Rain was starting to fall. Rain was always falling, but now it was building from a light, feathery patter to a proper storm, droplets hitting him across the face with a real weight. The trees at the island’s center bent and swayed in the cool breeze, charged with a hint of electricity.

Clay felt almost drunk on the mix of fading adrenaline and whatever Might was; as the storm descended he was lost in his new world.

The rock he’d landed on was connected to other outcroppings, a long chain of other rocks, going out all the way into the waves and water. Clay picked his way across carefully, making sure not to plant his feet on any burrowed crabs. There were rubbery knots of seaweed and small tide pools where fish grew fat. An octopus lifted its arm and waved to him.

A bottle rocked back and forth on the sloshing water. The peeling label depicted a buxom woman clinging to a dolphin’s back.

Inside was a rich amber liquid. He pulled out the cork and sniffed the alcohol-soaked scent of strawberries. Rum.

“Okay…” Drunk on Might, drunk on adrenaline.

“Time for drunk on rum.” He belt down a shot and coughed. It was rough stuff. All burn and no flavor. He took another hard slug.

「 Quest Obtained - Where Has All The Rum Gone

Find the source of rum on the island,

and uncover the mystery of the Lustful Tortoise.

Reward - Star-Burned reduction. 」

He paused.

And lifted his bottle of rum. “Wakey wakey, little snake.”

“Never call me that again. In fact, do not attempt any kind of familiarity.” The serpent snapped.

“Ooo, you should not be telling me your weaknesses. I can think of nicknames for days.” Clay smirked. It was one of his specialties, digging into people’s skin once he found their weakness. Not a specialty he was proud of, mind you… Well, maybe he was a little proud. “Now, tell me something. I just got a quest…”

“Yes, you are Chosen of the Gods. Quests come with the territory.” The snake explained.

Clay nodded. “Yeah, but the title of that quest… is a direct reference to something from my world… So either whoever gives out the quests has been to Earth, or, get this, I’m fucking crazy, and this is an insanely lucid dream.” He didn’t want that second choice to be true. He needed this to be real, like a man who’d spent his life in a cave finally seeing sunshine…

“You idiot. You are writing the quests. You’re writing every message you see. The gods don’t talk by flapping their tongues to make sounds, like you do. They communicate meanings, which your sleeping mind interprets into symbols, words, it can understand.” The serpent paused, and then added, “Or they make it my unfortunate task to explain everything…”

“Man, you really hate what you do.” Clay noted. “Tell me, do you have… somewhere in whatever passes for an office… a little picture of a kitty-cat hanging off a branch? With something really asinine, really stupid, written under it?”

The serpent was suspiciously silent.

“And you just find yourself staring at it, trying to burn holes in it with your eyes?”

“My eyes actually can burn holes in things.” The angelic messenger answered.

“That sounds like a yes.” Clay grinned. Gotcha, he thought.

“Well, perhaps, but it’s not a picture of a cat. That would be absurd. No, it’s a tree of frozen moonlight, that sings every day a song celebrating the world and all the work we do.”

“Sounds like hell.” Who wanted to be serenaded about their job?

“Worse. The people who designed the hells knew what they were doing. It’s the accidental malice that gets under my skin.”

“Well, tell you what. I promise- strictly promise, scout’s honor-” And he lifted up his hand to make a solemn oath. “That if you don’t try to kill me again, I won’t sing any songs about what a great job you’re doing.”

“You are making cheap attempts to win my favor. Don’t think I don’t see that.” The serpent hissed.

“Guilty as charged.” Clay admitted, easily. You know I’m doing it, but, you know what? It’s still working and you can’t stop me.

I’m winning.

「 Skill Gained - Personal Sway

Those around you for extended periods of time will find their mood subtly improved.

Decreases Will use for direct persuasion.

Rank - 0.0 // Grade - Mundane 」

Personal Sway Skill increased to 1.

Personal Sway Skill increased to 2.

So there are skills for things like that. Scary. He’d have to watch himself to make sure he wasn’t being subtly influenced by someone else.

What was charisma? Charisma was making a threat sound like an offer of peace.

It was the knife you thanked as it slit your throat.

---

Clay pushed Might through his body, feeling the warmth build and grow, before taking a flying leap towards the edge of the beach and the beginning of the jungle.

The world blurred underfoot. Olympic jumpers would have strangled him on the spot for the skill to do what he did; thirty feet from barely any runway.

But as he landed, he suddenly staggered and sunk to his knees in the tall, cool grass. Rain swept over his face as he gasped and groaned, feeling a great emptiness in his core, like part of him had just collapsed and fallen away. It was the precise inversion of Might’s fiery warmth; a cold, sucking emptiness.

“W-what…”

“Starburn. You were warned.” The serpent noted in prim tones. “Until you cure yourself of that pesky condition, you’re a candle blazing away at both ends. Keep spending Might and you’ll crack your body apart like an egg.”

Clay nodded, cold sweat joining the rain slipping down his face. He brushed it all away with a clumsy hand and gripped the trunk of a palm tree.

With a heavy grunt, Clay pulled himself up.

He lifted the rum to his lips and let the bottle run dry, run-off spilling down his chin. “Yeah, alright.”

And he kept moving. Into the forest, where the canopy sheltered him from the rain. Where bright, tropical fruits hung like poison promises from the vines climbing the trunks. Carved totems of stone leaned out of the earth, tilted as the soil eroded under them, their grimacing faces reminding him of tiki bars and significantly better rum.

Something moved in the trees. With the wind, the trees themselves were constantly moving, but this was different; a sharp, quick motion.

An ape’s face peered down at him. It was leathery black, with white stripes along the eyes and long tusks protruding from either side of the crooked, yellow smile.

No.

Not a smile.

Apes beared their teeth in threat.

Clay stumbled back in the instant before the long-legged creature dropped from the trees, swinging a crude axe made from a piece of flint shoved through a driftwood branch. The blow hacked into the vines and undergrowth as he darted back.

It turned and screamed at him, a motion that practically unhinged its mouth to show dagger-long teeth and unleashed a sound like-

A sound like-

It wasn’t like a sound at all. It was a punch, directly to Clay’s gut. His whole body tightened with fear until his bones ached from the muscle clamping down around them.

But his reaction wasn’t to flinch back or to run.

It was to shout back, primate howl to match primate howl, and swing the heavy rum bottle dead into the ape’s skull. The reinforced glass held as the face went crunch; the ape was sent staggering across the ground on its short, bent limbs.

「 Skill Gained - Crude Instruments

Increases skill with bludgeons and improvised weapons.

Decreases Might used to inflict blunt trauma.

Rank - 0.0 // Grade - Mundane 」

「 Skill Gained - Intimidation.

Slightly increases people’s perception of you as frightening.

Decreases Will used to terrify.

Rank - 0.0 // Grade - Mundane 」

Notifications sung in Clay’s head. He pushed them away mentally.

The blow had twisted the ape on its feet, but now it regained them. Steadied itself. Its jaws dripped saliva.

With a scream the monkey-thing flung itself towards Clay.

Clay met it again, lunging into the blow and taking the beast to the ground in a full force tackle that slammed its head against the wet, muddy earth. As they tangled, muck spreading over his knees and getting under his nails, Clay brought the bottom of the bottle slamming down again and again, hammering until it broke and he drove a fistful of jagged shards into the beast’s face.

It screamed. Clay screamed. An ape-hand grabbed for his eyes and raked rough, filthy nails against his cheek, ripping the flesh like paper.

Clay let go and stumbled back.

In the rain, blood smearing into his gaze, he saw the axe.

As the ape picked itself up, he lifted the crude tool into his hands.

As the beast turned its head towards him, lips peeled back to bare long yellow fangs, he swung.

The head came off in one clean arc; the axe jolted in his hand as it struck against bone, then bit through.

Crude Instruments Skill increased to 1.

The ape’s body stood for a second…

And then it began to dissolve into smoke. Long spools of multicolored smoke rose from the stump of its neck in place of blood, and it was like the beast was an unwinding sweater, tongues of flame crossing back and forth to turn flesh into rising threads of yellow, green, cyan smoke…

Somehow the sight made Clay feel better.

This wasn’t a living creature, he could tell himself. Just some abstraction of the game he was playing. A thing of colorful smoke.

As the remnants of the beast rose into the air, the smoke filled up with strange letters made of light in glowing lines like a lightbulb’s filament. They flickered and shone…

He reached a hand out to touch one of the beautiful letters, on instinct, and instantly yanked his fingers back as an electric shock cracked down them. For a moment his thoughts were overwhelmed with monkey.

Clay for a moment felt everything it had been to be the ape; every moment of primal battle, every night spent under the stars and the rain in the shelter of the forest canopy.

Then he snapped back to himself and his scorched fingers.

“Fuck.” He cursed.

“Idiot.” The snake said, happily.

「 Skill Gained - Conceptualization

Slightly decreases Clarity cost to memorize Essentia.

Slightly decreases Will cost to scribe Essentia.

Rank - 0.0 // Grade - Arcane 」

“Got a skill from it.” Clay snapped back. “Could’ve been worse…”

“A famously difficult skill, which you’ll likely die without time to master.” The snake replied, clearly enjoying the momentary advantage in their little struggle. “Now look down.”

Clay did, nudging the ashy remnants of the ape with his foot. As he did, something clear and gleaming sifted out of the pile…

He leaned down and picked up a tooth made from moonlit-white quartz. It was beautiful. The thin light coming through the storm picked out swirling clouds of pink and white, and although there were a few cracks, they did nothing to diminish the smooth and opulent surface. Caught within- like a bug preserved in amber- was a single one of the golden letters Clay had watched go up in the smoke.

"An Essentia. No core, sadly, but we'll make do."

"What are we using this for, exactly?" Clay turned it over in his hand, but his attention was elsewhere. He was searching the trees for more primate foes. If one crept up on him…

Those leathery, shovel-wide hands had been strong. One good grip on his throat and it was over.

"An offering to the gods in exchange for power. Don't ask useless questions, and I might just end up liking you. Now, we need to find an altar. That was a guardian beast so it can't be far…"

Clay nodded. At this point he was moving forward just to move forward- momentum was keeping him on his feet, and he was vaguely afraid of what would happen if he stopped.

So he took another step forward…

And something shifted underfoot, with a hollow, echoing sound, as if he'd knocked on a door.

"Aha!'