Surprisingly, the moment I moved to knock the inside of the building hummed into activity. The rough wooden door set in the center of the wall was practically blasted off its singular hinge only to reveal that Alan had been the source of the explosive reaction. Somewhat lamely, I lowered my hand as Alan's glowing eyes scrutinized me. He was building up steam to say something, but I gestured into his lab. "Can we talk in there, rather than out here where rain can get onto your equipment?"

Alan's enraptured expression flitted between horror and curiosity as he fought with his own mind. Thankfully, he had more than enough self control for everyone left on the planet... when it came to jeopardizing his research. Not much other than that, if I could recall. So, that was how I found myself pulled inside hard enough to rip a chunk of my off my chest and stumbling down the steep ramp that led down to the lab's floor. Blobby, who'd been following along behind me, was kind enough to latch on to my arm to keep me from faceplanting. Really, he's just as unpredictable as usual but now he's got magic juice in his veins.

Just in case. I fed mana into 's spell chain to repair my armor before turning to watch Alan securing his door. If I didn't trust him, I would have been worried by the number of latches he'd installed on the door... but it was comforting to know I could liquefy the walls and get out that way as needed.

"You have grown denser," the researcher said hoarsely. He started to circle, pausing for a moment to glance at Blobby before poking at the exposed joins of my armor. "The genetic matrix you had established has changed again. Tell me."

"I just capped my third Trait," I said. "Haven't assimilated it totally yet but I'm close. Fighting nonstop for two days will do that."

"That's not right," Alan said, glancing at a screen that was literally just a bunch of scrolling numbers with zero context. He stepped closer, placing his fingers on two of the columns and squinting. "The rate of acquisition and extrapolated density of mana required would still leave you short five point six percent even if you'd absorbed all the Pith of these creatures."

Mildly offended, I turned to defend myself. "I killed over a hundred elementals yesterday, Alan. Probably two dozen more just today, and all at higher levels. It's not impossible that--"

"You are messing with my variables," he said, still not looking at me. One hand was still tracing numbers and the other was wagging a finger in my direction. "I have been monitoring anything getting within a half mile of here and you have not exited that perimeter."

Alan shifted over to a strange contraption that looked to be an amalgamation of Materials from a number of creatures and technology from before the Fall. Man, he's really pushing the envelope with his MetierTech stuff... When he started to unscrew a port from the side and peel back a flower-bud looking arrangement of chitin plates I was stunned by what was housed within. A melon-sized hunk of a Metier Crystal! Instantly Blobby was on alert, but Alan seemed ready and gave him a prod with an electric prong stick he produced from... somewhere. Honestly I wasn't sure if he was revealing things to me or I was the one doing the revealing.

In the two seconds it took me to think that, the man was waving the Metier Crystal over my torso and frowning. When he returned the crystal to its housing and looked at the outputs on the number scrolling machine that frown deepened.

"You've dulled yourself."

"Alan, that doesn't explain anything," I said, somewhat concerned about the researcher's word choice.

"Your... For lack of a proper scientific term, your soul has hardened. What have you been doing, Ronan?"

I didn't quite know how to take that. There really were only two potential causes, well three but I wasn't counting Fievil since Alan had already studied the soulbound weapon and remained quiet about the results. Had it been harmful or concerning, he would have said something. Like he was doing. "Could be one of two things."

Alan didn't say or do anything different, but I could feel every iota of concentration he had to give was locked on what I was going to say. It was the unnerving part about interacting with Alan; one isn't normally subject to such a singular level of focus. Not wanting to prolong the tension I started rambling. "I unlocked my second tier Skill for and I've been forcefully overdrawing my mana in order to gather Dregs to push my level. Really, haven't had much chance to test the Skill since I've been fighting so many flying enemies but I've done now several intentional and unintentional sessions of the latter. Made some discoveries too I think you'd be interested in."

Alan didn't breathe for a moment. I was sure I'd killed the man, especially when he started to tip over forward perfectly stiff. Blobby rushed to catch him, but he instead bent and took the fall on his knees in what I would have called painful had he not completely ignored it. "Of course!"

His voice shook the small building as he exploded into a flurry of activity. Embers trailed his movement, clearly calling upon some aspect of his Traits to enhance himself. Almost with disdain, he once again manhandled my armor enough to rip a piece off my chest along with my shirt and replace it with a monitor of some kind. After hesitating for a moment, he stuck another onto Fievil and even two more on himself and Blobby. One of the devices on the tables whirled to life. Hair thin fibers strung together between two femurs of what looked to be human origins danced like an echocardiogram might, except the waves weren't a heartbeat. When I tilted my head I could see that the fibers were actually in clusters and formed a three dimensional tube. My brain had more than a little hard time parsing just what contraption Alan had created to measure god knows what. Thankfully he was more than willing to explain.

"As Ava would say, 'reckless'," Alan repeated in a pitch perfect impersonation of Daniela's mother, "but I would call it brilliance you have stumbled upon the link between the physical and manamorphic, Ronan! By forcing a link between yourself and the parallel dimension where the Metier Radiation exists you've been able to harness it into literal condensed evolution!

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"But there must be limitations. The boundaries of the Influence of Entities and Mana Shards isn't arbitrary and is in fact a factor of their Fibonacci growth metrics. Unrestrained, this would equal the opening of a gravity well within the mana layer of our reality."

"Uhhh I think I got some of that. It seems that after a certain point I ran out of... Let's call it 'juice' to overdraw for my mana pool and subsequently no Dregs." I hoped my explanation made some sense. Considering how much brighter Alan's eyes became I thought it was the case.

"Yes... So it would be like a gravity well on the fabric of the mana layer, but it would be of limited scope for a mortal entity. If the Entities are bowling balls then humans are marbles. But even in that, a non-zero gradient for mana would still cause a local effect. Yes... Your hardened Pathway would also lend you weight in this theoretical scenario." Alan was rubbing at his chin so vigorously that I thought he was going to erase the bit of stubble that was growing there.

"Wait, so my upgraded Skill made me absorb more Dreg?"

"In a sense," Alan said, staring at the weird bone-fiber contraption for several seconds from inches away. Curiously, the longer I looked the more I could see that three of the clusters that had activated were generally similar in their jagged shapes, while the fourth seemed to flick up and down irregularly. It felt somewhat of an obvious conclusion, but the devices had to be measuring... something from me and my companions pertaining to our Earth Attunements. It was really the only point of similarity between a gelatinous creature, a sapient hammer and a giant.

"Okay, can you explain?" I asked, urging Alan even as I was mesmerized by the strange device. Something about the jagged patterns was oddly soothing.

"Think of your soul as a giant amphora with six openings each leading to a basin that makes up your body," Alan started, pivoting to stare at me. "As you advance your levels, your amphora grows larger. This means it can fill more, but also apply more pressure out of these openings so they can reach the basins and nurture them. The flip side is that your amphora needs to be able to sustain this increase in pressure."

"Traits?" I asked, comparing Alan's explanation to what Gec had given long ago.

"Just so. To complicate this metaphor further, the openings all differ from subject to subject. While my study of children and unleveled revealed that the apertures are nothing more than a trickle, those with Implant-granted Skills have perfectly smooth flows."

"And that's bad?"

"Yes," Alan growled, picking at his hair in frustration. "For some very convoluted logic I have not been able to discern, more complex openings yield better flow rates. My efforts to glimpse within the soul have been impaired by my lack of openings. My amphora is sealed, so to speak, as someone born before the adaptations the Metier Crystals brought to this planet."

"Wait, so that's what you meant by 'dulled'?" I asked.

"Yes. If your openings were shapeless holes, they are now some simplified geometric form. I cannot view and twist your Pathways like the Metier Entities can, but I can see the 'splash' that is formed on your basin and record them." He gestured to the bone contraption.

This must be what Gec was talking about when it came to shackling myself. If I manage to upgrade all my skills, my Pathways will harden into something less... personal lets say. If we extrapolate, higher levels put greater pressure, hence the need for the Corporeal Thresholds of Traits and why more Traits make you stronger but also make you slower to level. If the vessel ruptures, your 'self' would just be the energy you contained which is no longer limited by openings as it is in the open turning you into an elemental. What happens to the fragments of your soul... maybe let's not find out.

"So, based on the reading I had recorded of your soulbonded weapon, your signature has changed," Alan said, drawing me from my thoughts.

"Wow, okay a lot to process," I said, trying to give my brain a moment to do just that.

"Exciting! Ingrid would have surely discovered a way to view the manasphere, but her grandson brought me the key I needed," Alan said, turning from me and growing distant as he scanned the contents of his laboratory. His voice turned into fervent mumbling. "Perhaps a Life Material to tether to organic structures and a Fire Material to output the data in a heatmap. Wait, there is a shortage then I need to go out and find the parts I need..."

"Uh, Alan," I asked, concerned by what I was hearing. "There's a hurricane on its way!"

"If I use a little force, I might be able to do some live harvesting. It could be important to make more of these devices, not to mention prototyping... yes, live specimen," Alan continued. I was being totally ignored.

"Al--" A spasmic series of messages flashed out of the corner of my vision. Had it been anyone else, or at any other time, I would have ignored them but I immediately accepted the call from Sarah through the comm-plant. "What happened?"

"We just got a ping!" Sarah said, pausing for a breath as she clearly focused on something else for a moment. "That sparky kid you brought says you need to go back to Ocala. They can see the hurricane!"

"Shit!" I shouted, hesitating for a second as I saw Alan rifling through his stuff for something. "Keep an eye on Alan, I think he's going to do something stupid!"

"What!?" Sarah called, clearly more than a little confused.

There wasn't a follow up response as I exited her Party and rushed to the spot I'd been calling home in the barracks. Just in the time I'd been talking to Alan I could see the storm had intensified. Such was the strength that I could see individual wisps of Air and Water mana swirling through the air like I would normally only be able to see in the Entities' Blessing of Magic. I grabbed the pieces of equipment I'd crafted for Billy and Danny and threw them into Blobby's bulk. The slime had already changed shape to better fit the saddle. Its bulk was much more than when we'd first arrived at the Outpost, so instead of taking a donut-like shape the slime stretched into an ellipse that moved much smoother than its previous form.

Blobby didn't wait for me to form an opening on the wall around the Outpost with and instead climbed directly up without much trouble. A band of slime secured me in place at the perfect moment before I fell off the saddle. I didn't have time to question the method in which the slime had managed to move vertically because Blobby zipped away much faster than I remembered it could go. A thin thread of mana flowed out of Fievil into Blobby and I knew my companions were conspiring for speed. I didn't complain, just focused on shaping into a slotted visor so that wind and rain combined with a speeding slime didn't leave me blind right before one of the biggest fights of my life.

Despite how much larger than life Galloway, the Death Crow, the Alligator Matriarch and the Spawning Sturgeon had all been, the prospect of fighting nature sent a shot of adrenaline right through me. Nervousness left me itchy, so I focused on forming my in the hopes of recovering the spent mana before the fight. The effort of riding and casting through the Hummingbird Charm took up almost all my thoughts. The remainder...

I didn't know if I was going to have enough time to reach my friends before the hurricane showed its ugly mug. All I could hope is that they were still alright through this.