Diana's metric for oddity and madness kept getting reset lately. She'd kept an eye on the new resident for a few days and couldn't figure him out. He kept quiet and seemed to be making himself at home. Something had to be wrong with him, though. No one sane would willingly go into the rift. That place ate people.

She watched him go in again and waited. The night sky was pleasant, and the air carried the scents of growing green life on the breeze. Enough time passed, and she was sure he was dead. A flash and a ripple to her mana sense warned her that he was coming out almost two hours later. She had hidden on her roof like usual, but she didn't think it would have mattered if she sat on her front step.

He was stumbling and bloody as he zombie-shuffled down the sidewalk. The moonlight and the light from the rift were enough to make out the details. Blood flowed freely down his back and arm, but that wasn't as bad as his face. Green ichor coated the lower half of his face and had dried all over his ruined shirt. Was he eating those things? It shouldn't have been possible.

The monsters had all burst into flame and left items behind in her calibration. Items that the council had taken from her the moment she came out of the rift. Diana hadn't made a fuss for a couple of reasons. She needed to wait for her cousins, and it wouldn't have made a difference anyway. The council was out in force, and a lone person wouldn't change any of their minds. It was all pointless anyway. Her two cousins never came out.

Diana and her cousins could have gone in together. They should have gone in together. The council told them to go one at a time, but they should have told them to shove it and rushed in together. She'd gone home and cried before pulling herself into a rough version of OK. Survival wasn't going to just happen, and Diana wouldn't quit now. She felt she owed it to her cousins and family in Dublin, whom she hadn't seen in a year.

That was enough of that. Diana shook her head to clear those thoughts and watched the young man continue his walk home. He was absolutely terrifying in appearance, and she held entirely still to be safe. Slowly, like an oak toppling, he fell to his hands and knees. She winced then and couldn't believe that he continued to crawl on his hands and knees for a dozen feet before finally collapsing. Diana watched him struggle for a minute before she climbed out of her window and, despite her better instincts, out the door to the strange man trying to crawl down the sidewalk.

Her nose wrinkled at the smell. Sweat and blood were present in significant quantities, but acid and the smell of awful wrongness from the ichor. Up close, he was even worse to look at as well. Cuts and punctures covered his body, and his veins bulged black around half of those. Poison! She felt a moment of pity well up in her heart despite his appearance. There wasn't anything she could do about poison. This man was going to die. Her jaw firmed as she looked down at him. She couldn't help him, but he didn't deserve to die in the street.

"Let's get you home, mister."

With that, Diana did her best to get him to his feet. She'd put her free Attribute into strength despite getting a mana class and was happy that she had done so for the hundredth time. As it was, he had to weigh around one hundred and seventy pounds of dead weight. It was a struggle, and despite the smell, she put his arm around her shoulder to try anything but dragging him down the concrete. His legs started to push slightly, and she almost dropped him in her panic. She was too close and couldn't get away.

His eyes were still closed, and his head rolled to the side. He wasn't conscious, but he still walked slightly with her help. A long nervous breath left her, and Diana helped him to the duplex at the end of the street. The door was locked, but that was Ok. Diana had been friendly with the Schmidt's before they left for Springfield, and she'd walked their dog when they had one and still had a key.

Diana left the man in the middle of the living room and went upstairs to find some bedding. She had barely carried him in the door, and there was no way she was trying to get him up a full flight of stairs. The rooms were empty except for the kid's bedroom, which was mostly empty except for a backpack and a bit of food and water. There was no bedding and only a few ripped-up shirts and pants on the floor. He was taking the bachelor life to new lows, apparently.

Downstairs the man hadn't moved, and Diana looked down at him for a minute. He was still breathing, though cramps or chills would wrack his body regularly. This was dangerous. She didn't know anything about him, and she didn't owe him anything. All these thoughts and more occupied her as she walked to her place and snagged an extra blanket and pillow from the closet. On the way back, she snagged his bat and placed it inside but well out of his reach.

The bat looked like he'd spent a week hitting rocks with it. It was covered in green and brown blood and was the scariest thing she'd seen except for actual monsters. She tucked the pillow under his head and placed the blanket on top of him. He mumbled and shivered but never woke up. Diana wondered what was in that awful place that could chew him up like this. She activated Mana Sense and gasped.

If his outside looked rough, his inside was worse. There were thick streamers of purple and toxic green mana winding through him, and her new senses supplied the names poison and gloom mana. He was utterly out of internal mana as well. That shouldn't be the case. She hadn't seen him use any skills after he left the rift. Even if he had bottomed out entirely in there, some mana should have been regenerated at this point.

Diana felt a small amount of mana condense in his pools as she focused on him. Suddenly it was gone, used to fuel a skill without him actually activating it. Golden life mana spun out from the man's core and moved towards his wounds. It was quickly smothered by the foreign mana in his system, some of it being destroyed in turn. Diana monitored him for five more minutes before the process repeated itself.

"He must have shit for magic Attributes."

Sense Mana

mana cost - minor(ongoing)/ activation - minor / cooldown - none

This skill allows the user to sense mana around them. Amounts and common types of mana are revealed as well. The range is SL x (meters), with accuracy diminishing after half the maximum range.

Her own skill drained mana but was replenished almost as fast with only having issues after an hour of sustained use. He clearly had an automatic skill trying to heal him, but it wasn't sustainable. Diana's sense drifted down his body and stopped at his waist. Specifically, it stopped at the pouch on his hip. Inside were spheres packed with small amounts of nature and life mana. She took the pouch, and several small white berries fell out when she opened it. It was a bad idea, but she ate one and continued to sense its path.

Soon after it hit her stomach, life and nature mana spread through her body. The life mana moved to heal any lingering wounds, and the nature mana sustained all the reactions. She felt better and slightly less hungry. Why the hell hadn't he eaten these? If his magic was that shitty, he might now even know what they were. Diana shook her head at that. She doubted he was dumb enough to not know what these berries were. The poison likely made him delirious, and he didn't get any into his system in time.

Diana stared down at the man again. His jaw often clenched at the spasms wracking him, and she doubted she could get a berry into him at this point. Looking around, she spotted the canteen on his other hip, and an idea took root. The berries went into the canteen, and Diana did her best cocktail shake until her arm was numb. According to her senses, the berries still held a lot of energy, but the water had taken on some of the healing mana. She poured the water into his mouth in small amounts when the cramps had subsided.

He choked and sputtered but eventually, some water made it into his stomach. The effect was subtle but immediate. His body relaxed slightly, and the poison and gloom mana drew back from the influx. Diana kept forcing the water in him until it was half gone. At that point, the foreign was gone from his body. He still looked like shit, but the stutter-step activations from his skill were healing him every time it kicked on.

The front door shut with a soft click as Diana left the house. She was surprised to see the twilight before dawn and hurried to get inside before any council members saw her. None of them had ever caused her trouble here, but the issues in Dublin were fresh in her mind. A year was not enough time to erase memories like that. Diana shook her head to clear the unpleasantness and headed off to bed. She still didn't trust that man, but she wasn't going to watch him die if she could prevent it. Not unless he deserved it.

_____________________________________________________________________________

A Few Days Later

Diana had cut it a closer than she liked while getting water last night. The stream had been cool and pleasant, with its sounds no longer covered up by the birdsong of the day. It would be so much easier to get it during the day, but she didn't want to risk it. Being invisible was the best defense she had. Still, she should be fine if she picked up the pace. The council boys walked around the rift all night and wouldn't be their most sharp right at dawn.

Rounding the corner as the first rays of dawn broke over the horizon, Diana heard a noise and froze. She squinted and realized the new guy stood about fifty yards before her and had just cleared his throat. He was shirtless and holding that bat of his. Fear flooded her mind, and she did the only thing that made sense. She dropped everything and ran away.

She sprinted with everything she had, tears of fear budding in the corners of her eyes as she ran away. He had looked strong, standing there in the morning light. In her experience, powerful young men couldn't be trusted. Not in the world before and even less so now. The dew clung to her shoes and socks as she sprinted through yards across the neighborhoods.

Diana risked a look over her shoulder and saw no one there. She ducked into an overgrown lilac bush and waited, doing her best to quiet her breathing. After five minutes, Diana was sure he wasn't chasing her. That was good, but it didn't mean anything. It was time to get back home and figure out her next steps. A fist of pain clenched her heart at the thought, but she probably needed to leave.

A quick trip through the backyards behind her neighborhood was an easy way to come up behind her condo. All these houses had been abandoned when everyone was forced into the center of town. They'd tried to force her to, but she'd just made herself scarce and hoped they thought she'd left. Diana paused at the fence and listened but didn't hear anything.

She peeked over the fence and saw the guards resting in a couple of camping chairs, waiting for their replacements. A quick jump from the woodpile put her over the fence. A couple of seconds later, she had the condo between her and the guards. She was walking to the front door when the jug caught her eye. It was still mostly full and sitting to the side of her front step. He knew where she lived.

"Shit! Shit! Shit!"

A pouch sat on the ground next to the jug. Diana recognized that pouch. It used to hold the magic berries before she'd used them all to save his life. She grabbed it and ran into the house, shutting the door behind her. Diana risked a glimpse out the windows, but no one was around. He could have been watching, but if so, she couldn't see him. A flash of her skill showed more of the whiteberries sitting inside the pouch. She opened the pouch to make sure, and the slightly sweet herbal scent wafted out to greet her.

The implications made her jaw drop, and her panic was forgotten for a moment. She had used all of the berries, but now he had more. He wasn't buying them at the store, which left the rift. Were the rifts more than just places for people to die? Somehow he was pulling magic healing berries out of that accursed thing, but it didn't change anything. She had to go.

Diana grabbed the bag she always had ready and a pair of canteens. A bowie knife went on her hip, and a surprisingly heavy walking stick completed the ensemble. After a moment of hesitation, she grabbed the berry pouch as well. Magical food and healing were worth more than gold to most people. She'd never been truly alone before and would take all the help she could get.

The gift didn't change anything, though. Gifts were usually tied to obligation. The worst people she'd ever met had started with gifts. The demands weren't far behind, and that's how she ended up hiding with her cousins in the first place. She couldn't go back to her family in Dublin yet, and Hilliard was almost as dangerous as a rift. She'd try to sneak around town and head north while she figured it out. It was time to get moving.