With those cheerful thoughts about her inability to eat in mind, Aurora looked on as Skadi slowly munched away at her bread, eyes closed. At the very least, while Aurora may feel cursed, no actual curse had been casted on her. Even if her current situation felt like one.

 

Though even after she finished eating the wayfinder bread from Skadi, Aurora’s hunger remained unsated. Her soul yearned to consume something, and her hunger grew ever so slightly more intense with every passing minute. If Aurora saw someone strong, even like the old, wizened man in the tunnels, she didn’t know if she could restrain herself. At this point, she really needed to sate her hunger, like eating some low leveled wolf’s essence… but she wasn’t sure if she wanted to go out to fight with Skadi again, at least for the moment.

 

“Skadi, I’m going to go out of this cave to look at the local flora and fauna of the area… or your world in general, I suppose. I haven’t really seen, well, anything of it yet. This is a lower leveled forest, right?”

 

“Ah.” Skadi responded, pausing halfway through another bite. “Lady Aurora, yes, this region does mostly contain low-leveled foes, with maybe the occasional E-grade here and there. I just wanted to say, Lady Aurora, thank you for not abandoning me earlier… and please do come back.”

 

“Just wait here.” Aurora said, striding down the cave tunnel and out of sight; Skadi had gone pretty deep in.

 

Watching Aurora’s nine tails disappear from sight as she went around the bend before the mouth of the cave, Skadi’s lips formed a slight smile. And, just out of curiosity, she looked at her class options for the first time in at least a couple weeks. Anyways, she might have qualified for the Novice Summoner class if she did well enough with Aurora, who knows?

 

And then Skadi got quite startled by Aurora’s head peeking back around the corner. “Skadi, uh, this is the way out of the cave, right?” 

 

“Lady Aurora, you startled me. Yes, that would be correct.”

 

“Alright, I’ll be back in a little bit.”

 

Picking back off where she was, before she was interrupted, Skadi opened her class options for the first time in weeks. She was a little disappointed at seeing the first option remain the same. Apparently, her summoning wasn’t adequate enough to award her most basic class possible for summoners. It does make sense though, others did construct almost the entire ritual for her, after all. The only thing she really did was activate it, and barter with Aurora for her services. Skadi swiftly skimmed through her class options, and there was no change to any of the descriptions.

 

1 - Disgraced Noble (Common) - Born with power to rule above the plebeians, who dares question the authority of your house? Beware your house never slips from their path, though, or your path won’t survive unscathed. Further class evolution or advancement is impossible until no longer considered disgraced. Will grant minor bonuses to charisma when no longer considered disgraced.

 

2 - Fledgling Swordswoman (Common) - A fledgling swordswoman just embarking on their path, achievements are sure to follow eventually, from the corpses of foes slain by their blade. Grants minor bonuses to physical abilities. Grants minor bonuses to all skills utilizing a sword.

 

3 - Frost Mageling (Uncommon) - A novice mage in the arts of Frost, they find their current comprehension lacking. Hence their path begins. Grants bonuses to mana-based abilities. 

 

At least, there weren’t any changes before the fourth and final option. One that wasn’t there before.

 

4 - Inexperienced Calamitous Summoner (Epic) No doubt an inexperienced summoner, but one with a true knack for the arts. Who needs experience when one can survive, along with the entirety of their continent, from such a dire calamity? Either way, fighting capabilities aren’t needed when one can sit in the back when such calamities do the fighting for them, and more. Grants large bonuses to the summoning arts. Grants debuffs to physical capabilities. Successfully summonings are 80,000 times more likely to result in the summoning of a Void Horror. 

 

Hands trembling, Skadi read over the description again, taking a double, and then triple look over everything, making sure she wasn’t hallucinating. She even pinched herself a few times; she didn’t just qualify for a rare class, she qualified for an epic class. An epic class, even with the obvious debuff of being inexperienced. An Epic class was something she only thought would appear in her wildest hopes and dreams, but was now right before her very eyes. There was one minor, teensy tiny concern she now had.

 

“How… how did I get this?” Skadi murmured, looking down at her trembling hands. Void Horrors? The boogeymen in the night, the creatures that one’s parents would say would get them one night if they didn’t clean their room, or do their chores. All of which, even the weakest, were at least at the power level of a B-grade. But other than the strongest, they almost always looked like eldritch monstrosities, and even the oversimplified, cartoonish illustrations in children's stories were absolutely horrifying. But a Void Horror couldn’t be as weak as Aurora, right?

 

What else could she be, though? She had never heard of such a low level Void Horror existing, much less having a stable form. But neither had she ever heard of one that didn’t go on a murder spree as soon as they were summoned. But one specific line had caught her eye, which she read over again. Either way, fighting capabilities aren’t needed when one can sit in the back as others fight for them, particularly such calamities. That would explain how Aurora had managed to kill that peak E-grade earlier, as well. An F-grade killing one? They would have to be quite the prodigy, and the E-grade rather weak for their level.

 

But a Void Horror, even an F-grade, killing one? That was much more reasonable.

 

A moment later, after a decision many may deem hasty or foolish, Skadi reopened her eyes. And with a faint smile, she looked at the screens in front of her.

 

Evolutionary Quest: Successfully ally with a summoned Void Horror. (1/1)

 

[*ding!* Class Skills Available.]

 

— — — — — — —

 

Walking to the edge of the cave, Aurora looked around at the surrounding forest; it consisted mostly of trees with brown bark, green leaves, and an abundance of various foliage, which was mostly green. The colors and various noises, like the chirps and insect noises, reminded her of the unenchanted forests of her home world. In fact, they were very similar.

 

Even the sky was the same color, or at least the same color of most places, being a bright blue, with a single yellow-orange sun glaring down from above.

 

The only wildlife visible in the surrounding area were some small birds chirping in the trees. Though, the mouth of the cave she still stood in was at least four meters above the ground. It was quite close to the ground, even though it was on a cliff face. After gently jumping down, landing perfectly fine thanks to her level thirteen body, Aurora looked up at the mouth of the cave. And then she asked herself how, exactly, did Skadi manage to get up there, especially considering she had a large bag on her back, and was carrying Aurora in her arms?

 

Looking up at the cliff face, Aurora was absolutely baffled, until she remembered that Skadi was actually level 24, somehow. “Thinking about it, I’m level 13 now, right? Can I jump up there now too?”

 

Bending her legs a bit, Aurora leapt up towards the mouth of the cave, and was actually able to land there pretty easily. Aurora even thought could jump a little bit higher, but she could always test that later. The hunger she felt took priority, and it needed to be dealt with, or at least partially sated, first.

 

Jumping down from the cave again, leaves crunched underfoot as Aurora walked forward, venturing into the trees. Looking around for anything in plain view, Aurora didn’t exactly see any living creatures other than the small birds… maybe she could find a river or something? Best to keep an ear out for water, then. Confidently striding forward, Aurora realized she forgot something decently important.

 

Turning around, she backtracked for a moment before looking at the sides of the cliff for any more caves. And to her delight, there here were actually quite a few dotting the surface of the cliff. She almost forgot that things could probably be found in caves, and if anything, it was surprising that the cave Aurora and Skadi were in didn’t already have something inside.  “Now, which cave to check out first…” Aurora thought, scratching her head.

 

The cliff face looked about twenty meters tall, though it stretched on for a while. Farther than she could see, actually. None of the cave mouths were clustered together; they were more spread out along the cliff. After debating which way to try first, Aurora began jogging to the right. Why not? And it only took around a minute for Aurora to arrive at the side of the cliff, where there was a cave about ten meters or so above ground. Leaping up as far as she could, Aurora stretched out an arm, but came up a couple meters short of the cave still, and fell back down only to land on her back. All nine of her tails actually provided quite a bit of cushion upon landing, despite being made of energy now.

 

A little disappointed she couldn’t jump all the way to the cave, Aurora continued jogging, even though she could have managed to make it up with more effort. Though she wasn’t sure if using any mana would make her feel even hungrier, and wasn’t the most enthusiastic about experimenting at the moment.

 

Anyways, the next cave Aurora saw in the distance was at ground level, with two stalactites dangling from the roof of the cave, almost like a snake’s fangs. “There’s no way there isn’t something in there, right?” And after about half a minute of lightly jogging, at about her fastest sprinting pace when she used to be level one, Aurora reached the mouth of the cave.

 

Looking inside, there was actually a really steep slope almost immediately past the mouth. As in, really steep, to the point where it was almost just a wall. Aurora didn’t even know if she could climb up it quickly without using mana, even after all the levels she gained. Standing there, Aurora didn’t know whether to risk heading down and finding nothing, or to just go to an easier cave to access. But then a guttural howl emanated from the depths of the cave, the echo bouncing off the walls. Hearing that noise, Aurora’s essence erupted into protests of how she had to feast, as her fingertips slowly grew less distinct, with Aurora none the wiser. But with hunger gnawing away her, Aurora slid down the stone slope. 

 

If all of her focus hadn’t been taken by the hunger that grew more and more with each passing moment, Aurora might have paid a little bit more attention to the fact that the slope she slid down was as smooth as glass, as well as the small scratches on the bottom.

 

After a solid bit of sliding, Aurora did reach the bottom of the cave. It was pitch-black, or it should have been… but Aurora could see just fine. She could still tell it was dark, and see it was dark, but it just didn’t obstruct her vision, just like in the Void, and the tunnels previously. “I guess it makes sense that Void Horrors can see in the dark, living in the Void and all that.” Aurora thought. Walking down the tunnel, Aurora went rather slowly, as she could hear some sort of faint whimpering; it sounded similar to whatever let out the howl from before.

 

As Aurora walked, her hunger urged her to move faster and feast, almost with a mind of its own at that point. Nevertheless, despite the compulsion to start running through the tunnel like a drooling dog, Aurora took her time and slowly made her way through the cave, making certain she wasn’t walking into an ambush. “Thanks mom, dad.” She thought, smiling as she recalled one of her least favorite training exercises her parents put her through, where she was trapped in a forest filled with various incorporeal creatures, like phantoms or ghosts. Going for at least a week without food during that was her absolute least favorite experience at the time. But she couldn’t deny that it helped her pace herself now.

 

And then the whimpering creature fell silent. Tiptoeing forward, Aurora spotted a small piece of paper on the floor, looking like it had been torn off of some sort of empty book, perhaps a journal? Picking it up, while still repeatedly glancing up at the tunnel in front of her, Aurora read the few works that were written.

 

shhhhh

turn off your lights

 

“Hm, is that a warning, or a trap? Either way, I don’t have any lights and I can still see, so I’m fine. Hopefully it’s not a trap…” Aurora thought, gently setting the piece of paper, now with a tiny hole in it from her fingers, back onto the ground. 

 

She considered whether to turn around, but she had already come this far. Might as well keep going, she had as much of an idea what was in this cave as just about any of the others. Although, the lack of sound was definitely ominous. “How long does this tunnel go on for?” Aurora thought, looking for any sign, at all, that someone else might be down there with her. She saw absolutely no other signs of there being more people, or any creatures, other than that previous note and the noises as she kept walking, the hunger growing in intensity even faster.

 

Thankfully, it didn’t take much longer for the tunnel to begin expanding, opening up into an open stone cavern, with… a polished door, made of some white and silver metal, just sitting at the end? Looking around, Aurora saw absolutely nothing else in the entire cavern. And feeling her intuition almost tingle slightly, she looked back at the wall above the entrance she just came through. Nothing.

 

The only other thing in the entire room was a tattered leather book, which looked like a grimoire, or at least something similar, lying on the floor in the middle of the cavern. The only issue? The cover was covered in dry, dark red bloodstains. 

 

Carefully looking around the room, Aurora slowly walked over towards the book on the floor, unsheathing her sword. Though while walking to the book, Aurora felt like she was having a case of déjà vu, and as she walked closer, it only got worse. She stopped in place, and just stood still, but was unable to place the feeling. At first, she swiftly looked around the room in all directions, blade in hand, but there was literally absolutely nothing else

 

And then her eyes widened, as Aurora finally realized what felt so familiar. But before her eyelids could even fully widen, two massive fangs stabbed through her torso like a skewer.