Chương 12: Chapter 11 - The Land Down Under

And there I saw her. A face more beautiful than the sunrise, and with teal hair streaming behind her like the ocean itself. Our eyes caught only for a moment, but I knew for sure that- Oh, come off it Garnt, or the next time you decide to go for a swim while less than sober, we aren't gonna haul your sorry behind back into the boat. Everyone knows that the water dwellers are just a myth. Conversation between two Gertian [Fisherman] I had accidentally discovered merfolk.

However, I had urgent business to attend to, so I promptly disregarded that and- Who am I kidding? All of my plans were going to take centuries to unfold. There was no way in Placeholder, Earth, or Hell that I wouldn't investigate merpeople. I took off swimming after the merman, but even with my high level, it was a struggle that I seemed to be losing. My armor probably didn't help matters, but there was no way I was taking it off.

Well, at least my swim speed is probably better than his land speed. I thought dryly. I could use [Blink] to catch up instantly and probably scare the carp out of the poor guy, or…

"Haste activate," I blubbed to the boots of my aforementioned issue. Haste more than made up the difference of swimming with my armor on, and I slowly started closing the gap. Meanwhile, the merman took me on a merry chase. While there was initially nothing he could use to try to lose me in the open sea, that quickly changed as he dove even deeper and we entered a reef. The flora there was giant and multi-colored, and a lot of it gave off a soft light.

There were also schools of fish that we startled and which took off in random directions. It was all an interesting view, but not enough to distract me from my chase. No, the thing that was enough for that was when a piece of the sea floor jumped up and grabbed me as I tried to swim past. I was too surprised to react, so I got one of my favorite System messages. System: You are grappled and cannot move"You've gotta be kidding me," I grumbled as the sandy-colored monster took up my entire view.

I started pelting it with [Earth Strikes], primarily because I was in a hurry and didn't want to test out how [Fire Strike] worked underwater. It retaliated by attempting to crush me and poke me with the hundreds of needles on its body's underside. Good luck beating out my armor. I mentally snorted as the needles bounced off harmlessly, and I continued punching the monster to death. Then it was over. I quickly looted the body and then looked around. Dang it. I lost him. I thought as I scanned the reef.

I guess I'll just have to make do with the knowledge that the merfolk exist. A bit disappointing, but- I trailed off as I saw the merman peeking over at me from behind a faraway rock.

"Gotcha!" I blubbed as I started swimming in his direction again. It was hard to tell with the sound all distorted by water, but I think I caught him giving off a high-pitched shriek? Anyway, our chase was back on, and I started closing the gap… Until we both heard a loud, low noise, like an underwater foghorn. It was difficult to audibly tell where it had come from since I wasn't very used to being underwater. Fortunately, its creator needed very little assistance with being noticed. It was huge.

It looked like a whale with armor-like scales on its belly and razor-sharp teeth lining its open maw in three rows.

"[Appraise]," I cast as it continued its approach. Status Level 35 Race Leviathan HP 10000/10000 MP 2500/2500 SP 15000/15000 I knew there had to be leviathans after the monster patch. I thought. But I would have thought they were super-rare, especially since they're above level 25… Oh. I sheepishly snapped a [Disrupt] on my [Monster Magnet] perk. Well, I attracted this thing, and I should even be able to level against it! Most people would have been rightly terrified.

I was fighting an unknown level 35 monster on its own playing field. However, I had a few advantages for remaining calm. One was that this wasn't exactly my first rodeo. A second was that death was only a minor setback for me. And the third was that I had a contingency if things got dicey enough that I was worried. In other words, I was more than prepared to face that giant sea-dwelling monster head-on… which is why its actions caught me entirely off guard. No, you stupid monster!

I shouted internally as it took off in a beeline toward the merman I'd been chasing. You're supposed to go after me! To make matters worse, the merman was frozen in fear. I doubted he could have escaped the colossal monster with how fast it was moving, but he could have at least tried to dodge or hide. The beast opened its giant maw, and the merman was a goner for sure… If I couldn't beat the giant swimming beast to him.

"[Blink]!" I gurgled. I reappeared in front of the leviathan's giant snout and laid into it with an [Air Strike]. It was pushed back just the barest amount, which honestly surprised me. I had no idea it would be effective on something that size. Fortunately, I had been in enough combat to know not to sit there slackjawed when something worked. I quickly followed up with another [Air Strike] that pushed it back another foot, but that was all the follow-up I got.

It quickly dove beneath me, swam away, and then circled back. I was now its target in earnest. … Which was actually a bit of a problem. I don't have enough mana to keep [Blinking] around. I thought with a frown as the giant beast approached with its mouth wide open. Instead, I tried my best to evade it. I swam away from the monster, but I wasn't fast enough and probably wouldn't have been even if my haste hadn't expired.

"[Blink]," I cast again, reappearing just above the leviathan's back. And it was time to get completely serious. I swiftly pulled my gauntlets out of my inventory and shoved them on. I was a bit surprised that my black flames apparently still worked underwater.

"Haste activate, strengthen activate," I stated as I grabbed hold and started whaling on the monster's back with [Earth Strikes] this time. The long low moan it gave out seemed to indicate that it was effective. It immediately went into a sharp dive, and I hung on for dear life. However, when that failed to dislodge me it jetted up towards the surface. It breached, and the leviathan got a lot more air than I ever expected it could. Unfortunately for it, I was still hanging on tight.

Unfortunately for me, it also wasn't as stupid as I thought. It was coming down on its back, so I was about to be slammed into the water from about a hundred feet in the air… which is somewhat like hitting concrete, or so I half-remembered from my vague "memories" of Earth. [Blinking] twice and casting [Appraise] had pretty much wiped out my mana too. So that left just one other alternative.

I pushed off the underside of the monster at an angle, then [Flash Stepped] and jumped away from the danger zone at the same time. It was mostly successful. I landed in the water, just barely clear of the actual impact zone, but I was then shoved around like a tiny boat in a hurricane by the wave it generated. I got shoved underwater, disoriented, and somehow ended up upside down. Fortunately, the beast was a bit more cautious the next time around.

It swam at a distance as I regained my wits, making several short high-pitched calls. I didn't have to wait to see what it was doing. Several near-transparent jellyfish appeared near it as it continued its call, and they slowly swam toward me. I could feel the mana that was composing them. Oh great. I thought. It's a summoner. That meant yet another reason why I shouldn't drag the fight out. I was about to pull out Singularity and prep a [Lightning Spear] when I remembered one crucial detail. Ship.

I attempted to swear internally. We're underwater, and I need to touch a surface to cast [Ground]. As fun as it would be to see how the demon lord of wrath handles a bath, I would have likely given odds to the leviathan at this point sheerly due to home-court advantage. The good news was that there was ground in the sea. I just had to get there. I quickly swam toward the ocean floor as the jellyfish approached. The first one made it to me, and I was prepared for many things…

I have to admit that I didn't expect the jellyfish to explode. The resulting wall of water crashed into me… But it was apparently counted as bludgeoning damage, so I was completely fine. Thank you, System, for not creating a random BS "water" damage type. I thought as I kept on my way. And for not giving this whale real explosion magic. Despite my initial worry about the summons, they ended up being more helpful to me than harmful.

Since they were summoned up above and only ever came at me in a straight line before exploding, they propelled me toward my destination instead. I assumed I had it in the bag… the monster had others ideas. It made a high-pitched noise that turned into an even higher one before cutting off. Then, the water around me started swirling. Usually whirlpools travel downward, but apparently, that isn't a requirement when they're created by giant magic-wielding fish.

The whirlpool shoved me closer to the surface, and then the jellyfish started hitting me from all sides. None of that dealt any damage, but dang was it disorienting. I was flipped upside down, rightside up, and any other possible configuration you could think of. By the time I figured out which way was up, and what directions even meant anymore, the leviathan had also approached on another attack run. This time it was going to swallow me whole. Part of me debated. I had an option to just get out of there…

but the greedy part of me overruled. Level 35 means I'll cap out again. I thought. And there's no guarantee I'll ever find another merman. Out came Singularity. And it would mean missing out on some damage, but I used some of its stored mana to cast [Blink] to get myself to the sea floor.

"Lightning become my radiant blade that will pierce the darkened heavens," I chanted, realizing that my chant sounded doubly ridiculous while underwater. Then, I slammed my foot into the sand to cast [Ground].

"[Lightning Spear]!" I shouted as I thrust my staff at the giant. Casting a lightning spell underwater was nothing less than spectacular… and not entirely in a good way. The lightning shot out, and most of it still went in the direction I had pointed. However, a good chunk of it also spread out quite a ways into the surrounding area. It suffused the area around me and killed all of the coral and small fish that had been too stupid to run in a radius of about a hundred feet.

That was all fine, but the electricity was still arcing around, and that meant it hit me again. That would have been okay too… except for how [Ground] was set up. [Ground] was a short-lived spell meant to give me immunity to the damage from my own lightning spells. However, short-lived was the key part there. The lingering lightning damage lasted much longer than my short window of immunity, and I took over a hundred damage just from the lingering effects.

The primary bolt still struck the leviathan just as I wanted, but I ran into a problem there as well. It hit, and the beast bellowed in pain, but that was not the kill I had been kinda hoping for. I stared up at the beast, and I like to think that it stared back as it circled me from a long distance away. Time to get out of here? I asked myself. I'd [Overchanneled] the bolt because I almost always did, but that meant I was fresh out of mana and, therefore, lost my ability to outmaneuver the leviathan.

If there was just a way to hold it still so that I could hit it. I paused. No. This idea's stupid. I shouldn't. Then, I waffled a bit. It wouldn't hold it still, but it would let me hit it… And I can still get out of there if there's an issue… I looked up at the monster and sighed. Why do fish monster fights always have to end like this? I asked as I swam directly towards the boss of the sea.

Jor-Ex was terrified. He had seen the calamitous one. He thought the prophecy was a myth. A hoax. Something to scare tiny swimlings away from the surface before their lungs were developed enough to breathe out of the water. But he was real. And Jor-Ex hadn't managed to get away from him. Then he lived up to his name as he summoned the titan of the depths, another mythical being, to come and feast upon the poor [Sea Hunter's] bones. Or at least, that's what he had thought would happen.

He hadn't expected the two to come to blows. Jor-Ex had tracked the entire fight from a hidden place on the ocean floor, astounded at the magic on display. The calamitous one could simply disappear and reappear wherever he wanted, while the titan was capable of manipulating the very water to do its bidding. It seemed that the calamitous one was… losing. Jor-Ex wasn't sure which one he should be cheering for.

Both would spell disaster for his people should they meet, but he supposed that the waterborne monster had less chance of actually making it to his home than the other. So, he mentally rooted for the leviathan. He hoped it would defeat the calamitous one and prove the prophecy wasn't true after all. It seemed like it would at first. The landborn seemed unable to retaliate… until he swam to the ocean floor and summoned a lightning storm under the sea.

Jor-Ex was hundreds of feet away, but he still took a small portion of his health in damage. He feared the worst after that… but the leviathan was still there, if a bit more wary. Thank the bountiful sea. He thought as he watched the two eye each other. However, the leviathan's foe was the calamitous one. The magician who had destroyed the entire island their people had come from. He was sure that the monster in the flesh of a man still had thousands of mana left and that… What is he doing?

Jor-Ex asked with a furrowed brow as the landborn swam straight at the leviathan. The leviathan met the challenge, and Jor-Ex was sure he would disappear again at a moment's notice… but he didn't. The leviathan's giant maw closed around the calamitous one and the battle was over. The narrative has been taken without permission. Report any sightings. Jor-Ex cycled water through his gills as his shoulders sagged in relief. The stories had been overwrought. The prophecies were wrong. He could go home now.

All he had to do was evade the titan of the depths as it swam around above- Was there something wrong with the beast? Its movements seemed a bit slower than before; its swimming was slightly erratic. It also continued to make sounds of distress on occasion. Jor-Ex didn't dare swim out from his hiding spot until the beast had left, so he was stuck there watching as the beast continued behaving strangely. It stopped right above his hiding place… and then suddenly disappeared.

Jor-Ex paled as what was left behind after the disappearance of the monster's corpse was only the calamitous one… well, him and a few lime-green blobs slowly sinking to the bottom of the sea.

"Ha! Get wrecked!" the calamitous one shouted in his strange, garbled tongue, which Jor-Ex could somehow understand completely. He looked down at the boneblade in his hand.

"Good job, Essence Thief." He stated as it vanished into his inventory.

"Couldn't have summoned those daves without you." The landborn seemed like he wasn't done celebrating, but he stopped himself.

"Oh yeah, where'd that merman get off to?" he mumbled. Jor-Ex did his best to stay calm. He had 5 levels in [Ocean Camouflage]. So long as he didn't move, there was no way that the landborn would be able to locate him. And while that was true, unfortunately, one of the small blobs had landed near him. It immediately jumped in his direction. Jor-Ex was too surprised to move, and even if he did, it would break his skill. So, he instead screamed out in pain as the monster's acid started eating into his HP.

The sacred words also informed him of his peril. System: You are grappled and cannot move He pulled out his harpoon to stab it, even as the calamitous one swam in his direction.

"Down! Bad dave!" he shouted.

"Get off the merman!" The monster detached, and Jor-Ex slew it with a [Piercing Strike]. His HP was down to single digits. Jor-Ex began hyperventilating, his gills opening and closing rapidly as the calamitous one stopped in front of him.

"Sorry about all of that," he said.

"Are you okay?" Then, as if he just realized that he was still glowing with the menacing dark-light, he removed his gauntlets and it vanished. Jor-Ex didn't hear his words. He was too busy panicking. I'm dead. I can't win against a monster who can defeat the titan of the depths. As a [Sea Hunter], he should have gone down honorably with his spear in his hand… but he didn't. Ancestors forgive me. The coward thought as he made the pose of absolute submission.

I was a bit confused. The merman had frozen up, which was completely understandable. I probably terrified the guy. No, what confused me was that he had put his spear back into his inventory, pulled his tail up to his chest with his right hand, and then put his left hand behind his back.

"I am Jor-Ex, son of Mattar-El. I submit to you as the superior warrior," he stated with a hint of trembling. Then, with a lot of trembling.

"Please have mercy on me."

"Woah, woah, woah!" I said with a wave of my hands.

"I'm not here to hurt you. I just wanted to talk. I didn't even know that merfolk existed!" He paused.

"Are you… not the calamitous one?" That's probably just another name for the [Demon Lord]. I thought. However, it wasn't like admitting that I was the [Demon Lord] would be any help here. I played dumb.

"And who exactly is the calamitous one?" I asked.

"And why would you assume I was him when we just met?" Jor-Ex paused for a moment.

"I suppose that isn't a secret…" he muttered almost too quiet for me to hear. He cleared his throat.

"It is a tale that has been passed down along with a prophecy…" From there, the merman told me the story of an evil monster who used a powerful magic spell to sunder an entire island. The monster had the appearance of a man but didn't need to breathe or eat to sustain his unholy existence. As he told his tale, I realized two things. The first was that he was telling me an incredibly exaggerated story about the time when I destroyed the prison island in the dragonlands…

but I had no idea how the merpeople had learned of that, much less how it ended up in their mythos. The second thing I realized was that the language the merman was speaking wasn't exactly the Virian I was used to. Please, System. I begged. Don't make me have to deal with dialects. You've been really cool about keeping language drift to a minimum over the past centuries. Could you please stick to that?

Meanwhile, Jor-Ex finished out his story by telling about the prophecy of how the calamitous one would come again to threaten not only the people of the sea, his word for themselves, but the entirety of the world. I guess that's technically true if you count my next plan. I thought. Then, I finally connected some dots. Wait… If living in the desert for generations can turn beastborn into desert beastborn… and these people speak virian…

"This island that was broken apart by the calamitous one's spell… Did your forefathers happen to live on it?" I asked. He paused and then nodded slowly.

"Yes, they did. Or so [Historian] Jan-El says. He says that our ancestors lived on rafts and small pieces of the island that remained and that they survived primarily by fishing-" Holy carp. I thought. They are the descendants of the guards on the prison island. I realized that since I was the one that put them in that predicament with my spell, I was technically responsible for creating the underwater race. Oops.

"-and as they spent more and more time in the water, that was when the first of us was granted our sea form-""Sea form?" I echoed.

"Does that mean you have a land form too? You can switch back and forth?" Jor-Ex's mouth snapped shut. I groaned.

"Come on, man! I'm not going to hurt you! I just want to know more about your people!"

"I have said too much," he trembled a bit more.

"Do what you want with me, but I will not betray them." I really wanted to visit the merpeople capital because my curiosity was killing me at that point. However, I didn't have a way to win Jor-Ex's trust… except for…

"What if I swear an oath?" I asked. Jor-Ex's eyes widened and then narrowed.

"An oath promising what and to whom?" he asked.

"I will swear an oath promising not to…" I trailed off for a moment. Can I promise that I won't harm them? Does taking down the entire OmniverseEngine count as harm? I managed to keep the frown off my face as I continued thinking. I already have a similar oath to the fey. Which means… Of course, it doesn't count as harm. I began the mental gymnastics at once. Taking down the OmniverseEngine will mean that none of us exist anymore. It would be impossible to harm something that doesn't exist.

I nodded to myself, my hasty justification accepted enough to continue. Meanwhile, Jor-Ex patiently awaited me to finish my oath… probably because he was still frickin' terrified of me.

"I'll swear an oath to the System so that it can never be broken that I will not harm any of your people," I stated. Then, with a brief pause.

"Unless they attack me first." Jor-Ex frowned.

"And… what do you require in return for this oath?" I shrugged.

"I'd like to see your city? Or wherever you live if it's not big enough to be called a city. Also, I have some ideas for trade that I think you might be interested in." The merman debated that for several moments.

"As a mere [Sea Hunter], I can't make promises. I would need to discuss this with the council," he paused.

"And I cannot take you with me." I shrugged.

"Just swear an oath that you'll come back as soon as you can with one of your leaders or whatever, and I'll stay right here." His suspicions made the oath take a while to hammer out, and I had to swear one on my end as well. It included things like I wouldn't try to follow him as he left. Once he was satisfied, the merman swam off, leaving me alone.

"Good thing Essence Thief gave me enough mana for this," I muttered as I pulled out my hand mirror.

"[Scry] Jor-Ex." It had also given me enough mana to cast a quick [Wordless Chant] [Appraise] on the merman as well. Other than the fact that he was a level 10 [Sea Hunter], which I took to be an advanced class, I mostly just learned that his name was in fact Jor-Ex… just Jor-Ex. No last name, similar to Primavia, Secondavia, and myself. Since he wasn't a fairy, I was prepared to tack on a "Null" on there, just in case, but the [Scry] went through without a hitch.

Seems like they've legitimately gone away from last names. I reasoned as I watched Jor-Ex's hasty swimming. Unlike me, who was supposed to have one, but the System couldn't retcon one into place… I watched Jor-Ex right up until he came to an unmistakable portal to the dragonlands that was sitting there at the bottom of the sea. Is that a different one, or does it connect to the portal on the prison island?

I asked as I watched him frantically communicate with a few other merpeople that seemed to appear out of nowhere. They eventually let him through… and my [Scry] cut out.

"Dang it," I groaned as I stared at my own reflection in the mirror.

"I forgot that [Scry] doesn't work cross-dimension." I unhappily stowed the mirror in my inventory. Need to learn like… [Advanced Scry] or something. Something like the scrying array I get to use when I'm dead that lets me peak in on Placeholder while I'm technically floating about in the tutorial dimension. I realized that I could ask the fey for advice… but I didn't want to accidentally use up my third favor. Also, there was a certain amount of merit to figuring out new spells by myself.

My skill levels seemed to approve of doing that, at least. [Deprendio] could certainly use some work on it. I snorted as I looked at the level 1 skill. I tacked that onto my growing todo-list… but definitely listed it lower than finding my personal island, setting up a slew of magicite crystals to charge, and creating a weapon out of demonite that might be able to stand up against Mishael's Lightbringer without breaking… or deal damage to the [Hero] through the Hero's Regalia.

However, I could work on none of those things in the current situation. I was stuck waiting at the bottom of the sea until Jor-Ex came back… or until a few days had passed. I made sure to give myself that out because being trapped under the sea by an oath forever sounded like an awful way to live out the rest of eternity. I found a rock on the ocean floor and took a seat. Then, remembering the reason that I had encountered a leviathan in the first place, I snapped a quick [Disrupt] on [Monster Magnet] again.

Nothing better to do. I thought idly. Might as well go over what I got for the kill. The first one was two brand-new achievements. System: New Achievement. Slayer of the Deep. Class Perk Points Gained 5 System: New Achievement. First Slayer of the Deep. Class Perk Points Gained 5 Together, those put me up to 39 perk points. Almost enough to buy [Memory Protection] again. I realized with a hint of amusement. But… there's nothing left to spend them on. And my stupid class doesn't let me buy away the downsides.

It would be really helpful if I could get rid of things like [Healing Inversion], [Heavily Decreased Class Experience Gain], or maybe [Decreased Skill Experience Gain (All)]. I kinda forgot that I've been leveling all of these skills up with the last one. I thought. The craziest part is that [Temporus] hit 10 despite that. I was well aware that the effort it took to gain levels was pretty much exponential in nature.

If it worked like I was assuming, that meant that the amount of time magic I had done was technically enough to get a normal person to level 11 if such a thing was possible. As for the loot, there was nothing I was too excited about. I got leviathan hide, leviathan scales, and leviathan bones… and I think some gold? I never really kept much track of my gold.

I didn't need it for anything day-to-day, and anytime I needed to make a large purchase these days, all it meant was that I had to make a quick trip to a zone that spawned wolves and quickly kill a couple thousand of 'em. Might be useful items to trade, though. I thought. I had noticed that Jor-Ex had been using a harpoon made primarily of bone and realized why after a second. Kinda hard to be a [Blacksmith] underwater, eh?

That gave me some other ideas for what they might want, but I went back to reviewing my gains. The last, and perhaps most helpful thing, was the levels. I was back up to level 25 for the first time in quite a while, so that meant that I was probably the strongest I had ever been. I wonder how I would match up against Pride? I idly mused. Pride had no cooldown on [Flash Step] or [Hell Blaze]… but that spell couldn't exactly damage me. He did use a [Cure] that one time against Cameron. I thought.

So, that would probably be enough to do me in. I paused as I remembered Pride's ignoble death. But all it took was one good hit, and Pride fell to pieces. Would I be able to get that one hit in myself? I paused. Or could I just [Disrupt] Pride form? Wouldn't that dump past me out at level 1 since he couldn't gain XP while Pride was active? I snorted. Assuming that it worked like that… the fight would be over quick.

That mental fight taken care of, I decided to pit myself against Admin in the form that he had appeared in at the end of my first life. It… did not go well for me. He's just so frickin' fast. I thought as I replayed the memories in my mind. Level 50, when people with Advanced Classes are restricted to level 25 is so frickin' unfair. I wondered if maybe my armor could tank the hits so that I could fight him anyway, but looking back on that memory, I had a sinking suspicion that club was demonite as well.

Probably does more damage than Lightbringer, too, not even due to craftsmanship but just sheer weight. The only good news was that my chances of fighting Admin for real seemed slim to none. He had left Placeholder behind and appeared to have no intention of returning. The rest of my wait was pretty dull. I amused myself by practicing a bit more with space magic and trying to figure out what exactly the fish people had that I would even want to trade for.

I came up with some ideas for that, but they had to be put on hold when Jor-Ex returned… with his arms bound behind his back and a group of a dozen other merpeople leading him with spears out.

"I take it things didn't go as you planned," I called out to the merman, who had his head hanging.

"I-" he started to reply.

"Silence, [Prisoner]," a gruff merman stated.

"You are guilty of aiding the calamitous one, and you-" he turned to look at me and then gave a quick hand gesture that immediately caused his men to fan out around me. Well, that's annoying. I thought as I looked at the enclosure. Underwater you can be flanked in 3 dimensions.

"Have you anything to say for yourself, calamitous one?" he asked. I cast an appraising eye, literally, around at the bone harpoons that were surrounding me and then shrugged as I put on my gloves.

"Only that you aren't capable of hurting me, so I'm still keeping trade on the table even after this stupid stunt," I replied. The lead didn't reply. He simply raised his hand and then clenched his fist. The attacks all came simultaneously. I was a little impressed with the coordination if I was being honest. Unless, of course, they have [Enhanced Party]. I thought, a bit less charitably. Either way, I faked a yawn as the spears all bounced off.

I didn't even turn to face the attackers, so I got to see the leader thrust forward with a skill-"Ow," I stated as my HP bar moved imperceptibly.

"Another…" I checked my status.

"200 of those, and I might be in trouble." I looked up at the shocked face of the leader.

"Is that enough to show you that you're in over your head, or…"

"Keep up the attack!" he bellowed. Alright, we have our volunteer. I thought. At that point, someone needed to be the one I kicked the crud out of to assert dominance. It might as well be their strongest one who was too stupid to take the out I gave him. The fight was over in seconds. [Flash Step] from the ocean floor caught him completely off guard, as did my level 25 speed and the [Earth Strikes] I peppered him with.

When he tried to get some more distance, I followed that up with a [Blink] and two more strikes before he realized where I went. I, of course, did a non-lethal takedown.

"Now, how about you untie him-" I nodded to Jor-Ex, "-and we continue this discussion in a more civilized manner. Okay?" The remaining underwater soldiers looked back and forth at each other before the first finally put his weapon away and did that weird salute with the pulled-up tail and one arm behind the back. The others followed suit, and it seemed we were in business.

I pulled my gauntlets off and met their bows with a bestian bow because it was the closest thing I could think of besides pulling my legs up to my chest or something stupid. Their looks of confusion meant that I had probably made some kind of social faux pas. Just another thing to figure out. I thought.

The first thing I learned was that everyone there had -Ex in their name. I asked if that was some kind of surname, and they all looked at me even more confused. I was asking the wrong people, but it would take a while before I figured that out. I let one of them go and grab someone who could negotiate on their behalf from the dragonlands, and then we finally got somewhere. This dude was Liel-Ex-Ar, and he was a member of their ruling council.

He assumed he was there to negotiate the release of the people I had "taken prisoner," but I hadn't even fully realized that was what they were. I mean, I hadn't bound them, taken their weapons, or done anything to say they couldn't leave. Then I remembered that I was some kind of teleporting, unkillable monster from their point of view, so I pretty much didn't need to do any of that to have prisoners. Oops. Anyway, Liel-Ex-Ar was pretty staunchly against letting me see the merfolk home city.

In fact, it seemed that they were willing to offer a ransom, and that was pretty much it. If I didn't take it, they were willing to sacrifice the lives of their people rather than let me in on their secret location. I confused him a bit after that by mentioning that I was willing to swear oaths not to harm their people. Even more, I immediately swore an oath that if he agreed to let me see their city that I would swear the oath against harm.

Maybe it was the fact that I wasn't what they were expecting, or maybe it was because I was strong enough to kill all of them if I wanted, and he wanted to avoid that situation, but the council member eventually caved. I got to follow them through the portal to the dragonlands and go to their city… which was much less impressive than I thought. It turned out that they mostly lived in caves on the ocean floor because the monsters in the ocean are frickin' terrifying.

AKA leviathans on the Placeholder side and ice dragons on the dragonlands side. Anyway, they lived underground with some type of glowing moss used for light. They also built a lot in 3 dimensions since being underwater made stairs redundant. Their furnishings were a bit odd as well. Chairs were a bit more like recliners since they needed a place for their tail. Floors were often rough or uneven since they didn't exactly use them for much. The last bit was the most awkward for me.

While the merpeople seemed to be naturally buoyant enough to stay at the same depth without exerting any effort (e. g. when they would "stand around" and talk), the same couldn't be said for me. I sank with my armor on unless I treaded water somewhat vigorously, but there was no way I was taking that off when I hadn't gotten any assurances that they wouldn't attack me. After getting through some preliminary stuff, I got an expedited meeting with their ruling council. Our first meeting went… fine?

However, there were definitely some cultural differences that I needed to ask about. I asked for someone to help me with things like that and was pawned off on a [Scholar] named Jack-El. He taught me the important bits, like the one pose the first merpeople had done was a pose of complete submission and surrender. That explained a bit. Also, that was my chance to finally ask about all the "Ex," "Ex-Ar," and "El" names. It was essentially their social caste.

"En" was the bottom of the barrel and it was reserved for manual laborers and prisoners.

"El" was reserved for craftsmen and gatherers. I wasn't sure why gatherers differed from manual laborers, but I couldn't exactly take in centuries of cultural development in a few hours. Anyway, "Ex" was a higher position given to those who were [Sea Hunters] or others who ventured out into the open sea while armed. And finally, "Ex-Ar" was the council members. It was a group that numbered 11 merpeople, and there was one for each area of life… or at least, one for each that their culture had picked.

As for why the System didn't auto-translate all of the Ex and El stuff?... It doesn't translate names for the most part. And unlike the Bestian honorifics, these were actual parts of the person's name, not an honorific that changes based on who addresses who. Things went a bit better after learning more about my target audience. And that's mainly because I nailed down what I could offer them. The first thing I could offer was weapons.

While they had made some decent bone harpoons, they had no [Blacksmiths] because they were underwater. It's kinda hard to make metal weapons without fire… or ore, for that matter. I wasn't sure how Placeholder steel would hold up underwater long-term, but I felt it would still be better than their current weapons. The second thing I could offer them was space. I was planning on claiming an island for a pocket dimension, but it wasn't like I was planning on using the water around it.

Assuming I could figure out a way to only allow certain people in, and not the monsters they were terrified of, that would solve their problems… and possibly give me an unwitting force to help defend against invasion, depending on the oaths I could get them to swear. I was even willing to front the money for them to make a zone in there because it turned out that it was a lot cheaper to make a town zone than one of my dungeon ones.

However, that depended on finding an island that was out of the way and wouldn't be missed, as well as turning it into a pocket dimension. … That was all a work in progress. What I was able to get done immediately was to get them some weapons. I didn't want to spend a whole lot, and I didn't want to give them the best stuff right out the gate, so I popped in to Gram for a bit to get a whole bunch of spears and then popped back to the [Teleport Beacon] that I had cast at the gate to the dragonlands.

That, along with joining their hunters on a few of their hunts, earned me enough goodwill that most people seemed convinced that the prophecy was inaccurate or didn't refer to me. There was even a big public ceremony where one of my acquaintances earned a promotion, mostly due to me.

"Before System, do you Jor-Ex swear to cast aside your name and previous calling?" intoned a mermaid who I think was some kind of [Priestess]? Must have missed that part of my culture lessons. I thought.

"I do," Jor-Ex stated quietly.

"Do you also swear to uphold our laws, to place the good of our people first, and to fulfill your duties as the 12 th member of the council to the best of your abilities?"

"I do."

"Then, by the power given me as [Aquarian Oracle] of the council, I declare your name cast aside! No longer are you Jor-Ex, but today forth you are Jor-Ex-Ar!" She turned to the gathered crowd.

"Glory to his new name!"

"Glory to his name!" the other merpeople shouted. And then… the ceremony was over. It was like 15 minutes tops, and I was super impressed at them for keeping things brief. Anyway, most people went forward to give him congratulations, and his family came around as well and were very enthusiastic… and huggy. I hung back for a bit and just watched until the crowd died down. I was kinda glad I did. The man of the hour didn't look terribly happy.

He had a forced smile on his face that seemed like it would break if you looked at him funny. When I finally went forward to shake his hand, I also whispered in his ear.

"You don't look too enthused about all this." He glanced at his family and then over at me.

"Excuse me, everyone. It would seem I need to attend to some of my new duties immediately!" They all nodded in understanding as he beckoned me away from the others. We turned some corners, and he groaned as soon as we were out of sight and hearing range.

"I'm a [Diplomat] now. That had no relation to anything I did as a [Sea Hunter], so I'm back to level 1 of all things!" Seeing my confused look, he paused.

"Do you not have the rites of identity where you come from?" he asked.

"No," I replied with a shake of my head.

"I kinda got the gist. You have your name changed, and then you lose your old class." He nodded in reply.

"Wouldn't you have lost all your levels either way?" I asked. He snorted.

"Not if I had gone to another combat class. Then I would have likely kept them all. Instead, I'm back at level 1 and stuck with only that class and [Chef]." He deflated a bit.

"I knew I should have chosen a different subclass."

"Wait," I frowned.

"[Diplomat] is an advanced class?" He cocked his head.

"If by advanced class, you mean a primary class instead of a subclass, then yes."

"So, couldn't you just level back up by killing some more sea monsters?" I asked.

"Or joining in on someone's party?" He laughed.

"If only it were that easy. No, I have to earn my levels by engaging in diplomacy with foreign powers, of which, the only one that we are in talks with is you." I shrugged.

"Well, if you want to start grinding some levels, we still have to work out that agreement about the island. And I could use some manpower to help locate a good one." He sighed and then gave me a long-suffering look.

"Alright, I'll see what I can do."