The dragon steak was fantastic. Callie actually gave me a bite of hers (I got something called Infernal Lobster, it was huge but absolutely delicious) before she finished. Once we were done we ended up getting cheesecake to wash it down, and that was pretty fantastic too. As we ate, we caught up with the others about what had happened during their days.

"So." I asked between bites. "Now that you're feeling better Valk, what the hell happened? Like...was the Vampire just waiting in an alley to jump you? How did you even get her attention? Or is she just like some crazy monster who attacks anyone nearby?"

Perit snickered at that. "He wishes." The tall woman didn't talk nearly as much as Nat or her partner, but she clearly felt more comfortable with us now that we were on the same team.

"I...well, I was showing off a bit in the street." Valk said with a grimace. "One of my whips clashed with an opponent's attack and a bolt of energy slipped free. It didn't hurt her but...it kind of burned a hole in her dress. She...wasn't pleased." He sounded more embarrassed than upset, despite having twenty points of his Vitality sucked out. It seemed like an overreaction to me, but then I didn't care much about clothes. I could understand being pissed about being randomly attacked by a stranger though.

Nat rolled her eyes. "This moron shouldn't have been doing party tricks for a crowd on the street. I can return the points, so no real loss. Even if losing twenty is a bit of a waste. That's almost a day of wishes."

Benny blanched. "Wait...is that enough to take him under a thousand? He's not going to like...die from that is he?" I hadn't actually considered that myself, but when he mentioned it I glanced to Zeke worriedly. Valk was a member of the team even if I didn't know him well, and he seemed like a decent guy.

"No." Said my uncle firmly. "Stat milestones let your soul know when it can handle more Impact, which lets it then handle more stats, but once you rank up your Impact and soul both qualitatively improve." He gestured to me. "Your soul is orange now, about fifteen percent of the way to yellow, like it was fifteen percent of the way to orange before. Losing stats won't change that. And it won't change your Impact, so you'll be fine."

That made sense. "What about losing Impact though?" I asked cautiously. "What will that do?"

"Kill you." He said bluntly. "Losing a point of Impact kills you unless you have some to spare. It's part of why you don't see people trading Impact with wishes at lower levels. Until you hit S-rank and have Impact to spare even a single point of it will bring most people below their threshold. Wishes require fair compensation, what's fair compensation for dying? Not just normal death either, your soul will shatter."

I blinked. I knew that Impact wishes existed and could work, but I hadn't really tried it except for with Benny and Amelia. Thought that brought up another question. "Wait. I've given mortals abilities before. They didn't have any Impact and I gave them a point of it, so can I give someone Impact just from my power?"

"Not possible." He said firmly. "Impact isn't like other stats. It's more...primal. You can't MAKE Impact. You can take it, hold it, trade it, but you can't make it. A mortal does have Impact, like they have other stats, it just isn't a full point. When you awaken someone as an Ascendant you're giving them a PORTION of a point of Impact. It works the same way Enchanting does. You can recover that over time. It pushes them to a point and then the universe does the rest."

Nodding slowly, I thought over everything I knew about Impact. "That explains why the WCP isn't mass producing gods. I know Impact has something to do with godhood, so aside from soul strength the need for Impact is probably a limiting factor. I guess stuff like the Moonglow Dew is an exception, right? If you have more than the rank limit in Impact you could trade it safely."

He waggled a hand. "Safely is a bit of an overstatement. Trading Impact HURTS. It's painful and diminishing. Finding someone willing to do it is difficult, and the cost is astronomical. You need extremely high stats to arrange an Impact trade for the most part. Theoretically though, yes, if you can afford the cost of the wish, someone with more than the baseline Impact for their rank could survive trading it."

Nat didn't look surprised by any of this, though Selka (who hadn't really spoken since we showed up here, presumably out of fear of Zeke) seemed intrigued that he'd mentioned all that to me. It was probably touching on secrets that candidates weren't allowed, though he hadn't crossed the line based on his lack of excruciating pain.

Gesturing to Valk, I asked Zeke my last question. "What about the Vampire? Can he consume Impact? Can the others?"

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Because that seemed incredibly broken. I wasn't sure why they wouldn't all be gods at that point. As expected, he shook his head. "No. Or at least, not most of them. Whatever Lark is, people believe HE can drain Impact, though judging by how long he's been in the S-rank not fast or reliably. Might be something to do with all the Vampires he ate when he was younger, or at least that's the prevailing theory. Regardless, the others only do stats, and the number of them varies based on both Vampire and target."

Nat finally had enough of the remedial nonsense and groaned aloud. "Oh gods, enough." We all looked at her. "I'm sorry, but I can only take so much of 'baby's first cultivation journey'. No offense little cousin. But spiraling over how scary the boogeyman of all S-rankers is won't accomplish much. If you want to meet a Vampire, I can introduce you with an apology as a pretext. I'll just offer her a wish in exchange for her dress. Now can we please get back to some proper dinner conversation?"

Abel started snickering around his own steak (some kind of shark or something). When we all looked at him he swallowed, looking around innocently. "What? It was funny." When we all kept staring he just sighed. "Alright, I guess I can share what we did during our day out. I..." He began with gravitas and suspense. "Got in a fight."

Something about the delivery, his serious expression, and the wait mixed together just broke me, and I cracked up, joined by Mel, Callie, Jessie, and Benny. "What my idiot means to say." Cut off Mel, still chuckling. "Is that we went out exploring and met up with some of the other contenders. Abel hit it off with some big burly guy with curly red hair named Craygen, and after yapping for about an hour they decided to mix it up in public."

Abel nodded. "It wasn't that weird of a call, there have been a LOT of street fights here based on what I saw. People just clear out a circle and throw down in the middle of the road. Craygen was a pretty tough guy, material shifting power, turned into some kind of gemstone. Super durable. It was a solid fight. He's much further into F-rank than I am, so I was able to really cut loose a bit."

I was about to ask how that was possible given the tournament requirements, but then I realized I was making assumptions. We brought Celine even though she hadn't been in the tournament. Granted, Celine was much closer to our rank because she had basically bribed Nat to grind her up to F-rank in that one month gap like I had done for Jessie. It made sense that the other winners would bring F-rankers who were stronger than the contestants.

"Anyway. Craygen lost, obviously, and he invited us to some crazy party tonight. All the other contestants will be there. Craygen's tourney winner got the invite from some imperial Ascendant who made it through their own tournament. It sounds like fun to me but I wasn't sure if you wanted to go."

It was a strange reminder that even though I was the legacy and Callie was the leader, Abel, for all his lack of care about it, was the real winner of the tournament. He was still our muscle, despite breaking through, and being able to take on a higher level F-ranker from this crowd just proved it. This party would be a damn good opportunity to meet some more of the people around here that were like him.

I looked at Callie. "I think that's a good idea." She looked pretty much poleaxed by the statement, knowing my hatred for parties and social gatherings, and I had to laugh at the expression. "Zeke said that we shouldn't treat this like a competition. These people aren't our enemies, even if they think they are. The mission is what matters. If we can make friends and be on good terms with the other entrants it could end up being a huge help for later."

She giggled at my impassioned speech. "Oh I know. I'm just shocked you're willing to go to a party. I think it's a good idea too." She glanced at Jessie, Benny, and Celine. "You guys in? Or you Nat, you're welcome of course. You're part of the team and we'd love to have you along."

My cousin smiled at her but waved her off. "Nah, I appreciate the invite, but we've had enough excitement for today." She jerked a thumb at Valk. "Besides, dipshit over there needs to recover. Even if he looks better after Agria topped him up losing twenty points of Vitality isn't something you brush off. He needs bed rest."

I could have sworn I heard the bald, red bearded man mutter. "Yes MOM." But if he did he did it so quietly even my Perception barely caught it. Nat heard it fine though, I guessed, because she whirled to glare at him and he looked away innocently, actually whistling as he avoided her gaze. She rolled her eyes at that, but I could tell she thought it was funny by her smile.

Benny cut in, answering Callie's question from earlier. I had seem him whispering to Celine, though they must have used a Stealth Skill to talk because I didn't hear what was said. "We're in. I want to check out some of the other entrants, see what we're dealing with. Plus it'll give me an excuse to stock my new artifacts. I made replacements for a few of my more outdated pieces of gear, I can't wait to show you guys."

I'd been wondering about that. He'd mentioned working on some things, but I wasn't sure if it was done. I never wanted to bring it up. Now that he was volunteering the information though I was excited to see what was coming. We decided to invite Cark, though I doubted he would come with us. Nat offered to watch Cass if he did though, my cousin was becoming just as enamored of the little girl as the rest of us.

As we finished dessert and headed back to the inn, I couldn't help but glance around the restaurant one last time, making sure to remember the details. I wanted to plan that date with Callie carefully. She'd adored that dragon steak, and while the place was a little pricey, it was worth it to see that smile light up her face like it had when she tried her dinner for the first time. Next time though, I'd get the steak too. That bite had been way better than my lobster.