Mike bowed back "thank you for everything." After the bow, he opened up is inventory and placed his new sword in it. Quickly realizing that he might have surprised Keiichi again, he said "oh, that's another part of my power; I can summon a window that I can put things into. Well then, see you tomorrow!" and with that, Mike left. School was so awesome! After he got outside, he noticed a PM from Ren, after reading it, he answered with;

Ren listened to Lucian speak, his tone sounding like he was somewhat nervous or something, but Ren just ignored that. "Upgrading your attack Skill would be good. Plus I also want to test out a few things as well, so I wouldn't mind helping you. We can use the Dueling function so that we don't kill each other..." Ren stopped speaking as he noticed a window, it being a PM sent from Mike. As much as Ren didn't like the guy and wouldn't spend time with that kind of outgoing idiot, as it wasn't that Ren didn't like him as a person as he was rather nice, it was just hard for someone cold and distant like Ren to keep up with someone that... innocent, honest, and outgoing.

"Mike says he's up for running an ID, ill tell him to meet us at the park where we all met the night before. We can grind Zombies there..." Ren began to quickly type up a PM which he sent to Mike, Sasha, and Silas, not bothering to create a separate one for Mike as he just sent out a mass PM.



After that he began to walk, somewhat expecting Lucian to follow. Once they got there, arriving before anyone else did, Ren set up an Empty ID, looking at Lucian. It was about 5:30 PM when they arrived. "Well before the others get here, if they even decide to come, what would you like to test out first?"

After getting a reply from Ren, Mike pulled out his scooter from his inventory and made his way over to the abandoned park from before. Mike was feeling very excited; he finally had a clear path to take. He felt a Maplestory Explorer who had finally gotten a job, and wasn't stuck with those really crappy Beginner skills anymore. Sure, he hadn't learned an offensive skill from Keiichi yet, but that would happen tomorrow. Anyway, now what he needed to do was level up so that he could increase his STR and DEX, maybe get them up to 7...nah, might as well raise them to 10 just to be safe. He arrived at the park not long after he left the school

Silas applied his stat points to meet the requirements needed to learn the new skill. Of course Silas didn't know that the book would disappear shortly after, and also didn't take it into account. Most of the RPG's he played the skills were simple learned by leveling or completing specific quests, so he didn't think about that. Silas decided to learn the skill. The book suddenly glowed bright and scattered into tiny pieces of paper then all headed towards his chest and were absorbed by him. Silas was a bit worried as he didn't expect the book to vanish, and he wanted to be on good terms with Genji.

Genji, like Silas, was surprised as what just happened. "I'm very sorry Genji... I didn't expect it to go this way..." he said. He walked up to Genji. "The book is gone now, but maybe you can still save some information about it. Silas showed the window that appeared in front of him explaining the new power. He already had closed the notification window. This would maybe make things not that bad, and Genji could learn more about the power of the 'Gamer'. He was a bit worried how Genji would respond. He was a cool dude, but even Silas himself, even if he didn't like books at all, would get a little angry about this. However it was not like he wanted to destroy the book, so hopefully Genji would understand.

Genji heard Silas' apology and noticed that he seemed genuinely apologetic, even offering to give him some information about it and he just shook his head, grinning. "Nah, its alright, I did say you can learn from it if you wanted to and having the book get destroyed in the process means I don't have to put it away. You saved me a trip to a bookshelf." Genji chuckled a little at his joke, not really mad at all that Silas made the book practically vanish from existence. If anything, he was impressed and somewhat baffled by it. "Besides, I can just ask for another from the Hiragaiyas and I was done reading it anyway, I was just... a bit surprised. I mean...I take it you now know the technique now?" He guessed from whatever Silas just did and his attempt to try and tell Genji that he would explain the Skill he just learned meant that he could not only perform it, but knew how to. "So from my understanding of what just happened, if you do know how to use that technique... you all can learn anything as long as its written down in a book or something... like the characters in videogames can or whatever, like that one a friend gave to me... Skyrim was it?"

Genji thought for a few moments, nodding to himself. "Well... your power just seems to keep popping up new tricks. If you really can learn anything from books, it'll make teaching you the basics of martial arts alot easier... so ill be right back. Just stay here and hang out for a bit or whatever." With that Genji ran off quite quickly, exiting the area, leaving Silas and Sasha alone for ten minutes.

When Genji returned about ten minutes later he came back with a box, a cardboard box, which he sent down on the ground before the two of them. He opened it up and it was filled with two stacks of books. "Well I'm back. Lets see if your power lets you learn from these books. If so, then your power will be more broken then I originally thought. Makes me a little jealous actually, that you can learn things that take others years to learn just by touching a book."

There were two stacks of five books in the box, a total of ten books, five for the each of them. The ones on top had the same colored cover, but no title on them.

Silas was relieved that Genji wasn't angry at all. Heck, he even want to get more books for Silas to learn skills out of. Genji left to get some books, he was gone for 10 minutes, but Silas didn't really interact with Sasha during that time. He just scrolled through his abilities and especially read the last acquired skill carefully. When Genji returned he had two stacks of books. Wow, could the power of the Gamer really be this powerful? He probably wouldn't even meet the requirements for the skills. Unless they all would be skills of a lower type, or maybe the Gamer power did have different rules to them with these books. And if Silas couldn't use any of these then at least Sasha could maybe learn some.

"Thanks." he said, having returned to his monotone. He grabbed the top book of the stack and opened it. He wondered if he indeed would get a new ability... again. Unfortunately the Gamer power didn't come with a manual.

The moment Silas touched the first book a window appeared for him, stating the following.



When he went to open it now, touching it again, another window appeared for him, asking him if he wanted to learn it. By tapping yes the book would once again vanish in the similar fashion as it did before, empowering him with the knowledge of the basic techniques that were written in the book and making a new window appear.





The second book was a different color, but again had no title. The moment Silas touched it the following would appear.



Upon tapping yes once again he could feel the strength and power that came along with this technique moving through him, a window appearing now saying that he learned the skill and another appearing after that explaining it.



The third one was called 'Ban Family Inner Ki Technique', giving the same windows that the other books did the moment he touched it. Upon attempting to learn it, he was able to do so, the same first window appearing stating that he acquired the Skill just as the one did for the Foot Technique.



The fourth book was called 'Ban Family Breathing Technique', and upon trying to learn it, Silas was able to, acquiring the Skill.



Upon learning this Skill another window appeared.



When Silas pulled out the last book, Genji looking at Silas as he seemed to make each one vanish and learn them, Genji nodded. "That one I picked out for both of you, you each have one as I figured since you both wield bladed weapons it would work well."

This book was called Ban Family Sword Technique, and upon learning it the same type of window appeared as the one for the Ban Family Martial Arts Technique in that it was a Talent Skill.



"Wow, I can sense the strength of my family's technique in you... that power of yours really is freaking bullshit. It took me a while to learn all of that." Genji just laughed, looking towards Sasha now. He really was a sort of jovial and laid back guy. "So... can you also learn stuff by touching books like he can since you both have the same power?"

If Sasha examined each book by touching them they were all the exact same books that Silas had just acquired.

"Let's find out."

Sasha took the books out and 'read' them just as Silas had done, each volume disappearing into nothingness the moment she stabbed the button with her finger. It felt like she was consuming the books. Checking her skills and talents, she found all of them there.

"That's sweet. I wonder if this works for, say, quantum mechanics, or something."

"You now have it to, the power of the Ki Technique of our family in you... yet it seems different... It feels like Mana, which is strange as normally you shouldn't be able to use a Ki Technique with Mana... which means that your power allows you to bend the rules of things, something else Gaia is probably assisting you with, which makes your power even more broken then before." Genji looked both of them over, nodding as he then kicked away the box so it wouldn't get in the way. "Anyway... there should still be about ten or twenty more Kobolds here... if you guys are up for some more fighting to test your new abilities, we could go find them. I want to see how strong you are now that you have learned these techniques... as even if you do know them, knowing how to properly use your skills on the field of battle is a different story. Are you two up for some more fighting? Of course, ill make sure you are only fighting one or two at a time and keep any stragglers away as I did before."

On closer inspection, Sasha realized that the passive skills gave a truckload of benefits to her. Sasha could understand Genji's feelings; this method of learning things was just plain cheating. She could learn anything in the world with the mere press of a button! The possibilities were simply endless.

"Yeah, I think we'll fare much better," Sasha said as she stretched her arms again, ready for more action. Eyeing a couple of kobolds, she raised her arm at one a fair distance away. She had to squint to see it clearly. At this range, her mana revolver was most likely going to miss.

"One can try, I suppose," Sasha said to no one in particular. She began the now familiar process of gathering mana at her fingertips to fire the mana revolver, but before she pulled the mental trigger, an idea hit her. Without letting go, she continued to pool energy into her fingertip for as long as her concentration would hold. She had to imagine it as something powerful. A large bolt? No, that wasn't fast enough. What about a beam? A quick pulse of a wide, powerful beam that could punch a deep hole through anything? Yeah, that might work.

With that image held firmly in her mind, she let go of the charged energy with a cry, hoping that her attempt would succeed.

As Sasha began to charge gather her Mana to her finger to fire a beam like bullet she would find that without a skill for controlling mana it was a bit difficult. She would find though that the Inner Ki Technique she now possessed as well as the Breathing Technique made it a bit easier to gather her Mana to her finger since those techniques used Mana instead of Ki as did her revolver ability, but it was still a bit difficult.

---

Sasha Focus: 12 - 23 Focus = -11

---

It seemed to work out though. The power ups that Sasha received from the Passive Skills helped her gather her mana more easily to her finger to fire it off in just the way she wanted. It wasn't really a beam, but more of a somewhat longer, bigger bullet that, with the extra mana, had a slightly further travel distance. It was more like a rifle bullet than a beam, but it seemed bigger than a rifle bullet. A rifle bullet made of blue energy. Of course that is just what it looked like anyway, as it was still kind of misty.

---

Sasha Experiment: 39 + 25 Distance - 23 Projectile Weaponry - 5 Skill Bonus = 37

Hit!

Damage Dealt: 11

---

The bullet hit the distant Kobold head on, the beast turning and glaring at Sasha, growling a feral growl at her as it began to charge, its eyes filled with blood thirst as it charged towards Sasha. Its teeth were gnashing and something that looked like smoke was rising from its body. "Be careful, its entering a blood rage. When it does that it hits twice as hard and is alot more wild, but also stupider as well. I recommend using the focused Breathing Technique", which for Sasha would be activating the Breathing Technique skill as her newly gained knowledge of this would allow her to know this, "and keep your distance."

When her bullet did work though two windows appeared for her.





The Kobold was a good bit away though, so Sasha could probably get another shot off before it arrived as it was moving rather quickly thanks to its own natural speed and immense physical strength.

"Well, I think it would be best to work on the new offensive skill first, But from your experiences in experimenting with skills, What did it feel like as you changed your mana blast?"

"Huh..." Lucian found it hard to grasp the concept of manipulating his mana, he could have it flow as he pleased, but to shape something untangable seemed hard to grasp, just like the wind. He would do his best to create something new though, just from a different approach to what he anticipated at the start.

---

Lucian Focus: 25 - 27 = -2

---

Using Mana Flow and Mana Wave, Lucian would be able to gather the Mana in his hands. Condensing the mana into a more focused, concentrated form. When launched from himself, he felt the flow of mana from this somewhat condensed, comet like blast. Lucian then discovered that, with the flow of mana from the blast to himself would still be connected, he could use his internal focus to essentially control the attack with his mind and body. When it hit his intended Ren, with his Mana Armor active as he used the Duel function of their power, Lucian would discover also that upon impact of the blast that the flow would still be there for just a split second, enough so that he could send a second surge through towards the target.

Unfortunately since it was a trial run and an experiment the Lucian could not create the second surge fast enough, but Lucian discovered that it could be done.

Two new windows appeared before him.





"Thanks, that seemed to work nicely," Clicking away the windows as the appeared, informing him of his new skill. "And thanks as well for using your armour, I have an idea to make my own as well, but with a bit of a natural twist." He took of his glasses to give them a quick shine as he tried to relax before creating his next skill. "...Say Ren, have you ever been overseas before?" His face going slightly red as he inquired, he tied to hide this by having his hand infront as he faked to examine his glasses. "I'm just wondering is all." He then got into a stance before giving his other idea a test run.

---

Lucian Focus: 2 (Critical!)

---

Lucian would be able to flow the mana around him, spinning it around him as though it were the wind, forming a sort of revolving shield around him. Of course it was puny and small since creating something big right now during experimentation would drain his mana in a second. Focusing on the feeling of the wind around him as well Lucian would feel his current protection from the wind assisting this as some of the wind that was invisibly surrounding him became one with this small, spinning shield of mana. Thanks to his Spirit Channeling Skill his own spirit could connect with the wind here automatically as he focused, making the wind and his current mana flow one for a slight surge of spinning mana that looked more like an azure wind.

After that somewhat intense rush was over as it only lasted for just a few long moments, as it was starting to drain Lucian's MP dry, two new Windows appeared.





After it finished, he let out a deep sigh of relief, that was easier than I imagined, yet harder than I thought it would be. Clicking his windows away, Lucian was well pleased with what he had learened. "Did you want to test anything out before Mike comes?"

Ren felt the blast hit him, his armor luckily reducing a good amount of the damage so it didn't really do a whole lot anyway, Ren watching as Lucian seemed to touch a few windows. "That blast certainly did feel different from your regular Mana Wave Skill." With Ren's ability to manipulate Mana he could sense it as well and sort of sensed a connection between Lucian and the blast, but it was not necessarily a tangible one, but more of a metaphysical one. It was quite strange at how all of these skills for using Mana could be so different yet they seemed so similar.

Then came a question of whether or not Ren had been overseas, which enlisted a raised eyebrow from Ren. "Yea, my parents used to take me to all different sorts of places for work. I even stayed in America for a few years when I was somewhat younger so I know a bit of English. I never really liked it there though, especially the strange parties that they took me to for whatever their job was, which is something to this day that I don't know anything about or even care about in the slightest." A simple response as Ren checked his own Skill window, nodding as he saw that MP Armor had gained a slight bit of EXP from blocking that attack.

After that he watched Lucian create something that was quite a bit more impressive. A swirling shield of azure colored winds, or so that's how it looked in its infantile stages. Ren knew that once a skill was created it would look much different than it did in the experimental stages, so the shield would probably be alot more solid than it was now, something like Ren's own Mana Shield Skill but also something that was alot more intricate.

Then he heard Lucian asking him if he wanted to test anything, and he nodded. "I would like to test out Eldritch Flame, see if I can't empower my own Mana skills with it since it seems to be sort of a rudimentary Skill right now. You should probably put that Shield of yours back up, that way you can get some EXP for it while I test out my new thing."

Ren would wait for Lucian to put up his Mana Whirlwind Shield. When he used the Skill the shield was now a complete small dome over him like most Mana shields were in games. While it didn't appear to be actively rotating and spinning, wind could be seen every now and again rotating around the shield, as if the spinning was more of an invisible thing rather than a flashy affect. So it was definitely spinning, but not in a manner that was entirely visible.

Ren focused, deciding to start with a simple mana skill. "Mana Bolt." He formed the bolt in his hand and began to focus upon its Mana. "Eldritch Flame." Now a greenish, blackish flame formed in his other hand, Ren gritting his teeth a small bit as it was very hot and looked somewhat hard to control. He began to focus more, trying to merge the flame's Mana with the Mana of the Mana Bolt.

---

Ren Focus: 38 - 38 Focus = 0

---

Ren seemed to get it, although with a bit more difficulty than normal as he would feel as though perhaps pure focus wasn't the best way to control this fire. Regardless he managed to get what he was going for. The blue mana bolt now burned with that greenish-blackish flame as Ren then launched it towards Lucian, the bolt impacting dead on since it was easy to hit a target that wasn't really trying to dodge.

The shield managed to hold up against the bolt for just a moment, but was effectively shattered by its strength, the fiery mana bolt slamming into Lucian. Needless to say the bolt hurt alot. The impact of the bolt itself was mostly nulled by the shield, but the dark fiery power it carried burned. Unfortunately Lucian wasn't quick enough to dodge the flame so he found himself on fire quite quickly, the flame burning really hot and hurting quite a bit. This made Ren's eyes widen as in a bit of a panic he aimed his hand towards Lucian. This was the other thing he wanted to test, but he didn't think he'd get to test it so quickly as the fire was chipping away at Lucian's HP. Perhaps this was one of the reasons why Saito said that agility was important.

"Force Siphon!" From what the Skill's description told him, Force Siphon could be used to siphon life force or spiritual force, Mana, from targets. He figured if it could siphon mana from living targets, then maybe it could drain the power of other people's powers if he used the Mana of Force Siphon to try and grasp and drain the Mana or power of a different ability. In this case, Ren was aiming for the Eldritch Flame that was currently burning Lucian.

---

Ren Focus: 22 - 38 Focus = -14

---

Despite it being a bit more difficult to control a dark power with just pure focus as it probably required a few different things, manipulating its Mana to grasp the Mana of the flame he created was pretty well executed. As he used the force siphon a dark, yellowish glow went from his hands and grasped onto the flame, seeming to literally suck the power right out of it, ceasing its burning and returning some of the Mana to Ren, who quickly ran over to him. "That got... a bit out of hand... are you alright?" Ren put his hand on Lucian.

"First Aid" Was what Ren said after putting his hand upon Lucian's arm. After waiting six seconds a green glow would wash over Lucian as some of the damage was healed. In total, Lucian had taken 38 Damage from all of that, but his Mana Whirlwind Shield did go up another Level. 21 HP was healed by Ren's usage of First Aid, which also took away a good bit of the pain.

He took a few steps back, sighing some, now feeling somewhat awkward after nearly accidentally roasting Lucian alive, so he wanted to move the conversation on from that point as he began to think of one more thing to test before Mike showed up as he looked at some new windows that appeared for him. While looking at the new windows, Ren decided to ask Lucian a question. "So... what about you? Have you been overseas before?"

hot...Hot...HOT!! Lucian was desperately trying to put out the flames that had covered his body, but the magical flames would not be subdued by normal means, He felt his life points dropping as the flames continued to lick away at his body, he wasn't burning up, but the pain was like no other. If not for Ren's other skill, Lucian was certain he would have died then and there. His body still feeling the pains of flames before Ren used a healing skill on him, which soothed the pain till it was all but gone.

"Okay...Lets not do that again, it wasn't fun." Lucian now understood why, in some games, when you are lit on fire, you run around like a fool and don't do anything else, "and to answer your question, pretty much the same as you, My parents had a job that took us all over, we ended up moving around a lot, and having to make appearances at special meetings or dinners." He patted off the arms of his shirt, it had no visible sign of damage from the magical flames gladly. "So, anything else you wanted to try? Hopefully not involving dark fire." He let out a weak chuckle.

"Yea. Even if we are in the middle of the duel, which means we can't kill one another right now, using that skill on anyone but an enemy is dangerous..." Ren also felt a bit strange as it had drained a little bit of his own HP when he used it, but he kept that a secret for now. As Ren also heard that Lucian had been overseas he nodded, a little surprised that they had a similar set of circumstances. "You ever go to America? Aside from anime conventions, its not all that great...don't see why people say foreigners are better." After reading over a window one more time he closed it with a swipe of his hand, looking towards Lucian.

"Use that Mana Whirlwind Skill again, I want to test something with a new Skill I just received. We can rest a bit to recover both our MP and HP after I try this out while we wait for Mike to show up." Ren waited for Lucian to use the skill once again, Ren aiming at the shield. He remembered the feeling of draining the power of the Eldrtich Flame with Force Siphon. He wondered if he could use his new Power Siphon skill to grab the power of the shield, but instead of absorbing it, using it on himself. He knew it would be difficult, but it was worth a shot.

"Power Siphon!" That same dark, yellowish glow from before moved from Ren's hands, aiming for the shield.

---

Ren Focus: 0 (Critical!)

---

The absorbing was easy, as that was part of the skill. He managed to absorb 21 MP from the Shield, which was 60% of its strength. Instead of absorbing the MP of it back into himself though he focused on it instead when it came to him, holding it in hand. He could feel the strength of the shield in the MP as he stopped and held it in his hands. It was a bit difficult to control the dark power of the Skill, but perhaps since the Skill Lucian used was made of purely mana with wind, it seemed... easier to control for some reason. Focusing now he raised his hand above himself and unleashed the power of the Mana he had taken control of, a noticibly weaker version of Lucian's Mana Whirlwind Shield forming around him for just a few moments.

Unfortunately, as this was only a trial run, it was too weak to stay around for long, but Ren felt like he easily obtained how to use it and grasp it, maybe even do other things with the power of other abilities. Ren noticed a window appearing for him and he read it, as well as two more, which he soon closed. "Anyway, we should wait to regain our MP and HP before Mike shows up since we'll need them for grinding..." As they waited, he looked towards Lucian, deciding to ask him a question. "What did your parents do and what kind of parties did you attend?" As they talked about this, something seemed familiar to Ren and he didn't know why, so he was a bit curious, but just guessed that whatever the familiar feeling he had was just a sort of a thing about them having a similar past.

"I have been to America a few times with my family, it wasn't bad, and it wasn't great. Also went to Europe a few times as well, it was great to walk through places that games and stories are based off of, kind of made me feel like a character in one of them, humorous as now we are." Lucian smirked, then got his shield ready for Ren's next move.

Afterwards they talked for a while whilst regaining mana and health and waiting for Mike to show up. "What my parents did? I'm not entirely sure. I think it had something to do with marketing or research. They never really talked much about it with me, and even now they are pretty hush about it." He shrugged, "As to the parties, they were more formal than anything, all the adults would gather in their groups and discuss things about work, and how they balanced work with normal life, meanwhile all the 'kids' got lumped together regardless of our age or interests. Most of us having common ground, but not really talking much. I usually just played on my GameGuy Colour." Lucian looked back on those memories fondly, nice place, fairly busy, yet being entranced in his games.

"I remember something like that including this one other person who was strange. I don't really remember much though as I was younger at the time I usually just kept to myself as well and played games or sat in the corner, not really liking them because I was always..." Ren stopped though as Mike finally showed up in the Pseudospace, Ren looking over at him.

"I guess its just us three then. We can just grind Zombies for now as I am mainly focusing on Skill grinding and since they are weaker we may not get as much EXP from them but they are good for grinding skills because they are slow. We will get some EXP on them." Ren had his ID Create high enough to make Wisp ID, but he didn't know what they are and wasn't sure if fighting an enemy he knew nothing about was a good idea as of yet.

"Is everyone ready?"

(Put in the wrong thread, delete)

Mike took out his new wooden sword and smiled "oh I am so ready" while he didn't expect to do much damage with physical attacks, he could at least get some EXP for his Katana Mastery skill. Since he was going to be a pure katana user, that passive was going to become his bread and butter. Right now, he didn't really have any active skills that he wanted to grind, so he was only planing to use some if he was in trouble. He didn't need to do any kind of overwhelming damage, he had Ren and Lucian around for that

Lucian looked at Mike, and couldn't help but smile. He wasn't keen on the kid, but his consistant optimisim was starting to be something that Lucian was expecting everytime he saw him. Regardless of their powers and what else could happen, he hoped that that aspect of the kid would remain...he also hoped he would endure some form of trauma and suddenly think more logically, but would be content with just the first. "Yup, ready to grind." Making sure no one else was around, Lucian pulled his bo staff out. It was going to be more for defensive purposes, he tapped it to the ground.

"Make sure to save some of your MP for the event that a Boss Mob shows up... as the one for these zombies pretty much killed me when I fought it as my HP did indeed go below 0, but I managed to survive somehow and kill it before it could kill me... I guess that's what the Deadly Status is... it probably means one more hit and we are dead." With that warning Ren broke their current ID and made a Zombie ID, around 11 zombies appearing.

The Zombies were pretty tough on the offensive, but on the defensive they were absolutely horrible, allowing them to be vanquished more quickly. Lucian managed to defend from most hits with his staff, the shield around him absorbing one blow from a zombie's powerful bite.

Mike would actually do really good on offense, scoring a Critical Strike even at one point, which actually increased the rank of his Senshin no Ken Talent by 1 and gave a level in Katana Mastery. On defense, not so much. He took a couple of bites, didn't parry anything, and even managed to feel sick for a moment after one of them, very sick, as if he had been infected by some awful disease. Somehow though, perhaps it was the teachings of the Senshin no Ken teaching about unity of body and spirit or just through pure hardiness, he managed to forcibly power through it and brush it off (Critical result in OOC terms), a window first appearing stating the following.



Two familiar looking windows appeared for him after that.





Luckily during the middle of the fight, for Mike, his HP and MP fully healed, but not the fatigue of battle as that did not heal with leveling up, as he leveled up to level seven.

Lucian did pretty well on both fronts. He managed to hit with the few Chained Mana Surges he got off, increasing the level of that Skill. He did pretty well in blocking attacks, but one did manage to get past his guard. Luckily his Mana Whirlwind Shield that he would have put up before the start of the fight to grind it blocked the entirety of the blow, granting a level in it since he got a small bit of EXP for it after activating it. He also got a little more EXP for Mana Flow, which was probably from training a Skill that took advantage of its full potential.

Ren seemed to do well on the offensive front, using Eldritch Flame and the Charge Skill to empower his Spinning Mana Blades, which looked like buzz saws made out of mana, but also were covered in the dark green flame of Eldritch Flame. Those seemed to tear apart zombies in nearly one hit, although were a bit of a mouthful since Ren first had to use Eldritch Flame, which required saying said words as all Skills did, then say 'Charged Spinning Mana Blades'. He got bit a couple of times as well, but the bite's damage one time was completely nullified by his MP Armor and own Resilience combined and another time the bite did connect. He even managed to get off Force Siphon a couple of times

All in all, the first session of grinding went pretty well, no Mob Boss appearing this time. Ren broke the barrier after the fight. "Well, that was fun... and easy, I think we can go one more time before resting a bit and trying again." After that he recreated another Zombie ID to let the grinding continue. Even if their HP and MP could regenerate, resting off fatigue was something that also needed to be done and continuous fighting could easily make one tired, but with how quick that fight was, as it only took about a minute or so since they fought back somewhat well but did awful in defense, but still fighting could get tiring even after a minute or so, give or take, of it.

These zombies were... alot more different than the last ones. More aggressive and they did alot better than the party did, alot better. Lucian's shield was quickly broken through pretty quickly into the fight and the rest of the party got a few bites on them as well as even though the zombies were normally slow they also could lunge forward pretty quickly to bite them, and that's what they were doing.

Of course, with the power difference they had over the zombies they managed to fight back somewhat with Ren sort of taking charge here for the most part. It took a bit longer though since these things did not want to die so easily. All in all, it was quite an exhausting experience. Ren even had to take some medicine, which was disgusting medicine, during the fight for some reason, being cured of the Disease status he got at one point, only to be bitten when he tried to put it away, but he managed to brush it off that time thanks to the Hardiness skill he obtained earlier as well during the previous fight.

Some EXP for Skills was gained as was some levels in Skills, but the most important thing were the level ups. Lucian finally hit Level 10, a window for him appearing when he did as well as restoring his HP and MP. In fact it was thanks to the restoration of MP and HP from level ups for both Mike and Lucian that they were even able to stay in the fight instead of being forced to retreat. The window read as such.



Not only that, but after this fight was over, Ren began to meditate using the Meditation Skill to recover MP while he waited for the others to apply their new level ups and regenerate their own MP and HP as well. Of course, recovering from fatigue was also important as well, so that would take a while as did recovering MP and HP, even with the Meditation Skill to help recover MP.

After Mike applied his stat and talent points, he saw a window pop up that said that he had just learned the First Aid Skill "Awesome! I just learned a new skill by getting my First Aid Talent to 10, my first healing skill! Now lets see what it does..." As Mike read the skill description, a frown appeared on his face "the bane of my existence; reagent skills! Oh how I hate it when skills require some kind of item in order to use them, just like the cube skills from DFO. That just drives me nuts! Even the Final Fantasy XII First Aid version of this skill would be better. Sure, I could only use it on HP critical allies, but I bet that I'd still get more use out of it then this. Where am I even supposed to find first aid items anyway?"

Ren looked at Mike as he apparently acquired the First Aid Skill and, judging from his reaction, he wasn't happy. Ren couldn't really keep up with this one, two... noisy in Ren's opinion. He didn't do too well with noisy people, especially since one person who liked to talk decided to talk alot about him and... well... that is a story for another day. Ren stood up and opened his inventory, pulled out one of the bandages in it, and showed it to Mike. "Just get some bandages, items used in typical first aid. You have knowledge of First Aid from your high rank in the skill, so it should be obvious." After that he put the bandage away in his inventory and went back to meditating with the Meditation Skill to recover more of his MP as he waited for Lucian to apply his level ups so that they could get on with grinding.

---

Mike First Aid: 55 - 21 First Aid = 34

---

In fact, even without Ren saying that Mike, as Ren said, would know that is indeed the correct answer if he had just taken a moment to think about it, or had a moment to think about it before outwardly expressing his anger towards the Skill.

Mike sighed "I'm sorry. It's just...skills that consume an item when they're used are hands down my biggest pet peeve. It always makes me second guess myself whenever I consider using that kind of skill; 'I think I'm going to go use this skill now.....but wait, what if I'm going to need it in the future, but can't because I'll have used up the material needed for it. Maybe I'll be able to make it without using this skill.' You know, that kind of thing. There were lots of times in the past when I began to run out of medicine sooner then expected...so in order to save money and not be anymore of a burden to my parents, I started rationing my medicine, and just dealing with the pain. I think that's why I hate reagent skills so much; the hit far too close to home, and I played video games to escape from that very reality that they reminded me off"

"Woohoo!" Sasha cried out when the attempt was successful. However, she had to deal with the enraged kobold first. She put her palms together and muttered, "activate breathing technique." Pointing both index fingers at it this time, she fired the mana revolver at the charging beast. She could examine the new ability later, after the immediate danger was taken cared of.