Henry had been dismantling [Rupturing Bite of the Sea Drake] when the crab finally came out of his shell.

The kraken looked up from studying the weird mana which wrapped and stuck to the blood red concept shard, and was about to wave to the crab when he sensed his crustacean friend’s deep and single-minded focus. So he just waited.

Nearly a minute later, the crab seemed to finally emerge from what was preoccupying him and glanced around the dimly lit cave. He came to a stop when he saw the blood-red shard.

Maurice scuttled closer and peeked at the ethereal construct in Henry’s arm.

“[Is that a concept?”] Then the crab glanced back toward the resting—or meditating—dolphin, then to Henry.“[Also, did you guys see a golden crab in your evolution? It seemed really smart. But it wouldn’t answer a lot of my questions…]”

Henry paused, and his human illusion frowned. Did the System visit Maurice as well? It sure sounded like it. “[Was it all-knowing and smug about it?]”

A red-haired kid with multi-colored eyes popped up next to Henry’s own illusion and nodded. “[Yes. Then it swam away and I woke up.]”

That definitely sounded like the System. “[Yes, I’ve seen it. It looked like a person to me. Talked to me about my Aspects and how I shouldn’t have too many of them.]”

“[You talked… to it? You’ve seen the Warden?]”

Henry and Maurice turned to the approaching dolphin, and Henry confirmed it as he tried to summon an illusory image of the System in his memory. He quickly found that he couldn’t. When he tried to summon its face, a random visage Henry had never seen before appeared; when he tried to show the odd hybrid forms the System had taken when it talked to him, he ended up summoning a pale imitation. A yellow copy of whatever animal it was, with none of the golden glow or intelligence in its eyes.

Odd.

Henry waved the illusion away, frowning. “[Yes. I believe it’s this world’s god… or something. I know what it looked like when I’ve seen it but… I can’t get my illusions to look like it...]”

Seeing him struggle, Maurice tried to summon his own recollection of the being, but the only thing he could manage was all sorts of different, pale yellow crabs.

“[I remember it, but I can’t get it to show. What is happening?!]”

The dolphin peered down at the two illusions, and a small burst of bubbles escaped in a chuckle. “[Both of you have seen the Warden…Why does this not surprise me?]”

“[What’s a warden?]”

Henry’s large yellow eyes flicked down to the crab, then back to the dolphin. “[A warden is a guard. Or a watchman. Or the administrator of a prison. Why do you keep calling it Warden?]”

This was a new and interesting name for the System. The whales had called it Absolute, but this new name sounded like it would have some interesting context behind it.

Stormsong wiggled both of her fins in a shrug. “[I don’t know.]”

Henry deflated while the dolphin kept going. “[That’s what we always called it. Some C-ranks see it when they evolve to B-rank. But I’ve never heard of anyone seeing it before that. I most certainly didn’t. And even the B-rank vision is not guaranteed. My mom saw it but not my dad.]”

The dolphin eyed Henry and Maurice’s illusions, then looked at their real bodies. “[How come both of you met it? When did this start?]” Then, catching herself, she added, “[If you don’t mind sharing… of course.]”

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Henry grinned and shrugged. “[This was the first time for you, Maurice?]” The crab nodded, so Henry continued, “[I’ve met it since the first day or so when I woke up in this body. I think it might have intervened because what happened to me… wasn’t supposed to happen. F-Rank octopuses aren’t supposed to be sapient, so it came to me, said hi, then did something so I could have a class. I saw it again on the E-rank evolution, not the D-rank, and now again at C-rank.]”

The dolphin stared at Henry—his kraken form—intently for a few quiet seconds, then she asked, voice almost vibrating,“[You weren’t lying about not being born a kraken. This is—I… I need a second.]”

The dolphin swam away, and Henry and Maurice shared a look, then the latter shrugged and pointed at the ability construct still in Henry’s arm.

“[So… what concept is that? It feels like blood.]”

Henry raised the ethereal construct in his hand and it turned over a bit. He’d discovered that imbuing his mana with the idea of preservation helped slow the degradation of the odd magic. Two of his Octominds maintaining the mana flow was enough for him to hold a conversation and think of something else.

And Maurice is about to get access to that.

It really was one of Henry’s best abilities, and he had a lot of ideas on how he could potentially get more out of it.

Henry glanced down at the crab, then back at the construct.“[Yes. It’s a temporary ability copied by my Bite skill. It would cause heavy bleeding to its target. The shard itself seems related to blood, but the stuff around it is what’s… telling the concept what to do? I think that’s the key of spells. Or at least, the key to temporary spells and effects. This seems… too flimsy to handle more than one use. That’s probably why it works the way it does. Regular—I mean, permanent skills are probably better made. Ah, Stormsong might know more about this…]”

The dolphin swam back. “[Know about what?]”

“[What normal skills look like? And um… you alright?]”

The dolphin blinked at him. “[Oh. Yeah. Well. It sounds like the Warden has plans for you both and it looks like I’m getting involved with something bigger than I expected, but that should be fine. I don’t mind the challenge. As for skills, just use one of your class skills. Pick one and excise it. You must have the option in your workshop, right? The stuff you’re holding looks like a mess, but it makes sense that it would work just once. You’ll see when you study a real skill. They’re a lot more… intricate. And don’t excise an important skill. For us dolphins, we can learn new skills by training and learning, and if we excise one of the skills, it takes a lot more training to regain it. I don’t know if your copying ability can bypass that, but you should be careful.]”

Henry glanced down at his current class skills—the ones he’d copied from Sundots—and grimaced. “[I got a few skills I could extract, but I don’t want to risk them…]”

Maurice clacked his claws.“[Then we should get some more!]”

Henry didn’t need to go outside to get skills. He had enough meat samples in storage. There were at least a handful of skills he had ignored—which reminded him of the lionfish’s self-detonating skill.

I completely forgot about that one. I should buy it and start leveling it. it would do well with my blood clones.

Stormsong bobbed her head.“[I agree with Maurice. We should be getting stronger. We’re not safe down here as we are.]”

Henry was aware that they were in dangerous territory, but the dolphin’s tone worried him. “[What do you mean? Do you think Sundots will keep coming after us, or do you mean there’s something else we don’t know about?]”

“[No, I think Sundots might not want to come this deep. It’s… dangerous. Even for him. There are predators down here that we won’t even see coming. Some we’ll see coming, but there will be nothing we can do about it. We might find a swarm. We might find something that’s been dormant for decades. Centuries.]”

Maurice looked up. “[Swarms?]”

Henry grimaced. That list of threats was concerning, and while he didn’t know much about this “swarm”, he had some ideas and didn’t like any of them.

Stormsong floated closer, studying the red blood shard as she spoke.“[Some fish that live in large group can sometimes go through a special change. A special evolution, of some sort. They get… hungry. And they devour everything in their path. The more they eat, the more they multiply. Imagine thousands of C-rank, small, sharp-toothed little monsters surrounding you. So if we were to a see a sign of a swarm, we have to swim in the other direction. Fast.]”

“[And how common are these swarms?]”

The dolphin glanced out of the cave for a second, then turned back to her two travel partners. “[I expect us to find one within thirty days.]”