"Is this really the same route we took?" Ning Xin asked.
"It should be, the tunnels were probably changed by earth magic." He led the way with her squeezing extremely close behind him.
He had to walk sideways with space to spare but she was having trouble. Their robe and mantle kept getting caught at their edges too. He was sure this stretch was only about 70 metres long and there was nothing moving in the walls as there was no vibrations.
They were finally through the dangerous stretch without the walls closing in on them.
"That was such a tight path." She had to suck in her breath while passing through.
His gaze dropped a few centimetres but there was a pair of hands blocking it.
"I'm not fat." She glared. Ebony didn't think that at all.
"Mmm. Don't worry, your figure is perfect from any direction."
"Do you like it?"
"Mmm. Slow down, I'll walk in front." He didn't even finish talking when she pushed him aside and continued the ascent.
It was only logical that he took the front in his opinion. He naturally pulled her back by the wrist and slipped it down to her palms. As always, he didn't really put any thought into every little thing.
Consequently, Ebony didn't realise the oddity that was happening.
"Don't let go…I trust you so don't give me up."
"I'm never gonna give you up."
Battle Song cast itself without his control.
"You're playing again. Can you translate the lyrics to me?"
"I'm embarrassed so no."
"Embarrassed? So you can be embarrassed too…"
"Of course."
She leaned forward to look at him but he looked the other way by reflex. It wasn't as if his facial expression changed so he imagined he moved pointlessly and looked back. Her eyes brightened up all of a sudden but they were interrupted when he sensed a tiny vibration to the right.
"Something is coming, either slowly or it's a small creature."
Ebony had to get serious and collect himself and his mental state again. The past few days of his increasing Wisdom had made large changes in how effective his overflowing Wisdom was. Ning Xin also had a great change in overflowing Vitality, exceeding Kong Jing's natural amount when she used the weakest Mortal's Pulse she could pull off.
He asked Ning Xin in the past, why or how her sister's Vitality was so high but she also didn't know.
What it should mean for both of them was that if any creature dared to come after them when they were not suppressing their essence was that those creatures either had the guts to do it, stupid or simply strong. Usually, all of the above and hopefully just stupid.
"Stay close, there's barely enough space to walk and it'll be hard to draw our weapons." Ebony was starting to question if the tunnels were changed because of monsters or the expedition's earth mages who wanted to cover their tracks. The smooth way downwards by following the expedition was no longer possible for the path back up.
❅❅❅
'Ting' 'Generic Skill Heightened Instincts evolved into Fervent Intuition'
Fervent Intuition - Highly trained and honed instincts to recognise danger, hostile intentions and perceive emotions. Fervent intentions to understand subtle emotions increases your ability to pick up mental activity and enhance situational cognizance by 5.0% per level.
'Huh? A sudden skill evolution?' Ning Xin was still trying to calm herself from Ebony's bold act, forcing her heart to be obedient and stopping herself from pulling her hands away.
It was the most effortless evolution of a skill that she ever had. All she had been doing was trying to grasp his emotions. She didn't understand 'situational cognizance' well but since it was an evolution of the skill and not a mutation it shouldn't be helping her in a different way, just doing what her original skill did but better.
She didn't expect to get a tier 3 Generic Skill so easily and Heighten Instincts was already very useful for a support skill.
She was irked by the interruption of a monster but she cocked her head when she looked where Ebony pointed at.
"It's not going to attack us, just moving in our direction while escaping something else." She blurted out.
"How do you know that?" Ebony also cocked his head in confusion.
He asked the same question she wanted to ask herself right after blurting out. She didn't even get the chance to answer before he opened his mouth, "You're right, the vibrations are getting weaker."
'Is this Intuition? It is level 116 but…that's a stronger effect on me than I thought.' Ning Xin was a little shocked if it was really her evolved skill at work. It might have been a fluke so she would have to observe herself a little more.
"It just felt like that." She was confused at her own vague guess.
"I see."
She trudged on with her eyes staring at their joined hands.
❅❅❅
"Did you increase your perception recently?" Ebony asked when she told him to take a different path because the path they were on was about to collapse.
He also sensed the loose soil above him so he already planned to move in another direction. She was still not as sensitive as him but she had managed to pick up signs of monsters a lot better than before.
"My instinct skill evolved earlier."
"I see."
They had to climb up a tight vertical shaft but he felt as if his fingers fell asleep while holding her hands.
"We have to climb here." There was barely space to climb, flying up was not impossible but climbing would be many times more efficient.
This particular vertical climb was about 3 km when he came down and was wide and smooth like that of a perfect cylinder. Now, the walls were slightly less than a metre apart and anyone with claustrophobia or nyctophobia would stay far away from this place.
He was reluctant but she pulled away first "Come on, Arcta might be in danger."
She took her mantle off and tucked her hair under her clothes even though she looked uncomfortable. Her climbing ability was above his despite how cramped it was, it must have been due to her experience with cramped tunnels that she climbed through day in and out while she was in that mysterious blood realm of hers.
He conjured a thin layer of ice over his robes so that they would slide off jagged corners.
"Hurry up, we don't want any earth magic to crush us. The previous time that happened I had to melt the earth around me but the earth here is more heat resistant." Ning Xin voiced her worries.
"I thought you fought blood magic-wielding spiders only?" He hastened his pace in response.
"A den of them was above me and they collapsed their floor above me to ambush me. I didn't sense them and almost got crushed to death. I hate cramped spaces."
"I think it's not so bad when I'm with you."
"Shh! Just climb!"
Ebony did not expect that he would get chastised but he could feel the temperature rise.
"Let's race." Ebony sensed vibrations from around him. She was faster than him but matched his pace, he knew the best method to make her speed up and didn't even hesitate to propose a race.
She sped up with pep as he thought, she was very competitive.
In a minute, he saw her snap her head down to look at him.
"I'll be there with you soon." He tried to tilt his head up to look at her but the back of his head hit the wall behind him.
He was glad to see her rush up even more instead of trying to get down. The walls squished together just as he sensed her at the edges of his senses and climbed out to a large tunnel.
'Opfff. Now that's a bone crushing squeeze.' Frostblaze Augmentation and Cladding burst out to freeze his surroundings. The tough earth easily crumbled when frozen and penetrated by the reflection of mana vibrations from his body.
'There's barely any air and I can't sense the opponent, it's beyond my range.' Ebony sent his flames upwards through the cracks and then punched out with Sonic Intrusion to shatter the frozen earth. It wasn't nearly as tough as the earth around the tomb city.
His surroundings shook hard, from the direction that he guessed that Ning Xin was in battle with whatever attempted to crush him. He quickly called her through the callstone and the short distance made the connection almost immediately. Buffing her to make her harder, better, faster, stronger. She did not like it but appreciated it.
His buffs have gotten considerable now that his Intelligence was higher and he sent highly compressed mana. It was indispensable for them when closing the gap with higher-level opponents. He fixed his neck and made his body look presentable before he reached the tunnel where she was. It was filled with the scent of blood, there was blood all over the tunnel and he didn't sense any remaining parts of their attacker.
"Don't do that ever again!"
"I will make the same decision, you would've turned to paste."
"Then you should've protected me and not make me leave you behind!"
"I will, if it was the best choice. You're more suited to evading, please evade by yourself if we're ever in a position where both of us are under attack and you are able to dodge it while I'm not. If you judge that you're also unable to dodge, I'll do everything I can to protect you." There wasn't a need for a discussion, they understood each other's strengths and weaknesses too well at this point.
"..."
"Okay?" He pressured for her response.
He had to get eye contact and a soft "mmm" before he was satisfied.
"So what was that monster?"
"I don't remember, it popped up right after you disappeared from my sight and my hands just moved."
The short incident was put aside but it weighed heavily on both of them. With how much they love putting themselves in danger, he was sure that the day would come when they bite off more than they could chew. He was more than a hundred times harder to kill and he probably couldn't protect her as well as he could protect himself currently.
He had conjured many Glacial Models in her form as accurately as possible but was still unable to cast Stalwart Endowment with her body frame. He also hasn't succeeded in changing the runes to consume either any type of mana or fire mana. With this thought, he obviously commissioned the job to sister Jing. It was the other purpose for leaving Glacial Models with them.
His Mental Mapping was of little use as the routes changed significantly. They were making progress upwards but it wasn't as fast as their descent.
"Let's take a break here." The quick ascent with extremely thin air wasn't easy on his body. Two flat scales were moulded with runes to produce air for himself and floated near his face.
They finally reached a relatively open space that would fit a party of 5 sleeping side by side.
They thoroughly washed their hands and prepared their meal. He helped with washing the liver and kidneys of Teratish. Tonight was offal night since they have enough collected to make a dish.
The taste of iron was very strong but she balanced it out with other strong spices. The dish had been heavily spiced.
There was no space for a spar or an after-meal walk.
"The ceiling isn't tall enough, I'll watch you, you can just sleep there."
"Don't watch me while I sleep. Come, sit here."
His shoulder had a temporary job as a pillow, they rested while sitting up. She fell asleep fast and he made sure he was awake to notice changes in the surroundings.
It wasn't exactly comfortable so she didn't sleep long. She insisted he slept as well so he took a nap.
When he woke up, he got complaints.
"You're too heavy, my shoulder feels like it's about to snap."
"Sorry about that, I'll give you a shoulder massage. But you have to be silent."
"Sure, why silent?"
"...Just be quiet."
He put pressure into his thumbs and fingers. Strength seemed to leave her body as her tense muscles relaxed.
"Please keep quiet." He repeated himself when she moaned. It tickled his ears.
"Huh?" She acted as if she didn't know what she did.
Painful minutes later.
They continued their ascent but they were lost.
"The structure changed too much to be natural." He said as they turned back from a dead end.
"Why don't you directly make a path up?" She asked, he did freeze and shatter his enclouse.
"I could, it might attract things and it's not exactly safe if I broke a part that I shouldn't and cause us to get squashed." He didn't really have a good sense of the tunnels above and around him.
"Fine, we'll force our way up after we get closer."
If they reached about 5 km from the surface, he was pretty confident that they would be fine even if the ceiling collapsed on them. They were just playing it safe currently, they needed to climb roughly 3 to 4 more km to reach the 5 km mark.
He contemplated his status and stat points to allocate. He had a few more points that he got a day or two ago.
It was miraculous that his Class, Sub-Class and Profession were levelling at the same pace. Ning Xin's chef Profession wasn't getting its fair share of experience when fighting non-edibles.
In such a short time, he had reached level 242 while Ning Xin had reached 247 since her Profession wasn't getting much. 30 levels in all 3 gave him 750 stat points to allocate and 90 Wisdom.
Strength: 400 [411] ➡ Strength: 400 [411]
Vitality: 400 ➡ Vitality: 400
Constitution: 900 [4211] ➡ Constitution: 1000 [6375]
Endurance: 150 [155] ➡ Endurance: 200 [205]
Agility: 600 [616] ➡ Agility: 600 [616]
Intelligence: 626 [643] ➡ Intelligence: 926 [951]
Wisdom: 1466 [1506] ➡ Wisdom: 1856 [1907]
Perception: 250 [985] ➡ Perception: 250 [1055]
100 to Constitution because his body started tearing apart again when he increased Intelligence. Intelligence got 300 together with Wisdom getting an additional 300. Endurance got 50 because he felt that it would help with his muscle tolerance rather than stamina.
He was handling the stress to his body with Stalwart Endowment and he felt like his body was getting more resistant to his mana. It would be ideal if a notification told him that his physique was changing but that hasn't popped up. It was torture day in and day out the past week since he was adamant in increasing Intelligence to increase the power of his spells. His body was constantly torn by the compressing mana and rebuilding itself with the vitality in his mana.
He was especially focused on directing his life force to his skin; it was hard for others to notice his body's state. Ning Xin knew though. She was just glad that he was able to heal at a greater pace and commented that it would surely change his physique sooner or later. Physique wasn't supposed to change so quickly like hers did.
He questioned the possibility of completing the next evolution and obtaining the 250% Fortification and the ones after the next. If they needed 2 times the skill level compared to the level requirement of 300, it meant he needed his skill to reach level 600.
The lowest requirement of 1.1 times would require all class skills to reach level 330 for a 25% Fortification. The next gap was 1.25 times or 375 for 50% and 1.5 times would mean a skill level of 450 for a 100% Fortification.
When approaching the natural limit, even gaining a single skill level was a challenge not to mention the gap of 150 levels from 450 to 600.
Even if it was possible from Master to Grandmaster what about after that?
They needed a better method of gaining Natural Potential unless Ebony misunderstood the scaling of Natural Potential.
Now that Everlasting Tranquillity reached level 322 and increased his regeneration by 1610%, his base regeneration would be multiplied by 17.1. The base regeneration of 1907 Wisdom of a normal human was 1907 per hour since their mana pool would be 19070 and 10% of that was 1907. His Fortification increased his base mana regeneration by 500%, it translated that with 1907 Wisdom, he would be regenerating 11,442 per hour naturally even if he was knocked out of Everlasting Tranquillity.
With his Core Skill and a multiplier of 17.1 though, he was regenerating 3260.97 mana per minute or 54.3495 mana per second.
Being near him if he didn't control his overflowing Wisdom was not pleasant. Not only due to the sheer volume but according to Mark, his overflowing mana was chilly, landed with a sting and was heavy. The part about it being heavy was the most obvious. It was almost to the point where it was dangerous to be near his overflowing mana. Mark compared it to having his brain squeezed in every direction.
Both Ning Xin and Kong Jing appeared completely unbothered by it though. He similarly wasn't affected by their Vitality at all.
"Why aren't you affected by my mana?" He had to ask. They had time since they were lost and couldn't go fast in these cramped spaces.
"You're not affected by my vitality either." Ning Xin pointed out.
"Is there a reason other than getting used to it?" He knew that resistance to overflowing essence can be gained relatively easily compared to resistance skills but he had never really needed to get used to them. He could feel and sense other's but most of the time, nothing that would affect his movements.
"An inherent trait. A child born from a pair of Masters and a pair born from a pair of King and Queen, which do you think is used to an immensely dense or high volume of vitality and wisdom?" She answered with an example.
"Oh. Sorry for the silly question." The answer was more simple than he imagined.
Another advantage from birth it seems.
"And, I am actually affected by your mana. It has a strong calming effect, I confirmed it when I drank your blood. Also, it is not obvious but I think my natural mana regeneration increases a tiny bit when I'm near you."
"Hmm…being near you increases my reaction speed I think. It's very minute so I can't tell if it's from you or it's my own imagination."
"My essence isn't nearly as potent as yours at the moment so I'm not surprised if it doesn't have any effect."
"So essence doesn't only have a debilitating effect but a positive one as well?"
"I'm not sure. Supposedly, the effect might not even be of any use if we evolved once or twice more but… I guess your potent essence might show useful effects a lot sooner than normal."
"Is there a way to choose whether to inflict the debilitation or the strengthening one?"
"I don't know! You're the expert here." She appeared exasperated.
He was asking questions to which she didn't have answers to. She was right that he used his overflowing essence a lot more than she did. He must have assumed that she knew everything but they were roughly the same age and she was actually not welcomed by her own people.
'Well, more things to figure out.' He constantly tried to call Roya or Halvis so that he could follow the link using the vibrations but the link was also not getting anywhere. The earth here might have been too dense for it to pass through. The previous connection should have been luck.
'Is this really under Hoarfrost Glade? Where's the snow if we're under Hoarfrost Glade?'
With that sudden thought, Ebony continued to lead the way to every path upwards before he realised that only Gen and Ful's underground dome was so deep and had so much snow but many parts of Hoarfrost Glade didn't have snow that went too deep.