Tense as things were, there was little Rylan could do to speed up the cloudcrank from his position on one of the wings, and they still had a ways to go. Restless, he decided to check his new Skill—and his mana reserves—as it might very well come in handy.

  “Blessed Ethereon,” he mumbled into the wind. “Please show me my Status and Stealth Skill Windows.”

  Status

  Mana Pool: 14/14

  Mana Shell: 4.2/6

  Attributes

  Strength 3

  Dexterity 4

  Endurance 2

  Mind 4

  Perception 3

  Presence -1

  Free points: 1

  Skills

  Knife-Throwing, Rank 4

  Jumping, Rank 4

  Cooking, Rank 3

  Knife-Fighting, Rank 2

  Stealth, Rank 1

  Quint Structures

  Mana Core, Tier I

  Mana Pool, Tier I

  Mana Shell, Tier VI

  Quintessence Credits: 848

  Thankfully, he’d used so little mana during their encounter with the giant mistbat, his Mana Pool had already refilled by now, and the overflow had probably already started restoring his Mana Shell a little.

  Good. He had a feeling he might end up needing it.

  Satisfied that he would be ready to go when they got back, he turned to the window detailing his new Skill.

  Stealth

  Rank 1

  Effects

  Mana Shell flash negation

  Improved dampening

  Soft shielding

  Attribute Requirements

  Dexterity ≥ 1

  Perception ≥ 2

  Mind ≥ 3

  Rylan’s eyebrows rose as he took in the details. The Stealth Skill was not quite what he’d expected.

  He’d thought it would be a movement Skill like Running, Dancing, or Jumping, except for sneaking around, but the description suggested it actually worked by directly influencing the Mana Shell... Wouldn’t that mean only an established Quinthar who’d already bought the Quintessence Structure could get it?

  The Attribute Requirements weren’t what he’d expected either...

  Wait, I’m thinking of Sneaking, but this is Stealth! It’s an entirely different Skill!

  With growing excitement, he tried activating it. A trickle of mana left his Mana Pool—not much more than the overflow of his mana generation, really—and pushed straight out of his sternum into his Mana Shell, forming a tiny tether.

  While he’d become more sensitive to the ripples and tiny movements of his Mana Shell, the moment his Skill made contact, he became aware of the protective layer of mana in a way he’d never been before.

  Thus, he could sense the moment the Skill took effect and the protective layer of mana... shifted.

  He felt it spread out a little, the layer surrounding his skin becoming thicker but less dense. The ripples induced by the wind started moving through it more sluggishly, dying out faster.

  From what Ethereon had whispered into his spirit when he’d read the words ‘Soft shielding’ on his Skill Window, he gathered his Mana Shell would be more effective at absorbing blunt impacts in this state, but not as good at stopping sharp objects.

  [Whoa! Boss, what did you do?]

  ‘I’m trying out my new Skill. Why? What does it feel like to you?’

  [It’s so weird! I can still sense you, but you’re all fuzzy, like you’re below ground or something. Even the sound of your bloodpump is muffled!]

  Rylan glanced down, but found that he was still perfectly visible. Of course, Arphin’s senses didn’t rely on sight, so he wasn’t sure why he’d expected otherwise.

  If you discover this tale on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the violation.

  Still, perhaps that was something he could work towards with Augmentations... Using his Mana Shell to help him blend into shadows or fog would certainly be interesting.

  What was a little less visible, interestingly enough, was his spirit.

  He could still see the emerald blob inside of his torso, but it looked dim, and kind of blurry.

  So the Stealth Skill even influences my spirit vision somewhat! That’s good to know.

  Rylan glanced over to the other wing, and found that Leahna’s spirit still shone brightly to his eyes. It seemed the Skill didn’t affect his vision by covering his eyes, which was good.

  Similarly he didn’t feel like his hearing was affected, but when he risked letting go of the handles for a second to clap his hands together, the sound was quite dull and soft.

  “Hey Yuel,” he said as a test, speaking at a normal volume. His voice sounded... odd. He could hear himself perfectly well, yet his words still sounded muffled in a way, as if he were speaking with his head wrapped inside a blanket.

  Either way, Yuel didn’t react, suggesting Rylan’s voice had been drowned out by a combination of his Skill and the wind.

  All in all, it seemed like a Skill with great potential. Already it could help him avoid detection by both Quinthar and non-Quinthar, and it seemed like it had defensive potential as well, if he could predict what kind of impact he was about to incur.

  Rylan deactivated the Skill, his sense of his Mana Shell dimming as the tiny mana tether fizzled out. He wasn’t sure if the mana he spent on it was actually wasted or just fed into his Mana Shell, but this wasn’t the time to figure that out; he was going to need all the mana he could get.

  Speaking of things he was going to need, he had a free point available as well. It would take some time to affect him even after he spent it, of course, but there was no reason to wait.

  He already met the requirements for his first Sapphire Skill, so for the first time, it didn’t actually matter all that much what he put the point in.

  After some thought, he still came back to Mind.

  A higher Mind Attribute meant a bigger Mana Pool and, more importantly, better mana manipulation. While improving his Strength or Perception would be nice, improving his Mind was basically the only thing that could help him reach Sapphire Grade faster.

  Rylan didn’t hate his improved memory either. Who knew what other improvements the Mind Attribute had brought him, and what more lay in store.

  “Ethereon, please put my free point into Mind.”

  《Free point successfully distributed. Attribute enhancement in progress. Estimated completion in: six hours.》

  Nodding to himself in satisfaction, Rylan leaned back a little and peered up through the fog, trying but failing to make out anything noteworthy.

  “I don’t get it,” Leahna suddenly called out through the fog, frowning straight ahead. “If the Talons are after the princess, why attack Cliffport? Why not just grab her off the cloudsea? Wouldn’t that be much easier?”

  Nazyr grunted. “Not necessarily. Cloudsea’s a good place to hide, and a hard one to search. The Crown Princess ain’t no pushover either—she’s a Sapphire at least, prolly has some real nice Runegear too.”

  Rylan cocked his head. “Doesn’t that go for Cliffport, too, though? I mean, there’s no fog, but taking into account the tunnels below the city... Maybe it’s not about her, and capturing her was just a bonus?”

  “You’re all thinking too small!” Yuel called back. “The Talons don’t want the Princess or the city, they want the throne! This isn’t some random attack, it’s the opening bid for a war; the best opening move they could think of!”

  Rylan’s brows rose. That... was a good point.

  “That’s not really an answer, though,” Leahna argued. “We still don’t know why the Talons came after the Princess, or why at Cliffport!”

  “You’re right, it’s not,” Yuel replied cheerily. “But at least you’re asking the right questions now!”

  A silence fell over the craft. Rylan frowned as he tried to think it through.

  The city was, technically, a separate entity with its own rights, subservient only to the King. Theoretically, all of the free cities should flock to the King’s banner if a conflict like this one arose, but there was no guarantee they actually would, let alone in a speedy manner.

  It was true that many of the more influential nobles living in Cliffport—like the Glades—were allied to the Thorns, but they could only advise the city’s council, not control it.

  Everyone knew the royal family was in decline and support for them was wavering, so if the Talons were truly trying to oust the King and take the throne, it would be most helpful to them if they could convince the free cities to stay neutral in the conflict. But if that was their goal, then attacking one outright as the first strike in the war seemed... counterproductive.

  Rylan racked his brain, but couldn’t come up with a satisfying answer. In the end, he shelved the big picture for later, his thoughts instead turning to what they might encounter when they reached their family home...

  He was brought back to the present sometime later by the sound of a heavy impact penetrating the haze around them. Glancing up, he found that the light coming from the Eye of Auris was angled quite a bit higher than before, indicating that they were getting close.

  The flaps behind Rylan shifted.

  “I think we’re nearing Raya’s,” Yuel called. “She was going to light a landing spot for us, but anyway... prepare for landing!”

  Rylan peered down into the fog, looking for lights. He didn’t see any.

  Below them, vague shapes slowly resolved into rolling dunes as they dropped lower. A shack built on top of one of them loomed out of the fog, and passed just barely underneath the fuselage, causing Rylan’s stomach to clench.

  Above them, the sounds of drums, clashing steel, and shouting slowly became more audible.

  ‘You sense anything, Arphin?’

  [I’m looking, Boss, but I don’t recognise—Forge, wall of rock, straight ahead!]

  “Yuel, the cliffs!” Rylan shouted.

  Yuel didn’t hesitate, banking the cloudcrank to the right just as the sheer limestone wall appeared before them.

  “Whoops!” he called back. “We were closer than I thought! Ugh, we’re never gonna find Raya like this; hang on, I’ll take us down here!”

  The cloudcrank dove, heading for a relatively flat strip of sand between shacks below at high speed.

  “Yuel, are you sure about this?!” Leahna shouted worriedly from the other wing.

  “It’ll be fine, trust me!”

  The flaps behind Rylan shifted, the cloudcrank starting to slow down as Yuel lined the craft up with the strip of sand that ended at a rather large rock.

  They were still going awfully fast when the cloudcrank’s runners touched down. The craft shook and bounced over the sand, and if it hadn’t been for the handles, Rylan would definitely have been launched off the wing within seconds.

  Staying on started to become less and less attractive, however, as the big rock at the end of their landing strip rapidly came closer. Rylan braced himself for impact and—as the stone didn’t appear too jagged or sharp—activated Stealth.

  In the end, Rylan managed to stay seated right up until the front of the cloudcrank hit the rock, the impact sending him flying.

  When he hit the rough stone himself, however, his spread-out Mana Shell didn’t flash, just quietly absorbed the impact. In fact, it felt like he’d hit a mattress rather than a big stone!

  I could get used to this!

  His Mana Shell would’ve been able to absorb the blow either way, but his Stealth Skill appeared to make blunt impacts both more mana-efficient and comfortable.

  Deactivating his Skill again, Rylan scrambled to his feet to check on Leahna. Thankfully, she’d been launched past the rock and into the sand, which she was spitting out as she got to her feet.

  Nazyr let out a groan as he hopped unsteadily off the craft, before helping out Yuel.

  Glancing at the broken propellers, Yuel let out a sigh. “Whoops. Raya isn’t going to like that...”

  “Forget about Raya,” Rylan replied, shaking his head. “We’ll compensate her later. Right now, we need to—”

  He cut himself off at a sudden, odd whistling sound.

  [Boss, incoming!] Arphin sent hurriedly, adding along an impression.

  “Take cover!” Rylan cried, rushing over to Leahna and yanking her beneath the cloudcrank’s wing.

  Yuel and Nazyr were quick to follow. Right after, a hail of arrows rained down around them, some of them thumping down on the craft, metal tips sticking out through the thick wings overhead.

  “We need to get to Kher!” Rylan finished when the volley had landed completely. “Let’s move!”

  Yuel and Nazyr seemed to recognise the area they were in, and led them to the right, sticking close to the cliff as they ran to avoid being hit by any stray arrows.

  Along the way, they passed the mangled corpses of several soldiers who appeared to have fallen down. Most of them bore the black on yellow claw of the Talons, but some sported a stylised blue mountain on a white background.

  Rylan didn’t recognise it, but Leahna did.

  “That’s the heraldry of the Peaks,” she hissed. “That means Summit is involved in this attack; they actually threw their lot in with the Talons!”

  Rylan frowned. As two of the largest free cities, Summit and Cliffport were known to have a kind of rivalry going on—exacerbated by the leadership of Summit having ties to the Talons and that of Cliffport to the Thorns—but he’d never expected them to go to war...

  Luckily, they had ended up pretty close to Kher’s shack, and they managed to make it there without any soldiers falling on their heads.

  However, Kher’s shack hadn’t been that lucky.

  Not only were there over a dozen corpses scattered around and on top of his shack, some large rocks had absolutely smashed through his roof.

  Fog, one of those massive harpoons must have hit the wall right overhead!

  Upon seeing the ruined shack, Yuel gasped and sprinted ahead. “Kher, are you there?! If you’re stuck, try to moan or—or knock on something!”

  ‘Arphin, is there anyone below the collapsed shack?’ Rylan sent as he sped up as well.

  [Hmm... Doesn’t seem like it, Boss!]

  Yuel was starting to pull on some of the whale bones Kher had used in the shack’s construction, quickly joined by Nazyr.

  A scream came from above, and another soldier came soaring down through the fog, landing right next to the two former pirates with a heavy thud.

  They both froze.

  “He’s not here!” Rylan called out decisively. “Come on, we need to get into the caves!”

  “But—” Yuel started

  “Trust me!”

  Rylan rushed over to the back wall, pulling away some of the ripped kelp weave that used to hold out the fog, and revealed the hole in the wall. “See? It’s open! He must’ve fled through here. Come on!”

  An ominous whistling sound rose up above them. Rylan quickly helped his sister inside, then Yuel and Nazyr, before finally—as arrows started raining down around him once more—crawling in himself.

  Want to read ahead? Check out my !

  You can also click here to go The Cloudfarers! ^^

  Got a burning question or want to glimpse some more behind-the-scenes stuff?

  Want more of my writing? I've published a completed six-book LitRPG series!

  The Whispering Crystals is available on KU, Audible, and in print:

  : Unnatural Laws

  : Unusual Enemies

  : Unimagined Adventures

  : Unchained Potential

  : Untamed Spirit

  : Undivided Worlds

  /

  Finally, you can to boost me on Topwebfiction.com!