"Hey, rise and shine, sleepyhead, it's time we leave this place," Olive said to a sleep stricken Gabriel.

"Lower your voice… jeez; you'll give me a headache," he answered, groggy and grumpy.

"I will? Didn't think I had such a high tone of- you chose Enhanced Senses, didn't you?" She asked, grinning.

"Yeah, so please hush… it's like you're hammering my ears with a folding fan… I don't even know how that would work."

She laughed, "That was why you kept sniffing me yesterday, uh? Pervert."

"Oh, you were awake? Well, you have a nice natural smell, you smell like… water, and I don't mean like fish, not at all, I could smell you all day long; so much like an oyster..." he added, grinning.

Shit kicked him, though he managed to evade.

"Anyway, get ready, we eat something, then we leave… too few monsters out there, it's not a good sign," she ordered.

Gabriel nodded and started packing; his head though more than tied to monsters or their pursuers was bound to his thirst, and his new Enhanced Senses induced headache.

"Oli, can you, like summon water or something?" He asked her before departing. Liz, instead, simply just didn't care. She didn't really need to eat or drink. She just did it because she felt like doing it; where did all that go? Nobody knew.

"Right! I'm so sorry! I forgot, yes. Wait, it's gonna be hard finding some in this environment; maybe the burrow will help given its depth."

Olive got back inside the burrow, getting as far inside as she could, then she placed her hand on the ground, a circle with runes manifested around them on the ground.

Gabriel waited, looking at her.

She's taking her sweet time, I wonder what she's actually doing, I wonder… you know what? I should try using Analyze on her. Yeah, why the hell not.

He called forth Analyze simply wishing for it and mentally targeted Olive.

Then it appeared, just like any other Anchor message, burning text in mid-air.

Olivia Wanderlust

Race

?

Level

? (?%)

Class

Magi-Healer

Class Level

26 (?%)

Spirit

Spirit of The Salamander

Spirit Level

? (?%)

Pools

Life

Energy

Mana

Spirit

?

?

?

?

Attributes

Body

Spirit

Final

Affinity

?

?

?

Alacrity

18

?

?

Power

16

?

?

Recovery

?

?

?

Resilience

18

?

?

Stamina

16

?

?

So, nothing new… although her level… I thought she was level 26, not Class level 26. Did she lie?

"Did you just Analyze me?" She asked, turning toward him with an arched eyebrow, a whimsical tone in her voice.

"I did? Yeah, I did. How did you guess?"

"So you chose Analyze, uh? I thought you were more of a Recall kind of guy. Anyway, it feels like being pulled by something, just… at a Spirit realm. I guess you would probably not feel it, and you probably didn't manage to see much, right?"

"Yeah, I just saw your Class level and some of your stats, though I don't know why? Anyway, didn't you say to me that your actual Level was 26? Or do I remember wrong? How does this thing really work, exactly?"

"Hey, slow down, boy. First things first, there's no water here. I can't pull a drop of it. So, we'll have to get further away from here. I won't have such a problem for quite a while; however, we'll… figure something out if by tomorrow we won't have found any."

"Oh… then I guess we better speed up and away from here." And she ignored the first question, nice...

"Right," said Olive, "Let's go over those mountains, less cover, but we'll be getting closer to the Expanse since we'll be leaving Magador behind."

"Magador?"

"Vulcan's mother volcano, it's the centerpiece and most dangerous of Vulcan's volcanoes, that's where the dragons lie, better leave them alone."

"Dragons… right, anyway, Oli, I don't feel really comfortable going over the mountains…" He said, scratching his too short hairs.

"Why is that?"

"You don't hear them, do you?" Asked the man.

"Hear what? Are our pursuers close?" She asked, becoming a little paler.

"No, no, nothing like that. The cries, from the mountains. They are… ominous. Just what the fuck is going on over there? I had nightmares by the dozens listening to those sounds yesterday night."

"I'm sorry. I have no idea what you're talking about, Gabe. I didn't pick Enhanced Senses, though that means that you made it all the way to level ten, congratulations! It's really rare to make such a jump. It's hard to even those with heavy backers." She admitted.

"Yeah, thank you, so? What do you think?"

"I don't know what to say; maybe let's get closer first if it turns out we're going over problems we can't handle, we change our route… but Gabriel, we can't stay here. Those people looked organized, and I can bet my Salamander, sorry Brill, that there are other parties like them, maybe a whole squadron." She drew in, taking him by the hand. Her half-grown arm, going up, then down once she realized she had still only one hand at her disposal.

"Alright… anyway, tell me about Analyze while we go. You'll distract me from the cries. I'll bolster your healing with Helping Hand as a payment."

She chuckled, "Alright, it's a deal."

So they started climbing the slope.

Above the slope, the mountain became steeper at a slow pace, then the place once again opened up. The massive mountains started being seeable once the jungle gave way to a clearing.

Gabriel couldn't help but gape; he had never been anywhere near any big mountain range, and yet what he saw in front of him right now was unbelievable.

If Yggdrasil covered the sky, the mountains in front of him pierced it.

When vision started failing, and his improved sight meant being able to see at almost five times the maximum human range, the mountains' peak had long since broken the clouds; it became simply too tall to correctly follow, and haze covered it.

"This is abnormal… I mean, that is an illusion, right?" He asked, stopping in its tracks.

The mountain changed color multiple times, red gave way to the green, which gave way to brown, which gave way to black, which gave way to silver, which finally gave way to the ice white.

"Yeah, it's kinda scary, now though, turn around, maybe you'll find something equally scary there," she signaled, turning to her back.

Then Gabriel saw it, Magador.

It was as if a snapshot of hell had been taken and attached in the middle of the territory.

Above the jungle, far, really far from where they stood, so far that not even a hunch of the explosion came from, a volcano, so far away, yet so massive, released a spiral of flare in the sky.

The thing, looking like a devilish solar flare, moved about like a whip, then a spiral, then a wave, without finding peace; then it exploded only to reform once again inside of the core of the humongous bisected mount. It seemed as if it had a life of its own.

There were shapes, flying forms moved about in the sky around the ever-changing flare. He gulped down, knowing that those were real-life dragons.

His gaze went to his left shoulder, looking at marveling Liz.

No comparisons, Gabe. You are not that kind of guy.

Then he turned back and back again.

Though the mountains in front were huge, almost each one of them taller than the volcano, Would I even be able to correctly gauge it given the unknown distance? He thought.

The volcano was vast, so vast that it could have been big as a little state; thankfully for him, the living fire was a dark red one, with shades of orange; if it had been any shiner, he would have gone blind.

"This is absurd, Oli... these things cannot exist in nature."

"It's ma-"

"Don't say it!" He interrupted her, "Let's just move on, please." He continued, unperturbed.

The eerie cries kept getting higher and nearer as they moved down toward the valley, which would then splice into the mountain paths.

He let Olive fill the silence with tales about the Analyze Perks and other things related to Alter, to him unknown.

As it seemed, Analyze allowed gazing at up to fifty percent of a target's Anchor page in case of people on the same Level or in case of objects, based on their rarity in regard to the user's Level.

When the user had Levels above the target, that user would be shown as much as the entirety of the target's Anchor Page for up to fifty levels of advantage. The same system was, of course, used for the negative difference, which meant that a person with ten levels of disadvantage over the one being analyzed was able to see only forty percent of the target's Anchor page. And finally, the Anchor page showed first the known Attributes and already discovered info, placing them in the correct order. Then again, there were ways to resist Analyze, but they were far from being open for him.

Though what really was interesting was discovering that there were ways to gain unchosen Perks or even Titles, which gave surprising gifts.

By the time they got on their first mountain path, the environment around them was still blessed by fire, and so could be said for the lower parts of the first mountain paving leagues above them.

The jungle had given way to an open field composed of ups and down, tall orangish grass alternating with regular filled it; the occasional thicket and sparse tree could be sighted, each with their characteristic fiery veins; and yet tree hybrids were common as well.

In the distance, fast-growing dots seemed to be making their way to them at a faster pace than it was natural for regular leveled humans.

"Those look like... "Gabe squinted, Liz suggested an image in his mind, to which he agreed, "yes, dogs."

"Going fast, eh? Should we brace for a fight?"

"Most probably. However, Gabe, since you've leveled up now, I should warn you. I'm kind of a cross between a magician and a healer, not good enough at both roles… so; since there's six of them, keep your guard up, and back me up as much as you can… a single monster I can handle, but six fast attackers might be a bit out of my league." Confessed Oli-

"I kind of figure that out. Have you got anything to increase my damage?" He asked.

"Directly? No, but we should be in luck; they must have some form of water weakness, as long as they are still fire element," she said. "Here it comes."

Olive's hands moved into the air, a magic circle sprouted around her wrists, and she started a soft dance with her arms, reminding a bit of her kata, then she cast it on Gabriel.

Gabriel felt the change as the blue Mana sunk not in him but in his weapons, covering them in a glowing, wavy blue aura. It was of an intense blue rather than the azure signature of uncorrupted Mana.

Then he got his shortsword and lance at the ready. It was an awkward posture; he didn't really know how to properly handle the lance, even less if he had to use it as a spear, but that was what he had in stock. He had to manage.

"That will hold for five minutes. Let's try and do them the most amount of damage in that period," Oli said.

"Shouldn't we create a party or something?" He asked.

"I haven't got the Perk for it," she shook her head.

Oh, so it was a Perks thing. Good to know.

As the monsters, now clearly heading for them, drew closer, he could correctly make out their forms in their entirety. They were big ass dingos, roughly twice the regular size, patches of their mantle were on fire, and their eyes looked like molten nuggets.

Let's try and see where this goes. Analyze.

Molten Dingo

Race

Canine

Level 19

Class

Dingo

Level 16

Element

Fire

Fire - 2

Pools

Life

Energy

Mana

45/45

?

5/5

Attributes

Affinity

12

-

Alacrity

21

Bound

Power

18

Bound

Recovery

16

-

Resilience

?

?

Stamina

26

?

Holy fuck! Those stats are fucking high!

"Those things stats are out of the roof…"

"Are they? I'm glad you picked Analyze; by the way, it's gonna come in handy. What does it say about the Element?"

"It says Fire - 2. Is that good?" He asked.

"Better than nothing, 100% more damage from the Water element. Level?"

"Level 19, Class level 16."

"Good, they look fast, so let's whittle them down and keep our guards up. It shouldn't be too hard."

"If you say so… anyway." He cast an instance of Helping Hand on her before starting. The dingos, now almost on them.

"What was that for?"

"We're gonna get hurt. Better cast it now than not have the Mana later; it doesn't specify the duration so, I don't know how actually helpful it'll be," he confessed.

"Very, you shall see for yourself once I'll be fully healed. And the duration, it lasts for roughly one hour per Affinity level. It doesn't stack with itself, but it is great since it stacks on top of my water-based healing. Which is not the best in a fire environment, so thank you, Gabe," she said, turning to him with a sincere look on her face.

"Don't embarrass me now. I'm already on edge because of those fucking dogs coming at me. I'll mess it up," he retorted.

"You can be really, weird…" she said, shaking her head, "Getting naked and having sex is fine, but a thank you and you melt. What kind of person are you, really?"

"A weird one!" He said, bracing himself. The six dingos split.

Brill disappeared. Liz already knew what to do; she had to distract one of the dingos.

The dingos attacked head-on, like a train, their paces faster than he had ever seen an animal could move, but weirdly enough, he managed to follow them with eyes, even if barely. They opened up in a fan, two jumping right on them, two attacked by the sides, and the remaining two took their time to circle around them.

The one attacking Oli was caught up in a water shield; it was strong enough to halt its dash; the one attacking Gabriel was too fast for him to intercept; what he managed to do was put his spear horizontally among them.

They tumbled on the ground, the lance the only thing between the dingo and its shiny and sizzling teeth. Hot saliva dropped from its mouth, landing on Gabe's shirt, burning through it and quickly marking his skin; thankfully, it wasn't lava, nor real fire, but it was scalding, and he couldn't help but yelp, but that wasn't remotely all.

The real danger laid behind them, the dingos which had turned around them, were ready to intercept; one attacked him right away, directing at his face; Gabriel paled, but he reacted soon.

The Dingos were starved, attack-focused. So he impaled one with his shortsword.

Burst Attack!

His attack power, multiplied by the elemental damage, reached a staggering amount of 45!

He had no idea what it meant, but it was enough for his sword to penetrate the dingo's abdomen, and he chose that moment to hurl the oversized dog behind, sending it crashing against the other incoming dingo.

The impaled one yelped; his shortsword had been lost in the attack; the other gnashing the other's ear in rage for the presupposed assault. Roaring slowly as it tore away at its pack colleague.

A spike of fear soon made Gabriel turn his head to the side, toward Liz. She was in danger; he knew that to keep evading the monster, she had used all that she had; his Spirit tank was already empty, and she was now defenseless.

Gabriel moved in, without restraint.

Spear gripped tight, he launched himself at the monster, the dingo evaded easily. And soon, retaliated; it bit on his calf, but Gabriel knew he had seen the movement. He knew it was too fast for him to evade, so he did the only thing which would save him from the ravenous bite, he plunged his spear toward the ground, where he knew the beast would bite.

The spear shone of Mana, runes appearing on its entire length, then it encased itself inside the monster's skull. Though his teeth had already locked on Gabriel's leg.

They yelped in pain at the same time.

Though Burst Attack did much more damage, the teeth mowing his flesh, and the power from the spear hitting the monster's head, were enough to tear muscles, skin and break bones in Gabriel's leg.

Soon, the monster stopped whining, dead.

Gabriel wanted to close his eyes and just scream the pain away, but he couldn't. Not even a second later, the unhurt dingo launched itself at him, its jaws closing on Gabe's arm.

A razor-sharp wave of water cut it in half the next second, viscera hitting the ground with a slosh.

The dingo's eyes unfocused right away, but it was left dangling from Gabriel's arm.

He fell on his ass. A white as a rag, Olivia finished the sword-pierced monster by getting close to it and grabbing its head with a Water Element imbued hand; it took her just a few seconds to finish the job.

"Gabe, how are you?"

"Better than you yesterday. For sure." He managed to say, his eyes refusing to open.

Why does she always get so pale when she uses magic? Is it a water magic thing?

"Yeah, for sure. Now focus, cast Helping Hand to heal your leg and arm."

He nodded and did just so, but it took him a few seconds, Helping Hand refusing to collaborate from his adrenaline enhanced excitement.

Then it was her turn to heal him; it took her some time.

"Working with just one hand is not ideal," she said, a forced smile on her face as her hand moved around his leg injury, bones and meat adjusting themselves following her movements.

The pain turned into tingling as she did. To escape the look of his mangled leg, Gabriel escaped to his Anchor Page.

You have killed (2) Level 19 - Molten Dingo

You have gained:

Level + 25.65%

Class Level + 4.8%

Spirit Level + 28.5%

Burst Attack Tier 6 + 4.8%

"Nice job, Lizzy. Looks like you'll get your level 7 before long." Liz whipped her tongue happily as she wagged her tail left and right for a few seconds.

"She deserves it. She did much better than you, you know?" Olive said, still intent on fixing his wound.

"Hurt my pride more, won't you? It's already enough the damage you've done to me," he said.

"What damage are you talking about?" She quizzed, sincerely confused.

"Well, how come how would you call this now?" He said, pointing at something dangerously pointing forward.

"Oh…. Oh! You became an S&M...." She finally understood.

"Yeah! And that is your fault!" He retorted, a little tear leaving his right eye. Though there was a smug smirk on his face.

"The jobs I involve myself in…" she said, with clear scorn, "I should have let them take you, I swear."

Gabriel turned Liz's way and winked at her; she had no idea what to respond.

***

If one interested party was at the norther-eastern borders with the Expanse, another was at the northern one with it, unexpectedly closer than they would have thought.

"Still nothing?" Huge antlers poked the too-tight fabric of the construct.

"Nothing at all… we should just keep patrolling the borders; it's our only certainty for now."

"How in Yggdrasil's name is that possible? Do you have any idea how many people we sent out there? Dragons have started suspecting an invasion already. The Seer has given you two weeks before there'll be the first skirmish with the Dragons!" Retorted the giant Elk.

"Yagais, Vulcan is enormous, and we've been running like crazy, searching all over the place, but scrying magic is useless, and we can't send a flying patrol. It was already bad having sent such a massive number of troops, if they really catch us flying over their skies, then it'll really be war; we can't upset the Dragons, we don't stand a chance against them. Not with most of our forces employed on the front against the Priests. Why don't you just go there and ask politely for help in catching prisoners? You know they like their prisoners and dungeons and stupid shit like that," said Nastia. She had already "reported" to Gaia, but Yagais wanted to hear it for himself. "More importantly," she continued, "are there no new sightings from mother?"

"...No. The previous blunder on their part has just been a random stroke of luck on our side."

"Then just collect some old favors, like from the Witch of the Depth! Isn't she like the greatest seer that has ever walked Alter? Can't we ask her to help us out?"

"We-

"We can't," came a voice, a young voice, interrupting the exchange.

"While you were wasting your time, I've instead made my men run some errands for us, errands which came back with interesting results," continued the voice.

"Darte, weren't you in hiding or something?" Said Nastia, her hands nonchalantly placed on her hips.

The tent in the border of the territory between the Den and the Expanse was getting stuffy with the young Shadow's appearance.

"Please, Nastia… does your envy bar, suffocated sexual desires toward my sister, stop you from even maintaining a fake conversational tone with your speakers?" He retorted, annoyed.

"You, little son of a bitch, you dare…" she said, drawing forward.

"Ah, ah, ah," Said Darte with a smirk, his finger saying no-no, "I've been Tier 4 for a bit now, little Nastia. Do I need to prove to you the abyss that paves between us?"

"I could take you on, Tier 4 or not; you've just got lucky. Without your mama's assistance, you wouldn't have made it so high in such a little time; your levels are empty," she retorted.

"Say whatever you want, but before trying anything which you shall regret, listen here, cause what I've got to say will really make you think twice about contacting the Witch of the Depths."