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

The gatherers and harvesters worked well into the night after dinner, and even the rest of them pitched in to give a helping hand, as besides the vast quantity of jungle's mercy, the itself pond had proven to be surprisingly deep, and the number of fish somehow living within it had far exceeded their expectations.

"It must connect to an underground stream somewhere," Sej had told them. "That's where they must be coming from."

The thin, forearm length fish were slippery and fast, and they darted at the most minute disturbance in the water's surface. Since they needed to be caught alive, plus the fact that no one had wanted anything to do with water inside the Brightnight and thus no one had brought in any fish capturing tools, that meant stumbling into the water and using their hands.

Nar grit his teeth as he wrestled another fish into the freeze-storage box that Sarke, always well prepared, had produced from her own personal storage. The aetherium construct, powered by its own batteries, was a small marvel. Toss a squirming fish into it and a few minutes later, when it dinged, you could take it completely frozen and ready to be stored in an animal livestock container.

Nar dunked for his next target, but misjudged his footing and went tumbling into the water, raising a curtain of cool water that elicited startled cries from all around him.

"Are you okay?" Calli asked him.

She had her pants sleeves rolled up, and she was barefoot in the water. For Nar however…

"Agh!" he cried out, more out of startled surprise than true pain.

He quickly pulled himself upright again, but it was too late. There was now burning water sizzling all across his arms, neck and even face, too now.

"Damn," Calli said, wincing, as smoke wafted from his darkening skin. "Are you sure this is…"

Nar sighed and cycled, and waved her concerns away. "It's alright. It's good training!"

"Hmm, I think it could be improved though," Leon said, frowning at Nar from his other side. "Eum, do it!"

"Do what?" Nar asked, but even as the words spilled past his lips, he already knew what was coming. But as he was still pulling himself upright, struggling on the slippery stones that made up the bottom of the pond's shore, there was little he could do to prevent it.

There was an expected shove on his back, accompanied with heavy laughter, and Nar went hurtling into the deeper end with a mighty splash.

"What the fuck are you doing?" Calli howled at the tygaris.

Nar came up gasping and sputtering.

"Oh…" he groaned. "I swallowed it…"

"Are you two out of your gods' damned minds?" Calli shouted at the other two as they howled in laughter.

"Relax, sis!" Leon said. "It's for his own good. We're just helping him with his training! Right?"

"I guess," Nar said, still spitting the heavy, aetherium laced water from his mouth, bubbling forming around as the water reacted with the aura within his skin.

But Calli growled in frustration.

"Did you stop to think that none of them know how to swim? Or that there may be parasites or diseases in the water? Or that something could be hiding in the water?"

Leon's expression dropped before the molten fury pouring from his sister's blazing eyes, and even Eum choked on his laughter, a grimace of regret spreading over his furry, human features.

"It's fine," Nar said. "I can still stand here, and Sej said it was safe. Jasphaer?"

The healer, who happened to be passing by, threw a glance at Nar.

"The water's surprisingly clean. We checked," he said. "You can even drink if you want to make it harder, and I'll keep an eye on your HP in case you go too crazy."

"Thanks."

"And now that we have healer's permission, why don't you just soak in there?" Leon asked, though his tone was a lot more subdued now.

"What about the fish?"

"Ah, it's fine," Calli sighed. "I'll just make them catch your share."

"Fair enough," Leon said, nodding easily.

"Hey! This wasn't my idea!" Eum protested.

"You pushed me in!" Nar retorted. "So shut up and fish!"

**********

Hours passed.

He had stripped down to his underwear to fully expose himself to the training, and his whole body darkened, his skin and flesh ravaged by successive dives into the water, which were then followed by periods of slow, agonizing self-healing. The process wasn't perfect, and he never waited to heal completely, so the constant aether burning he subjected himself to blistered his skin and burned the flesh within…

Eventually, even Eum had moved on, having had enough of the horrific "training" that Nar inflicted upon himself.

I wonder if this puts a damper on their desire for self-healing, Nar had wondered, as he eventually was left alone. By then, he had dived into the water five times, and oozing pus was leaking from his abused flesh in a few spots. Tys would've been proud.

Still, even as crazy as he was, his self-healing was far from the state it needed to be at, and his HP continued to dip as he gobbled down his aura, meditated to recover it, and went again.

Dive.

Drink.

Agony.

Heal.

Agony.

Heal.

And on and on it went.

"I think you should end it here," Jasphaer told him, as Nar pulled up from the pond, steam rising from his abused body. "Any more than this, and you risk your pathways, Nar. It's too much."

Nar nodded. "I thought the same. This was my last one."

"Alright. Heal up then, but no pathways practice after this. Let them rest," Jasphaer said.

And he dried himself by the pond, and self-healed, the waters before him being a mirror of silver opposite the silver jungle's mercy that grew across the cave's ceiling.

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He almost relished the pain, he realized, and the intermittent process of grabbing hold of his aura, telling it to heal him, and then letting go of it, allowing it to heal him by a few seconds on its accord, and then repeating the whole process again. It kept his mind off of things.

It only worked while he hurt, however. Properly hurt, which could also be why he hadn't allowed himself to fully heal in between dives and big gulps of that burning, deadly water. But now, it was time to end the training, and before his thoughts could take over, he made it for camp.

It was past dinner already, and small pockets of conversation had formed in the aura light. Under that glowing silver ceiling, there lay an atmosphere of easy relaxation across camp that gave it that hugging sensation of comfort and safety.

And with a glance towards the cave entrance, he found an aura light illuminating Tuk, Kur, Gad and Leta, who were standing watch by the cave's mouth. Tuk seemed to bent over one his jungle suits, while Leta offered him advice and instruction, and from the flashes of blue still coming in from outside, he realized that Mach was still going at it, in the center of his personal vortex of aether.

We are all crazy, aren't we? Nar thought. Elites my ass… We're all just insane.

He was too tired and ragged to join any of the more intense circles of activity, and instead, spotting Cen sitting by herself, besides a small aura torch, he headed in her direction.

The caster lifted her eyes from the glowing aura she was struggling to shape in her hands and offered him a tired smile.

"Any progress?" he asked, crouching beside her.

"I can sort of hold the rightish shape now," she said, showing him the hexagonal shaped aura in her hands. "But it's really hard. Any distraction and…"

The aura fell apart, returning to its glop like state, and the caster heaved a sigh.

"That happens," she lamented.

He rubbed her back. "Baby steps, Cen. Maybe this skill is just a lot harder to get right, you know? Besides, thanks to it, you managed to unlock [Aura Sight] already, and that's huge!"

"Meh, that was all thanks to Jasphaer's teaching," she mumbled, her little body deflating. "And it took nearly a month and a half!"

"Do you have any idea how fast that is?" Nar asked, with a chuckle. "Relax, Cen. You'll get it."

"I know, I know," she said. "I just… I worry if it's being this hard because it goes against my affinity."

She sighed, and went on before he could say anything. "I know! I'm being stupid! The master said to just go ahead and learn it, and I doubt she would let me waste time doing it…"

Nar grinned at her. "Then if you know, just keep at it… Soon enough, you'll figure it out."

"Ugh," she groaned, but she began forming the aura in her hands once again.

And once she's got the shape down, she needs to condense it, kind of like what I'm trying to do with my [Aura Blade], Nar thought, watching as the glob of aura in Cen's hands slowly formed into a somewhat straight rectangle. And then she needs to form Crystal knows how many in order to form the barrier… In comparison, Leon just got handed that barrier skill of his from his patron, and there's not even a speck of [Creativity] or [Shaping] in him.

He sighed. Eum says we've got an advantage in that we can learn our own skills, but I wonder if that's really the case.

He glanced over to where the tygaris was laughing with the usual troublemaker crew and grimaced.

I guess we can at least control our own paths, within the tenets of the System and our affinities, he thought, and as Viy and Mul came to mind he was forced to add, Some more than others, though.

"The flora and fauna here are adept at laying traps to catch the unaware, and the terrain itself is part of it. You could be walking in firm land, not realizing that there's a crevice hidden in the bushes ahead of you… And then SNAP! A giant balora closes its jaws around you and you're off to the Great Beyond!" Sej was saying to Jul and Medis, by their makeshift kitchen area.

And besides them, standing around a bubbling pot, Sarke was aiding Rel in better preparing and making use of her ingredients, with Cor watching in fascinated silence.

Right… Let's get showered. If I can't practice aura tonight, I might as well get to sleep early.

**********

Despite the early night, morning arrived predictably all too soon, and with it, came the rewards of his submerging himself in what was effectively poison to him, and then fixing himself up non-stop for hours, straining his pathways.

"Oh…" he groaned.

"Sore?" Mul asked him.

"Fuck my life," Nar muttered, hunching as he stared at his hand. It was even shaking! He must have pushed himself harder than he had thought.

"You were at it for hours, man," Lim said, with a wince. "You're nuts."

"Meh," Nar said, shrugging.

"Up, up, up!" Kur called from outside. "These plants and fish aren't going to gather or harvest themselves!"

Nar rolled off his mattress while swallowing a groan coming straight from his battered soul, and stumbled to his feet.

"Hang in there, man," Mul said, patting his thigh.

And grumpily, Nar trudged outside after the others.

"Alright, keep eating but listen up," Kur said, while they were having breakfast. "The storm should last the whole of today, so we're going to spend the day here and continue harvesting. We're making a lot of XP from this little cave, and there's no reason to stop."

"Hear, hear!" Mach shouted.

Nar glanced over at the aethermancer, and found his eyes glowing blue. Sparks occasionally erupted around from his body, and his hair swayed to a breeze Nar couldn't feel. The guy was bursting with aether, and it was oozing out of him, which explained why he was not sitting beside his usual company of auramancers.

And glowing eyes? Is that why Leon, Calli and Eum's glow too? He wondered, doing his best to ignore the ravaging soreness in his body and pathways. But then, are they always overflowing with aether? Hmm, maybe another one of those rude questions to ask.

"But beyond that, and once the storm has passed?" Kur said, grinning. "It will be time for what you've all been waiting for!"

"A nest? Really?" Eum asked, his fur bristling with excitement as celebration rang across the camp.

"Finally," Mul muttered.

"We've also been doing extremely well in our gathering efforts, thanks to everyone's hard work and the non-gatherers pitching in wherever possible," Kur continued. "And we've also managed to secure a good amount of supplies, even though the aethermancers are having a much more enjoyable time of eating them!"

"Booo!" Nar said, adding to the chorus.

"Therefore, we decided that it's time for us to start doing more fighting, and yes, we're going to try our hands at a nest at last, and at the rare beast that leads. And we already picked a den," Kur said. "But I say try, because there's still some skepticism and questions around how well we'll perform together. So, this will be our test run. If everything goes well, good. If not, we've been thinking of different strategies and we'll pivot to something else. Regardless, we only have another two weeks left in the Jungle Tops, so we're going to make the most of it. Our next area, the Hungry Jungle, is going to be a lot nastier than here, so let's rack up some proper gains to make sure we're not as outclassed in there as we were here when we'd just entered. While we can't level up past 50 in the Jungle Tops, we can at least ensure that we make every level count, and net ourselves some great attribute densities!"

"That would be a relief," Cor whispered to Era and Leta, who sat behind Nar.

"Hopefully, we'll move from nest to nest, racking in the gains and valuable materials, and moving southwards to the edge of the Jungle Tops, all within schedule in order to make our detour into the Nest, Dream and the Giant's Canopy," Kur said. "And that's it. Any questions? Worries? Doubts?"

"Our first den will be a "weaker" one," Row added, when no one spoke. "But, let's not underestimate it."

"When have we ever underestimated anything?" Jaz asked, rolling his eyes.

The red-haired party leader grimaced, but gave him a nod. "Fair enough."

"Even calling it weaker sounds like a lie," Sej cautioned. "That rare may be on the lower end of low-rare ranked, but it will still beat the shit out of you all if you're not careful. And I can't be there to help you this time, or you'll be penalized."

"No one's going to underestimate anything," Kur said. "And this is our way forward. More tokens, better gains, more XP… For today though, just finish eating and get back to gathering the jungle's mercy. We're all getting rich here. Well, at least some of us are…"

"Hey!" Leon said. "We're poor too!"

"Yeah, right…" Kur snorted.

**********

They were even more grateful for their shelter that night. As the night fell, the storm seemed to triple in strength, and groans and crashes rumbled the jungle floor as trunks crashed outside, and the thunder boomed so loudly that none of them managed to sleep properly.

Even Leon kept Mach on a tight leash, forbidding him from going outside again. That aetheric rage was too much even for the storm aspected aethermancer.

Nar, who had been a part of the last watch, had been treated to a spectacle of searingly blinding lightning the likes he had never seen before, and he, Mul and Row had stared out in mute awe, while Mach stared transfixed at the wrathful skies.

When morning finally arrived, the jungle was almost startlingly silent in comparison, and they set out under the brighter, mysterious green light that seemed to coat everything, obscuring the distance in between tree trunks.

Signs of the storm's devastation were everywhere as they rushed on their way south, with open clearings of fallen trees revealing the dark, green tinged twilight skies overhead, and having to go around massive craters caused by several uprooted trees.

Later that day, they crossed the Tchan'Ohlan, the first of the two mighty rivers blocking their path towards the inner edge of the Jungle Tops, the one that bordered the Hungry Jungle.

The river had been a raging beast almost two thousand feet wide, and for the first time, they had met other parties of apprentices, as they all gathered to cross over a perilous passage made out of rocks, debris and broken logs. But they didn't waste much time here, and that night, they set up their temporary camp and took an early night.

In the morning, they would finally face their first nest, and the rare within.