It was surprisingly easy to fly over half an ocean to get back to Atlantis. Crap, even I start calling the old city like that. I hate it when the media name something before we have any real certitude on it. Only propagate false ideas and expectations. Sarah had used this time to check a lot of things on Enigma’s website. And she had made a little list with everything she knew about the new rules in this world:

People usually get their first class around 15, but circumstances can make one have one before that. You can have as many classes as you want, but the way the experience is distributed tend to make 4 classes at once a maximum. You can’t lose levels, nor classes, though there seems to be legends of a class that can remove unwanted classes. Seems fishy. Almost all skills have passive effects that aren’t listed when you read them, going from bonus damages to higher chances of some events. Getting to 0 HP doesn’t necessarily mean death, but it always brought unconsciousness. Getting to 0 MP put you in serious pain, and can make you collapse. No death observed. Magic exist, and can be learn. TRY!

Looking to her right, she saw that Audrey was still practicing whatever it was she was doing. It seemed she muttered to her fist while looking intensely at it. Sarah averted her gaze, and looked in front of her. She could see a small landmass, probably the island. Suddenly, her vision seemed to jump ahead, and she managed to make out some landmarks, indeed confirming it was it.

New skill discovered!

Eagle’s eyes is now level 1!

+3 PER per level.

Only Perception? Isn’t that kind of broken? Using her new ability, Sarah peered at the island. She located the tomb of the gods, and was surprised to see the excavation work had been pursued. They had unearthed a dozen meters on each sides of the door, revealing some impressive sculptures. At least, some true archeologist work!

They still had around an hour of flight available when the two girls landed in front of the doors. Sarah’s team was at work, photographing everything, taking measurements of the big statues. From up close, they were even more awesome. There was a dragon, and the details of the scales were amazing. Maybe it was even another of those ‘living’ sculptures, like the gods were. But no one will know, since it didn’t change back. Which was probably due to the lack of half his head. In front of the statue was a white sheet, upon which Lise was slowly depositing and examining black stone fragments. Sarah went to her, and saw that those were probably pieces of the dragon.

“Do you have everything?”

Lise jerked upright, clutching her hands around the stone piece, and shrieked. Her wide eyed gaze finally fell upon Sarah, and went from terror to surprise to resentment to tears.

“Why would you do that? F-first you almost die, then you go away with a strange woman, then you fight a pyromaniac, then you try to make me d-die! That was mean! MEAN!”

She had left the stone on the sheet and was trying to punch Sarah in the stomach, without a lot of success since the supposed victim just had to stretch her arms out to keep the small girl to reach her. After a full minute of rambling, Lise fell on her knees, her tears drying. She lifted her head with a tired smile.

“Glad you’re well.”

Sarah didn’t knew what to do. Anyone with a shred of ability to read emotions could tell she was lost and required help. But the rest of the team present around had work to do, and Audrey seemed fascinated by the other statue.

“I… I’m sorry? I didn’t think you would miss me that much…”

Sarah was patting Lise’s head awkwardly, slowly stroking her hair, an uncertain smile on her face.

“Miss you? You’re my main teacher and my thesis patron! I’m supposed to be your first assistant! Never let me like that without at least some instructions or indications! I am supposed to handle everything when you’re not there!”

“And you did it very well! Now, explain me everything you found. Please?”

Lise only had a little grin before turning back and starting her explanations.

“This here is probably the petrified corpse of a dragon. I didn’t find any kind of mark indicative of a sculptor work, and the inside of the body is as detailed as the exterior. You can see a part of the brain if you go up there.”

“How big is he?”

“Twenty meters long, thirty if you include the tail. Five meter high, neck and head not included. This other sculpture is, as you can see, a gigantic and beautiful bird. It doesn’t seem there’s anything missing, but we can’t check for too long, since it’s quite hot. We think maybe it’s some kind of phoenix. But we can’t know for sure.”

Audrey, who was inspecting the sculpture all along, spoke.

“It’s alive… There’s mana and life in there.”

“What do you mean?”

“I got a ‘Mana sense’ skill, and similar skills for life and death. I can feel it, there’s mana inside. Not a lot of it, but a lot of life too.”

Sarah frowned, and decided to look seriously at the statue, searching for something moving, or anything really.

New skill discovered!

Mana sense is now level 1!

+1 PER, +1 INT, +1 WIS per level.

Mana sense to Mana instinct!

Mana instinct is now level 1!

+2 PER, +1 INT, +1 WIS per level.

Mana sense to Mana sight!

Mana sight is now level 1!

+2 PER, +1 INT, +1 WIS per level.

Suddenly, it started making sense. There was indeed something moving inside the stone bird. Like a small ball of fire. Sarah wanted to reach out to it, but managed to stop the compulsion. Last time wasn’t a really good idea. Looking around, she saw that Lise had gone away, and Audrey was experimenting while looking at her closed fists and punching in the air. Actually, it seemed everyone had gone away. Wait, it’s night?

“How much time did I stay here looking at it?”

“Around four hours. I wanted to stop you, but your assistant told me to let you be until midnight at least. You learned something?”

“There’s something in here, like some kind of fire. I think it wants out.”

“How could you know that?”

“I think it’s the Mana instinct. I can feel how it moves. I suppose. It’s not that clear.”

Audrey went up, and looked at the bird statue.

“Is there anything we can do?”

“Well, I don’t want to destroy the sculpture, but maybe we could make a small opening?”

“How?”

“I’ll see in the morning with the team. We should go to sleep.”

“Ok, but wait for me before doing anything.”

-----------------------------------

Audrey POV:

I was walking toward the God’s tomb, as it was named by most people here. There was a lot of activity, and it took me some time to locate Sarah, speaking with a mature man over what looked like a steampunk railgun.

“What’s that?”

The man turned around, and smiled as he replied.

“A laser gun. No seriously, it’s pretty much it.”

“I supposed whatever is in there wouldn’t like water, since it’s hot. So Henry offered to use this instead of a water pressure tool.”

Sarah added this before gesturing toward two guys. They came close, lifted the machine and followed her to the door.

When we arrived before the phoenix statue, I noticed there was a clear perimeter around it, marked by some roadwork tape. The workers started to install the laser, under the surveillance of Henry. I shouldn’t call a man that old by his first name. But I don’t know his name.

I turned to Sarah.

“How long did you work with mister…?”

“Henry is a contractor of our department, so since I became a teacher.”

“Ladies, we’re ready!”

We turned our heads at the same time to see the two lifters going away, and ‘Henry’ manipulating a complex remote. Sarah handed me a pair of protection goggles, then gave the engineer the thumbs up. He engaged a lever, and a loud rumble started. It came from two generators, probably running with fuel at the smell. Then heat seemed to be emitted by the engine, before a stream of white pure light started cutting the black stone. With small movements, it opened a circular hole as big as a fist on the bottom of the sculpture. It then went on to deepen it, as the gravel were bouncing of it’s protection harmlessly.

After a good half hour, my mana sense picked some movement. I looked over Sarah, and she apparently saw the same thing.

“Stop it, whatever’s inside is moving.”

Henry stopped the machine.

“Good, it was almost overheating, I don’t think we could have went on more than five minutes.”

Everyone watched the bottom of the sculpture, and saw little wisps of flames emanating from the hole. It quickly started to look like fireworks, and without the goggles I would have had to look away.

Suddenly, there was a wave of heat. The ground was heated enough to glow a little, and there was a ball of fire flying rapidly toward Sarah.

Before anyone else could move, I jumped in front of her and punched with my ‘Death fist’ skill. I worked since yesterday to understand it, and finally managed to understand what an amount of damage that small could do. By observing my own body when using it, I noticed that the death energy was actually avoiding some places. After some cross-referencing, it was clear, Death energy was particularly harmful to cells. While that seemed obvious, the main point was that it’s effectiveness would greatly vary depending on where it would touch. When I talked about it with Bob, he called it ‘a critical hit modifier’. Whatever he may mean, what mattered to me was that if you touched someone’s vital spots with that, the damages would be considerable.

And that’s what I did, hitting the flaming ball dead center. Given it’s size, there were only weak spots on that thing. I noticed my hand was only slightly hurt by the flames.

I saw the ball of fire disappear, a small stack of ashes at my feets.

Congratulations! You killed a mighty phoenix!

New title acquired: Phoenix killer.

Congratulations! You killed a legendary creature with only one blow!

New perk acquired: Elder slayer.

I opened my status to look those over when a little voice at my feet startled me.

“Can’t you take a joke? You fucking killed me!”