An excerpt from ‘A Survival Manual for the 5th Wave’, by Multiple Authors

While the 5th Wave contains many interesting planets, filled with a variety of civilizations and species, you must avoid the Chroln at all costs. These short-sighted fools pursued an understanding of Mana and became blinded to the costs of their research. We shall not speak of their Final Experiment, but know that they corrupted their bodies, infusing themselves with Mana and turning into ephemeral creatures whose only purpose is to consume. Gone is their empathy, their love, their intelligence; all of it has been replaced with an endless hunger for Mana.

“So how does this work?” I ask him as he throws the bag over his shoulder onto the ground. His regular uniform is gone, replaced by a strange article of clothing that covers his entire body. Dark navy in color, a pattern of a coiling creature wraps upwards from both legs and continues to his left shoulder, ending in the open maw of some sort of reptilian creature.

Watching as he leans down and opens the bag, I’m caught off guard when he pulls out two cylinders the size of large beers. He carefully sets them on the ground and then takes a step back. Looking me dead in the eye, lacking any of his regular foppishness, he begins the lesson.

“I’ve got books in this bag that will help teach you, and you’ll read them later, but the best way to learn how to sense Ranks is by seeing and facing the creatures themselves. Engaging in combat with these creatures will develop your senses, and eventually you’ll be able to instinctively gauge the rank of your opponent. Little things like their body position, coloring, emotion, weight, level, and hundreds of other variables will combine and your unconscious mind will translate that into a Rank.”

I listen to his words and commit them to heart, but there’s something off-putting about his demeanor and voice. Gone is the mocking charm, the anticipation of the derisive chuckle, replaced with a weariness that makes me uncomfortable. For a person to change so significantly … obviously something has happened. It’s obvious, however, that I won’t be able to get the reason from him, at least not yet. Better to focus on the present and learn all that I can.

“So you’re saying that I’ll just learn it from repetitive combat? That seems like a poor training method,” I respond, keeping my tone neutral, if somewhat skeptical. I spent over a year on a planet that thrived on combat and never picked up this Rank system.

Snorting in derision, he responds,“Of course not. There’s a reason that it was developed, not discovered. Genesis may have turned it into a Skill, but my people are the true creators.”

He leans forward and picks up one of the cylinders. In one quick motion that I’m barely able to see, he throws it against the ground and it explodes in a flash of bright light, blinding me for a few moments. After seconds of rubbing my eyes, I open them to discover a creature in front of me, patiently staring at Octavian as if waiting for a command.

With a slight frog-like build, the differences between it and its human counterpart are evident immediately. The most prominent of these differences is the size. Sitting at nearly nine feet tall, this creature is taller than both Octavian and I, and is covered in green scales that glisten in the setting sunlight. Horns just out of its head and a trail of foot long spikes go down its spine, each one covered in a strange greenish liquid that I suspect is some sort of poison. Perhaps the most surprising thing about the creature, however, is the low noise of contentment it makes as Octavian walks up and scratches underneath its chin.

My eyes widen as I finally take in the words above its head, Horned Greten of Sol [Lvl 42]. Only a few levels below my own, this creature has not only been transported in some sort of container able to hold it, the design of which I desperately want to get my hands on, but it also appears to be domesticated or tamed by Octavian.

“Is … Is that your pet?” I manage to ask him incredulously. The Greten’s eyes travel towards me for the first time and I see that, despite its taming, it still contains the animalistic urges that I learned to spot so long ago. My body instinctively tenses up, preparing itself for the possibility of combat.

You can’t spend over a year surrounded by bloodthirsty beasts without developing defensive instincts around them.

“This is my Greten and his name is Nuva. His race is a common beast on my planet, but I’ve trained him enough that he is the perfect representation of a creature that is Rank 1. You’re going to spar against him, without killing him, and I’m going to point out the signs of his rank. Most Physical Skills cause miniscule levels of physiological change to the person or creature in order to carry out the action. For example, I can see certain muscles on your arms and back are mildly accentuated, suggesting that you have a very low level weapon mastery. Nuva, on the other hand, has highly developed leg muscles because his highest Skill is based on jumping movements.”

A quick glance at his Greten, that I absolutely refuse to call by its first name, shows the truth of his words. Not only do I spot the leg muscles, I also notice that its feet are glistening, suggesting that they are coated in the same poison as the spikes.

Hopping up to a ledge over fifteen feet above him, he sits down and dangles his feet off the edge, adopting a smile that, while not exactly the same, is similar to his previous mischievous look.

“Let’s get going then.”

Octavian watches as Cael’s face calms, smoothing away any expressive emotion and causing his eyes to move quicker than usual. He runs through the known Skills that could bring about such a state, settling on either Meditation or Battle Trance. The former would give him significant Mana regeneration, obviously a benefit given his use of that strangely malformed Mana projectile, while the latter would improve his movement and predictive ability.

The spar then begins, the two combatants testing themselves against one another. Within a minute it becomes obvious that Cael is limiting himself to extremely common Skills and ones that he’d already displayed. The respect he feels for the kid begrudgingly increases.

Given that neither combatant is fighting to kill, Octavian begins to call out the telltale signs and intuitive realizations that combine within the unconscious mind as a Rank. This isn’t the first time he’s had to teach someone this particular Skill and he finds himself running on autopilot, the majority of his mind focusing on the strange events of the previous night.

After the revelation of Cael’s Temporary Class, he’d quickly retreated back to his camp and begun to prepare a message to his father and the Council, summarizing the information he’d discovered and requesting further instructions in light of his discovery. He’d hated that he was forced to go fleeing back for orders on his first assignment but he knew that hiding this information from his father would result in punishment beyond his comprehension. It wasn’t unheard of for members of the Royal Family to go missing, and he had no intention of following the path of his less fortunate siblings.

To his complete surprise, however, he’d been interrupted before he could send the request out. A message had appeared on his communication terminal, a machine built by Marcelle the Blind to only interact with the home system, and it wasn’t from Sol. Lacking any formalized contact information, the message had been simple and to the point. Octavian had forced himself to read it a dozen times over before he even considered the implications.

It had read:

Dearest Octavian,

Congratulations and condolences on your assignment. Your position brings you the power you’ve always wanted but, with it, risks you cannot even comprehend. However, that is not the reason for this message.

I implore you to withhold on sending the information of your discovery back to Sol. You have stumbled onto a revelation that you were never meant to see, and there is a good chance that you would be removed for it. The last thing I want to see is one of my more curious nephews die to those who seek their insidious goals. There are Factions within the Empire, unknown to all but those within them, which seek to destroy the people who you have been assigned to.

I must confess I am also interested in this young man with the Temporary Class. While more common than you know, it is still a method of growth inaccessible to most. The large percentage are wasted, becoming nothing more than rarer Classes of marginal power, but I suspect this young man could be an exception.

You have no reason to trust me. Should you decide to send your message, I will not blame you. I only ask that you question what you have been taught and make the decision that you feel is best. I am not the monster you believe me to be, only seeking my own goals.

Sincerely,

Your uncle, Bine

He’d always suspected that there was more to the story of Bine the Lesser than was told, but never in his wildest theories had he imagined that the boogeyman of his civilization would be his father’s brother. Bine had supposedly killed entire planets in his rage. That … didn’t seem to agree with the tone of the message. The man behind the words had seemed calm, even somewhat affectionate.

Of course, there was no way to know for sure that he really was who he claimed to be. The communication terminals had been built to only allow for communication between the home system and Octavian, which raised the possibility that it was someone masquerading as Bine to try and influence him into a position of weakness. On the other hand, if there was anyone in the Universe who could gain access to the home system without detection it would be Bine the Lesser.

Against his more cautionary instincts, Octavian decided to temporarily hold off on making the decision. Parts of him screamed in frustration, but his natural desire to obtain information won out. His response to his supposed uncle was short and curt, demanding clarification and not making any commitments to his decision. Should this be someone masquerading as another, Octavian had no intention of tying himself a noose that they could use to hang him.

He considers all of this as he watches Cael and Nuva continue their spar, yelling out the telltale signals endlessly so that they sink into his trainee’s mind. Unbeknownst to Cael, he’d also misappropriated a training sphere from the Merchants, none of whom would dare challenge a member of the Royal Family, and set it up as soon as they’d begun. He disliked having to take from his own people, but his budget for this expedition hadn’t been enough to afford the prohibitively expensive tool. What would normally take multiple weeks could be condensed down to a single day with the use of the sphere, the design of which was based around the effects of Dungeon Worlds.

This course of action could result in his downfall if any of his political enemies were ever to find out, as misuse of the rare training sphere was a capital offense, but he planned on making sure the merchants made enough profit for them to turn a blind eye. Mutual interest and threats were his usual modus operandi, and they’d always helped him to work things out in the end.

Keeping a careful eye on the combatants, Octavian banishes the worries of his uncle, his possible impending death, and even his political goals to focus on the spar. He’d learned long ago that focusing on things he couldn’t change would improve nothing. Better to focus on things within his control.

Spotting Cael darting back for another long range strike with his malformed projectile, he shakes his head and yells out another point of analysis. “Notice the sacs underneath his neck! You aren’t the only one with long range capabilities!”

Octavian sighs as he settles himself in for the training. It could take a while.

I fall down to the ground in exhaustion, panting heavily to try and get enough oxygen into my body. My chest rises and falls with each breath and I splay my arms out in a star pose. Training had become part of my life during my exile, but I haven’t been worked this hard since Faul was teaching me. Perhaps not even then.

It’s been 24 hours since we started training. Combat with Nuva lasted for the first half of the session, but Octavian returned him to that strange cylinder at that time, bringing out a smaller but far more dangerous creature afterwards. Apparently the perfect representation of a Rank 2 creature, this one was the size of a young boy, only three feet tall. What it lacked in size, however, it more than made up for it in sheer viciousness. Bone like claws extended from its furry hands, and it moved with a speed that I could barely keep up with. Without Fleet Feet of Air and bursts of Mana Infusion I would have lost within moments. Moments of recovery were only given when I was completely out of Mana or Stamina, and they ended as soon as I was halfway full.

Octavian’s relentless observations wormed their way into my mind until I felt as if I was hearing them before the words ever left his mouth. While I wasn’t able to know what Skills the creature possessed, I eventually began to sense … something about the creatures. Some instinctive part of my mind classified the creatures and I could sense their Rank after a few moments.

If I’m completely honest, I’m not entirely sure how it works and it’s extremely frustrating. My power has been my ability to understand my Skills and how they can be manipulated. This one, however, avoids my understanding. Well, at least until I develop the Skill itself.

It is only after the 22nd hour that I receive the formal notification of the Skill.

You have developed the Skill Combat Ranking of Sol Invictus (R-4) Rank 2! Created by the Royal Army of the Empire of Sol Invictus, you have developed the instincts that allowed these people to innately understand the risk and potential of their enemies. This Skill does not possess Levels, instead replaced with the highest Rank interacted with. Way Points will be granted on a 1:1 basis.

Unlike other Skill discoveries or creations, this one doesn’t bring with it an innate knowledge of how the Skill is formed. Frustrating, but perhaps it is just a side effect of Genesis taking it from Octavian’s race.

I let out a yell of accomplishment upon reading the notification, which is quickly followed by a sigh of relief from Octavian. Exhaustion fills my entire body, and I want nothing more than sleep, but, of course, that is when Genesis decides to make its move.

People of Earth. This notification represents the beginning of the Primus Trials, a competition to determine the leader of your world. In order to qualify as a competitor in the Primus Trials, an individual must be:

Over Level 15 Possess a Skill with Lvl 25 or above Be over the age of (16 Earth Years).

Analyzing… Analyzing …

As you satisfy these requirements, you must represent a qualifying town in order to compete. To determine qualifying towns, select [Qualifying List].

Do you wish to participate and, if so, who do you represent? [Vocal Assent Required]

I swallow my nervousness and speak in a confident tone of voice, steeling myself to the Trials that are to come. “I wish to participate and will represent Everwall.”

Competitor Cael King of the City Everwall has been entered into the Primus Trials. The First Trial shall take place 7 days from now in the City of Everwall. Prepare yourself. Only the strong will survive.

Behind me, I hear a small whisper from Octavian, just faint enough for me to catch. “And so it begins.”