split apart into a bunch of lower-level versions. It was weird though because they were all the same size. And they had these inside of them instead of orbs.” He pulled out a small crystal from his pocket.

“What does it do? Wyatt asked, even as he examined it.

⦗Shard, Level 1⦘

Brandon shrugged. “No idea.”

“Have you tried to feed the sacellum these?” He was thinking of the message his Analyzer skill gave him about consuming various items to increase power.

Brandon nodded. “Yeah. Didn’t work.”

He used Analyzer on the shard.

“What was that?” Brandon asked at the flash of light. It was only a dim glint, so Wyatt was surprised he’d caught it in the bright sunlight.

Shard

An undifferentiated shard of power.

Use ⦗Essence Orb⦘ for more information

He tried using his Reformation Orb on it, but got a message he’d never received before.

Invalid prototype for desired action

Wyatt thought for a moment before nodding to himself. “Okay, we’re going to go over all the items we have and everyone’s skills. We—”

Kevin scoffed loudly. “You guys just waltz back in like nothing happened and take control? How’d that work out last time? Oh right. You left, and stranded us on that fucking pyramid.”

“We died,” Emma shot back. Carlos tensed and raised his crossbow again. “Saving your asses.”

Kevin rolled his eyes. “You—”

He was interrupted as a giant snake-monster crashed into the makeshift camp, carrying the corpses of three smaller but still massive snakes.