Despite the exhilarating rush he felt with his skill and stat gains, he was humbled every day that he was put in his place by the pair of grinning 19 Strength monsters. Because whether it was winding and binding with bladed spear staves, or having his weapon twisted completely out of his grip before his legs were swept under him by a grinning Drake, he always found himself humbled after every sparring session with the pair.

Which, of course, only motivated him to train all the harder.

Especially when a smirking Alice, surprisingly with her cheeks flushed and without any tobacco stick in hand, was chuckling at his scowl when his bardiche bounced off the now triply-reinforced pel.

“Looks like you finally met your match, boy scout.” Alice laughed when neither draw cut nor cleaving blow could even part the thick fur hide Eric was now almost certain had been cured and treated, just like the rawhide and lizard scales underneath.

Eric was forced to nod.

Alice was right.

It was time to take this seriously.

He stood absolutely still, ignoring his friend’s good-natured ribbing, turning his focus inward.

Embracing that laser-like intense focus that had aided him with pushing himself past all limits when last he fought for his life, even as he realized what all his training in safe, controlled circumstances, despite his intense dedication, had cost him.

He was polishing his skills.

Without polishing his core.

Forgetting the very essence that had literally forged him in fire.

But all he had to do was remember Alice's haunted gaze when she spoke of horrors witnessed and endured. All he had to do was remember his sister's terrified screams as monstrous pig-headed abominations laughed and savored the pain, to set ablaze that which had been left dormant for far too long.

You have embraced your inner flame!

Before the cavern echoed with the roar of his soul as he howled and struck with the memories of a thousand panicked victims in chains. Children thrown into fires. The screams and howls of men and women suffering torments unimaginable. All catalized into one furious swing as he visualized the sneering porcine monsters that had so callously chucked his sister into the flame.

You have successfully embraced your Wrath!

Training pel Critically struck!

You have successfully sliced through: Enchanted Fur.

You have successfully sliced through: Enchanted Rawhide!

You have failed to pierce: Enchanted Scales.

Essence skill: Burst of Strength is now Rank 2!

Eric took deep, heaving breaths, feeling drained in a way he hadn't in quite some time, even after going all out, powerlifting for an hour straight. But now? Now he was beginning to feel a bone-weary exhaustion.

Which did nothing to dispel the growing embers of flame in his heart as he glared at the memory of the horrific abominations that were destroying his world. No more than Alice's look of naked fear when Eric whipped his blade around with a howl that was almost a scream, and sent the pel, with its concrete-filled base, cartwheeling a good twenty feet, tearing up the increasingly loamy cavern floor, now sporting a second gaping rent as Eric collapsed to his knees, feeling closer to exhaustion than he had in over a week.

Burst of Strength is now Rank 3! You are in tune with the Essence of your Wrath! You have a natural affinity with this skill!

You have Depleted your Soul Reserves.

You have failed to save versus Exhaustion.

Eric was only dimly aware of a hot-eyed Morlekai glaring down at him. “What the hell did you do, Eric?”

Eric just blinked. “Sorry?”

Morlekai grit his teeth. “Why did the cavern echo with shouts? Why is my sister shaking in terror?”

“Morlekai, it's not that bad. He just startled me, is all," Alice whispered.

“Shut up.” Morlekai was suddenly radiating a presence that Eric found downright chilling in his depleted state. “Well, Eric?”

Eric took a deep breath, forcing a smile. “I managed to cut it.”

Morlekai frowned. “What, exactly, did you cut?”

Then he turned to Drake’s whistle. “Damn, Eric, you did this? Shit. Look at this, boss. Inch-thick hide here feels like that rubberized steel shit we stole last year!”

Eric blinked at this. “Rubberized what?” he then turned to Alice, wincing in apology. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to...”

But she just shook her head, flashing a wan smile, shaking hands pulling out cigarette and lighter, one bit of technology that still worked just fine. "And I had just quit today," she said with a chuckle, gazing thoughtfully at Eric through a blue haze of smoke. "You have nothing to apologize for. I'm guessing you were accessing some primal magics? Because sure as shit, you don't get any weapon perks with a weapon you've just learned." She smirked. "Not that anyone around here has any weapon perks anyway. They’re rare as hell, and I knew only two cats in Freetown who had them. Won’t stop Morlekai from pushing us all to hit Journeyman tier, just on the off chance...”

Eric swallowed, before forcing a nod. He supposed that explained his essences as much as anything else. “I guess you could call it primal magic, sure. Not that I have any real idea what the fuck I’m doing.” He frowned down at his now chipped warblade, hissing at the crack he found in the haft. “About anything, really.”

She flashed an approving smile. "I think you're doing just fine, Eric. And I won't even tell you how hard I practiced, or how long it took, before I began to master my wand. Or what I had to do to get it, or about the fucked up shit in me and my brother's past that allows me to recharge it far fucking faster than putting points I can't afford into mana recovery." She chuckled bitterly. "Because our mana recovery stat is such a joke compared to an elf’s Arcane Potential that I’ll never match them, no matter what I do.”

She shrugged. “But just like any other game out there, if you know how to play it right, if you know how to mix together unexpected class strengths and professions, you can break all expectations.”

Her smile turned jaded, a certain dark glimmer in her gaze. “And we humans have our strengths, however much the other races look down on us.”

Before Eric could even ask what she was talking about, Morlekai was peering thoughtfully down at him once more, angry glare replaced by something far more speculative, though his lips were still stiff with displeasure. "Primal Magics?"

Eric shrugged. “I guess?”

“Think you can maybe access them without your shout echoing through the whole damned underworld?

Eric winced. "is that what we're calling it?"

“What else would you call endless tunnels not on any city blueprint leading into caverns that have no right to exist? And we’ve just scratched the fucking surface, kid. But secure as this little corner of what I’m guessing is the tamest part of this brave new world, we sure fuck don’t need to be shouting our location out to every corner of this fucked up realm.”

Eric bowed his head. "You're right. I guess I kinda fucked up."

“Not by the look of that cut, you didn’t.” He flashed a smile that was almost approving. “Think you can maybe pull it off without alerting the whole damned cavern?”

Eric shrugged. “I can try?”

“Do that.” He then frowned down at Eric’s bardiche.

“You actually managed to crack the haft, using the weapon as intended.” He chuckled softly, picking it up. “John’s going to love seeing this.” He turned to his sister. “You okay?”

“Never better,” she snapped, lighting a second cigarette off the first.

“Good. I’m glad you’re hitting the weights again. We’re cleansing that nest in less than two weeks, and you need to be ready. We’re sparring with sabers again tonight.”

“Fine,” Alice snapped, glaring at her brother as he went off to find the smith with an odd spring to his step. “Asshole,” she muttered, but Eric was almost positive she was smiling when she said it.

The rest of that day went about as Eric had expected, easily trounced by both a grinning Drake and a scowling Louie, as if both were eager to prove that his freakish Burst of Strength didn't mean he was a threat to their own impressive prowess. And of course the day wasn't complete without John Smith himself coming over for a scathing lecture about proper weapon maintenance, care, and what a fool he had been to let Eric talk him into file sharpening even that one precious blade.

Until his eyes widened at the gaping gashes Eric had inflicted upon fur and hide the man freely admitted he didn’t think any of them could do more than thrust through with a needlepoint tip spear on their best days. Then coming back the next day with a completely new haft for Alex's backup bardiche, with the same blade head, though now sporting a tiny chip, making it clear he wouldn't replace it, but he would maintain it, and was halfway curious to see how long it took before Eric eventually destroyed a weapon already far stronger than any steel blade had a right to be, thanks to the smith’s own unique gifts and chosen specialization.

Eric, both humbled and vindicated, took the lessons of the day to heart.

He had more than just physical skills to master, and if he didn’t master them to the point that they didn’t drain him utterly after just a pair of uses, then he was truly playing the fool.

So after his daily sparring sessions, which increasingly became the focus of his training, an exercise that benefited his partners as well as himself, he would end his final hour of perfecting the power of his draw cuts and swings with a final pair of deadly cleaving cuts channeling all the raw fury, frustration, and despair that had infected his life, and his world. Always feeling better for the release, always taking pride at the growing number of impossible cuts, yet not stopping or ceasing his final exhausting push for excellence three times a day, even as the energy for 2 finishing moves became three.

Burst of Strength is now at Rank 4!

Apprentice Bardiche (War Blade) is now at Rank 8!

And for all that he had been reluctant to practice his weapon feats for too many days, afraid that he might damage his sword and his joke of a spear, a silver coin offered to a wide-eyed town militia guardsman got him the man's backup spear, which might have seen better days but with a little practice felt better in his hand than his jury-rigged mess of a spear ever had, finally able to practice Piercing Strike on a pell he could now pierce and knock over, without any shout at all.

Best of all, even his short evening practice sessions with his spear, embraced more to facilitate development of his piercing strike perk than anything else, still resulted in a level up, the glaive-like bardiche using so many winding and thrusting techniques it was effectively training him in both weapons.

Congratulations! Spear is now Rank 11! You may use all spear perks with decreased risk of fatigue or mental drain!

He even had a solution for his saber, a tightly bundled ball of rawhide armor he no longer needed now serving as the perfect tool to enhance both his iado fast-draw skills, and his ability to cut with such deadly intent that the air itself parted before his blade.

And what a rush it was, switching between such vastly different disciplines as Wrath-infused power blows to tapping into the galactic mastery of a martial field, the memories of countless master bladesmen infusing him with a moment's sublime grace so transcendent, that one out of three cuts cleaved through the armor as easily as sheering through living dream, so effortlessly his blade hardly felt any resistance at all, let alone resistance sufficient to risk damaging its micro-serrated edge.

And the other two attempts made Eric wince, as his blade kept twisting in his grip, thanks to using an Adept tier technique with less than absolutely perfect edge alignment, and he couldn’t help but worry about damaging his precious blade.

But he was improving, he could tell. And when his will and killing intent were truly one with the environment, the chunks of bundled rawhide he tossed in the air he could cleave through as effortlessly as air.

Too bad he could only manage a tiny handful of Doom Slices before he was so drained he could barely even focus, and that was a sure way to get killed in a fight.

Nonetheless, he took sweetest comfort in the sense that he was coming ever closer to an epiphany with his saber, finally on the cusp of breaking through to Rank 12 at last.

Still, the time he spent attempting to improve his more exotic techniques was only a fraction of that which he spent striving to master the basics, the foundation upon which everything else was built.

Yet despite his dedication, Eric was quite surprised to find the gulf between him, Drake, and Louie shrinking far quicker than he would have expected, even though he, unlike the rest of them, never bothered hunting in the tunnels at all during those first two weeks, merely training with ever-increasing intensity while they were gone, savoring the hot burn of muscles forced to endure the most extreme workouts, until his brain was too tired to focus on anything at all, and he’d crash into the deepest of slumbers.

And he kept on going at that mad pace because the thrice daily messages his interface gave him were almost as powerful a reinforcer as the victory he had stolen from a surprised-looking Louie, when a sudden burst of tightly channeled fury at just the right moment didn’t just let him master the bind, but sent a surprised Louie’s practice polearm flying when a visibly panting Eric nonetheless managed to rest the rubber blade of his bardiche against his glaring opponent’s neck.

Of course he was sent flying onto his back seconds later, but it didn’t stop Alice, still sporting the bruises from her earlier practice session with her brother, and cranky from trying to quit smoking in time for their mission, cackling with glee.

“Looks like our boy scout got the best of you, lover!”

And Eric couldn’t help grinning as well, even as Louie stormed off, pleased as punch by the messages now flashing across his interface.

You have successfully channeled Burst of Strength while Freesparring!

Burst of Strength is now Rank 5!

Strength is now 14(85%)!

Bardiche (Glaive) is now Rank 8!

Bow (Compound) is now Rank 9!

Bow (Yew Longbow) is now Rank 8!

Unarmed Combat is now Rank 4!

And then, surprisingly, as week 2 drew to a close, his rate of growth slowed to a crawl, no matter how hard he trained.

He tried to deny it, training harder than ever, but he was savvy enough to understand what had happened, and what his next move had to be.

He had finally finished consolidating all his gains, thanks to his maximum Potency to Skill Rank Conversion, and had pushed his insights just as far as he could.

If he wanted to continue to grow at an inhuman pace, he'd need to earn it the old fashioned way.

He'd have to kill for it.

Just like every adventurer in every RPG game he had ever played.

And for whatever reason, not even sleeping the sleep of the utterly exhausted was enough to keep him from waking up whenever the topic of his friend's good-natured grumbling downstairs somehow turned to him.

“I tell you, Morlekai, it's not fucking natural. He actually jerked my bardiche off-line, yesterday, and clipped me so hard I almost saw stars!" Louie grumbled. "If I didn't beat him Strength-wise by five points, I'd call him my fucking equal. It's only been two weeks, and he can feel me out as well as I can him, and he's already slipping free of all my power binds!"

“Because of his primal magic. That Burst of Strength.”

“Not always,” Louie sighed. “I told him to save that cheating shit for the last match of the day, and he seemed down with that. Said he wanted to skill up the right way, that he’s hitting a bottleneck. The hell he is! Kid’s a fuckin’ monster, is what he is.”

“And the cutting targets, Morlekai! His serrated blade is cutting through our own as well as his own, despite our Strength differential!" a clearly impressed Drake noted. "And you've seen the inch thick fuckin' rhino hide on his pel. Shit, I can't cut through that on my best day, though sure as fuck I'm breakin' every bone underneath. But Eric? His primal shit? Cuts through every time. Yesterday he even cracked one of the lizard scales!" Drake chuckled ruefully. "What if he actually gets so good he can cut through even Greater Lizard Hide? And how the hell can I learn this shit?"

“He’s using primal magic shit, Drake,” Alice said. “I don’t think it can be taught any more than what me and Morlekai use. Not unless you have the gift for it. But still, the boys are right, Morlekai. The kid’s picking this warrior shit up at a crazy pace. You’ve seen how hard he trains. And power lifts. Three fucking times per day, and I’m patting myself on the back for quitting smoking. And do you know what I hate the most?”

“No idea," her brother said in a rather droll voice echoing through Eric's awareness as he slipped completely free of slumber.

“That fucker’s actually getting me to work out again. Me! I was actually in the gym, coughing my silly lungs out when I thought I could jump right back into my old routine. Fuck, Morlekai, I almost want to take up saber again. For real, this time.”

“Then do so. You still got the touch. You proved it to me just the other day with the 1796's. No way you're not at Rank 7 at least. You push and train and level it up a bit, you'll hit Olympian levels, which we can actually do now, especially if you use it in combat. Besides, that's two free points, once you hit System recognized Journeyman status. Fucked up as this brave new world is, I’m never one to turn down free points. And Alice?”

"Yes, brother dearest?"

“Quit smoking my pot and drinking away my profit while your at it.”

She chuckled softly. “Like I'm going to hit Journeyman tier in a week's time, when these two lugheads haven't gotten past Rank 8 with their favorite weapons since Smith first made us these sweet new bardiches, what, almost two months ago? But maybe I will, fucker. Just to spite you. By the way, the girl your all smitten with when you think no one's looking? Lucy's pretty sure she'll actually be able to grow some fresh buds, just as soon as she levels up her profession. And thank god your pet greenmage has a taste for the good stuff, because your shit's getting stale. Even she said so."

Alice sighed. “I just know my arm will be killing me for days, if I start getting serious about this shit.”

“Your arm will be fine,” Morlekai assured. “And you better not be seducing my girl.”

“Hey, I don’t mind,” Louie assured with what Eric just knew was a shit-eating grin.

“Shut the fuck up, Louie. As far as training goes, Alice, best you go hardcore, just like our favorite boy scout. The stat bonus is almost beside the point. Perfecting your ability to take down a centipede, rat, or a lizard that slips past us when you're out of juice? That just might save your life. Now we only have a week before John says our armor should be ready. And by that time...”

“I know,” his sister whispered. “Then it’s go time. One mission down...”

“And one vault to claim!” Drake said with a hoot.

“That’s the plan,” Morlekai said. “Now someone wake up boy scout. He and I need to have a little talk.”