“I think I figured out what the skill is really doing,” Naran said.

“Oh, what is it?” I asked as we got up for the day.

“It is a repair skill. It is stretching out the physical properties of what it is used on. That is why it didn’t feel right when I used it on myself,” Naran explained.

“So, if you sword was hit with acid, it only fix the pitting by pulling from the rest of the sword,” I worked out.

“Yes, at least that is what it feels like. Based on my sword’s weight.” I nodded at that. “That has some disturbing implications.”

“Some maybe, but not that many. Repairing gear and a sub-par healing skill combined is quite useful. Try it with my Acid Shot,” I said.

“Imbue Reform,” Naran said and poked me. Acid Shot. Acid Shot. I did one attack next to the other to compare. The first had the imbue skill applied to it. Comparing the two, it one Naran’s skill had been applied to melted more into the ground.

“It is a physical property mixing skill and type. If an enemy has a way to repel acid off its surface, then it would be useful. Otherwise, not very much,” I said and shook my head.

“So, repair work only then really,” Naran said.

“Just about. The extra stuff is what takes it from good to great. But the energy cost is too high in combat. It isn’t a combat skill. Repairing equipment damage is a big find, even more so when we go all in on enchanted gear,” I explained.

“Makes sense, any other ideas?” Naran asked me. I shook my head and then paused.

“Try on a rock and push it into another rock?” I suggested. Naran picked up a rock and did exactly as I suggested. The rocks were kind of welded together, but the interface was very weak and the rocks were easily snapped apart.

“A poor man’s solution to welding. A horrific torture technique. But repair is the best function, with everything else just being bonus utility,” I said with a shake of my head. My earlier excitement had been tempered a bit. This was not the magic skill to end all skills. It was still definitely top four, which was why I was going to get it myself once I had another skill slot.

It was the perfect utility skill, filling several niches. Also, the last new skill I would be getting for a long time. With the hassle of upgrading the city store to level 4, I was scared to think what level 5 and beyond would look like.

We set off for the day. It wasn’t long before there was a smell in the air. Even with my bad sense of smell it was nauseating. Like raw sewage. We kept going forward and eventually came to a brown lake. There was an island in the middle of the lake, and it was clearly an island.

I looked at the brown water. I looked at Naran who looked at me. He shook his head slightly. I winced and nodded slightly. He tilted his head forward and glared a bit at me. “Fine,” I said with as much exasperation as I could put into it. “Let’s do plan boat,” I said. After the salt lake I had a plan.

“What boat, may I ask?” Naran said while looking around like a boat would just pop out of thin air.

“Stop messing around, we go to the swamp to the South, and cut down a giant tree. Use acid to melt out the center, we have a boat,” I said.

“Fine, fine, but if we fall in, I am blaming you, that is disgusting. There are chunks Michael. Chunks!” Naran gestured at the foul lake. I winced at that. But dungeon, and skill point.

“Just scenery,” I replied. Naran rolled his eyes.

We made our way counterclockwise around the lake and then turned to the South. The swamp apparently cut South further to the West, so it took a while to reach it. Once we did, I picked out a large tree.

There were a couple of deer that appeared to be made of mist. Acid Shot x2. That took care of the monsters. One skill to rule them all, one skill to kill them. Or melt them as it were.

Acid Shot x3. Acid Shot x3. Acid Shot x3. I had to keep reapplying the acid to melt it through enough. The terrain was quite resistant to damage, especially the plants. That did not bode well for the level 4 jungle zone.

Naran slammed his palm on the side of the tree and toppled it over. It floated in the swamp water at least, which was a good sign. Acid Shot x3. Acid Shot x3. Acid Shot x3.

I melted the top portion of the tree to leave us with a trunk about 15 feet long or about 5 meters. Naran got on the front end, and I went to the back end. We lifted the log up with some difficulty and got in out of the swamp.

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Naran then got on top of the log and began hacking downwards with his buster stick. He notched the middle so the acid could pool there.

Acid Shot. I aimed it carefully at an angle down the length of the log. The acid mostly rested in the notch melting out the center of the tree. Once the previous acid was gone Naran turned the tree to dump the wood sludge out.

I repeated the skill. Acid Shot. Once that acid was gone Naran dumped out the sludge again. He then began whacking down some more to dig into areas that the acid didn’t completely get to.

Acid Shot. I used the skill one last time, melting out the interior to more than halfway through the tree. Naran dumped out the sludge one last time. We then pushed the log back into the swamp water to test it. We had to be careful to keep our balance, but it worked. I was in the front, Naran in the back with his massive sword to keep the nose of the canoe pointed upwards.

“Going to try and move us, Air Burst.” I prepped the skill first. Then I braced my body inside the carved-out tree. I activated the skill and the canoe shot forwards, rocking rapidly. But it worked. That was the key thing. We got out and carried the canoe back to solid ground. Naran hacked up four branches as makeshift paddles. They weren’t that good, but hopefully we would be hopeless.

He used Imbue Reform on the canoe several times to smooth out the bumps and the hacked appearance. The changes were minimal, but they added up over the day and would keep adding up. Also it was interesting to see the skill at work.

We got some distance from the swamp and out of the range of the foul lake smell and called it a night. “It needs a name,” I said.

“What, the canoe? Well we are going onto that…lake. Any ship or boat would cry going into water like that,” Naran replied. I winced and was forced to agree. Heba had prepared sliced fruit. Fethee had spent most of the day chasing down gray ants and white chickens in this part of the deadlands. He had checked in a couple of times during the day, so we weren’t that worried about him.

“Yeah, I really don’t want to go out there. If there is a really good skill, I am going to cry,” I said.

“Doubt it. I mean the large dead tree was easy, but had a great skill,” Naran said.

“While we figured out where all the shit goes in the Systemic Lands, at least,” I said.

“It should be illegal. Chunks Michael. Chunks. Why? Who in their right mind would design something so terrible. Even the swamp water is better,” Naran complained.

“Well if it is like the other salt lake and spring, there is a poo spring,” I said with a grin.

“Just squiring out of the ground? No… just no. Maybe the Ritualist tripped and fell into the shit. This should be illegal.” Now that was a great thought. If I did manage to catch him alive, it was hard decision to skin and salt him, or to drown him in the foul lake.

Why not both? Skin and salt him and feed him that water with chunks. I grinned at the idea. I could taste the closeness. He was alive and we were closing in. He would need to pull out an army and at least four breakthroughs to have a chance at even slowing me down. The Ritualist’s days were numbered.

The journey made the end all the sweeter. I would just take the foul lake and blame it on the Ritualist. Was it fair or reasonable? Absolutely not, but he was an easy person to blame for everything, even the foul terrain.

Fethee returned for the night with lots of level 2 crystals. Good to see he was working on catching up. We went to sleep with a midnight clear.

The next day, Fethee cleared the path. Naran and I carried the canoe. Heba pulled the cart. The smell hit us long before we reached what was trying to pass as water. If we had to suffer so did the other two people on our team. We all advanced to the lake. Naran and I had spare shirts wrapped around our nose and mouth.

The smell was trying to dig its way through my nose into my brain. The foulness was horrible. Almighty System, I was having a hard time coming up with anything with how horrible and disgusting this was. We very carefully moved the canoe onto the lake. I got in first while Naran held the canoe stead.

Fethee then held the canoe while Naran carefully got in and we got our balance. At least that was one nice thing about the Body stat or the Mind stat, one of them was helping with balance and body control, maybe both.

Regardless, we were not about to tip over any time soon due to that. If there was the risk of falling in, there would be no way I would risk this. “Good?” I called out.

“All set,” Naran called back through his cloth mask.

“Air Burst.” I prepped the skill, braced myself, and then activated it. We shot off across the foul lake. I ignored the chunks moving to either side of our canoe. “Air Burst.”

My eyes were watering slightly from the stench. Naran was on lookout for monsters and to adjust our course with a paddle at the rear of the canoe. I was focused on propelling us and keeping an eye on where we needed to go, directly in front of us.

The island came closer and closer. I had to stop to recharge my energy twice, but eventually we reached the island. Just a short distance in front of us. It was a chicken island as light blue chickens rushed forward leaping up into the air. They were a bit bigger than Earth chickens. Oh, there were a couple of white chickens trying to brain blast us.

Oh no. They were rushing into the foul water to get to us. I was about to use Acid Shot and then stopped. That might melt the bottom of our boat out since the acid would spread out. “I am going ahead!” I called out. I stood up and leapt off the front of the canoe, making sure I didn’t push down too hard, just enough to clear the canoe.

“Air Burst!” I shot over the monsters in the foul water and reached land. Acid Shot x10. Acid exploded into existence all around me, killing the chicken monsters. The few in the foul water came out of it and rushed at me. There were chunks on them, which was more of a threat than the monsters themselves.

“NO!” Acid Shot x5. They were quickly melted. Naran paddle the canoe the rest of the way to the cleared beachhead. I then helped drag the canoe ashore. Naran tossed the paddle away. There was a reason we had spares. We would have tossed the canoe away as well, with what was stuck on the bottom, but we needed it to get back.

“I am going to need therapy from this. The canoe almost flipped when you leapt off,” Naran said heatedly and glared at me.

“But it didn’t all good. I will pay for the therapy, haha,” I forced a laugh out.

“Let’s just get this over with,” Naran said with a heavy sigh.