Lucian had doved out of the way of both the zombie and the attack from Ren, and was just picking himself off the ground when it was all over, the pain in his body fading away as if it had all been just a dream. "Yeah...Fun..." The day went from completely in his favour, things going well, grinding, skills being learnt, to being set on fire, being punted, almost being squished to death, "I think I have had enough 'fun' for the day." He adjusted his glasses, which he was quiet happy the gamer ability kept from breaking after he went through, "I think I am going to go play pokemon or something else mind numbing, and call it a night." He then noticed the remainder of the loot after Ren had taken his share. Sure it looked a bit unbalanced, Ren getting two items compared to their potions, but it was true, they had no use for them, and Ren did do most of the damage...even if it was himself and Mike in the most danger. "Well Mike, I will take the blue ones, you take the red? It seems like it would work best with what we are both doing." Lucians reasoning was that of a tank needed heals, and a mage needed mana. Simple really, but he would leave it up to Mike.

After quickly using Observe on both potions, Mike said "sure, that sounds okay to me." With the build he was going with, he really wouldn't need mana potions anyway. If he kept putting points into WIS (which he was going to do, since it was going to be his main damage stat), then his mana regeneration would be high enough to cover the cost of his skills. Mike found it really exciting that he was actually going to be able to make a build that mimicked the tanky Asura from DFO. With his STR at 8 now, he could just gring for 2 free points later, yes he realized that grinding for free stat points wasn't east, but he felt that 2 was doable. Right now, all he had to do was put points into VIT and WIS, both were the stats that made someone tanky, and WIS was also going to be his primary damage stat...Mike was starting to feel broken, the good kind of broken. While his Mana was still low, he quickly used Meditate to get some EXP for it

Lucian would recieve the Medium Mana Potion and the Small Mana Potion while Mike received the Medium Health Potion and the Small Recovery Potion. Using Observe on each of the different types of Potions revealed the following windows. Of course, Mike had already used Observe on a Small Recovery Potion before, so there was nothing new to be seen for that and thus no EXP to be gained for using the Skill upon it.









As Mike sat down to use Meditate Mike's Mana would have completely recovered when he leveled up, so using Meditate wasn't going to give him any EXP as a window appeared when he tried to use it.



Granted that didn't mean the Skill couldn't be used for other purposes, as from its description it could be used in other focus or mediation oriented tasks that were non combat based, but using it right now would be fruitless so there would be no point in continuing its usage.

---

Meanwhile, on the Sasha and Silas front...

---

Kobold grinding was not going all too smoothly. These Kobolds were fierce and tough. While Sasha and Silas, working together, would be able to kill a few of them, there were times when Genji had to step in and save them from a head crushing, or in the Gamers' cases all HP draining, blow from the raging Kobolds. When all was said and done Genji had killed six more by himself and of the 10 that Silas and Sasha had to fight, Genji had to step in to either block a hit or kill a Kobold before the Kobold's killed them, doing this for five of them. He was incredibly strong, easily making these very tough Kobolds look like minor chumps.

During the fighting the two of them hit Level 10, each getting a window alerting them to a +1 increase in all Stats, which was nice. Some EXP was gained in Skills, which was also good, Sasha leveling up the Breathing Technique and her new Mana Rifle while Silas gained some more EXP in his Energy Strike and Chain Attack while, at the same time, getting a level in Katana Mastery. If he decided to use either his Tamashii no Nessho or Breathing Technique (or both) those would go up in level as well (Ill leave that up to you, you can put which one(s) you use in your response post) Over all it was a pretty successful grind, despite how tough the enemies seemed to be. Of course, it would have been impossible without Genji's help. Unfortunately, or maybe fortunately depending upon how one looked at it, no boss mob showed up,.

He returned with a couple more clubs and two more suits of armor, as well as three recovery potions and a decent sized stack of yen bills as he gathered all of the item drops. "Well... that was fun. It seems like you guys have grown a mite bit stronger as well, and just from one fight... you're power is quite something. You can grow stronger instantly and produce enough weapons to arm a gang... if people found out about this they would probably move mountains to get their hands on you..." Genji sighed some as he handed half of the money to Sasha and the other half to Silas, handing each of them a recovery potion, but looking at the third.

"You mind if I take this one? I actually wanna check to see if this is actually a really rare, incredibly expensive recovery potion... also if you two aren't willing to use those clubs or armor the Ban Clan, as I mentioned before, will be willing to buy them off of you. Also, do you two have any more questions or anything else you'd like to go over, like perhaps questions about the techniques you have acquired or anything else?"

Around this time a PM would arrive for Sasha and Silas, from Ren.

Mike slapped his head after seeing the notification "oh yeah, forgot that leveling up restores HP and MP. Boy do I feel stupid." Well, while he was meditating, he might as well do something; thinking back to when he tried to make a skill to replenish an allies mana, he felt that he had been extremely close, and that he was just missing...something. Because meditating now boosted his focus, he decided to get a little practice manipulating his own mana, the fact that they could create magic skills from scratch was proof that they had the potential to do so. Returning to his meditation, Mike tried to gather his mana at his hands, and then send it outside of his body while still maintaining control over it

Silas battled the Kobolds alongside Sasha and Genji, and in his opinion it went pretty well. He had experimented the Hiragaiya Tamashī no Nesshō technique. He combined it with his Energy Strike which he in turn used in his Chain Attack. Hopefully it would go pretty well, as he first attacked the Kobold that Sasha dodged moments ago, and afterwards headed for the next closest Kobold if the first one was killed successfully, else he would continue to attack the first Kobold. After that he fought more Kobolds in a similar fashion.

After the training he felt better than ever. He noticed that he finally had hit the two digits in his level and also leveled in the abilities he used in battle. Silas was a bit disappointed that no boss showed up, as he was on a roll, but anyways it was a very decent training. As Genji examined the drops of the enemies he noted that a whole there was weapon and armor to equip a whole army. He was right, along with their special ability to become stronger through training, many people would want to get their power. Maybe even try to drain it from them with some kind of special device, if there was such a thing.

"Hey, Genji. Take it. You helped us very much and also gave us some things too. It would be unfair to let you not have some things, after all you are a person who can be trusted. And I don't easily have that with people. It took some time for me to trust this girl here." Silas said pointing to Sasha, and added a playful smile afterwards. "And I don't have any questions, I think I'm just going to experiment with it and make it my own." Silas noticed the PM he got from Ren. He hadn't seen the rest of the gang at all. The only one he really bonded with was Sasha, who at the moment also was the only one he trusted. He knew that Mike could be trusted but he was.... clumsy. "I'll send a reply Sasha." Silas answered as she probably also got the PM. He wasn't going to write a long PM or anything, he didn't need to know everything. It was not like he was their leader or something.

Mike would still be tired from the fighting, so perhaps focusing on this wasn't the best idea, Ren even wondering if this kid was gonna take a rest as he awaited a response from Silas and Sasha while massaging his own slightly sore shoulders.

---

Mike Focus: 98 (Fumble)

---

Indeed, perhaps it was because he was so tired. For a moment, Mike would feel as if he had control over his Mana as he began to slowly move it out of him, but something went wrong. For just a moment, a split second he lost control of it, the possible cause fatigue or perhaps a lack of knowledge on how to do this. It was hard to say. Next thing though he would feel the Mana rebound and go back inside of him, moving wildly in him as it began to swell. Next thing Mike knew a burst of pain rocketed his entire being, tearing into his spirit as he felt his entire body go numb, yet the pain was still there and real, as if there were thousands of shards of glass all shattering inside of his spirit.

Ren's eyes widened as he saw this, quickly using Observe on Mike to see what was wrong. After a few moments though, for Mike, the pain was gone, but...

---

Mike Vit: 8 - 18 = -10

---

Mike's body would be able to easily endure the powerful pain, which is why it dissipated after a few seconds, although for Mike those six seconds would seem like an agonizing eternity. Mike also felt his MP drop to 0, cutting off access to all of his special skills. His entire body and mind would feel completely drained, as if he couldn't really do much of anything except walk maybe, as if everything inside of him had just shattered into a thousand pieces.

"I don't know what you just did... but apparently you now an ailment called Spirit Drain... you should probably get home and rest that off..." Normally Ren wouldn't have cared, but Ren may have been cold to people but he wasn't a heartless jerk. He walked over to Mike and offered a hand to help him up. "Can you stand and walk?"

Ren also noticed the PM and just tapped out a quick, two word to them.



Its not that Ren was trying to be their leader. In all honesty he would rather someone else do it since this was real life and technically not a game. He hated talking to other people, but somehow or another with his greater experience with the power the role somehow just.. floated over to him. If it wasn't for the impending danger they were all in and thus they all needed to help one another, he would have just left them all alone a while ago.

---

Meanwhile, on Sasha and Silas' front

---

"Cool, thanks." Genji pocketed the potion, looking over the two of them. "Its still hard to believe that your power is letting you a spirit technique with not only Mana, but without the technique you need to use it." He had watched Silas when he used the Tamashi no Nessho and needless to say he was a bit impressed. "But after seeing it for myself its needless to say that you really are getting assistance from Gaia. You would be wise to hide that from people."

Genji looked at the other weapons and armor that were gathered. "Anyway, if you two don't want all of these clubs and armors the Ban Family will buy them for a decent price, but before that... there is one thing I want to ask the two of you..." He sighed a little as his expression grew a bit more serious.

"While I am all up for you two training and growing stronger... I also somewhat agree with Sumi and would respect your decision if you decide to ignore the Abyss and go back to your normal lives... which is why I have an important question to ask. There is info on the auction about you and your three other friends that is selling very well. For now it'll probably just be small time Hunters coming after you, but eventually you may have to fight people if you cannot run.... which brings me to my question." His tone grew a little quieter and more serious, as if he really didn't want to ask this question, but knew that he had no choice.

"If it comes down to it and you have no choice, are you capable of killing someone?"

"Geh" Mike mumbled as he got to his feet "I've...felt worse pain" he said "and with my VIT 9 times as high as it was before, I'm sure I'll be fine." He had been close, he could feel it. Mike decided that first thing tomorrow, he was going to try again. Maybe he just messed up because he was mentally fatigued or something. He had heard about something like that before, but never experienced it. It was too bad too, he still had so much he wanted to do today, like working on his Katana Mastery skill. "I think I'm done for today, I'm going to head back home. See you both later" he said before he began to make his way back home. As happy as he was nowadays, Mike knew that he was going to have to fight for his life sooner or later, this power made him a potential target. However Mike is no stranger to struggling to survive, he had to fight his entire life just to see tomorrow. This time was different though, this time he could prepare. Although things were pretty carefree right now, Mike knew that that would change, calling it his gamer instinct...and he wasn't going to waste any time

"Travel safely." Lucian waved goodbye to Mike as he left to go home, "Well, I think that I'm going to do the same now, Games to play, books to study." He cracked his neck and started to walk away, but stopped after only a few steps. "Say Ren, Where do you live actually? I know with our ability, we really don't have to worry about anything," he walked back to the boy, "but letting you just walk home this late sort of feels wrong." Lucian had started to feel a bit of an attachment to Ren actually, they had worked together more or less since they found out about their powers, and though he did have a few friends in college, with the strange bond of being a 'Gamer', he felt he could talk with Ren a bit more openly than he could with others now.

Ren was about to get up and walk home himself, but suddenly found Lucian asking him where he lived, the older man mentioning that he would walk Ren home. "I live in the Residential District not to far from this park actually..." He guessed this was Lucian's, who was an adult, way of showing concern for a kid. "Also you can walk me home if you want, as its not like we can use our special Skills against muggers due to the interference law, we would just have to run away at most, so don't slow me down with your crappy Dex score if it comes to that." Ren gave the man a small, joking smirk before breaking the Pseudospace.

Ren hated people, most people. These past couple of days though these other four were starting to grow on him though, just a little, Lucian the most though since they had spent the most time investigating with one another. While Ren was nowhere near ready to call this man, or any of them for that matter, close friends he felt like he didn't have to act like a complete and total jerk all of the time. Normally Ren would have told Lucian not to walk him home but... being walked home felt sort of nice for a change.

The way to Ren's house was a quiet walk, Ren not choosing to talk unless Lucian talked to him, and Ren sort of being quiet during any small talk that Lucian made. He was acting a bit... quieter than usual for some reason, and not in a cold way either. It was hard to tell what it was unless Lucian tried to use his powers of observation to see through it.

---

Lucian Observation: 2 (Critical Success)

---

Somehow just by a brief look at Ren, Lucian was able to tell without really trying all that hard. For some reason or another, Ren was being quieter than usual maybe due to a bit of shyness, as if perhaps he has never walked with anyone like this ever, but with the way he was looking either forward or up he was doing his best to hide that as to not make the walk awkward.

To somewhat interrupt whatever Lucian was thinking a window suddenly appeared in front of him.



Eventually they arrived in front of a somewhat nice, modest looking house, Ren walking up to the door. "Well here we are... my uncle's place, or more like mine since he's never around even though he just runs a game store in Septemberes. You wanna come in for a drink or something before you head home?"

They resumed their training session with renewed vigour, thanks to the new skills. Sasha felt significantly faster and stronger, although the kobolds still proved to be a tough challenge. Her new ability, the Mana Rifle, filled in a gap in her repertoire. She could now engage enemies at a father distance and whittle them down. Silas similarly had gotten stronger. His already fluid movements got faster.

When they finally took a break, there was a sizable amount of loot gathered from their kills. Sasha eyed the stack of bills. "That's quite a lot of money... If we get more from higher leveled creatures, I think I've just found my career..."

She raised an eyebrow when Silas answered Genji's request for a potion. "I didn't know I was so trustworthy," she jibed with a smile. Although Sasha had never been particularly hungry for companionship, it was still nice knowing that someone held her in some regard, whatever it was. "You're not as bad as I thought either. That dour look kinda puts people off, you know."

Genji put the potion away. After expressing his disbelief at their abilities for the umpteenth time, he moved on to other, more grim news. That their secret was not theirs to keep, and they were apparently rather valuable in the eyes of the new community they had set foot in. "Hunters" will come after them. Sasha felt a pang of fear strike her heart, but she kept calm. Finally, Genji asked them if they would kill if it came down to it.

"Frankly... I don't know," Sasha struggled to answer. Could she really snuff the life out of another human being? Maybe not with her bare hands, but perhaps if she just used her mana revolver? "I mean, if it was between me dying or them, I suppose I would pull the trigger. I guess. I don't know. It's not something I've ever had to think of."

Lucian was just about to say something when he got interrupted by a notification window. Their walk had been a bit awkward, but Lucian did notice Ren was try. He knew that it must be hard when you are really shy. He had issues like that when he was younger as well.

"Oh we are here?" Lucian looked at the house, it was quiet nice, a bit more than what he was expecting to be honest, thinking of him maybe living in an apartment with his relative versus an actual house of their own. Lucian shook his head with a smile at Ren's offer, "No thanks, maybe next time, its starting to get late, and I really should take a peek into my textbook before tomorrow. The joys of uni." He chuckled as he started to head in the direction he needed to go, "Take care, probably send you a message tomorrow for some grinding of sorts. Later." With that, he left, making sure that Ren made it safely home.

The rest of Lucian's night was pretty dull. He took the train to get home, and it was pretty empty, a few people, but nothing out of the ordinary, which sort of bothered him a tad. He was starting to live an unorthodox life, where he could slay monsters, get stronger or smarted with a push of a button, and defy nature by having something made out of nothing. These other people on the bus, unless they were living a strange secret as well, were boring...He let out a sigh and continued home.

Upon arrival, he did just as he said he would do, he took a peek into his text book. "Why couldn't you work as a skill book?" He held the book in the air and waved it around a bit, "Instantly learning you would be so much nicer..." He stopped his complaining and gave it another shot. trying to finish a few pages prior to playing pokemon.

There was no one with any special Class or any high levels on that bus. Well, maybe one. A person who looked kind of tough was Level 2 and his class was apparently Delinquent as he dressed all rough and rugged to look the part. Other than that, no one really all that special or noteworthy was there. After getting home, Lucian decided to hit the books, his new INT and Knowledge Scores possibly giving him a fair edge on this.

---

Lucian Studying: 61 - 36 Knowledge = 25

---

It was all pretty easy, Lucian's new smarts achieved from level ups making him working off the books alot easier than it would have been normally. Of course, he by no means breezed through them, but it was definitely alot easier than before, Lucian able to finish all of the pages he wanted within maybe an hour or two, depending upon how much time he wanted to spend. Unfortunately no new increases to Int or Knowledge were present. Getting free increases to Stats, Talents, or Skills probably being much harder as they got to higher levels, which did indeed make sense.

Aside from playing Pokemon, if there wasn't anything else Lucian wanted to do for the night the rest of his night would go pretty uneventful.

Ren just nodded, going into his house after Lucian left. She sighed once again as her Uncle was not there, once again. Probably off god knows where doing god knows what once again with his friends. Still, tonight Ren was glad that her uncle wasn't here as he had a few things he wanted to take care of tonight first. The first of those two things being shopping in the Auction. There were a couple of things that Ren wanted to get from the Auction, plus he wanted to experiment some with his black magic and try to at least get the Black Mark ritual to Level 5 before the end of the night.

First came making dinner though, and with the Craft Skill not only was it easy and quick, but it also gave EXP towards said Skill. Not a whole lot, but every bit counted. Ren figured with the money he had to spend he could start getting into Alchemy, maybe create potions without having to rely on Mob Bosses dropping them, as to Ren's knowledge that seemed to be the only enemy capable of dropping them so far. That was for a later time though, Ren currently had alot on his plate already with Black Magic and the other thing he planned to learn. Stretching oneself to thin was not the best idea, but maybe it could be something he worked on at night or on rainy days when going out wasn't really the best idea.

For dinner though Ren decided something simple and really quick. So she just went with grilled mackerel since it was in the fridge. After today he just wanted to eat as quickly as possible and get to shopping on the Auction's site.

---

Craft Skill (Grilled Mackerel) (2):
--Auto Failure Chance: 17%
--Results: -13 (Success), -25 (Success)

---

It was done in a short bit, much shorter than normal thanks to the mysterious powers of the Craft Skill. Ren wrapped the meal he made for his uncle and stuck it in the fridge before eating his own quickly. After that, and the dishes that were piling up a little bit, were done Ren was about to dash up to his room, but got a window that made every cell in his body twitch with irritation. Ren guessed that this window didn't appear since his Uncle usually did the dishes, but he hadn't been do them this time, so Ren did it. After closing that window with a heavy sigh before quickly going to up his room.

By this time of day it was about 9:00 PM. Not much time for practicing the dark arts tonight in the part of creating new marks. He figured he could just drain his HP and keep reusing the ones he already has in his Brand. Might be enough to get it to Level 5. As well as imbuing a third mark into his Brand, which he could do now thanks to achieving a higher level in the Skill, but that took an hour to do and Ren wasn't sure if he wanted to attempt that while relaxing from the day's activities, especially after he saw what happened to Mike.

First he decided to go check out the Auction's site though, deciding to get that out of the way. Ren remembered the fact that if he mentioned the name of the Dealer who referred him to the auction when making his first purchase he would get a 25% discount as long as it was of D Rank or lower. He wondered if the others knew this and decided to send a quick PM to them all stating the following. (This PM won't be received until well after everyone gets home at about 9:00 PM or so).



The fact that it was only the first purchase though made Ren want to go ahead and buy a few things at once, make the discount a bit bigger. He knew that this was how these companies got you to buy more all at once to make them more money, but there were already several things Ren needed to get, so he figured it couldn't hurt to fall for that obvious trap to get a discount on a bulk purchase. This was money he got from the power anyway, so he figured using it for just Abyss related things was probably the best. It was just three things he needed.

A healing skill. There were no books on healing magic, but if Ren knew anything form games, anime, and manga was that Water magic or water users usually had some form of healing abilities. If water magic didn't have healing spells then he could learn how to use Frost magic for some damage causing spells that included AOEs or some neat CC spells including ones that froze enemies. Healing magics were probably the highest priority right now. Sure Ren had the First Aid Skill, but that took six seconds to use and required items like Bandages or other such items. Its combat usage was abysmal, making it more of a between battles quick HP restore kind of thing to cut down the amount of time they had to spend resting for HP to regenerate.

So naturally Ren's first purchase was a book on the basics of Water Magic. The next was that Basic Magic Ritual Kit, since Ren didn't have all he needed here for performing proper magic rituals. Some of the names of these things were kind of strange, it really did feel like shopping in an MMO's online store. Some of these things were just as expensive as the things in MMO game stores as well, in a comparative sense. That was already 90,000 Yen. With the discount it became 67000 Yen, but even that was a very large amount. The discount was only a one time thing for the first purchase as well, which was a business thing to make people purchase more their first time for a bigger discount, meaning they may purchase things that cost alot but that they don't necessarily need so it makes the auction and other sellers more money.

While Ren realized that he didn't have a credit card for putting this money on to pay for the online they did accept cash payments through delivery, but that made it take a little longer. Ren made a note to go get a debit card tomorrow for Abyss Auction purchases tomorrow from the bank, a more secretive one since he wasn't sure how her Uncle would react when he suddenly saw the account he gave Ren for an allowance suddenly getting tens of thousands of yen putting into it without Ren actually having a job.

After about thirty minutes of tinkering around on the auction's site Ren decided to forgo Alchemy. With the ability to find healing potions and mana potions on the boss mobs and food and drinks also giving HP and MP, Ren figured that it would be best to just sell anything alchemy based he found for money and focus on just magic. In the end though the things he did buy, after the discount, totaled at -202,500 Yen. "Sheesh... this is just all basic stuff as well and it may seem cheap, but that is only because of this one time discount that I have to use on my first purchase... I swear this is just like shopping on an MMO's site, everything is just as freaking expensive..."

Still, Ren knew that it was worth it. This stuff was to become stronger, so it was all worth it. Ren figured this stuff would make him more like his Dungeon Busters character Shimo, who was a powerful frost runic magic user, which is why Ren bought the things he bought. "Well... here goes enough money to buy a month's worth of games, or a week's worth for me." Ren just nervously laughed before clicking checkout and selecting cash as his payment. He wondered if he would have to send it out through the mail, which seemed strange.

Another message appeared though when he clicked checkout and Ren mumbled it out loud to himself. "Quicker delivery for Cash payments... 20,000 Yen? Also for an additional 5,000 Yen you can get a free Abyss Auction ATM Card so you do not have to deal with the inconvenience of cash transactions in the future" Well, normally Ren would have said no to such a ridiculous price for quick delivery, but this situation was different. This was the Abyss and they could get attacked any day now, so Ren went with yes. It would be worth the additional 20,000 Yen to get his purchases a few days quicker or however long it took to get here and the ATM Card was nice to, as it prevented him from having to risk the bank asking questions of why a 15 year old high school student needed an ATM Card. Not only that, but this special card could be used as a credit card online and it could be customized with a picture to, which was nice in Ren's opinion as a small little extra. After accepting the total amount of 227,500 Yen Ren decided to go about practicing some more Black Magic and watch anime at the same time, or so was the plan.

The moment he turned his head his eyes widened and he nearly fell out of his chair. Out of his window was... well... something. A UFO for all intents and purposes holding a large parcel. Sure Ren heard of quick delivery, but a few seconds? No, maybe even less than that. Was this the power of the Abyss Auction? To find out where every customer who bought something was located exactly? Sure Ren had to put down his address when he made his account, but to be able to be right outside of his room before he even knew what was going on... that was quite... amazing and scary at the same time.

Ren opened the window and looked at the ufo, reaching out to take the present, but before he could the dome atop opened and a small, robotic voice came from the device that simply said "Put Cash in Here." Ren was quite tempted to take the present and smash the device, but he was pretty sure he would get killed by the Auction if he did. After all, he remembered attacking that dealer. His attack didn't even get to hit him as the Spinning Mana Blades just sort of broke right before they did, and Ren knew that wasn't his own fault. Not wanting to incur the wrath of an organization that was supposedly the face of the abyss, according to Saito, Ren complied with the command, placing the total amount inside the opening that then closed.

Ren was able to take the parcel after that, closing the window and watching the UFO depart as quickly as it came. "This certainly beats regular mail and any other super fast shipping services...I didn't even have to go and get it from my door nor did I need to bring my seal to stamp for anything..." After that Ren turned his eyes to the parcel, opening it up and, to his own satisfaction, but not the satisfaction of his inventory that just lost more than 2/3rds of the money in it, that everything he ordered was in here.

Ren got to work after that. Setting up the basics for the ritual kit on the floor. First he learned the new book he got, but figured it was too late to attempt anything new, maybe in the morning he could since he planned to skip school tomorrow as well. He decided to spend the next few hours grinding his black magic to raise its level, first using the two marks he still had on some random trash in his room. It didn't give as much EXP as using it on an enemy, person, or actual object meant for this, as Ren didn't have any, but it helped enough. The next few hours he spent in ritual to imbue new marks upon his Brand.

---

Ritual 1: 57 - 33 Black Magic Ritual - 4 Skill Bonus = 20
Ritual 2: 37 - 33 Black Magic Ritual - 4 Skill Bonus = 0
Ritual 3: 50 - 33 Black Magic Ritual - 4 Skill Bonus = 13

---

Some large amounts of MP and HP later and all three rituals were a success, Ren quite tired from all of that as three of the rituals in a row were quite tiring, the second one having been a much greater success than the others. Now it was about 12:30 AM. Ren decided to give it a rest on everything now and play Dungeon Busters for a few hours, immediately being swarmed with requests for parties upon logging in, but Shimo in the game usually went alone unless the dungeon required a party. After playing that for a few hours Ren hit the hay, deciding to call it a little bit earlier tonight since Ren knew that there was a big day ahead tomorrow full of practicing magic, the thought of which made Ren quite excited.

After getting home, Mike found that his parents were out, most likely still at work. Since the cost of medicine for him used to be really high, they both had to get a job. While it meant that he didn't see them that much, he understood that it was only to keep him alive as long as possible, so he couldn't get mad at them for it. After he got himself a quick dinner, Mike got a PM from Ren about the Abyss Auction, something he had completely forgotten about. Going to his computer, he went to the site to see what the had for sale.

The blacksmithing book interested him, since he knew that he would need to get a better Katana sometime. However, it was the Spirit Channeling for Dummies book that really caught his attention. It sounded like it might be a WIS based skillset, however he didn't want to risk wasting money. So he decided to ask Keiichi about it tomorrow. If it was more like the Senshin no Ken then magic like he thought, then it was most likely WIS based. Hell, he might even end up a Spirit Bender/Asura hybrid, that sounded awesome. However he didn't buy anything yet, as he wanted to wait until he had a larger purchase to make to take advantage of the discount. Yeah he knew it was a gimmick to get people to spend more money, but he already knew that this was where he was going to be spending a vast majority of the money he made, so might as well take advantage of whatever deal he can get.

Before leaving the site, he took a quick look at the slave tab in a fit of morbid curiosity. What he saw sickened him. Some of the people being sold didn't look any older then him. "If I'm not prepared...I could end up on here." After banishing that dark thought, Mike went to bed

Silas chuckled a bit when she thought of him as "not as bad as she thought". Silas knew himself he could be nice and social, but he just chose not to do so. Sasha also mentioned the money they received after killing monsters. "It certainly is a better pay check then I currently... don't have." Silas said. He only earned some money by winning Squash competitions and the rest of the money was delivered by Tomoyo, that is until Silas finishes his online study and can get a proper job. However this will probably be better than any other job he can get.

Genji brought up the subjects about certain people called "Hunters" who wanted to... hunt them down. That was to be expected as Genji said earlier that people wanted to get their hands on the powers that the Gamers have. However was a one who could kill another, take away the life of another? "I am willing to take another life. The situation you are handing me is very simple. They want to kill me, imprison me, torture me, or whatever, so I have no problem taking away the life of someone who wants to do the same with me, or any of the people I trust... my partners." Silas said. He was too afraid to use the word friends as that would get him too emotionally close to that friend. And especially in this situation in which deaths may occur, it is best not to be like that. Although in the back of his head he already know he had gotten too close with Sasha.

Genji listened to the two of them, giving a nod. "I can appreciate those answers. The Abyss can change people. Power can change people. If you aren't careful, this world can end up consuming you. Don't lose sight of your normal lives and don't lose sight of those answers. In time you will come to learn a very popular expression here in the Abyss..." He paused for a moment, trying to remember the exact words, but it was only a moment's pause.

"The longer you stare back into the Abyss... the longer the Abyss gazes back into you..."

"This world, the Abyss... is dangerous, but it also is not at the same time. You will learn what I mean as you make new friends and grow stronger while dwelling in this world, if you choose to do so. Remember though, it still isn't too late for you to turn around and not look back. However... tomorrow... you may have to make a choice. Do you live your normal lives, accepting what you have gained and pulling back before you face more danger? Or do you delve deeper, even knowing of the dangers that lie ahead?" He gave them a small, confident, and reassuring smile.

"Whatever answers you and your other friends come up with are one's I will respect. Anyway... enough with this serious talk, lets take those clubs and armors you found to the storage room and ill pay you all for them."

---

When all was said and done, Genji bought all of the clubs from them for 15,000 Yen a piece. The armors for 20,000 Yen a piece. In total the two of them made 200,000 Yen from the equipment. 100,000 Yen for both Sasha and Silas if they both decided to split all of the money evenly.

"You two got yourselves quite the haul there today. Its starting to get late though, you two should head home. Stay safe you two, and feel free to come by tomorrow if you wanna practice your newly learned techniques, ill still be here tomorrow as well since I don't have any classes. I go to Neo Tokyo U by the way if you ever wanna hang out outside of this place." With a friendly farewell, he said goodbye to the two of them, willing to answer any more questions or respond to anything else they had to say.

Other than anything else Silas and Sasha decided to do during the night at their homes the rest of the night would be uneventful, bringing everyone to the next morning.

---

In the morning, right after waking up, everyone would be greeted with the same familiar window and feel incredibly well rested.



Ren woke up in the morning around 10:00 AM with no intention to go to school again for the second day this week. He figured he could go tomorrow. For now he wanted to start with learning water magic, so after making sure that her Uncle wasn't there and after eating a bit of breakfast, Ren got to work.

When Mike woke up, he felt deeply refreshed, that Spirit Break ailment having completely vanished "ah. It's a new day. So much progress to be made" Mike had about an hour before he had to go to school, since he could get ready fast, he had plenty of time to do a little work "alright, now that I'm fully refreshed, let's give this another go" still on his bed, Mike began to meditate, and proceeded to practice controlling his mana like he did yesterday. Mike knew that his build was going to give him a lot of HP and MP, so he really needed to learn some kind of skill that could restore an ally's MP, especially since he was going to be putting most of his points into WIS, which was the stat the seemed to increase MP capacity the most. It would mean that most likely, he would end up with the largest MP pool, so he needed to make sure he could put it to good use. But first, he needed to learn how to control his mana better, hence the practice

An hour to practice wouldn't be much, and it was still a little early, but nonetheless it could possibly be attempted as Mike began to use the hour he had before he needed to get to school, and not be late, to try and practice controlling his Mana.

---

Mike Focus: 89 - 36 Focus = 58

---

As hard as Mike tried, nothing seemed to work. Maybe there was a special trick to it, or maybe Mike just didn't have the natural knack for controlling Mana as Ren or Lucian did. Whatever the case was, in the amount of time mike had, or even if he had more time, Mike was unable to get the skill he desired this time as well. The good thing though was that he didn't get Spirit Drain like before, which healed after he woke up thanks to resting in a bed.

Still with no more time to do anything else, Mike would either have to go to school or skip if he did indeed want to do anything else, and skipping on the second day probably wasn't the best idea.

Feeling a little disappointed at his lack of results, Mike quickly got ready for school "oh well, I guess I'll just have to try again later". This time when he left, he decided to run the whole way, instead of using the scooter. He was now physically fit enough to make the run from home to school, and he wanted to enjoy that. He instantly perked up when he remembered that Keiichi was going to teach him his first skill with the Senshin no Ken. While he wasn't sure that his current skills would benefit from his Katana Mastery skill, he felt confident that these Senshin no Ken skills would, seeing as how they required the use of a Katana...so yeah, that was awesome. He arived at school far sooner then he expected, clearly he underestimated the effect that those new DEX points had on him

Lucian woke upto the annoying chitter of his alarm going off. If he didn't set the thing, he wouldn't get out of bed till late noon, but as useful as is was, It was still something of a nucense in his eyes. "Damn clock, damn morning, I hate you..."He rolled over and buried his face in his pillow. He felt perfectly fine as if nothing dangerous or painful had happened the night before, but whenever he closed his eyes, he could still see the foot coming for him. "Accursed low level, I hate you even more..."

After loafing around in his bed, complaining about the morning for a while longer, he found that twenty minutes had already passed and that he actually had to get going if he was to get anything done this day. He would have some time before classes began, and he would use it wisely. The joys of uni, classes don't always start bright and early, nor do they last all day.

He got himself ready for school, he only had a single class, so he though of what to do before he got there. He could check out the auction that was mentioned to him by Ren in a pm the night prior, but decided against it due to his debt with Saito. He thought of sitting around and training his mana flow, but just wasn't feeling up to it. In the end he started to head of to school early, but stopped along the way by the waterside, he had time, so why not commune with nature? First he created a psudeo space, best if it did anything like the wind to not freak out passerbys, then he say down, and began the ritual.