Considering my Skills deeply, I'm not sure what I want to focus on. Since I want to get them to start them leveling, I should go for things that will see a lot of consistent use, but- Huh?

While I scan down the full skill list, my eyes trip over the glaringly obvious change.

That's right, it said I unlocked new Skills!

At the end of the list, there's a brand new section, labeled 'Transcendent.' There aren't many Skills in the new section, and they all have pretty out there names. After tapping through them, I find that there are thirteen in all. One that fits under each of the twelve Skill types, and one that's all its own thing.

The odd one out, all the way at the end of the list, is called 'Faith.' Its entire description reads 'The power of belief.' Not exactly helpful...

I look through the others, and I quickly see a theme. Uniquely overpowered, with extremely long cooldowns. Like 'Glory,' the Melee ability. It gives complete immunity to all damage and status effects, with an attack buff added on top. But it can only be used once per day.

It's a similar story for 'Perfection.' Ranged attacks hit instantly, can't miss, be avoided, or deflected. And the same kind of attack buff. Again, once per day.

I keep reading, and it looks like any one of these could be super useful. They're mostly designed around combating 'evil' enemies. Like, 'Judgment,' the one under Piercing, just makes your special attack do true damage if your target is judged to be evil. Which I'm assuming means all of the Oblivion. Maybe it's written that way to cover other things. Like, maybe a player killer could be considered evil, so they'd count too.

Once I've finished reading through each one carefully, I'm pretty sure the two most powerful ones are the Healing and Mobility Skills.

Absolve is a touch healing ability which basically looks like a full heal on steroids. Besides maxing their health, it repairs any damage to the body, like severed limbs or broken bones. It completely wipes out all status effects. So buffs, debuffs, corruption, damage over time, anything targeted at them even. And then it resets all their cooldowns too. If they just died, it'll outright revive them on the spot. I haven't seen any other healing magic that can do that. The closest was Lara reducing respawn timers.

Even if it's once per day, that is an absurd amount of power to put into a single ability.

The other is Promise. It's the Mobility type Skill, and is significantly more simple. You mark targets, and then activate the ability to move to a marked target. Instantly. With absolutely no limit on distance. It looks like the cooldown varies depending how far you go, but it maxes out at once per day like the others. Basically, it's an ability that could let you move clear across the world at will, so long as you've marked someone over there.

I'm rubbing my chin, considering which of these new Skills I should take. Any of them could be useful. So what's the catch...? I search around through the info screens until I find it.

“Ooh,” I wince a little when I see they cost five times as much SP as normal. Twenty five points to take a single one of them. That's an absolutely absurd price, but I can see why...

Hell, this means I can only afford one right now. I still want one since they're worth the cost, but which one is best?

It doesn't take much thought before I tap on 'Hope.' It's the Support ability. According to the description, it functions like a Party Boost passive skill, so it wouldn't help just me, but everyone else too, and it would be active all the time, rather than once per day like a lot of the others.

If nothing else, that means it will level up faster since it's always in use.

But really, the effects are what draw my interest the most. It's a passive buff to Aura, corruption resistance, and most importantly, Personal Affinities. That would give me three different bonuses for them, and this one will even affect me. I may not have support abilities to match my higher level sister, but it looks like I've found my niche.

I only hesitate briefly before I press the button the take the skill.

Are you sure?

The first Transcendent Skill you learn will permanently modify your Title.

I stare blankly at the warning message that appears. Modify my Title? Modify it how? Will it replace another part of it? Will I lose some other effect? Ugh, I wish I had more answers... But as I stare at the message, I think I finally get it. That would defeat the point.

Just looking at this – at all of this really, especially with the weird names and utter lack of in-depth game mechanic details I'm seeing, they aren't interested in that. It's not about min-maxing, choosing the best or most optimal one. None of the the Skill choices are supposed to be about that.

Since the beginning, the devs have made that as obvious as possible. No number to crunch, largely hidden stats, seemingly random natural character growth based off even more hidden information.

In this game, it's not about what's optimal. It's about what I want to do. Who I want to be while I'm here.

I close the confirmation dialogue and look over the list one more time. Just the words, and what they mean to me.

Glory, Perfection, Arcana, Prayer, Judgment, Purge, Absolve, Hope, Banish, Promise, Oracle, Antiquity, Faith. Of those thirteen options, which one fits me best? Glory and Perfection have little draw to me. Arcana is nice because I like magic, but isn't particularly special. Prayer makes me picture religion, which I don't have much stake in. Judgment and Purge are both too overbearing and aggressive for me. Absolve is good, but most of the time, it feels like I'm the one who needs it. I don't know how I would do something like that for others.

Hope is still a good choice, it's always good to have hope. Banish is also too aggressive. Promise makes me think of the promise I made to Fara. Oracle is a nice sounding word, but doesn't mean much to me, and Antiquity is about the same. Faith makes me think about my faith in others, which is what's getting me through a lot of this.

So... Hope, Promise, and Faith are the only ones I feel any particular draw from. Which one though...?

I promised Fara not to kill myself. That's a pretty strong connection, but that was as Ray. Even out there, I'm Alex now. Sure, the promise itself still stands, but it definitely doesn't feel the same. And I'm Mei here anyway. The person who made that promise isn't me. That one doesn't fit.

Hope has gotten me through a lot since I came here. I survived against those monsters that chased me because the game devs convinced me not to give up. Even this quest we're on is because I have hope that I can find an answer to what's happening to us – me and the other Mei.

And the outlier, Faith. I have faith in my companions of course. Especially Lara. I can believe in them, to help me and protect me.

For a minute, I sit, comparing the two words and their associated feelings. I think I'm still leaning toward Hope. While it's nice to have faith in my friends, I feel like faith in other things can be more important. Faith and belief not just in your allies, but in people and the world in general. I had so little of that as Ray, it's a wonderful joy that I can believe in things as Mei. Like myself.

My thoughts pause when I come to that, and I bring a hand up to my chest, staring down at my feet. That's right, I believe in myself as Mei. Not only do I believe in myself, as Mei. I believe in myself as Mei. Between Fara's questioning and the Oblivion Core's antagonism, I've had my own belief in myself as Mei questioned a number of times now. I know being Mei doesn't make sense. It's my own faith that makes it possible, isn't it?

I still like the Hope Skill and I think I'll take it as soon as I have the opportunity, but having actually thought things through, I feel like so much of myself is wrapped up in the idea of faith and belief that I have to at least choose that one first. Tapping on it, I get that empty description once more.

Faith

The power of belief.

The power of belief is what makes me who I am. I glance toward the camera. Let's see what I get for putting some of it toward the devs... I tap to learn the Skill. When the confirmation comes up, I accept. The message closes out, and a new one appears in its place.

You have taken a transcendent leap of faith. Your Title has evolved.

That's it. It doesn't say anything more, or give me any further insight or information. Once it disappears, I go straight over to my title menu to see the damage.

Dissonant Priestess of Faith

“Heh.” I can't help but chuckle. I worried so much, and all it did was add a new bit onto the end. It makes me feel silly, but I don't regret the choice. Even as I flip back to my Skills and see that I only have 12SP left. I just spent 25 on one Skill, and increasing its mastery by one level costs as much as taking a whole extra Skill. God, that's expensive...

I take one more look at my Skills, and jolt a little when I spot the change.

'Faith+'?

I tap on it.

Faith+ is stronger than normal due to your Transcendent Faith Personal Affinity.

My what? Is that something new? Is that why it just gave me that 'leap of faith' message? Or maybe it's part of the Title change, because I chose that Skill first. So your first Transcendent skill is stronger? As always, it's all questions, no answers. Eventually, I have no choice but to drop it and move on.

I have two Skills left to choose. I'm still thinking in terms of what I want to do. But also going with things I'll actually use regularly, I open the Sense section. After all, you use them literally all the time.

Just taking one look through the short list of options, there are actually a couple things that might be immediately useful. Navigation literally helps navigate better. Better sense of direction, the ability to detect nearby survival resources, towns, and so on. A definite consideration, given how much traveling I'll be doing. Before I take it though, I keep looking.

Of course, there are the five senses, each as their own Skill. I already have Keen Touch, and I'm most interested in Keen Eye. When I open it up, besides just increasing your visual acuity, it also helps with uncovering hidden locations, items, enemies, weak spots, and such. The hearing, taste, and smell don't really draw me in so much, so I move on.

Instinct is an interesting skill. It basically just gives a danger sense, to know when you're about to be attacked or something.

All the way at the bottom of the section, there's one that clearly doesn't fit, and I get the impression the devs put it there because it doesn't technically fit well in any other section either. Style Switch lets you set up a whole second set of specials, switching back and forth between the two with only a moderate cooldown. A great Skill if you want to have a wide variety of special attacks to choose from. Not really my thing right now, but still a pretty great skill.

After a little more thought, I take Keen Eye and Navigation. Both feel like they'll just be great to have and use on my journey. I put my last couple SP into Dark Curse Magic mastery since I really want some more spells from it. When I look at my Abilities, I actually did get another one from that.

'Pain Curse' this one is called. As far as I can tell, it's more or less the same as Dark Curse. However, they both get bonus damage based on however many curses are already on a target, so the idea would be to roll through every curse you have I guess, to get as much damage as possible. Since it doesn't have any AP invested, I look at transferring some like I did last time. Looks like I have another twenty four points I can move. Half, when going between different skills, I remind myself.

I tap through the operation to move twelve points off of Drain Touch, to Pain Curse. Good. That's everything, so I look over my full character sheet one last time.

Status Power: 25 Vitality: 23 (25) Finesse: 37 Speed: 31 Perception: 33 Spirit: 24 Sorcery: 38 Aura: 114 (180) Character Points: 0 Status Details Attack Power: 30 | 30 Magic Power: 43 Health: 52 Mana: 82 Defense: 32 (33) | 34 (35) Resistance: 30 | 29 (35) Attack Speed: 41 Move Speed: 29 (31) Block: 1 Attunement: Fire Level: 6 Total CP: 268 Total AP: 628 Total SP: 193 Skills Stat Boost Vitality Boost II: 1 Defense Boost I: 1 Aura Boost V: 2 Spell Resistant III: 3 Melee Hammer I: 1 Boost II: 1 Ranged Bow I: 2 Sniper I: 2 Power Shooting I: 2 Magic Jewelry I: 1 Fire Attunement I: 1 Dark Curse Magic IV: 3 Contagion II: 1 Melee Spell Trigger I: 1 Ranged Spell Trigger I: 1 Servant Expand Servant Limit II: 1 Piercing Exploit+ XI: 3 Warp Strike II: 1 Splash Field I: 2 Healing Life Drain Magic II: 1 Self Healing I: 1 Critical Healing II: 1 Support Party Defense Boost II: 2 Party Utility Boost I: 1 Control Blight I: 1 Mobility Running Boost I: 2 Wall Cling I: 1 Sense Keen Eye I: 1 Keen Touch I: 1 Navigation I: 1 Industry Item Modification I: 1 Transcendent Faith+ I: 1 Skill Points: 0 Abilities Skillful: 193 Offensive Abilities Power Shot: 28 Counter+: 13 Stunning Blow+: 19 Sneak Attack+: 44 Weapon Parry+: 14 Offensive Magic Dark Curse: 23 Pain Curse: 12 Drain Touch: 10 Control Magic Blight: 3 Magic Modification Contagion: 4 Field: 33 Self Enhancement Boost: 18 Active Effect Warp Strike: 19 Crafting Modify Item: 0 Ability Points: 0 Empowered Attacks Spells Cleansing Ray (Lesser) - 50 Empower Points: 50/223

Oh, I need to set up my special attacks again. As I'm doing that, I keep looking back at the cleansing spell. It has such a huge cost even though it's a weakened version of the original spell. I should also get cleansing magic when I have the chance, since I'm so suited for it with my Title and everything.

Just one more thing to keep in mind. I leave the spell there in case I need it and finish putting together the rest of my attacks. I do note that the cost of Dark Curse went down a little from what I remember. I guess increasing your mastery level does that.

Satisfied with my preparations, I close out my menu, and immediately notice everyone watching me.

“U-umm, yes?” I ask, blinking around at them in confusion.

“Just waiting for you to finish up,” Lara explains. “You were pretty focused, I guess you leveled?”

“Oh, thanks for that. And yeah, I leveled back in Pollton, so I'm six now. I just finished with my points and Skills and everything.”

“Great, let's keep it going,” Flare waves a hand with a big, excited grin.

Everyone gets going again, heading up the rocky incline as we curve along the mountainous slopes. I start looking around with my newly acquired Skills. Without even trying, I can tell how we're heading east, slowly drifting north as we follow the river.

Mebin is southeast, so we'll need to change course later. I can vaguely tell that there is... something south of us too. I can't really tell what it is, but with the way we're sticking to the river and avoiding it, there's no way it can be anything good.

The other big change is from Keen Eyes. First off is the obvious thing: I can see everything way better than before. To the point it suddenly feels like I was nearsighted before. That almost makes the Skill worth it all on its own, and I'm definitely considering picking up all the others because this is just incredible.

Moving beyond that though, is the more interesting part. Now I can kind of tell bits and pieces of information just looking around at stuff. Like, there's this one kind of tree we keep passing. It has lighter bark and feels less rough to the touch than the couple other common tree types in the area.

When I look at it, I don't automatically learn its name or anything, but I do get a feel for the weakest and strongest parts of the tree. And when I trace my fingers over the bark, I can get even get more, with an actual feel for the overall hardness and flexibility.

I feel like these would be invaluable for crafters, like someone who does wood carving. But I only have the one crafting skill I learned. Could they help me with item modification, however it's done?

I'm still wondering about a while later, that when Taryn raises a hand and calls everyone to stop.

He speaks quietly. “I hear something. Monsters, I think.” I flick my ears, twitching here and there to try and pick up whatever sounds he's hearing, but can't. He must have better hearing than me. If the faces of the rest of the group say anything, it goes for all of them too.

Staying low, we all crawl forward, carefully approaching the next crest in our path. Leaning up just over the edge of a rock, we peer around. I don't see it at first, but further out from us, there's a change in the environment.

“Hey, this is familiar...” I murmur after we climb over the boulder and begin to descend again, keeping my voice just loud enough for the others to hear.

“What is?” Having taken point at the head of the group, Taryn is the one to look back at me and ask.

“Mm, I'm not sure yet. I can't pinpoint it.” When I don't give a clear answer, he waves us all forward. I move up next to him as we all advance, weapons drawn. I keep an arrow perched on my bow string, while Taryn trains his loaded crossbow straight ahead. The others sweep out behind us, all moving slow and careful, like something is going to jump out at us.

Now that we're out in the wilderness, I guess we'll have to battle monsters along the way just to travel. This is finally starting to feel like a real adventure...