Chapter 17: In need of rescue.

He couldn’t find it. He had progressed well into the level 40 zone, but he hadn’t seen one new monster. Currently, he was killing a lot of level 41s, but still couldn’t find a single one of the new enemy type. There was going to be one, right? It wouldn’t make sense if the pattern just stopped.

But it would make way less sense if the pattern continued forever. He still didn’t have much of an idea about why this place existed, but it was unreasonable to assume that the enemies would just continue getting stronger forever. The closest he could come to an explanation was that the godly presence that healed him created this place for some reason. Be it in an attempt to recreate a less bleak realm, or a training ground just for him.

...That was a bit too narcissistic. Although, his Titles did imply he was quite special... well, there wasn’t any conclusive evidence so he just had to go on.

The wait and suspense, combined with the disruption of a pattern he relied upon was driving him crazy. The Void Beholder Skill was actually quite helpful at keeping him sane. Having a few of them patrolling made him a bit less paranoid, and the option of using them to investigate anything suspicious was comforting.

At first, he was worried that he had been caught in an illusion far stronger than the Yellow Knights’, but blasting Voiding didn’t make anything happen. And if it was strong enough to ignore Voiding, then there was nothing he could do, so why worry?

Another possibility was that it was still an evolution of the Yellow Knights, but one that specialized in their stealth capabilities instead of their mind-fuckery. He was working on an upgrade of Void Beholder to counter that.

The final, and most dangerous possibility was that the new enemy was so powerful that they spawned extremely rarely. Well, not final. There were many more possibilities, but those ones felt the most likely.

Trent was broken out of his paranoid speculation when one of his beholders noticed some movement. He had it go toward the commotion.

It seemed like an Abyssal grunt was chasing a Lost Velder, but the Velder didn’t seem all that... lost. There was an expression of panic on its face, and it acted a lot like a human. It also stood straighter and looked prettier than the normal ones. That wasn’t him being creepy, it was straight up more beautiful. The Lost Velders were quite ugly due to their expressions and had lots of imperfections that this one didn’t have.

It was quite androgynous like the other Velders and wore simple clothes quite unlike them. He could assume that this was likely the new ‘enemy’ type. The question was whether it would be hostile. Well, he should probably save it now and worry about that later.

The... person, until proven otherwise, was slightly faster than the Abyssal grunt at full sprint. But the grunt’s Endurance was second only to its Vitality, so the situation wasn’t sustainable. As he flew using Levitation in the direction of his beholder, the fleeing demon pointed behind at the grunt chasing it and unleashed a fireball.

Trent noted that the fireball wasn’t very good for damage, but it did knock the grunt back quite a bit. Assumedly, it had been altered for that purpose. That, along with the obvious investment in Mind, probably explained why a higher tier creature was struggling to get away from a simple Abyssal grunt.

He got closer to the commotion with his real body and could just barely see the two. Fortunately, they were heading towards him. He was only barely faster than them even when pushing Levitation quite hard. It would take a while to get into accurate throwing range at this rate. This was the ‘problem’ that was caused by having such a ridiculously inflated Perception stat. He could see them from far off, but he took a long time to cover the distance.

That also tied into another can of worms. His method of attack. His only vector of reasonably dealing damage to the foes he faced. It was just basically shooting a cannon at everything. Which was not subtle, careful, or safe. His latest Skill pick had solved the danger his own attacks posed, but it made things even worse for anyone else that happened to be in the crossfire.

He had to be careful to ensure that he didn’t just kill the person he was trying to save. Wait... he wasn’t thinking about this carefully. The fact that this was the first actual urgent confrontation that he couldn’t take his time to prepare for was messing with his head.

Directing his beholder, he got it directly into the way of the Abyssal grunt. Pushing with his will, he shaped a small aura of Voiding out of his drone. It was weaker in every respect from being used through a proxy, but it got the job done. The grunt was immediately halted by the momentum negation property.

The demon person ran for a bit longer before looking back and coming to a halt from confusion. It started running again when it saw that the monster was still moving, but he could see its eyes linger on the winged ball of void that was his beholder.

The person he saved wasn’t running as hard anymore and was seemingly more aware of their surroundings. At least, they quickly noticed Trent flying towards them and stopped. They stared warily at him as he landed some distance away. Trent used Identify on them.

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Velder (Lv. 44)

Thanks, useless. I never could have told you that on my own.

The two stared at each other for a bit before the demon spoke. “Was that you?” it nodded towards the still slowly advancing grunt. Trent was a little silent as he tried to form an answer, and the demon mistook it for something else. “I mean, was it you who did that to the Abyssal grunt?”

Trent snapped out of his thoughts. “Uh... yes. It was. That’s my Skill that slowed it down.” He paused again. The demon lowered its head and fidgeted a bit. “Um, thank you very much, but... wha—who are you? And why is your level so low? And what is with your Titles!?”

Trent had enough presence of mind to recognize that what was happening was peak introvert to introvert conversation. His social awkwardness hadn’t been helped by all his time alone in this place. “Ok. I’m Trent, a human if you know what that is. And my level is so low because I started at level one and the enemies don’t give enough experience to go higher. The Titles show that I’ve done certain things. They don’t actually do anything besides show up in Identify.”

The demon’s eyes widened. “You’ve leveled up fourteen times!? How?” Trent held up a hand. “Can I ask some questions first?” The demon startled, and then nodded rapidly. “Sure!” Trent rallied his best extrovert impression. “How can you speak... English?” “English? The... language? Um, Velders get the Ability Universal Language Comprehension.”

“Ok. What is your name?” He asked. “Talos. Um, nice to meet you, Trent?” The now named Talos responded. “Talos, are you a guy or girl? Or something else?” Trent said. Talos blinked, confused. “I’m a guy, but why does it matter?” Trent thought about it and answered honestly. “It doesn’t. I just couldn’t tell, so it was bugging me because humans are weird like that. Actually, you seem pretty similar to a human. Do you know what I'm talking about?”

“I, guess? But why would you think that in the first place? I don’t have boobs.” Talos spoke hesitantly. Trent snorted. “I’ve never seen a girl Velder, so all I had to go off was Lost Velders which are totally androgynous. Ah, sorry if it’s offensive to compare you to them.” “You’ve never seen a girl? Then... why did you want to know if I was a girl or guy?” He tilted his head. “Oh, and that wasn’t offensive.”

Talos POV:

Trent laughed awkwardly at his question. “Well, I've seen plenty of humans, just no Velders besides you. Anyways, enough about that. Can I kill the grunt, or is there a reason not to?”

Talos snapped his head towards the slowly approaching enemy. He still had no clue how Trent was slowing it down like that. There wasn’t even any mana that he could sense with his high magical Perception. The creature was still steadily getting closer, and they would have to run again before long. “Yes, please kill it if you can. I totally forgot about it. But how are you going to--”

A sonic boom resounded, and gusts of abrasive force beat against Talos’s skin. His eyes snapped towards where Trent stood languidly, with a slightly smug expression on his face. “Like that.” Trent said with a grin. Talos looked towards where the Abyssal grunt had stood. In its place sat a shaped crater unlike anything he had ever seen before. It wasn’t the melted rock that a powerful fireball left, that was for sure.

“How? I didn’t even feel any mana. What the hell are you?” He demanded of the mysterious ‘human’ He identified Trent again, as if that would change the ridiculous result.

Human (Lv. 15) Titles: Prodigy, Runeforger, Trailblazer Run Manipulator

Barely a third of his own. Level was never the deciding factor in the epic fights Corgan regaled him with, but that was within a couple of levels. This human would have a third of his own stats at that level. Less, because if he was this low level, he couldn’t be part of a high-tier species. But... was that the absolute rule, or just what his people had seen so far?

Back to Trent:

Maybe he shouldn’t have done that. It should have been obvious that all showing would accomplish was frightening a potential friend. And by god, did he need a friend. He decided that it was probably best to apologize now. “Sorry about that. I just got excited and wanted to show off. Sorry…”

Talos stared at him with wide eyes “How?” He asked. “Was that the result of Runes, like your Titles? Why are you so strong?” Trent thought a moment about how to tell him without revealing his secrets and weaknesses. There didn’t seem to be a point in pretending to be weak, and he didn’t have to reveal all the fine details to give him the appropriate idea about his power.

“Sort of. The Runes in my Titles refer to the runic structures of Skills. Wait, do you have Skills?” He asked. Talos shook his head. “No, I don’t think so? Can you explain what they are?” He questioned in response. Trent thought about how to explain. “Well, they appear in your status sheet; they have descriptions of what they do, as well as things like their cost, I guess. They are powers, things that you can just…do. Like this.” He raised himself off the ground with Levitation.

“Oh, so they’re like Spells? Or maybe Abilities? No, more like Spells since you can create them.” Talos looked curiously at him as he floated. Trent touched back down to the ground. “Maybe? I don’t have any stats in magic so I don’t think I could use Spells, but I believe that Skills are harder to create than spells. Seeing as I got a three-in-one Title for making just one. And also, you get a free one every five levels.”

“Oh!” Talos exclaimed, as if he had figured something out. “You gain more than just stats for levels?” Trent suddenly realized that there was a huge amount they each didn’t know about the other. “Ok, can I explain some things, then you tell me a bit about Velders? I’m not even from this place. Like, I come from somewhere with a bright blue sky and literally everything is different.”

…

“No levels? No STATUS?! What are your starting stats?”

…

“I can’t imagine that at all. All Velders can understand we aren’t in a normal place, but we don’t really know what ‘normal’ is. I think Language Comprehension helps with that though.”

…

“It’s only been a year since you appeared here? I’m twenty years old and I can’t kill a single grunt…”

“Wow.” Talos had gotten a bit more comfortable around Trent over the course of his tale. “This feels like the start of some tale of the ages. Not that I’ve ever seen a book.” He looked up with a spark of conviction in his eyes. “If you ever get a Skill that allows you to get back to where you came from, or, anywhere besides here really, please… can you take me with you?”

Trent smiled. “We shall see. Now, can you tell me about your people, Velders? You have given me some idea, but it seems so odd that a society could exist in this place.”