Lan woke up shivering, which was nothing strange considering where he was. The ice he had slept on melted slightly while he slept, meaning he got to experience the joys of waking up inside a puddle.
"Is this really the grand life of a pathfinder?" He bemoaned, extracting himself from the puddle.
All things considered, he was used to the cold. So, his numb fingers and dull toes didn't frighten him. Instead, he felt a twisted sense of nostalgia. It brought him right back to the times he slept on the street.
Not that being homeless was a fond memory for Lan. It's just that no matter how bad it was, that was still his childhood. He couldn't help reminiscing.
'It feels so long ago now… Why? Just why did he do it?' A man in a bloody suit flashed across his vision.
A shudder even more substantial than his shivering ran through Lan's body, and he shut that line of thought down. Locking it up tight and throwing away the keys.
Despite doing his best to block the thoughts, his neck still ached. Lan rubbed it uncomfortably; he could still feel the hands there. The grip like steel, the dead eyes he had once known, the blood…
"Fuck, I need to get started," He roused himself. One thing he had found over the years was that doing something, anything, helped far more than moping about whatever had gone wrong in your life.
And so, he did something.
Walking to the edge of the cave, he placed his hands in the river. Cold water rushed over his numb hands, stinging slightly.
He looked down through the crystal-clear glacial water. At the bottom of the river, strange, prehistoric shelled sea creatures scuttled across the sea floor, nibbling on dark green strands of seaweed.
Out of curiosity, Lan reached down through the water, trying to touch one of the alien creatures…
Like lightning, another thought hit Lan over the side of the head. "What if, instead of just using my ability to shoot water, I make it more adaptable. If I could control water like a limb, I could use it to enhance weapons or even create them if I could turn it into ice."
'Okay, first, I need to understand my talent better. It says that anything I touch, I can use as a weapon. Could I expand that to something my mana was touching? Seeing as mana does kind of feel like an extension of my body,'
"It's worth a try."
Lan began by pushing mana out of his arm, but the rushing water current ripped it away as soon as he generated it. After a few failed attempts, he decided his approach must be wrong.
'Instead of just pushing mana out of my arm, I should try and give the mana some structure, something that will keep it together when it's out of my body,'
What that structure would be remained to be seen.
While trying to think of something, the image of a rope got stuck in Lan's head. Although each strand isn't particularly strong, they become greater than the sum of their parts when woven together.
'The problem is, how do I weave mana into a rope?'
For the moment, this stumped Lan. He had no idea where to even begin with something like this.
A few hours into the testing process, Lan looked up. He could hear flippers slapping on the ice in the cavern behind him.
Turning around, he noticed that the whole flock of Dref was on the move, and the same was true on the other side of the river.
As one, the Dref walked to the side of the river, pausing at the banks. Instead of getting in, they began to organise into orderly rows, one behind the other.
'What are they doing?' Lan wondered, taking a break from experimenting to watch the proceedings.
He had been at it since early morning, and by now, the sun was directly above him. As the temperature rose, the plants on the riverbed began to bloom, a process as breath-taking as it was surreal.
Pink and red flowers blossomed on the dark green seaweed, making the riverbed look like an ornamental garden.
But contrary to this beauty, the scuttling sea creatures that scoured the riverbed were fleeing in their droves. It seemed the arrival of these flowers struck fear into the underwater creatures.
'Why are they running? Or what are they running from?' Lan shifted his gaze upstream, where a faint foam could be seen rising on the water's surface. Further upstream, the whole river was frothing like boiling water.
At the riverbank, the Dref stood at the ready, silently watching the disturbance grow closer. And when the bubbles were within a few hundred metres of the Drefs' Cave, they sprang into action.
With well-oiled precision, they slid into the water. Lan felt like he was watching an army march as they swam in perfect unison through the water, gliding in formation towards the centre of the river.
The Dref had picked a spot in the middle of the seaweed and began swimming in formation across the river's width. In the middle, they met their rivals, but instead of fighting, they joined hands… Or flippers in this case.
'What are they doing?' Lan craned his neck up the river, trying to see what exactly was coming.
With the bubbles bearing down on them, the Dref started floating in place, only swimming to fight the current. As one, they opened their beaks, leaking a dark green substance from within.
Instead of dissipating in the water, the dark green substance behaved like seaweed, waving like the plants when buffeted by the current.
As more dark green filled the river, each Dref's little string joined together, creating a vast net across the width of the river. A net that was almost indistinguishable from the seaweed that filled the riverbed.
"Oh, I see," Lan muttered, scrambling to get closer to the water to see just how the Dref were getting their mana to move like that.
Clenching his teeth, Lan stuck his head underwater, trying to get as close to the mana as possible.
Thanks to this decision, he got a full, first-hand view of what came next.
Beneath the bubbles, thousands upon thousands of newly hatched, bright pink salmon swam furiously towards the blooming flowers on the orchard of seaweed.
Like passing locusts, they devoured the flowers in a matter of seconds, moving from plant to plant in a furious feeding frenzy.
Their momentum was unstoppable, until they reached the net.
It bulged, straining against the massive force but stubbornly refusing to break. Endless salmon swam into the net, desperately trying to break through to no avail.
'Are the Dref moving?' Lan wondered, noticing that the net hand began to enclose at the edges.
It seemed the salmon had noticed this as well. The closer the net got to closing, the harder they swam. Thrashing their bodies with every ounce of life they had.
At that moment, while the net was bulging and straining to the very limit of breaking, Lan saw it. Like an oasis in the desert, he figured it out.
Just to confirm, he sent out a few tendrils of mana, using the water as a medium. But before the tendrils could be blown away, he wound them together as tightly as he could manage. He could only create about 50 tendrils before his head started throbbing violently, but it was enough.
The rope wouldn't hold up any bridges, but for now, it would do. He sent it through the water towards a nearby salmon.
His movements were clumsy initially, but the more practice he got, the nimbler his control became. With a deft flick of his hand, the rope of mana and water snaked around a salmon, gripping it tightly.
That day, Lan had salmon for lunch. He felt contended as he sat beside a crackling fire in the alcove, stoking it with dried tinder he had dug from the snowy forest upstream.
He was close, so close. Right now, he had the blueprint for his skill, the foundations. What remained was to decide how high he should build.
'I could make it more intricate, possibly even stronger, but that would take time. With only nine days left now, I don't want to spend all my time making a skill. I still need to complete five steps, the dungeon I got from Archie and make sure I end up with enough points to get into the top 100,'
For now, Lan's skill was basic, but that straightforward nature left a lot of room for growth, which he fully intended to take advantage of when he had the time.
As he watched the flickering flames, a thought occurred to Lan. 'Does the medium I channel mana through have to be water? Why not air, fire, earth, even space could work.'
Immediately, he tried to weave a mana rope in the air, and it worked to an extent. But for the rope, what gave it strength wasn't the mana but the water.
It was like trying to build furniture entirely of wood glue. In this case, the water is the wood, and the mana the glue, binding the individual parts together and giving them structure.
To remove the solidity and flexibility a fluid gave to his rope, Lan was left with something that could barely move a pebble. Even when he gritted his teeth and poured half his mana reserves into the rope, the most he could do was pick up the salmon he had half eaten. It wobbled unsteadily in mid-air before falling after a few seconds.
'I can't see that doing much damage in an actual fight, but if I work on it… This could be deadly. Imagine I'm fighting someone, and it's a really close battle. How would they react when a knife floated up behind them and started attacking all on its own?'
Just thinking about it got Lan excited, but that was all it was in the end. A thought. Deep down, he knew he couldn't execute this right now.
Sighing, he shook his head and focused on the feeling the mana rope made when he created it.
Every time he created one, a fleeting rush of mana passed through his body, always in the same way. If he could just capture that sensation and analyse it, his skill would be as good as made.
Hours passed, and his mana continuously ran out, but Lan created rope after rope without fail. With every rope he made, he learned something new.
The next rope was always better than the last, always more flexible or stronger or faster to cast. He wouldn't stop. He couldn't stop until he was done.
Time slipped by at a blistering speed as the noon sun began to settle below the horizon, sinking deep behind the glacial ocean.
Through the night, Lan cast his rope over and over again. Practising on the Dref by trying to capture them while swimming. Each successive casting was more accurate, and bit by bit, he was learning.
When he applied what he had learned from the Dref, narrowing the rope and increasing the water pressure. It took on a sharp, almost cutting quality like a high-pressure hose. Lan had seen those cut through steel and knew just how dangerous they could be.
As the stark morning sun rose again on the glacial paradise, Lan finally figured it out. What followed was the most beautiful sound he had ever heard.
Ding!
Alert: Skill created: Mana manipulation (String)
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Effect: Binding mana strings together creates a flexible and sturdy medium to carry objects. The resultant stings are almost as effective as an additional limb, with added range. (Adding a medium to conduct the mana strengthens the strings)
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Cost: Initial: 1 – 50 mana (Dependent on desired strength of the rope) Cost per Second: 10% of the initial cost.
At that moment, Lan felt like the blazing morning sun was dwarfed by the subtle glow of the system. That notification was his entire world. His painstaking efforts had been worth it! He had done it!
"Let's go!" Lan yelled, laughing as he activated the skill for the first time.
A blue stream of mana flowed from his hand, separating into 50 individual strands before weaving together seamlessly. What resulted was an ethereal rope floating in the breeze above his hand.
Thanks to it officially becoming a skill, Lan felt as though the casting process was smoother and the result more complete.
The first thing he tried was his scythe. With a flick of his wrist, the rope wrapped around the base of the scythe, pulling it towards him.
'It's so slow… and it can barely pick the damn thing up,' Lan bemoaned, not that he hadn't expected that to happen.
Walking over, he grabbed the scythe and continued on to the river. The rope sank into the river, and water flowed up all 5 metres of its length.
Concentrating, Lan began to apply pressure, condensing the rope. As he bound the individual strings tighter, the rope went from its original thickness of an inch to half a centimetre.
Lan decided It was ready when the water on the rope's surface began to shimmer, vibrating back and forth with a low hum.
"Let's see how strong this thing is," Lan muttered, flinging back his arm.
He picked his target, a log floating down the river, and his talent kicked into gear. Lan shifted his weight onto his backfoot and leaned back, twisting his body to generate the most force possible. Like a coiled spring, he unwound, lashing out with the rope like a whip.
The blue whip tore through the space between Lan and the log in barely a second, cracking as it obliterated the metre-thick chunk of wood.
The initial cut was clean, surgical even. But the resulting impact blew the log into splinters that splashed back down into the river.
"Wow…" Lan held up his hand in shock, looking at the whip with a mix of fear and awe. "It's… It's even stronger than I expected…."
Congratulations on a successfully created skill – Time taken: 37 hours 45 minutes (Below average)
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Skill quality – Above average, bordering on excellent. Grade – B
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Reward: 8 Mind stat points.
"Why Mind? Does Mind have something to do with creating and using skills?" Lan wondered. 'It seems like every damn stat point is useful,'
Porting begins in: 3… 2… 1…
Lan waved goodbye to the Dref and disappeared into nothing, not a soul having known he was there to begin with.
For a moment, the world went black. But as fast as it came, the feeling passed. Once again, Lan had returned to the tutorial.
"Home sweet home," He sighed, taking a deep breath of the stale air that was crying out for a breeze.
'I wonder how long I have left,' Was Lan's first thought the second his feet landed on the forest floor.
As much as he would have liked to relax and take it easy, he couldn't see that happening any time soon. The time crunch was just too pressing, and he needed to know exactly how much time he had left.
Time remaining – 8 days, 5 hours 35 minutes
"Well, shit,"
While he was using the system, Lan decided to check up on his profile.
Name: Unknown
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Title(s): [Punching Up] [Class Of Your Own] [Disciple of David][Epiphany(Temp)]
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Age: 18
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Race: Human - G
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Class: None
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Talent: Weapons are my Weapons - G
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Health: 676/676
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Mana: 340/340
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Level: 9
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Strength: 67
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Dexterity: 48
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Endurance: 54*
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Vitality: 39
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Mind: 40
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Intelligence: 34
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Luck: 32
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Free Points:
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Skills: [Strengthen – F][Mana String – B]
"Damn, that sure is a lot of stat points. The problem is that they are fairly balanced right now. If I want the mana string to be my primary weapon, I need to put more points into Intelligence and Mind. But if I do that, I will lose out on all the points I could put into Strength and Dexterity. Is it a waste of my talent to move away from physical fights and use mana more instead?"
For the moment, Lan was stumped. He decided that before he allocated any more skill points, he would ask Archie, Morgan and Rachel how he should move forward.
'Actually, where are Morgan and Rachel? I haven't seen them in days. Hopefully, they are okay.'
***
Morgan and Rachel were not okay.
***
Lan wished them well and stepped out of the forest. One thing he had noticed was that whenever he returned from a trial at the steps, he never arrived at the same place. Presumably, that was a measure to stop ambushing someone right after they reappeared, but it was also a pain in the ass trying to find the path back to the town.
Exhausted from the night spent relentlessly practising his skill, Lan wandered through the forest, deciding to grab something to eat before he made his next move.
It wasn't long before he found the path and, with it, the smell of war. Blood stains spattered the path, beginning to fade into dark brown stains on the cobbles.
'Is this the aftermath of the riot? But that one fight couldn't possibly have caused all this damage… Unless there were more after I left,'
Lan took a second to figure out which direction he was headed and set off, walking towards the town.
Every person he passed heading towards the sheer steps looked grim. Locked jaws and tight grips on their weapons showed they were ready to kill, not wait in line.
He could practically feel the tension in the air as he neared the town.
The town looked like it had recently suffered a meteor shower, with hundreds of buildings having disappeared since Lan was last here. In particular, the buildings around the town square had been torn down, leaving only scraps of wood and ash.
Lan walked through the gates into the city, feeling searching gazes land on him the second he stepped foot in the town. He was certainly a fascinating figure.
Standing over six feet tall and rail thin, Lan looked like a ghoul with his blood-soaked robe hanging off his body in tattered shreds.
Perhaps this image stopped people from approaching him, despite the naked greed he saw in their eyes as they stared at his scythe.
On his way to the city square, he took a detour, checking on Rachel's house. When he arrived, he was greeted with a heap of splintered wood, collapsed in a pile where she had used to live.
Shaking his head, Lan moved on. He wasn't sure how to contact Morgan, who was probably off with his party, so he decided to leave them be.
As for David, George and Thea. He would be glad just to avoid them for as long as possible. If they ended up killing each other, he would be the winner in the end.
After finishing his detour, Lan made his way to the city square. As he grew closer, the smell of broth and the incessant hum of conversation drifted over.
'There are more people than I expected,' Lan noted, keeping an eye open as he stepped into the square.
It was far larger than before, fire having razed many of the surrounding houses to the ground. In the centre were the ever-present bubbling cauldrons of broth, around which a dozen or so pathfinders queued for food.
Facing off on opposite sides of the square, the two factions shot threatening glares at each other.
The Moon strider, led by the almighty Prince.
The King of the Night, Led by the Farmer.
'Maybe I should make my name like theirs. I could be… The Homeless, The Bellhop, oh, what about The Stow Away?' Lan joked to himself, making his way to his side of the picket fence after grabbing a bowl of broth.
There were about 30 people in all on the King of the Night's side. They all looked rugged and, for the most part, wore school uniforms, which were worse for wear. They were standing around a large oval table and pouring over various maps of the tutorial in almost religious fervour.
Noticing Lan's approach, they scowled, tense hands reaching for weapons.
"Woah," Lan raised his own hands in submission showing he wasn't carrying a weapon..
"Stop right there," A girl shouted, getting up from the table she had been sitting around.
Lan nodded, finishing his bowl of soup and sliding the wooden bowl into his pocket, "I'm stopped."
The girl raised an eyebrow at his odd actions but left him be. She turned around and gestured towards a short boy on the edge of the table.
"Edgar, come with me," The girl ordered.
Edgar, a short, rather frail-looking boy with pale brown hair and freckles, nodded, getting up. He followed the girl, a rustic redhead with tanned skin, towards Lan.
They stopped around 10 feet from Lan, where Edgar stood sheepishly behind the girl.
"I am Niamh; this is Edgar. Edgar doesn't like lies. In fact, he hates them so much you could say he's allergic. If he so much as hears a lie, he'll break out in hives… If you catch my drift," The girl looked pointedly at Lan.
"Yeah, yeah, I get it. No lies from me. I wouldn't want to hurt Edgar," Lan said with a smile.
"That's what they all say," Edgar mumbled glumly.
Niamh rolled her eyes at Edgar before asking her first question, "What faction are you a member of?"
Lan smiled, trying and failing to diffuse the tension, "The King of the Night,"
Hearing this, Niamh glanced at Edgar, and when he remained blissfully free of hives, she relaxed a little.
"What is your business with us? I can assure you now the Farmer needs no more farmhands. If you were looking for a free ride to the top 100, I'm afraid you've come to the wrong place,"
Lan frowned, "Aren't you guys supposed to be the faction leaders? Why are you already planning for failure? Isn't there a plan to kill the Moon Strider or something?"
Niamh laughed sharply, "Killing the Moon Strider? What do you think this is, a charity?"
"Huh?"
"The Farmer has one goal: to be number 1 in the tutorial. He cannot waste his time on this useless endeavour. Just let the Prince handle it, the little perfectionist she is," When she spoke of the Prince, scorn almost dripped off Niamh's tongue.
'So, they only care about individual points and not what happens to our faction… As long as they get into the top 100, they couldn't care less who goes down with the ship.' Lan recognised, feeling glad he hadn't fallen out with Archie. He would need that little bastard's schemes if he wanted a hope in hell of killing the Moon Strider.
"Fair enough, what I have come to talk about isn't related to that whole issue anyway."
"Oh, please tell me more," Niamh drawled.
"I need two people to enter the fourth step with,"
Immediately, there was a change in Niamh's expression, and the people behind her began to listen closer.
"I overheard the cooks talking about your… Situation."
Niamh scowled, "Yes, that. It can't be helped that nobody is willing to enter a group battle with the strongest people in the tutorial,"
"I can help,"
"How?" Niamh asked excitedly.
"Like I said, I am looking to enter the fourth step and need two people to accompany me,"
Just as she looked eager to agree, a tall boy with raven black hair ran up and grabbed Niamh's shoulder, "Hold on a second, why would you be so eager to go in with us? You know there's no chance you win, right?"
"I have my reasons," Lan said evasively.
The boy squinted, looking Lan up and down, "What level are you?"
"9," Lan replied shortly.
The boy checked with Edgar, who remained hive free, "I see…." He muttered, looking Lan up and down again.
"Are you okay going in with two level 12s? We will definitely have a massive advantage,"
"I am," Lan nodded; level 12 was nothing compared to his stats. Although, he wasn't 100 per cent sure how strong a class made someone. When he was reminded of George's insane strength, he wondered whether that was a result of his class working or his talent.
The raven-haired boy nodded grimly and motioned for another man around the table to stand up, "This is it, Nate. Only one of us is going to win this one,"
Nate, a pudgy boy with short brown hair and the beginnings of stubble, stood up, his expression similarly grim.
"It's just you and me, Reed," Nate cracked his knuckles as he walked towards the raven-haired boy.
"No offence," Nate added, glancing at Lan, "It's just that there's no chance of you winning,"
"None taken," Lan smiled broadly, looking for all the world like he had just opened a Christmas present.
'Being underestimated is a gift in its own right,' Lan mused, following the two boys out of the square and to their doom.