An unknown amount of time later Tormacc woke up. His eyes slowly slid open, revealing the pale sky above him, the sun beating down on him and warming the rock he was lying on. The sky was beautiful, the pale blue seemingly stretching into infinity, the depth of the sky holding infinite possibilities. He let himself be sucked into that infinite stretch of blue, digesting the memories of his frenzied flight. He had been in over his head without a doubt, and looking back on the experience, it was hard to believe it had really happened, the whole thing reeking of the surreal.

But checking his Fate Wheel confirmed the three new abilities he now possessed; it hadn’t been a fever dream bought about by some unknown element of the Shard. He knew he should think about it more, reflect on the hubris that got him into the situation in the first place, but he just lay there, internally celebrating his escape from the jaws of death.

But as much as he wanted to just lay there, his body was screaming at him, muscles and bones crying out in pain. With reluctance he brought his mind back to the present, putting aside his harrowing experience for the problems of the now. He hadn’t yet managed to properly activate his Meditation skill, but that didn’t stop him from meditating normally: channeling the Essence in his body to return it to its optimal state. As he focused on healing himself, he could almost feel the changes, the speed noticeably improved from his time in the starting zone. Evidently Kaz Ehen hadn’t been wrong about the Blood Empowerment Ritual. His healing was greatly improved.

Even with the improved healing it still took him the rest of that day and into the next to feel he was back in tip-top state. The fight with the stone rats had been short, but he had strained himself beyond what was truly safe just to stay alive. If he hadn’t been able to make it to safety he would have perished at the hands of whatever monster found him, unable to even summon the mental strength to use a skill.

The skills he had didn’t require resources to use other than the Essence required to unlock them, but that didn’t mean they were free. He still had to spend mental energy to activate them, and as he now found out, he could drain that energy completely, leaving him unable to activate any abilities at all. Even his Tattoo of Perception was bothering him, pulsing like a headache centered behind his ear.

There was a short cooldown time before he could use an ability again. This varied between abilities, and he thought he might be able to forcefully overcome it, but seeing the state he was in now, he knew he should only do so as a last resort, as it would leave him drained, likely for days. Despite his body being fully healed he could feel a headache coming on just by thinking about using a skill, let alone trying to activate one. Overdrawing on his mental energy was obviously something he needed to avoid in the future if he didn’t want to leave himself weak and vulnerable afterwards.

It took another three days until he could even think about using a skill and another two after that until he really felt like he was back to normal. All told, that was a full week he had lost after his ill-planned adventure. To make matters worse, four days into that he had felt something, and upon checking his Essence, found three missing. His Essence drain has started. If the next day he hadn’t felt his ability to use his skills coming back he might have panicked.

The drain of his Essence was annoying, but at least he knew how much it was. It would go up at some point, but now that he knew approximately how much he was losing per day he could plan around it, so in some ways it was a weight off his mind. But even if the drain hadn’t started, he still needed more Essence.

It was time to hunt some rats.

He had been careless before; he assumed the rats were weak and powerless because they were only worth one Essence. While it was true he could easily kill them, as evidenced by the amount he killed before he had been forced to escape, he was still limited both in his strength and his vitality. Even if he could hold out for a while he would eventually be overwhelmed by pure numbers. But now that he had a way to escape he would be fine even if he was surrounded. In fact, he planned to get himself surrounded, the clumped-up rats the easiest targets for him to farm Essence off of, especially now that he had unlocked Cleave. He now had the ability to kill a large number of weak enemies, and he planned to make full use of that.

He couldn’t remember which direction he had come from in his harried flight, but finding the answer to that proved easier than he thought. With Power Jump, he was able to jump more than ten meters straight up, giving him a good view of his surroundings. The rat corpses hadn’t disappeared, and they stuck out like a sore thumb amidst the otherwise empty plateaus, allowing him to rather easily update his map.

Reaching the plateau full of corpses, Tormacc surveyed the destruction he had wrought. It wasn’t a pretty sight, smashed up rat bodies lying in dried out blood. But as he looked around, he noticed something shining among the otherwise dull browns. Walking over and bending down, he pulled out a shining White Sphere from in between the bodies. It was similar to the white crystals he had seen before, the only difference its shape. It must have dropped from one of the enemies, the corpse imploding when he hadn’t been looking.

Holding it in his hand, he acquiesced to the invisible pull from the sphere, and after pulsing three times, he felt the sphere dissolve and Essence flowed into him. It was like a river, the Essence gushing into his Fate Wheel at a frightening rate. And then it was over, and checking his Fate Wheel, he was now 250 Essence richer than before, a far cry from when he had used a White Sphere in the starting zone for only five Essence.

In general, spheres were rarer than crystals, dropping at a reduced rate in comparison. The White Spheres were the weakest, their reward noticeably smaller than the blue and purple spheres. But the rewards from spheres scaled, with the White Sphere giving half the Essence your highest unlocked ability. So because he had a tier six ability unlocked with cost 500 Essence, the White Sphere gave him 250. It was a welcome boost, and Tormacc could feel himself relax a little, realizing he was no longer under immediate pressure to earn Essence. But since he had earned so much Essence at once it would be a waste to let it sit there, so he concentrated inwards to inspect his Fate Wheel.

The two abilities revealed by Cleave were Explosive Blow and Sweep. They seemed useful, but not quite necessary for what he had planned. Based on the previous battle he didn’t need more damage, the addition of Cleave enough by itself to keep the rat horde at bay. He would be better served by diversifying his kit, as demonstrated by the utility of Dash and Power Jump.

The first two abilities he unlocked were Energy Sustenance and Focus for twenty Essence each. Energy Sustenance revealed Enhanced Vitality and Iron Stomach while Focus revealed Overcharge and Shaping. Out of those, Enhanced Vitality stood out, as it increased his body toughness and ability to heal, so he unlocked that for fifty Essence. Out of the rest of the abilities available he decided to go with two abilities in the bottom section in tier 3, Ability Increase and Essence Finder. Essence Finder was similar to Loot Finder, except it gave a bonus chance for monsters to drop additional Essence, not crystals or spheres.

Ability increase was the more interesting one. It allowed him to select another ability to have an increased effect, supercharging it. He was able to change it too, although only every eight days. Without hesitation he selected Loot Finder as the target. There was a reason Stella had hinted at him to get it. That one loot drop had given him a huge amount of Essence, and anything he could do to boost the number of drops he found would pay off dividends in the long run.

He had used up most of the Essence gained from the sphere, but it had been a bonus anyway. His original plan to farm stone rats still stood. But before that, he made sure to thoroughly investigate the top of the plateau and the rats he had killed below for more loot. He didn’t find any, but if he hadn’t checked he would have agonized over the possibly of missing something, the potential rewards haunting him.

After descending into the crevices it didn’t take long for the rats to make another appearance. He only had to slay a few of them to draw the horde out, their home base apparently nearby. But unlike last time, he was ready, and after aggroing the horde he made his way to the top of a plateau before taking a combat stance to prepare for the coming slaughter.

The rats climbed up slowly, only a few making it up before he dispatched them, then more coming in progressively larger waves until he was alone in a sea of rats, whipping his hammer around him to fend off the squeaking mass of claws and teeth. He was much calmer than when he last fought them, keeping his cool under pressure and calmly responding to the various attacks. He was also able to keep his guard up, always making sure to keep something in reserve in case of the unexpected.

Eventually the rat corpses started to pile up, and he swapped to a different plateau to avoid getting tangled up in the bodies. He thought he had seen at least one rat implode on death, but he was under too much pressure to check during the battle. He would have to loot afterwards.

As the battle dragged on he struggled to keep up a similar pace to the beginning. The rats just didn’t have an end, their small stone bodies constantly thrown at him in a vain attempt to break his defense. Thinking about what else he could do to help ease his burden, he decided to try out Elemental Blade. To his surprise there was a synergistic effect with Cleave, and instead of the water blade being centered around his hammer it spread out in an arc, making his attacks possess more lethal splash damage. Before he would usually only kill two or three rats with one attack, but now he was killing three or four, a noticeable upgrade.

The upgrade to his offensive strength allowed him to last for a while longer, but eventually he had to give in under the endless waves of rats, retreating back across the plateaus. The rats tried to follow, but they were unable to keep up with his mobility, their baritone squeaks fading into the distance.

Once he was far enough away Tormacc slowed down, finding a place to rest. It felt kind of wrong to run away, especially as he was leaving his loot behind, but he could, and would, go back for it later. In the meantime he had to distract himself from thinking about what the rats dropped. That turned out not to be that difficult, as loot wasn’t the only thing he gained from killing the rats. He also gained Essence, so instead of worrying about what the loot he would find when he went back to the battlefield he turned inwards to his Fate Wheel. He hadn’t kept track of how many rats he had killed, the individual kills blurring together in the chaos of battle. But upon checking his Fate Wheel he couldn’t help but be shocked. In only one battle his Essence had jumped up, going from below 100 to over 700. Feeling a satisfaction that only came from watching numbers go up all thoughts of loot were forgotten as he turned to the abilities on his Fate Wheel, contemplating what he would unlock next.