They ended up spending the following day hanging around the island and getting to know the people better. David spent the earlier part of the day off shooting bows with Nosmiles and his son Taju.

They also asked a lot of questions about the Realms.

The Shaman had told them that the other Denizens close in the area were some large, extemely hard-skinned people similar to their myths of trolls. They usually kept small communities of one dominant adult male, four to eight adult females, and their children. When the male trolls began to reach adulthood, they either left their small tribe and wandered alone growing stronger until they could challenge the leader of another tribe, or they'd challenge their father for dominance, in which case they most often died.

According to the Shaman, the inbreeding and short life expectancy had only exacerbated the problems their Spirit's corruption had caused, making them even more stupid and violent. Fortunately, that stupidity and conflict also kept the trolls unable to coordinate any type of attack on Home. But the goblins were still always scouting to see if any were coming close to threaten their settlement. The goblins had to be extremely wary of attacks while they were on a hunt, especially when actually attacking a herd of buffalo or when traveling with their kills.

The Shaman also believed they weren't capable of swimming, which is why she'd chosen the island for their settlement. And they were slow and only used simple stone weapons of crude axes or clubs, making their attacks slow but devastating if they landed.

But they were incredibly resilient, able to withstand blows that would be fatal for almost anything else, and they healed at an absurd rate, making it almost impossible to kill them without using methods such as decapitation, drowning, or fire. The toughness of their skin and their size apparently made decapitation so difficult that it wasn't worth attempting.

However, according to the goblins, when the trolls fought amongst themselves, they would pin their opponents, then pull at the head and bite the neck until the head was torn free from the body. That observation was how the goblins had discovered decapitation was a possible method to kill the trolls, but it was also a powerful testament to the trolls' immense strength and brutality.

The general concensus among the adventurers matched that of the goblins. Trolls were best to simply avoid altogether, if possible.

The Shaman also explained things about how the Realms worked in relation to their own world spatially. They could travel through the Realms to get to another location in their own world, traveling to the corresponding location on Earth through a different portal. Paige verified this by checking the marker on her map to her family's safezone. It still showed on the Realms map.

The scale of the Realms was twice as large, however. So, if Paige wanted to travel through the Realms to her family's safezone, it would take twice as long for her and Levi to make the trip. Plus, they'd be putting themselves in a lot more risk with the presence of monsters and Denizens.

On the other hand, with the time dilation, very little time would actually pass outside the portals. Paige and Levi had discussed it in length because Paige wanted to get to her parents faster by Earth time, if they could. She preferred they reach her family more quickly by Earth time not for her own sake but because Eric had made her aware that there was a possibility her family may not be as safe in a safezone as she had initially believed. The only reason she wasn't rushing everyone to leave was that the time dilation meant that not even a half hour had passed since they'd been inside the Realms, and there were possibly important gains they could make in the Realms they could never make outside the portal.

After some back and forth, Levi had convinced Paige to shelve the discussion until after they were finished inside the portal. She reluctantly agreed but made Levi promise to truly consider it and have the discussion with her later.

Levi also finally remembered to bring up something that had been bugging him.

Figuring the Shaman had the longest history with the system, or 'Law-shaper' as the goblins referred to it, he asked if she knew why the system had removed all music, fiction, and presumably art from their world.

Though she had no exact answer, her best guess had been that the system wanted to promote creativity, and therefore the growth of the Spirit-bonded, by removing competition and increasing demand for creativity. While it wasn't a perfect answer, and Levi could see how that could possibly have more negative affects than positive ones, the explanation made sense in a way, especially if you considered what she had said about the naivety of the Spirits and system.

It also alleviated any concerns that were brewing about it in the back of his mind. They hadn't taken priority due to everything else he'd had to juggle, but they had always been present and nagging.

Though their plans had been entirely derailed, and Joe had added the goblin-rehoming issue to his to-do list for when they left the portal, they'd still entered the portal for a reason. They wanted to challenge whatever was there, maybe get some levels, and if they were lucky, find some good loot.

They hadn't seen anything resembling monsters, quests, or loot--other than the coffee quest--outside the portal. But they knew, now more than ever, it could be found in the Realms.

When they told the Shaman that was their plan, she'd seemed to understand entirely. She told them to give her some time and that she'd have some information for them by the end of the day.

Levi used that time to make more progress with his meditation.

Paige used that time to try out her new traits she'd unlocked with the crows, Avian Bone Density and Crow Wings.

----

"Hey, hey, miss. Maybe start from a little lower, yeah. You ain't got no tail feathers or nothing." The crow's tone seemed concerned.

Paige stood at the very top of the highest wooden structure in the village. Goblins stood below watching, strangely at ease, comfortable in their belief that Spirit-bonded could do all sorts of amazing things. The crow wings, sized to match Paige's body and spread out wide like she was some angel of vengeance, probably didn't do anything to shake that belief.

Something that was entirely new for Paige was that using Avian Bone Density and Crow Wings were draining both mana and stamina. It was at a slow rate, but it was the first time she'd really had to consider the resource comsumption of her Trait Share Ability.

"I'll be fine. I may not be able to fly quite yet, but I bet I can glide." Paige bent her knees and prepared to jump.

"WAIT!" The crow cawed loudly.

Paige paused. "What... uh... crow?" Paige relaxed for a moment and stood up straight. "I'm sorry, but I need to have a name for you. It was different when there was a constantly rotating crow on 'Paige duty,' but it is weird now that it has been just me and you for the last couple of days. I'm going to call you... Blacky."

"No, no. Don't you dare, miss. Or I'll regret not letting you jump."

"Oh, I'm definitely still jumping... but you're right. Now that I hear it out loud, Blacky sounds a little racist. I don't want to be yelling out, 'Hey Blacky, I made you some cornbread,' and then turn the corner to see Kenny looking at me like I just kicked a puppy. I mean, I totally might kick a wolf puppy at this point, but I still wouldn't say some crazy shit like that. Do you know what I mean?"

The crow's beak opened for a second, then closed, then finally opened again in a squawk of an answer. "No Miss, aint got a bloody clue what in the squirrel brained hell you just meant. But if you start calling me Blacky, I will shit on... well, probably not you directly, but definitely... Levi. I will shit on Levi. Try me."

"Well, with that attitude, I'll just start calling you 'Grumpy,'" Paige answered sourly.

"I accept." The crow answered.

Stolen novel; please report.

"Wait, what? Really, you just jump on 'Grumpy' like it's the first guy to compliment you after a bad break-up?" Paige raised an eyebrow and cocked her head. "You do realize that it is not a compliment, right?"

"Assuming I understood half of what you just said miss, and that is a big bloody assumption, then yes. Call me Grumpy. It's a compliment to me and a damned sight better than the other one," the crow, Grumpy, said in an oddly confused yet simultaneously confident tone.

Beast Friendlist Updated - Crow has added the sublabel Grumpy.

Friendship With Grumpy Increased. Mental Communication Unlocked.

Paige smiled at the unexpected notification. "Fuck yeah. That's cool. I'm definitely going to have to try that out later." She looked back up at Grumpy. "Well Grumpy. I'm glad you're here with me, sharing this moment when I spread my wings for the first time. I got lucky that you're the one who came through the portal with me."

"Ah, now see miss, that is sweet. Sometimes I worry about you, think you've lost your marbles and all. Then you go and say something like that." Grumpy fluffed his wings a bit pridefully as he answered.

Paige smiled at him. "Also, thank you for all the advice I'm about to ignore."

And then Paige jumped.

----

Levi sat inside his meditation space, puzzling over a curiosity he had noticed when his cycling and refined essence production was heightened, when the essence became thick like fog. He'd planned on doing this particular meditation near the portal when they arrived, but he'd been interrupted by the goblins' arrival.

As the essence moved out of his Core to the outer rings, some of the essence would sometimes get caught in erratic orbit around the rings rather than entering the ring itself. As it looped and swirled in the odd orbit, it would slowly just fade. Levi had no idea where it went, but the idea that he was losing essence for some unknown reason troubled him. The question had nagged at the back of his mind.

He tried to relax his mind while also focusing on any essence that fell into one of the erratic orbits. They didn't occur constantly or by any predictable pattern that Levi could recognize, but they did occur frequently enough that Levi only needed to apply a little patience and wait for when it did happen.

After three attempts of focusing on the essence, he knew he'd have to try a different tactic. Rather than relying on the mental imagery and visualization he'd created, Levi tried to sense or feel his Core, the rings around it, and the essence.

He was actually surprised that he immediately sensed the Core and the surrounding rings. Holding his focus on the feeling of the Core and Rings, he also tried to feel the refined essence as it was produced from the Core's center. It took a while to get a firm understanding of the way the essence felt, and even when he did, the feeling was very faint.

He shifted all of his attention to the essence exiting the Core as it moved toward the rings. Even with all of his attention on the essence, it was still like trying to focus on a distant sound with other noise all around, or like trying to pick out the scent of a single flower in a botanical garden.

'I bet Paige could do both of those things, easily,' Levi thought.

That thought was distracting enough before the surging thoughts of Paige that followed. First, he thought of her wild grin and disheveled look the night before. Then he thought about her eyes the night she'd worn makeup and the way her slitted pupils would sometimes expand into dark orbs when she looked at him. Then he was remembering how they had done exactly that the night before, as his hands had gotten a little too urgent and greedy after a kiss. And he remembered the feeling of her soft lips.

They hadn't ended up sleeping together, but Levi was pretty sure that was only because both of them were filthy from the day and needed a bath. At least, that's what had made him stop himself, and she had seemed okay with that, happy and content in the moments they had shared.

He felt his heart was pounding and a smile was on his lips... and he suddenly realized he wasn't even meditating anymore. He'd gotten distracted and completely lost his focus.

He felt somewhat frustrated for a second, but the smile he wore from the night he'd had with Paige never left his lips. He stood up and stretched. He decided to meditate while going through the slowsets for a while, hoping that may give him some insights. If nothing else, it would keep his body from getting too stiff. He hadn't realized he'd sat for so long in meditation.

As his body moved on it's own, without Levi even being aware of it, Levi was back into his meditative state. This time it was easier to find his way back to feeling his refined essence as it was cycled through his Core and flowed toward the orbiting rings. After a few attempts at following the strange rogue orbits of essence around the ring, Levi felt like he was finally on the verge of understanding something. He never actually felt the essence vanish, it felt like it was still there, just out of reach.

Levi closed his eyes to focus on the feeling. The vague notion of how odd it was to close his eyes within his meditative state, when the eyes of his real body were already closed to begin with, flitted across Levi's mind, but he dismissed it before it could distract him.

His focus narrowed in on another of the disappearing anomalies, entirely focused on feeling it, following, and blocking out the visualization of his spiritual landscape.

As his focus locked onto the essence, it suddenly felt different. He no longer struggled to maintain his focus, but instead, it felt like he was being pulled along with the essence as it made it's way to wherever it went.

And then he was standing, eyes open once more, in what appeared to be a different meditative landscape. In front of him was a huge tangle of essense. It looked like a knot of essence strings, and he knew that was where the essence had went. Looking around, he saw more of these knots, forming a large circle, though they were sporadic and unevenly spaced, all of varying size, and some clumped together.

He realized he was inside the main ring around his core. At least, in a way. It felt like this place and the ring overlapped somehow but weren't exactly occupying the same space at all. A higher or lower dimension?

Levi quickly dismissed the thought before he spiraled into trying to understand that. Taking in the greater surroundings, he realized he could still see his other meditative landscape from where he was inside the ring. He could see his core, his mana and stamina channels, the ring he was in... and even the faint secondary ring he usually had a hard time seeing was easily visible. Except the colors were wrong.

It wasn't quite like looking at a photo negative or an inversion of colors, but it was very similar to that.

Yet the knots of essence stood bright in this landscape, shining tangles of essence strings.

Levi stared at the tangle in front of him for a minute thinking about what he should do. With his will he tried to pull at a string of essence and see if he could begin to untangle it. He pulled one loose string free, and held it there for a moment. Then released his will power, and the string of essence snapped right back to where it had been before.

Levi looked around at all of the knots again. They were all obviously within the ring, but he still didn't see a pattern to any of it. Not their size, placement, or the way they were individually knotted. He wasn't sure if messing with them was a good idea, but there was only one way to find out. Without risk there was no reward.

He began walking the ring, looking for the smallest and simplest knot he could find. Before he could find what he was looking for, he felt a rumble that seemed to come from his first meditative landscape. Something tugged at him, trying to pull him out of this new place.

With a raw power that surprised himself, he forced his will upon the pull and his internal landscape, both this new meditative place and the old one. 'NO. Keep me here, no matter what.'

With a ripple, Levi watched his own willpower pour out and seize control of everything within his spiritual universe. He noticed some sparks of energy in his mana and stamina channels, but they didn't seem to be anything even at the level he usually saw when he activated his abilities at low levels.

Dismissing a problem that had clearly been solved, he continued his search. After a while, he finally found what he was looking for, one of the smallest knots of essence. He was sure he could unravel this one.

Before he could begin, a new burst of essence suddenly began streaming into this new meditative space. He watched as the thick, bright strings of essence poured in, knotting into a ball as he watched. He tried to apply his will again against the new tangle of essence, to stop its formation, but it was like trying to catch a tsunami in a bucket.

Rather than fight against it, he dismissed that too, deciding to focus on his task.

His focus tightened sharper than he'd ever experienced before. And he got to work on the knot in front of him. It was like he was possessed by the purpose he'd set himself to when he'd entered this place. And piece by piece, string by string, he unraveled the knot.

----

Paige had crashed hard. Three times. She broken her summoned wings twice. It had taken half a healing potion each time, even after unsummoning the wings, and her shoulders still ached. But the forth time, she'd managed to pull herself into a turbulent glide, landing on her feet roughly.

As much as her shoulders ached, Paige was satisfied with her small win. Calling it quits, she decided to go find Levi. She wanted to see if he'd ask to spend some time with her later that night. She'd drop a lot of hints if she had to. If that didn't work, she'd ask him. If he still wasn't understanding what she was meaning... well, she'd get as direct as she needed.

All day, she'd been trying to distract herself. Jumping from high places and broken bones had really helped her clear her head. But she just couldn't escape from the thoughts of how his hands had unapologetically explored her body. She felt an ache in her lower abdomen at the thought. God, she needed more, she needed to feel all of him.

She tried to put the thought out of her mind as she looked for him. It wasn't easy. Fortunately, a certain crow did help.

'Can you still hear me, Miss?' Grumpy said through their new telepathic link.

'Yes, I can still hear you,' Paige answered.

Grumpy was flying around attempting to find the limits of their mental link.

Paige found Levi by the shore, eyes closed, doing his slowsets. She guessed he was probably meditating. Instead of being an asshole, she decided to let him finish, content to sit down and watch him.

'Can you hear me now?' Grumpy suddenly cut in again.

'For fuck sake, AT&T, yes I can hear you. Grumpy, can you please take break? Go find some corn or something. I am about to be with Levi,' Paige answered, frustration flooding her words through their mental bond.

She felt the hurt as he answered, but knew he'd quickly get over it. 'Well, fine then, miss. No need to be so rude about it.'

It was honestly kind of fascinating to see him move through the Tai Chi moves. And his calm expression and smell gave her comfort, too. She'd never actually gotten to experience him without sensing that tension he had inside him, either on his face, his body language, or his smell.

Well, except that night before, where all she'd felt from him, all she'd smelled on him, was desire. 'Stop it, Paige. You can't do shit about that right now, so don't get yourself worked up.'

At that moment he only smelled like a calm, if sweaty, Levi. So she wrapped her arms around her knees, switched one of her Beast Traits to her new wolf friend Sombo's sense of smell and just watched and smelled Levi as he moved.

After an hour, when Levi was still moving through his Tai Chi forms with his eyes closed and no hint of stopping soon, Paige decided it was time to disturb him. She grabbed his shoulder and shook it lightly. For a moment, less than a second really, Levi paused. And then Paige was gasping for breath.

It took her a moment to realize she was on her back. She hadn't even registered Levi's movement. As she got to her feet and backed away from him, she saw he'd already resumed the slowsets. But his eyes were open, and out of them shone a white glow.

She tensed as she watched Levi. He looked like he wasn't there, at least not mentally. He smelled like no emotion, just empty sweat and skin. How had she not noticed sooner? But she was certain, Levi wasn't there.

Concern and panic pieced through her, and she rushed up to him, trying to shake him out of whatever trance he was in. Then everything went black.

Paige woke up 10 meters away with the taste of blood in her mouth. She got to her feet shakily, realizing she'd been knocked unconscious. Finding some presence of mind, she pulled out a healing potion and drank half of it. Then she ran to find Joe and the others.

Something was very wrong with Levi.