Aura of Rebirth – A magically contained aura with the power of rebirth. Can be broken to obtain an aura ability. The aura ability will be created based on the bound attributes of the user. Will guarantee a healing effect with the aura. Can only be used by the one that vanquished the Resurrected Spectre.

  “It seems to be able give someone an aura ability, but also says it can only be used by the one that vanquished the Resurrected Spectre.” Gaia stated.

  “Really? That would be extremely valuable if anyone could use it, but it seems like only you can, right?” Griff asked.

  “Yeah. I want another person to analyze it though, so no one thinks I decided to just take it.” Gaia replied.

  “Fair enough. Shall we go get someone to identify it?” Titania asked.

  “The floor is cleared so we may as well. I’ll send some scouts to the fifth floor in the morning. Let’s go back and relax after all the fighting we did today.” Delilah replied.

  The group returned to the camp where Delilah called someone who could identify items. They weren’t common since they were usually employed by the nobility or Hunter’s League to appraise unknown items. Even then the only reason they had one in the camp was in case the exploration uncovered an artifact. The appraiser relayed information matching what Gaia said so the orb was left with her. The others from the battle wanted her to use the item so they could know what it was like so she used it.

  All she had to do was squeeze the orb a bit and it shattered before melting and entering her skin. There wasn’t any pain or uncomfortable feeling, more it felt like a warmth moved from the hand she’d crushed the orb with to her heart. When it reached there, it stayed a moment before extending to her entire body. Then she felt different parts of it change to match the different attributes she had, before it returned to her heart. There it stayed for around ten minutes with nothing happening. Once the ten minutes passed it surged to envelop her body entirely with a mixture of the different attributes. The entire time this occurred screens kept popping up.

  Aura of Rebirth has been used. Assessing qualifications.

  User is qualified.

  Assessing bound attributes.

  Bound Attributes: Agony, Radiation, Miasma, Chaos, and Poison.

  Generating Aura.

  ErRoR. Aura ability detected.

  Searching for a solution.

  Solution discovered.

  Aura Ability generated.

  Replacing Aura ability.

  Calamitous Aura – An aura of the calamity is exuded by the holder in a spherical field determined by their influence over mana. The holder can designate allies to be unaffected by the aura. Allies within the Aura are given a boost to regeneration that is determined by the number of conditions on enemies. Any being within the aura is buffeted by a maelstrom of energies that inflict random conditions. If one receives every condition from this Aura it becomes Calamity Stricken. Once Calamity Stricken is inflicted, for its duration, no other conditions can be inflicted by the aura.

  Calamity Stricken – Spiritual Condition. Effects the spirit and body. Removes all instances of other conditions on the effected being when inflicted. Causes the inflicted creature to take extreme damage over time. Cannot be healed. Will end after twenty-four hours have passed or the inflicted being is dead.

  New Title Awarded.

  Walking Calamity – The holder is a harbinger of chaos and misfortune. Their mere presence causes changes to the world. Their aura amplifies their actions causing all conditions to be 10% easier to inflict. With each condition inflicted the percentage increases by 1% to a maximum of 50%. Effect lasts for as long as the conditions are in effect. This comes at the cost of healing causing the efficacy of healing to decrease by 75% within its range, unless conditions have been inflicted. Making them reliant on the suffering of their enemies to channel their own resilience.

  Gaia took a few minutes to read and understand the information on the screens. When she finished reading them all, her companions eagerly asked about what she got. She hesitated for a few moments, before telling them exactly what she got and what it did. She also explained her concern for how it was worded. It seemed like it was always active so she was worried about hurting people.

  It also brought up one of her biggest insecurities. If she was a good person why were all of her bound attributes along with her new title and aura so dark? All of her conditions were objectively meant to harm or even torture whatever she inflicted them on and now her aura would likely harm anyone near her unless she actively focused on it. Her new title even just outright called her a Calamity and makes her rely on the suffering of her enemies to heal. She didn’t like what all of this meant.

  She was a good person. No matter what the gods or the Overseers tried to make her think through these titles and abilities. No matter what everything tries to paint her as, she was determined to prove them wrong. With these thoughts swirling through her head and threatening to make her spiral Stephanie shook her and brought her back.

  “Gaia! Are you alright?” Stephanie asked worriedly.

  “Yeah.” She started before continuing. “Actually no. Not really.”

  “What’s wrong? You were unresponsive to us for like a half hour.” Griff asked.

  “I got an aura ability.” She said.

  “That’s great! But why aren’t you happy? What does it do?” Fergus asked.

  Gaia took a minute to remember how to share her status with people and showed them the aura ability and new title, along with their descriptions. She also took this time to try and label everyone as an ally, which she somehow instinctually understood how to do. She also found out that there seemed to be a limit for the number of people and things she could designate. This was also when she realized that her aura seemed to be bound to her mana field.

  When she extended or reigned it in, her aura’s range matched it. When she thought about the screens that appeared she had a sinking feeling that it had designated her Mana Field as an Aura ability and replaced it with the new one. That was very bad. If she couldn’t gain control over it like she had with the original then she would be harming anyone who entered her field. This was even worse since this meant she would have to reign her Aura in to keep from hurting people thus making it difficult to move around again. It had also reduced the range of her aura to around half of what it had been, so around fifty feet. Her companions spoke up again as her thoughts raced on how to deal with the new predicament.

  “I see why now. The ability is great for combat, but if you can’t turn it off or reign it in that could be an issue. I’m sure we can figure out how to work around it.” Fergus stated.

  “I’ll gladly help you. It’ll be like it originally was with your Mana Field.” Griff added.

  “For now, I’m guessing you don’t want go anywhere near people though, right? We can camp near the wall and reign in your aura until we figure it out.” Stephanie stated.

  “If you guys don’t mind. I can designate allies, but there are only a certain amount I can use. A little under half are already taken up by you guys. Thankfully my bonds aren’t effected by it and they don’t count towards the limit.” Gaia explained.

  “Alright. We’ll camp out by one of the walls. You’ll need to reign your aura in so it doesn’t reach the walls too though. While we’re out there let’s plan to experiment and work on how to control it.” Griff stated.

  Delilah came back a couple minutes later and they relayed the basics of the situation to her. She was generous enough to offer to watch that section of the wall to alleviate any worries about accidentally hurting someone. They took her up on the offer since it was unlikely Gaia’s conditions would affect her much due to the rank difference.

  They found a spot near the southern wall, but off to one side so they didn’t affect any of the explorers. They pitched their tent, and Griff activated the monster ward to hopefully make the night somewhat safer. Once they finished setting up camp, Griff and Gaia got to work on trying to control the new aura.

  They didn’t make much progress that day due to the unfamiliarity of the aura ability. They continued practicing with the aura for a few days and her control slowly got better, but it required a lot of mental energy. In order for her not to hurt anyone she had to put almost all of her brain power into focusing on control. Almost to the point of being unable to walk due to her not paying attention to where she was going. This didn’t even include the focus needed to reign in the range of the aura.

  After a week of practicing, she was able to walk and designate people as they entered her range. When she tried to push past her limit one time, she nearly gave herself an aneurysm. She started bleeding from her ears and nose before collapsing and blacking out. She didn’t wake up for about three days even with most of the healers constantly healing her, due to her new title. Her aura was completely gone during the incident, so thankfully no one got hurt, even during treatment.

  When she woke up, she couldn’t stand, and it felt like the world was swirling around her. She was scolded for hurting herself from overexertion, again. She had to recover for a few days to ensure there weren’t any lasting effects. During this time, she realized her control over her aura had drastically improved. She didn’t know why, and wasn’t going to look a gift horse in the mouth, but was grateful. It wasn’t quite as under control as her old one, but she wasn’t causing things to die around her and could choose to exclude people from its effects. She still couldn’t have it affect someone just off intent, so she still needed to concentrate on what to effect if it had been excluded.

  This was a massive improvement since she didn’t have to worry about hurting anyone now. She could just mentally designate the races in the camp, and the plants of course, to be excluded from her aura’s effects. She was excited since that meant they didn’t need to stay outside the walls anymore. The week and a half of practice and recovery was well spent in her mind. She wasn’t going to stop practicing and working on it of course, but she was confident enough to not hurt anyone due to her lack of control.

  Thankfully, they weren’t required to be on the walls for most of the practice time so there weren’t any incidents because of that. Their title as the dedicated hunters had gone into effect a few days after their self-imposed exile so they used the entire time to work on control. Now, since she was fully recovered, they could explore the ruins. Gaia was excited about this since she could now see how her aura worked without worrying about others safety. They decided to just go to the first floor for a little bit to see how it worked.

  This was easily done since the first floor was still teeming with monsters. This was odd since their numbers seemed to stay the same no matter how many were killed and disintegrated. Their best guess for why, was that the ruins repopulated the monsters every day to replace the killed monsters. This was a good thing as it gave them ample monsters to practice and test skills along with abilities on like they were currently doing.

  The monsters were drawn in by a mixture of ranged attacks from Fergus and Stephanie and Griff leading the monsters towards Gaia. Once they entered her range her aura started rapidly inflicting them with conditions. She guessed that the reason this occurred was the new title and the fact she was around three times their level. As the conditions stacked, subsequent conditions became much easier to inflict. It eventually reached a point that all of the monsters were Calamity Stricken and the effect of the condition was insidious from what she could sense. She had thought Miasma was bad, but this was magnitudes worse.

  From what she could sense, the monsters, after being inflicted with the Calamity Stricken condition were damaged severely causing them to stagger and the damage seemed to increase each time this occurred. The areas around the monsters had random phenomena occur, such as lightning strikes or fiery explosions, without any catalysts. The monsters also seemed to have issues with their skills. Like a spider monster tried to fire a poison shot at Gaia, but the shot exploded creating a magical burst that showered the surrounding monsters in poison and caused a magical backlash to the spider. The worst part was that the monsters, as the condition dealt more and more damage, seemed to shatter apart like stone under a hammer while attacking each other relentlessly.

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  Gaia was stunned and horrified by the condition’s effects and even her companions were shocked to silence. The around twenty monsters that had entered the aura’s range, were reduced to shattered bits within about twenty minutes of entering. This was disturbing to see since as they waited for the bits to disintegrate it took nearly twice as long as usual for the parts to disappear. Gaia didn’t even want to imagine what would have happened if her aura had been out of control in the camp.

  When Gaia turned to walk towards her friends, they all instinctively flinched from fear and backed away as she walked towards them. She noticed this and quickly moved backwards. It hurt for her friends to be fearful of her, but she completely understood why they would be. When they didn’t say anything, she took it upon herself to speak.

  “You guys head back. I’ll be staying here for a while.” She said with audible hurt. After saying this she hopped on Malachite’s shell with her other bonds, and they dashed into the ruins. As she rushed away with her bonds, tears started to well up in her eyes before streaming down her face. It apparently didn’t matter if someone knew she would never hurt them, if her abilities were monstrous, they would still fear what she could do.

  As Gaia rushed away her friends weren’t sure what to do. They genuinely cared for her and knew she would never hurt them if she had a choice, but after what they’d just witnessed, they were afraid of her. The scene they witnessed played through their minds over and over and it made them shudder every time it happened. They decided to head back to camp so they could sort through their thoughts. They didn’t know what to do, but that was the only thing they could think to do.

  After returning to the inn, they all split up to be alone and think about what happened. They needed to figure out what to do now. They didn’t figure it out that night and met together at breakfast to discuss their thoughts.

  “I don’t know what to do. I know Gaia wouldn’t ever hurt us, but her ability was just so terrifying.” Griff stated.

  “Same. After seeing what happened and her turning back towards me like nothing happened, I just froze. My brain couldn’t comprehend what happened and my fear took control.” Stephanie said.

  “I know why I did what I did. My fear took hold, and my brain couldn’t process anything aside from the destruction that Gaia caused, so my instincts said to back away. I don’t like that it happened, but it did. Nothing I can do about that. What I can’t bring myself to understand is why we just came back here. She was so completely hurt by our reactions, and we just left her without even trying to go after her. Her expression was so heartbroken and lost.” Fergus stated.

  There was silence for a while after that. They all split back up after finishing and went to think about what to do. Stephanie had entered her forge and tried to forge while she thought, but couldn’t bring herself to continue. As Fergus had said Gaia’s expression had been heart wrenching and hurt. She was the one that had talked to Stephanie the most. They had grown quite close, and she considered Gaia as her sister and yet she had hurt her. She decided to talk to Gaia at dinner, when she came back, since she wasn’t sure if going to look for her was a wise decision with the current situation.

  Griff had been trying to go through some martial arts forms in one of the training areas while thinking about the situation, but like Stephanie, he couldn’t focus on it. He had been around Gaia for a long while now and saw her as a part of his family. He was almost old enough to be her dad and viewed her as a kind of daughter. He trusted her immensely and while he had been afraid in that moment he hated himself for what happened. He should have immediately followed after her like Fergus had said. Now he couldn’t bring himself to go after her, since he didn’t know what to do. He wasn’t the best with emotions or anything like that, but knew that what they did, while logically understandable, was wrong. He also thought to talk to Gaia at dinner time when she came back.

  Fergus was the one beating himself up the most of the group. He’d known and been with Gaia the longest. He knew how worried she was about being helpful and how much everyone meant to her. She had been thrown into the world without a single idea of what was going on or where she was. Then, ended up blind and finally met a group of people who treated her like a person and cared for her. She thought of them all like family and that family had been afraid of her. They had backed away from her, the only people she cared for and trusted in an unknown world, had been afraid of her. He knew he should have ran after her immediately, especially after seeing and hearing the hurt in her voice and on her face. He decided to wait by the gate for her to return, since he didn’t know where she went and would likely end up lost while searching.

  Meanwhile, Gaia was dashing through the ruins on Malachite’s shell until they reached the fourth floor. Once she reached there, she climbed down and leaned against the wall before curling into a ball and sobbing until no more tears came. She had made her family afraid of her. The only people she had were terrified of being near her. Seeing their reactions had hurt, but Fergus’ had hurt the worst. He’d been with her almost from the beginning of her hunting days. As her thoughts spiraled and her sorrow grew, there were a couple voices that spoke to her and a few nudges from her bonds.

  “Mom! You have us. You can talk to us.” Malachite said breaking Gaia from her thoughts.

  “Yeah. We’re always here for you.” Liv added.

  “Will a cuddle help? That always helps me.” Shadow asked.

  “Mom! Where do you hurt? I’ll heal.” Antonio added.

  Gaia’s spiraling was stopped with her bonds help. Shadow’s input even had her chuckle slightly. “I love you guys. I think I’ll be fine after a bit of time. I’ll always have you guys, so I’ll never end up to far gone.”

  As she and her bonds cuddled up Gaia could feel her sorrow slowly fade to the background as she talked with her bonds. They were always cheerful and loving, so when she talked with them her mood slowly improved. She could still see the faces of fear her friends had shown her, but her bonds helped keep her mind calm. She understood why they reacted that way and she probably would have in their shoes, but it still hurt her deeply.

  She eventually fell asleep with her bonds cuddled up with her against the wall. Liv was on watch as usual and would swiftly deal with any wraiths that came close with Shadow’s help. They let Gaia sleep for as long as she needed, knowing she needed it. Gaia awoke to a familiar and despised voice.

  “I see your so called ‘friends’ abandoned you. This is why I don’t have any.” The Amalgamation stated.

  “I think it’s for a different reason, like you being a horrific monstrosity that no one wants to get near, maybe?” Gaia stated angrily but innocently.

  “You know, I figured you’d try to at least try to be amicable when speaking to me after last time. I’ll give you a new quest then. This one shouldn’t be too difficult with your little group. Oh, wait." He stated before a momentary pause, then continued. "It’s just you, isn’t it? I hope you’re ready for it.” He finished before going silent and a screen appeared in front of Gaia.

  Quest: Kill the Fifth floor’s guardian (the Mutated Oni) or obtain its treasure. (0/1)

  Restriction: If help is given to Gaia, the quest will automatically fail.

  Reward: Bonding item.

  Failure: Unknown.

  Gaia read the screens and her heart raced. The quest seemed to be nearly impossible, but didn’t give a time requirement. The restriction caused her some trouble though since she couldn’t return to camp since she didn’t know if hearing anything from the scouts counted as helping. She did like that it gave her some more time alone to sort out her thoughts though. She would just need to figure out what the Oni’s treasure was and obtain it alone, how hard could it be?

  It was in fact very hard. After seeing the screens, she moved towards the fifth floor. It only took her around two hours to find the path and trek to the new floors entrance. As she walked down the tunnel, which had been in the opposite wall from the fourth floors entrance, it slowly changed to feel like cobblestone. Almost like a cobbled street from medieval times. When she reached the entrance of the floor, she noticed that it seemed to turn into a street right at its entrance. Along each side of the street were barren arid sections with small patches of grass or similar plant growing sporadically.

  She stepped onto the floor and her aura spread out finding herself to be on the outskirts of some kind of city. She walked forward and noticed that while the buildings were similar to modern buildings they all had one glaring similarity. Instead of windows there were metal bars and instead of doors there were thick chains. It seemed to be a bastardized version of modern buildings meant for containment. She couldn’t sense anything inside, so she guessed whatever had been inside had long since died or disappeared. As she rode in Malachite’s shell, she heard the sound of chains clinking together and wind howling through the cells that made the buildings.

  Malachite continued forward and they soon reached what she guessed was a central plaza. In the middle was a large statue of a muscular man with claws for toes, and at the end of each of his fourteen fingers, and an Oni mask. In each hand he carried a club and iron rod. He stood in the center of what seemed to be a fountain, but the smell told a different story. It was a pool of poison, and she could sense a few bodies floating within. This was also when she heard the sound of chewing. When she paid close attention to the sound, she heard another noise, someone speaking.

  “Ah my sweet child, continue eating. Worry not for our new intruders, for soon you may taste their flesh as well.” The deep voice stated.

  After hearing those words Gaia hopped back on Malachite’s shell and they sped away from the area. She could hear the sound of footsteps running behind them and the worrying part was that they were rapidly getting closer. The creature seemed to be faster than Malachite and when it reached the edge of her aura she analyzed it.

  Name – Mutated Oni

  Level – 80

  She panicked after reading that, but thankfully they had reached the entrance tunnel. They passed through the tunnels edge and the Oni stopped immediately. She couldn’t sense it since the entrance to a floor stopped her aura from passing into it. They stayed there for a while as her bonds relayed whether he was still there or had left. They stayed there for a few hours and the Oni stayed at the entrance. Eventually she called her bonds into their tattoos and spoke.

  “Why do you want to feed me to your child?” She asked.

  “Ah, so it speaks. As for why, because she likes flesh. Why else?” The Oni said.

  “So I’m gonna guess your child is your treasure.” She replied.

  “Yes. She. Is. And no one will touch her.” The Oni growled.

  “I’ll leave you be and go sleep. I hope we don’t see each other again.” She stated and walked back up the tunnel.

  As she walked she let Antonio out to climb the roof and keep a watch on the floors entrance for the Oni to leave. She had to somehow steal whatever he called his child and escape with it before he caught her. That seemed like a near impossible quest. He was faster than Malachite and likely stronger too.

  She went back to the fourth floor and started to formulate her plan. It took her a few hours to do so and then waited until the Oni had left. Then waited a few more hours with Antonio still watching to ensure he didn’t return before enacting it. The plan consisted of two main parts. Gaia would stay on Malachite’s shell until they got close with her other bonds in their tattoos. Then, she’d let Shadow out of her tattoo in her incorporeal form since she was nearly invisible when in shadows. After drawing the Oni away from his treasure Shadow would catch it and run to the floors entrance. Then She and Malachite along with Liv and Antonio would have to distract the Oni long enough for Shadow to carry it off the floor.

  Her hope was that it would count the quest as completed if it was pulled off the floor whether she was the one to do it or her bond did. Her biggest worry was about Shadow since she’d be the one dragging the treasure away and she wasn’t sure if it would attack her. Then she also worried for herself and her other bonds since it would be dangerous to try and distract the Oni without major injury or dying.

  Now that her plan was ready and everyone prepared, she moved towards the floors entrance. It was time to act. She entered the fifth floor on Malachite and reached the central plaza. She didn’t hear the voice but could still hear the chewing. She let Shadow out of her tattoo, and she hid. Then she moved over to try and get a sense for what the treasure actually was.

  The treasure was some kind of long snake with a mouthful of sharp teeth similar to a dinosaur’s. It had two short arms, that only had a curved spike at the end of each, a bit down it’s serpentine body. It was around ten feet long from its snout to the tip of its tail. When she saw it she had a quick thought. Why don’t I just grab it and we run now? She couldn’t hear any indication of the Oni nearby so she grabbed the odd serpentine creature and Malachite dashed back towards the entrance. She analyzed it to try and figure out what it was, but all the screen said was “Oni’s Treasure.”

  Everything was going smoothly until the creature started to bite and chew on her arm. It wasn’t causing a problem until they got close to the entrance and Gaia heard some chuckling from beside the entrance tunnel.

  “I knew you would need to leave through here for whatever you planned to do. I just needed to stay nearby.” The Oni started before seeing the creature in her arms. “Why do you have her? Your death will not be painless since you have placed your hands on her. If you give her to me now, I will give your pets a quick death.” He finished.

  Gaia was terrified since she knew the Oni was much stronger than her and could kill her easily if he desired. Her only bargaining chip was the creature chewing on her arm and she couldn’t make it release her whether she wanted to drop it or not. Her mind raced as she thought about what she could do to get out of the situation. Then an idea popped into her head, she was going to hate doing it, but it was her best bet at survival and keeping her bonds from being injured.

  “How about you let me pass and I won’t harm her?” She asked as her vines wrapped around the creature ready to bite and slash it. She also simultaneously put her bonds in their tattoos so he couldn’t take any hostage.

  “You’re despicable. Humans always are. Go. Ensure I do not find you otherwise you will die last and watch everyone around you be tortured. Then you’ll beg for death.” The Oni spat angrily.

  Gaia inched towards the entrance tunnel and didn’t let her focus leave the Oni until she couldn’t sense him anymore. When she entered the tunnel, the creature came with her which wasn’t entirely sure would happen since it was a monster of the ruins. She hated using the creature as a hostage, but due to the quest and situation she didn’t have a choice. She walked up the ruins tunnel for a while before the biting of the creature got worse and she could feel it digging into her flesh and lapping up the blood. This was also when a screen appeared.

  Quest: Kill the Fifth Floor’s guardian (The Mutated Oni) or obtain its treasure. (1/1)

  Reward: Bonding item

  As the screen appeared, the creature went limp and started to shrink. It shrunk until it was around the size of an armlet. When she analyzed it, she understood it was the reward for the quest and that the creature was likely dead. She hated that the treasure had to be a living creature and not some item. Instead she kidnapped the Oni’s beloved creature and proceeded to use it as a hostage and then, essentially kill it.

  Niehoggr’s Oath – Bonding Item. Is created from the body of a baby Niehoggr. Requires a drop of blood to bind. When bound, it moves to the upper arm and bites into the skin before wrapping around. Once bound it requires the holder to make an oath. As the holder enforces their oath, Niehoggr’s Oath will grow in power. Effects depend on the oath.

  Gaia had a bitter taste in her mouth as she read the description. It was indeed the item for her reward. She had just committed something she would never have done if she hadn’t been forced to, and would never forget or forgive herself for what just happened. She couldn’t do anything about it though and could only blame the Amalgamation for forcing the quest on her. With regret and anger she made her way back to the camp not realizing multiple days had passed since she and her party had parted.