Lucian and Annabelle’s journey deeper into the jungle continued. They fought their way through several other monsters as they pushed forward. They cut down another giant mantis, as well as some giant centipedes.

  They both ended up leveling up again before the day was done, Lucian leveling once and reaching level 20 and Annabelle leveling twice and reaching level 16 - both gaining access to new skills.

  Lucian found [Lightning Infusion] interesting, if only because it was essentially a different version of the [Flame Infusion] he had been offered previously - yet at a higher starting rank. He assumed the rank it was offered at was the reason for the secondary effect, though he reasoned it was also possible it was simply a stronger skill, “I wonder if it exists as a rank 1 skill, or if it begins at rank 2.”

  Despite the skill being interesting, he would be damned if he picked it over one of the other two options.

  “[Empowered Strength] is great for the same reason [Slash] is great…” [Slash] let Lucian double dip on Strength by increasing the force of his attack based on it, and [Empowered Strength] would have a similar effect by multiplying his Strength. Lucian assumed that the multiplier would increase as the skill leveled up, though he couldn’t be sure.

  “But… [Spirit Recovery] solves the one issue I truly have. Even if it’s only, say, half as effective in combat it makes the use of [Manifest Weapon] a net zero draw on my Spirit. It also cuts down my recovery time…” Lucian pondered on it for a moment longer before picking [Spirit Recovery] - it had been exactly what he was looking for, after all. The change was immediate, he could practically feel the Spirit in his body welling up. He sighed happily and looked over at Annabelle, “What did you get for your skill?”

  “I decided to go with an option that would help against groups, it’s an area of effect poison spell called [Banecloud].”

  “That sounds… Like a war crime…” Lucian laughed.

  “Oh. I guess it would be!” She nodded, “It isn’t like I’m going to use it on people!”

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  “The only thing to be careful of is catching me in the area. Other than that, I foresee something like that being extremely useful for clearing out groups of smaller targets.”

  “I’ll be careful!” She whined before playfully punching Lucian in the arm.

  “I’m sure you will.” Lucian smiled, before looking up at the sky for a moment, “The sun is gonna set soon - and only one of us can see in the dark. We should set up camp soon.”

  “Alright!” She nodded, “I’m getting hungry anyway!”

  They kept walking for a while longer before finding a spot they liked to set up camp. They went about unpacking their tents and helping one another pitch them. With their tents set up they set up the portable stove and set about making dinner.

  Getting water was easy enough, they weren’t far from the river - having been traveling vaguely along it. Once it was filtered they lit the stove, took out some packaged ramen, and got cooking. It didn’t take long to be finished.

  Lucian lifted his bowl and smiled at the warmth, “Good call bringing this.”

  “Naturally! All my calls are good calls!” Annabelle grinned.

  They waited for the ramen to cool enough to not burn their tongues, and began eating.

  “So, tonight. We should keep a watch, I imagine.” Lucan said as he swallowed some.

  “That sounds like a good idea! I can go first, and let you get some sleep.”

  “Alright, fine by me. Nighty.” Lucian yawned and slipped into his tent. He curled up in his sleeping bag and before long he drifted into sleep. He slept soundly, and dreamed of comforting things - such as Bianca’s freshly made pizza.

  “Lucian, wake up.” Annabelle yawned as she opened his tent.

  “Mnn…” Lucian’s eyes opened and he sat up, “My turn?”

  “Yeah, I’m sleepy now…” She yawned again, stretching as she moved to her own tent and vanished inside it, “Good night.”

  Lucian smiled, “Good night.” He left his tent and cracked his neck, stretching himself a little before taking a breath. His pupils dilated and his ears twitched. The darkness between the trees seemed to retreat as his eyes adjusted to the darkness and [Night Vision] kicked in. He could only see so far but with the trees restricting his vision past a certain point the skill’s effective range wasn’t an issue.

  Lucian walked a circle around the tents, looking around as he walked. He kept his senses open and took a moment to think, “My ‘build’ started out as a high mobility striker, but with [Spirit Barrier] and [Spirit Recovery] it’s moving towards a more well rounded bruiser style, without sacrificing any of that mobility. I’m always going to get Strength, Intelligence, Agility and Clarity from leveling up. I can put my free points into Constitution or Endurance and lean into this new well rounded style. I’m already, frankly, much stronger than my level would signify. I’ve been punching up the whole time, from the bird to the first mantis I killed.” Lucian assigned his 3 free points to Constitution, bringing it up to 35, “I can already out speed most enemies, against enemies that I can’t outpace my speed effectively becomes useless, diversifying will help make up for that without hampering anything I do.” Lucian chuckled softly to himself, things were progressing wonderfully as far as he was concerned.

  The night passed without incident, and keeping watch in the dark ended up leveling up Lucian’s [Night Vision].

  Lucian woke Annabelle as the sun rose over the treeline.

  “Good morning…” She mumbled, poking her head out of her tent.

  “Good morning, I think it's time to pack our things up and get going?”

  “Mnf fine, alright…” She grumbled before vanishing back into the tent. A few minutes later she came back out, running her hands through her hair trying to touch it up.

  “Awake now?” Lucian laughed.

  “Yeah, I’m awake now… I hate getting up in the morning, it’s the worst.” She sighed.

  They began to pack up their tents and sleeping bags, folding and rolling and compacting them back down to their travel sizes. It was marginally more annoying to put everything back into their bags then initially set them up, “I guess that's just how life is, huh?” Lucian mused to himself as they left the clearing.

  They found their way back to the river and continued walking along it. The sightlines were better by the riverbank than in the jungle, and sticking near the cover of the trees provided a measure of cover from anything flying above without drastically cutting down what they could see and react to.

  They walked and walked, stopping occasionally to purify river water and slake their thirsts. Eventually, they came across something strange.

  “Wow, what is that?” Annabelle pointed down the river.

  “It looks like a marker of sorts…” Lucian mumbled.

  Down river, a set of square stone pillars stood on either side of the river. They stood tall, but not taller than the trees around them. As they approached they could see that the pillars looked to be single pieces of stone, carved out from a larger rock - a pale white granite with veins of black running through it.

  Once they reached the pillars Lucian ran his hand along the stone, “Shockingly smooth.” Lucian remarked. The stones were smooth and polished, like a countertop might be. He frowned and pulled his hand back, “Something about this feels off.”

  “Agreed. Humans would have had no reason to put this here when the city was here…” Annabelle began.

  “Which means they appeared here with the jungle…” Lucian finished, looking around cautiously.

  “I have a feeling things are about to get more interesting!” Annabelle laughed.

  “I think you might be right.” Lucian stepped away from the pillar and looked out down the river, “Let's go, then.”