Chapter 77 - The Descent

Climbing onto a nearby island, Claire took to the sky and shot herself into the water like an arrow. It was already her third attempt, and despite the high velocity that came with the air-to-surface approach, victory remained outside her grasp. The sea cow would always dart out of the way at the last second, no matter how much speed she gained or how many minor adjustments she made to try and thwart it. Adding to the difficulty was the way the light diffracted beneath the surface. The living steak was never exactly where it looked from her airborne position and she would always have to guess its true location.

Having failed thrice at emulating a petrel, the force mage switched strategies and propelled herself through the sea. Though the water wasn’t exactly heavy, it was much denser than the air and imposed a hard limit on her speed. Even with her magic at full throttle, she could only move half as quickly as she could above the surface. Fine adjustments were also more difficult. Her tail was a lot slower to get into position; even the slightest change in her direction had to come with a brief delay. Still, the magic helped to overcome her greatest weakness, the propensity to sink like an anchor.

Even with her mobility improved, Claire’s face was never without a scowl, no doubt in part because her breakfast was darting around with nearly twice her speed. It swam a literal circle around her and stopped to point and arf when she failed to turn quickly enough to face it. Still grumbling, Claire pushed herself towards it again and kept to its left until it found itself stuck between the lyrkress and the shore. Ramping up to her maximum speed, she tried to grab it, but it ducked, weaved, and slipped right under her hand.

Biting her lips, the lyrkress spun around and gave chase. As she kept her eyes on the not-bovine, she made note that its flippers were a major part of its submarine mobility. It beat them against the current whenever it tried to accelerate and twisted them when it needed to turn, both behaviours that she immediately began to replicate. Before long, she found herself a much more capable swimmer. Catching up to it was still beyond her, but she was able to swivel on a dime by opening her flippers and flapping them in opposite directions. Moving her legs also proved surprisingly helpful. Attempting to run under water, even without anything beneath her hooves, helped to keep her afloat.

Her body wasn’t the only thing she learned about. She had also started to uncover the manatee’s flaws. Unlike the lyrkress, who was capable of breathing underwater, the eggplant-shaped pseudo-cow had to go up for the occasional breath. It was especially vulnerable after a sprint, often needing to surface for several consecutive seconds before diving back beneath the waves.

Capitalising on one such opportunity was what finally allowed Claire to catch up to the more adept swimmer. She drove it into a shallow inlet after a long chase and boosted at it right as it surfaced. It tried to escape by leaping out of the water. An act made in futility.

In the air, she was the one with superior mobility. She wrapped her arms around the beast the moment the two made contact. Only to have it slip right out of her grasp. Like a bar of soap in the bath.

“That did not just happen!”

Log Entry 1806

Force Manipulation has reached level 16.

With an annoyed groan, the lyrkress fell back into the sea and slowly sank to the bottom. She was so vexed that she almost dumped all her points into agility, but stopped short of following through on the poor decision. She wanted to keep holding onto them until she was sure of how her ascension would affect the way she fought. So far, she had only a few opportunities to experiment, none of which had provided anything conclusive enough for her to form an opinion.

“Why are you trying so hard to capture it? Can’t you just attack it?” asked Sylvia, who swam up beside her as the sea cow darted out of the inlet.

“It’ll ruin the meat,” said Claire.

She couldn’t tell if it was an animal or a monster, and as evidenced by the fish she killed, Llystletein authority would only provide her the option to spawn something if it was the latter. Even then, she doubted that the skill was capable of providing anything palatable. Getting aggressive would do little beyond punching holes in all the various cuts of meat. Not that she knew anything about butchering a sea cow. Or a real cow, for that matter.

Steak can be eaten raw… Should I even bother trying to cook it?

Licking her lips, Claire gave chase with renewed vigour. She kicked off the seafloor, treading the water as she beat her tail and pushed forward with all four of her other limbs, all moving perfectly in sync.

Log Entry 1807

You have acquired the Swimming skill.

More force manipulation already?

…

Wait.

What?

The log entry came so far out of left field that she didn’t fully process it until she left the inlet. Frankly, a part of her had long given up on acquiring the skill. There were times where she thought herself the victim of some sort of curse, a bizarre malediction that barred her from ever learning it. But there it was, fresh in her logs, ten whole years after she had nearly drowned because she had just so happened to dive into a lake without supervision. She tried to open it and examine its details, but the skill vanished from her list before she could.

Log Entry 1808

The Unarmed Combat Mastery skill has been reclassified as a Frostblight Lyrkress skill. This reclassification has earned you a proficiency bonus.

Log Entry 1809

The Unarmed Combat Mastery skill evolved into Lyrkrian Martial Arts.

Log Entry 1810

The Swimming skill has been assimilated into Lyrkrian Martial Arts. This assimilation has earned you a proficiency bonus.

Log Entry 1811

The Lyrkrian Martial Arts skill has mutated into Frostblight Lyrkrian Martial Arts.

Three additional log entries came alongside the skill’s advent and subsequent departure. Claire was left puzzled, half because she suddenly felt as if she was no longer being pulled towards the seafloor, and half because she recognized the sudden evolution as one she had failed to acquire during her ascension.

With a strange sounding squeak, the sea cow turned around, and after a brief pause, swam over. It started swimming circles in front of her and using its flippers to push the water in her direction, but Claire was too busy reading and listening to care for it or any of its antics. Food was important, but not nearly as important as the ability to punch things in the face.

Frostblight Lyrkrian Martial Arts - Level 2

Swimming is hard. Your head is harder. There is a lesson to be learned here, but you are unlikely to ever decipher it.

Effects

- You are neutrally buoyant.

- You are capable of deflecting some projectiles with any of your limbs.

- Your movements are no longer impeded by water, or by other fluids similar in quality or composition.

- Improves all techniques that do not strictly require weapons, especially those that leverage your lyrkrian frame.

- In combat, your strength is improved by 105% (75% + 15% per level) of your dexterity. Half of this bonus is lost if you are armed with a weapon that is not affected by your highest level weapon mastery skill.

- Your physical attacks are imbued with frostblight. The damage you deal is increased by 12% (10% + 1%) per level when making physical contact with your target, increased twofold against targets susceptible to the power of ice. This bonus may also apply through indirect contact with ice magic as a catalyst.

The extra strength it gave was less than that of what Unarmed Combat Mastery previously provided, but the downgrade was by no means permanent. Levelling the skill a few times would get her right back to where she was. Even with the temporary demerit taken into consideration, the evolution still seemed highly valuable; reading through it didn’t give her a clear idea as to whether the additional frostblight damage only applied on barehanded attacks, but whatever the case, she was eager to test it, albeit not on the manatee.

Her considerations complete, Claire continued to sit perfectly still, but the sea cow didn’t take the bait. Somehow, it was able to sense her intentions, darting away with a squeal before she even thought about moving her hands. Seeing as how there weren’t any other options, the lyrkress stretched her tail, cracked her neck, and shot after her prey.

She could still feel the water’s weight, but it no longer impeded her. It glided off her skin, or perhaps it was more accurate to say that she glided through it, as would a pair of skates atop a rink of ice. The sea was helping her, its currents acting as her escort. She could feel the waves against her skin, and by moving in tandem with them, she was able to boost her speed.

As the more experienced of the two swimmers, the sea cow was still able to outperform her at first. Her newfound mobility did nothing to stop it from pulling off a fair number of last ditch evasive manoeuvres and slipping right out from between her fingertips. But it couldn’t keep her off its tail forever. Every exchange boosted her speed; a few minutes was all she needed to finally secure it and bring it up to shore.

“Woah, you did it! It looked like you suddenly got a lot faster too. Did you finally learn to swim?” asked Sylvia, who was basking atop a nearby rock.

Claire nodded as she set the surprisingly docile meat slab down in the sand. Much like a real cow, it didn’t quite seem to mind being captured. “I can’t wait to cook i—”

A high-pitched voice, an odd surprised chirp, interrupted the half-lamia mid-sentence. Turning towards its source, Claire found the sea cow slowly backing away, its forehead dripping. For some odd reason, she couldn’t quite help but think that it wasn’t because the creature had just come out of the water.

Sylvia blinked. “Ummmm… I think it just said that it thought you guys were just playing tag.”

Claire looked between the fox and the cow. “You can understand it?”

“Apparently!”

The manatee breathed a sigh of relief as it flopped its way back over to the two halfbreeds. It even went as far as patting Claire on the tail, as if to compliment her sense of humour.

This thing… must be really stupid. She could feel a dark smile surfacing, but stopped just shy of letting it show on her face. “Make a fire. I’ll cut a piece from its flank.”

“Are you sure that’s how you’re supposed to cook a cow?”

“I don’t know. But it’s worth a try.”

Another squeak emerged from the eggplant as it looked between the two in horror.

“Yes, I do know you can talk,” said Claire. “I still want to eat you.”

It looked at her with pleading eyes, but she suppressed a giggle and ignored it.

“Wait, you can understand it too?”

“Not at all.”

“Huh? Then how’d you know what it said?”

“What else was it going to say?”

“Oh… right. Good point.” Sylvia smiled awkwardly. “But ummm… I don’t really think we should eat it. I kind of feel sorry for it, and it’s really cute…”

The sea cow flubbed its way over to the fox, rolled into a ball, and did its best to hide behind her, squealing all the way.

“Fine.” Claire shrugged and sat down in the sand. “I don’t think it would have been very tasty anyway. It’s not a real cow.”

Despite the obvious good news, the manatee didn’t seem pleased. It stamped its flippers in the sand as it made its way over, almost growling as it pointed at its own flank. I knew it. It really is stupid.

“So you want me to take a bite out of you to prove that you’re tastier than a land cow?”

The manatee nodded, froze, and suddenly broke into a sweat as it started shaking its head and squeaking.

“Claire, stop bullying it! I think it’s gonna cry!”

“If you insist.” Stifling another giggle, she grabbed it by the tail and dragged it back into the sea. It swam away almost immediately as it hit the water, its terror striking her with a twinge of guilt. Making the poor thing suffer wasn’t her intention, but its reactions had been amusing and served as a good distraction from everything else on her mind. “I guess we’ll need new breakfast plans now.”

“Well, maybe you can ask dad to teach you to cook or something. That might work.”

“Maybe.” It took her a moment to steady her nerves. “But I don’t want to go back yet.”

“Ohh… right.”

Claire magically pulled a coconut out of a nearby tree, tore it in two, dumped all the excess liquid within, and tossed one half at the fox. “Here.” It wasn’t going to be enough, seeing as how her new body required much more fuel than it had before her ascension, but at least it was a start. Stale bread it is.

“Uhmmm… so I’ve been wondering, Claire…” The fox pawed at her share as she looked between it and the person that had so graciously decided to share it.

“What?”

“I’ve actually been meaning to ask you this since yesterday, but why are you eating the green ones?”

“Because the brown ones are rotten.”

“Actually, I think you might have that kinda backwards. The brown ones are the ones that are ripe, and I don’t think the green ones are as good for eating.”

Claire stared blankly as Sylvia skittered her way up a tree and retrieved a more mature nut. A quick swoosh of the tail cleaved the fruit into two perfect halves, each with many times the flesh that their greener counterparts contained.

“See? It smells better.” She nibbled on a piece of its flesh. “And tastes better too.”

Slowly walking over, the lyrkress retrieved the ripened nut and took a bite. After chewing for a few seconds, she dug a hole, buried its greener counterpart in the sand, and sat down on top of it.

“We will never speak of this again.”

Needless to say, the fox made sure to mention it a good number of times. Especially in front of other people.