-Radiant-

As we walked through the tunnels of level one, slowly and almost blindly trying to follow whichever pathways felt colder, we encountered quite a few more Vermilligators. Instead of fighting them myself, Lucky displayed his Skills and capabilities as a swordsman. It wasn't anything super impressive, since he was only 16, but he showed promise and actual growth during his encounters. I had to heal him quite a few times, but he had enough skill to avoid anything I would've had problems healing without spending too much mana.

Of course, if I was willing to use time magic, wound reversal would be pretty much the same mana cost no matter what kind of wound. However, with this being recorded, and the proctor giving me strange readings from my [Space-Time Sense], I didn't want to take the chance of exposing such a critical life saving power, for fear that it might get noticed and leaked.

None of my previous selves that had gone through this time had been able to pinpoint what it was that led us to ruin, so I was trying to be cautious and limit my use of time related magic. I could use it if I fired off a divination and found that I wasn't being watched, but since I was being recorded by the proctor, that was a pointless endeavor.

Similarly, I could feel the urge to swipe a few things off of the proctor for myself, but not only was everything being recorded, but the strange sensations I was getting from him via my [Space-Time Sense] was deterring me from doing anything blatantly space related or time related.

My desire to steal things was really getting squashed recently, and I could feel a rising tension build up in the back of my mind, and it was really distracting. However, being recorded helped me stomp down on these feelings, at least for now. After I get out of the Dungeon I need to go to the black market and see if there's any job to steal or something. I might as well get paid to vent my desire to steal, right?

I was feeling a bit better while having these thoughts, when we came to a short passage with clearly colder temperatures, and I could feel a faint breeze as the warm and cold air shifted around me.

Lucky put his hand in the water to check if it was also cold and said, "Yup, this is definitely the way. I'll explain what we'll find, now that we're close."

We both started walking down the short passage, and I said, "Sounds good to me."

Shaking off his wet hand, Lucky said, "First off there are the Water Skaters. They walk on the water with their thin legs and try to fire water projectiles at you while staying at mid range. They're not very fast, but they can be really tricky to handle.

"Second are the Water Elementals. There isn't anything too complicated about them, they're just floating balls of water with ice exteriors. As long as you can break their cores at their center there won't be any problem. The tricky part about them is their regenerating defensive outer layer of ice, however as long as you can continue to target the same spot that's no big deal. Otherwise they're just slow melee tanks that'll try to crush you with their weight if you get knocked over."

Our steps echoed along with us as we walked and talked, "Sounds simple enough, but why haven't we encountered either of them yet?"

"That would be because the place they're at is different from the rest of the level. You see they live in an ice chamber with ice platforms that float on the water and birth the Water Elementals."

"I guess that explains the Water Elementals, but what about the Water Skaters?"

"They also spawn in these chambers, and they rarely venture out of them because there's less ground and more room for them to maneuver in the chambers. So they can be found outside of the chambers, but it's fairly rare."

"What about the Vermilligators?"

"Oh, the Vermilligators don't like the cold water, so they won't be appearing in the ice chambers."

"Sounds good, so all we need to worry about is the Water Skaters and Water Elementals then."

Lucky nodded, "That's right."

"And how exactly are we going to go about fighting them? I've refrained from doing much attacking so far, but I won't hold myself back during a fight with new enemies."

"That's alright, I think I've shown enough of my abilities to pass the test. So all we need to do now is complete the task and find the exit." Lucky rubbed his chin in thought before saying, "You know, I'm not an expert on the mind or anything, but will your mental attack even work on the Water Elementals?"

I nodded, "That's true, Elementals have strange minds, especially non-sapient Elementals. So no, my mental attacks probably won't do much of anything to them. Also, my quick mental attack range is only about five meters, so I don't know how useful it'll be against the Water Skaters either."

Lucky tried not to show it, but he looked somewhat distressed, "Well, I guess we could try to herd them into a corner?"

"Oh, that shouldn't be necessary. I actually have some attack magic I recently learned. I'm still a bit clumsy and slow with it, but using it to fight these low Tier creatures shouldn't be a problem."

Lucky visibly relaxed, "Whew, that's a relief. Why haven't you used it before?"

I shrugged, "Well, it's not like using it against ambush predators is an easy task. Like I said, I'm still slow and clumsy with it, so it would've done more harm than good. But against the Water Skaters it'll be perfect."

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Up ahead was a bend in the tunnel, with the air getting cooler and cooler I fully expected to find the ice chamber soon. However, as we rounded a bend, there was what I could only assume was a Water Skater, standing on top of the water.

It turned its long thin body towards us using its six skinny legs, and without hesitation seemingly started to scoop up water with its face pincers, similar to what an ant had, but a little more hairy and thin.

I wasn't exactly sure it was a Water Skater though, so I asked Lucky, "Hey, is that a Water Skater?"

Lucky hurried around the bend, being a bit further back since he had been contemplating the upcoming fights and strategies.

He took one look and said, "Definitely. Watch out for its face hands, that's what they use to fire their water spells."

I turned towards Lucky with a raised eyebrow, "Face hands? Really?"

"What?" He got into a defensive position with his sword facing towards the Water Skater, "They're on its face and it uses them like hands to scoop up the water. Face hands."

I now had both of my eyebrows raised skeptically, but as I watched the Water Skater it indeed pulled its face up out of the water, and in between its 'face hands' was a floating ball of water that was starting to spin.

I pursed my lips before saying, "Well, alright, I guess they are kind of like face hands. But I'm going to call them pincers since that sounds way less lame."

Lucky shrugged, "That's fine. Just get ready to dodge its shot. If you could dodge the Vermilligator, then dodging this shouldn't be a problem."

True to his word, the Water Skater opened its pincers and fired off its spinning ball of water right at me. My mind sped up just in case, but I was able to dodge to the side without much effort due to the distance between me and the Water Skater.

It started to scoop up another water ball, and I didn't waste any more time observing it. I manipulated my mana and started to form it into the spell I had gotten from the Dungeon of Tribulation, Frozen Water Lance.

I was still getting used to the spell, so getting it right wasn't going to happen without a lot of effort. I had to focus and use most of my mental capabilities to try and make the mana flow exactly how it was meant to, but even with all of my efforts the spell was fairly crude. The good news was that it was actually a complete spell, and I was ready to fire it off towards the Water Skater just as it was also ready to fire off its water ball towards me.

However I didn't want to miss and have to do this all over again. So I started to overload the formed spell framework with excess mana, causing it to vibrate and potentially shatter if it weren't for my expertise in overloading spells.

The Water Skater fired off its spinning water ball, and I was only barely able to dodge with my mind so occupied by my spell. But my Frozen Water Lance was now complete, and I fired it off towards the Water Skater, now with the added capability of a minor homing function.

My spell whooshed through the air towards the Water Skater. It tried to dodge, but it was useless as the moving icicle slightly changed its course to cleanly impale the creature from its face to the end of its thin body.

Lucky broke the silence by saying, "Nice, you only damaged its body. The legs are the most valuable part, so the more we can harvest the better."

The Water Skater corpse had been pushed towards another bend in the tunnel, and it wasn't sinking due to its legs still working to hold its body above the water alongside the icicle keeping its body buoyant.

Lucky once again started to collect the task materials, and was able to secure two legs from the creature before its body disappeared. We continued on our journey through the tunnels, and it wasn't long before the tunnel ended and opened up into a large cavern.

The large open cavern had a few stalactites hanging down from the ceiling, and there were a few pillars of rock here and there throughout the chamber blocking line of sight. Floating around on the water were platforms of ice with one or two floating spheres of ice and water on them, which I could guess were probably the Water Elementals we needed to fight.

I turned to Lucky, "So how are we going to get onto the ice platforms if they're just floating around? Are we supposed to swim to them or something?"

Lucky rubbed his arms to keep warm, and shook his head, "No, I guess you could do that if you want, but there's no need to." He pointed to the pillars of rock, "You see how those pillars have a little area to stand on near the water?"

I looked closer, and indeed there was a little bit of ground in a ring around all of the pillars near the water's surface.

"I see, but we would still have to swim if we wanted to get to those."

"Not at all. You see, the ice platforms don't just wander around randomly. They each follow a predetermined path, and they'll eventually pass by at least one of those pillars. So as long as we wait we can move between the ice platforms and the stationary pillars."

I said, "OK, sounds good, but those Water Skaters are going to be a problem. I can see like fifty of them throughout the room."

Lucky waved off my concerns, "Oh, don't worry about them. They're very territorial and stupid, it would take them at least a day to realize they don't need to be careful of another dead Water Skater's territory. Though they have been known to chase someone relentlessly even through another's territory, so make sure you kill one that's after you before it becomes a horde of the things."

"Nice to know." Fighting off a bunch of ranged opponents all at once would definitely be annoying. Considering Lucky is so knowledgeable about these things why isn't he prepared to fight them? "You know, why don't you have a gun or anything? I would think that since you know about all of this you would have at least prepared something to deal with the ranged Water Skaters."

Lucky scratched his neck, "Ah, that's a simple question with a simple answer. I forgot to bring it." He chuckled to himself, "I guess I was too excited and anxious for today's test. I didn't get a lot of sleep last night and woke up late. Then I had to rush to get ready, and in my haste I left behind my gun."

I chuckled with him, "Heh, yeah that definitely sounds like you."

He looked offended, "What do ya mean it sounds like me?" He huffed, "I'm usually much more composed and prepared."

I smiled, "Sure, sure."

"Hey! I'll have you know, back in my hometown I-"

I shook my head as he began his story. Lucky is such a character. Talking to him is definitely a different experience. I wonder if past Radiant's even bothered to interact with him at all though.

I frowned slightly as we waited for an ice platform to come along our path.

Well, I'm sure it doesn't matter. I'm sure I can get out of this 'time loop' on my own, so my interactions with others are purely for my own self satisfaction. What does it matter if the past me's interacted with Lucky or not? In the end it all comes down to whether or not I can free myself.

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