'Yo… look at that, Aika. We are finally Grade Two!'~

Aika materialized right beside me, placing a hand on my shoulder as she leaned in to study the screen with me. An amused smile grew on her lips as she muttered to herself.

"It's about damn time. Seriously, I was getting tired of being in the same Grade as humans."

I chuckled and shifted my gaze from her face, back to the screen. Impatient, we both quickly looked to the exclusive skill section.

[One with the Ravens - Lv1]

I arched a curious brow. 'Is there a description?'

Instantly, a different screen appeared beside the main one:

[One with the Ravens <—> Utility]

[Description: The ravens of the night of absolute death are the greatest utility of the beings of decay.]

Honestly, when I saw utility, at first I felt a bit deflated. I was probably expecting a defensive skill. But then I suddenly remembered how I initially complained about Gamer Privileges being a utility attribute, only for it to be one of the biggest reasons I'm still alive today. My deflation immediately faded, replaced by excitement over what the new skill might be.

I turned to face Aika. "How do I test it out?"

She looked lost in thought for a bit, tapping a finger against her chin. After a brief pause, as if something clicked, she quickly spun, took my left hand, opened my palm, and instructed, "Try expelling mana."

By now, my control over my mana had grown instinctual. I expelled mana, and an inchoate wisp of black smoke appeared directly on my palm before instantly solidifying into a black feather.

"Huh?" I arched a brow and picked up the feather by the quill, then rotated it. "A feather?"

Even Aika seemed a bit confused for a moment. She narrowed her eyes studying it, then after a few seconds, she said, "Try expelling more mana into the feather. Let's see what happens."

I did as she instructed, and suddenly, wisps of black smoke began streaming upward from the feather until the entire object vaporized. The smoke then quickly coalesced and, in the next instant, a raven materialized on my palm, looking up at me.

"A raven?" My eyes widened in amusement. I slowly tilted my head to the side, and the raven mirrored the movement perfectly. When I tilted to the left, the raven tilted its head, too.

I chortled in surprise and looked from the raven to Aika, asking, "So… what does it do?"

However, the moment I finished the question, the raven took flight, soaring to a fair distance before landing on the floor. It then shook its feathers vigorously, before settling its gaze on me.

"…"

I immediately leaned forward slightly, narrowing my eyes at the raven in the far distance. Then something strange happened. At that moment, I felt a very disorienting split in my mind, and then part of my vision was overlaid with another perspective, one that showed the room from the raven's eyes.

I could see myself and Aika, who stood beside me, with startling clarity from the low, wide-angle viewpoint of the bird, as if we were both standing directly in front of it.

The bird's vision was so clear and sharp that even the textures of the craggy, lichen-covered rocks and the sparse alpine grass right beneath the raven's talons stood out with terrifying, hyper-focused clarity, like a photograph taken under a magnifying lens.

"Woah…" I blurted in surprise.

But that was not all…

I realized that while I was sharing vision with the bird, I could also directly control the direction it looked and its physical movement.

This was amazing. With an exclusive skill like this, I was very much not only a perfect scout but a perfect spy too.

I immediately turned to Aika with a look of utter elation on my face. But as soon as I saw her, my excitement dimmed. She wore a look of intense contemplation, almost as if she was not satisfied with the incredible results.

I opened my mouth to speak, but before any words could come out, she quickly spoke. "I don't think that's all this skill can do." She paused, then added with more certainty, "I feel like there's more to it."

"There's more?"

She nodded, tilting her head slightly in thought. After a few seconds, she finally muttered, "Try swapping places with it."

I frowned in confusion, then nodded and started to turn away, thinking I needed to walk closer. But she grabbed my hand instantly and clarified: "No, expel even more mana and switch places with it."

Suddenly, my jaw dropped in disbelief. "Wait… you mean like teleportation?"

She nodded, "Something like that."

"Woah." My excitement grew even more.

I immediately expelled a large surge of mana and focused intently on the distant raven. When I expelled enough, a notification finally flared across my vision:

[One with the Ravens]

In the next instant, both Aika and I erupted into a flurry of dense black feathers. The feathers drifted down, dissolving into wisps of black smoke that quickly faded to nothing, leaving just a single feather remaining on the ground.

At the exact same moment, the raven across the distance flapped its wings, bursting into its own storm of feathers and intense black smoke, which instantly coalesced back into my form.

The moment I fully solidified, the last remaining feather on the opposite side where I had been before shimmered and transformed into the sleek shape of the raven.

…Now I was even more impressed.

The ability to swap places with my ravens?!

A teleportation ability such as this was a game changer.

Not only could I use my ravens as a scout and visual asset, but I could also instantly switch places with them.

'Insane!'

At that moment, Aika's voice echoed in my mind. 'Indeed…'

I raised my hand to see the tattoo dissolve into smoke that immediately coalesced and reformed into Aika beside me. It looked like when I teleported, she had returned to her dormant form in order to travel with me.

Grinning like a child who had just found a new toy, I grabbed her hand and quickly exclaimed, "Yo! Let's try that again!"

I looked to the raven, expelled another surge of mana, and tried swap places again.

…However, nothing happened.

Instead, the raven still on the ground in the distance, simply tilted its head and looked at me as if it were utterly confused.

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