Walker smiled at Amberlin gratefully. Still amazed at the breadth of her powers, Walker sheathed the dagger and unshouldered his bow, the speed of his movements still amazingly fast and smooth.
"I don't know how you found us, but you likely saved us both, so thank you." Walker said hurriedly.
Ahead, the knights coordinated, working on destroying the corpse ball. Between their efforts and the scouts, it was now reduced to about half of its original size.
Tucking a couple of errant locks into her hood, Amberlin nodded at him while smiling. She replied politely but seemed unable to focus fully; her face flushed and rosy. She brandished a staff and began to breathe deeply while focused on it.
The scurrying undead creatures on the ground were much more manageable by this point; the knight wielding a spiked mace hammered relentlessly on the hurrying brood of undead alone.
Walker realized that he might still be missing something essential to make his Space Arrow skill function correctly and how helpful it would be if it worked. After firing so many shots, it hadn't activated a single time.
When he had acquired Space Arrow, he had only obtained a single piece of the skill fragment. This was likely the reason for Space Arrow's inability to be cast, despite the skill showing a 10% chance of occurring. After all, his luck simply couldn't be that bad, could it?
It occurred to Walker that he had another skill, that was acquired differently, and it didn't rely on a successful chance of activating in order to work, ostensibly. This one wasn't from a skill fragment; it was a complete skill.
Walker wasn't sure how to activate his recently obtained skill. Suddenly realizing something he'd forgotten that could help, he said "[Sheet]" and then watched the surroundings as the light screen appeared to the side.:
- - - - -
Human with CoA Bloodline (0.7%)
Archer Scout of Rostovo (Class Mastery: 0.9)
Skills:
1. Archery, Novice (Skill Level One) - Your mastery and ability with archery, quantified. Provides bonuses to hit, damage, and precision, when utilizing archery. [Passive]
2. Focus Fire - Focus to improve your ability, talent, and precision with archery. Additional attacks steadily increase the amount and duration of the bonuses obtained. [Active]
3. Space Arrow (Incomplete - 1/10) - Normal attacks have a chance (10%) of piercing space to arrive at a different location traveling a completely different vector to the intended target; space cutting gives the arrow the ability to pierce armor effectively. [Passive-Potential]
Magic Mastery: n/a
Traits: Unknown
Special: [ACTIVE!] - no description available
- - - - -
After dismissing the light screen, Walker noticed his two skills were listed. The light panel only provided very generic descriptions, which perhaps wasn't as helpful as he'd hoped. It confirmed that the skill he had in mind was an active one, but no further instructions were provided.
Amberlin's chanting, when casting her spells, suddenly came to mind. Another realization was that this was ultimately some kind of game, even if it appeared real to himself.
'A game would need some way for the characters, or the game, to tell the player what skill is used, or what spell is being cast.' Walker thought with some amusement and wonder.
He drew in a breath, only intending to say the two words of the skill name, when an entire phrase came unbidden from his own mouth:
"Burning will into its true form!
Walker drew the arrow back and fired, while suddenly feeling a heady rush in his mind. The increase in his perception and thinking benefitted his ability.
The shot flew quickly, with its flight path miraculously avoiding the knights fighting the monstrosity. It struck the corpses surrounding the core, piercing through to the fletching. Despite the hit, Walker could see from this distance that he had not hit the core itself.
Though the core had the shape of a walnut shell, it was easily the size of a man's head. While not a tiny target, it could still be a difficult one to hit at this range for a novice, like himself.
His hand automatically drew another arrow from the quiver, nocked it, and fired. Despite his recently taking up the bow, the motion looked smooth and practiced. The arrow cut through the air and quickly struck the corpses shielding the core.
Within several blinks of an eye Walker shot three more arrows.
Each shot became more accurate and powerful than those before, and they effortlessly avoided the knights. They also struck the corpse-ball itself in widely different spots.
Then Walker fired another five arrows rapidly. His movements were like a machine, mechanical and without error.
Those five arrows tore through the air loudly Two of the five punctured the walnut-shaped core with precision. Floating in the air, the core itself shivered and trembled with two arrows piercing it completely.
After a moments delay, the monstrosity let out a piercing cry and the remaining corpses fell to the ground. Those now-grounded corpses lost some of their vigor but continued to move forward to attack their group.
By this time, Walker's use of the 'Focus Fire' skill still hadn't ended. He was able to fire a third salvo of arrows while also under the effect of Amberlin's 'Quicken' spell, which had greatly increased the speed of all actions and reactions.
Three of the five shots in the third wave hit the core dead-on while the other two actually missed. It shuddered and dropped noticeably before melting into red blood-like goo in mid-air.
Everyone cheered but remained focused, engaging the rotting animal corpses that continued to bite and slash at them as they advanced. However, these were merely small animals and various other creatures who were devoid of any special abilities.
It took only a few moments for the knights and scouts to dispatch them with ease.
Up ahead, the blood-red light seemed to dim noticeably as the core melted.
Immediately, the three stumps sagged a bit. The red color permeating the area became webbed with cracks, and the red fluid covering the ground began to disappear.
After a few more moments of uneasy suspense, the light vanished completely in the trees above the stumps. The stumps themselves sagged and warped as if made of wet mud.
The reddish color covering everything shattered; beneath was the exact same landscape, only monochrome of grey and white. Normal colors slowly leaked into the affected area as the group watched on in stunned silence.
Teffrey took the lead and walked toward the spot where the stumps had been. They were now little more than mounds of reddish-brown mud.
Walker watched the Knight Captain and his men investigate, while Wilford looked around wide-eyed. It had been a bit of a close call for the older Archer Scout Captain.
Wilford kicked aside some of the animal skeletons and stood in an area behind the stumps, examining the grassless space carefully and then shifting his focus to the trees above. "There's something up there, but I can't exactly make it out. Looks like some branches or a box of branches."
Teffrey glanced at the two scouts and then back at his knights. "With our armor, there's no way to get up there. Besides, are you sure that thing is safe?"
Amberlin stepped forward and spoke up, "Prob'ly betta' to pick it up ner [now], rather than later." The earlier flush had vanished from her face, and she appeared significantly more clear-eyed and composed.
She looked toward Walker and rubbed her cheekbone in thought. "I don't have any spells tha' [that] could levitate one up there, nor any such as could use some object to pull it down."
Walker could see the runes tattooing her neck and arms flickering more quickly than usual and he wondered what that signified. Feeling it would be improper to ask, he instead looked up above into the trees where the red light had come from.
Unlike Wilford, Walker couldn't notice anything other than leaves and the occasional branch through small breaks in the leaf canopy. The group began to discuss ropes, climbing the tree, and some other options for getting up there to see what was giving off the light, if anything.
Walker didn't think it was that important to look in the branches. Suspecting that the light had something to do with the stumps, he instead began focusing on the grassless ground. After examining the area for only a brief moment, Walker was so surprised he froze.
The grassless area formed a perfectly edged octagon. Reminiscent of the stone octagonal depression they had found earlier, this one wasn't a depression perfectly lined with stones, but just a dirt outline.
'Perhaps we stopped it in time?' Walker thought, curious at the coincidence. Unsure whether any of this was even related, he again started walking around the octagon.
Wilford was climbing the tree and had carefully made his way into the branches above, which now slowed his progress tremendously.
While pacing the octagon, Walker stopped where he estimated the exact center was. At the prior octagon, there was a hole, or some sort of depression. Here, there wasn't anything of the sort.
Grabbing a rock nearby, Walker dug into dirt at his estimate of the center point. He dug for a few minutes but didn't find anything at all.
Wilford yelled from above that he didn't see anything in the branches directly above the group and slowly started making his way back.
Walker looked up into the branches, near where Wilford had called down, and suddenly frowned.
Between the leaves directly above him, he could see a large black and silver lantern hanging from a limb. Though the wind blew fairly strong, the lantern did not sway in the wind at all, despite that the leaves around it flapped wildly.
Wilford crawled over it, looked down and around, then continued crawling back toward the trunk to climb down. Walker pointed to the lantern.
Wilford noticed him pointing. He looked at the spot where the lantern hung, and then looked at Walker questioningly. "Do you see something?"
Surprised, Walker replied, "Don't you see that lantern? Sort of a black and silver wire lattice shape?" He pointed at it.
Wilford looked at Walker solemnly and then back at the spot Walker pointed at. Returning his gaze to Walker, he shook his head. "I don't see anything. Nothing at all there."
Walker waited until Wilford had made his way to the trunk. He drew an arrow and nocked it in his bow.
Aiming carefully, he shot it upward where it struck the lantern with a metallic ringing noise.
The group all looked above, shocked as the lantern then fell quickly before slamming into the ground with a loud crash.
They could all see it now.
Walker was closest and bent down to pick it up.
The light screen appeared:
{The Blood Lantern (Relic) - A lantern wrought of strange unknown metals. Gives off the mysterious 'blood light' when fueled properly. Blood light imperfectly blocks out other forms of light, sometimes leading to unnatural occurrences. Purposes unable to be ascertained.}
While holding the lantern, Walker examined its finely wrought black and silver metals, which formed a lattice like flowers or vines around the outside, forming the container itself. It had no glass but also had two metallic slotted chambers inside. One a black metal ball suspended from the top of the lantern, the other a silver metal ball coming from the bottom, both situated inside the container.
After examining it, he was just about to hand it to one of the others when the light prompt flashed and a new screen appeared:
{Class Mastery Increased! You have unlocked the 'Sphere Helix' portion of the [STATS] Menu}
{You are now a character at the First Sphere. Congratulations! Showing your upgraded [STATS]}
STATS (LIMITED v.2.0) - {You're still weak, but you're improving.}
Class Mastery: 1.0 (ARCHER SCOUT LEVEL - Solidify your archery and enhance yourself.)
STR: 2 (STRENGTH - recently up from 0.8, due to attaining the First Sphere)
DEX 3.1 (DEXTERITY - recently up from 1.4, due to attaining the First Sphere)
DEF 0.4 (DEFENSE - value unaffected by First Sphere gain; little armor, no defensive skills)
MIND 2.5 (recently up from 1.5, due to attaining the First Sphere)
CHA 1.6 (CHARISMATICS - recently up from 1.2, due to attaining the First Sphere)
END 2.7 (ENDURANCE - recently up from 1.3, due to attaining the First Sphere)