Jin rolled her eyes at her ridiculous Familiar that seemed to care more about snacks than about surviving in this hell hole—er, Abyss hole? She was still trying to get used to the local colloquialisms. Instead of arguing at all, though, she focused on her Aura but also on her perception ability, [See Without Sight]. She had only gotten it a day before her Aura, and even that was only the night before yesterday. Losing a day to sleeping off her Caste Ascension had thrown her off a bit, but it wasn't like she really needed to keep track of the weekdays in here.

Her new sense was… weird. It was like looking around normally with her eyes, but wherever her Aura touched was like she had x-ray vision, or rather, it was more like everything else became partially translucent like her [Treasure Hoard]. She could see everything, but like it was layered on top of one another. It was disconcerting at first and took her a couple of minutes of looking around just to make sense of it all.

When she looked down at the soft, spongy ground beneath her boots, she was immediately grateful that she didn't suffer from vertigo. It must have been at least a fifty-foot drop to where her Aura bubble seemed to cut off, making it feel like she was standing on a hologram. Hadia even seemed like some kind of ghost next to her, and turning towards the rest of her team showed the same. Thankfully, she couldn't see into them, no bones or muscle layers, but it did make her wonder what differentiated them from the dirt beneath her.

Jin turned back toward the area that Clover had pointed toward, and sure enough, just under the surface of the water was some kind of creature slowly moving closer. It was bigger than the skeleton fish, and she was fairly certain it was some variant of a crocodile or alligator—she was never sure which was which.

She lifted her [Silent Spear] and used one hand to sign as she called out to the others in a loud whisper, "Incoming." Then she readied herself into a defensive position as she turned to face the monster while adding, "Liraz, you think you can [Slime Drop] on it even with it under the water?"

The smaller girl nodded as she moved a few steps forward and incanted quietly, "Sticky, not icky, not rain nor shine. Stretchy and bouncy is going to come. Welcome a visit from some tons of fun. A drop on all of you."

Dark clouds swirled in the air above the murky water, casting a darker shadow than the already dull gray light that permeated the overcast sky. Jin could see the monster react immediately, swimming downward into the depths that she realized were much deeper than they appeared from the surface. When the massive drop of slime hit the water, it created waves that Jin hadn't been anticipating at first, but they were far enough away still to move back towards the wall that offered more solid ground.

The distraction of retreating cost Jin, though, as she searched to find the monster again, the waves and disrupted flora distorting her view as she tried to differentiate the various moving layers in her perception. Just as Jin caught sight of the beast, it broke through the surface of the wave it was riding in and lunged straight for Liraz.

Jin lunged as well, triggering her own [Piercing Thrust] to try and skewer the enemy before it could clamp those massive jaws on the small girl. She was surprised but relieved when the monster slammed into the [Mana Barrier] around Liraz, and as her spear struck its side, Alim moved between Liraz and the overgrown reptile.

He raised his hand quickly, and Jin caught a glimpse of his mouth moving without any sound being made before a bright beam of light burst from his hand to slam straight into the monster's face.

Alim was lucky that he had been watching Jin and Hadia carefully as they talked with one another. He had mostly been trying to make out what they were saying—something about nightmares and sunshine and Auras—when the little dragon had pointed, and Jin was suddenly on high alert again. He was grateful she had remembered to sign, "Incoming," for him, but frowned when she turned to say something to Liraz that he couldn't quite make out from this angle.

He should have known that Jin would have been ordering an ability use, but it still caught him by surprise as he finished casting the last [Mana Barrier] around Jin. He had disliked casting it on himself before either Hadia or Jin, and had been debating about discussing with them over potentially changing up the order once they reached the new base, especially now that they had a better understanding of their Class roles.

That was all pushed to the back of his mind, however, when the slime hit the water and the waves began to rush towards them. He saw the momentary panic that Jin let slip through her guarded mask of indifference as she frantically looked around while they moved backwards to avoid the sudden tide. Luckily, he was ready to react because of that small tell, and as Jin moved to attack, he moved to protect.

He hadn't cared what type of monster it might have been; he only cared about keeping its attention long enough for the others to kill it. To that end, he was already silently incanting when the creature jumped from the water towards the person who had tried to attack it first.

Sear the paths your mana travels, he thought as he mouthed the words, holding his hand out towards the monster as he activated [Mana Sear]. The blue beam that shot from his hand looked more like molten cobalt infused with lightning as it arced and dripped pure mana.

The monster's long mouth opened wider, showing rows of sharp teeth as it was violently shoved to the side by Jin's spear a moment before his beam connected with its face. It was large and had a muddy green color to its leathery skin. Its body was solid-looking and long, with six stubby legs that seemed webbed to help it maneuver through the water.

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Alim wondered if the beast was screaming as it began thrashing on the ground, snapping at Jin, who jumped back to save her leg from getting bitten off. He knew his ability wasn't damaging the enemy, but that it was also incredibly painful because of that, as the beam burned through its mana channels and slowly lowered its mana capacity.

While a beast monster like this one might not cast Spells like a normal Caster, many still used mana to enhance themselves and perform special abilities. This one had likely been using something to move through the water without disturbing it as much, or whatever let it leap out of the water like that. Alim didn't have much time to ponder it as the monster seemed to regain enough sense to try attacking the person who was currently still hurting it—him.

A cone of blue slime joined his beam, coating the monster and the spongy ground in stickiness. Alim chanced a glance at Liraz, who had moved slightly to the side instead of directly behind him, and she seemed determined to help defeat the monster. She had succeeded, it appeared, as it halted its forward momentum and began writhing in place. The weird box Familiar then skittered into the fray, dodging teeth and claws to wrap its massive tongue around the monster's tail before gnawing on it like a chew-toy with its own shark-like teeth.

That provided the opening Jin and Hadia had been waiting for as both of them charged forward so fast that he knew it had to be their new abilities enhancing their speed. They both landed devastating blows to the struggling reptile, and the Terram rushed in a moment later to bash their skulls together.

Alim took a moment to trigger his other new ability that would hopefully keep the monster attacking him instead of the others. Bear the mark of my protection, he silently incanted in his mind as his [Mana Sear] beam ended to channel his mana into [Rune of the Protector] instead. A bright blue rune began glowing in the center of the creature's forehead, giving his enemy the [Mark of the Aggressor] Bane. Now, if it attacked anyone but him, it would deal damage to itself as well.

It proved to be good timing when the monster's maw began to glow a brilliant crimson and snapped its jaws down hard on the nearest target: the Terram. Blood sprayed as the Summon was decapitated in an instant, and the massive reptile seemed to lurch back and writhe from the retribution damage.

He noticed in the corner of his eye when Liraz lifted her hands up to cover her ears the next moment as the monster seemed to go berserk, and he wondered if his lack of hearing was actually a boon in this particular case, much like how he was able to focus on completing the ritual puzzle when they captured their base on the last floor. He was also fairly certain he was inadvertently immune to certain abilities that required being heard, mostly belonging to the Song magic category.

With the monster trapped and forced to try attacking Alim while Jin, Hadia, and the sentient box continued their relentless assault, it was only a matter of time before the monster collapsed and went still in the puddle of slime. He used his own perception ability [Arcane Insight] to make sure the monster was dead. When he was unable to see any mana flowing around it, he felt satisfied, though Jin's looting ability would be the truest proof. Being able to see mana flowing was fairly useful in some cases, but he was afraid that his mind, with its tendency to either get easily distracted or so focused that everything else seemed to vanish around him, would end up getting lost in the entrancing colors that lit up the world.

Trying to refocus again as he suppressed the magical sense, Alim could tell Hadia and Jin were breathing hard as they stood over the corpse, the latter leaning down to brush a hand against the hide to loot it, and it quickly crumbled into pale white ashes. He took the color as proof that it had indeed been Crystal Caste, like he thought he had sensed through his Aura.

His wandering thoughts were drawn to movement again as Karam approached Hadia and bent slightly as she lifted her knee up. The healer moved his hand along her calf for a few moments, wrapping it in the [Regenerative Cocoon] threads to heal the wound she must have gotten from the monster's thrashing. He had been so focused on the monster teeth that he must have missed a claw or tail swipe that caught her.

With a heavy sigh and mental reprimand to try to be more aware of everything while fighting, he waved to get Jin's attention and started signing, "We should start moving quicker. I know you said go slow to avoid the monsters, but they'll be everywhere, and we don't want to get caught in the wilds at night. Our base will be the safest place for us to rest."

Jin seemed to contemplate for a while before signing back, "You're not wrong, but if we get overwhelmed because we ran through a bunch of monsters without realizing it, we're dead. If we go slower, we can hopefully reduce the number of mobs we take on at once. If that takes us into a night cycle, we'll just do our best to set up a camp and take watch. Are we even sure there will be a night?"

Alim thought about that for a moment, a hand resting on his chin, before carefully replying, "We should assume there is, but you've got a point." He glanced up at the dreary sky before looking around at the eerie bog again and sighed as he added, "I'm not looking forward to sleeping while wet."

"Then we should get going. Lead the way, Monster Bait," Hadia signed at him with a smirk.

"I thought the dragon was the bait?" He replied but moved forward to lead the way. Alim noticed the little dragon Familiar looking upset as it pointed at him and jumped up and down on Jin's shoulder, its mouth moving fast, and he knew he wouldn't have been able to lip-read it anyway, so he asked Jin, "What's it mad about now?"

Jin rolled her eyes and signed back, "He's being pissy because he recognized the sign for dragon but didn't know what else you were saying." She appeared to sigh and added, "I'm going to prioritize teaching him the Whisper signs so hopefully you both can communicate better."

Alim paused, staring at her for a long moment before his eyes flicked to the irate little creature, and he slowly asked, "Do we have to?"

Jin gave him a flat look, leaned down to grab a handful of the sticky slim that Liraz was in the process of sucking back up to replenish some of her reserves, then threw it right at him.

He reacted by moving his new shield into place to catch the flying globule and smirked when it hit. Moving his hands in a languid drawl, he signed, "A bit childish, no? Or are you just jealous that you don't have an excuse to ignore the little beasty?"

Jin gave a sidelong glance at the dragon on her shoulder that had its tiny arms crossed over its chest and seemed to be sulking. She seemed to try to hide her hands with her body as she signed, "Only a little jealous."

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