It was nightfall by the time we arrived at More Sea. We ended up stopping by the shoreline for some rest. Unfortunately, the other occupants made it rather difficult to do so.

Shouting emanated from the twenty-odd Mysterious Waters Sect members. Two of them, the instructors most likely, watched and ordered the others to occasionally rotate positions or yelled out about some of the student’s mistakes. The rest would alternate between sparring each other and going into the waters to hunt for Polypus to eat and replenish their mana, or keep and sell for later.

“Alright you lot, that’s enough training for one day!” One of the instructors called out. “Line up for today’s rewards!”

All of the students huddled around the instructors, being paid various amounts. Three of the students were paid fifty mana crystals, a huge sum just for training, though they likely earned back most of what they paid the students by selling the extra Polypus to a processor. The rest were given half that amount or less, with one unfortunate soul only being offered a single mana crystal.

All of these sect members were human. All but one.

“Is that a fish-person inside a sphere of water?” I thought to Geistig.

“Best I can tell, that’s a Merfolk in a water slime. I don’t see many of them around, being aquatic fae and all.” Geistig replied.

“You there, you three and your pet bird. Leave now! We were here first!” One of the top students called out to us.

One of the instructors immediately smacked them in the back of the head. “You fool, there’s a dwarf among them! I swear, you wouldn’t recognize Mount Tai if Alexandra herself dropped it on you.” The instructor bowed to Geistig. “I apologize if my apprentice was rude. He will be disciplined, I assure you.”

“It’s alright, it’s not my first time seeing that type. Preparing for the tournament, I assume?”

“Precisely. Are you here for the same?”

“Nah, we’ve got a blue mage that needs a few Polypus for himself.”

“I see. That may be a problem. With all the hunting we just did, the Polypus have fled to deeper waters. There should be another shallow breeding ground a few days west. Or we could sell you some, if you'd like. 30 Mana stones each.”

“30? Nah, I think we’ll just stay the night and head into slightly deeper waters tomorrow. I’m sure we can find something without wading out too deep, and I don’t want this errand to run too long or far from Aurelia.”

"Suit yourself."

The two said their goodbyes, and we set up camp. As the others set up camp and went to sleep, I got to work.

I need to prepare one of my free terrariums for the Polypus. Generally speaking, only a few things matter when it comes to farming: Food, water, temperature, and air.

For food, some monsters can be quite picky with their dietary restrictions. Thankfully, according to Geistig’s notes, these things have a diet of fish and shellfish, and only get easier to feed as they grow.

I won’t have enough free time to establish every aspect of an ecosystem fish can live in, so I’ll want to purchase what I can. Since I won’t have an income from jobs or learn to crystalize mana for a while, so I'll have to manually hunt a steady supply of fish for the Polypus to feed on until I have the necessary funds.

For water, well, there’s a whole ocean in front of me. It’s most certainly enough for my needs, assuming I can figure out how to fill up the subspace. Phasing water in won’t cut it within a reasonable timeframe, but what about a portal?

I flew over to the ocean water, and imagined both ends of the portal. One about a foot under the surface of the More sea, and the other at the top of the Polypus terrarium. I concentrated as hard as I could, and after three hours of trying, I was able to keep the portal stable about a foot wide. The ambient mana I was unwillingly absorbing roughly matched what making the portal required, so I didn’t need to take a break once it stabilized at that size. A few hours later, I noticed the air bubbles no longer coming up, and the water was no longer draining into it, suggesting it was finally full. It took most of the night, so I wouldn’t be getting much sleep. Oh well, I’m a night owl anyways.

Next on the list was temperature. These monsters were resilient, so it’s unlikely that any minor temperature differences in my subspace compared to the sea surface would be enough to kill them. It might not be as comfortable as they like, but comfort isn’t a luxury I have time for.

Finally, there was air. Even sea creatures need to breathe, and we’ve got just the thing right here to help with that. Seaweed. Not only does this stuff provide enough of air to the water, but it might also solve my herbivore’s lack of food problem, once I find a way to keep a steady supply of it. Since the Polypus are carnivores at the early stages, and prefer high mana density foods in the later stages, they won’t touch the stuff. Therefore, I’m safe to put as much in there as I want. I’ll periodically export some of the seaweed if needed. I spent the remaining hour before the others woke up phasing as much seaweed as I could into the terrarium.

The others awoke, none the wiser of all the effort I put in to set up that terrarium. That being said, Geistig didn’t take long after re-establishing our mental connection to realize I had skipped out on sleep.

We got on the boat and sailed out towards the depths. We had to drift out fairly deep before Kaz told us we were in range.

“So, how exactly are we going to reach the Polypus when they’re deep underwater?” I asked.

“That’s rather simple, actually. we’ll make them come to us.” Geistig replied internally, then continued aloud. “Kaz, I’m adding you to the mental connection. I’ll need to visualize your detection to find them.”

Kaz nodded, and after a short period, pointed his wing towards the water. Kaz sent a blurry mental image through Geistig’s connection, and Geistig used that image to construct an illusion in the water of a few Polypus below us. Most of them were only about 4 feet long, but there were one or two that were thrice that size. Geistig created a small wisp of red mana in his hand, then blasted it at one of the smaller ones closest to us. It faded as it traveled through the currents, but struck true.

The Polypus stopped what it was doing and darted straight towards our boat. Geistig patted Tishina’s shoulder, and told her “your turn.”

Tishina’s lips curled into a sadistic smile as her shadow armor manifested and produced the black elongated mouths. They reached into the water, and chomped onto each of the Polypus’s tentacles. She pulled it out of the water, and ripped it apart, one tentacle at a time. Though the laughter ringing out in my mind was scary, what was truly frightening was the image of her face with its silent laughter.

I barely suppressed the urge to scream, thankful to not have that monstrous voice whispering into my ear.

“So that’s what you meant,” I thought to Geistig. “Kids can be rather terrifying.”

Geistig smiled at that. “Breakfast is ready. I hope you like calamari.”

“These are octopi, not squid. Therefore not calamari.” I corrected. “Also, it’ll take a while to eat it with a mouth this small. Quicker just to do this.”

I phased the Polypus into its terrarium, and promptly transformed into it.

I was wondering what taking a form with the same alignment as me would do. As it turns out, it’s a whole lot. For the short time I was unconscious, I could feel all of it. My own mana, my subspace, and everything inside. Below me, I felt the Polypus’s mana as well. Everything remotely related to space mana I felt so much more vividly than I ever had outside of my subspace.

The feeling faded quickly as the grogginess of transforming did. I still need to learn to keep hold of that feeling, but I at least have a path forward.

Fully awake now, I felt the usual feeling of euphoria, as I usually did when becoming a monster. But there was something else there too. What was it? Fear? Panic? Whatever it was, it made me feel suffocated. I gasped for air, yet had no lungs.

Right, this form has gills, not lungs. I crawled off the boat and into the water, pulling myself by my four working tentacles, and clung to the underside of the boat with my suction cups. My other six arms dangled down beneath me.

“Geistig, I should have asked this before, but why did you choose a form that can’t breathe air? How are we even going to train?”

“Finally realized, eh? You strike me as the type to get way ahead of yourself, and start acting alone early in training. I don’t want you taking unnecessary risks, especially when you’re barely functional as a Powered. We can have our training sessions down by the river.”

That’s… Not wrong. I was planning on pushing my luck. I have quite the safety net, after all. Though he doesn’t know that.

“I’d never do such a thing.” I lied.

“Sure you wouldn’t,” Geistig sarcastically agreed. “Now let’s grab a few more of these things. Since we’re here already, we might as well get those two big ones, too.”

One after the other, we pulled in five more of the E rank Polypus. Tishina tore three of them apart, somehow getting her shadow to actually eat two of them. Kaz used his wing arms to launch air blades and sliced the other two into chunks. Is that an innate ability of whatever monsters his arms came from, or can Kaz use wind spells?

“My turn now” Geistig called. He manifested two more red spells, almost water-balloon like in consistency this time, and launched them simultaneously at the two D rank Polypus. They charged at the boat, and I swam out of their way. Geistig manifested another two spells, and launched them at the two just before they reached. Instead of attacking the boat, they grappled each other. They squeezed each other’s heads as hard as they could, and tried to bite the other’s tentacles off or inject them with poison using their beaks. Just before either reached, the other would suck their tentacles into themselves, into their subspaces. It seemed like the stalemate would go on for some time, but Geistig began channeling a new spell. This one took longer to channel than the others, and was a bright shade of white. The mana even looked visually denser, as if it were a crystalline crescent moon. Geistig launched the spell, hitting both of the Polypus. Their struggles stopped, and they just… Froze. Tishina fished them out of the water and finished them off.

"That was a waste of mana." Kaz commented.

“What was that?” I asked Geistig.

“Mind blank spell. Doesn’t kill anything, but it leaves them no better than dead. Usually it only lasts a few seconds, but I hit them with enough juice to make it permanent.”

“Well that’s terrifying. Remind me not to piss you off.”

I held my breath and returned to the boat where the captured Polypus were. I managed to pull the three remaining E ranks and one of the D ranks into my subspace before running out of mana.

“I’m out of mana, and it’s not my rank right now anyways. Kaz, why don’t you take the other one? It could be useful for you.”

“It is my rank… Gills and tentacles seem useful, and they can even be stored away when I don’t want them. Yeah, not a bad idea.” Kaz cut off four of the tentacles and the gills and placed them against his back, just inside his turtle shell where his neck and legs were sticking out.

“Oh great, now all three of you have tentacles. I know where this is going, and I don’t like it.” Geistig snarked.

“I’m not sure what you’re referring—” Kaz cut himself off mid-sentence, squinting into the distance. “Guys, we have a problem.”

Geistig shared the mental image with us of whatever Kaz was referring to. Another Polypus, but this one maybe 80 feet in length, with a hundred giant tentacles thrashing around, and a gaping teeth-filled maw in front of its eyes, just above its beak. C rank.

Geistig turned to us, and said one word: “Run.”