By the time Eik and Bin joined the search, Heath had already been found again. The man hadn't run away or tried to hide per se. Understandably, he had simply needed some time to himself to breathe and to digest what he had just experienced so they had eventually found him wandering back on his own after having spent a couple of hours walking the outskirts of Forest.

He had lost the last member of his family and he deserved to process that however he wanted to. Eik hadn't been particularly worried that Heath might do something drastic in his grief but he wanted to show his friend that they were family even if not by blood.

None of them wanted to be in Heath and Sonja's shared home right now, so Eik and Bin had gathered with Michael, Heath, and Olivia in her house. They put Heath to bed as soon as they walked in, the big guy looking like a zombie as he swayed on his feet. The ordeal had taken more out of him than any of them and he was in dire need of a rest.

Michael had also collapsed into a bed while Eik and Olivia kept Bin company. Olivia's B-rank endurance allowed her to go without much sleep and both Eik and Bin had gotten some rest recently.

The city was… in total chaos. As far as structural damage to buildings and such, there were actually barely any signs that anything had happened since, unlike monsters, the cultist had not committed any senseless acts of destruction. The loss of life, however, was rivaled only by Earth's initial transition into the Unified Mass ten years ago.

It would be a long road to get back to the relative stability of their little society. Besides the practical issues of losing that many people in a single day, there was also the matter of the tremendous decline of public morale. Eik was worried about the capability of the population of Forest to muster up the will to rebuild. Knowing that they were being targeted directly by a civilization magnitudes more powerful than their own would tie a knot in the stomachs of most people.

They needed reinforcements, not just from the alliance, but from other areas of Earth — a necessity Eik would take advantage of to justify finally making the trip to Copenhagen to search for his family, or what was left of it.

Going to Copenhagen would present its own perils, especially if the cult had managed to track down other potential settlements around the globe. According to intelligence gathered by the Nidafjeld Alliance, it was very likely that Earth's existence had been revealed by leaked information and not a spontaneous discovery. Eik still didn't know how newly introduced worlds were discovered by the powers of the Unified Mass but it didn't seem to be a simple process by any means.

Hopefully the cult hadn't expanded their search of Earth too much but even if they had, Eik couldn't see them having found Scandinavia already. It would probably be prudent to venture further south through the Americas sooner rather than later to bolster their forces. Perhaps they could persuade any Earthlings they met to come with them back to Forest and build a united front.

The truth was that there was plenty of space for more people now, and Forest was a pretty good base of operations even considering the most recent disaster. Selfishly, however, Eik was going home before anything else.

And upon consideration, he had gone to Andihar Dayarunar to request his presence during the trip to Copenhagen. The home world of the house of Dayarunar had not been among the targets of the cult this time. Being one of the older worlds, the rather large and powerful population was already more than aware of the cult and firmly against anything having to do with them.

Unfortunately, while Andihar expressed a deep and endless gratitude for Eik's part in saving his daughter twice, he simply couldn't justify that during the ongoing crisis. The invasion had been a different matter, being a clear an present threat.

This search could easily end up taking weeks, months, or even longer if Copenhagen had been abandoned in favor of a different base. In fact, there was no certainty at all that there even were survivors left on the continent. Although it seemed unlikely, it wasn't impossible to imagine that Forest literally held the last of the human race.

Andihar had offered him a beacon which, when activated would send out a powerful distress signal that would alert the house Dayarunar of his position so they could immediately drop in to assist.

But Eik would have to gather his own group to go, and since Forest needed all the protection it could get, now more than ever, Olivia couldn't afford to go either even though she desperately wanted to.

For now he had to wait though, because it would take some time to triangulate the target point for the fracture. Unless you were extremely skilled, opening a portal to an unknown place apparently wasn't as simple as just looking at a map to imagining it in your head. It required calculations that would take a couple of hours for someone at Mikla's level.

"Alright, let's get to it then, shall we?" he said and pulled out his wooden plaque, Bin sitting in his lap and sipping on a cup of juice. Olivia had already done her levels so she came to watch his.

[Acquired Movement Boost — Lv. 31]

[Acquired Movement Boost — Lv. 32]

You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story.

[Acquired Movement Boost — Lv. 33]

[Acquired Movement Boost — Lv. 34]

"Not bad at all," Olivia said as the text faded, replaced by new notifications.

[Acquired Living Manifestation — Lv. 20]

[Acquired Living Manifestation — Lv. 21]

[Acquired Living Manifestation — Lv. 2…]

[Acquired Living Manifestation — Lv. 29]

[Acquired Living Manifestation — Lv. 30]

Ten levels was crazy! But then again, he had been using it as much as he possibly could both during the Championship trial and in the ensuing battle against Moon Shall Swallow. In fact, one was still hanging out inside the system of some random Gohkamorian.

Congrats to that guy for still being alive. He must have survived the raid by the cult.

Reports from headquarters were coming in with high frequency and with each one it was becoming clearer that the attack on the alliance center of operations had been far more involved than what had initially been assumed.

{Skill evolution available. Skill available for evolution — (Unique) Living Manifestation]

[Choose one]

[Living Manifestation — Eyes of the Beast]

[Living Manifestation — Fusion]

"Again, it only gives me two options. It happened before as well."

Olivia read along over his shoulder. "That's actually kind of common. We think it's because, as you specialize, the system, or whatever it is that offers our powers to us, seeks to adapt to that narrowed specialization. Although I guess we can just ask the alliance folk now. Surely they have something more figured out about this than we do."

"Huh," he said.

"Do you know anything about any of them?"

"Not really," he admitted. "Since it's an ability that's derived from Profound Toxin, it seems to have the unique tag as well so there isn't really even any reason to check the records. I already know that nobody on Earth has gotten these specific options before. I can take a guess though."

"Eyes of the Beast seems pretty obvious, doesn't it?" she said. "You get to look through their eyes. Could be a really nice ability for scouting operations, information gathering, and all that kind of stuff. This might be able to be of some help when looking for other settlements as well. Fusion is a bit more…"

"I think I know exactly what that is, actually."

"Oh yeah?"

"I told you about the weird, other world I sometimes go to, right?"

"Yeah."

"Well, I was there again when Molanda put me to sleep. I fought a mountain of toxic beasts and before I knew it they were mashing together into a huge serpent. Maybe the other world was trying to give me some kind of sign?" he wondered.

"That sounds like a bit of a stretch, Eik, I'll be honest," she said with a frown.

"You think so too, huh? I kind of realized it the moment I said it."

"But what you're describing doesn't sound too far fetched in and of itself though. It's the best thing I can think of at least."

"I've been hoping for a way to upgrade the tier of the Living Manifestations. Maybe this is it."

"Tier?"

"Yeah, they come in different tiers in the other world. Small snakes, bigger snakes, drakes, wyverns, and even bigger snakes, although I think the really big snake was something else. Pretty cool, right?"

"And you kill these things in there?"

"Yep."

"And what do you get out of that? Why not just leave?"

"I'm beginning to think that I have to prove myself in there every time I want to evolve."

"Seriously?"

"I'm not really sure. I think I also gain some extra control over the toxin when I kill them. Their essence sort of flow into me."

"So why aren't you in there all the time?" she asked.

Eik tilted his head. "I noticed today that it only works for the first few I kill in there. Maybe? I'm really kinda fumbling through this as I go."

"Well, keep it up. So you're going with the Fusion trait then?"

"Yeah, I need combat power more than anything else right now. The Moon Shall Swallow cult proved that without a doubt."

"Eik, you can't take all of it on your shoulders alone."

"I know, I know, but that doesn't change the fact that we're simply not powerful enough to keep up yet. That has to change, preferably quickly."

She pulled a face but conceded the point. "You're not wrong."

With the flick of a finger, he chose Fusion.

[Evolved skill Living Manifestation. Skill acquired trait Fusion]

He threw two little guys out onto the floor. Immediately one was snatched up by Bin who was suddenly overcome with childlike curiosity. Proving stronger than her, the blue snake squeezed itself out of her grip with ease, but she simply grabbed the other one.

It wiggled in her hand but Eik could feel that there was no real hostility in the manifestations. Somehow he felt one hundred percent certain that they would never harm or inflict any toxin on her.

Even if they were as cheeky as Profound Toxin tended to be, they were still an extension of his will and in his mind there was a single notion that took the front seat when it came to little Bin. Protection.

"Alright, you," Eik said and pointed at the one currently stuck in her grasp. It stopped wiggling to look at him. "You can be Bin's teddy for now." The Living Manifestation drooped like a disappointed puppy as the little girl hugged in tightly against her cheek.

Eik sent out another one and, on his order, they made contact and merged into a single, slightly bigger version of the small ones. It regarded him with eyes that were still nothing but small grooves in its forehead.

"Are you stronger too?"

It nodded and flexed its tail to show its strength.

"Let's try with more of them," he said and Bin clapped eagerly as he let out as many of the little buggers as he could — twenty six additional troops, also making it clear that a fused Living Manifestation counted as the number of manifestations of which it was made up.

A fusion of eleven total individuals turned out to be the limit for now, creating a serpent whose features weren't quite as apparent as those of the third tier drake, but more so than the tier two beast.

That meant he could make two fully powered manifestations. One of them sprouted legs to resemble a drake only for Bin to clamber onto its back for a ride.

He'd have to experiment much more with this ability later.

[Acquired (Unique) Profound Toxin — Lv. 76]

[Acquired (Unique) Profound Toxin — Lv. 77]

[Acquired (Unique) Profound Toxin — Lv. 78]

[Acquired (Unique) Profound Toxin — Lv. 79]

No evolution for Profound Toxin this time. But then again, he had just gotten Visage of Death after all. Eik was about to put away the wooden plaque when Olivia's hand on his arm stopped him.

"There's more, Eik."

[Reached threshold: Evolution to ??? possible]

[Evolve?]

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