The chime sounded softly, close and internal.
Miri blinked, squinting up through the leaves as early light filtered down.
“…Yeah, yeah, I’m up,” she muttered.
The System unfolded in her vision.
[ System Quest Available ]
She lay there for a moment, staring up through the thinning branches at a sky just beginning to pale, and felt it again.
Mana present and waiting, without strain or resistance. It was a subtle, steady awareness under her skin. A second pulse.
She was becoming more than she had been.
More better, she chuckled to herself as she stood and stretched.
She brought up the System message.
[ System Quest: God’s Lonely Man ]
Go make a friend.
“…Excuse me?”
She blinked. Read it again. Slower.
“Make a friend,” she repeated aloud to the empty woods. “That’s not—that’s not a quest.”
The System did not respond.
She stood there for a moment trying to parse it the way she would a normal objective. Kill something. Gather something. Don’t die. This was none of that.
“How,” she asked the trees, “am I supposed to do that on purpose?”
No additional text appeared.
Miri huffed, shook her head, and broke camp.
“Fine,” she muttered, shouldering her pack. “I’ll… keep an eye out, I guess.”
As she started walking, the thought lingered uncomfortably.
The idea of making a friend—really making one—in a world that still felt sharp and dangerous around the edges made her chest feel tight in a way no fight had.
She pushed the thought aside and focused on the road.
Still… every so often, as she walked, she thought a friend might be nice to have.
She didn’t have to wait long for her first excuse to practice with her new spells and skills.
A skittering sound in the brush made her slow, Threat Perception humming like a low note behind her ear. Not immediate danger, but not a future friend either.
She drew her sword and kept walking.
The creature burst from the undergrowth with a hiss—long-bodied, low to the ground, all teeth and spite. Some kind of forest lizard, maybe drawn by the lingering scent of blood from her earlier fights. It looked like a komodo dragon, which meant it was some kind of liscamp.
Miri didn’t panic.
She raised her free hand and fired an Arc Bolt.
The spell leapt from her fingers faster than before, tighter and cleaner. It struck the creature square in the shoulder and sent it tumbling into the dirt with a pained hiss.
She didn’t chase. Instead, she stepped forward and raised Warden Veil.
The barrier snapped into place just as the creature lunged again. It slammed into the veil with a wet crack and rebounded.
“Hoooly… okay,” Miri breathed, surprised despite herself. “That’s cool.”
She dropped the veil, surged forward, and finished the fight with a single, decisive swing—mana flowing into the blade without flooding it this time. Sharp. Intentional.
The body partially dissolved moments later as the System did its quiet work.
[ You have defeated a River Liscamp Lv3! ]
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Miri stood there, chest rising and falling, then laughed under her breath.
“Okay,” she said again, grinning now. “Xena Warrior Princess, eat your heart out.”
She learned as she walked.
Not recklessly. Thoughtfully.
Arc Bolt at different ranges. From stillness. On the move. She learned how much mana she could afford to put into it before the return buzzed unpleasantly behind her eyes.
Warden Veil while running. While turning. While pivoting mid-step. While using Arc Bolt or swinging her sword.
She learned that the shield wasn’t just protection, it was also timing. Raise it too early and it bled away before the hit came. Too late and it was useless.
Between spells, she moved and danced with her sword.
Agility mattered. Footwork mattered. Her Swordsman skill was leveling slowly, but her actual competence with a blade was improving faster. Less hesitation. Better angles. Cleaner follow-through.
She didn’t notice the Snot Fairy until it hit her in the face.
*splorp!*
Something wet and warm smacked into her cheek, gluing her head sideways as her hair stuck firmly to her shoulder.
Miri froze. Slowly, carefully, she reached up and touched her face.
Her fingers came away coated in translucent green goo that stretched obscenely between her knuckles.
“—What,” she said flatly, “the fuck.”
A high-pitched giggle answered her.
The creature hovered a few feet away, wings buzzing like an angry mosquito. It looked like a fairy—small, vaguely humanoid, gossamer wings—but its skin was a sickly pearlescent green, its eyes too large, its grin far too sharp.
It inhaled.
“Oh hell no,” Miri said.
The Snot Fairy fired again. She dove sideways just in time, the glob splattering against a tree trunk and sticking there with a wet thwap.
“Not a friend,” she muttered, scrambling to her feet. “You’re super dying now.”
She swung her sword.
The fairy zipped upward, impossibly fast, and responded by firing another shot. This one caught her thigh, pinning her legs together mid-stride. Miri yelped and nearly face-planted.
The stuff was strong. Sticky in a way that felt actively malicious.
She yanked, swore, yanked harder until the glob separated. The fairy laughed again and circled, clearly enjoying itself.
Miri growled as she stood. “You little piece of—”
*shwack!*
Her vision blurred. Her nose stuck shut. Her hair was now aggressively involved in the situation and getting worse. She staggered back, coughing, blind, panic flaring—
Then instinct kicked in.
“Cleanse,” she snapped.
Warmth rippled outward from her chest, washing over her skin. The snot evaporated instantly, leaving her face, hair, and clothes clean and dry.
The fairy froze midair. Miri froze too.
Bingo, she thought viciously.
The Snot Fairy shrieked, offended, and fired again.
This time Miri was ready. She dodged, Cleanse flaring again as a glob clipped her shoulder. The goo vanished before it could even finish sticking.
As the fairy screeched and fired again, Miri snapped her hand up.
“Cleanse.”
The fairy darted, zigzagged, fired wildly—each attack erased almost as soon as it landed. Though she couldn’t land a hit on the fairy as it zipped around faster than she could follow, Miri advanced steadily now. Timing her movements between casts, conserving mana, letting the fairy wear itself out.
Another glob. Another dodge. Another cast.
“Cleanse.”
Her mana dipped, recovered, dipped again. She wasn’t even thinking about it anymore—just reacting, scrubbing herself clean as fast as the creature could foul her.
The fairy’s laughter turned shrill.
Sticky threads wrapped her arm.
“Cleanse.”
Her boots glued to the dirt.
“Cleanse.”
A shot caught her across the chest.
“Cleanse.”
The world narrowed to motion and reflex and the steady rhythm of mana in, mana out.
Then the chime sounded.
[ Skill Updated: Cleanse Level 3 ]
Miri barely registered it.
The fairy lunged, desperate now, wings buzzing unevenly.
Another cast. Another surge.
[ Skill Updated: Cleanse Level 4 ]
Then it happened.
One clean step forward. One clean swing.
The fairy burst apart in a spray of green light and evaporating goo.
“Blugh!”
[ You have defeated Snot Fairy Lv1! ]
Miri was outraged.
“Level ONE!?!” she yelled at the sky. “That was a fucking level one?! Are you kidding me!?”
She shrieked. She literally stomped her feet. She briefly resembled a wacky waving inflatable tube man from a roadside car dealership.
Eventually, she wore herself out.
Miri stood there afterward, chest heaving, unsure whether she was more terrified, offended, or deeply embarrassed that she’d nearly lost to a Level 1 monster.
Probably all three.
She wiped her face out of habit and felt nothing. No grime, no sweat. No ache. Even the bruises from earlier felt muted, already easing.
She stared at her hands.
“I just weaponized hygiene,” she said, awed. “And power-leveled.”
