Jason hops back onto the starting platform and no other poles are lit. Suddenly it hits him and he sort of just slumps over. For the first time in this life he felt completely worn out, both in body and mind. From the side John shouts over, “Oy, you should have gotten the skill. Check what level it is at.”

With a quick wave to confirm he heard him Jason pulls up the messages he had missed.

After checking the skill Jason yells back, “Yeah I have the skill and it’s at Initiate 3!” He is actually surprised at the stat ups. Those tend to be quite rare and require impressive amounts of effort.

Hearing that John is actually relieved. While making it to Initiate rank was surprising the level reached wasn’t to shocking. Satisfied at this he starts filling Jason in on some of the details, “Good job, that is above average. Though you only managed it as you got lucky and triggered Powered Grip. That tends to be a bottleneck for most people. Anyway since you learned it within the first day lets get you learning a second skill. Normally the skill would be something like hidden weapon use and how to hook it up to their main weapon type. You however have something most of our recruits don’t. You have a sturdy body so can probably survive to learn the skill. Now follow me.” and he slaps the wall behind his back and a hidden door slides open.

After catching his breath Jason follows John through the door. Inside looks more like an alchemist lab rather than a thief hideaway. Though there is a distinct lack of any glowing liquids you would expect in such a place. In fact a lot of the bottled liquids are colorless or look like some common drink. Once he is in the door closes behind him and John continues, “Now as you seem to have half a brain you will have realized this is a lab for poison production. No I won’t be teaching you how to make it, rather to resist it. There are a number of methods to develop the resistance. Most rogues get it from exposure to small amounts when making them. You however get to do it the hardest way that isn't just getting poisoned over and over. Hopefully you can deal with pain. While my special concoction won't kill you, in exchange it will cause horrible pain which cuts through all resistances. Honestly if it wasn’t because you have to choose to be affected by it this poison would be impossible to make. That's the secret though. There is only one chance to learn the skill from this poison and it takes a while. Combined with how the poison stops working the second you want it to, you need to want to keep feeling the pain to gain the resistance. Sure the longer you last the more results you get but most can’t even last long enough to gain the skill in the first place.” Then he grabs a small vial and hands it to Jason, “Now do try to last long enough. This isn’t the easiest poison to make and we don’t keep much of it around”

Taking the vial Jason uncorks it. Before he can down it a sickening odor flows out. He can’t even think of what to compare it to. There just isn’t anything in his memory that quite matches it. Grimacing, he quickly downs the small amount of liquid though even once it is gone the vial still stank. Then it hit.

pain

The Pain

THE PAIN

and a pop up

Jason shakes his head no and the pain continues

Then the pain gets worse and the pop up appears again Once again Jason denies it. The last moments of his previous life were still worse.

Time seems to trickle by for him. Second after second the time passes and the pain worsens. Yet still he preserves.

He loses 1 hp. Not from the poison but his nails digging into his palms. Then he spasm as the pain starts to randomly sweep through his body. For a short moment it even stops completely though that only makes when it comes back worse.

A thought manages to trickle through his mind, ‘what about the glassware in the room?’ If he could pay attention to the world, then he would notice his worries didn’t matter as he was now in a padded room. The open trapdoor in the ceiling would make it clear that this place was setup with this in mind.

Finally after a minute has passed the skill is gained. If only Jason was able to notice it. Unknowingly he continues on past the point he could just stop. Finally the pain reaches a new level of pain. It is now something unknown to him and worse for it. Now without knowing it he selects to end the pain. However it doesn’t just end but rather slowly fade away. Probably best for a person's sanity that way. Then Jason, finally free of the pain faints.

Once again John is impressed as he knows how bad it gets after a minute. Down into the pit he jumps, just to grab Jason and then jump right back out. Nodding to himself he has to admit that this kid is quite the odd one. Just seeing a new traveller getting both his starting skills up to initiate during the training was worth training him for Penny.

Jason wakes up in the Guilds bar, leaned up against a barrel along the wall. Quickly he stops himself from trying to remember what happened as he knows that way only leads to pain. To take his mind off of it, he checks out his new skill.

While he is doing so Penny walks over to him, “So it looks like you had quite the experience there. Don’t worry the rest of your little group is still training. I didn’t want to mention it yesterday but you all will probably only get to head out tomorrow. Unlike you, they seem to be more in line with the average learning speed and will likely have to finish some last things up tomorrow morning. My advice is head back to your inn and turn in early. It isn’t quite night yet but close enough.” and so Jason did.

Akhier

Things I wanted to mention but didn’t:

Jason learns the skill so quickly because while any energy can be used for Powered Grip, actual Energy is the best for it. The reason for this stems from how each energy type works.

Mana is the classic energy for ranged combat. It isn’t very good for close range and horrible for actually affect your own body. Mana powered healing spells have the best range but are horrible for healing yourself if it even works. Similarly a Mana shield, no matter how close to the skin, never actually touches the caster.

QI is the reverse in most ways. It can hardly even leave the users body except for infusing held weapons. The closest to ranged attacks it can manage is QI infused arrows. Healing spells powered by QI are amazing at self heals, normal at touch healing, but worthless beyond that. Finally shields using it tend to be based around toughening the skin itself and stabilizing the organs.

Energy does both though with less range then Mana and less precise internal work then QI. The actual usability of it for healing is unknown but the shield use in particular is important for this explanation. A QI shield begins in the body and expands outward.

This is why it works so well for this movement technique. Where the other two have problems. Mana will hold onto the surface but the user slides off of his own Mana. QI stays with the user but has a hard time holding onto other surfaces besides personal items like weapons or armor. Energy however doesn’t have this problem as it can permeate both the user and the surface.