When Aelon awoke, it was bright.
Precisely said, a sun hung on the sky, illuminating the entire area.
'It hurts.'
With a groan, he forced himself to stand up. Luckily he found that the wound had not worsened, and even gotten better to a degree.
His field of view increased, making him see what happened to the dark waters.
Nothing.
It was all... gone.
And several hundred meters below where the surface previously was, there stood red trees, resembling corals. They were tall, and made the lower area appear like a maze.
'I'm on some kind of cliff as it seems...'
Deciding to move now, when it was day, to find a safe spot- if there was one- Aelon decided to climb down the cliff.
'Wait. I got a memory from the Caraoace Shark...'
With contained excitement, Aelon summoned his runes, and inspected the memory.
Memory: [Aquatic Hide].
Memory Rank: Awakened.
Memory Tier: III
Memory Type: Armor.
Memory description:
[The sea knows no mercy.
In the lightless depths, where even the sun's memory had long been swallowed, an ancient predator ruled in silence. Countless creatures fled at the faintest disturbance of the water, for the Carapace Shark hunted without sight, guided only by the trembling of living souls.
For years uncounted, it devoured everything that wandered into its domain.
Then, one day, it bit down upon something that refused to yield.]
'Classy.'
Enchantments: [Filtering Gills], [Carapace Fins]
[Filtering Gills]: [The sea knows no mercy. It steals the breath of all who enter its embrace. While wearing this armor, its embrace may yet be endured.]
[Carapace Fins]: [Even the mightiest predator would starve if it could not swim.]
Aelon debated summoning it, then remembered he still wore clothes, and was worried about what would happen to them, so he decided to take them off first.
'I'm keeping my underpants on, don't wanna be sued for public nudity.'
When he summoned [Aquatic Hide] he felt as if he gained a second skin. When he looked down, he found himself being covered in a black layer, that only enclosed his frame.
Even his hands were encased, but he apprehended that his sense of touch worked just as well as before. Carefully the palm of his hand touched his new layer of skin, and it felt weird.
Like sandpaper.
Between his fingers, there were fins. His feet seemed to be encased in something that looked like flippers, which would also allow him to move better in the water.
Aelon tried to inhale, but it just wouldn't work. That was when he felt something weird, his neck had gashes, just like... gills!
When he focused on the [Filtering Gills] enchantment, they disappeared though, and he could steadily breathe again.
'I think this will allow me to navigate the water with ease! And I can also breathe in it, it's just perfect!'
The hide ended at his neck, leaving his head uncovered.
'Good.'
He wasn't sure he wanted to know what a shark's helmet looked like.
'It's warm too, I think I'll keep this on...'
Putting his clothes back on, they covered the second skin well, although his shirt and pants were still torn in some spots.
'Walking with these fin-like feet is difficult though...'
Focusing on the [Carapace Fins] enchantment, just like he did with the [Filtering Gills] enchantment, he discerned that the fins retracted, making the hide just look like socks, that connected with the rest of his body.
Shoes on, Aelon finally made his move to descend the cliff.
'How will I get down here...'
An idea struck him. By the placement of the sun it was to guess that it was either morning, or late afternoon. Aelon hoped for the former.
'Alright let's see...'
Summoning [Mino's Soulblade], he made it assume it's physical form.
Gulp.
"I'm totally gonna die."
In a swift motion, Aelon jumped.
While falling, he quickly drove his sword against the stone, slowing his fall, and preventing him from falling multiple hundred meters deep.
After a while it stopped cutting, and embedded itself in the stone, stopping Aelon's fall.
His wrists were aching like crazy.
'Man why can't I just be baseline strong like any other sleeper!'
Right now, he was no better than he was as a mundane person. Of course he had gained way more physical strength through good nutrition in his first nightmare, and training, making him physically superior to himself prior to his first nightmare. But in general strength, when there were no souls around, he found himself to be as weak as he would guess his mundane self to be with all that training.
'Significantly weaker than any adult.'
Gritting his teeth, he repeated the motion again, this time something in his shoulder popping when he prevented himself from falling.
'Did I just dislocate my shoulder?'
Luckily for him, during Wilderness Survival class, Teacher Julius had made sure to teach Aelon how to treat any minor or major injury which he would encounter during the dream realm.
Still hanging, he managed to put his shoulder back in place, tears rimming his eyes.
'I'm such a wuss man.'
For the next hour he repeated it again, and again, until finally he reached the ground.
His palms were raw, his shoulders trembled uncontrollably, and every finger refused to close properly. Simply standing still felt like a luxury.
'My arms feel like mush.'
Now in the red maze of coral trees, he noticed how tall they were.
'Wow they look like buildings.'
Of course not the endlessly tall skyscrapers that were found in NQSC, but it came close to the taller buildings in the outskirts.
Carefully Aelon surveyed his surroundings, and made sure that he was alone. When his mind was calmed, he sat down, and rested.
'I'll wait for half an hour, and then continue ahead. There should be a human settlement close.'
To be honest, this area didn't look anything like the places that Aelon learned about with Teacher Julius. But he had to hope that still, there would be human settlements around.
After resting, the short boy propped himself up on his aching leg, hamstring still stinging from the gash, and made his way ahead. Of course he made sure to keep the soulblade summoned, in it's physical form.
'The soul form will certainly come in handy, but for general utility, I think I'll keep it physical.'
If a Nightmare Creature attacked him, the soul form wouldn't be able to defend him, it would just phase through the abomination, making him caught up in the attack without any means of parrying or deflecting the strike.
Literally seconds after starting to walk ahead, he encountered crabs, big crabs. They seemed Juvenile, but still matched Aelon in height.
To be precise, they were feasting on the Carapace Shark that Aelon had defeated before he blacked out.
It was a lot bigger than he imagined. To be honest, he thought of it as more of a whale than a shark, but those sharp big teeth did not lie.
There were around eight dormant beasts in front of him, and he felt the augmentation immediately, the strength that was drained from the descent replenished now.
Luckily for him, due to being beasts, and not possessing any intelligence, nor special abilities, they didn't notice his presence.
'I'm so thankful for [Concentrated Existence].'
Slowly, but surely, he sneaked up on one of them, all of them distracted by eating.
'Piercing this carapace won't be easy... well, I can just activate soul mode.'
The longsword gained a blue glow.
The black haired boy activated [Resonance Shift], weakening the beast. In a swift motion, the blade went through the abomination's hide without any resistance, and pierced it's soul.
[Congratulations, you have defeated an dormant beast, Carapace Crab.]
It didn't even have time to scream, or make any sounds, so the surrounding creatures didn't notice.
'This'll be perfect Soul Shard loot!'
Next, he approached the Carapace Crab next to the one he had just slain, and killed it as well.
Not after long, Aelon finished killing all of them, and found himself surrounded by the corpses of nine nightmare creatures.
'This was way easier than expected... now comes the disgusting part.'
Slowly, Aelon dissected every one of the Nightmare Creatures, including the Carapace Shark, and found one awakened soul shard, and eight dormant ones before him.
'According to Teacher Julius, I'm just supposed to crush them.'
So he did that, and immediately he felt himself grow stronger. Shard by shard he crushed every single one, until he was at the awakened one.
'Hopefully this'll give me a good boost.'
When he assimilated the strength from the Awakened Soul Shard, it was a let down though. It just had twice the effect a normal one had.
[Soul Shards: 10/1000]
'Ninehundred and ninety to go'
But indeed, he felt strengthened by a lot. Not double strength or anything, but definitely a lot stronger.
It seemed like the range of his innate ability increased too, as he sensed new souls, that were farer than he was able to sense before.
'Before the requirements were that they were in my presence, looking at me, or in a ten meter radius. I think it increased to fifteen.'
Quite content with the increase in range of his innate ability, Aelon made a fire, and cooked some crab meat.
'I'll leave the rest for the nightmare creatures or something.'
After taking a bite, the flesh turned out not to taste that bad, actually pretty good.
'I understand why rich people pay for crab meat now...'
Finishing two legs before being full, Aelon continued onwards. His starving belly was now saturated, and he was reenergized.
'Please let me find a human settlement.'