Go easy on me

Aldred remained silent for a few moments before he finally answered Failure's question.

"No. He caught a glimpse of the blue blood, but I don't think he associates it with you."

Failure nodded.

"That's good. So, let me hear it. How did he do?"

"He stepped up after just over a day. He even got Wa'rak to go with him and they cleared the cave in under five minutes. He must have upgraded his innate ability or unlocked something else as he was much stronger than before."

Their plan had worked. The whole situation was a set-up from the start. The abominations attacking The Dome may have been real, but the moon beasts defending it were all fake, puppets controlled by Failure.

Their plan was simple, see how Kai and the other humans would react to the abominations taking over the tunnel.

In their eyes, Kai has gone above and beyond their expectations. They only wanted him to man up and complain to one of them about what they were doing, they absolutely did not believe that he would sort out the situation himself.

All the other humans were disqualified based on the fact they did nothing.

"We may have underestimated him."

Aldred nodded in agreeance.

"His progress is steady. They should be happy enough with it and we won't have to resort to plan B."

Failure sighed solemnly.

"Plan B... We won't know until the time comes. Anything can change with the snap of a finger. All we can do is hope the click is in our favour."

After a few moments of silence, Aldred spoke up again.

"How much rest have you gotten in the last few days?"

Failure smiled weakly.

"A few hours, nowhere near enough to replenish my Mana. Especially now that there's the other issue to deal with."

Aldred grunted and closed his eyes, trying to fall asleep beside the fire.

"Get some rest. I'm sure you'll need it."

Failure nodded.

"Got it."

Listening to the sound of Failure walking away, Aldred sighed and thought about... Everything.

It was hard.

Scheming, fighting, acting, everything was tedious. But it was also essential, for their wellbeing, and for the Catalyst's.

The plan seemed to be a success for now, and barely anyone knew about it.

The only ones who knew were Aldred, Failure...

... And the one who was watching from the shadows.

********

Damn, they got to work quick.

Arriving back in The Dome, Kai was happy that he didn't have to make the journey through the corpse-infested tunnel.

Aldred must have cleaned it up on the way back, because all the bodies were gone.

Now... What to do...

Kai was honestly stumped for what he could do. He was going to go to sleep at some point soon, obviously, but there had to be something else he could do.

There wouldn't be any ambushes for the time being as they were postponed indefinitely after the tunnel was taken over, and it's not like he could just go hang out with Sofia or Noelle.

Maybe John...

Wa'rak was probably resting as well after their joint attack, so Kai would leave him alone.

Inwardly sighing, Kai made his way over to the beautiful, pink tree which he had buried Ethania's diary under so he could lie down in its shade and get some sleep.

"Awhhh"

Yawning as he woke up, Kai opened his status and saw that only seven hours had passed since he fell asleep.

Only? Seven hours is probably a lot in a situation like this.

Sitting up off of the ground, Kai leaned back against the tree and decided to check another part of his status.

Quest: Fight for the Forest

Allied: Creatures below the trees

Current effort: 7%

Seven percent?

Kai was gobsmacked. A whole seven percent of the war efforts came from him. Was reclaiming the tunnel really that important?

Actually, maybe some came from the fact he killed the Depth Dweller and the Veiled of the Dark Side. Both were evolved abomination, so they must have been worth some bonus points.

But seven percent was no small number. Nearly a tenth of the war effort had come from Kai. Of course, the was was not over and that percentage could very well go down in the coming days, but it could also go up.

Anyways...

Kai groaned at what he was about to attempt. This could either end up with him gaining an incredible new asset to him, or absolutely useless and a waste of time.

The idea was a simple one in theory, yet Kai knew more than enough by now that nothing was as simple as it seemed in this place. Just the fact he had manipulated his soul into changing a single stat accounted for that much.

What he was about to attempt was another thing to do with souls, though it was souls other than his he would be using.

Bringing his furry familiar out of shadow, Kai smiled softly as the pitch-black wolf emerged from his shadow, a much lighter shade of black.

A theory Kai developed when working on changing his claws was that he wasn't doing it properly. While majority of it was probably due to the fact he was an absolute novice at everything he's attempted so far, there was something else as well.

Kai didn't understand how to be a wolf.

It may sound stupid to say out loud, but it was true.

Sure he may have been trained by wolves and even fought side by side with wolves, but that doesn't mean he understood them.

For example, what Wa'rak said about raw power being best yet he also said percision with your claws is key. Two fairly contrasting points, yet the arrogant wolf believed they were two sides of the same coin.

Meaning, wolfs saw things differently. So if there was a way to fully comprehend the essence of being a wolf...

It would be through their soul.

Activating the telepathic link, Kai patted Umbra on the head as he properly spoke to her for the first time in a while.

"Hey girl, how are you?"

Umbra... purred... happily.

"Me is good. Me enjoyed training with the elders. They teach me lots"

Kai smiled again.

"That's great to hear."

Kai was happy that Umbra didn't seem to be affected by the horror that was dwelling at the bottom of the lake, he knew he certainly was. There was absolutely no way he was going to go anywhere near a body of water for the time being unless he could either stand in it or clearly see the bottom.

"Okay then, how about we do some training?"

Umbra nodded innocently.

"Training is good. Me like training."

Ignoring the fact that his familair might be addicted to training, which isn't necessarily a bad thing, Kai told Umbra the game plan.

"I want you to go over to that tree, then attack me. But, hold back a little, your physical stats are much higher than mine."

"Okay!"

Now that Kai had over ten times the amount of Mana he previously had, the three Mana per minute cost to uphold the telepathic link was basically non-existent. Maybe throwing all your stat points into one stat isn't such a bad choice after all.

Unless that stat is Luck.

Getting into position, Kai summoned Life Eater just for the Strength bonus and the fact it could maybe help with his Soul Sight since it might be to do with Mana. Watching the wolf get into position, Kai thought to himself:

How bad can this be?

Extremely.

Umbra dashed towards Kai, no hesitation in his furry familiar's face. It's almost as if she was excited to hurt him.

Panicking slightly at the fact Umbra might be a sadist, Kai activated Soul Sight and tried to see if he could spot anything that could help him do what he wants to do.

Umbra's soul was a light violet. It had a slight glow to it and it seemed to be radiating loyalty and excitement.

Shit!

Lifting the crimson blade to block Umbra's attack, Kai felt his bones creak under the weight of the blow.

It may have been cute that Umbra thought so highly of her master to go all out on him, but for Kai it was anything but.

After blocking, Kai dashed to the side and focused deeply on Umbra's soul. The violet orb seemed to throb with excitement with every opportunity she got to attack her master.

Minutes passed and Kai was slowly losing HP from blocking every one of Umbra's attacks. While it was a miracle he could block them in the first place, the reverberations which were sent through his body was slowly whittling him down.

But it was working.

Almost imperceptible happenings were going on in Umbra's soul. Her very essence laid bare before Kai's eyes, he was peering into what she truly was.

Is... this what the description meant when the skill could be considered perverted?

Raising his blade to block another one of his familiar's attacks, Kai braced himself, only for him to inwardly curse.

Shi-

Umbra changed her attack at the last moment, going low instead of high. Kai was hit right in stomach and sent skidding backwards along the ground.

At least Umbra held back at the actual hit, otherwise Kai would have been hurt a lot worse. Umbra holding back combined with the small amount of protection the Tunic of Rememberance offered meant Kai only lost a few health points.

Umbra quickly made her way over to where Kai was lying, the wolf was nervous that she accidently hurt her master. It's only once she was right beside him that she noticed something was off, and it wasn't that he was injured.

Kai was grinning.

Master's a masochist!

Unaware of Umbra's thoughts, Kai continued to grin. He was excited, no, extremely excited.

The first breakthrough in Soul Sight had occurred.

While he started this training as a way to better become a wolf, what he just caught a glimpse of was much more valuable than that.

No offence to Umbra, of course.

I knew she was going to attack low before she even did.

What Kai caught a glimpse of in the moment before his familiar's attack was a change in her soul. You would never be able to spot it if you didn't know where to look, Kai just got extremely lucky and happened to look at the right place at the right time.

Maybe upgrading Luck wasn't such a bad choice after all.

Deep in Umbra's soul was a tell. Most gamblers had a tell, a way to see if they were happy or sad with their hand. Masters often knew how to exploit these visible tells to the best of their advantage.

But what if tells weren't only externally visible?

Kai felt that Umbra was going to switch up her attack at the same time the wolf decided it, just he wasn't quick enough to react to it.

But he still knew, he could tell what was about to happen before it happened by looking at the attackers soul.

If he could learn how to use this properly...

Hah... I don't even need the Seer class to have future sight.