Ebb And Flow

For the first time since her new life had started, Mia finally had somebody to talk to! The freedom was, well, liberating! "So what was your life like before, all this?" she asked over the mind link, having managed to keep it running for a little less then an hour. Though she definitely felt the reserve of energy within her that she took to be mana beginning to dwindle. She was getting dangerously close to running on empty. 

"I was going through a coming of age ceremony before I woke up here... I'm not quite sure what happened, but we were hunting a Laggilia... Then I woke up in the presence of something, I'm not even sure what it was but it felt like my heart would've stopped right there."

"Yeah, I get it, had to deal with the same guy I think... Anyway a coming of age ceremony? What were you like, a member of a tribe?"

"No, it is common practice for the men of my nation to hunt a fearsome beast at the age of eighteen, to prove their might and competence. I live in the city, or well, used to live in the city I suppose. But I did have some practice."

"That's certainly news to me, cultural research was a pretty big focus in one of my classes, but I've never heard of something like that. What nation do you live in again?"

"Hm? The largest one in the world, Gritania of course. Are you sure you were schooled properly?"

Mia stopped and stared at him for a moment. "Are you messing with me? Gritania isn't a nation."

He stopped and stared right back. "What are you talking about? Gritania conquered the whole world twice over a few hundred years ago."

"I think you're talking about Britain, and even then it wasn't like they conquered everything," She tilted her head in confusion.

"No, I mean Gritania, are you making some kind of joke here?" Willa asked thoroughly perplexed with Mia's confusion. 

She didn't reply for a bit, the gears turning in her head. She asked one final question. "What's your planet called?" 

"...Loam? What is the point of this?"

"Oh my god." Mia thought in a moment of clarity. "I don't think we're from the same worlds. That is a sobering confirmation of a whole lot of theories, wow, shame I can't go and prove any of them given I'm in a whole other world. I suppose the concept isn't that out there given we're in a world different from our own already." Where had they been walking to in the first place you may ask? Just around the forest doing things that Mia considered daily requirements. She had been giving Willa what was essentially a glorified tutorial. First and foremost she had wanted to get him to a class advancement. So she asked what exactly it was that his class was.

To her surprise, he seemed to have something that should actually work fairly well with hers, what with illusions and shadows being a classic combo, even if he had a much lower level and skill level then she did. But regardless, after cramming a bunch of rune language mumbo jumbo into his brain Mia had managed to get him two level ups. Which unfortunately, did not result in a class advancement. For some reason, his starting level cap had been higher then ten, unlike Mia. So for now, she had relented on trying to jam as much knowledge into his brain as possible.

As of this moment, she was leading Willa around the forest in search of something to eat, as neither he or she had eaten something for a fair amount of time now. Currently she was tracking down what she believed to be a... Elk... She hoped this one wasn't nearly as upsetting as the previous one she'd eaten. Both for her and Willa's sake.

She could tell she was getting closer and closer, the scent trail which she'd been using to track it down was growing less dull. The monster having recently passed over the grounds she walked. She started noticing hoof prints as well, making small indents in the dirt beneath her paws. Not long after, she saw it in the distance. Drinking slowly from a nearby stream.

Mia whipped around silently, held a paw up to her muzzle in a vague imitation of a shushing motion, then turned back around.With lazer focus, Mia silently dashed from one soft patch of earth to another, adeptly avoiding every source of noise on the way. She was fairly certain it didn't even matter if it noticed her, that even if it ran she could catch it in seconds. However practicing saved you in the long run more so then just brute forcing it, so practice Mia would. 

Eventually, she judged that she'd gotten close enough and undertook the attempt of killing it, leaping forward and flexing her claws out. In the short moment that she had from which she took off and when she landed, Mia adjusted her trajectory mid air very slightly, positioning her claws in a better area to kill it in one hit. Or well, paralyze it.

Ever since she'd classed up and gotten that "Low Natural Weapons Combat" skill, there was always a persistent nagging in her brain whenever she used her claws inefficiently. Within short order she'd realized that unlike her other skills, this skill didn't actively do something but rather, made HER better at doing her job. She could get behind that, pretty useful skill. Back to the present however, moving just right Mia raked her claws across the Elk monsters back, making contact with a very long bone. Which just so happened to be its spine.

Mia, in the most literal sense, rended the monsters spine. It collapsed without so much as a cry, laying on the ground twitching. She made sure to put it out of its misery within short order. Mia didn't want to think about what not having half your spine felt like, and frankly, she never intended to know it either. But she was fairly certain she wouldn't want to be alive to feel it. Or well, feel the lack of feeling it.

Mia lifted a paw up and waved it in the direction of Willa, and he came walking over. I mean... I should have enough mana to use another mind link for like, a minute. "Low, Link, Low, Translation." And... Cast. 

"Hey so do you care how your food tastes?" "Alright, dig in then." She gestured to the cadaver with a paw, performing an extravagant bow, or well, the best one she could in this body for Willa. Before walking over to the other side of the monster. Alright, this ones a little different from the last deer monster I killed... That one had some white spots across it, this one doesn't. So hopefully it doesn't try to flip my stomach inside out this time? ...

...

A few minutes later, and she didn't feel as if she was about to lose her brunch so Mia figured it was fine. Willa could've looked a little better, but she wasn't sure if that was just him having a lack of facial expressions or if he was actually grossed out by what he just did. It may very well be both.

"Alright, so given you can level up without fighting, that's what you're going to be doing." Mia stated as she opened up another mind link. "We're going back to learning now that we've eaten. Got it?" She told Willa as she dropped him off from her back. Mia had Willa climb aboard shortly after they'd finished eating, then dragged him back to one of her little hidey holes. Specifically the first one she'd made that was near the stream. It was her favorite, though she always felt a little unsafe in it given it had already been found by humans once in the past. 

"No need to treat me like a child," he told Mia as he shook his head a bit. "I'd like to not fight as well, no need to go rushing into battle. Though if what you've told me is true and that the "pull" as you call it is a daily occurrence, I might be screwed either way... At least until I... Class advance? 

"Right." She affirmed. "And the way to class advance is to level, so let's get to it shall we? First off, we already went over the power outputs and such. But I recall you saying you have a rather different set of runes compared to what I have?" 

"Yeah, you said you had "Low, Medium, and High." But I don't have those... But you did describe their shapes to me and I think I can tell what's supposed to be the equivalent for my magic now... I have two runes that are almost identical to what you said your Low and High looked like, Individual and Mass."

"If they're different I'm not sure how much I can help... I've been here longer but as I told you before I'm not really a master of all this magic stuff. I've barely got a grasp on it myself to be honest."

"Mmm... Yeah, but you've at least got some experience with how to go about learning this stuff. I just-" The pain that Mia had felt when her mana began running low returned once more. And she had to quickly shut the spell off. 

"Sorry, out of mana, we can talk more soon! Keep practicing!" Turn it off! 

And silence. Mia breathed in for a moment, then turned in the direction of the stream. Then noise. She instantly turned around every which way, eyes scouting her patch of the forest. Then more noise. Noise from within, nothing except her mind was making this noise... No, that's not right, it's not me... What... What is this?! Rghhhh...!"

She almost collapsed on the spot, but quickly refocused her mind, beginning to walk backwards. Walking... Walking in a forced direction? Wait what?! This isn't something else, this is the pull! But how? I thought it couldn't affect me any more what the hell? Wait, crap-if this is even affecting me what is it doing to Willa? 

Mia flipped her body around, now facing the direction in which her mind was being pulled. Only to see Willa sauntering off towards it with little resistance. Ah crap, I can't just let them go off and die but if I go in to try and stop them I'm only bringing myself in even closer to the inevitable! ...Oh to hell with it I can take care of myself! We're going in!