"Umm..." I started, but my words utterly failed me. The heck? The cute and hyperactive hugger was using death magic? To be fair, it wasn't as if death magic had a bad reputation. It didn't have any reputation; I'd never seen anyone using it before! Perhaps I was just acting off my Earth biases, but my experience in the Emerald Caverns had done nothing to rid me of them.

"What? Are you jealous because you have no offensive spells?"

"I just... never imagined you using death magic," I answered carefully.

"Yeah, a bit of an unusual choice, but the common beastkin affinities are different from humans, and death affinity has the best damage dealing spells I can use. Shame there's nothing long range, but it'll do."

I'd never considered beastkin affinities, and whether common affinities may differ by race. Beastkin very rarely became mages, because their racial handicap was so crippling, and I simply hadn't seen enough of other races to have a good sample size.

"So you want to take the [Death Mage] class? Does that offer some sort of combo with [Scout]?"

Cluma tilted her head, looking at me in confusion. "How would [Death Mage] improve my surprise hugs? No, I want [Darkness Mage]."

Not just death, but darkness too?! Cluma held up a hand, and the light dimmed. For the first time in the Dawnhold dungeon, I cast a shadow, but it was inverted, brighter than the floor around it as Cluma's magic ate up a fraction of the dungeon's soft glow.

Darkness and death? And she was already wearing black, too. All she needed was some hair-dye and makeup. And maybe to do something about her cheerful, outgoing personality. Or not... I didn't want the angry, gloomy Cluma back, from when she'd just returned from the Emerald Nest. But now I wished I'd got her a gothic lolita dress for her birthday. Of course, that would involve me explaining to mum what a gothic lolita dress was, which I'm pretty sure I would have failed miserably at.

"How does darkness magic improve your surprise hugs? You can already turn completely invisible, so magical darkness wouldn't make any difference. In fact, it would alert people you were coming."

"It's not all about removing light. There's a rank two spell that would probably blind your [Mana Sight] too. But the main reason is that I want a rank three class that requires [Scout] and [Darkness Mage]. [Shrouded Reaper]."

Reaper? I assume it's a slightly magical version of [Assassin], but with reaper in the name, it certainly sounds like death magic should be involved. Forget the dress; I should have got her a black cloak and scythe.

Putting aside Cluma's unexpected attuned affinities, we moved on to the boss chamber, with Cluma managing not to torture any goblins to death for the entire walk. That simply turned out to be because she was saving her mana for the orc, though.

"Drat, I ran out," she complained, as the orc staggered towards her, swinging his arms as if he was trying to backhand slap her. He didn't have much choice; despite the shallow wounds caused by Cluma's [Minor Harm] spell, she'd managed to take out some important muscles and tendons, and the orc could no longer grip his tree branch, or even make a fist.

"Should I wait for it to regenerate? Any other delvers queuing up?" She asked, somersaulting over the orc's wild swing, landing neatly on his shoulder and kicking off hard enough to send the orc stumbling.

"I know the spells are shiny and new, but remember you can just stab it," I answered.

"I want the skill levels, though."

Bah. It wasn't as if there was anyone waiting, but at this rate, we'd never reach floor eight. She had no passive regeneration boosting skills, and the fifty percent racial penalty. I suppose I could cover for her while she used [Meditation] if she was that desperate to kill it with death magic.

...Or perhaps I could do something even better.

I scanned Cluma with [Mana Sight], looking over the layout of organs in her torso. Beastkin biology seemed very similar to human. Perhaps the digestive tract was shorter to make space for larger heart and lungs, which would explain the heavily meat-based diet, but that didn't change the fact that there was a digestive tract, heart and lungs. And above the heart, an ovoid, pulsating organ, drawing in mana from outside of her body, storing it, and pumping it through her flesh and bones. It was smaller than mine, but it was there.

"Pull back from the orc, get over here and stand very still," I called, using [Far Reach] to trip the orc the moment Cluma disengaged. I'd never before tried to do this on someone else, but I could do it to myself without even having to think about it. I was sure my rank three control skills would be sufficient to recharge others. "Let me know the moment you feel any pain," I added, placing my hands on her back and concentrating.

"What are you doing?" she asked, just as my stream of mana hit her, causing her to gasp and buckle at the knees, landing on all fours.

At least she wasn't screaming, but obviously that hadn't worked as intended. Even without skills, I could feel the effect as I recharged myself, but that was through my rudimentary mana sense, and not any sort of physical sensation. Whatever just happened, I don't think I should be doing any more experimentation in a boss chamber. Maybe once we're out of the dungeon.

"I was trying to recharge your mana, but given your reaction, I'm not going to try that again in the dungeon."

By this point, the orc was back on his feet and approaching rapidly. With Cluma still on hands and knees, I employed [Far Reach] to stab it through the heart.

"Well, my mana jumped up by a point, so it was working," said Cluma. "It felt weird though. Like instead of touching my back, you'd pushed your hand straight through me, and were tickling my insides."

She climbed back to her feet and squinted at me, tail flicking back and fore behind her. "Yes?" I asked.

"You're cheating again, aren't you?" she asked. "You don't have life affinity. You shouldn't be able to recharge my mana just by touching me."

"I was using [Expert Mana Control] to move ambient mana into your... I have no idea what it's called, actually. The organ in your chest that handles mana."

"The thauma? How can you not know what that's called?"

Oh, so it was common knowledge, after all. A long time ago I'd wondered if it was a physical thing and no-one had mentioned it because I'd given the appearance of already knowing basic biology. Apparently, that was indeed the case. People thought I knew all the bits of a body, but I'd been working based on Earth knowledge. I didn't have a thauma back on Earth. For some reason, I'd never asked about it in all this time.

"Earth humans don't have them. Nothing on Earth had them."

"Wow. How strange. But I think it's equally strange that you don't have a tail or proper ears, so I suppose it's the same sort of thing. Anyway, this room is safe, so hurry up and recharge me!"

"Umm... Are you sure? From your reaction the first time, it didn't look pleasant..."

"It wasn't, but at the rate my mana recovers naturally, I'm more than willing to spend some time being tickled to speed it up."

Well, since she insisted. And at least here we're next to the teleporter if things go wrong. Nevertheless, I pushed far more lightly this time, and Cluma didn't react at all as I reinforced the mana she was absorbing.

"Hurry up!" she exclaimed. "I don't want to stand around waiting for you to tickle me!"

"I already started," I answered. So she couldn't feel it if I went more slowly. Where was the cut-off? Would I have a similar reaction if I pushed myself too hard, and if so, why was my limit so much higher? "I'm going more slowly this time. I'll gradually speed up, so let me know when you can feel it, and I'll keep going at that rate."

I gradually increased the pace, eventually reaching a point at which Cluma started to squirm uncomfortably. "Too much," she gasped, shuddering. "Back off a bit."

From the flows of mana, I guessed I was boosting her regeneration by ten times. With her maxed [Enlarged Mana Pool], but no regeneration skills, she would have a two-hour base rate to fill her pools from empty. "At this rate, it will take twenty minutes to fill your mana pool," I pointed out.

"Bah. How long if you went all out?"

With this ambient mana density, I could boost my own regeneration by more than ten times. My intelligence was far higher than Cluma's, and then I had [Enhanced Mana Regeneration], [Victorious Underdog 3] and [Magician] on top, not to mention the lack of the beastkin racial penalty. My base regeneration rate was something like twenty times Cluma's. Despite already boosting her regeneration rate by an order of magnitude, I still had another order of magnitude to go.

"Less than two minutes."

"Fine. I'll just have to treat it like a really strange hug from someone who's rubbish at hugging."

Cluma sat down on the floor and tensed up, so I pushed her regeneration as high as I could manage. I watched her grit her teeth, doing her best not to move, and for the first minute, I wasn't convinced she was going to make it. Thankfully, by the second, despite still being tense enough to bend a pole around, her expression had notably improved.

With the upgrade to [Mana Sight], I could see when the thauma was filled to capacity. That was interesting too; how did it interplay with skills that increased mana pool size? I'd already seen the hero's last stand cause damage to it, so I knew the System's mechanisations weren't completely artificial. Did those skills directly improve my biology? When I took the rank three versions, I'd need to ensure I was watching closely with every perception skill I had.

If they did improve my thauma, did the stamina pool skills boost my heart and lungs? And what the hell did the health skills do?

"All done," I said.

Cluma immediately went limp, flopping face first into the ground. "Thank goodness," she mumbled from her prone position. "Worth it, to save two hours of recharging mana, but nevertheless, I'm glad it's over."

ding
Skill [Expert Mana Control] advanced to level 13

"You looked like you were getting used to it towards the end there," I pointed out.

"I don't think that was me getting used to it, and more that I lost feeling in my everything."

I watched Cluma pull herself back to her feet, but she was swaying in a rather alarming way.

"Hey, are you okay?!" I exclaimed, catching her as she fell over sideways.

"I think my pins and needles have pins and needles," she muttered. "My health pool is full though, so I'm fine."

"Remember when I was in hospital and you were taking so much pleasure in feeding me, because I couldn't feed myself? My health pool was full then, too."

I took another look with [Mana Sight], but without any advanced knowledge of beastkin anatomy, or magical anatomy in general, I wasn't sure what I was looking at. Were the walls around her mana veins thicker than they had been? But more uneven? Were they inflamed?

ding
Skill [Mana Sight] advanced to level 8

"It's okay, they're going away," said Cluma, detaching herself from me and making a second, more successful attempt at remaining upright. "So, two minutes' recharge time and another five minutes' recovery time? Still better than twenty minutes. Or two hours, without your help at all. Also, did I mention that you cheat?"

"Yes. Once or twice."

"Well, you do. How fast can you refill your pool?"

"A quarter hour? Ish?"

"Hmm... Still quite a while, but I suppose your pool is far bigger than mine. How fast do you reckon Darren could recharge you?"

"I've never tried? Why?"

"Just wondering."

It was another interesting question. Darren had far better mana control than me, but given his habit of messing with my spells, I wasn't entirely sure I'd trust him manipulating my internal organs. Besides, I didn't need any more mana.

With Cluma recovered and topped off on mana, we resumed our trek to floor eight, with goblins and wolves alike falling not only to suddenly missing hearts or heads, but also to magically severed carotid arteries, or blinded by a magical cut to the eye. She may have started by aiming her magic randomly, but it didn't take Cluma long to work out where a small wound could be made to deal fatal damage.

By the time we set foot onto the eighth floor, she'd gained two levels of [Minor Harm] and one of [Minor Drain], suffering another three sessions of mana regeneration in the process. She certainly did seem to be getting used to the process, though, taking only a couple of minutes to recover the third time.

Unlike [Mana Perception], [Mana Sight] was sufficient to pick up the assassins, even without active scanning. Not with sufficient fidelity to engage in melee combat with them, but enough that I knew when one was approaching us. In fact, there was one in the very next room. Let's see if Cluma could spot it.