*???'s Pov*
Hello?
Is anyone here?
Can anyone hear me?
[I] guess it doesn't matter if anyone does anyways.
[I] died a long time ago.
[I] guess [I'm] here to talk about my certainties, and uncertainties.
[Sweet Horrors Beyond, Within, and Inside the Human Comprehension]
[Our] understanding of horrors within human comprehension is naturally complete.
They consist of things humans do.
Their repulsive actions the, murder, sexual crimes, the crimes against the rights, the embodiment of humans.
All humans inherently exist with a psyche, to disrupt it is to drive a stake into the heart of their humanity.
Within the psyche lies relationships the mind builds.
When these relationships are destroyed instead of enhanced, the body learns, but the mind is repulsed in pain.
This is the certainty of horrors within human comprehension.
The feeling of fear.
Knowing that unknown.
Facing the uncertain with certainty, that is the horrors within human comprehension.
***
Horrors beyond human comprehension.
These are also known to [Us].
[I] used to wish to become like these.
[We] used to wish to become powerful, to see the world as they did.
Those monsters, gods, whatever beings influenced the world behind their veil.
Now, [You] understand.
There was never a veil.
Just beings far more than a simple world could handle.
The world was their toy.
And they were children fighting over who could create the most interesting story.
As for me, [I] died a long time ago, well at least [Our] body did.
My mind persisted, and [I] became the incomprehensible.
[I] changed.
Anything [You] were, was lost to [Myself].
Once you become these, you are tied to what you once were, but are no longer related.
[I] embody the drive, the insanity of mortals to persevere to immortality, to omnipotence.
[I] am that.
Or more accurately [We], [I], [Us], [You], embody the unimaginable.
I am you. You are not me.
We are us. You all cannot be We.
We are All. I am All.
***
Horrors inside the human comprehension.
I am uncertain of the true limits of these.
What draws the line between imagination and insanity?
Is it the line between childhood and adulthood?
Many mortals believe so.
So then why is it that insanity in the form of entertainment is simply imagination?
Simple.
Imaginations that are made from, or make fears are simple lunacy.
The derivation of imagination and insanity is useless.
They are the same thing.
It is only in the eyes of the human psyche, the machinations they create that guide them to the answer.
The death of a mortal may be distressing to one, but entertaining to another.
The uncertainty of death mixed with the certainty of that person's life, mix in the psyche of the observer, and in reality, neither matter.
Death is simple, and life is too.
The complexity of it all arrives from human comprehension.
So in this way, whether a human retches from seeing a human die, or witnessing an eldritch being, it does not matter.
The cause and effect are the same.
Horror.
A word that loses all of it's meaning once you realize We create them, whether we understand them or not.
***
*Lucas' Pov*
I felt a shiver run up my spine.
I was being stared at by Aura.
"And where are you staring off into?"
"Sorry. I just liked watching the two of you play so much."
"Well, our daughter here has been calling out to you with no response."
She held the baby dragon under the front legs holding her face towards my own.
'Daddy? Are you okay?'
'Daddy is okay.'
'Daddy is just dealing with the influx of mana.'
'I will heal Daddy.'
She pressed her paws up against my chest, and my mana began to relax.
My mana was pushing up to the 4th circle.
My body could handle it, but my mind and soul were not ready.
I hadn't fully understood a concept.
So Alea's healing was welcome.
'Thank you Alea, Daddy is feeling much better.'
It still felt a little weird to call myself a dad, but watching over the baby dragon gave me a weird sense of fatherhood, so I took to the calling.
'Mhm.'
I felt Alea's pride in herself.
'Alea, where did you learn this?'
'Mom left it for me.'
Ah. Mana memories.
It seems the exceptionally large shell wasn't only to contain a large baby dragon, but to store many memories stored using mana.
Mana has memories, which is why death mana can be used in a certain way to see the life of the recently passed.
Mana memories can also be passed between people.
Mana can be imbued with memory, or be engraved.
The former merely passes memories along like information.
It will eventually disperse.
But the latter serves to engrave a person's perspective onto the world.
The use of this, caused many scholars debating on the speculation of everything being simulated to be a lie.
At least that's what I learned in one of my classes in the duchy.
How could one fabricate a memory?
But I knew.
This was a game.
I mean it was real life, but it was a game too.
Maybe this was a world just like 'Total Brake'.
Or maybe the creator of the game in Nyx Studios was a person in the game?
And we moved between worlds?
I certainly had no answer.
"Lucas, lets go introduce your new companion to the girls!"
Aura was a little excited to show off my little feline ferret to the other girls within the Estelle hall.
"Alright. Some have already seen it though."
"That's okay, Alea is too cute to miss."
"Sure."
I agreed.
With that we traveled down to the 3rd floor.
Celeste was the first person to be shown the newborn.
"Oh my god, she's so cute."
"Right?"
"I've got to let the other ladies on the floor know."
I sat in silence watching Celeste grab a big red button from out of her closet.
She pressed it alerting all the girls in the hall.
They began to rush into Aura and Celeste's room.
As they walked in they stopped, causing those behind them to push forward and do the same.
In the end we had roughly 35 girls in one room staring at a companion.
Alea tired of being carried by Celeste, slinked out of her hands, and came over to me.
The girls wasted no time, asking to pet, touch, shake hands with, and carry Alea.
Many of them began to coo to the baby dragon, which did catch her attention for a little bit.
A chorus of "Oh my" rang out as Alea began to move hands from one girl to another.
I'm sorry Alea, I should have prevented this.
"Celeste, in the future, use the emergency button for an actual emergency, but please do create a button to bring things like this to our awareness again."
"Can do."
She held a thumbs up.
As the girls began to leave, a few turned around to pinch Alea's cheeks or pet her one more time.
I was exhausted with the questioning about my companion.
Aura was also inundated with questions about seeing Alea.
I don't think many were even listening.
I think that maybe 15 of them even know Alea's name, despite me saying it multiple times.
Aura and I departed to the 4th floor to avoid being pelted with more requests to pet and questions.
But, of course that was wishful thinking.
A few boys had gathered to see what the companion I had brought to the 6th floor was.
Thankfully it was only 7.
And I got something useful out of it.
Harry Riesling.
Well, him and his older brother Harvey.
Harry is a companion, or an npc, depending on your recruitment choices.
Just like the monster index built into the game, Harry has a monster index.
In game he has a quest that goes a little something like show him 50 unique monsters and he will reward you.
It's a great quest, since it takes most of the playthrough to complete, if you aren't trying.
It also gives a lot of exp, and rare materials, since players this late in the game aren't short of it, and because it makes thematic sense.
A monster documenter having rare materials?
Of course they'd have samples from the creatures they studied.
Money?
Of course not, they spent it all on research and looking at new creatures.
Honestly Harry deserved to be in the research side of the academy.
However, he just like his older brother, had an affinity for magic their family couldn't refuse.
The Riesling Family.
A western family.
A viscounty.
They lived in the southwestern part of the empire.
They had massive sprawling plains home to many of the crops in the empire.
Their family had a few distinct features.
One being their bright golden-flax colored hair.
The other was their attribute tendency to nature magic.
Plant, tree, water, sunlight, specifically, sun magic and plant magic.
They were amazing cultivators of land, and many of their residents liked the noble family.
In 'Total Brake' good people weren't hard to find, but you did have to find them.
Thankfully I still haven't even tapped the potential targets for recruitment yet.
Harry was the animalist, and indexer in the family.
Harvey was the hunter, and monster predator in the family.
Both would be mission critical in the next episode.
Harvey wouldn't play an active role so much as Harry, but he was still important.
The next episode was the dungeon break episode.
With the demon's attack on the academy, and almost all of the students in the freshman class being in the intermediate tier, the academy wanted to push forward the student's introduction into dungeons.
The 5 Gates were a dungeon instance.
Thankfully there weren't many dungeons that formed naturally.
In fact many dungeons are artificial worlds that are made by mages.
Dungeons also become natural once they anchor to world after the mage who owns it dies.
So many old mages domains have been claimed by superpowers with the claim of teaching the next generation.
So where do Harry and Harvey fit into this?
Well, the episode actually contains no demons.
It's purely monsters.
Harry and Harvey are good at recognizing them.
Harvey has knowledge of their weaknesses and strengths.
Harry has knowledge of their habits.
With this in mind I could learn enough in the next several days to prevent any serious damage to the academy.
I honestly think the dean is letting me run wild with the demons because he likes my potential.
But it's a little dangerous to keep attracting his attention, so I'll try to avoid it this time by simply letting my teammates carry me.
I was definitely going to team up with Harry.
Harvey couldn't tag along since he's a second year.
But I was thinking I could add Aisha and Morgan into my party.
Aura has a friend group now outside of me, and can handle without me.
So this unbalanced mage group would have to do.
We had a main dps, Morgan, a tank and healer in Aisha.
We had 2 strategists in me and Harry.
I was an all-rounder with Harry being a buff and debuff support.
We had no long or mid rangers, but we should be okay with the team composition I made.
Let's just hope they can kill enough to keep me under the spotlight.
Anyways, Aura and I finally made our way past the boys to Mark and I's room.
"Yo, Lucas-"
"Dude, what is that in your arms?"
His eyes sparkled.
"Oh my god dude, it's so cute."
He booped her little snout and began to rub Alea's head.
"First off, it's a she not an it."
"Secondly, she came out of the egg I had."
"Really, the egg was huge."
"I really thought a dragon was going to emerge."
I kept mum.
I shot a look at Aura.
She watched as I awkwardly navigated the talk about Alea without letting it slip to either of them her true form.