Kenny and Val entered the second half of the third area with joy and excitement filling them that they were trying to dampen down. They were happy with the results they had received when fighting the Toxic Slimed Skinned Bullfrog. While Kenny didn’t receive a Title this time since he was no longer solo, he was still happy to see Val had received one thanks to him giving her that tome. The other thing they were happy with was the loot they received.

Val had received a pair of muddy brown frog skinned gloves with dirty green lining. They gave her a plus four in Vitality and a plus two in Wisdom. However, that was not all. They also had an effect that when she channel her mana into her gloves before sending a blast of magic through her wand it would give that blast of magic a poisonous effect. This meant that her wand attacks now had a chance to poison her enemies. Something that would be immensely helpful when attacking groups of opponents.

Kenny on the other hand had received a sleeveless muddy brown hooded cloak with dark green streaks and dark purple lining. It didn’t come with an effect like Val’s gloves, but it did have a plus four to Vitality and a plus one to Wisdom.

It didn’t have any buttons which made it flap whenever he moved fast. He thought it would fly right off if he moved to fast, but to his surprise and joy it didn’t. He was also afraid it would be too long and get soaked in the swamp water, but after putting it on it stopped above his knees.

While he had concerns about this before they entered the second half, the worries he had disappeared after seeing the terrain of the next half. While there were still a lot of wet swampy areas, there were a lot more of drier land starting to form.

Something both he and Val were ecstatic to see. They had contemplated on where they should dry their footwear, but after seeing they would still need to trudge through areas of wet ankle-deep water here and there they decided to wait till after they passed the area.

The monsters they came across didn’t change like the last two areas did. Instead of fighting new monster they ended getting more numbers in the group. When there were groups of two Toxic Skinned Toads and Barbed Mosquitoes roaming around there were now four to five of the toads and the mosquitoes mixing in with them.

Even though the number of monsters grew in each group they came across, Kenny and Val showed they were capable of killing them as a team. It was slow and difficult at first. Val spent too much time trying to stack her Slow Debuff on a single target, allowing each failed attempt made for the other creatures, especially those damn mosquitoes, able to swarm Kenny and her.

After surviving the onslaught of creatures, they both took a small amount of time talking about what they did wrong and what they could do to adapt and improve. While Val’s Stacking ability paired with her Slow ability they came to an understanding of a short-term problem. Her Mana Pool.

The amount of mana she spent to cast her first Slow on a target wasn’t great, but after constantly trying to stack it and failing each time the amount of mana used stacked up. While her Mana Pool was higher than Kenny’s the amount used after constantly trying to stack the ability as much as she after each failure was taxing.

The solution they decided on? Cast Slow on a couple of high priority targets one time. Kenny would target the ones not hit by the Debuff to keep their attention on him until she was able to successfully stack a second or third time. He would then focus on them as she got the rest of the targets debuffed. She would then focus her attacks with her wand on the flyers, poisoning them before recasting her Slow Debuff on those who lost her Debuff while Kenny took down the ones who still had the stacks as fast as he could.

They tried this strategy out a few times after talking it out. During those fights they learned some of the strategy was good while they needed to work on the other parts. For example, the ones that didn’t get a Debuff on them and escaped from Kenny’s sight before he could get their attention.

They had to adapt to him focusing on the ones that weren’t hit with a debuff and try to take them out before focusing on the ones that were stacked. That worked on a few fights, but not all. They had to learn to adapt to the situation and they agreed on that and figure out who was the more dangerous target. Thankfully, Kenny no longer had to be the one who to figure this all out. He now had Val to do that. Something she was showing a lot of potential in.

After a few fights Kenny had asked how she was able to see everything so well when they fought. While he could deduce it was because she had positioned herself a certain distance away from him and the monsters, he also felt there was something more to it. Something she had a theory in. Her Perception stat.

She had explained the more the stat grew the clearer everything looked as well as the easier it was for her to spot potential dangers when it came to the monsters they were fighting. She hadn’t realized it that much before because she didn’t have to focus on scouting and spotting the monsters like in her last team or when she was by herself, but after dividing up the roles with Kenny she was starting to see it more.

Not only that, but after having to scout and focus on the monsters she felt her ability to successfully land her first initial Debuff on a target and a second or third stack was starting to get better and easier. The number of successful back-to-back Debuffs landing weren’t a lot, but the improvement in her successes was noticeable, at least to her.

Another thing they talked about as they walked between fights was how to successfully use mana. Kenny, while embarrassed to bring this up, had informed Val he wasn’t sure how to use his mana and the reason why he needed to understand how to channel it.

While she felt the effect of his vest was bullshit and had voiced it a few times, she had also found the situation funny. This highly enduranced man had a piece of equipment that gave him an even more durable body for a short amount of time and yet he couldn’t get the effect to work because he had no way to utilize his mana.

After laughing at the thought of it, she explained to him that the only way for him to understand how his mana worked was for him to have someone channel their own mana through him to help kickstart the mana within him until he was able to feel it flowing. That or a powerful source of mana needed to wash over or through him in order for the mana to become active enough for him to grasp it fully.

During one of their short breaks Val took the time to try and go through the process she went through to get her mana to be active. However, throughout the entire time she tried nothing happened. She felt bad because as she tried to help him the mana she channeled kept discharging a few seconds after entering him.

She wasn’t sure why it kept happening and couldn’t find a solution. They had to stop after a while since it did cost her mana to do this, and they didn’t want to have her drink a Mana Potion for something like this.

After their break was done, they started up their trek through the dry patches of land and swampy waters. They came across a few more fights that helped them get a better feel of each other’s current capabilities. As they fought their way through the second half of the area Kenny was starting to understand that until he formed a team with Val his fights felt more like street brawls where anything and everything was a weapon.

He wasn’t going to deny that his fighting style wasn’t effective since what he did, using the bodies of either living monsters or dead ones as a makeshift club, had helped him survive and proceed further into the Trial Ground Areas. However, he also wasn’t going to claim that that’s the direction he wanted to venture down with his fighting style.

With Val having his back and taking up some of the responsibilities meant for four or more people, he was able to slowly course correct his techniques and fighting style slowly. He was starting to work on his techniques when throwing his punches and his kicks as well as worked on combinations and incorporate some grappling where he could.

This helped him further understand how his stamina came into play when he threw his punch combinations, jukes, fakes, and more. He knew that this would evolve later in something different after he got his other two Skill Trees awakened, but for now this was good since it helped him set up his base foundation for possible future fighting styles. However, as he worked on this he was starting to come to a realization. He was having fun.

He knew that with the timer over their heads and the increase of monsters they were having to fight that the last thing he needed to think, or feel was…the joy of having fun. However, now that he was in the Tower, fighting monsters, and doing so with someone he was slowly trusting to watch his back…this was the most fun he had ever had so far in his life.

Sure, he had fights with people outside the Tower, but those fights were different. Many of them the odds were heavily stacked against him, and it was shown when he was knocked out or beaten pretty badly. There were some he knew he could have won but held on long enough to survive long enough that the opponent got bored, tired, or scared because someone yelled police. Those fights were never meant for him to try and win, and he understood that. If he won then there was a chance they would seek him out for retribution.

Here in the Tower, however…there was no need to hold back. No need to survive long enough for the monsters to get bored, tired, or scared over a scream of police. The monsters didn’t care about any of that. They wanted him dead, and he was free to kill them back.

While Kenny was worried about his sudden feeling of being free and having fun, Val had other things going on. She was stressing. She was stressing because after seeing Kenny fight so far she felt her contributions so far were lacking.

While Kenny had praised her ability and talked about how useful it was, she still feared there was a chance his opinion could or rather would change. All it would take is a single slip up. Mistiming when to land her Debuff or losing track when it came off or not being able to successfully land it at all. Or, the rather important one, not being able to land a single successful Debuff.

She had experienced that before at the start of her Trial Grounds adventure. Until she had raised some of her stats and found that helped her start landing her Debuff more, she felt so embarrassed and useless that she tried to make up for it with her wand. Her low damage wand that used more mana than her only ability made it a mana pit and caused her to stand there doing nothing for the first few fights.

After she had finally gotten a better grasp on what she needed to improve on, increasing her Mana Pool, help increase her chances to successfully land her Slow Debuff, and manage her mana better, she was able to be a better teammate. Her success rates still weren’t the best, but it was better than missing each time.

All that work she had put in to helping her team though was for naught when they dismissed her after the last boss fight. When she mentioned she had felt a pull towards one of her triggers for one of her unawakened Skill Trees, the leader of the party had informed her that it would probably be for the best if she went that way on her own since two of the other members felt a pull from a different portal.

She wasn’t stupid. She knew they had wanted to get rid of her for a while now. The whispers they didn’t think she heard, the comments, the suggestions of how to get rid of her or the best way to ditch her still replayed in her mind.

Some of the things one of them had said were downright evil to her. She was starting to fear for her life after what she had heard that one guy had suggested doing. While she was glad to get away before that maniac put to work what he was suggesting to the others, she was also upset they had gone ahead and kicked her out instead of that scumbag. It just showed her how little her contribution to the team was. She was useless and he wasn’t.

That was why she was worried when it came to Kenny. While he did propose such perfect terms that made her feel like she couldn’t say no, they were, in the end, just words. Words that he could go back on whenever he felt like only because there was no power of binding to them. He could ditch her or leave her at any moment.

While he could do that, and she felt very sure he could if given the right reason, the more time she spent with him the more she was starting to feel he wasn’t that type of guy. During their interactions after the fights and when they weren’t walking around, he seemed like an… awkward guy.

The type that knows how to act around people, but at the same time doesn’t. Like a shy person, but also not. A shy, awkward guy with a lot of questions. He questioned her about a lot of things he wasn’t told about. Things related to mana, the tomes, and more. The more he asked the more she started to feel like he was more like a curious puppy wary of people.

That was another thing that confused her heavily. Most of the time when he wasn’t asking questions, he was silent and seemed serious. But when he was fighting…he was a whole different person. His movements in the fights also made him look like a puppy to her.

A playful puppy that smiled and looked like he was having the time of his life as he moved around beating all the monsters. He didn’t seem to know she had seen him acting this way. The image of him as a puppy had surfaced a few times. Those few times she almost slipped up on her part of the responsibilities because she had to hold back the giggles that threatened to escape her lips.

Overall, while Val was wary of Kenny changing his mind at any time, she was also starting to feel slightly comfortable with him. Something had also started making her worried. Back in school, the teachers and the Ascenders that came to visit would warn everyone not to get too comfortable with those who they teamed up with during the Trial Grounds.

Their reasoning? The chances of a team that was formed during the Trial Grounds sticking together after it, if any or all had passed, was low. There were too many factors that broke a team up at the end. Uncapable to work well together, their abilities overlapped or didn’t mesh well, a love triangle between members or an unrequited love blossoming and making the one who didn’t reciprocate feel uncomfortable, or members already had a team waiting for them due to connections. The reasons were endless.

Val understood and agreed with them. Especially the love one. Something she had experienced not too long before meeting Kenny. It was actually the reason why she had added the no flirting rule to the terms. She didn’t want to go through that again. She was thankful that he agreed to it and was as serious about finishing the Trial Grounds as she was. It made wanting to work with him all the better.

That and the fact he would listen to her suggestions and advice. He didn’t just listen. He made counter suggestions on anything he felt wouldn’t work with reason of his own or make suggestions to things he believed wouldn’t work. He just made things so much easier. While his knowledge was completely different from her own, probably the difference in where they went to school or the people they knew, he wasn’t stupid nor lacked in areas she didn’t have a full grasp on.

He had admitted to her that he lacked proper understanding in a lot of areas, like magical aspects of mages and certain stats. But where his knowledge was lacking, he made up for in areas she didn’t have a clue about.

For example, he had told her about how the Endurance Stat not only focused on a person’s Stamina, but it also helped with damage reduction. When she asked more about what he meant he further explained it.

She was surprised by what he had told her. She also laughed when he told her that while it helped with damage reduction and lessening the amount of damage done physically, it did nothing to help a person mentally. She didn’t laugh at what he had explained but rather at the way he had found out about it. He then told her he believed it was something he needed to train and after a while it would fix itself, but as time had passed and he had received so many blows he was starting to think that wasn’t the case.

This was a concern she wasn’t aware of. If that was the case for Endurance then that meant the other stats had drawbacks to them as well. That was something they were going to need to learn as they go. Luckily, the stats she focused on were all mental and physical.

After spending a few hours fighting through monsters and swapping information during their breaks they finally came to a clearing that was screaming Area Boss ahead to them. To their surprise though what was waiting in the area was completely different from what they had experienced in the other two areas.

Inside this clearing surrounded by damp rotted looking trees was a hut. The hut wasn’t extravagant or anything. It had a straw roof with walls made from twigs and branches and a grass skirt hung in place of a door. It wasn’t very tall either as it stood almost as tall as Val. The ground around the hut was solid except for two small swamp pools the size of a small bus on both sides of the hut. In front of the hut was a fire pit with a bundle of twigs and branches burning.

The thing that stood out the most though about the place were all the skulls and bones. Skulls hung along the edges of the roof while some were stuck to tip of spikes that were scattered about the whole area. The whole aesthetics of the place made both Kenny and Val pause. They stared at each other and the looks on their faces were easy to understand. They both were asking each other the silent question, What the hell?

As they turned to look back into the area a gnarled muddy brown hand opened the hanging grass door. Following the gnarled hand came a bony thin arm attached to a short, pudgy bellied creature wearing a grass skirt, a skull necklace and bracelets, and a feathered skull on top of its oddly shaped wart crusted face.

Kenny grimaced at the sight of the creature as it yawned and revealed sharp pointy teeth. It had dark yellow eyes surrounded by black cornea. As it moved towards the fire Kenny watched as it moved its right hand over its head and used the wooden skull staff it was clutching as a backscratcher. It didn’t take long for a screen to appear to reveal what it was.

[3^rd Area, Swamplands, Area Boss. Goblin Swamp Witch Doctor. Level – 8. Stat Talent – Wisdom.]

Kenny felt his body suddenly tense as he felt a hand grip his bicep tightly out of nowhere. He turned to see Val staring at the Area Boss with a strange look on her face. Her eyes were wide, mouth slightly opened with the edges slowly curving up. She slowly turned to look at him and he saw excitement and joy in her eyes.

At first, he was confused. He almost believed she was excited at seeing their first Goblin. However, he thought better of it since goblins had a nasty reputation in the Tower. They were a pack monster that, if you weren’t careful, could cunningly kill you without you knowing what was going on.

Even the weak ones were not to be taken lightly. Women especially had to be careful of them since there were reports of women getting knocked out and dragged away before anyone could know or do anything about it.

Since it wasn’t something like being excited about seeing a creature like that it had to be something else. Realization dawned on him when it finally clicked. His realization was confirmed when Val whispered, “That Boss creature is making one of my triggers scream.”