I should probably try and reach Tier 2 again, just need to figure out if that incident will happen again, or not. Hopefully, Katania will be able to help me with that. Eldrian thought, believing that someone specialized in divine magic must know more about souls than most others.

With that thought finished, he went over to the general posts made by players. Eldrian sighed helplessly right as he saw the top posts. More and more Tier 3's were popping up. It made him feel like he was falling behind all the more, especially with the top 100 global now being fully occupied by Tier 3's. They would all most likely end up in the top hundred in the coming tournament with little doubt.

Most of these players were now all complaining about the ridiculous amount of training, or rather grinding, they needed to do to reach the next rank in their weapon proficiencies. They stated they felt it was an unnecessary addition, that just learning the skills of the next Tier should be enough.

It was how the NPCs progressed, or so they believed, so why couldn't they. Even in magic, where there was no weapon used, they needed to use spells a certain amount of time. With how slow mana regened, and higher Tier spells costing far more, the players felt more and more distraught.

At first, most players hadn't been that opposed to the proficiency system, it had given them a direction and conclusive evidence of their training. Reaching Rank 1 was easy, requiring only 10 proficiency XP to reach level 1 of Rank 0, and double that for each of the following four levels in Rank 0.

The levels in Rank 1 had added a zero, but even so, there were only ten levels. With the starting level 1 only needing a hundred proficiency XP, players felt it was still totally possible to quickly grind out. The proficiency requirement would double for the first five levels, after which the growth would slow down, though it was certainly still there. This growth though was acceptable to them.

Especially when they discovered the attribute reward for reaching Rank 2. Some players had even gone and ground a bunch of Rank 2's for the attributes, though this had resulted in them staying Tier 2 while others reached Tier 3. Ultimately whose method worked better was hard to say, as those who ground had gained more raw attributes, while Tier 3 now had Tier 3 skills and spells.

This type of grinding growth stayed consistent at Rank 2, with level 1 now needing a thousand and there being 15 levels. The problem was that upon reaching Rank 3 players found it still stayed consistent, level 1 of Rank 3 needing ten thousand and there being twenty levels.

They quickly realized that this would likely just continue growing in this manner, meaning that the amount of grinding would just end up mindboggling, if just the zero addition stayed the same then level 1 in Rank 4 would require a hundred thousand. Rank 5 a million, Rank 6 ten million, and so forth. Players would simply be limited by time, unable to reach certain Tiers simply due to time. The addition of levels in each rank was not even considered as these numbers were already discouraging enough.

While it was possible to get more than 1 proficiency skill per attack, that only held if one was attacking an opponent of relatively equal skill. This worked well when training in the empire as it seemed the empire also knew this. Or at least they knew that it was the best way to allow people to train faster.

The problem was in this case some attacks would be rushed, which meant no proficiency would be gained. Hence at most, it increased their speed by thirty to fifty percent. Only geniuses could use this method to double their growth, which they still felt disappointed in. Acquiring the ten thousand required for the first level in Rank 3 thus took a great deal of time.

After reading through most of the top posts, Eldrian felt slightly better as it was clear that players were quickly going to become stuck grinding to reach higher Tiers. Most likely Tier 4 will also be where they end up staying for much longer as had happened to the game testers.

However, this relief did not last long as Eldrian realized it meant that the players would stay a weak force in the world, not able to help much in the invasion. Shit, it doesn't matter if I end up far behind and weak. I shouldn't use that as an excuse to hope other players are limited. Eldrian chastised himself, having momentarily only thought of trying to be the winner of the tournament.

Disappointed in himself, he headed down to eat a late lunch before logging in. Flavia stopping herself from going over as she could tell Eldrian was in a bad mood, and recalling last time, she didn't want to push things. She couldn't help but complain how hard it was to actually talk to him.

...

Waking up in the game world, Eldrian wanted to try and meditate in the magic abyss as soon as possible. He stopped himself as he remembered that he had no idea if any of the others were safe, nor how long it would take and if it was safe to do so.

Standing up he got ready to leave his room, stopping as he saw a figure huddled in the corner of the room. The hell? He questioned as he slowly approached this person, whose hood twitched as soon as Eldrian stepped forward. Not even a step later Kydone sprang up and looked at Eldrian warily.

"Oh, it's you..." Eldrian said as soon as he saw her face, "Do you know what happened to the others?"

Kydone shook her head and kept looking at him with seeming hostility. Backing up Eldrian then asked a bit confused, "What happened?" To which Kydone seemed unwilling to answer, so he asked, "Where were you?"

"Forest," Kydone replied shortly, pressing herself against the wall, ready to use it to jump away if needed.

"And why did you come here?" Eldrian asked.

"Don't know where Evale is..."

"What about Evules?" Eldrian asked, to which Kydone shook her head.

"I followed him, but too fast..."

"I see, then what happened with the attack? Are you hurt?" Eldrian asked, not understanding why she was acting so guarded. Her actions reminded him of cornered beats, he did not understand why though. While they had not grown close perse, she shouldn't think this badly of him. Heck, she came into his room, so she must feel somewhat safe at the very least.

Hearing Eldrian's question Kydone looked at him with wariness again, refusing to reply.

"Where? Let me help," Eldrian said, to which Kydone fiercely shook her head. Causing her to flinch as the pain acted up again, all her fur silver fur standing up from the shock.

"Alright, then let me just heal you from here," Eldrian said, quickly casting Thera on Kydone. To his surprise this caused her to gasp in pain and fall onto the ground. "The hell?" Eldrian shouted in surprise, heading over without a care.

As soon as he reached Kydone she tried to slash at him with her hands. Most of her skin having turned into fur and her nails now proper claws. She stopped only when she saw and her instincts told her that Eldrian did not mean her harm.

"Can I see?" Eldrian asked, for the first time glad of the friend system. Having only used it before as a simple messenger system. Hurridly he looked up to see if Erik was online, starting to record what was going on and sending him a message asking for help.

Kydone did not respond for a few seconds, after which she slowly lifted her robe. Allowing Eldrian to see a gash running from just above her knee to her upper thigh. Black blood slowly seeping out of this wound and staining her silver fur.

"What did this?" Eldrian asked, quickly recognizing the foal stench of undead on her. He also tried to use Observe on her, but it did not return anything. Only three question marks, not even a name. Normally at the very least, a name would be given, no matter how much weaker Eldrian was.

"Ghoul," Kydone replied as the pain slowly started leaving, along with it her remaining energy. Eldrian quickly sent a picture of the wound to Erik, asking if he had ever treated something like this. Eldrian did not dare to think he knew what to do, not after that strange effect from Thera.

Not really knowing what to do as he waited for a reply, Eldrian thought of trying to sense the wound. He had no idea how to really do this, having mostly focused mageia only on mana he summoned from himself.

Treat this as the magic abyss, there mageia is much more concrete. Almost as what mana is in this world. Eldrian thought, recalling how mana would always appear active in the magic abyss. If it was something to do with fire magic, it would be in the form of flames. This was certainly the element that reacted the strongest in there, but the others all also had some type of reaction.

I should definitely be able to move my willpower out to feel things. It has never worked before, because I always need mageia, my concrete thoughts, to contact mana to give any feedback. Else I can't know if I am willing mageia or just thinking I am willing something. This wound must be filled with manat. Eldrian thought, receiving a reply from Erik as he did.

Erik had no answer for him, "The wound is easy to treat, IRL stitched would do. In-game using healing magic such as Thera should work perfectly, it is not that deep a wound. The problem is that it is clearly corrupted/poisoned/rotten, I do not know which nor have I ever treated such injuries. If worst comes to worst, cut off her leg.

"It should save her life, though getting the money to regrow it might not be possible for her. If you do this, don't heal, just burn the wound closed and use Anthizo to supply her with energy to naturally fight through it."

"Fuck!" Eldrian cursed one simple word after reading the message. He really did not want to resort to the latter, he was not even certain if the blackness of the blood originated from the wound or inside her body, nor if she had more wounds.

Should I rather rush her to the keep? Eldrian wondered, throwing this idea out of his mind as he saw Kydone had fallen asleep and was only barely breathing. Getting to the keep would take ten to twenty minutes, depending on if he could find a horse or not. He had no idea what her condition was, and with Observe not working, Eldrian couldn't see how much time she had left.

I really can't use magic just haphazardly! Eldrian shouted at himself, certain she was only in so much danger now, due to him having used Thera without checking what was wrong. He never expected a healing spell to work on a living being as if they were undead.

Shit, is that the reason? Eldrian paused for a second, quickly denying it as Kydone was still clearly alive. Blood was pumping through her body, she was breathing, and she was warm to the touch.