Drake rubbed his sore head, with one hand, his other stirring the warming pot of leftover stew shakily.
"I didn't deserve that...." Drake grumbled.
"Says you!" Natto countered.
"That's why I said it!" Drake shouted.
"Stir the pot and be silent dolt!" she shouted back, raising another geta in her hand.
Chancla PTSD from his mother took over, and he quietly mumbled indecencies while he stirred the pot.
Impatience taking over Drake's mind again, he began casting spells in his free hand, focusing on how the spells felt when he rotated them from one element to the other. Watching how if he was able to smoothly transition from one to the next the magic circle would also shift from color to color forming a beautiful cascade of shifting lights.
"Ha, it's almost like RGB for my hand…" he smiled.
"Enjoying yourself, child?" Natto quipped from the side, eyeing him.
"Says the damn 2 day old," Drake spat back, "I'm practicing since I can't do much else here. I'm taking the little blessings where I can. God I miss my damned computer," Drake said, then froze, a thought suddenly hitting him.
"Noooo! If the world is fucked that means all my anime and manga serializations are going to stop! Fucking system! Damn you!" Drake shouted into the air.
Natto sighed, "Good, now maybe you will finally run out of dumb references to use," she said, spitting the words like a bad taste in her mouth.
Drake looked over, disbelief on his face, "How. Dare. You! I've never heard a more blasphemous thing in my entire life. If we were at ComCon they would eat you alive!"
"ComCon is not a thing anymore doofus," she said, rolling her eyes.
"Well aren't you just expanding your vernacular? Your food is warm, you little demon," Drake said, pulling a clean bowl from his inventory and scooping the stew into it.
Natto's mood did a full 180 as she trotted over happily, grabbing the bowl without a word and blew to cool it.
Drake gave the little construction a sidelong glance and half smile, returning to his practice, and reviewing what he could do differently next time he inevitably fought another person. There was even the possibility he fought an intelligent enough monster at some point.
Many possibilities crossed his mind, but the most prominent problem he came across was why did his ploy fail in the first place.
Was it because I used the exact chant? Or maybe it was because of the full chant instead of having some of it omitted. I need to figure out just how common those types of skills are. I can't exactly form a good lie if I don't have a solid base of truth to weave it in. Drake thought.
Drake had too many things he still didn't know, information was clearly the weakest aspect in his arsenal at the moment.
He sighed and focused on other things he could influence, looking down at the newly obtained stone he pulled from his inventory.
[Skill Stone: Confluence [Rare]
[Unlocks a random skill from the Confluence Tree]
[Requirements: Open Skill Slot and at least a Main Tree, or Sub-tree Unlocked]
Natto had seen the stone as well but didn't comment on it. Drake assumed it was because of who it had come from, as he eyed the happily eating construct. Bear had said he had gotten it by trading, but Drake wasn't naïve enough to believe such a lie.
Skills in this world were power, a way of freeing yourself from the oppression of the atrocities that might befall you at any moment should you give it the chance. And with the randomness of skills, a high quality stone was a premium.
No. Drake knew. This stone was probably taken from someone, or looted from someone.
Looking back at Natto his thoughts turned to how he would have to do his best to gingerly nudge her into answering later about the stones, as Drake had another rare stone he was waiting anxiously to use also.
Drake thought of the perfect thing to sway the little garbage disposal. Pulling out the tub of cores from his inventory in front of him.
"Perfect!" Drake said, a smile creeping on his face, "I can practice some control, and wash these stupid things all in one go. Two birds, one massive tub!"
It had been another hour since Drake and Natto had left the crater, and his body had started to respond better, the pain slowly but surely receding.
Raising his arm Drake summoned a Water Shot, the magic circle forming in a light blue then deepening to a brilliant sapphire, pouring mana into it he manipulated it into a stream to fill the tub. In his other hand. lit a flame to warm the water as it streamed down.
Finally having time to really appreciate it, he looked at the workings of magic he was doing. The surreal feeling that he was actually using Magic nearly seamlessly was a wonder, and brought a melancholy smile to his face. Replacing the joyful one that was there.
He sighed, thinking that such a wondrous thing was used for the most part used for killing.
But that's just how it is isn't it… Drake thought looking upwards. This system wants and needs strong vessels. And this tutorial, I can only imagine where I would be if I didn't improve. Dead? Drake wrapped his hand around his neck stopping the stream of hot water. Or would those Goblins and Kobolds have done worse..?
Drake clenched his hands together, determined to never let such a thing happen. The world before had constantly been a struggle, and the system now exacerbated the problem by turning it primal.
"Primal but more simple huh.." Drake whispered, his thoughts slipping out.
The system was awful all things considered. Looking at the Participant Count alone would tell the story of just how awful.
[Time Remaining Until Tutorial Concludes: 109 Days, 17 Hours, 23 Minutes, and 14 Seconds]
[Remaining Participants: 2,636]
Nearly 50% of the Participants had already died for one reason or another. So Drake could only grimace at the thought of how much the world's overall population was probably doing.
Drake's mind began to wonder further as he gave a sidelong glance towards the gluttonous construct to the side of him, chowing away on the stew.
He needed to be stronger so that he would not worry her anymore. The sounds of her crying and then witnessing it in the aftermath of his defeat had put a small scar not only on his pride but his ego as someone who promised to improve and protect what was his. And Natto had become that, she had become family.
A parallel was drawn between her and his family outside the tutorial. He prayed that they were alright, and swore to do the worse should they not. And for that.
I need to be the strongest I can be, and go even further to beat people like Bear. You know, the ones that don't like pretty things… Drake thought, trying to cheer himself up with the image of his friend frolicking in a meadow of blooming flowers, picking up some here and there.
Holding back a cackle Drake's mind unfortunately moved to something darker.
He had never expected this to be his reality but now that it was, it posed some very real problems. The government had probably fallen, or there would be some real tyrannical people that would try to take up the flag of the missing security the government provided, in the wake of the world going pure tribal. Certainly Drake hoped the better side of humanity would win out and protect the good and righteous, allowing the world to stay in relative peace in this new world, but.
He wasn't so sure. With all types of power people grow blind. Who would stop someone who could literally level mountains with a swing of their sword like Bear, or even worse? Had Drake had enough Mana he could most likely blow up the entire eastern seaboard with a custom spell.
Could Drake be so cynical and hubris in thinking that he could be the one to police those types of people?
"Probably not…" laughed Drake.
But the world would most likely not be so kind to allow him not to step in. Drake could already see the effects of the system taking hold here in his tutorial not even a month into it. It was sad, but he didn't expect the time after to be much better.
Suddenly an empty bowl came into view in front of Drake.
"Cease your internal monologue. I am not even inside your head and I can hear the cogs turning so loudly, I can not even hear myself chew…" Natto said softly, boucning the bowl up and down.
"I'm fine," Drake said flatly, taking hold of the bowl, and moving to refill it at the pot.
"Are you? You will have to address this at some point," Natto forced.
"Look I'm fine if F is for feeling overwhelmed," Drake began humming.
"A-and I is for I'm not alright…. Damn it! Why must you do that!?" Natto shouted next to him.
Drake shrugged, "It's just how I cope. Anime, manga, comedy. They were comforts for me as a kid when I grew up getting bullied for being different, or going a little too far beyond my peers when I was homeschooled coming into a public school. I learned a lot from those shows that I don't think many people get to experience because they dismiss them as being for kids. Or for one thing or another," Drake mused scooping up more food.
Natto looked up, holding her hands out for the bowl, content to just listen. Not wanting to interrupt now that Drake had for some reason decided to unload his mental baggage.
"When I was a teenager anime was just starting to come over to the West, DBZ, OP, Naruto, Bleach. And you know what?" Drake grinned, "I found escapism in those shows. The characters faced indifference, tragedy, and weakness head on, never giving up, and using pure raw ideology to overcome their problems. I can't even count how many times I was in my room using body weights thinking I could be just as strong as them, or have the same unwavering ideals and morals like them if I tried hard enough. Day after day that grind eventually pushed me to be disciplined, even when I didn't want to get up half the time in the morning," Drake laughed.
There was a short pause of silence, Drake taking a shaky breath in, "You know where I used to live, when my Dad was alive. There was this beautiful river. And little off where we lived was this stupid makeshift pier my Dad built with stones he found on the shoreline. He said he wanted to build an inland beach or something so he would go every few days to throw some stones in the river. And on days he wasn't there," Drake looked over to Natto, "I would go out and pretend I was pushing and pulling the waves that crashed on the rocks. I'd scream at the top of my lungs to vent or just pretend I was going over '9000',"
Drake stopped for a moment, biting his bottom lip as he slunk to the trunk of the tree, "After a few years my dad developed cancer, and he was going into remission. It was getting better, we all thought it was getting better. But it came back and took him from me…. From us. And you know what I thought the day I saw him in that hospice bed?" Drake whispered.
Natto hadn't touched the food handed to her, it slowly going cold. Her mouth quivered trying to eke out something, anything, but couldn't. She shook her head.
"I didn't cry. I didn't think about the good times, I didn't think of everything he did for me for us. I-... I thought 'Why did you leave me?' 'What am I supposed to do now?' I was so weak and miserable on the inside that I couldn't even find it in myself to grieve for my own father on his deathbed," Drake clenched his hands, his nails digging into the skin, "That day I knew I had to embody those lofty ideologies I held so dear through my teen years. If I couldn't become strong enough to even stand on my own, I wouldn't be able to ever look him in the eye, let alone honor his memory."
Silence fell over the outpost for a few drawn out seconds. Both Drake and Natto collecting their thoughts.
Drake spoke first. "But, it got better. It took a long time, and meeting a lot of colorful people along the way, but it got better. It was a road bump in my life that pushed me off track, but I'm stronger for it. Just like… other road bumps I'll get past this one. So no. I'm not fine, at least not right now. But I will be," Drake smiled, placing his hand on the construct's head, ruffling her hair, "I made quite a few promises, after all. And I don't want to keep breaking promises. So I'm going to get stronger. Strong enough that no one will ever hurt what I hold dear again."