Level 1 Fallen

The next morning, I awoke to seeing the wooden ceiling above my head, having to remind myself that we had made it to an inn room. Looking at my status, it seemed like the poison had already expired, and didn't leave behind any injuries that hadn't been able to recover naturally while I slept.

I sat up, glancing over my body while re-equipping my armor. For now, everything was going well, so we needed to keep this up. I had four new offensive skills that I needed to practice, too, though I wasn't sure what Diane's plan for that would be. I was sure that she had already made some sort of plan, however.

Glancing off to the side, I saw that Diane's bed was empty, with Diane herself sitting and reading in a corner of the room. With her hat off, I could see that her brand was unlit, so this was her Chosen. "Don't suppose that she left you any notes before bed?" I asked, and she shook her head.

"None today. And, this is a Thursday, so she'll be a bit later to get on." After Diane said that, she submitted the quest that I had issued the night before, marking it as complete and gaining the promised skills. "That said… I'm pretty sure that I know where she'll want us to go."

I looked over curiously, seeing that the book in her hand was titled 'Farro's Ways'. Which I could only assume meant that it was going over the cities and landscapes of Farro. "Mind sharing, so I'm on the same page?"

Diane smiled slightly, snapping the book shut. "There are two places that she could have us go, and both of them are to the southeast. First is a small mountain, you might have noticed it when we were coming into the city. It's full of caves, making it an ideal spot for privacy. There is also a river leading away from that mountain, which forms a large lake a few kilometers away. If her goal is to find somewhere to quietly train for the next few days, those will probably be ideal."

I gave a small nod, thinking it over. Aside from skill books, I hadn't done much reading since Athua. "That makes sense. Though… if it is that close to the city, won't we still be in danger of being discovered?"

Diane hesitated at that, glancing down at the book and opening it again. "Maybe… I doubt she wants us to go any further along the road, though. It would take the rest of the week just to reach the next city, Slitherhold. Granted, we could pick up more poison skills there, but that seems a relatively low priority right now."

"Maybe she wants us to cross the northern border..? We're pretty close to the border now, but I'm not seeing anything in the guide about a travel route. Pike City is the suggested transit point when heading further west… And that is way too far for us to reach in a week."

"I'll ask her when she logs on." I said with a shrug. "For now, let's have breakfast. We can think about where to go after that."

Diane nodded her head, closing the book once more and putting it in her inventory. "Right." She hopped up from her seat, putting her hat back on before the two of us made our way down to eat. After filling our stomachs, we wandered the city to listen for any new rumors. While we were out and about, I withdrew another five gold from the bank, our finances running rather low given that we never really sold anything.

Diane had offered to sell one of the trait scrolls, but that was immediately rejected. Those were even more valuable than skill books, so we had to save them in case we needed them in the future.

In total, we had to wait about two hours after getting up before Diane's brand suddenly let up, her smile turning into a stoic mask. "Any news?" I asked idly, my hands in my pockets.

"Nothing new." I let out a sigh of relief when she said this. "Are you ready to go?"

I arched a brow at that, but nodded my head. "Where are we going?"

"Mountains." She answered simply, pointing towards the south. For a moment, I thought that her Chosen had guessed correctly, but what she sent over a private message startled me.

Originally, I wanted to turn around and begin walking back after spending one day in Harkenfeld. That would give us our one week to train our skills. However, you said that your Flicker Step evolved, so our travel options should have expanded. There is a mountain range that splits most of Farro in half, and this mountain range is the highest level area in the country.

From our current position, we would need to move a hundred kilometers south-by-southwest to reach these mountains. If you can get us there quickly with your new skill, we can train our skills and our levels at the same time while we make our way back towards Shadowbane.

I arched a brow at that, quickly sending my response. If it's the highest level zone, won't there be plenty of players there? However, to my surprise, Diane shook her head.

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The only city directly adjacent to one of the mountains is Thunderwich, located near the eastern end of the range. Without anywhere to sell their loot or repair equipment, most players consider the mountains to be a waste of time.

Additionally, I have reason to believe that Drake is setting up his nest in the range directly south of Shadowbane. The mountains closer to that city are small, and he would be too conspicuous. If we're lucky, and this is the case, we might be able to ambush him. I don't know where his respawn point is, but it will surely be an inconvenience to have to come back.

I smirked slightly at that, nodding my head. I hadn't had the chance to test out Glancing Step-X since I acquired it, so I was also quite curious how it would pan out. Aren't you worried about people seeing us speeding off?

Diane hesitated for a moment, before shaking her head. No. You'll be using your Ghost skill, and carrying me. Between that and your speed, nobody should be able to spot us.

That made me blink in surprise, not having expected her to ask me to carry her. I suppose that it made sense, since I'd need to do so to get us there so quickly in the first place. So, I nodded my head in agreement. As soon as I did, she jumped up at me, forcing me to hurriedly catch her as I activated my Ghost-X.

Looking down, I saw that Diane seemed a bit shy, figuring that she wasn't used to being held like this, given her circumstances. With that said, I focused on activating my Glancing Step-X. When I did, my vision seemed to zoom in on the area where I was looking, rippling and shifting me to that location. Granted, I was looking at the ground about ten meters ahead of myself, so that wasn't all that impressive.

When I directed my gaze to the top of a nearby building and repeated this, however, it was far more effective. I found myself standing on the ledge that I had been looking at, overlooking the building's roof. This allowed me to confirm a few things about this new skill.

First of all, I could travel to any point that I could see clearly enough to focus on. Looking out into the distance, I wouldn't be able to just move to a mountaintop that I could just barely make out on the horizon. However, I could increase this distance with my Scout skill.

Secondly, there was no rush of momentum when I traveled, as there had been with Flicker Step. From my perspective, I was standing still the entire time when the skill activated, but my position in the world changed, zooming in on where I had been looking.

Finally, because of how this travel worked, I maintained the direction that I was originally facing when activating the skill. Since I can't accurately see what is behind myself, I can't use that as a target for this skill.

Now that I knew that, I turned my gaze to the south, briefly standing on the city's wall before appearing beyond it. Between Scout and Glancing Step-X, I could move multiple kilometers with every step. Granted… these steps couldn't be executed as rapidly as before, because there was a brief moment of disorientation when my vision shifted so abruptly.

All in all, my travel speed had increased by an order of magnitude, but my combat speed will have likely declined, unless I could figure out how to activate the lower form of the skill. I knew that it was possible, since Kelly had demonstrated doing just that to me during our training.

After a few steps, I was on top of the mountain that Diane's Chosen had told me about before, straining my eyes to see the distant mountains that were our target. Maybe when I level up Glancing Step-X and Scout more, I'll be able to travel that far…

As it stood, there was still a bit of travel time, but it was nothing compared to walking, which would have taken days. A few minutes after we left the city, we had arrived at the base of the large mountain range, and Diane hurriedly jumped out of my arms. "That skill is far too powerful…" She muttered to herself. "And there is still a further evolution to it?"

"I thought you knew how good the skill was, since you made this plan around it." I told her, and Diane hesitated, before shaking her head.

"There's a user on the forum, Encyclopedia Karlson. Apparently, he's obsessed with the lore of this world, and has been traveling from library to library for the last six weeks, reading any new books he can find. He's been sharing the skill advancement paths that he's aware of, as well as the skill descriptions."

Karlson? That sounded familiar. It took me a moment to remember that Karlson was the name of the halfling I met on the day after I became a Fallen. As I thought about that, Diane brushed herself off, continuing. "According to him, the Glancing Step skill is a martial teleporting skill where the range is determined based on the user's vision-based abilities. Given that you have the X version, I assumed yours would be even stronger than what he reported."

"Did he happen to say what it turned into?" I asked hopefully, but Diane shook her head.

"He hasn't posted much information on X-rank skills, other than the fact that they exist. I can tell you that the original version of Glancing Step evolves into Backtrack, which allows you to teleport to any location you've been to within a set amount of time. As for what you'll get, I don't know."

"Either way, this should be a good spot for us to train." She said, looking around at the dense forests that surrounded the base of the mountain. As she said that, a dull thud echoed from the surroundings, causing the two of us to look towards its source. Walking along the side of the mountain, we saw a figure standing eight meters tall, carrying a small tree that had been stripped of its branches over one shoulder like a club. It had piercing red eyes and black skin, a horn protruding from its forehead.

"...You didn't mention that the monsters in the mountain range were giants." I pointed out, but Diane shrugged her shoulders.

"The book didn't say the specifics, only that different monsters inhabited different parts of the mountain range." She said, already pulling out her real daggers, not the ones that she had gotten from the Dark King's Palace. There was an excited glimmer in her eyes at the thought of being able to level up again, and I simply sighed with a slight chuckle, pulling out my own sword. I wasn't sure how much basic magic would work on them, but there was no reason for me not to weave it in with my other skills, right?