Chapter 26: Chapter 26: Lake Karasol

It was well past sunset when Sara woke back up. Her hammock had sagged a little, so it was almost touching the floor, and the swaying had taken some getting used to. But once she got past that it was the softest sleep she'd had so far in this world.

Honestly she hadn't really minded sleeping on the cave floors. Her new body didn't have a big problem with it, at least nothing a few light stretches didn't sort out. Probably because of how it was designed. And due to the environmental settings she didn't really get dirty. Or at least, it didn't stick to her very long. But having something resembling a bed after more than three weeks was a game changer. Maybe spiders weren't so bad after all.

Though she would have still preferred not fighting them. That experience was going to live inside her head now, possibly forever. Was a nice, soft bed (hammock) really worth that? Actually, maybe it was. She could ask herself that again in a year, if she remembered.

After hopping onto the floor, and stretching a little, she considered her hammock again. From what she had understood, the cave would go back to normal once her respawn point was no longer here, so was it fine to leave this hanging? Well, maybe it would give whomever found it an interesting story to tell. She had zero idea how long spider silk lasted, but if it was possible to make clothing from it, then hopefully very long. It was probably fine.

Something had occurred to her as she was waking up, and she had a quick look at her skill list. Her Keen Senses skill had ended up in the Concealed section, which she had suspected. On the one hand she was tempted to hide what might be a rare skill, but on the other it might be even more suspicious that she was a wolf (or cat) that didn't have any of the Keen skills that predator mobs always seemed to have at least one of. So she decided to push it up into the revealed section, and tentatively set its level to 15, on the assumption that it was possible to get this skill in a way that made it start at level 1. Sadly she didn't have the ability to just add fake skills to her list.

Savage Blow could stay Concealed. She was a Druid, and she didn't have any intention of hiding that, nor any intention to complicate that image if she could avoid it. She would love to find another Mystic Wolf to compare herself to, but she had no way of knowing if that would happen. The elven forest was her only clue as to where there might be others, so she'd see when she got there.

She poked her head outside to make sure it was actually dark. The stars were out, and for someone who had lived in the city most of her life it was a little breathtaking to see a crystal clear night sky like this. Moorhold's two moons were just over half full, on the growing side. Meaning that it if the moon cycles were the same length as on Earth, it would have been full moon around the time of release. It was hard to remember for sure, but that seemed correct.

There were dark clouds slowly encroaching on the sky from the north, so her rain prediction looked like it was coming true. How soon was a different matter.

She confirmed the location of the river, and then headed a bit further west of it for her crossing point. That would let her to approach more to the side of the lake, rather than heading right down towards the beach. Once she got close to the road, she made another stop to scout further. There were not a lot of people out at night, though the fact that there were still some pointed to the west side having more traffic than the east. Nothing that resembled a search party, though, so she carefully crossed the road in stealth mode. The gaps between travellers were more than big enough.

[ Discovered Area: Lake Karasol. ]

Just in case some there were people out at night around the lake, which didn't seem like too much of a stretch to assume considering there were tourists there, she kept Erase Presence on all the way down to the lakeside. It was beautiful how it glittered in the moonlight as well. It almost made her want to howl at the moons, but that would give herself away right away. Sound probably travelled incredibly well across the water.

She crept further around the side of the lake until she hit an area where there was just a thin stretch of flat land before it went downhill. Her reasoning being that it would make it easier to get away if she could just immediately rush down the hill if needed.

When she finally felt prepared, she turned her attention to the water. She had gotten to see how beautiful the lake was, so the next question was: could she find any fish? That was where Thermal Vision would really shine, because she couldn't really hear or smell what happened underwater, and even maxed Keen Vision had some issues seeing very deeply into it. Maybe if she stuck her head underwater, but Thermal Vision should work. Especially if she also paid close attention to Sense Presence. Maybe Sense Mana would help as well, but for some reason it was hard to think of fish as particularly magical. Plus the skill level was still low.

She couldn't really feel anything from the shore, and the only heat signatures she could see she wasn't able to use Identify on. As if they were too small to count as mobs. So maybe non-mob animals existed. Like if they were too small to fight, or something.

Sense Presence was reacting to something further out, but it was beyond Thermal Vision range. She'd have to actually get in the water.

Tentatively setting her paws in, she found the water to be quite pleasant. It honestly made her want to bathe. Though that wasn't her current purpose. Maybe after her investigation was done. It had been like a month. Surely she deserved a reward. But first! Fish!

The water seemed to be pretty shallow for the initial stretch, only very slowly getting deeper. At some point it would probably drop down more quickly.

Oh! There's something!

A larger heat signature came into view, and this one she could Identify.

[ Shallow Roach (Scout Lvl 12) HP: 31/31 ]

Wait, why is it so weak?

"Fish in the shallows are meant to be early catches after you level up your fishing on the non-mob fish. The fish mobs in the lake start at level 10, and grow as you get deeper in. The fishing piers go far enough out to let you get fish up to just past level 20, but beyond that you need to rent a boat, or go spear fishing underwater."

It probably didn't have a lot of things on it, then.

[ Skill List ]

[ Active: ]

[ Bite Lvl 4 | Struggle Lvl 3 | Sprint Lvl 3 ]

[ Passive: ]

[ Swim Lvl 3 | Agility Up (Small) Lvl 2 ]

So this thing is absolutely helpless once pulled out of the water?

"Yes. That is the case for a lot of fish. Fighting them in the water can be tough, but if you manage to fish them up, you just have to finish them off. There are some with ranged abilities that you have to be wary of, but they cannot move much on land to freely fire at you, or use anything with a cast time."

Well, it did have two things she hadn't seen before.

[ Struggle (Active): Attempt to escape someone's grasp by struggling violently. Makes the user hard to hold onto. Does minimal damage. Can also be used to attempt to release the user from being stuck. Effect increases with skill level. Damage value: 0.1+(0.01*skill level)*attack power. Cost: 2 SP. Refresh: 5 seconds. ]

[ Swim (Passive): Improves swimming prowess, and speed. Able to hold breath for longer. Reduces SP drain from swimming. Effect increases with skill level. ]

Oh, I want that! Wait, do I need the Swim skill to be able to swim?

"No, it simply improves how good you are at it. Though as a wolf you can pretty much only doggy-paddle, so you will not be able to swim very well regardless. Even with the skill there are limits to what you can do considering your physique."

Even so, she wanted that skill. Struggle was whatever, but Swim was something she definitely wanted. But how to catch a fish? She had her doubts whether she would be able to simply walk close enough to grab it, even when stealthed. It was likely better to come up with a ranged solution.

Fireball... no. The explosion was probably not strong enough to stun fish, a la grenade fishing she'd seen on video. Assuming it wouldn't just get extinguished.

Poison Bolt probably wouldn't penetrate deep enough, and the fish could just swim away from the poisoned water.

Frost Bolt was a maybe. Ice should be able to penetrate the water, but it wasn't a bolt of hard ice, it was just really cold.

Maybe she could Leap into the air, and DFA them. The splash might make them flee, though.

Thorn Bind... actually, that was promising. If she could trap the fish, then there would be no problem grabbing it. But would the vines actually work in the water?

She cast the spell, and it worked! Thorny vines shot up from the waterbed, and wrapped themselves around the fish. Though since the damage was percentage based, it didn't really do a lot, so she hurried out there as quickly as she could, and Chomped down on it.

[ Shallow Roach (Scout Lvl 12) Defeated. ]

[ Skill Gained: Swim. ]

Easy.

There was no real reason to hunt any more of these fish though. She had a further look around with Thermal Vision, but they all seemed to be the same type. While there were situations where Struggle might be useful, she could also just... struggle normally. And with their low levels, she probably got next to no experience from them.

[ Thermal Vision Skill Level Up! ]

Which meant it was time to bathe!

She rushed further out until she could no longer reach the bottom with her feet, and then started paddling around. It was so nice finally getting to immerse herself in water after so long. Honestly she hadn't even realised how much she had missed it until she got here. Maybe she should make a point to regularly bathe in rivers from now on. It wouldn't be quite the same as this, but it would be something. And when she got out she wouldn't have to be miserably wet for very long thanks to the settings menu.

[ Swim Skill Level Up! ]

Aaaahhh, bliss. I wish I could just live here, but there are too many people. I'll be back some day, when I am also people. At some point I want to go visit the sea as well.

She stuck her head into the water, and tried to peer down. It was surprising how well she could actually see. Was it due to Night Vision? Did that really have an effect underwater? There shouldn't be enough moonlight, even with two moons, to see that clearly otherwise. Everything looked like it was shimmering.

There were different fish as well. Briefly turning on Thermal Vision let her better pinpoint their locations.

[ Shallow Perch (Fighter Lvl 16) HP: 54/54 ]

[ Skill List ]

[ Active: ]

[ Bite Lvl 6 | Struggle Lvl 5 | Sprint Lvl 4 | Water Needle Lvl 5 ]

[ Passive: ]

[ Keen Eyes Lvl 6 | Swim Lvl 6 | Strength Up (Small) Lvl 3 | Agility Up (Small) Lvl 3 ]

[ Water Needle (Active): Fire a rapid needle with water element property that inflicts piercing damage. Hard to aim. Works well underwater. Damage value: (1.0+(0.03*skill level))*magic power. +50% damage when striking a vital point. Cost: 3 MP. Cast time: 2 seconds. Refresh: 3 seconds. ]

Is that a spell?

"Indeed. One of the basic water spells. Even without a magic class, fish type mobs are granted permission to use it, and its evolutions. It is rare in that it will not show up in the skill store, so it requires a different means of acquisition. Like a skill scroll, or a quest."

Or Skill Gain.

"Correct."

Well, there looked to be plenty of these fish around, and they seemed to mostly just swim around lazily, or chase the smaller Roaches. She might as well grab a few until she got the spell.

She raised her head to take a deep breath, then plunged back underwater so she could cast Thorn Bind, and dive down to snag her catch. Unfortunately the thing didn't just sit still, it managed to turn towards her, and fire Water Needles. She wasn't really dexterous enough in her swimming to be able to dodge, as her stats helped her very little with manoeuvring underwater.

[ Swim Skill Level Up! ]

That wasn't really enough to help either, so she had to just tank a couple of hits until she could reach the fish, and dispose of it. Then she quickly hurried back up to the surface.

[ Shallow Perch (Fighter Lvl 16) Defeated. ]

[ Thorn Bind Skill Level Up! ]

No luck on that one. She cast Regrowth on herself in preparation for the next dive.

[ Regrowth Skill Level Up! ]

The fish had evacuated the immediate area, but she didn't have to swim very far to find more of them, and repeat the process.

[ Shallow Perch (Fighter Lvl 15) Defeated. ]

[ Skill Gained: Struggle. ]

[ Shallow Perch (Fighter Lvl 17 Defeated. ]

[ Skill Gained: Water Needle. ]

[ Chomp Skill Level Up! ] [ Swim Skill Level Up! ]

She ended up with both skills, regardless of whether she had wanted them. And a few skill levels, but she didn't really do much, and these things probably didn't grant a lot of skill experience in the first place. But every little bit helped.

She was curious just how hard it was to aim, so she needed another target.

Turned out it was pretty tricky. Even against an immobile target she missed the two first shots, had to cast another Thorn Bind, finally hit with the third shot, missed the fourth, and had to cast Thorn Bind a third time before she finally killed it with the fifth Water Needle.

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[ Shallow Perch (Fighter Lvl 17) Defeated. ]

[ Water Needle Skill Level Up! ]

That was a little embarrassing, but maybe it was to be expected from a first attempt. She remembered to check her remaining SP, and saw that it had actually drained a fair bit. Not helped by her actually attacking underwater. It was down to around a third left. She wanted to swim some more, but she would have to head to the shore to recharge first.

She sat her ass down on the sand, and took a breather. When she was younger she had really enjoyed going to the ocean, and swimming in the sea. This was actually her first... no, second time bathing in a lake. Freshwater was definitely a different experience. Less crusty. The salt really stuck to you from seawater.

As she sat there she had the eerie sensation that she was being watched. Danger Sense wasn't reacting though, and neither were her other sensory skills. Maybe it was just her imagination. Once her SP recharged, she went in for another swim. Maybe she could get even further out, and find more fish.

[ Swim Skill Level Up! ]

* * *

After sitting there for hours with nothing happening, Barls had decided to go to the lodge for a meal, and some drinks. Mirgon ended up leaving too, saying he wanted to process more of the materials he had gathered, and he needed the mine's facilities to do it. Which just left the four girls.

Sa Lamba had gone with Barls to get food earlier, and then had returned without him, but with meals for Grace, Laloti, and Le Hoot. Then she had returned to fishing. Even if you didn't catch much, there was something zen about it. Le Hoot had gotten interested in trying, so Sa Lamba had begun teaching her.

Grace was telling them about how she had been searching for caves on the Plateau, because the treasure chests could have skill scrolls, and the chance of one appearing wasn't too rare. She'd even snagged a few unrestricted ones. If she couldn't use them herself, she could give them to guild members, or sell them for a tidy profit. She was actually quite rich.

Laloti kept lookout while the rest were passing time. It was easy to imagine something like that would get boring, but she was good with handling monotonous tasks. It was part of why she had chosen the Scout class, and taken the Tracker profession. And it was a little exciting to be on a stakeout with the others like this.

As Le Hoot managed to gradually snag bigger catches, Grace was happy to tell them about how almost all fish mobs had Struggle, a skill you didn't see much elsewhere, and how the predator fish had a spell that was considered the rarest of the basics, since there were very few ways for players to get it.

Darkness had fallen upon them, and Le Hoot took out a picnic basket she had gotten from the guild's #1 cook, along with some large bottles of iced tea. Even after dark the air remained warm. While it was late autumn back where they lived on Earth, it was late spring here. Almost early summer. The game company was based in the southern hemisphere, so they had gone with their seasons, which honestly suited Laloti fine.

It was starting to seem like this stakeout had been good for nothing except hanging out when Laloti finally spotted movement to the west, in the water. She had recently maxed out Keen Eyes, and her Night Vision was pretty good at level 15, so she was able to zoom in with high clarity.

"There's something," she told the other two, and the both of them scrambled closer.

"Where?" Grace and the others hurried closer.

"On the west shore. Something suddenly appeared in the water. But it's not black..."

While she wasn't entirely certain why she hadn't spotted anything approaching the water, the most likely answer was stealth. She took out her binoculars to get a better look. Le Hoot also had binoculars, while Grace and Sa Lamba had monoculars.

Beastkin all had Night Vision to start with, and the same applied to elves. Also dwarves, and for some reason goblins. But Laloti had gotten it simply for becoming a Scout. But since the others had started with it earlier, they were also higher level than her. Sa Lamba was at max, Grace was at 18, and Le Hoot was at 17.

"I don't think that's a cat either," Sa Lamba said. "Looks more like a wolf."

"A wolf?!" Le Hoot's sudden exclamation startled the other three.

"What's gotten into you?" Grace asked.

"Remember the wolf back in Merwyn?" she asked Laloti. "The one we think was a growing mob?"

"Oh yeah..." Laloti was still of the opinion that it was probably different wolves in the forest, and the tutorial field, but it had been odd to be ambushed like that, plus now there was a wolf in a zone that wasn't supposed to have any.

Sa: "What's it doing?"

Gr: "Looks like it's playing around... is it trying to catch fish?"

Sa: "Do mobs do that? Hell, do wolves do that?"

Le: "This one seems to. Look, now it's started to swim."

La: "It looks so lazy... as if it's just enjoying itself. I wonder if the water still feels nice at night?"

Laloti had had a dip earlier during the day, but she hadn't tried any night swimming.

Le: "Oh! It dove underwater!"

Sa: "Is it actually trying to dive for fish? Surely it can't hope to catch them."

Gr: "Unless it has some sort of skill that traps them."

Sa: "Oh yeah, there are a lot of those... would they work underwater, though?"

Gr: "I don't see why not. Holy Shackles work anywhere."

Though Grace hadn't actually tried it underwater. Very few players bothered with underwater combat.

Le: "It's back up. Wait... that light... it definitely just cast a spell. I think it was Regrowth."

Le Hoot was quite familiar with the visual effects of her Druid skills.

Sa: "I know there are magic mobs, but wolves too?"

Le: "We haven't found one yet, I think. Wolves always seem to be physical types like Fighters, or Rogues. I'd have to check with the other guild members, but this might be the first. A Druid wolf."

Gr: "How very exciting!"

Sa: "Maybe we can ask the bookworms to check the libraries for any information on that."

Le: "They're researchers!"

Sa: "Same thing."

La: "Asking the Residents might not be a bad idea either. They have their own legends, and folk tales, and stuff. Though which ones to ask..."

Gr: "Since it's here, maybe we should check with the humans first?"

Le: "But if it's here... where is it going?"

Sa: "What do you mean?"

Le: "Well, if it travelled from Merwyn, then I doubt this would be its destination. It can really only come out at night, and has to sneak around everywhere. But since it came from a forest, maybe it's going to a different forest..."

La: "I am not convinced of your line of reasoning, but... say for the sake of argument that you are correct, and it's travelling from east to west, then it would have to be Ildhena right?"

Le: "Exactly! I think I'm gonna move my base to Komeron for the time being, just in case."

Sa: "Looks like it's taking a break."

La: "It's looking around... you don't think it can tell we're watching, do you?"

Gr: "Surely not! Look, it's going back in the water."

Sa: "I wanna go for a swim myself now..."

* * *

Sara was enraptured with looking around underwater. It was starting to get pretty deep, yet she didn't really feel any fear. Her Swim skill had already levelled up enough that the SP drain wasn't that bad, and even if she happened to drown, her respawn point was in a position where she wouldn't lose a lot of travel time. She would just end up further north again.

This was probably as far out as she should go, but there was still a lot to see. Underwater there were interesting plants, rocks, and stuff that wasn't just fish. There were some rather large snails, several sizes of shellfish, probably crayfish if she remembered her freshwater fauna, and also a new type of larger fish. She couldn't Identify the crayfish, or snails without diving down, but the fish was in range.

[ Lake Pike (Fighter Lvl 21) HP: 99/99 ]

They were starting to get pretty tough now. At least it didn't seem to be an elite.

[ Skill List ]

[ Active: ]

[ Chomp Lvl 2 | Struggle Lvl Max | Tail Whip Lvl 2 | Charge Lvl 8 | Crush Lvl 2 | Water Jet Lvl 2 ]

[ Passive: ]

[ Keen Eyes Lvl 12 | Keen Nose Lvl 12 | Swim Lvl Max | Dive Lvl 3 | Tough Scales Lvl 6 | Strength Up (Small) Lvl 6 | Agility Up (Small) Lvl 6 ]

Water Jet?

[ Water Jet (Active): Fire a rapid jet with water element property that inflicts piercing damage. Hard to aim. Works well underwater. Damage value: (1.1+(0.04*skill level))*magic power. +60% damage when striking a vital point. Defence piercing: +(10+(1*skill level))%. Cost: 4 MP. Cast time: 2 seconds. Refresh: 3 seconds. ]

Ah, so it's the upgraded version of Water Needle.

[ Dive (Passive): Able to move better underwater. Swim faster underwater, and move more precisely. Able to hold breath for longer. Stacks with Swim. Able to handle the increased water pressure of the depth better, and suffer less from decompression sickness. Effect increases with skill level. ]

Oh, I want that too! I can become a merwolf! Okay, maybe not, but I still want it.

Her SP looked good for at least one fight, so she'd really have to bank on her luck. Even if the effect was dubious, she said a quick prayer to Norax, and then checked whether Thorn Bind was able to grab the fish even when it was over a metre from the bottom.

It got snagged, and seemed really angry about it. With its size, and length it was hard for it to move much when it was restrained such, but it still did its best to fire Water Jets at her. She fired back with Water Needles, trying to aim for the weak spots she could see, and also attempted to fire a Frost Bolt. It did launch, and it did hit, but it seemed to fall apart a little while travelling through the water, so it wasn't full damage. The Slow effect still helped though.

In the end it was a bit of a slug fest as they traded spells back and forth. Sara might not have the upgraded version, and her accuracy wasn't perfect, but her magic power was higher, so she still dealt more damage when she hit, and Rejuvenate gave her a bit more leeway. She had considered diving down, and trying to finish it off with biting, but there was really no need to. She just had to recast Thorn Bind a few times. The third cast actually missed because the fish was charging at her, and the vines couldn't stretch far enough, but at that point she finished it off with a Water Needle right between the eyes.

[ Lake Pike (Fighter Lvl 21) Defeated. ]

[ Skill Gained: Dive. ]

[ Thorn Bind Skill Level Up! ] [ Water Needle Skill Level Up! ] [ Rejuvenate Skill Level Up! ] [ Water Needle Skill Level Up! ] [ Swim Skill Level Up! ] [ Solid Coat Skill Level Up! ] [ Insulation Skill Level Up! ] [ Nature Element Up Skill Level Up! ] [ Mana Manipulation Skill Level Up! ]

Thankfully that had worked out as she had hoped. She needed two Regrowths to top herself up, and then she swam back to shore. She felt like that had satisfied all her urges for the time being.

Once ashore she flopped down for a bit to recover her SP, and let the water dry off. It was so handy to have it happen so quickly. If only she could have had that in real life.

Actually... I guess this is my real life now...

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