I’m not sure if I hear more thunder or the low rumbling of Cerberus growling, but my body instinctively tenses in preparation. I consider drawing my sword, but… would that even help when fighting water? Unlikely. The freezing effect might honestly work against me, giving these entities solid masses with which to hit me.

My thoughts are immediately drowned when the mass of water reaches us. It’s like standing under a waterfall, and the only way I can maintain a space of air for me to breathe is by hunching over and letting my back take the brunt of it. Even with my increased Strength, the weight of the water is noticeable, and the fact that I can barely see anything through the distortions of water around me make matters even worse.

I have just enough time to wonder how The Barrows is going to avoid being put completely under water by all this when I feel something cold on my foot. My eyes flick down, and I register a small puddle coating my foot before I’m whipped onto my back and dragged downhill. A howl of fury echoes behind me as Cerberus takes notice, but I’m dragged away very quickly given how much rain there is, and I can’t see or breathe very well with my face now pointed towards the sky. Water immediately runs up my nose, but I at least have the sense to keep my mouth closed. My hands skid uselessly along the grass as I’m unable to find purchase on the slick surface, but I manage to start to sit up, despite the movement and the water, and grab at the thing gripping my foot.

I feel water there, but it reacts just like normal water and merely coats my hands as well. Unlike normal water, it reacts to my touch by spraying me hard in the chest and slamming me back onto the grass, knocking some air from my lungs as I slip underwater.

The shock of the sudden drop in noise level is jarring, going from a cacophony of sound to a muted sound of bubbles and water on water. Whatever was dragging me stops for a moment, and I struggle to push myself towards the rippling surface. That surface suddenly rises away from my movement, before slamming back down with the force of a crashing wave. I smash into the ground, forced to take a knee just to withstand the pressure, before the currents change unnaturally around me and try to flip me onto my back again.

I try my best to resist, clawing my way toward the ever retreating surface and suffering the resulting cascade of water pushing me back down. As if aggravated, the water proceeds to flip me around until I don’t know which way is the surface. I’ve heard you’re supposed to follow the bubbles, but there are no two bubbles going the same direction in this washing machine. I swim, following with the current for once, only to find I was swimming the wrong way when I’m slammed head first into the grass.

My lungs burn from being empty for far too long, and my body responds slowly to my orders for it to stand. Alright, that’s enough. I light a fire in my Energy, burning as much as I can, as fast as I can, and put all the power into my legs before rocketing myself in a reverse dive out of the water. I gasp at the air greedily even as the water churns in displeasure below me. A spyre of sentient water reaches up towards me, intent on dragging me back down, but it needn’t have bothered; I’m not done with it.

Letting my Energy burn for a few more moments, I switch focus to my arms and back and use the immense amount of water falling around me to hasten my journey to the reaching spyre, where I punch the ever-loving fuck out of it. The spyre explodes, only able to cope with the force by dispersing outward, and I follow it all the way down. I know it probably had no effect, but it was deeply satisfying.

The water opens up below me, creating a shallow space for me to land before rising up and crashing onto me like a circular wave. The crushing force makes my vision blur slightly, indicating that I definitely lost some health that time, but I still can’t help but smile.

The water makes a point to drown me again, but its efforts are far less unnerving when I know I can break free to take a breath. As long as my Energy lasts, and it seems to be holding up fairly well, I can wait this storm out while literally battling the elements. Swimming skills pop up rapidly, and I mindlessly accept them. I accumulated over ten thousand Power from the assault on our home, and these trivial skills don’t cost much anyway. Swimming Proficiency? Sure. Water Resistance? Whatever that means. Adaptive Combat? Hell yes. Don’t know what it does, but it sounds useful! Levels in Natural armor? Don’t mind if I do.

In short order, the experience changes from deeply concerning to a sort of fun challenge. I even start a very broken dialogue with Cerberus, who mostly says insulting things about how I’m ‘a fool beyond compare’ or that I ‘should already be dead’ and he definitely doesn’t appreciate that I’m having fun, nor my attempts to coax him in because ‘that water’s fine!’. I have to wonder why the water doesn’t attack him, but it’s probably for the best. If he died somehow, the whole treaty with the Carnines would fall apart… which would suck. Maybe I should have… nah, even if it targeted him, a boss monster wouldn’t be taken down by water, right?

The sentient moisture, not to be outdone or mocked, rises ever higher to hit ever harder. It quickly reaches the point where the Health impacts are lowering my Energy regeneration, which actually poses a threat. If I can’t launch out of the water, I can’t breathe, which spells death rather quickly. The storm doesn’t show any signs of ending, either, so no use banking on that being my savior.

Still reeling from the latest attempt to reduce me to a pulp, I decide to activate River’s Flow and River’s Source simultaneously, specifically targeting the water. It’s dangerous, but I try to compensate for the lack of body awareness by paying close attention to my vision. When it starts to darken, I’ll try to get to the surface as fast as possible… but until then, I want to try to beat this thing at its own game.

The roar of water and thunder fades, and my vision sharpens. My skin prickles as my sense of touch enhances, and I can feel the way the water moves every hair on my body. I can’t fight the water, not really, but I can move with and around it. Every bit of control I lose, the water gains, so as long as I maintain control, I’m fine. If I don’t know where I’m going, or what’s coming my way, that’s impossible, but now…

Now I can see the ripples, the slight distortions as the water is squeezed one way or forced another. I can watch the unnatural tendrils manipulate the normal flows of water into impossible currents and crushing waves. It’s blurred and fragmented, but the information is there, and that’s all I need to fall into my battle trance, and flow.

I have enough presence of mind to be amused at how infuriating it must be for this thing to have dragged me into its element, where it is most powerful, and find itself so utterly impotent that I can dance with its attacks for fun while rarely, if ever, feeling threatened. I almost feel it in me to thank the dark AI that designed this particular hazard, as it has probably never failed so spectacularly before.

My vision starts to fade, and I ride an errant current that was certainly designed to blindside me and knock me over, but instead nicely pushes me toward the surface. Two currents swirl in an attempt to flip me, but I simply catch the upward one while streamlining through the down, easily breaching the surface for a moment before a veritable jet of water sprays me in the face, and it’s back to the depths.

Despite my efforts, I let my Stamina wane too low on several occasions and have to drop out of my reverie to be sure I don’t actually die, but, all in all, the time passes quickly. Somewhere along the line, my partner releases me and returns to wherever it came from. This entirely escapes my notice, and it isn’t until Cerberus knocks me over that I realize I’ve been reacting to the currents of the wind for some time.

Looking up at him, with his paw on my chest, his disgust makes clear how much of my happiness shows on my face.

“A fool, but a resilient one. I do not understand you, human, but you would do well to avoid testing this place so callously.”

“Are you *cough* saying you didn’t have fun?”

A threatening growl is all I receive in reply.

[Congratulations! You’ve passed the Trial Of Water. Water Affinity acquired.]