It's been close to 4 hours since the start of their slaughter with the ants. Peter and Sarah are in a killing frenzy, while Abel and Attica are trying to keep up and polish their skills and teamwork.
Before Peter runs to lure in the last few remaining ants, he tells the group, "There are only a few ants left and we haven't gotten lucky with any skills yet, so we will kill the rest as quickly as possible and then we will head back home. It's going to be getting dark in a couple of hours."
Seeing no complains from his tired team, he begins to run towards the ants again.
Bringing in two more ants, Peter and Sarah quickly finish theirs off in under a minute, while Abel and Attica are close to killing theirs.
Attica, with a swing of her spear, directly lops off it's head. Not even a second later, a white ball of light begins to drift over the top of the ant.
Seeing this Peter yells at Abel, "Abel, hurry and inspect it! We can't waste any time!"
Abel, knowing it will disappear soon, quickly used his [Assess] on the spirit module that just came out of the ant.
[Support Ability: Mending]
[Able to slowly close and heal wounds.]
[Potential: C+]
Seeing the potential and type of skill, Abel quickly told everybody about it. Attica, upon hearing about the skill replied immediately, "I want it! Please, I've always loved the idea of healing people!"
Peter, upon hearing the excited tone of Attica, looked at Sarah and Abel. They both shrugged their shoulders and smiled at Attica.
Seeing her friends nonchalant attitude towards he skill, she hurriedly extender her hand out and grabbed the light.
Waiting for Attica to do the same thing Abel did when he first got his skill, Peter asked Attica, "Since you got the mending skill, try to mend Abels war torn battle wounds." Pointing at Abels arms where you could only see scratches with a little bit of blood coming through.
Rolling her eyes at Peters overexaggeration, Attica used [Mending] on Abel. Seeing a green glow come from her hands, Abel could feel his skin getting itchy from the quick healing.
Looking at Abels now healed arms, everybody is satisfied with the skill, especially Attica. "Even though the skill is pretty slow in healing, it can still potentially save a life from bleeding out or recover fighting ability in a pinch." Attica says out loud to nobody in particular.
Sarah, not wanting to spoil the moment, curses inwardly. "Why couldn't that have been an offensive weapon skill. I could really use a new weapon. I'd love to have a new sword. These daggers are just normal tier. The only reason they seem deadly is because they're poisoned, but that's about to fade soon enough."
Continuing their slaughter of the ants, the group eventually kills them all without anymore skills popping out. Since there was nothing else to do, they all started making their way back home.
Right before darkness came, the group could see the walls that always gave them safety. with renewed energy from the excitement of being back home, they all start to quicken their pace.
A few minutes later they enter the gates of Edgeville. Smiling like an idiot as usual, Peter turns to his friends and says, "Now that we're back home, go and get some rest. I'll report to Roger myself and tell him everything. You guys go and relax and I'll meet up with you later!"
Everybody goes their own separate ways, either to reunite with their families and tell them what happened or in Abels case, go home by himself and see what his new ability can actually do.
Peter, casually walking into the meeting hall to talk to Roger, tells him everything. Leaving out no details at all.
"This is good news!" Roger says smiling. "Nobody was hurt, the newbies potentials are apparently exceedingly high, and we have two new skill users to add!" Taking it all in with a wide grin on his face, Roger suddenly starts to frown. Looking at Peter, he suddenly says, "The thing about being watched worries me though. Somebody that can watch you guys with battle experience without being noticed is troublesome." Seeing Rogers change in attitude so quickly surprised Peter. He wasn't expecting him to take this small piece of information so seriously.
Peter asks out of confusion, "It could have been a small mutant bird or something watching us, then got bored and flew off. I don't understand why this is weird?"
Roger ponders on Peters explination, but eventually shakes his head. "No, this isn't the first time someone has complained about being watched on their missions. Another team was sent off last week for a supply run a few miles north, the leader of the team said he felt like he was being watched for a few hours before the feeling faded away for the remainder of their mission. I didn't think anything of it at the time, but now that there are two such occurrences, it's weird."
Peter, knowing that Roger was a military man, has probably trained in scenarios like this before, decided to leave it all up to him. If he thought that it might be a potential problem, then he would have no arguments whatsoever.
"Then what should we do about it? If somebody is following or targeting us, it could lead to panic." Peter says with a little shakiness in his voice. Thinking about what could happen, he was legitimately scared.
Roger looks at Peters worried face and says with confidence, "Don't worry about it. I'll take care of it myself. Now, before you go and rest, I want to hold a meeting with your team. I know your probably all tired from the traveling and fighting, but I want to share some information with you guys now that you have a full party."
Confused about what the meeting could be about, Peter tells Roger goodbye before rounding everybody up again.
"What do you think the meeting is about? He said he wanted to share information, but I can't guess what it could entail." Abel says while thinking about what exactly the reason behind the meeting could be.
"I think it will be about our mission. Telling us what we could have done better or to tell us we risked too much for fighting the ants." Attica says.
"The mission part makes sense, but Roger always encourages battling mutants whenever possible, as long as it isn't a suicide mission. Think about it, the more skills we have, the safer this place can be. More powerful means you can protect more efficiently."
Surprised by the wisdom Peter sometimes is capable of, everybody can only think that what he said makes sense.
Arriving at the meeting hall and walking in, Roger is sitting behind his desk and motions for everybody to sit down in front of him.
Abel, for the first time, actually starts to look around at the inside of the hall. The hall is a pretty spacious building. Roughly 1200 square feet. The size of a normal modern home except without the walls separating the different rooms. Roger has his desk closer towards the back of the room with a few dozen chairs in front of himself. Behind him is filled with bookcases filled with books and a massive map of the world.
The walls are dark red in color and the floor is your standard wooden floor. "The room would make a nice ballroom if outfitted right." Amused at his thoughts, Abel snaps out of his inner monologue just in time to see Roger about to speak.
"I know your all tired and want to celebrate and rest on a completed mission, but there are some things I want to share with you all."
He then looks at Peter and says, "Peter, since you were the team leader in this mission, you would naturally be the only one to be disciplined or congratulated based on performance, but since this isn't an official party yet all of you are responsible for your own actions."
Hearing this, everyone is worried if they had done something wrong. Roger, seeing the worried faces of everyone, starts to laugh. "Don't worry, although there are some things I would have done differently, like instantly annihilated every ant, I can't expect you to be strong enough to do that yet. Regardless, I'm impressed with your efforts, so I'm making this 4 man team a permanent one with Peter being the leader. Any questions?"
Hearing this, everyone is immediately ecstatic. Slapping each other's shoulders and hugging each other, Roger can see the trust they have in each other. "Ok, settle down now. I know you're all happy, but I have to now explain to your party, like every party before yours, a detailed explanation on spirit modules. Remember, do not explain this to anybody. This is a secret I only tell individuals I trust. If you break my trust, i have no qualms about killing any one of you."
Seeing Rogers serious face, everybody sits back down with sweat rolling down their back. "Roger is really terrifying when he wants to be." Abel tells himself after he sits down. "I don't think he's bluffing in the slightest. I wonder what's so confidential to make him this bloodthirsty."
Roger looks at each and every party member before continuing, "This is a secret that only members of the military know, not only that, but only the higher ups of the military know it. When I was escaping Chicago because I had nothing left to live for, I overheard my superior talking to the general about this very subject I'm about to explain to you."
Taking a deep breath and sorting his thoughts, Roger continues on, "Have you ever thought about what spirit modules actually are?"
Seeing the shaking heads of the kids in front of him, he elaborates, "Exactly, nobody does, or if they do they haven't told anybody yet. What we do know, however, is that when we decide to fuse with those white balls of light, it triggers our sea of consciousness. When we enter we can see our skills and darkness in the surroundings correct?"
Seeing everybody nod this time, with the exception of Sarah, he continues, "Go into your sea of consciousness right now and try to walk towards the perimeter of your consciousness."
Abel, upon hearing Roger, immediately enters his sea of consciousness. Upon entering, he can see his little ball light which is the [Assess] skill.
Walking past it and continuing straight, he bumps into whay feels like a barrier. Putting his hand up he can feel an invisible wall. Walking in a complete circle, the wall itself is pretty small. Not trying to hurt his brain thinking of an explination, he exits only to see the same confused look on everyone's, except Sarah's face.
Sarah, looking aggravated and confused as well asks, "Why is everybody looking like they just ate a pile of mud?"
Roger, hearing this, chuckles. He begins the explanation of the barrier. "Im sure you've seen and mapped out the barrier in your minds correct? Well if it's bigger than a yard in diameter, color me impressed. The wall is your current limit. On average, a person can only hold up to 2 skills."
Waiting for the information to sink in, Roger contemplates on how to continue his speech. "You all, in assuming, know about body potential, yes? Well that barrier is your consciousness level. The only way to expand it, is to upgrade your current skills. You have to upgrade your skills twice, before your barrier will grow enough to add a third skill. More upgrades, means more space in your sea of consciousness. Not only can you upgrade your consciousness, but you can also lose your upgrade."
Attica, getting the hint, asks Roger with a little anxiety and excitement in her voice. "Wait, so we can also get rid of some skills? Like say, we got excited at a skill showing up and also nobody to scan it for us, we grab it only for it to be a pretty useless skill with a bad potential. We can decide to rid ourselves of thay burden?"
Roger, surprised at the intelligence of Attica, nods his head. "Yes, you can get rid of skills, but in doing so, your sea of consciousness will regress back to what it was before the skill. Also, if one of your skills come with a body potential upgrade it will regress as well. So, if you have a weapon conjure skill that has a strength +1 attribute, if you rid yourself of that skill your strength that was at D will regress to D-."
Abel, processing this information, can't help, but be surprised. "If my assess skill winds up being useless, I can always get rid of it to save space in my mind. It's a shame I can't use it on itself to see it's potential." He sighs to himself while hoping for the best.
"Now that you all are now a permanent party, have the secret I told you, and are all exhausted, go and rest. Always remember, when spirit modules pops out of a mutant or monster, you have a choice to take it or not. Your limited space in the beginning makes choosing all the harder. So, make sure you guys know what direction you want to take. Unless you have further questions you can go." Roger says expecting that they would all immediately leave to process everything that has happened.
To his surprise they all stay, raising their hands in unison. "Uh, yes go ahead ask your questions." He says embarrassingly scratching his chin.