Chapter 30-

Krisyn didn't say anything for a whole minute and it felt like that one minute lasted an hour. But then she spoke.

"Very well. What's your first question?" She said without looking at me.

"Ok. First, what's with the boar that attacked me in the past? It had some weird black thing on its tusks and how did that have anything to do with you?" I asked.

"If you were trapped inside a prison for who knows how long, wouldn't you try breaking out?" She replied. "With my power weakening every year that I was stuck in that wretched place, I couldn't waste any of it trying to lure fools to free me. Anyone I attempted to lure couldn't hear my voice. But for the ones that did manage to hear my voice, they simply thought that I was a devil and got a powerful priest to permanently block me out from their heads."

"Normally just mentioning my name to them would've made them obey, but it seems that my name was wiped out from history and nobody knows who I am?" Krisyn said as she picked up a nearby stick and started poking at the campfire.

"And the boar?" I asked. "How did you have anything to do with the boar that gave me your mark?"

Krisyn then pulled the stick out of the fire and stared at the small ember at the end of it.

"Since asking others to come and free me didn't seem to work, one day I gathered some of my mana and created a spell to curse a nearby animal. The spell was made to make the creature go berserk and let the boar place my mark on whoever it met. This would give them a reason to come to me, since it gave them a time limit and I made the mark unremovable.”

“It also lets you speak to me inside my head, right? But why do I only hear you once a week?” I asked.

“With my powers weakening, I couldn’t hold the telepathic link for any longer than a few minutes a month." She replied. "Now ask your next question."

"Alright. So what exactly did you do to me and why do I look younger? Does this have anything to do with consuming your blood?" I asked.

Krisyn then glanced at me up and down, then went back to poking the flames with the stick.

"I don't know?" She replied.

"What do you mean that you don't know?! I was a full grown adult when I freed you!" I shouted. "Other than my hair and muscle mass, I look the same as when I arrived here! You even said it yourself, that I've now became a Chosen!"

"It's true that you became a Chosen, but there's so many things about this that I don't know."

"Like what?" I asked.

Then Krisyn looked at me and calmly answered.

"Travelers can't become Chosen." She said.

She then reached towards the flames and grabbed two chunks of the roasted boar meat, then immediately started chomping on them. She didn't even look back at me while I was sitting there, confused.

"What do you mean by that? You were the one that turned me into one and clearly said that I'm now a Chosen. Also, what the hell is even a Chosen?" I asked.

Krisyn started saying something, but I couldn't understand since her mouth was full.

“Oh for the love of... please don’t talk with your mouth full.”

Krisyn then swallowed the food that was in her mouth and held a hand out towards me.

“Water.” She asked.

I then took out my water pouch from my inventory and handed it to her. She took a long swig from it before she spoke again.

"To explain what a Chosen is, I need to explain the difference between Travelers and the people of this world. The people of this world are different from your world. While you Travelers get abilities or items the moment you enter this world, the people of this world don't have that benefit. Even Though the ability, skill, or item is a lesser version compared to the other things in this world, it's still better than what the people of this world could do."

"While Travelers start off with abilities or items, the people of this world have to work hard to acquire their own abilities or items. It's the same as having a favorite child between two babies and the angels are like the parents that spoil only one of them. While one side gets to start off with gifts for free, the other needs to spend years in schools, academies, or training with an experienced instructor in order to be on the same level as the Travelers. But giving gifts to Travelers usually ends in three ways."

"While some Travelers go out to explore the world, do good deeds, and make a name for themselves. Some choose to use their gifts to help them live normal lives, help around the city or town that they live in, and sometimes not even use their gifts at all. But there are some that get arrogant, cocky, and think highly of themselves since they're slightly stronger than average people of this world. So it depends on the individual that acquires the gift and up to the angels if they should let them keep the gift or immediately remove it from them."

"So where does the Chosen fit in all of this?" I asked.

"While the humans from your world get gifts, the people in this world have their own version of that. In your world you only have one god that sometimes watches over you and can't intervene all the time. But in this world, we gods have our own followers that we watch over and step in only on special occasions. We also pick special individuals to become our champions and this is what Chosens are."

"A Chosen is what the gods call an individual that we bestow our gifts and send out to deal with certain things. It's almost like those angels who give Travelers their gifts or items before they get sent into this world. Chosen acts like the Holy Knights for the gods, but each god could only have one Chosen and they can't do anything to the other god's Chosen. They're close to each god because they formed a bloodpact with them and gained a percent of their power."

"That sounds like a very big deal. But why can't Travelers become Chosen? Is it something about us already having gifts?" I asked.

"That's not it." She replied. "It's because us gods have a list of laws and restrictions that we must follow. One of them is 'to never make a Traveler into a Chosen'. We don’t know why, but that’s just what we were told?”

Hearing this left me confused.

“Told? Weren’t the gods the one that made the rule?” I asked.

“We weren't the ones that made the rules.” She replied. “They were there the moment we were created and brought into this world.”

“If the gods didn't create the rules, then who did?" I asked.

"... Next question." Krisyn said annoyed.

"What, why?" I asked

Then one of Krisyn's eyebrows twitched and she turned to look at me.

"Next question!" She shouted.

Hearing her shout startled me and I raised my hands since I thought she would hit me.

"Fine! So what, does this mean that the other gods would kill me or come after me since I'm a Traveler?"

"No." She replied. "I lost my position, so you wouldn't even be considered a Chosen. By the looks of it, you're not fully a Chosen and I believe that it's because of my weakened state. So while the changes are minor, you still lost your humanity and stepped into something above yourself."

I didn't know what she meant by that and I wondered if becoming a Chosen might bring trouble in the near future.

"What do you mean that I'm not human anymore? I still look the same and I don't think a lot of things have changed about me. I do feel stronger and I look like my younger self, but I don't think I stopped being human?" I said to her while grabbing one of the roasted boar.

Krisyn then sighed at my response and grabbed another piece of boar.

"You've met an elf before, right?" She asked.

"Yeah? So what does that have to do with anything?" I asked.

"Other than the ears, they look so much like a human and could be mistaken as one if you cover their ears." She replied. "They look like humans, but their bodies are different and they live longer than humans. The same could be said about you. You only look human and if you tried resting your blood, you would find out that you no longer share your people's cells and that your anatomy has been completely changed. That is what would naturally happen when you take my blood."

Despite wanting to argue with her, I knew that what she was saying was true. Logically, having the blood of a god enter your body and completely altering it would mean that you wouldn't have any human cells anymore. I started feeling a little bit confused and sad after hearing this. But I wondered why she even bothered making me into a Chosen.

"If turning a Traveler into a Chosen is against your rules, then why did you turn me into one?” I asked. “Couldn’t you have just removed your mark and fixed me up like what you did with my fox?”

“Your condition was different compared to your fox. Your body was in a critical state from the injuries that you sustained from the guardian and letting my mark spread throughout your body.” She replied. “Things might’ve turned out differently if you were stronger and didn’t take so long to get to me. Your pet here was just injured, but your body was past the point of recovery. There are also the terms of the contract.”

“Contract? What contract?” I asked.

“The one that you made me agree to, remember?” She replied. “By forcing a god to use their true name in a deal, one could create a contract that forces them to keep their word on any agreement and they can’t do anything to break or get out of it. Since I’d rather be free from that place than wait until I find another person to free me, I didn’t have any other options. Since two of the things that I agreed to were to heal you and to not go back on my words, I couldn’t let you die and was forced to do something that’ll guarantee a full recovery. So I had to turn you into a Chosen.”

“But wasn’t one of the things I said was to not harm me?” I asked. “When I slammed you into the wall, you sent me flying across the room and you even kicked my leg. Wasn’t that considered breaking the contract?”

“Only if I didn’t get punished for those.” She replied.

“What do you mean by that?”

She then lifted her dress slightly to show her leg and I could see a slight bruise on her shin.

“Whatever wound I give you, I receive the same wound on myself.” She explained. “So if I were to undress, you would see a few bruises on my chest and back that are in the process of healing.”

She explained this while tugging the cloth on her shoulder. Embarrassed at the thought, naturally my face heated up.

“I don’t need you to show it. I believe you.” I said while averting my eyes.

“It’s not like I’ll show you my naked body, so don’t let the thought get to your head. This vessel doesn’t even have reproductive organs, so it’s not like you’ll be fortunate to even see anything.”

“I really didn’t need to know that!” I shouted.

It’s not like I was interested in it and wasn’t interested since her body looked like a thirteen year old, but I was curious when she called her body a vessel. But I didn’t want to ask about it and moved on to my next question.

"Alright, time for the main one I wanna ask." I said as I crossed my arms.

"And what would that be?" She asked.

"Who the hell are you?" I said without breaking eye contact. "Others called you The Banished One, you were placed in the bottom of a deadly dungeon, you said that you're a god, and you were the one responsible for almost all of my problems. So I wanna hear it from you.”

Krisyn then tossed the chunks of meat aside and Lux didn’t hesitate to immediately eat them off the ground.

“I no longer hold my old status as a god, so I don’t have anything else except my true name, Krisyniellankal.” She explained. “Due to getting banished, I’m magically bound to never say the names of my former title. But there is one thing that my people used to call me that I could freely say.”

Then the flames of the campfire turned black and it gave a strange glow to the surrounding area.

“They gave me the nickname, Princess of the Black Flame.” She said just before the flames went back to normal. “But other than that, I cannot tell you more and I don’t wanna go through the details of why I was banished.”

“So what now?” I asked. “What are you going to do and what should I be expecting?”

Krisyn then got up and dusted the dirt off of her dress.

“I’m going to go back to rest and regain some of my mana. Then by tomorrow I’ll go back to my realm and pretend that all of this was just a bad dream.” She said before walking back to the tent.

“But what about me? Is there gonna be anything different now that I’m a Chosen?” I asked.

“Listen... I wanna make something clear here. I really hate all humans and I really hate the fact that I had to turn a Traveler into a Chosen. I was really scraping the bottom of the barrel there and I’d rather just get back to my realm. Do whatever, you’re not my problem.” She said before closing the tent.

I was left there by the campfire confused and almost relieved. But the only thing that left my mouth was one word.

“... damn?”

*****

I didn’t sleep that night since I didn't feel tired. It probably had something to do with my new body and that I just woke up after Krisyn altered my body. So for the whole night I kept myself busy with checking out my new stats and skills. Using the skills felt different from using runic magic and they didn't require much practice to use them.

When I used the Scale Hands skill, I just focused on the thought of scales covering my hands and it happened immediately. Both of my hands turned black and the texture of the skin had a slight scale pattern on them. It didn't hurt at all when they changed, but my hands felt like they both had some type of thin skin tight leather gloves on them. The description on the skill wasn't kidding, since I tried poking a sharp stick against them and couldn't even pierce them.

For the Summon Skeleton skill, I walked over to where I left the remains of the giant boar and tried using the skill on it. I tried verbal commands, touching the remains and using the skill, and I even tried slapping it. But no matter what I did, nothing seemed to work and the corpse didn't move. So after that I decided to forget about it and walked back to the camp.

While I was walking back to the camp, I wanted to try out my new MP level and see what effects it had on my runic magic. So I picked up a small rock and pulled out the remains of my old dagger from my inventory. The dagger still had it's handle and guard, but most of the blade was gone. There was only a small amount of the blade left, but it was long enough to help me carve the runic symbol of fire on it.

I then looked over at an old tree in the distance and decided to test it out on that.

"Alright, here we go." I said as I started channeling my mana into the stone.

As I channeled my mana into the stone and got ready to throw it, something happened that caught me off guard. The stone immediately exploded in my hand and it slightly burnt the skin on the palm of my hand.

"Ahhh! Son of a b*tch!" I shouted as I shook my hand. "What the hell was that?!"

There were no remains of the rock and I saw that the palm of my hand turned red from the explosion. It stung when I wiggled my fingers and clenched my hand a few times, but I was glad that I didn't lose my hand.

"Ok, I'm never doing that again." I said as I poured some water on my hand.

I then opened up my menu and checked my HP.

[HP: 8,350/8,309]

"It didn't look like I lost much, but I should probably avoid explosions from now on?" I said as I walked back to camp.

When I arrived back at camp I didn't feel tired yet, so I decided to practice my martial arts and see how my new stats would affect it. But there was also another reason why I wanted to practice my martial arts. Medis’s Terra-Breaker Style that Sona taught me had two parts about it. The first was that it is used to train to break boulders, but the second thing was something that I couldn't do since I had the bracelet that drained my mana.

The second thing about it involves using mana from the earth to improve your strength and make each attack more deadly. Since I had the bracelet that Tashin gave me, I couldn't use the earth magic with it and Sona was only able to teach me the martial art techniques. Back when Q broke the bracelet, I was able to use my mana again. But when I tried to use earth magic, I found out that I couldn't use it with my low mana level and I was forced to go through the dungeon without it.

But now that I have more MP, I believe that I could now use some of the earth magic that goes with the martial arts.

"Alright, hope this doesn't blow up in my face." I said as I got ready. "Now let's see if I could remember what Sona taught me about using earth magic?"

The trick on how to use earth magic is to connect yourself to the earth beneath your feet. Kind of like how druids could connect themselves to the surrounding plants, earth magic could be done in the same way.

So once I took off my shoes and planted my feet into the ground, I then focused on building the connection to the ground under me. I did this by closing my eyes and visualizing the mana from my body going into the earth under me. It took some time building a connection, but after a while something flowed from the ground and into my body. Once this happened, a notification popped up in front of me.

[You have gained the ability of Lvl.1 Earth Magic.]

[Channeling Earth Mana while using Medis’s Terra-Breaker Style now gives you 5% damage reduction and +5 Strength]

"Huh? Well that was surprisingly easy?" I said as I felt the flow of earth mana throughout my body.

I was surprised with the bonus that using earth magic had with the martial art. But now that I had it active, I decided to test it out with some punches and kicks. Using earth mana didn't have much of an effect with my attacks, but it did feel a bit easier performing each of the various techniques. But I was more amazed with the fact that using earth mana didn't use up any MP and I could use it as much as I could.

But after a while of practice, I took a short break and immediately felt the earth mana fade away when I sat down.

"Guess I really could only use it as long as I'm using martial arts?" I said as I got up and started doing some stretches.

I then noticed that the sun was coming up and that I spent the entire night testing out my new skills. So I decided to finish up my stretches and start getting ready to leave. Since I already had most of my stuff in my inventory, I just needed to pack up the remaining cooked boar and kick dirt over the fire. But as I approached the tent, I noticed that I didn't hear anything from inside the tent and got close to tap the side of the tent.

"Krisyn, you there?" I asked.

Lux had just woken up and walked over to sniff the front of the tent, then looked up at me and yawned. So taking my chances, I decided to open the front of the tent and look inside.

"Hey, are you still asleep?" I asked.

But when I looked inside, I saw that the tent was empty.

"Huh… guess she left?" I said as I closed the tent. "Well she did say that she'd leave by tomorrow morning?"

But the more I thought about it, this might've been the best outcome.

'I think it's best that she left?' I thought to myself. 'She gets to leave and I continue on with my life. I even get to keep these skills and have a second chance at life… again.'

Now with all of my problems dealt with and knowing that Krisyn is bound by some type of contract to never harm me or innocent lives, I then stored my tent in my inventory and got ready to leave this place.

I looked back at the mountain and thought about how long I've been inside the dungeon.

'Back at the chamber, Krisyn said something about taking eighteen years to get to her.' I thought to myself. 'Guess this makes me thirty-seven years old, huh?'

I then called Lux over and we both started our walk back towards the town, Tusk.