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

The final and last dungeon of the day was an interesting affair.

Its structure was similar to the first two, a boss room with several adds fighting alongside it, but the third dungeon had three such rooms instead, and in their "learner" state, it ended up taking hours to slog through the entire wet, smelly tunnels they found themselves in.

Thankfully, there was no near-wipe threat of the ceiling collapsing on them again, as Cen vowed to be extremely careful and Viy elected to not use her [Weight of Guilt] in such an enclosed space. But they were tired, and wet and cold, and frustrated at their pace and mistakes, and for Gad and Mul in particular, their lack of proper progress rendered them nearly mute.

The final boss only made things worse by being some slimy bivalve stuck to the ceiling in the center of a V shaped cave. Not only was the damn thing out of reach for the melee, its shell was incredibly tough and arrows and rings bounced off of it easily, even when coated with aura.

Since Cen couldn't go all out for fears of cave in, and it was ruled best for Nar not to use his [Aura Blade] either, what followed was a full near 20 minutes of Tuk and Rel slowly chipping away at the boss' HP whenever it opened its shell to spit at them, and for the party to basically stand in a never ending stream of regenerating smaller bivalves that just like the boss, spat at them non-stop.

By the time they finally killed the beast, they were all coated in slimy, corrosive, thick and smelly light greenish goo.

"All good, it didn't actually do a lot of damage and the poison is already gone," Jasphaer declared, examining the parts where the slime had eaten through the aura armor, after they hastily washed in ankle deep, salty water from one of the tunnels. "We all just need a hot shower and we'll be okay."

All in all, it had been absolutely nasty, and the other apprentices made faces at their party as they joined the queues rushing down to make it to the beetle before it left, which soured their moods even further. And it only got worse when they were forced by the crew to go under a heavy duty, communal shower specifically built for just exactly that purpose, and they were blasted from all sides with a mix of boiling hot water and a strong-smelling chemical of some kind. And because the damned showers were transparent, they, and other unfortunate parties, were everyone's entertainment as they waited to be loaded onto the beetle.

By the time they were somewhat dry and seated aboard the ship, thankfully being flown back to the Scimitar on time, they were a quiet and exhausted party.

"I know it was rough out today, people. But hang in there! We'll get better," Kur told them through the party chat.

"Of course we will!" Tuk chimed in, his enthusiasm shining through as always. "Besides, I've made some very fond memories today…"

Nar could feel Mul glowering at his side, and was thankful for the suppressor keeping his fires contained to the brawler's imagination.

"Tomorrow morning, we get our own lectures and classes, but the afternoon is free training again," Kur continued. "I've got some notes for everyone to work on, and I'll send them over tomorrow. For now, let's just go home, and tomorrow we'll worry about tomorrow."

They gave him a tired mental acknowledgment and Nar peered past Rel to look out the window. Outside, the beetle flew alongside the Scimitar.

Home, he thought. And it felt true in his heart.

A warmth, a sense of belonging and safety after the wet and cold day that they had out in the dungeons.

**********

The beetle had barely touched down on the hangar when he received the notification.

New gear?

He looked down at his black, light sucking skin tight combat gear. After the encounter with the bivalves' slime attacks, there were holes and gaps across it, showing his reddened skin underneath. His combat gear was slowly fixing itself, tugging at his aura to speed up the process, and would be good as new in the morning.

What does she want me to wear? He wondered as he joined the others in queuing to exit the aethership.

He tapped on Kur's shoulders as they climbed down the stairs.

"I need to head over to my training," he said, purposefully avoiding any mention of Tys or COO where others could hear him, and whispering the words in Kur's ear rather than the use the party chat so he could avoid a round of encouraging, if pity filled stares and words from the others.

"Got it. Nervous?" Kur asked, hanging back a little without the others noticing.

Nar grimaced. "A little, yeah."

"You'll do great. Go on, I'll tell the others."

A few minutes later, Nar was by himself, on his way towards the same arena in which they had talked the day before. His heart hammered in chest, steady, but a little anxious about what was to come, and the warnings of the brutality of his upcoming training echoed in his mind. No matter how hard he tried to, he couldn't help but keep thinking about them.

At last, he made it to the double doors of the arena, and his feet walked across the surprisingly soft, brown-orange sand.

Tonight, the Ascendant was wearing an entirely black attire that displayed the symbol of Tsurmirel in a much more discreet size to the left of her chest.

"Evening," Tys said, looking him over with a smile. "Tough luck?"

Nar grimaced. "Our party has some stuff to work on."

"Good. Better here than in the Brightnight, and it's part of the process," she told him. "It was the exact same with my own party, but we got it sorted in the end."

Nar nodded. In all honesty, he wasn't worried about it. They would get through it, individually and together. It was just a matter of time and patience.

Then, pleasantries out of the way, Tys folded her arms and her expression darkened.

"Before we begin, I will once more give you an out," she said. "Once we start tonight, we won't stop until you depart for the Brightnight. So, do you still want to do this?"

Nar clenched his jaw, but gave her a firm nod.

"Alright. First, a little bit of theory then," she said. "I told you yesterday that we're going to focus on unlocking a number of passives that will be crucial for you, and that seemed to come as a bit of a surprise."

He hesitated, then he nodded.

"I know that passives are important, and all of mine are incredible. And I also know that they can even be critical to some paths, who lean heavily on passives," Nar said, having mulled over it throughout the day.

Those people were Jul with her [Insidious Fear] passive that was the current center of her entire fighting style, and Mul with his still locked, but terrifyingly powerful fiery rage passives awaiting to be unleashed. However, his eyes had always been set on [Mantle of the Champion] and [Strike of the Champion], the two immensely powerful advanced skills that he had been allowed to use at the end of the Ceremony of Final Atonement.

"It's just that I never thought my path would be one of those," he concluded.

"A fair point," Tys said. "Each path is usually composed of one guiding concept and that concept manifests through what we call mechanics. The mechanics of a path are the unique ways with which its skills synergize with one another, and some skills may only become available following the use of another skill first, while for some paths their skills might need to be used in a specific rotation that maximizes their damage potential based around cooldowns and cascading effects."

"So Jul's [Insidious Fear] is a mechanic?" he asked, frowning.

"It's a core mechanic. Currently, her path is built around stacking up that debuff as quickly as possible in order to trigger, or proc as some like to call it, the devastating effects of [Insidious Terror]," she explained. "And your brawler is currently learning to control his rage to a point where he can finally start using his passives. [Heart of Rage] in particular, is the core mechanic at the heart of his soon to become a berserker path, and is what we call a resource management mechanic. He needs to gain and spend his instances of [Burning Anger] in order to boost his DPS and to avoid burning himself up in the process, and despite their many varieties and unique styles and flavors, all berserker paths follow a resource management mechanic at their core."

"I think I get it… And my path is going to be like that? Centered around a passive mechanic?" he asked.

She shook her head.

"Your path is a lot freer and relaxed when it comes to skills. You won't have any rotations, or combos, or demands, or any other such things that require you to follow a set strategy or setup," she said. "No, your mechanic will be more in tune with your two hybrid concepts."

"To take damage and deal damage?" he asked, unable to cringe a little at the sound of it.

She smiled. "Don't be ashamed of your path, Nar. There is true might in it, and much more than you can even begin to imagine now. But yes, to be able to deal enormous amounts of damage and self-tank immense amounts of damage as well."

She approached him and circled him, looking him up and down.

"In order to achieve that, your core mechanic needs to be one that empowers you. That bolsters and strengthens you much beyond any other path."

She chuckled at his blank expression. "I know that sounds like all passive skills, but what you in particular need to do is purposefully earn a range of very powerful passive skills. Most people have some of these passives, but very, very few have them all. The combined price to acquire them is… Heavy."

A shadow passed over her expression, then she shook it off with a smile.

"Passive skills will be crucial to you, and they will help tremendously with enabling your hybrid path without stretching it to the point of breaking apart. Passive skills take a lot less to maintain than active skills, and thus, they will be the core of your hybrid path, and at this stage, suffice to say, you will have a good deal more of passives than active skills. As for the actives you do get in the future, they should all be powerful, and highly upgraded skills of course, which will be flexible in order to cover any and all situations… But more on that in the future," she told him. "We've got enough on our plate just with passives alone for now."

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"I see," Nar said. "That makes sense…"

And it really did. His own master had cautioned him again and again about the risks of their hybrid undertaking, and that in order to succeed, Nar needed to be laser focused on cutting out anything that was not crucial to his path.

So far, that list included taunt skills, buffing and debuffing capabilities, and AOE effects like Viy's [Weight of Guilt] mental assault or Mul's [The Roaring Fire Within], which, once under the brawler's control, would affect the effectiveness and control of all skills within a 6-feet radius. And that was just the current list, as his master promised him that there would be more. Also, Nar would never have a significant number of complex active skills either, and instead, the golden man promised that the skills Nar did gain would be upgraded to almost beyond recognition.

And Tys seems pointed in the same direction, he thought.

Beyond skills, the Master of Blades had basically forbidden him from even pursuing activities such as gathering and harvesting, as well as any and all elective modules and disciplines available aboard the Scimitar as well, all in the name of keeping him focused and supporting his already overfull routine and path demands.

Tys pursed her lips and crossed her arms, the movement bringing Nar back to the present. "As for your first two passives, I wish I could show you, as these two are skills that I have. But there's no weapon aboard that can get through my [Toughness], and even with my hands, before I could actually hurt myself, I would probably wreck the ship first… So you're just going to have to take my word for it, alright?"

"Uh… Sure," Nar said, stunned at the casual revelation of her prowess. Or, more accurately, to what was probably just a tiny portion of her capabilities.

"Right, so, the very first thing we're aiming to get is self-healing," she said.

He blinked at her. "What…"

She burst out laughing. "I know it sounds crazy, but stay with me, alright?"

He nodded slowly.

Self-healing? How is that even possible? He thought, his heart racing at the sudden possibility.

"They told you kids that you're pretty shit at actually making full use of your attributes, right?" she asked him.

"Yes. We're all around 50%," he said, remembering what the Master of Blades had told them in their first Blades class.

"Something like that, though right now, you're above the average. The Master of Aura puts you at around 55% efficiency, which is pretty impressive given how little training you've gotten," she grimaced. "Have to have gotten something for growing up an Unclean, I suppose…"

Nar stiffened at the sudden mention of his past.

"Sorry. I… Uh, sort of saw the whole thing raging from you when you unlocked your [Presence]," she said, pursing her lips apologetically.

He held his breath for a moment, but then he exhaled heavily. "It's fine. It's who I am. Who I was. And if you are to be my teacher, it's probably best that you know everything."

She nodded.

"Your past is safe with me, and I don't have a habit of babbling about other people's lives anyways," she said. "But as I was saying, your double shifts are the main reason why you are ahead of the other apprentices in attribute utilization. And this all comes down to aura."

"Aura?"

"Yes. Or aether. It's the same for the aethermancers," she explained. "We all start as just natural creatures of bone, flesh and blood. When we join with the System, we gain the capacity to stack up attributes, and to go beyond what our natural bodies, which are initially forged out of materialized aether, like all other things are, can achieve"

"Even us?" Nar asked, surprised.

"Even us. Just like water comes from aether and we can safely drink it, so are we made from aether and then become auramancers," she told him. "But to be a class holder is not so simple. There are limits to what our natural bodies can endure, and limits to what our minds can perceive and process. [Neural Processing] is an attribute that specifically targets the enhancing of our brains, but in itself, it too can only go so far before the matter turns to goo and leaks out of our ears."

She raised a hand to his eyes and his eyebrows rose as aura of the deepest, purest black coated the tip of her fingers. It was such an impenetrable darkness that his eyes had trouble simply staring at it, his mind struggling to comprehend the simple and utter nothingness of all devouring darkness.

"And that's where aura and aether come in. As aura cycles through our pathways, and aether flows through an aethermancer's channels, it leaks. Into Creation yes, but also into our very flesh," Tys said. "And this gradual seeping, this residue, accumulates inside us, and it slowly changes us. Empowers us. Strengthens our weak bodies so that we can make more and more use of our attributes."

She grinned at him. "In effect, by having a 55% attribute utilization rate means that your body is already well on its way to becoming aurium itself."

"What?" he breathed.

"It's another reason why we can't use aethertech. For me, even being around the more complicated aethertech, like a ship's bridge or cabin, is enough to break it. I have to make sure to stay well away from those more fragile bits of aethertech," she explained.

"Then my body is…"

He looked down at his hands as though they were strangers.

"Partially made out of aurium. In our case, aura infused flesh and bone and whatever else is inside of us," she said. "This is something the masters will go over soon enough, but you need to know this in order for us to work on unlocking your first passive. Self-healing."

Nar looked up at her, still shocked at the revelation that his body was turning into aurium.

"Healing?" he asked. "Like… Like our new healer does?"

"There's only one type of healing."

"But… I-I don't know how? Don't I need to study about the body and all of that?" he asked.

She shook her head.

"Fair question, but no. That's for healing others," she revealed. "Healing yourself is a much more straightforward and instinctual process. As your body turns to aurium, as your aura cycles more and more, and deeper and deeper through it, your aura learns about your body. It learns of its capacity, status and knows the right shape of things and where everything goes. So when you get injured, it knows that something is wrong, and when you use your aura with the intention of healing yourself…"

"It knows what to do?" he asked, floored as he stared down at the brown-orange sands at his feet in a daze.

"Exactly. But, of course, there are caveats to self-healing," Tys said. "The first and foremost of those is that it needs a mind fucking insane amount of aura to achieve. But you have no issues there, do you?"

"I-I guess not," Nar said, still reeling from everything she was revealing to him.

"It also requires a very strong hold and control over one's cycling. And again, with your enhanced [Pathways of the Champion], and a lifetime in those machines, it shouldn't be much of a problem for you either, right? At least according to what the Master of Aura told me."

"Right…" he said, giving her a half-nod.

A bundle of dark clothes appeared in her hand. "Here, change into this before we go on. And don't worry, I won't look."

Nar took the dark clothes from his smirking teacher and unfurled them to reveal a set of Tsurmirel's clothing identical to what she wore. She turned his back to him, and he hurriedly turned around and got working on unlacing his boots.

"Any questions so far?" she asked.

"Uh… I mean, this sounds like a really good passive skill to have. Shouldn't other apprentices learn it as well? I think that some of them, especially the casters, also have a lot of aura…"

"Fair. And the answer is yes. Most melee will get a passive self-regen skill at some point… That is, after decades and decades of combat. But whatever they unlock, and then naturally upgrade, will never be as strong as what we're aiming to unlock with your Brightnight gains this soon."

"What? Why?" he asked, as he hurriedly pulled up his new, black pants.

She chuckled. "Do you think what we're trying to achieve here is easy? We're basically about to teach your aura to behave independently from you and to continuously heal you and regenerate your HP! Conscious or unconscious. Awake or asleep. In battle or in the shower! Your aura will always be working to heal you! Not only does that entail a huge strain on your core, it also requires strong enough pathways to handle that kind of constant cycling, and a vast amount of aura to draw from. So trust me, if it sounds easy, know that it's not."

I never thought it was going to be easy, Nar thought to himself, pulling off his boots. But Cen also has a massive chunk of [Aura***] on her.

"And as to teach other apprentices… Well. We could try, but as you're about to find out, I doubt they would want to learn it this way. Provided they even could…"

A wave of sweat coated his back, his armpits, and the palms of his hands, and he wondered what sort of expression she was making. Her tone had turned almost…

Afraid? He wondered. That couldn't be a good thing.

"You… You need to understand, Nar, that what I'm about to do to you would be considered a crime in the eyes of the law of the Nexus," she said, her tone devoid of emotion.

Nar's heartbeat sped even faster at that.

"I'm going to teach you the same way my Named Few teacher did. By compressing and compacting all the damage you would have taken across the span of decades into months. Days. Minutes," she said, her tone lowering to almost become a whisper in the dead silent arena. "The System will not give you anything that you do not earn, so I need to make it real in order for our efforts to register."

Nar gulped and tightened his jaw as he pushed his arms to his sleeves, realization finally dawning on him. On why his master had warned him. On why Tys herself had warned him, and on how she had insisted on allowing him a way out.

"The only people I've ever known that followed this training were those learning under a Named Few," she said from behind him. "Nothing short of that sheer willpower and ambition will push a sapient to go through this kind of training."

Crystal, Nar thought, his heart hammering in his ears, the orange-brown sands at his feet darkening and brightening as he fumbled with his new shirt under that suddenly glaring white ceiling light.

What am I doing? Is this really what I want? Is this really necessary? The questions tumbled through his mind.

"In order to unlock one of the most coveted and powerful skills in Creation, you need to pay its price, and it's a heavy one," she said. "But at least, under this training, you will drastically increase your HP pool and [Aura**] as well, both of which are crucial for your path, and you will probably unlock [Toughness] soon enough too. And don't worry, not even a god can keep rightfully earned gains from the System for long. The Law of the Crystal does not permit it, so I expect you to unlock [Toughness] at some point during your delve into the Brightnight."

"Right…" he said, his mouth dry. "That's… That's good to hear."

He should have been excited. A skill that allowed him to passively self-heal and regenerate HP? A massive HP pool on top of that, and [Toughness] finally unlocking on top of that? He should've been jumping around that damned arena, howling and laughing with joy, but instead, his breath only got quicker. Shallower.

He knew what was coming. It was clear as day, and he didn't know why it had taken him so long to realize it.

Well, maybe because its fucking insane? A small voice asked him from the back of his mind. A sane voice, pleading to him to not go through with this!

"Breathe," she told him, her hand coming to squeeze his shoulder. "Just keep breathing, Nar. And if it's any consolation, I know people that passed out on their first day. And in the weeks that followed it…"

Nar nodded, and turned around to face her, taking in her blank expression.

"What you will do is to cycle with the focus being on the injury," she said, her voice clinical. "Your intent will be on imparting onto your aura the need to heal you. To fix the damage, and to regenerate the HP."

"The HP too?" Nar asked, his eyes growing wide.

"Yes, but… Ugh, HP is a mess, so for now, just assume that whatever HP you lose, it can also be replenished through self-healing, alright?" she asked him. "Things will be complicated enough without us going down that garbage chute."

"Alright…" Nar said, frowning at her lack of explanation, but letting it go.

"There's a lot of secrecy surrounding HP. The Church says that it's for security purposes, so even healers aren't fully sure how they can heal HP, so, I'm not just being lazy," she told him. "At this stage, it would only confuse you."

Nar nodded vehemently. "I wasn't doubting that."

"Good," she said with a sigh. "Anyways, once your aura cycling is healing you, you need to let go of it, and for a little while, a split second only at the beginning, your aura will continue healing you on its own. But then, it will disperse back into your pathways and return to your core as normal. When that happens, you will make your aura heal you again, and then let go again, and again and again you need to repeat this until your aura learns to detect an injury, leaves your core of its own accord, and heals you back to full health. All on its own."

"Crystal," Nar mumbled.

"And as another added bonus, your [Mediation] will probably upgrade to include healing as well," she said. "But what we really want is the capacity to keep your to-become massive HP in a state of continuously regenerating, and your body continuously healing, so that no matter how much damage you take or soak, or how hurt you are, you can keep going. Therefore, unstoppable, the first half of your path."

Unstoppable, Nar thought, repeating the word to himself in a bid to seek solace and strength from it. His fingers had begun to shake.

Tys sighed, glancing down at his hands he clenched them into fists, his arms going rigid and his normal uniform forgotten in his hands.

"This will not be pleasant, Nar. Not for you and not for me. But just like my teacher did for me, I will stomach it for you," she vowed. "And while we're working on unlocking this passive, we'll work on unlocking the second one besides it. Now this second one is…"

She hesitates, then groaned. "Well, there's no nice way to put it. The second passive is about beating pain itself, Nar. To be unbeatable, to be truly unstoppable, you need to overcome pain itself. You need to shatter the mind destroying chains that pain has wrapped around a sapients mind as natural defensive mechanisms. Only then will you have what it takes to remain calm and razor focused during battle, no matter what injuries you sustain or in how much pain you are. Whatever is being thrown at you, you will keep going. You will remain standing. So, pain resistance is the second passive we'll be aiming for."

He nodded again, and she nodded at the clothes in his hands, prompting him to store away his normal uniform into his ring. He tried to take in a deep breath, but found that he couldn't, his throat tight, his body locking in at the promise of pain.

"There's nothing fancy in those clothes other than aura-charged auto-fix and auto-clean features," she said, eying him up and down. "The reason why I want you to wear these instead is because it will make it easier for me to do what I have to do, and for you to face your party and not drive them insane with worry by showing up covered in blood before you can wash up. Especially your healer. Because from now on, you are forbidden from getting healed, Nar. No matter what the circumstances are, and no matter how unreasonable anyone says you're being, you cannot be healed! Unless you are actually dying, you are not to be healed until I allow you to again. And, Nar? I won't be using my [Presence] to enforce this. It has to come from you. Is that clear?"

Nar could only manage a queasy nod at her.

"Good. Then keep breathing, and show me your hands," she said, her tone dropping.