I’m starving-

  Everyone else should be hungry too, but no one said anything as we kept walking in silence. I frown as I look around me. We’re walking in formation with Toulif, Geltor, and Gent in the front, Jammie and Eva in the middle of the pack, and me in the rear.

  I tilt my head and frown, “Aren't you guys hungry?”

  Everyone stops and looks at me as if I just said something crazy. Geltor simply grins. My frown deepens “What?!”

  Jammie starts looking around nervously and I scowl as I remember an earlier interaction with him. “What the fuck is wrong with you people?! And that’s rich coming from me! I was talking about finding an Abominable Mole or something to eat!”

  Jammie looks immediately relieved and Geltor frowns at that. Gent lets out a simple “Oh.”

  I sigh and shake my head, “Jesus, look. I’ll tell you when I sense some sort of abomination and we can eat that. I don’t really want to eat roach meat if I don’t have too.”

  Everyone nods at that and we keep moving. Damn, I can’t believe everyone’s first instinct was to eat the weakest member of the party. Maybe this world is a bit more fucked than I thought.

  I wonder what the outside world is like, maybe I’ll bring it up later.

  For now I need to distribute my stat points. I put 3 Into Agility, Endurance, and Intellect. The rest I dumped into Durability. I felt a small bump in my vitality when I increased my durability, but it was negligible. I think durability increases my total vitality and increasing it gives me a boost, like how increasing endurance gives me more stamina, but my durability is already so massive that it gives diminishing returns.

  I’ll take what I can get. Next I check my new title skill.

  Titanic Presence / Level (N/A)

  (You are able to change your aura to appear titanic. Your presence can’t be ignored by anyone around you. This will affect both friend or foe.)

  Expend stamina to draw attention to yourself

  This skill cannot be leveled

  This seems gimmicky at first glance, but the more I think about it, the more I like it. It synergies perfectly with Obscene Presence. I want to test it out, but I think it would be a bad idea to do that with being around the party. It’s also interesting that this skill can’t be leveled.

  I’ll save it for later for now.

  Next I start working on trying to improve my healing abilities. I lost several molars in my fist fight with Toulif and I think trying to regrow teeth is a good place to start.

  I manifested my aura. With everyone walking in front of me, they won’t freak out from looking at Terrifying Presence. I start focusing on my mouth with the repair function of Aura of Constitution.

  It’s not going very well. No matter how much mana I spend repairing my mouth, no new teeth are coming back. I thought suddenly crossed my mind.

  The Roach Empress-

  They had amazing regeneration abilities, but thinking back I don’t think it was magic. The roach's body was doing it on its own without any assistance from magic. Maybe that’s what I’m missing.

  Manipulate the soul to manipulate the body. To force the body to change. Change the body so it is capable of regrowing.

  It’s worth a shot. Over the next few hours, I attempted to change my body to be capable of regrowing new teeth. Several times I accidentally ripped open my gums before stitching them back together. My teeth cracked before fusing.

  After the third hour I received a notification.

  (Aura of Constitution) has leveled up! (6 → 7)

  And I got a few new baby teeth. I grin as I ignore the aching pain in my mouth. I’m definitely not anywhere near capable of regrowing any eyes, but this is a good start.

  A couple times during that process, I caught Jammie looking back at me before flinching and turning away. He’s not completely frozen up at Terrifying Presence anymore. Maybe people can build up a resistance to it. That sure would be convenient.

  My eye flicks to the side as Magical Aura Perception finally catches something. Two Abominable Mole souls-

  “Alright gang! I found lunch, so let's take a detour!”

  I jog to the front of the pack and Gent lets out a sigh of relief “Finally.” And with that, I take the lead to go hunting.

  ---

  We eventually arrive at where the Abominable Moles are supposed to be, but there is a bit of a speed bump.

  Jammie looks at me confused as I stare at the ground. “Um, where are they?” He asks.

  I look back with furrowed brows. “They are right below us, but I don’t know how to get to them.” I look at the ground with a frown.

  Gent walks past Jammie and prepares his wand. “Tell me exactly where they are.”

  “Right below me, I’d say 13, maybe 12 feet. The other one is the same depth a few feet to my right.”

  Gent walks over and points his wand down. He carves a magic circle into the air, I squint my eye as I pay close attention to the magic. He draws symbols into the circle with the wand and I listen to his chant.

  “World… Break… Movement… Earth…”

  It’s the kind of magic I can’t perform with my class, but something about it I find alluring. I want to reverse engineer the process. Why is he chanting, what do the symbols mean?

  My eye widens as I look closer at the wand. Where have I seen those engravings before?

  My thought is interrupted as he finishes his spell. “Unearth.”

  I decide that it’s a good time to move out of the way as the ground starts rumbling. I look down to see the moles suddenly start moving away only to be stopped. The Abominable Moles are pulled up to the surface and I grin as the ground breaks apart.

  The first mole launches out of the ground and I catch it. I throw a jab at its head and I hear a crack.

  You have slain a (Abominable Mole / level 14)

  -

  Very little experience rewarded

  I look over to see the other mole scrambling towards me with rage in its soul. I smile sadistically as a rock hand grabs the mole. I Instant Position next to it and step on its head.

  If you spot this narrative on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.

  You have slain a (Abominable Mole / level 12)

  -

  Very little experience rewarded

  I sigh, “And that’s that.”

  Eva and Toulif look at each other and Jammie scowls “We are supposed to eat those?”

  I frown at him, “Yeah?”

  I shake my head as I grab the two moles and set them next to each other. The party watches as I start to butcher them.

  I start by ripping off their snouts and hanging them to the wall by their tail to drain their blood. While they drain, I rip off all of their claws and discard them. After they finish draining I pull them off the wall and peel off their skin. I create a large incision with a soul-knife on their midsection and take out all their internal organs and entrails to discard them.

  I use their ribs to make more kebabs after I cut up their flesh. I turn to ask Eva to make a fire only to pause. Toulif is crouched next to her collapsed body. Oh, she fainted-

  ---

  I ended up having to use my soul as a bonfire to cook the meat, which I think is metal as hell, but the others are still disturbed my Terrifying Presence. I explained it to them, so they know I’m not doing it on purpose, but it’s still uncomfortable.

  That’s why I wanted Eva to make the fire, but since she is… Taking a nap, and no one else can make fire, soul fire will have to do.

  Gent, Geltor, and Jammie are sitting by the fire with me. Frowning while looking into the flames. Eva is sleeping nearby within eyeshot. Toulif took his food elsewhere to ‘eat’ without his mask. Toulif used to just sit in the tent and discard his food. Do elves just not need to eat?

  I look over to see Jammie noticeably closer to me. Huh… Jammie speaks up before I can question it however. “Are we going to talk about it?”

  He looks between me and Gent. I raise an eyebrow, “Talk about what?”

  Jammie turns to me before ‘very inconspicuously’ points toward Eva. “About the captain and vice captain. They aren’t who they say they are.” He keeps his voice low, “I heard you refer to her as Eva.”

  I grimace as I remember that I accidentally said that during my grand speech. It’s not my fault, I thought I was dead! I open my mouth only for nothing to come out.

  I frown and try to speak again. I’m completely unable to make any noise. “What the fuck?!” I blink at my sudden ability to speak again.

  Geltor starts to chuckle, “Looks like you can get affected by your summoner’s skills as well. Sucks to be you!”

  “What?”

  Geltor jumps up and perches on my shoulder “Tied Tongue, you are unable to talk about anything about your summoner that they consider a secret. It’s annoying, but common among Demonic Summoners.”

  I blink at that and grin internally. That means I have a perfectly good excuse to be unable to reveal Eva’s real identity. I turn to the now frowning Jammie and simply shrug. I go to start eating again, only for Gent to speak up.

  “They’re elves.”

  I pause mid bite and Jammie's head snaps to him, “Are you serious?”

  Gent looked at him with an uncaring gaze, “Yeah, it makes sense. What did you expect when you joined a cult this size? That it would be based solely within the Holy Kingdom. No. I’m confident all the higher ups of this cult are elves.”

  I feel Jammie's soul rapidly shift through shock, confusion, then rage. He stands up and snaps at Gent. “How can you be so calm! If they’re fucking elves-”

  “Quiet!” Gent’s gaze switches to Eva as she turns in her sleep. He shakes his head. “Calm down. Come on Jammie, you joined a cult. Are you going to be a good guy now that you know that you're working for elves? Switch your class to Cleric, why don’t you?”

  Jammie scowls and his face contorts into various emotions, before finally sitting down. He looks over at Eva and whispers under his breath. “We’re working for fucking zetan’s.”

  “What’s wrong with being an elf?”

  The two humans look at me and Geltor reclines over my shoulder, completely uninterested in the conversation. Gent scratches his chin, “I don’t know what elves are like from where you’re from, but on this continent, all elves are under the Zeta Empire.”

  He chews on the end of his kebab of mole meat and continues, “Zetan’s don’t like humans much, viewing us as lesser beings. The Holy Kingdom of Soteria has been ‘at war’ with the zetan’s for the past 2000 years for their crimes against humanity. They have been slaughtering and enslaving humans for millennia now.”

  Jammie shakes his head as his anger boils over. “And you knew that they were elves and yet you’re completely fine with this?”

  Gent shrugs, “They kept me alive so far, so as long as I pretend I don’t know what they are, they’ll keep me alive.”

  “Until you’re not useful or an inconvenience. They will throw you away the moment it’s advantageous to them. That's what happened to Charlie!”

  Gent’s glare bores into him, “Quiet.”

  Jammie clenches his teeth before throwing his hands in the air and scoffing. He gets up and walks away from the conversation. He goes to sit by himself, near the dungeon wall.

  A tense silence envelopes us, but I’m too busy contemplating this issue. Apparently elves hate humans. I look over at the sleeping Eva to my right and pull up a part of my status.

  Objective / Earn Trust!

  -

  Gain the favor of Eva Le’tain (0/1)

  -

  Reward / New Skill

  I thought I made good progress towards this goal. I guess this is going to be harder than I thought.

  I turn back towards Gent. “Anything else about elves I should know?”

  He is in the middle of chewing and he tilts his head as he thinks about the question, he swallows. “Their emperor is about to die. Well, maybe not. The emperor is over 2000 years old if the rumours are true. That would be if a human was over 200 years old, so take it with a grain of salt.” He sighs, “Other than that, I don’t know.”

  I frown, I was hoping for something more useful, maybe Gent would recognize the Le’tain name, but when I tried to ask, nothing came out. Oh yeah, forgot about that.

  I lay on my back and just let the conversation end like that. Still, this is an annoying problem to have. Maybe Eva isn’t racist towards humans, it’s not like prejudice is genetic and I don’t expect all elves to hate humans. But if Eva grew up in the Zeta empire or whatever, she would probably have some disdain for humans.

  I sigh. In the end, the only way I can resolve this is just by talking to her, so I’ll just shelve this issue for another day when I get the chance to talk to her alone.

  For now, I want to do something else, “Hey Gent! Can I see that wand?”

  He blinks for a moment before shrugging and tossing me the wand. I catch it and bring it up to my face.

  My eye glazes over the intricate engravings on the wand. It’s mostly just squiggly lines, but sometimes they spiral together into a point. I’ve seen these engravings before.

  They match the engravings on my soul-

  I turn my perception inward to see the small engravings going around the edges of the container of my mana. I have literally no idea what they mean, or why they are engraved onto wands as well.

  My curiosity reaches a new zenith. I can’t hold back anymore, so I decide to ask Gent. “So, what are the engravings for?”

  He looks down at me before shrugging “On the wand? I don’t know.”

  “Huh?”

  He repeats himself with a mouth full of food, “I said, I don’t know.”

  I blink to myself as I process his words. “W- what? Whatever- Why do you chant then?”

  He nods and swallows, “That, I do know. It helps to actualize the visualization of magical effects.” He grins at me. “Wanna have me give an example?”

  I have a hard time following his words, “Sure?”

  He takes his hand and hovers it over the rock. He pulls his hand up and a hand made of rock emerges out of the ground. “That was Magical Earth Manipulation.”

  I blink at him as he pushes the hand back into the ground. He brings his hand over the same patch of rock and starts chanting. “World… Break… Grasp… Lust…” He pulls his hand up and dozens of hands emerge from the ground all around us.

  “Again, that was Magical Earth Manipulation. This time I used it while chanting. Both times I used the exact same amount of mana.” He grins at me again with his usually tired eyes. I feel a small amount of excitement coming from his soul. “Here, hand me the wand.”

  I hand it to him and his smile deepens. He begins carving the symbols into the air and I start to smile as well. I think I might be able to chant as well to affect my magic, it’s something I’ll have to give trial and error.

  Gent is also enjoying himself as he shows off his magic skills, but right about when he was going to cast a particularly big spell, Toulif walks around the corner.

  Gent immediately stops casting and Toulif gives him a glare before joining Eva’s side without saying anything. Geltor rolls over and continues his task of doing nothing. Gent sighs and continues eating in silence. Jammie sits by my side and grabs another kebab.

  I grit my teeth in silence. This is fucking awkward-