(Arc 2 Complete!) Path of the Last Champion [Sci-Fantasy LitRPG, Party Dynamics, Earned Power]

"Hmmm…"

Cen raised her eyes from the floating, shifting poorly formed spheres of aura that she held, with a clenched jaw, just about under control above her two hands.

"Good gains on [Mastery] and [Aura Pathways], and [Piercing Projectile] is a good addition to your tool kit. As casters, it's pivotal for us to build up a repertoire of skills that we can use for any situation, and quantity really is quality for us," the Master of Aura said, her eyes still on the floating window of Cen's stats, made visible to each of them through their UIs. "And I reckon you will continue to add more and more modifications to your [Aura Projectiles] as you continue to experiment with your aura."

"Yes, master," Cen said, breathing the words rather than speaking them.

One of the globs of aura dipped dangerously low and away from her hands and she grit her teeth to bring it back under control.

"[Scattering Drops] is an interesting addition, and the fact that a perfectly functional skill such as this comes up with an incomplete warning makes it even more interesting," the master said, unbothered by Cen's near loss of control. "It suggests that rather than the issue being with the skill itself, it pertains to your own understanding of it and to the way you yourself see it. This most likely means that given your unknown affinity, this skill is not in its correct form as you have unlocked it…"

"M-Me?" Cen asked, unable to keep her eyes on the spheres of aura.

Predictably, the three of them went drifting off on their own accord, their shapes loosening as her will lost control over them. Before they could touch the floor, however, the three semi-shapes congealed together, compressed into a tiny dot, and floated back inside Cen.

"Thank you, master…" she said, mutely, as her aura bar reflected the recovery of nearly 100% of the aura she had just spent.

"As you might have guessed, this is most likely due to your unlocked affinity," the master continued, unbothered. "It manifests, yes, but it is incomplete. Incorrect… We shall need to see what you make of this skill as your understanding of your affinity and path progresses. As for the part of the warning where it says you need to control this skill yourself, don't worry about it. It is just the nature for the more hands-on auramancy skills, caster or not. I myself have a good deal of such skills. It's just part of the System's poor understanding of auramancy."

"Yes, master," Cen said, keeping her eyes on her knees.

The two of them sat cross legged in a tiny room that Cen had never been in before. A cube that was barely 6 by 6 feet wide, its flooring was hard and cold, necessitating them to sit upon wide, flat pillows for comfort. The walls, ceiling and floor were made of interlocking grays of different colors, and a sense of heavy emptiness emanated from them, making Cen feel as though she was encased in a floating nothingness.

She had been excited at the Master of Aura's invitation to join her in her own private meditation chambers to discuss her dungeon gains and future training, but that excitement had been quickly doused by the master's ever so cold attitude towards her.

What have I done? Cen wondered to herself, keeping her hands from balling into fists. I know how she is with the others… So why? Why is she like this only to me?

Even when the promise that the two of them would delve into the mysteries of aura together had given Cen hope that she had managed to win the woman's affection, admiration and perhaps even her praise, all of her hopes had been and remained dashed by the master's cold behavior. What was she missing?

"Start again," the Master of Aura told her. "Focus."

"Yes, master."

Cen closed her eyes and concentrated on her core, reaching for the warm, powerful sensation of her aura within it. Stilted at first, but growing smoother and more confident, Cen pulled her aura down her pathways, to pool onto her hands. Then, with sweat beading down the sides of her brow, she commanded her aura to rise to about eight inches above her joined hands, and split apart the three spheres once again, setting them to follow a circular motion in the air.

"The best of these skills gain however, is undoubtedly [Aura Constructs]," the master said, her eyes back on the list. "This is the perfect entry point for direct aura manipulation, and it will continue to wield you with many more skills, just like it has for [Piercing Projectile] and [Scattering Drops]."

"Yes, master," Cen said, trying not to think too much at the master's use of the word "perfect".

It only implies that the skill is good, which it should be given that it's a rare skill, she told herself, coolly, keeping the orbs under control. Not that you are.

"As for attribute gains…"

The skills tab disappeared and was replaced by Cen's status.

"Not bad," the master seemed to reluctantly concede. "Sure, there's little to nothing on Body attributes, but we have no use for those, do we? The core of your power is your Soul and Mind skills, and that's where we want to see the gains. However, before we proceed, I sense that you are unhappy, Cen… About these gains."

Startled, Cen looked up.

"Don't drop them…" the master said, motioning with her chin towards the glowing orbs of aura.

The lengos pressed her lips together as she coerced her aura back into place, and fixed the shapes of the orbs. She was unsure of what to say, however.

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"You can be honest," the master said. "In fact, you should. Or else this doesn't work."

Cen sighed.

"I'm sorry, master… It's just… [Scattering Drops] feels so… Wrong. It literally blows holes through… Things," she said, grimacing. "And I already have another skill in mind that is even worse… And I cannot shake it away from my head. Nor do I actually think I should push away such a powerful skill…"

Her orbs drifted once again, and she turned her eyes back to them.

"I just… I don't want to have a path that is filled with such… Horror… It's not why I choose a caster class, and it's not what I want my life to be… I want to understand aura. To connect more deeply to it and to-to fulfill its true potential! To see the wonders that it's truly capable of! But this… My potential affinity scares me."

The thought of her bare aura, tearing flesh and bones, and limb from limb, making a mess of bits and gore… As naive as it sounded, the way to bring down the enemy mattered to her. Better it be a [Piercing Projectile], steady and true and quick, than… Than whatever that new skill whispering to her from the depths of her mind was.

But didn't you want your [Piercing Projectile] to instead explode that moss-back from inside? The stray thought reached out to question her, and she sighed heavily at it.

The master considered Cen's words for a moment, her boundless blue eyes trailing the movement of the orbs above her curled palms.

"I can see where your concerns stem from," the master said, her tone growing softer. "While DPS skills are destructive and damaging per nature, some skills are more so than others… And some are significantly more so. But if your path is heading in a direction that makes you unhappy, it is within your power to change that, Cen. "You are what you do" is law, and for an auramancer caster, especially those like us, who more deeply connect with our auras, that is even truer."

Cen lifted her eyes, hope brimming in them.

"If you wish to shape more defensive and supportive skills, then by all means, have a go at it Cen. I am not here to sway you in either way, only to guide you as you further your learning of aura, in the process hoping to learn more myself," the master said, a hint of a smile touching her lips.

"It… It would be okay?" Cen asked, her voice cracking.

"Of course! Shape and create what you wish, Cen. It is your life to live and your path to build!" the master said, with a chuckle that startled Cen. "If you want more "wondrous" skills, as you put it, who is stopping you from going after them? I certainly won't, and no one aboard this ship is going to either!"

Cen sniffled lightly, and nodded effusively. "I-I see, master. Thank you."

The master gave her a firm nod, but then a pensive expression took her ageless features.

"That being said, Cen, you cannot forget that destructive skills got you where you are sitting now," she said, her tone cautious. "You had to blast and break your way up from that cubeplant and through that Ceremony, and if not for your new [Scattering Drops], you and your whole party would not have survived the encounter with that illatrian and its forces. Nar and Mul finished it, yes, but only because you cleared all those ads for them… I would therefore advise extreme caution in forswearing offensive skills entirely, even those you deem "horrifying". As I said, it is good for a caster to have a broad and varied toolkit of skills from which to draw from, and you never know when you will face a situation where, for example, that new horrible skill in your head might prove to be the only solution, and the way out for you and your party… Better to tear the enemy limb from limb, screaming and bleeding, than let that happen to you or your party instead. You would only die with regret, Cen. Trust me, I have seen it… You are not my first apprentice, after all, and despite my looks, I am quite old."

Cen clenched her jaw, but she couldn't fault the master's logic. She knew she was being disingenuous and naive, but she couldn't help but dream for more from her affinity. Creation had proven itself to be so much more awe striking than she had ever imagined, and she couldn't hide the pang in her heart when she considered the possibility that she would bring nothing but devastation onto it. She wanted more than that.

She wanted to create in some way, and to bring joy into existence in some fashion. She had no idea what, or how, but the desire, the need, beat strongly in her chest, echoing through her core and soul, and she knew she couldn't let it go.

"As I said before, Cen, there is a balance to all things," the master told her. "If you want to deepen your understanding of aura far beyond what most do, then you will need to embrace its dual nature. Aura is both destructive and healing, eradicating and nurturing, and horrifying and awe strikingly beautiful both. So, and by all means, explore different kinds of skills and ways of using your aura, but don't shy away from its more offensive applications, no matter how horrific. Or you will come to regret it."

It was not fully what Cen had wanted to hear, but again, she could not fault the master's logic. And she was entirely correct. Better she bring upon horror upon her foes, than her foes bring it upon her and her party…

"I-I will, master. Thank you," she said, bowing her head. "I will… And will also learn this new skill as well."

"No worries, apprentice," the master said, once again surprising Cen with a beaming smile. "But please, do your experimenting here, in this room."

"Here?" Cen asked, frowning at the walls nearly entombing them.

"Yes. From what you told me, you've been lucky so far you haven't wiped your entire party!" the master said with a cackle, Cen's expression turning horrified. "And I can guess they are tired of it happening too! That's why I called you in here. This room is built with immense anti-aura safeguards. It's essentially a much, much, much more powerful aura pod, and in here, you can go as wild as you want in relative safety. And I say relative because the ship will be absolutely fine, but the same can't be said for you… This room will do nothing to stop you from doing something dangerous or stupid, and you can quite literally turn yourself into bloody bits."

Cen gulped, scanning the walls that now felt even more claustrophobic, the silence within the room with them even denser now, as though it were a true presence.

"If you feel prepared for it, I will give you the permissions needed to enter and use this room as you please," the master continued. "But it will be your responsibility to keep yourself unharmed, Cen. Is that understood?"

"Yes, master," Cen said, quickly bowing her head. "And thank you for letting me use your personal meditation chamber."

The master waved her words away. "Thank me with results, apprentice, and by keeping yourself in one piece. Now, let's talk about the next steps."

Her tone adopted its usual cold and business-like manner, and Cen sighed inwardly, even as she leaned forward, excited to know what they would be doing next.

"We have confirmed that you have a great ability for direct aura manipulation, and to do anything other than to build your path around this capability would be nothing but a disservice to yourself and the guild," the master said. "With that said, I want you to continue training your direct control over your aura, and to expand your skills list. But I do want to see quality, you hear me? Despite what I just said, you are to be an elite caster, and I don't care for dumb, lazy numbers. I want powerful and useful skills, and they should be uncommon at the very least! So whether it is defensive or offensive, put your brain to task and bring me awe inspiring skills that deepen your understanding and control of your aura, is that clear?"

"Yes, master!" Cen said, nodding with conviction, and she wouldn't want it to be any other way.

"It goes without saying that you should continue improving your 3 Skills of Aura Governance if you expect to keep growing as an auramancer caster. Getting your third attribute modifier in [Aura***] is excellent, but it will be impossible for you to get the fourth and fifth into it as well. There is a chasm between the 350 points required for the third attribute, and the requirements for the fourth one. And as for the fifth… Well, I don't know what the requirements for that are, and there might as well be a whole Creation between the fourth and fifth attribute modifiers. So put those last two out of your mind! Instead, we are going to try and focus on something much more useful for you…"

She brought back Cen's status, and six attributes were highlighted across it.

"The attributes of the Mind?" Cen asked.

"Indeed, the next priority for a caster," the master said, holding her chin. "You have thus far unlocked six out of the 8 Attributes of the Mind, and I am sorry to tell you, but you will never unlock the final two. One of them is [Steadfastness], which makes it aether based and therefore completely out of your grasp, and the other one is the [Neural Processing] variants, which casters do not possess. But more on that later, hold that thought… Instead, what's going on with those things you call aura spheres?"

Cen leaned back from the window in between them as though it had scalded them, the master and tutted at her as her aura spheres dropped even further, risking collapsing against her lap.

"Sorry, master!" Cen cried out, pulling them higher once again.

"Focus! Now, first, a little bit about the attributes of the Mind," the master continued. "While I told you we would be talking about them after your third assessment, that was not due to any great, Nexus shattering secret or mystery. I simply wanted you to concentrate on your aura control first. But that said, the attributes of the Mind work a little differently than the other ones."

Cen's spheres suddenly pressed forward, picking up speed on their own volition, and with a strangled yelp she was forced to keep them from zipping straight into the walls.

"Now that's better. Keep it up," the master said, nodding to herself. "Attributes of the Mind behave a little bit like [Mastery], in the sense that they do not operate on fully defined, set rules. While you can place two combat classes side by side and know that the faster one is the one with the highest [Speed], you can't do the same with these attributes. Just like auramancers with the same level of [Mastery] can control different quantities of aura, so the attributes of the Mind can manifest themselves in different ways and quantities. A thief's [Cunning] can be very different from a party leader, or, quite the same… It comes down to paths, personality and deeds. The same goes for [Intuition]. While one might be more intuitive in scholarly pursuits, another might instead be better at reading people for example, and how in the Nexus can you decide between which one is smartest, other than circumstantially? And the same goes for [Logic], [Creativity], [Shaping] and [Memory], though the last one, for casters, tends to materialize in the very concrete way of allowing us to know more skills."

"You need [Memory] for that?" Cen asked, her eyes going wide.

"Yes. While the System, in general, handles the major share of creating, assigning and facilitating skills, the knowledge is stored within your subconscious mind. And it's quite large," the master explained. "Thus, the more skills you hope to attain, and of higher quality, the higher your [Memory] must be, or you will reach a hard limit. This is one of the reasons why casters, in general, have a lot more skills they can draw upon, building extensive databases worth of skills for every function and need, than non-caster classes."

"Databases…" Cen breathed, stunned.

The master chuckled. "Well databases might be pushing it a little, but there are casting masters out there walking with hundreds of skills in their heads."

"Hundreds?" the apprentice gaped.

"It's a big Creation out here, Cen. And we have barely begun to scratch the surface of it," the master said, grinning at her. "But getting back to your attribute modifiers in particular, [Creativity] and [Shaping] are the ones we would be aiming for next, and it shouldn't be too difficult given your path. Of course, we would want [Shaping] to take the fourth modifier rather than [Creativity], because the doing always beats out the thinking. Which is why I want to see more skills coming into fruition."

"Understood, master."

"And on top of that, Cen, while the other casters will be receiving a variety of new weapons to aid them, new focuses, you will receive no such thing," the master said, motioning towards her quick spinning orbs of aura. "Such things are only hindrances to casters like us, bringing disadvantages, rather than benefits. To reach true mastery of aura, your mind, body and soul will be your only tools. So give me your staff, Cen. Going forward, you have no more need for such a crutch. Ah-ah! Don't drop the orbs!"

Squinting in concentration, Cen split a tiny part of her willpower to bring out her staff, and it was with relief she saw it appear beside her, leaving her spheres undisturbed. However, it was with a heavy heart that she watched the master reach forward to store it into her own inventory.

"I know you might have some attachments to it," the master said. "It helped and served you well thus far. But to go further, you need to let go of it. And I need to take it from you, to ensure the temptation of going back to it does not distract or hinder you."

"I… Yes, master, I understand. Thank you."

"Then, we have the matter of your senses," the Master of Aura said. "I'm sure that by now, you must be struggling to keep track of your enemy, even of your own party!"

Cen winced. "Yes. It's becoming harder and harder, especially with Nar and Viy. Most of the time, they're just blurs to me during combat!"

The master nodded sagely. "And it will only get worse… Unless you do something about it, that is."

"Me?" Cen asked, dumbfounded.

"Party leader apprentices will have reached level 35 across the board, and with it come two important gains. One of them you will hear about soon enough, but the other is one of the [Neural Processing] attributes, [NPL] in their case, with the "L" standing for Leadership," the master explained. "There's no chance in the Abyss for party leaders to be able to do anything if they're blind, deaf and their brain can't keep track of the increasingly faster battles around them. For that reason, amongst the boosts provided by [NPL], is the fact that it grants a passive effect that allows party leaders' sense attributes to match the average of the entire party."

"Wow…" Cen breathed.

"Powerful, isn't it? It won't be enough to replace the role of scouts or sentries by any means, but it should be enough to at least keep them in fighting shape and to be able to keep up and continue making decisions in the heat of battle… And this is all good and fine for them, but it doesn't do anything for us. No, in the case of casters, we need to take matters into our hands. And surely you can easily guess how…"

"We boost ourselves?" Cen said, frowning. "With aura?"

"Or aether, if you're an aethermancer. But for us, it starts with cycling first, as I'm sure you've seen the physical classes do, and then our efforts turn into skills," the master explained. "And none of that incomplete drivel for these skills. They will be perfectly functional, and they can be both passive or active."

The older woman gave her a cursory glance. "In your case, I think we should aim for both, and we'll focus on your [Sight] first. No use in having all of those "horrifying" skills of yours if you can't track and hit anything, eh?"

"Yeah…" Cen said, downcast.

"I'm joking with you, child," the Master of Aura said. "But yes, let's focus on giving your [Sight] a boost first, as you will desperately need it for what's coming. However, Cen, I must warn you that one thing is seeing, another one entirely is acting. Plenty of casters have died due to forgetting this simple rule, so Cen, always remember that we are not Body fighters. Distance and a safe position are your greatest allies and priorities in battle. Never forget that."

"And speaking of sight, something else we want you to unlock is [Aura Sight]. This skill is a must for every aura healer out there, and while it's not extremely helpful per se for you, one, it will be good for you to be able to actually see your aura within your body, and two, it's the humble origins for something far more advanced that you will need down the line. But, baby steps. Baby steps… We'll talk more when we get there. But for the most part, there you have it. What do you think of my plans?"

"It's great, master! I can't wait to get started!" Cen said, her eyes ablaze.

The master pursed her lips. "It will be exciting… But unfortunately, that blocker is going to have to stay where it is for the foreseeable future. Especially if you're going to continue messing around with your aura like that. We don't you blowing yourself up, do we?"

Cen shook her quickly. "It's not a problem, master. I trust you, and I'm grateful that you've done it."

"Hmmm…" the master said. "Anyways, what happened to your orbs?"

The apprentice caster glanced down at her hands and didn't find a single shred of aura.

"Up," the master said.

Cen looked up and found her orbs motionless, and floating just inches from the ceiling. "Oh…"

The master sighed.

"We have a lot on our plate. Come on. Again."