Vorn wasn’t sure if he should be grateful for his greatly enhanced attributes at this point or not. For all that it felt like he wanted to sleep for an entire day to just get over that… experience, he just couldn’t. After two hours he was fully rested and bursting with restless energy. Energy that he just couldn’t be bothered to spend.

He just wanted time to himself to process, but his body was actively working against him. four hundred CON didn’t let you feel slow or sluggish. Didn’t give you the privilege of your body reflecting your emotional state. It just felt wrong. His eyes didn’t even puff up from crying.

He had just gone through the single most traumatic experience of his adult life and he felt fine. Physically, at least.

Mentally… Well, he was doing better than he thought possible, but not great. He was in a state of kinda sorta exhaustion that he couldn’t really describe with words. His mind wasn’t exactly exhausted, but there was a sense of fatigue that lingered at the edge of his consciousness. Did high Attributes give you trauma resistance? Was that a thing?

Vorn couldn’t help but wonder. Perhaps it wasn’t resistance per se, but rather expedited recovery? He couldn’t know for sure, but maybe someone had written about it.

Slowly, he brought himself out of bed. Rowan was being oddly silent, but Vorn wasn’t going to push it. He wasn’t exactly feeling particularly chatty, either.

The walk to the library was automatic. He didn’t need to think about the route he had traversed so many times, so he just let his mind wander. Vorn wasn’t exactly lost in thought, he was more so purposely keeping his thoughts occupied. He tried to avoid thinking about his recent experience as much as possible, but as much as attempted such, it just kept coming back to him.

Rowan was an immense help, but he didn’t understand the full scope of what had happened. What he didn’t realize was that his perk, [Synchronized Mind] was a part of him. It didn’t so much combine them equally, it more just brought elements of Vorn’s personality into him. He was the dominant host.

Vorn wasn’t disturbed by that fact, it was his perk. It was honestly to be expected.

But what that did mean was that Rowan didn’t get the full effects of Vorn’s abilities. He only gained about half of their power and not every effect.

For some unknown reason, Rowan’s perk completely ignored the enhanced cognition effect of [Learning]. Whether it was because his perk saw it as anachronous to Rowan’s personality, or unnecessary, Vorn didn’t know.

What he did know was that time was two times slower for him, and that was disregarding his enhanced thought speed. For Voran, it would have felt like a few days.

For Vorn, it felt like weeks. Completely alone. Except for when his personality was sucked into Rowan's, but that relief was only fleeting.

Before he could dwell on his thoughts any longer, he arrived at the capitol library of Bern. It was the largest and most prestigious. It was clear that it was of Lunarian construction, the building practically screamed of function over form. Large runes that protected against all forms of damage covered every square inch of available surface. The only thing decorative about the building was the material they built it out of, marble, but even that was reinforced with iridescent veins of mythril to increase mana conductivity.

The only reason he had a pass to enter was because his mother got him one on his sixth birthday. For a large portion of his life, this building was his only comfort.

The narrative has been taken without permission. Report any sightings.

Those blood-sucking nobles couldn’t lay a hand on it.

He entered the fortress of a library and headed left, towards the nonfiction section. From there he navigated his way to the section on Attributes. It only took him a few minutes of searching to find the title he was searching for.

‘A comprehensive list of potential effects of various Attributes on mental wellbeing and spiritual recovery - A research paper by D.V Tailor’

Vorn sat down and truly relaxed for the first time in, relative to him, weeks.

— — —

Vorn walked home that day feeling… better. Weeks of relative isolation, helpless and completely dependent on his soulmate, had done a number on him, he would admit that freely, but it wouldn’t hold him down for long.

Not because of some magical effect that the System granted them, – As it turns out, Attributes did not have a known positive effect, besides physiological, on mental health. It was posited that the increased stamina and energy granted by CON did have a positive effect sheerly by virtue of some mental ailments feeding off of exhaustion, but that was a tangential positive effect. – but because he was just a resilient person. He always had been.

Would this have lasting effects? …Probably. But that hadn’t stopped him before! He genuinely enjoyed delving with his friends, and he wouldn’t trade it for the world. He wouldn’t let some partially self-inflicted trauma stop him from doing what he enjoyed.

— — —

“I apologize for waiting so long to have this conversation. I needed some time to organize my thoughts.” Rowan sighed, almost seeming resigned, “If you don’t want to continue endangering your life on delves-”

“I’m going to stop you right there. You think I’m going to allow one set back to hold me back? I was the one that suggested delving in the first place, remember? No, I enjoy delving and adventuring with you… and our… party. Oh no.” Vorn said, with rising dread.

They had forgotten to check back on their party.

Fuck.

“Fuck.”

— — —

One short sprint to the Guild later, they learned that Rexen and Ark arrived safely at the front desk only hours earlier. They even left their part of the pay for the various hides. And a note.

‘Expain. Lunasday at 13:00 at the Guild. If that’s not possible, you can find me here.’ An address was written at the bottom of the note.

Lunasday was tomorrow, so they took the note and went back home. Vorn couldn’t help but worry about what they’d say, abandoning your party was a big no-no.

Rowan pointed out that they would only know once they explained everything, and told him to stop worrying.

If only it were that easy.

Still, for now, all they could do was wait.

— — —

Arriving at the guild the next day, Vorn felt haggard. Leaving someone behind in a dungeon was a no-go, basically no matter what. How could he explain his situation without making everything worse? Could he? Was his situation even an excuse?

Before he could answer any of those questions, Rowan walked into the Guild confidently and sat down right in front of Ark and maybe Rexen. He looked entirely unrepentant, but that was just his resting “I don’t care about anything except fighting” face.

“Explain.” Ark said

“Well, the Guild called it a “Code Black Perception Event” but I could explain in more detail if you don’t know what that means. I certainly don’t.” Rowan said neutrally.

Ark sucked in air through her teeth, seeming to cringe at the sheer notion.

“No, I understand. How bad?”

“Does ‘code black’ not tell you? I don’t know how that system works.” Rowan asked, genuinely curious.

“Code black is the highest it can go. Everything past 32:1 is code black.”

“It was 72:1. Not fun for either of us. Still, I do regret having to leave suddenly like that. If possible, I’d like to discuss how we can handle a future situation where one of us urgently needs to leave. That is, if you still wish to be a part of our party?”

“Holy fuck, man! Seventy two! No wonder I couldn’t even see you write that note- Did you write that in fucking hyperspeed you goddamn moron! Oh my gods, I can’t leave the two of you alone, yes I’ll stay in the fucking party with you, godsdamn! You two need adult supervision-” Ark ranted for a few minutes. Honestly? A better reaction than Vorn expected. Rowan was just happy they understood.

“Well, glad that’s cleared up.” Vorn said awkwardly, popping in now that he wasn’t at risk of an angry Ark ripping his head off. Call him what you want, but he didn’t have a death wish, and he knew he was worse at clearly communicating than Rowan.

“Oh don’t think I don’t have some words for you. But we can do that later, for now, I’m just glad you seem okay. Not many people bounce back from shit like that very quickly.”

“Well, it’s not like I wasn’t given plenty of time to process.” Vorn joked.

“This is why everyone thinks Rowan is funnier than you despite him having as much vocal personality as a brick. No offense.”

“Offense taken!” Vorn shouted, pretending to be mortally wounded by the insult.

“I was talking to the brick.” She said dryly.

“None taken.” Said brick responded.

Speaking of the brick, a rock bounced off his forehead only a moment after his comment.

“Uh, you said to do that instead of sneaking up on you…” Rexen said, now visible in the chair next to Ark’s.

“That does work. And I didn’t nearly stab you this time. Continue to keep rocks on you, and work on your aim. This is a good emergency solution to communicate.” Rowan commanded.

“Y-Yes sir.”

“You don’t need to call him sir!” Ark laughed.

It was good to have the group back together, Vorn thought. He missed it a lot during his forced “vacation”.